How Orwellian : Gaps in understanding the meaning of equality

The WEF's Gender Gap report (PDF) redefines inequality as equality. 

US Educational Attainment (page 370)

The female to male ratio of USA enrollment in tertiary education is 1.41 but it is scored as "1" (1 = Equality). There is no extra credit given for women being in an advantageous position as the maximum score is one. When there is a gender gap where men suffer then it is defined as equality.

Fiji Educational Attainment (page 198)

The result of truncating the score at 1 is that Fiji's Educational Attainment has women equal to men or leading men in 3 of the 4 subcategories but because they trail in one subcategory the entire category is graded as showing inequality to women.

Cameroon Health and Survival (page 158)

Further, they define the "equal" life expectancy ratio at 1.06:1. If men and women have the same life expectancy, like Cameroon, then that is marked as inequality. 

Also note that the Sex ratio at birth is bounded at a predetermined "equal" value of 0.94 instead of Cameroon's actual 0.97. The result is that despite being equal in life expectancy and higher in sex ratio at birth the result is a overall Health and Survival score of 0.961 – Not Equal. 

As an aside, I'm unclear as to why "Sex ratio at birth" is a significant category. It doesn't capture female infanticide (except for sex selective abortion) and unlike most categories it doesn't seem determined by traditions or social institutions. A cynical person might suggest that it is a subcategory added solely to lower the Health and Survival average and to game the OMGsomethingHasToBeDone system.

Burundi Health and Survival (page 154)

Burundi's women have a higher sex ratio at birth than average and a higher life expectancy than men. This may lead some to think men are suffering inequality. Not according to the WEF. Because the sex ratio at birth score is capped at 0.94 and because women outlive men but do not outlive them to a sufficient degree that means the women of Burundi are the ones suffering inequality. 

In Australia (p120) men have a lower life expectancy than women by 3 years which the WEF scores as women suffering a gender gap. 

It is interesting to note the existence of a category listed under "Additional Data - Social Instutitions" : "Quota type" which notes if there are laws requiring a quota of female candidates or if laws require seats in the legislature be reserved for women.

On page 4 they acknowledge that they could present both gaps in the achievements of women and also the gaps in men's achievements but "We find the one-sided scale more appropriate for our purposes." 

One might get the impression these are not the most rigorous egalitarians.




the critique of the WEF Gender Gap report continues here.

a non-identifying ID card

Over the past 20-years, Janice 'Lokelani' Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele has carried two separate IDS - a state ID card and a driver's license.

The driver's license was printed with an abbreviated version of her family name and her first and middle name was completely left off.

However, to counteract this, the Hawaiian Governor's office allowed her special dispensation to accommodate her full name on her state ID, but that expired in May and her problems began when her new one arrived laid out the same as her drivers license.

Her frustrations began when she contacted her local county on Hawaii and asked them what could be done - they suggested she change her last name to make the situation easier on her and them.

a non-identifying ID card.
This might be what they mean by "close enough for government work"

Just think, there are only about 1.3 million people in Hawaii so with a 26 letter alphabet the Hawaiian government could assign a unique 5 letter surname to anyone with a name 6 characters or longer. So, "Dwight D. Eisenhower" could become "Dwight D. Abcde".

If we treat capital letters as distinct from lowercase letters everyone in Hawaii could have a 4 letter surname so "Michelangelo Buonarroti" could become "Michelangelo AcDQ".

Imagine how much ink that would save. The time save by having to type fewer letters! Don't be selfish, those Hawaiian DMV computer hard drives cost money and it just might process a 4 letter name more quickly than a 36 letter name thereby saving someone at the DMV a millionth of a second or so.

Often bureaucrats are more concerned about the impact on bureaucrats than whether a policy actually works, like issuing a card to show a person's ID should actually shows the person's ID as opposed to issuing an ID card that does not show the person's ID. It is easier for them to try to get her to change her name than for the bureaucrats to be inconvenienced.

If only the Hawaii DMV had a database of resident names so they could have planned around these types of issues.

A chair of note

Not necessarily built for comfort

A chair made in 1870 of 2 pieces of solid beech wood by August Thonet of the Austrian furniture company Gebruder Thonet (Brothers Thonet) as a demonstration of their steam wood bending technique.

