From Edge.org:

Gödel mistrusted our ability to communicate. Natural language, he thought, was imprecise, and we usually don’t understand each other. Gödel wanted to prove a mathematical theorem that would have all the precision of mathematics—the only language with any claims to precision—but with the sweep of philosophy. He wanted a mathematical theorem that would speak to the issues of meta-mathematics. And two extraordinary things happened. One is that he actually did produce such a theorem. The other is that it was interpreted by the jazzier parts of the intellectual culture as saying, philosophically exactly the opposite of what he had been intending to say with it.

More here.

Michael Yahuda in The Guardian:

The author of Wild Swans and her historian husband, Jon Halliday, have torn away the many masks and falsehoods with which Mao and the Communist party of China to this day have hidden the true picture of Mao the man and Mao the ruler. Mao now stands revealed as one of the greatest monsters of the 20th century alongside Hitler and Stalin. Indeed, in terms of sheer numbers of deaths for which he responsible, Mao, with some 70 million, exceeded both…

More here.

Peter Bergen reviews Adam Curtis’ The Power of Nightmares, a three-hour BBC documentary on Al Qaeda and the war on terror’ in this week’s The Nation.

“Curtis has done some wonderful archival research to illustrate his film, finding rare footage, for instance, of [Sayyid] Qutb in prison (and he wittily punctuates the narrative with passages of popular songs and old film clips). But in telling Qutb’s story, Curtis argues that it is mirrored by that of the University of Chicago political philosopher Leo Strauss, a forced analogy that is emblematic of Curtis’s occasionally questionable polemical methods. Curtis says that around the same time Qutb was formulating his apocalyptic vision of waging offensive jihads against the enemies of Islam, Strauss, ‘who shared the same fears about the destructive influence of individualism in America,’ was telling his students, many of whom went on to influential careers in politics, that liberalism was fatally weakening the US body politic and sapping Americans’ will to defend ‘freedom.’ Intellectuals, he believed, would have to spread an ideology of good and evil, whether they believed it or not, so that the American people could be mobilized against the enemies of freedom. For this reason Strauss, we learn in one of many telling asides, was a huge fan of the TV series Gunsmoke and its Manichean depiction of good and evil.”

A new study finds that local priorities in post-war torn regions and those of peace keeping operations may be very different.  Jobs and education appear to rank high as immediate goals for the population, unsurpisingly, while peacekeepers see the end of physical threats as the immediate task, again unsurprisingly.

“[P]erceptions of security differ significantly among the three sets of actors. Within the context of their mission objectives, the military contingents that characterize PSOs [peace support operations] understand security first and foremost in terms of “force protection”, that is, the need for protection of their own personnel from attacks and threats of attack. PSO perceptions of the security needs of AAs and local communities are viewed through those lenses. While AAs [Assistance Agencies] are also concerned about insecurity as it impinges on their ability to carry out their assistance and protection activities, they are more likely to take risks in the interest of carrying out their tasks. They also tend to have a better understanding of how socio-economic issues impact on security and generally have a better grasp than PSOs do of the concerns of local populations. For their part, local communities view security as safety from physical harm and abuse but also extending far beyond to encompass a sense of well-being, including elements such as employment, access to basic services, political participation, and cultural identity. As one respondent put it, ‘There is no peace without bread.'”

Certainly, each part has its arguments for its priorities.  But there may be another issue. Paul Collier and Anne Hoeffler’s oft-cited argument–namely, that it takes time to build the absorptive capacity to effectively utilitize aid–may imply that it’s not so easy a matter as switching focus.  In conjunction, post-conflict expectations and constraints may be a recipe for frustration and disappointment. Maybe.

From MSNBC:

One of the medical marvels of stem cells is that they continue to divide and renew themselves when other cells would quit. But what is it that gives stem cells this kind of immortality? Researchers report in the journal Nature that microRNAs — tiny snippets of genetic material that have now been linked to growth regulation in normal cells as well as cancer growth in abnormal cells — appear to shut off the “stop signals” or brakes that would normally tell cells to stop dividing. “What we think we see is that there is a special mechanism to get rid of the brakes,” said University of Washington biochemist Hannele Ruohola-Baker, a leading member of the research team.

Stem cells have been the focus of intense research interest because of their role in regenerating all the body’s tissue types, from blood cells to brain cells. MicroRNAs could conceivably be harnessed to give a boost to aging stem cells, or even add some of the qualities of stem cells to more ordinary types of cells.

More here.

Constant Speed is inspired by Einstein’s 1905 publications; the World Year of Physics celebrates their centenary. From the patent office in Bern, Switzerland, Einstein dashed off five papers, all of them seminal work, on three themes: brownian motion, the photoelectric effect and the special theory of relativity.

