Underwater Demolitions

VLT time lapse.

2011-07-16T22:40:00.005+01:00

A clear night.

Exciting future possibilities described by Michio Kaku

2011-03-30T07:54:00.008+01:00

A decade or so ago, Michio Kaku, professor of theoretical physics at the City College of New York, interviewed a bunch of scientists about the subject of their research and it's potential impact in the future. He collected his findings and extrapolations in a book called Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century. This talk was delivered in 2009 and addresses many of the subjects covered in that book with a fresher perspective.

Curb the banks? The government has propped them up at every opportunity

2011-02-06T10:53:00.001Z

Source: the Guardian. Monday 24 January 2011 21.00 GMT
Author: George Monbiot

Here's the story of how Cameron and Osborne secretly tried and failed to kill tougher European rules on bankers' bonuses.

It's bonus season, the time of year when bankers show us what they really believe. As soon as they get their money, they spend much of it on land and houses. They know that these are safer investments than the assets in which they trade. If they trash the economy again, they at least will survive.

This year the frenzy will be almost as bad as ever. But it could have been worse. Here is the story, revealed by a leaked document, of how our government covertly tried – and failed – to kill tougher European rules on bankers' bonuses, and how the chancellor of the exchequer appears to have misled parliament.

Before I explain what the government did, let me remind you of a few of the statements the Conservatives made about bonuses while in opposition. In February 2009, David Cameron announced: "Where the taxpayer owns a large stake in a bank, we are saying that no employee should be paid a bonus of over £2,000." Stephen Hester, the chief executive of RBS – 84% owned by the taxpayer – is now said to be lining up a bonus of around £2.5m.

In October 2009, George Osborne announced that he was calling on the Treasury to stop retail banks "paying out profits in significant cash bonuses. Full stop." Bob Diamond, the chief executive of Barclays, is due to make around £8m this year, half of which is likely to be cash.

In April 2010, a Tory policy paper observed: "News that bank bonuses this year are expected to total £7bn shows that Gordon Brown's claim to have ended the era of the big bonus was ridiculous." Bank bonuses in 2011 are expected to total £7bn.

A fortnight ago, a Downing Street spokesman admitted that the government would, after all, make no attempt to limit the size of bonuses. This much we knew. But what the leaked document shows is that even as the government claimed to be seeking strong international rules to curb the bonus frenzy, it was secretly lobbying to prevent them from being passed. The document is, or should be, big news, but so far it has been covered in just one place: Tribune magazine, where the freelance reporter Ben Fox broke the story.

As Cameron pointed out before he took office, the UK's bonus culture "encouraged short-term risk-taking instead of rewarding the long-term interests of shareholders and the public." This risk-taking helped cause the financial crash. The EU wanted to prevent it from happening again, by reducing the incentive to chase short-term gains. It hoped to update the Capital Requirements Directive, to ensure that bankers could take only a small part of their bonus as an immediate cash payment. The rest of the bonus would be a mixture of cash and shares, held over for up to five years. If, during that time, the bank did worse than expected, some of the promised money would be clawed back.

This would force bankers to think about the future as well as the present. The European draft proposed that no more than 30% of smaller bonuses and no more than 20% of larger ones could be paid upfront in cash. The British government had other ideas.

The leaked document, which was passed to a socialist-group MEP, lays out the UK Treasury's negotiating position. It reveals that "throughout the negotiation and implementation of the Directive, we have supported an interpretation that limits upfront cash to 40% of a total bonus". The European parliament's proposal – for a 20% limit – would, the UK claimed, "have a significant impact on the European financial services sector's international competitiveness." The Treasury, the document shows, also contested the plan to impose a minimum period for deferring the rest of the bonus payment. "Some may argue," the leaked document conceded, "that we are supporting a position that is less onerous on bank pay than other European legislators."

Under the heading "Line to take", the document proposed that the government should claim that it has "led the way in implementing G20 principles and doesn't believe that the EU should go further than what was agreed by the G20". It argued that "the only consistent option" is to drop the "minimum retention conditions". I'm publishing the leaked document in full on my website.

In December the UK proposals were defeated, and the tougher rules on bankers' bonuses were adopted by the European parliament. But here's the kicker. On 11 January 2011, the chancellor, George Osborne, made the following statement to the House of Commons. "… on 1 January this year we introduced the most stringent code of practice of any financial centre in the world. For the first time, there will be a strict limit on the amount of bonus payable in upfront cash. Also for the first time, there will be a requirement that 50% of bonuses be paid in shares or other non-cash instruments, which bank employees will not be allowed to sell on for an appropriate period."

In other words, Osborne is claiming credit for the very policies his government tried to squash. He is also wrong to claim that the UK's is the most stringent code of practice. It is in fact the minimum possible implementation of the EU directive (for example, under the UK interpretation, bonuses aren't classified as "large" until they reach £500,000). The rules are mandatory, and they came into force in all member states on 1 January. It seems to me that Osborne misled parliament.

As for the claim in the leaked document that the tougher rules would damage the sector's competitiveness, such restraints will do the opposite, as Cameron and Osborne both acknowledged while in opposition. They defend the banks against their bosses' greed.

The Treasury made the following statement when I asked if it had tried to water down the directive. "This accusation is wrong. The updated code is tougher than last year's … for the biggest risk-taking employees, the amount they can take upfront in cash has been halved from 40% to 20%." Yes, but what it failed to add is that this happened despite its best efforts. The deception continues.

The prime minister and the chancellor have been playing a double game. They claimed they wanted to tame the banks. In reality, they were protecting them. They never meant to address the economic polarisation of this country, or to check the incentives which caused the last crash. Their intention was always to pamper the rich and to make the poor pay for their follies. As the leaked document shows, the Conservatives are ready to risk the whole economy to help the filthy rich get richer.

Perceptions

2011-01-24T10:15:00.001Z

Changing faces is a UK-based charity which supports and represents people that have a disfigurement.

Rethinking capitalism

2011-01-14T01:05:00.000Z

Plenty to think about in this fascinating talk by Richard Wolff.
Some alternatives to the current economic model are laid on the table.

A new way of thinking about the economy

2011-01-01T12:00:00.000Z

Anthropology professor David Harvey offers his insightful perspective on the current economic crisis by deconstructing the operations of the financial system that precipitated it.

Greece in turmoil

2010-12-16T16:05:00.001Z

A bill introducing reforms in the public and private sectors was due to be passed through Parliament late last night, just hours after Prime Minister George Papandreou’s meetings with opposition party leaders highlighted the lack of consensus on the changes being undertaken by the government.

Papandreou’s efforts to build consensus between party leaders proved largely unsuccessful. All three of the leaders he met – Aleka Papariga of the Communist Party, Giorgos Karatzeferis of Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS) and Antonis Samaras of New Democracy – said they found little or no common ground with the government. “There was no consensus on anything,” said Papariga. “We think that the real battle will start now because the workers will realize that there is no point in negotiating over how much they are going to lose.”

Samaras said ND would continue to support any “common sense” measures, underlining that the conservatives had voted for 33 of the government’s bills. But he added that “consensus is complicity.” Samaras said he was opposed to the bypassing of collective contracts as that would lead to “medieval working conditions.”

The announcement of the new measures affecting working conditions sparked violent riots in Athens.

Grow and prosper with Arsenic?

2010-12-09T16:55:00.002Z

New Rochelle, NY, December 7, 2010—NASA-funded research has uncovered a new life form on Earth, a microorganism that can not only survive but can thrive and reproduce by metabolizing arsenic, a chemical that is highly toxic for most other earthly organisms. This finding will revolutionize the field of astrobiology—the study of the origins, evolution, distribution, and future of life in the universe.

The new form of life, discovered in Mono Lake in California, a harsh environment with high salt, pH, and arsenic levels, represents a new strain of a common family of bacteria. It is able to substitute arsenic for phosphorus, one of the six basic building blocks of all forms of life on Earth. The microbe utilizes arsenic in place of phosphorus to build critical cell components, including its DNA, proteins, cell membranes, and energy-producing machinery.

“The discovery of a bacterium capable of substituting arsenate for phosphate in essential biomolecules impacts astrobiology in a number of ways,” says Sherry L. Cady, Professor in the Department of Geology at Portland State University. “It is quite astonishing to learn that this life form has the capacity to function in a way no other known life form can. The directed search for this biochemistry, revealed by routine methods, was essential to this find and an important lesson. Astrobiology search strategies for environments that harbor microbes with such biochemistries now increase in a way few have predicted.

However, one external researcher expressed “lingering concerns that the arsenic is simply concentrated in the bacterial cell’s extensive vacuoles and not incorporated into its biochemistry, and another said that the claim of bacteria subbing arsenic for phosphorous “is, in my opinion, not established by this work.”

Feynman on Honours

2010-12-08T10:08:00.000Z

R. Dawkins answers e-mail questions

2010-12-03T09:52:00.001Z

Here Dawkins answers a number of questions from reddit.com users. The bit towards the end of the clip, when he reads his hate-mail, is refreshingly amusing. And we learn he's a MAC user..

