Think Different

Still thinking about the fate of our (possibly) more talented neanderthal cousins, I don't think I used one of the best metaphors which was, almost literally, under my nose. It is a truth universally acknowledged among those who care about such things, that early versions of the Windows OS which I'm using at this moment were way behind what Apple were doing in terms of user-friendly user interfaces back in the '90s. For your average non-techie user, the choice should have been a no-brainer. But Microsoft eventually triumphed, not because its system was was easier to use or technically superior, but due to Microsoft's foresight in dealing with software licenses, which meant that there was just way more stuff to run on PCs than Macs. In this way, the PCs simply out bred the Macs. The neanderthals - don't think dumb, think different.

Talking of thinking different, something which isn't new but is new to me. The Danish software company Specialisterne is employing people with Autistic Spectrum Disorder to improve the quality of its software testing. Instead of seeing difference as a problem, the company is harnessing the special skills of people with ASD -("motivation, focus, persistence, precision and the ability to follow instructions") with, according to the radio interview which alerted me to this story, considerable success. The company are apparently looking to start up an operation in Glasgow. More about this splendid organisation here.

Sadly there are some people who think different but not - in my humble opinion - in a good way. After recently writing a few complimentary things about what religion can inspire people to do, I came across a deeply depressing article in the Guardian which reminded me why I'm definitely not religious. The article was written in defence of the Shi'ite practice of self-flagellation, a form of devotion to the memory of Imam Hussein, the Prophet's grandson (in case you missed the case, a man was recently found guilty of child cruelty after forcing two boys to beat themselves during such a ceremony). It's the sort of activity which would be laughed at if anybody outside a "faith community" indulged in it. Yet, according to the writer, the spectacle is

keenly watched by onlookers, children and adults alike, who, though they have seen it all before, continue to be mesmerised by the sheer spectacle of it – the display

I'm not a fan of Max Mosley and his antics, but at least he didn't take kids along to share in his unconventional jollies. But it seems that any activity, however bonkers is OK if it's an expression of faith, and the warping of young minds with such nonsense seems to be a parental right of the Godly. Dreadful.

It's a a crazy old world out there, sure enough. Like the man said:

I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.

My perfect cousin

Back to the blog after a Bank Holiday spent visiting family and I find that more distant relatives have been in the news. There's been a trend in more recent years to rehabilitate our evolutionary cousins the neanderthals from their original "nasty brutal and short" image, but the general assumption still seems to be that they died out and we survived because they were in some way inferior - maybe their brains, although on average bigger than ours, were less highly convoluted. Perhaps the anatomy of their vocal tract, not preserved directly, but inferred from their skeletal structure didn't permit the range of complex language sounds produced by Homo Sapiens. Whatever it was, we're here and they're not, ergo we were better in some significant way.

Interestingly the latest piece of research on the stone tools produced by the neanderthals and by humans just like us living at the same time, suggests that they may not have been out competed at all. Their stone technology, argue the authors, was every bit as good as ours, perhaps even a little better. Why, then, did they perish when we survived? The theory is that they just happened to be a small group of folk, living in the challenging, marginal environment of ice age Eurasia. The conditions were against their population expanding, whereas modern-type humans coming out of the tropics, lived in a more benign environment and were simply able to out breed them, even though they may technologically and intellectually have had the edge.

It's an intriguing theory. It may, of course be dead wrong, but it's not unusual to find that being in the right place at the right time can count for more than actually being better. We think of life and nature as a quest for perfection and our culture, from the Olympic Games to advertising encourages us to think that being the best is all that counts. But in real life, good enough and on time often beats a more efficient solution which can't be made to work, or doesn't have the right resources behind it. Think about the VHS v Betamax videotape format war, which many feel was won by the technically inferior product - or even the emd of the Second World War, when the Nazis' sophisticated rockets, jets and Tiger tanks counted for nothing against the allies' almost endless supply of workaday kit such as Sherman and T-34 tanks.

So, just maybe, we are actually the second-best species of humans on the planet - the really bright guys hung on until 25,000 years ago but got wiped out by the challenge of maintaining a viable population in an extreme and hostile environment. Unlike Kevin in the Undertones' famous song, our perfect cousins just didn't survive to prosper, be envied and, presumably, excel on University Challenge.

In the news

Considering the extravagant displays of poor sportsmanship to be seen in any number of Premiership and international football matches, I'd have thought that Usain "Lightning" Bolt's celebrations after his astonishing and effortless-looking sprint victories might be excused. Jacques Rogge doesn't seem to think so. Then again, there are a few pointed words for M Rogge here - and quite right, too, IMHO.

Elsewhere in the news, the Russian show of force in Georgia continues. The con incidence of the anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia following the Prague Spring may be just chance, or maybe it's a sign that Czarist, Communist or Capitalist, the huge autocracy at the heart of Eastern Europe has always put its faith in the strong man and feared the "virus of freedom".

