Mutation

Mutation (pronounced myoo-tey-shuhn)

(1) In biology (also as “break”), a sudden departure from the parent type in one or more heritable characteristics, caused by a change in a gene or a chromosome.

(2) In biology, (also as “sport”), an individual, species, or the like, resulting from such a departure.

(3) The act or process of mutating; change; alteration.

(4) A resultant change or alteration, as in form or nature.

(5) In phonetics (in or of Germanic languages), the umlaut (the assimilatory process whereby a vowel is pronounced more like a following vocoid that is separated by one or more consonants).

(6) In structural linguistics (in or of Celtic languages), syntactically determined morphophonemic phenomena that affect initial sounds of words (the phonetic change in certain initial consonants caused by a preceding word).

(7) An alternative word for “mutant”

(8) In cellular biology & genetics, a change in the chromosomes or genes of a cell which, if occurring in the gametes, can affect the structure and development of all or some of any resultant off-spring; any heritable change of the base-pair sequence of genetic material.

(9) A physical characteristic of an individual resulting from this type of chromosomal change.

(10) In law, the transfer of title of an asset in a register.

(11) In ornithology, one of the collective nouns for the thrush (the more common forms being “hermitage” & “rash”)

1325–1375: From the Middle English mutacioun & mutacion (action or process of changing), from the thirteenth century Old French mutacion and directly from the Latin mūtātion- (stem of mūtātiō) (a changing, alteration, a turn for the worse), noun of action from past-participle stem of mutare (to change), from the primitive Indo-European root mei- (to change, go, move).  The construct can thus be understood as mutat(e) +ion.  Dating from 1818, the verb mutate (to change state or condition, undergo change) was a back-formation from mutation.  It was first used in genetics to mean “undergo mutation” in 1913.  The –ion suffix was from the Middle English -ioun, from the Old French -ion, from the Latin -iō (genitive -iōnis).  It was appended to a perfect passive participle to form a noun of action or process, or the result of an action or process. The use in genetics in the sense of “process whereby heritable changes in DNA arise” dates from 1894 (although the term "DNA" (deoxyribonucleic acid) wasn't used until 1938 the existence of the structure (though not its structural detail) was fist documented in 1869 after the identification of nuclein).  In linguistics, the term “i-mutation” was first used in 1874, following the earlier German form “i-umlaut”, the equivalent in English being “mutation”.  The noun mutagen (agent that causes mutation) was coined in 1946, the construct being muta(tion) + -gen.  The –gen suffix was from the French -gène, from the Ancient Greek -γενής (-genḗs).  It was appended to create a word meaning “a producer of something, or an agent in the production of something” and is familiar in the names of the chemical elements hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen.  From mutagen came the derive forms mutagenic, mutagenesis & mutagenize.  Mutation, mutationist & mutationism is a noun, mutability is a noun, mutable & mutant are nouns & adjectives, mutated & mutating are verbs & adjectives, mutational & mutationistic are adjective and mutationally is an adverb; the noun plural is mutations.  For whatever reasons, the adverb mutationistically seems not to exist.

In scientific use the standard abbreviation is mutat and forms such as nonmutation, remutation & unmutational (used both hyphenated and not) are created as required and there is even demutation (used in computer modeling).  In technical use, the number of derived forms is vast, some of which seem to enjoy some functional overlap although in fields like genetics and cellular biology, the need for distinction between fine details of process or consequence presumably is such that the proliferation may continue.  In science and linguistics, the derived forms (used both hyphenated and not) include animutation, antimutation, backmutation, e-mutation, ectomutation, endomutation, epimutation, extramutation, frameshift mutation, hard mutation, heteromutation, homomutation, hypermutation, hypomutation, i-mutation, intermutation, intramutation, intromutation, macromutation, macromutational, megamutation, mesomutation, micromutation, missense mutation, mixed mutation, multimutation, mutationless, mutation pressure, nasal mutation, neomutation, nonsense mutation, oncomutation, paramutation. Pentamutation, phosphomutation. point mutation, postmutation, premutation, radiomutation, retromutation, soft mutation, spirant mutation, stem mutation, stereomutation, ultramutation & vowel mutation.

Ginger, copper, auburn & chestnut are variations on the theme of red-headedness: Ranga Lindsay Lohan demonstrates the possibilities.

Red hair is the result of a mutation in the melanocortin 1 receptor (MC1R) gene responsible for producing the MC1R protein which plays a crucial role also in determining skin-tone. When the MC1R gene is functioning normally, it helps produce eumelanin, a type of melanin that gives hair a dark color.  However, a certain mutation in the MC1R gene leads to the production of pheomelanin which results in red hair.  Individuals with two copies of the mutated MC1R gene (one from each parent) typically have red hair, fair skin, and a higher sensitivity to ultraviolet (UV) light, a genetic variation found most often in those of northern & western European descent.

A mutation is a change in the structure of the genes or chromosomes of an organism and mutations occurring in the reproductive cells (such as an egg or sperm), can be passed from one generation to the next.  It appears most mutations occur in “junk DNA” and the orthodox view is these generally have no discernible effects on the survivability of an organism.  The term junk DNA was coined to describe those portions of an organism's DNA which do not encode proteins and were thought to have no functional purpose (although historically there may have been some).  The large volume of these “non-coding regions” surprised researchers when the numbers emerged because the early theories had predicted they would comprise a much smaller percentage of the genome.  The term junk DNA was intentionally dismissive and reflected the not unreasonable assumption the apparently redundant sequences were mere evolutionary “leftovers” without an extant biological function of any significance.

