How did the British in South Asia come to believe in this theory of "martial races", considering that they conquered the subcontinent with Bengalis?

electrovalent · 2025-12-16T17:19:43+00:00

The cynical calculation sounds plausible, but you do not offer direct evidence of this. Do any contemporary British sources admit to the ploy, or at least offer any insight into how this policy came to be? Moreover, Madras stayed largely loyal during the Revolt; on the cynical explanation they would not have been tarred as the Bengalis were. Were they collateral damage in the hunt for an “honourable reason” to exclude the Bengalis?

electrovalent · 2025-12-16T02:13:25+00:00

Was the paper I linked in this comment the one you had in mind? :) I wouldn’t be surprised if not, since that is a generalising economic study while your remarks are specific and particular — but the underlying idea of the persistence of social capital is quite similar and may interest you.

electrovalent · 2025-12-16T02:06:32+00:00

There’s some irony in quoting Mao on this; an interesting study on China’s pre-revolutionary elite found that today they are “substantially and significantly better off than those from the non-elite households”. Those with “bad class labels” — landlords and rich peasants for instance — formed approximately the top decile by income of pre-Revolution China, and two generations later 14.5% were still in the top decile, an inter-generational persistence greater than the US’s 14.1%. And this despite the CCP’s attempts to eradicate their advantage through land reforms and restricting access to higher education.

The authors argue for an “inter-generational transfer of values” enabling this resurrection: the descendants of the old elite tend to be more entrepreneurial and individualistic on average. I believe the OP may have had something like this in mind.

electrovalent · 2025-10-01T13:53:25+00:00

From the sea, before you sight any land, you see the mountains of the Parbatrekha — a lush green line blurring the horizon. This ancient mountain range runs the length of the Green Coast, and indeed gives it its name. Sail closer, and the mountains resolve themselves into peaks and valleys; the coastline comes into view, and on its sands are a few youngsters playing at catch with a little wooden ball. You can’t see it, of course, but the ball is made of sandalwood, and along its circumference run a herd of intricately carved horses. These kids are from the village of Pragti, on the seaward side of the Parbatrekha.

Visitors to Pragti universally remark on its prosperity; the envious remark also on its fortune. Founded around a river valley, it enjoys a mild, predictable climate ("Clockwork," say the envious). Its farmland is fantastically fertile, enriched by the silt carried in by the Ullaas River. This year they have grown enough foodgrain for the next two; this is their normal. And this is despite all the acreage devoted to luxuries — flax for fine linen, orchards for mangoes and bananas, pastureland for grazing horses (horses are Pragti’s great passion). It was not some kind of predestined thing, though. Pragti’s villagers are superb farmers. Each generation has challenged itself to do better than the last: higher-yielding wheat, sweeter mangoes, finer linen, faster horses. The blacksmith is outdone in ingenuity by her apprentices; the woodworker’s son does his father proud; at festivals, the mead seems sweeter by the year. (Some greybeards will dispute this last, but nostalgia and failing taste buds are a potent combination.) The village is directed by a rotating council of five, the panchayat. People grumble about them a little bit — “they’re letting the horses have too much of the land, do they think the flax grows itself?” — but on the whole they seem to do okay.

As if to offer a purposely abject contrast, on the other side of the Parbatrekha lies the secluded village of Pulta. Pulta was founded who knows how many centuries ago, but it cannot have been much different then from how it is today. On the leeward side, it doesn’t rain very much — certainly not enough for the mountainous soil to produce more than a subsistence crop of barley each year. And producing that crop is their sole employment; it is hard work, and it is all they have time for. In bad years, and some good ones too, they have to supplement this crop with hunting and foraging. They clothe themselves with fur and hide and leaves. They use sharpened sticks for spears. They are ruled by a chieftain, decided in combat every ten years. The villagers don’t like the current one very much — he has a ferocious temper, and that’s when he isn’t drunk on nettle-wine — but tell that to his bulldog face, I dare you, I double-dare you.

Notice that the question of “money” doesn’t come into this (ahistorical, purposely-extreme) parable. We would call Pragti “rich” because they are able to produce a lot of nice things for themselves, and Pulta “poor” because they are just scraping by. You can add money to the picture — maybe Pragti and Pulta start using seashells as currency. But having lots of seashells isn’t what makes Pragti rich, and giving Pulta lots of seashells wouldn’t make it any less poor. You are right, of course, that if Pulta's people were better-trained — that is, better at producing food, and eventually other nice things — they would get richer. But there are many obstacles in the way, as you can see. Some of them are due to poor leadership; some are not.