Pale Blue Dot

2010-10-30T15:06:00.001+01:00

Cyclopean (part 3 - the myth of the Cyclops revisited)

2010-08-18T17:49:00.010+01:00

Cyclopean (part 2)

2010-07-25T12:57:00.012+01:00

Cyclopean (part 1 - prelude)

2010-07-23T17:32:00.013+01:00

Cyclopean (Introduction)

2010-07-23T13:46:00.009+01:00

For some time now I have been entertaining the though that it would be an interesting challenge to attempt to translate into English certain passages from the books of the late Prof. Dimitris Liantinis. His writing style, marrying lyrical didactical prose with untranslated passages from English, German, Italian, Spanish, Ancient Greek and Latin works as well as frequent references to traditional Greek demotic poetry guarantee the daunting nature of this task.

Liantinis' was a passionate speaker and in his writings he cares nothing for political correctness. His works are highly critical, primarily focused on the Hellenic society, and have extremely high expectations from the reader. They were not written for a mass market but for a tiny minority. These are often satirical, spirited, blatantly honest works and they traverse the existential spectrum from the Apollonian to the Dionysian end, creating a treasure chest in which he collects, pebble by pebble, his world view. His ecstasy in the face of (natural) beauty is ostensibly contagious while in his darker moments he reaches for the solace of lyrical melodic writing, not so much in order to eschew the mists, but in order to sail smoothly along these dark waters and befriend the soul with the inevitable in life. In that, his clarity of mind is of a Socratic nature.

The passage that I will start working on is "Η ΚΥΚΛΩΠΕΙΑ" (Cyclopean) from the book ΓΚΕΜΜΑ (Gemma) and it will be posted here in parts over the next few days, weeks, months, however long it takes. I intend to take a lot of liberty with the translation in my attempt to convey the essence and style of the passage to a non-greek reader instead of attempting a - virtually impossible - literal translation. It deals with the meaning of the encounter between Odysseus/Ulysses and the Cyclops Polyphemus.

The translation has been removed after the request of the copyright owner.

On the Low

2010-07-23T00:40:00.000+01:00

Hope Sandoval singing On the Low from Bavarian Fruit Bread

Death Melon

2010-07-19T16:10:00.001+01:00

In a galaxy far far away ...

The microwave sky

2010-07-06T12:06:00.000+01:00

This image show below is a map of the whole sky as seen by the space mission Planck. This mission was launched in 2009 and is part of ESA's Cosmic Vision Programme. It is designed to image the anisotropies of the Cosmic Background Radiation (the "afterglow" of the Big Bang) over the whole sky with unprecedented accuracy.

The bright line bisecting the picture is the contribution from our own galaxy, viewed edge-on. The intense light comes from the radiation released by the interstellar dust and gas clouds.

Planck will test theories of the evolution of the universe and the origin of cosmic structure as well as provide insights into the nature of dark matter.

Kids and Digital Media

2010-07-02T14:34:00.002+01:00

The prophets of doom are at it again with renewed fervour.

"PHANTOMS" who trawl the internet are the greatest threat to our children, says best-selling author Jilliane Hoffman.

Every so often we encounter horror stories about the corrupting influence these uncontrollable new Digital Media have on today's innocent youth. Fear mongering at it's most exquisite.

Everything Bad is Good for You approaches the taboos associated with the transition to the digital age from a humorous, refreshingly honest, if slightly biased (the author is a devout gamer), perspective but it is also instructive to have a look at the summary of findings from the Digital Youth project.

"Kids' Informal Learning with Digital Media: An Ethnographic Investigation of Innovative Knowledge Cultures" is a three-year collaborative project funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Carried out by researchers at the University of Southern California and University of California, Berkeley, the digital youth project explores how kids use digital media in their everyday lives

In their summary they state:

The digital world is creating new opportunities for
youth to grapple with social norms, explore interests,
develop technical skills, and experiment with new forms
of self-expression. These activities have captured teens’
attention because they provide avenues for extending
social worlds, self-directed learning, and independence.

Specifically, they stress:

Most youth use online networks to extend the friendships that they navigate in the familiar contexts of school ... youth also use the online world to explore interests and find information that goes beyond what they have access to at school or in their local community ... youth may find new peers outside the boundaries of their local community. They can also
find opportunities to publicize and distribute their work to online audiences, and to gain new forms of visibility and reputation. By exploring new interests, tinkering, and “messing around” with new forms of media, they acquire various forms of technical and media literacy.

New media allow for a degree of freedom and autonomy for youth that is less apparent in a classroom setting. Youth respect one another’s authority online, and they are often more motivated to learn from peers than from adults. Their efforts are also largely self-directed,exploration, in contrast to classroom learning that is oriented by set, predefined goals.

Youths’ participation in this networked world suggests new ways of thinking about the role of education.

Why all the doom and gloom?

The three virtues

2010-06-24T14:02:00.001+01:00

Introduction to Citizen Ethics in a Time of Crisis by Philip Pullman.

At first sight, of course, vice is more attractive. She is sexier, she promises to be better company than her plain sister virtue. Every novelist, and every reader too, has more fun with the villains than with the good guys. Goodness is staunch and patient, but wickedness is vivid and dynamic; we admire the first, but we thrill to the second.
Nevertheless, I want to say a word in praise of virtue: the quality or qualities that enable a nation and its citizens to live well, by which I mean morally well.
And to see what virtue looks like, we need to look not to lists of laws and commandments, but to literature. Was a lesson on the importance of kindness ever delivered more devastatingly, or learned more securely, than Mr Knightley's reproof of Emma in the novel that bears her name? Was the value of play in childhood (a profoundly ethical matter) ever more memorably conveyed than by Dickens's description of the Smallweed children in Bleak House?

The house of Smallweed … has strengthened itself in its practical character, has discarded all amusements, discountenanced all story-books, fairy tales, fictions and fables, and banished all levities altogether. Hence the gratifying fact, that it has had no child born to it, and that the complete little men and women whom it has produced, have been observed to bear a likeness to old monkeys with something depressing on their minds.

The lesson of every story in which the good is illustrated is, as Jesus said after telling the parable of the Good Samaritan, "Go, and do thou likewise." The genius of Jesus – and Jane Austen, and Dickens, and every other storyteller whose tales are as memorable – gives us no excuse to say we don't know what the good looks like.
When it comes to public virtue, William Blake's great poem Auguries of Innocence reminds us in forthright and indeed prophetic terms that the personal and the political are one:

A dog starv'd at his Master's Gate
Predicts the ruin of the State.
A Horse misus'd upon the Road
Calls to Heaven for Human blood ...
The wanton Boy that kills the Fly
Shall feel the Spider's enmity

And, in a couplet the Blair government should have remembered before licensing the creation of super-casinos:

The Whore & Gambler, by the State
Licens'd, build that Nation's Fate

In fact, ethical guidance is something we have never actually been short of. Those who insist that all ethical teaching must be religious in origin are talking nonsense. Some of it is: much of it isn't.

But when it comes to public or political virtues, are there any in particular that ought to characterise a virtuous state? I can think of three that would make a good start.
The first is courage. Courage is foundational: it's what we need so as to be able to act kindly even when we're afraid, in order to exercise good and steady judgment even in the midst of confusion and panic, in order to deal with long-term necessity even when short-term expediency would be easier. A courageous nation would not be afraid of its own newspapers, or toady to their proprietors; it would continue to do what was right even when loud voices were urging it to do wrong. It would stand up to economic interests when others were more important, and yes, there are interests that are more important than short-term economic benefits. And when it came to the threat of external danger, a courageous nation would take a clear look at the danger and take realistic steps to avert it. It would not take up a machine-gun to defend itself against a wasp.

The second virtue I want to praise is modesty. Modesty in a nation consists among other things of fitting the form to the meaning, and not mistaking style for substance. A modest kingdom, for instance, would have to think for a moment to remember whether or not it was a republic, because the members of the royal family would be allowed to spend most of their time in useful and interesting careers as well as being royal, and their love affairs would remain their own business; and people would always be glad to see them cycling past. Acquiring modesty in our public life would be a big step towards developing a realistic sense of our size and position in the world.

The third virtue I'd like to see in a nation (all right: in our nation, now) is intellectual curiosity. Wakefulness of mind might be another term for it. A nation with that quality would be conscious of itself and of its history, and of every thread that made up the tapestry of its culture. It would believe that the highest knowledge of itself had been expressed by its artists, its writers and poets, and it would teach its children how to know and how to love their work, believing that this activity would give them, the children, an important part to play in the self-knowledge and memory of the nation. A nation where this virtue was strong would be active and enquiring of mind, quick to perceive and compare and consider. Such a nation would know at once when a government tried to interfere with its freedoms. It would remember how all those freedoms had been gained, because each one would have a story attached to it, and an attack on any of them would feel like a personal affront. That's the value of wakefulness.

