Hymn to Urania

11:00 pm - The good doctor's introduction

At the risk of sounding easily amused, this is doubly a cause for celebration.  First, I have joined the ranks of the "elitterati," as it were, by finally succumbing to the relentless seduction of consumer electronics and buying an iPhone. I must say, that as experiences with electronics go, Apple has something of a nack for delivering devices with a high degree of polish and useability that makes their products a delight to use. the iPhone is no different. It is, quite simply, a Mac that fits in your pocket that also serves as a phone. And so far the first 24 hours, which include purchasing my first app, have been delightful.  

Two of my friends have had their iPhones for sometime now, as have a few people at work, and so I have been subjected to a perpetual marketing campaign, ceaselessly hearing of how wonderful this device is. It was only a matter of time before I broke down and picked one up myself. And now that I have been able to spend some time with one, I can honestly say that they were not exaggerating.

I had graduated from cellphone as mainly telephone and clock to cellphone as device in the past year, getting a dataplan and browsing on it regularly. While the mobile Internet is rather limiting, the essentials like wikipedia and the news were available, and I had even gotten into the habit of using the note feature of the phone as a surrogate notebook. The limitations of accessing data from the phone, however meant that I would have to transcribe the day's notes onto the laptop when I got home; a labour not entirely without merit, but still time consuming and somewhat tedious. Which brings me to the second cause for celebration: Evernote.

With Evernote the days of separate piles of electronic notetaking are over. Evernote brings the worlds of centralised intra-media notetaking and photographic character recognition software together.  No more transcribing between media silos, and no more transcribing information from photographs.  Evernote does it all.

And so I have finally left the 20th century behind and stepped into the 21st. And who better to serve as my guide, my psychopomp, my Sibyl to Virgil's Aeneas, my Virgil to Dante's Everyman, than the wise, luminescent, and portable Doctor Theopolis.    

Current Mood: excited

01:50 am - Dr Michio Kaku, physics, the impossible, and rings of power

Listened to a lecture plugging Dr Michio Kaku's 2008 book Physics of the Impossible: A Scientific Exploration into the World of Phasers, Force Fields, Teleportation, and Time Travel.





Kaku is an engaging and charismatic speaker who enthralls his audience as he slips from the seduction of science fiction to the hard realities of science fact and hints at promising new discoveries that await. Far from the mythology of the run-of-the-mill futurist, Kaku prefaces his speech with the caution embodied by Lord Kelvin and his famously inaccurate predictions of the future of science despite his lofty credentials. Having said that, however, Kaku's subject matter does come from the staples of science fiction while still having one foot solidly on the ground of current areas of exploration in physics. Kaku demonstrates how science today is able to effect on small scales (and thus, eventually, on large scales) things that were once thought to be impossible.


Kaku's rhetorical style leans towards the informal, humourous, and engaging. He demarcates changes in topic often by appealing to jokes or anecdotes foreshadowing the subsequent topic. Unfortunately however, while charming and with the best of oratorial intentions, on occasion the comical references require some trimming and editing on the part of the listener which serves to distract more than enlighten and facilitate. One example of this is Kaku's introduction to scientific research into invisibility.


During his lecture, Kaku takes a moment to play an excerpt from a BBC documentary that he worked on also dealing with the physics of the impossible. As a result, his description of the research into invisibility occurs twice; once live and once in the documentary. In both cases he prefaces the research into invisibility with the statement that the idea of invisibility has fascinated people for millennia, and in both cases cites the reference to invisibility in Plato's Republic as an august and ancient source. Now, I am likely reading too much into what is probably intended to be an introductory gloss, but Kaku's double reference to the same reference in Plato struck me as emblematic of an overly materialistic interpretation of mythology.


Into the invisible

Kaku is referring to a passage from Book 1, Chapter 4: 359(d) - 361(d) of Plato's Republic; in which Glaucon uses a version of the myth of Gyges the Lydian in a discussion on the nature of justice and human behaviour. What Kaku describes somewhat off-handedly as a commentary about humanity's fascination with invisibility may infact represent something a bit more profound.


Plato is describing a conversation occurring between the pragmatically cynical Glaucon, his brother the radically cynical Ademantus, and the idealistic Socrates. During the bulk of the passage, Glaucon has the floor and is expressing his opinion of Socrates' naive statement that people choose justice for its own sake. Glaucon states that human experience falls within the boundaries of two poles: one is either dispensing violence upon someone else, or one is having violence dispensed upon one's self. "Justice" is the product of social convention: a collection of mutual agreements that mitigate the extremes of both poles, while keeping the majority of people in the middle ground. Glaucon hints that the bulk of the agreement for justice comes from the bottom of the pile; that majority of people who are among those who cannot dispense violence upon others without fear of reprisal. The only people in whose interest it is not to engage in such agreements are those who have sufficient power to indiscriminately dispense violence and oppression against others. "This is the origin and nature of justice, " Glaucon says. "It lies between what is most desireable, to do wrong and avoid punishment, and what is most undesireable, to suffer wrong without being able to get redress; justice lies between these two and is accepted not as being good in itself, but as having a relative value due to our inability to do wrong. For anyone who had the power to do wrong and was a real man would never make any such agreement with anyone - he would be mad if he did" [359(a-b)]. An interesting affirmation of the United States' approach to international treaties, it would seem.


Glaucon has a very pessimistic view of human nature. He argues (though does not prove) that left to our own devices, people would tend towards the desire to do evil and avoid punishment. Glaucon argues that if one were to imagine a case in which a person would be free from accountability, then that person would instinctively lean towards evil. "This we can most easily see if we imagine that a just man and an unjust man have each been given liberty to do what they like, and then follow them and see where their inclinations lead them. We shall catch the just man red-handed in exactly the same pursuits as the unjust, led on by self-interest, the motive which all men naturally follow if they are not forcibly restrained by the law and made to respect each other's claims" [359(c)].


To demonstrate this state of liberty, Glaucon tells the tale of Gyges the Lydian. Glaucon describes in adventurous detail how Gyges comes across a magic ring that can turn the bearer invisible at will. Gyges proceeds to slay the king, seduce the queen, and sets himself up as a tyrant. "Imagine now that two such rings existed and the just man put on one, the unjust the other. There is no one, it would commonly be supposed, who would have such iron strength of will as to stick to what is right and keep his hands from taking other people's property. For he would be able to steal from the market whatever he wanted without fear of detection, to go into any man's house and seduce anyone he liked, to murder or to release from prison anyone he felt inclined, and generally behave as if he had supernatural powers. And in all this the just man would differ in no way from the unjust, but both would follow the same course... and if anyone who had the liberty of which we have been speaking neither wronged nor robbed his neighbour, men would think him a most miserable idiot, though of course they would pretend to admire him in public because of their own fear of being wronged" [359(c)-360(d)]. While it's quite true that the question of invisibility serves as a central theme in Glaucon's argument, it is harder to see this as an exposition on the nature of invisibility and its impact on human society, as much as it is a device with which to imagine a set of conditions of freedom from accountability, and that Glaucon's argument is intended to apply generally to human nature, restrictions on behaviour, and the relationship between a person behaving justly or unjustly and his neighbours, rather than the principle of invisibility itself.


Glaucon and neonazis

Glaucon's exposition on justice, injustice and human nature extended further, and he extrapolated on the abstract conditions of the two poles of the most unjust person, and the most just person. The perfectly unjust person, Glaucon says must be a "skilled professional... able to avoid detection in his wrongdoing; for the man who is found out must be reckoned a poor specimen, and the most accomplished form of injustice is to seem just when you are not. So our perfectly unjust man must be perfect in his wickedness; he must be able to commit the greatest crimes perfectly and at the same time get himself a reputation for the highest probity, while, if he makes a mistake he must be able to retrieve it, and, if any of his wrongdoing comes to light, be ready with a convincing defence, or when force is needed be prepared to use force, relying on his own courage, and energy or making use of his friends or his wealth" [360(e)-361(b)].


The key elements of the perfectly unjust person, according to Glaucon, are unjust action restrained only insofar as the demands of his reputation for justice permit. Glaucon never states why the appearance of justice is beneficial for the unjust person; why a tyrant could not flaunt and indulge his tyranny at his whim without care for what people subject to his power thought of him. Presumably, it is to better keep him from drawing attempts by others to curtail his actions. This is an interesting pragmatic observation about people who engage in behaviour knowing it to be unacceptable, and may go beyond merely wanting to avoid accountability. There appears to be something more than a grasping to justice for the purposes of avoiding punishment. Glaucon is cynically describing a scenario in which the perfectly unjust person is manipulating the populace. "His sacrifices and votive offerings to the gods are on a suitably magnificent scale, and his services to the gods, and to any man he wishes to serve, are far better than those of the just man, so that it is reasonable to suppose that the gods care more for him than for the just man" [361(c)]. But that grasping seems to be towards the convincing illusion of justice. The perfectly unjust person desires to appear just to the populace, perhaps because there is some kind of legitimacy or authority that is to be mined from it.


A similarly curious inversion of principles; of the unjust being uncomfortable with people seeing it for what it is, seems common throughout a variety of unjust behaviour. One example may be found among neonazis. Why, for example, are neonazis Holocaust deniers? If one were to ask a neonazi or antisemite what would most please them, they would probably say something like the elimination or disenfranchisement of the Jews, for whatever reason. This is precisely what happened during the Holocaust. Why would neonazis want to deny the occurrence of something, for which there is ample historical evidence, and which just so happens to coincide with their ideology? Part of me suspects that it is some kind of reaction to the horror and scale of the injustice of the Holocaust. By seeking to deny its occurrence, neonazis are tacitly acknowledging the Holocaust's power, injustice, and evil. Perhaps neonazis believe that hitching their horse to that cart sufficiently distances them from the possibility of whatever authority or legitimacy comes from public perceptions of justice.