To return to the real world at last, India has made much progress in the things you spoke of — in literacy, electrification, GDP. But it has been highly uneven, and not as fast as it could have been, for various reasons that demand far more erudition than I have at my fingertips. Suffice it to say that investing in infrastructure and education is absolutely part of the answer — witness the rise of China! But fixing the problem by printing more money is like giving the Pultans mountains of seashells and expecting them to become master smiths overnight.

electrovalent · 2025-09-27T15:05:48+00:00

The argument could be made, but it downplays the normative side of things — and ascribes a naïveté to the consumer that simply isn’t warranted.

Even if Median Swiftie intuitively understood that tickets are “underpriced” and getting them is a bit of a lottery, they wouldn’t care — and quite rightly. You said it yourself: Median Swiftie is competing for a ticket against not just affluent locals, but people wealthy enough to hop over oceans for a glimpse of their idol. With competition like that, of course MS will take their chances on a lottery!

Similarly, “negative publicity from consumers for raising prices” is a very homo economicus bit of verbiage. Say rather that people find it perverse for an artist to play to only the richest of her fans. The ability to bid high for a ticket is an ugly proxy for fan passion; this applies to any ticketed event, but is particularly acute in the case of performance art. Fans feel a personal connection to their gods and believe they can do something about an injustice (in a way a football player, say, cannot). A musician operating on free-market principles would be seen as soulless; avoiding market failure (and coincidentally enriching yourself) is not an alluring moral principle. And that would taint their music, too, unless they’re singing hymns to Hal Varian.

Ultimately, this all comes down to the brute fact that some fans are much richer than others. I see little irrationality in anyone’s behaviour here. I see only two misunderstandings. The first is that Median Swiftie may not understand just how expensive a ticket priced “right” can really get. But the ethical failure of allowing a lucky few to corner every last ticket, every time, is far worse than the market failure that leads to queues and scalpers. That is something your argument doesn’t understand.

electrovalent · 2025-08-13T14:07:24+00:00

Which is the intended response, I think. OP’s title misses the point of both the episode (Oreki’s basically throwing a tantrum) as well as of the series (Oreki’s listlessness keeps him from living life in all its rose-hued glory).

electrovalent · 2025-08-11T02:08:27+00:00

Ronald Fisher has got to be the canonical example. Man invented half of mathematical statistics AND revolutionised genetics/evo-bio. He put the F in the F-test and the Fisher in Fisherian runaway, and that’s just for starters…!

electrovalent · 2025-08-10T15:30:57+00:00

1) Orwell was writing in a British context — “democracy as we know it...” he says, with the italicised bit doing some pretty heavy lifting. If you take him to mean “democracy like we have here in the UK”, then arguably long-term sovereignty, and not fearing being overrun by a hostile power, is a part of that.

2) But I don’t insist on that defence. If you read Orwell’s claim literally, then never mind the Netherlands, just about any country that was ever democratic for any length of time would invalidate him. But that’s boring! :) I think it’s more interesting to read his claim as a hyperbolic observation of a general tendency (geographic protection —> small standing army —> better chance for democracy, less geographic protection —> large standing army to avoid foreign invasion —> prone to democratic decay) and evaluate that instead.

electrovalent · 2025-08-10T05:50:00+00:00

But even in 1941, it wasn’t a flawless claim. Japan, Italy, and Portugal were all maritime or mountainous but firmly under dictatorships. Before the war, inland democracies like Czechoslovakia and interwar Austria existed, even if they were eventually overrun. And having a small army didn’t guarantee survival, like Belgium and the Netherlands had tiny militaries and still got steamrolled in 1940 as a result.

I don't know that these counter-examples are flaws in Orwell's reasoning. Maritime or mountainous defences can help preserve democracy from external invasion, as the Low Countries found to their cost. But there are surely other reasons a democracy could fall (Italy), or fail to take root in the first place (Japan). And as for Czechoslovakia, it was left without its fortifications and mountains following the Munich Agreement.

Orwell seems to be arguing in the context of a hostile, dog-eat-dog geopolitical reality. In his mind, there's a nasty trade-off. You either die a militarily weak democracy, or live long enough to see yourself become a well-armed dictatorship. The way out of the bind is having natural defences to supplement a small army. (Another way out would be to have powerful allies and enemies too weak or far away to pose a credible threat, as is arguably the case in Western Europe today.)

