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Law, who is calling for self-determination for Hong Kong, was one of the main leaders of the 2014 Umbrella Movement rallies which brought tens of thousands to the streets calling for democratic reform.
Two new pro-independence lawmakers, Baggio Leung and Yau Wai-ching, added their own words before the oath, pledging to serve the "Hong Kong nation".
Both displayed flags emblazoned with the words: "Hong Kong is not China".
Leung took the full oath in English but refused to pronounce "China" correctly, instead calling it "Cheena".
Yau was distinctly heard saying "the People's Re-f-----g of Zeena", instead of "the People's Republic of China" in her oath, although she denied that later, blaming her accent.
Local media reported that they had used the word "Shina" instead of China, an archaic, derogatory Japanese term for the mainland.
New lawmaker Eddie Chu, who advocates a public referendum on Hong Kong's future sovereignty, shouted "Democratic self-determination! Tyranny will perish!" after taking his oath.
Teacher Lau Siu-lai, also a former Umbrella Movement activist, read every word of the oath at a snail's pace, prompting some pro-Beijing lawmakers to walk out.
The Legco clerk told Leung, Yau and one other pro-democracy lawmaker that he was unable to "administer" their oaths, because they had modified them.
It is not yet clear whether any of the lawmakers deemed not to have taken the oath properly will be barred from taking up their seats.
In a statement issued before the oath-taking, the government cited a law that stipulates "any person who declines or neglects to take an oath duly requested which he or she is required to take shall vacate office or be disqualified from entering on it".
The session was suspended after Law refused to return to his seat, questioning why the clerk had objected to the three lawmakers' oaths.
According to government rules, the clerk must now refer the invalid oath cases to the Legco president, who was elected Wednesday afternoon amid further chaos.
The three lawmakers who did not have their oaths approved were told they could not vote for Legco president.
The vast majority of pro-democracy lawmakers left the chamber before the vote, with some shouting and tearing up their ballots.
Pro-Beijing legislator Andrew Leung was voted in by 38 to zero by establishment lawmakers, who are in the majority in the Legco.
The pro-democracy camp had objected to his candidacy.
Election campaigns are carnival times for dodgy words. Politicians and their hacks dog-whistle them out of their lairs, summon them from Shakespearian lexicons and haul them back from used-word graveyards. The most noxious of them slither noisesomely in, sleazing and sliming their handlers.
The slimy words are those that convict their targets of simulating virtue. They include the old favourite 'bleeding hearts', the perennial 'political correctness' and the most recently minted 'virtue signalling'. All these phrases began as commendation.
The original Bleeding Heart was Jesus' heart seen as a symbol for compassion: Bleeding Heart Tavern in London originally had a sign emblazoned with a picture of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The phrase was then applied to people who were compassionate and open-hearted. As such, of course, it was appropriated by politician...
'Political correctness' was coined to commend people for acting consistently with their ideology. Their opponents, disagreeing with their ideology, then turned the phrase to imply that their actions were not based on reasoned argument but on party loyalty.
'Virtue signalling' was also first used to describe actions that expressed a religious faith or way of life. Convinced Christians, for example, who visited people in prison might be said to signal virtue through their actions. Critics then turned the phrase to describe the motivation of the action and not its effect, a...
When people speak of bleeding hearts, political correctness and virtue signalling today, they do so to attack their opponents and the opinions they commend. Bleeding hearts are soft-headed, sentimental and weak. Their arguments may be dismissed because they are driven by emotion, not by reason.
People who are politically correct are motivated by the desire for approval of the crowd, are self-regarding, lack an intellectual centre and are not serious seekers after truth. Their judgments may also be dismissed because they do not reflect intellectual argument but acceptance of majority opinion. People engaged in...
"When elections draw near, truth, respect and rationality are as rare and endangered as rainbow coloured butterflies in a dust storm."
The reason why these phrases are slimy, slithery and sludgy is that they purport to be counters in rational argument but dismiss opposed arguments without engaging with them. They rely on destroying the credibility of the argument by insinuating the personal unreliability of the person who makes the argument.
This frees those who have recourse to these phrases from the bother of careful analysis of their opponents' positions, still less of demonstrating the motives attributed to them. They display a fundamental lack of respect both for their opponents and for the discipline of argument. In the vernacular, they play the man ...
