My friend Richard died this year in January. Shortly after his death I submitted a paper he had written for publication in a scientific journal called Bioscience Hypotheses. The editors were interested, but they had questions. As I had contributed somewhat to Richard’s ideas, I was familiar with them and I felt I could refine the article for the editors. This I did and the paper was accepted for publication in late January. The article has finally been officially published at the journal and is available online here: Honey bee colony collapse disorder is possibly caused by a dietary pyrethrum deficiency and also on Richard’s personal website.

This paper presents a hypothesis regarding the possible cause of Bee Colony Collapse Disorder, but the inspiration for it actually came from consideration regarding the controversial cancer treatment laetrile and a general principle of economics known as the Law of Returns.

The Law of Returns was first made explicit for me after studying Ludwig von Mises’ Human Action. Mises discusses the law in relation to economics, but it is in fact a universal law which holds for any goal-oriented action. In essence it states that: if for the realization of goal G, a given system S requires ingredient I, then for I there exists an optimum; i.e., there is a “too much”, a “too little” and a “just right”. Aristotle boiled it down to a simple rule: “everything in moderation, nothing to excess.”

Put that way, it seems a little obvious. But despite most people having an implicit understanding of it, the lack of an explicit one leads people very often to violate it. They seem to say “If a little is good, then a lot will be even better!” The reverse is also popular: “If a lot is bad, none is best!” Hence, one can always find violations in the current news; a woman, for example, who died after drinking too much water, or the off-hand rejection of a treatment for cancer because the molecule includes a cyanide group.

Thankfully, our bodies can handle small deviations one way or the other fairly well, either by filtering out when we take in too much or by breaking down the least necessary of our tissues to reuse what we don’t take in enough of (this second principle is also discussed by Mises in relation to economic science, it’s known as the Law of Marginal Utility.) Still, our explicit understanding of the law can mean the difference between health and disease. After all, just what qualifies as a “toxin” or a “nutrient”? For the woman who drank too much water, the water was clearly toxic. But for the bee that consumes pyrethrum, a natural insecticide, the trade off may be resistance to parasites. The answer is not as easy as we might first think and is affected in no small part by the Law of Returns.

Okay, so now that you know what it means…

For those of you who live or work in the tri-state area (or could travel to NY once a month), a new group called the Tri-State Polymaths has recently formed. The idea behind the group is similar to Benjamin Franklin’s Junto and works something like this:

The entire group meets once a month to discuss current events and to present overviews of subjects or ideas that they are currently studying. As the group grows, smaller groups develop with narrower aims. For example, if a group of meeting members all happen to be interested in studying physics, they can start a smaller group which will meet to discuss physics in particular. Another group might be interested in studying the German language. Another might work on understanding a historical event or period. All these groups would continue to meet with the main group thereby enhancing everyone’s understandings.

The group is still new and rather small at this point. There are, however, some very dedicated polymaths. If you think you might be interested, check us out.

La scorsa notte, il mio amico Richard Sharpe e’ stato trovato morto nella sua cella al penitenziaro di MCI-Norfolk, dove era un detenuto. Ho scoperto che il mio amico era morto tramite notzie via internet. Nessuno scrivera’ mai un necrologio per Richard. Egli e’ conosciuto per aver ucciso sua moglie a luglio del 2000. Questo e’ molto difficile da difendere. Io ho le mie opinioni su come Richard arrivo’ a compiere questo gesto e forse in futuro scrivero’ a tal rigurdo. Per il momento pero’, posso dire, basandomi sulla mia esperienza, che questa NON e’ l’unica cosa da poter dire su Richard. Nonostante i suoi difetti, Richard e’ stato un grande amico per me. Mi ascoltava e provava a confortarmi quando ero giu’ di morale. Cercava di aiutarmi a risolvere i miei problemi, dandomi idee e suggerimenti, tra i quali il suggerimento di creare una nuova strutture per il sito “The Generalist”. Era molto paziente con me quando ero arrabbiata, ed a volte, mi permetteva quasi di “abusare” di lui. Mi permetteva di criticarlo per i suoi difetti, anche se a volte le mie critiche lo facevano piangere, perche’ davvero voleva essere una persona migliore a tutti i costi, e credeva che l’essere criticato, anche in maniera aspra, lo avrebbe aiutato a fare cio’. Voleva disperatamente rimediare al crimine che aveva commesso ed ha fatto tutto quello che poteva per aiutare le altre persone che incontrava. Insegnava matematica, scienze ed economia agli altri detenuti, e poco prima della sua morte, ha cercato di far diventare le sue lezioni qualcosa di piu’ formale. Aveva infatti contattato il dipartimento di educazione per esporre la sua idea. Richard aveva anche iniziato a scrivere varie tesi su diverse ipotesi scientifiche, ed one di queste era stata accettata per essere pubblicata su Medical Hypotheses ed un’altra. Gamma Interferon Induced Organ Regeneration, sono stata io stessa a  metterla online per lui. Quando e’ morto, Richard stava lavorando su altre due tesi, ed io ho intenzione di pubblicarle entrambe dopo averle opportunamente revisionate.

