Procedure 289712B

If you haven't already done so, please make your way to Right Behind and bow before the glory of the Legendary Write-Off. The instructions:

Write a manual or guide of no more than 500 and no less than 300 words describing the procedures involved in preparing a sandwich of your choice.

This is a competition and not merely an exhibition but still, please, no wagering.

* * * * * * * * *

The Billionaire Murders of 2010

Billionaire investor Warren Buffett, the third richest man in the world, testified yesterday at a Senate Finance Committee hearing on estate tax reform. Testify, brother Buffet, testify!:

Warren Buffett thinks those who use the phrase "death tax" are intellectually dishonest because the phrase in his words is "clever, Orwellian and dead wrong."

The billionaire investor has been an outspoken critic of efforts to repeal the estate tax and in testimony at a Senate Finance Committee estate tax hearing on Wednesday, he told lawmakers that you'd have to attend 200 funerals to be at one where the family of the deceased would owe estate tax.

Buffett said if anything the estate tax is a "death present" because heirs figure their capital gains on inherited assets based on the price when they inherited them rather than when the decedent bought them. ...

The intellectually dishonest Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the committee's ranking Republican, responded by continuing to use the made-up and inaccurate phrase "death tax" throughout the hearing, thus demonstrating that he is "Orwellian and dead wrong," but not particularly clever.

"I believe in keeping equality of opportunity," said Buffett. "You don't get to be a quarterback ... because your father was a quarterback 20 years ago."

Citing these comments from the world's third-most-successful capitalist will inevitably result in comments below accusing Comrade Buffett of "socialism." Please feel free to cut out the middle man and send those comments directly to his office at Berkshire Hathaway.

Regardless of one's position on the merits or demerits of dynastic plutocracy, sane people on all sides of this issue can agree that the current situation is absurd:

Under current law, estates worth up to $2 million this year and next will be exempt from federal estate tax, and portions of an estate above that amount would be taxed at 45 percent.

By 2009, the exemption level rises to $3.5 million, and by 2010 the estate tax will be repealed for one year.

Come 2011, the tax will be reinstated, with an exemption level of $1 million and a top rate of 55 percent.

This suggests -- no, requires -- a movie to be made. A black comedy set in 2010, perhaps incorporating the quasi-documentary style of the E! television "reality" shows featuring heiresses and heirs desperate to trade wealth for fame. The plot would, of course, involve a rash of suspicious accidents taking the lives of multi-millionaires, resulting in a tax-free windfall for their unconvincingly grieving children. I picture a suspenseful big finale set at a New Year's Eve party in a Manhattan penthouse. (As a kind of meta-joke, you could cast Paris Hilton to play a Paris Hilton-type in the movie, but I'm not confident she has the acting range to pull it off.)

On the other hand, the crazy-quilt of year-by-year changes in the estate tax between now and 2010 also provides a potentially useful framework for studying the effect of these changes on charitable giving. Here's hoping the folks at Independent Sector are tracking this.

* * * * * * * * *

The Center for Responsible Lending has been looking at the potential consequences of the Subprime Spillover. Lorainne Mirabella and Jamie Smith Hopkins of The Sun summarize their findings in "Ripple effect is feared from foreclosures":

The center's report estimates about a third of homes nationwide -- or 44.5 million homes -- will see property values drop by an average $5,000 two to three years after the foreclosures of loans originated in 2005 or 2006. It estimates the total loss at $223 billion. ...

So here's another question: If post-bubble or post-subprime mess property values do, indeed, drop by something like $200+ billion, what will that mean for school districts dependent on those property values for the tax base that funds their budgets? It seems likely that quite a few art and music teachers could wind up joining former Merrill Lynch CEO Stan O'Neal in the unemployment line.

* * * * * * * * *

Homework blegging

Speaking of science that a layperson (or, at least, this layperson) can't easily follow, it was somewhat encouraging to read the following, from the Wikipedia entry on Barbara McClintock:

Her work on controlling elements and gene regulation was conceptually difficult and was not immediately understood or accepted by her contemporaries.

Nor was it immediately understood by this blogger when called upon to try to explain it for his girlfriend's seventh-grade daughter. Barbara McClintock was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1983 "for her discovery of mobile genetic elements."

