I am not so fat after all???

I think this deserves a quick mention. Tonight I was amused when a friend insisted the Boots weighing machine was defective – and indeed his scales claimed I weighed one stone ten pounds less than the Boots ones. Er, that is most of the weight I had mysteriosuly gained since Christmas (though not all – but I have given up smoking in the same time frame, seven weeks yesterday I think.) So I went and tried another friends scales, and they said the same as Robs. So it seems I am not so outrageously fat as I initially believed!  Well either that or playing Dungeons & Dragons 4th edition tonight caused miraculous weight loss! If so, Wizards should perhaps consider a new marketing approach?  And yes D&D 4e is a skirmish wargame/computer game wannabe really – but an excellent fun one.  You can add as much roleplaying as you like to any system after all…

The Men of Science & The Witches

So how is the new legislation that was designed to replace the Fraudulent Mediums Act working out? Have we actually seen any increase in prosecutions? I supported it fully in principle, but as always am hesitant about how it will work out in practice… If there is one thing that deeply concerns me, it’s when supposedly rationalist scientists turn their attention to witchcraft, superstition and religion. My reason is that I have read rather a lot of history, and I am unwilling to ignore its lessons.

Witchcraft and World War Two

Let’s start in England back in 1956. While the Pope was busy promulgating the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the UK government had weightier concerns. In the last days of the Second World War a British medium named Helen Duncan had been prosecuted for Witchcraft and imprisoned, and had died shortly afterwards as her health deteriorated. Her supporters were keen to claim it was because she was giving away secrets of British losses in seances — HMS Barham I believe, whose sinking was supposedly classified — her detractors pointed out she was already caught out in fraud long before that date. Whatever the cause, the persecution of witches was clearly out of step with enlightened post-war Britain, and something needed to be done. Spiritualists could now rightfully fear religious persecution — and after all, Spiritualism was a religion in its own right. The need to do something was clear. So in 1956, the British Government repealed the Witchcraft Acts, and replaced them with the Fraudulent Mediums Act, which remained in force till last year. This piece of legislation was somewhat redundant — it merely made obtaining money fraudulently by deception in a spiritualistic manner illegal. Very few prosecutions have been brought under it, as fraud and obtaining money by deceit are already illegal regardless of the context, and as the Act requires the approval of the home Secretary or Director of Public Prosecutions to bring a case. As soon as Witchcraft was legal, Gerald Gardner brought out High Magick’s Aid, Wicca was born, and everything got more complex.

Religion, Scam, Mumbo Jumbo or Occultism?

As the legislators found out, its quite hard to distinguish between what is a religion, and protected by UN Charter of Religious Freedom, what is a scam, and what is occult practice. Is there much difference? Any difference? Yet the British Government made a rational choice. In 1948 Orwell wrote 1984, and the idea of Thought-Crime sickened many. This is where I and Sam Harris of the New Atheists totally disagree – well we disagree on many things, but God comes high on the list-  I believe that people have the right to hold whatever beliefs they wish, but that behaviours should be subject to law. Harris apparently does not.  We do not in my opinion need laws limiting religious freedom – we need laws that protect people from criminal and anti-social behaviour, which may curtail active expression of those religious beliefs. You can believe what you want about the value of virginity, but that does not give you the right to wear a purity ring to school. As Lou Reed sang, “Between thought and expression, there lies a lifetime…”

So if you want to believe you can talk to the dead, and try to convince others, such is your right. If you however defraud or injure others in pursuit of your mediumship, you go to prison. Actions, not beliefs can be legislated for. It is when people lose sight of this fundamental distinction I get worried, and from what I have seen Sam Harris has.

