WhirledView

WhirledView Finds Cosmos in Bhutan: A Picture Story

By Patricia Lee Sharpe

We needed a logo for WhirledView, something attractive, evocative and, above all, memorable. We considered the solar system, but the planets weren’t inspiring enough, so we expanded our scope. We thought of galaxies, those great swirling clusters of billions of stars that are mere smudges of brilliance against blackness to observers without a telescope.

We’d be the telescopes, of course, scanning the vast info array that dances around us, connecting dots to make constellations of sense from apparent chaos.

It was my job to contact an astronomer. “Where,” I asked my sky-scanning son, “can we find suitable images in the public domain?”

He suggested the NASA website among others that would have been obvious, if I were an astrophysicist, a cosmologist. “Piece of cake,” I thought, much too optimistically.

Googling as directed, I drooled over the star-studded images that arrive courtesy of the Hubble space telescope, which NASA has condemned to a premature death. Reduced to blog size, unfortunately, these logo candidates had all the pizzaz of mud smeared on a picture window. Science, it seemed, was letting WhirledView down.

But there are other sources for cosmology.

I’d visited Bhutan in September and October, the month before we started WhirledView, filling flash card after flash card with digital photos. Presciently I’d taken several shots of an intriguing wall painting I encountered during a visit to the ancient dzong in Punakha.

Punakha is an Eden of a valley toward the center of Bhutan. Thanks to its low altitude, about 4500 feet, it's stepped with rice paddies that were golden with ripening grain when I was there. The subtropical climate explains why Punakha was the winter capital of Bhutan for 300 years, which in turn explains the elaboration of older structures into the existing impressive dzong.

A dzong is a traditional administrative and monastic center. The one in Punakha, erected in 1637, stands at the confluence of the Pho and Mo rivers, an auspicious site traversed by Guru Rinpoche, also known as Padma Sambhava, when he brought Buddhism to Tibet and its neighbors in the eighth century.

Dzongs are lavishly embellished with ornamental woodwork. Symbol-rich painting adorns most every surface. One eye-catching wall painting at Punakha had, for its central element, a cosmological design or mandala that suggested the solar system.

Sadly for photographers lacking very very wide angle lenses, this huge painting faced a narrow porch fronting on a courtyard shaded by a sternly-pruned Boddhi tree with world-embracing ambitions. I perched on the railing, leaning back as far as I dared, camera in hand. I squatted in the courtyard below and aimed up. I tried to eliminate dark roof shadows. No matter how I positioned myself, I couldn’t capture the whole length and breadth of it in one bright, glorious shot.

So I nibbled away at the painting, photographically, getting the mountains, the clouds, the sky, the vegetation, along with, always, a portion of that fascinating mandala.

This was the painting I recalled, in a flash of delight and relief, while I sat staring glumly at the featureless reductions of space telescope images that had been so thrilling in larger sizes.

I scrolled through my picture files and voila! The Punakha mandala, very slightly cropped, was indeed just what we needed for the WhirledView logo. Had I experienced mysterious intimations of a logo-needing-blog-to-be the day I put myself through such physical contortions to focus my camera? The psychic stuff, I mean. Of course not. I’m just interested in science. I raised scientist sons. And yet, what a wonderful coincidence!

This shot of the logo-yielding painting at Punakha dzong shows the annoying railing, but, more important, it illustrates a highly cherished aspect of Bhutanese culture, the Tale of the Four Friends.

Here’s the story: an elephant, a rabbit, a monkey and a goose planted a seed which grew into a towering tree laden with luscious fruit. Unfortunately not even the elephant, with his long trunk, could reach the fruit. But four is better than one, according to Bhutan's Buddhist-based folk culture. Like acrobats, the friends climbed one on top of the other, the bulkiest at the bottom, the lightest at the top. When the topmost succeeded in plucking a mouth-watering fruit, he immediately shared it with his friends. So all the friends ate well and were happy.