"What does that mean?" I am asked. Ah, hmm. Well.

The good news is that her report is not due until after Thanksgiving, so I still have time to appeal to the hive-mind of the blogosphere for a way of explaining McClintock's contributions to science in simple language that even a seventh grader and/or a journalist/theology student/blogger can understand.

Comments

[Spalanzani]

I know Fred's a busy guy and all, but I can't help thinking it would have been much nicer to get a shout out to the Legendary Write-Off while the polls were still open.

Speaking of which, the final results:

Entry 1: 5 votes
Entry 4: 5 votes
Entry 3: 7 votes
Entry 2: 22 votes

Jesus Christ, talk about your decisive victories...

[Ecks]

I'm not a geneticist, I just had a few undergrad courses that talked about it for a section or two, but my understanding of the mobile elements is that basically a chromosome is just one big long string of DNA (it's all curled up around each other, but if you ironed it out flat, it would be a string. In a computer information is stored as sequences of 1's and 0's, and (to oversimplify), DNA codes information as strings of A, G, T, or C molecules. A string of computer code goes 1011011011, and a string of DNA goes AGTTGGAGCCTA, for example. Obviously, the order they are in is important, and the way it works is (to horribly oversimplify) you get meaningful bites of code, interspersed with random nonsense.

The way DNA actually does stuff is with this other molecule called RNA, which sort of plays carbon paper to DNA's blueprint. Something will skim along the DNA molecule, find the right bit, snip it open, make an RNA carbon copy (actually wax casting might be a better analogy) of part of it, then seal the DNA back up again.

Here's the bit she discovered, though (and also the bit where my explanation is likely to go furthest off the rails): Because the DNA gets snipped open and closed when making these wax castings, you can actually snip a part out, and move it to somewhere else in the DNA string, or you can snip it open, and insert some new DNA that you made from a wax cast you took somewhere else. Sneaky retroviruses like DNA take advantage of this, by arriving in cells with their own wax cast already on board - they snip them self into a DNA string, and make new code there from the RNA they come built with. Sneaky sneaky).

The upshot of all is this is that DNA isn't a completely static program - it's not ROM, but can re-write itself in cunning ways on the fly, in individual cells, not just in your whole body (every single cell has its own copy of your entire DNA set in its nucleus).

I'm sure that more learned people will correct this narrative where it's gone too far astray.

[Geds]

By 2009, the exemption level rises to $3.5 million, and by 2010 the estate tax will be repealed for one year.

Come 2011, the tax will be reinstated, with an exemption level of $1 million and a top rate of 55 percent.

I was reading a tax book today, specifically the section dealing with handling the Estate Tax. There was an example section that literally read "[Deceased person] will not have to pay estate taxes if she is lucky enough to die in 2011, the only year there will be a complete repeal of the tax." (Emphasis mine.)

As ghoulish as that is, the example person used in the paragraph? "Mom."

I hope I never get to the point where I feel lucky to get the news that my mother has died...

[Jesurgislac]

Spal: Jesus Christ, talk about your decisive victories...

Entry 2 was decisively the funniest. (I still think mine was better if you actually wanted to, er, make a sandwich...) But I bow to comic genius, which is better than sandwiches any day.

[Jesurgislac]

Geds: I was reading a tax book today, specifically the section dealing with handling the Estate Tax. There was an example section that literally read "[Deceased person] will not have to pay estate taxes if she is lucky enough to die in 2011, the only year there will be a complete repeal of the tax." (Emphasis mine.)

Good god. Now that's comic genius. The gruesome kind.

[bulbul]

The results of the Legendary Write-Off of 2007 are up. So are the names of the contestants.
Now we need to figure out what the first prize is...

[Geds]

Entry 2 was decisively the funniest. (I still think mine was better if you actually wanted to, er, make a sandwich...)

See, that's why I didn't vote for No. 2. It didn't actually do what a manual is supposed to do. I ended up voting for No. 1, though.

[bulbul]

No worries, Jesu, you still beat Bugmaster :)

[bulbul]

This suggests -- no, requires -- a movie to be made.
I think we have the subject for the Legendary Write-Off of 2008...

[BenMc]

Yeah, what Ecks said about the transposons (aka the mobile genetic elements).