If you drag slimy creatures along the floor you make it slippery, making it likely that you will slip on it. So it is with resorting to slithery phrases. If you define a conversation by the use of phrases such as virtue signalling, you are essentially claiming the high moral and intellectual ground. Your opponents are ...
In this case it inevitably falls, because the rhetorical style in which it is made is characterised neither by disinterest, love, the exercise of reason nor virtue. It is an exercise of power in which opponents are crushed by scorn and innuendo not by rational and respectful engagement. It is not a trial of opposed ide...
No doubt when elections draw near, truth, respect and rationality are as rare and endangered as rainbow coloured butterflies in a dust storm. Concern about slithery arguments will seem a little delicate when walking through grasslands full of hyenas, jackals and funnel web spiders as well as snakes. Still, a proper att...
Your penultimate sentence is a beauty, Andy. When referencing the use of speech in regards to elections we all have had experience of meeting the politician who is listening to our words and thinking of the response 'he/she wants to hear' before articulating their reply. Politicians usually have to condense their comme...
I think most of our current politicians do not want intelligent voters who weigh up all the issues carefully and then vote. Very few politicians have any real vision for this country and its future as well as the future of the world. They want either to retain or gain office and the power which comes with it. Most are ...
Thank you Andrew for expressing so succinctly why many Australians have become so cynical about our politicians. Another term that is used to put down people apart for "bleeding heart" and "politically correct" is "do-gooder". When these terms are used against people as they are during public debates, they are usually ...
Ah! The Use and Abuse of Words - a subject of limitless possibilities. Reminds me of Humpty Dumpty in Alice Through the Looking Glass. "When I use a word, HD, said in a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less." I was looking for a word that would describe the process by which word...
OK, so what shorthand phrase SHOULD one use to describe positions which are driven by emotion, not by reason, motivated by the desire for approval of the crowd, acceptance of majority opinion and the desire to look good, for example automatically clicking "like" to a popular opinion on social media for fear that not "l...
Love this analysis of the arguments and language often used in shutting down an opponent to great effect. It attacks the person rather than the argument. As you imply, it is a slippery slope!
As you say, Andrew. Slippery slide to... Under so many of today's problems there is an epistemological problem.
So Andrew, what about such terms as racist, neo-Nazi, fascist, homophobic, Islamophobic, sexist, misogynistic that the “slimy, slithery, sludgy” PC operatives used to viciously attack those they disagree with? Such nasty ad homien abuse are regularly employed by PC virtue-signallers as substitutes for reasoned argument...
Thank you, Andy. While I did find the epistemological summaries helpful, I do think there is cause for a search through a number of the affects (emotions) at play here. What is it that is driving people to attack each other on social media, on public airwaves and in supermarkets in our multicultural cities and towns? W...
Thank you for your comments on my article. A couple of clarifications. 'Slimy words' are not the only kind of objectionable words that should be deplored in public conversation. Facist, commo, homophobe, idiot, etc are also demeaning labels that substitute for argument, whichever of the many sides they may come from. B...
The advice "Physician, heal thyself" could be dangerous if the physician was a crook doctor!
Unequivocally, the finest exchange of views that I have encountered in ES so far! And thank you, Andy, for replying: it showed that you read - and respect - your audience. The past fortnight has been a bad one for those who uphold virtue, while taking care not to use it as a cudgel. Firstly, the sensational Pell traged...
President Barack Obama said on Tuesday the United States wanted a strong, prosperous but also democratic Russia, as he set out his vision of his country’s relationship with its former Cold-War era foe.
In the most eagerly awaited address of his two-day visit to Russia, Obama reached out to Russia but did not shy away from the differences between the two countries.
The speech to students graduating from the progressive New Economic School came as Obama sought to revive ties with Russia bruised by a string of crises over the last decade.
“America wants a strong, peaceful, and prosperous Russia,” he told an audience of 1 500 in central Moscow.
The challenges facing the modern world “demand global partnership, and that partnership will be stronger if Russia occupies its rightful place as a great power,” he said.
Russia has repeatedly been criticised by the West for a lack of full democratic freedoms under its strongman, current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, and President Dmitry Medvedev.
Obama said: “The arc of history shows us that governments which serve their own people survive and thrive; governments which serve only their own power do not.
He also took aim at corruption, widely seen as one of the scourges of Russia’s post-Soviet society and something that Medvedev has pledged to end.
