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Why we should dive deep into studying music history

By Scott Huntington

Why should people bother to study music history or, for that matter, go on to major in it? What could you possibly gain from studying music history?

The answer to these questions might surprise you. Besides the more obvious career paths, such as musical research, publishing, and criticism, music degrees still have plenty of merit for a lot of professions out there. Check out the following statistics:

Check out the following statistics::

According to a study conducted by Georgia Tech, college students who take a minimum of one music-related elective, such as music history, have a greater likelihood (4 ½ times higher) of staying in school than the rest of the students enrolled.
Another study conducted by the University of Alabama says that when it comes to getting into medical school, students who majored in music have the best chances (compared to their peers in other majors) of being admitted.
Taking music courses has the ripple effect of helping you become better at other courses too. A team of researchers explored the connection between intelligence and music. They found that music instruction is far more effective than computer based instruction. This is especially true when it comes to developing the abstract critical thinking skills required to learn science and math.
Compared to their peers who don’t study music, music students show significantly less stress and anxiety when taking a test.

Clearly, music education has many benefits to offer, but why study the history of it? Regardless of what we do for a living, all of us are listeners who can learn from the past. We are surrounded by music on a regular basis. It’s an integral part of our culture that has ebbed and flowed in various directions over time. Learning about its history and the ways in which it has changed over time, will make our appreciation for it much greater.

When I was studying at Shepherd University, I was like most of my peers and took a music history course only because I needed it to graduate. I was new to the school and didn’t know about any of the professors, so I ended up studying with Dr. David Gonzol. It was by far the most difficult class I have ever taken, but it was also the most rewarding. When I think back to college, every once in a while I’ll think about my time at the other college I attended (Vista College), my creative media classes, or hanging out with friends. Usually though, I’ll think about that music history class.

Dr. Gonzol struck me as strange at first, as he would abruptly lead the class in songs, dress in his graduation robe and even break out his bass recorder. As time went on, I began to get it and truly understand that this wasn’t just a class I had to take in order to graduate, but rather an incredibly important class.

I realized how absurd it was, that I was attempting to become a professional musician without even knowing how the music I was studying was linked to the past. I can’t imagine movie directors being clueless about the beginning of film or a professional hockey player getting by without studying the greats who came before him. Yet, here I was, ignorant about the past.

An example of early Western music staff notation. Jan Verdonck, bass part from ‘Godt is mijn licht’, 1571. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons.

As the class went on, one thing that really stuck with me was the importance of having a well-rounded education. As a percussionist, I was used to the concept of being well-rounded, since I had to be solid in so many different instruments. It wouldn’t matter how great a marimba player I was if I didn’t have any snare drum chops or ignored the surprisingly difficult techniques of playing a soft buzz roll on a tambourine. In the same way, I could never be a truly accomplished musician until I had a thorough understanding of things like music theory and music history. Dr. Gonzol explained it best by saying:

Photo courtesy of David Gonzol

“All the best professional and amateur musicians, from Ella Fitzgerald to Paul McCartney, Adolph Herseth to Johann Sebastian Bach and Clara Schumann to Jean Ritchie, all made sure to know their field thoroughly and well. They knew their own performing skills, other performers, the repertoire, the history, the theory, the business, the culture, the people, everything. One can sing a melody or play a harmony, only if one really understands how those melodies or harmonies have been valued in their particular culture. How they have been performed, thought about, composed, improvised, listened to, danced to and worshipped to. Truly successful musicians understand all their music because they worked hard at becoming terrifically well-rounded. As cellist Lynn Harrell once said to a sixth-grade boy, ‘There are no shortcuts.’”

Music history is significant; it has value.

Perhaps Anthony Storr, author of Music and the Mind, said it best: “Music exalts life, enhances life and gives it meaning. Great music outlives the individual who created it. It is both personal and beyond the personal. For those who love it, it remains as a fixed point of reference in an unpredictable world. Music is a source of reconciliation, exhilaration, and hope which never fails.”

Now isn’t that something you want to dive deep into? It’s time to stop treating music history as a list of dead composers and understand how much we can learn from it. Once you do, you’ll have a brand new appreciation for music of all kinds.

Scott Huntington is a percussionist specializing in marimba. He’s also a writer, reporter and blogger. He lives in Pennsylvania with his wife and son and does Internet marketing for WebpageFX in Harrisburg. Scott strives to play music whenever and wherever possible. Follow him on Twitter at @SMHuntington.

Oxford Music Online is the gateway offering users the ability to access and cross-search multiple music reference resources in one location. With Grove Music Online as its cornerstone, Oxford Music Online also contains The Oxford Companion to Music, The Oxford Dictionary of Music, and The Encyclopedia of Popular Music.

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The legacy of the Superconducting Super Collider

By Stephen Blyth

Almost exactly 20 years ago, on 19 October 1993, the US House of Representatives voted 264 to 159 to reject further financing for the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC), the particle accelerator being built under Texas. Two billion dollars had already been spent on the Collider, and its estimated total cost had grown from $4.4bn to $11bn; a budget saving of $9bn beckoned. Later that month President Clinton signed the bill officially terminating the project.

