Links to Chapter One and Chapter Two
Edmund slipped and shivered through the snow until he eventually found the Witch’s castle. It looked quite creepy, but bolstered by thoughts of Turkish Delight (oh, his Saracens – and the Scarlets were his favourite Welsh side), he crept through the imposing main gate.
He found himself in a courtyard filled with statues. They had snow settling on them, and they all looked very sad. Near the gate, there were a couple of magnificent Lions, and then he spotted a statue that looked very like Lucy’s description of Mr Iknus. There was a collection of stone rugby balls, and what looked like a few referees. (“Those referees probably deserved it,” thought Edmund.)
Suddenly, Edmund was rooted to the spot by a chilling low growl. He turned his head to find himself staring into the eyes of Maugrim, chief of the Witch’s Very Secret Police.
“Come,” said Maugrim, “Her Majesty is expecting you.”
* * *
“What!” said the Witch, not at all friendly like the last time, “Have you come alone? I told you to bring the Daughters of Maeve and the other Son of George.”
“B – b – but,” stammered Edmund, afraid of her icy stare and stern manner, “I couldn’t get them away from the Beavers. They were all talking about the return of Paulan to Narnia.”
The Queen turned even paler, if that were possible.
“Paulan!” she muttered to herself, “No, it cannot be possible. My spells are strong.”
Before Edmund knew what had happened, she had crossed the room and spear-tackled him with one strong arm. “Tell me all,” she said, preparing to drive his head into the ground.
Edmund, quaking with fear, told her all that he knew.
The Witch released him with a thump on the floor, and clapped her hands to summon her minions.
“Harness the springboks and prepare my sledge immediately! Get my dwarf! Maugrim: take the swiftest of your wolves, go to the Lodge, and kill the children and the Beavers. If they have already gone, then proceed to the Stone Stadium.”
In the twinkling of a drop goal, the sledge pulled up, driven by a dwarf who looked suspiciously like a scrum-half. Edmund was bound, and unceremoniously dumped into the bottom of the sledge. There wasn’t even any Turkish Delight.
* * *
“Susan,” said Peter, “Where’s Edmund?”
“I – I don’t know. Now that you mention it, I haven’t noticed him for a while.”
“Ah, children,” said Mr Beaver, “I’m afraid he’s gone to see the Witch. We must be on our way quickly.”
“What?”, said Lucy, “No, surely Edmund would never betray us.”
“Daughter, I’m afraid he has the look of one who is in the Witch’s favour. How long that favour lasts is another matter.
“Did anyone notice when he left? Did he hear that Paulan is on the move?”
Nobody was quite sure.
“Then we must be off at once. Mrs Beaver, please pack us up as quickly as you can.”
Mrs Beaver – for of course it’s always the females who are prepared for anything – had already got nearly everything ready for travelling. She had a pack ready for everyone, and they were off in less time than it takes to reset a scrum.
* * *
They had a long, cold and weary journey, and stopped after some hours at a safe hiding place, where they cast themselves down on the floor, covered themselves with the blankets kindly provided by Mrs Beaver, and fell asleep immediately.
They were awakened at dawn by some faint voices, which became clearer as they drew closer.
“Ho, ho ho! Go left! It’s on!”
“I’m straighter than that throw-in.”
The children rubbed the sleep from their eyes and looked in confusion at the Beavers.
“It’s Father Jiffy and Father Nige,” beamed Mr Beaver. “The Witch’s magic has kept them from Narnia for so long, but her enchantment is fading. The voices of rugby have returned to the land.” They rushed outside to find a volley of rugby balls flying through the air, and the snow at last melting.
Ovally Balls 
@brookter
Nowt wrong with what you said. It’s actually why I was largely not bothered about the massive furore about the number of covid tests in the media recently – they fixated on that as if it was a measure of the government’s performance. Whereas if you have a test with a) an unknown false positive rate b) an unknown false negative rate and c) a condition with an unknown prevalance in the community, the numbers arising from those tests may well be close to useless.
I used to teach first year labs and if you didn’t calculate an uncertainty you didn’t get a pass mark. So it drives me potty in any politicised area (covid-19, climate change etc) that quotes numbers without uncertainties, and even worse, forecasts from models.