Relativity, and E=mc², will be forever associated with Einstein. But it is his work on the photoelectric effect, which established the notion of the ‘quantum’, that Einstein himself regarded as his most revolutionary. The effect describes the release of electrons from a metal when light is shone on its surface. To explain the relation between the energy of the electrons released and the frequency of the incident light, Einstein proposed that light energy is transferred to the electrons in distinct chunks, or quanta. No less significant was his study of fluctuation phenomena within the framework of kinetic-molecular theory — work that recalled the brownian motion seen in the dance of pollen grains in water decades earlier.

Choreographer Mark Baldwin, the artistic director of the Rambert, developed Constant Speed through conversations with Ray Rivers, professor of theoretical physics at Imperial College London. Although he claims to be ignorant of physics, Baldwin was struck by a similarity of language — space, time, energy — between physics and dance. Quite rightly, I think, he shied away from specifically representing relativity in the piece, alluding only in the title to that theory’s central tenet of a constant speed of light. Brownian motion, on the other hand, is a concept easily reflected in the movements and configuration of the dancers. But it is the ideas surrounding the photoelectric effect that dominate Constant Speed.

More here.

From Nature:

Sitting in a temporary office, Pier Oddone seems relaxed, even confident. Next month, the 60-year-old physicist takes the helm of the leading high-energy physics laboratory in the United States, at a time when the lab’s particle accelerator — its raison d’être — is scheduled to close within five years. Quarks are the building blocks that make up protons, neutrons and other subatomic particles and the top and bottom quarks are the heaviest. The bottom quark had been detected at Fermilab in 1977, using the existing main ring accelerator. To find the heavier top quark meant smashing protons and anti-protons together at energies between 500 million and 1.5 billion eV, which the Tevatron was designed to do.

With further modifications, the collider netted the top quark in 1995. This discovery created elation among physicists and a headache for Fermilab management: what next?

More here.

From Nature:

It might sound unlikely, but men looking at explicit pictures of two naked men with a naked woman have been shown to produce higher-quality sperm than those watching pornographic images featuring women only. Although this seems to go against common perceptions about male sexual preferences, it is consistent with the theory of sperm competition, says study leader Leigh Simmons of the University of Western Australia, Perth. This states that males (of many species, including humans) should produce better sperm when faced with a female who has other mates, because this stimulates them to boost their chance of procreation.

The findings may help fertility clinics to obtain the best possible sperm samples from their clients, by providing specialized images of intercourse for men to view. This might help prospective fathers maximize their fertility, Simmons suggests. Though he adds that some women may disapprove of their partner viewing such material.

More here.

In n + 1, Isaac Scarborough reviews Michael Walzer’s Arguing About War.

“When an American president sends soldiers into battle, Walzer is arguing, he is doing more than asking them to defend American interests. He is asking them to be the representatives of the United State’s general will—of its moral calculus. ‘The assertion or presumption is that they have chosen or will choose, and also that they can choose, to live like citizens.’

Thus to act justly, the US should act not only in the interests of its soldiers, but should also take into consideration all the lives involved, be they civilians on the ground, or even opposing combatants. This is not to say that opposing soldiers cannot be killed. It is to say that we treat them justly by creating a moral calculus in which human life is valued equitably.

This understanding of the ‘general will’ and its significance in foreign policy underpins a great deal of Walzer’s thinking. If war itself should be seen as an extension of the moral life of a nation, then intervention on the behalf of oppressed peoples is ethically required.”

From the Guardian:

“Tim Spector of St Thomas’s hospital in London, who led the research, said: ‘The theory is that the orgasm is an evolutionary way of seeing if men can prove themselves to be likely good providers or dependable, patient and caring enough to look after the kids.’

Women who orgasm very easily may be more likely to be satisfied with poor quality men.

‘Perhaps women who had orgasms too easily weren’t very good selectors,’ Professor Spector said. ‘It paid women to be more fussy and this is one way of doing it. The simple fact is that it takes women on average 12 minutes and men two and a half minutes to reach orgasm. Adjusting to that imbalance is a test.’

His team used a national register of twins to ask 4,037 women, aged 19 to 83, about their sex lives and to compare their DNA. About half were identical twins, who share all their genes. The others were non-identical twins, who do not. Assuming twins are brought up in similar environments allows scientists to tease out the differences that are down to genes.”

From Killing the Buddha:

You can gain tremendous success in life, raise a big family, have an exciting job, develop a rich spiritual life, spend your time helping others—life offers lots of opportunities for the time we’re here. But no matter how much you achieve, aging, sickness, and mortality are working away, whittling you down to size until the day they finally win for good. Like circling sharks they are always hounding us, harrying even the happiest of lives.

