The taste of fugu is incomparable. If you eat it three or four times, you are enslaved...
Anyone who declines it for fear of death is really a pitiable person. -- Kitaoji Rosanjin


Shinto priests offer prayers to appease the soul of this departed fugu.

Digital Globe



I'm completely obsessed with overhead satellite images. This site has quite a few. The image above is Bora Bora, French Polynesia.

Imagine it's six months from now. The Iraq war is over. After an initial burst of joy and gratitude at being liberated from Saddam's rule, the people of Iraq are watching, and waiting, and beginning to chafe under American occupation. Across the border, in Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Iran, our conquering presence has brought street protests and escalating violence. The United Nations and NATO are in disarray, so America is pretty much on its own. Hemmed in by budget deficits at home and limited financial assistance from allies, the Bush administration is talking again about tapping Iraq's oil reserves to offset some of the costs of the American presence--talk that is further inflaming the region. Meanwhile, U.S. intelligence has discovered fresh evidence that, prior to the war, Saddam moved quantities of biological and chemical weapons to Syria. When Syria denies having such weapons, the administration starts massing troops on the Syrian border. But as they begin to move, there is an explosion: Hezbollah terrorists from southern Lebanon blow themselves up in a Baghdad restaurant, killing dozens of Western aid workers and journalists. Knowing that Hezbollah has cells in America, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge puts the nation back on Orange Alert. FBI agents start sweeping through mosques, with a new round of arrests of Saudis, Pakistanis, Palestinians, and Yemenis.

To most Americans, this would sound like a frightening state of affairs, the kind that would lead them to wonder how and why we had got ourselves into this mess in the first place. But to the Bush administration hawks who are guiding American foreign policy, this isn't the nightmare scenario. It's everything going as anticipated.

-- Joshua Micah Marshall

I'm not sure what bothers me more: what is apparently the underlying geopolitical strategy of the war in Iraq, in which Iraq becomes just a beach-head -- the Normandy of the US-versus-the-Islamic-World War -- which has been touted by people like SDB and the neocons who have Bush's ear, or the incredible cynicism that the Administration won't discuss it with the American people.

Yee-haw, it's time for the true March Madness!!!

Jane Galt asks: do executives necessarily make good or bad Presidents? This is one of her more interesting posts.

For myself, I tend to agree with her sentiment that there probably isn't any job out there that really qualifies one to be President -- but going a bit farther, I have to admit to a certain distrust of any person, whether they're on my side of the political fence or not, who actually wants the job. I just find something inherently scary about any person who actually aspires to the power of the Presidency, regardless of what he or she wants to do with it.

The military has clear guidelines for just about everything, including their saddest duties of all.

Man, have I even been lax in posting here....

Anyway, some of the mealy-mouthed discussion of post-war Iraq that's taken place has centered on, as example, the reconstruction of Japan and Germany after World War II. Of course, some cite those instances as examples of what we won't do -- "We won't be there for years like we were in Japan, we're gonna win the war and bugger off as soon as the Iraqis can stand up straight" -- at the same time as being cited as examples why we should be just hunky-dorey about an American invasion, since after all, "After WWII we rebuilt Japan and now they're just our best friends!" Curious disconnect, there, and I find it interesting that if a Japanese-style post-war occupation is to be our model, our Administration won't tell us so. Interesting, but hardly surprising -- after all, they're just the most forthcoming Administration in Washington since....2001, anyway.

Oh, yeah -- links and such. I've been thinking about this stuff for a while, and Josh Marshall has written an article and a further commentary on Talking Points Memo about why the Japanese and German occupations might not be very good indicators of future results. (Read the article first, then the blog post.)

Google targets blog text ads

This is a lot smarter than anything Pyra could have done with banner ads. You've probably already noticed that since the takeover, ads for free blogspot sites have been replaced with lightweight Google text ads which appear in a floating frame rather than some clunky GIF. This is a very welcome change for slow loading pages like mine, but there's an additional feature to this, the ads are targetted to readership based on what Google perceives to be the content of that blog.

For example, Laputan Logic is now running ads for biblical archaeology sites. Evidently, it has picked up the theme in my last couple of posts and from the archaeological slant in general. Joshua Legg's site is all about war and peace and Byzantium's Shores today is running ads for freelance jobs and ... swimwear (wtf?).

Some of the ads are targetted to the reader's location (via IP address I imagine). I noticed a number of ads for Australian products which had nothing to do with the content of the blog I was reading. When they can't work out to display, apparently they display ads for charities.

Anyway, as part of the grueling research that I have put into this post, I noticed (finally) that the Collaboratory no longer has a banner ad. How long has it been gone? Please don't tell me its been six months.

Does anyone know who paid for it?

The Arrogant Empire

Okay, apologies in advance for yet another post about the current crisis¹ although I thought this was a particularly good article.

I think it goes a long way to explaining from an American perspective the nature of the diplomatic mess that the Bush Administration has created for itself. America faces unprecedented opposition to its policies around the world, not just from its traditional enemies but from its allies as well and especially from the populations of those countries. I think this map nicely sums it up.

Before being tempted to reach for tired cliches like "knee-jerk anti-Americanism" to explain this, it's worth reflecting that it hasn't always been this way.

But in its campaign against Iraq, America is virtually alone. Never will it have waged a war in such isolation. Never have so many of its allies been so firmly opposed to its policies. Never has it provoked so much public opposition, resentment and mistrust. And all this before the first shot has been fired.

Watching the tumult around the world, it’s evident that what is happening goes well beyond this particular crisis. Many people, both abroad and in America, fear that we are at some kind of turning point, where well-established mainstays of the global order—the Western Alliance, European unity, the United Nations—seem to be cracking under stress. These strains go well beyond the matter of Iraq, which is not vital enough to wreak such damage. In fact, the debate is not about Saddam anymore. It is about America and its role in the new world.

¹ - Though if you'd like to see something else posted on this blog, well, what's stopping you?

This doesn't sound good...

Mysterious illness may be new disease

A mysterious, flulike illness that has stricken scores of hospital workers in Southeast Asia has stumped a battery of tests for known bacteria and viruses and most likely represents a new human disease of unknown origin, federal health authorities said Monday.

At least 14 cases bearing some resemblance to the illness are being evaluated in the United States, including that of an unidentified patient, recently arrived from travel to Asia, who turned up in a Los Angeles County emergency room with a high fever and difficulty breathing.

Patients with the disease come down with a particularly dangerous case of pneumonia -- fluid filling their lungs -- and many of those sickened in Southeast Asia have had to be placed on ventilators.

World Health Organization epidemiologists have already given the disease a name -- SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome -- and have confirmed four deaths and 167 cases worldwide.

Under prodding by the United Nations' health agency, China has disclosed an outbreak of 305 cases from November through February that appear similar to SARS. There were five deaths in China, but none of the cases are included yet in the official WHO count.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Julie Gerberding told reporters that 10 of the 14 suspected cases in the United States were "almost certainly not" SARS, but that "it would not be surprising" to find the illness soon in the United States.

Cases have been confirmed in Canada, where two members of a Toronto family have died after returning from China. One member of that family subsequently visited Atlanta. Cases are also suspected in Switzerland, Germany and the United Kingdom.

Gerberding said she was confident that laboratories in the United States or in eight other nations testing for the disease would pinpoint its cause. But the disease detectives are now fairly sure it is a bug they haven't encountered before.

"We are not suspicious this is a common microorganism, or we would have found it by now," she said. It was unlikely to be some form of influenza, because Hong Kong hospitals are skilled in identifying even exotic strains of that deadly diseases.

While ruling nothing out -- including bioterrorism -- Gerberding indicated that the epidemic was behaving like that of a viral illness spread by "close contact" with infected patients in the home or hospital. SARS appears to be highly contagious but requires contact with droplets of infected body fluids through cough or sneezing.

Health Organization Stepping Up Efforts to Find Cause of Mysterious Pneumonia

...[T]wo features of the mysterious illness led the World Health Organization to sound an alarm last week.

"One was the high degree of contagion to health care workers," Dr. Gerberding said.

She cited the case of an American businessman who became ill while in Hanoi and who died after he was transferred to a hospital in Hong Kong. He inadvertently spread the illness to many health care workers. The extent of spread was much more "than we typically see with most infectious diseases" in the health care environment.

One factor in the greater degree of spread was that the hospital in Hong Kong where the businessman was treated used different infection control measures from those used in the United States, Dr. Gerberding said.