Glaucon then goes on to describe the lot of the perfectly just person. True to form, the perfectly just person is an inversion of the perfectly unjust person. While the unjust person behaves unjustly but seeks the illusion of justice, if for no other reason than to enjoy the fruits of that reputation, the just person behaves justly not only without care to his reputation, but in a manner antagonistic to it. "Beside our picture of the unjust man let us set one of the just man, the man of true simplicity of character who, as Aeschylus says, wants 'to be and not to seem good'. We must, indeed not allow him to seem good, for if he does he will have all the rewards and honours paid to the man who has a reputation for justice, and we shall not be able to tell whether his motive is love of justice or love of the rewards and honours" [361(b-c)]. Again the question of reputation comes into play, although in this case reputation is a distraction. The perfectly just person must act without regards to the honours and glory that comes from justice. It is not sufficient that justice be legitimately the just person's motive, however, it must be demonstrated to others. In this case, perception, and not reality, is reality. The unjust person cultivates a lofty reputation, while the just person undermines it. In order for the integrity of the just person's virtue to be evident to others, Glaucon says, "we must strip him of everything except his justice, and our picture of him must be drawn in a way diametrically opposite to that of the unjust man. Our just man must have the worst reputations for wrongdoing even though he has done no wrong, so that we can test his justice and see if it weakens in the face of unpopularity and all that goes with it; we shall give him an undeserved and life-long reputation for wickedness, and make him stick to his chosen course until death" [361(b-c)].


Job and the most just person

Glaucon's almost fiendish desire to test the limitations of the perfectly just person by stripping him of all exterior or popular indications of justice has echoes with other explorations of the same topic. Glaucon's cynical conclusion is almost indistinguishable from that taken of Satan in his conversation with the LORD in their discussion over the virtue of Job:


"One day the heavenly beings came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them. The LORD said to Satan, 'Where have you come from?' Satan answered the LORD, 'From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.' The LORD said to Satan, 'Have you considered my servant JOB? There is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man who fears God and turns away from evil.' Then Satan answered the LORD, 'Does Job fear God for nothing? Have you not put a fence around him and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face" [Job 1: 6-12].


Satan argues that Job's virtuousness is bourgeois: based only on the grounds that he is successful and wealthy. Should Job be purged of all indications of wealth and success, Satan argues, then Job would shun virtue and faithfulness. Gd takes Satan's bet, having faith that despite being purged of all outward signs of success, that Job's virtue would remain intact; in short, that his virtue stems from something other than clinging to its manifest honours and glory. It is interesting that Glaucon would seem to be sympathetic to Satan's test. It is only in the removal of outward signs of virtue and honour that one can demonstrate the purity of one's motivations. It certainly is the case that people who sacrifice for the purposes of justice tend to have more credibility than those whose decisions are consistent with their own interests. It is interesting to note that the same ethical structure governs conflict of interest guidelines. It is less relevant whether a conflict of interest in fact exists. What is more of a concern is if a conflict of interest appears to exist. It is also interesting to see political leaders on occasion seeking to distinguish between the politically expedient choice, or the popular choice, and the "right" choice.


Before putting the finishing touch on his argument, Glaucon stresses that this is not his own opinion that he is articulating, but rather his interpretation of the "popular" views of justice. Glaucon concludes by taking the perfectly just person to its most extreme conclusion. "'They will say that the just man as we have pictured him, will be scourged, tortured, and imprisoned, his eyes will be put out, and after enduring every humiliation he will be crucified, and learn at last that one should want not to be, but to seem just" [361(e)-362(a)]. It is difficult to imagine early Christians not looking to this passage when seeking to formulate their early Christology, and adding weight to the idea that Christ had met an end consistent with Glaucon's description of the perfectly just person. Moreover, despite Glaucon's evident concern for public opinion, he ends his study of the unjust and the just with the unfortunate formula that it is the unjust, rather than the just, that is more likely to be the role model for a distracted population. The violent, humiliating end of the perfectly just person is morely likely than not to repel sensible people trying to put food on the table and raise their children.


What both the unjust and the just have in common, however, is their appeal to the authority, ambiguous as it is, of justice. In the case of the unjust person, it is a shallow, calculated appeal. The unjust person wants to appear just to others in order to obtain a benefit from them. In the case of the just person, the appeal to justice is extreme in its purity, a desire to be just at the exclusion of all else. But in both cases there is an appeal to the same centre. Unfortunately, as pragmatic, cynical, and fraught with warning as Glaucon's exposition is, he does nothing to bring the reader any closer to how it is that justice has the currency that the unjust fraudulently claims, and the just seeks to purely manifest.


In spite of its limitations, this passage would seem to have quite a bit more to chew on than merely the question of invisibility and society, I'd wager.

Current Mood: contemplative

03:09 pm - Slavoj Zizek

A friend of mine sent me a link to an interesting lecture given by Slavoj Zizek:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZniZSv19kJw

I'm always up for listening to Zizek.  He is an engaging speaker, intelligent, well read, and I enjoy going through the process of articulating why I disagree with him. 

Zizek on art

I was surprised to hear him speak out in favour of a canon, and am curious to hear more from him on this point precisely because I agree with it.  I was also surprised to hear him object to the role of the artist as challenger of conceptualisations.  I did not expect Zizek to come out in support of anything remotely akin to a taboo.  His objection to the artist's argument reminds me of a similar discussion I had, in which I remarked how little respect I had for artists who pushed the boundaries for its own sake, as such a project could only end with the artist consuming himself and his audience as a suicide bomber.  Zizek appeals to the unacceptability of the justification of torture as limit to boundless deconstruction.  

I find it interesting, though, that in both cases Zizek and I are objecting to a logic, not by "disproving" it or demonstrating a logical flaw, but by appealing to a higher aesthetic/ethical principal: that torture (or suicide bombing of innocents) is of sufficient unpleasantness that no logic that brings one any closer to it ought be supported.  My gut tells me that that is a weakness in the objection.  It is an argument that appeals to those of similar mind and will have no impact on those who have no objection to either torture or the suicide bombing of innocents.  This may be an example of how logic follows desire, or at least the aesthetic/ethical principle.

Zizek on capitalism and democracy

I found his citation of the experiments on mind/body to be interesting, but I found his willingness to entertain the question of "freedom" to be a tad premature.  Zizek seems to be predicating his argument upon a view of the self or will that is quite shallow.  In short, he is excluding all subconscious psychological material from the will.  While the view that our conscious decisions are influenced by our unconscious may, for the flag-waving determinists, demonstrate our lack of freedom, I don't think that is at all necessarily the case.  It merely challenges the perhaps flawed notion that our conscious mind is somehow privileged over our less-conscious elements.  If one has a view of the mind or the ego that is slightly larger, that includes one's unconscious material (a more Jungian view rather than a Freudian view, for example), then the unconscious material becomes a partner in one's decision making and the question of freedom or sovereignty is unaffected.  A decision is still being made by one's self, but that self is evaluating and weighing a wider range of considerations.

I thought Zizek was at his weakest in his appeal to the tension between the economic choice and the existential choice as a critique of capitalist democracy for two reasons.

1) Neither capitalism nor democracy need to appeal to providing an existential or radical choice to its members in order to be sustained.  So long as the capitalist democrat is able to understand the context within which those choices operate, then there is no problem.  Certainly, believing that either capitalism or democracy either can or ought to provide radical or existential choices would be either delusional, or perhaps the setting one's expectations of the blessings, complexities, and possibilities of life too low.  I don't think the fathers of either system ever promised that.  I am quite sure you will find terms such as "moderation," " a middle path," "negotiation," in the earliest philosophical reflections on both capitalism and democracy.  As such, it seems odd to suggest that the weakness of capitalism and democracy are that they do not provide things they have never promised to provide or what any mature capitalist democrat would ever expect them to provide.  To consider democracy to be a weakness because I will likely never find a candidate with whom I agree 100%, or capitalism to be a weakness because I cannot purchase a consumer product that perfectly articulates my own self-identity as a person seems a tad bourgeois to me.

2) By criticising capitalist democracy because it cannot provide a forum for a radical, existential choice Zizek seems to be implying that there is in fact a system that can.  Given the Zizek is a card-carrying communist, I can only assume that Zizek believes that communism provides a better forum for its citizens to quench their existential thirsts and satisfy their radical urges.  Unfortunately when you get down to brass tacks I think you would be hard pressed to find any communist government at any time that has done either.  The irony of the situation is that communist governments are synonymous with the curtailing of its citizens rights, and thus the ability to be existential and radical.  I defy anyone to demonstrate any communist regime that has been able to provide an unfettered access to the fully existential and radical to all of its citizens, which is precisely what Zizek faults a capitalist democracy from doing.  While far from perfect (the recognition of which by a citizen is both key and widespread), the capitalist democracy has so far proven far better capable of providing for better fora for existential and radical choice for its citizens than any communist government ever has. 

Zizek's subsequent objections to capitalist democracy; that the market economy is corruption in principle, and that democracies aren't neutral seem melodramatic.  His view that the person in a market economy is reduced to an object, and that it demands the undue commodification of things is legitimate; but only up to a point.  Something is commodified in the market economy if one wants to sell it to someone else.  That is a far cry from having the thing commodified in the experience of the citizen.  I do not value the presence of my friends and family based on the size of their incomes.  Sometimes value, meaning, and art can be conveyed in the simplest and least expensive of actions and gestures.  I think many people living in a capitalist democracy realise this (although many behave as though they don't, as is evidenced by their patterns of consumption).  But Zizek seems to be ignoring the possibility that an individual person can ascribe a value to a thing other than that which the market gives it.  