This was not good news for two of my Harvard roommates, PhD students in theoretical physics. Seeing the academic job market for physicists collapsing around them, they both found employment at a large investment bank in New York in the nascent field of quantitative finance. It was their assertion that derivative markets, whatever in fact they were, seemed mathematically challenging that catalyzed my own move to Wall Street from an academic career.

The cohort of PhDs in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics that moved to finance from academia in the early 1990s (a cohort I have called the “SSC generation”) sparked a remarkable growth in the sophistication and complexity of financial markets. They built models which enabled banks and hedge funds to price and trade complex financial instruments called derivatives, contracts whose value derives from the levels of other financial variables, such as the price of the Japanese Yen or a collection of mortgages on apartments in Florida. They created a new subject, known as financial engineering or quantitative finance, and a brand new career path, that of quantitative analyst (“quant”), a vocation that became so popular — for its monetary rewards certainly, but also for its dynamism and innovation — that by June 2008, 28% of graduating Harvard seniors going into full time employment were heading to finance.

However, just as some investors in 2007-2008 were questioning the inexorable rise in house prices and the potential for a market bubble, so too were many students questioning their own career choices, sensing the possibility of a career bubble. As Harvard University President Drew Faust said in her first address to the senior class in June 2008, “You repeatedly asked me: Why are so many of us going to Wall Street?”

Three months later, both market and career bubbles collapsed as Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy. In the midst of the financial crisis, on 3 October 2008, the House of Representatives voted 263 to 171 to pass the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, authorizing the Treasury secretary to spend $700bn — roughly 65 Super Colliders — to purchase distressed assets.

What went wrong? While the causes of the financial crisis have been widely debated, it is clear that many financial engineers were caught in what I have termed the “quant delusion,” an over-confidence in and over-reliance on mathematical models. The edifice of quantitative finance built over 15 years by the SSC generation was dramatically rocked by the events of 2008. Fundamental logical arguments that practitioners had taken for granted were shown not to hold. Decades of modeling advances were revealed to be invalid or thrown into question.

It is hard to prove a direct causal link between the cancellation of the SSC, the rise of financial engineering, and the chaos of 2008. However, if some roots of the financial crisis can be traced, however distantly, to October 1993, might one consequence of the financial crisis itself be a healthy reassessment of career choices amongst graduates?

I encounter evolving attitudes among students in the class that I teach at Harvard, Statistics 123, “Applied Quantitative Finance”. Many still plan a future on Wall Street, and are motivated by the mathematical challenges and dynamic environment ahead of them. Some are interested in the elegant mathematical and probabilistic theory that underlies derivatives markets, and are keen to understand the way of thinking that exists on Wall Street. Others appreciate that they have a broad range of equally compelling career options, whether in technology, life sciences, climate science, or fundamental research, and take my course simply because they have enjoyed their introduction to probability and want to experience one of its most compelling applications.

Stephen Blyth is Professor of the Practice of Statistics at Harvard University, and Managing Director at the Harvard Management Company. His book, An Introduction to Quantitative Finance, was published by Oxford University Press in November 2013.

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Image credit: graphs and charts. © studiocasper via iStockphoto.

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13 things you need to know about the 27 Club

As of 1 January 2014, 27 years have passed since the first edition of the Grove Dictionary of American Music was published. In those 27 years, The Beatles sold two billion albums, Michael Jackson died, and Simon Cowell had the excellent foresight to create One Direction. While many notable music events have transpired over the past 27 years, the number ‘27’ holds an eerie identity within the music industry. The term ‘27 club’ was coined to recognize the alarming number of musicians who have died at 27 years of age. To honor both the number of years that have passed between editions as well as bring light to this strange phenomenon amongst musicians, here are 13 things you need to know about the American members in the 27 Club.

Never one to conform, Jimi Hendrix learned to play the guitar upside down because he was left handed. He would continue to play the instrument this way throughout his career.
In 1969, one year before his death, Jimi Hendrix was the highest paid musician at Woodstock.
Jimi Hendrix died of asphyxiation 18 September 1970. Hendrix’s autopsy revealed that the singer had ingested nine Vesparax sleeping pills, 18 times the recommended dose.
Even though revered blues artist, Robert Leroy Johnson, did not sell much music before his untimely death on the 8 May 1911, a two-set CD released of his music in 1990 sold over 500,000 copies.
The cause of death for Robert Johnson still remains unknown, but his sudden and mysterious death at 27 has been rumored to have been caused by a poisoned drink!
Janis Joplin, lead singer of the Kozmic Blues Band and Full Tilt Boogie Band, once smashed a bottle of Southern Comfort over fellow 27 club member Jim Morrisson’s head.
Janis Joplin drove a 356C Porsche which she paid $3,500 for in 1965. Unlike other porsches on the road, Joplin’s was completely covered in psychedelic design.
While it is generally accepted that Janis Joplin died of an overdose on 4 October 1970, some maintain that her death is attributed to a tainted batch of heroin as many other of her dealer’s clients also overdosed that week.
Instead of a traditional funeral, Janis Joplin’s will allotted $2,500 to be spent on a party in her honor. The party was held at the Lion’s Share club in San Anselmo California on 26 October 1971. The Grateful Dead played for most of the party while guests were treated to an open bar in honor of Janis.
Kurt Cobain, lead singer of punk-rock band Nirvanna, was wed to Courtney Love on 14 February 1992. Cobain donned green checkered pajamas in favor of a traditional tuxedo.
Kurt Cobain’s body was found in his home on 5 April 1994. Cobain’s suicide note quoted a Neil Young lyric saying “It’s better to burn out than fade away”.
Choosing not to pursue his film degree from UCLA, Jim Morrison teamed up with Ray Manzarek to form The Doors, a title inspired by Aldous Huxley’s book The Doors of Perception.
There was never an autopsy for The Doors singer-songwriter Jim Morrison after he was found dead in a bathtub in Paris on 3 July 1971. French Law did not require autopsies for deaths free from foul-play.

