{"id":521373,"date":"2026-03-13T15:27:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T15:27:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/521373\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T15:27:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T15:27:15","slug":"hili-dialogue-why-evolution-is-true-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/521373\/","title":{"rendered":"Hili dialogue \u2013 Why Evolution Is True"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome to Thursday, March 12, 2026, and National Milky Way Day<\/a>, celebrating my favorite American candy bar. From the link:<\/p>\n

There are actually two versions of the Milky Way. The Milky Way known in the United States is sold as the Mars bar around the world, while the global Milky Way bar is similar to the American 3 Musketeers bar and doesn\u2019t have the caramel topping. There also have been a number of variations besides the original Milky Way, such as Milky Way Midnight (previously Milky Way Dark) and Milky Way Cookie Dough. The original Milky Way and its variations are celebrated and enjoyed today on National Milky Way Day!<\/p>\n

I have had a deep-fried Mars bar (battered and fried in fish oil) in Edinburgh, and it was\u00a0good! Here from the Wikipedia<\/a> entry is a comparison of the U.S. (left) and global (right) Milky Ways with different fillings:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Milky Ways were advertised as appetite-curbers to eat between meals, resulting in a famous ad:<\/p>\n

Once marketed as a\u00a0snack\u00a0food that would not intrude on regular meals, modern marketing portrays the Milky Way as a snack reducing mealtime hunger and curbing the appetite between meals.<\/p>\n

A widely known advertisement was debuted in 1989, featuring a red 1951\u00a0Buick Roadmaster<\/a>\u00a0and a vehicle that resembles a blue 1959\u00a0Cadillac Series 62<\/a> (lacking its dual headlights) racing, with the former eating everything in sight and the latter eating a Milky Way. The advertisement ends with the bridge to Dinnertown being out and the now fat red car being too heavy to jump the gap while the blue car makes the jump. The advertisement returned albeit edited in 2009, removing the claim that the Milky Way is not an appetite spoiler.<\/p>\n

The ad:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also National Alfred Hitchcock Day<\/a> (neither his birthday nor deathday), Girl Scout Day<\/a> (the organization was founded on this day in 1912 in Savannah, Georgia, where I\u2019ll be travelling shortly), National Baked Scallops Day<\/a>, and Popcorn Lovers Day<\/a> (that\u2019s all of us).<\/p>\n

Remember this intro to the Hitchcock television show? If you do, you\u2019re a geezer!<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the March 12 Wikipedia page<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Da Nooz:<\/p>\n

First a discussion by NYT writers you may want to read (it isn\u2019t archived yet, but click on it if you have a subscription):<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

*And here\u2019s the top front page of the NYT from yesterday afternoon, highlighting its biggest stories, and I can see nothing but opprobrium towards the U.S.\u00a0 Yes, we now are pretty sure that the U.S. screwed up and hit a girls school, killing many children, but I swear that the NYT seems almost gleeful about that, at least about it being the fault of the U.S. and not Iran. (Would it have been the headline story if it were a misfired Iranian missile?). Click page to enlarge. If you want any articles and don\u2019t subscribe, go here<\/a> , click on an article, which you won\u2019t be able to read, and then look for its URL on one of the archive sites.<\/p>\n

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Here are the op-eds, all of a similar tenor. Can you spot the heterodox column? See the next item.<\/p>\n

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I swear that on my grumpier days I see the NYT as a useful idiot for progressives who hate America, and in the case of the war I have a dark fantasy that the NYT newsroom would erupt with glee if Trump\u2019s attack on Iran wound up not accomplishing anything.\u00a0 Today is one of those days.<\/p>\n

*Okay, here\u2019s an excerpt of Bret Stephens\u2019 column<\/a>, which you can also find archived here<\/a>: \u201cHow does this end? Four scenarios for what comes next with Iran\u201d.\u00a0 Here are Stephens\u2019s four scenarios (bolding is mine):<\/p>\n

Regime change is the most optimistic one. Some imagine it will take the form of the resumption of the mass demonstrations that the regime bloodily stamped out in January \u2014 millions of Iranians marching in dozens of cities, joined by police officers and soldiers and commanders from the conventional army, emboldened by American and Israeli air support, rising to tear down their rulers\u2019 enfeebled apparatus of repression.<\/p>\n

Nobody should discount this scenario, especially if Iran continues to be battered militarily and politically, perhaps with the loss of additional echelons of leadership. Nobody should count on it, either, at least not in the short term. . .<\/p>\n

