confused equivalence

Here's a trivial puzzle that was posted in an egroup and how I answered it. Hope someone has a better solution.

May natagpuan kang T-shirt sa Department store, ito ay nagkakahalagang Php 97.00.
Wala kang Pera, humiram ka sa nanay mo ng Php50.00 at sa tatay mo ng Php 50.00... magkano na pera mo? (ans: Php 100.00)
Binili mo ang T-Shirt, Magkano sukli mo?
(ans: Php 3.00)
Binalik mo yung piso sa nanay mo, magkano na lang ang utang mo sa nanay mo? (ans: Php 49.00)
binalik mo yung isa pang piso sa tatay mo, magkano na lang utang mo sa tatay mo? (ans: Php 49.00)
Yung isang piso na sa iyo.
(ito na ang pang gulo)
49 + 49 ? (ans: 98)
98 + piso na nasa iyo? (ans: 99)
Tanong: nasaan na yung piso?

My answer:
Bale, P98 pa rin ang utang mo sa nanay at tatay mo. Ang problema kasi sa puzzle na ito ay may confused equivalence dun sa inutang at dun sa paggamit sa inutang.

Kaya:

50+50=100 ==> [(50-1)+(50-1)+1]=49+49+1=99
100=99, which obviously isn't equal.

Dapat kasi dinidifferentiate pa rin yung inutang at
paano ginamit ito.

Kaya on one side of the equation (inutang):
50+50=100

Other side (paano ginamit at sukli?)
97+3=100

Iba na yung ibinalik ang dalawang tigpi-piso at ang natirang piso.

Ang dapat lang tingnan dito basically ay:

inutang = shirt price + tira
50+50 = 97+3

Dito lang nareresolve yung conundrum kasi wala naman
nawawalang piso.

Nagiging confusing na lang pag binabalik sa kabila ng equation yung 3 piso. Pero maski na tingnan mo, equivalent pa rin sila.

forces and state

Some thoughts on social forces and State seizure.

In the period when industry and finance capital still weren't linked, in industrial societies, workers in factories could take over and paralyze production and political governments would be reluctant to use force on workers that are vital to production. Such was the case for example in Italy, when workers nearly seized power and the country was on the verge of a social transition. But the workers' party was indecisive. So another lesson would be to have a strong association or party to carry forward the changing of social relations resolutely.

In the era of industrial capital only, such industrial actions could cripple the State and make possible its collapse, with the subsequent transition. But in the era of monopoly and finance capital, struggle cannot be waged by industrial action alone. It has to be fought outside the factories as well. So if workers' actions are not sufficient, where are the social forces to create the transition?

Let's take the Philippines. The country has experienced at least 2 EDSA's but obviously they're not revolutions in the sense that there were no changes in social relations. How can the elite maintain its dominance?

And one has to look at the government bureaucracy - especially the (government) workers. Now focusing on organizing among these workers to change their consciousness would encounter problems, not least in their orientation of preserving the state, but that can be remedied if the lesson to be put through is genuine service to the people, with an awareness of the prevalent social privilege that runs counter to that dictum. Another way would be to show the antagonisms between their status as workers, and their exploitation in the immediate in the hands of the state and on the far plane, by the elite. There would of course be studies on the different gradations in rank and political loyalties, but progressives have to distinguish friends from enemies.
Another thing is that with the neoliberal ideology of streamlining government, with the concommitant effects on job security, there is a case to be made for organizing efforts among government employees. One can argue that finance capital is something existing as supra-state, or above the state; but social reality shows that it does go through the state and its movements are mediated by regulations that favor it. Everything else is ideological. So the state is still something that capital goes through, in fact depends on its mediation.
The situation of workers would be: while they serve as tools for the perpetration of elite rule through their maintenance work and ideological continuation, they are exploited with low wages and the haggardness of civil service, not least from their superiors. They're also caught between neoliberal doctrines of lessening the state, which proposes that any government role should be minimal, and the real dependence of these same forces on the state to preserve monopoly and enforce policies and regulations to favor finance capital and multinational business. Looking at this complex template, one can advance the opinion that when government workers launch strikes, the civilian state apparatus can be paralyzed.
Now one can counter that this would lead to reformism and over-dependence on legal forms. But that is not the consequence of the whole argument; it is the degradation of it. You don't argue against organizing among industrial workers because of their degeneration into trade bureaucracies and compromising labor parties. I think the Philippines has shown the way again on how organizing among government employees could still be done along progressive lines.

