Baron Munchausen - the original (a translation) - Part 1

(Pic source)

The earliest printed edition of Munchausen (originally Münchhausen) stories I have found so far is from a magazine of humorous prose published in Berlin between 1774 and 1783. The Baron (or Freiherr) appears largely in 1781, with a couple of extra tales two years later (Vade Mecum für lustige Leute, Theil 8 (1781), Nr. 175, S. 92-101 und Theil 9 (1783), Nr. 106, S. 76–79). The first book dedicated solely to the Baron's adventures appeared in London in 1785.

Here is my translation of the Berlin edition's introduction and the first episode:
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There lives in Hessen a very witty man, Herr von Münchhausen, who has issued a certain type of curious stories that bear his name, though not all may have been invented by him. They are tales full of the most unbelievable exaggerations, but at the same time they are so comical and humorous that we have to laugh heartily without bothering about their plausibility. In their way, they are truly Hogarthian caricatures. Our readers, who may already have heard several of them, will find some of the finest here. The comic effect is greatly increased if the narrator relates everything as if he has seen or done it himself. So:

1. I once had to make a long and difficult journey in a hard winter.  I was on horseback and not dressed very warmly, either. On the way I saw a poor sick man who was almost completely naked; my heart bled for him and despite feeling so cold myself I threw him my coat. And a voice from Heaven could be heard, saying, “Münchhausen, Münchhausen, that shall not go unrewarded, or may the Devil take me!”

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Original:

Es lebt ein sehr witziger Kopf, Herr von M–h–s–n im H–schen, der eine eigne Art sinnreicher Geschichten aufgebracht hat, die nach seinem Namen benannt wird, obgleich nicht alle einzelne Geschichten von ihm seyn mögen. Es sind Erzählungen voll der unglaublichsten Uebertreibungen, dabey aber so komisch und launigt, daß man, ohne sich um die Möglichkeit zu bekümmern, von ganzem Herzen lachen muß; in ihrer Art wahre hogarthsche Karrikaturen. Unsere Leser, denen aber vielleicht schon manche davon durch mündliche Ueberlieferung bekannt sind, sollen hier einige der vorzüglichsten davon finden. – Das Komische wird sehr erhöht, wenn der Erzähler alles als selbst gesehn oder selbst gethan vorträgt. Also:

1) Ich hatte einst eine weite und unbequeme Reise im strengen Winter zu machen. Ich war zu Pferde, und eben nicht sehr warm gekleidet. Am Wege sah ich einen armen Kranken, der fast ganz nackt war; mein Herz blutete mir, ich warf ihm, trotz meines eignen Frostes, meinen Mantel hin. Und eine Stimme ließ sich vom Himmel hören: „M–n, M–n, daß soll dir, hol mich der Teufel, nicht unbelohnet bleiben!“


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Horses, wine and shoes

Some believe the Good to be that which is useful; they accordingly bestow this title upon riches, horses, wine, and shoes; so cheaply do they view the Good, and to such base uses do they let it descend. They regard as honourable that which agrees with the principle of right conduct – such as taking dutiful care of an old father, relieving a friend's poverty, showing bravery on a campaign, and uttering prudent and well-balanced opinions. We, however, do make the Good and the honourable two things, but we make them out of one: only the honourable can be good; also, the honourable is necessarily good.

Seneca - Epistulae morales ad Lucilium c. 65 AD

So with 650 newly-minted honourable members, the House of Commons should be awash with prudent and well-balanced opinions.

Maybe we should wait and see though. I think Cameron's lot may still be swayed by riches, horses, wine, and shoes.

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Costly coffee

How much?
source

An interesting Starbucks story from pcpro.

Hackers are emptying people’s bank accounts using the Starbucks app.

Starbucks has admitted that users of its app are having their bank accounts drained by hackers. Thieves have gained access to a number of users’ apps - and with it access to their bank accounts, PayPals and any other linked forms of payment - all without needing an account number or password.

After gaining access to Starbucks accounts, thieves are exploiting the auto-reload feature of the app. Designed to make buying Starbucks even more convenient, the app will helpfully use a linked bank account to top up your Starbuck balance when it’s low.

Maybe lovers of inferior coffee saw the app as a kind of direct debit, but I still don't see how they could possibly have been so gullible as to drink the stuff on a regular basis.

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Fairer votes for the UK (2): regional inequalities

One way in which the voting system is skewed is the disproportion between the size of the electorates in our member nations and number of their seats in the national Parliament, as discussed in the previous piece.

Overlaid on that is a difference in turnout (which in itself may be an indication of other inefficiencies in our system of representation that dissuade many from involving themselves at all). So the results in the 2015 General Election show that Welsh and Northern Irish voters returned more MPs per vote cast, if one can put it that way:

Within the nation-regions, Party voters are unevenly distributed and this leads to a bias in results under "First Past The Post". That bias varies regionally, again reflecting the uncomfortable compromise between local and national loyalties. In the charts below, equitable representation would score a 1.00 ratio between overall votes obtained and seats gained:

 

An independent MP (and we have only one in the UK!) will score highest of all, since all her votes are concentrated in one constituency.