Perhaps we should read this story to our own children and grandchildren.

Now, we of WhirledView are three friends, not four, but we hope you are enjoying the fruit we select for your delectation.

And here is one final painting from Punakha dzong. We'd like to think you savor our blog with a little serenity, a cup of tea perhaps, or a pleasant glass of wine at desk- or lapside. Though we aren't and never will be sages or gurus, we hope a little wisdom creeps in, off and on, in spite of ourselves.

(Clicking on images will enlarge them, though some cropping will occur.)

Reagan and Gorbachev: How the Cold War Ended

Reviewed by CKR

The photo on the dust jacket says something about this book. Glance at it once, and you see Ronald Reagan telling a joke to Mikhail Gorbachev, who seems to be anticipating the punch line with pleasure. Look a little longer, and you see two shadowy presences: the whisper-interpreters who make the conversation possible. Look again, though, and it’s clear that it is Reagan and Gorbachev who are carrying on the conversation; even the postures of the faceless interpreters mimic those of the principals: both feet flat on the floor for the Soviets, the left hand on the knee for the Americans.

The author, Jack Matlock, is a career diplomat, which means that he served both Democratic and Republican administrations with an ethos of allegiance to his country rather than to a party. He tells the story of the principals and the people who worked behind the scenes on, but he gives the credit for ending the Cold War to Reagan and Gorbachev.

Reagan and Gorbachev both possessed strong visions of a future. That future was one in which the arms race of the Cold War and the constant threat of world destruction were no more. Reagan and Gorbachev accomplished those goals to give us the world we now live in.

But other threats have arisen, and the goal that both men wanted, nuclear weapons abolished by the year 2000, is nowhere close. In order to make this a safer world, we need to consider how Reagan and Gorbachev defused the crises of their day.

It’s tempting to attribute large historical events to the individuals involved. We are fortunate to have had men like Reagan and Gorbachev in office when they were, but Matlock shows that it was not simply force of personality nor rhetoric nor the more memorable incidents—“Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” or the apparent failure of the summit at Reykjavik—that propelled the history of the 1980s.

Matlock begins the story in 1981 and considers the Cold War to have ended when the Soviet Union gave up applying the idea of class warfare (expressed in the phrase “peaceful coexistence”) to foreign policy, a point he also made in his previous book, Autopsy on an Empire. He sketches events through the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 and the fall of the Soviet Union, but these were consequences of the ending of the Cold War.

The contrasts with recent events are many. Reagan showed great patience and focus on his goals as events in the Soviet Union initially foiled his desire for a substantive dialog. He and Gorbachev needed time to understand each other, and there were many difficulties along the way. Movement toward disarmament was fitful and foiled by the bureaucracies on both sides. Both men had to pull their subordinates back to the paths toward their visions.

In his epilogue, Matlock makes some of these contrasts clear.

If there is a lesson in the outcome of the Cold War other than the fallacy of Marxist ideology and the bankruptcy of the Communist system of rule, it is that a country cannot for long guarantee its own safety by the military domination of others. Security in today’s world, as Mikhail Gorbachev came to understand, can be found only if countries cooperate to achieve it.

This is an outstanding book and a gripping read. I recommend it to those who believe that George Bush is following in Reagan’s footsteps, to those who believe Reagan was a dangerous fool, and to anyone who is interested in learning how to avoid war and move the world toward peace.

The Oceans Hum, What Corn Oil Tells Us about Genetics, and Neandertal Sex

by CKR

The 4 February Science magazine reports on a symposium at the fall American Geophysical Union meeting where scientists compared notes on the seismic activity they can pick up from the oceans’ waves. Long considered a nuisance in seismometers, the low-level seismic activity of waves slapping the shore can now be associated with storms, as well as give information about the temperature of the earth’s crust and El Ninos past. If you want more technical details try Googling ocean waves microseisms at Google Scholar.