The truth about the Witchfinder General

We have all heard of the Witch Trials I am sure – and i am going to briefly describe a couple of them, Salem, and the work of the Witchfinder General, Matthew Hopkins. I’ll keep it short. Let’s start with Matthew Hopkins. Pretty much everyone knows he was a religious fanatic, a Puritan Zealot who hanged and tortured little old ladies for fun and profit, till an angry mob “swum” him and lynched him. Problem is, it’s all rubbish. We don’t know much about Hopkins, but we do have his book,  The Discovery of Witches . I have read the original, and what we find is very interesting. Firstly, Hopkins was no Puritan. We can tell this because he was eventually denounced by a Puritan minister named John Gaule who bravely denounced him for persecuting innocent folks. The idea he himself was a Puritan is founded on nothing more than the fact a minister of Great Wenham was named Hopkins, and some scholars thought he might be his father.   What we do know is that he did not like the Rev. John Lowe, who may well have had Catholic sympathies, and who was hanged.

Secondly, Hopkins was a lawyer, and an educated man, quite probably university educated. Thirdly, his reign of terror was completely extra-legal – it took place in the chaos of the English Civil War, and the legality of proceeding was dubious – the older Elizabethan Witchcraft law required two previous convictions before it was punishable by death, and you were not killed for thinking you were a witch, but rather for capital crimes you claimed to have committed by witchcraft. The law of James I, an educated and inquisitive fellow with an obsession with witches, had become rather harsher, but torture was still illegal, and indeed Hopkins very quickly gave up on it once this was pointed out. His career after all attracted constant condemantion and controversy, throughout.

So what kind of fellow comes over in The Discovery of Witches? It certainly is not a religious fanatic. It’s a man who has a lawyers attitude of investigation, and is keen to refute his critics. He poses questions and answers them, and is keen to try and substantiate his claims with evidence — it’s interesting reading.

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14015

Hopkins was attacked by a bear, and with many other witnesses believed he saw imps and demons. What the heck was going on? Whatever the truth, he strikes me as rational…

Also it is worth noting that the conviction rate at Hopkin’s Assizes was about 33% — they were by no means show trials, and the majority of those accused were released — and those who were hanged see to have almost all confessed. Why?Were they actually witches? Did they believe they were witches? Was it just coercion? What was going on?

So how did Hopkins come unstuck? Because the Reverend John Gaule, an outspoken Puritan Minister denounced him from the pulpit for superstition, and for preying on the innocent and misguided. As a result a Parliamentary Enquiry was held, and the (Puritan) Oliver Cromwell with his (fanatically Puritan) Rump Parliament denounced Hopkins, and ordered him to cease and desist. He retired back to Mistley, where he died in 1646 or 47 of consumption, within a few months of Parliament shutting him down. So the story of Hopkins is quite the reverse of the myth: not a vicious religious fanatic puritan, but an educated man who seems to have made a genuine attempt to come to grips with phenomena he thought were witchcraft, and who was quite rightly shut down by Puritans before his investigations became even more genocidal. So much for the Witchfinder General…

Salem: home of the educated, not redneck loonies

OK, so what about Salem? Many readers of this forum are American, and everyone knows the Salem witch trials were caused by sexually repressed ignorant Puritans, right? Well Congregationalists, and in the spirit of Puritanism. The bare bones of the story from the children’s accusations through mounting hysteria to the trials and executions are too well known to bear repeating here, as is the sad postscript as the town realised the tragedy of its mistake and apologized to the victims, too late for many And since Nathaniel Hawthorne’s 19th century writings we have all known that Salem was the ultimate expression of the darkness in the Puritan soul, and the ignorance and superstition therein. Ignorance and superstition like that of …

Cotton Mather, FRS, BA. 1678 (Harvard College), A.M. 1681; honorary doctorate 1710 (University of Glasgow), author of 450 books and pamphlets, instigator of Smallpox Innoculation in the 1721 Boston epidemic, perhaps one of the keenest scientific minds of his time?

Increase Mather, BA Harvard 1656, MA Trinity College Dublin 1659, Hon. Degree Harvard (STD) 1692, Acting President, then Rector, then President of Harvard University. Best known for his sensible dictate at Salem that “It were better that Ten Suspected Witches should escape, than that one Innocent Person should be Condemned”.

