The Julian Calendar, the longest-lasting civil influence of a troublesome Imperator-General, was a marked improvement over the previous system, under which an intercalary month would be, on occasion, specifially declared by fiat, the Republic Officer in charge being titled Pontifex Maximus. As the last such Pontifex Maximus, Gaius Julius had grown tired of the corrupting pressure on a PM who might be bought off with a cut of profits from bills due in the new year, and of the antinomian tendency stirred up by an official State Calendar which was blatantly four months out of sync with the Sun. The switch to prescribed Leap-Years, intercalating but a single day at any time (doubling the ante-diem sextius Calendas Martiis), was stroke in favour of Republican Liberty, Rule of Law, and Sensible Scheduling.
It was, I repeat, a marked improvement. And it was just good enough to get into trouble.
How good? The Julian cycle was a bit less than one day too long every Hundred years. That is: it was just long enough to start going measurably wrong, on average, just as soon as everyone who was used to the start of it was dead. If the error had been just a bit greater, corrections could have been made much sooner. Had the error (by some Astronomical fortuity) been smaller, well, so much the better!
But it was what it was, which has some curious consequences for the Catholic Church, and our current Calendar of Feasts, movable and otherwise.
Much is made, as it happens, of the apparent confluence of Christmas (25th December) and Satyrnalia (Winter Solstice (though no-one really announces Satyrnalia anymore...)). I'm sure we're all quite bored with that. The point, however, is: it was part of the business of an early post-Milvian Council to confirm the schedules for celebrating both Christmas and Easter, and there is an important difference between these schedules: Christmas is fixed to a Solar Date, and Easter is fixed to a Sunday around a Lunisolar Date. The curious circumstance between the scheduling decisions is that: In the First Year of Our Lord, the Winter Solstice fell about 25th of December, the vernal equinox about the 25th of March; and by the time of the relevant Coucil, Julian's Error had stretched the calendar about three or four days late, the actual equinox and solstice falling therefore about three or four days earlier than on paper. And so the interesting decision was: to confirm the Solar Date of Christmas, now out of sync with Solstice and Satyrs, and to adopt the Present equinox date of 21st March, for the calculation of Easter.
That is, while Easter was already a Movable Feast and its motion could be re-regulated to the Sun without causing any hassle, the Calendar Date of Christmas was considered Too Important to adjust it to the Solstice as well.
This indicates (quite stongly, I think) that the Date of Christmas was a Very Old and Important Tradition indeed, having its roots in a period well before there was any risk of paganising syncretism in the Church, or schemes to capture the hearts of specifically-roman pagans with a great feast to cover their own... um... friskier... feast.
There are other external indications towards this quite reasonable supposition that Our Lord really was born on Christmas Day, but I do so enjoy an internal logic argument about Things.
Monday, December 21, 2015
Thursday, December 17, 2015
Tuesday, December 8, 2015
The Internet is a Weird Place
... full of weird people who don't have to practise sociable reservation... somewhat like the Industrial English Countryside.
Do you know there are people who are seriously worried that an Artificial General Intelligence will eventually be constructed and will, that it will "escape into the internet", and then enslave/kill/plow through us all. There are books written about this worry.
I think this worry is hilarious. Machines do not need to be intelligent to enslave/kill/plow through us all. And they do not need the internet to do this. It is sufficient that people using the machines be themselves thoughtless. I have enough problems with machines that are insensible and without guile. Did you know that most "trading" on the stock market is done by computers? It happens so quickly and so voluminously they laid a straighter, shorter fiber optic connection over Telegraph Plateau between New York and England, to save microseconds off transatlantic trading time; this was considered a Good Investment. And because part of the fun of this trading game is anticipating when the Other Firms' Computers are going to initiate their "trade"s (then you can maybe undercut them! or other things!) that Insanely Fancy Maths is used to complicate these timing patterns and confuse the other computers. Billions of Imaginary Dollars, and the trade commodities supposedly backing them, are already thoroughly at the mercy of several competing artificial untelligences; and it doesn't always work out well for us.
And do you remember a huge power outage in 2003? It cut off electrical power to 55 million people for several days. That was a machine (The Grid) that went just a little bit wrong.
Dear Master Gray,
I think I should warn you against imagining suffering people. It is unkind of you to imagine people, and then make them suffer in your imagination! Please desist!
