Dr. DeGregori at U of H has an excellent wrap-up on the technology of modern food production:
http://www.butterfliesandwheels.com/articleprint.php?num=50
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Monday, April 16, 2007
Great Reading
Just finished Gates of Fire, by Steven Pressfield. Terrific! I'll probably pick up his others this summer.
He's here, by the way: http://www.stevenpressfield.com/
He's here, by the way: http://www.stevenpressfield.com/
Jackie Robinson
Trapped at home doing grades this weekend, I had the TV on. The sports channels, especially those that carry baseball, were wall-to-wall Jackie Robinson, and rightly so. I think his achievement and character become more significant as time passes in this country. However, there was NOTHING on the regular news channels. Once again, the news networks prove their utter lack of a clue.
Congratulations to MLB--you got this one right!
Congratulations to MLB--you got this one right!
Monday, February 19, 2007
The True Treasure of Sierra Madre
[Peg and Al are teachers. Late on a Tuesday afternoon Peg enters the lounge to find Al nuking a package of popcorn.]
Peg: That smells good, Al--reminds me that it's almost dinner time.
Al: I've got to finish my lesson plans for the week and this is some pretty good quiet time, so I'll have this snack as I work on them. If they've started playing, I might check in on the basketball team before heading out.
Peg: It's movie night for me. My sister usually drops in with a video. We fix a big antipasto and some warm bread.
Al: Now that sounds like a plan. What's the film tonight?
Peg: I told her to surprise me. I have no clue, but she usually picks out something good, since she keeps track of all the new releases.
Al: My current movie viewing is really limited, but I did watch a great oldie over the weekend: "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre."
Peg: I don't care for those old things--they're just too primitive and dated for me. There aren't any women in that one, either.
Al: I hadn't looked at it that way--do you think that makes it sexist, too?
Peg: Probably.
Al: Wait a minute--there are some women in the story.
Peg: You were seeing things.
Al: No, no, I'm not--there are at least . . . three.
Peg: Where?
Al: That crooked businessman--the Irish guy--who swindles Dobbs and Curtin out of their wages for building that oil camp: when they meet back up with him in Tampico, he has a girl on his arm. Of course, she's probably a prostitute, since he doesn't remember her name and she has to correct him.
Peg: THAT woman doesn't help your case at all--a film with one woman, in the minor role of a prostitute!
Al: But the scene has a point--she's exploited, too, just like Dobbs and Curtin and many other poor laborers.
Peg: So you're saying the film is secretly a feminist manifesto?
Al: I didn't say that, but it might be about exploitation, and that certainly has a gender aspect to it.
Peg: True, but I'm not convinced that the story is as progressive as you say. Besides--you said there were three women, not one. How do you figure?
Al: The second woman has a whole monologue in the story.
Peg: You're dreaming.
Al: No. Remember Cody--the fourth drifter who tried to blackmail his way into the partnership with Dobbs, Curtin and Howard?
Peg: Maybe. And that wonderful trio of exploited heroes plots to kill him in cold blood to protect their gold. Truly a sordid tale.
Al: After Cody gets killed in the gunfight with the banditos, the other three check his wallet and find that letter from his wife, who has let him go on this gold adventure while she tends to their farm, orchard and family.
Peg: There--you see? An oppressed housewife waiting for Mister Bacon Earner to make his triumphant return, money bags and all.
Al: But he doesn't, does he? Try it this way--a strong, loving voice of conscience calling all the dreamers back to reality. And even Cody's listened, I think, because he's willing to try that desperate gamble with the guys on the mountain--apparently at the risk of his life. You'd have to think that reading her letter at least helps convince the troop to leave the mountain--and at the end of the story gives Curtin, who is much wiser now, a mission of hope for his future. It's not all perfectly symmetrical, but I think it might be an apt and just resolution, and it gives this woman a voice in the story.
Peg: So, Curtin's going to swap the hunt for gold for the pursuit of a domesticated little woman?
Al: He's swapping greed for something much more human. I'd bet the human side won't leave him as empty as the gold-lust does.
Peg: I'm not sure I buy that. But, O.K., where's the third woman?