McClintock found them by wondering about how corn kernels in multicolored corn got the message to be multicolored. She found out that the differently colored kernals actually had different DNA -- and the DNA was programmed to fling these little DNA bits into different places to form the different colors. No one else was interested in that problem, and no one else had the creativity to imagine that DNA, like any chemical, can float around into solution and change its configuration.

DNA is awfully fluid, which is something many intelligent design proponents don't seem to grasp when they talk about how impossible it would be for protein X to change into protein Y.

Your immune system uses a similar "flying pieces of DNA" trick to generate millions of different immune cells that are ready to attack anything that gets into your bloodstream.

[Bugmaster]

Yeah, by 2 votes. Good Game, though.

I originally toyed with the idea of submitting the (then unwritten) Hidden Sandwich entry as my main entry, but I figured it'd be too humorous and/or obscure. Sucks to be me.

[Ecks]

Hm. Tempted as I was to vote for Hapax's brilliantly funny one, I conscientiously voted for Jesu's as the best actual instructions.

My guesses about who wrote what:

1: Bulbul (actually bugmaster)
2: Husband (actually Hapax)
3: Jesu (right!)
4: Bugmaster (actually Spalanazi).

My guess for the bonus round

4: (Bugmaster). So I was right, even though I was wrong about the actual person. Most people voted for 3 because the bonus was funny, and so was Hapax's main one, but I voted 4 because it matched a slightly ramped up version of the same type of wit. Go go me :)

[Ecks]

make that "SpalaNZAni"...

That's why I didn't call myself a long word, I can't spell them.

[Jesurgislac]

No worries, Jesu, you still beat Bugmaster :)

Yeah. *buffs fingernails* And he used the neuter pronoun "you" throughout, thus losing the larger argument we were having at the same time. Hee.

I originally toyed with the idea of submitting the (then unwritten) Hidden Sandwich entry as my main entry, but I figured it'd be too humorous and/or obscure.

If you had, I'd have voted for it - I thought it was funny enough to overlook the tiny problem that it wasn't actually very good about making an edible sandwich: and oddly enough, I think I voted for your entry as "best of the rest" in terms of actual instruction in how to make a sandwich. (Obviously, I couldn't vote for mine. ;-) )

[Johnny Pez]

Speaking of Right Behind, I can't seem to get in touch with anybody with the power to add me to the contributors list. Can anyone help? Email me at jpez9 at localnet dot com.

[Bugmaster]

And he used the neuter pronoun "you" throughout, thus losing the larger argument we were having at the same time. Hee.

Oh, that was on purpose... I wanted to compete on equal ground, so I scrapped my original idea about writing a sandwich serving guide, involving multiple guests (who have identifiable genders). I did add the pronouns to my Hidden Sandwich entry, though.

[jamoche]

"[Deceased person] will not have to pay estate taxes if she is lucky enough to die in 2011, the only year there will be a complete repeal of the tax."

In one of Dorothy Sayer's Lord Peter Wimsey murders, the motive for murder is an upcoming change in inheritance law. From wikipedia:

A change in the law was imminent and meant that a great-niece would no longer inherit automatically and the estate would probably pass to the Crown. Killing her great-aunt before the legislation came in allowed the niece to secure the fortune intended for her.

Seems like this would set up similar motives.

[Jesurgislac]

Oh, that was on purpose...

Yeah, you had to use a neuter pronoun to write clear explanatory text: you could not have competed equally if you'd chosen to cripple yourself by insisting on writing gendered text. You still lose.

[Marza]

I'm willing to admit I have teh dum, but when Ecks wrote Sneaky retroviruses like DNA take advantage of this is that right, or is "DNA" sneaking around taking the place of "HIV" or something like that in that sentence?

Other than that, I understood it almost completely which makes it pretty impressive science writing in my book.

[Bugmaster]

you could not have competed equally if you'd chosen to cripple yourself by insisting on writing gendered text.

Actually, I wanted to make sure that the texts are judged based on their merits, not on partisan politics, and making my own entry less distinguishable seemed like a good strategy. Thanks for proving me right !

