Looking Glass War. It turns out that the question of why a mirror “reverses left and right but not up and down” is a disturbing philosophical quandary that preoccupies serious thinkers. Read about it here and see what you think. My take on it is that the distinction comes from the fact that our eyes are on a horizontal and not a vertical axis with each other.
The editors of Lingua Franca are offering a new book, The Sham That Shook The Academy, about one of my favorite academic hoaxes of the decade. “In May 1996 New York University physicist Alan Sokal revealed that he had tricked the editors of the
fashionable academic journal Social Text into publishing a sham essay titled “Transgressing the Boundaries:
Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity.” The essay was a parody of postmodernist
thought intended to demonstrate how little contemporary theorists and philosophers like Jacques Derrida
understand the science they invoke and, at times, criticize. The Sokal Hoax, as the event has come to be
called, instigated a scandal both inside and outside the academy that has had an enormous impact on
scholarship and is still debated today. Collected here for the first time are the most significant articles,
essays, letters, e-mail exchanges, and forums that have responded to and tried to make sense of the Sokal
Hoax. The original essay from Social Text is included, as are news stories from the United States and
abroad. Also featured are the views of a host of prominent intellectuals such as Michael Bérubé, Stanley
Fish, George F. Will, and Stanley Aronowitz, further responses from Alan Sokal and the editors of Social
Text, and informative panel discussions.” [You can find the (quite amusing) text of the original essay here.]
“After a ten-year fight, the “abortion pill” RU486 is finally available in the US. But the pill’s supporters fear theirs
may be a pyrrhic victory, because production of a second pill that has to be taken with RU486 is now under threat. Now that the US Food and
Drug Administration has approved mifepristone, attention has turned to misoprostol, a prostaglandin pill originally
developed to treat gastric ulcers.
Supporters of RU486 told New Scientist that they fear anti-abortion campaigners will target misoprostol supply
because, although it is officially produced to treat stomach ulcers, obstetricians use it to complete the abortion
process started by RU486.” New Scientist
New Orleans Patients Exposed to Rare Brain Disease. Sterilization of surgical instruments may not have prevented the transmission of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease [an incurable “slow virus” or prion disease related to bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE, or “mad cow disease”), scrapie and kuru] from a neurosurgical patient later found to have had the disease to patients subsequently operated on with the same instruments. If the exposed patients are infected, it’ll be a horrific way to die.
And, after mad cow, rotten duck.
The Emperor’s New Brain – George W. and the stupidity issue. Michael Kinsley: “The rule seems to be that if a
candidate can recite half a dozen policy positions by rote and
name some foreign nations and leaders, one shouldn’t point
out that he sure seems a few whereases shy of an executive
order.” Slate
New wave of exorcisms seen; some people can be convinced they witnessed a demonic possession as a child. Elizabeth Loftus is a psychological researcher hellbent on proving that “false memories” can be created convincingly. I have a quandary; I agree, but I also know her work is used in the service of denying the reality of memories of early abuse and thus maintaining one of this century’s dirtiest domestic secrets. Now I don’t fault anyone for trying to show that histrionic memories of satanic ritual abuse were made, not recovered…
British ‘addicted to curry’. “…sitting
down to eat a chicken
korma increases our heart beat by an extra
three beats a minute, a tikka masala increases
it by four and a half, and a rogan josh by
seven.” They didn’t rate the vindaloo?? BBC
Best wishes restoring, Ftrain.com.
Jungle Fever – Did two U.S. scientists start a genocidal epidemic in the Amazon? UC Santa Barbara anthropologist John Tooby (arguably the founder of evolutionary psychology) has a go at the controversy over journalist Patrick Tierney’s forthcoming book Darkness in El Dorado: How Scientists and Journalists Devastated the Amazon, to which I’ve devoted space in “Follow Me Here…” before. Tooby’s take on it, after being involved in the academic ethics investigation of Napoleon Chagnon, one of the supposed villains of the scandal: the book should have been published in the fiction category. Tooby wonders if Tierney was knowlingly perpetrating a hoax on the publishing world. Phrases like “pattern of falsification” and “comically self-aggrandizing” pepper this essay. The scandal, the raciest issue to rock the usually sober field of anthropology (which was my undergraduate concentration in college), seems to be getting dangerously close to the slippery slope of libel and litigation. The best may be yet to come…Slate
What Global Language? Contradiction: as English is supposedly consolidating its position as the world’s lingua franca, the U.S. is becoming more polyglot. The English language is becoming more complex while at the same time most speakers’ experience of the language is being dumbed-down. Despite the self-involved certainty of those who think web-centrically, “…the globalization of English does not mean that if we who speak only English just sit
back and wait, we’ll soon be able to exchange ideas with anyone who has anything to say.
We can’t count on having much more around the world than a very basic ability to
communicate. Outside certain professional fields, if English-speaking Americans hope to
exchange ideas with people in a nuanced way, we may be well advised to do as people
elsewhere are doing: become bilingual.” A fascinating thoughtful article exploring the futures market for the English language from a variety of vantage points.
Eventualities such as “political alliances that have yet to
be formed; the probable rise of regional trading
blocs, in such places as Asia; the Arab world, and
Latin America, in which the United States and other
primarily English-speaking countries will be little
involved; the possibility that world-changing
technological innovations will arise out of nations
where English is little spoken; a backlash against
American values and culture in the Middle East or
Asia” could transform the language picture. Demographically, English will probably lose its second-place standing (after Chinese) to the South Asian linguistic group (Hindi, Urdu, etc.), and will possibly fall behind Arabic and Spanish as well. China could in one fell swoop alter the English dominance pattern by withdrawing state support for efforts to teach English to its populace, for instance if political relations between China and the US deteriorate further.
