Picture Books about Interracial Families, via Random Walks.

Though they’re trespassers to police, stealthy subculture thrives. Urban exploration continues to exert its odd fascination. SF Gate I wrote about this in FmH early on (when I have time, I’ll search back for the relevant links…)

David Brake is back he wrote me to say, although this most recent post on his weblog is dated April 20: “Apologies for the seemingly erratic updating of this blog. It is moving from one server to another – a process I thought

would be straightforward but which turned out to be a little trickier than I had bargained for. I’ve brought this copy up to

date now and soon you will be getting blog.org from an all-new and hopefully greatly improved and reliable location.

Hurrah!”

Weblog Madness: Other Media; here’s a list of media coverage of weblogs and weblogging.

The critics ring in: The Sopranos: Violence Rises on TV, but on This HBO Show, It Makes a Point

“But while the blood, beatings and deaths have kept everyone buzzing, from

ordinary viewers to the president of NBC, the more important issue goes beyond

how much splatter appears on screen. For the first time, this season’s Sopranos

relied heavily on violence directed against innocents, especially women,

characters not involved in Tony’s mob career.

And Tony’s explosion against his girlfriend put him in the center of violence

outside what his business demands. By daring to put Tony in such an

unsympathetic position, the series’s creator, David Chase, has done more than

escalate the brutality. He has kept the series honest, true to the lethal

consequences of a mob boss’s life, and refused to let audiences feel comfortable

with Tony’s career choice. In giving new meaning to the phrase brutally honest,

this season matched the awe-inspiring artistry of the first.” New York Times

And the psychoanalysts:

‘For 13 weeks the debate has intensified about what makes The

Sopranos so compelling. With tonight’s final episode for the

season–which was indeed anticipated in much the same manner

as the Super Bowl–we can answer the question. We are drawn

to the show because it is so radical in the sense that it explores

in an unflinching way some of our most troubling and deep-seated

sociocultural problems…

Kafka said that psychoanalysis provided a means for secular Jews

to try to orient themselves in the modern world. Tony is in the

same position as the newly secularized Jew was of Kafka’s time.

The traditional solutions don’t work, and the best place to turn to

get one’s bearings is some form of psychotherapy. Therapy

certainly can’t provide the certitude and the consolation of

traditional religions. Like life itself, it is an imperfect process

practiced by imperfect people, and we shouldn’t pretend

otherwise. And while Dr. Melfi has come in for her share of

criticism at our hands, she has turned out to be one of the most

constructive figures in Tony’s life. At times, it seemed she wouldn’t

make it through this treatment. But she persisted, battling her own

demons along the way. And now–psychologically

speaking–we’d have to say that Tony is in a much different

position than he was when he first walked though her doors three

seasons ago. Whether he is at the same time politically weakened

as a mafia don is another story.’ Slate

Like “… jazz musicians collecting themes that sound good for a

work in progress”: Before the Big Bang, There Was . . . What? ‘…(L)ately, emboldened by progress in new theories that seek to unite Einstein’s

lordly realm with the unruly quantum rules that govern subatomic physics —

so-called quantum gravity — (cosmologists) have begun to edge

their speculations closer and closer to the ultimate moment and, in some cases,

beyond it.

Some theorists suggest that the Big Bang was not so much a birth as a transition,

a “quantum leap” from some formless era of imaginary time, or from nothing at

all. Still others are exploring models in which cosmic history begins with a collision

with a universe from another dimension.’ New York Times

To Err May Be Human, But to Forgive Is Good for You. A psychologist thinks about the crucial, and often overlooked, significance of the complex internal process of forgiveness. New York Times

Solomon Snyder, one of the founders of modern psychopharmacology, reviews Psychedelics, psychosis and dreaming by Allan Hobson, a preeminent and synthetic neuroscientist of consciousness. ” All in all, Hobson succeeds in providing a fresh

perspective on the mental alterations that are

common to dreaming, psychosis and psychedelic drug

actions. The book is written in a lively style with

complex neurophysiologic and pharmacologic analyses

made lucid enough for any intelligent lay reader. It is

one of those rare books that will be of importance to

the most sophisticated researchers and clinical

practitioners and yet an accessible and a fascinating

read for many non-specialists.” Nature Neuroscience

An objection to the memetic approach to culture by Dan Sperber, French anthropologist and cognitive scientist. Note the ‘strong’ definition of memes — cultural elements non-genetically transmitted and subject to a process of selection; selected for because transmission benefits themselves, not necessarily their human carriers. Sperber’s objection to a memetic notion of culture is the low fidelity of reproduction of memes when they are transmitted, i.e the ‘Lamarckian’ reproduction of characteristics acquired in each generation. If, cultural patterns have high stability despite this low copying fidelity, something other than the meme, ‘behind it’ in a sense, is being transmitted and shaping consistency. He concludes:

Memeticists have to give empirical evidence to support the claim that, in the micro-processes of cultural transmission, elements of culture inherit all

or nearly all their relevant properties from other elements of culture that they replicate (i.e. satisfy condition 3 above). If they succeeded in doing

so they would have shown that developmental psychologists, evolutionary psychologists and cognitive anthropologists who argue that acquisition

of cultural knowledge and know-how is made possible and partly shaped by evolved domain-specific competencies are missing a much simpler

explanation of cultural learning: imitation does it all (or nearly so)! If, as I believe, this is not even remotely the case, what remains of the memetic

programme? The idea of a meme is a theoretically interesting one. It may still have, or suggest, some empirical applications. The Darwinian

model of selection is illuminating, and in several ways, for thinking about culture. Imitation, even if not ubiquitous, is of course well worth

investigating. The grand project of memetics, on the other hand, is misguided.

More about Sperber here.

Brain Damage Case Reveals Mind’s Filing System — “A woman who could not tell you whether an

orange is orange has led to new insights into how the brain organizes its

thoughts. Researchers say her case illustrates how the brain files away

the different details of individual objects so that we can know them

inside and out.” The punchline is that it appears that the attributes of an object — its color, size, shape, function, etc. — are stored in distinctive places. Here’s the abstract. Nature Neuroscience

Evolutionary origins of stigmatization: the functions of social exclusion. From the abstract: “The authors propose that phenomena currently placed under the general rubric of stigma involve a set of distinct

psychological systems designed by natural selection to solve specific problems associated with sociality. In particular, the

authors suggest that human beings possess cognitive adaptations designed to cause them to avoid poor social exchange

partners, join cooperative groups (for purposes of between-group competition and exploitation), and avoid contact with

those who are differentially likely to carry communicable pathogens.” Psychological Bulletin

Taleban to mark Afghan Hindus — “Hindus will be required to wear an

identity label on their clothing in

Islamic Afghanistan to distinguish

them from Muslims, a Taleban

minister told Associated Press on

Tuesday.” CNN Shades of Nazi pogroms?