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Monday, August 11, 2003
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 John Brand writes: A sort of a parable happened when I started thinking about writing this column. Stopping for a red light, I saw a homeless man holding up a sign that read, "Why lie? I need a beer." Impressed with his honesty, I gave him several dollars. I believe that one badly handwritten sign contained more truth than can be found among many of those who claim to be our leaders. My fervent wish is that they -- politicians, executives, religionists, academicians -- might learn to speak to us with the same integrity as that bum who stood on the corner of Braker Lane and Highway 183 in Austin, Texas on July 18 at about 3:30 p.m. What a shot in the arm it would be to our ailing and sick society if truth would take the place of mendacity. How gratifying it would be if honest examination and logical evaluation would replace the mumbo-jumbo inundating our lives. Certainly, before the dogmatists seeking to plaster the Ten Commandments all over the U.S., it would behoove them to discover the profound problems raised by these proscriptions. In the Fourth Commandment we are told that God made the world in seven days and rested after he finished his labors. If God rested the seventh day, did he just take a break from his creative work or did he go off on a permanent vacation? Genesis 1:1-2:3 comments "And God saw that it was good" after each day's scheduled work. Well, how good was it? Was it good enough that no further improvements and developments were needed? Or was it just good enough for starters? (08/11/03)
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Joël de Rosnay writes: Everything is linked to time, even the full meaning of words. Any vision of nature and society that wants to be comprehensive cannot ignore the vast problem of time; it determines even our manner of thinking. The contrast between physical time, a frame of reference that is outside events and phenomena, and psychological time, which is rich with the intensity of living experience, reveals itself in everyday language as well as in the languages of organization and data processing. We speak of time gained or lost, of shared time and real time, of free time and the lack of time. Beyond the difference between physical and psychological time lies a fundamental question: Do not many of our understandings and irreconcilable points of view arise from the use of strongly "polarized" concepts through implicit reference to a privileged direction of the flow of time?  These concepts have an entirely different emotional meaning, depending on whether the unconscious reference is to time that aims toward entropy or toward organization--according to a causal explanation ("pushed" by the past) or a final explanation ("pulled" by the future). Does this also explain the unreconcilable conflicts--between determinists and finalists, for example, or between materialists and spiritualists--that spring up as soon as the discussion turns to evolution? To go beyond such conflicts, we must free ourselves from what I call our chronocentrism. The term may seem a bit strange; I use it here in relation to two better-known terms, geocentrism and anthropocentrism. Thanks to the theories of Copernicus and Galileo we have succeeded in getting rid of our geocentrism, the stifling idea that the earth is the center of our world. It was just as difficult to escape anthropocentrism, which put us at the center of all living things. Thanks to the theory of evolution, man is again one species among thousands. Yet the most difficult threshold remains to be crossed. We are prisoners of time and words. Our logic, our reasoning, our models, our representations of the world are hopelessly colored by chronocentrism (as they formerly were by geocentrism and anthropocentrism). From chronocentrism come the conflicts that paralyze our thinking. Can we free ourselves from them? It is difficult and dangerous to tackle the concept of time. Each of us feels deep inside that he must struggle fiercely, step by step, to preserve the concept, to continue to let himself be guided by this vital thread to which we cling as though it held our universe together. To break the thread would be to risk undoing, stitch by stitch, the net woven by preceding generations, the web in which our past is imprinted and our future constructed. (08/11/03) | |
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 BBC Environment -- The record for the hottest day ever in Britain was broken on Sunday as temperatures soared to 38.1C (100.6F) in Gravesend, Kent. The record was initially topped earlier in the day when Heathrow airport registered 37.9C (100.2F), meaning the hottest day since records began about 130 years ago in 1875. The previous record was 37.1C (98.8F), recorded at Cheltenham in 1990. However the heat has brought with it violent thunder storms, heavy rain and lightning across northern England and the Midlands. More than 20 people were injured after being struck by lightning. Fourteen were hurt when lightning struck a football match in a leisure centre in Birmingham on Sunday afternoon. One woman was directly hit and had a heart attack, while others were treated for burns, eye injuries and shock. In Lancashire, two Brownies were slightly injured when lightning struck between them at a camp near Blackburn. Another six people were injured when lightning struck at an agriculture show in Corley, Warwickshire. Brighton beach was crowded and chaotic But elsewhere Britons have been soaking up the sunshine. Roads to the south and west coasts were jammed on Sunday as motorists headed to and from the seaside. Resorts including Clacton-on-Sea in Essex and Tenby in Pembrokeshire said there were no spare beds at all in hotels and B&Bs. (08/11/03)
