Program Archive - Capital District Humanist Society

Andrew Goodman’s topic was “Uncovering Vladimir Putin’s Inner Man.” This was not an armchair analysis; Goodman detailed his personal interactions with Putin over several years beginning in 1992, while Putin was an official under Saint Petersburg’s first post-Soviet elected mayor, Anatoly Sobchak. Goodman, a government official representing the U.S. consulate, was Putin’s opposite number, hence their constant numerous meetings, getting to know each other well.

Putin’s youth was described as violent and nasty; a self-described hooligan. Somehow he succeeded in getting into the KGB, the Soviet “secret police;” but was posted to East Germany, a career backwater. That gig ended when the USSR fell; Putin managed to land on his feet in Sobchak’s administration. Sobchak was later voted out, despite Putin’s ballot-rigging for him, which Goodman actually witnessed. But Putin landed on his feet again, this time worming his way into Boris Yeltsin’s national regime, by means of assuaging its desire to get hold of a certain Moscow property, which Putin managed to steal for them via his gangsterish connections. He later emerged as head of the FSB, the KGB’s successor; then was named prime minister. Then managed to make a deal with Yeltsin, easing him out in return for a pledge of immunity. Thus did Putin become Russia’s ruler at Millennium’s end.

Meantime he and Goodman had had wide-ranging conversations. Goodman rated him no “conceptual thinker,” with only “average intelligence at best.” He’s not a gambler but a planner, acting only when he feels confident of success. Thus Goodman doesn’t think the Ukraine invasion was some roll of the dice; rather, Putin ascribes the failure (so far) to poor planning — i.e., scapegoating. (There’s another prominent leader who likewise always blames others for every failure.)

The Ukraine venture reflected Putin’s world view of Russia as entitled to be a superpower equal to America, with other nearby nations properly subject to Russian dominance — “the natural order of things.” He’s always had a jaundiced view of the West, its leaders always only acting from self-interest. Ukraine was a particular target especially because Zelensky, before becoming president, did a TV comedy show which made mock of Putin.

Goodman talked about various speculations on the endgame. In brief, he opined that Putin will only go out “with his boots on.”

Nancy Scarselletta, an experienced teacher, heads the Language Learning Institute. Her talk was about France’s July 14 holiday — which we call “Bastille Day” — then two days hence — with an emphasis on how language figures into the story. She focused on words like “liberty, equality, fraternity,” the French national motto arising out of the Revolution. And power, fear, inequality, collective action, dignity, participation, rights, and freedom. Words that she said still matter.

Language, Scarselletta said, is more than just vocabulary and grammar, but carries memory, embodying emotions, feelings, culture, voice.

Pre-revolutionary France was a monarchy, with power flowing from above, a society of privilege, with the masses having no voice — and decreasing food. The King (since 1774), Louis XVI, was married to an Austrian import, Marie Antoinette, who never said “Let them eat cake,” but Scarselletta discussed what she may actually have said. Anyhow, this outsider Queen was not exactly popular.

Royal extravagance led to mounting debts. Finally requiring Louis to summon (after a long hiatus) the Estates General, a governing body, to address the financial crisis. The body was divided among the nobles, the clergy, and everyone else. The king wound up dissolving it; but on June 20, 1789, the “everyone else” component said, “Screw that,” and decamped outdoors to swear an oath declaring they represented the people. That “Tennis Court Oath” was really the start of the French Revolution. Then on July 14, insurgents successfully stormed the Bastille, a (nearly empty) prison, which event has come to symbolize this historic watershed. There soon followed the “Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.”

The King and Queen duly lost their heads. But it took the French nearly another century to get rid of monarchy once and for all. A lesson for us.

Tyina Steptoe, who hails from Houston, Texas, holds a Ph.D. in History and an M.A. in Afro-American Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Currently, she is an associate professor of history at the University of Arizona in Tucson. In her presentation Juneteenth: Celebrating Freedom in Texas and Beyond she detailed the origin of the Juneteenth holiday and how its celebration has evolved since

Juneteenth commemorates the announcement of freedom for enslaved people in Texas on June 19, 1865, when Union General Gordon Granger read an order in Galveston that all slaves in Texas were free in accordance with President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. Dr. Steptoe noted that the Emancipation Proclamation only applied to Confederate states in active rebellion and did not immediately end slavery in Union states. It was not until the ratification of the 13^th Amendment in late 1865 that slavery was ended in all of the United States.

Tyina detailed how Black ministers Sandy Parker and Elias Dibble led the first Juneteenth celebration in Houston in 1866 and the subsequent establishment of Emancipation Park in 1871 as the permanent site for Juneteenth celebrations. She noted that the name “Juneteenth” likely originated from shortening “June 19^th.” Juneteenth celebrations continued in Texas throughout the reconstruction and the Jim Crow eras. She explained the significance of Jewish business owners advertising in Black newspapers in Texas during the Jim Crow era despite Klan opposition.