###
One has to look, too, at the tools of finance: the production of surplus has made a gigantic niche in the services sector, because capitalism still has to sell its surplus products. This does not preclude organizing in the services sector, but the focus in this sector at the present can only be diluted. Finance capital finds ways without the physical labor and voice of masses of physical beings. It has technologies that easily replace the work of human beings.

But again, there is force that the other repressive elements like the police and military can inflict. Which is why in the Philippines, those wanting change cannot just place aside the discourse of arms. Plus, in the Philippine situation where it's mostly rural, peasants can only defend themselves from landlord tyranny and militarization if they have an army that may be seen as their defenders - in conjunction with peasant organizations and inter-class solidarity - such that total exploitation would have to be seriously re-thought. This does not preclude organizing among reactionary soldiers.

This does not displace workers from the scene, because industrial actions have their place, especially in relatively backward economies where production is in the concrete, more or less, and not just in finance capital, where the more important power lies.
But the reality of the relative autonomy and domination of finance capital does change the landscape for struggle. Which makes it hard for the masses to conquer power for the advancement of their own interests. So powerful is money-capital, that any moves it does not approve of could mean the lightning rush out of much-needed capital. If progressives are to advance forward, they must be able to at least feel these subtleties of the all too rugged political landscape.
Again, this does not replace traditional organizing, rather it complements it, in line with class and social analyses which focus on interrelated organizing among communities and workplaces.

Green Day

It's St Patrick's Day!
Too easy...

scan

Have new scanner installed. Loaded Soli pics from way back 2002 and from last year's congress.

Quote: Give me 26 lead soldiers and I will conquer the world - Benjamin Franklin, referring to the alphabet for the printing press

The Way of the Saturday

March 12, Saturday:
While waiting at Tita Erlinda's place at Leichhardt, was watching Spanish news. Despite the Philippines being a former Spanish colony, of course the language is now generally incomprehensible for most Filipinos. Spanish is spoken probably by more than a hundred million people all over the world, from Spain, to its near-similar cousin, Portugal, to the Latin American countries, some parts of Africa and some islands, yet no one is proposing that the Philippines re-adopt Spanish as a medium of instruction, not like English. Or 'US English,' which only makes the neocolonial outlook in present Philippine 'leaders' very glaring.

***
Filipino fiesta at the Gosford waterfront. It is really amazing to me how an activity that's intended to be a community affair can sometimes look like a sponsor's event. There was ABS-CBN global having a segment where you have silly questions like 'How much is the monthly fee for TFC?' I hear echoes of complaints by people from Iloilo when the hosts of ABS-CBN's MTB aggressively tried to appropriate the Dinagyang as if it were just part of the show. It's the commodification of tradition and community events all over again.
To be fair, different groups were able to present their song and/or dance numbers -traditional Filo fare that they are - and there was even a priest that sermoned on the evils of greed and materialism. It was a fun affair all over.
***
Attended UP alumni assoc meeting. Part of the new generation, a few though we may be. Anyone from the Philippines needing legal help, I met a former regional trial court judge, asking if I knew people who needed her advice. She's more than willing I surmise, from altruistic motives and because her legal expertise would now be unutilized in this society with its own laws.
Was talking to a grad from same college as mine, he points out studies of theirs regarding Sydneysiders. He tells me that because of the privatization of services, ie, in bars (not that they weren't private before; he means the introduction of vices like gambling), the individualization has contributed to an unbelievable statistic of one in five Sydneysiders having mental problems such as depression. Even if the figures are much less than this, it would be a significant trend that points to the ill effects of gambling and the 'cult of the individual' (quoted from a professor of mine). Whereas before, pubs would be used for social occasions, ie, celebration of birthdays or holidays, now people are more alone, despite the wealth of this city. Moreover, in suburbs in the Inner West, places where people greet you (even if they don't know you), the habit is now getting less and less practiced. Hurrah for individualism indeed.