Trial Judge William Stoughton BA Harvard 1650, MA New College Oxford, 1652, colonial chief magistrate, the first Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, and later Governor of Massachusetts.

Magistrate Samuel Sewell, another Harvard man who wrote The Selling of Joseph (1700), for instance, he came out strongly against slavery, making him one of the earliest white colonial abolitionists.

Magistrate Bartholomew Gedney, a doctor.

Magistrate Thomas Danforth, Treasurer of Harvard, Deputy Governor of Mass, President of Maine, later Deputy Governor of Maine, etc, etc

Magistrate Col. Nathaniel Saltonstall, BA Harvard 1659. He appears ot have resigned as he disagreed with the trials.

John Hale, Prosecution, BA Harvard 1657. Later changed his mind after his wife was accused. “It cannot be imagined that in a place of so much knowledge, so many in so small compass of land should abominably leap into the Devil’s lap at once”

Samuel Willard, Minsiter of Religion, who denounced the Trials. BA Harvard 1659, President of Harvard after Increase Mather

Notice a recurring theme? Salem was not some backwater lost in the New England woods, where primitive Puritans played out a savage holocaust in ignorance. As someone has remarked it is rare to find so many future members of the Royal Society, distinguished scientists all, as were  found at Salem that year. Salem in fact was far from a bastion of ignorance — it attracted some of the greatest minds of the age. So what the hell happened? Quite simply, there was no existing model to explain what was occurring – and to some extent we are even more perplexed today. I don’t believe anything “paranormal” or “supernatural” has to have been involved – but I do believe that a body of highly intelligent men decided to go with the evidence of their senses, and their considered judgment, and executed innocent people. What I believe most firmly however, was that this was no religious scandal, as the 19th century anticlericals who shaped many of our modern view of history believed. The Salem Witch trials were presided over by men of learning, and men of scientific distinction, not religious bigots…

It is all too easy to forget that fact. Maybe there are lessons here for us today?

Let’s pray for Jade

OK, I don’t exactly do Big Brother. Not in a “I’m too elite for pop culture canon” sort of way; though I once told my mother that “I do not engage with popular culture” when she asked if I had seen something on TV, and her reply was uncharacteristically unprintable. My mother does not swear, so I learned my lesson – even if you don’t intend to be a pretentious f*ckwit, and are pretty sure you are not, it is best not to give the appearance of being one.

Anyway it’s my middle class friends (unlike working class heroes like me ) who actually watch BB- either with genuine pleasure, or with fashionable ironic something-or-other that I’m just too thick and proletarian to get.  Still I understand that is where Miss Goody made her mark. I knew nothing about her, till her infamous remark about “East Angular being In North Africa” reached even those of us who are too absorbed in the 13th century to pay much attention to the 21st — well those of us from Suffolk at least.  (Bits of Suffolk, mainly the farming communities, are probably more feudal now than the thirteenth century ever managed*…)

Not of the Brightest

So she was badly educated, and not so bright, a bit like that American lady , a singer or some such, who thought Chicken of the Sea Tuna might be Chicken. So what? I might make the same mistake, and I have plenty of education, and can think. I still sometimes wonder if County Durham might be in Northern Ireland (of course I know it’s not) and I frequently make tragic mistakes while shopping that make Miss Jessica Simpson, for such I think it was,  chicken/tuna quandary look quite sane. Supermarkets are another country: they do things differently there.

Then I heard from Beast, and he likes Jade Goody.  What does the mighty browed Mekon, the most academic thing ever to walk across humanities, social sciences, engineering and natural sciences, probably the most intelligent thing on the planet today,  see in Miss Goody, sorry, Mrs Tweed as she now is? (Sincere congratulations!)  No idea, but he likes her, and thinks she is pleasant and was annoyed by the criticism of her. There is nothing “fashionably ironic” about beast. Fashion and Beast are not just separated: the divorce was the trial of the century.   He is to cool what Hell is, and I mean in the usually prevailing climate, not when it’s frozen over. That is what makes Beast so awesome.

