The Emperor's New Clothes

It strikes me at the moment that the nation is very much in the position of the kingdom in Hans Christian Anderson’s 1835 tale, “The Emperor’s New Clothes” who admire the king’s royal trappings, despite that fact that the weavers who created them had duped the king by undressing him, while flattering him with their sycophantic blather.  

We fail completely to identify Narcissus’s nakedness, I think, for two reasons. Most importantly, there is no signal; everything he does is astonishingly horrific, so there is nothing on which to focus. Of course, it is also because of two hundred plus years during which we were taught American exceptionalism.

And this despite broadly-based and robust evidence: 

 He has created an immigration crisis at a time when illegal immigration is at an all-time low, thanks primarily to Barrack Obama. He has sowed fear of violent crime at a time in history when it is at an all-time low. He wishes to erect a barrier of tariffs that will inevitably cause a deep recession. He angers all world leaders except for the totalitarian dictators whom he both admires and apes. He pummels the department of justice and persuades justice Kennedy to retire in order to install a bullet proof SCOTUS that will exonerate him for colluding with the Russians to steal the presidency. He is a massively criminal racist who defrauds and stiffs his creditors. He lies about virtually everything, national and personal. He confirms in daily tweets that he is at once the most vain and the most deluded individual on the planet.

Indeed, Anderson’s tale is so subtly constructed and relevant, and Narcissus is a dangerous buffoon who so resembles the Emperor in his story in every particular, that I despair for the child in the crowd, too young to understand the desirability of keeping up the pretense, who will blurt out that Narcissus is wearing nothing at all, so that the cry can assumed and amplified by others?

Textualism; Originalism

About a year ago, or perhaps two years ago we were treated to a wonderful and original play at the Arena Theater in Washington DC called "The Originalist". It is remarkably well-written, with word-play and ensemble performances of Scalia and a hypothetical lesbian graduate of Harvard Law School as his clerk. What made it stunning was that the actor who played Scalia was not only a dead ringer physically, but that he had studied Nino's mannerisms carefully and managed a stupendous theatrical coup of making us think we actually watched the judge himself. I thought long and hard afterward about the meaning of the word "originalist", now popularly textualist. I decided, rightly or wrongly, that Scalia's pretense of revering the US Constitution was, inherently, an act of the deepest form of hypocrisy; he used the protection of claiming reverence to the founding fathers words to justify whatever he felt in his most partisan feelings. To my knowledge, he NEVER found that the words in the US Constitution actually told him otherwise. In science, an idea that cannot be falsifed—i.e., for which no test can be constructed that would show it to be false—cannot be considered a theory. If Scalia never deviated from partisan beliefs, that would be an exceptionally strong and scientifically valid basis for accusing him of hypocrisy. Thus, unless Scalia even once issued a progressive ruling because the Constitution was written that way, he cannot avoid being guilty of hypocrisy. In the context of the scientific method, Scalia's "originalism" was inherently not falsifiable, and hence logically akin to scientific creationism. Scalia was gifted at word games, to be sure, and lawyers love word games, often perhaps more than justice itself. The central truth of my perception of hypocrisy has now become self-evident. The Constitution assigns the responsibility of judicial appointments to the sitting President, and yet Scalia's partisans now wish to efface that authorization from the Constitution and are willing to risk a lasting constitutional crisis to get it erased. We have already been treated to Elizabeth Warren's sparkling statement that the people have already spoken. I'm curious to consider the opinions on this point from folks more familiar with jurisprudence than I am.

Excitement at SCOTUS!