However, as advances in computing power have enabled the genome further to be explored, it’s been revealed that many of these non-coding regions do fulfil some purpose including: (1) A regulatory function: (the binary regulation of gene expression, influencing when, where, and how genes are turned on or off; (2) As superstructure: (Some regions contribute to the structural integrity of chromosomes (notably telomeres and centromeres); (3) In RNA (ribonucleic acid) molecules: Some non-coding DNA is transcribed into non-coding RNA molecules (such as microRNAs and long non-coding RNAs), which are involved in various cellular processes; (4) Genomic Stability: It’s now clear there are non-coding regions which contribute to the maintenance of genomic stability and the protection of genetic information.  Despite recent advances, the term junk DNA is still in use in mapping but is certainly misleading for those not immersed in the science; other than in slang, in academic use and technical papers, “non-coding DNA” seems now the preferred term and where specific functions have become known, these regions are described thus.

There’s also now some doubt about the early assumptions that of the remaining mutations, the majority have harmful effects and only a minority operate to increase an organism's ability to survive, something of some significance because a mutation which benefits a species may evolve by means of natural selection into a trait shared by some or all members of the species.  However, there have been suggestions the orthodox view was (at least by extent) influenced by the slanting of the research effort towards diseases, syndromes and other undesirable conditions and that an “identification bias” may thus have emerged.  So the state of the science now is that there are harmful & harmless mutations but there are also mutations which may appear to have no substantive effect yet may come to be understood as significant, an idea which was explored in an attempt to understand why some people found to be inflected with a high viral-load of SARS-Cov-2 (the virus causing Covid-19) remained asymptomatic.

In genetics, a mutation is a change in the DNA sequence of an organism and it seems they can occur in any part of the DNA and can vary in size and type.  Most associated with errors during DNA replication, mutations can also be a consequence of viral infection or exposure to certain chemicals or radiation, or as a result of viral infections.  The classification of mutations has in recent years been refined to exist in three categories:

(1) By the Effect on DNA Sequence:  These are listed as Point Mutations which are changes in a single nucleotide and include (1.1) Substitutions in which one base pair is replaced by another, (1.2) Insertions which describe the addition of one or more nucleotide pairs and (1.3) Deletions, the removal of one or more nucleotide pairs.

(2) By the Effect on Protein Sequence: These are listed as: (2.1) Silent Mutations which do not change the amino acid sequence of the protein, (2.2) Missense Mutations in which there is a change one amino acid in the protein, potentially affecting its function, (2.3) Nonsense Mutations which create a premature stop codon, leading to a truncated and usually non-functional protein and (2.4) Frameshift Mutations which result from insertions or deletions that change the reading frame of the gene, often leading to a completely different and non-functional protein.

(3) By the Effect on Phenotype: These are listed as (3.1) Beneficial Mutations which provide some advantage to the organism, (3.2) Neutral Mutations which have no apparent significant effect on the organism's fitness and (3.3) Deleterious Mutations which are harmful to the organism and can cause diseases or other problems.

(4) By the Mechanism of Mutation: These are listed as (4.1) Spontaneous Mutations which occur naturally without any external influence, due often to errors in DNA replication and (4.2) Induced Mutations which result from exposure to mutagens environmental factors such as chemicals or radiation that can cause changes in DNA),

Because of the association with disease, genetic disorders and disruptions to normal biological functions, in the popular imagination mutations are thought undesirable.  They are however a crucial part of the evolutionary process and life on this planet as it now exists would not be possible without the constant process of mutation which has provided the essential genetic diversity within populations and has driven the adaptation and evolution of species.  Although it will probably never be known if life on earth started and died out before beginning the evolutionary chain which endures to this day, as far as is known, everything now alive (an empirically, that means in the entire universe) ultimately has a single common ancestor.  Mutations have played a part in the diversity which followed and of all the species which once have inhabited earth, a tiny fraction remain, the rest extinct.

Nuclear-induced mutations

Especially since the first A-Bombs were used in 1945, the idea of “mutant humans” being created by the fallout from nuclear war or power-plants suffering a meltdown have been a staple for writers of science fiction (SF) and producers of horror movies, the special-effects and CGI (computer generated graphics) crews ever imaginative in their work.  The fictional works are disturbing because radiation-induced human mutations are not common but radiation can cause changes in DNA, leading to mutations and a number of factors determine the likelihood and extent of damage.  The two significant types of radiation are: (1) ionizing radiation which includes X-rays, gamma rays, and particles such as alpha and beta particles.  Ionizing radiation has enough energy to remove tightly bound electrons from atoms, creating ions and directly can damage DNA or create reactive oxygen species that cause indirect damage.  In high doses, ionizing radiation can increase the risk of cancer and genetic mutations and (2) non-ionizing radiation which includes ultraviolet (UV) light, visible light, microwaves, and radiofrequency radiation.  Because this does not possess sufficient energy to ionize atoms or molecules, which there is a risk of damage to DNA (seen most typically in some types of skin cancer), but the risk of deep genetic mutations is much lower than that of ionizing radiation.  The factors influencing the extent of damage include the dose, duration of exposure, the cell type(s) affected, a greater or lesser genetic predisposition and age.

Peter Dutton (b 1970; leader of the opposition and leader of the Australian Liberal Party since May 2022) announces the Liberal Party's new policy advocating the construction of multiple nuclear power-plants in Australia.

The prosthetic used in the digitally-altered image (right) was a discarded proposal for the depiction of Lord Voldemort in the first film version of JK Rowling's (b 1965) series of Harry Potter children's fantasy novels; it used a Janus-like two-faced head.  It's an urban myth Mr Dutton auditioned for the part when the first film was being cast but was rejected as being "too scary".  If ever there's another film, the producers might reconsider and should his career in politics end (God forbid), he could bring to Voldemort the sense of menacing evil the character has never quite achieved.  Interestingly, despite many opportunities, Mr Dutton has never denied being a Freemason.