What’s so wrong with Living TV, hey?

And I saw his point: here was a woman not unlike the guys I grew up with, indeed not unlike some of my friends now.  Sure she worked on a lot of Living TV shows – er I’ve appeared on a couple myself, and have a great deal of respect for Living TV.  Back in the days when it was run by Richard Woolfe and Jane Millichip it was a great place, filled with ideas and energy, a sort of televisual Woman’s Realm. I miss those days…  Anyway, Jade is OK. One does not have to be Archimedes to have a kind heart, and what is this gnosticism that denies value to the simply thick? Why do you have to be bright to be worthy? What a stupid idea! I’m pretty bright I think and I can be an utter tosser.  In what way should moral worth be equated with intellectual achievement? Are we really trying to outdo the Americans is sheer inanity here, with their curious notion that dollars make you worthy, and we in the UK are just substituting academic ability, or how articulate you are, or the ability to do crossword puzzles, for this? That’s obscene – completely obscene. I don’t care fi your IQ is 40, so long as you are pleasant, kind, loving and thoughtful. I might well prefer you!

Class war?

Now it might be that Jade’s crime is to be working class, in a post-Thatcher “classless” Britain where 95%  seem to see themselves as middle class. I call myself working class and my friends laugh – they point out I’m underclass, as the one thing I seem to rarely do is actually work.  Yet there is no crime in being working class as far as I know, and the people who seem to be  the most vicious towards “chavs” are those who only in this generation have escaped that sort of background. I don’t think anyone would call me a chav, but I’m definitely working class. Maybe “chav” really was a huge experiment in psychohistory, and Jade was manufactured to enforce the “do not be this” message — I have often suggested as much.  In a society which prides itself on egalitarianism and having finally dismantled class prejudice that would have kept Jade hidden from us in even recent decades – a form of segregation in broadcasting every bit as prevalent and vile as that practiced in the USA in the same period, that is well in to the 1950’s – Jade still had the power to offend. Why? We are still unconscious racists snobs?

Am I racist?

Then came the racism thing – Celebrity Big Brother. Amusingly I managed to offend a lot of people myself, when I said Jade was a bully, not a racist. I may well have been wrong, I did not watch the footage, but Shilpa Shetty and her were both of the same race surely?  How could this be racism?  Both are Caucasians, as am I – Shilpa from India, Jade from the UK – and part-Indian. There is a difference in skin tone, and that is all.  Shilpa is of the same race as probably most of the readers of this blog, in as far as race has any meaning.

Mind you, I still get in to trouble for refusing to call myself “white”, instead preferring “pinkish grey”. I see very few white people on the streets as it happens, though there are a few.Most people range from pinkish to copper to chestnut to a few who really are black. Maybe we should base peoples race on Dulux colour charts, if skintone is all that counts? Anyway,  Jade was culturally ignorant, bullying and dumb. She was not as far as I can make out racist.

Slaughtering teenagers endorsed

Next time I heard of her was when her boyfriend set about a teenager with a golf club. I know nothing of the rights and wrongs of that incident, and shall say no more – the courts decided I believe, passing verdict on the fellow. “let he who is without sin cast the first stone”; when it comes to maiming teenagers I refuse to be hypocritical, but I suspect that if my opinions were widely adopted the bridges of most cities would have a lot of pikes with gobby brats heads, which would be a lot more useful and some might argue decorative than Britain in Bloom.

