Economic incentives to end the war? A proposal

Offer each soldier that surrenders to Ukrainian forces a reward sufficient to start a new life in Ukraine, settle down, find a wife or become an immigrant in EU.

-- Ukrainian citizenship, with the right to free travel to the European Union, and the possibility of asylum in the EU.
-- The right to bring relatives, and, perhaps, friends.
-- one plot of land to build a house in Ukraine. Good location.

1000 m2 should be enough for 500 m2 plot and associated infrastructure - roads, parks, etc. Thus, 1 square km is enough for 1000 soldiers. If 100 000 soldiers surrender, a piece of land 10 km by 10 km is sufficient. There are virtually no costs to Ukraine, as this would be state owned agricultural land that turns residential. The tax income from so much residential property would cover the cost of the agricultural land in a few years.

-- one $ 10 000 cash paymemnt to buy materials and start building a house
-- a monthly stipend of $ 1000 for one year, sufficient for a decent living, finding a nice Ukrainian wife, and a good job.
-- senior officers should receive more. A larger cash bonus, perhaps a nice house, and a significant fraction of the value of the military equipment they surrender. There are so many empty house with the decreasing population all throughout Eastern Europe that the governments can afford such decisions easily.

Russians and Ukrainians are similar people, with common tradition and similar language. There are many Russians living in Ukraine and nearly all Ukrainians speak Russian. Thus, assimilating Russians into Ukrainian society is very easy. Soldiers are young, capable people and very much needed in a society like Ukraine that has a low birth rate and has lost many people to the European Union. We cannot afford to kill the best and the brightest yet again.

The cost of the above package is very low to the Ukrainian society, and, overall, a profitable deal.
Each soldier that surrenders will bring with him military equipment that is very much needed and costly. The cost of this military equipment is likely to vastly exceed the rewards.
The damage this military equipment would inflict upon Ukraine is orders of magnitude greater.

Sure, there is a risk of such soldiers becoming spies, but, this risk exists for many Ukrainians, like the millions of separatists. Thus, the overall composition and global sabotage risk in Ukrainian society would not change dramatically.

There is a good chance that, in this way, Ukraine will use the German money as a weapon and, perhaps, destabilize the Russian army and hasten the collapse of the Putin regime.

All weapons surrendered are weapons that won't be used in war. It is buying lives.

Obviously, in the advertising, perhaps the President of Ukraine should tell the truth. The Russian soldiers are children of the USSR, just like Ukrainian soldiers. They are the most valuable and loved age group in society. They are children. They are young men and women. They should grow up into old men and not kill each other or maim each other in the battle field for the sake of criminal leaders. People should find a way to stop the war now! It should be stopped before more blood is lost to the contagious madness incited by leaders who should know better than to cause and applaud such destruction!

Note: a few days later they implemented such a suggestion backed by Ukraine's defense ministry with money donated by the international IT community.

And the sanity contest is won by Pope Francis

I generally don't quote religious leaders, but today I agree with the pope -- yet again he is a voice of reason. War a 'shameful capitulation', Pope Francis says “Every war leaves our world worse than it was before. War is a failure of politics and of humanity, a shameful capitulation, a stinging defeat before the forces of evil,” the leader of the Catholic Church said in tweets published in English and Russian.

It's sad that of all our leaders he is the only one who seems sane. How have Putin, Xi, Boris, Trump (Biden is slightly better; he is way too old to lead America, but he does not appear to be mad) and others like them ended up in charge? What about the non-descript creatures that don't seem fit to lead to anything other than disaster? How can we build institutions that fail us so? I don't believe war is ever necessary. There must be a way that makes sense and does not result in such destruction. Hiram W Johnson said in 1917 that "The first casualty when war comes is truth" and this still holds true today.

Another of my favourite quotes by Pope Francis is "who am I to judge?". He said it when referring to gay people. Perhaps I am wrong to judge world leaders. But when everything I read seems so wrong, I can't help it. The UK, the US and some of the EU give automatic weapons to civilians in Ukraine and brag it's the next best thing to being there. They don't let men of fighting age leave Ukraine. All have to be part of the blood bath. The conflict will blow over in time. But when? how many will die? how far will it extend? and what will be left behind? The cold war lasted until 1991 -- a very long 50 years or so.