On paper, while not without challenges, Australia does enjoy certain advantages in making nuclear part of the energy mix: (1)  With abundant potential further to develop wind and solar generation, the nuclear plants would need only to provide the baseload power required when renewable sources were either inadequate or unavailable; (2) the country would be self-sufficient in raw uranium ore (although it has no enrichment capacity) and (3) the place is vast and geologically stable so in a rational world it would be nominated as the planet's repository of spent nuclear fuel and other waste.  The debate as it unfolds is likely to focus on other matters and nobody images any such plant can in the West be functioning in less than twenty-odd years (the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) gets things done much more quickly) so there's plenty of time to squabble and plenty of people anxious to join in this latest theatre of the culture wars.  Even National Party grandee Barnaby Joyce (b 1967; thrice (between local difficulties) deputy prime minister of Australia 2016-2022) has with alacrity become a champion of all things nuclear (electricity, submarines and probably bombs although, publicly, he seems not to have discussed the latter).  The National Party has never approved of solar panels and wind turbines because they associate them with feminism, seed-eating vegans, homosexuals and other symbols of all which is wrong with modern society.  While in his coal-black heart Mr Joyce's world view probably remains as antediluvian as ever, he can sniff the political wind in a country now beset by wildfires, floods and heatwaves and talks less of the beauty of burning fossil fuels.  Still, in the wake of Mr Dutton's announcement, conspiracy theorists have been trying to make Mr Joyce feel better, suggesting the whole thing is just a piece of subterfuge designed to put a spanner in the works of the transition to renewable energy generation, the idea being to protect the financial positions of those who make much from fossil fuels, these folks being generous donors to party funds and employers of "helpful" retired politicians in lucrative and undemanding roles.

Blackwing

Blackwing (pronounced blak-wing)

(1) In zoology (mostly ornithology, entomology & ichthyology), a widely used descriptor of birds, insects, certain water-dwellers and the odd bat.

(2) As Blackwing 602, a pencil with a cult following, manufactured by the Eberhard Faber between 1934-1988, by Faber-Castell 1988 to 1994 and by Sanford 1994-1998.  A visually (though not technically) similar pencil has since 2012 been produced by Palomino.

(3) A high-performance V8 engine manufactured by the Cadillac division of General Motors (GM) between 2018-2020.  Cadillac continues to use Blackwing name for the some of its sedans.

1100s (originally of birds, first informally, later in formal taxonomy): The construct was black + wing.  Black (In the sense of the “color”) was from the Middle English blak, black & blake, from the Old English blæc (black, dark (also "ink”)), from the Proto-West Germanic blak, from the Proto-Germanic blakaz (burnt (and related to the Dutch blaken (to burn)), from the Low German blak & black (blackness, black paint, (black) ink), from the Old High German blah (black), which may be from the primitive Indo-European bhleg- (to burn, shine).  The forms may be compared with the Latin flagrāre (to burn), the Ancient Greek φλόξ (phlóx) (flame) and Sanskrit भर्ग (bharga) (radiance).  Black in this context was “a color” lacking hue and brightness, one which absorbs light without reflecting any of the rays composing it.  In the narrow technical sense, black is an absolute (absorbing light without reflecting any of the rays composing it) but in general use, as a descriptor or color, expressions of graduation or tincture are used, thus the comparative is blacker and the superlative blackest.  The usual synonyms are ebony, sable, inky, sooty, dusky & dark while the antonym is white.  Wing (in the sense used in “flight”) was from the twelfth century Middle English winge & wenge, from the Old Norse vængr (wing of a flying animal, wing of a building), from the Proto-Germanic wēingijaz, from the primitive Indo-European hweh- (to blow (thus the link with “wind”)).  It was cognate with the Old Danish wingæ (wing), the Norwegian & Swedish vinge (wing), the Old Norse vǣngr and the Icelandic vængur (wing).  It replaced the native Middle English fither, from the Old English fiþre, from the Proto-Germanic fiþriją (which merged with the Middle English fether (from the Old English feþer, from the Proto-Germanic feþrō)).  The original use was of birds but this quickly extended to things where a left-right distinction was useful such as architecture, sport and military formations (later extended to organizational structures in air forces).  Blackwing is a noun & adjective; the noun plural is blackwings.  In commercial use, as a registered trademark, an initial capital is used.

Quite why Cadillac (the premium brand of General Motors (GM) since 1909) chose the seemingly improbable “Blackwing” as a name for an engine and later the premium, high-performance versions (the V-Series) of its sedans (a now rare body-style in North America) is said to date to the very origin of the brand, more than a century earlier.  It was to recall the stylized black birds which appeared on the corporate crest first in 1902 (although not widely used until 2005 and trademarked in 1906).  That escutcheon was adopted as a tribute to the French explorer (some are less generous in their descriptions) Antoine Laumet de La Mothe, sieur de Cadillac (1658-1730) who in 1701 founded the settlement which became the city of Detroit.

Evolution of the Cadillac Crest: Antoine Laumet's original (and dubious) family crest (top left), A early Cadillac from 1905 (top centre), from a 1960 Coupe DeVille (top right), with the restored laurel wreath on the unfortunate vinyl roof of a 1968 Eldorado (bottom left), a post 2014 version without couronne & merelettes (bottom centre) and the current versions (bottom right), the black & white edition an illuminated badge created to mark the transition to electric propulsion; it's currently available as an option on petrol vehicles.  The illuminated grill badge was a trick long used by the English manufacturer Wolseley (1901-1975). 

