prior probability

I could not help but contemplate our mortality as well as our moral obligations to our ancestors after visiting the great monoliths of Rapa Nui (Easter Island), so among other things, I revised and corrected my homage to my father during my travels and have now posted my work to SSRN; see here. (As an aside, although I blame President Kennedy for the Bay of Pigs disaster, I would be willing to submit my claim to an information market like the World Truth League.)

Although this year’s “Christmas in July” gift is for a specialized audience, I would still like to shout out a call for proposals (see here or here) from the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies. The deadline is this Friday, 26 July.

Update (7/26): I just submitted a session proposal titled “Adam Smith Problems” based on my co-authored work (with Salim Rashid), Die Adam Smith Probleme.

Here is how this Wikipedia entry begins: “Hoa Hakananai’a is a moai, a statue from Easter Island. It was taken from Orongo [a stone village and ceremonial center at the southwestern tip of the island] in 1868 by the crew of a British ship and is now in the British Museum in London.” See also this BBC report dated 18 Feb. 2024. (In all, 12 of these Easter Island monoliths are believed to be overseas, presumably stolen, and housed in such venerable institutions as the Smithsonian and the Louvre!)

Although this thread does not include the Easter Island monoliths, I loved the aerial view of the Great Pyramid of Giza as well as the photo of the Shanhai Pass:

The mysterious monoliths of Rapa Nui (Easter Island), called moai (see here), have always fascinated me. What an incredible feat of human ingenuity! Alas, according to my guide, the original inhabitants of this beautiful island became embroiled in feuds and ended up knocking down most of the moai of their rivals, though I have also read that one or more earthquakes may have knocked them down. (Either way, these rival Easter Island theories would provide another great test case for the World Truth League.)

P.S.: I apologize for having to link to my separate Instagram account to post some of my Easter Island pictures, but I have used up all my storage space on WordPress, and I refuse to pay them for extra storage. P.P.S.: I also posted a few more photos from the iconic Ranu Raraku site here.

I heard this song somewhere in Santiago de Chile last week — on the afternoon of 18 July, according to Shazam — and what a fitting title, considering that I will be on a well-deserved sabbatical until the end of the year.

The photo below was taken at the Tahai Ceremonial Complex on Easter Island.🗿