Al: This one's a stretch--be ready.
Peg: I should have known.
Al: The third woman is Gaia, Howard's goddess. She creates, gives and takes away. Of course, only Howard acknowledges this powerful female, courts her and knows her ways.
Peg: Huh?
Al: The earth--the mine--the mountain--the Sierra Madre--the Mother.
Peg: I don't see it, and I'm not sure I want to.
Al: Answer this: where will Howard wind up at the end?
Peg: He says he'll go with the Indians. They'll treat him like a chief or something.
Al: Not a chief; a shaman, healer, medicine man--someone who knows the wisdom of Mother Nature, by whatever names the Indians know her and her totems.
Peg: Just because he revives that little boy? Even he says it's common knowledge, Boy-Scout tricks.
Al: I'm not sure it's actually that he heals--he does acknowledge the Indians' request and is open to them in ways none of the other adventurers are. He shows a rapport with the Indians, and they call and ordain him their shaman.
Peg: It's a nice gimmick, but I have a feeling there's more to this story.
Al: Sure, because there's more to Howard. His values, especially in the end, are very different. You couldn't imagine either Dobbs or Curtin doing anything other than they did when the
Indians came to ask for help, could you?
Peg: Of course not.
Al: He's the only one at that point for whom the issue of the gold is something that has a chance of being transcended. Howard's getting over his sickness already.
Peg: He's got a different attitude toward the gold at the end, too. I guess you have to put in the same ballpark the issue of his uproarious laughter, when he and Curtin figure out that with Dobbs the gold is gone for good, too.
Al: That's the incident that actually pointed me in his direction. He's the key antagonist to Dobbs and the key to the whole of the story's meaning. Howard heals; Dobbs gets sicker and sicker, mentally and physically, as the story wears on. The improvement in Howard's appearance opposes the decline in Dobbs'.
Peg: You're stretching again.
Al: I don't think so. When Howard gets into the wilderness and on the mountain, even Dobbs and Curtin have a little conversation about Howard's surprising energy and youthfulness. Dobbs says he's like a mountain goat.
Peg: So Howard has this special relationship with the Indians because he is in better touch with nature?
Al: In a way, yes. Howard's in better touch with HIS nature, at least. So there's one sort of theme: compassion is the opposite of greed and selfishness. Compassion heals and greed is a sickness--at least of the soul. The characters' physical appearance in the movie is a great metaphor that points to the moral of the story. Howard understands nature and human nature. He knows himself and his "connectedness" with things much better than the others know theirs.
Peg: I suppose that would explain that strange scene that's always bothered me--why Howard stops on the descent from the mountain and makes the party salute "her" for giving them the gold.
Al: It's real incongruous--almost out of place.
Peg: I know you'll tell me that makes it important, because films have no accidents, or something like that.
Al: Sure. Great films are completely intentional. No accidents. Every detail is in a place where the director thinks it belongs. When something seems to stick out oddly, it deserves attention. So, on the thesis that this is a great film, things like the salute to the mountain, the boy's healing and Howard's uproarious scene at the end are windows into John Huston's mind.
Peg: So you think that this is more than a tale of greed and how "the love of money is the root of all evil"?
Al: Yeah, I think it's much more than that. Of course, the tale of greed is there to carry the story and prevent it from being, umm, preachy.
Peg: But there is an agenda.
Al: That's not a bad thing. All art portrays an observation about reality, life, nature, society, the human psyche, good and evil, gender, and the intentions of the human heart. --Are you sure you don't want any popcorn?
Peg: No, I've got to get rolling. My sister's probably waiting for me to show up. I may stop and pick up some popcorn on the way, however. Now I really wonder what film she's coming over with.
Al: Whatever it is, enjoy it. Don't forget the popcorn!
Peg: That smells good, Al--reminds me that it's almost dinner time.
Al: I've got to finish my lesson plans for the week and this is some pretty good quiet time, so I'll have this snack as I work on them. If they've started playing, I might check in on the basketball team before heading out.
Peg: It's movie night for me. My sister usually drops in with a video. We fix a big antipasto and some warm bread.
Al: Now that sounds like a plan. What's the film tonight?
