I don’t know about you, but my life is full of questions.
Some of them are of my own making, some of them come from elsewhere — but once they work their way into my brain, it’s hard to get them out until I know the answer.
Usually it’s a mug’s game. A lot of questions are in the realm of “Why did the chicken cross the road?” — unanswerable, in other words, and probably meaningless (or at least useless) even if we did all agree on an answer. So I just live with those brain farts floating around in my subconscious.
But other questions are relevant and vital to our well-being and understanding of the universe (or our own particular corners of the general universe). And often answers do exist, even if those answers are vague, partial or biased. And, of course, some “answers” are really only opinion, not proven fact — but sometimes an informed opinion is better than no answer at all (just ask the pioneers of any medical advance that’s responsible for you being currently alive).
And, as I said, some questions are the mental equivalent of an ear worm, which is a song that, once lodged in your ear, just won’t go away.
Here, for example, are five questions that I consider brain worms.
(But pause and think carefully before you read on: If you are at all like me, once you have these questions lodged in your mind, you won’t be satisfied until you have some kind of answers.)
Does Shouting “Stay With Me!” Actually Help Keep People From Dying?
How Come China Became One Country But Europe Became Lots of Countries?
Why Is Coffee In France So Bad?
What Was The Hardest Computer Game of All Time?
Why Do Some Police Officers Seem Arrogant?
See what I mean? You were fine getting on with your life before you decided to ponder these questions. Now you need to know the answers — to at least a couple of the questions — before you’re ever comfortable getting back to what you were doing before you disregarded my advice and looked at the questions.
Fortunately, answers (or at least vague, partial or perhaps biased answers) exist to all those questions and we will soon plop them on the table for your perusal.
But first I have to tell you something: All those questions and their resultant answers come from a fairly well-known online magazine, slate.com.
I’m not promoting slate.com in any way. Slate.com runs all sorts of other things besides raising existential questions and (sort of) answering them and a lot of times what slate.com runs just annoys the hell out me.
I don’t really like their über-hip, I’m-cool-and-you’re-not, urban elitist view of the world and the relatively narrow parameters of what they think the important issues of the day are. But they do cover a lot of bases, so there’s generally something for everyone there (except for maybe the Koch Brothers and their simpering acolytes). But for anyone with half a brain and an open mind, there’ll be something there to catch your fancy.
And, of course, I’m a little pissed off at slate.com at the moment for putting those nasty questions in my head to begin with. But at least they’ve had the good grace to provide answers or, at least, possible answers to all the questions they’ve raised. I’m just giving credit where credit is due.
If you’re in a hurry, the good news is that my curiosity forced me to read the full articles attached to each question so I can now give you brief, capsule answers (or as brief and capsulized as it’s possible for me to get).
If you’re not in a hurry, I’ve tacked on links to the full articles so you can wallow for a while in the full mud bath of information, opinion and speculation. Just remember, all these articles are vouched for by slate.com, not by me. I’m just taking slate.com’s word for some of the spins.
Here goes:
1. Does Shouting “Stay With Me!” Actually Help Keep People From Dying?
This is actually the Question Of The Year (the year being 2013, of course) for Daniel Engber, slate.com’s helpful Explainer.
You can read all the ins and outs of the issue by clicking on the linked question, but here’s Engber’s short, pithy summation: “The answer: No, no, and no. If someone’s about to fall into a coma, there’s nothing you can say to change his mind.”
2. How Come China Became One Country But Europe Became Lots of Countries?
Because the nomadic Mongol hordes from the steppes of Asia presented a far greater threat to the stability of China than the threat of Huns, Vandals and Vikings presented to the individual kingdoms of Europe. And, since a larger state was better able to meet and survive the Mongol threat (for a while, anyway) than a bunch of small ones, China coalesced into one big, unified empire. That’s the view of economists Chiu Yu Ko and Tuan-Hwee Sng of the National University of Singapore and of Mark Koyama of George Mason University anyway.
For me, that answer is not really satisfying and raises a whole lot of “buts” … but it is, at least, an answer. Take it or leave it. I left it.
3. Why Is Coffee In France So Bad?
For starters the question is bullshit — and slate.com basically admits that once you get into the article. Coffee in France is not bad — it’s just different than coffee in the U.S. And I’d rather drink the worst cup of coffee France has to offer than half the boiled sludge or dishwater that passes for coffee in North America.