This is so not funny

So, then the tragedy. Jade find out, on TV, she has cancer. And now she is dying. And people makes jokes about it, and seem to think somehow being famous make sit all so deserved. We all hate some celebrities, and wish they would die I suspect – and indeed often say so – but when they do, should we not reconsider, just for a moment?  This is an appalling tragedy. All over Britain, women are ill with this disease. 2,700 a year. Now we have a great screening programme, and a new vaccine which will reduce it – but Jade’s plight is that of many others.  And no, Jade is no more important or worthy or tragic than any one of them – but she is no less so either. She is rich and famous – but she is also I guess scared, unhappy and hurting. And I feel for her,  I really do.  She is too stupid, too fun filled, too happy, to die.  A lot of people are. They lose their kids, their boyfriends, their folks, and pass in to the unknown. Jade should not die – no one should die, not at that age. (Unless gobby teenagers, obviously…)

So I’ll pray for Jade, that she should recover, that she should get better, and that if not, that her final moments she be joyous, and that she should pass in to a happy hereafter peacefully. But Jade, get better. I’m sick of people moping and mocking – I don’t know if it will help or not, if prayer can work, but it costs nothing, and if it might help, well why not try it? There is no point condemning, analyzing, or berating: the comedy has turned tragedy upon us, and I really think in all decency all there is left is for us all to pray for Jade…

cj x

* I shall rant on this sometime. It will not be pretty.

The Science of Ghosts, Saturday, April 4th 2009, Edinburgh Uni

I’ll be attending this event, and felt that although Edinburgh Science Festival will clearly never be as dear to my heart as Cheltenham Science Festival this sounded really fun – so just in case anyone else interested, here is the advert! Yes I know it is in Edinburgh, but I have the ticket now! Anyone else want to go?

I ATTENDED THE EVENT — AND IT WAS EXCELLENT. You can read my report here

www.science of ghosts.com - the website

“Join renowned psychologist Professor Richard Wiseman and a host of leading experts to examine the science and history of hauntings. Are spirit photographs evidence of the afterlife or ingenious trickery? How do scientists investigate haunted houses, and what have they found? Can your brain fool you into seeing an apparition? Come along and witness a genuine Victorian phantasmagoria, discover how poltergeists once panicked the nation, and meet the man responsible for ghostly goings-on in Harry Potter movies.

Investigating haunted locations: A scientific approach (Prof Richard Wiseman: Psychologist)

Imaging the impossible: Investigating spirit photography (Gordon Rutter: Writer)

Things that go bump in the mind: The psychology of apparitions (Dr Caroline Watt: Psychologist)

The haunted: A social history of ghosts (Prof Owen Davies: Historian)

“No more ghosts!”: The regency phantasmagoria (Dr Mervyn Heard: Historian and performer)

“Dialogue with the dead”: Creating ghosts for television (Stephen Volk: Writer of Ghostwatch and Afterlife)

Grappling with ghosts: The practicalities of staging ghost effects in the modern theatre (Paul Kieve: Illusionist and film consultant)

Event runs 10am to 5pm, tickets £30. Details and booking here -

http://www.scienceofghosts.com/ “

This has been a Public Service Announcement. Normal Service will now resume.

Myths of Evolution

It’s the Year of Darwin, and boy am I bored with it. All the myths are being cranked out – and very little new (with some honourable exceptions — see below.) It’s also a year after I spent a lot of my energy examining Darwin and the Church, and reading around the subject. I thought it might amuse people to read some of it here – because most of  “what we know” is wrong… This will be the first of a short series of posts on Dancing on Darwin’s Grave,  as I lash out at the absurd hagiography surrounding the chap, and the modern myths that have grown up around the birth fo Evolutionary theory. And no, I am not a Creationist! I fully accept Evolution by Natural Selection – just making that clear, ok?

Everyone knows that Darwin was opposed by the Church right? Evolution was accepted by scientists, and mocked by evangelicals? Fundamentalists hated Darwin, and Soapy Sam and Wilberforce had a huge row over religion? Er, nope. It never happened like that.

Charles Darwin

I argue quite the opposite is true – at a time when the scientific community were still intensely sceptical of Evolution in the Darwinian model, many Evangelicals played an important role in supporting and accepting evolution, and few Evangelicals seem to have opposed it in the period 1850-1920… I suspect this will please almost no one, from Darwinians to Fundies!