Peg: I told her to surprise me. I have no clue, but she usually picks out something good, since she keeps track of all the new releases.
Al: My current movie viewing is really limited, but I did watch a great oldie over the weekend: "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre."
Peg: I don't care for those old things--they're just too primitive and dated for me. There aren't any women in that one, either.
Al: I hadn't looked at it that way--do you think that makes it sexist, too?
Peg: Probably.
Al: Wait a minute--there are some women in the story.
Peg: You were seeing things.
Al: No, no, I'm not--there are at least . . . three.
Peg: Where?
Al: That crooked businessman--the Irish guy--who swindles Dobbs and Curtin out of their wages for building that oil camp: when they meet back up with him in Tampico, he has a girl on his arm. Of course, she's probably a prostitute, since he doesn't remember her name and she has to correct him.
Peg: THAT woman doesn't help your case at all--a film with one woman, in the minor role of a prostitute!
Al: But the scene has a point--she's exploited, too, just like Dobbs and Curtin and many other poor laborers.
Peg: So you're saying the film is secretly a feminist manifesto?
Al: I didn't say that, but it might be about exploitation, and that certainly has a gender aspect to it.
Peg: True, but I'm not convinced that the story is as progressive as you say. Besides--you said there were three women, not one. How do you figure?
Al: The second woman has a whole monologue in the story.
Peg: You're dreaming.
Al: No. Remember Cody--the fourth drifter who tried to blackmail his way into the partnership with Dobbs, Curtin and Howard?
Peg: Maybe. And that wonderful trio of exploited heroes plots to kill him in cold blood to protect their gold. Truly a sordid tale.
Al: After Cody gets killed in the gunfight with the banditos, the other three check his wallet and find that letter from his wife, who has let him go on this gold adventure while she tends to their farm, orchard and family.
Peg: There--you see? An oppressed housewife waiting for Mister Bacon Earner to make his triumphant return, money bags and all.
Al: But he doesn't, does he? Try it this way--a strong, loving voice of conscience calling all the dreamers back to reality. And even Cody's listened, I think, because he's willing to try that desperate gamble with the guys on the mountain--apparently at the risk of his life. You'd have to think that reading her letter at least helps convince the troop to leave the mountain--and at the end of the story gives Curtin, who is much wiser now, a mission of hope for his future. It's not all perfectly symmetrical, but I think it might be an apt and just resolution, and it gives this woman a voice in the story.
Peg: So, Curtin's going to swap the hunt for gold for the pursuit of a domesticated little woman?
Al: He's swapping greed for something much more human. I'd bet the human side won't leave him as empty as the gold-lust does.
Peg: I'm not sure I buy that. But, O.K., where's the third woman?
Al: This one's a stretch--be ready.
Peg: I should have known.
Al: The third woman is Gaia, Howard's goddess. She creates, gives and takes away. Of course, only Howard acknowledges this powerful female, courts her and knows her ways.
Peg: Huh?
Al: The earth--the mine--the mountain--the Sierra Madre--the Mother.
Peg: I don't see it, and I'm not sure I want to.
Al: Answer this: where will Howard wind up at the end?
Peg: He says he'll go with the Indians. They'll treat him like a chief or something.
Al: Not a chief; a shaman, healer, medicine man--someone who knows the wisdom of Mother Nature, by whatever names the Indians know her and her totems.
Peg: Just because he revives that little boy? Even he says it's common knowledge, Boy-Scout tricks.
Al: I'm not sure it's actually that he heals--he does acknowledge the Indians' request and is open to them in ways none of the other adventurers are. He shows a rapport with the Indians, and they call and ordain him their shaman.
Peg: It's a nice gimmick, but I have a feeling there's more to this story.
Al: Sure, because there's more to Howard. His values, especially in the end, are very different. You couldn't imagine either Dobbs or Curtin doing anything other than they did when the
Indians came to ask for help, could you?
Peg: Of course not.
Al: He's the only one at that point for whom the issue of the gold is something that has a chance of being transcended. Howard's getting over his sickness already.