And even with its spread would come an accentuation of communication difficulties among disparate English-speakers. Witness the need for subtitles for Americans to understand the recent Scottish films My Name is Joe and Trainspotting [both highly recommended, IMHO]. The Atlantic
San Francisco anti-SUV activist Robert Lind stalks “these gas-guzzling SUVs being used by people who don’t really need them” and slaps bumper stickers on them pointing their owners to his website, where they hear about the harm Lind claims their vehicles are doing to the environment and receive helpful hints aboout how to remove the bumper stickers. “If you ‘tag’ ANY of the three trucks I own, you will wake up in the hospital” is one response he receives on the site’s bulletin board. [via Spike Report]
Desert of Memory. “Paul Bowles, the American writer, composer, and expatriate, died eleven months ago in
Tangier, the northern Moroccan city where he had lived for more than half a century.
Bowles was controversial in Morocco, and his death was a major news event there; yet the
Moroccan response to Bowles has not made it into American accounts. Next to nothing has
been written here about the last decades of Bowles’s life, nor about his often tense
residence in Morocco, where he had as many enemies as friends. Even with various articles
and memorials planned to commemorate the first anniversary of Bowles’s death — a two-day
tribute is planned at New York City’s 92nd Street Y on October 29 and 30 — it’s safe to wager
that his fans will be fed the tired and typical version of Bowles’s life abroad.” This essay by a professor of literature at Northwestern looks at the complicated legacy both in Morocco and the West of the “expatriate’s expatriate.” Bowles’ own Moroccan stories and the Arabic tales he brought to Western readers were a predilection of mine long before the film of The Sheltering Sky revived interest in him in the last decade of his life. Feed
Jonathan Yardley used to be a bibliophile, he says. But it seems that, with the thrill of progress he finds inevitable, he won’t bemoan the passing of the bookstore. Publishing on demand will get stories and information to readers so much “easier, faster and cheaper” that the death knell tolls. Me, I think the reports of the death of conventional books and bookselling are greatly exaggerated (to coin a phrase). Washington Post
Stone Age ‘Atlantis’ Found in North Sea. More evidence of catastrophic primeval sea level changes. I previously blogged the work of the National Geographic expedition claiming to have found archaeological validation of the Great Deluge in the Mideast. National Geographic
Being there. Tele-immersion could profoundly alter long-distance communication, allowing a new kind of intermingled presence of people geographically separated. Despite Jaron Lanier’s current skepticism about cybertechnological advances, a recent experiment was the culmination of a three-year National Tele-Immersion Initiative project he directed. It seems a natural next extension of his pioneering work in VR. Plans include building in haptics — touch simulation — to allow a fuller simulation of tele-presence at a distance. Consider, first, the demand for bandwidth expansion this would stimulate if realized. And some of the novel uses to which it might be put.
The fast-food
chain McDonalds showed interest at one early workshop… McDonalds envisioned fitting tele-immersion booths in
its restaurants so people away from home could have dinner
with their family. “The technology for that is not that far off”… The gaming industry is another potential user.
Players could tele-immerse themselves in a virtual reality
environment, chasing monsters or firing phasers at each other.
[And then there’s another, even more obvious, use about which many will likely soon be, if not already, salivating…] New Scientist
US concern over new Palestinian ‘alliance’. Seeming new coordination of plans between Yasser Arafat loyalists and more radical Palestinian groups to direct the uprising in the West Bank and Gaza has reportedly involved the release by Palestinian civil authorities of dozens of jailed Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants. BBC [Change of heart, failure of will, or loss of control by Arafat vis a vis his peacemaking role?]
Court orders Texas death-row inmate resentenced. Til now, I hadn’t heard of much, if any, effective judicial review of the seemingly rampant abuses associated with Texas capital sentencing. Nando Times
Now Jupiter’s got a great white spot Three giant storms on Jupiter have merged to form a massive
storm half the size of the planet’s famous Great Red Spot.
Observations of the new “great white spot” could reveal if this
was how the Red Spot formed… New Scientist
Fast-Forward Election: the way the debates were meant to be watched. 
That
little FF button liberated me. No longer am I
enslaved by the spin doctors and news
analysts. No longer do I have to listen to the
what Bush and Gore actually say. In
fast-forward, it’s the more basic stuff of life.
You know, the nervous twitches, subliminal
thoughts and repetitious grimaces.Sped up, Gore, with his quick and jutting
movements, is a cross between Max
Headroom and the Tin Man. He’s a twitchy
Vulcan struggling with “technical difficulties.”Bush’s perpetually droopy grin shows a
conniving boy caught with his hand in the
cookie jar. He’s a used car salesman, asking
us: “Hey folks, what do I have to do to get
you to vote for me today?”In double time, their running mates are also
transparently clear. Joseph Lieberman,
whose mouth moves but little else, is a
sappy ventriloquist’s dummy. Dick Cheney,
folded hands and sideways glances, is a
plotting old woman. Getting It
U.S. learns of terrorist plans; analyst quits over Cole warning. “During a hearing on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, senators said that a Pentagon intelligence expert on terrorism in the Persian Gulf warned of
possible terrorist attacks on U.S. forces there before the bombing of the USS Cole, but that higher-ups failed to pass the information to military
commanders.
The intelligence official, whose name was not disclosed, resigned in protest the day after the Cole attack.” Nando Times
Ford shows off newest bells, whistles for safety, “(including) a tiny video camera in the rearview mirror linked to a cell phone and a crash sensor. If the car is in a wreck, its computer
sends out an alert routed to the nearest emergency dispatcher.