driven by imagination

This is the result of a test:

Caesar, your subconscious mind is driven most by Imagination

This means you have a deep desire to use innovative ideas to enhance your life and influence the world around you. This drive influences you far more than you may realize on a conscious level.
Your need to be innovative drives how you look at new opportunities and the kinds of experiences in life you choose to have. On an unconscious level, the reason you may be so driven by imagination is your fear of destruction, the opposite of creation. When you are unable to create due to restrictions imposed by your environment or even ones you unwittingly impose on yourself, do you feel trapped or confined? You may find these feelings of unease only get better when you find another outlet for your imagination.
With such a strong creative orientation, you are willing to entertain a broad spectrum of ideas at any given time. The world is a fuller, richer place because you can contribute new ideas to any experience. Your natural curiosity inspires those around you and encourages them to come up with ideas they wouldn't have thought of without your help.
Though your unconscious mind is driven most strongly by Imagination, there is much more to who you are at your core.

English retaking the US

A Message from John Cleese
To the citizens of the United States of America:

In light of your failure to elect a competent President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately. Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy).
Your new prime minister, Tony Blair, will appoint a governor for America without the need for further elections.

Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed. To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect: You should look up"revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up "aluminium," and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.
The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' and 'neighbour.'
Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters, and the suffix "ize" will be replaced by the suffix "ise."
Generally, you will be expected to raise your  vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up "vocabulary"). Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication.
There is no such thing as "US English." We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take account of the
reinstated letter 'u' and the  elimination of "-ize."

You will relearn your original national anthem, "God Save The Queen." July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday. November 2nd will be a new national holiday, but to be celebrated only in England. It will be called "Come-Uppance Day."

You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not adult enough to be  independent. Guns should only be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough to sort things
out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.
Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. A permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left with immediate effect.
At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling "gasoline")-roughly $6/US gallon. Get used to it.

You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called "crisps." Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all.
Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as "beer," and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as "Lager." American brands will be referred to as "Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine," so that all can be sold without risk of further confusion.

Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys.
Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie MacDowell  attempt English dialogue in "Four Weddings and a Funeral" was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a cheese grater. You will cease playing American "football." There is only one kind of proper football; you call it "soccer." Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American "football," but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies).
Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the "World Series" for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable.

You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.

An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776).

Thank you for your co-operation.

Autumn is here...

First day of classes.

Autumn is here.

Oh, didn't I say? I've enrolled at USyd.

We lack an appreciation of the sky

Never thought that a sliver of sky could evoke such a feeling of oneness with the universe. After walking through the Sydney CBD, through the hustle and bustle, the traffic and throng of people - businessmen on their profitable walkabout, women who looked like models cascading through, tourists sitting at Town Hall, taking pictures, looking in shops at the Queen Victoria Building, teens lurking in a video arcade or near Hoyts movie centre - I took a bus on the way home.
So the sights were of neat buildings, stores, roads and people - a cosmopolitan surrounding, right? Suddenly I noticed the sun-roof of the bus, and there was just such a difference: the blue sky. Like a window against the shadowed world.

An appreciation of the sky is an appreciation of openness, of vastness, of beauty.