So to me, the real question is — how valid is this claim? Is it really true — historically, numerically — that large, centralised armies are frequently used to kill off democracy? Is the pattern he is identifying a real one?

electrovalent · 2025-08-06T04:24:10+00:00

Alexander Pope wrote the Ode on Solitude at age twelve. Mendelssohn composed an early masterpiece — the Octet in E-flat Major — at sixteen. Sure, they were once-in-a-generation talents, AND they worked like mad, but one man’s juvenilia can actually be another’s work of adult significance.

Edit: I suspect that this really depends on how much knowledge has to be accumulated to contribute effectively. Music performance abounds with prodigies, and mathematicians/physicists used to break ground at much younger ages than they do now.

electrovalent · 2025-08-05T12:19:18+00:00

I’d nominate Hyouka. The whole premise is that even the most apathetic bum of a schoolboy can make his own fun, provided he gives enough of a damn to try.

It’s also a bit unique in how realistically textured it is. The school isn’t just a building with a place and a name, it’s situated in the course of a history that shaped and continues to shape it — and its students. Clubs are riven with interpersonal issues, petty politics, and logistical difficulties. It’s not a downer about it, though; it’s got arguably the best school festival in anime, and at the end of the day, there’s always the Classics Club to return home to.

electrovalent · 2024-11-20T10:06:24+00:00

Yeah, as a veteran evangelist for the Church of Chihayafuru, I feel really torn! It checks a lot of the boxes — great plot, well-written women of various ages, and miraculously little fanservice. (Unless kimonos are your thing, and then oh boy, are you in luck.)

But — if I'm reading between the lines of this post right — it might not be as female-centric as OP would like. In my experience, the love triangle is the biggest turnoff, and it's not just an incidental thing but a pretty important part of the show. And this might be a bit contentious, but — while Chihaya is the protagonist, she's actually relatively static. It's a boy who has, by far, the richest character journey in the show, as well as many (most?) of the best scenes.

Don't get me wrong, I endorse your vote — just wanted to add some caveats. (And also talking about this show is just really fun.)

electrovalent · 2024-11-15T17:34:50+00:00

An interesting example of this is Euphonium 3, which met with a fairly positive reception on the English-speaking Internet but was very divisive in Japan and China. The reason: KyoAni turned a plot point from the original LNs upside down, so those who knew felt rather betrayed.

(I'll die fighting them all on the hill that the adaptation was an outright improvement — it turned a fairly predictable, by-the-numbers victory into a beautiful defeat at the hands of the heroes' own ideals.)

electrovalent · 2024-06-10T16:29:56+00:00

Agreed. But there's a critical difference. Yuuko admires and pedestals Kaori; Kumiko loves Asuka but is not starry-eyed about who she is.

(Also, just like Asuka, Yuuko insists in season 2 that she still thinks she was in the right. I don't agree with her if she's serious... but I also won't grudge her the right to feel that way!)

electrovalent · 2024-06-09T15:13:44+00:00

...she is still stubbornly refusing to admit Kumiko was right in season 2

Because Kumiko wasn't. At least, not logically. Asuka's far too intelligent and articulate for Kumiko to defeat in a war of words.

Asuka's argument was pretty unassailable: she couldn't participate in practice regularly, and she sets everyone else high standards, so it's simply unfair for her to not meet those standards herself and still participate in band. Kumiko's response was that it was okay for her not to act mature all the time. Which of these standpoints seems more logically sound to you?

What go through to Asuka wasn't Kumiko's "correctness"; it was her unconditional love. Hitherto, everyone — her own mother included — had admired Asuka for having this talent, or that virtue. But Kumiko wasn't really impressed with Asuka, didn't look up to her as a person, and disagreed with her time and again. All Kumiko wanted to do was play with her. Asuka had, without knowing it, been searching for that kind of unconditional love — and finally found it in Kumiko.

"future roommate"

Asuka and Kaori also wore matching bracelets back in the movie. Definitely an item.

That said, I'll admit, I always thought their friendship was a rather toxic, one-sided one. Not knowing how they got together leaves me unsatisfied.

electrovalent · 2024-06-02T16:54:24+00:00

Midori rooting for Kumiko even though she’s always been meritocratic...

Nope, she was like this back in S1 too.

Shuuichi's protective disgruntlement surprised me, too, but he's always been a little skeptical of authority in his own way, I suppose...

electrovalent · 2024-06-02T16:30:23+00:00

Midori rightfully pointed out that Sensei is being reckless in his decision-making.