To finish I want to say something briefly about how virtue manifests itself in daily life, local life. I saw two little things recently that give me hope that the spirit of common, public, civic virtue is still alive in this nation of ours when people are free to act without interference.
The first is an example of "folk traffic-calming". People living in a residential road in Oxford, home to a lot of families and children, a road which normally functions as a rat-run for cars, recently decided to take matters into their own hands and demonstrate that the street is a place for everyone, not just for people in large heavy mobile steel objects. They set up a living room right in the road, with a sofa, a carpet, a coffee table, and held a tea-party. They parked their own cars in a chevron formation all the way along the road and put planters containing bushes and small trees there too to calm the traffic down. They set up a walk-in petrol addiction clinic. The result was that cars could easily get through, but drivers couldn't see clear from one end of the road to the other and didn't feel it was just for driving along at 30 miles an hour. Everyone shared the whole space. It was a triumph: wit in the service of a decent human standard of life.

The second thing I saw was a television programme. It was about the work done by Michael Rosen when he was children's laureate, a project he undertook with a school in South Wales where books had been undervalued. He showed the children, and the teachers, and the parents the profound value of reading and all it could do to deepen and enrich their lives, and he did so not by following curriculum guidelines and aiming at targets and putting the children through tests, but by beginning with delight. Enchantment. Joy. The librarians there were practically weeping with relief and pleasure at seeing so many children now coming in to search the shelves and sit and read and talk about the books they're enjoying.
But I seem to be describing delight. Is that a virtue too? Well, it's like the canary in a coal mine: while it continues to sing, we know the great public virtue of liberty is still alive. A nation whose laws express fear and suspicion and hostility cannot sustain delight for very long. If joy goes, freedom is in danger.

So I would say that to sustain the virtue of a nation, we need to remember how the private connects with the public, the poetic with the political. We need to praise and cherish every example we can find of imaginative play, of the energy of creation, of the enchantment of art and the wonder of science. A nation that was brave, and modest, and curious sounds to me like one that understood that if it told its children stories, they might grow up to feel that virtue was in fact as interesting as vice.

The next economic crash

2010-06-15T10:17:00.003+01:00

This is a summary of the main points raised by Will Hutton in his critique of the handling of the financial crisis by British authorities. The full article is available on the Guardian website.

After the crisis there were cries of 'never again'. But the glacial pace of reform leaves us all in imminent danger

It was the biggest bank bail out in British history, and it came with scarcely believable costs. A trillion pounds of tax-payer support; a trillion pounds of lost output. After a disaster of this magnitude you might have expected some collective soul-searching by both banks and government. There has been far too little. Instead we risk a repeat – our banking system is as disconnected from real wealth generation as ever.

The return to business as usual – bonuses, trading in derivatives, the organising of banking as an exercise in which money is made from money – is breathtaking and depressing. And so, given the recent buoyant profit figures reported by our banks, is the easy money.

Labour delivered the minimum reform it could get away with, subcontracting responsibility to the Financial Services Authority. As the crisis broke in May 2008 it commissioned an inquiry populated entirely by industry insiders, chaired by the now chair of Lloyds, Sir Win Bischoff, to examine how the City could become more internationally competitive. When it reported a year later, it recommended little or no change. The conclusions were tamely accepted by politicians.

The poverty of action is inexcusable. The value of outstanding lending by British banks in all currencies is five times our national output – proportionally greater than any comparable country – and is underpinned by a puny amount of pure equity capital; £1 for every £50 lent. As an internal Bank of England working paper hypothesises, this collective balance sheet structure is so precarious that without substantial and far-reaching reform a second crisis is almost inevitable within 10-25 years. And next time we would be overwhelmed as a country.

Most industries that had undergone such a near-death experience – along with such a high probability of a recurrence – would be taking precautions. Not banking. Instead of building up its reserves aggressively, it is carrying on paying salaries at pre-crash levels. As it is, £6bn of bonuses were paid out last year. As Springer says, the status quo won. The regulators certainly want more prudence over pay, but the banks play cat and mouse with them, as they always have.

Barclays, RBS and HSBC each boasts more than 1,000 subsidiaries – most of which are secret vehicles created to warehouse lending or direct financial flows in artificial ways, whose purpose, as one official told me off the record, is to avoid tax or regulation or whose complexity is designed so that in an emergency all a government can do is write a blank bail-out cheque.

The opacity is dramatised by the ongoing multitrillion dollar trading in derivatives – essentially bets on the future prices of financial assets. The justification is that derivatives help buyers and sellers – companies or banks – better to manage risk. Some do. But derivatives are an invitation to speculate. British banks have £1 trillion wrapped up in derivatives – a business that Nouriel Roubini, the economist who predicted the crash, thinks should be as closely regulated as guns because they are no less dangerous.

But progress on financial reform – nationally and internationally – is glacial. Part of the reason is the fiendish complexity that western governments allowed their banks to create, and part is the jealous defence of alleged national banking interests by governments.

The status quo is bad news not just because of the risk of another crash. British banks shamefully neglect enterprise, entrepreneurship, investment and innovation. Only 3% of cumulative net lending in the decade up to the crash went to manufacturing; three quarters went to commercial real estate and residential mortgages. The result – devastated industries and sky-high property prices.

Almost everybody accepts that banks need to carry more capital, except getting international agreement on how much is close to impossible. And banks should indicate how in a crisis they would wind themselves up without costing the taxpayer billions – so-called living wills. The question is how much more should be done.

There should be much more transparency; living wills, for example, should be public documents rather than secret arrangements. So should derivative trading. There should be a great deal more competition. The government, according to the new business secretary Vince Cable, needs to get tough and insist that banks lend to enterprise. Britain needs more banks, transparent banks and safer banks that really contribute to the British economy.

TED talks: Brian Cox: Why we need the explorers

2010-06-09T00:30:00.006+01:00

Cosmos: Carl Sagan (7 DVD Set)

What motivates people?

2010-05-30T11:57:00.002+01:00

Είμαστε πιά πρωταθλητές

2010-05-06T12:04:00.002+01:00

Απόσπασμα απο σημερινό άρθρο της Kαθημερινής

"Οι αντιδράσεις...
Εκείνη την ώρα, στην πλατεία Συντάγματος εκρήγνυνταν χειροβομβίδες κρότου -λάμψης, ενώ διαδηλωτές με πανό συνέχιζαν να ανεβαίνουν τη Σταδίου. Ενα λεπτό αργότερα, το τοπίο άλλαξε. Η φωτιά στο ισόγειο του κτιρίου φούντωσε και από τα ανοιχτά παράθυρα του β΄ ορόφου άρχισε να βγαίνει πυκνός καπνός. Στο μικρό μπαλκόνι στην πρόσοψη του νεοκλασικού στριμώχθηκαν τέσσερις ή πέντε εργαζόμενοι προσπαθώντας να αναπνεύσουν, ενώ άλλοι που δεν χώρεσαν εκεί άνοιξαν διάπλατα τις μπαλκονόπορτες. Οι αντιδράσεις των διαδηλωτών κλιμακώθηκαν. Εκείνοι που νωρίτερα έκαναν χειρονομίες, τώρα χλεύαζαν τους υπαλλήλους φωνάζοντας «να καείτε ζωντανοί, ρε!», ενώ άλλοι τους καλούσαν ειρωνικά να πηδήσουν στο κενό. Ορισμένοι πιο νηφάλιοι τους έκαναν νόημα να κατέβουν από το κτίριο. Οσοι διαδηλωτές από τα οργανωμένα μπλοκ σάστισαν και κοντοστέκονταν στη θέα των εγκλωβισμένων υπαλλήλων επανέρχονταν στην... τάξη από τους επικεφαλής, οι οποίοι τους φώναζαν «προχωράμε σύντροφοι, προχωράμε». Καθώς τα δευτερόλεπτα κυλούσαν, το μαύρο σύννεφο καπνού από τα παράθυρα του α΄ και β΄ ορόφου έγινε τόσο πυκνό που έκρυψε την πρόσοψη του κτιρίου και τους πανικόβλητους υπαλλήλους που από ένστικτο έσκυβαν για να αναπνεύσουν. Ο ένας από αυτούς έβγαλε το σακάκι του, πέρασε πάνω από το κάγκελο της μπαλκονόπορτας του β΄ ορόφου, πάτησε στη μαρκίζα και πήδησε σε μια πρόχειρη κατασκευή από ελενίτ στην ταράτσα του διπλανού κτιρίου. Αυτή δεν άντεξε το βάρος, και ο νεαρός βρέθηκε στο κενό. Προσγειώθηκε μερικά μέτρα πιο χαμηλά στο πρεβάζι του κινηματογράφου «Απόλλων». Στην άλλη άκρη του κτιρίου της Marfin, άλλος εργαζόμενος, ισορροπώντας πάνω στο κάγκελο και στη μαρκίζα του β΄ ορόφου, κατάφερε να φθάσει στο μπαλκόνι του διπλανού κτίσματος. Στη συνέχεια φάνηκε να προσπαθεί να τραβήξει συναδέλφους του που είχαν μείνει πίσω. Στο μπαλκόνι παρέμεναν δύο γυναίκες κουνώντας ένα χαρτόνι με το οποίο μάταια προσπαθούσαν να απομακρύνουν τον καπνό. Η Πυροσβεστική έφτασε πέντε λεπτά αργότερα. Παρευρισκόμενοι φώναζαν συνθήματα και πετούσαν αντικείμενα εναντίον τους."