For more information about these famed members, consult the Grove Dictionary of American Music 2 ed.

The Grove Dictionary of American Music, Second Edition is the largest, most comprehensive reference publication on American Music. Twenty-five years ago, the four volumes of the first edition of the dictionary initiated a great expansion in American music scholarship. This second edition reflects the growth in scholarship the first edition initiated.

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Image credit: Los Angeles, United States – October 1, 2011: The Hollywood Walk of Fame is a long walkway with two sidewalks That run along the Hollywood Boulevard, there are over two thousand five-pointed stars in a brass bearing the names of celebrities including the famous guitarist Jimi Hendrix. © martaland via iStockphoto.

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The Epiphany: the original celebration of Christ’s coming into the world

By Philip Pfatteicher

Some would say the Church has lost the battle over Christmas. Continued insistence that we “put Christ back into Christmas” is futile, and instead of wasting time on that campaign it would be much more useful to emphasize the original celebration of Christ’s coming into the world: the Feast of the Epiphany on the 6th of January.

Baptism of Christ, 1497. Church of the Assumption of the Mother of God, Kyrillo-Byelozhersk. Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

The festival of Epiphany originated in the Eastern Church, where it retains its importance, and then spread to the West. In its origin, Epiphany was a celebration of beginnings: the baptism of Jesus, which was his authorization for his public ministry, and his first miracle at Cana in Galilee, when he “showed forth his glory,” as St. John says. As the festival developed, it became a celebration of these two events, together with the visit of the mysterious Magi. A wonderful antiphon weaves the three into one:

“Three mysteries mark this holy day. Today the star leads the Magi to the infant Christ, today water is changed into wine for the wedding feast, today Christ wills to be baptized by John in the river Jordan to bring us salvation.”

Another antiphon ties the three events together even more tightly, and with interpretation:

“Today the Bridegroom claims his bride, the Church, since Christ has washed away her sins in the waters of the Jordan; the Magi hasten to the royal wedding; and the wedding guests rejoice, for Christ has changed water into wine.”

The feast proclaims the manifestation of Christ to the world: to its waters which he cleansed when he was baptized in the Jordan, to his people who are invited to the marriage of heaven and earth, and to the representatives of the nations in the form of the three kings who come to adore and pay homage to their sovereign.

There are abundant riches in this great feast to ponder and celebrate and enjoy.

Philip H. Pfatteicher is Professor of English and Religious Studies Emeritus, East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania and sometime Adjunct Professor of Sacred Music at Duquesne University. He is the author of Journey into the Heart of God: Living the Liturgical Year. Read his previous posts on the Holy Cross and on Advent.

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The Sister Wives make the case for abolishing civil marriage

By Edward Zelinsky

Judge Clark Waddoups of the US District Court for the District of Utah has declared unconstitutional parts of Utah’s statute outlawing polygamy. Utah’s statute was challenged in Judge Waddoups’ courtroom by the Brown family of the television show Sister Wives. Days later, Judge Robert J. Shelby, also of the US District Court for the District of Utah, declared unconstitutional Utah’s Amendment 3, which restricts Utah’s definition of marriage to a man and a woman.

The decisions of Judges Waddoups and Shelby should provoke debate about the benefits of abolishing civil marriage. Abolishing civil marriage would recognize the cultural and legal reality that civil marriage is no longer the exclusive, perhaps even predominant, framework for forming intimate family relationships. The one-size-fits-all design of civil marriage fails to account for the diversity of practice and views in modern America.

The Browns are a polygamist clan, consisting of Kody Brown and his four wives, Meri Brown, Janelle Brown, Christine Brown, and Robyn Brown. Kody is legally married to Meri. With Janelle, Christine, and Robyn, Kody has spiritual marriages recognized by the Apostolic United Brethren to which the Browns belong. Together, Mr. Brown and the four Mrs. Browns have seventeen children. The Apostolic United Brethren recognizes as religious marriages the kind of noncoercive, plural arrangement entered into by consenting adults such as the Browns.