Although of bourgeois origin and having departed France surreptitiously after “some unpleasantness”, shortly after arriving in the new world, Antoine Laumet re-invented himself, adopting a title of nobility named after the town of Cadillac in south-west France and in some histories, it wasn’t unusual for him to claim some vague descent from the royal line, a story common among many of Europe’s aristocratic families and his “family crest” was wholly his own invention.  Such things were possible then.  The Cadillac company modified the crest but retained the most distinctive elements: (1) The couronne (crown (from the Old French corone, from the Latin corōna, from the Ancient Greek κορώνη (korṓnē)) symbolized the six ancient courts of France; (2) The pearls (which appeared in various numbers on both the family & corporate versions) signified a family descended from the royal counts of Toulouse; (3) The shield denoted the military traditions of a noble family, the “warrior symbol” one of the most commonly used in heraldry while (4) The black birds were known as merlettes (an adaptation of the martin), mythical small birds without beaks or feet and never touching the ground, always in flight; they represent a constant striving for excellence, and when presented as a trio, referenced the Holy Trinity and thus a family’s adherence to Christianity.  The merelettes appeared often on the standards flown by knights during the late Medieval Christian Crusades staged to recapture the Holy Land but they didn’t disappear from the Cadillac crest in deference to sensibilities in the Middle East (a market of increasing value to GM).  Like the crown, the black birds were removed in 2000 as a part of a modernization exercise, the aim to achieve something “sharper and sleeker”, the more angular look of the new “Art and Science” philosophy of design.  “Art and Science” was from the class of slogans campaign directors of corporations and political parties adore because they mean nothing in particular while sounding like they must mean something.

A Cadillac Escalade driven by Lindsay Lohan receiving a parking infringement notice (US$70) for obstructing access to a fire hydrant, Los Angeles, September 2011.  The crest’s laurel wreath would remain until 2014 but the merelettes had been removed a decade earlier.

Prestige by associative semiotics: Emblem of the 1971 HQ Statesman de Ville by GMH (General Motors-Holden's).

Cadillac over the years made may detail changes to the corporate crest and structurally, the most significant addition came in 1963 when an almost enclosing laurel wreath returned (it had been there in 1902 but was gone by 1908, returning for a run between 1916-1925) and it proved the most enduring design thus far, maintained until 2014.  It clearly had some cross-cultural appeal because in 1971 Holden (GM’s now defunct Australian outpost) made a point of issuing a press release informing the country “special permission” had been received from Detroit for them to borrow the wreath to surround the Holden crest on their new HQ Statesman de Ville, a car so special that nowhere on the thing did the word “Holden” appear, the same marketing trick Toyota would three decades on apply to the Lexus.

Well GM understood the symbolic significance of the wreath.  The Cadillac 62 (1940-1964) had existed as an "entry level" model (ie lower cost) after the shuttering of the LaSalle (1927-1940) and when it was replaced by the Calais (1965-1976), one signifier of its place in the hierarchy was the corporate crest appearing wreathless, unlike the more expensive de Ville & Eldorado.  However, unlike the accessories, ahat has remained constant throughout are the emblem's core colors and, according to Cadillac, black against gold symbolizes riches and wisdom; red means boldness and prowess in action; silver denotes purity, virtue, plenty and charity while blue stand for knightly valor.  Behind the and crest, the background is platinum (a high-value metal) and the whole combination is said to have been influenced by Piet Mondrian (1872–1944), a Dutch artist noted for his work with color and geometric shapes.

The elegant black-winged Damselfly, one of dozens of insects, birds, aquatic creatures and the odd bat known as the “black-winged” something.  One of some 150 species of Calopterygidae, the taxonomic name is Calopteryx maculata and the stylish little mosquito muncher is commonly found in North America, its other common name the ebony jewelwing.

Cadillac Blackwing V8.  It was a genuinely impressive piece of engineering but according to Road & Track magazine, Cadillac booked a US$16 million dollar loss against the project.    

Cadillac’s all aluminium Blackwing V8 was designed with an AMG-like specification which would once have seemed exotic to Cadillac owners.  Built in a single basic configuration, it featured a displacement of 4.2 litres (256 cubic inches), double overhead camshafts (DOHC), four valves per cylinder, cross-bolted main bearings and twin, intercooled turbochargers mounted in a “hot-V” arrangement (atop the block, between the cylinder banks) a layout which delivers improved responsiveness but, as BMW found, can bring its own problems.  Intended always to be exclusive to Cadillac’s lines (recalling GM’s divisional structure in happier times) it was in production less than two years because the collapse in demand for the models for which it was intended doomed its future; it was too expensive to produce to be used in other cars.  The early indications had however been hopeful, the initial run of 275 over-subscribed, a slightly detuned version accordingly rushed into production to meet demand.  In 2020, the Blackwood V8 was cancelled.

2025 Cadillac CT5-V Blackwing.

Repurposed, Blackwing however lives on at Cadillac, the company in 2021 appending applying the name to exclusive variants of its CT range sedans.  The CT5-V Blackwing is the last survivor of what once was a well-inhabited niche and although clearly an anachronism, demand still exists and although Cadillac has admitted this will be their last V8-powered sedan, in announcing the 2025 range they’ve made it clear the last days will be memorable.  In a nod to history, the company chose Le Mans in France to reveal details of the 2025 V-Series Blackwing “Special Editions”, honoring the “Le Monstre” and “Petit Pataud” Cadillacs which contested the 1950 24 hour endurance classic.  Each of those was a one-off (one especially so) but in 2025 there will be 101 copies of the Blackwing Le Monstre and 50 of the Petit Patauds.  The two are visually similar, the exteriors finished in Magnus Metal Frost matte paint, accented by Stormhawk Blue Carbon Fiber and Royal Blue brake callipers, the blue theme extened to the interior fittings.  Mechanically, the two are essentially stock, the Petit Pataud based on the CT4-V Blackwing powered by a twin-turbo 3.6 liter (223 cubic inch) V6 while the more alluring Le Monstre includes a supercharged 6.2-liter (376 cubic inch) V8.  For those who care about such things, although Mercedes-Benz AMG once offered rear-wheel-drive (RWD) 6.2 litre V8s, the Batwing offers the chance to enjoy the experience with a manual gearbox, something the Germans never did.  The Blackwings are also much cheaper and have about them an appealing brutishness, a quality Stuttgart’s engineers felt compelled to gloss a little.