As I said before, slate.com often exhibits a very egocentric view of the world and this is just another example. It’s an American trait (and I’m saying this as a born American), but that just comes with the territory when you’re sitting at the epicentre of a world empire.
When Ancient Rome ruled the world, Romans would have thought their coffee was better than France’s too (if the Romans and French drank coffee two thousand years ago — which they didn’t since roasting coffee beans, crushing them and pouring hot water over them seems to have originated in the Arabian peninsula in the 15th Century). The difference is that the Romans are right (now that Romans and French make coffee) and the Americans are wrong. I do love a cup of Timmy’s, by the way, but that doesn’t mean I’d give up a good French or Italian espresso to get one. They’re just different — and fortunately we don’t have to give up one to get the other.
But back to the question — and let’s substitute the word “different” for “bad,” thus making it quite a good question. Why is coffee in France so … different?
Because of the bean, Jean (that would be the English Jean, not the French Jean).
According to slate.com, it’s a matter of empires again. Coffee beans grown within the French empire in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries tended to be of the hardier but harsher robusta variety rather than the other major variety, the mellow arabica bean which predominates in northern Europe and North America.
Because France had trade barriers which favoured the French colonies and put much higher tariffs on goods and produce from elsewhere, the robusta beans grown in places like Vietnam and Senegal were much cheaper and more abundant than arabica beans grown outside the French empire.
So, of course, French coffee merchants used the robusta bean primarily and the French coffee consumer’s palate became accustomed to the stronger, more bitter taste of robusta coffee. As slate.com says (and who am I to dispute a statement I know nothing about?), “Before coffee deregulation in the 1950s, Robusta comprised 80 percent of the French coffee market. More than 60 years later, that palate for a harsher bean still exists, and Robusta beans still account for around 50 percent of French coffee. ”
Except …
Except I actually do know a little about this subject and so I am going to dispute it — a little.
If it was really primarily a matter of empires and favourable trade regulations, why then is the robusta bean the favoured grind for traditional Italian espresso — arguably the greatest cup of coffee in the world?
In the end, it may just come down to acquired taste. The robusta bean produces a coffee that is stronger and more full-bodied — as well as more bitter (acidic) — and some people just prefer that in the same way some people prefer a cabernet sauvignon over a merlot.
And, also in the end, good robusta beans properly roasted and prepared make a great cup of coffee. Mediocre arabica beans make a lousy cup of coffee, no matter how well roasted and prepared.
4. What Was The Hardest Computer Game of All Time?
According to computer programmer David Auerbach, it’s Robot Odyssey — which Auerbach calls “the hardest damn ‘educational’ game ever made.” Auerbach says it took him 13 years to finish the game.
Since I know sweet fanny adams about computer games — and have exactly the same amount of interest in them — I’ll just have to take the Auerbach’s word for it. Although I do think that’s just a personal opinion and a dozen other “computer programmers” would have a dozen other suggestions for “hardest computer game of all time.”
Whether or not you agree with Auerbach, his piece is a good read, gives an interesting look back at the world of computer nerds in the 1980s and also offers us techno-idiots a bit of insight into what makes a super-techie’s brain tick.
5. Why Do Some Police Officers Seem Arrogant?
Slate.com actually picked up this question (and its corresponding answer) from another website, quora.com.
Before we get to the answer, I’d just like to point out that a lot of people think all cops are arrogant. I wouldn’t go that far, but a lot of ‘em could easily appear that way to the average citizen.
I don’t mind a cop being arrogant as long as he or she is a good cop, just as I would prefer to listen to a brilliant violinist who happens to be arrogant rather than listen to a nice, considerate mensch who makes my teeth ache when he or she picks up a violin.
Getting back to the good cop/arrogant cop equation: A good cop, to my mind, is honest, courageous, smart and reasonable (all within reason, of course) and doesn’t mix up the fact that he or she has power over other human beings with the right or need to exercise that power for personal reasons. That person can be as arrogant as all get-out and still be aces in my book — a benefactor to humanity.
I despise a cop who is stupid, brutal and/or corrupt and who is arrogant because he or she knows he or she has the power to abuse other people and get away with it by lying and cheating and threatening and being protected from truth and justice by the siege mentality of a self-serving guild. That person is just a piece of crud and his or her arrogance is a crime against humanity.
That being said, let’s get back to the question: Why do some police officers seem arrogant?
And now the answer, as provided by ex-cop Justin Freeman through the auspices of first quora.com and latterly slate.com:
“Because they have different priorities than you do,” is the former patrol officer’s starting point.