Πέραν την κοινωνικοπολιτικής ωριμότητας που τα άνωθεν εκφράζουν και ενώ το Ευρώ βρίσκεται στην κατιούσα (έφτασε χτές στη χαμηλότερη τιμή έναντι του Δολλαρίου εδώ και 14 μήνες)

η δική μας αριστερά οραματίζεται την επικείμενη επανάσταση για την, πλέον καθυστερημένη, εδραίωση του σοσιαλιστικού-κομμουνιστικού ιδεώδους εν Ελλάδι η οποία, ελπίζουν (Αη Φανούρη βάλ' το χέρι σου), οτι θα οδηγήσει στην αναζωπύρωση του παγκόσμιου κομμουνιστικού αγώνα και φάτε μάτια ψάρια, κολιούς, μαργαριτάρια.

Ενώ λοιπόν η αριστερά κάνει βόλτες στα ανθισμένα λιβάδια της ονειροφαντασίας, η αντιπολίτευση αποπειράται να αποσπάσει κομματικά οφέλη απ' την καταστροφή (σιγά, τώρα θα αλλάξουμε πατροπαράδοτες συνήθειες?) και η κυβέρνηση (όπως άλλωστε και η προηγούμενη) δέ ξέρει απο πού να το φυσήξει για να κρυώσει. Η εικόνα του πρωθυπουργού να κλαίει μόνος τα βράδυα στην μαξιλάρα του θά ήταν τουλάχιστον αστεία αν δέν ήταν τόσο κοντά στην αλήθεια.

Σε άλλα νέα, έχει ηλιοφάνεια σήμερα στο Λονδίνο...

"Love's easy tears" - Cocteau twins

2010-04-21T07:25:00.001+01:00

The halcyon days of the Cocteau Twins (late 80s/early 90s) were often perfumed with the carefree extravagance of Liz's melismatic vocalization, Robert's somnific reverb overlays and indecipherable (and hence polysemous) lyrics. "Love's easy tears" is a typical example from that period. I have absolutely no clue what she is singing about but I just love the tonality.

Academic articles explained

2010-04-10T03:21:00.001+01:00

One of the ways that academic articles differ from articles that appear in popular magazines is the peer review process. This 5 minute video below explains the concept.

The last lecture of Randy Pausch

2010-04-05T06:25:00.002+01:00

The late professor Pausch giving the Lecture that evolved into the book which topped the charts. Not that topping the popular book sales charts is a necessary qualifier, but regardless, Randy's talk is inspiring and fun stuff, delivered expertly, while it elegantly avoids resorting to sentimentalism.

Randy died on July 25th, 2008 from pancreatic cancer; a year after the lecture.

Slavery in the modern world.

2010-03-30T16:02:00.001+01:00

An exposing talk by Kevin Bales.

The ultimate love song - bill bailey

2010-03-16T04:13:00.000Z

The old man and the Sea

2010-02-28T19:10:00.002Z

The Old Man and the Sea is a short animated movie by Alexander Petrov based on the Hemingway novel. It is the story of a friendship between a young boy and an aging fisherman tormented by hunger and weeks of ill luck. Santiago, a once strong, proud man is coming to terms with his failing abilities and age.

After many weeks of returning home to his small village, day after day with nothing in his boat, Santiago is forced to accept the other villager's small charities. He resolves to sail far out to sea in search of a catch that will redeem his self-confidence. Early the next morning, he descends to his fishing skiff, and rows out, into the dark sea, saying good-bye to his friend, the small boy, and the safety of the beach, perhaps for the last time.

"The Old Man and the Sea" is one of Hemingway's most enduring works and this film, animated and directed by Alexander Petrov, recasts in the authors striking style, the classic theme of courage in the face of defeat, of personal triumph won from loss. Magnificently transposed through this award winning artist's more than 29,000 oil paintings, this film carries all the emotional power and meaning of the original story.

Animation Director, Alexander Petrov, worked tirelessly for over two and a half years under his animation camera, painting the more that 29,000 magnificent images that make up this film.

Petrov's animation style of painting oils on sheets of glass, using his fingertips as brushes, gives all his work a dream-like quality reminiscent of a Rembrandt painting in motion.

How do we know how far away the stars are?

2010-02-27T13:46:00.008Z

This is a very common question. How would you answer it? If you are a school teacher, it is a useful excersise to ask the class to come up with ways to determine distances to nearby objects. If, on the other hand, you're too lazy to think about it, here are a couple of ways to do it.

1. For solar-system objects and relatively nearby stars, you can use the trigonometric parallax. What is parallax? For a quick demonstration, stretch out your arm, hold out your thumb upwards and close one eye. Then switch to the other eye and look at the thumb again. Even though your thumb is still, it looks like it's moving. This is because your eyes are a certain distance apart. Schematically, it looks like this:To measure the position of the star, we do the following: First, we take a photo of the area of the night sky we're interested in and measure the position of the star. Then we wait for half a year while the Earth rotates around the Sun. When the Earth is at the diametrically opposite position, we take another photo and measure the position of the star again. Because of this motion of the Earth around the Sun, stars that are too far away from us will have moved very little or not at all. But stars that are relatively close to us (up to around 40 light years) will appear to have moved more. Then, using the simple geometry shown in the diagram above, we can derive an estimate of the distance:
Distance to star = (Earth-Sun distance) / (parallax)

2. Parallax works for close-by stars, but what about really far away ones that don't seem to be moving at all? How can we get the distances to them? There are many other methods we can use and here's one of them: Main-Sequence fitting.

To explain how this method works, I'll need to introduce you to an old friend, the Hetrtzsprung-Russel diagram, shown below:

What this diagram shows is the evolution of the lives of stars. Based on many, many measurements, this is plot of the absolute brightness (also called luminosity or magnitude) of stars relative to their surface temperatures. I also need to explain the difference between absolute and apparent brightness, so let's do that first.

The light coming from a car's headlights when the car is far away will of course appear to be dimmer than if the car was closer. In other words, if you take two car headlights that are equally bright, but one is only half the distance away of the other, it will appear to be brighter. This is called apparent brightness and it is used to describe how bright a star appears to us on Earth. On the other hand, absolute birghtness is used to describe how bright the star really is.

The temperature of the star is directly related to it's colour, so Red stars are cooler than Blue stars, which have surface temperatures of tens of thousands of degrees. Astronomers measure the colour of stars by taking observations at different wavelengths (using different filters) and taking the ratio of the brightnesses. It turns out that this can be measured with great accuracy, so from that we can derive the temperature of the star, and using the information in the diagram above, we can find out the absolute brightness. Comparing this absolute brightness with the apparent brightness gives us a measure of the distance to the star. This method actually works for stars thousands of light years away!

This is by no means an exhaustive list of the methods used to determine distances to stars. To find out about some other methods, check here.

Nobelist J.Stiglitz discusses U.S. Stimulus & Greece's Debt Crisis

2010-02-26T17:23:00.004Z

The risk of Greece sinking

2010-02-25T23:26:00.002Z

The Guardian - 14 Feb 2010. Article by Will Hutton

British schadenfreude has reached new heights of delicious self-indulgence. There is feverish market speculation that Greece will default on its debt, leave the euro and create a eurozone crisis as other members are pushed by the markets into following. It just proves that the euro is and was a disaster, the thinking goes. Thank God Britain did not join, runs the chorus from right to left, proving once again how wise the sceptics were and how foolish were those (like Will Hutton) who urged entry. Gordon Brown was careful as he answered questions before the European Summit last week to say Greece was an issue only for members of the euro. Britain would stay on the sidelines – gloriously uninvolved and independent from any possible expensive bail out. He was a financial Neville Chamberlain. I half expected him to come back in a twin-engine de Havilland proudly waving a paper – no bailouts and no euro membership in our time.

However, Greece and Germany are not far-away countries of which we know little. Our interdependence is a growing economic and political reality. Britain owns a fifth of Greek bonds; if Greece defaults, the write-offs will impact on our banking system as severely as any other in Europe. We also have no interest in Greece triggering a wave of exits from the euro and the 1930s-style competitive devaluations that will follow. Those dreaming of the free-market utopia of floating exchange rates should be careful for what they wish. By now you might hope there might be just a grain of suspicion about the manias and panics of free financial markets. Hope in vain.