That dispatcher would get data from the car regarding the position the vehicle came to rest in, the severity of the crash, the number of people in
the car, the number wearing seat belts and even a rough estimate of injuries. The camera would transmit two photos of the interior – one taken
just before the crash and one taken just after – so doctors would know what kind of injuries were suffered.” Some privacy advocates have expressed concerns about a camera taking pictures of you every few minutes… AP
Protesters storm Justice Department entrance:
“More than 100
protesters stormed the entrance of the U.S.
Justice Department building Wednesday
afternoon to demand the prosecution of a
police officer who killed a college student.” CNN
“All of these people are here for poetry? If you locked me in a room full of poets, I’d be looking for any way to get out.” CSM
Silly New-Age Pseudo Science Gets a Sound Thrashing. A review of “veteran
science writer and playful gadfly” Martin Gardner’s Did Adam and Eve Have Navels? ‘Most of the essays…are “attacks on far-out cases of
pseudoscience.” Gardner’s targets are generally not the religious notions or
superstitions of people swept along by their ancient cultures but phony science
promulgated by, and believed in, by people who should know better. Thus he does
not attack the pious millions who, in Brazil, are devoted to the cult of the Virgin
Mary that they celebrate in Belen on the Amazon every October. Rather, he
skewers such “preposterous” claims that “positions of stars correlate with character
and future events.” ‘ LA Times
Prostitution and the sex discrepancy in reported number of sexual partners: “One of the most reliable and perplexing findings from surveys of sexual behavior is that men report substantially more sexual partners
than women do….We find that prostitute women are underrepresented in the national surveys. Once their
undersampling and very high numbers of sexual partners are factored in, the discrepancy disappears. Prostitution’s role in the discrepancy
is not readily apparent because men are reluctant to acknowledge that their reported partners include prostitutes.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [Is this restating the obvious?]
Children With Mental Problems Not Getting the Care They Need. Federal health officials, mental health experts and mental health advocacy groups agree. The problem is multifactorial, involving families’ lack of resources or adequate insurance, shortages of qualified professionals, and the complexities and fragmentation of the care delivery system. Last month’s conference on the issue convened by US Surgeon General David Satcher is expected to result in a national action plan by the end of this year. Journal of the American Medical Association
My infatuation with Phil Agre‘s work only begins with the Red Rock Eaters’ mailing list, to items from which I often link. If you read my blog, you may find something of use or of interest on this list of his recent or forthcoming work (the annotations are his, not mine):
Life after cyberspace, EASST Review 18(2),
1999, pages 3-5.Yesterday’s tomorrow, Times Literary Supplement,
3 July 1998, pages 3-4.The Internet and
public discourse, First Monday 3(3), 1998.Advice for undergraduates considering graduate
school A brief how-to, perhaps ten pages, for undergraduates who
think they might want to go to graduate school. I originally wrote it for
students in my own department, but over time I have extended it in response
to comments from people in other fields. It emphasizes the value of getting
involved in research and is especially intended for sophomores and juniors.
Designing effective action alerts for the
Internet This is a guide to designing political action alerts. It
also suggests what kinds of badly designed action alerts you should refrain
from forwarding to others.Find your voice Writing for a webzine: how to
build a public voice on the Internet that communicates your values in a way
that people can understand.Hosting a speaker A guide for graduate
students concerning the practicalities of playing host to a visiting
speaker, for example in a weekly seminar series.How to help someone use a computer
A short set of practical guidelines on helping people use computers without
oppressing them. I learned most of these ideas from teachers of young
children, but they apply equally well to anyone.Information and institutional change
This is an annotated syllabus for an upper-division undergraduate class
that I taught at UCLA in the spring of 2000 on the role of information
and information technology in the process of institutional change.The literature on institutions My
research takes an institutional perspective on the place of information
technology in people’s lives, and this article summarizes the literature
in sociology and and political science about the concept of an institution.
Networking on the network A detailed
guide to professional networking both on and off the Internet. Although
written principally for advanced graduate students and others in academia,
the underlying principles apply widely.Cyberspace as American culture, to appear in Science
as Culture.Designing a wired life, paper prepared for the WebNet
2000 Conference.Growing a democratic culture: John Commons on the
wiring of civil society, to appear in David Thorburn and Henry Jenkins,
eds, Democracy and New Media, Cambridge: MIT Press, 2000.Hazards of design: Ethnomethodology and the ritual
order of computing, submitted to Mind, Culture, and Activity.
Imagining the wired university, paper presented
at the Symposium on the Future of the University, University of Newcastle,
September 2000.Portents of planning: A critical reading of the first
paragraph of Miller, Galanter, and Pribram’s Plans and the Structure of
Behavior, paper presented at the Conference on Narrative in the Human
Sciences University of Iowa, July 1990.Writing and representation, to appear in Michael Mateas
and Phoebe Sengers, eds, Narrative Intelligence, Amsterdam: John
Benjamins, 2001.
I guess I expected that a number of you would react with surprise (or alarm??) to my Ira Glass blink below. To each her own, of course…
Evidence of ‘life after death’. Several people have blogged this link but, oh man, is it wishful thinking to think that this study is anything of the kind! At least there’s nothing to suggest differently in this BBC coverage; I’d love to read the research paper to see if it’s more convincing. I’ll post a blink to it if I can find it. In the meanwhile, here’s a piece by the lead researcher, Sam Parnia, on near-death experiences.
Air travelers face blood-clot dangers. “Economy-class syndrome” is a new focus of concern after an otherwise-healthy 28 year-old British air traveller collapsed and died from pulmonary complications of a deep venous thrombosis (DVT) after a flight back from Sydney.
People at risk include older fliers, those who are
overweight and pregnant women.