Peg: He's got a different attitude toward the gold at the end, too. I guess you have to put in the same ballpark the issue of his uproarious laughter, when he and Curtin figure out that with Dobbs the gold is gone for good, too.
Al: That's the incident that actually pointed me in his direction. He's the key antagonist to Dobbs and the key to the whole of the story's meaning. Howard heals; Dobbs gets sicker and sicker, mentally and physically, as the story wears on. The improvement in Howard's appearance opposes the decline in Dobbs'.
Peg: You're stretching again.
Al: I don't think so. When Howard gets into the wilderness and on the mountain, even Dobbs and Curtin have a little conversation about Howard's surprising energy and youthfulness. Dobbs says he's like a mountain goat.
Peg: So Howard has this special relationship with the Indians because he is in better touch with nature?
Al: In a way, yes. Howard's in better touch with HIS nature, at least. So there's one sort of theme: compassion is the opposite of greed and selfishness. Compassion heals and greed is a sickness--at least of the soul. The characters' physical appearance in the movie is a great metaphor that points to the moral of the story. Howard understands nature and human nature. He knows himself and his "connectedness" with things much better than the others know theirs.
Peg: I suppose that would explain that strange scene that's always bothered me--why Howard stops on the descent from the mountain and makes the party salute "her" for giving them the gold.
Al: It's real incongruous--almost out of place.
Peg: I know you'll tell me that makes it important, because films have no accidents, or something like that.
Al: Sure. Great films are completely intentional. No accidents. Every detail is in a place where the director thinks it belongs. When something seems to stick out oddly, it deserves attention. So, on the thesis that this is a great film, things like the salute to the mountain, the boy's healing and Howard's uproarious scene at the end are windows into John Huston's mind.
Peg: So you think that this is more than a tale of greed and how "the love of money is the root of all evil"?
Al: Yeah, I think it's much more than that. Of course, the tale of greed is there to carry the story and prevent it from being, umm, preachy.
Peg: But there is an agenda.
Al: That's not a bad thing. All art portrays an observation about reality, life, nature, society, the human psyche, good and evil, gender, and the intentions of the human heart. --Are you sure you don't want any popcorn?
Peg: No, I've got to get rolling. My sister's probably waiting for me to show up. I may stop and pick up some popcorn on the way, however. Now I really wonder what film she's coming over with.
Al: Whatever it is, enjoy it. Don't forget the popcorn!
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Morality and Religion
The relationship between religion and morality is complicated(--duh). There are a couple of issues that critics of religion regularly cite:
[1] Commonly, we make the assumption that morality simply emerges out of religion. That recreates the Euthyphro dilemma: do we do that which is just because that's what God commands, or does God comnand our doing of the just because the just is what is just, purely and simply?
[2] Moral codes embedded within the self-understandings of religious communities don't seem to meet the ideals of human nature that those communities (from our modernist point of view, at least) promise. There are outstanding examples of flagrantly bad behavior by religious adherents, and flagrantly bad behavior attributed by religious adherents to their deities.
I'm not completely certain that I've seen this complex of issues dealt with lately in a systematic and satisfactory manner addressed to a secular audience--without an air of superiority or a polemical agenda of one sort or another. For me, this discussion could constitute the basis of a "proof"--in the philosophic sense--or moral argument toward the reasonableness of religious faith, assuming that truth is truth in whatever context it may be seen to abide.
See the discussion here, for example:
http://nerdcountry.blogspot.com/2007/01/with-thanks-to-atheist-in-mini-van-and.html
[1] Commonly, we make the assumption that morality simply emerges out of religion. That recreates the Euthyphro dilemma: do we do that which is just because that's what God commands, or does God comnand our doing of the just because the just is what is just, purely and simply?
[2] Moral codes embedded within the self-understandings of religious communities don't seem to meet the ideals of human nature that those communities (from our modernist point of view, at least) promise. There are outstanding examples of flagrantly bad behavior by religious adherents, and flagrantly bad behavior attributed by religious adherents to their deities.
I'm not completely certain that I've seen this complex of issues dealt with lately in a systematic and satisfactory manner addressed to a secular audience--without an air of superiority or a polemical agenda of one sort or another. For me, this discussion could constitute the basis of a "proof"--in the philosophic sense--or moral argument toward the reasonableness of religious faith, assuming that truth is truth in whatever context it may be seen to abide.