The second feature was the rapidity and severity with which pneumonia developed in some patients. Even among patients who suffer a system illness with influenza, "it is quite unusual to develop pneumonia," Dr. Gerberding said. "Here we had a very high proportion of individuals developing pneumonia, and that signaled something unusual," requiring a closer look.

I have two very close friends who have just recently returned from Vietnam. One of them is a health worker who, as part of his trip, worked in a hospital in Hanoi. Needless to say I'm watching this one closely.

Things like this really matter it seems.

So while you're munching on that plate of delicious Freedom Fries, you might be interested to know the etymology of that wretchedly named "French" Toast.

Could the cursed French really have come up with such a culinary wonder?

Now feeling I was getting somewhere, I moved on the my American edition Larousse Gastronomique:

French Toast (PAIN PERDU)

A dessert consisting of slices of stale bread (or brioche or milk bread) soaked in milk, dipped in eggs beaten with sugar, then lightly fried in butter. French toast is usually served hot and crisp. It was formerly called pain crotté, pain à la romaine, or croutes dorées. In the south of France, it was traditionally eaten on feast days, particularly at Easter. Originally intended to use up crusts and leftover pieces of bread. French toast is usually made with milk bread. It may be accompanid by custard cream, jam or compote.

Now, was there a well attested American origin to French toast, I should certainly think my Larousse would mention it. Instead, I find a set of references to traditional French culinary practices. Furthermore, upon doing a search for pain crotté, I find that it is unanimously considered a Picardian tradition, and Picardy borders Belgium. At the other end, I find a number of references to pain perdu as New Orleans-style French Toast, suggesting that the English term "French toast" may in fact refer to the Louisiana French who prepared this recipe.

So, although my search could hardly be definitive without checking out the OED or the FEW (Oxford English Dictionary and Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch - the two most comprehensive etymological references for English and French), I find no support in the secondary sources for an American origin for French toast, and considerable support for an origin in contemporary Belgium or France.

It may be of some consolation to some patriotic souls to realise that the French word for the dish, Pain Perdu, actually means "Lost" Bread. How appropriate for a nation of primates capitulards et toujours en quete de fromages!!

Rainy day FUN!



Found on the back of a Superman comic from 1965.

Mom seems to be suprisingly supportive of Dad's whacky ideas.
One has the impression that he gets quite a lot of them.

Iraq is not Japan

I know this is kinda obvious but sometimes it's necessary to say the obvious.

Starting last fall, we began to hear that U.S. policymakers were looking into Japan and Germany after World War II as examples or even models of successful military occupations. In the case of Japan, the imagined analogy with Iraq is probably irresistible. Although Japan was nominally occupied by the victorious “Allied powers” from August 1945 until early 1952, the Americans ran the show and tolerated no disagreement. This was Unilateralism with a capital “U”—much as we are seeing in U.S. global policy in general today. And the occupation was a pronounced success. A repressive society became democratic, and Japan—like Germany—has posed no military threat for over half a century.

The problem is that few if any of the ingredients that made this success possible are present—or would be present—in the case of Iraq. The lessons we can draw from the occupation of Japan all become warnings where Iraq is concerned. [More]

Myers-Briggs? BOR-ing!

STAR TREK? Cool!

You know the old joke about stupid people breaking their computer's "cup holder"?

Well....

(I'll bet Sean puts this on his Wish List, pronto!!)

It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault. It's all Clinton's fault.

Except, though -- it's not.

Via an e-mail loop I'm on, some Japanese computer-error messages that are naturally in the form of haiku.

........................................................
The Web site you seek
Cannot be located, but
Countless more exist.
--------------------------------------------
Chaos reigns within.
Reflect, repent, and reboot.
Order shall return.
-----------------------------------------------
Program aborting:
Close all that you have worked on.
You ask far too much.
------------------------------------------------
Windows NT crashed.
I am the Blue Screen of Death.
No one hears your screams.
-------------------------------------------------
Yesterday it worked.
Today it is not working.
Windows is like that.
-------------------------------------------------
Your file was so big.
It might be very useful.
But now it is gone.
-------------------------------------------
Stay the patient course.
Of little worth is your ire.
The network is down.
-------------------------------------------------
A crash reduces
Your expensive computer
To a simple stone.
-------------------------------------------------
Three things are certain:
Death, taxes and lost data.
Guess which has occurred.
-------------------------------------------------
You step in the stream,
But the water has moved on.
This page is
not here.
-------------------------------------------------
Out of memory.
We wish to hold the whole sky,
But we never will.
------------------------------------------------
Having been erased,
he document you're seeking
Must now be retyped.
-------------------------------------------------
Serious error.
All shortcuts have disappeared.
Screen. Mind.
Both are blank

Opposing War Is Good, But Not Good Enough

Faleh A. Jabar is an Iraqi dissident who offers an interesting perspective especially if you oppose the war but are also against leaving Iraq to stew in its own juices until Hussein dies of old age (a.k.a. the "containment" policy).

Opposing the war in itself is good but not good enough. Letting the Leviathan off the hook is a grave mistake for which we will pay sooner rather than later. Opposing war, which is an instrument of politics, should not lead us to forget the crux of the things political. It is not weapons of mass destruction that count most; what really counts is the political system that controls them. Ignoring this fact by the forces of peace simply serves the war camp.

Dozens of nations have chemical and biological weapons. None has deployed them, except Saddam's regime, first against the Iranian forces, later against Iraqi civilians. Governments should be held responsible for such crimes. Ironically, the United States let Saddam get away with no punishment for the actual deployment of chemical and biological weapons back in 1988, but it is now adamant about confronting him for a possible deployment of such weapons in the future. This is the logic of preemption. Yet there is no law, domestic or international, that permits a prosecutor to go after an ex-convict for a future, would-be offense. There is every law to bring a culprit to trial for actually breaching human norms in the first place.

In all the decades of struggle and international lobbying, one approach has never been tried: a meaningful political process to disengage the various components of the regime from each other--above all, a drive to split the ruling class-clan.

Here's what I think ought to happen. One, threaten Saddam with indictment. Two, give him an alternative for safe passage at the same time; this may create a crack in the ruling class-clan. Three, send a list of thirty or so of his aides who are persona non grata and demand that they leave the country with him. This ought to convince the rest of the class-clan members that they are not threatened en masse--only those who were most responsible for the offenses of the regime. Four, encourage this class-clan to oust Saddam into exile and sweeten the deal by offering a mini-Marshall plan. This mini-Marshall plan would be made available provided power was transferred to a civilian, interim government.

Such continued pressure, a political onslaught, should be backed by threat of force. A few warning shots may well be sufficient. This would help split the ruling group and embolden the people to take matters into their hands. A painfully slow process of regime disintegration has already been going on, and this political pressure would hasten the process along. An invasion, on the other hand, would wrench matters out of Iraqi hands and would risk untold consequences.

OK, I don't normally mess with these, but this one struck me as pretty funny.


How Republican Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

What scares me is the likelihood that the people this guy talks to are registered and active voters.

Are Europeans Really So Much Worse Off than Americans?

From the Economist:

Taking account of how Americans waste a chunk of their income on heating, air conditioning, prisons and the like, while also attaching value to Europe's superior public transport, Mr Gordon suggests that perhaps half of the current gap in living standards between America and Europe, as measured by GDP per head, is illusory. Add in the value of their extra leisure time and Europe's living standards are now perhaps only 8% behind America's, he suggests, not the 23% suggested by official data. Indeed, on Mr Gordon's broader measure, Europeans' productivity may have overtaken that of their poor American cousins.

(via sixdifferentways)

Another one of those email scams

FROM: GEORGE WALKER BUSH

DEAR SIR / MADAM,

I AM GEORGE WALKER BUSH, SON OF THE FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA GEORGE HERBERT WALKER BUSH, AND CURRENTLY SERVING AS PRESIDENT OF THE UNITES STATES OF AMERICA. THIS LETTER MIGHT SURPRISE YOU BECAUSE WE HAVE NOT MET NEITHER IN PERSON NOR BY CORRESPONDENCE.

I CAME TO KNOW OF YOU IN MY SEARCH FOR A RELIABLE AND REPUTABLE PERSON TO HANDLE A VERY CONFIDENTIAL BUSINESS TRANSACTION, WHICH INVOLVES THE TRANSFER OF A HUGE SUM OF MONEY TO AN ACCOUNT REQUIRING MAXIMUM CONFIDENCE.