Dr. Steptoe noted that Juneteenth celebrations spread to other parts of the country during the Great Migration of Blacks from southern states to the Northeast, Midwest, and West Coast during the first half of the 20^th century. Juneteenth became known as “Texas Day” on the West Coast. She concluded by noting that Texas was the first state to recognize Juneteenth at the state level, followed by federal recognition in 2021.

Dr. Scott Solomon is a Teaching Professor in BioSciences at Rice University and a Research Associate at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History. In his presentation The Wisdom of the Ants, he discussed the biology, social structures, behavior, and architectural achievements of ants.

Scott explained that ants reproduce through haplodiploid sex determination, where fertilized eggs become females and unfertilized eggs become males. Scott described various ant social structures and behaviors, including how weaver ants build nests using silk produced by larvae and how some ants live inside acacia tree thorns, forming protective relationships with the plants.

Scott provided overviews of how ant behavior and architecture has been adapted for the conditions they face. He described leafcutter ants’ sophisticated farming practices, including their cultivation of fungus gardens using leaves and the development of antibiotic-producing bacteria to protect against pests. Scott also explained how army ants coordinate movement without traffic jams through chemical pheromone trails, a behavior that inspired ant colony optimization software used in modern navigation systems. The presentation concluded with a discussion of how ants’ ability to thrive in extreme environments could offer insights for humanities’ future space colonization efforts.

Mark Ferrara is a professor at SUNY Oneonta, speaking about his book, Sacred Bliss: A Spiritual History of Cannabis. 

He began by suggesting that America is in the midst of a revolutionary experiment  — many states (now including New York) having legalized cannabis for recreational as well as medical use, with a regulatory system for distribution. (A system which, in New York, is quite typically fubar — FSR.) 

“Cannabis” is a plant, commonly referred to as “marijuana” or “pot;” which people have long used for mind-altering purposes. The killjoy federal government still considers it illegal, but that doesn’t seem to matter much any more, baby. 

Ferrara noted that there are many other substances people have used for similar purposes, many of them sending folks on trips of greater depths and/or durations. In comparison, cannabis is fairly mild stuff; it’s not apparently physically addictive, and apparently has never (directly) killed anyone. Pot is a “kinder, gentler” alternative to stuff like Mescaline or LSD. 

Ferrara’s book goes around the world tracing its role in culture, used for some medical but mainly spiritual purposes. Particularly in the context of some eastern religions, like Hinduism or Buddhism; we heard talk about “the self and god are one,” “the unity of all being,” and asceticism, renunciation, relinquishing material things. You know, that kind of stuff. 

He did bring in psychologist Abraham Maslow’s concept of a “peak experience,” a transcendent moment, supervening ordinary everyday consciousness. Something a little pot can induce. But meantime he suggested that what one should really aim for is not a momentary peak but, rather, consciousness on a generally higher level. And Maslow didn’t actually see a difference between a substance-induced peak experience and one occurring, through, say, responding to natural beauty. Ferrara also said that one experience does not a religious life make, but it can put you on a higher path. So, while after a peak experience, one does return to normal life, you can “linger” at the higher plateau. 

But people with fear of heights should beware. 

Eric Schnitzer is a Saratoga Battlefield park ranger. His talk was titled “Perticulars (sic) that I have been Eye and Ear Witness too” — How Nathaniel Bacheller changed history.

The past is unchangeable. But history is the study and interpretation of the past, and that can change.

At issue here is the Second Battle of Saratoga, on October 7, 1777, decisive in our Revolutionary War —in particular, the role therein of a certain General Benedict Arnold. Who’s got a bad rep. And the conventional story of Saratoga has him on the outs with the commanding General, Horatio Gates, and running around madly on his horse till he got shot in the leg.

Nathaniel Bacheller also fought there. Schnitzer’s talk centered upon an October 9, 1777 letter Bacheller wrote to his wife, which turned up sold on eBay, discussing the battle. The letter describes Arnold not as going rogue but, rather, following orders given him by Gates, to attack the British forces, which helped seal our victory.

That does contradict the traditional story. Which, Schnitzer explained, actually originated in much later publications, mainly an 1816 memoir by General James Wilkinson, which doesn’t mention Arnold, indeed ascribing Arnold’s actions at Saratoga to Wilkinson himself. Not a reliable source; Wilkinson has a very dubious personal history. And Schnitzer detailed how the Bacheller letter merely confirmed contrary accounts in other documents written shortly after the battle. But those true accounts got eclipsed by later ones less complimentary to Arnold.

Who was indeed a bad guy — but that was later. Until then, he was actually one of our greatest heroes.

Blair Horner has been a leading legendary figure in the New York Public Interest Research Group since 1979, recently as Executive Director. His topic was the workings of New York State government budgeting, which really encompasses mostly all public issues in the state. (Please don’t yawn and turn the page.)

The state’s fiscal year begins April 1, and a budget is supposed to be in place by that date. It’s typically been late in modern times.