The shocking news just came across Huffington that Antonin Scalia had passed away in his sleep. I am one who, since the 2000 ruling in Bush Vs Gore has felt that the Supreme Court of the United States was little more than a joke. In the intervening time, five Roman Catholic men have made that characterization even more certain. I don't feel that institutions deserve our respect; I feel they must earn it. Antonin Scalia's time on the court was dominated by his own hypocrisy. Rather than actually considering the meaning of the constitution, he hid under that rubric while issuing rulings which, instead of reflecting what the framers of the constitution meant, actually expressed his own, particularly nasty, partisan feelings. What now? I have been reserved in my response to many of Barack Obama's accomplishments; I think he has all too often taken everything valuable off the table before he went to the mat. However, his two appointments to the court have been stellar. Will he now make a similarly progressive appointment? More importantly, can he get his appointment confirmed by a Senate that houses a ravenous minority? Stay tuned!

Mittens insults his own base!

There is a rich and delicious irony in the news story that broke late Monday afternoon, 17 September, and which was covered extensively tonight major network news hours. Romney describes a group of voters to a group of investors and, by extension political supporters. The scene, according to David Corn of Mother Jones, was a private a fundraising party with lots of booze and sex playmates. Those who take more from the government than they pay, said Romney, are not his concern. They will vote for Barack Obama under any circumstances. This inane charge breaks entirely new ground in political naiveté. Unbeknownst to mittens, he was actually describing where most of his votes actually come from!!! According to quite readily accessible demographic figures, It insults precisely those voting blocks most likely to vote for Romney himself. If these voting blocks only could hear what he said about them, might change their minds about for whom they are going to vote. The only demographic in which Romney holds a lead are those over 65 - those "entitled" to medicaid and medicare. Those who pay little or no income tax are those in red states! Ah what a glorious turn of events! When your enemy is making a savage mistake, don't interrupt - Napoleon.

Administration defense of the Affordable Care Act

As a former enthusiast for Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign and as someone approaching most political questions from the far left, I register here my dismay at the case prepared by Mr. Verrilli and Mr Kneedler to support the Affordable Health Care Act. Good friends who are accomplished lawyers tell me that the SG and ASG are indeed among the best of the nations lawyers. I am also not a lawyer. Nonetheless, it is clear to me from what was presented on the media I’ve seen that both the SG and the ASG were unconvinced of the constitutional foundation of the ACA. Their argument failed even to convince me of its constitutionality.

Ironically, the unconstitutional part of the law is actually a conservative republican idea that the president was forced, against his better judgment, to admit because he began negotiations by taking most reforms worth achieving off the table before any negotiations took place in Congress. The defense given repeatedly by the Administration is that the ACA does many good things. Perhaps that is true. However, if as seems likely, the five conservative justices declare the individual mandate unconstitutional, then we are left with a skeleton from which most of the good things in the bill have been removed.

I don’t know why the arguments presented by the Administration were not better prepared. I suspect it is a combination of factors, including the sense that the ACA itself is deeply flawed together with the national inattention of the President for the detail necessary to ensure that the Act will be declared constitutional, which led to a pathological combination of overconfidence and insecurity. At least that is what came across. How else could the Republicans find so easy a path to ridicule the Administrations presentation (ie., the clinking of glass and repeated “excuse me” from Verrilli). The SG’s closing remarks were typical flimsy liberal argument so pastiched by right-wingers over the years. Nowhere was there evidence that the Administration understood that the right wing plays hardball. No mention of the underlying constitutional issue. In short, it failed even to convince me that the law really is constitutional. It is difficult for me to imagine a worse argument, or to think of the SG and the ASG as anything but rookies. I am deeply embarrassed and shamed.

venture/vulture capitalism

There was an especially helpful discussion of this issue on PBS last night where Judy Woodruff interviewed Josh Kosman and Stewart Kohl. Kohl is head of a Canadian Venture Capital group that has an much more respectable record than that of Bain Capital. Kosman is one of the most articulate and well-informed critics of venture capitalism that I have heard on the topic.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/business/jan-june12/privateequity_01-18.html

One aspect of venture capital that is especially troubling to me is those cases, exemplified by Mitt Romney's Bain Capital, in which the debt incurred by Bain to purchase a company - usually one that is not in need of any help, but is unable to defend against the hostile takeover - is then vested somehow in the company itself, so that the purchaser (Bain Capital) can basically swallow up the assets of the healthy company, often including the pension plans of the workers at the purchased company, leaving that company to pay off the debt incurred when Bain Capital purchased them. Statistically speaking, many of these companies go bankrupt, while the venture capital group reaps multimillion dollar profits.