“People everywhere should have the right to do business or get an education without paying a bribe,” Obama said.
In his speech, Obama quoted from Russia’s greatest poet Alexander Pushkin and paid tribute to the country’s sacrifices in defeating fascism in World War II.
He lauded Russian culture, saying its writers had “helped us understand the complexity of the human experience” while painters, composers and dancers had “introduced us to new forms of beauty”.
But he told his audience—a future Russian elite in business and government—that “you are the last generation born when the world was divided”.
“Your lifetime coincides with this era of transition,” said Obama.
“What kind of future is Russia going to have? What kind of future are Russia and America going to have together? What world order will replace the Cold War? Those questions still do not have clear answers,” he said.
Earlier on Tuesday Obama had his first meeting with Putin, who told the US president Moscow was counting on him to improve bilateral ties.
The pair sought at their breakfast meeting at Putin’s country residence to project a cordial atmosphere after the US president caused controversy last week by saying Putin had “one foot” in the past.
Obama praised Putin—seen by most as Russia’s de facto leader—for his “extraordinary work” as president between 2000 and 2008 and now in his new post as prime minister.
Obama was also due later on Tuesday to meet former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and opposition leaders, including the former world chess champion Garry Kasparov.
Medvedev and Obama announced a breakthrough deal for US military transit for Afghanistan across Russia on Monday.
The two countries, which for decades during the Cold War maintained a sometimes perilous nuclear stand-off, also issued a declaration on replacing a key disarmament treaty—including figures for major cuts in nuclear warheads.
НЬЮ-ХЕЙВЕН – В своей новой книге «Невероятное уменьшение альфы» Ларри Суэдроу и Эндрю Беркин описывают инвестиционную среду, полную всё более опытных и совершенных аналитиков, которые опираются на «большие данные», мощные компьютеры и научные исследования. В условиях столь острой конкуренции «всё выше и выше становятся...
Такой вывод приводит к важному вопросу: а не уменьшится ли альфа со временем до нуля для любых возможных инвестиционных стратегий? Или в более фундаментальном смысле – не приблизился ли уже тот день, когда благодаря столь большому количеству умных людей и еще более умных компьютеров финансовые рынки станут по-настоящем...
Это воображаемое состояние можно назвать финансовой сингулярностью, по аналогии с гипотетической будущей технологической сингулярностью, когда компьютеры заменят человеческий интеллект. Финансовая сингулярность означает, что все инвестиционные решения лучше оставить на усмотрение компьютерных программ, потому что экспе...
The alpha investment is about to start for real estate.
Through REIO tm real state market. Human are not required, other than the buyers and sellers. The are showing returns / revenue from 7.01% to about 18.5% yearly.
How will this markt structure effect US economic outlook of the next 100 to 200 years?
What would be uncorrect in this statement : Smart money will eventually make markets efficient and stay there while the yields are interesting in the first time. Then, as soon as the markets start becoming inefficient, smart money will flow back and correct the market.
Rationally, it is a possibility. I would agree with Curtis Carpenter that computer will squeeze out human intelligent and invent their own financial instruments (derivative based derivatives and computational risk swaps. Perhaps, we look back to the recent refinancing of the euro in 2014 that swaps are often used till ...
Of course, since the interest rate is at the bottom, it would be alpha all the way. But, in history, regardless how the science advances, often we miss the market by miles like oil glut and gold rush; who can claim winner at all time? Not with American or Chinese. Even though we knew Chinese flush out 5 ton of gold to ...
Financial singularity will not be about market efficiency or algorithm. The information inequality is the source of alpha, and remains so as a result of power and balance.
If we do enter such a perfect market phase; I see co-ordinated insider trading atleast in the stock markets.
By stating that human behavior is what causes markets to be irrational , Shiller is making a great case for introduction of algorithms that take into account how rational markets should behave. Besides, who said equity and debt and instruments surrounding it are how machines will help in raising, investing allocating a...
A corollary is the financial discontinuity enjoyed by Ireland despite Merrill Lynch's crazy (tranquil) vista from a synthesis of heart-to-heart talks with rational people who knew better (better).
The derivative conclusion we can draw is that alpha distribution is becoming even more skewed left. Alpha won't even go away as long as humans are involved in the decision making process, but those who own the big data, powerful computers, and scholarly research will take an increasing share of the overall profits.