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Some varieties of corn have been bred for oil production for more than a century. Now scientists from the University of Illinois and Monsanto have taken a look at what that has done to the genome of those varieties. What they found correlates with studies on body size in poultry and may have broad ramifications. Although a single trait (corn oil production, body weight) was selected for in both cases, several areas of the genome contributed to the result. For corn oil, about fifty locations on ten chromosomes participate, and thirteen locations for poultry body weight.

This says that the findings of a “gay gene” or “God gene” are highly suspect. If many genome locations contribute to a characteristic as simple as corn oil production, then behavior is hardly likely to be a result of a single gene.

Tying this to the surprisingly small number of genes found in the human genome (between 20,000 and 30,000), it also supports the idea that interaction among genes is at least as important as the individual genes.

Sorry, couldn’t find a good link to the overall story. Reported in the 4 February Science, subscription only.

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The skeletons of Neandertals show them to be quite distinct from modern humans (people like you and me), but both types lived in some of the same places, like the Middle East, at the same times. So the first thing many of us have wondered about them is if they had sex. At a meeting on Neandertals in New York in late January, reported in the 11 February Science, paleoanthropologists said the DNA evidence was that the two had probably stayed separate, although there was maybe some sex around the edge that may have transferred, say, genes for pale skin color, since the Neandertals seem to have made it to the north before the others did. Trent Holliday of Tulane University in New Orleans said, “If you’re counting on humans not to mate, you’ll be very disappointed.”

Sorry, no good links again, but here’s a selection from Google Scholar.

John Negroponte?

By Patricia H. Kushlis

The appointment of Ambassador John Negroponte, the Bush Administration’s fourth choice for the nation’s first intelligence czar (National Director of Intelligence), was announced with great fanfare on Thursday. The President finally found someone willing to take on what is likely to be one of the administration’s toughest positions over the next four years.

Did Negroponte take this difficult job because he sought a new challenge or because he wanted out of Iraq as some have speculated inside Foggy Bottom’s endless corridors? Perhaps both or neither. But it’s unlikely that he sought out this thankless position for personal publicity because that is not his style. And at 65 years old, one wonders if he still hungers for career advancement.

Many people greeted Negroponte’s appointment with enthusiasm, or at least relief that one of Bush’s neocons had not been named instead. They point to Negroponte’s lengthy professional diplomatic career during which he served as Ambassador at several large and difficult posts and well before that as a junior officer in 1960s Vietnam. They stress his strong management skills, demonstrated willingness to defend the administration’s policy line – regardless of administration or line - and no-nonsense approach to work.

As with almost every appointment, there are critics, and although Negroponte’s appointment is expected to slide like glass through the Senate confirmation process, it’s worth looking a little more closely at the man, his history, his critics and the potential pitfalls that come with this demanding new post.

Where to begin?

A House-for-a-House Beats an Eye-for-an-Eye in Palestine

By Patricia Lee Sharpe

Good sense triumphs, at last: Israel has decided to abandon the policy of retaliatory house-demolishing in Palestine. That ugly process worked like this: a sixteen-year-old kid gets suckered into the suicide-bomber syndrome. Although his father, mother and all his siblings are apolitical, the family house is bulldozed. Over the years there were many other security-related excuses for reducing whole districts of Palestinian housing to rubble.

Obviously the Israeli bulldozer dispatchers never believed that such a tough love policy would convert a homeless family and all their friends, relatives and neighbors into Israel boosters. They couldn’t be that stupid.

But house-razing is a terrific way to accomplish ethnic cleansing, to clear the land for more Israeli settlement. Get rid of the beautiful old stone houses! Get rid of those land-greedy old olive groves! Like the Afghan Taliban destroying the famous ancient Buddhist sculpture in Bamiyan, get rid of as much guilt-inducing physical evidence of Palestinian history and culture as possible!

Yasir Arafat played into this policy, as did many of his rivals, who are still on the scene. He would and they will "save" Palestine by getting it destroyed, stone by stone.