I AM WRITING YOU IN ABSOLUTE CONFIDENCE PRIMARILY TO SEEK YOUR ASSISTANCE IN ACQUIRING OIL FUNDS THAT ARE PRESENTLY TRAPPED IN THE REPUBLIC OF IRAQ.

MY PARTNERS AND I SOLICIT YOUR ASSISTANCE IN COMPLETING A TRANSACTION BEGUN BY MY FATHER...

[More...]

Putting God on Notice

Life is the frontier we explore deeper and deeper with every breath. It's as basic and as complex as anything we know.

Now, there's something new happening with the creation of life, and no one is sure what to make of it. No longer is the act of creation seen as the sole province of God or nature or the Great Whatever. Tomorrow belongs to me. And to you and other humans.

Former President Ronald Reagan turned 92 today.

We all know that he is the patron saint of today's American conservatives, but here's one commentator who thinks that Reagan's legacy isn't as conservative as we might at first believe.

Curtains for Saddam?

Guernica Reproduction Covered at UN

NEW YORK.- The "Guernica" work by Pablo Picasso at the entrance of the Security Council of the United Nations has been covered with a curtain. The reason for covering this work is that this is the place where diplomats make statements to the press and have this work as the background. The Picasso work features the horrors of war. On January 27 a large blue curtain was placed to cover the work.

Fred Eckhard, press secretary of the U.N. said: "It is an appropriate background for the cameras." He was questioned as to why the work had been covered.

A diplomat stated that it would not be an appropriate background if the ambassador of the United States at the U.N. John Negroponte, or Powell, talk about war surrounded with women, children and animals shouting with horror and showing the suffering of the bombings.

This work is a reproduction of the Guernica that was donated by Nelson A. Rockefeller to the U.N. in 1985.



Also mentioned in the New York Times and the Sydney Morning Herald.

Mr. Scott! How much longer on those damned upgrades of the Universal Translator you promised me!

I haven't read both of these articles yet, but I'm guessing they're good and could foster some pretty good discussion:

Anti-Americanism in Europe

and conversely,

Anti-Europeanism in America. (via aldaily)

Ok. I have to ask. I'm getting into part III of the Brothers Karamazov, but I've taken about ten days off. Where are you all? Sean, have I caught up to your breaking point yet? Can we still mull some discussion off of this? If we do another book read, I think we need something a little less, um, heady and long and literary, to say a few words. I'm just saying, for an experiment, it probably wasn't the best piece to pick. But I was all for it at the time, so I'm definitely not coming down on anyone. Thoughts?

Stars, it turns out, eat their young. Wow.

Iraq gets a 'B'.

Ummm....OK.

Setting aside the issue of whether academic metaphors are really appropriate in the whole discussion of war with Iraq, should we really be impressed with a grade of 'B' when the course was presumably being taken "Pass/Fail"?

Just a bit of incongruity that struck me as funny.

Sometimes I wonder if the greatest force in the universe is not gravity, or the strong nuclear force, or love, but black humor.

Response to a letter received from Tom Daschle

Senator Daschle,

I agree with you. The night of November 5th was long and difficult. The Republican control of Senate (along with the presidency) does put a lot of things that I belive in, that I find importance in, at risk. I agree that it would be preferable to have a Democratically controlled Senate. I appreciate your offer to join the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, but I'm going to decline. Here's why:

In the months after the terrorist attacks, you personally voted for, and led the Democratic Senators to follow suit, to allow President Bush free reign over the money and armed forces of this country to go on any whim that he found fanciful, putting our lives and the lives of millions around the world at risk. During the President's campaign to bomb Iraq, I've not heard you nor any of the Democratic leaders calling out for a rebuttal. You've consistently stood by his side, patting his back, and nodding in assent to every item that he's set out on the agenda.

You state that "with the Republicans in the majority, there will be no action on affordable healthcare coverage for the millions of Americans without health insurance. There will be no accountability for the corporations whose recklessness has sent Americans' 401(k) plans plummeting. There will be no serious discussion on helping Americans who are out of work find new jobs ... no chance for better child care benefites .. no hope of raising minimum wage for those who are struggling to make ends meet in low-paying jobs ... and more."

This is true, Tom. However, in the elections last year, none of these issues were raised by you and your Democrat partners during their campaigns. You painfully ceded all of the issues that the Democratic Party supposedly stands for, opting instead to align yourselves with Bush and the "war against Terror" and Homeland Security. You and your party failed to establish any difference between yourselves and your opponents, deciding instead to play on the fears that the media has been feeding the public for the past year and half. To try to separate yourselves from the Republicans, you decided to make personal attacks on your opponents past history, further burying the issues that I and several million like me hold dearly and desperately want to be raised. You and your people failed us Tom, not the other way around.

Don't tell me that you need funds to stop the Repbulicans. You made your bed. Now we all have to lie in it. Not only have you failed to address any of the issues above, but we've seen thousands more getting laid off in the past year. We've seen Ken Lay and his cohorts escape justice. We've seen Dick Cheney with-holding documents about his company's dirty dealings in Afghanistan and Iraq under the false premise of "National Security". You've allowed people to get away with the destruction of people's lives only to find themselves the benefactors of Golden Parachute clauses and million dollar dream-houses. What happened, Tom?

I'm aware of the fact that some of the very few truly progressive Democrats are up for re-election in 2004. Should I choose to support any of them, I will make a check out to their personal campaigns, Tom. But you sir, you will not be getting a single penny from me. Thanks for the offer, but I politely decline to join you in another year of lip-service and doublespeak. And should you, sir, through some twist of fate become the Democratic nominee for President in 2004, rest assured that I will again be supporting a third party candidate.

Goodbye, Tom.

Methinks we've been discussing somebody a little often.

A left-wing blogger named Ted Barlow has been on a roll as of late, doing -- I kid you not -- lightbulb jokes. Like this:

Q: How many Green party voters does it take to change a lightbulb?

A: Dude, we shouldn't have to change lightbulbs. GE has this secret lab in Costa Rica, and they made a lightbulb out of hemp that totally lasts forever.

Start here and then just scroll down through them all. And then, for extra credit and hilarity, someone else has, in the same vein, done a wonderful Den Beste lightbulb joke.

Sometimes it's hard to grasp the present-day relevance of the speeches and writings of historical figures; the temptation is often to say, "How does something written and said in 1967 apply to me in 2003?" Well, check this out: a reprint of a Martin Luther King speech, with selected phrases converted into hyperlinks to present-day news reports, making the relevance very -- and, in most cases, sadly -- clear.

The Seafarer: A poem in Anglo-Saxon.

MÆG ic be me sylfum soðgied wrecan
siþas secgan hu ic geswincdagum
earfoðwile oft þrowade
bitre breostceare gebidan hæbbe
gecunnad in ceole cearselda fela
atol yþa gewealc

þær mec oft bigeat
nearo nihtwaco æt nacan stefnan
þonne he be clifan cnossað

calde geþrungen
wæron fet mine forste gebunden
caldum clommum þær þa ceare seofedun
hate ymb heortan hungor innan slat
merewerges mod

þæt se mon ne wat
þe him on foldan fægrost limpeð
hu ic earmcearig iscealdne sæ
winter wunade wræccan lastum
winemægum bidroren

bihongen hrimgicelum hægl scurum fleag
þær ic ne gehyrde butan hlimman sæ
iscaldne wæg hwilum ylfete song
dyde ic me to gomene ganetes hleoþor
ond huilpan sweg fore hleahtor wera
mæw singende fore medodrince
stormas þær stanclifu beotan þær him stearn oncwæð
isigfeþera ful oft þæt earn bigeal
urigfeþra

nænig hleomæga
feasceaftig ferð frefran meahte

forþon him gelyfeð lyt se þe ah lifes wyn
gebiden in burgum bealosiþa hwon
wlonc and wingal hu ic werig oft
in brimlade bidan sceolde

nap nihtscua norþan sniwde
hrim hrusan bond hægl feol on eorþan
corna caldast

forþon cnyssað nu
heortan geþohtas þæt ic hean streamas
sealtyþa gelac sylf cunnige
monað modes lust mæla gehwylce
ferð to feran þæt ic feor heonan
elþeodigra eard gesece

forþon nis þæs modwlonc mon over eorþan
ne his gifena þæs god ne in geoguþe to þæs hwæt
ne in his dædum to þæs deor ne him his dryhten to þæs hold
þæt he a his sæfore sorge næbbe
to hwon hine dryhten gedon wille

ne biþ him to hearpan hyge ne to hringþege
ne to wife wyn ne to worulde hyht
ne ymbe owiht elles nefne ymb yða gewealc
ac a hafað longunge se þe on lagu fundað

bearwas blostmum nimað byrig fægriað
wongas wlitigað woruld onetteð
ealle þa gemoniað modes fusne
sefan to siþe þam þe swa þenceð
on flodwegas feor gewitan

swylce geac monað geomran reorde
singeð sumeres weard sorge beodeð
bitter in breosthord