Yet our whole civilization is hinged on alienating people from their environment. Houses do not have sun roofs, cars - except maybe convertibles, which only shows our treatment of nature as a luxury - are hooded, and there's no option of the hood sliding temporarily to give way to a transparent roof to enable heavenly awe. We are entreated to see only the mundane, we are children of the buildings that imprison our sweeping view. We are not reminded of the amazing background that is nature.

And we forget that it's such a small part of it all, that had we time to take a few minutes to look, all the troubles, all the pain, all the enmity, seem so trivial and comic, compared to the awesome wholeness of it all. So next time, take a few minutes to see, really see, the above-encompassing sky.

How to travel the world without leaving your place

Here's an idea for a website: How about a site that allows you to see the world in simulcast?


How did the idea occur again? Ah, okay, it had to do with uploading pix on a website. See, when uploading pictures, we usually take it from somewhere else, a stock footage. For example, the background picture in this blog wasn't a picture taken by me. But what if I wanted to take a picture of a place I can never go to, yet would want artistic claim to the photograph?

So the idea is, what if some people set up special cameras all over the world? Like a camera pointed at the Eiffel Tower or one at the Egyptian pyramids and other wonderful places? Maybe for a fee, people can click pictures of the scene, at anytime of the day. It could also be a movable camera that can slide up or down and it could also have a 180-degree swivel, so we can take pictures at any angle.

Or better yet, people can collaborate so that their special web cameras can serve the purpose of being one camera in a fly's eye-like world camera. One can just click the link on a specific part of the world, then look at it from the vantage point of the set-up camera. Then anyone can indeed see the world at anytime of the day without leaving their place, and take pictures as well. It brings new meaning to interconnection and shrinking the globe into a village (or into a room).

Oh, wait a minute, I'll just take a peek at Paris.

Capoeira in the afternoon

Music punched through the air, as people tensed their necks to the coming confrontation. Two guys were hustling, facing each other, posing to fight. Legs and torsos did acrobatics through the air. A body tossed and turned to defy gravity in aerial ballet. One turn, two, three turns. And all that in synchronicity, as agile bodies gracefully moved in rhythm to the beat.

This was Capoeira, the Brazilian street dance/martial arts.

Capoeira has its origins in groups of Angolan slaves that were trying to hide their fighting practices from their masters. The fight dance is increasingly becoming popular in the world. Other than that, don't know much about it. I'm interested though, don't know, (a big) maybe can try it, no?

Galactica Politica

Some political lessons from the show: Lee Adama is having a crisis of conscience over the shooting of the Olympic Carrier. Lee asks his father whether or not they have a responsibility - an obligation as leaders to question their decisions to ensure that all decisions are the right decisions. The older (William) Adama informs him simply that they all did what had to be done, and that all that is required of a man is to take responsibility for his actions - right or wrong, and to accept and live with the consequences.


In Adama's quarters, Roslin reveals that water rationing is now leading to rioting aboard a cruise ship, and she requests Adama provide military personnel to provide policing efforts. Adama resists, stating there is a
reason for separating the military and the police, "One fights the enemy of the state, the other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the state tend to become the people."
Roslin acknowledges the complexity of the issues and assures Adama she will not let that happen. In return, he agrees to send troops to the ship where the rioting has broken out.

Roslin asks Lee to become her personal military advisor- to advise her on how the military mind works. She reveals a hard decision by the former president of the colonies. She tells him that "leaders must remember and learn from their mistakes, even if they can't admit them publicly." Rationale perhaps for enforcers, but the pragmatics of politics may be more complex. Lessons are taken when applicable.

media filters

The main study comes from a book by E. Herman and N. Chomsky. The proposals are mine.
###
A study of the evolution of the media in Great Britain shows that there was a lively working-class press that reached a national audience in the first half of the nineteenth century. It was perceived as a major threat by ruling elites, such that coercive efforts were undertaken to crush this, in the form of libel laws and prosecutions. In the end these methods were deemed ineffective, and were ultimately abandoned in favor of market means to undermine the reach of the popular press.