2025 Cadillac CT5-V Blackwing.  Compared with some of the atmospheric interiors in the Cadillacs of old, the Blackwing is disappointingly close to what one finds in a Chevrolet but for a number of reasons, creating something which is both attractive and lawful is not as easy as once it was.  For many, the sight of the stick-shift and a clutch pedal means all is forgiven.

In something which would for most of the second half of the twentieth century have seemed improbable or unthinkable, it’s now possible to buy a Cadillac with a manual gearbox and a clutch pedal but not a Ferrari so configured.  Ferrari by 1976 had begun to flirt with automatic transmissions in their road cars (GM’s famously robust Turbo-Hydramatic 400) but until 2004, Cadillac hadn’t needed clutch pedal assemblies on the assembly lines since the last 1953 Series 75 (among the Cadillac crowd the Cimarron (1982-1988) is never spoken of except in the phrase “the unpleasantness of 1982”).  However, by the early twenty-first century, the market for the cars Cadillac had perfected was shrinking fast so, noting the success of Mercedes-AMG and the M-Series BMWs, Cadillac entered the fray and the existence of the Chevrolet Corvette’s transmission in the corporate parts bin meant offering a manual gearbox was financially viable in a way it wasn’t for the Germans.  In the same decade, advances in hydraulics and electronics meant the earlier inefficiencies and technical disadvantages attached to automatic transmissions had been overcome to the point where no Ferrari with a manual transmission, however expertly driven, could match their performance and customers agreed, sales of manual cars dwindling until a swansong when the Ferrari California was released in 2008 with expectations some 5-10% of buyers would opt for a clutch pedal.  However between then and late 2011, a mere three were ordered (some sources say two or five but the factory insists it was three).  Ever since, for Maranello, it’s been automatics (technically “automated manual transmission”) all the way and that wasn’t anything dictatorial; had customer demand existed at a sustainable level, the factory would have continued to supply manual transmissions.  The rarity has however created collectables; on the rare occasions a rare manual version of a usually automatic Ferrari is offered at auction, it attracts attracts a premium and there's now an after-market converting Ferraris to open gate manuals.  It's said to cost up to US$40,000 depending on the model and, predictably, the most highly regarded are those converted using "verified factory parts".  The Cadillac Blackwing offers the nostalgic experience from the factory although the engineers admit there is a slight performance penalty, buyers choosing the manual purely for the pleasure of driving.

The quincunx induction system, the Cadillac Le Monstre and the 24 Heures du Mans, 1950

Living up to the name: The 1950 Cadillac Le Monstre.

The two Cadillacs which in 1950 raced at Le Mans were mechanically similar but visually, could have been from different planets.  The more conventional Petit Pataud was a Series 61 coupe with only minor modification and it gained its nickname (the translation “clumsy puppy” best captures the spirit) because to the French it looked a lumbering thing but, as its performance in the race would attest, Cadillac’s new 331 cubic inch (5.4 litre) V8 (which would grow to 429 cubic inches (7.0 litres) before it was retired in 1967) meant it was faster than it looked.  Underneath the second entrant (Le Monstre obviously needing no translation but used in the sense of “monstrosity” rather than “large”) there was also a Series 61 but the body had been replaced by something more obviously aerodynamic although few, then or now, would call it “conventionally attractive”.  Although Le Monstre seemed very much in the tradition of the “cucumber-shaped” Mercedes-Benz SSKL which had won the 1932 race at Berlin’s unique AVUS circuit, the lines were the result of testing a one twelfth (Uncia in the Latin) scale wooden model in a wind-tunnel used usually to optimize the shape crop dusters and other slow-flying airplanes.  Presumably that explains the resemblance to a section of an airplane’s wing (a shape designed to encourage lift), something which would have been an issue had higher speeds been attained but even on the long (6 km (3.7 mile)) Mulsanne Straight, there was in 1950 enough power only to achieve around 210 km/h (130) mph although as a drag-reduction exercise it must have contributed to the 22 km/h (13 mph) advantage it enjoyed over Petit Pataud, something Le Monstre’s additional horsepower alone could not have done and remarkably, even with the minimalist aluminium skin it wasn’t much lighter than the standard-bodied coupe because this was no monocoque; the robust Cadillac chassis was retained with a tube-frame added to support the panels and provide the necessary torsional stiffness.

Le Monstre's 331 cubic inch V8 with its unusual (and possibly unique) five-carburetor induction system.  The layout (one in each corner, one in the centre) is a "quincunx", from the Latin quīncunx.