Zizek notes that "Democratic elections are not a priori indications of truth.  As a rule they reflect the doxa determined by the hegemonic ideology."  Well duh.  Who, especially those living within a capitalist democracy believe anything else?  Look at the media, look at democratic theory, listen to political conversations among citizens on the subway, at restaurants, at the office.  How many of those people honestly believe that the democratic process actually conveys any kind of a priori truth?  How many of them appear to believe, not only that the laws passed by their government are on the whole good, but that the laws passed by their government are reflections of a priori truth?  I think that number would be infinitesimal, even amongst the most delusional of party members.  Once again, both capitalism and democracy are not about truth, objectivity, or radicalism.  They are about negotiation, moderation, and the middle path between competing interests.  The closest thing to perfection that a capitalist democracy can provide for its citizens may in fact be that nobody gets what they want, but they get enough to keep them happy enough from revolting.  And there is a certain genius and goodness in that.  If you want existential radical choice, then go live at the top of a mountain, grow your own food, collect your own water, make your own clothes, and write your own books.  If you want to trade for the labour of others, then you will need to negotiate with them and that will entail some kind of mutually agreed upon value and some kind of infringement upon your sovereignty and unfettered radical existential choice.  Suck it up. 

Zizek on Obama

Zizek's criticism of Obama was unfair.  He attacked the Cairo speech on the grounds that Obama called for a dialogue between civilisations.  Zizek objected somewhat emotionally on the basis that what the world needs is political struggle, and not more dialogue.  I’m sure Zizek would be hard pressed to find any American foreign intervention which would meet his standards of constructive political action.  His cynical remark that when looking at the current political environment it is important to remember that the United States is not always the worst of the worst, is suggestive.  On the other hand, I don’t think the world can ever have too much dialogue.  Certainly dialogue between the West the Muslim world could do with a bit of work.  Misperceptions, stereotypes and fears abound, and they will not go away by themselves.  While I can sympathise with Zizek’s emphasis for substantial change, I’m not sure that the time Obama spent crafting and delivering his speech detracted in any meaningful way from any concrete policy of change in which the US government may be involved.  His objection seemed based on the grounds that Obama’s time could have been better spent offloading USAID grain bags at a refugee camp than delivering a speech.  I’m not sure I agree.  Of course, the more ominous side to Zizek’s objection could be that his decision to trump dialogue with struggle is consistent with a Marxist view that the other side is beyond redemption, that dialogue would only serve to strengthen the bad guys or prolong the misery of the innocent, and so any dialogue at all is counterproductive.  Zizek never said this, of course, but that is a cornerstone of not only Marxism, but of any ideology that endorses violence or revolution.  The first step towards destroying your enemy is to be convinced that they are irredeemable sources of evil and oppression.  The rest follows naturally.  Dialogue should never be a substitute for action, but it is an ongoing process that is essential for any healthy relationship.

Zizek on Iran

Zizek was at his strongest in his discussion of the Iranian election and its aftermath.  He painted a welcome and needed portrait of Mousavi.  While I'm not sure the misrepresentation of Mousavi in the western press was as widespread as Zizek suggested, it is curious to see any western media touting Mousavi as a "reformer."  Mousavi a reformer in the sense, perhaps, that he has a view that is in any way different from the current ruling establishment (as is evidenced by the electoral misrepresentation that kept him from office, as well as the hundreds of thousands of people willing to protest and endure violence to express their solidarity and support).  He's different where it matters it would seem.  But simply by having been vetted as a candidate by the Iranian elites Mousavi had to demonstrate sterling loyalty and credentials which he apparently did (though perhaps more of the the latter than the former).  Zizek painted a credible picture of the current Iranian political action as representing something much larger and authentic than a stolen election, and I don't think he's far from the mark when he suggests it is a legitimate act of authentic revolutionary political action.

Current Mood: content

12:09 am - Stratford 2009 part 2

 Julius Caesar  by William Shakespeare

I picked up a copy of Makers of Rome a while ago; a collection of biographies of prominent Roman historians compiled by Plutarch from his Lives.  Plutarch's intention in authoring and structuring the work the way he did, was to contrast the lives of prominent Greek figures with their Roman counterparts, thus drawing lessons in civics and providing Romans with a framework to envision their own history and its inheritance from Athens.  Plutarch's work is less histories in the modern "scientific" sense as much as they are narratives redacted into a particular structure (simultaneously spiced with insightful comments on Roman society, human nature, and religiosity) with an eye to Roman and Greek cultural symmetry and the demands of style.  They occasionally acknowledge varying accounts of where, how, and with who important deeds were done, and so, and the variation in accounts often are themselves sources of interest.  Despite Plutarch's secondary interest in scientific accuracy, he nevertheless provides the 21st century reader with a unique level of detail, insight, and reflection into the lives of prominent classical-age figures and their societies without which we would know next to nothing.  As such, it seems only fitting that Plutarch should have served as the source of Shakespeare's classical historical plays such as Coriolanus, and Julius Caesar.

Never having read Shakespeare's Caesar, I was curious to see what kind of spin the bard would put on the famous conspiracy and its aftermath.  Would Brutus be portrayed as Roman traitor or patriot?  Plutarch's presentation of Brutus is unambiguously the latter.  Brutus is seen as among the most selfless and noble of all Romans; putting the needs of the Republic above even his own personal relationship with Caesar.  Alone among the conspirators, it was Brutus who had nothing personal to gain from Caesar's death.  To the contrary, actually, as Caesar had been Brutus' own patron.  Brutus, then, is considered by Plutarch to have acted primarily out of what he considered to be the best interests of the state.  What, precisely, was it that had so worried Brutus and moved him to conspire against and kill his former patron and king?  Shakespeare lists the cult of personality that had arisen around Caesar and Caesar's ambition as the grounds of his assassination.  Brutus, consistent with the rhetoric of all revolutions and regicides to follow,  commits the bloody deed in the name of freeing the people Rome from tyranny.  The list of Caesar's offences is never specifically listed by Shakespeare, and Plutarch notes simply that Brutus was opposed to the dictatorship.

The Stratford programme seems to have been a victim of cost-cutting measures and its format has changed as a result.  Gone is the glossy-paged elegant pamphlet, and in its place a considerably less elegant tabloid-style publication on newsprint quality paper.  As one would expect, commentary about the story came second after advertising.  Gone is the helpful and informative discussion about the playwright and the play, and in its place are a handful of paragraphs commenting tangentially about the plot.  While such an omission may suit such easy to follow productions as Oscar Wilde, anything pre-Victorian would considerably do with a plot synopsis with which to orient the new young people in the audience who are being exposed to the material for the first time (the demographic with which the Festival desperately needs to demonstrate its relevance).  In the case of Julius Caesar, the few words of the programme made vague reference to the relevance of the story to the (sadly, now cliched) "post 9-11 world."  Unfortunate, in that case, that the pageant imagery of Caesar was plumbed from the 1930s and 40s cementing the unoriginal, though apparently perpetually tempting, comparison of Caesar and Hitler, and did little to orient the audience differently.

The imagery surrounding the stage was, perhaps unsurprisingly, Nazi-chique, though with a light touch.  Reds and blacks were prominent, as were those originally Roman elements that the Nazis had put to such good use, such as eagle wings outstretched surrounded by a wreath of laurel.  As it turns out, the oblique reference to the post 9-11 seems to have had some impact on my early impressions of the production.  Despite imagery that unambiguously evoked the Third Reich, the contemporary clothing of the civilians chanting "Caesar, Caesar, Caesar," at the white-and-purple draped soon-to-be divinised leader suggested something else altogether.  The image that came to mind from the reaction of the adoring crowd to a divinised leader, inviting the consternation of individuals concerned for a healthy functioning democracy, was that of Obama.  For the record, I do not wish to in any way suggest that I think that Obama to either Julius Caesar or Hitler.  For the record, such a comparison is completely without merit.  Jon Stewart has done a well-enough job illustrating the insanity of those who see Obama as a force of evil: socialist, fascist or otherwise.  The problem lies not in some conspiratorial quality of the head of state deceiving the public and stealing power, but rather the people who by not engaging in oversight of sufficient quality, and by succumbing to a paternalistic desire to be ruled by a comforting hand during a time of chaos and uncertainty, forsake their civic responsibilities.  It was the imagery of the crowd desperate for a benign divine dictator to solve their problems and lead them through the wilderness.  The warning is not directed at the danger of an ambitious and irresponsible leader who steals power, but rather the danger of a fearful and directionless electorate that, blinded by their faith in the heroic qualities of their leader, surrenders it.

12:40 am - Stratford 2009 part 1

Today's shows: Cyrano de Bergerac and Three Sisters.

 
This year's pilgrimmage to the Stratford Festival involved four fantastic plays: Cyrano de Bergerac, Three Sisters, The Importance of Being Earnest, and Julius Ceasar.  All four productions are from the theatrical canon, and all four were quite striking in their own way.  Far from being obsolete, good theatre seems to be its own niche within the realm of media and experience.  No doubt, the much of the power of these four productions came from the first-rate writing, as much as from the professional-level acting and direction.

 

Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand

Cyrano has the same emotional appeal it had the first time I saw it, and I still found myself identifying quite strongly with the main character.  Also consistent with my recollection of the last time I saw the production, however, was a slight stain on Cyrano's heroism in the form of a nagging sense of selfishness and indulgence on the part of Cyrano and his relationship with Roxanne.