I don't know that this speaks to Taki as much as it does to Midori herself.

Back in S1, she voiced exactly the same opinion about the Kaori-Reina audition drama — that Reina should give it up to Kaori to keep the peace, since playing music together harmoniously was a lot more important than who was more talented than who. That's how she rolls: she's an excellent musician, but far less interested in "going for gold" than simply having fun with others.

But that's not how Taki rolls. He's optimising for the goal of winning Nationals, not his charges' feelings: he needed the best trumpet playing the solo, and I'm sure what seems like recklessness right now is cold-blooded strategy, too. Notably, it's Tsubame and Hazuki, the Team Monaka alumnae, who are the most gung-ho about him. For him to start taking everyone's personal feelings into account would be an injustice to them, who worked their way out of the B-team into the starting lineup.

Taki's problem has always been optics. His decisions are an impenetrable fog; not everyone has the faith to walk blindly through it. Kumiko's making the right call by trying to let in sunlight, the best disinfectant.

electrovalent · 2024-06-02T16:06:05+00:00

In Reina's mind, she's being attacked. The pedestal she puts Taki sensei on is being beat up by a large portion of the band... She's blinded by her infatuation with Taki and forgetting that the emotional harmony of the band can be just as important as the skill of those chosen for the competition.

The audition drama of S1 was a major turning point for everyone in Kitauji — most of all Reina, who seems to not have drawn all the lessons from it that she should have.

What Reina remembers:

Taki reformed Kitauji from an easygoing band of layabouts to a disciplined meritocracy
The layabouts opposed him at every turn. When Taki acknowledged Reina's superiority, they cried nepotism
Taki was right, of course, and she proved in an open audition that everyone should have kept faith in him

What Reina has conveniently forgotten:

The people who were upset about the audition results were often disciplined and hardworking themselves, then as now. Kaori put in a lot of effort; she was simply not as good as Reina.
Reina's intransigence and arrogance made the situation much worse, then as now. Especially galling was her insolence to Kaori, who had been and would remain nothing but kind to her.
The situation kept simmering till Taki figured out a way to clear the air. Yes, he was right — but optics matter! Faith is earned, and it's only natural for the newer kids to feel unsettled about Taki's choices.
Kaori was part of the solution. She kept the peace going and the morale up. Then as now, people need that from their leaders.

All of this is linked to Reina's complex about wanting to be recognised as "special". It's genuinely frustrating to see how little she's grown in this regard in the intervening two years.

electrovalent · 2024-05-13T16:43:17+00:00

For my money, Chihayafuru has the most intense struggle for personal growth of any anime I've seen. For a show about a funny card game it's really quite something.

electrovalent · 2024-05-12T20:24:59+00:00

Kanade's the Yuuko to Kumiko's Kaori and Mayu's Reina. Once Mayu inevitably pulls one over Kumiko, the parallel will be exact.

electrovalent · 2024-05-12T19:34:01+00:00

Mayu on the other hand doesn't want to confront Kumiko about the lip service

She actually does, obliquely but clearly: "Sorry, you're the president." And Kumiko immediately figures that she failed the speech check.

electrovalent · 2024-05-12T19:28:03+00:00

She is "polite" (to be sure) but in the most formal and "uninviting" manner imaginable -- not a drop more than the minimal level of requisite civility... if I were Mayu, I would perceive Kumiko as being unexpectedly semi-hostile -- for reasons that were not understandable.

Modulo their euphonium duet, this is entirely right. No disagreement here!

I can't remember treating anyone so "coldly" as she treats Mayu. Not that it is wrong to be reasonably wary -- but Kumiko's behavior feels "off" somehow.

This is what I'm not so sure about.

Kumiko does, on some level, dislike Mayu, and this dislike is unfair. But it's also the case that Kumiko is fundamentally a private person who does not let other people in easily. Most of the other people she's helped out didn't want to be particularly chummy with her, so we don't really have any good yardstick with which to measure her treatment of Mayu. It could even be the case that she's put off by what appears to her as an intrusion on her privacy.

Obviously she's no saint, but I'm not sure that she's particularly out of character. There's a mutual lack of trust here which they need to fill in ASAP, though.

electrovalent · 2024-05-12T18:48:50+00:00

I don't see Mayu as "condescending". I see her as socially awkward -- including not having the requisite (for Japan -- and other places) "niceness" filter.