To lower risk, doctors suggest an aspirin before
flying to thin the blood, lots of water while in flight to
stay hydrated and exercise.
“Get out of the seat periodically, maybe every half
hour, and walk around…(W)hile in the seat, massage
the feet upward, massage the calves, and massage the
lower thighs.” MSNBC
Emerging disease news: Ebola may shut off immune defenses. Researchers report the identification of a protein that Ebola uses to antagonize the body’s secretion of interferon, necessary in orchestrating the immune response against the invading virus. MSNBC
Ira Glass is coming to San Diego to give a lecture, so here’s this puff piece in a local paper about how he’s the hippest thing on National Public Radio. According to him. Trying to be ironic about it doesn’t make a hipper-than-thou attitude any less execrable. It would only be a slight exaggeration if I said I never move faster than when I reach to retune the radio when he comes on. And I wrote to my local NPR station to tell them I wasn’t going to contribute to them anymore as long as their fundraisers featured his smug, self-satisfied pitches with their vicious undertones of humiliation to less with-it listeners. The station manager tried to tell me I don’t have a sense of humor (which I found very funny).
Not happy with one definition? OneLook® Dictionaries lets you look up a word in hundreds of online dictionaries with several clicks. Over in the left column, I’ve added a lookup box that gets you there too.
Japan’s new ‘salaryman’ Kintaro: think Dilbert gone ballistic. Christian Science Monitor
Physicians’ Attitudes About Involvement in Lethal Injection for Capital Punishment
The majority of 482 physicians surveyed approved of most aspects of participation in executions disallowed by the American Medical Association, “indicating that they believed it is acceptable in
some circumstances for physicians to kill individuals against their
wishes. It is possible that the lack of stigmatization by colleagues
allows physicians to engage in such practices.” Archives of Internal Medicine
Chameleons suck. New Scientist
Today’s the day the swallows leave San Juan Capistrano. Until March 19th…
Nader supporters urge at least some to vote for Gore. A group calling itself “Nader’s Raiders for Gore” accuses Nader of going back on a pledge to campaign only in those states where a vote for him would not hurt Gore’s chances. ‘”It is now clear that you might well give the White House to
Bush. As a result, you would set back significantly the social
progress to which you have devoted your entire, astonishing
career,” the group wrote Friday in its open letter to the
consumer advocate.’ The appeal has been rejected by Nader’s press secretary. “Greens for Gore” has taken a similar stance. “If the last minute exit or public opinion polls in your state
show Gore or Bush clearly projected to win, then vote Nader. If
it is too close or undecided at that point, then vote for Al
Gore.” I’ve previously blinked Nader advisor Steve Cobble’s “Your Vote Doesn’t Matter,” suggesting that progressives vote for Nader in states where (and only where) one of the major candidates has locked in the electoral college votes already. Singer Ani Difranco, a Nader supporter, has written an open letter urging Oregonians to vote for Gore.
An article in The New Republic suggests that Nader may actually be seeking a Gore defeat by working so hard for swing state votes. The theory is that a Bush presidency would galvanize the progressive movement. [The last time I remember anyone reasoning like that was when people jokingly suggsted we might bring on the Revolution by electing George Wallace!]
These CNN maps show the status of the races for each state’s electoral votes. They will be updated regularly until Election Day, and can help you decide whether, and how, to waste your very own vote. Here are the current “tossup” states:
Chemtrails? I stumbled onto this site which suggests that, if you’re among those noticing more contrails these days, some of them may represent secret government experimental spraying campaigns over populated areas, which are making numbers of people feel ill.
These I feel are in fact the deployment and
experiments with military countermeasures against Bio-Warfare.
Another probably smaller percentage still are weather control
experiments. Both of these programs have been outlined in the
defense budget proposals and have been funded by DARPA as has
been established by our research and that of other independent
researchers. I feel what we are seeing here are the deployment of
both the Oily Water detergent based bio-warfare countermeasures,
and the antigen producing spores being developed by MaxGen under
DARPA contract.It is these programs and their unforeseen or possibly considered
acceptable effects that are causing the wide spread suffering felt by a
certain percentage of the population.
Bye-bye, Barry McCaffrey. Ariana Huffington bids a fond farewell as another drug czar bites the dust. Only this one left a legacy of the U.S. boondoggle involvement in the Colombian “interdiction”, which may be stacking up to be our biggest and most ill-advised foreign misadventure since Indochina. Salon
New battleground: resistance moves into cyberspace. The Lebanese Daily Star reports on Hezbollah accusations of an Israeli denial of service attack on Hezbollah’s website after the kidnapping of three Israeli soldiers on October 7th. Noting that a large number of these increased “hits” came from North American sites, the Hezbollah webmaster concluded, “It’s obvious that the Americans are conspiring with Israel to cripple our site.” (It’s obvious he doesn’t understand distributed denial of service attacks.) The article includes links to mirrors of the Hezbollah site in case it’s down. [via The Web Today]
Al Gore knows that some of you peek behind the scenes of his campaign. Read the HTML code of this page from his official campaign website and see a special message for you. [via Memepool]
Nader supporters urge at least some to vote for Gore. A group calling itself “Nader’s Raiders for Gore” accuses Nader of going back on a pledge to campaign only in those states where a vote for him would not hurt Gore’s chances. ‘”It is now clear that you might well give the White House to
Bush. As a result, you would set back significantly the social
progress to which you have devoted your entire, astonishing
career,” the group wrote Friday in its open letter to the
consumer advocate.’ The appeal has been rejected by Nader’s press secretary. “Greens for Gore” has taken a similar stance. “If the last minute exit or public opinion polls in your state
show Gore or Bush clearly projected to win, then vote Nader. If
it is too close or undecided at that point, then vote for Al
Gore.” I’ve previously blinked Nader advisor Steve Cobble’s “Your Vote Doesn’t Matter,” suggesting that progressives vote for Nader in states where (and only where) one of the major candidates has locked in the electoral college votes already. Singer Ani Difranco, a Nader supporter, has written an open letter urging Oregonians to vote for Gore.