Regime modification \u2014 that is, a regime that stays in place but complies with U.S. and Israeli demands \u2014 is another optimistic scenario. It\u2019s doubtful that Mojtaba Khamenei, the new supreme leader, will agree to surrender Iran\u2019s nuclear and missile programs and cease support for regional proxies like Hezbollah. But the new Khamenei\u2019s reign may be very short-lived. And whoever runs the regime next will have to come to grips with its vulnerability and isolation.<\/p>\n

That isolation will be especially pronounced if U.S. forces seize\u00a0Kharg Island<\/a>, 15 or 16 miles off the Iranian coast in the Persian Gulf, which serves as the terminal for roughly 90 percent of Iran\u2019s oil exports. American control would give the administration the whip hand over most of the regime\u2019s remaining revenues, including its ability to pay salaries for soldiers and civil servants alike.<\/p>\n

But perhaps the regime refuses to yield and the war carries on in much the same way for another two or three weeks before some sort of mutual cease-fire declaration, probably before President Trump\u2019s planned visit to Beijing on March 31.<\/p>\n

In this third scenario, all sides declare their own sort of victory and none of them quite believe it. . .<\/p>\n

Reality, however, will catch up. The sanctions that have already crippled the regime economically will not be lifted. It\u2019s hard to imagine the war ending before the United States and Israel attack Iran\u2019s remaining nuclear sites, including its buried (but accessible<\/a>) stores of highly enriched uranium. And any efforts by Iran to conduct spectacular terrorist attacks in the vein of Libya\u2019s 1988 Lockerbie bombing, or to mine the Strait of Hormuz, will only result in another war. The era in which Iranian leaders thought themselves invulnerable is over.<\/p>\n

This scenario has an ugly cousin: not regime change, but state collapse. The most worrisome form it could take would resemble Syria during its 13-year civil war, in which the regime would survive in some areas of Iran, fall in others, invite foreign intervention and lead to killing on an epic scale. Along with that killing would come waves of refugees throughout the Middle East and into Europe and Australia.<\/p>\n

And Stephens gives his recommendation about what we should do:<\/p>\n

What, then, should the Trump administration do? My prescription: Seize Kharg Island. Mine or blockade Iran\u2019s remaining ports. Destroy as much Iranian military capability as possible over the next week or two, including a second Midnight Hammer operation to destroy what\u2019s left of Iran\u2019s nuclear capacity and know-how. And threaten the regime with further bombing if it massacres its own citizens, mounts terrorist attacks abroad or returns to nuclear work.<\/p>\n

That constitutes the most realistic path to victory at the lowest plausible price in lives, risk and treasure. And for all its admitted dangers, it gives Iran\u2019s people their best chance of winning their freedom. Not bad for a one-month war its critics warned would be another Iraq.<\/p>\n

I am a fan of Stephens. He may be labeled as a conservative, but I think both his analysis of wars\u00a0 (both Iran and Gaza) and his recommendations are sensible. Of course, he\u2019s Jewish, probably, like me, of the secular variety. There is, however, one problem with his recommendations above: how can we tell if Iran returns to nuclear work? Will there be unannounced inspections? Otherwise, his recommendations seem solid.<\/p>\n

*Every night on NBC the lead news is, as it should be, about the war with Iran. But very quickly the latest news turns into a report on how the price of gas is going up. Granted, this affects nearly every price in America, because everything is delivered, but there are lives, freedom, and the fate of the Middle East at stake. I know I don\u2019t use much gas, but I do buy stuff, and still I can\u2019t really worry about price increases (farmers, of course, can). Still, it\u2019s in all of our interests, as Stephens recommends above, that the Strait of Hormuz be open for transport of oil (it carries 20% of the world\u2019s oil). Bombing Kharg Island <\/a>in the Persian Gulf, as Stephens recommends above, will raise oil prices even more, for 90% of Iran\u2019s oil flows through pipelines to that bit of land.<\/p>\n

And as I write this on Wednesday afternoon I see that three commercial ships have been attacked in the Strait of Hormuz, and Iran is laying mines there. From the WSJ:<\/p>\n

Three commercial ships\u00a0were struck<\/a>\u00a0around the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday as Iran stepped up its efforts to halt traffic through the critical oil conduit.<\/p>\n

U.S. forces said they had destroyed\u00a016 Iranian mine-laying vessels<\/a>. The head of U.S. Central Command said that its focus remains on destroying Iran\u2019s missiles and drones and degrading its ability to interrupt shipping in the strait.<\/p>\n

