An anniversary

My grandmother rejoiced in an unusual first name - for a woman that is. Hector Mary Heron nee Hopkins was born on this day in 1899 at her parents farm near Harrismith in the then Boer Republic of the Oranje Vrijstaat. Her parents though, Richard Vaux Hopkins and Gertrude Hopkins (nee Bowes), were British through and through and owned one of the largest farms in a large country. On the day my grandmother was born, General Hector MacDonald drove a Boer Commando out of Harrismith and began a campaign to secure the Eastern Orange Free State of Boer Forces which would ultimately lead to the capture of Bloemfontein and then the advance into the Transvaal Republic.

Ironically her future father in law was with the army advancing from the Cape. Colour Sergeant James Heron was with his Regiment, the Royal Irish Rifles, having left at home his wife Susan, two year old daughter Mabel and infant son, Henry Nelson. Twenty-two years later Hector Mary and Henry Nelson would meet in Johannesburg, and in 1925 they married.

They died in 1977 within six months of one another. I remember them with pride because they played a very large part in my childhood and, without doubt, gave me the values I still hold to today. And, in case you were wondering, the 'hero' in my books, is named after my grandfather. When the fourth book finds its way into print you will meet Hector Mary as well.

Interesting Visitor

Ever get that feeling you're being watched? I had it earlier today and when I looked up I found I needed tolook down. My easy chair is next to a large window onto our patio which I had earlier cleared of snow. This still leaves a wall of snow around 500mm (50cm or 18 inches!) in height. Sitting calmly on the patio, between the snow wall and the window was a Pine Marten.

Bold as brass, the little fellow was watching me watching him and not even phased by Madam Paddy Cat who, also aware of him, was staring back - a totally different response to her confrontation last night with a large black and white moggy who'd had the temerity to walk through 'her' garden!

Of course, as soon as I moved to get the camera, the Marten departed. Still, the camera is now ready for when he returns as I'm sure he will. We seem to have provided a neat little highway for Martens, cats, rabbits and sundry other wildlife across our garden and giving access to next door's wood store and dense shrubs that have become home to quite a menagery.

A nice boost

I have to say thank you to my friend "Krylon" who has posted a great piece on my latest book at his blog, New Book Releases.

And a huge thank you to all those who have supported me in this project and to those who have bought it and will buy it. For the record, it is also available through Waterstones and W H Smith and I believe it can be found at Barnes and Noble and other bookshops.

The Red Cross

The Politically Correct Directive of the UK Red Cross management to their staff that they may display nothing that celebrates Christmas or the "Christian Story" in any of their shops is, as far as I am concerned, the final straw. They have given as their reason, that they do not wish to "upset Muslims."

Fine. But apparently they think they can offend Christians and still rely on our support.

Well, not mine. I hereby give notice that the Red Cross will never again get even a brass button from me and I sincerely hope that every other Christian will take the same action. Enough is enough. It may come as a surprise to the morons who now infest the "management" of these charities - all founded by Christian philanthropists who would be appalled at this sort of behaviour - but Muslims also celebrate Christmas!

Book News

My latest book, Their Lordships Request ..., has finally made it into print. Some of you may already have spotted it in the side bar! At present it is linked to the Author House, UK, bookstore, but can be found on their US Bookstore as well. It will be on Amazon in a few more weeks, it takes a while for Amazon to catch up. Those of you who enjoyed my first, will, I now, enjoy this one - it even has a Glossary to help with all those nautical terms ...



It will soon be available through Amazon but is already obtainable direct from the Publisher. I am rather pleased with this one, a prequel to Out of Time which introduces Harry, Ferghal and Danny Gunn. It is, essentially, a 'rite of passage' for them, following their adventures and development as they voyage on the "74 gun" HMS Spartan, to Australia and India. Like Out of Time, it is two stories in parallel with the introduction of the ship they find themselves joining involuntarily in Out of Time, and Harry's "descendent," her Captain.

This brings to three the number of books I have published in this series. The Enemy is Within! (See the sidebar for the link to where it and Out of Time can be purchased) and I hope that they bring some fun and pleasure to my readers. A fourth, with the working title at present of On The Run, will, I hope, be published in the New Year.

Expectation Bias

"Expectation Bias" is a rather fancy way of saying that I have made up my mind on something and will henceforth only see the evidence that supports my view and ignore anything which may suggest there is another view. This is something that investigators are made very aware of during training - indeed, some of us who train investigators, deliberately plant "evidence" to invite students to go the wrong way as a part of their learning experience.