An article in The New Republic suggests that Nader may actually be seeking a Gore defeat by working so hard for swing state votes. The theory is that a Bush presidency would galvanize the progressive movement. [The last time I remember anyone reasoning like that was when people jokingly suggsted we might bring on the Revolution by electing George Wallace!]
These CNN maps show the status of the races for each state’s electoral votes. They will be updated regularly until Election Day, and can help you decide whether, and how, to waste your very own vote. Here are the current “tossup” states:
John Horgan on his book, The End of Science: “(I) thought it might be useful for me to
present a succinct summary of my
end-of-science argument as well as a
rebuttal of 10 common
counter-arguments.” An interview by John Brockman.
“I believe that this map of reality that scientists
have constructed, and this narrative of
creation, from the big bang through the
present, is essentially true. It will thus be as
viable 100 or even 1,000 years from now as it is
today. I also believe that, given how far
science has already come, and given the limits
constraining further research, science will be
hard-pressed to make any truly profound
additions to the knowledge it has already
generated. Further research may yield no more
great revelations or revolutions but only
incremental returns.”
Horgan feels that scientists have turned from true science, in which investigation converges on the truth, to what he calls ironic science, ” a speculative, non-empirical mode that… resembles
literature or philosophy or theology in that it
offers points of view, opinions, which are, at
best, ‘interesting,’ which provoke further
comment” but are no longer empirically proveable. As examples, he cites superstring theory, the Gaia hypothesis, parallel universe theories in cosmology, and almost the whole of psychology and the social sciences. “Some observers say all these untestable,
far-fetched theories are signs of science’s
vitality and boundless possibilities. I see them
as signs of science’s desperation and terminal
illness.”
[Personally, I think Horgan’s faith in empiricism and “capital-T” truth is naive.The objection to his thesis he dismisses least convincingly is the charge that it is itself ironic science. The “end of science” is not upon us, because “science” as he envisions it never really existed in the first place. I often find this shortcoming in science writers who don’t do, or haven’t done, science themselves. Having invested so much in their career choice, their faith must be unassailable to avoid painful self-doubt.] The Edge
Loch Ness webcams, both surface and underwater (although when I went to the site, the surface camera wasn’t working). Park this in the corner of your screen and do some monster spotting.
Gendercide Watch, a fascinating resource confronting historical and contemporary gender-selective mass killings around the world, whether against
women (the Nanjing massacre, female infanticide) or men (slaughters in Rwanda and Colombia).
There is no new new thing. USA Today
Hacker Site Raises GM’s Hackles. After 2600‘s recent high-profile loss in the court case brought by the MPAA over its posting of links to DeCSS (which defeats the copy-protection scheme on DVD’s), it is again courting legal danger by registering unflattering domain names referring to large corporations. General Motors demands that the magazine turn over the rights to fuckGeneralMotors.com on trademark infringement grounds. 2600 defends its actions on free speech grounds. It has also registered FuckNBC.com and VerizonReallySucks.com. Interestingly, Verizon, which has recently been going after unauthorized uses of its name on the web, decided that the 2600-registered domain did not violate fair use principles. I’m not a lawyer but it’s hard to see how GM or anyone else could make a case that these infringe on their trademark rights, any more than, say, a book about a company that uses that company’s name in its title. Wired
The rule of opinion and the fate of ideas: “What are the prospects of science in a society that is steeped in a democratic
ethos, professes to admire science, and expects great things of scientists,
but which, notwithstanding a massive educational system, comprehends
science rather poorly?”
The news, as I see it, is bad. To put it plainly, despite
three centuries of co-evolution, despite frequent episodes of mutual
encouragement and support, the culture of modern democracy and that of
modern science are in many ways incongruent. Orthodox history of science
regards certain developments as the most sweeping and fateful of triumphs:
the Copernican Revolution that culminated in Newton’s synthesis, the
Darwinian revelation that humanity is an adventitious consequence of the
convolution of biology and history, the relentless explication of biological
process, including those of the human organism, in terms of chemistry and
physics.The depressing, though often unspoken, truth is that these are regarded as
sovereign insights only within the relatively tiny community of the scientifically
well-educated. In the larger society, even Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler and
Newton are more accepted than understood. It is hardly necessary to remark
that Darwin, as a historical figure and as the symbol of an idea, is widely
reviled. The ongoing revolution in genetics and molecular biology, while
doubtless deserving of intelligent ethical scrutiny, has often been received with
what amounts to superstitious terror.
Annals of the Age of Depravity: Woman Suspected of Flushing Infant Down Toilet Reuters
Ignore the undecided — “Voters who haven’t made
up their minds yet are a
little like the O.J. jury —
they’re clearly not paying
attention and shouldn’t be
trusted with an important
decision.” It’s inconceivable to me, and to this columnist, that those who remain undecided until the last minute are intelligently deliberating about differences between the candidates. Instead, the campaign is shaped by and the candidates held hostage to the least discerning of voters, drawing the candidates to migrate their position toward the middle rather than play to their differences. Salon
A Minor Political Screed ‘The following piece came to (a Slashdot poster) as a personal letter from
David Brin. David is a prominent scientist and author of best-selling novels like
The Postman, who has shared entertaining and provocative views with us in the past. His letter
struck us as so biting and timely that we asked permission to post it before the whole Slashdot
community, in order to provoke your rambunctious discussion. David graciously agreed, on
condition that you all remember, it was written first of all as a private person sharing his
“cranky political opinions” with a few friends. “It goes over the top in a few places,” he
warned. “First draft expressions of outrage tend to be that way.” So as friends, let’s not get too
vexed with him. Above all David is interesting, as usual….’