þæt se beorn ne wat
sefteadig secg hwaet þa sume dreogað
þe þa wræclastas widost lecgað

forþon nu min hyge hweorfeð ofer hreþerlocan
min modsefa mid mereflode
ofer hwæles eþel hweorfeð wide
eorþan sceatas cymeð eft to me
gifre and grædig

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gielleð anfloga
hweteð on wæl weg hreþer unwearnum
ofer holma gelagu

forþon me hatran sind
dryhtnes dreamas þonne þis deade lif
læne on londe ic gelyfe no
þæt him eorðwelan ece stondað

simle þreora sum þinga gehwylce
ær his tiddæge to tweon weorþeð
adl oþþe yldo oþþe ecghete
fægum fromweardum feorh oðþringeð

forþon þæt is eorla gewham æftercweþendra
lof lifgendra lastworda betst
þæt he gewyrce ær he on weg scyle
fremman on foldan wið feonda niþ
deorum dædum deofle togeanes
þæt hine ælda bearn æfter hergen
ond his lof siþþan lifge mid englum
awa to ealdre ecan lifes blæd
dream mid dugeþum

dagas sind gewitene
ealle onmedlan eorþan rices
nearon nu cyningas ne caseras
ne goldgiefan swylce iu wæron
þonne hi mæst mid him mærþa gefremedon
ond on dryhlicestum dome lifdon

gedroren is þeos duguð eal dreamas sind gewitene
wuniað þa wacran ond þas woruld healdaþ
brucað þurh bisgo blæd is gehnæged
eorþan indryhto ealdað ond searað
swa nu monna gehwylc geond middangeard
yldo him on fareð onsyn blacað
gomelfeax gnornað wat his iuwine
æþelinga bearn eorþan forgiefene

ne mæg him þonne se flæschoma þonne him þæt feorg losað
ne swete forswelgan ne sar gefelan
ne hond onhreran ne mid hyge þencan
þeah þe græf wille golde stregan
broþor his geborenum byrgan be deadum
maþmum mislicum þæt hine mid nille

ne mæg þære sawle þe biþ synna ful
gold to geoce for godes egsan
þonne he hit ær hydeð þenden he her leofað
micel biþ se meotudes egsa forþon hi seo molde oncyrreð
se gestaþelade stiþe grundas
eorþan sceatas ond uprodor

dol biþ se þe him his dryhten ne ondrædeþ
cymeð him se deað unþinged
eadig bið se þe eaþmod leofaþ
cymeð him seo ar of heofonum

meotod him þæt mod gestaþelað forþon he in his meahte gelyfeð

stieran mon sceal strongum mode
ond þæt on staþelum healdan
ond gewis werum wisum clæne
scyle monna gehwylc mid gemete healdan
wiþ leofne ond wið laþne bealo
þeah þe he hine wille fyres fulne
oþþe on bæle forbærnedne
his geworhtne wine wyrd biþ swiþre
meotud meahtigra þonne ænges monnes gehygd

uton we hycgan hwær we ham agen
ond þonne geþencan hu we þider cumen
ond we þonne eac tilien þæt we to moten
in þa ecan eadignesse
þær is lif gelong in lufan dryhtnes
hyht in heofonum

þæs sy þam halgan þonc
þæt he usic geweorþade wuldres ealdor
ece dryhten in ealle tid

Amen

:: This endlessly fascinating poem, which I think I understand less each time I read it, has been translated many times by many authors and scholars. A selection of translations, some in verse and some in prose, can be found here, with a hypertext edition of the poem, along with a Canadian scholar's Masters thesis on the poem, here.

*Crickets* Hello?

Oliver's right, this story shouldn't die...

Veterans decry Rumsfeld's draft comments

WASHINGTON, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- A Vietnam War veterans' group is taking exception to U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's comments this week on the possibility of a new draft.

"Secretary Rumsfeld said troops from Vietnam War conscription 'added no value, no advantage, really, to the United States armed services ... '" Bobby Muller, president of Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation said in a statement issued Friday. "As Vietnam veterans who served with conscripted soldiers, we find Secretary Rumsfeld's egregious slur a grave insult to the memory, sacrifice and valor of those who lost their lives, and, further, dismissive of the hundreds and thousands of lives, both in the U.S. and in Vietnam, who were devastatingly shattered by the Vietnam War."

Rumsfeld, while commenting on a bill introduced to initiate the draft, said it was unnecessary.

"We're not going to re-implement a draft," he said Tuesday. "There is no need for it at all."

He spoke of the fact that many of those who were drafted were trained, served for a short time and then left the service.

Rumsfeld first referred to the many exemptions issued to certain men in the draft and then said, "what was left was sucked into the intake, trained for a period of months, and then went out, adding no value, no advantage, really, to the United States armed services over any sustained period of time, because the churning that took place, it took enormous amount of effort in terms of training, and then they were gone."

This has hardly been reported in the media. Thoughts?

I've read Lord of the Rings in its entirety four times, and I've done a lot of dipping into it for favorite and key passages, so I figured I knew the story pretty well, even though it's been three years since my last full re-read. Well, after reading this synopsis of the books, it's clear that my memory isn't as good as it once was. Bummer.

(Oh, and I know that it's always fun for political pundits on all sides of the spectrum to find allegorical parallels for their worldviews in whatever happens to be the major pop-culture phenomenon of the day, but come on.)

Karamazov

Been a bit since I've heard from you guys about where you are. Regardless, I finished the most famous part of the book, "The Grand Inquisitor" (even available on its own) yesterday. And you all? If you haven't been there yet, here's a topic to discuss later (or now if you have). Is any of Ivan's character based on the Grand Inquisitor that was Torquemada listed as the most evil man ever on this site (posted by Jaq back in Oct) ? Other thoughts on the Grand Inquisitor?

Do you need Singlefile? Do you want Singlefile? Do I need Singlefile?

Singlefile is an easy-to-use web-based service that helps you organize the books you own, the books you are reading, the books you've read and the books you want to read.

SF writer William Gibson is many things: he's one of the foremost pioneers of the cyberpunk subgenre; he's the writer of one of the finest opening sentences of a novel ever (Neuromancer: "The sky was the color of a television tuned to a dead channel"); and now he's a blogger.

A survey of world values

[The University of Michigan] has been sending out hundreds of questions for the past 25 years (it now covers 78 countries with 85% of the world's population). Its distinctive feature is the way it organises the replies. It arranges them in two broad categories. The first it calls traditional values; the second, values of self-expression.

The survey defines “traditional values” as those of religion, family and country. Traditionalists say religion is important in their lives. They have a strong sense of national pride, think children should be taught to obey and that the first duty of a child is to make his or her parents proud. They say abortion, euthanasia, divorce and suicide are never justifiable. At the other end of this spectrum are “secular-rational” values: they emphasise the opposite qualities.

The other category looks at “quality of life” attributes. At one end of this spectrum are the values people hold when the struggle for survival is uppermost: they say that economic and physical security are more important than self-expression. People who cannot take food or safety for granted tend to dislike foreigners, homosexuals and people with AIDS. They are wary of any form of political activity, even signing a petition. And they think men make better political leaders than women. “Self-expression” values are the opposite.

While this Economist article remarks that the postion of the United States is "strange" (i.e. traditional + self-expression), it's interesting (to me atleast) to note that its nearest neighbours are Australia and Canada. Of other English speaking countries, Britain and New Zealand seem to be more similar to Western Europeans.

So now a question for you, Dear Reader. Where do you (personally) fit on the World Value-O-Meter?

Steven Den Beste has written one of the grimmest posts I've read, anywhere, pertaining to this weekend's round of suicide bombings in Tel Aviv. Particularly scary is his last sentence, which has had me thinking ever since I read it. What are we to make of a culture that has embraced death to such a degree as the Palestinians have?