Perhaps the persistent tendency to harden insight into unquestioned doctrine arises from our need to feel secure, to gain a hold on our situation and stave off the fear that things are dangerous and beyond our control. It’s an attitude that naturally appears when dealing with illness, aging, and mortality, the greatest of fears; and the fact that we really aren’t in control, that we can’t wield power over such awesome eventualities, just makes us crave answers and solutions all the more.  In a similar way, the modern formulation of the stages of grief popularized by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross offers a guidepost on the way of loss for the bereft, yet if taken literally, it denies how we revolve continuously in these mental states.

A famous Buddhist story tells of Kisa Gotami, a young mother from the Buddha’s clan whose baby boy died suddenly. Grief-stricken, she carried his corpse with her everywhere, wailing and wondering aloud why her child had left her. People pitied her, and eventually she was told to go to the Buddha for advice. When she reached his retreat, she demanded that the Buddha bring her boy back to life. Somewhat surprisingly, the Buddha agreed to do so, but first asked Gotami to do something. “Anything, anything,” she cried in desperate hope. The Buddha told her to go into the village and bring back a mustard seed from a house which had never known death.

More here.

From Ms. Magazine:

What motivated Margaret Sanger and Estelle Griswold was more than a simple desire for freedom in this most private of matters — the decision of whether or not to bear a child. These pioneers of modern feminism also understood that the ability to plan and space one’s family is a necessary condition for women to achieve equality in all walks of life.
So much is at stake. Before birth control and abortion were legally and readily available, the average woman would become pregnant between 12 and 15 times in her lifetime. Even today in the United States, nearly half of all pregnancies remain unintended, and nearly half of those result in abortion. This is why polls show that the vast majority of Americans reject the extremism of a determined minority and do not want the Supreme Court decisions that protect their private decisions to be overturned. Doctrines of privacy and equality for women are simply not separable: Eroding one imperils the other.

And all this rests on the shoulders of just one new justice.

More here.

From BBC News:

Two species of octopus have been observed moving in an upright bipedal stride since the discovery was announced in March this year. And scientists at the University of California at Berkeley believe they can develop artificial muscles for use in a new field of soft robotics using the studies of the octopus’s movement. “Each arm rolls along the suckers and pushes the animal back, and then the other arm touches down, rolls along the suckers, and pushes the animal back again,” biologist Chrissy Hufford explained to BBC World Service’s Science In Action programme.

“That’s why it was such a surprise to see – because every other example of bipedal locomotion before had involved the support of a rigid skeleton,” Dr Hufford added. “As we know, octopi and other cephalopods don’t have anything rigid in their arms – they are supported by bands of muscle… that allows them flexibility, but also some support.” This extreme flexibility and strength is of great interest to biologist Bob Full, who believes the octopus is an excellent model for how robots that move might be built without hard parts.

More here.

From “On the Asymmetry of Creation and Appreciation,” an essay by Rochelle Gurstein in The New Republic:

[Matthew] Arnold, even though he is ignorantly dismissed today as an “elitist,” had the “democratic insight,” as Trilling put it, that “a human value exists in the degree that it is shared, that a truth may exist but be unalive until it receives assent, that a good may have meaning but no reality until it is participated in.” As I finished reading these sentences to my husband, I felt myself returned to our walk through the garden earlier that day, to all those occasions where complete strangers, enchanted by the beauty all around them, felt compelled to seek our assent, the way their pleasure increased our own and ours theirs, and how, in that moment, we created a shared world between us, but also with Victor and Madame Lemoine, and with all the unnamed gardeners who have tended and continue to tend the lilacs in Brooklyn.

Read the whole article here.

There’s one last thing from NOVEL that I must post as it represents something of a little internal spat between different factions at the NY Times. Julie Salamon, who wrote the rather friendly piece at the beginning of the show, writes a summation that takes issue with the rather hostile op-ed that appeared three weeks ago.

“Only a handful of people dropped by daytimes, but the readings drew audiences of a few dozen. There was much press coverage, including an editorial in The New York Times saying “The installation trivializes the nature of writing.”

The writers said they were undeterred by the criticism. “The time pressure and unexpected attention were incentives,” said Mr. Sidhu, interviewed a few hours before the experiment was over. “People were expecting you to finish a book, something you weren’t utterly embarrassed by.” Readers can judge from excerpts Mr. Sidhu and the others posted on blogs at fluxfactory.org/otr/fluxnovelproject.htm.”

Harry Kreisler’s Conversations with History is a valuable site.  Here is an hour-long conversation with Amartya Sen on “the interplay of economic theory and political philosophy in his work on public choice, development, and freedom. Sen recalls his own intellectual odyssey, commenting on some of the factors that shaped his thinking.”

It wont be long now before Gordon Brown steps into Tony Blair’s shoes. As such, he’s already taking steps to develop his international policy. Putting Africa, especially Sub-Saharan Africa in the spotlight is a nice start. Mr. Brown pens a column in The Observer on precisely this matter.