The process starts with the governor submitting a budget proposal to the legislature, by the third Tuesday in January. The Assembly then prepares a “Yellow Book,” and the Senate a “Blue Book,” with their analyses on the governor’s submission. These provide the templates for public debate. Then they hold hearings in which, Horner said, legislators pretend to be interested in the issues. These hearings are the only opportunities for the public to provide input. Meantime, based upon this process, the governor has 30 days in which to amend the submitted budget proposal.

The final version is subject to negotiation between the governor and the Assembly and Senate leaders — the “three men in a room” system — though currently two of the three are non-men.

In those negotiations, the governor has the upper hand, able to hold up the whole thing in order to force approval of non-budget legislation. Meantime, the governor already had the ability to get, into the budget, various policy initiatives (which typically do entail expenditure of money). And then, in the end, the legislature does not actually have any ability to amend the package; instead it must approve or reject the whole budget in toto. Not much of an option.

This is the system we have, embedded in New York’s constitution, making the governor practically all-powerful. The two legislative leaders do have a little power. All the other 200+ legislators are really just window-dressing.

A big controversial issue lately has been Medical Aid in Dying (or assisted suicide). The legislation had passed, and the governor said she would sign it — with some changes, making the system more restrictive (and hard for people to actually utilize). She finally did sign it on February 6 — the last possible day under the state’s rules — and with so little fanfare it was not even noted in the Albany Times-Union’s Saturday print version.

Other big issues coming up include utility rate affordability (an old mainstay); auto insurance (the system rife with fraud); and rollback of the state’s climate targets. A 2019 law aimed for net zero emissions by 2050. We’re not biting that bullet, or even licking it. Horner noted that while Germany’s power supply is 50% solar, in New York it’s not even 5%. He saw no political will to get serious on the issue — with proposals for rollback representing capitulation.

Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow’s book is Atomic Dreams: The New Nuclear Evangelists and the Fight for the Future of Energy. It’s about reviving nuclear power in the U.S.

The author explains that she started from a mindset of antipathy toward nuclear power, bedazzled instead by clean renewable energy sources like wind, solar, and batteries, as the ultimate and favored solution for climate change. Nuclear just gave her bad vibes, as dangerous, costly, tainted by its sheer bigness, and entailing the problem of nuclear waste. She noted that this is a widespread feeling, with many people associating nuclear energy with nuclear weapons, and Godzilla. Soured by accidents at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima. And the issue seemed to have receded since for a long time no new atomic power plants were being built. New York had shut down two, at Indian Point and Shoreham.

But as she chronicles, there’s a new and growing awareness of the technology’s importance if we’re serious about combating climate change. Renewables like wind and solar are great, but just cannot fill all our energy needs. She was influenced by information coming from sources she could trust, like the Union of Concerned Scientists, and an article whose lead author was James Hansen, the renowned NASA scientist.

Nuclear power has three big pluses: 1) virtually zero carbon emissions, thus truly clean energy; 2) it’s “baseload power” that can operate 24/7, unlike solar and wind power dependent on the weather gods; and 3) greater “energy density,” or less land use, producing much more power per unit of whatever than burning coal or oil or people.

The nuclear waste issue is actually not that big a deal. Nobody’s ever been harmed by it. While on the other hand, people aren’t alive to the very real and greater risks of fossil fuel energy production, causing air pollution that kills great numbers of us, but below the radar.

She noted that after closing Indian Point, with natural gas power production filling the gap, New York’s nasty emissions rose. Nearer her home in California, the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant was slated for closure. But then, in 2022, overcoming pushback from the state’s legions of tree-huggers, Governor Newsom got that decision reversed. There’s meantime been a lot of progress in designing cheaper, better, and safer nuclear power technologies.

Jennie Erin Smith is a journalist who’s authored the book Valley of Forgetting. It’s about an extended rural Colombian family, with 6,000 members, in which early onset Alzheimer’s disease is endemic. Smith spent seven years in Medellin working on this.

The family’s cause of illness is a genetic mutation, which kills sufferers in the 45-50 age range. Smith’s main contact point was Dr. Francisco Lopera, a neurologist, who focused his career working on this particular problem. The effort was complicated by pervasive political violence in Colombia during the 1980s. Also part of the story was Dr. Ken Kosik, who identified the gene involved.

One family that Smith spent much time with had two girls whose mother died of the ailment at 49 —one of seven siblings, out of ten, who died before age 50. Smith noted that even many in the larger family who were spared the gene, and the illness, had their lives derailed by having to care for prematurely afflicted elders.

Dr. Lopera spearheaded a clinical trial, concentrating on this family, using a drug called Crenezumab, to see if it could prevent the onset of illness in people having the otherwise deadly mutation. There was hope that this work could also be helpful with regard to late-onset Alzheimer’s. Unfortunately, the trial ultimately failed.

However, meantime, they started seeing people having the mutation who did not get sick. It turned out that there was a separate mutation that counteracted the first one. Showing the complexity of the problem.

Fresh trials, with different drugs, are currently underway; and prelapsarian U.S. authorities in fact approved a medicine which does seem to combat Alzheimer’s symptoms. However, a problem for Colombian sufferers is that they can’t afford its stiff cost.

Recap prepared by Frank S. Robinson