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Thonet's #14 chair

Gebruder Thonet started as a craftsman but embraced mass production. Michael Thonet, the father of the Thonet Brothers and founder of Gebruder Thonet, even built much of his own machinery. In 1859 they introduced the Thonet's #14 chair and by 1900 they had sold 40 million.

pics from the magazine Fine Woodworking #20 (Jan 1980).

word of the day : callipygian

The word of the day is callipygian : kallos means beauty, puge means buttocks. Aphrodite Kallipygos.

a Callipygian Venus (Naples)
1st or 2nd century BC

a Callipygian Venus (Naples)

1st or 2nd century BC

(second view)

Callipygian Venus by François Barois, 1683-1686 (2 views)

movie notes : Prometheus

spoilers abound below the fold

Book Notes : nasty, misogynistic, fearful contempt

page from The Essential Hieronymus Bosch

from the little book The Essential Hieronymus Bosch by W. John Campbell (2000) p81 about the painting the Temptations of Saint Anthony :

Unlike the abstract theme of salvation through prayer in the middle panel, the right wing – like the left – is a narrative, the temptation of the saint by a beautiful girl. This misogynist episode – a nasty medieval expression of fearful contempt of women – pits the saint and his Bible against the allure of a slender nude in the hollow of a dead tree.

the Temptations of Saint Anthony triptych (right panel) by Hieronymus Bosch.  (A complaint about misogyny and no one mentioned the phallic shaped top of the building in the upper right?)  

click to embiggen
detail of the Temptations of Saint Anthony (right panel) by Hieronymus Bosch

So, Saint Anthony being tempted by a plate full of gold coins is a gold-hating episode and a nasty medieval expression of fearful contempt of gold.

Is it misogynistic to suggest that many men can be tempted by a naked woman? Is it misogynistic to reject the advances of a naked woman? Or is it that she is naked? It must not be the temptation itself or it would be "biblical contempt" and not medieval contempt. Or is it misogynistic that she appears not to have feet (because she is standing in water)? Is the man and woman on a flying fish misogynistic too?

She appears to be covering herself with a crab. If she is infested with gigantic genital crabs then most men would be less tempted by her.

If the author intends "misogynist episode" to refer to Saint Anthony's rejection of the woman then the author has it wrong as I think she was actually the devil in disguise. A mis-diabolus-ist episode!

an attempt to show the scale of the painting

Essential Hieronymus Bosch book review : As an aside, I bought the book on impulse and blindly online and it wasn't exactly what I was hoping for.  It is physically small (about 6" x 6") and parts of it are written in a style that, I think, is intended to sound like a high school girl. Oddly, this casual style isn't consistent. It is as if an editor circled a few paragraphs and said "Hey, punch this up a little and make it sound cool and youthful. Y'know, hep and groovy like the kids talk these days. And be sure to mention a popular TV show so the readers know that we know what's on TV. And call something misogynistic because the whippersnappers are always doing that."

It isn't a very deep book. Many of Bosch's paintings have a great many elements in them and while the book may take a stab at explaining a couple things it then moves on to the next painting. For example, the painting The Seven Deadly Sins illustrates the 7 deadly sins. There is an overview of the painting and about basically one line illuminating what is going on in most scenes. Like "Greed (Avaricia), as a judge taking a bribe (sitting on a bench, as in a modern court, he extends his palm behind him in a gesture called a 'porter's tip')" I would point out that the judge in the painting is literally sitting on a long bench with 2 other people while a modern judge sits on an elevated platform behind a large desk – which is called the bench for historical reasons. No mention of the other 2 men in the painting, the wood in the body of water or the peculiar tree behind the judge or if any of those elements are significant.

Some barely lend any insight at all to the painting like "Gluttony (Gula), a common problem in a world of feast or famine," or "Lust or Excess (Luxuria), as a party in a tent that recalls medieval book illustrations for romance of courtly love" while I think most people might want to know if that is a monk spanking a jester's bare bottom? The answer isn't found in this book.

Hieronymus Bosch's Seven Deadly Sins detail of Lust
"medieval book illustrations for romance of courtly love" =  a man in robes spanking a man dressed like a rabbit?

The blurb on the otherwise sparse back cover (there is only "bosch" in large letters, the UPC and the blurb) says "'Be an art expert in 5 minutes.' – The New York Times". The actual headline is "MAKING BOOKS; Be an Art Expert In Five Minutes!" and may involve sarcasm. The article itself says things like "At their worst (and perhaps at their best, too) the books provide art education through one-liners, sometimes with an attitude that, if not snide, is flip and condescending."  Also from the NYTimes article is this bit of snobbery "…the words may be embarrassingly rudimentary at times…" The problem is the lack of information not the lack of polysyllabic words.