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@Chimpie,
I find it fascinating, but it’s really hard for someone like me who’s not used to mathematical logic — one of the things I have to think really hard about when they give you a scenario is deciding which way round the ‘assumptions’ go based on what they’ve told you so you can fit them into the formula.
E.g. In the question I posted, if you’ve tested positive and you’re sick does that translate into P(P assuming S) or P(S assuming P)… I’ve got that for this particular problem now, but if you gave me another set of circumstances I’d have to spend ages working out which was which.
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Thanks OT and Brookter.
Yes, I can see this – the maths isn’t difficult but you need to “think” in the correct mindset or think using the correct tools to approach the problem.
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@OT,
The coronavirus tests were definitely in my mind while I was doing the exercises…
The fuss about the tests was totally misjudged, I agree (not surprising when the govt includes someone as gifted at numbers as Priti Patel…) — I had no problem with them saying we’re going to have a challenging target for numbers of tests (testing, for the obviously correct need to interpret the result properly as you point out), it’s the transparent fiddling the figures to make it seem as though they had reached it. It’s not encouraging.
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@brookter
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@Trisk,
That’s a good way of putting it: I can identify that there are tools to solve this problem, and I know how each tool is supposed to work, but I can’t always see which tool should be used in which order…
Thinking about it, I have the same gift for maths that Eric Morecambe had for playing the piano.
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Having a load of tests is all very well but not much use if you don’t do anything with the information they’re providing, or interpret it wrongly.
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@OT,
Lord save us…
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And another question:
A random president of the United States is known to have a 1/10000 chance of saying a true thing. This same random president is known to have a 1/10000 chance of doing something to benefit his country. There is an election less than six months away.
The president has just said that he has been taking a treatment which he has a financial interest in, but which is known a) not to deal with the virus and b) to have severe side effects such as death.
How likely is it that the president is lying to own the libs?
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Hi guys – I have found this discussion fascinating and even got books to add to my wishlist!
Just wanted to say – and not gloating, honestly – what a glorious day it is in the French countryside today. Thw sky is bluest blue, the birds are singing and still only a few people about.
It’s perfect but, I feel genuinely lucky and think of all those who don’t have my freedoms – or this blog.
ps – still nothing about SH-C on Exeter’s website…………………………………
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Splendid stuff on the read back. Far better than the webcast on eating fruit and veg I’m currently sitting through.
The mathematical thought process reminds me of the bat and ball question where they both cost £1.10 and the bat costs £1 more than the ball. How much is the bat? A lot of people instinctively get it wrong.
And I’ll have what Slade is having thanks.
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Ooh.
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And once again I have to sympathise with the government. They take advice from scientists but even scientists often don’t know what to do when they have no data. Too often they say “there is no evidence” and advise you to carry on as normal. And they believe their own models. Sometimes you have to accept you don’t know and make decisions accordingly.
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OT – if we are covering maths…
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This is Meggie’s finest moment
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OT – love the £50 note.
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OT, How much do you think the scientists are tailoring stuff for the politicians, trying to work out what might be heard based on what they know about the politicians?
Face masks have been mandatory here in the CR for two months now and it’s generally adhered to by the residents. Even now if you’re approaching someone in a park, the mask goes on.
I’ve convinced myself Johnson would be very unwilling to introduce such a measure. Partly because an argument about people who cover their faces has been used by politicians of by both major parties over the last 15, 20 years.
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@tomp
It’s a good question that I honestly don’t know the answer to. Scientists aren’t a special race of super humans immune to the usual pressures on ego and from their perceived place in a hierarchy. Any scientist has a narrow bit of expertise that they are expert in, but there is no guarantee they are more informed than the layman once they step outside of that. That link I posted had Jenny Harries saying there was “no evidence” masks would help. I heard her colleague Jonathan Van-Tam say much the same over the last few weeks – of course there is no evidence as nobody has had time to test the affect of masks on the transmission of Covid-19. I found myself shouting at the telly as you don’t need a peer reviewed publication testing it to realise that slowing down a sneeze or a cough using a mask would reduce transmission. But that doesn’t count as evidence.