[damnedyankee]

I was always told to never write in the second person ("You come to a door. As you grasp the knob, the smell of steaming produce drenched in butter wafts over you..."). Please don't tell me that my eighth grade English teacher lied to me. I... I... really couldn't handle that right now...

[Geds]

I was always told to never write in the second person ("You come to a door. As you grasp the knob, the smell of steaming produce drenched in butter wafts over you..."). Please don't tell me that my eighth grade English teacher lied to me. I... I... really couldn't handle that right now...

There are some cases where it's bad to use 2nd person. There are some places where it's unavoidable. There are fewer places where it's appropriate to use 2nd than 1st or 3rd, however. And it's never okay to use 4th person...

For technical training manuals it can really go either way, depending on what is actually being taught. Step-by-step instructions should probably have the 2nd person, though, as, "One should count the money before one goes home at night," doesn't work so well.

[Jesurgislac]

Actually, I wanted to make sure that the texts are judged based on their merits

Exactly. But you still lost. Your argument was consistently that it was not possible to write clearly using gender-free pronouns. Self-evidently, you lost the argument when you wrote a clear piece of prose using gender-free pronouns. It was an unwinnable situation for you, as I saw at once, I'm afraid, when you proposed it: either you wrote a piece of trash with gendered pronouns and lost thoroughly, or you wrote a decent piece of technical prose with neutral pronouns and, while you might win the specific challenge (and 5 votes to 7 is close) you would lose the larger argument, as you'd disprove your own assertion by doing what you claimed was not possible.

[Jesurgislac]

(Granted, my cunning plan was slightly foiled by the fact that Hapax wrote a very funny entry and won handily because Slacktivites appreciate comic genius more than cool technical prose, and would have been further foiled had you entered the funny entry instead of the technical one: but, this isn't Florida and you're not the Republican party, so you still lose...)

[Bugmaster]

Your argument was consistently that it was not possible to write clearly using gender-free pronouns.

Yes, I believe you're right. StrawBugmaster, who made this argument, really did lose. Good job defeating someone who wasn't me ! It's too bad that hapax creamed us both, but it's ok, I don't want to rain on your parade.

For a good example of using gendered pronouns, however, you can check out my Hidden Sandwich entry. It is still phrased as a set of step-by-step instructions, where it is absolutely appropriate to use "you" as the pronoun (as I said on one of our earlier threads, and as Geds said above), but I introduced some third parties into it just so that I could refer to them in the third person. If you like, you could try re-writing my entry using genderless pronouns. It would lose a bit of its dramatic impact, but not too much, seeing as it's still a technical piece.

[Bugmaster]

Yes, I believe we both out-tacticsed ourselves when we opted for gravitas instead of humor :-(

[Geds]

Am I the only one who's pretty sure that we now have proof that the Right Off didn't actually accomplish much?

Although I think that just makes it funnier...

[Jesurgislac]

Bugmaster: Yes, I believe you're right. StrawBugmaster, who made this argument, really did lose.

Heh. It's lovely to see you so embarrassed by your own stupid argument that you're now denying you ever, ever made it. Please, do go on squirming: it's very, very entertaining.

Yes, I believe we both out-tacticsed ourselves when we opted for gravitas instead of humor :-(

Yep. Oh well.

[Jesurgislac]

Bugmaster: Yes, I believe you're right. StrawBugmaster, who made this argument, really did lose.

Heh. It's lovely to see you so embarrassed by your own stupid argument that you're now denying you ever, ever made it. Please, do go on squirming: it's very, very entertaining.

Yes, I believe we both out-tacticsed ourselves when we opted for gravitas instead of humor :-(

Yep. Oh well.

[Jesurgislac]

I never thought Bugmaster could bring himself to admit that he'd, um, written himself into a corner and proposed a challenge which he literally could not win. But I am entertained by his Aunursa-type solution: pretend he never made that argument in the first place. I wonder if, like Aunursa, he will go on making the argument that clear prose and genderless English are absolutely contradictory, while simultaneously claiming he never said it when it's pointed out to him that he lost that argument?

Good fun, anyway. (And the challenge was itself intrinsically good fun - we should do it again in 2008.)

[hapax]

Jesu: I still think mine was better if you actually wanted to, er, make a sandwich...)