Alexander The Possibly Quite Good

I see that the Alexander Technique has received a positive write up in the British Medical Journal. Despite my scorn for "complementary" and "alternative" quackery, I'm quite prepared to give the Alexander Technique the time of day - there's nothing ostensibly risible about the benefits of good posture/movement and not damaging your body by putting it under unnecessary strain - any workplace training video in manual handling demonstrates what damage you can do by, for example, lifting things incorrectly. The converse, positively getting into good habits of posture and movement could well have benefits. After all, we're not talking way out crazy stuff about crystals, auras, healing energies or homeopathic infinitesimals.

So, just to prove that, although sceptical about unproven treatments, I'm not completely closed-minded, the picture above is of a group of people on an Alexander Technique Course in Spain a little while back - a group including yours truly.

I don't know if it really works or not, but it felt good and there might be something in it - the jury's out at the moment but whereas I'd be truly astounded if someone produced convincing proof for the benefits of homeopathy or crystal healing it wouldn't amaze me if the Alexander Technique had real benefits beyond the placebo. Not yet Alexander the Great, but interesting territory on the edge of conventional therapy, as opposed to the wilderness way beyond reason....

Nostalgia

Loads of stuff to do and little time to blog ATM, so here's a real oldie, but one which always makes me smile - as does this one, featuring an ex-Goodie and of Springwatch guru...

Smart cookies

The discovery of cookery may have been a necessary step in the creation of all subsequent human culture, it says here. Highly speculative, but food for thought...

Religion - Devil's advocate

Religion, especially the organised variety, doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. But does it have anything going for it? On the face of it, yes. It's been the inspiration behind some of humanity's great works of architecture and art. From the surreal mud mosques of Mali to William Byrd's Ave Verum Corpus, works dedicated to the glory of religion can astonish and move even a crusty old humanist like me. The cathedrals of medieval Europe, the gilded pagodas of the Far East, the gospel music of the American Deep South, the geometrical marvels of Islamic architecture, Milton's Paradise Lost, Nkosi Sikeleli Africa, the Parthenon; it's a list which could go on and on.

As important, maybe more so, is the sense of community and fellowship which people can experience at their church, temple, mosque, whatever. In our self-centred, atomised western world, this valuable feeling of community isn't something to be lightly dismissed. In a country where you probably live miles from your family and hardly know your neighbours, a sense of belonging would be a valuable addition to many people's lives and religious congregations often provide that. Furthermore, there are plenty of religious people are just genuinely nice people - perhaps being socialised by a strong community can make them so.

So, what's not to like?

Well, my problem is with truth. As most religions believe themselves to be in possession of a very special truth - The Truth - this should be, along with humility, one of religion's Unique Selling Points. The trouble is that if you can't accept that central truth, then by definition you don't have faith and aren't religious - and that's where I am. There have always been a few who questioned the claims of religion, but in the last couple of centuries, the evidence that the creation myths of the world's religions aren't truthful accounts of what actually happened has become overwhelming.

Speaking as someone from a culture where Christianity has been the dominant faith, obviously Darwin V Genesis has been the big match. It isn't the triumph of Darwin alone which conflicts with the narratives of Christianity. Think about the size and age of the universe, according to the best estimates patiently put together by generations of scientists. The Universe of the Bible was a large place, but of comprehensible size and old, but of an age which could be grasped in terms of the generations of men and women. Within that framework, it would be possible to believe in an earth that was at the centre of the universe and in a God whose chief concern was his earthly creation. Now that we know that the size of all human civilization is an almost dimensionless point in great gulfs of time and space, it would seem a tad presumptuous to postulate a God who created everything and yet keeps us under his special care. In the words of Arthur C Clarke, "if there are any gods whose chief concern is man, they cannot be very important gods."

As if that wasn't enough, there have been generations of pesky Biblical scholars, picking apart our sacred texts, pointing out inconsistencies and contradictions, suggesting that Gospel Truth ain't necessarily ... well ... true. In fact the documents have all the hallmarks of texts written amended and developed by fallible humans rather than direct dictation from on high.

Some religionists - often the more "liberal" and sophisticated ones, don't have a problem reconciling all of this with faith. The bits which have been thrown into doubt or dis proven are, they say, beautiful metaphors. The bits which are currently un-provable or un-dis-provable are, they say the real Truth. I almost prefer the wilful blindness of Biblical literalists, determined to ignore any contrary evidence to the literal truth of Genesis to this level of intellectual dishonesty.

So, although there are many things which religious people have, which I actually admire, the central tenet of their religion is the sticking point, along with all the accompanying baggage of faith trumping observation, empirical inquiry, questioning or anything else which isn't literally a prejudice (pre-judging an issue in the absence of evidence). It's a bit like the placebo effect - good things can happen though believing alone, but that doesn't actually make what you believe in true. In fact, I did a bit of a sneaky thing in including the Parthenon in my list of religiously-inspired architecture - although religious people find it hard to accept dismissal of their own spiritual beliefs, they find it quite easy to dismiss those of past believers, whose beliefs, presumably just as deeply held, are no longer in fashion. To quote Arthur C Clarke again, "No one ever demonstrated, so far as I am aware, the non-existence of Zeus or Thor — but they have few followers now".

Along with many religious people I believe that there is more to life than our society's current obsessions with making money, shopping and celebrity. But whatever that "more" is, I don't think it's the sugar pill of religion.