Utopia, you are standing in it!

Stardate: 5730.2 (2268)
Original Air Date: January 10, 1969
Writer: Gene L. Coon (pen name of “Lee Cronin”) and Oliver Crawford
Director: Jud Taylor

“There was persecution on Earth once.
I remember reading about it in my history class.”
“Yes, but it happened way back in the twentieth century.
There’s no such primitive thinking today.”

The planet Ariannus is a vital transfer point on regular space commercial lanes, however it has recently been attacked by a bacterial invasion which threatens to render it lifeless unless checked. The Enterprise is presently en route to Ariannus (about three hours and four minutes away) while Lt. Uhura advises the planet’s Ministry of Health that the Enterprise will begin immediate decontamination of the planet’s atmosphere upon arrival in orbit –but suddenly, a Starfleet shuttlecraft appears onscreen (it looks to be a recently stolen Starfleet shuttlecraft). Spock notes there is one…

Credit: alaskapublic.org
A researcher said: “Remarkably, the data suggest that the ice sheets can change in response to more than just global climate,” calling into question some long-held ideas. A professor connected to the study commented: “These findings appear to poke a hole in our current understanding of how past ice sheets interacted with the rest of the climate system, including the greenhouse effect.” Well, fancy that. The commentary notes that ‘global temperatures were relatively stable at the time of the fall in sea level, raising questions about the correlation between temperature, sea level and ice volume’. In short, the ice sheets grew faster than scientists had thought.
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Princeton scientists found that the Bering Land Bridge, the strip of land that once connected Asia to Alaska, emerged far later during the last ice age than previously thought, says Eurekalert. 

The unexpected findings shorten the window of…

In her interview in the Flemish newspaper (subject of previous two posts), our Minister of Energy not only said that the wind always blows somewhere in Europe, and especially at sea, but she also made following remark about Belgian offshore wind (translated from Dutch, my emphasis):

When I became minister, I hoped that our new offshore wind farm would be operational by 2027. It has a capacity of 3.5 nuclear power plants and can supply all Belgian households with electricity.

I heard members of the current Federal Government draw (variations on) this analogy between offshore wind and nuclear power plants quite a lot lately, especially (and unsurprisingly) by members of the Flemish Green party.

For the record, there is a core of truth in this statement. It is true that the capacity of offshore wind in Belgium is expected to be 3500 MW in 2027 and since most…

Jupiter [image credit: NASA]
Unexpected patterns and teleconnections. Some new light is shed on the workings of the solar system’s largest planetary atmosphere.
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Scientists have completed the longest-ever study tracking temperatures in Jupiter’s upper troposphere, the layer of the atmosphere where the giant planet’s weather occurs and where its signature colorful striped clouds form, says Subaru Telescope.

The work, conducted over four decades by stitching together data from NASA spacecraft and ground-based telescope observations, found unexpected patterns in how temperatures of Jupiter’s belts and zones change over time.

The study is a major step toward a better understanding of what drives weather at our solar system’s largest planet and eventually being able to forecast it.

Jupiter’s troposphere has a lot in common with Earth’s: It’s where clouds form and storms churn. To understand this weather activity, scientists need to study certain properties, including wind, pressure, humidity…

Batman: The Movie (1966) Director Leslie Martinson

“Pow!” “Wham!” “Ouch!”

Holy film review, Batman! Every bit as campy and goofy as the 1960s television show starring Adam West and Burt Ward, Batman: The Movie is an ironic and all-around ridiculous comedy that is so self-aware, it is often difficult to follow the wandering plot all the way to the end. Directed by Leslie H. Martinson and written by Lorenzo Semple Jr., the film was hurriedly patched together and released between seasons one and two of the Batman television show. It conveys the convoluted rise of a criminal group known as the “United Underworld” which consists of the all-star villains from the show –Penguin (Burgess Meredith), Catwoman (Lee Meriwether), Joker (Cesar Romero), and Riddler (Frank Gorshin) as they develop various unfolding plots to take over the world. In each case, Batman and Robin stumblingly thwart their efforts at word…

Here are my (political) predictions for 2023 … in for a penny, in for a pound. Feel free to argue the toss …

Jacx will not lead Labour into the election

National and ACT will form the next government

The Greens will struggle to hold onto their ten seats

NZ First will not be in parliament.

Te Pati Maori will pick up two additional seats … one List seat and Tamaki Makaurau

John Campbell will lose his cool on election night

David Seymour will be Deputy PM

Nicola Willis will be Finance Minister

Gerry Brownlie will be Speaker

ACT will pick up Education, Local Government, Defence & Veterans’ Affairs plus one other ‘name’ portfolio as well as having two ministers outside cabinet

Post the election there will be a bruising battle for the ‘soul’ of the Labour Party.

