Fake news

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Fake news may not be as widespread as thought. An analysis of the daily media consumption of people in the US found fake news made up 0.15 per cent of time people spend consuming media. The study found traditional news outlets may be a greater source of misinformation than fake news (Science Advances, advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/14/eaay3539  (New Scientist , 23 May 2020).

My comment:   Are they saying that the New York Times and the Washington Post are greater sources of misinformation than the obvious lies and fabrications that abound on Facebook and other social media?

I read the New Scientist every week – it is a wonderful publication (in the interests of fairness to all, I’m sure some of the articles are based on mistaken data.  This may be one of those rare pieces of research and reporting?).   The Russians, for instance, are conducting a cyber war against the US – against us all. They are not alone.   If you believe a word they say on social medfia, I despair).   The whole point is to get us all to suspect everything we read.  It is proving amazingly successful.

 

 

America’s food chain

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Warren Buffett famously observed that “only when the tide goes out, do you discover who’s been swimming naked”.  And Covid-19 represents “an ebb tide of historic pro-portions”.

One thing it has exposed with brutal clarity are the flaws of America’s industrialised food system. On one side, there are empty supermarket shelves; on the other, farmers discarding milk, eggs and animals because they can’t get produce to market.

This is the result of “economic efficiency gone mad”. Since the 1980s, the US food industry has become absurdly concentrated: just four companies now process more than 80% of the country’s beef cattle; a single plant in South Dakota processes 4% of the pork Americans eat. This has pushed down prices, but resulted in a supply chain so brittle that the closure of a single plant causes havoc. And such disruptions, caused by Covid-19, have been all too common of late. And little wonder, given that the meat-packing lines are staffed by poorly paid workers who must stand shoulder to shoulder, cutting and deboning animals so quickly that they can’t pause long enough to cover a cough, let alone go to the bathroom. The US is paying the price for a food system that has put cost savings ahead of every other consideration. (Michael Pollan,The New York Review of Books  23 May 2020).

My comment:  It’s great that this issue is now being discussed. There is too much industrial concentration and too little competitiveness. The politicians have turned a blind eye to it, and the obscene pay of the bosses, in return for financial support.  The system is corrupt.  It is bad for democracy, for the lousily paid workers and for the health of the population.

The irony is that the Administration wants to lower, if not totally stop, immigration of desperately poor people with the aid of the famous and expensive wall.  Without the immigrants the bosses of the food processing companies would not have their huge incomes, and the politicians would have to forego a sizable portion of their electoral donations.  And the food market would grind to a halt.  Has anyone thought this through?  The system needs the cheap labour.

What has this to do with Epicureanism?  A desire for peace  of mind and a feeling of security and pride in a just and fair system for all.

Bagavad Ghita, part 2

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(16.15). ( Some people think…)  I am wealthy and well- born!  Who can rival me? I will show my greatness by giving alms and making public sacrifices.  I will rejoice in my glory”.  Thus they boast,  befuddled by their own lack of wisdom.

(16.16). Addled in thought, caught in a spider’s web of delusion, craving only sensual “delights”, they sink in life , and even more so after death, to a foul hell.

(16.17). Vain, heedlessly obstinate, intoxicated by pride in wealth, hypocritical in whatever sacrifices they perform, careless of scriptural injunctions….

(16.18).  egotistical, ruthless, arrogant, lascivious, prone to fits of rage, these evil- intending persons despise Me, though for all that I dwell in them, as in all beings.”

My take:   Years ago one can imagine the man or woman in the street, reading the above and thinking, “It can’t apply here!  It’s inconceivable. Collectively, we are well- governed and rational, on top of the world. Yes, there are important things that need fixing, but in general the country is moving in the right direction”.

In 1963 I hitch-hiked round the US. y car and airplanevisiting 48 States and encountering rich and poor, black and white – a cross- section of the population, getting temporary jobs as I went.  Hardly a day went by when I wasn’t told, “Isn’t this just a great country?”. They meant it and it was; and very open and generous, too.

Epicurean peace of mind?  Not today.

Excerpt from the Bhagavad Gita, Part 1

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……..Virtuous people find it difficult to believe that such evil exists on earth. It’s proponents, moreover, often proclaim (if they have a degree of intelligence) teachings that are designed purposefully to win others to their side: teachings like “the greatest good for the greatest number” and “each according to his need, from each according to his capacity to give”.  On the field of actual activity, however, they show themselves nothing but power hungry, ruthless, and utterly cynical in the application of their so-called “ideals”.

Such people appear in every age.  Usually they are more or less successful according to how many dissatisfied Shudras and idealistic but undiscriminating intellectuals they can persuade to fill their ranks.

(16:10).  Abandoning themselves to insatiable desires, hypocrites, pretending a noble purpose, filled with self-conceit, insolent (to anyone who disagrees with them), their concepts (assuming they have any) twisted by delusion; their actions prompted solely by impure motives.

(16:11). convinced that the fulfillment of physical passion is man’s highest goal, confident that there is no world (and no life) but this one, such persons, until the moment of death, are engrossed in earthly cares and concerns.

(16:12) Bound by the fetters of hundreds of selfish hopes and expectations, enslaved by passion and anger, they strive by unlawful means to amass fortunes with which to purchase sensual physical pleasures.

(16.13) “This much” they say, “I have acquired today, putting me in a position to attain this desire. I have this much money at present; my goal now is to acquire more”.

(16.14)  Or they say: “Today I have slain this enemy.  Next, I shall slay more.  What I’ve wanted I possess. I am successful, powerful and happy”.

 My comment:  It was ever thus.  Regrettably, the sort of people discussed above seem to scrabble to the top, trampling underfoot any who oppose them.  These attacks by the hyper-ambitious, self-reverential and unempathetic seem to come in bursts.  The last outbreak required a worldwide war to dislodge Hitler and  Mussolin, leaving the malevolent Stalin still out and about.  Now we have another eruption, as usual supported by the aggrieved and the economically insecure, who nonetheless support the massive wealth disparities in society.   When will we ever learn?

The robot priest

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A robot priest has been installed at a 400-year-old temple in Kyoto. Costing almost £800,000, the android Kannon is 6ft 5ins tall and is modelled on the Buddhist deity of mercy. “With AI, we hope it will grow in wisdom to help people overcome even the most difficult troubles,” says Tensho Goto, a priest at the Kodaiji temple. The robot can move its head, arms and torso, and is programmed to deliver sermons from the Heart Sutra, a Buddhist text. “You cling to a sense of selfish ego,” the robot warns worshippers. “Worldly desires are nothing more than a mind lost at sea.”  (The American Conservative, 28 September 2019)

Firstly, Epicurus was saying something remarkably similar nearly two thousand years ago.  He didn’t need a programmable, moving robot.

And why believe a machine without empathy and a mind of its own, spouting pre-digested dogma?  This story seems to indicate a collapse in the trust accorded human priests, or maybe a lack of candidates for the priesthood in the first place?  Seems to be a world-wide problem.