Freeman goes on to expand on that theme at length and it’s well worth the read. I would highly recommend that you peruse his whole answer whether you like cops or not.
But I promised a capsule version too, so here it is (although not particularly brief):
Freeman points out that the way a civilian — a “normal” person — approaches “normal” situations and other “normal” people in their daily life is far different than the “normal” situations a cop is constantly dealing with on the job.
When “normal” is a series of 911 calls that can turn ugly and/or deadly at any given moment and when many of the people you’re dealing with much of the time are criminal and/or armed and/or dangerous and/or crazy and/or drunk and/or high on other substances and/or obstructive and/or lying to you, then your approach is quite different. (I am not saying that’s what cops are dealing with on every call — not by a long shot; I’m saying that’s what they have to be mentally prepared to deal with on every call.)
But I need to turn the floor over to Justin Freeman again because there really is no short answer to this one:
Now, think about the workday of a police officer. Her job assignments consist, primarily, of being dispatched to successive 911 calls. When someone calls 911 for police service, there is a tacit admission by the caller that the situation at hand has deteriorated beyond the caller’s control and police are needed in order to bring the situation back under control. That is the unstated assumption that the officer has going into each situation—not that a social equilibrium needs to be maintained, but that a situation needs to be quickly and efficiently brought back under control.
Further than this, when she gets to the scene of many to most of these 911 calls, she encounters people who seek to frustrate her endeavors. She talks to witnesses who lie in circles about not seeing anything. She talks to suspects who lie about where they’d just been or what they were just doing. She talks to drunk people who can’t coordinate themselves and won’t remember what she said in 10 minutes. She talks to addicts who try to conceal the fact that they’re high even though involuntary tics have consumed their body. She talks to grade school kids and teenagers who have been conditioned to mistrust or despise police. She talks to people who lie about their identity because they have warrants or because they just want to frustrate her. She talks to people who act nervous and take too long to answer simple questions, raising her suspicions. She talks to people who have drugs, guns, knives, and any manner of other contraband hidden in their residence, in their vehicle, or on their person.
Now consider that the officer is doing this many times per shift—10, 20, maybe more encounters every day. She will quickly learn that, in order to get anything accomplished with these liars and obstructionists, she is going to have to employ tactics that in any other field would be unacceptable. She is going to have to be blunt, brusque, and curt. She’s going to have to call bluffs and smokescreens and BS. She’s going to have to interrupt rambling, circular explanations. She’s going to have to look people in the eye and say, “We both know that you’re lying to me right now.”
… Now, you, who I will assume is (sic) a normal, everyday citizen, comes into contact with this police officer. Even though she can probably surmise that you’re not a frequent flyer, she doesn’t know you and doesn’t enter into interpersonal contact with the same assumptions you do. Additionally, if she’s in uniform, it’s possible she has a task at hand she’s focused on. Until you are a known quantity, you may be treated coolly and humorlessly.
Now, let’s take a step back. You… interpret the response of this police officer through the lens of your (“normal”) expectations and judge her to be arrogant. I mean, after all, she’s acting all distant and aloof and snobby, right? However, your assessment is based on your interaction in a vacuum and likely doesn’t factor in much of anything I just said. That doesn’t mean either one of you is “wrong.” You’re coming from different places.
In closing, I’d bid you to be forgiving. This officer cannot afford to give people the benefit of the doubt, because there are only so many people you can relax your guard around in her line of work before she gets herself or someone else hurt or killed. Be gracious to her, for her burden is great.
This is a pretty good answer. But to my mind it addresses the issue of some cops appearing “distant and aloof” — which, to me, is qualitatively different than “arrogant.”
I think some cops are truly arrogant on top of approaching the world from a stand-offish, watch-your-back perspective. And I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing.
A few cops I’ve known at various times would have to be described as “arrogant” … but that’s usually because they’re very good at their job, which is a tough, tough job to do right. I think it’s the same sort of arrogance elite athletes exhibit when they’re on their particular field of play. It’s a case of knowing they’re the top dogs in this arena and nobody or nothing is going to get the better of them if they’re on their game. It’s the essence that is given off by a highly concentrated mix of competence and confidence — and it smells like arrogance.
So that’s it with our Five Good Questions — And Their Answers.
Thanks to slate.com and everyone who did the asking and answering.
And thanks to you, dear reader, for sticking it out to the end.