Will this be the winter sensation after you stow your Razor when the snow flies?
Where ‘caught in the crossfire’ can leave no room for doubt: ‘When I read the word “crossfire”, I reach for my pen. In the
Middle East, it almost always means that the Israelis have
killed an innocent person.’ Independent
CDRW Troubleshooting: a four-part series on troubleshooting — when your Windows system has been perturbed by the installation of a CDRW drive; when data isn’t written properly, etc.
Slate‘s “explainer”: What Are Hamas and Hezbollah?
The Israel Defense Forces responds to the killing of the Palestinian boy. “The IDF wishes to express its sorrow at the death of the child and any incident in which lives are lost, but emphasizes that the Palestinians make cynical use of children’s lives by sending them to throw stones under cover of Palestinian fire that endangers their lives.”
Britannica.com‘s navel-gazing. And the Chicago Tribune‘s take on it.
Find your local haunted house. Go.com
Annals of the Erosion of Privacy (cont’d.): ACLU Action Alert: Secret Evidence. “This week, the House may vote on a bill, which has
already passed the Senate, to drastically expand
government power to seize personal information
without judicial approval.
The bill, H.R. 3048, would allow law enforcement to
obtain any kind of document it wants, without first
getting a search warrant or a subpoena from a court.
These documents include any written or electronic
document possessed by an individual or, more
frighteningly, any document held by a third party (such
as bank records, credit card records, telephone
records, school records or an Internet Service
Provider’s customer records). The bill would gut the
Fourth Amendment requirement that private documents
should be searched only after a court issues a warrant
based upon probable cause.” If you agree with ACLU’s efforts to oppose this bill, two clicks will send a fax to your Congressional representative saying so.
The Presidential candidates responded in detail to queries from the New England Journal of Medicine about their positions on health policy issues: the uninsured, Medicare, patients’ rights, and quality of care.
Ritual Objects of Cosmology: “DISCLAIMER: Manipulation of the space-time continuum may have unexpected consequences. We are not responsible for the release of
quantum singularities, or any electromagnetic, gravitational, nuclear or temporal effects including orbital perturbations, annihilation of
matter, suspension of physical laws, time loops, or other consequences, intended or not, that may result from normal, excessive or improper
use of these devices.” Explore the fermion accelerator, the graviton detector, the quantum flask and other exotic devices.
Both Oppose E-Mail Tax Bill (Good, Because It Doesn’t Exist). Someone in the audience asked Hilary Clinton and Rick Lazio, at their Oct. 8 debate, about their positions on the pending legislation that would levy a tax on email messages. Now you know, I know, and the New York Times knows that that is an endlessly recycling internet myth for the endlessly gullible, but Clinton, Lazio and their moderator took the bait and ran with it (and we’re eating up the egg on their faces?)
Carnahan’s Death Reshapes Senate Battle. Immediately, the chances of the Democrats gaining control of the Senate have plummeted. And Lieberman’s maintaining his candidacy for his Connecticut Senate seat while running on the Presidential ticket doesn’t help. Washington Post
“They revolted against their leader, but not against themselves,” says Leon Wiseltier. Milosevic’s overthrow is nothing like the fall of the Communist regimes a decade ago. Kostunica is no Lech Walesa, but rather an “unembarrassed…nationalist who does not see or does not wish to see that the tribal sentiment of his people…has not been the solution but the problem.” The Serbian people were outraged at what Milosevic had done to them, not what he had done to Croatians, to Bosnians, to Kosovars. In other words, “what brought him down were the unhappy consequences for Serbia of his failure in his ugly adventures. And the notion that the opprobrium that was visited upon Milosevic’s Serbia was in any way deserved — that it was the right result of Belgrade’s criminal actions — seems not to have figured prominently in the thinking of the Serbian crowds.” Wiseltier thinks more could have been asked of the Serbian people. The New Republic
Bush Gets a Free Pass From Inquiring Minds. Good to see the news media picking up on Dubya’s prevarication on his military record as well as beginning to police their own unquestioning acceptance of Republican claims that Gore lies and exaggerates. New York Observer
I’ve seen more instances of the word schadenfreude in the last month than in the previous year. Are we taking more pleasure from others’ misfurtunes recently? Here’s the result of a Google Search.
Bold enterprise: “An antimatter-aided space drive might bring deep-space missions within our grasp. Engineers at NASA and
Pennsylvania State University say that by the end of the century, spacecraft could reach the edges of the Solar
System and beyond.
They believe an antimatter drive could lead to a one-year round trip to Jupiter, a five-year trek to the
heliopause–the boundary separating the Solar System from interstellar space–and, in a 50-year trip, the Oort Cloud,
source of the comets.” New Scientist
The bombing of the USS Cole has reinforced Republican campaign rhetoric about a re-infusion for the US military, as if any added amount of manpower or military hardware could stop this kind of attack. But the incident is also the occasion to question the wisdom of US ‘engagement’ policy, says the Christian Science Monitor‘s Cameron Barr.
The idea, warmly embraced by President Clinton, is that a government
should cozy up to its potential adversaries in the hope of winning them
over.Indeed, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh hardly seems a likely friend
of the United States. He is Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s warmest
political supporter, his country has long been a home away from home
for a variety of militant groups, and his brand of politics is a good
distance short of fully democratic.