However, anyone sensible could see that the mutual eye-for-an-eye policy was a lose-lose proposition. The Palestinians weren’t cowed, and Israel was having a hard time retaining its hold on the moral high ground, although none but the ruthless righteous condone the killing of ordinary shoppers or school bus riders or people taking tea at a café. Palestinian violence had been indiscriminate, but the response had been disproportionate.

So innocents were suffering on both sides. Even the notorious fence hadn’t stopped all the killing. Kudos go to Ariel Sharon for deciding to remove settlements from Gaza. But the idea of razing abandoned settler homes is a bad one, for all the reasons pointed out by Walter Isaacson in his op-ed piece in the Times on February 18. It’s good housing. A scorched-earth approach to pulling out of Gaza will cancel out the good will generated by the policy itself.

Let the new policy be a-house-for-a-house, then, and let there be no more flirting with the notion of collective guilt. It’s too reminiscent of the times when Jews were killed just because they were Jews. Palestinians, too, deserve to be judged on the basis of what they have actually done, not because they have relatives who are guilty of crimes, even murder.

Photos from Estonia

by CKR

We at WhirledView have been talking about brightening up the page with a few more pictures. We've also been concerned about getting too serious. It's hard not to, of course, with the depth of mismanagement you see most places you look in the world, but all Bush and no smiles make Cheryl a dull girl.

So, to check out some of TypePad's capabilities, I'm going to share some of my photos of Estonia. Last night I dreamed I got on a plane, no baggage, just bought an instant ticket to Paris, with the intention of buying onward passage and some clothes when I got there. I was in Estonia at this time last year, and maybe it's time to go back.

This is from that trip. I was surprised that the swans stayed that far north for the winter, but the water in the Gulf of Finland usually doesn't ice over near Talllinn.

Last year's Independence Day (Iseseisvuspäev) celebration in Vabaduse Väljak (Freedom Square), Tallinn.

Old Town (Vanalinn), Tallinn, during Laulupidu (Song Festival) last summer.

Flowers in a cornfield. Omigosh, the flowers are so wonderful in summer, and everywhere...

The atomic monument and Palace of Culture in Sillamäe, where the Soviets located a uranium-processing plant that the Estonians are now cleaning up and making into an industrial park. The first company located there reclaims lead from batteries.

Tartu, near the University. The Heino Eller Music School, named for a well-loved Estonian composer, the teacher of Arvo Pärt and others, is on the left.

Bloggers "Sitting in Pajamas" Awake! A Judge Balks at the Really Free Press

By Patricia Lee Sharpe

That’s Judge David B. Sentelle, of the federal appeals court in Washington, who says that Judith Miller of the New York Times and Matthew Cooper of Time magazine must go to jail if they continue to refuse to divulge sources to a grand jury investigating the leak of a C.I.A. operative’s name. The prosecutor hopes the two will squeal to save themselves from serving time.

This decision is ominous enough for the prospect of a well-informed American public. But Judge Sentelle and his two colleagues on the bench went further. The proliferation of journalistic voices made possible by the Internet frightens them. “The judges debated,” according to the New York Times for February 16, “whether some sort of legal protection of reporters is even feasible in the Internet era.”

It was Judge Sentelle who asked:

Does the privilege also protect the proprietor of a Web log:
the stereotypical “blogger” sitting [in] his pajamas at his
personal computer posting on the World Wide Web his
best product to inform whoever happens to browse his way?

I seldom write in pajamas myself, but the judge’s scornful phrasing of the question can’t be ignored. Has Judge Sentelle never heard of Marcel Proust, who wrote A Remembrance of Things Past mostly in bed?

Maybe future judges don’t read literature. Maybe they also don’t read American history.