One could argue that Cyrano's heroic qualities, if not his entire essence as a character, arose out of a compensation for his insecurity.  He is reputed to be a viscious and bitter swordsman who flies into a temper and effortlessly dispatches anyone who comments even indirectly on his nose.  Cyrano's sensitivity to the topic, and the rage that accompanies it, are well known and part of his reputation.  His evident heroism, wit, and intelligence do not translate into enlightenment or acceptance of his insecurity.  Far from it.  His nose has had a significant impact on his identity and behaviour.  In a sense it is the centre of his whole person.  Cyrano's psychology is quite transparent and logical.  One can easily imagine a young Cyrano, beset by bullies, having to develop a quick wit and a strong arm to teach a painful lesson to anyone who would make fun of him.  This has evolved into a loud, aggressive, overbearing and tyrannical confidence best illustrated in the opening scene where Cyrano skewers the player, quite contrary to the wishes of the audience, solely on the bounds that he finds the player's acting to be, in words that can only be taken seriously coming from an armed poet, without passion.

Cyrano evoked Cervantes' Don Quixote, the Illiad, and Moliere.  Cyrano is very much a romantic-tragic figure cut from the same cloth; grandiose, suave, witty, dashing, but perpetually insecure.  His love for Roxanne is the sort of love that can only be found among romantic heroes; pure and devout in the extreme.  It is precisely in that uncompromising extremism, however, that what was an ethical snag the first time I saw it, grew a full-blown feminist challenge when I saw it today with The Muse.

Cyrano's failure to overcome his own insecurities led to his conspiracy with the handsome Christian, which resulted in both men actively deceiving and manipulating Roxanne to satisfy their own selfish desires.  Roxanne, unaware of the conspiracy until the last moment, falls for it, falls in love with an illusion, and ends up being dominated by that illusion for 15 years; effectively her entire adult life.  Cyrano is unable to admit his part in the deception, and only has the truth pried from him reluctantly upon his deathbed.  By this time, both he and Roxanne are old, Christian is dead, and she enjoys the protection of a convent and thus is both unlikely to enjoy either matrimony or motherhood.  This feminist critique is a bodyblow to any sense of Cyrano as a heroic character in any positive sense.  His love becomes less a pure and genuine love, and more a selfish and cowardly desire to maintain an illusion in the face of his fear of rejection, even when it should have been clear to him that he would not have been rejected.  Cyrano's fear is as extreme and uncompromising as is his taste in actors.  It would be merely tragically Quixotic if it did not so negatively impact an otherwise innocent woman.  Instead, it becomes indulgent, selfish, and particularly unbecoming of a hero.   Should the audience be inclined to be generous, Cyrano's unquestionable abuse of Roxanne, despite his evident love for her, simply heightens the tragedy; but the abuse must be somehow integrated into any equation evaluating Cyrano's heroism.

Three Sisters by Anton Chekhov

Chekhov's Three Sisters was held, rather appropriately, at the Tom Patterson theatre.  What better venue to tell the story of a pre-revolutionary Russian aristocratic family struggling with its own domestic conflict and straying dangerously close to a morally and intellectually eviscerating existential nihilism than the same stage that brought to life such light-hearted comedies as Waiting for Godot and The Trojan Women.  The rustic Tom Patterson theatre would only fulfill its role of temple of nihilism more if its darkly accented industrial chique ductwork were stained with rust, and the seats covered in a layer of post-apocalyptic ash.  

Most striking in Chekhov's play is his use of dialogue: both realistic and frank.  The dialogue was unadorned and tended to wander off into brief tangents, contained interruptions, and occasionally overlapped with realistic chatter from another group of people on stage.  While the device tended to make the people more realistic, personal, and accessible, it nevertheless ironically served to repel me from them as I felt as though I had gotten to know them quite well, though didn't much care for most of them.  

It seems as though pathos is best conveyed through sympathy.  Characters with whom the audience feels sympathy are most likely to carry the audience along through their emotional narrative.  This bond of sympathy seems to be associated to a bond of empathy, and the audience then finds themselves reacting with deeper emotion to the plight of the characters and inviting the audience to react sympathetically.  This effect is consistent with the experience of tension and horror I noticed in 28 Days Later.  I found myself losing the experience of horror when the heroes did something stupid such as wander around a dark house at night after being told not to, or drive through a dark tunnel at high speeds.  Those scenes, while technically well-delivered, conveyed the least sense of horror because I found the stupidity (or lack of realism, or lack of logic of place) among the characters to be distancing.  The same applies to my lack of interest in the White Wolf saga by Michael Morcock.  I lost interest in the character when it became apparent that he was the source of his own and other people's misery.

While Chekhov's dialogue is effective at conveying the characters and their dilemmas, it was very much the characteristics of the characters themselves (effectively conveyed) which I found unsympathetic.  Even the young, ideological and proto-revolutionary Irina seems cold, distant, and alien by the end of the play, as evidenced by her singular lack of grief for the death of the Baron.  

Chekhov's portrayal of the Russian aristocracy is particularly interesting in that he died in 1904.  His depiction of Russian upper-class society as being beset by a variety of challenges is either thoroughly insightful and prescient, or thoroughly polemical.  Chekhov's point seems to be that the Russian aristocracy is sick.  The characters are infected with a variety of sicknesses: sickness of morality, sickness of philosophy and reason, sickness of family relations, and sickness of body.  Nihilism, infidelity, migranes, and exhaustion abound.  The frequent guests and inhabitants of the house are either nihilists (Dr. Chebutykin), insane (Captain Solyony and Kulygin), vile (Natasha), or hopelessly defeated (Andrey).  The dysfunction of the unhappy marriages (that is, all of them) is compounded by their formal though unconsummated infidelity.  Happiness is perpetually elusive: something we strive for, but never get.  "I think I do know the most important thing.  The only real thing.  And I want to convince you of it too.  That happiness doesn't exist as yet, it will never exist for us, and that's all right, that's as it should be....  Our task is only to work and work; happiness is reserved for our descendants.  It's not for me.  It's for my distant descendents."

Those few glimmers of light are the Baron and Irina whose romanticised vision of work, while grotesquely bourgeois, has a certain redemptive quality.  The Baron and Irina have the sort of gleeful view of work that only a person who has never worked before could possibly maintain.  Then there are the dual qualities of revolutionary optimism and progress exhibited by Colonel Vershinin.  His philosophy is pragmatic and evolutionary.  While things are particularly vile and bizarre at the moment, one can nevertheless improve the world meaningfully through work.  One can work to make sure one's children are smarter than their parents, and better equipped to deal with the struggles that lie before them.  Chekhov's anticipation of the revolution is also evident in Vershinin's looking forward to the great light that will free the aristocracy of their prison, and bless them with the experience of labour.  In so doing, however, Chekhov's portrayal of the Russian aristocracy displays its complexity.  He is prescient enough to see the revolution coming, though it seems odd that it would be so romantically characterised among an officer of the military.  Chekhov chooses members of the aristocracy (the Baron, Irina, and Vershinin) to demonstrate and be redeemed by seeking to manifest Marxist principles.  It would seem that Chekhov's revolutionary Marxist politics, while gentle and humanist in outlook, were at the same time horribly naive given the bloodbath that stretched from the revolution to the end of the Stalinist period.  Chekhov paints a very complex and nuanced portrait of Russian aristocratic society: privileged and educated, but mostly idle, useless, and without any meaningful contribution to society (apart for the ability of some to adopt the virtues of the lower classes).  Would that Chekhov's idealised Russian character have been the one to have survived the revolution and have paved the way forward for his country, rather than the monstrosity that did.    

This tension between the evidently pro-Marxist and pro-revolutionary qualities of Chekhov, and his openness to members of an otherwise sick and nihilistic aristocracy to embrace the merits of Marxism raises the question: how would Chekhov have interpeted the violence that unfolded after 1914?  If the aristocracy are redeemed only by adopting the hardships of the lower classes, are those who do not worthy of the guillotine?  Was Chekhov demonstrating that the intelligent and upright of the aristocracy could be converted to Marxism based on the strength of its principles?  Was he issuing a warning and prescribing the only means by which an aristocrat could save his skin?  Or perhaps a bit of both?

02:19 pm - The To Do List

Hello folks, long time no post, eh?

I've elected to take something off the List. Last week I had my first consultation with a tattoo artist. Rashelle came recommended by a well-inked friend of mine, and her evident artistic skills are well beyond the requirements for my modest image. She is working on a couple of images following our meeting, and even her brief sketch left me quite pleased. Our next meeting is tentatively scheduled for early May where we will go over the shortlist.

I've had the basic image and vague desire floating around my imagination for about 10 years or so, and as the permanence and ordeal of the process would demand, I am satisfied that the personal gravitas of the symbolism is worthy of being etched in stone, as it were. The final image took form thanks in large part to feedback from amphigori. I am quite excited.

On an materialistically unrelated matter, I will be heading to Vegas for the first time in a couple of days. I am both excited and somewhat intimidated. A handful of friends of mine have gone, and so I have a page of places to visit and places to avoid. For the longest time I had no interest at all in going to Vegas. It was a temple devoted to the wrong god, I'd say. Strangely enough, however, that no longer repulses me.

Much of the change of heart is a result of romance. It was, in fact, the Muse that inspired me to even consider Vegas as a vacation destination. For some reason I feel compelled to do crazy, silly things with her, and nothing strikes me as crazier or sillier than Vegas. She very much approves, and if our preliminary list of places to visit is any indication, the trip will be crazy and silly indeed. Still, the tendrils of my imagination are writhing and I cannot escape (nor do I feel I care to) the image of Vegas as a vast temple complex. Sure enough, neither notebook nor camera will be far from hand.

Current Mood: contemplative

02:54 pm - High drama

Yet another fine moment from Youtube.

05:25 pm - GYBE

A very fine Youtube link to a video featuring Godspeed You! Black Emperor. Very good track, very good vid. Near-apocalyptic poetry at its finest.

7 min long.