See the discussion here, for example:
http://nerdcountry.blogspot.com/2007/01/with-thanks-to-atheist-in-mini-van-and.html
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
Earth's insignificance.
See this Google video, showing the relative sizes of certain astronomical bodies:
http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=-3974466981713172831
http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=-3974466981713172831
Thursday, December 14, 2006
Christmas break reading
For a spring semester class, a new text to prepare: Ellwood and McGraw, eds., Many People, Many Faiths: Women and Men in the World Religions, Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2005.
For background: Roggema, Poorthuis and Valkenberg, eds., The Three Rings: Textual studies in the historical trialogue of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Thomas Institut Utrecht/Peeters Leuven, 2005.
For background: Roggema, Poorthuis and Valkenberg, eds., The Three Rings: Textual studies in the historical trialogue of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Thomas Institut Utrecht/Peeters Leuven, 2005.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Christopher Dawson--1937
From the eminent historian's "Essay on War"--
But any peace propaganda which shuts the eyes to realities is worthless and may even increase the danger which it sets out to combat. It has been the fault of both pacifism and liberalism in the past that they have ignored the immense burden of inherited evil under which society and civilization labor and have planned an imaginary world for an impossible humanity. We must recognize that we are living in an imperfect world in which human and superhuman forces of evil are at work and so long as those forces affect the political behavior of mankind, there can be no hope of abiding peace.
But any peace propaganda which shuts the eyes to realities is worthless and may even increase the danger which it sets out to combat. It has been the fault of both pacifism and liberalism in the past that they have ignored the immense burden of inherited evil under which society and civilization labor and have planned an imaginary world for an impossible humanity. We must recognize that we are living in an imperfect world in which human and superhuman forces of evil are at work and so long as those forces affect the political behavior of mankind, there can be no hope of abiding peace.
Friday, December 08, 2006
ISG #2
Of course, WE, the Americans and the "coalition of the willing" must decide that we will stand fast to the convictions with which we entered (a) the war on terror and (b) Iraq. Parties have so muddled the reasons for this intervention in Iraq that many are quite confused at this point. At times it seems the current Administration itself is confused--at least its spokespersons (plural!) aren't very clear in articulating their and our purposes. I think this is an important part of the problem.
Secondly, WE have to decide what, or whom, we care about. Do we care about a vision of peace for the Middle East? Further, do we care about the survival of the state of Israel? Make no mistake: the radical Islamists have the massacre of Israel's Jews and the elimination of "the Israeli entity" as their first priority.- How do we know this? They say so repeatedly.
- Do they mean what they say? We can't afford to take the chance they don't--can we?
I know it's probably not fair to use the Holocaust as an equivalent example here, but it's a dreadful fact of history that Hitler meant what he said. If we had understood in the 1920s what we knew in May of 1945, would we, the Germans, the Europeans, have behaved differently? If we had understood in the early '60s what we understood about Southeast Asia after the last helicopter left "Saigon" and after the Pol Pot came to power in Cambodia, would we have chosen differently?
The ISG Follies
The President is not obligated to adopt the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group. He has the opportunity to do so, and thereby absolve himself partially from recriminations that will follow from the resulting chaos. It seems that, based on press reports, what the committee is suggesting will have the effect of "kicking the can down the road"--of delaying an eventual confrontation with the ideologues of the Middle East, now entering their ascendancy. It may be possible to delay the fragmentation of Iraq and its radicalization by Iran and Syria by maintaining some kind of presence on the borders, the no-fly zone, strict surveillance, economic sanctions, etc. There will at some point come a showdown with these power-hungry parties. It may be that the no-war coalition in the U.S. will be the ones in power when it happens. Then, they will be forced to do as FDR did, as JFK did, and become the party of war. If the current "hawks" were to act in the most cynical manner possible in order to assure their eventual return to power, they would implement the ISG's recommendations in short order and enthusiastically. I'm not sure that this is acceptable as a moral option, but it surely is politically alluring.
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