Judge Waddoups did not invalidate Utah’s statutory prohibition on multiple marriages. He did rule unconstitutional Utah’s statutory prohibition of cohabitation. That prohibition makes it illegal for a married person to live with a person other than his or her one legally-recognized spouse. Utah, the judge found, does not construe or enforce this prohibition in an “operationally neutral” fashion. Rather, the statutory ban on cohabitation, as implemented by Utah, is targeted at families like the Browns, members of “religious polygamist communities.” It violates the First Amendment, Judge Waddoups concluded, for Utah to “criminaliz[e] religious cohabitation but not adulterous cohabitation.”

Moreover, while Utah authorities say they do not intend to prosecute the Browns, Utah has interpreted its anti-polygamy statute as outlawing arrangements like the Brown household since Janelle, Christine and Robyn, to whom Kody is not civilly married, have entered into religious unions with him. Judge Waddoups declared that Utah’s anti-polygamy law must be construed to prevent only multiple civil marriages and as not interfering with purely religious unions like Kody’s relationships with Janelle, Christine, and Robyn.

In Judge Shelby’s courtroom, four same-sex couples challenged Utah’s decision to deny them the ability to marry civilly. Judge Shelby agreed, invalidating on equal protection and due process grounds Utah’s Amendment 3, which had been passed overwhelmingly by the Utah electorate to outlaw same-sex marriage under Utah’s state constitution.

At one level, Utah’s laws and the challenges to them are peculiar products of Utah’s particular history and demographics. However, the decisions of Judges Waddoups and Shelby should not be so easily dismissed. Rather, those decisions highlight the need to deregulate marriage in the 21st century. In a world without civil marriage, the state would not define, regulate or recognize marriage. Instead, marriage — the structured, publicly-proclaimed, communally-supported relationship of mutual commitment — would be defined contractually by the participants in the marriage, typically under the guidance of religious and other culture-shaping institutions.

It is no longer sensible or feasible for the state to define the family through the institution of civil marriage. We should accordingly deregulate it and thereby get the state out of the business of declaring what (and is not) a bona fide family. Deregulating marriage in this manner would recognize the legal and cultural reality of 21st century America. Abolishing civil marriage would also strengthen the institution of marriage by encouraging robust competition in the market for different forms of marriage. Traditional monogamous marriage, promoted by entrepreneurial religious leaders, could emerge from this competition as the big winner.

Consider in this context “covenant marriage,” a proposal to tighten the monogamous marriage commitment by making divorce more difficult. While several states have agreed to extend to couples the option of covenant marriage, most, so far, have not. In a world without civil marriage, a couple could contract to enter into a covenant marriage, if that were their desire. The advocates of covenant marriage, instead of spending their time and energy lobbying legislatures, could more profitably invest their efforts advocating among couples for their form of stricter monogamous marriage.

A world without civil marriage would not be a one without domestic relations law. We need vigorous law and vigorous law enforcement to protect the underaged, the coerced, and the defrauded. When marriages or other living arrangements break up without the parties having contracted for that possibility, the law will need to provide default rules concerning income, property, and off-spring. However, such rules should not utilize the now-archaic notion of civil marriage.

On a variety of levels, the Browns’ family arrangement strikes me as dysfunctional. But, as Utah acknowledges, Mr. Brown and the four Mrs. Browns are adults who have voluntarily entered into that arrangement.

The opinions of Judges Waddoups and Shelby confirm that it is not the job of the state to tell consenting adults how to organize their families. That is a task for consenting adults to undertake themselves with whatever guidance they seek or accept from religious and cultural institutions. Abolishing civil marriage would properly remove from the state the role of defining marriage and the family in 21st century America.

Edward A. Zelinsky is the Morris and Annie Trachman Professor of Law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law of Yeshiva University. He is the author of The Origins of the Ownership Society: How The Defined Contribution Paradigm Changed America. His monthly column appears on the OUPblog.

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Image credit: ‘Sister Wives: Season 4′ Promotional Image via TLC. Used for the purposes of illustration.

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                Related StoriesA New Year’s Resolution: to think hard about environmental issuesWhat can we learn from economic policy disasters?Public debt, GDP growth, and austerity: why Reinhart and Rogoff are wrong 

A New Year’s Resolution: to think hard about environmental issues

By Liz Fisher

I sit here writing this on New Year’s Day. Looking back at 2013 it has been a year in which there has been a growing disjunction between academic discourse and political discourse over environmental issues. On the one hand academic and scholarly discourses have become more sophisticated. Sophisticated in this regard is not another word for pretentious. What I mean is that such discourses are increasingly becoming more nuanced and rigorous so as to get to what Garrett Hardin once described as ‘the nature of things’. The starting assumption is that environmental problems are complex, uncertain, value laden and polycentric and do not yield to simple solutions. As this is the case, responses need to be careful, calibrated and constantly under scrutiny. Scholarship is thus stressing the fundamental importance of critical reflection and hard thinking. There are countless examples of this and I am always reminded of it when I am editing articles for the Journal of Environmental Law. These articles are not rushed diagnoses with simplistic treatments. Rather the majority of them require the reader to think harder and more carefully about a problem and possible responses to it than that reader thought was necessary. This is particularly when the agreed frames for action in relation to environmental problems does not exist.