Isn’t isolationism always the refuge of some after a U.S. tragedy, or misadvanture, abroad?
Go ahead, lick your wounds. Beyond 2000
Culture, the non-issue: Has the anti-arts far-right lost the culture war against the “blasphemers and the pornographers”? Philadelphia Inquirer
Sit down and clap. It’s one of my pet peeves, and Stephen van Esch’s as well, that people give a wild standing ovation after any performance, no matter how mediocre. Why is this, and what is it doing to the arts? Spark
Former jazz piano cult figure Keith Jarrett is back from the frailty of a debilitating chronic illness. But does he have the chops to enchant jazz listeners anew, or will “sickly pallor” in his work become a “mark of heroism for the Jarrett cult”? New Statesman
NewsWatch blows the whistle on the Los Angeles Times’ struggle to start a drug scare.
A critical eye for detail. John Sutherland is an immensely popular literary critic — some thought that a contradiction in terms — who “examine(s), with forensic precision, neglected details and
apparent anomalies in classic novels and plays, and thus inject(s) new life into well-loved
literature. He has been instrumental in reviving the art of close reading at a time
when many literary academics use deconstruction and other arcane theory to place
themselves between readers and books, with the result that criticism becomes a
narcissistic end in itself, rather than a skill that deepens the pleasure of reading.”
Baby Girl Receives Arm From Twin who had died at birth. Reuters
Bizarre scenes from the “million Family March” in Washington, which involved only around several per cent of a million. Rev. Louis Farrakhan oversaw a Sun Myung Moon-like mass wedding ceremony. The Unification Church was a co-sponsor of the rally. He also didn’t come forth with any of the anti-Semitic or anti-white rhetoric for which he is renowned. And speaker after speaker urged attendees to get out and vote.
Why does an anti-depressant work for some people, but not others? One of the mysteries of psychopharmacology has been accounting for the two- to four-week latency of antidepressant response after a depressed patient starts taking the medication. A complicated cascade of neurochemical changes has to occur, resulting in altered brain functioning. Now a team of Toronto neurologists using positron emission tomography (PET scanning) have demonstrated a progressive sequence of changes in the brain function of patients in those weeks and the absence of those predictable changes in patients who will turn out to be nonresponders to the antidepressant studied, fluoxetine (Prozac). PET scanning visualizes levels of brain activity in various regions by imaging rate of glucose metabolism. The hippocampus, a “hot” region in current neuropsychiatric research on a variety of disorders, was one of the areas implicated.
The Fingerprint Mouse from Sejin America allows you to use a fingerprint to restrict access to a
computer system.’ Hey Neat!
Emerging Disease News: Ugandans Slap Quarantine on Ebola Virus Areas. A new outbreak over the last two weeks has killed 43, the WHO says. Ugandan authorities threaten those breaking the quarantine with death. The Ebola virus,
which first emerged in what was then Zaire in 1996, is a
hemorrhagic virus that causes patients to bleed to death
through every orifice — including the eyes and ears.There is no vaccine and no known cure. It is spread through
contact with an infected person’s bodily fluids and can kill
within 48 hours.One doctor said the symptoms were “like watching someone
dissolve before your eyes.”Medical staff in Gulu Monday were clearly overwhelmed, but
even with the best treatment in the world, Ebola is usually
fatal. Some 793 people have died out of 1,100 cases recognized
by the WHO since 1996. Reuters
Court Says No House Vote for D.C.. Democratic principles fall prey to the letter of the law. The District of Columbia representative in Congress can’t vote just because the Constitution says that membership of the House “shall be
apportioned among the several states.”
New realities? ‘The “standard model” of the way the universe works is just
about complete. Time to start looking for a new one.’ With an incredibly lucid summary of the aforementioned “standard model”. The Economist
The New Science of Character Assassination. Even more impressive domestic counter-terrorism from Phil Agre’s Red Rock Eater mailing list. Required reading, no matter whether you like Gore for President or not, to prepare yourself for the relentless, contemptible Republican distortions about his record only likely to heat up the last days of the campaign further. This is a point-by-point examination and rebuttal of claims by Dubya’s handlers and the largely reprehensible way they are covered in the media, with appropriate links.
Skilled Terrorists, Financing Believed Behind Ship Blast
. “This wasn’t just two guys with a dream,” said a U.S. counter-terrorism expert
who asked not to be identified. “This was carefully planned. You need people with
explosives expertise, with logistics expertise, who know how to put together a cell,
know how to do surveillance. . . . This isn’t the work of a bunch of amateurs.”
The United States has spent more than $1.5 billion to upgrade security at
U.S. diplomatic facilities overseas since the August 1998 terrorist bombings of
American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed more than 220 people.
The apparent attack on a 4-year-old warship, sheathed with half-inch armor and
bristling with the latest high-tech weaponry and radar, suggests a deliberate attempt
to humiliate those efforts.
…And apparently very easy to do. Los Angeles Times
Review of Laurie Garrett’s Betrayal of Trust: the collapse of global public health. Garrett’s last massive tome, The Coming Plague, was all you ever need to read (at over 700 pages) about the rather scary picture of emerging infectious diseases, and began the process of examining whether global public health capabilities were up to the threat. Here’s another 700+ pages that apparently completes the job. “For those who shop early for the holidays, Betrayal of Trust should be on your list. Laurie Garrett, a health reporter for Newsday and contributor to The Washington Post, has written a well-crafted and meticulously documented treatise on global public health. Before you roll your eyes, let me reassure you: This book reads like a Robert Ludlum thriller. Garrett and her critical eye travel from Minneapolis to Kikwit (the Congo), from Sura (India) to Kiev. Nothing escapes her: Plague, pollution and prostitution are all examined in turn.” The Washington Post
Love: a qualitatively, not just quantitatively, different neurological activity than liking.
