Utopia, you are standing in it!

On March 15, I highlighted an op-ed in Natureby science writer Angela Saini, in which she discussed—if “discussed” is the proper word for such a biased and tendentious piece—University College London’s (UCL’s) recent inquiry into the eugenic practices of Francis Galton and Karl Pearson, science pioneers who were also racists, and whose name was bestowed on UCL buildings, lecture rooms, and endowments. What irked the UCL scientists who responded below to Saini’s claims—and irked me as well, since I spent considerable time at UCL—was her repeated assertion that UCL scientists had swept its racist and eugenic history under the rug, and were lacking objectivity.

Here are some of her claims (click on screenshot to read the whole sorry piece):

Two excerpts. The first is an arrant whopper (in bold):

When a survey conducted as part of the UCL inquiry asked staff and students whether “we should separate science…

This article in The Atlantic discusses a dilemma that shouldn’t exist in a rational world—a world without faith and, in this case, without the attendant and ridiculous notion that menstruating women are unclean. Read and weep:

For many Orthodox Jews, a menstruating woman is described as being in the state of “niddah“, which means that she’s sexually impure. As Green says in her article above,

Each month, when they get their period, some Jewish women observe a time of niddah, or ritual impurity. As long as they’re bleeding, and often for at least a week afterward, they can’t have sex with their partner. Many couples won’t hug or kiss, sleep in the same bed, or even pass objects to each other. Under any circumstances, this can be challenging to maintain. Imagine what it’s like under quarantine.

She remains “impure” until her period ends and she immerses herself in a…

Power them up with cheap & reliable coal-fired electricity.

A Chinese virus has taken up where Australia’s suicidal energy policies left off; crushing the entire economy, rather than just energy hungry industries, like manufacturing and mineral processing. Well, in truth, it’s the political reaction to COVID-19 that’s done the damage, rather than the pathogen itself.

Having destroyed the hospitality and tourism sectors overnight, throttled air transport and eliminated the free movement of Australians between states, talk has already turned to what comes next.

With shortages of medical equipment and machinery, one notion that’s taken hold is the idea that Australia could, once again, become a manufacturing powerhouse. The concept is being branded as “self-reliance” or “self-sufficiency”. Ignoring the fact that Australia’s manufacturing sector has been practically destroyed over the last decade, not least due to the fact that Australian businesses pay among the world’s highest power prices, thanks to an…

In this post I argue, with reference to Privacy International, that the nature of legislation as a speech act entails that the tension between parliamentary sovereignty and the rule of law is not as profound as is often thought.

In Privacy International the Supreme Court was tasked with interpreting s.67(8) of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, which provides:

Except to such extent as the Secretary of State may by order otherwise provide, determinations, awards, orders and other decisions of the Tribunal (including decisions as to whether they have jurisdiction) shall not be subject to appeal or be liable to be questioned in any court.

My aim here is not to argue in favour of a particular interpretation of s.67(8), but rather to explore some of the ‘meta-issues’ thrown up by Privacy International, specifically concerning legislative intention and parliamentary sovereignty. I shall stress a point that…