04:25 pm - The end of the decade of darkness

At the risk of sounding either naive or masochistic, I must say that I am disappointed with the media. While I applaud the media’s clear objectivity, demonstrated by the ease with which critics at opposite ends of the ideological spectrum are able to label the same media as having both a left and right wing bias, as well as it’s relentless pursuit of insightful and stimulating matters of crucial importance to both individual and society as we have seen in the thoroughness and attention given to the Anna Nicole Smith and Britney Spears sagas, I dare say that on occasion I do not find myself agreeing with where they choose to place their emphasis.

A few weeks ago, Canada’s Chief of Defence Staff General Rick Hillier was critised by opposition party defence critic, Denis Coderre, for playing politics by having described the cuts to military spending implemented by the previous government as “a decade of darkness.” The opposition accused Hillier of politicising while the possibility of a spring vote is being mulled over by federal electioneers. The story had been picked up in a few Canadian media outlets, and clearly had an impact on the audience. A poll taken by the Globe and Mail on the same day the article ran indicated that over 80% of respondents believed the General’s comments to be inappropriate. Incidentally, in today’s poll, 60% of respondents believe that the upcoming documentary about the alleged tomb of Jesus “could” be true.

Hillier’s speech was delivered at the 23rd Annual Conference of Defence Associations Institute General Meeting and was attended by predominantly current military officers from various countries, as well as representatives from the defence industry. In short, many people who would have had first hand knowledge of the impact of the military’s budget cuts, and people who most likely would have felt the impact of them in their work. Certainly there would have been few, if any, who would have been entirely ignorant of it. Nowhere in Hillier’s speech did he make specific reference, a critique or otherwise to the Liberal party. It is clear that in his speech, Hillier was referring to the period of budget cuts as the “decade of darkness,” and not the Liberal Party rule in general. Moreover, the reasons for the cuts are irrelevant in the face of the fact that the cuts occurred, and had a considerable influence on what the military was able to do. Coderre’s response to Hillier’s unquestionably colourful presentation of an otherwise unassailable fact appears overly sensitive in the same way that the guilt-ridden doth protest too much.

The unquestionable fact of the matter, is that the military bore the brunt, rightly or wrongly, of the LIberal government’s policy to get the federal deficit under control. Added to the disappointment that any government department faces when it sees it’s resources cut, at the same time that money was being taken from the military, the government was making more and more use of it; including the dangerous and complicated work in the Balkans. This increase in operational activity which accompanied the reduction of resources forced the military to make some very difficult choices and, as Hillier describes, some programmes were kept on “life support” to avoid them being lost entirely. Others were lost entirely.

While newspapers focused almost exclusively on Hillier’s “decade of darkness” comment and Denis Coderre's aggravation of a self-inflicted wound ensuring that the General's otherwise innocuous comment would be well-circulated, they overlooked the greater important element in Hillier’s speech, and one, I feel, that is entirely consistent with the question of military funding, training, and the demands placed on our soldiers both in the 90’s and today in Afghanistan. After commending of the importance of soldiers leading from the front, Hillier said:

“Let me just tell you a little story.

Charles company, 1st battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment, Labour Day weekend. On that terrible weekend ... they lost the company commander in action, lost the company sergeant major. Lost 1 out of 3 platoon commanders, lost all 3 platoon warrant officers: 1 wounded, 2 killed. Lost 5 section commanders out of 9. Lost all of the section 2nd in command section master corporals, a total of 40+ wounded and 5 killed in a 48-hour period. They stepped up. A young sergeant, promoted to sergeant last July, became the company sergeant major. Young master corporals became a platoon commander. And platoon second in command and young soldiers became section commanders and they carried on the operation and the fight against the Taliban that gave NATO such an incredible boost right at the start of that mission.”

As painful as the decade of darkness was, it did not keep our military from training and fielding quality soldiers capable of adapting to the sudden decapitation of the leadership of their company mid-battle, soldiering on, and winning. Surely a testament to strength, courage, and determination of those serving, what they are capable of when provided with the right tools, and what they are undertaking on our behalf.

Operation Medusa was a NATO victory.

And thank goodness the decade of darkness has ended.

05:50 pm - Templars, Hospitallers, and Lazars

I recently finished a rather engaging book, The Monks of War: The Military Religious Orders by Desmond Seward. The work is a general history of the most prominent of Christendom’s chivalric orders, the Knights Templar, the Knights Hospitaller, the Teutonic Knights, and the Spanish and Portuguese orders. Monks of War reads primarily like an old-school history book focusing primarily on battles and battlements. Seward focussed much of his attention recounting stories the knights' bravery and martial prowess, seemingly as perpetual underdogs repeatedly achieved the herculean in the most demanding of circumstances. I was disappointed that he skimmed over other central elements of the knights' vocation and legacy; the establishment of public infrastructure, banking, hospitals and generally caring for the poor and sick.

It was hard to read Monks, and its accounts of battles between the faithful and the infidel without reflecting on the current friction between Islam and the West. I was struck by the similarity of language used to describe the “conflict” and the subtlety of the seams among greed, ambition, politics, religion, and religious rhetoric. I was surprised by which side I found myself sympathising, on occasion. Seward, for example, is epic in his description of the battles of Rhodes and Malta where a handful of Hospitallers repelled waves of attacks from the much larger Turkish forces. He only briefly notes, however, the Hospitaller raids on Turkish merchant ships the preceded the invasions, and offers no suggestion of the role played by the raids and the Turkish decision to invade. Was a Turkish invasion of the Mediterranean underway, spurring the Hospitallers to use their small force as guerillas picking away at a conquering empire, or were the Turks acting in self-defence of their shipping? In our current political context, such politically expedient glosses of history serve only to drive opposing historical interpretations apart. If one cannot muster the necessary courage to be balanced and accurate in one’s representation of history, how much more reliable will be one’s representation of the present?

It’s also interesting to note the Hospitaller mission to establish, well, hospitals. While the caring for the sick is invariably presented as a religious mission for the Hospitallers, I wonder how long it took them to realise that it also wins points in the cynical world of realpolitik? From the ISAF in Afghanistan to Hezbollah in Lebanon, when militant groups or factions establish themselves in a population, having the support of the locals is of paramount importance. One of the ways in which a militant group can ensure they are seen as a net positive influence, is to provide humanitarian work. It would be interesting to see at what point, if ever, the Hospitallers became aware of the potential for political leverage in humanitarianism, and if that ever affected their policies. It was also inspiring to see how the medieval crusading chivalric orders have today morphed into charitable organisations run by common lay people. If only more zealous religious enthusiasm and people’s heartfelt commitment to do God’s work could be redirected to fighting poverty and suffering rather than perpetuating it. The evolution of the military religious orders, however, clearly leaves one with hope.

Despite a mission to care for the poor and downtrodden, it seems as though the knightly monastic orders took a dim view of one disease in particular: leprosy. Any knight contracting leprosy, or any other similarly unflattering skin ailment, would find himself expelled from the Order. Removed from an august communion and the privilege of being among the spiritual elite, what was a leper knight to do? Why, establish an order of leper knights of course.

Unsurprisingly, the humanitarian work of the Knights of St Lazarus were primarily devoted to the establishment of leper houses in both the Holy Land and Europe. Like the Templars and Hospitallers, their headquarters and principal source of revenue was originally in Jerusalem. While their mission was closer to that of the Knights of the Hospital, the leper knights numbered former Templars as well as former Hospitallers in their ranks. The first Grand Master of the Knights of St Lazarus, it is said, was also the first Grand Master of the Knights of the Hospital, who himself turned in his habit when he contracted the disease. Seward writes: “The Lazar Knights were never numerous and had only a handful of non-leper brethren for protection, though no doubt in times of crisis unclean knights also took up arms.” In fact, Seward notes the presence of Knights of St Lazarus at a number of battles, including the fateful sieges of Acre, Rhodes, and Malta. There is something very appealing to me about the Knights of St Lazarus: fighting the good fight despite being outcast, and having the strength and courage to overcome personal and social obstacles for the privilege of living an austere, disciplined, challenging life devoted to God, church, and the sick. It is begging for a story.

Current Mood: thoughtful

03:01 pm - Good riddance

Props to the 'Stralians for taking the initiative and getting rid of those insatiably ravenous glass demons. If only the rest of the world could be so courageous.

I spoke to a consultant who was working for the Toronto municipal power utility. He estimated that the city could save about 10% of its energy consumption simply by getting rid of incandescents.

LEDs. Not just for the developing world anymore.

05:11 pm - Ghosts, gods, and the temporal lobe

I went on a podcast blitz a few weeks ago, scrounging around for interesting lectures to play in the background now that my leisure time is no longer dominated by the Unnamed Beast that I submitted myself to for so long. I found a very good collection among the Big Ideas lecture series produced by TV Ontario. While the lectures are primarily geared towards a Canadian audience, and much of the data in these lectures is bent in that direction, the material is largely accessible and relevant to just about everyone.

See you tomorrow

One lecture in particular caught my attention. Dr Michael Persinger of Laurentian University has spent the last 20 years conducting neurological research into how specific electrochemical changes in the brain affect conscious experience, and delivered Big Ideas’ April 26, 2006 lecture. Persinger presented the results of his findings of how electrical stimulation of the temporal lobes can evoke what Persinger refers to, not uncontroversially, as the prototype of the “God” experience: the “sense presence.” As a fan of psychology, religious studies, and their intersection I found the psychological material in the lecture quite interesting, while having some serious reservations about the methodology used to approach the question of religion.