Some of the additional horsepower came from the novel "quincunx" induction system.  Le Monstre’s V8 was configured with five carburettors, the idea being that by use of progressive throttle-linkages, when ultimate performance wasn’t required the car would run on a single (central) carburettor, the other four summoned on demand and in endurance racing, improved fuel economy can be more valuable than additional power.  That’s essentially how most four-barrel carburettors worked, two venturi usually providing the feed with all four opened only at full throttle and Detroit would later refine the model by applying “méthode Le Monstre” to the triple carburettor systems many used between 1957-1971.  As far as is known, the only time a manufacturer flirted with the idea of a five carburetor engine was Rover which in the early 1960s was experimenting with a 2.5 (153 cubic inch) litre in-line five cylinder which was an enlargement of their 2.0 litre (122 cubic inch) four.  Fuel-injection was the obvious solution but the systems then were prohibitively expensive (for the market segment Rover was targeting) so the prototypes ended up with two carburettors feeding three cylinders and one the other two, an arrangement as difficult to keep in tune as it sounds.  Rover’s purchase of the aluminium 3.5 litre (214 cubic inch) V8 abandoned by General Motors (GM) meant the project was terminated and whatever the cylinder count, mass-produced fuel injection later made any configuration possible.  Five carburettors wasn’t actually the highest count seen in the pre fuel-injection era, Ferrari and Lamborghini both using six (done also by motorcycle manufacturers such as Honda and Benelli) and Moto-Guzzi in the 1950s fielded a 500 cm³ Grand-Prix bike with the memorable component count of 8 cylinders, 4 camshafts, 16 valves & 8 carburetors.  The early prototypes of Daimler’s exquisite hemi-head V8s (1959-1969) were also built with eight carburettors because the original design was based on a motorcycle power-plant, the reason why they were planned originally as air-cooled units.

Le Monstre ahead of Petit Pataud, Le Mans, 1950.  At the fall of the checkered flag, the positions were reversed. 

Motor racing is an unpredictable business and, despite all the effort lavished on Le Monstre, in the 1950 Le Mans 24 hour, it was the less ambitious Petit Pataud which did better, finishing a creditable tenth, the much modified roadster coming eleventh having lost many laps while being dug from the sand after an unfortunate excursion from the track.  Still, the results proved the power and reliability of Cadillac’s V8 and Europe took note: over the next quarter century a whole ecosystem would emerge, crafting high-priced trans-Atlantic hybrids which combined elegant European coachwork with cheap, powerful, reliable US V8s, the lucrative fun lasting until the first oil crisis began in 1973.

Perfection in a pencil: The Eberhard Faber Blackwing 602.  They were not cylindrical so, like a "carpenter's pencil", were less prone to rolling onto the floor.  

The Blackwing 602 remains fondly remembered by those who admire the perfect simplicity of the pencil.  Produced in the shape of a square ferrule (both pleasant to hold in one’s hand and less susceptible to rolling off the desk), it used a soft, dark graphite blend which required less pressure (the manufacturer claimed half but it’s not clear if this was science or “mere puffery”) to put what was wanted on paper.  To casual users, this may not sound significant but for those for whom pencilling was a full-time task (notably writers and artists), the advantages were considerable and the advertising claim “Half the Pressure, Twice the Speed” must have convinced one target market because the Blackwing 602 was a favourite of stenographers (a profession one of the early victims of the technological changes which have emerged in the wake of the transistor & microprocessor).  The Blackwing 602 was manufactured by Eberhard Faber between 1934-1988, by Faber-Castell (1988-1994) and by Sanford (1994-1998).  In 2012, after buying rights to the name, Palomino being production of a visually similar Blackwing but they didn’t quite replicate the graphite’s recipe.  Original Blackwing 602s are now a collectable and in perfect condition are advertised between US$50-100 although there was one recent outlier sale which benefited from a celebrity provenance.

Pencil porn.

Doyle’s in New York on 18 June 2024 conducted an auction of some items from the estate of US composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim (1930–2021), attracting dealers, collectors & Sondheim devotees.  There was Lot 275: (Three blue boxes printed with "Eberhard Faber/Blackwing/Feathery-Smooth Pencils, two of the boxes complete with 12 pencils, one with 8 only (together 32 pencils).  Some wear to the boxes and drying of the erasers”, listed with a pre-sale estimate of US$600-800.  The hammer fell at US$6,400 against a pre-sale estimate of US$600-800.  That’s US$200.00 per pencil, indicating the value of a celebrity connection but whoever set the pre-sale estimate (US$18.75-25.00 per pencil) clearly didn’t check eBay.

Murmuration

Murmuration (pronounced mur-muh-rey-shuhn)

(1) An act or instance of murmuring (now rare and mostly jocular).

(2) In ornithological use, the standard collective name for a flock of starlings although sometimes (controversially according to the ornithologists) extended to bees.

(3) In sociology and zoology, an emergent order in a multi-agent social system.

1350–1400: From the Middle English, from the Old French murmure (which endures in modern French) from the Medieval Latin murmurātiōn (stem of murmurātiō (murmuring, grumbling)), from the Latin murmur (humming, muttering, roaring, growling, rushing etc).  The wealth of words related to the onomatopoeic murmur includes rumble, buzz, hum, whisper, muttering, purr, undertone, babble, grumble, mutter, susurration, drone, whispering, humming, mumble, rumor, buzzing and susurrus (the last handy for poets).  The construct was murmur + -ation.  Murmuration is a noun and murmurating & murmurated are verbs; the noun plural is murmurations.