In my view, this practice should be highly illegal. However, it is not. It is, rather, venal, hypocritical, and devastating to the jobs and pension plans of the employees of the company taken over.

I cannot believe that anyone in his right mind can think of such an odious vulture as Mitt Romney in positive terms. The prospect of his ascending to power is abjectly horrifying.

Some years ago, I made a dance that celebrated the molecular choreography of three transducing NTPases. These are molecules, also known technically as "motors", that make things happen in the cell. They all use a fuel called adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Having misplaced the relevant files several times, I decided to post it here, with these notes.

Thoughts about the NTP Celebration Suite – Cincinnati July 2002


Discussing myself over the years with colleagues and friends, I’ve describe myself as an eclectic, pragmatic, Platonist – I have worked in a wide variety of areas, from biological electron transport to the origin of life, mechanistic enzymology, statistics in experimental design and screening (phase diagram analysis), the crystallographic phase problem, bioinformatics, and allostery. Each time I’ve changed into a different area, I’ve had to re-define myself, learning new things. It’s been a pretty good run, all things considered. Although I’ve embraced many different techniques for pragmatic reasons, however, I feel inwardly committed to one ideal form or another, and consequently am fascinated with models. I question data first, when they conflict with models I’ve invested in. For that, I consider myself a Platonist as opposed to an Aristotelian.

I read in Aaron Klug’s biography from the Nobel pages that his wife is a modern dance enthusiast. I hope it does no injustice to Aaron to reflect on his role in shaping these aspects of my professional life. I was in Cambridge barely long enough to learn where the lifts and centrifuges were. Yet, Aaron and Roger Kornberg both proved to be major intellectual role models, to whom I return in my mind surprisingly frequently for spiritual renovation. So, I am deeply grateful that Aaron was generous enough to share his lab with me for that brief, but very formative year.

Interpreting Molecular Choreography

The dance, NTP Celebration Suite, is an interpretive piece drawing inspiration from the three-state behavior of molecular motors. I want to share some of the history of this dance. I learned late in life that I derive a deep joy from dance. When I was in secondary school (grade 7-8) I enjoyed ballroom dancing (in those days, I tolerated it better than my friends!). At one point, I had the opportunity to perform in a recital as the partner of one of the instructor’s serious dance students. It was truly a lovely experience, and I seemed to have done pretty well, because the instructor came to me afterward and told me I should consider studying dance.

The Research Triangle has a major cultural resource in the American Dance Festival, ADF, located on the Duke Campus in Durham each spring and summer drawing the best modern dance companies from around the US and the world. I re-discovered dance in the mid 1990s, after we saw Pilobolus, a marvelous company with musical grace, gravity-defying choreography, a sense of humor, and a very full sense of what the human body can and cannot do! We have had season’s tickets ever since. Some years later, I decided to volunteer at ADF, and have been a docent for their summer school tours ever since. The classes are every bit as exciting for me as the professional performances.


Being ACA Past President

So it was natural that I thought of dance on my first terror-stricken moments after I was elected President of the American Crystallographic Association and thus would have to present a Past President’s address at an annual banquet three years later. The ACA Past President’s address is a wonderful tradition, and the previous ones I had witnessed had a very intimidating variety of creativity and intelligence! I began to talk about what I might do with Bill Duax (Past President of the IUCr), whose wife and daughter are both dancers. I told others, thinking that if I told enough people, I would HAVE to do make good on my plan.

In Memoriam Pierre Morell

An especially poignant moment came at our departmental Christmas party six months before the banquet when I would have to perform. I was talking about the idea to friends, and one of them, a neurochemist named Pierre Morell, got excited and volunteered to invest in the project and help me hire a choreographer! Sadly this colleague very soon fell ill with a brain tumor and died within four months. So the dance will always have that personal memory.