And that leads us on to another conflict: are we voting for a political party or a person? Opponents of the political-list system like to stress the connection between the local MPs and their constituents. But in a "safe" seat it seems that only the rosette matters and candidates can be parachuted in from Central Office. Or (as in my former MP's case) switched to a safer neighbouring constituency when boundary changes threaten his effortless security.

Looking at the UK as a whole, we see a bizarrely skewed result, reflecting inequalities in regional seat allocation (average size of constituency), turnout, and geographical distribution of party voters:

This has worked heavily against certain minor parties:

It is said that the current system allows us to have majority governments (and to throw out ones we don't like).

But this is at a cost: we have (in my opinion) been misgoverned for many decades by parties who have an eye on the swing voter in the swing seat, who often pursue policies that the majority greatly dislike (and that may be harmful and foolish), and who are happy to see large numbers of the electorate become completely disconnected from the process of (alleged) self-government.


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Fairer votes for the UK (1): adjusting regional disparities

Whether the current voting system is broken or running fine, depends on your point of view. For the Tories it seems to be going swimmingly. For many others, it looks like a pig's ear.

In the first place, there is the issue of local or regional identity vs national identity and governance. The four components of the UK are not represented in Parliament in proportion to their voting population:
 

Scotland and Northern Ireland are favoured slightly (by about 1 seat), and Wales significantly so (by 8 seats). A closer fit would be this (and I give another alternative based on Cam's plan to cut the number of MPs to 600):

There are regional differences in turnout, but doubtless these will vary from one General Election to another, and for different reasons, so it wouldn't be just to allocate seats according to actual votes cast in previous elections. But the differences in turnout this time are noticeable:

	Turnout %
England	65.9
Scotland	71.1
Wales	65.6
N. Ireland	58.1

I suppose the independence issue stimulated the Scots, and perhaps as Northern Ireland's changing demographic continues to steer them into an accommodation with the South their voters may increasingly see the lands to their East as of declining relevance to them?


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Lancing the boil of democracy

"Red Ed" was urged to do it two years ago, now Cam.

Hitchens says (or did, before he was taken off the paperwaves) the same cornucopia of lies that got Mr 37% his unexpected majority last week will swing behind No in the EU referendum, however neutrally-worded the question. I've said the same myself.

The people will vote for the loss of their vote. Probably for Wilson's "FOOD and MONEY and JOBS." Then they'll find, just like Greece, how much food and money and jobs are actually in the mess of pottage for which they've irrevocably thrown away their power to say no.

"And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, Behold, Esau my brother [is] a hairy man, and I [am] a smooth man."

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Belief and wild orchids

source

I'm no great shakes at chemistry, but for some reason I’ve always found it interesting, easy to understand and the exams easy to pass. Hence my career in chemistry no doubt, but why do I find the subject comparatively easy? Why do you find your areas of expertise easy?

In my case I’d love to put it down to intelligence, but a far more convincing clue is in the words interesting and easy to understand. There is a significant similarity here because we are not usually interested in anything we find difficult, where the learning effort just doesn't yield the hoped for return. So perhaps interesting and easy to understand are much the same.

If we think in terms of conditioning then the similarity also becomes easy to understand. And therefore interesting of course. So I found it easy to imitate the things chemists are expected to do, say and write. I was easily conditioned by these things. 

In other words I absorbed the approved behaviour easily, acquired the correct expectations for mixing copper sulphate with sodium hydroxide or spilling concentrated sulphuric acid on my shoe plus a host of other expectations, both practical and verbal.  

Yet remembering the names of wild flowers is an entirely different matter. Daisy, buttercup and dandelion I know, plus one or two others, but even though I encounter many wild flowers while out walking, their names mostly go in one ear and out the other. So when it comes to the names of wild flowers I am stupid, not intelligent at all.

Yet I do recognise wild orchids such as the Early Purple Orchid because there is something memorable about them. Even though fairly common, people ooh and aah over them, take photos and generally raise their status in the pecking order of local flora. So in spite of my wild flower stupidity I’m conditioned to remember wild orchids because they are associated with a different, more forceful type of conditioning.

So what has this to do with belief?

Belief is also a symptom of a person’s susceptibility to conditioning. It is an indicator of education, upbringing social and economic status and possibly genes. It is evidence that a person is conditioned to respond to certain situations in a certain way, evidence that they were easily conditioned and in consequence they find their beliefs easy to understand, explain and elaborate. As we know, beliefs can be extremely stable, commonly lasting a lifetime.

All belief is conditioning while unbelief or scepticism could indicate some kind of contrary conditioning or simply a lack of conditioning. Or aspects of both. Life is complex.

Does it matter? Of course it does. If we see belief as some kind of rational structure inside our heads then we cannot analyse it adequately. We are controlled by it, unable to think our way round it, unable to see alternatives. The alternatives remain difficult and uninteresting, in stark contrast to the overwhelming clarity of our beliefs.

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