The lecture was personally relevant for another reason. A few days before I had my own experience of the sense presence for the first time. While drifting in and out of sleep 2-3 times late in the morning I had the very specific experience that there was someone in my apartment with me. At first, as I shook the sleep from my mind, what began as a rather vague experience coalesced into a specific awareness of someone in the room across from me near my sofa. I heard sounds that I attributed to a person gingerly using my computer in the living room not far from where I had been sleeping. It seemed a little odd, but after thinking about it for a moment, concluded that a friend of mine who lived upstairs had let himself into my apartment and was doing some work and had tried not to disturb me, as had happened on a handful of occasions in the past. I went back to sleep. The feeling of presence persisted during the two or so times that I awoke over the next couple of hours, and was again accompanied by subtle sounds suggesting that someone was in the room. Just prior to fully rousing myself, and being almost certain that the presence had just recently left, I heard very clearly and distinctly a gruff woman’s voice saying, rather ominously though clearly, “See you tomorrow, Jeff.” The only door to my apartment was, of course, barred from the inside just as I had left it the night before.

The atheistic unscientist

In describing his work with the temporal lobe Dr Persinger is quite careful to present his material as the result of specific scientific experiments which are interesting enough without drawing too much in the way of conclusions or implications of the research. In short, Persinger states that by stimulation of the left and right temporal lobes he is able to reliably create an experience in a subject whereby they report sensing a presence nearby. The experience may be accompanied by other elements, for example, specific visual content of a place or person. In cases where Persinger has conducted longitudinal studies on specific subjects and thus been able to refine the stimulation according to his subjects' self-reports, Persinger is also able to evoke specific aesthetic content as well as the sense presence: that is, whether the presence is experienced as benevolent or malevolent.

Bookending Persinger’s presentation are introductory and concluding remarks by Robert Buckman, an unrepentant atheist, which, unlike Persinger’s own presentation, does indeed nudge the audience in the direction of specific conclusions concerning experience and the existence of the divine, which he presents with some enthusiasm. As may come as no surprise Buckman aims Persinger’s research at religiosity. Sadly however, Buckman’s approach to the question of the basis of religion, and the role of psychology and religion is, ironically, unscientific and unfounded.

Buckman uses the phenomenology of the mirage to illustrate how he sees the impact of Persinger’s research on religious belief. Buckman describes the mirage as the bending of light by a combination of air pressure and temperature before it strikes the eye, leading the eye and brain to process data which the mind falsely concludes indicates that water is present. Knowledge that the perception of water is in fact a mirage has no impact on the organs of perception informing the consciousness that water is being perceived. Buckman says that it is not the perception or experience of water which is in error, the eye and brain are doing their jobs properly as far as the mechanics of perception are concerned, but rather the belief that one’s conscious experience of water equates to the existence of water where one’s experience indicates it is. Buckman adds that the phenomenology of the experience of water in the desert may, without error, rise to a variety of subjective and artistic representations and interpretations of water in the desert, to which he expresses no displeasure. Personal interpretations and expressions of the experience of the mirage are fine. Error, however, is introduced when one’s behaviour is inconsistent with the reality: when one crawls out into the desert in a vain attempt to drink from the water, for example.

Buckman’s example of the mirage, while generous from the point of view of the apologetic religionist, (he did not after all, use examples of hallucinations where there is no correlation between the conscious experience of perception and the proper functioning of the organs of perception) is of uncertain usefulness in evaluating Persinger’s research and its impact on the relationships among experience, perception, and belief. Taking the opposite track of Buckman’s example there are, after all, examples of perceptions of water which accurately indicate the presence of water, and dismissal of an accurate perception can bring about disasters of an equal proportion. The challenge of this dilemma lies in the ability to accurately separate that perennial epistemological square of the subject-object dualism: true belief from true perception, false belief from true perception, and false belief from false perception. True belief from false perception being a somewhat rare and accidental creature. The difficulty is that the proper evaluation of belief and perception requires an unobstructed view of both the basis of perception and the accuracy of the belief. Such a privileged view of both an object and an observer is not easy to come by and, I would say, beyond Buckman’s demonstrated authority.

Buckman’s hypothesis of religion and its relationship to consciousness is equally unconvincing. Buckman says that religion is evolutionary in the sense that it has helped humanity survive and flourish. That assistance, Buckman rightly suggests, comes from religious belief as a part of pattern-formation qualities of consciousness. Less evident is Buckman’s hypothesis that religion is or was primarily a coping mechanism for fear. Fear or objects of fear Buckman suggests, would be less fearful if they are integrated into a religious orientation providing them with particular meaning and context.

This hypothesis has been suggested by others, Christopher Hitchens quickly comes to mind, equally intent on doing away with religious behaviour altogether. At the very least it is unclear to me how the assuagement of fear would constitute a positive evolutionary trait. Fear, it seems, could play a positive evolutionary role by encouraging one to avoid danger such as tall cliffs, lions, spiders, mice, dead bodies, and the dark, and thus increases one's chances of survival and odds of successfully reproducing. Anything that deprives fear of its power also deprives one of a state of arousal which is the first line of defence against threats. In the jungle, one could reasonably argue, it is probably best to err on the side of caution and be slightly more afraid than the circumstances warrant, rather than less afraid. Any assuagement of fear, then, would detract from one's chances of survival.

For a scientist, Buckman is rather confident in his broad and complex picture of the psychology of early modern humans as they interact with their environment. With the possible exceptions of fragmentary tidbits such as Palaeolithic art, examples of which have been found in caves in the Pyrenees with Lascaux being among the most famous and elaborate, and the cave bear cults of Asia there is no evidence of the contents or structure of religious belief or mythology among early modern humans.

After having studied examples of religious belief and mythology from aboriginal people of Australia and the North American woodlands of the north east, shamanic practices of the North American and Siberian Inuit, aspects of Judaism, Hellenistic religious philosophy, the Indian Vedas, Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam it is far from clear that the unifying theme either among these traditions, or even within these traditions, is the assuagement of fear. Certainly there are specific examples of individual prayers and rituals which may be intentionally designed to reduce fear, anxiety, or stress, as well as a tendency for some religious traditions to deteriorate into crude and patronising “everything will be all right” palliative tonics. Yet it is far from clear that these are the central guiding themes behind religious traditions. Examples such as these notwithstanding, I would argue that it is wonder, and not fear, that determines whether an experience becomes entwined with the ordering, narrative-creating principles of religiosity. As he seeks to explore the roots of religion from an evolutionary perspective, Buckman’s hypothesis is thus at best neither obvious nor necessary, unverifiable, and inconsistent with that evidence with which we do have access. Rather unfirm ground from which to begin approaching a question, one might say.

In the beginning was the Wonder

Among the mind’s most impressive features is it’s inclination to place things into order, to establish relationships of narrative, and it’s abhorrence of vacuums of meaning. A random collection of prominent stars becomes a constellation, the multifaceted gruntings and stutterings of the mouth and throat are refined into poetry, and a tangle of obscure policy decisions are woven into a conspiracy. Much moreso than the assuagement of fear, one could suggest that a trait that makes our species successful is the consciousness’ ability to perceive, imagine, and anticipate relationships, correlation, and causation. I would suggest that it is not in a reaction to fear that one finds the roots of religious belief, but in the mind's arrangement of conscious material into order, or a narrative, based on a negotiation between perception, and both conscious and unconscious influences in the imagination.

While anything may be, and probably has been, subject to the narrative ordering principles of the mind, those which seem to gather the greatest attention and enjoy the greatest popularity are those that include objects or conditions that attract our greatest sense of wonder. Here I am borrowing from Rudolph Otto’s classic The Idea of the Holy in which he, I believe rightly and insightfully, ascribes the sense of wonder and mystery to the prototypical experience of the sacred. It is telling and consistent that many religious narratives eventually come to address the three major steps along the cosmological path which culminates in the anthropos: why is there being rather than non-being; why is there life rather than non-life; why is there consciousness rather than non-consciousness? It bears mentioning that the “why” in these questions may equally be interpreted as a teleological “why” as well as a how-like “why.” While some religious traditions and mythologies approach or integrate these questions into their narratives, I do not believe that religious traditions spring up with the principal aim of addressing these questions. Religious traditions do not originally set about answering “why” we are here, and most certainly are not primarily dedicated to alleviate the fear of death. These questions tend to be addressed after a religious movement has begun, has already begun to laid down a spiritual foundation, and is usually in response to specific challenges, usually political, that arise. These questions directed towards the mystery of the human condition become wrapped up in religious narratives not because they are the most important concerns of any particular religious orientation, and not because they are fear-inspiring, but because they are such great sources of wonder. The questions of existence, life, and consciousness provide an epic and awe-inspiring cosmological backdrop, anchor and parallel for an otherwise local narrative.

Of trees and gods

Having said this, it is not clear how exactly Persinger’s work poses the challenge to religious belief that Buckman certainly suggests it does. In collecting and organising bizarre experiences Persinger’s research is part of a noble line including William James, Sigmund Freud, and Carl Jung. In Persinger’s case, however, and to his credit, for the first time the psychology of religion is able to reliably stimulate a very specific experience and demonstrate the neurological anatomy of that experience. This is a first, tentative and exciting step towards a greater understanding the interaction between perception, the brain, the mind, and experience. Persinger’s research offers a novel approach to a host of other questions of relevance to religion: for example, is there a correlation between right and left temporal lobe activity, the respective functions of those parts of the brain, and religions’ tendencies to hermetically pass back and forth between notions of the transcendent and the immanent; between the wholly other and utterly unknowable, and the definite and manifest? Is the consciousness' interpretation of Persinger’s stimulation, that there is a presence nearby, indicative of an error in belief or perception, or rather infrastructure for a potential organ of perception? What is the relationship, if any, between the effects of various religious traditions' epistemological worlds and brainstem activity? These questions would seem to fit Persinger’s research better than an assumption that he is uncovering, and thus able to explain away, the prototype of the “God” experience. Even less substantiated is the implication that by demonstrating the neurological basis for religious experience Persinger is able to disprove traditional religious interpretations of that experience. After all, were Persinger to alter the focus of his device to the extent that he was able to accurately stimulate the experience of a tree, does it therefore follow that trees do not exist?