I’m assuming most people are aware that what we call Young Earth Creationism, the belief the earth is a few thousand years old, is really only a North American Protestant belief and has only been prominent there since 1961. Sure, in recent years it has grown in the Islamic World, and in the rest of the Christian world following US example, but YEC is really quite a modern thing.

It was not the most common belief at all in the time of Darwin, even among conservatives. Age Gap, Framework and Age Day theories were the ideas common in the Evangelical mainstream before Darwin – a fact reflected in the massive contribution of Evangelicals and Anglican churchmen to the geological breakthroughs of the early 19th century.

Ah, some may cry,  what are they? Wikipedia to the Rescue! You don’t really need to know this to get the main point, but hey–

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gap_creationism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day-Age_Creationism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framework_theory

Catastrophism and flood geology was an extreme minority position, and only one Evangelical newspaper, The Record, appears to have much time for it.

Evolution was pioneered in America by the devout Evangelical Asa Grey, writing Darwinia (1876) which reconciles his Evangelical beliefs with orthodox Darwinism, and indeed being the only non-British member of the Darwin circle who saw Origin of the Species (1859) prior to publication. He dedicated much of his life to publicising and popularising Darwinian Evolution. A good bibliography is here- http://www.huh.harvard.edu/libraries/asa/asabio.html So by Darwin’s time, a number of  Evangelicals were already evolutionist.

Many of the objections raised like those of Soapy Sam Wilberforce were primarily scientific not theological — Kelvin pointed out Darwinian Evolution was completely impossible in terms of our understanding of the laws of physics and a theory not substantiated by the empirical evidence: indeed it ran contrary to much we knew until we understood stellar nucleosynthesis. It was of course correct,but that was not to be established for many decades to come.

Despite these problems, the Evangelicals response was generally positive. So who accepted evolution in those first years? It’s a Who’s Who of Evangelicals. Marston & Forster list BB Warfield, AH Strong, Van Dyke, Landey Patton, AA Hodge, WT Shedd, James McCosh — all hard core Evangelical leaders. ( They cite  Livingstone, Darwin’s Forgotten Defenders, Scottish Academic Press, 1987).

Many historians of science and religion have already surveyed this territory and found that on both sides of the Atlantic works in favour of Darwin in Christian circles far outnumbered the minority opposition. Fundamentalism? Looking at The Fundamentals, I am immediately minded of Chapter 69 – The Passing of Evolution. (online here – kudos to the chap who undertook this herculean task! – http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Parthenon/6528/fund69.htm ) As you can see, this limited acceptance of Darwinism and objections based upon scientific principle is not quite what one might be led to expect from the very founding document of Fundamentalism. Orr’s chapter 18 contains a resolute defence of evolution, though he was Lamarckian and here disparages Darwinism. You can read it for yourself here http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Parthenon/6528/fund18.htm

Orr accepted Lamarckian evolution, or at least appears to. I could go on and on – I probably will, it’s what I do – but I suspect that the “meme” of Evangelical refusal of evolution has developed quite recently, and part of the “conflict between science and religion” woo one sees so much of these days. The popularity of the idea is simple — it appeals to both hard atheists wishing to disparage religion as an opponent of reason, and to devout Young Earth Creationist types who wish to claim this was always the Christian faith.

Few voices speak out against it – few people bother to check the facts, despite the mountains of printed material available, and modern studies like those of Marston and Livingstone.

My contention is that YEC only dates really from 1961 and Henry Morris – certainly OEC was common, but that looked at an earth many millions of years old (though limited by Kelvin’s calculations on the sun which gave the Earth an age of not more than 25 million years -  http://www.me.rochester.edu/courses/ME201/webexamp/kelvin.pdf - which led to his and many other physicists rejection of Darwin as physically impossible.)