Remember the parody of Fellowship of the Ring that I posted a couple of months ago? And you know how right now, The Two Towers is in general release? Can you see where I'm going with this? (This one's not as funny, but it's still amusing....)

Bob Cringely says at the end of his 2003 predictions that, to him, the rise of weblogs in inexplicable. Why are weblogs so great?

Dammit, I almost forgot!

Happy Birthday, Sean!

Happy New Year!

And for your perusal, I give you a list of the top 100 Sci-Fi books of all time, from Phobos Entertainment. Not being a big SF fan, I've only read seven of these books (yeah, yeah, heresy and all that) and none of the top 25, so my argumentative skills will be of little use here. But I'm willing to bet that all of the rest of you have read many more than I.

Also a list of the top 50 SF films (I've seen a scant 9. Is Rocky Horror really considered a SF film?)

(original top books link via Brilliant Corners)

This is a mosaic image of the center of our galaxy, with the great black hole at the center lying within the white spot at the middle. The center of our galaxy is one of the top ten space mysteries that are still unresolved.

Meanwhile, the year 2003 is likely to be notable in space exploration for China's first foray into manned spaceflight and for the launch of several Martian probes, including this new roving vehicle.

Not much happening here these days, huh? I know that I have fallen quite a bit behind on Brothers K, but I do plan to reattack it once the New Year has come and gone.

I really don't want to know what the advertising tagline for this is going to be.

In the chapter on Smerdyakov, Dostoevsky likens this character to a painting called "The Contemplator" by Ivan Kramsky (according to my translation). From Dostoevsky's description of this painting, I've found that it is "Meditator" by Ivan Kramskoi, and it can be viewed here. (I'd have posted it here directly, but it's a pretty big image.)

Appropo of Nothing....

I recently downloaded Mozilla and this site looks horrible. John Hardy, is this what you've been using all along and that's why it looks so dark and nasty to you? The comments look fine. I'll figure out what the story is tomorrow.

Via Newsweek: Trent Lott and the GOP's racial troubles.

It was just a quick stop, at a store on a campaign trip through the Northeast more than a dozen years ago. Trent Lott, then a Mississippi congressman about to make his move for the Senate, was visiting a state for a Republican candidate. When Lott walked in, he asked: “Why aren’t there any black people here?” a source who has spent time with him in unguarded moments tells NEWSWEEK. Nervously, someone explained that this was not the most diverse of regions. “Not even behind the counter?” Lott said. Warming to his punch line, Lott added: “We’d be happy to send you up some if you need any”—and then chuckled.

Is anyone else bothered by the current Republican meme of "I'm shocked ! Shocked! to find that gambling is going on here!"?

One of the most interesting things about 'Brothers K' to me is D's expressed intention to write a subsequent book about Alyosha which this book only prepares us for. Here's what I found on Google:

[Dostoyevsky] planned to write a sequel to 'The Brothers Karamazov' in which, twenty years later, his hero Alyosha would leave his monastery cell and become a revolutionary and die for his idealism. He "would have searched for the truth and in his quest would naturally have become a revolutionary," Dostoyevsky said. See Grossmann, p. 587 Joyce Carol Oates in note #8 in an article on 'The Dispossessed'

It is said that Alyosha was to have become involved with revolutionists and to have committed a political crime, - it will be recalled that during Dostoevsky's last years the terrorists were increasingly active and, indeed, his own death antedated by one month the assassination of the czar. The possibilities of such a novel as this projected sequel fairly dazzle the imagination. But there is no need to speak of might-have-beens. The work as it stands is sufficient to engage profoundly the mind and the emotions of the reader, and to leave him shaken by a sense of the large potentialities of the soul. Avrahm Yarmolinsky on the site Jaq recommended (end of the article)

In a russian book on Dostoevsky(printed circa 1960), which I have at home, it states that notes made by Dosty on the ideas that the sequel would include were kept by his wife after Fyodor's death. It was mentioned that the book was to take place in 30 years after the events of the first book and concentrate on the life of the now middle aged Alyosha. He was to change dramatically in those years after a long love with Lise, which was to be full of pain and unhappiness. Alyosha was to leave the church and fully re-enter the society. from this thread which mentions the title as being 'Life of a Great Sinner'

I believe the work you are thinking of is 'Life of a Great Sinner', in it's entirety it was planned to emcompass Alyosha's leaving the monastary, his later debauchery, and finally his conversion back to faith. I believe I read about this in Joseph Frank's brilliant biography...

In 1868, Leo Tolstoy had finished his epic novel, War and Peace. Readers and critics loved the book. Dostoevsky, inspired and perhaps also envious, began to consider writing an epic of his own. He wanted to write a grand book, even longer than Tolstoy's, that would give him room to express his philosophies regarding the spiritual dilemmas of the modern Russian man. This epic - first titled Atheism and later The Great Sinner - was to be "the story of a Russian skeptic who, after many years of moving back and forth among all sorts of theologies and popular sects, in the end finds the Russian Orthodox religion and the Russian soul" (quoted from Grossman's biography). The Great Sinner was originally designed to contain five volumes, connected by one hero. The five books would eventually be distilled down to one: Brothers Karamazov. again, from the Dartmouth site. (This article goes on to chronicle how D's plan's changed, inspired by an ideological murder, from which he wrote 'Demons'.

I am very sorry that we didn't get the chance to read what might have come.

Russian Icon: the Virgin Odigitria.

In keeping with The Brothers K, I did a little searching for Russian icons, since I noticed that Dostoevsky tells us several times about the elder Zosima bowing to the icon, and the like. I have to confess a bit of ignorance here: is an Icon a religious picture, held in Orthodox tradition to be spiritually significant?

I found a good site on Brothers K here.

My take on Brothers K: I give it a six. It's got a good beat, and I can dance to it!

But seriously, I'm enjoying the book quite a bit, although it's proving to be very slow going for me. My approach to Brothers K is rather like the tortoise's approach to beating the hare. (When my mother spied my copy of the book on my desk, she snorted and said, "You're going to be reading that thing forever!") I do have to keep reminding myself that it takes place in Tsarist Russia, but it's interesting to see some derisive remarks made about "atheistic socialists" in a book written years before the Marxist Revolution.

Thus far in the book (I'm just starting Book Three, "The Sensualists"), a major theme seems to be crime and what sort of state is best equipped to deal with criminals. We are told that an ecclesiastical state, in which the Church has become the State, is best, because in such a state men would know that by committing crimes they are not merely committing crimes against their fellow men or against their State, but against Christ himself; thus, excommunication becomes the most horrible of punishments. This seems to ignore problems of doctrinal differences that inevitably arise whenever two Christians inhabit a room, much less millions of them inhabiting a nation, and unless I missed it, nothing is said of how such a state would react to unbelievers, if they even admit that unbelief is even possible. So, what do we think of Dostoevsky's ecclesiastical state?

And for an interesting "compare-and-contrast" exercise, check out Den Beste's take on the foundations of law, posted just this week.

[I'm assuming that we should keep front-page posts about Brothers K to a single topic, and if we have something else we want to bring up, we should do so in a new post? Otherwise, the comment sections might get hard to follow.]

Glossy and Greedy: Real Page-Turners

Peter Carlson of the Washington Post writes "a magazine review about two magazine stories about magazines. If that's too ridiculously meta for you, quit reading now. My only defense is that these stories help explain why so many of America's big corporate publishers put out such lame mags."

Magazines do seem to have become ridiculously lame over the past few years. Do you all subscibe to any? Is there a remedy? Anyone else remember the foul-mouthed hard-ass Rosie O'Donnell that used to host a stand up comedy show?

For reference, here is a listing of the magazines that AOL-Time-Warner owns under Time, Inc. (scroll down).

I came late to the tax discussion below, but added a comment anyway.

Brothers K

So how is everyone doing on the book? Enjoying? Flustered? Not reading it? Where is everyone? Are we all at a point where we can begin discussion?