Has Judge Sentelle never heard of Peter Zenger, one of the heros of American journalism, the gutsy guy who ran an unofficial, which is to say “personal” little press in New York during the colonial period? He’s the one who was tried for seditious libel. He printed a truth the royal governor didn’t like. Since revolution was already in the air, Zenger was acquitted. The soon-to-be born United States of America was going to have an unmuzzled press, which some of us still cherish. If Zenger were living today, he’d be a blogger.

Benjamin Franklin also churned out newspapers that weren’t always popular with the powers-that-be. In fact, those were the great days of pamphleteering in England, too. Think of Thomas Paine. Think of Addison and Steele and so many others we still read and admire. They were lone wolves, often, and fiercely partisan, but they were often right.

They were the bloggers of their day.

Over the past decade or more, the major newspapers and TV networks on which we used to depend for news have cut back on editorial staff. As family-owned newspapers have gone public or been bought by chains and once-independent networks have been gobbled up by corporate behemoths, higher profits have been demanded and less has been invested in news gathering and presentation. There are fewer foreign bureaus, fewer reporters for investigative journalism, fewer feet (and keyboard fingers) pounding the national, state and city beats. The loss in depth and breadth of news is staggering. Ben Bagdikian and others have described it.

Suddenly, however, the information is flowing again. Computer science, modern telecommunications and a bumptious democratic spirit have converged to make possible a journalistic revolution that has traditionalists like Judge Sentelle reeling.

We bloggers don’t need millions to start a newspaper. We don’t even need advertisers, which means we are free of commercial pressures. All we need is a vision, a computer and a modest facility with words. And so we sit down and type out the hard questions that are going unasked. We ferret out the facts and add up the numbers, doing the research the commercial media hasn’t done. And then we deliver the information to the public; we get the much needed debate going. What’s so wrong, so scary about that?

Many bloggers are egoistic, superficial, opinionated, rude, crude and irresponsible, you say?

True. But too many political discussions on TV are nothing more than shout shows, and studies indicate that most local TV stations devoted more time to car crashes than to the election last fall. Reality television is not exactly edifying either. The magazine racks are full of fluff for both sexes, and need I mention the checkout counter tabloids? As for best-selling books, they tend to cluster in the self-help category. How, then, can blogging be held responsible for demeaning the quality of discourse in the United States?

Bloggers, so far from being a threat, may well be the heartening sign of a revival of substantive discourse and robust public debate that pundits have been calling for. They’ve simply been looking in all the wrong places. The "missing" public intellectuals in America are bloggers, and we are very much alive, airing the issues in this vast electronic cafe.

Meanwhile, we bloggers need to make common cause with our colleagues in the print media on free press issues. If Miller and Cooper go to jail for protecting sources that serve to inform a public this government prefers to keep in the dark, we’ll be next.

Finally, there’s the matter of Robert Novak. He’s the conservative columnist who actually printed Valerie’s Plume’s name, yet the government isn’t prosecuting him. Absent any explanation to the contrary, it’s hard not to conclude that only liberal or independent voices are to be stifled.

All the more reason to hail the advent of blogs and e-zines, the newest media for ensuring a well-informed public--until autocracy-minded judges like Mr. Sentelle figure out how to muffle electronic journalism, too.

Fear This! Uh, No, Don't

By CKR

The annual ruckus is on about the plutonium mass balance at Sellafield, Britain's nuclear reprocessing center. The Times has one of the better articles that explains the issues involved.

The plutonium is tracked through processing by the radiation it emits, from which the amount of plutonium can be calculated. But the radiation is attenuated by what it has to pass through--lumps of material and solutions are harder to measure than thin layers and pure material. So errors occur and accumulate. This year's error is 30 kilograms, higher than usual. Because the size of the error will vary statistically, one higher error is not surprising.

The media love to say that 30 kilograms is enough for your unfriendly local terrorist to manufacture seven or eight or ten bombs, and you just don't ever know where that 30 kilograms is, do you? Sells papers. And they can do it every year, when the yearly inventory figures are published.

That 30 kilograms is a small amount of the total processed. Now maybe that's something to think about.