“Neurologists have found that, when you see your beloved, parts of
your brain ‘light up’. The heart has nothing to do with it,
suggesting St Valentine’s Day cards should be emblazoned, not
with images of the heart, but of the medial insula.
A study by Professors Semir Zeki and Andreas Bartels of
University College, London, to be published in the journal
NeuroReport next month, confirms that being in love is
physically different from merely liking someone.
Physical effects of this brain activity may account for the
traditional sensations associated with love, including euphoria,
butterflies in the stomach, love sickness and love addiction.” Guardian
Love: a qualitatively, not just quantitatively, different neurological activity than liking.
“Neurologists have found that, when you see your beloved, parts of
your brain ‘light up’. The heart has nothing to do with it,
suggesting St Valentine’s Day cards should be emblazoned, not
with images of the heart, but of the medial insula.
A study by Professors Semir Zeki and Andreas Bartels of
University College, London, to be published in the journal
NeuroReport next month, confirms that being in love is
physically different from merely liking someone.
Physical effects of this brain activity may account for the
traditional sensations associated with love, including euphoria,
butterflies in the stomach, love sickness and love addiction.” Guardian
Love: a qualitatively, not just quantitatively, different neurological activity than liking.
“Neurologists have found that, when you see your beloved, parts of
your brain ‘light up’. The heart has nothing to do with it,
suggesting St Valentine’s Day cards should be emblazoned, not
with images of the heart, but of the medial insula.
A study by Professors Semir Zeki and Andreas Bartels of
University College, London, to be published in the journal
NeuroReport next month, confirms that being in love is
physically different from merely liking someone.
Physical effects of this brain activity may account for the
traditional sensations associated with love, including euphoria,
butterflies in the stomach, love sickness and love addiction.” Guardian
Love: a qualitatively, not just quantitatively, different neurological activity than liking.
“Neurologists have found that, when you see your beloved, parts of
your brain ‘light up’. The heart has nothing to do with it,
suggesting St Valentine’s Day cards should be emblazoned, not
with images of the heart, but of the medial insula.
A study by Professors Semir Zeki and Andreas Bartels of
University College, London, to be published in the journal
NeuroReport next month, confirms that being in love is
physically different from merely liking someone.
Physical effects of this brain activity may account for the
traditional sensations associated with love, including euphoria,
butterflies in the stomach, love sickness and love addiction.” Guardian
Ringing disapproval. Thinkers like James Katz, communications professor at Rutgers, and David Karp, a Boston College sociologist, think they’ve figured out what’s so annoying about cell phone use in public. The phrase Katz uses is that it’s “like cutting up the park,” which I think is probably a reference to the seminal ecological article, Garrett Hardin’s “The Tragedy of the Commons” (1968). The concept is somewhat analogous to Hardin’s, indeed. The idea is that the cell phone user is privatizing public space and indicating a disregard for others whose rights have been appropriated. It strikes me that this explains what, to a lesser extent (yes, around 50% less, because it’s just listening and not speaking) is similarly annoying about public walkman use.
Scientists control the content of dreams. However, the significance of the findings reported in this article are not really along the lines of “lucid dreaming” or anything like that. The exciting thing was the demonstration that patients with damage to the brain region called the hippocampus, who as a result have no short-term memory, nevertheless dreamed of their day’s experience. Arguably, this is one of the most direct confirmations of the role of the unconscious in shaping the content of dreams, which has recently come under fire.
Lennon Killer Had Hit List of Stars. Mark David Chapman continues to be a seriously disturbed and confused man, it seems, reading this report of his recent parole board hearing. New York Post
Do Horror Films Filter the Horrors of History? There could be no more concrete confirmation of the idea that horror films echo the fears of the day than the fact that Tom Savini, master of visceral gore as makeup artist for such films as Dawn of the Dead and Friday the 13th, served in Vietnam photographing corpses for the U.S. Army.
Israeli Left’s Ideals Take a Beating Amid Violence
“There is a deep crisis of conscience for the left in this country, for those of us
who were brought up believing that peace was possible, that we should pay the
price and that Arafat was our partner. The most severe
damage caused by recent events has been to the solidarity, commitment and belief
of the Israeli left in the peace process.” Los Angeles Times It’s been more painful to follow recent Middle East events than much else in the world; maybe naively, I thought at times that peace was within reach, and then to watch it fall so utterly apart, and the killings start again. However, some feel, at least in retrospect, that Israel never bargained in good faith. Read one Jewish leftist intellectual, Michael Lerner’s, anguished, apologetic appraisal of Israel’s failure in the peace process.
ATTRITION Web Page Hack Mirror. “For reference and posterity sake. And we are tired of having to visit
thirty two sites to reference these. Having them in one location is nice.” Regularly updated, this lists and archives hacks of various websites by guerrilla culture-jammers.
No more neanderthals. “I am now convinced that Neanderthals are alive and well in our
society. While we may have grown beyond our primitive huts
and scavenging ways, many Neanderthal characteristics are
with us today. Look around you; I’m sure that you could point
out a few of our primitive ancestors right now.
Now, I don’t mean the jerk who cuts you off or the moron who
pays for three bucks worth of gas with a credit card. I’m talking
about the people whose cognitive functions have not moved
beyond those of their ancestors.” It’s an interesting hook to what turns out to be a pretty prosaic essay, but I like the way it’s characterized. I’m sure you have your own examples of the survival of the neanderthal…
Terrorism: terror or tease? “People need to decide if
it’s worth maintaining an artificial state of anxiety and being
watched by the government to be protected from something
that may not exist at all.” Spark