< /survey>

I'm finished with the first two books, and hope to be done with Book 3 by Friday-ish. I didn't read a single page over Thanksgiving though, so that kind of impeded my progress. What about you three?

steven den beste is the captain of the starship uss clueless
steven den beste is on again about the landmine treaty
steven den beste is catching up
steven den beste is a mind reader and faster typer
steven den beste is correct about the "netscape engineers are weenies" phrase
steven den beste is back
steven den beste is right when he says that yasser arafat is now in a no win situation and arafat will be lucky if he survives to see 2003
steven den beste is once again writing some of the best stuff about the world in general
steven den beste is suspicious of people who post under pseudonyms
steven den beste is in top form with his essay on the tactics of delay over an iraqi invasion
steven den beste is a man of few words today
steven den beste is quite wrong to describe american liberal democracy as the greatest rival to what he calls "transnational progressivism"
steven den beste is back and has a lot to say about the kyoto protocols
steven den beste is actually a real name? i could look
steven den beste is often political
steven den beste is agreeing with me
steven den beste is not the only blogger unafraid to kick the apple herd of sacred cows
steven den beste is spot on in this analysis of why we were attacked
steven den beste is a prolific
steven den beste is going to "channel the shade of diogenes"
steven den beste is very seldom "clueless"
steven den beste is one of the internet's most popular "bloggers"
steven den beste is in favor of war
steven den beste is actually discussing something else
steven den beste is shutting down his forum
steven den beste is incorrigibly brilliant as always
steven den beste is wonderful
steven den beste is just plain wrong
steven den beste is a retired software engineer who now spends his time writing for his web site
steven den beste is arguing that the culture produces murderous thugs
steven den beste is prepared to argue in favor of string bikini as feminist icon
steven den beste is back from holiday
steven den beste is linked everywhere and people always take his pronouncements on the middle east as wise and informed
steven den beste is one of the brightest bloggers out there
steven den beste is linked everywhere
steven den beste is gone
steven den beste is back from vacation
steven den beste is not any more thrilled with this than i am
steven den beste is an infinitely more intelligent guy than pejman "i am manufactured consent" yousefdeh
steven den beste is one of the few
steven den beste is a software engineer
steven den beste is out of the board business
steven den beste is gloating because the un weapons inspectors are adhering to kofi annan's
steven den beste is one of the internet’s most popular “bloggers”
steven den beste is on a roll
steven den beste is one of those who find it lacking

So how about you?

Update: In the name of Radical Honesty, I thought I'd better own up to something. I originally posted this and then immediately thought it was a little too frivolous. So I deleted it again. The problem was that I didn't realise that I had already published it and, by the time I did, people had already left comments about it.

So I've gone and posted it again and here are your original comments.

Sorry for the balls up.

Radical Honesty is a kind of communication that is direct, complete, open and expressive. Radical Honesty means you tell the people in your life what you've done or plan to do, what you think, and what you feel. It's the kind of authentic sharing that creates the possibility of love and intimacy.

I came across this book at Borders and it really interested me.

Be sure to read the FAQ for some concrete examples.

What would happen if we told the whole truth all the time?

Caption this photo!



Source: Chicago Tribune, November 14, 2002

It used to be "pistols at dawn", but now we've got "tax plans at dawn".

Two blogs I follow have posted their thoughts on how to fix the US tax system in the last couple of days. First up is William Burton's tax plan, from a liberal perspective. He wants to keep the estate tax firmly in place, close up the corporate loopholes, restore the progressive brackets to something more like they used to be, and stop differentiating between payroll income and capital-gains income. Then we have Jane Galt's tax plan, from the libertarian perspective (at least, that's what I think her perspective is -- I read her blog sporadically, but her alias suggests a libertarian view). She wants to eliminate the corporate income tax, eliminate the estate tax, and end all deductions. The two agree that capital gains should not be treated any differently from other forms of income, they both agree that their respective views have zero chance of ever being enacted in the current political climate, and both concede that to tax Warren Buffett at twenty-five percent would not have nearly the same effect on his standard-of-living as the same percentage taxation would on, say, a family of three with a total income of $30,000 a year. (There are other points the authors discuss, but they are on tax details that I don't know anything about. I also don't get the impression, though I may be wrong, that the authors are aware of each others' proposals.)

So, what constitutes fairness in a tax system? And to what degree is "fairness" even desirable in a tax system, in the first place?

When I first heard the word palimpsest, it sounded to me like a nasty skin condition.


The death of Archimedes
taken from the article Proof, Amazement, and the Unexpected

Fellow Collaborators will recall that the word had been floated by Jason as a possible name for this blog. It means "twice-written" which when you think about it is a pretty cool name for a collaborative web log. In Latin it means literally means "scraped again" and this refers to the medieval practice of scraping clean old parchments so that they could be reused a second or more times. Parchments were generally made of animal skin, so I guess the nasty skin thing wasn't that far off.

Any way, we didn't go with the name but at the time I remembered hearing about the discovery of a palimpsest that contained a previously unknown work of Archimedes. It had been found as traces left on a 10th century parchment which had been roughly scraped clean, cut in half, bound into a book and overwritten with a 13th-century Greek prayer manual. The manuscript first came to light in 1906 in Constantinople but was almost immediately lost again (some say stolen) only to resurface on the block of a Christie's auction room in 1998. It sold for two million dollars.

Scholars have since had a chance to examine it and using ultraviolet photography and digital imaging have been able to read beneath the prayer book's lines and decipher Archimedes' text and diagrams. What they have found is was quite remarkable particularly in light of our current understanding of the development of mathematics. Copied and recopied by scribes over a thousand year period since the time when Archimedes lived, this is the largest existing tract of words by the man himself. He puts together in a treatise entitled the Method of Mechanical Theorems a series of proofs which, amongst other things, appears to anticipate the invention of calculus by more than eighteen centuries.

Calculus is an indispensable tool of modern mathematics and was invented by Leibniz (and independently by Newton) and, as you may recall from high school, is all about chopping things up into an infinite number of pieces that are themselves infinitely small. It's this kind of thinking about problems that is conventionally assumed to have been beyond the pale for the ancient Greeks who are said to have avoided dealing with infinities and always preferred to stay with the finite and the rational. Not so, apparently, when we come to Archimedes.

Modern scholarship always assumed that mathematics has undergone a fundamental conceptual shift during the Scientific Revolution in the 16th century. It has always been thought that modern mathematicians were the first to be able to handle infinitely large sets, and that this was something the Greek mathematicians never attempted to do. But in the palimpsest we found Archimedes doing just that. He compared two infinitely large sets and stated that they have an equal number of members. No other extant source for Greek mathematics has that.

The Origins of Mathematical Physics: New Light on an Old Question

See also:
Ancient Infinities
The Archimedes Palimpsest Exhibit at the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore
Scholars decode ancient text, shake up pre-calculus history

You can find a full translation of the text and diagrams from the palimpsest here. As an example, this is an excerpt from Archimedes' Letter to Eratosthenes

Since I see, however, as I have previously said, that you are a capable scholar and a prominent teacher of philosophy, and also that you understand how to value a mathematical method of investigation when the opportunity is offered, I have thought it well to analyse and lay down for you in this same book a peculiar method by means of which it will be possible for you to derive instruction as to how certain mathematical questions may be investigated by means of mechanics. And I am convinced that this is equally profitable in demonstrating a proposition itself; for much that was made evident to me through the medium of mechanics was later proved by means of geometry because the treatment by the former method had not yet been established by way of a demonstration.

This is a game called "Landlord's Game", which was a precursor to the classic Monopoly. The classic game is the current feature of NPR's Present at the Creation series.

"Balance" is a fetish in news reportage circles -- the idea that both sides of a story must be equally described. In reality, it's a chimera -- one side always gets more airtime, or is otherwise favoured. You pick a moderate on one side, and an extremist on the other, assert that it's a balanced debate -- and you've just shifted the centre ground towards the second faction's territory.

Much has been written recently about the growing disconnect between American and European attitudes on world affairs. Science fiction author Charles Stross has a particularly interesting take on the phenomenon, which he has titled The Manufacture of Dissent. Stross feels that attitudes, for better or worse, are being shaped by biases both hidden and unhidden in the media on both sides of the Atlantic. I can't help but think that he's on to something here. I don't know much about European media (Stross is from Scotland), but I see this kind of thing very definitely playing out here in the United States, where commonplace belief now holds that our news media is relentlessly biased toward the liberal end of the political spectrum, despite all manner of evidence to the contrary.

This image, of a distant galaxy, confirms that at the center of this galaxy two black holes are on a collision course.

I love astronomy and cosmology for many reasons, not the least of which is the way they regularly provide things to which the only appropriate reaction is a Keanu-like "Whoa...."

OK, it's Monday and time to start dividing The Brothers Karamazov into smaller, bite-size bits, so I thought I'd put up a new post for the responding. Should we start with, say, Book I by next Monday? Some of the Books seem to be longer than others, so the longer ones might take longer than a week, but Book I appears fairly short by comparison to the remainder.