It is worth engaging in a thought experiment. Any monetary regime in Europe has to deal with the reality of living alongside the world's most successful and, until China pipped it in 2009, largest exporter – Germany. Either there is the hard deutschmark, a world reserve currency second only to the dollar, against which the rest of Europe consistently devalues, or the euro. Up against the deutschmark, Greece would certainly be devaluing now – but so would Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Belgium, Austria, Holland and probably France. When the financial crisis struck most of them would have been in a similar, if less acute position to Iceland. There would have been a flight from their money markets to Frankfurt and New York. Who thinks Greece, Belgium, Ireland and Austria would not have had an unstoppable bank run? Or could have survived it? There would have been no co-ordination within a world reserve currency zone to bail out stricken banking systems. There would have been no enjoying 1% euro interest rates. No capacity to increase government borrowing to weather the crisis. Europe would have had a bank-run induced slump – and the contagion would have hit Britain hard. It would, simply, have been a variant of 1931.

Or there is what we have. The euro has been a brilliant shock absorber. Icelandic politicians were as eurosceptic as our know-nothing political class – until disaster struck. Faced with the Hobson's choice of permanent economic stagnation, or adjustment within the euro zone and some light at the end of the tunnel, they have plumped for the latter. It is one of the reasons Greece will fight so hard to stay inside the euro; life is even more intolerable outside. If Greece leaves, its new independent currency will collapse; its interest rates will soar; its public debts will become unfinanceable; it really will default on its debt as it has so frequently in the past. It will slide back into being a failed state – with a military coup one all too possible response to the crisis.

It faces no choice but to reform. Greece has been so plundered by its super-rich elite of bankers and ship owners, so fully bought into the conservative doctrine that taxation is a form of coercion akin to slavery, that in key respects it is not a functioning state. The shadow, non tax-paying part of its economy is 30% of the total. Most middle-class professionals – lawyers, accountants and surgeons – insist on being paid in cash to avoid tax. Uncollected tax runs at 13.6% of national output per year – more than the deficit. The civil service is over-manned and corrupt. Everyone mercilessly tries to profit at someone else's expense. Of course Greece falsified its finances for qualification for entry to the euro zone. In this culture you tell the truth only to family. Revealingly, Mr Papandreou is the third member of his family to become prime minister.

There is no national consensus over what constitutes a just distribution of reward and obligation. As a result, its institutions don't function – as the European Commission team assembled at the behest of EU heads of states, backed by officials from the IMF, will soon discover. They will forensically examine how tax is not collected, how pensions are used as patronage and how statistics are rigged – and find a mess. Yet they and the Greek government will have to be careful. There is a mood in Greece ready to reform; witness the proposals to lift the pension age to 63. But if the elite is allowed to go free while the rest of society suffers, there will be revolt from below. Offend norms of fairness and societies risk disintegration and violence – something British politicians might ponder as they compete with visions of public sector wage freezes while allowing private sector salaries at the top to grow explosively.

This adjustment is an imperative – but so are two more. Germany's reluctance to offer an unconditional bailout to Greece is more than understandable, and the European deal – some support but only after reform has been shown to be implemented – is within its terms fair enough. Greece's problem is as much political as economic. But if Greece cannot devalue, and if there are social limits to how much it can lower wages, it needs some leeway somewhere . It needs more buoyant markets for Greek goods in the rest of the EU, and in Germany in particular. Chancellor Merkel wants it every which way. She wants no bailouts, a strong euro and Germany to carry on being an export machine. All three are not possible. Germany must boost its demand at home and loosen its purse strings if Greece– and the other weak states – are ever going to get out of trouble.

And there is a last reform. The financial markets invented toxic credit default swaps (CDS) – allegedly insurance against bond default which the markets could buy and sell – in the deregulatory mania of the last decade. But England banned trading insurance policies in which nobody took responsibility for paying insurance as the worst form of financial depravity in the 18th century. Now the practice is back as "innovation", except we know after Lehmans that the contracts are as worthless as they were under George I. However, hedge funds love them because they are such a juicy tool with which to speculate. It has been the CDS market that has prompted such a rapid confidence collapse in Greece. As they currently work, they should be banned.

The struggle to reform Greece and find a system of economic governance to make the euro work is all of Europe's battle, notwithstanding Gordon Brown at his evasive worst. If it is lost, we all go down. Western societies were served an awesome warning of the risks contemporary civilisation is running by allowing the rich to make the rules and ignore their obligations. If fairness is put at the heart of the reform programme – both within Greece and between Germany and the rest of Europe – there is a sporting chance of success. If not, the next decade could be very unpleasant indeed.

The Hunt for Gollum

2010-02-18T10:09:00.004Z

With a tight budget of less than $5,000 and the help of numerous volunteers, a team of LotR fans under the banner of Independent Online Cinema brought to life the first of what looks like to be a series of prequels based on the Lord of the Rings franchise.
The Hunt for Gollum dramatises Aragorn and Gandalf's search for Gollum, which takes place before the events in Peter Jackson's trilogy. It is surprisingly well done! Kudos to the team of fans that brought it to life. You can watch the full film on youtube.

Iblard Jikan

2010-02-15T00:25:00.004Z

Iblard Jikan is a 30 minute anime produced by Studio Ghibli. It is but a brief visit to the fantastic world of Iblard, experienced by the viewer while traversing the tranquil landscapes of non-static oil paintings created by Naohisa Inoue. Watch for the subtle wind motion in the grass and the playful display of the light patterns on the waters.
Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

'How do we get industry to invest more in research and development?'

2010-01-13T14:51:00.002Z

Panel discussion from the 2009 SciTech European conference on Innovation in Science and Technology that took place in Brussels this November.

London Mayor Says 9,000 Bankers May Quit City Over Bonus Tax

2010-01-11T21:05:00.014Z

Jan. 11 (Bloomberg) -- London Mayor Boris Johnson said that as many as 9,000 bankers may leave the U.K. capital’s financial district as a result of a 50 percent tax on bonuses announced last month.

Amen and good riddance.
Admittedly it would be much better if there was general consensus for the formation of an international regulatory agency and a thorough crackdown on tax-havens but since there is little chance of that happening anytime in the forseeable future (which is a practical way of addressing the problem), I'll settle for the bankers exodus while extending my heartfelt apologies to my friends that work in the City. Yes, let them leave and try their luck elsewhere. Meanwhile the world will softly slumber until the next crisis looms ominously in the horizon.

Millions of people worldwide lost their jobs and had their livelihoods compromised owing to the extravagances, short-sightedness, irresponsible behaviour (and, yes, incompetence) of a large part of Wall Street and the City. Governments worldwide rushed to prop the decaying structure -using public money- by buying off toxic debt and keeping the patient on life-support.

One would expect that the opportunity would be seized by the world governments to bring some order in the house but it seems pretty certain now that this unprecedented chance has been squandered.

Anyone who wandered the streets of the City of London in 2007 and 2008, the (g)olden days of yonder, will know of the references herein. You say you want to use my tax money to keep the bonus culture (and the associated decadent structures that go with it) thriving? Disgraceful.

Bonus time

2010-01-09T12:19:00.003Z

After the government helped bail Banks out of their toxic investments with public money it seems like it's still just "business as usual" in the City and Wall Street.

The Guardian reports:

The world's biggest investment banks are expected to pay out more than $65bn (£40bn) in salaries and bonuses in the next two weeks, reinforcing the view that it is business as usual on Wall Street and in the City barely a year since the taxpayer bailout of the banking system.
Despite efforts by Alistair Darling to deter banks from handing out multi-million pound bonuses through the introduction of a 50% windfall tax, City sources believe that the biggest employers will absorb the cost of the tax rather than cut the size of the bonus pools they amass throughout the year.
This will mean that while proceeds from the tax could top £2bn – more than four times the £550m estimated by the chancellor in the pre-budget report – the government will have failed to alter the traditional bonus culture in the City.
Lord Oakeshott, the Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman, described the size of the potential bonuses as "global greed by banks when global governance has failed". He added: "Britain's bonus tax only toys with the symptoms of the sickness, not its cause. These last few investment banks left standing have state-backed licences to print money so they must pay supertax on their superprofits, not hold taxpayers to ransom."

What does Starbucks have in common with the Beatles and Africa?

2010-01-08T10:46:00.002Z

On December 7th, 2009 at 1:30pm GMT Starbucks invited musicians from all over the world to sing together at the same time to raise awareness for AIDS in Africa. When the clock struck 1:30, the chariots turned into pumpkins and people from 156 countries sang "All You Need is Love" together. A cheesy corporate ploy? Perhaps, but still heartwarmingly enjoyable.

Starbucks coordinated it via its partnership with the Red organisation to generate money for those living with HIV/AIDS in Africa.

Karaindrou Eleni - Adagio

2010-01-02T16:00:00.000Z

The Known Universe

2009-12-23T10:55:00.003Z

Why not let your mind briefly drift away from the delays and lockdowns this Christmas period and take a flight of fancy around the known universe in this little video produced by the American Museum of Natural History.