In any event, once Persinger tires of the back and forth between neurologists and theologians, he will no doubt be able to make a killing licensing his device to Nintendo.

Current Mood: content

02:30 am - From the makers of "The Office."

British comedy kicking it back oldschool. And what's best, is you don't even have to have an iPod to enjoy it.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Ricky Gervais podcast. Also available on mp3 format for those of you still unpodded. With the addition of Ficino to the family, along with the venerable Edna, the seductive Esmerelda, and stoic Alexandria I find myself surrounded by more white polycarbonate than Darth Vader.

Enjoy.

Current Mood: amused

08:54 pm - What's so funny about fascism?

Lewis Lapham, editor of Harper’s magazine for the past 30 years announced his retirement last month. A semi-artsy magazine of literary and political commentary, Harper’s is probably one of the most credible and professional magazines in the United States catering to a left-of-centre audience. For the past couple of years, while some American media outlets have shrunken from taking too pointed a position against US policy, Harper’s has pulled no punches in its critique of the Bush administration’s handling of the economy, the war on terrorism, and the invasion of Iraq. Harper’s Index, a staple of the magazine, is a regular supply of statistical hilarity and ominousness, mixing the sinister with the surreal. The last two issues have included such zingers as: “Months of vacation that President Bush has taken in five years: 11,” “Days after Katrina hit that Dick Cheney’s office ordered an electric company to restore power to two oil pipelines: 1,” “ Days after the hurricane that the White House authorized sending federal troops to New Orleans: 4”, “Number of toilet seats at the EU Parliament building in Brussels that a TV station had tested for cocaine: 46,” “Number that tested positive: 41,” and “Number of erotic Harry Potter fan-fiction stories posted on a website run by an Illinois woman: 1,750.”

But while I may appreciate Harper’s for its editorial courage and the quality of its writing, I find the magazine is becoming a trifle dogmatic. Whereas at one point I enjoyed Harper’s thoughtful and well articulated analysis of policy, I now fear that they have done away with reason and analysis in favour of an ideology, or worse, an agenda.

In the October 2005 issue, Lapham’s “Notebook” piece revisits a 1995 article written by Umberto Eco published by the New York Review of Books where Eco seeks to outline a typology of fascism. Lapham picks up on the article and after a brief summary, according to my reading, prepares to argue that the United States is either on the road to becoming a fascist state or at the very least is having its domestic immunity to facism eroded. While that hypothesis itself is quite provocative to say the least, Lapham chooses satire to make his point. For example, Lapham writes: "It does no good to ask the weakling’s pointless question, 'Is America a fascist state?' We must ask instead, in a major rather than a minor key, 'Can we make America the best damned fascist state the world has ever seen,' an authoritarian paradise deserving the admiration of the international capital markets, worthy of ‘a descent respect to the opinions of mankind’? I wish to be the first to say we can. We’re Americans; we have the money and the know-how to succeed where Hitler failed, and history has favored us with advantages not given to the early pioneers." Lapham then proceeds to list a collection of legitimate concerns, such as the state of public education funding levels, the consolidation of control over the media, the lack of dissenting political voices, and the rise to power of Christian evangelicals; though offering his endorsement of these “brave strides forward” with his tongue firmly planted in his cheek. While I certainly have no specific aversion to either satire or sarcasm, I think that Lapham’s presentation works against his point in this case.

I’m of the opinion that serious matters ought to be taken seriously. While “seriousness” is obviously a subjective category, I would like to think that a helpful benchmark for seriousness can be whether or not something is either a) inflicting intentional and unnecessary suffering on people, or b) leading to people’s premature deaths. If people are dying then I think one can say with a certain degree of confidence that the matter is serious. I think that Lapham’s hypothesis, that the United States is heading down the road to facism, qualifies as a serious allegation. As a result, I believe it is beholden upon Lapham to do his best to put forth a well argued, cogent argument that can either be proven or disproven in order to best facilitate a correction to the problem. Granted, part of Lapham’s satirical presentation seems to suggest that the majority of people in United States either are not, or would not be interested in pulling themselves away from facism. But I’m not sure if I believe that.

Lapham demonstrates how various social and political developments in the United States are consistent with Eco’s typology of Ur-Fascism. But he does so with a quick convenient gloss and appearances of sympathy. Without a clear, coherent, serious argument, I fear the impact of Lapham’s article will be merely a matter of preaching to the converted, or serving as ammunition for the Right against the Left’s bourgeois irrationality. In either case, Lapham’s satirical presentation of fascism’s rise in the United States, rather than contributing to it’s defeat, merely further entrenches and alienates both sides of the argument and makes it both a little more difficult to arrive at a solution, and a little more difficult to bring the question beyond the current roster of feuding party members.

Current Mood: content

10:31 pm - The Tempest

I've had the pleasure of seeing Shakespeare's The Tempest a couple of times. In both cases William Hutt played the part of Prospero; a role he carries quite well. This year was Hutt's last at the Stratford Festival, a relatively well-known stage festival running for over 50 years and hosted in the the small town of Stratford, Ontario a little more than an hour's drive west of Toronto. Hutt has been a fixture of the festival for years. This marks Hutt’s last at Stratford, and it’s somehow fitting that this is his finale.

I’m a fan of Shakespeare. That is, a fan, at least of the brooding, dark, vengeful, inhuman, backstabbing Shakespeare moreso than the sugary, romantic Shakespeare. While The Tempest isn’t my favorite piece, there is much of it that I do enjoy, and I find Prospero to be an interesting character. Prospero's closing lines of the play resounded ever more strongly when spoken by Hutt who was performing his next to last performance prior to his retirement from the stage. Prospero is the genuinely concerned enlightened father, who, while tenderly watching his daughter evolve from maiden to woman, is simultaneously plotting revenge most bloody against those who had deposed him from his throne. A smiling, caring, doting father at one moment, a murderous, Typhonic bringer of storms the next.

There are, however, two things about The Tempest that never quite sat well with me. At the end of the story, when the storm has abated and chaos brought to order; Miranda married to a caring husband, Prospero’s humanity saved as he forsakes revenge for forgiveness, Ariel released from the magikal bonds with which Prospero had bound him, and Prospero’s dukedom restored, there is nonetheless one decision that seems a little out of place to me. While summing up the happy ending, Prospero also announces that he is giving up his studies and research. For some reason, this decision strikes me as being quite out-of-character for Prospero. He had been devoted to his studies and research before being a duke, while he was a duke (indeed, it may have been his unbalanced devotion to the Arts that led to his post being usurped in the first place), and kept him sane and safe while he was exiled on the island. Prospero evidently has no small amount of passion for his studies. For him to so quickly do away with, and without any previous hint of disatisfaction with, Adepthood, strikes me as being wrong in a number of ways. For Prospero to announce that he is no longer committed to his studies in the same breath as announcing all these other rightings of wrongs, is for me, too much of an implication that his studies were counted among the deficiencies that needed righting. I don’t buy it.

Second of all, is Ariel. I tried to pay particular attention to Ariel’s lines and his role in the production to see if there was any suggestion on Shakespeare’s part as to how the role should be played. While I have yet to commit the project to careful examination, I didn’t notice anything in the dialogue that demands Ariel be a prancing airy-fairy, pastel-and-feather ballerina. Ariel is a spirit, yes. Ariel is celestial while Caliban is chthonic, yes. But Ariel is a spirit enslaved to a mortal. Indeed, twice enslaved to a mortal as Prospero simply inherited him from Sycorax who had also imprisonned him. I can imagine Ariel easily sublimating his ample anger and frustration from Prospero and Sycorax. Ariel is also in part a Herculean figure: one which is greater forced into servitude of one who is lesser, and longs for freedom and dignity accordingly. I would imagine Ariel would be animated by feelings of anxiousness and resentment as well. Inspite of Ariel’s otherworldiness, he nevertheless serves to bring Prospero back to his humanity. Indeed, it is Ariel’s very inhumanity that helps bring Prospero back down to earth and leads to his renunciation of revenge in favour of reconciliation. All this is fine.

But Ariel is not a pansy. He was enslaved by an evil witch and has been forced into servitude by a failure of a man whose days are numbered. Inhuman and celestial, yes. Ballerina, no. I appreciate that there ought to be some contrast between Ariel and Caliban. I appreciate that Caliban is, without question, the more earthier of the two characters. But there’s no reason that Ariel could not be convingly represented by Samuel L Jackson’s character in Pulp Fiction, for example. Ariel serves as the vehicle for Prospero’s wrath. Ariel brings fear, deception, and the tempest to Prospero’s enemies. While enslaved to Prospero, Ariel’s every action is guided by Prospero’s burning desire for revenge. That strikes me as more consistent with cigarettes, leather, and a 9mm than feathers and sparkle paint.

Current Mood: drunk

02:00 am

For any of you interested in digital art, I'd like to direct you to a site maintained by a friend of mine. He's had a number of successful showings in the past six months and has some particularly interesting ideas (if I may say so) in the field of interactive digital art.

May I introduce you to Stephen Boyd.

04:01 am - Martyr?

Since the rollercoaster of press releases prior to Yasir Arafat’s death the former Palestinian Leader has remained almost continuously in the news. First the endless stream of world leaders and politicos paying their last respects both in person and in print and the obligatory street rallies bursting with uncontrollable emotion and the brandishing and discharging of weapons. Almost immediately arose open questioning of Arafat’s legacy to the Palestinian struggle, and whether his lengthy work as leader of his people would be judged in a positive or negative light. Senior figures have stated that they’re looking forward to the next generation of Palestinian leadership, and for the first time in awhile there seems to be a hint of optimism about the whole situation.