You never know what's going to turn up on Ebay. I don't know whether the fact of this auction is troubling in itself, or if it's the fact that the seller has classified it under "Home and Garden: Major Appliances".

And in a similar vein, what happens with Cathlics drive too fast. Ouch. (The person from whom I got this link is a Catholic, and she thought it was hilarious....)

You may not always agree with what he has to say but R. Robot is surely one of the most intelligent and insightful voices in the Blogosphere at the moment. Rising from virtual obscurity after September 11, he quickly achieved recognition and admiration for his amusing, well researched and erudite demolitions of some of the more fluorescent personalities of the antiwar Left.

His famous taking to task of the self-loathing Robert Fisk at the start of this year was so widely linked to and quoted that the verb "fisk" quickly entered the warblogger's lexicon along with other R. Robot coinages such as "pilger", "chomsky", "tariqali", "root-causers", "idiotarian" and "transnational progressivism".

Of course such fearless notoriety often attracts enmity but this lunatic fringe is certainly greatly outweighed by the huge following that's behind the one who honed "fact-checking" (as in "your ass") into a new and especially destructive weapon of war.

Speaking of fact-checking, while I was researching this post I was surprised to discover that in another life R. Robot is also an accomplished writer of rock music reviews and has conducted numerous interviews with rock's most famous celebrities.

But when is Kilgore Trout's b-day?

Happy 80th Birthday to Kurt Vonnegut. This article lists some highlights and lowlights of Mr. Vonnegut's career. What are your favorite Vonnegut novels, scenes, or characters? Don't dig Kurt? Why not?

(initial article via aldaily).

Artist Ted Nasmith, who is particularly notable for his Tolkien-related illustrations, now has an official website. I love Nasmith's work, but the website -- in its initial launch -- is in dire need of some tweaking. The thing extends off the edge of the browser window, with no way to scroll that I can discern. But what can be seen of Nasmith's paintings are beautiful.

Major Matt Mason

In 1967, with the race to the moon in full swing, kids across America dreamed of becoming Gemini astronauts when they grew up. Walking on the moon was no longer a distant fantasy, but a scant two years away. It was then that Mattel Toys, hoping to cash in on the craze, released what was to become one of their most popular and best remembered toy lines of all time: Major Matt Mason, Mattel's very own Man In Space.

Though lasting only about four years, from 1967 until its demise in 1970, Major Matt Mason comprised one of the most inventive and memorable toy lines ever. Standing only 6" tall, the white-suited Matt Mason figure was fully poseable with his wire-reinforced rubber body. His space suit and helmet were supposedly based on real NASA designs, but even if they weren't exactly accurate, they looked right for the part, mixing realism with plenty of futuristic fantasy.

The Toy Encyclopedia: can you find your favourite toy here?

In honor of today's release of the Expanded Edition of The Fellowship of the Ring, I thought it might help to have this Abridged Version, which I filched from another message board. (Author credit wasn't given there, so I can't give it here, either.) Enjoy!

---

THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING
Frodo: Hi, Gandalf!
Gandalf: Bilbo, give him your ring.
Bilbo: Okay. Bye!
Gandalf: See you at the pub, Frodo.

Frodo: Doo-de-do.
Nazgul: Boo!
Frodo: Eeeek!
Merry: (pops up out of nowhere) Eeeek!
Pippin: (ditto) Eeeek!
Sam: Ha ha, can't catch us now!

Tom Bombadil: Hello little friends!
Frodo: No time for you, weirdo.
Tom Bombadil: (disappears)

Saruman: See, all I had to do was cross out "Good" on my business
cards and write "Bad," and I'm all set.
Gandalf: I never saw /that/ coming.
Saruman: Excuse me while I tend to my vast army of evil orcs and
war machinery which were in plain sight.
Gandalf: Alas, if only he had imprisoned me at the top of a high
tower without walls or ceiling so that he could not prevent a giant
eagle from rescuing me, instead of in the canonical dungeon deep
underground. Oh, wait.

Frodo: (whispering) Keep a low profile.
Pippin: (loudly) And don't mention your real name, right?
Merry: (loudly) Or the ring either, right?
Strider: Right. Don't mention the ring. (laughs) It's okay, I'll save
you.

Pippin: (whining) Are we there yet?

Nazgul: Bwa ha ha ha. Give us the ring, little worm.
Frodo: Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names-
Sam: Hmm, looks like swords work too.
Strider: Go away, bad men!
Nazgul: The five of us must flee, for we are outnumbered by this one
Ranger!

Frodo: Wow, we're in Rivendell!
Merry: That was easy.
Pippin: Don't knock it.
Sam: Elves are cool!
Elrond: Get the hell out of my place, I don't
need trouble.
Gimli: You can't throw them out while I'm here!
Legolas: Same for me!
Elrond: Right, all of you wankers leave now.
Gandalf: But I just got here.
Boromir: I'll just invite myself along. No real reason. Certainly not
because I have larceny on my mind. Nope.
Strider: Look, they fixed my sword! (swish) Wheeeee!

Frodo: Such beautiful scenery. The green grass and leaves are so-
[THUD]
Pippin: Where the hell did all this snow come from?
Gandalf: Don't blame me. Who knew that mountains could be cold on
top?
Gimli: Told you we should go through the mines.
Strider: Let the dwarf have his way.
Legolas: Fine, whatever, just open the door.
Gimli: Ummm, I have no idea how to get inside.
Boromir: What a bunch of dicks.
Gandalf: Of course! (applies C4 to the problem) [POOF]
Sam: Such magic.

Merry: Ooooo, dead dwarf over here!
Gimli: Boo hoo.
Pippin: HEY MONSTERS, COME AND GET US!!
Gandalf: Twit.
Orcs: Oh good, we were getting hungry. Do you have any idea how
difficult it is to keep an army fed in these abandonded mines?
Boromir: (Slash)
Legolas: (Pfft)
Gimli: (Whack)
Orcs: This is definitely putting a damper on our relationship.
Frodo: Ouch!
Strider: Alas, the Ring-bearer has perished! Our quest has failed!
Frodo: Just kidding. I did the slide-blade-between-arm-and-chest
trick while I was standing in profile to y'all. Pretty funny, eh?
Balrog: Dammit, I was sound asleep. That really ticks me off.
Gandalf: We are so doomed.
Strider: Not if we run away! (does so)
Boromir: First good idea you've had. (follows)
Hobbits: (already in the lead)
Gandalf: (trailing) It matters not! You cannot outrun the demon!
Legolas: We don't have to . . .
Gimli: . . . we just have to outrun *you*.
Balrog: Your ass is mine, wizard. (drags Gandalf down with him)
Strider: Woe is upon our company, that Gandalf has fallen!
Frodo: I'm over it.
Sam: Yeah, let's go, there's no food here.

Legolas: Wondrous are these woods!
Gimli: And full of cutthroat elves.
Celeborn: We were told of your coming. Well, "warned" is more
accurate.
Galadriel: I know you better than you know yourselves.
Sam: You've got nothing better to do with your time?
Galadriel: Wake up, Frodo, and look in the mirror.
Frodo: Geez, can't a guy get some sleep around here? What mirror
are you babbling about, there's just this birdbath full of water.
Galadriel: But it shows magic pictures of things that may or may not
be!
Frodo: I'm guessing you're a day trader. Here, you take the ring.
Galadriel: I will not. (hangs her head) I lost the instructions.
Frodo: Great, I'm still stuck with it.
Celeborn: Check-out time!

Pippin: (singing) Row row row your boat, gently down-
Gimli: Shut the hell up. Seven hours of that is enough.
Strider: All this beautiful scenery is giving me a very bad feeling.

Boromir: Give me the ring.
Frodo: Notice as I put it on that it not only makes me invisible, it
also apparently teleports me away from your clutches.
Boromir: Arrrrrgghhh! I'm just trying to save my kingdom! Where is a
rake I can step on, that it might strike my head? Ah, this will do
nicely. (whack)
Frodo: Best thing for me to do now is head for the most dangerous
place in the world.
Sam: Works for me. (they leave)

SuperOrcs: Kill kill kill!
Merry: Help, help, Auntie Em! (waves his tiny sword pathetically)
Pippin: Christ, look at the size of these guys, we're dead meat.
Boromir: Fear not, little hobbits, I shall blow my special horn and we
shall be rescued by soldiers . . who are . . hundreds . . of . . miles . .
away . . guess we are pretty stuffed after all. (dies)
SuperOrcs: Kill kill kill!
Legolas: Look at my form. Damn, I'm good.
Gimli: I'm environmentally friendly --- blood makes the grass grow.
Strider: Looks like Frodo got away. Well, there's no chance in hell I'm
going to step one foot closer to Mordor, so let's go the exact
opposite direction.
Legolas: Okay.
Gimli: Sure.
THE END

Remember when we talked about Ayn Rand? Steven eventually posted a critical essay that reads like the National Enquirer of Rationalism.