Hope Sandoval: Suzanne

2009-12-10T23:07:00.001Z

Her voice is heavenly.

Mary and Max

2009-11-24T23:49:00.011Z

Directed by proudly gay australian director Adam Elliot, this unconventional claymation movie is a treat and heading straight for an Oscar! It chronicles the friendship of Mary, an excitable and curious australian girl, and Max, a middle-aged american living with Asperger syndrome. Narrated in Barry Humphries mellow tones, and spiralling through 20 years in shades of grays and browns (with the odd touch of red) we see how this long-distance friendship evolves as week by week, month by month, Max and Mary wait for each other's letters.

There is a lot to enjoy in this movie and it's a safe bet that it will tickle your funny bone and stir your emotions in equal measure. The soundrtack features two wonderful tracks by the Penguin Cafe Orchestra although it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that the whole film is beautifully themed. The use of Puccini's "Humming Chorus" from "Madama Butterfly" was well placed and achieved almost the same impact, though in a different context, as when Peter Jackson used it in the defining scene of Heavenly Creatures back in 1994.

Well worth a viewing if you can find it.

9/10

A Universe from Nothing

2009-10-24T00:27:00.003+01:00

An accessible and entertaining introductory talk by Laurence Krauss on the subject of Cosmology. If you're a little bit curious about how the Universe will end, watch this.

Socialism has failed. Now capitalism is bankrupt. So what comes next?

2009-10-13T16:03:00.005+01:00

by Eric Hobsbaum
The Guardian - 10 Apr 2009
The 20th century is well behind us, but we have not yet learned to live in the 21st, or at least to think in a way that fits it. That should not be as difficult as it seems, because the basic idea that dominated economics and politics in the last century has patently disappeared down the plughole of history. This was the way of thinking about modern industrial economies, or for that matter any economies, in terms of two mutually exclusive opposites: capitalism or socialism.

We have lived through two practical attempts to realise these in their pure form: the centrally state-planned economies of the Soviet type and the totally unrestricted and uncontrolled free-market capitalist economy. The first broke down in the 1980s, and the European communist political systems with it. The second is breaking down before our eyes in the greatest crisis of global capitalism since the 1930s. In some ways it is a greater crisis than in the 1930s, because the globalisation of the economy was not then as far advanced as it is today, and the crisis did not affect the planned economy of the Soviet Union. We don't yet know how grave and lasting the consequences of the present world crisis will be, but they certainly mark the end of the sort of free-market capitalism that captured the world and its governments in the years since Margaret Thatcher and President Reagan.

Impotence therefore faces both those who believe in what amounts to a pure, stateless, market capitalism, a sort of international bourgeois anarchism, and those who believe in a planned socialism uncontaminated by private profit-seeking. Both are bankrupt. The future, like the present and the past, belongs to mixed economies in which public and private are braided together in one way or another. But how? That is the problem for everybody today, but especially for people on the left.

Nobody seriously thinks of returning to the socialist systems of the Soviet type - not only because of their political faults, but also because of the increasing sluggishness and inefficiency of their economies - though this should not lead us to underestimate their impressive social and educational achievements. On the other hand, until the global free market imploded last year, even the social-democratic or other moderate left parties in the rich countries of northern capitalism and Australasia had committed themselves more and more to the success of free-market capitalism. Indeed, between the fall of the USSR and now I can think of no such party or leader denouncing capitalism as unacceptable. None were more committed to it than New Labour. In their economic policies both Tony Blair and (until October 2008) Gordon Brown could be described without real exaggeration as Thatcher in trousers. The same is true of the Democratic party in the US.

The basic Labour idea since the 1950s was that socialism was unnecessary, because a capitalist system could be relied on to flourish and to generate more wealth than any other. All socialists had to do was to ensure its equitable distribution. But since the 1970s the accelerating surge of globalisation made it more and more difficult and fatally undermined the traditional basis of the Labour party's, and indeed any social-democratic party's, support and policies. Many in the 1980s agreed that if the ship of Labour was not to founder, which was a real possibility at the time, it would have to be refitted.

But it was not refitted. Under the impact of what it saw as the Thatcherite economic revival, New Labour since 1997 swallowed the ideology, or rather the theology, of global free-market fundamentalism whole. Britain deregulated its markets, sold its industries to the highest bidder, stopped making things to export (unlike Germany, France and Switzerland) and put its money on becoming the global centre of financial services and therefore a paradise for zillionaire money-launderers. That is why the impact of the world crisis on the pound and the British economy today is likely to be more catastrophic than on any other major western economy - and full recovery may well be harder.

You may say that's all over now. We're free to return to the mixed economy. The old toolbox of Labour is available again - everything up to nationalisation - so let's just go and use the tools once again, which Labour should never have put away. But that suggests we know what to do with them. We don't. For one thing, we don't know how to overcome the present crisis. None of the world's governments, central banks or international financial institutions know: they are all like a blind man trying to get out of a maze by tapping the walls with different kinds of sticks in the hope of finding the way out. For another, we underestimate how addicted governments and decision-makers still are to the free-market snorts that have made them feel so good for decades. Have we really got away from the assumption that private profit-making enterprise is always a better, because more efficient, way of doing things? That business organisation and accountancy should be the model even for public service, education and research? That the growing chasm between the super-rich and the rest doesn't matter that much, so long as everybody else (except the minority of the poor) is getting a bit better off? That what a country needs is under all circumstances maximum economic growth and commercial competitiveness? I don't think so.

But a progressive policy needs more than just a bigger break with the economic and moral assumptions of the past 30 years. It needs a return to the conviction that economic growth and the affluence it brings is a means and not an end. The end is what it does to the lives, life-chances and hopes of people. Look at London. Of course it matters to all of us that London's economy flourishes. But the test of the enormous wealth generated in patches of the capital is not that it contributed 20%-30% to Britain's GDP but how it affects the lives of the millions who live and work there. What kind of lives are available to them? Can they afford to live there? If they can't, it is not compensation that London is also a paradise for the ultra-rich. Can they get decently paid jobs or jobs at all? If they can't, don't brag about all those Michelin-starred restaurants and their self-dramatising chefs. Or schooling for children? Inadequate schools are not offset by the fact that London universities could field a football team of Nobel prize winners.

The test of a progressive policy is not private but public, not just rising income and consumption for individuals, but widening the opportunities and what Amartya Sen calls the "capabilities" of all through collective action. But that means, it must mean, public non-profit initiative, even if only in redistributing private accumulation. Public decisions aimed at collective social improvement from which all human lives should gain. That is the basis of progressive policy - not maximising economic growth and personal incomes. Nowhere will this be more important than in tackling the greatest problem facing us this century, the environmental crisis. Whatever ideological logo we choose for it, it will mean a major shift away from the free market and towards public action, a bigger shift than the British government has yet envisaged. And, given the acuteness of the economic crisis, probably a fairly rapid shift. Time is not on our side.

Guaglione

2009-10-12T09:38:00.006+01:00

I first heard this lovely mambo on a Guinness TV advertisment. Now Guinness are well known for having made great ads in the past, such as this one and this one , always with excellent musical accompaniment. Below is the video for Guaglione composed by Pérez "Prez" Prado which resurfaced timidly in 1995 after the success of the aforementioned advert.

Βιβλιοκριτική σχολικού βιβλίου

2009-09-17T00:43:00.012+01:00

Αυτές τις μέρες βρίσκομαι Ελλάδα. Θάλασσα, ήλιος, φαγητό πλούσιο σε θερμίδες και τηλεόραση που δέ βλέπεται. Αντε, για να φανώ αντικειμενικότερος, να εξαιρέσω τα κρατικά κανάλια και κομματάκι το ΣΚΑΪ - αν και η ελληνοφωνητική απόδοση εγγλέζικων λέξεων/ονομάτων ανέκαθεν με ξύνιζε, σά να στραβοκατάπιε στρουθοκάμηλος. Εν πάσει περιπτώσει, ξεφεύγω απ'το θέμα (και αγαπητέ αναγνώστη, προειδοποιείσαι, θα πρέπει να υπομείνεις μαζοχιστικά τον παρενθετικό μου λόγο)...