Yes, so did I, which is why I voted for it. And Bug's unnecessary (sorry!) use of gendered pronouns made it dead obvious who wrote the Hidden Sandwich.

I was wrong about Spalanzani's, though. I thought it was Ecks.

[Bugmaster]

Heh. It's lovely to see you so embarrassed by your own stupid argument that you're now denying you ever, ever made it.

As always, I challenge you to quote one of my posts where I said either a). that all technical writing should use gendered pronouns at all times, or b). that 2nd-person form of address is inappropriate in step-by-step guides, or c). both (a) and (b). And, as always, no doubt you'll refuse, because who needs truth when you've got all these lovely straw men to keep you company ?

[bulbul]

Am I the only one who's pretty sure that we now have proof that the Right Off didn't actually accomplish much?
Nope :)
I particularly liked how everyone loved hapax' piece and at the same time believed that Bugmaster's bonus entry was written by the same person. I'm sure it is indicative of something, but buggered if I know what...

And the challenge was itself intrinsically good fun - we should do it again in 2008.
Definitely. And we'll do it bigger and much better.

[Bugmaster]

And Bug's unnecessary (sorry!) use of gendered pronouns made it dead obvious who wrote the Hidden Sandwich.

See, this is why I didn't use them in my main entry :-)

On reflection, though, my gendered pronouns were probably thematically appropriate. The overwhelming majority of the Warlords in The Spoils are male (Warlords are not big on equality in any case), and all the lab-assistant 3lphz (well, all three of them IIRC) are male as well. Clearly, this shows that The Spoils CCG is completely sexist and oppressive, and no woman should ever play it, or allow her husband to play it (assuming she has one).

Random fact: I actually contemplated submitting the Hidden Sandwich in 1337, which is what the 3lphz (as well as their Majigs, heh) speak, but then it would've been too painful. Heh.

[Bugmaster]

I'm sure it is indicative of something, but buggered if I know what...

It means that everyone should strive to be like Hapax. Duh.

:-)

[Jesurgislac]

Bugmaster: As always, I challenge you to quote one of my posts where I said

where you said, over and over again, that anyone who insisted on writing gender-neutral language was putting gender-neutral language over clarity - arguing that, in your view, gender-neutral language and clarity are opposed? Which argument, Bug, you just lost?

Certainly I'll quote and link to the posts where you said that. If you still want me to do it, after you've had a little while to think it over and decide whether you really enjoy humiliation that much.

[hapax]

I'd add one thing to Ecks's nice summary of gene mobility. You can think of the two sides of a DNA molecule as strips of velcro, except that certain hooks only attach to certain loops, which are varied in non-random ways to make "gene sequences" (like letters making up words). When the molecule unzips for replication, this specificity usually means that the new DNA half-strips will line up the same way, and you'll get the same word.

But sometimes you'll get gene sequences with sufficient "affinity" -- just enough codes in common (think of "baritone" and "abortion" over at Making Light) that the velcro strips get "snagged" as it were, in a different place. When that strip of DNA replicates, it will do so with that particular gene sequence attached to a different part of the molecule.

What does this mean in practice? Greater variability, of course. But specifically, how it usually works is that certain traits -- the expressions of particular genetic sequences -- become linked in a way that they hadn't previously. Made-up example: the genes for hair color and eye color might at one point have been inherited totally independently (you could get one from your father, and one from your mother); but due to gene mobility, the hair color gene "jumps" to the same chromosome as the eye color gene. so offspring inherit them together. (This may be the origin of some "sex linked" traits, such as hemophilia, which are inherited exclusively through the female but have nothing obvious to do with sex).

Does that help clarify, or just muddy the waters?

[hapax]

It means that everyone should strive to be like Hapax.

Well, THAT goes without saying. [g]

[Ecks]

I can't seem to get in touch with anybody with the power to add me to the contributors list

It's in the mail.

(nb. along with "I love you" and something else I forget, this is considered one of the 3 great lies. Except in this case it's true).

I'm willing to admit I have teh dum, but when Ecks wrote Sneaky retroviruses like DNA

Ecks has frequent outbursts of teh dums. It was definitely supposed to be HIV, yeah. Good catch :)

I was wrong about Spalanzani's, though. I thought it was Ecks.