It is said that Nero set Rome on fire so that he could watch it burn. Some even say he played the fiddle by the light of the flames. Of course, since it happened so long ago it's unclear how much of Nero's story is true. However, it's pretty certain he was a horrible person, a criminal, and ultimately mad. But are our leaders better today? Our Neros are giving weapons to civilians and applauding each other for that. It's the only thing they could have done they say. It's like saying the only choice is to be a mad criminal. Perhaps it is, if one is a criminal and is in charge. But why do we keep them in charge? Many US presidents who started a war were reelected. So, they must be supported by the kind of people who gain from wars. They gain as long as the war is not on their soil. Perhaps that is why there are so many people in charge who are either criminals (e.g., Putin) or criminally incompetent (e.g., EU leaders). It seems to make no difference either way. The leaders in Eastern Europe merge the two categories in a brilliant show of ingenuity. And they are not even that original if one thinks of Nero and of other leaders of the past.

Dia Internacional de la Dona i la Nena a la Ciència

Our outreach staff from Institute of Cosmos Sciences at the University of Barcelona put together this video for the International Day of Women and Girls in Science. Anna and Esther did a wonderful job. Thank you!

I wear a sweater that my mom knitted some 15 years ago before she had grandchildren. She had more time for art back then.

The shameless years

When the COVID pandemic started I thought it might continue with world war III. Has it? I hope not. But I am not sure. My friends from the US write me messages of condoleances as if Romania was already lost. Is there some hidden napkin that has redivided the world? or is it a digital drawing in Ms. Paint shared on Zoom?

I look at the news and my children play with cars. They see the Russians as the bad guys. So they have a toy car that's Russian and hits the other cars. James is 5. So he sometimes takes the bad car and throws it out of the room. Ira is 1 and 1/2. He can say a few words. One of them is shoe, another is war. Edward is 11. But the young men and women from the military are never all bad or even bad on average. They are young people doing their job. I am in Spain now, but I have a ticket to return to Romania for a few weeks in March. Will the conflict escalade by then? Will it stay in Ukraine? Will I be able to go? will I be able to return?

What do I think of world politics? I think political decisions range from shameless to criminally shameless. I can say that about

-- the Monica Lewinski scandal.
-- the election of George W. Bush twice . Luckily he quit politics and switched to painting.
-- the invasion of Iraq, Syria, and Afganistan...and of other countries who had their sovereignty breached.
-- the trial against Julian Assange followed by his continued mistreatment and arrest with no regrets and no thought to appologize or simply to let him go
-- the migrants left to cross the sea in inflatable boats to escape war
-- the camps built for migrants in such a way that people leave with any price and die crossing from France to England
--the election of Donald Trump as president. He proudly stated in his electoral champaign that he could shoot sombody on 5th Avenue and be elected. He still won.
--the invasion of the US capitol by people with Bufallo horns, and the calls for the arrest of "via Getty" and the chanting of "hang Mike Pence" who retaliated by saying he won't speak with President Trump again.
--Brexit, Boris Johnson
--American's withdraw from Afganistan without prior notice or any kind of plan for those left behind and without mentioning their plan to other NATO countries followed by America's decision to simply take the Afghan relief assests without worrying about the humanitarian crisis left behind
--the management of the COVID-19 pandemic.
--the election of a comedian as president in Ukraine
--Putin's move to recognize the separatist regions in Ukraine followed by the invasion of troops
--giving automatic weapons to civilians in Ukraine.

Why give weapons to civilians? I am not a politician or an expert in anything other than the physics of stars and that of dead stars. But it seems such an awful thing to do. It justifies the murder of civilians in any number by the ocuppying army. It will lead to murders. People could shot each other by mistake. They could shoot their neighbors (some might be of Russian origin so why not shoot them dead, some might be Nazis, or Jewish, etc), their wives (there has been an increase in domestic violence during the pandemic), their children, their pets. It's like saying there are not enough deaths. We want more theater, more people to die, and yes, Ukraine will fall, its fate is decided in advance, but we want the bloodshed, we need it. Why? Russia installed pro-Russian goverments in most of Europe (e.g., in Hungary) and in the US (e.g., president Trump). It's hard to imagine they could not do so in Ukraine where they speak Russian and part of the population is of Russian origin. Is it to scare Western Europe? Russia produces 40% of Europe's gas and several pipes run through Ukraine. Who could benefit from war in Europe? China?, the US? whoelse? perhaps Russia but only if it suceeds in re-expanding?

Shouldn't the world stop the various wars and focus on dealing with climate change? i.e., work together to tackle climate change? Any kind of destruction of infrastructure is yet another proof we don't give shit about the climate. Or about each other, about freedom or human rights. War is a degradation beyond words. It's a return to a period before the stone age where people are turned into something worse than beasts. They kill each other so that some weapon manufactures get richer and so that the class divide grows even more.

The situation in Ukraine

My colleague, Valeriu Predoi, has drawn some brilliant cartoons that represent his take on the Ukraine conflict. They are the best I've seen to date, and quite representative for what's going on. He's got untapped talent!