At the same time, political discourse over environmental issues in some jurisdictions is moving in another direction — a direction in which the way in which environmental problems are framed has three distinct aspects — all of which jar with academic discourse. The first I have noted before on this blog: the way in which environmental law is perceived as at odds with economic growth. This characterization is deeply problematic for the very obvious reason that human society is ultimately limited by the capacity of the natural environment to sustain what we do. Perceiving environmental law as an economic threat flies in the face of the rich literature on sustainable development. I don’t pretend that that literature is an easy read or there are simple solutions — but that is exactly my point above. The impact of environmental law scholarship is that it makes clear that these are difficult problems that require responses that acknowledge that fact.

That relates to what I find the second jarring feature of some current political debate. The way in which environmental protection regimes are being characterized as a luxury that in straightened economic times we must do without. As such, I feel environmental law is being understood as a bar of chocolate or day trips that a family decides to forgo so as to make their budget balance. The problem of course is environmental protection is not really like a day out to the zoo or a jar of sweets. It is more akin to good dental hygiene, insurance, or maintaining your car. These things do cost but if you don’t manage these issues properly you store problems up for the future.

The final aspect of current political discourse that is at odds with scholarly discourse is the way in which debate over ‘the facts’ in relation to an environmental problem is being carried out. Scientific uncertainty is a feature of environmental problems, not least because as a society we are trying to predict what will happen in the future. As this is the case, the explicit engagement with scientific uncertainty is a feature of most disciplines that deal with environmental problems. As this is the case, scholarly discourse is less about uncovering the right set of facts but about crafting the best methods and best approaches to determining our ‘objective’ understanding of the world. Yet much political debate tends to pivot around an assumption that either one political side or the other is wielding the ‘correct facts’. This results in the significance of intricate scientific practices and institutional frameworks being sidelined.

The end result of all of this is the rolling back of environmental protection regimes in some jurisdictions. This is both explicitly and implicitly. The best explicit example can be seen the dismantling of the comprehensive regulatory scheme that Australia set up to deal with climate change and replace it with a more ‘voluntary approach’. Crucial to this process was the framing of a complex trading scheme as a ‘tax’. A good implicit example is the set of planning reforms introduced in the last two years in the United Kingdom. Thus while the new National Planning Policy Framework does state the importance of environmental protection, the definition of sustainable development clearly favours economic growth. In highlighting these examples, I am not arguing we should not reflect on the state of environmental laws and how they can be better (when ‘better’ is a multifaceted concept) but such reform must be on the basis of reflective discourse.

So sitting here on New Year’s Day, the issue of New Year’s resolutions comes to mind. I am slightly hesitant in regards to such resolutions, particularly in relation to an issue as large and complex as environmental protection. Resolutions in relation to my own action are trivial and demanding others make resolutions in relation to their own actions is a bit like telling my children that their New Year’s resolutions will be to clean their teeth properly and to think about their maths homework more carefully. But all of the above is less about action in relation to environmental problems (although that is important) and more about how we understand such problems. So let me make a suggestion — that we all try and engage in critical reflection in regards to environmental problems over the next year, and more importantly encourage others to do the same. This type of discussion will not result in magic bullets in relation to environmental problems. But what it will result in is an understanding that such magic bullets do not exist and that environmental problems need to dealt with and require careful analysis and measured debate.

Liz Fisher is General Editor of the Journal of Environmental Law and Reader of Environmental Law in the Faculty of Law, University of Oxford.

The Journal of Environmental Law celebrated its 25th Anniversary in 2013 and a special Anniversary issue of reflective pieces ‘Environmental Law: Looking Backwards, Looking Forwards’. The special issue considers the nature of ‘hot environmental law’ and the role of environmental law scholarship.

The Journal of Environmental Law has established an international reputation as a lively and authoritative source of informed analysis for all those active in examining evolving legal responses to environmental problems in national and international jurisdictions. Appearing three times annually, the Journal is a rigorously peer-reviewed forum dedicated to publishing significant articles across a wide environmental law spectrum, seeking out innovative and authoritative appraisals of policy and practice, alongside current and emerging legal concepts.

Oxford University Press is a leading publisher in international law, including the Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law, latest titles from thought leaders in the field, and a wide range of law journals and online products. We publish original works across key areas of study, from humanitarian to international economic to environmental law, developing outstanding resources to support students, scholars, and practitioners worldwide. For the latest news, commentary, and insights follow the International Law team on Twitter @OUPIntLaw.

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Image credit: A hiker standing on top of a large rock at Hound Tor in Dartmoor England overlooking a valley. © Rich Legg via iStockphoto.

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                Related StoriesCatch statistics are fishyPublic debt, GDP growth, and austerity: why Reinhart and Rogoff are wrongI spy, you spy 

Catch statistics are fishy

By Dalal Al-Abdulrazzak

Despite their wide usage, global fisheries catch data compiled by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) are questionable.