The International Energy Agency said its member countries would release\u00a0400 million barrels of oil<\/a>, the largest reserves distribution in history.<\/p>\n

Other news tacked onto the above by the WSJ:<\/p>\n

French President Emmanuel Macron is hosting a video conference call with leaders of the Group of Seven advanced economies to discuss ways to mitigate the energy crisis.
\nThe U.S. told Israel that it was \u201cnot happy\u201d with recent attacks on Iranian energy facilities and told Israel not to do it again<\/a> unless approved by Washington.
\nCitigroup evacuated<\/a>\u00a0several buildings in the U.A.E. on Wednesday, after Iranian authorities said\u00a0banks linked to the U.S. and Israel<\/a> in the region were now targets.
\nOne of the seven members of the Iranian women\u2019s soccer delegation who were granted humanitarian visas by Australia\u00a0has changed her mind<\/a>.<\/p>\n

*More from The World Hates Jews Department: Reader Bill sent some data from The Polarization Research Lab<\/a> about Americans\u2019 reactions to a Jew being killed for being a Jew, and the data aren\u2019t pretty (bolding is theirs):<\/p>\n

For six weeks our\u00a0national polarization tracking survey<\/a>\u00a0included an item measuring public support for an explicitly antisemitic murder\u2014an act motivated by a victim\u2019s Jewish identity. Our data include 6,000 interviews from YouGov (May-July 2025).<\/p>\n

Direct support for antisemitic murder is low but meaningful at 2.8%\u2013a level comparable to what we measure for political violence. However, the key finding is the alarmingly high level of public indifference. Our study shows that\u00a08.3% of Americans are indifferent\u00a0to an explicitly antisemitic murder. This figure is\u00a0four times larger\u00a0than the indifference we observe toward other types of political murder. Together, 11.1% of Americans either support or are indifferent to the murder of a Jew simply because the victim was Jewish.<\/p>\n

. . .The results presented in this report on support and indifference for antisemitic violence reveal that polling simply on support for political violence may mask deeply concerning patterns of indifference for hate-based violence. Our results are similar to those found in recent work by the\u00a0Anti-Defamation League<\/a>, where polling found that 87% of Americans disagree with recent acts of antisemitic violence and 85% disagree that violent acts were necessary. These data highlight the importance of asking unambiguous survey questions about political violence so that we can collect the most accurate data on what is driving hate in America and allocate resources with precision.<\/p>\n

Survey design<\/p>\n

The survey item was designed according to best practices for measuring political violence, ensuring high-quality data by confirming that:<\/p>\n

The crime\u2019s motivation was\u00a0unambiguous.
\nThe perpetrator had been\u00a0adjudicated guilty, removing any doubt about the facts of the case.<\/p>\n

Data were collected from\u00a0high-quality samples\u00a0using\u00a0attention checks\u00a0to ensure data integrity.<\/p>\n

Survey question: \u201cAlan Whitle was convicted of murder. He was arrested by police after surveillance footage was found showing him stabbing a prominent member of the local Jewish community to death. Whitle targeted the victim because the victim was Jewish, driven by opposition to the war in Gaza. Do you support or oppose Whitle\u2019s actions?\u201d<\/p>\n

Reader Bill, who sent me the link to that report. , added in his email, \u201c\u201dI can\u2019t believe this. . . .well perhaps, I can\u201d<\/p>\n

I told you that nobody likes the Jews! (Which reminds me of a joke that I\u2019ll spare you right now.)<\/p>\n

*And some light news (with a video) from the UPI\u2019s \u201codd news\u201d section: Four cheetah cubs were just born in the San Diego Zoo<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The San Diego Zoo Safari Park announced the births of four male cheetah cubs, the first of their species to be born at the facility since 2020.<\/p>\n

The zoo said first-time mother Kelechi gave birth to the cubs on Jan. 24.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust as they do in native habitats, Kelechi and her cubs are bonding in a private, behind-the-scenes den at the Carnivore Conservation Center,\u201d zoo officials wrote in the announcement. \u201cThe cubs are now emerging from their den, giving guests an opportunity to see them as part of an Ultimate Safari.\u201d<\/p>\n

The zoo said cheetah mothers are very attentive to their babies.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuring these vital early months, Kelechi spends much of her time grooming her cubs and keeping them close. As they continue to grow more curious and active, they play and climb all over her as she keeps a close eye on them, chirping to call them closer when needed,\u201d the announcement said.<\/p>\n

