Wednesday, April 30, 2003

Machiavellian Realism and U.S. Policy Howard Zinn writes: While teaching courses in political theory at Boston University, and fascinated by the figure of Machiavelli, I came across the remarkable volume by Ralph Roeder, The Man of the Rennaisance, with its brilliant portraits of the dissident Savonarola and the toady Machiavelli. At the same time I noted the respect with which Machiavelli was treated by people on all parts of the political spectrum. The Vietnam War led many people, including myself, to look more closely at the history of United States foreign policy, and to me there was a distinct Machiavellian thread running through that history. ... About 500 years ago modern political thinking began. Its enticing surface was the idea of "realism." Its ruthless center was the idea that with a worthwhile end one could justify any means. Its spokesman was Nicolo Machiavelli. In the year 1498 Machiavelli became adviser on foreign and military affairs to the government of Florence, one of the great Italian cities of that time. After fourteen years of service, a change of government led to his dismissal, and he spent the rest of his life in exile in the countryside outside of Florence. During that time he wrote, among other things, a little book called The Prince, which became the world's most famous hand book of political wisdom for governments and their advisers. (04/30/03) Thinking about Tunity Dirk Laureyssens writes: The Big Tube concept is a new 'calculatable' approach. To understand the Universe there no need for mystic explanations, for a complex system of believe, and it confirms the intuitive 'feeling' of many people that there a Unity in this Universe, a vibrating force. But Tunity offers already to many people a remarkable understanding, and even a better understanding of their religion. Unity offers the possibility to explain in a rather simple and understandable way the complexity of dimensions, and offers a solution for infinitessimally small and the infinitely large gravitational interaction. In fact the old image: a snake biting its tail ... is not so bad. ... For me personally this tube approach offers me (1) as an inventor the satifaction that I discovered a new type of mechanism, (2) as a philosopher the way to explain and understand a number of 'strange' realities of this cosmos, such as synchronicity (Carl Gustave Jung), homeopathy, acupuncture, clairvoyance, Kabbala and other fields where resonance is the prime intermediary, (3) as a human the feeling of joy to be connected to all others. Everything is connected to everything, it's only a question of amplitude, length, frequency, level, angle and position in the tube constellation. (04/30/03) There be Dragons! New York Times: Science -- A huge scaly serpent, usually with the wings of a bat or bird. Four or two or no legs. Breathes fire or poisonous fumes. May talk, but won't take guff from mere mortals. Sometimes has a vulnerable underbelly (good luck, Siegfried!) and sometimes is solid armor plate. May guard a treasure. May diet on virgins, or anything that crosses its path, halitosis-barbecued. Sound familiar? Of course. For everyone from Perseus of Jaffa to Harry of Hogwarts, it's a dragon. ... Now scholars drawing on primitive art, fossilized bones and ancient legends are struggling to explain how cultures that had no contact with one another constructed mythical creatures so remarkably similar. And why did dragons persist so long? (04/30/03) Are Vitamins always Good for You? New York Times: Health -- A growing number of medical experts are concerned that Americans are overdoing their vitamin consumption. As many as 70 percent of the population is taking supplements, mostly vitamins, convinced that the pills will make them healthier. But researchers say that vitamin supplements cannot correct for a poor diet, that multivitamins have not been shown to prevent any disease and that it is easy to reach high enough doses of certain vitamins and minerals to actually increase the risk of disease. No longer, the experts say, are they concerned about vitamin deficits. Those are almost unheard of today, even with the population eating less than ideal diets and skimping on fruits and vegetables. Instead, the concern is with the dangers of vitamin excess. "There has been a transition from focusing on minimum needs to the reality that today our problem is excess — excess calories and, yes, excesses of vitamins and minerals as well," said Dr. Benjamin Caballero, a member of the Food and Nutrition Board at the National Academy of Sciences and the director of the Center for Human Nutrition at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Caballero said that for some supplements, including vitamin A, the difference between the recommended dose and a dose that could lead to bad outcomes like osteoporosis was not large. Popular multivitamins, he added, often contain what could be risky doses. "Certainly," he said, "by consuming supplements, people can reach that level." Doctors who once told patients that multivitamins were, at worst, a waste of money now say they are questioning that idea.  (04/30/03) Dammed is a Damnable Word New York Times: Environment -- Cambodia: The old skiff nudged gently against the tree trunks and the boatman ducked his head to avoid low-hanging branches. Yellow birds hopped and twittered above him; fish swam below. The boatman was making his way through a flooded forest, a strange compromise of nature in which land and water time-share the fertile plains of central Cambodia. It is an intricate ecology of flux as the waters of the country's great lake rise and fall with the seasons, now favoring the fish, now the flatlands. It is a balance that is threatened now, with plans to dam the river that feeds it, muting its annual rhythm. When the restless lake, the Tonle Sap, breathes in, it expands like a giant lung to more than double its dry-season surface area, submerging farms and forests. When it breathes out, fish course down the river by the millions, herons and whistling cranes cluster around the ponds it leaves behind, and villagers abandon their tall stilt houses to pursue its receding banks to new fishing grounds. (04/30/03) Ending Spam Email New York Times: Technology -- The three leading providers of e-mail accounts said yesterday that they had started to work together to develop ways to reduce the unwanted commercial messages, commonly known as spam, that are increasingly clogging their customers' mailboxes. The companies — America Online, Microsoft and Yahoo — are calling for technical changes in the way e-mail is passed around cyberspace to make it easier to determine who really sent it and what it is about. Each company has developed its own technologies to identify and discard spam, and they boast of these in their advertising. But even though these systems sidetrack several billion pieces a day, they miss so much more that spam has become a leading source of complaints from users. Many studies show that the quantities of spam have at least doubled in the last year so the companies have agreed to cooperate with rivals. "We believe it will take broad industry efforts to really have an impact because spam is an industrywide problem," said Geoff Ralston, Yahoo's senior vice president for network services. (04/30/03) Another Gun found Innocent CNN National -- CHICAGO, Illinois: A 12-year-old boy was gunned down by gang members after he and other children had just finished cleaning up their neighborhood, police said. Authorities were questioning three "persons of interest" in the shooting, police spokesman Matthew Jackson said. The victim, Rene Guillen, apparently was mistakenly shot by the gang members, Jackson said. Witnesses said several youths, at least one of them riding a bicycle, fired shots at a group of kids who had been participating in the neighborhood cleanup program Saturday. "This is a case where the victim was just a victim," Jackson said, adding that no one had been arrested. "Here you have a minor who was shot down by gang members who were shooting at rival gang members who had been fighting in the area for weeks." (04/30/03) Going Camping, Take Warm Clothes New York Times: Environment -- The North Pole is rapidly becoming busy. Humans, ever the adaptive, inquisitive, risk-taking species, are crisscrossing, probing and camping out in increasing numbers on the ice veneer, particularly in the window from mid-March to early May, when winter's cold has ebbed but summer's thaw has not yet turned surfaces into knee-deep slush. The northward rush has been simplified by satellite phones and global-positioning devices that allow trekkers and scientists to know their position even where compasses spin uselessly, the sun rises in March and sets in September, and the icescape shifts moment to moment. Since 1992, almost everyone who ventures to the pole first stops at this seasonal, floating way station, run by entrepreneurs from Russia and France for tourists and scientists as both an Everest-style base camp and a hub for researchers studying shifting climate and ocean patterns. It has rows of domed red and yellow tents with thermostat-controlled heat, two Russian helicopters and a runway big enough to accommodate 20-ton planes coming from northern Canada, Siberia and Norway. The mess hall has four stacked white microwave ovens and a Nescafe espresso machine. Any notion that this is a comfortable place, however, is jettisoned when one spots the slug-loaded shotguns set here and there, lest a polar bear seeking seals stumble upon a skier or oceanographer. Of course there is the cold, which even now rarely rises above 5 below zero. (04/30/03) 6:04:19 AM

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