In our study, we use Google Earth satellite images to examine fish weirs, a type of trap that works with the changing tides. Using the Persian Gulf as a case study, we combine the estimated number of traps—which accounts for likely present, but unseen traps—with assumptions about their daily catch and fishing season length to estimate annual catches for the region that are up to six times more than what is officially reported but Gulf countries.

These results, which provide the first example of fisheries catch estimates from space, speak to the potential of satellite technologies for monitoring fisheries remotely, particularly in areas that were once considered too dangerous or expensive for fisheries surveillance and enforcement. For example, we were able to reveal and account for 17 illegal operating traps in Qatar, and suggest that similar methods can be used to expose other illegal marine practices such as monitoring activities in Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) and assessing the magnitude of oil spills.

Because of the near global coverage of satellite imagery, and because images are repeatedly captured over the same area, our methodology can easily be adapted to other fixed gears and provides a cost-effective way to monitor large areas of the ocean. By coupling satellite images with robust data we are able to more accurately assess human impacts in marine ecosystems (however it is still up to people to better manage these impacts).

Numerous other studies have also shown that fish catches are not what the national agencies report, often due to limited resources, historical legacies, or political interference. For example, when biological models could not explain the global increases in fish catches, scientists realized that Chinese officials were intentionally inflating their catch statistics. When these figures were accounted for, models showed that global catches were in fact decreasing, not increasing.

Misreporting catch data has non-trivial consequences that extend far beyond fisheries sustainability and can lead to policy decisions that jeopardize food security, underestimate the contribution of small-scale fisheries to rural food security and GDP, and potentially lead to overoptimistic management plans or between-country access agreements.

Dalal Al-Abdulrazzak is PhD Candidate at the University of British Columbia’s Fisheries Centre where she is researching long-term changes in the marine ecosystems and fisheries of the Persian Gulf. Along with Daniel Pauly, she is co-author of the paper ‘Managing fisheries from space: Google Earth improves of distant fish catches’ in the ICES Journal of Marine Science.

The ICES Journal of Marine Science publishes articles, short communications, and critical reviews that contribute to our scientific understanding of marine systems and the impact of human activities. The Journal serves as a foundation for scientific advice across the broad spectrum of management and conservation issues related to the marine environment.

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Image credit: Satellite image of the Persian Gulf. By NASA [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

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What can we learn from economic policy disasters?

Is it morbid or therapeutic to analyze the economic catastrophes of the past? What critical strategies can be imported from the realms of medicine and military history to the study of the current state of the economy? Richard Grossman, author of Wrong: Nine Economic Policy Disasters and What We Can Learn From Them, skillfully dissects the cadavers of economic policies. In the following videos he argues why it is cogent to examine the economic policy disasters of the past and how potential antidotes to current financial maladies can be located by carefully diagnosing economic policy missteps throughout history.

How the living can learn from the dead in economics:

Click here to view the embedded video.

What we can learn about economics from the Irish potato famine:

Click here to view the embedded video.

On the state of the economy:

Click here to view the embedded video.

What we should expect from our politicians in regards to economic policy:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Richard S. Grossman is the Professor of Economics at Wesleyan University and a Visiting Scholar at the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard University. He is the author of Wrong: Nine Economic Policy Disasters and What We Can Learn From Them and Unsettled Account: The Evolution of Banking in the Industrialized World since 1800. Read his previous blog posts and follow him on Twitter @RSGrossman.

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Celebrate National Trivia Day with Oxford trivia

Today, Saturday the 4th of January, is National Trivia Day. We may employ a few competitive pub quiz champs in our offices, so we gathered together a few trivia questions from our resources to play a game. Why not bring these puzzlers to your next Trivia Night and let us know how it goes?

Oxford Trivia Questions

In which Spanish city did George Orwell arrive on Boxing Day 1936 in order to offer his services to the Spanish Republic in the Civil War?

Whose Alfoxden Journal was begun in January 1798?

Only one of King Henry VIII’s and Catherine of Aragon’s children survived into adulthood and took the English throne. Who were they?

What animal does the Buddha talk of in his story of the former king of Sāvatthī and his blind subjects?

Following which famous publication did psychology expand to include the functions as well as the structures of consciousness?

What part of the frog do the three witches throw in their cauldron in Shakespeare’s Macbeth?

In Shakespeare’s Othello what does Othello accuse Desdemona of giving to Cassio?

Whose birthday was being celebrated when the famous crack in the Liberty Bell first appeared?

What southern state is predicted to outgrow New York in terms of population in 2014?

What did the slang term ‘dudes’ mean in the 16th century?

Triviidae (Trivia family). Photo by David Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA. Creative Commons License via Wikimedia Commons.

Oxford Trivia Questions and Answers

In which Spanish city did George Orwell arrive on Boxing Day 1936 in order to offer his services to the Spanish Republic in the Civil War?