You think I could write something that long without stupid jokes in it?

And I thought we knew each other so well...

[Bugmaster]

Certainly I'll quote and link to the posts where you said that. If you still want me to do it, after you've had a little while to think it over and decide whether you really enjoy humiliation that much.

If I didn't want you to do it, would I be asking you to do it ? But we could stall some more, if you'd like...

[rubberband]

I like to think of McClintock's work as showing that DNA is less like a hardbound book than a loose-leaf binder. Sections can be moved around in the same book pretty easily--sometimes changing the sense of the story. This re-arrangement will certainly be most likely when you are attempting to copy it, 'cuz if you drop the loose pages they can get mixed up, but if were like the hardbound one it wouldn't be able to change. This 'explanation' replaces all the important details of how the genes might jump around with something more familiar, but to a seventh grade audience it probably won't make any difference. (Of course them seventh graders can surprise you!)

nb. along with "I love you" and something else I forget, this is considered one of the 3 great lies.

"There's another train right behind this one"?

(aka The MBTA Motto)

[Ecks]

hapax, these tracts on the intricacies of gene splicing aren't doing much good for your claims not to be a scientist ;)

In any event, the thing confusion that your new addition raises for me is that I'm not sure exactly what happens when the velcro gets caught in the wrong place. Presumably this happens after transcription*, when it's trying to stitch the two strands back together, right? So what happens to all the A-G and C-T pairs** that now follow after the snag? Do they fall off the strand, or do they just sit across from each other and sulk?

The other thing I'm not really sure about is how the bit of code that has been lopped out magically floats to the new right place to be spliced back in. Presumably it's the same thing with the accidental velcro snags - they just lodge somewhere their guide mis-recognizes?

As you can tell I'm a dilettante here.

*transcription is splitting the DNA open to make the wax castings with RNA

**The matching velcro loops and hooks are actually the A, C, T, and G molecules themselves. DNA is a double helix, so you get two strands wound together. If one strand has an A, the other will always have a T sitting right opposite, because A and T stick to each other like post-it notes to a subordinates' monitor. Same thing with G and C. So for every bit of actual meaningful code ("sense", say: AACCGT) there's a mirror image of it on the other strand ("anti sense" e.g., TTGGCA. somehow the transcription molecules recognize which is which).

[Ecks]

Nice analogy, rubberband.

Anyway, let me fast-forward the bug-jesu flamewar*
[quote, claim victory]
[quibble, claim victory]
(quote quote quibble, claim victory]
[quibble, claim victory]
[quibble quibble, claim victory]

Bug: see, what is says is that "where there's a tradeoff between clarity and gender neutrality, you should always choose clarity." So I never said "always," it's clearly a conditional statement [claim victory]

Jes: gender neutral is always more clear [claim victory]

Bug: Actually there *IS* sometimes a tradeoff. For example...

(Bug, you may now fill in your example)

* This goes to a conundrum: Does the flamewar end when it reaches some sort of logical impasse (in which case this attempt may do some good), or does it not end till someone gets tired and quites (in which case this post will be approximately as useful as giving jellyfish a ladder)**

** Who am I kidding. Put your asbestos undies on kids, it's going to be a long one. Lucky for me I have some deadlines past due, so for once I have sufficient motivation to sign off for a while. Hopefully long enough.

[Ecks]

QUITS, not QUITES... Teh dums strike again :(

[Ecks]

Oh, looked up the 3 great lies, BTW. I was almost right:

1) "Of course I'll respect you in the morning."
2) "The check is in the mail."
3) "I'm from the government, and I'm here to help you."

Not so fond of #3, though I'm sure there are many instances of it being true ;)

[Geds]

Y'know, I had been thinking that the Thursday flamewar was mysteriously absent.

It's always gotta be something, right?

[Spalanzani]

Wait, are there any prizes or awards for the Legendary Write-Off? Since Bugmaster and I are technically both in 4th and 3rd place, I think we should both get two prizes.

[harmfulguy]

Maybe it should be, "I'm from the insurance industry and I'm here to help you." Really, which one is more terrifying?

[bulbul]

Y'know, I had been thinking that the Thursday flamewar was mysteriously absent.
I blame the snow.