Lord Kelvin, critic of Darwin's theory

The debate between physicists and geologists over the age of the Earth was ongoing, until the understanding of the actual processes involved in the sun showed the geologists were right. Physicists however probably were greater opponents of Darwinism in the early years (as pseudo-science that defied our understanding of physical law) than Evangelicals? Dunno! The Creationists as we know them are very modern – the Seventh Day Adventists, who gave Americans many interesting doctrines almost unique to that continent did much to support the rise of OEC, and McCready Price in the 1920’s was the first major anti-evolutionist who went for seven literal days I can think of? Willliam Jennings Bryan for example (he of the famous Scopes Monkey Trial) favoured one of the two main Evangelical theories –, Age/Day, where a Day represented millions of years not a 24 hour period, and the famous Schofield Refence Bible of 1909went for the other – Gap theory, where there was a Gap of millions of years between Day 1, and Day2, and possibly between other Days. Both arguments preserve Biblical inerrancy.

The myths were already building fast even by then, indeed before the end of the 19th century, one of the most famous being about the debate between Huxley and Wilberforce over On the Origin of  Species. Superb essay on the history of this by JR Lucas here, well worth reading (honestly it is!) — http://users.ox.ac.uk/~jrlucas/legend.html As you can see, this encounter is one of the most common stories almost everyone knows, but the truth is shall we say a little more obscure? Legendary indeed! Inerrantists has long accepted Gap Theory, Framework Theory or Age/Day by Darwin’s period – many leading geologists were devout evangelicals, so the age fo the Earth was known to be exceedingly ancient, and as Augustine and Origen both accepted the reading of this passage as non-literal as did theologians all through the ages, it is not surprising really they had cheerfully gone with the new science. It was a reaction to be expected in light of the dominant Baconian “Two Books” paradigm? Anyway, one does not have to be stupid ot be a Christian, it’s entirely optional – then as now. A few of us still possess brains, and a cynical scepticism about how susceptible we are to modern myths, no matter how much we can see the problems with ancient ones… Hope my historical whitterings have not bored to death.

I wrote that brief summary last year, after conversations with Beast, then luckily John Van Wyhe (Historian of Science, Cambridge University, leader of the Darwin Online Project)  published a very interesting article in BBC History magazine — January 2009 – Volume 10 – No 1 http://www.bbchistorymagazine.com/currentissue.asp in which he also exposes ye olde myth.   Anyway, question all these myths! I f everyone knows something, it’s often nonsense!

cj x

I grow fat, and the perils of bicycling.

Warning: CJ is rude about weight loss, weight, television, pantomine dames and fatness. If you are offended by such things, do not read further. In fact try another blog. CJ is rude about everything, but mainly psychics, ghosthunters and Richard Dawkins. Not in that order.

I am Fat

Well I am fat. Obscenely, horrendously, miserably, intolerably fat.  I was always aware I was fat, but a recent photo of me at St Briavels Castle made it clear — I am hideous! (OK, this may be the most unflattering photo ever, but you get the point…)

Widow Twanky

Yes I know I am wearing a pink beret, a pink scarf and a shawl. They belong to Natalie and Lorna, and no I would not willingly dress like this, the girls mugged me and made me don such silly apparel.  For which fact you should all give praise to God –  imagine meeting that coming through Tesco aisles towards you on a Friday night? Every little helps, but not with a heart attack it doesn’t. Or if you are made of sterner stuff, you might just die laughing. Or weep in sympathy, if of charitable disposition. Anyway you don’t want to see people willingly dressed like that.

So I figure I need to find out how overweight I am, and finding myself passing Boots the Chemist, which has a “I speak your weight” machine which actually does no such thing, discretely printing it instead on a slip of paper, I succumbed. (The “I shout your weight” machine should be invented for the benefit of bored shop assistants. One customer in ten it just sets off a siren and starts shouting insults along with the customers weight. Except people would be upset  and sue – it is after all the machines fault they are morbidly obese porkers, like er, well, me.)