ANSWER: Barcelona


From George Orwell: English Rebel by Robert Colls.

Whose Alfoxden Journal was begun in January 1798?

ANSWER: Dorothy Wordsworth


From William and Dorothy Wordsworth: All in Each Other by Lucy Newlyn.

Only one of King Henry VIII’s and Catherine of Aragon’s children survived into adulthood and took the English throne. Who were they?

ANSWER: Mary I


From The Children of Henry VIII by John Guy.

What animal does the Buddha talk of in his story of the former king of Sāvatthī and his blind subjects?

ANSWER: An elephant.


From Buddhism: A Very Short Introduction, “Chapter 1: Buddhism and elephants,” available on Very Short Introductions Online:

“A former king of the town of Sāvatthī, he related, ordered all his blind subjects to be assembled and divided into groups. Each group was then taken to an elephant and introduced to a different part of the animal—the head, trunk, legs, tail, and so forth. Afterwards, the king asked each group to describe the nature of the beast. Those who had made contact with the head described an elephant as a water pot; those familiar with the ears likened the animal to a winnowing basket; those who had touched a leg said an elephant was like a post, and those who had felt a tusk insisted an elephant was shaped like a peg. The groups then fell to arguing amongst themselves, each insisting its definition was correct and all the others were wrong.”

Following which famous publication did psychology expand to include the functions as well as the structures of consciousness?

ANSWER: The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin in 1859.


From Psychology: A Very Short Introduction, “Chapter 1: What is psychology? How do you study it?,” available on Very Short Introductions Online:

“…following the publication by Charles Darwin of The Origin of Species in 1859, the scope of psychology expanded to include the functions as well as the structures of consciousness. Mental structures and functions are still of central interest to psychologists today, but using introspection for studying them has obvious limitations…”

What part of the frog do the three witches throw in their cauldron in Shakespeare’s Macbeth?

ANSWER: The toe.


From The Oxford Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Macbeth, available from Oxford Scholarly Editions Online:

“Fillet of a fenny snake


In the cauldron boil and bake;


Eye of newt, and toe of frog,


Wool of bat, and tongue of dog;”

In Shakespeare’s Othello what does Othello accuse Desdemona of giving to Cassio?

ANSWER: A handkerchief.


From The Oxford Shakespeare: Othello, the Moor of Venice, available from Oxford Scholarly Editions Online:

“DESDEMONA: What’s the matter?


OTHELLO: That handkerchief which I so loved and gave thee,


Thou gav’st to Cassio.


DESDEMONA: No, by my life and soul—


Send for the man, and ask him.”

Whose birthday was being celebrated when the famous crack in the Liberty Bell first appeared?

ANSWER: George Washington’s — celebrated in February 1846


From American Civil Religion: What Americans Hold Sacred by Peter Gardella

What southern state is predicted to outgrow New York in terms of population in 2014?

ANSWER: Florida.


Listen to a clip with Social Explorer creator and sociology professor, Andrew Beveridge, from The Takeaway show for more.

What did the slang term ‘dudes’ mean in the 16th century?

ANSWER: Clothes.


Discover more fashion history with the Berg Fashion Library.

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide.

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Public debt, GDP growth, and austerity: why Reinhart and Rogoff are wrong

By Robert Pollin

In 2010, the Harvard University economics professors Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff published a paper in the American Economic Review, “Growth in a Time of Debt,” that spoke to the world’s biggest policy question: should we cut public spending to control the deficit or use the state to rekindle economic growth? This paper subsequently served as an important intellectual bulwark in support of austerity policies in the United States and Europe. It has been frequently cited by major economic policymakers, including the US Congressman Paul Ryan, the UK Chancellor George Osborne, and Olli Rehn, the leading economic official of the European Commission. Indeed, the Economics Nobel Laureate and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman observed that “Reinhart-Rogoff may have had more immediate influence on public debate than any previous paper in the history of economics.”

However, my co-authors Thomas Herndon and Michael Ash and I showed, initially in an April 2013 preliminary working paper of the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) titled “Does High Public Debt Consistently Stifle Economic Growth,” that several of the critical findings advanced in the Reinhart-Rogoff paper were wrong. Our working paper set off an intense global debate through much of the spring of 2013, including multiple responses by Reinhart and Rogoff themselves, and rejoinders by my co-authors and I.

Now, in a final, fully refereed version of our paper, with the same title and published online in December 2013 with the Cambridge Journal of Economics, we examine these questions further, by expanding the range of our critique of the Reinhart-Rogoff research, and addressing the responses advanced by Reinhart and Rogoff in response to our initial working paper. Reinhart and Rogoff have referred to this debate as an “academic kerfuffle,” yet we think the debate has been constructive because it has brought greater clarity over the ideas shaping austerity policies in both the United States and Europe. We would welcome a formal substantive response by Reinhart and Rogoff to our published CJE paper.

The Reinhart-Rogoff research is best known for its result that, across a broad range of countries and historical periods, economic growth declines dramatically when a country’s level of public debt exceeds 90% of gross domestic product. Working with the Reinhart-Rogoff data set, we show that there is no evidence to support this claim.