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 The New Scientist -- Cases of West Nile Virus in the US have tripled in a week, prompting officials to warn that the 2003 outbreak may well surpass the previous year's record levels. At least 164 people in 16 different states are infected with the deadly virus, compared with 59 a week ago. Seven people have died so far in 2003 from WNV. The virus's spread also appears more extensive this year - by 7 August 2002, there had been 112 human cases in only four states, Julie Gerberding, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, said on Thursday. Gerberding noted that most of the cases in the 2002 WNV season occurred in August and September. "So [the current levels are] very concerning to us. It indicates that we are starting the epidemic with more cases and more areas affected than 2002, and if the same pattern proves to hold true, we could be seeing an even greater number of affected people," she warned. The deadly virus rampaged across the US in 2002, causing a record 4156 cases and causing 284 deaths. Only handful of states - Arizona, Oregon, Utah and Nevada - had no cases in humans or animals in 2002. But Gerberding cautions that "this virus is on the move and therefore no one can be assumed to be exempt". (08/11/03)
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 BBC Environment -- The Kyoto Protocol on cutting greenhouse gas emissions will not stop climate change, a leading think tank has warned. The report from the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) in the UK, which has close links to the government, comes as some experts cite Britain's heat wave as further evidence of global warming. Even if the Kyoto agreement is fully implemented, greenhouse gas emissions worldwide will still increase by 70%, says the IPPR. The think tank wants a new approach instead of the "horse trading" over emissions allowed under the treaty, which the government stresses is the only agreement in place. ... Professor Whitelegg, who is tipped to take up a leading role in the Green Party, said: "Blair and Prescott have boasted about 'leading the world' in terms of Kyoto. But all they'd done was agree to a treaty aimed at 5% carbon dioxide reductions by 2012, with slightly higher but still completely inadequate targets for the UK. Since then they've acknowledged that stopping climate change means achieving 60% carbon dioxide reductions globally by 2050, but in typical New Labour style they've called this an 'aspiration'." He added: "New Labour has completely failed to grasp that 60% global reductions means a 90% reduction in high-polluting countries like the UK." (08/11/03)
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 BBC Science -- Scientists have developed a fast-acting Ebola vaccine that protects monkeys after a single shot. If the vaccine proves similarly effective in humans, it may one day allow scientists to contain Ebola outbreaks quickly. Ebola virus spreads easily from person to person, causes illness quickly and kills a significant number of the people it infects. There is no treatment for the disease, so preventing the spread of the virus is key to containing outbreaks. The research is the result of collaboration between teams of scientists at the Dale and Betty Bumpers Vaccine Research Center and the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. ... Eight monkeys were given a shot of a booster jab, and then injected with the Ebola virus. The researchers found the single injection completely protected all eight animals against Ebola infection - even those who received high doses of the virus. Researcher Dr Peter Jahrling said: "After years of developing candidate Ebola vaccines that protected rodents but failed in primates, it is gratifying to have a vaccine that holds great promise for protection of humans. "Eventually, this vaccine may reduce the hazard of working with Ebola virus in the laboratory, as well as provide protection to populations at risk of natural exposure." (08/11/03)
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 New York Times: Environment -- Global warming is a fearsome proposition, dredging up visions of rising tides engulfing shoreline cities, and other cataclysms. For winemakers, especially those in historically cool grape-growing regions, the changing climate has already markedly affected their lives and wines. "This has been great, no doubt," said Johannes Selbach, speaking by telephone last week from Zeltingen, Germany, where his family has grown grapes along the Mosel River since the 17th century. "Just look at the row of fine vintages we've had. From 1988 through this year it has been strikingly warmer than any time I can remember. Everybody talks about it here." Wherever winemakers have historically struggled against the elements, hoping to coax just enough warmth from the cosmos to release the sugar inside the grapes and achieve ripeness, the last decade seems to have brought little but blue skies. In Germany, the run of good and great vintages since 1988 has been, as Mr. Selbach said, unprecedented. Piedmont in northwest Italy had a great vintage every year from 1995 to 2001. In Oregon, the run of excellent vintages began in 1998. In Champagne, where single-vintage bottlings were once the exception, done only in the best years, vintages were declared nine times in the decade from 1990 to 1999, as against six in the 1980's and four in the 1970's. That increase may in part be because of the higher prices the Champagne producers can demand for vintage bottles; greed may have been inflamed by the bigger, riper grape harvests. (08/11/03)
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5:37:20 AM 
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© TrustMark
2003
Timothy Wilken.
Last update:
9/1/2003; 1:44:57 AM.
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