Io ero una fonte di luce nella vita di Richard ed egli ha sempre provveduto a ricordarmelo. Mi ha detto che ero “una lice brillante in un mondo oscuro” ed aspettava sempre con ansia le mie visite. Come ci si aspetterebbe, Richard era molto solo. Gli ho insegnato filosofia e gli ho fatto conoscere Ayn Rand, facendolo diventare un fan dei suoi libri. Gli avevano appena approvato il permesso per farsi mandare da me un altro dei suoi libri, appena prima che morisse. Ricordo che una volta mi disse che la sua visione del mondo era cambiata drasticamente da quando mi aveva conosciuto. Gli credo. Eravamo soliti discutere di filosofia, psicologia, economia, scienze, di borsa ed anche di arte, Sapeva che stavo lavorando su alcui articoli per il sito “The Generalist” e mi ha detto che era molto interessato a leggerli.

Io non posso sicuramente difentere le azioni di RIchard nei confronti della moglie e della famiglia, a parte dire che le cose sono spesso piu’ complicate di quello che sembra, specialmente di quello che i media fanno sembrare. I media spesso si concentrano su conse sensezionali, spesso false, ed a volte sono proprio loro a creare false dicotomie. Forse un giorno daro’ la mia opinione su cosa sia potuto succedere a Richard che lo spinto verso quella direzione. Per il momento, vorrei che fosse noto che quegli eventi non sono stati l’unica componente della peronalita’ di Richard. Lui era mia amico. L’ho amato. E so che mi manchera’ terribilmente.

inglese

My friend, Richard Sharpe, was found dead last night in his cell at MCI-Norfolk where he was an inmate. I found out about my friend’s death this morning via Internet news reports. No one is likely to give Richard much of an obituary. He is known for having killed his wife in July of 2000. That’s very hard to defend. I have my own views as to how Richard came to do this and maybe at a future date I will write about it. For now, though, I can say from my own experience that this is NOT all there was to Richard. Despite his flaws, he was a good friend to me. He listened to me and tried to comfort me when I was upset. He tried to help me with my problems, giving me ideas and suggestions, including one that resulted in the new layout for the Generalist. He was very patient with me when I was angry, even when he took some abuse from me. Richard would allow me to grill him on his flaws, even when this sometimes brought him to tears, because he very much wanted to be a better person and he believed this could help him do that. He wanted desperately to make up for his crime and did everything he could to help others that he came in contact with. He would tutor other inmates in math, science, and economics and shortly before his death he was looking to make this tutoring more formal. He had written to someone in the educational department about it. Richard was also recently writing a number of scientific hypothesis papers, one of which was accepted for publication as correspondence in Medical Hypotheses and another, Gamma Interferon Induced Organ Regeneration, which I had made available online for him. He had two other papers in the works at the time of his death, both of which I intend to publish as soon as they are properly edited.

I was a bright spot in Richard’s life and he always let me know that. He told me that I was a “very bright light in a dark world” and he looked forward to my visits. As you would expect, Richard was very lonely. I taught him about philosophy and Ayn Rand and he came to be a fan of her books. He had just gotten approval for me to send him another one of her books before he died. He once told me that his views of the world had changed dramatically since he came to know me. I believe that. We discussed philosophy, psychology, economics, science, the market and even art. He knew that I had some articles in the works for the Generalist and he told me that he was very interested in reading them.

I certainly cannot defend Richard’s actions with regard to his wife and family, except to say that things are often more complicated than they appear, especially in media reports. The media often focuses on things which are sensational, sometimes simply false, or else they create false dichotomies. One day I may give my own opinion as to what happened to Richard that led him down that path. For now, let it be known, that this was not all there was to Richard. He was my friend. I loved him. And I’m going to miss him terribly.

Italiano