Ως συνήθως, κάθε φορά που επισκέπτομαι το σπίτι των γονιών μου συμβαίνουν τα εξής περίεργα (μερικά εκ των οποίων, εικάζω, πρέπει να είναι κοινή γνώση των Ελλήνων εν αποδημία - και όχι μόνο)
α) Στο όνομά μου, προστίθεται συχνά το υποκοριστικό "-άκης" και, συνεπώς, θέλοντας και μή, ταξιδεύω στο χρόνο τουλάχιστον μιάμιση δεκαετία πίσω. Τα πτυχία και διδακτορικά εξανεμίζονται και με πιάνει άγχος άν ξέρω το μάθημα αύριο για το σχολείο. (όχι, δε το ξέρω)
β)Πέφτουν βροχή τα τηλέφωνα απο συγγενείς και φίλους που όλοι -βέβαια- θέλουν να με δούν πρίν φύγω, πράγμα φύση αδύνατον καθώς έχω 10 μέρες διακοπές και για να τους δώ όλους θέλω τουλάχιστον ένα μήνα και βάλε. Φυσικά, αν δε τους δείς παρεξηγούνται. Πράγμα το οποίο ανέκαθεν με κάνει να μηρυκάζω τη σκέψη να καταφτάσω incognito...
(Εν πάσει περιπτώσει, κάπου εδώ είμαι σίγουρος οτι ελλοχεύει μία παραβίαση κάποιας βασικής αρχής της Φυσικής αλλά ακόμα το δουλεύω... μπάς και χτυπήσω καμμιά δημοσίευση στο Nature)
γ)Πάω κατ'ευθείαν στη βιβλιοθήκη. Ναί, δέ ξέρω. Γενετικό είναι; Κάτι σαν αλυσιδωτή αντίδραση γίνεται. Ανοίγω την πόρτα και "τσούπ", αντιστέκομαι για μερικά δέκατα, και υποκύπτω λαχανιασμένος και καταϊδρωμένος. (Αυτό το τελευταίο μάλλον είναι γιατί είμαι στον πέμπτο όροφο και συνήθως παίρνω τις σκάλες, τρομάρα μου, αλλά ακούγεται πιό δραματικό σάν να πρόκειται για τη "δίψα της γνώσης"). Το λοιπόν, ανακεφαλαιώνοντας: Πόρτα -> βιβλιοθήκη.

Αυτό το τελευταίο είναι στο οποίο θέλω να αναφερθώ, παρά την ανούσια πλήν διασκεδαστική (χά!χα! γελάσατε) μακρυγορία της εισαγωγής . Το λοιπόν, η βιβλιοθήκη έχει ράφια (ώχ!) και συρτάρια (αμάν!). Σημειωτέον οτι ΔΕΝ έχει αλεξικέραυνο, δέ λειτουργεί ως πλυντήριο και δέ φτιάχνει φραπέδες. Και προσπερνόντας, δίχως να δώσουμε πολύ σημασία, αυτό το σουρεαλιστικό ιντερλούδιο, προχωράμε στο καυτό θέμα μας.

Για να μή το κουράσω άλλο, ξεφυλλίζοντας διάφορα βιβλία, ξεφούρνισα και κάποια παλιά σχολικά. Αλγεβρα, ανάλυση, κάτι αρχαία ελληνικά της πρώτης και δευτέρας λυκείου (όλα γεμάτα με βιαστικά σκίτσα και εφηβικές ποιητικές απόπειρες, αναμφισβήτητα -αλλα γαργαλιστικά- εξαμβλωματικές) και, μεταξύ άλλων, και το βιβλίο στο οποίο πρόκειται να αναφερθώ: "Χριστιανισμός και Θρησκεύματα" των Α. Καριωτόγλου, Α. Κεσόπουλου, Π. Παπαευαγγέλου, Γ. Τσάνανα (απίθανο επίθετο;) - βιβλίο της Β' Λυκείου, Γ΄έκδοση 1991. (Σημειώσατε την ημερομηνία έκδοσης. Θα αναφερθώ σχετικά παρακάτω) . Εδώ αρχίζει ο τζερτζελές, η μάλλον όχι ακόμα, γιατί δεν εξήγησα πώς έτυχε να το ξεφυλλίσω μετά απο 18 χρόνια...

Σήμερα, γυρίζοντας απο την έκθεση βιβλίου στο Ζάππειο, η παραφορτωμένη σακούλα που κουβαλούσα κυωφορούσε δυσβάσταχτα το "Η περι Θεού αυταπάτη" (εκδόσεις Κάτοπτρο) του Richard Dawkins που προοριζόταν ώς δώρο για τη μητέρα μου (ναι, είμαι διαβολικός γιός). Ανεξάρτητα απο τις απόψεις κανενός για το ζήτημα της ύπαρξης Θεού η όχι και τη θρησκεία, Χριστιανισμός η μή (πράγματα τα οποία προσωπικά με απασχολούν απο λίγο μέχρι καθόλου - εξ' ού και το ενδιαφέρον μου για το συγκεκριμένο σύγγραμμα είναι περιορισμένης εμβέλειας), το βιβλίο του Dawkins αποτελεί ένα ενδιαφέρον ανάγνωσμα για όσους τους ιντριγκάρει το θέμα. Υπο αυτές τις συνθήκες λοιπόν αναδύθηκε μέσα μου η περιέργεια και επιθυμία να επισκευτώ και πάλι τις σελίδες του βιβλίου της Β' Λυκείου που διδάχτηκα στο σχολείο.

Γενικά δέ με εξέπληξε τόσο πολύ η Ορθόδοξη Χριστιανική προπαγάνδα, προφανής σε όλο το βιβλίο, καθώς είναι ήπιας μορφής (δέ παύω να το θεωρώ κακόγουστο και ενοχλητικό). Τα ερωτήματα που θέτει στην εισαγωγή είναι σοβαρά και έχουν φέρει ατελείωτους πονοκεφάλους σε φιλόσοφους, επιστήμονες, έφηβους και θεολόγους ανα τους αιώνες. Το βιβλίο αναφέρεται συγκεκριμένα στους Immanuel Kant, και όταν προσπαθεί να προσεγγίσει - ειλικρινά αλλα άτσαλα- το "φαινόμενο της αθεϊας" (σά να λέμε "γρίπη των χοίρων"), αφού αφιερώσει μια γραμμή για τον Σωκράτη (ασ΄τον αυτόν, είναι δικός μας, δε κάνει να τον "θάψουμε") κάνει μιά εισαγωγή στον Ludwig Feuerbach, περνάει στον Karl Marx , αποπειράται να προσεγγίσει (και δέν ακουμπάει) τον (κατά τη γνώμη μου) τεράστιο Friedrich Nietzsche, και τελειώνει με τον (πλέον ξεπέρασμένο αλλά ουσιαστικά πατέρα της μοντέρνας ψυχολογίας) Sigmund Freud. Συνοψίζει δηλαδή ορισμένους απ΄ τους μεγαλύτερους αστέρες της διανόησης στην εξέλιξη της ανθρώπινης ιστορίας σε 12 σελίδες. Αξιέπαινο πόνημα βέβαια (πολλάκις καταδικασμένο δε στο προπαγανδιστικό στύλ προσέγγισης - θα το εξηγήσω αυτό παρακάτω) καθώς και μόνο η βιβλιογραφία των μισών εκ των προαναφερθέντων άνετα γεμίζει μια μικρή βιβλιοθήκη. Για να μήν αναφέρθούμε κάν στο πόσες βιβλιοθήκες γεμίζουν οι αναλύσεις και οι επηρροές των έργων τους. Αναφέρω ενδεικτικά ένα απόσπασμα απ το βιβλίο της Β΄Λυκείου (τα σχόλια μου σε κόκκινο):
Γράφοντας για τον Feuerbach λένε

"Η κεντρική του θέση οτι η έννοια του Θεού και η σχέση μαζί του, δηλ. η θρησκεία, ειναι έκφραση και προβολή των επιθυμιών και τάσεων του ανθρώπου, απέναντι στις οποίες δεν υπάρχει κανένας Θεός, καμμιά θεία πραγματικότητα, δεν ευσταθεί (ακολουθεί το ακράδαντο επιχείρημά τους). Το να υπάρχουν μέσα του επιθυμίες και τάσεις τις οποίες εκφράζει προς τα έξω και με τις οποίες θρησκεύει είναι κάτι το φυσιολογικότατο στον άνθρωπο (αυτό υποτίθεται οτι το δεχόμαστε εξ ορισμού, ασ' το δεχτούμε για να ακολουθήσουμε το συλλογισμό τους) που όμως ούτε την ύπαρξη ούτε την ανυπαρξία του Θεού αποδυκνύει. Με ποιά λογική αποκλείεται να υπάρχει αληθινά μια θεία πραγματικότητα, την οποία ο άνθρωπος επιθυμεί και προς την οποία στρέφεται και ανα-φέρεται; Κάποιος ή κάποιοι θέλουν και επιθυμούν να μήν υπάρχει Θεός. Με βάση τη λογική του Φώυερμπαχ, γιατί δε θα μπορούσε η μή ύπαρξη και παρουσία του Θεού, δηλ. η αθεϊα, να είναι απλώς και μόνο η προβολή αυτής της θέλησης και επιθυμίας τους (χα! στη φέραμε Φώυερμπαχ! τράβα τώρα να κλάψεις στη μαξιλάρα σου) ;
Με στοιχειώδη λοιπόν λογική (τώρα είμαστε και οι πρώτοι! καταρρίψαμε όλο το φιλοσοφικό έργο του Φώυερμπαχ σε μιά παράγραφο) το σχήμα του Φώυερμπαχ:<<επιθυμίες και τάσεις -> προβολή τους -> Θεός και θρησκεία>> δέ φαίνεται να είναι τίποτα περισσότερο απο ένας ισχυρισμός χωρίς αποδεικτική ισχύ για τη στήριξη της αθεϊας.