As an easy road to peace in the Holy Land seems like too much to ask, to make things even more challenging, a splinter group from the Al Aksa Martyr’s Brigade has reformed as the Brigades of Martyr Yasir Arafat holding Israel responsible of, if not directly then indirectly, Arafat’s death. More specifically, they believe that Yasir Arafat met an end by foul play.

And so, on the one hand you have the allegation that Arafat died of poisoning, an allegation from which no good will spring, and no pile of evidence will ever dislodge from the imaginations of the True Believers. On the other there is the allegation put suggested by journalist and former Bush speech-writer David Frum that perhaps Arafat had AIDS as a result of a homosexual encounter. Popular among neo-con pro-Bush, pro-Evangelical Christianity and pro-Israel camps, Frum’s suggestion, far from being swept away like an ill-timed joke of poor taste has instead made its way to senior members of the leadership of the Conservative party of Canada. In an internal party memo, Conservative Party Foreign Affairs critic and former party leader Stockwell (Doris) Day suggested that the reason why no statement addressing Arafat’s death had been made by the party was because Arafat had succumbed to complications relating to AIDS.

Now, while it’s not impossible that a person could be both poisoned as well as suffer from AIDS, I would think that such a cause of death would be both somewhat unlikely if not contradictory. If Arafat were dieing of AIDS I doubt impatience would sufficiently override caution so as to lead Arafat’s hypothetical killers to flirt with the risk of discovery by poisoning him. After all, they’ve been so patient thus far. Rather, not only is someone not telling the truth, but he is also appealing to a particularly low rhetorical standard. I think it shows that the interested parties in this conflict are equally affected by questionable judgement bordering on neurosis. Both parties’ true colours are being shown for what they are: mirror images of one another equally blinded by hate. My hunch is that neither rumour is true and both camps are deliberately being inflammatory: Arafat was neither poisoned nor did he die of AIDS. A shameful embarrassment and indulgence of the worst sort from the elites on both sides, and a sound reminder that moderates are desparately needed to bring this bloody and tragic conflict to a sensible resolution.

Current Mood: disappointed

03:51 am - Team America

Once again the creators of South Park manage to stuff a gleaming jem of a joke into the heart of a roll of shit. True to form, Trey Parker and Matt Stone use keen eyed political satire to push the boundaries of potty humour. Both American policy and radical Islam are equally targeted for ridicule as “Team America: World Police” combines a satirical view of terrorism, now a very grave and real danger in the lives of just about everyone on the planet, with the by now self-characaturising American action movie.

The villains of the story are Chechen rebels planning to carry out a series of terrorist attacks. The opening shot and the archetypal opening action sequence are dripping with irony and take the audience through the now cliché action movie emotional progression of visceral exaltation, rage, and pathos. The film would have been only mildly entertaining had Parker and Stone looked no further than to string a series of action movie vignettes and parodies together with the aim of a comedy of errors. Parker and Stone do, but for only a delightfully brief time, entertain the politically prickly theme of America’s finest inadvertently destroying the people they had come to save (whether this is a case of Pax Romana or keystone cops, the jury will need to decide). But they press on to greener pastures, and despite never passing up an opportunity to explicitly or implicitly joke about bodily cavities or their issue Parker and Stone show remarkable confidence in the intelligence and worldliness of their audience. How many jokes have you seen about Hans Blix?

“Team America” has a by no means bad or unfunny plot with the kind of artfully stylized scenes that one can only find in animation. As always, the potty humour is complimented by an equally insightful critique. The climax of “Team America” occurs when teammember Gary Johnson is able to overcome his fears and self-doubt and rise to the occasion. He grabs hold of the piece of wisdom found while at his lowest, and uses it to articulate one of the most satisfying and genuine justifications for a robust US foreign policy I have seen to date. I only wish I could believe its sincerity. Michael Moore was, of course, included among the satirised cameos of actors targeted for having committed a variety of treasonous leftist thought-crimes. That Moore was singled out for the role of Judas came as only a slight surprise, although I would think that even the likes of Parker and Stone could come up with someone a bit higher up the food chain; like Noam Chomsky for example. I’m not even sure if I saw Jon Stewart in there anywhere.

I don’t see how "Team America" can be at all critiqued on the grounds that it trivializes the war on terrorism. Quite the contrary. Parker and Stone provide a discomfortingly technically and politically realistic scenario, and even crude images of destruction and despair do, in some way, nevertheless speak of destruction and despair. Ironically, while Parker and Stone have the reputations of being the archrebels of the entertainment industry, their political orientation is ultimately of a charismatically flawed though generally well-intended American agenda, and thus is about as subversive as motherhood and apple pie.

Current Mood: calm

01:20 pm - P2P legislation

Technologyreview.com reports that yet another run at controlling file sharing is on the table in Congress. The Intellectual Property Protection Act is a particularly broad bill touching on a number of different elements of intellectual property issues. Among the more troublesome parts, however, is the criminalisation of file sharing even if no copyright infringement is taking place (for example by making available a file on a local network under "fair use" terms).

Obviously such legislation will find vocal supports among interested parties such as the RIAA, who seem to be all bent out of shape over people freely sharing music that they couldn't pay me to listen to. But I'm particularly troubled by the targeting of file sharing in particular. While I'm certain that a considerable proportion of P2P are used for activities that are likely violations of copyright, that is not their sole enterprise. P2P also provide a means to distribute open-source and other freely available material that do not have the same copyright or licensing demands. It is entirely possible to use P2P networks to share files that does not result in a copyright violation. Having said that, criminalising P2P software is a bit like criminalising automobiles capable of driving faster than the speed limit, or guns, or telephones on the grounds that they could be used to break the law.

Such a blanket attack on P2P or other file sharing software and applications at best neglects the presumption of innocence and, at worst, is yet another interest-based (rather than well-thought-out-rational) attack on open source developers and the fair use of media.

04:24 pm - Sovereignty and a stronger mandate

As the GOP has made quite clear, not only did GWB win the election despite pointed criticism over the handling of Iraq (the before, during, and after), controversial tax cuts of questionable benefit to the middle and lower classes, and directing an at best regressive and at worse potentially disastrous energy policy, he now enjoys an even stronger mandate than he had in 2000. There are strategic advantages to having some consistency during wartime; and not only is the administration in the middle of fighting two wars, but the case of North Korea can rightly be considered an emergency, and the Iranian clerics seem to be a little self-conscious at not yet doing their part to properly intimidate the infidel West.

The US election should be a lesson to the ROW (and I am directing this particularly against my own country as well). If you don't like the way the US operates, then come up with an alternative (I don't mean that to sound snarky after all, I don't like the way they operate). The French and Germans, while making a fair attempt to mend fences with GWB will, I expect, nevertheless indulge in more than their fair share of chauvenistic and unhelpful pooh-poohing. If there is any lesson to be learned from patterns in US foreign policy, it's that it will put its own perceived interests before all other considerations; including those of "friends and allies." I'd be genuinely surprised if any significant number of US voters really worried about the impact their President would have on the ROW when casting their ballots. It's up the the ROW to protect their its own interests.

There's much to be lost (like, I guess, everything), but also much to be gained. Somebody's going to have to get their hands dirty and somebody's going to have to pay the bill. Security, the environment, energy, global trade, and the question of how differing political, religious, and cultural entities will share the same space and resources are all on the table. The majority of those challenges are not solved by having the greatest military in history, but rather by having level-headed, sensible, creative, and intelligent people working in good faith and out in the open. States that have progressive health, education, environmental, and childhood development programmes will have a distinct advantage on these issues. In the case of my own country, we're going to need to invest heavily in defence and research and development while maintaining our social programmes (a tall order, but by no means impossible). That may mean that more people will simply have to take less things for granted.

With the ever-increasing likelihood that Yasser Arafat will in short order cease to be a relevant political player in the ongoing strife between Israel and Palestine, a long-awaited opportunity is now within reach. The Palestinian extremists need to be isolated, or must become integrated into the political process in exchange of their renunciation of violence, and Palestinian moderates who have a support base other than extremists need to be cultivated. Part of that may (likely will) involve ensuring the security of Palestinians who would dare negotiate with "the enemy," or who are prepared to settle for anything other than the complete destruction of Israel. My understanding is that the vast majority of Israelis and Palestinians are, indeed, moderate and are prepared to negotiate a settlement. Enough innocent souls have been devoured by the Holy Land. Now is an unprecedented opportunity, provided both sides play their cards right. In all likelihood help from nations other than Israel and Palestine will be necessary to either serve as diplomatic intermediaries or disinterested observers to help things from once again flying off the rails

The international community has been slow and timid in their policy on Darfur. Perhaps countries are waiting for the United States to commit troops and then follow along behind supplying field hospitals and cheerleaders. After all the breastbeating and teethgnashing that occurred over Rwanda, and so many misty eyes vowing "never again," it's happening again. According to Romeo Dallaire, only 5000 troops would have been required to secure Rwanda. If Canada (or the ROW for that matter) is to be good for anything other than bourgeois rhetoric, it will need to back up its words. Given Canada's humanitarian ideology, and being a relatively wealthy country with a respectable military, any concern about Rwanda or similar tragedies should be backed up with specific policy changes. Rwanda should be the acid test. Canada should make it a priority to have the legal and strategic infrastructure in place so that should a situation like Rwanda, or Darfur, arise again, with the UN's blessing (or, perhaps without) we would be willing and able to commit 5000 troops in a reasonable period of time to secure the area: by ourselves.

Sovereignty starts with having the confidence, wisdom, creativity, and resources to solve real problems.

Current Mood: aggravated