I believe we already see this occurring in the general economic sphere regarding income distribution.
The thing is this, (and it is somehow not obvious to the authors of the hundreds of articles on the subjec)t: Computers cannot think, they never have and never will. They can only be programmed with the thoughts that humans think first. There is no Hal. Singularity of any type is not possible theoretically until a comp...
A brilliant article that points to the diminishing alpha, somewhat like the diminishing marginal utility, sparked off by a myriad of issues. Larry and Andrew have identified a slew of things that contributes to this paradigm shift, the most striking of them I found was the change from 90% of equity holders as household...
The reason markets will never be completely efficient is because man is fickled. If markets were run exclusively by ordinary materials, inanimate machines, and/or non intervening processes, then efficiency might one day be achieved with the right algorithm tapping into a large enough database while using a fast enough ...
Alas, as long as we live in an irrationally imprudent world filled with millions who do not always act in their best interest, markets will continue to remain inefficient for the foreseeable future.
I am surprised that we have not yet come up with a program that captures irrational exuberance, bizarre conspiracies, and crazy theories!
But of course we have. The best-knownones are called Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
I can imagine a future in which computers simulate greed, and in pursuit of that objective deploy both "good" and "bad" judgements as an element of greed-based goal seeking algorithms. The computers will be faster, better able to digest masses of information, and will indeed be able to take greed to whole new levels of...
That's my version of the singularity.
Unfortunatly I think we will allways have Fraud and missmanagement, so unless we figure out an algorythm that accounts for that, we will be far out from efficient markets.
Actually the more we evolve in terms of technology the further away the markets are from efficiency. The levels of disclosed information that were sufficient 3 decades ago, now are clearly insufficient.
How can we make decisions on quarterly information when the world changes in a second.
How long does it take to find frauds like the subprime in the US and the banking failures in Europe?
I'm not sure which is more amusing, the hubris of financial engineers who believe they can construct algorithms which will consistently yield them above average returns or market operators who by dint of confidence in their personal prowess believe they can "beat the market". That such hubris exists is evidenced by the...
LOL: economystics talk about reality.
I clearly understand, and accept `s conclusions, that human conduct is more relevant than all the "sophisticated analysts who rely on big data, powerful computers, and scholarly research." But then, why all the fuss for achieving an eventually zero alpha by using all the machinery and smart scholars? Are they making th...
The bloody, sometimes farcical events in Afghanistan and Iraq are the most compelling stories of our times, and every other stand-up comic has a routine about the absence of weapons of mass destruction. But it might seem premature for distinguished dramatic writing on this topic to have emerged.
Yet The Pugilist Specialist, by the remarkable 24-year-old American playwright Adriano Shaplin, is exactly that - a riveting drama posing thoughtful questions about the war against terrorism.
The cast comprises Shaplin and three other members of the San Francisco theatre collective the Riot Group. They play four US Marines on a clandestine mission to eliminate a hostile Middle Eastern political leader, nicknamed "Big 'Tache".
They're an intriguing quartet: the wisecracking sniper Lt Freud (Shaplin); a paternal, ex-liberal colonel; Harpo, an uptight, secretive communications/propaganda man; and Emma Stein (Stephanie Viola), a single-minded explosives expert, distrusted by the military since she complained about sexual harassment and made the...
Shaplin's characters talk in stylised cadences, delivered at quickfire pace. "I eat unconscious desires for breakfast," quips Freud. "I know where loose talk goes to die," Harpo protests. "There's a reason peace and quiet are partners."
Each character typifies a certain attitude towards the war on terror and the moral ambiguity of murder in pursuit of a possible greater good. In exploring these conundrums, Shaplin has created dazzling theatre. It's hard to imagine more brilliant or arresting new writing being uncovered in Edinburgh this year.
One argument explored is whether hate figures such as Saddam and bin Laden are more useful alive as embodiments of evil, or dead as trophies of victory. This theme also underpins Finding Bin Laden, a sharp satire by Henry Naylor. It's not in the same class as The Pugilist Specialist, aiming for dark comedy rather than ...
Peter Britton (Dave Lamb), a self-aggrandising TV war correspondent, finds himself outside Kabul, forever trailing in the wake of smarter, better-connected rivals. Together with Raheem, a mercenary Afghan militia man (Paul Chowdhry), he concocts a plan to tell the US military that he has tracked down bin Laden. But do ...

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