The verb murmur was from the late fourteenth century Middle English and was used in the sense of “make a low continuous noise; grumble, complain”, from the twelfth century Old French murmurer (to murmur, to grouse, to grumble) from murmur (rumbling noise), the transitive sense of “say indistinctly” dating from the 1530s.  As a noun meaning “an expression of (popular) discontent or complaint by grumbling”, the form emerged in the fourteenth century and was from the twelfth century Old French murmure (murmur, sound of human voices; trouble, argument), a noun of action from murmurer, from the Latin murmurare (to murmur, mutter) from murmur (a hum, muttering, rushing), probably from a primitive Indo-European reduplicative base mor-mor, of imitative origin (and the source also of the Sanskrit murmurah (crackling fire), the Greek mormyrein (to roar, boil) and the Lithuanian murmlenti (to murmur).  The meaning in describing sounds from the natural environment (a low sound continuously repeated (of bees, streams, the wind in the trees et al)) was in use by the mid-late 1300s while that of “softly spoken words” dates from the 1670.  The use in clinical medicine to describe “sound heard during auscultation” (the action of listening to sounds from the heart, lungs, or other organs, typically with a stethoscope) has been in the literature since 1824.  A “heart murmur” is an abnormal sound heard during a heartbeat (most often described as a “whooshing or swishing” are the result of turbulent blood flow within the heart or its surrounding vessels.  Such murmurations can be ominous if classified as “pathologic” (or abnormal) but those regarded as “innocent” (or benign) are common (especially in children) and often resolve without treatment.  A diagnosis of a pathologic murmur can indicate an underlying heart condition, the most common causes of which are congenital defects, valve abnormalities (such as stenosis or regurgitation) and infections.  The suffix -ation was from the Middle English -acioun & -acion, from the Old French acion & -ation, from the Latin -ātiō, an alternative form of -tiō (thus the eventual English form -tion).  It was appended to words to indicate (1) an action or process, (2) the result of an action or process or (3) a state or quality.

The New Yorker: Shouts & Murmurs

The New Yorker’s “Shouts & Murmurs” section is dedicated to humorous essays and satirical pieces; the topic range is wide (essentially unlimited) and the whimsical content can be discursive.  It’s reported by many as being the first section turned to when their copy arrives (The New Yorker’s print sales have held up better than most), the takes on everyday situations, cultural phenomena & current events handled in the magazine’s typical way.  In a (vague) sense, “Shouts & Murmurs” is The New Yorker’s “TikTok”: punchy, short form pieces that touch more on popular culture than most of the editorial content.  It’s called “Shouts & Murmurs” rather than “Shouts and Rumors” presumably because (1) it’s a “light & dark” sort of title and (2) The New Yorker really doesn’t do gossip (well it does but usually it’s well-glossed).  While a murmur is “a soft and even indistinct sound made by a person or a group of people speaking quietly or at a distance (ie the opposite of “a shout”)”, a rumor (rumour in British English) is “speculative information or a story passed from person to person but which is just hearsay”.

Birds, sociology & social credit

The adoption of murmuration as the collective noun for starlings is thought almost certainly derived from the sound made when very large numbers of starlings gather in flight, the behaviour most obvious at dusk.  The ornithologists did not approve of the apiarists borrowing the word to describe their bees, saying they’ve already co-opted bike, charm, erst, game, grist, hive, hum, nest, rabble (which seems misplaced given the efficient structure of their industrious societies) & swarm.  There are however no “rules” which govern all this and an alternative collective noun for starlings is a chattering, this applied also to chicks, choughs and goldfinches.

Murmurating eponymously: Tempting though it is to believe, ornithologists assure us that individually or collectively, birds almost certainly make no attempt to form specific shapes when murmurating and are unaware of what shape the formation has assumed.  Such is the variety of shapes achieved, if enough cameras are filming enough murmurations, just about any shape will emerge although, unlike the pareidolias people find in slices of toast, rock formations and such, a specific image summoned by a murmuration is fleetingly ephemeral.

The discipline of sociology relies sometimes on the methods of behavioralism developed in zoology and the term murmuration is co-opted to describe the coordinated, collective behavior of people, an allusion to the movements in unison of flocks of birds which appear both spontaneous and harmonious.  The concept has proved a useful analytical tool when dealing with phenomena where individuals in a group synchronize their actions or thoughts in a fluid and cohesive manner without any apparent centralized direction.  Sociologists tend to group the dynamics of murmuration into four categories:

(1) Self-Organization: The group organizes itself in a dynamic way, adapting to changes in the environment or within the group.

(2) Emergent Behavior: The collective movement or actions arise from the interactions among individuals, rather than from a single leader or directive.

(3) Non-verbal Coordination: Just as birds in a murmuration do not communicate verbally but through subtle cues and reactions, humans in a sociological murmuration often coordinate through indirect signals, such as body language, shared norms, or common awareness.

(4) Complex Patterns: The resulting behavior or movement of the group can form intricate and complex patterns, reflecting a high level of coordination and mutual (and ultimately common) adjustment among the participants.

The seemingly chaotic aerial choreography of starlings murmurating, Sassari, Sardina.  The music is a fragment from the aria Nessun dorma from Giacomo Puccini’s (1858–1924) last opera, the flawed Turandot (1926).

Sociologists were most interested in understanding how individuals within groups create complex social dynamics and outcomes through decentralized interaction but in the last decade, advances in the processing power of computers and the capability of artificial intelligence have enabled the mechanics of murmuration to deconstruct phenomena such as flash mobs, protests, crowds at events, or even online social movements where large numbers of people synchronize their actions through shared information and collective consciousness.  That has been helpful in developing predictive models of behaviour in situations such as evacuations from fire or terrorist incidents but the dystopian implications have been much discussed and, as some sinologists have observed, in the CCP’s (Chinese Communist Party) China’s mass public surveillance machine (integral to the generation of a citizen's "social credit" score), possibly to some extent realized.

Shemozzle

Shemozzle (pronounced sch-moz-il)

(1) In slang, a state of chaos or confusion (especially if noisy); an uproar.

(2) In slang, a quarrel (especially if noisy).