But with only 440,000 people with HIV receiving treatment in 2004 – just 250,000 in sub-Saharan Africa – much more finance will be needed to meet the World Health Organisation target of three million people on anti-retroviral therapy. Hilary Benn has already promised that Britain will increase resources to develop healthcare systems with well-trained staff and equipment and fund stronger anti-poverty strategies.
Globally, tackling the world’s deadliest diseases and halving world poverty will require the overall doubling of aid recommended by the Commission for Africa. Which is why additional resources need to be agreed at Gleneagles and why it is critical that all wealthy countries, including the richer oil-producing states, join in.

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,

Come summer, we escape Cambridge for points East and despite our poverty, find ourselves in Italy. Here, we do as the Romans do: during the day, we sprawl at piazzas in the shadows of mighty edifices, and at night, prowl the streets, like the progeny of the wolf-suckled. And soon, we will meander through the undulating gold and olive hued Tuscan countryside, drunk on fresh warm Chianti from roadside enotecas, and on the periphery of Montepulciano, will find our kinsman’s villa where we will drink more, eat more and revel for a fortnight. Then we will head further east on a cheap ticket that includes a long layover in Amman, before arriving at our final destination, Karachi.

Sipping wine in the shadow of the edifice of history, we have mused that the next leg of the journey, from Italy to Jordan, recalls another made a millennium ago by the Franks of Italy who swept south circa 1097. Let by Peter the Hermit and Walter the Penniless, David Koresh-like figures, the First Crusade began with an attack on the Jewish communities across the Italian coast and ended at the gates of Nicaea where they were wiped out by the young Turkoman leader Arslan. Subsequently, one Bohemond of southern Italy, along with a French contingent comprising Raymond St. Gilles and the Brothers Bouillon, led another effort that succeeded in taking Jerusalem. Carnage followed the fall of the city: Muslims, Jews and Christians alike were slaughtered.  Soon, a tenuous Frankish empire comprising the principalities if Jerusalem, Antioch, Edessa, and Tripoli was established, one that relied on the Genoa and Venice for naval support.

The attack stirred a period of introspection amongst the disparate Muslim nations of the region: the Fatamids of Egypt, the Seljuk Abbasids in Baghdad and the Turkomans of “Rum.” Ultimately, because of the attacks, the Muslims were able to summon a coherent response: Salahuddin. Salahuddin expelled the Crusaders circa 1290. There were other Crusades, the most unfortunate being  what has come to be known as the Children’s Crusade (when bands of children were sold into prostitution before they left the continent.)

Although we don’t like reading too much into history, today, when the horrid specter of jihad looms, the Crusades seem strangely relevant. Moreover, the quest for Jerusalem seems to be a powerful historical dynamic. Of course, the Crusades summon different memories for different peoples. Here in Italy, the Crusaders are lionized while in the Middle East they are remembered as the defeated. Of course, history like literature, is simply an exercise in perspective.

Ridley Scott’s perspective on the Crusades makes for a mildly interesting spectacle (although Orland Bloom is an unfortunate casting decision). Amin Malouf’s the Crusades Through Arab Eyes is a novel variety of historiography. P.M. Holt’s unembellished version appeals to our sensibilities. It is, of course, the ascendant civilization that canonizes collective memory and defines discourse.

We remember things differently and different times (and like to think of different things altogether) but then we’ve had too much to drink. And we believe, “It’s not where you’re from/ It’s where you’re at.”

From The New Scientist:

By simply baking peanuts with a harmless fungus, researchers can dramatically decrease their “allergenicity”. The process could one day allow millions of peanut allergy sufferers to enjoy nutty foods without fear of a lethal reaction, they suggest.

“This is a simple biological method that is safe, edible and won’t add too much to costs. If the process is adopted by industry we think it could really help to reduce allergies,” says Mohamed Ahmedna at North Carolina A&T University in Greensboro, US, one of the team.

Peanuts cause the most severe food-induced allergic reactions. An estimated 1.1% of the US population is allergic to peanuts and each year approximately 100 people die from food-related allergic reactions, many provoked by peanuts or tree nuts.

More here.

From BBC News:

In June 1855, Darwin began a study of the local plants, which supported his theories on evolution and was mentioned in his book On the Origin of Species. Now, three generations of the Darwin family – aged from 21 months to 78 years – have begun a repeat survey. It should show how flowering plants have changed over the past 150 years. The descendants are Erasmus Darwin (great grandson), Randal Keynes (great, great grandson), Sarah Darwin (great, great granddaughter), Chris Darwin (great, great grandson), Allegra Darwin (great, great, great, granddaughter) and Leo Darwin Vogel (great, great, great grandson).

“It was in this field that Darwin went with the governess – the children’s governess – and simply counted the number of different kinds of plant that were growing in the field. “And he realised that the number and the pattern made a very important point about how species diverge as they evolve; and this is the key to the modern idea of biodiversity.”

More here.