Ayi - 🍸 Molotov - Dossavi.

Partout où l'Etat ne peut ou ne veut ; tant que faire se peut, faire sans l'Etat !

Me adding geologist to my resume after hitting rock bottom of my life

The Origin of Species was published in 1859. Principia Mathematica was published in 1687, two centuries earlier. Conceptually, it seems like natural selection is much simpler than the theory of gravity. So why did it take two centuries longer to discover? A contemporary of Darwin's, Thomas Huxley, read the Origin of Species and said, “How extremely stupid not to have thought of that!” Nobody ever said the same for not beating Newton to the Principia. I wonder if the reason this happened is that Darwin’s cannot be decisively tested. The evidence is circumstantial, retrospective, and cumulative. There's no equivalent of Newton running the numbers on the moon's orbital period and radius, and confirming that it corresponds to his theory. In fact, nearly two thousand years before Darwin, the Roman poet Lucretius argued in De Rerum Natura that organisms suited to their environment survive while ill-adapted ones perish. But nobody built a science on it. Without a tight verification loop, the idea just floated by. Terence Tao argues that Darwin succeeded where Lucretius failed because he had the ability to convince people that the gaps in his theory (specifically, what is the mechanism of heredity) would be filled. This was less about ‘hard’ scientific insight, and more a matter of having good research taste and being persuasive. But it was crucial for progress in biology.

In Ozoro, Delta State, women and girls were hunted like prey. This must not go unpunished.

"the intuition nature itself has a purpose is hard to resist...educated people who profess an acceptance of Darwinian evolution cling to versions of the Gaia hypothesis—that nature forms a harmonious whole in which every species has a useful role to play" maartenboudry.substack.com/p/the-roots-of…

"the fact that we allow genetically unrelated individuals to care for our children, even briefly, is a pattern of behaviour that is practically unknown in the animal kingdom. That we do so routinely is a phenomenon that cries out for explanation" utppublishing.com/doi/book/10.31…

"some men prefer to open up to other men...The most common reasons they gave for preferring men were feeling more comfortable (46%) and feeling better understood (26%). They also felt more empathy from and less judged by male therapists." wsj.com/health/wellnes…

The real false accusation rate is 40-50%. There are older studies and military studies where men looked at the issue objectively before liberal politics took over & turned the study area into pure propaganda. Studies showed that: 1. Certain kinds of women (cluster b) lie about rape a lot. 2. Women tend to lie about rape when they have certain motives, like revenge or reputation protection. Conceptually, very few men are willing to engage in rape <1%, and a small, but much larger group of women ~10% are willing to lie about it. Many women lie about rape, but do not escalate to the police. I have been accused of SA by women I had consensual interactions with I think ~3 times. The common factors were: (1) they were very crazy, (2) they felt I had wronged them in some way & were mad about it. Once you account for non-police accusations, the false accusation rate is probably over 90%.

Huh! Apparently if you recode all the cases where a woman withdrew her accusation as false *as false* (they're generally not counted that way for some reason), the false rape accusation rate rises to 20-40%.

This paper just came out in the American Economic Review. One of my favorite findings was that people who experienced more economic growth while growing up had less "zero-sum" attitudes as adults.

"One reason women like muscular men is that formidability was, in the ancestral environment, useful for protection. But if a man is unwilling to use their formidability to protect them, then their attractiveness plummets." robkhenderson.com/p/an-instinct-…

SEXUAL ASSAULT ON WOMEN AT OZORO FESTIVAL IS A NATIONAL DISGRACE A society reveals its true character in how it treats its women. Where women are chased, stripped, groped, violated, and publicly humiliated by mobs under the guise of celebration, what is on display is not culture. It is barbarity. It is a collapse of conscience. It is a stain on our shared humanity. The deeply disturbing reports emerging from a recent festival in Ozoro, Delta State are not just troubling, they are horrifying. Women were allegedly accosted in broad daylight, forcefully stripped of their clothing, sexually assaulted, and subjected to degrading treatment by groups of young men while others watched, recorded, and, in some instances, cheered. No woman should ever have to endure such terror, such exposure, such violation of her dignity. This was not a festival. This was lawlessness. This was gender-based violence in its most primitive and shameful form. These acts amount to a grave violation of the fundamental rights to dignity of the human person, personal liberty, and security as guaranteed under the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended), as well as other international human rights instruments. They also constitute serious criminal offences under our laws, including assault, sexual violence, and public indecency. The NBA condemns these acts in the strongest possible terms. No tradition, no custom, no so-called cultural practice can excuse or legitimise the degradation and violation of women. Any practice that permits such cruelty is not culture. It is criminality. We call on the Delta State Government and all relevant law enforcement agencies to act swiftly and decisively. The perpetrators must be identified, arrested, and prosecuted. Those who aided, enabled, or failed to intervene must also be held accountable. Justice must not be delayed, and it must not be selective. Silence, indifference, or excuses in the face of such brutality only embolden further abuse. We further call on community leaders, traditional institutions, and festival organisers to take urgent responsibility. Cultural celebrations must never become theatres of violence. They must reflect dignity, order, and respect for human life, not chaos and cruelty. The protection of women is not optional. It is a legal duty. It is a moral obligation. It is a test of who we are as a people. Nigeria must not become a place where women live in fear of being stripped of both their clothing and their dignity in public spaces. This must never happen again! Mazi Afam Osigwe, SAN President, Nigerian Bar Association Huwaila Muhammad Chairperson, NBA Women Forum

I tested something I'd written myself: my first academic article, published 45 years ago. It came in at 77% AI-generated.

game theory + marketing psychology + insane implementation speed + delusional optimism + specific knowledge = the highest form of leverage

Terence Tao spent a year at the Institute for Advanced Study - no teaching, no random events of committees, just unlimited time to think. But after a few months, he ran out of ideas. Terence thinks that mathematicians and scientists need a certain level of randomness and inefficiency to come up with new ideas.

Nouveau post : Ensemble, mais seuls : comment les écrans ont envahi tout notre quotidien ! open.substack.com/pub/renaudoss/…

The slick A350 flight deck! 🙌 📹: jonny_heather

Really neat! Women's sick leave days are cyclical. Specifically, they're on the 28-day menstrual cycle, and the modal number of days between episodes is that long.