At least, it is at least as unkind as making a machine that you arbitrarily construe as modeling (and hence doing) rational thought and sensation, and observing it, as you construe, to be modeling (and hence doing) suffering. In fact, I suggest your imagination of suffering people is probably crueller! Because I'm sure you can imagine all the more realistically the suffering of a realistic person, all the more out of proportion to their imagined deeds or imagined natures than might reasonably be modeled in an electronic machine. Why, no, I don't insist on electronics. You can do the modelling on paper, or in patterned braids of thread, if that suits your fancy. Except, of course, because of the suffering of the paper-modeled thing, you shouldn't model it at all. That would be cruel.
the ironist
Do you know there are people who are seriously worried that an Artificial General Intelligence will eventually be constructed and will, that it will "escape into the internet", and then enslave/kill/plow through us all. There are books written about this worry.
I think this worry is hilarious. Machines do not need to be intelligent to enslave/kill/plow through us all. And they do not need the internet to do this. It is sufficient that people using the machines be themselves thoughtless. I have enough problems with machines that are insensible and without guile. Did you know that most "trading" on the stock market is done by computers? It happens so quickly and so voluminously they laid a straighter, shorter fiber optic connection over Telegraph Plateau between New York and England, to save microseconds off transatlantic trading time; this was considered a Good Investment. And because part of the fun of this trading game is anticipating when the Other Firms' Computers are going to initiate their "trade"s (then you can maybe undercut them! or other things!) that Insanely Fancy Maths is used to complicate these timing patterns and confuse the other computers. Billions of Imaginary Dollars, and the trade commodities supposedly backing them, are already thoroughly at the mercy of several competing artificial untelligences; and it doesn't always work out well for us.
And do you remember a huge power outage in 2003? It cut off electrical power to 55 million people for several days. That was a machine (The Grid) that went just a little bit wrong.
Dear Master Gray,
I think I should warn you against imagining suffering people. It is unkind of you to imagine people, and then make them suffer in your imagination! Please desist!
At least, it is at least as unkind as making a machine that you arbitrarily construe as modeling (and hence doing) rational thought and sensation, and observing it, as you construe, to be modeling (and hence doing) suffering. In fact, I suggest your imagination of suffering people is probably crueller! Because I'm sure you can imagine all the more realistically the suffering of a realistic person, all the more out of proportion to their imagined deeds or imagined natures than might reasonably be modeled in an electronic machine. Why, no, I don't insist on electronics. You can do the modelling on paper, or in patterned braids of thread, if that suits your fancy. Except, of course, because of the suffering of the paper-modeled thing, you shouldn't model it at all. That would be cruel.
the ironist
Friday, November 6, 2015
"By short or long"
Well, it turns out the rumours were false. His Holiness seems not to hold an MSc in Chemistry.
There's nothing wrong with that, of course.
For what little it is worth, there is nothing wrong with the hope that sinners eventually return to communion. In fact, it would be wrong to hope otherwise. The only qualification on that principle is: said sinners must repent before they can return. And in those very strange but very real cases where public communion would be a public skandal, the repentence itself naturally ought to be made (reasonably) public.
That, surely, isn't an alien principle. And, very likely, many will find it a long path indeed. Long and straight. And narrow.
When I believed the Chemistry rumour, I had hope for the Pontiff that he might still be susceptible to the power of precision. Like titration curves and Ecumenical councils. Now that I understand he isn't an accredited chemist, I may be less frustrated by imprecision in his person (if not in his office)... and we'll save ourselves some ado.
Obviously, I don't know what was in His Holiness' head when he allowed those words reported as his; he may have something very different in mind indeed. But the "headline quote", as it were, admits an orthodox interpretation, and we can (and should!) pray that His Holiness come around to believing it himself.
There's nothing wrong with that, of course.
For what little it is worth, there is nothing wrong with the hope that sinners eventually return to communion. In fact, it would be wrong to hope otherwise. The only qualification on that principle is: said sinners must repent before they can return. And in those very strange but very real cases where public communion would be a public skandal, the repentence itself naturally ought to be made (reasonably) public.
That, surely, isn't an alien principle. And, very likely, many will find it a long path indeed. Long and straight. And narrow.
When I believed the Chemistry rumour, I had hope for the Pontiff that he might still be susceptible to the power of precision. Like titration curves and Ecumenical councils. Now that I understand he isn't an accredited chemist, I may be less frustrated by imprecision in his person (if not in his office)... and we'll save ourselves some ado.