Traditional economics, specifically convergence theory, tells us that poor nations should grow faster than rich nations.

I’m more interested, however, in why convergence often doesn’t happen, or only partially happens.

And I’m extremely interested in why we often see divergence, which occurs when two countries are at a similar level of development, but then one grows much faster than the other.

Let’s consider the example of Brazil vs, South Korea.  Otaviano Canuto has an interesting article, published by the Center for Macroeconomics and Development, that looks at how the two countries have diverged over the past 50 years.

Here’s the chart that depicts the dramatic difference.

The author analyzes many of the reasons that South Korea has enjoyed faster growth.

It’s especially worth noting that Brazil’s protectionism has been self-defeating.

The “middle-income trap” has captured many developing countries: they succeeded in evolving from low per…

Media Myth Alert directed attention periodically in 2022 to the appearance of well-known media-driven myths, those prominent tales about the news media that are widely believed and often retold but which, under scrutiny, dissolve as apocryphal or wildly exaggerated.

Here’s a look at the year’s five top posts at Media Myth Alert, a year in which myths associated with the 50th anniversary of the origins of the Watergate scandal figured conspicuously, although not exclusively. (The demands of other projects necessarily trimmed the volume of blog posts in 2022.)

■ ‘I’ll furnish the war’: 25 reasons why it’s a towering media myth (posted January 10): William Randolph Hearst’s supposed vow to “furnish the war” with Spain at the end of the 19th century is one of the best-known anecdotes in American journalism. The aphorism has been presented as genuine in innumerable histories, biographies, newspaper and

I noted a month ago that President Xi and the CCP have taken credit for relatively low (reported) deaths from COVID, due to strict lockdown protocols. By “strict” we mean locking down whole cities and blockading residents in their apartment buildings for months at a stretch. However, public protests rose to an unprecedented level, and so the Chinese government has done a surprising full 180 policy change, towards almost no restrictions.

According to Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel in the Wall Street Journal, the way this policy is being carried out has the makings of a mass human tragedy:

Zero Covid was always untenable and had to be ended. But it could have been done responsibly.

Among other things, that would involve buying Pfizer and Moderna bivalent vaccines and administering them to the elderly and other high-risk people, and purchasing Paxlovid and molnupiravir to treat those who test positive. Supplies of…

Stardate: 4372.5 (2268)
Original Air Date: December 20, 1968
Writer: John Meredyth Lucas
Director: John Meredyth Lucas

“Mister Spock, the women on your planet are logical.
That’s the only planet in this galaxy that can make that claim.”

On a top-secret diplomatic mission, the Enterprise has entered the Tellun star system –a border region which is also claimed by the Klingons– in order to pick up the ambassador from Troyius, Petri (Jay Robinson). Troyius is the outer planet within the Tellun system. Next, the Enterprise heads for the system’s inner planet, Elas, for a covert escort mission. The Elasians are a demanding race and their women are rumored to possess strange mystical powers over men –a man who is touched by the tears of a woman of Elas has his heart enslaved forever. Nevertheless, Kirk is not excited about this transportation mission, he calls it simply…

I’m a big believer in looking at long-run trends, particularly whether countries are experiencing convergence of divergence with regards to per-capita economic output.

Poor nations normally should grow faster than rich nations, so we can learn a lot when we see exceptions to this rule based on several decades of data.

• Why does/did South Korea out-perform North Korea?
• Why does/did Chile out-perform Venezuela?
• Why does/did the United States out-perform Western Europe?
• Why does/did West Germany out-perform East Germany?
• Why does/did Hong Kong out-perform Cuba?
• Why does/did Taiwan out-perform China?

I think the answer to these questions is obvious, for what it’s worth.

Today, let’s consider another example. Mike Bird of the U.K.-based Economist tweeted about how the United Kingdom is diverging from Australia.

Since Australia and the United Kingdom have similar levels of economic liberty, some people speculate the divergence we’re seeing has a lot to do with regional…

Stardate: 5718.3 (2268)
Original Air Date: January 3, 1969
Writer: Jerry Sohl and Lee Erwin
Director: Herb Wallerstein

“I’m afraid that subjugating you won’t be enough. You must be confined.
And all the people of the galaxy who do not bow to me must be confined, or be destroyed.”

The Enterprise is orbiting Elba II, a planet with a poisonous atmosphere where the Federation maintains an asylum holding a few remaining incorrigible criminally insane people. The Enterprise is transporting a revolutionary new medicine which might permanently eliminate mental illness and thereby cure the inmates on Elba II.

Upon arrival, Kirk and Spock beam down to meet with the governor of the colony, Dr. Donald Cory (Keye Luke), who invites them to dinner despite his skepticism of the new medicine. Apparently, the rehabilitation program has not been going well. A new inmate arrived named Garth (Steve Ihnat), bringing…