The rising cost of newspaper production sadly led to the demise of national-scope labour newspapers, and into the arena emerged national commercial newspapers.

Ownership of newspapers and other media increasingly became concentrated, occurring till today, with 'horizontal' and 'vertical' integrations taking place left and right. Moreover, keep in mind that the business of these media is to reap profits. The scale of concentration is so vast, that alternative voices would be hard put to compete in the market. This does not mean that organizations aiming for social change shouldn't set up their own publications and media units. On the contrary. The point is that ownership and its profit orientation is the first filter through which news of the world is sieved through.

When setting up a newspaper, one has to think about production costs. Those with advertising revenues can afford a copy price well below production costs; those depending on sales only would seriously be disadvantaged. With advertising, therefore, the so-called free market does not in the end lend to neutral buyers' choice. Advertisers' choices influence the survival and expansion of media companies.
Advertisers tend to buy space from media that synch-in with business outlook - generally conservative - again at the disadvantage of alternative voices. From time to time, advertisers pull out advertising if they perceive the media getting out of line. Thus, advertising as a source of revenue becomes a second filter.
But even if advertisers have their eye on who's got the money to buy their goods and services, media is still a mass media. Therefore, advertisers are affected by ratings or the number of newspaper subscribers. Advertisers generally avoid programs with serious complexities and disturbing controversies that affect the "buying mood" of consumers, thus educational programs and shows that explore the workings of businesses and governments are frowned upon in favour of light, escapist entertainment. Shows with the lowest common denominator would find sponsors anytime. Consumers of the media can affect network content by subscribing to programs that actually enlighten, tell us something of the workings of social institutions, until there is critical mass that even corporate sponsors would be forced to pay attention to.

Progressive groups may have to find sponsors either from other institutions -even the elite state - or organizations with similar principles such as theirs, with the clear understanding of content and managerial independence. The alternative press must moreover be not-for-profit if it is to continue its mission of wriggling truth from the world for justice and transformation.

Another filter is the media source. News organizations tend to go to steady news sources, mainly the government and corporate PR offices. Economic costs and the demands of news deadlines dictate that they focus their resources on where significant news often occur. There is also the "principle of bureaucratic affinity: only other bureaucracies can satisfy the input needs of a news bureaucracy." Thus don't be surprised that news sources come from official ones, and "experts" often are linked to similar power interests.

Progressive organizations thus have to step up their response times in the form of press conferences and other press events. The quick polishing of news releases in copyable format also becomes imperative. In this arena, I think progressive groups in the Philippines are in a relatively advanced stage of information dissemination -without overestimating - and aided by quite relevant issues they constantly raise. In my fieldwork in Batangas with a peasants' organization, I saw how Ka Orly would call the local radio station daily to issue their stand on relevant issues. I also got involved in the publishing of their paper.
Another means is to cultivate long-term relationships with media personalities and organizations, whatever their orientation. Conducting workshops for practitioners and budding journalists would also be of great aid.

Powerful forces also negatively respond to news content or opinion that could be seen to be against their interests. It could take different forms: letters to the editor (LTTE), phone calls, petitions, lawsuits, speeches and bills before Congress, threats and other punitive actions. Sometimes the irony is that the military, for example, would claim that the media people are too biased against them, for left-wing causes. Which obviously overlooks the resources on their side and the quantity of reportage that do indeed show them in a flattering light.

Again, forces that may want to counteract this could also write more letters to the editor and point out relevant facts that media may deliberately be missing.

The dominant worldview is another filter. That is something that many progressive groups are more than armed to combat.

The minor proposals for progressive groups are of course not to be substituted to a thoroughgoing movement that involves a comprehensive program for societal transformation, only possible through the radical transformation of social relations. This is just one institution that has been analyzed - albeit inadequately - and is aimed only as as a contribution to the more general project.

To truth (the small and big one) and transformation.