Obviously, I don't know what was in His Holiness' head when he allowed those words reported as his; he may have something very different in mind indeed. But the "headline quote", as it were, admits an orthodox interpretation, and we can (and should!) pray that His Holiness come around to believing it himself.
Saturday, October 17, 2015
If I may say...
There are two issues w.r.t. Regional Bishops Conferences that perturb me (for which, on reflection, I am grateful that they haven't been more important in the past). First is the implied by-default subordination of... Ordinaries... to Sæcular order. Which is, quite simply, up-side-down. Or maybe "sideways", in the "it all went sideways" sense. Second: what do we do when the borders move? Because: It happens. It has happened in Germany and in the Balkans, in Living Memory. It might be happening in the Ukraine. It is almost certainly happening all over the Middle East (where, all things said, there are more important worries for the Local Ordinaries). There are still people who want it to happen in plenty more places. The Church, however, really ought to look more æternal than principalities.
So. There. That's my denarius' worth on the matter.
So. There. That's my denarius' worth on the matter.
Thursday, October 15, 2015
What are Commandments 5-10?
Thou shalt not kill
Thou shalt not commit adultery
Thou Shalt not Steal
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor
Thou shalt not covet anything that is thy neighbor's (twice)
There is difference of opinion on whether occides should be rendered "kill" or "murder"; if we insist on the superficial reading of the later judgments, it's easier to accord "murder" with "shall die the death [by stoning]", until some folk try to insist that all direct killing of men is murder (and indeed some do)... But, you know, the last six commandments are all neatly summarized by the first one: Thou shalt not kill. They are even better summarized and overleapt by the Second Greatest: love thy neighbor as thyself.
Of course, while having a shorter, simpler summary of the whole system is a powerful tool, the mathematician's art also relies on finding more (as it may seem) from less, and so it is a good exercise to work towards the later commandments from the earlier, rather than from the Great Two.
To begin the argument, note that custom subdivides the "not covet" into two commandments (in various ways): thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife; thou shalt not covet his goods (poetically elaborated). This is in exact parallel with the two commandments: thou shalt not commit adultery; thou shalt not steal. The verb used is precise: to "covet" is not merely to behold as desireable, but to approve or wish knowledge of the person, possession of the thing. It is an act of the will already contrary to the earlier commandments.
"False witness against", again, is much more precise than "lying"; particularly as preface to the many crimes for which a death sentence may be allowed, false witness against a neighbor may be manslaughter and it may be murder, by perversion of justice.
Theft itself and adultery itself tend towards murder in many ways; King David, for instance, committed murder to enable his adultery (and this sort of thing is why adultery is, to the best of my knowledge, still a capital crime in the US Armed Forces Uniform Code and its analogues in other armies). Theft itself can directly harm another; theft in the desert (sandy, snow, or urban) can certainly end in a man's death. And so can adultery (cf. American Heart Association on "Broken Heart Syndrome").
I think that's enough sketch to show that "murder not" is sufficient to cover the human side of the Decalogue. Which ought to be a humbling thought: "murder not", on its own, sounds like a very timid admonition, doesn't it? Lacklustre, even. If we weren't such durned fallen passionate creatures, it should have gone without saying! And yet, it's actually hard to get everyone today to quite agree on it. Ah, but murder today is mostly veiled in mystery and hieratic language, the tendency of all perverted religious impulses...
Christ's Second Cardinal Law is both harder and more vivifying: LOVE thy neighbor as thyself. His own proper commandment even more: "Love one another as I have loved you".
Monday, October 5, 2015
Wells of Prophecy
There's something of a trick to recognizing a prophecy fulfilled. Uncle Gilbert described (in The Napoleon of Notting Hill, I believe) a joke played by the young, upon the old, at their ascending in turn to venerable age... the game of Cheat the Prophet, which consists of attending carefully to all predictions of their future, and then carefully doing nothing of the sort. And the comical opening of The Napoleon was that so many strange changes were predicted under Edward VII (or whom you will) that the only cheat available was to change practically nothing in the next generation.
But, of course, that's not the usual sense of "Prophecy". Genuine Prophecy and mere Prediction are different games, and So. The game of Cheat the Theological Prophet can be played by either tact: the simple one of doing nothing of the sort, OR the surprising one of doing exactly that, simply because it was written in a Prophecy.