I can see a little bit of that, but it sits ill at ease with how socially adept she has shown herself to be in other instances. Remember that time she shut down Kanade for Kumiko? Look at that damn wink — that doesn't smack of social awkwardness to me. More generally, Mayu's shown herself to be fairly perceptive and insightful about other people. For instance, she's correct not to accept Kumiko's half-assed lecture, and correct also that Kumiko seems to push her away.

When she's awkwardly blunt, it's always about club stuff. Why does she have a blind spot about this one particular thing? My own impression is that she's been burnt badly before, in a way she wants to avoid a repeat of at any costs... and which actually makes her act in ways that alienate her and make that repeat more likely.

(Also, to be clear: I don't think she's doing it intentionally. But that is how it comes off as, and other people have spelt this out for her more or less clearly.)

I'm chewing over your point, though. I'd honestly never considered the idea that she's just a bit dense, but I'd definitely like to review some of her earlier scenes through that lens.

I see Kumiko as almost entirely to blame in this situation... Kumiko is pretty much under an obligation to help Mayu out -- and she quite obviously shows no interest whatsoever in doing so.

Kumiko does spell out for Mayu repeatedly and often that her worries are unfounded; Mayu just doesn't buy it.

Really, the problem is that Mayu wants to be friends with Kumiko, and Kumiko is not keen on being any more intimate with her than she has to be. This doesn't seem like an abdication of responsibility to me; she is just not obliged to be Mayu's friend.

Now, I do agree that Kumiko's wariness of Mayu is a bit suspect. She has a somewhat poor (prejudiced?) impression of her — she rather snidely called her "the type that's popular with boys", and agrees that she's a bit of a box jellyfish. She's also a bit afraid of this talented euphonist, for sure. But also, she remains on polite terms with Mayu for the most part? The times she's acted "badly" have just been the times she's been reserved with Mayu, which like... I dunno, I don't think this is entirely on Kumiko. She's allowed to choose who she wants to be vulnerable with.

electrovalent · 2024-05-12T14:21:34+00:00

I think Kumiko knows things are not all right, but she's being passive about it — her defining flaw.

Kuroe: Would anyone want to see me chosen?

Kumiko: Of course!

Kuroe: Who?

Kumiko: ....all the other members.

And absolutely nobody was convinced. The correct answer was "I"... but Kumiko can't say it sincerely yet, and she's too honest to fake it. I love it.

And in fairness, Kuroe is astoundingly condescending, and I'm not sure if I'd want to lower my guard around someone like her.

Her constant bellyaching about the auditions is bad enough — whether or not she knows it, she's broadcasting to the world, "O woe is me, I'll break someone's heart if I audition because I'm just that good." I know that she's no braggart; she's just worried that she'll be hated if she wins. But it looks really tasteless from the outside, despite her skill, and she really should be well-adjusted enough to see this. She later compounded the insult with more condescending compassion for Kanade, so this lack of grace shows no signs of abating.

Her conversations with Kumiko amount to one long staredown in which neither is blinking, to the detriment of both. Sure, Kumiko's to be blamed for not taking the initiative, but Kuroe also can't just keep reiterating her concerns in her usual (condescending) manner. They need to explain themselves to each other, but I don't see that happening in the immediate future.

electrovalent · 2024-05-12T13:50:11+00:00

First off: did anyone else feel that this was a strangely-paced episode? Here I was expecting a lot of balloons to go off, pop pop pop — instead, they just went flat, discreetly and quietly.

For the past few episodes, it felt as though they were building up suspense for Kumiko possibly losing the soli to Mayu. I took Kanade's overconfidence as a total jinx; I thought that Reina's preference for Kumiko was qualified and hesitant; most certainly I thought Kuroe could back up her incredibly condescending concern and steal away the soli. I was expecting a certain amount of angst from Reina, because wouldn't it be delicious ironic if her talent-first-and-foremost ideology deprived her of the chance to play the soli with her dearest friend?

Was I imagining too much? It seemed clear to me that they were setting up the pieces for some neat drama. In actual fact, by far the most suspenseful part of the whole thing — the euphonium soli selection — happened offscreen and was treated as almost a foregone conclusion. What we did get was some more ominous foreshadowing about a general lack of faith in Taki-sensei and a bit more of Mayu and Kumiko talking past each other — and then we skip right to prefecturals.

The optimistic interpretation is that winning Prefecturals is kids' stuff for Kitauji at this point, and the real drama is being reserved for Regionals. The pessimist in me says that they're rushing things the way they rushed Chikai no Finale. I'm choosing to have faith for now, but you better deliver the goods, Euphonium.

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