Thursday, October 24, 2002

When Snipers are Common Pierre Tristam writes: We had something similar in Beirut after 1975. It was something like "Sniper on the Eights," a regular radio report on Voice of Lebanon that gave us the latest on sniper activity in the city as if it were a weather or traffic report, which is actually what it was. We listened to the radio before going anywhere to know what streets were safe and what streets were "hot," as the usually female, usually sultry voice on the radio described it, meaning nothing sultry by "hot," obviously. Snipers very quickly became the roving demons of the Lebanese Civil War. They were mercenaries with no conscience or convictions. They took up posts on rooftops and accepted paychecks from whichever side paid best. It was a job that promised plenty of work and no chance of unemployment. They had their favorite haunts -- bridges, major crossings, the so-called "Ring" highway that was Beirut's equivalent of a crosstown expressway, and which was the inaugural Highway of Death (by 1980 even dirt roads and back alleys were highways of death in Lebanon). They slouched in their sandbagged nests like the lethal dregs they were, alone or in teams of twos, drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes (preferably American), reading paperbacks, murdering civilians. A handful could paralyze the whole city. Their kills were tallied in the morning paper in bullet form. It was an unintentional visual pun that sometimes took up two or three columns, because it also included the kidnappings and the throat-slashings of the day before. So Beirut's equivalent of a crime blotter was made up of the finds of young mothers or elderly men with bullets in the head, of children who'd bled to death where they'd been playing moments before, of the occasional victory bullet listing the kill of a sniper. (10/24/02) The Awakening Society Peter Russell writes: If an enterprise is to ensure its survival in the years ahead, it is going to have to take into account not only the requirements of the customer, and the deeper needs of the employee, but also the long-term interests of humanity as a whole. True quality then is equivalent to high synergy. To achieve this is going to require a willingness to step back and explore our fundamental requirements. Over the last few centuries western society has made tremendous strides in external growth and development. But in terms of really understanding ourselves and what we really need, both individually and collectively, we have not really progressed much since the time of the Greeks. We now stand at a very important time in human development. We are becoming aware that inner exploration and development has now become as crucial, if not more, to our future welfare as outer development. We are very much in a time of balance. It is a time both of crisis and of challenge. And it is the decisions that we make today that are going to determine the future. The quality of those decisions is going to depend upon the extent to which we really understand ourselves, understand what it is we really want, understand our deeper values, rather than just our apparent superficial needs. The more that we can begin to explore ourselves and open up to the inner potential, then the greater will be our chances of moving through the most exciting time in history. (10/24/02) Learning to like it HOT! New York Times: Science -- The latest round of international talks on global warming begins today in New Delhi, with delegates focused more on ways to adapt to changes than on cutting emissions of gases that scientists say are the main cause of rising temperatures. The shift in focus is to some extent motivated by the Bush administration's rejection of the Kyoto Protocol, a 1997 climate pact completed last year and endorsed by most of the world's countries, rich and poor. Without the United States, the world's largest producer of greenhouse gases, the Kyoto treaty is so weak, experts and government officials say, that it may have little effect. Others say the treaty has in any case been so watered down through years of negotiations that it is likely to be of limited benefit. Instead of looking mostly at ways to reduce the level of heat-trapping gases, then, the 10-day conference "will discuss how to build greater capacity, especially in developing countries, for minimizing vulnerabilities and preparing for worsening droughts, floods, storms, health emergencies, and other expected impacts," said a statement issued by the United Nations, which supervises the talks. (10/24/02) Why does Dark Matter ? SPACE.com -- New X-ray observations add further evidence to the likelihood that most of the universe it comprised of exotic dark matter. The finding may also help narrow down the types of dark matter researchers should consider viable. Most astronomers already view dark matter as the only logical way to explain the orbits of stars and shapes of galaxies. Nobody has ever seen dark matter, and scientists don’t know exactly what it is, but without it galaxies would fly apart. ... The new data, from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, shows a galaxy called NGC 720 is enveloped in a slightly flattened, or ellipsoidal cloud of hot gas that has an orientation different from that of the optical image of the galaxy. Hot gas emits X-rays but cannot be detected in optical surveys. "The shape and orientation of the hot gas cloud require it to be confined by an egg-shaped dark matter halo," said David Buote of the University of California, Irvine, and lead author of a report on this research in the Sept. 20 issue of The Astrophysical Journal. "This means that dark matter is not just an illusion due to a shortcoming of the standard theory of gravity -- it is real." (10/24/02) Lifting Weights Good for your Heart NewsDay -- Moderate physical activity is good for preventing heart disease, but revving up the pace may be better - especially if combined with weight training, a Harvard study of more than 40,000 men suggests. The study found that men who exercised at high intensity were 17 percent less likely to develop heart disease than those doing low-intensity exercise. High-intensity exercise includes running or jogging at 6 mph, while low-intensity activities include walking at a pace of about 2 mph. Researchers have debated whether weight-training has a big impact on the heart, since it does not give the heart and lungs the kind of workout they get from aerobic activities such as walking or running for at least 20 minutes. However, in the Harvard School of Public Health study, men who engaged in weight training for 30 minutes or more weekly had a 23 percent lower risk of heart disease than men who did not pump iron.  (10/24/02) IRAN has Ballistic Missiles with 800 Mile Reach Yahoo News -- The Iranians conducted a successful flight test of a regular Shahab-3 in May, and tested the missile again in June, the official said. They had launched the missile four times before then, with mixed results. The missile is based on the North Korean No Dong design but is produced domestically, U.S. officials say. The United States accuses both North Korea and China of assisting Iran's missile program. The missile's 800-mile (1,287-kilometer) range is enough to reach Israel and several countries in the region. It is Iran's longest-range ballistic missile. U.S. intelligence officials have said Iran can probably fire several of the missiles in an emergency but that it has not yet developed a completely reliable weapon. The missile can conceivably carry conventional, chemical, biological or nuclear warheads, although Iran is not believed to have nuclear weapons. (10/24/02) Global Internet Traffic Crippled, Practice Attack ? CNN Technology -- Nine of the 13 computer servers that manage global Internet traffic were crippled by a powerful electronic attack this week, officials said. But most Internet users didn't notice because the attack only lasted an hour. Its origin was not known, and the FBI and White House were investigating. One official described Monday's attack as the most sophisticated and large-scale assault against these crucial computers in the history of the Internet. Seven of the 13 servers failed to respond to legitimate network traffic and two others failed intermittently during the attack, officials confirmed. The FBI's National Infrastructure Protection Center was "aware of the denial of service attack and is addressing this matter," spokesman Steven Berry said. Service was restored after experts enacted defensive measures and the attack suddenly stopped. (10/24/02) 8:13:13 AM

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