So is it ignorance or doing the bosses bidding? Probably both, these people don’t get these jobs by being politically naive. But remember the problem Brookter posed earlier – Gerd Gigerenzer asked a similar question to doctors a few years ago and about 80% of them got it wrong (see below). I think most scientists don’t understand probability properly, and succumb to all kinds of confirmation bias using models etc.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-28166019
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Afternoon all! I’ve just realised that maths is not my strong suit. Except the bat and ball question.
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I guess the test in the earlier example would still be useful (if it really reflected a Covid test or whatever) if you were prepared to treat all positives as true positives and isolate those people and those they’ve been in contact with? Or perhaps not. Think I might be in Deebee’s camp on this one.
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Disagree with Deebs about the bat and ball question though. Seems like a complete waste of time as I can’t see how it gets us any closer to finding out whether the bat has Covid-19.
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Would be minded to get rid of the bat just to be on the safe side. And get rid of the test as well.
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Have spent the day doing a very thorough job of sorting the parts for some very old fashioned level crossing barriers into the sort of order from which someone who doesn’t know what any of them are could at least consider that they were in a position to try to make one. What is the probability of anyone actually ever opening the pallets?
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Aside from Professor Brian Cox
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@TomP – are you aware of a book of Brian Cox’s asides? Would like to get OT a birthday present.
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My sister also despises Brian Cox. “He’s not an astrophysicist!”
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“He’s not an astrophysicist”
He’s an aphorist as TomP has demonstrated.
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thaum, that’s right he’s Professor Brian Cox, professor of particle physics. and a super human immune to the pressures of ego.
Plus, if the whispers I’ve heard are right, he might be getting the old sword on the shoulders treatment soon enough. “Arise, Sir Science”
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I don’t know if there’s a book, CMW. If there were, I’d get the audiobook so that OT can revel in the shared Oldham accent.
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Thus Spake Cox.
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Please. Also Sprach Cox.
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@Thaum – the accent might sound ridiculous in German.
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You don’t hear rugby league commentators saying they can’t sprach, that’s for sure.
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You don’t hear RL commentators speaking like Brian Cox either. That’s a very weird accent he’s cultivated. Barrie McDermott he ain’t.
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“You don’t hear RL commentators speaking like Brian Cox either.”
You do in the bonus extras section of the deluxe audiobook edition of Thus Spake Cox.
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He’s a well good keyboard player too.
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I quite like Brian Cox. I’m not a hater.
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@Craigs,
I don’t mind Brian Cox either. I don’t watch all that much television, but the couple of things I’ve seem in him seemed reasonable enough and he gets people interested in science, which is a good thing, as far as I can see. He may be different in person, of course, but as I’m never likely to meet him, I’ll never know…
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I have no strong opinions the the Coxer either.
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Brookter – I feel the same way. I also quite enjoy the OTT style of some of his programs. I can remember a shot of him walking towards the camera whilst the building behind him was being demolished. All to make a basic scientific point. Peak excitable fizziks teacher imo. And thoroughly enjoyable.
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A pale shadow of James Burke:
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Tomp – ‘snot a competition.
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That Burke clip is the boy.
Amazing to think they could have done it when none of the production crew or the director or James Burke himself were even rocket scientist.
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Brian Cox focuses on the important stuff anyway.
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craigs, I’ve confused myself now. Not sure which side of the non-argument I’m on. Just lashing out wildly in favour of Cox and then against Cox. I need a lie-down.
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@Craigs,
Quite. Though, obviously not on a pair with the Best TV Science Programs Ever: 1980s Open University.
This is from S102 Science Foundation Course (which I did in about 1988, I think). The videos for M101 Maths Foundation is on YouTube as well — I did it a couple of years later. Sadly, M205 Fundamentals of Computing, which I did in between, doesn’t seem to have been preserved — that was fun, running a cut down Pascal clone on a 486DX33 with a 10GB HD. Such power… Happy Days.
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Tomp – it’s well timed, I’ll give them that.
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The younger ones amongst you may be wondering why the presenter has a Lockdown Haircut 30 years before his time. Not so: that’s what a Real Physics Teacher ™ looks like.
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The plaster on the finger is a neat touch.
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