(3) In slang, to run away; to flee; to scarper (rare).

Late 1800s (in English and some sources cite 1889 as the first known instance of use): From the Yiddish שלימזל (shlimazl) (bad luck; difficulty; misfortune), the construct being shlim (bad, ill), from the Middle High German slimp (awry, not right) + the Hebrew מַזָּל (mazzāl), from the Late Hebrew mazāl (luck, fate, (one’s) star) and cognate with the US English schlimazel (an unlucky person).  There are many variations of the German joke (such things really exist, even in Prussia) to explain the related nouns shlemiel & shimazl but all are in the flavor of: “A shlemiel is the fellow who climbs to the top of a ladder with a bucket of paint and then drops it and a shimazl is the fellow on whose head the bucket falls.”  The colloquial German noun Schlamassel (plural Schlamassel) (trouble, difficult situation, misfortune) was from the same Yiddish source.  The gender of Schlamassel is usually masculine in Germany except in the southern state of Bavaria where, like the neighboring Austria it can also be neuter, this prevalent in the latter.  Because from the ninth century Yiddish evolved from its West-Germanic origins as a vernacular tongue which a number of forks & parallel streams in Europe, the Middle East and North America before being (sort of) standardized in the mid-twentieth century in “Western” and “Eastern” variants, many words spread by oral use and the a variety of spellings was not unusual and other spellings of shemozzle included: chemozzle, chermozzle, chimozzle, schemozzle, schimozzle, schlemozzle, schmozzle, shamozzle, shimozzel, shimozzle, shlemozel & shlemozzle.  The modern alternative spelling is schmozzle.  Schmozzle is a noun & verb and shemozzled & shemozzling are verbs; the noun plural is schmozzles (which is sometimes used also as a singular).  In humorous use, shemozzle is used also as a collective noun.

Because there’s rarely been reluctance by English-speakers to adopt words from other languages if they’re useful, better than what’s in use or just an attractive alternative, there no compelling reason to use shemozzle because there are so many other words and phrases to describe states of noisy chaos or confusion.  Obvious candidates include frenzy, mess, fiasco, snafu, chaos, clusterfuck (often sanitized as the clipped “cluster”), commotion, hubbub, kerfuffle, débacle, disarray, confusion, turmoil, ado, affray, altercation, argument, battle, bickering, brawl, brouhaha, bust-up, bustle, clash, combat, commotion, competition, conflict, contention, controversy, debate, discord, dispute, muddle, dissension, disturbance, dustup, fracas, quarrel, row, ruction, scandal, strife, struggle, tiff, tumult, uproar, wrangle, disorganized, disorder, mayhem, pandemonium, uproar, havoc & bedlam.  That the list is long suggests shemozzles are a significant and not infrequent feature of human interaction and the choice of which to use is one of nuance, the connotation one wishes, some of the words emphasizing the chaos, some the conflict.  Shemozzle is an attractive choice because (1) most know what it means, (2) it’s not commonly heard so has some novelty value and (3) it's a "fun" word to say.

A media shemozzle snapping Lindsay Lohan walking into LA Superior Court, Los Angeles, February 2011.

A shemozzle can be used to illustrate chaos theory, a conceptual model of the phenomenon of an event’s ultimate trigger being something distant and apparently unconnected with its consequences.  Physicists illustrate the idea by speculating that waving one’s hands in the air might, some billions of years hence, alter the Earth’s speed of rotation and the most commonly quoted thought experiment is the metaphor for the behavior: “Can a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil cause a tornado in Texas?”  It’s an intriguing topic for those building big-machine models which can both explore and reveal patterns in what was once thought randomness.

The shemozzle of reporters and photographers clustered when Lindsay Lohan in February 2011 walked to one of the well-publicized (and not infrequent) court appearances of her “troubled Hollywood starlet” phase wasn’t unexpected and nor would she have found it an unfamiliar environment, the yellow & black plastic “Police Line: DO NOT CROSS” tape strung between the bollards vaguely reminiscent of the velvet rope & stanchions which define the limits for photographers at red-carpet events.  What was unpredicted was the almost immediate effect in commerce, the white Kimberly Ovitz (b 1983) Glavis Albino bandage dress from the houses pre-fall collection reported as “sold out worldwide” within hours of the images appearing on-line, a reasonable achievement for a piece listed at US$575 made in a run of a few hundred.

The matter before the court raised no novel legal points and thus attracted little analysis but the re-purposing of the walk to the arraignment as an impromptu catwalk strut triggered a shemozzle of its own as women around the world clamoured to buy their own Glavis Albino and media companies sought comment from Kimberly Ovitz, anxious to learn if the appearance was some sort of “sponsored promotion”.  A representative from the company was soon quoted as saying “Kimberly had no role in Lindsay Lohan wearing the dress” which Ms Lohan had purchased.  Apparently disappointed, the journalists resorted to dutifully noting her “signature Chanel 5182 sunglasses.”

Ms Lohan that evening tweeted: “What I wear to court shouldn’t be front page news. It’s just absurd” although her choice of wardrobe for subsequent court appearances hinted she may have concluded absurdity has its place and at Kimberley Ovitz’s corporate headquarters the reaction was equally pragmatic, the company offering retailers a “re-cut” (the industry term for a second production run, a la a “second printing” in the publishing world) of the Glavis Albino in response to the phones “ringing off the hook”.  “It’s been a frenzy!” CBS News quoted an Ovitz sales associate as saying.  So that’s a case study in how the choice should be made: A rabble of photographers milling behind the bollards while shouting questions is “a shemozzle” while desperate fashionistas and boutiques besieging a designer for a frock is “a frenzy”.  Now we know.