For instance, between the Imperium of Augustus and that of Hadrian, there were at least two Men to arise in the province of Palestine, said to descend from David son of Jesse, said to be annointed, who raised or rose against the wrath of Rome. The later one had an abler army, but was eventually beseiged and executed with a band of loyal followers. The earlier one was abandoned by his friends and crucified about 786 AUC, and then conquered Rome about three hundred years later.
At most one was not, whether unwittingly or fully conscious, trying to Cheat the Prophets: to fit his life to those parts of the written prophecies that his contemporaries recognized and he could reasonably pull off. The trouble with things that can actually be done and are predicted is that, if they are written, anyone can then go ahead and do them. It were as if someone had published a password long ago that later on many publicly said they would use.
So, properly recognizing a prophecy fulfilled is going to be more like engaging in prophecy ourselves; because a genuine prophecy shouldn't be a published password, but more like a hash or checksum, one has to carefully compare against prophecy those events of moment and currents of mood that overtake him through life.
Which brings me to Wells. Herbert George, that is. Wells wrote in The Time Machine of vision in which it seems two species of human exist together in a strange relationship: one lives mostly below ground and keeps various important machinery working, while the other lives mostly in gardens and arcades maintained by the various important machinery — and are occasionally food for the first species. And he named these two creatures Moloch and Hevel. No... Sorry. Morlock and Eloi. actually, no, I'm not sure what Wells had in mind behind the name "Eloi"; I hope it wasn't "LHM", which is to say, a Hashem; but one can't be sure, on the internet... Let us say it again: Wells envisioned a future in which a life of vain ease is apparently supported by the cult of Death.
Now, it's more than possible H.G. thought he was writing a critique of contemporary affairs — much as Dickens criticised workhouses and the Chancery Courts and other Georgian attrocities; and some have certainly thought he was talking about class matters. That's all very well for Wells the writer, but Wells the prophet (indulge me) has something profounder in the words. Because, the surprising pattern-match is that Moloch and Hevel are, more than in Wells' time, today's demons.
But, of course, that's not the usual sense of "Prophecy". Genuine Prophecy and mere Prediction are different games, and So. The game of Cheat the Theological Prophet can be played by either tact: the simple one of doing nothing of the sort, OR the surprising one of doing exactly that, simply because it was written in a Prophecy.
For instance, between the Imperium of Augustus and that of Hadrian, there were at least two Men to arise in the province of Palestine, said to descend from David son of Jesse, said to be annointed, who raised or rose against the wrath of Rome. The later one had an abler army, but was eventually beseiged and executed with a band of loyal followers. The earlier one was abandoned by his friends and crucified about 786 AUC, and then conquered Rome about three hundred years later.
At most one was not, whether unwittingly or fully conscious, trying to Cheat the Prophets: to fit his life to those parts of the written prophecies that his contemporaries recognized and he could reasonably pull off. The trouble with things that can actually be done and are predicted is that, if they are written, anyone can then go ahead and do them. It were as if someone had published a password long ago that later on many publicly said they would use.
So, properly recognizing a prophecy fulfilled is going to be more like engaging in prophecy ourselves; because a genuine prophecy shouldn't be a published password, but more like a hash or checksum, one has to carefully compare against prophecy those events of moment and currents of mood that overtake him through life.
Which brings me to Wells. Herbert George, that is. Wells wrote in The Time Machine of vision in which it seems two species of human exist together in a strange relationship: one lives mostly below ground and keeps various important machinery working, while the other lives mostly in gardens and arcades maintained by the various important machinery — and are occasionally food for the first species. And he named these two creatures Moloch and Hevel. No... Sorry. Morlock and Eloi. actually, no, I'm not sure what Wells had in mind behind the name "Eloi"; I hope it wasn't "LHM", which is to say, a Hashem; but one can't be sure, on the internet... Let us say it again: Wells envisioned a future in which a life of vain ease is apparently supported by the cult of Death.
Now, it's more than possible H.G. thought he was writing a critique of contemporary affairs — much as Dickens criticised workhouses and the Chancery Courts and other Georgian attrocities; and some have certainly thought he was talking about class matters. That's all very well for Wells the writer, but Wells the prophet (indulge me) has something profounder in the words. Because, the surprising pattern-match is that Moloch and Hevel are, more than in Wells' time, today's demons.
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