My take: The US is weak, the EU has been beheaded through Brexit and disheartened through the retirement of Angela Merkel, and so the world is being split between Russia and China with China dominating world-wide for the COVID-19 pandemic perdiod and Russia taking over parts of Europe now to make up for its pandemic losses. The increase in oil and gas prices is just not enough for them. The media said the invasion will start on Wednesday. How nice of them to announce ahead of time so that the US citizens and the Brits can get out in time. The US and the UK are making sure their boots are out of the way, while claiming they support Ukraine. Luckily, Ukraine's president is a former comedian, and seems a level-headed person who might somehow find a way to diffuse the conflict. Of course, like all wars, this one is being spear-headed by the media, which goes as far as them making up a date for when the Russian forces would enter Ukraine. China has already increased its influence in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

I am so afraid of war. It leads to such destruction at a time when we should worry about the climate and NOT blow up things. It never makes sense to kill the best and the brigthest just for the heck of it. I have three boys. I can't imagine any of them going off to war, which is a temporary return to the stoneage. I can't imagine anything worse than having young men and women out there in the cold trying to kill or maim each other and more often than not maiming and killing civilians around them. Blowing up bridges, roads, cars, and homes makes just as little sense. All those take energy to rebuild. So, how to resolve conflict? If I could, I'd put all world leaders in a room, and let them fight it out for as many years as they chose with any weapons they care to have at their disposal.

In Demark - restrictions end: will the rest follow?

At the beginning of the year, I argued that the epidemiological situation warrants lifting all restrictions by the end of January.

This is for 2 reasons
(1) Omicron is mild, and doesn't kill

(2) Omicron is unstoppable, making restrictions pointless.

Denmark is an example of a country following my advice. Restrictions have been lifted, despite infections being at all times high and deaths pretty high as well.

For a country of 5 million people, Denmark is counting about 40 000 infections a day and 1.7 million positives overall, most of them during the latest Omicron days. As not all infections are documented and not all people test or choose to declare a home test, this means that the number of infected people is likely not far from the total Danish population. The virus obviously does the same thing everywhere. The Danes are just better at testing.

What do these numbers mean? Well, let's assume people live about 30 000 days (think of a round number a bit under 100 years x 365 days/year). A death occurring within a month of a positive test is generally counted as a COVID-19 death, regardless of other conditions. If 30 000 randomly chosen people are diagnosed today, one of them is expected dead by the end of the day and one more every day forever. Thus, a virus running at 30 000 positives a day should be running at 30 daily deaths without even doing anything as an infection.

If we look at the Danish data, Omicron has 40 000 cases and only about 20 deaths. Thus, it seems to be doing about nothing if not less than nothing.

This is strange, as any illness, no matter how mild, is expected to kill some people. The people who are supposed to die next month, should die now if they catch a cold or Omicron. Strangely, this is not what we see in the Danish data. Omicron seems to cause no deaths at all.

This is even stranger, as you expect dead people to be more frequently tested than live ones and, thus, undetected Omicron infections to be more frequent among the living than among the dead.

Sure, Denmark has a population which is well educated, well vaccinated (80% vaccinated, 60% boosted) and a good health care system.

In countries without a good medical system, you expect
-- fewer tests
-- more deaths, vaccinations are low and unvaccinated are more likely to die
-- a higher death ratio, as having fewer tests makes it more likely to miss infections in healthy people than in the dead or dying,

This we see, for example, in India where Omicron appears to infect a relatively small fraction of the population, like Delta appears to have done. This seems impossible, as the wave is going down. The only plausible mechanism is that most people are infected and therefore immune. Next wave will come when the virus mutates enough to evade immunity (antigenic drift).

Running at 100 000 cases, if the virus does nothing, we should see roughly 100 deaths a day. In India, we see about 1000, as, unlike Denmark, a lot of cases go undetected. This is not because the virus is more deadly in India: It isn't. It is most likely, less deadly, due to India's young population and poor medical system (e.g., weak people are long dead, and don't wait for COVID-19 as they do in western countries).

Conclusion: Like I said at the beginning of the year, Omicron's high transmission rate signals the end of the pandemic. We should have a restrictionless spring and summer! I am so looking forward to it.

I note that like most boring educated people, who want to travel from time to time, I am vaccinated and boosted, as are my mother and sister.

References:
https://www.dw.com/en/covid-digest-denmark-lifts-almost-all-restrictions/a-60618361
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60215200
https://edition.cnn.com/2022/02/01/europe/denmark-lifts-covid-restrictions-intl/index.html