It is a problem in many legal cases, and much of the legislation that now dictates methodologies, acceptable evidence gathering techniques and evidence handling and processing arises from failures by investigators to eliminate their biases from the process. If, as a fire investigator, I go into a fire scene with a predetermined conclusion, I will find only the evidence I expect to find - and misinterpret or discount everything which may point to a different conclusion. It is something researchers studying human cognitive behaviours are very aware of as I was reminded reading an article in the Scientific American recently -

The past few decades of research in cognitive, social and clinical psychology suggest that confirmation bias may be far more common than most of us realize. Even the best and the brightest scientists can be swayed by it, especially when they are deeply invested in their own hypotheses and the data are ambiguous. A baseball manager doesn’t argue with the umpire when the call is clear-cut—only when it is close.

The problem is, the more senior, the more experienced and the more 'acknowledged' you become as an 'expert', the less likely you are to admit to bias or to having made a mistake! This is certainly the case in the scientific field. It also led to one of the most tragic series of miscarriages of justice in the last decade - all because a very respected and emminent Doctor developed a theory, unsupported by any research, that allowed him to declare an enormous number of children were being 'abused,' destroying their parents - many mothers went to ail merely on his evidence of 'abuse' - and sending the children through a truly abusive process of examinations, fostering, being declared delusional when they refused to 'confess' or 'admit' they were being abused and finally removal from their families and friends. The doctor in question got away with it despite mounting evidence that he was totally wrong and it was not until enough of his colleagues got up the courage to stand up in court and show why and how he was wrong that it came to a stop. But the damage has been done and many 'lay' people still believe that garbage this man put forward - because they do not have the expertise or the knowledge to unravel what the press fed them and has singularly failed to correct. Again this 'bias' among senior 'experts' is well known -

Scholars in the behavioral sciences, including psychology and animal behavior, may be especially prone to bias. They often make close calls about data that are open to many interpretations. Last year, for instance, Belgian neurologist Steven Laureys insisted that a comatose man could communicate through a keyboard, even after controlled tests failed to find evidence. Climate researchers trying to surmise past temperature patterns by using proxy data are also engaged in a “particularly challenging exercise because the data are incredibly messy,” says David J. Hand, a statistician at Imperial College London.

Two factors make combating confirmation bias an uphill battle. For one, data show that eminent scientists tend to be more arrogant and confident than other scientists. As a consequence, they may be especially vulnerable to confirmation bias and to wrong-headed conclusions, unless they are perpetually vigilant. Second, the mounting pressure on scholars to conduct single-hypothesis-driven research programs supported by huge federal grants is a recipe for trouble. Many scientists are highly motivated to disregard or selectively reinterpret negative results that could doom their careers. Yet when members of the scientific community see themselves as invulnerable to error, they impede progress and damage the reputation of science in the public eye. The very edifice of science hinges on the willingness of investigators to entertain the possibility that they might be wrong.

The more I have learned about the edifice that has been built around Global Warming, the more I become alarmed at the fact that the scientists behind it seem to be very selective in their "evidence" and in their "models." I fully understand the desire to find the solutions to the very complex problem that climate change presents, but I cannot escape the feeling that there is now a huge amount of "Expectation Bias" at work in the IPCC, Greenpeace, East Anglia University and other "Climate Research" bodies. Data is manipulated in ways that are simply not acceptable in my field at all - and would be thrown out of any court if presented as 'evidence.' But that is the problem, the only 'court' looking at any of this is one stuffed with 'believers' who would not dream of questioning the 'expert' or challenging his view.

Sadly, unless this changes, science will ultimately be the loser as the Scientific American article says.

Stormy weather

You know that a storm is going to be a bad one when someone 'names' it. The one that passed across Germany last night and yesterday, was named 'Petra' and she certainly made an impact. For the second time I could not get to my language course, the wind was drifting snow across the road to Bliedenstadt and even 4x4s were struggling.


The view from the patio doors after I had dug my way out through them ...

Petra dumped a huge amount of snow across Hessen, though we seem to have got of relatively lightly. This is the dry powdery stuff and I have to say, it does look pretty - but then I don't have to fight my way to work through it any longer. It is certainly looking more and more as if we will have a "White Christmas" this year. If so, it will be my first ever.

Something to look forward to I think.