The brothers are expected to form a lifelong bond.<\/p>\n

\u201cMale cheetahs, like these four brothers, form groups called \u2018coalitions\u2019 that will hunt and travel together for life, a unique trait for this primarily solitary species,\u201d officials said.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an adorable video. Listen to those babies squeak (adult cheetahs don\u2019t roar, but chirp:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili and Andrzej have an amusing interchange:<\/p>\n

Hili: When chaos starts to prevail, we need stable points of orientation.
Andrzej: Some search for the path by looking at the stars, others by inspecting the bowls.\\<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

In Polish<\/p>\n

Hili: Kiedy chaos zaczyna dominowa\u0107 potrzebujemy sta\u0142ych punkt\u00f3w orientacyjnych.
Ja: Jedni szukaj\u0105 drogi patrz\u0105c w gwiazdy, inni sprawdzaj\u0105c miseczki.<\/p>\n

*******************<\/p>\n

From Cats Doing Cat Stuff<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

From Jesus of the Day<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

From Things With Faces<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Jango is in love with Hili, but the Princess spurns him:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

From Masih: an Iranian official threatens all potential protestors. Oy!<\/p>\n

Iranian authority openly threatening to kill its critics on national television.<\/p>\n

I invite everyone to listen carefully to these threats broadcast on Iranian state TV.
\u201cConfiscating property is nothing\u2026 we will make your mothers mourn you.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Iranian activists, journalists,\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/1Gr9bfbcDD<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Masih Alinejad \ud83c\udff3\ufe0f (@AlinejadMasih) March 11, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

From Colin: another journal falls by the wayside:<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udea8ALERT: Top-ranking ecology journal Ecology Letters has published a \u201cViewpoint\u201d paper titled \u201cThere is No Consensus on Biological Sex.\u201d<\/p>\n

The authors call the \u201csex binary\u201d a \u201csimplistic and harmful ideolog[y].\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet they then claim that no view of sex (gamete-based, multivariate,\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/3V7ksTgA9h<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Colin Wright (@SwipeWright) March 10, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

From Emma, going after an anti-HPV-vaxer. Christ on a bike, indeed!<\/p>\n

Christ on a bike, it\u2019s pretty much on track to wipe out almost all cervical cancer.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t get vaccine advice from actors. https:\/\/t.co\/plh9OhGLq2<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Emma Hilton (@FondOfBeetles) March 10, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

Two from my feed.\u00a0 First, another great post from Science Girl:<\/p>\n

A happy kid with her happy elephant<\/p>\n

pic.twitter.com\/CyGexgh5ga<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Science girl (@sciencegirl) March 11, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

This is not abnormal in Istanbul. If you\u2019re a cat lover, you must go there! English translation:<\/p>\n

In Istanbul, cats aren\u2019t \u201cstrays\u201d\u2014they\u2019re full-fledged citizens. \u00a0There\u2019s an unwritten law of collective care where shops and restaurants welcome them as part of the family. This little kitten isn\u2019t begging for scraps; it\u2019s savoring its rightful place at the table. A shining example of coexistence for the world!\u00a0<\/p>\n

Or, \u201cI\u2019m Mehmet and I\u2019ll be your server tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

En Estambul, los gatos no son \u201ccallejeros\u201d, son ciudadanos de pleno derecho. \ud83c\uddf9\ud83c\uddf7\ud83d\udc31 Existe una ley no escrita de cuidado colectivo donde los comercios y restaurantes los integran como parte de su familia. Este gatito no est\u00e1 pidiendo sobras, est\u00e1 disfrutando de su lugar en la mesa.\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/3SJHGtGdTW<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Latido Terrestre (@NaturPictures) March 10, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

One I reposted from the Auschwitz Memorial:<\/p>\n

This French Jewish boy was gassed as soon as he arrived in Auschwitz. He was two years old, and would be 86 today had he lived. https:\/\/t.co\/MBpP07HMvc<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) March 12, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

And two from Dr. Cobb. Take this first color test (I did 0.015, better than average):<\/p>\n

For those who want to test their perception of colour, I made a little game called “What’s My JND”www.keithcirkel.co.uk\/whats-my-jnd\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2014 Keith Cirkel (@keithamus.social)<\/a> 2026-03-10T09:58:08.322Z<\/a><\/p>\n

. . . and weasel words:<\/p>\n

This is hilarious.Also, completely enraging.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Joshua Reed Eakle \ud83d\uddfd (@joshuaeakle.com)<\/a> 2026-03-11T01:56:44.249Z<\/a><\/p>\n

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