The suite of three dances (myosin, kinesin, and F1 ATPase) did not spring fully blown. I actually had worked out much earlier a crude version of the ATPase segment after a Gordon Conference at which Andrew Leslie presented the F1 crystal structure. That structure was a tremendous stroke of luck for Andrew: three successive states analogous to those it had taken me a decade to solve for tryptophanyl-tRNA synthetase – Open, Pre-transition state, and Products – were present in the same crystal structure, owing to the cyclic symmetry of the ATPase. Three in one go! I was quite envious of people like Andrew and Ivan Rayment, because I recognized the enchantment of free-energy transduction, but had not had (or made) the same opportunities they had had. Yet, the F1 ATPase was indeed a wondrous and very beautiful structure, both intellectually and esthetically. By celebrating it with a dance, I found a way to “own” it in my own way, without taking anything from those who had solved the structure and my envy dissipated.

A Choreographer!

Anyhow, chance brought Joy Javits into my path. The daughter of a wonderful Republican Senator from New York, Jacob Javits, and recognizably his kin, Joy is a choreographer who enjoys working with eccentric academics. She had worked before with a maths professor I knew pretty well, and was a perfect match for this project. We worked out something of a contract, and went to work, with roughly eight weeks to go. I described the ATPase structure and what it meant functionally to her and showed her a schematic video of the ATPase as well as Ron Milligan’s molecular videos of kinesin and myosin, and she started to work with me. Joy has a wonderful imagination, and she quickly seized what it was I wanted to capture about the three-state behavior of transducing NTPases. I got really excited when I selected the music and found that I could synch it with the videos. We decided that it would be a multi-media performance.

A Clog

When Joy found I had selected a Doc Watson rag for the ATPase segment, she immediately suggested a clog. Clogging is a dynamic folk dancing technique native to North Carolina. I had tried and failed several times previously to learn to clog. Joy took me in hand and carefully worked through the various steps, and soon I found myself doing it! She also suggested a simple two-step to go with the Myles Davis Blues accompaniment to the kinesin segment. The lament from Talk to Her by Alberto Iglesias for the myosin segment was the first one I selected. It matches Ron Milligan’s video just right, and was perhaps my favorite choice in the end. I had great fun editing the soundtrack and video to synchronize them. Little by little things fell into place.

Chicago Art Institute: Dress Rehearsal

I went to Chicago a couple of days before the ACA meeting in Cincinnati to give a lecture to the ACA summer course, and stopped in to visit with my daughter, Emily, then at the Chicago Institute of the Arts. Emily had a recital for an improvisation course that day, and I was privileged to watch it. Afterward, over snacks, I got to talking with the instructors and students, and it came out that I was working on the dance. We also spontaneously realized that I had yet to perform the entire suite in one go. So I got out my laptop and had the chance to do dress rehearsals for two different audiences in a small room where the sound quality from the laptop was pretty good. Their enthusiasm was an incredible tonic!

In the end, the performance went over very well. It was accompanied by a short, non-science reminiscence, not included in the video. There was a photographer but no video camera (I had kept the whole thing so secret that this was impossible to arrange without spilling beans). It was glorious fun for me, and I think others enjoyed it.

A common theme in all three parts of the suite is that my arms represent the three successive states – ligand-free, ATP, ADP plus Pi – encountered during a single cycle of ATP hydrolysis (or synthesis in the case of the F1 ATPase. There is an introductory phase showing these three states for the kinesin and F1 segments, whereas the myosin segment begins with the ligand free (attached, rigor) state and proceeds without explanation. There is no footwork to speak of in the myosin segment, whereas there are steps associated with the other two.


Credits

The video was shot by Alex Tropsha, a colleague in Bioinformatics here at UNC, at a reprise I did for the Triangle Biophysics Symposium in 2004. It is not professional, but then, neither am I!