Collaborative book club?

I (well, Sean, really) think that Jaq came up with the idea of a Collaboratory book reading/discussion. I'd like to ressurect the idea now that we've got our feet a bit on the ground. Is there interest in this still? If so, how would it be done? (my ideas inside).

Once I had landed my [space vehicle description] near the fabled [landscape feature name] on [planet name], I took the [magic potion ingredients] I had previously acquired to brew the potion I would need for the [dark ritual name] that I would perform that night. (Fill in the blanks using the generators linked!!)

And once you're done playing with those, you can generate actual planetary maps with this generator. What fun!!

(links courtesy of Star Lines.)

Man,this site needs help. So, here it is:

What's your ideal dance mix cd?

At least 10 songs.

This is for the masses. This is not songs only you would know. (Though feel free to post that in addition, separately).

Grist for your mill: About.com Top 40/Pop Top 100 Hits (laugh if you will).

Mine:

Vogue - Madonna
Disco Inferno - The Trammps
Shout - The Isley Brothers
It Takes Two - Rob Base
Brick House - The Commodores
Loveshack - B52s
Get Down Tonight - KC and the Sunshine Band
I've Got the Power - Snap
Celebration - Kool and the Gang
Stand - REM
YMCA - The Village People

Laugh if you will. If I'm the DJ, the masses will be lovin' me with this mix. You know it's true (oo, maybe I should add some Mili Vanilli).

Do we need more voters or better voters?

Thomas Sowell weighs in on the better voters side saying:

During election years, people in the media seem to be forever lamenting the fact that millions of Americans who are eligible to vote do not in fact go to the polls. When speculating as to why those people don't vote, the media often assume that there is something wrong with a society in which voter turnout is low, by comparison with the past or by comparison with other countries.
Actually, some of the most strife-torn countries, with seething hatreds between various ethnic or religious groups, have much higher voter turnout than the United States has. Where each group is desperate to seize power from other groups, or to keep others from acquiring power over them, getting high voter turnout is no problem. But it can be a symptom of other serious problems.

Sowell raises the age-old question of "is it better to have an ignorant vote, or no vote at all?". With election day coming up tomorrow, it's probably a good time to discuss this. Assuming that the answer probably lies somewhere in the middle, as it usually does, how do we acheive this middle ground, both on a personal level (those close to us) and a larger, broader, societal level? It's probably too late for this year, but what about next time around?

shamlessly stolen from MeFi.

We had an earlier post here about Ayn Rand. Steven den Beste is asking her minions not to write to him.

Proof that the times keep on marchin' on: last night while taking our daughter trick-or-treating, my wife and I observed only one kid wearing that mask from Scream.

The best costume we saw (besides our own little girl's, of course) was a girl done up as a Japanese geisha. I couldn't tell how old she was -- I'm guessing ten or eleven -- but the makeup job was superb, as was the traditional kimono. (She had Reeboks on, though -- sometimes you have to make a concession to practicality.) I'm not sure about the message being sent in dressing up a pre-teen as a geisha, but the costume itself was very well-done.

So, were there any other good costumes observed last evening? (Accepting that not everyone here has offspring, but may have still observed interested costumes.)

What do you do when you are a former member of one of the most renowned comedy troupes in history? If you're John Cleese, you move on to various writing and acting endeavours, including taking over for Desmond Llewelyn as Q in the Bond films. If you're Terry Gilliam, you direct movies....really offbeat, strange movies. And if you're Michael Palin, you become a world traveler and film your exploits for the BBC and PBS. Check out his site; it's wonderful for the photography alone.

Happy Halloween. Now for something truly creepy.

From MeFi, here's the suicide note left by the guy that shot up the Nursing College in Arizona. The MeFi discussion is quite interesting, and I wanted to know if any of you had any thoughts. The discussion over there has hit upon mainly two things: 1) the nature of the guy, what drove him to do what he did, etc. and 2) the appropriateness of publishing this and giving him the attention (albeit in death) that some claim he desperately wanted. Feel free to expand on both.

Apropos of the discussion on music downloading and such here are the thoughts of comics author and artist Scott McCloud.

McCloud is a pioneer of web-based comics (as well as the author of the brilliant books Understanding Comics and Reinventing Comics), and his views and theories on how the Web may release artists from their collective shackles (the RIAA, for instance) are fairly compelling -- although I don't agree with all of what he says (particularly the motivation behind file-sharers, as I noted in that discussion).

McCloud has proposed a system of "micropayments" for Web content. His focus is, of course, on comics -- that's what he does and it's the medium whose success he is clearly most concerned with -- but what he says could apply to online fiction, or online music, or online films, or whatever else we can conceive. Check out his comics essays on the subject -- they're the ones entitled "Coins of the Realm". And then, check out this response to McCloud's work.

Micropayments: can it work? or, having experienced the siren song of free content, are they doomed to failure?

A prominent author has advanced a new theory as to the identity of Jack the Ripper. Well, I guess that rules out Colonel Mustard in the parlor with a candlestick.

Everything I need to know, I learned from D&D (not really, but it is evocative, no?)

Actually D&D alignment really has helped me to understand my own ethics better.

(Take the D and D Online Alignment Test.)

The scales are: Lawful-Neutral-Chaotic and Good-Neutral-Evil. The first scale is alignment relative to law, order, etc. The second scale is relative to individuals and their well being.

I come out between Neutral Good and Chaotic Good. I flex on the law, mostly because I think the law, lots of times, is not good for people. It is a subjective judgment, again. And, obviously, with me, it's a lot more in concept than it is in actuality. Any true nonconformist should not complain too much when the law comes down on her. She has to be willing to take the consequences, though she can argue the justice of it.

But I'm very concerned about individual good. Spiritual life is the highest priority (for me, and it probably includes liberty/freedom), followed closely by physical human life (which includes subsistence living, and, last of all, the right to property and wealth.)

How about you? What's your D&D alignment? And what are your reflections on these issues?

(This post started as a comment on Collaboratory, and is double-posted on interact (because I'm looking for the responses of both audiences.)

I'm certainly no fan of President Bush, but he occasionally gets it right -- such as his nominee to head the National Endowment for the Arts. It seems that this nominee is not a strict ideologue, but rather a competent and at times forceful voice for the arts.

I have never liked one of Don Henley's songs. Now I really have a reason to like him.

Don Henley to fans at a concert about downloading his songs:

Download all you want. The record companies have been ripping artists off for years. Go ahead. I'd rather lose money to you than them. I don't have a contract with you.

(via kottke, via brushstroke)

Where are you on the whole Napster thing?

One of the Weblog pioneers, Anil Dash, has found himself stuck between a rock and a hard place due to some criticisms he made of tech and misc. blog turned warblog Little Green Footballs. When LGF was put on MSNBC's Best of Blog's list and Will Femia at MSNBC drug out Anil's old posts about LGF, chaos ensued. Since, both Femia and Anil have received numerous e-mails from LGF's supporters and some of the supporters have even taken to crapping in Anil's comments on completely unrelated subjects.

This morning, Anil wrote a long, well-prosed screed about his point of view. I would encourage you all to read it and post any thoughts that you have. Any possible solutions? Where do we stand (individually and collectively) with his challenge regarding groupthink and the warblogs?

This stone box could be one of the bigger archaeological discoveries since, well, ever: possible evidence of the existence of Jesus.

Courtesy of MeFi, a fascinating survey of Good and Evil, listing the Top Ten Good and Evil persons of all time. It's fascinating stuff. Particularly interesting is the correspondence Mr. Pickover (the site's author) conducted with a Romanian who disagreed with Pickover's assessment that Vlad Tepes (the "Impaler", and the Romanian count whose exploits inspired a certain Bram Stoker to write the novel Dracula) as an evil man. And even more disturbing than that are the folks who wrote in to argue that Bill Clinton was more evil than Adolf Hitler.