First, in their work with a sample of 20 advanced economies over 1946-2009, they report that average (i.e. the mean figure in formal statistical terms) annual GDP growth ranges between about 3% and 4% when the ratio of public debt to GDP is below 90%. But they claimed that average growth collapses to -0.1% when the ratio rises above a 90% threshold.

However, Herndon, Ash, and I show that these results were based on three sets of mistakes: (1) exclusion of some of the available data; (2) coding errors with their working Excel spreadsheet; and (3) inappropriate methods for averaging statistics to produce their overall results. For example, because of these data-handling problems, a one-year experience in New Zealand in 1951, during which economic growth was -7.6% and the public debt level was high, ends up exerting a major influence on their overall findings. Indeed, this 1951 experience in New Zealand exerted equal influence on their overall findings as 19 years in which the UK economy operated with high public debt/GDP ratios. The UK economy experienced postwar growth at an average rate of 2.4% over these 19 years.

When we performed accurate recalculations using Reinhart-Rogoff’s dataset, we found that, when countries’ debt-to-GDP ratio exceeds 90%, average growth is 2.2%, not -0.1%. We also found that the relationship between growth and public debt varies widely over time and between countries. For example, for the years 2000 to 2009, the average GDP growth rate for countries carrying public debt levels greater than 90% of GDP was either comparable to or higher than those for countries whose public debt/GDP ratios ranged between 30 and 90% .

In their response to our April 2013 working paper, Reinhart and Rogoff say that their incorrect GDP growth figures, based on average (i.e. mean) GDP growth rate calculations, were never what they had emphasized in any case, either in the 2010 paper itself or subsequently. They argued that they had always given more credence to the alternative measures of GDP growth reported in their 2010 paper, which are the median figures (medians being another way to measure central tendencies in data). Most importantly, they observed that, using either our corrected average figures or the medians from their 2010 paper, GDP growth declines by about one percentage point when the public debt/GDP ratio crosses the 90% threshold.

Yet there were serious problems with Reinhart and Rogoff’s response. The most obvious was that the median GDP growth figures they reported in their 2010 paper are distorted by the same errors that affected their average growth figures. Indeed, in an “Errata” memorandum responding to our working paper, when Reinhart-Rogoff themselves corrected their Excel coding error and included all the data for all countries in their spreadsheet, the differences in median economic growth rates falls by only 0.4 percentage points between countries whose public debt/GDP ratio was between 60-90% and those where the ratio was over 90%—from 2.9 to 2.5% median GDP growth. In other words, based on Reinhart-Rogoff’s own recalculations in their Errata memo, we actually see, with their preferred median figures, still stronger evidence that there is no significant drop off in growth when a country passes the 90% public debt/GDP threshold. Reinhart-Rogoff themselves do not highlight this result in their Errata memo.

Reinhart and Rogoff also initially defended their 2010 findings by referring to the results with their dataset spanning 220 years, from 1790-2009. However, as we show in our CJE paper, they made the same statistical errors generating these 220-year calculations, and their results are similarly distorted. For example, with the 1790-2009 data, a one-year experience in Norway in the 60-90% public debt/GDP category—when economic growth happened to be an exceptionally high 10.2%—is accorded equal weight with 23 years in Canada, 35 years for Austria, 42 years for Italy, and 47 for Spain. We show that when properly recalculated, there is no difference at all in the average GDP growth rates over 1790-2009 for the countries in Reinhart-Rogoff’s dataset in which public debt ranges between 90-120% relative to countries in which public debt/GDP fell between 60-90%.

What does our critique of the Reinhart-Rogoff research mean in terms of economic policy? Consider a situation in which a country is approaching the threshold of a 90% public debt/GDP ratio. It is simply not accurate to assume that these countries are reaching a danger point where economic growth is likely to decline precipitously.

Rather, our corrected evidence shows that a country’s growth may be somewhat slower once it moves past the 90% public debt-to-GDP level. But we cannot count on this being true under all, or even most, circumstances. Are we considering the US demobilization after World War II or New Zealand experiencing a severe one-year recession? Our evidence shows that one needs to ask these and similar questions, including whether slow growth was the cause or consequence of higher public debt, before we can draw meaningful conclusions.

More generally, as my co-authors and I write in concluding our CJE paper, “policymakers cannot defend austerity measures on the grounds that public debt levels greater than 90% of GDP will consistently produce sharp declines in economic growth.”

Robert Pollin is Distinguished Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and Co-Director of the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI). He is the co-author of “Does high public debt consistently stifle economic growth? A critique of Reinhart and Rogoff” (available to read for free for a limited time) with Thomas Herndon and Michael Ash in the Cambridge Journal of Economics.

The Cambridge Journal of Economics, founded in 1977 in the traditions of Marx, Keynes, Kalecki, Joan Robinson and Kaldor, provides a forum for theoretical, applied, policy and methodological research into social and economic issues.

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Image credit: Wooden clamp pinching a penny. © jsolie via iStockphoto.

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