And you know what? I’m really overweight. Well two and half stone over the top of my right weight for height, which given my height is not enough to make me in the red “have you considered a Co-op funeral plan?” category to mean I will not see Christmas, but is so far in to the yellow “I look like I have liver failure” bit that I may not live to see 2012 and the Mayans hoover us all up or whatever is supposed to happen. Bummer.

A Digression

Now there are lots of really good reasons why people get fat, many medical, many quite sad. My uncle weighed 54 stone, lived to a ripe old age and was a wonderful mortician. He died after he had slimmed, and slipped on the ice and struck his head. I could not help wondering if it would have happened if he had not lost the weight – but anyway, he was a great example of someone who is obese for medical reasons, which do not seem to much impact his general health, given his longevity and quality of life. A few of you met uncle Ted, and can attest to his joyful happy existence. I have no time for the cult of anorexia, and the super-skinny fad. Size zero? Get lost.

Supersize versus Superskinny

It was a shame to see the journalist Anna Richardson, a lovely attractive woman who I have met a few times and is not in the least overweight on this Supersize vs. Superskinny show talking about her weight loss plans. OK Anna, if by some bizarre chance you read this give up on the weight loss,  it’s no better than the psychic artists! As I recall you are gloriously sexy in real life, so cut out the “I’m lardy” nonsense and the huffing around with a bunch of jolly welsh WI types, nice lasses all from what I saw, and get back to counting the profits from this production… You do not need the LA treatment, you need a sympathetic commissioning editor and a better pitch – this show is strangely compelling though!:)  Wonder what, other than this, Anna doing these days? Last I saw she was hanging around with Ben Devlin in a TV studio in the basement of a North London  club, making stuff for Living TV? Well anyway Supersize versus Superskinny is probably one of her productions,  and it was bizarrely interesting for someone like me who has absolutely no interest in diets – till now.  BAh, I’m being nice about a TV show – this will never do!

Um, actually is seeing that show why I think I’m fat? Am I really actually svelte and graceful? Have I been traumatized by a TV show? I’ll get my solicitors on to it in the morning. Oh no, I remember – it was the Widow Twanky photo and the fact I’m a fat b*stard.

So I have to get a plan. I’m two and a half stone in to the Sheriff Fatman dimension. Baby Isabelle born to my friends Steve and Carol earlier today is about a quarter of what I need to lose: unfortunately despite appearances, I am not pregnant.

On my Bike

So I have made a decision. My old bike has rusted solid, so I need a new bike. I am now going to attempt a cost/benefit exercise on if I get a new bike or not.

Pros

I get to exercise

It beats walking

I get to kill old ladies at the sight of my bare arse hanging over the saddle

I get to places quicker.

The fatness may kill me

Cons

I dislike exercise of any type. Well almost!

Cycling round here requires a death wish. I will get run over!

Old ladies may jab me in the rear with their brolly’s as my undignified flab slowly rumbles past, asthmatically wheezing

I have no where to go, on foot or bike.

Cars WILL kill me. I know nothing of roads, I grew up on a farm.

That last thought made me consider buying a horse instead. I’m not sure when I can pasture said beastie, but I will see if the town has a medieval charter or if I can find any local Commons rights in medieval legal manuscripts that I can invoke. Maybe I can pasture my horse in the town hall?  Failing that I can apply for a residents parking permit for the local multistorey, buy  a load of hay, and stable it there.

Bah, humbug. I don’t like horses. Big smelly things that bite your legs off if I remember Becky correctly.

So bike or fat?

In 2007 136 cyclists were killed in the UK, with 2,428 seriously injured.

Obesity kills around 30,000 a year according to the NHS.

So the answer is clear, and CJ is buying a bicycle. Well he bought the Echo, and is going to look for a very cheap machine. Wish me luck! It sounds like in answer to the question bike or fat, fat kills you faster.

So we will see. Watch this space.