Ας εξαιρέσουμε για λίγο το γεγονός οτι όντως υπάρχουν ορισμένοι ενδιαφέροντες ισχυρισμοί για την ύπαρξη μιάς "θεικής", ή όπως θές πές το, δύναμης (οι οποίοι σπάνια ακούγονται) και ας ψάξουμε να βρούμε το πρόβλημα συλλογισμού στο προηγούμενο κείμενο. Η αδυναμία του είναι προφανής άν κάνουμε την εξής αλλαγή στο κείμενο: όπου λέει "Θεός" ή "θρησκεία" αντικαθιστούμε "Αϊ Βασίλης" και "Χριστούγεννα". Με λίγα λόγια, οι συγγραφείς τότε καταφέρνουν να αποδείξουν οτι είναι εξίσου πιθανό να υπάρχει ή να μήν υπάρχει ο Αϊ Βασίλης...
Τρία πουλάκια κάθονταν και παίζανε μπαρμπούτι. Κι αυτά τα διδασκόμασταν και έπρεπε να τα μάθουμε στο Λύκειο. Αλλα το καλύτερο δέν ήρθε ακόμα!

Προσπερνάω το πενιχρό μέρος του βιβλίου που αναφέρεται συνοπτικά στις άλλες θρησκείες, σε αντίθεση με το μεγαλύτερο μέρος του που αναφέρεται στον Ορθόδοξο Χριστιανισμό, και αναφέρω μόνο οτι αν θές (και είναι θεμιτό) να κάνεις συγκριτική ανάλυση θρησκειών, τουλάχιστο κάν΄ το σωστά.

Και πάμε τώρα, μοναδικέ αναγνώστη μου (να σε λέω Μήτσο τώρα που γνωριστήκαμε;), σε ένα θέμα κοντά στην καρδιά μου (απ' την πλευρά της σπλήνας). Το βιβλίο αναφέρεται επιστημονικά (μ'αεροπλάαααααναααα καιιιι βαπόοοοριααααα) , η τουλάχιστον προσπαθεί σά κουτσή, στραβή λεχώνα χήνα που μαθαίνει να παίζει ακορντεόν, στις τελευταίες ανακαλύψεις της Αστρονομίας στον τομέα της κοσμολογίας (αρχή του σύμπαντος κ.τ.λ. - αντιπαθώ τον όρο "δημιουργία" λόγω των συνειρμών που ακολουθούν τον όρο).

Γράφουν λοιπόν οι συγγραφείς (τα σχόλια με κόκκινο είναι δικά μου):

Σήμερα οι επικρατέστερες θεωρίες για τη δημιουργία του κόσμου είναι δύο: <<της μεγάλης έκρηξης>> και του <<παλλόμενου σύμπαντος>>.(Αναφέραμε ήδη ότι το σχολικό βιβλίο εκδόθηκε το '91. Η θεωρία της μεγάλης έκρηξης έπαψε να είναι θεωρία το 1964 όταν οι Penzias και Wilson ανακάλυψαν τυχαία την κοσμική ακτινοβολία υποβάθρου που αποτελεί, ουσιαστικά, τον απόηχο της μεγάλης έκρηξης. Για αυτή τους την ανακάλυψη δικαιωματικά μοιράστηκαν το βραβείο Νόμπελ Φυσικής το 1978. Αρα οι συγγραφείς του βιβλίου ή δε ξέρουν τι τους γίνεται, ή δε καταλαβαίνουν, ή είναι ανενημέρωτοι ή λένε ψέματα (και ποιός τα ελέγχει τα βιβλία που διδάσκουμε τα παιδιά μας για λάθη;).

Η δεύτερη θεωρία που αναφέρουν έχει πλέον σχεδόν μηδενικό επιστημονικό κύρος. Προς τιμήν τουλάχιστον των συγγραφέων, αναφέρουν τις επιμέρους ηλικίες του σύμπαντος και της Γής όπως τις έχουν υπολογίσει οι αστρονόμοι, δηλαδή περίπου 12-15 δισεκατομμύρια χρόνια για το πρώτο και 4.5 δισεκατομμύρια χρόνια για τη δεύτερη (κάποια στιγμή θα γράψω σε γενικές γραμμές πως κάνουμε τους υπολογισμούς). Καταλήγουν δε οι συγγραφείς στο (να τραβάς τα μαλλιά σου) προσβλητικά ανενημέρωτο και εγκληματικά ανεύθυνο- όταν πρόκειται να το διδάξεις σε χιλιάδες ελληνόπουλα- συμπέρασμα (τα bold δικά μου):

...μπορούμε σίγουρα να πούμε οτι τα προβλήματα της δημιουργίας του κόσμου δεν έχουν ακόμα διαφωτιστεί ικανοποιητικά απο την επιστήμη, γι΄αυτό και διατυπώνονται συνεχώς νέες θεωρίες, συχνά αντίθετες μεταξύ τους (ποιές είναι αυτές, δέν αναφέρουν). Η χριστιανική μας θρησκεία δίνει με τη θεόπνευστη Αγία Γραφή μια δική της ερμηνεία του προβλήματος (χωρίς επιστημονικές βλέψεις (μας έχωσε και μπηχτή ο τσαχπίνης)). Για τους πιστούς χριστιανούς, φυσικά, που δέχονται τη θεοπνευστία της Αγίας Γραφής, δεν υπαρχει πρόβλημα αλήθειας αλλα μόνο πρόβλημα σωστής ερμηνείας της (δηλαδή ψέματα, πίστευε και μη ερεύνα).

Να υπενθυμίσω οτι η ανακάλυψη έγινε το '64 (αναγνωρισμένη και διεθνώς, πώς να το κάνουμε, με ένα Νομπελάκι) ενώ το βιβλίο εκδόθηκε το ΄91! Κι απ΄ότι μου λέει η ξαδέλφη μου, που μόλις τέλειωσε το Λύκειο, αυτό το συγκεκριμένο βιβλίο ακόμα διδάσκεται!

Άλλο δείγμα της άγνοιάς τους:

Μπορεί βέβαια οι υλιστές (μπηχτή) επιστήμονες να επιμένουν οτι ο κόσμος δημιουργήθηκε τυχαία μόνος του. Αλλα δε μας εξηγούν πως βρέθηκε η πρώτη ύλη (τα 106 απλά φυσικά στοιχεία που συνθέτουν όλες τις μορφές ύλης). Μήπως και αυτά δημιουργηθηκαν τυχαία απ' το τίποτα;

Η θεωρία της μεγάλης έκρηξης το εξηγεί απλά και όμορφα (εν ταχεί, τα βαρέα στοιχεία δημιουργούνται στο κέντρο των αστέρων). Όπως επίσης και το βιβλίο αστρονομίας της Β΄Λυκείου, καθώς και τα βιβλία Φυσικής και Χημείας της Γ΄Λυκείου. Αλλά ίσως οι συγγραφείς να μή πέρασαν τάξη (ποντάρω μπισκότο πτι-μπερ οτι κόπηκαν στην αστρονομία). Εν πάσει περιπτώσει, θα μπορούσαν βέβαια οι αξιότιμοι κύριοι συγγραφείς να ρωτήσουν οποιοδήποτε φυσικό η χημικό να τους το εξηγήσει. Δεν ήξεραν, δέ ρώταγαν...δέ ρώταγαν, δέν έμαθαν...

Και μεταδίδουμε την άγνοιά μας στις επόμενες γενεές.
Αντε και του χρόνου!

Despite the worst global recession in decades, executive pay keeps rising

2009-09-14T09:52:00.004+01:00

source: The Guardian

Executives at Britain's top companies saw their basic salaries leap 10% last year, despite the onset of the worst global recession in decades, in which their companies lost almost a third of their value amid a record decline in the FTSE.

The Guardian's annual survey of boardroom pay reveals that the full- and part-time directors of the FTSE 100, the premier league of British business, shared between them more than £1bn.

Bonus payouts were lower, but the basic salary hikes were more than three times the 3.1% average pay rise for ordinary workers in the private sector. The big rise in directors' basic pay – more than double the rate of inflation last year – came as many of their companies were imposing pay freezes on staff and starting huge redundancy programmes to slash costs.

The Guardian data also shows that a coterie of elite bosses at the helm of multinational corporations are seeing their overall pay packets soar ever higher. The 10 most highly paid executives earned a combined £170m last year – up from £140m in 2007. Five years ago, the top 10 banked some £70m.

The Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman, Vince Cable, said: "The Guardian's analysis shows the breathtaking cynicism involved in a lot of executive pay deals, which are unrelated to either personal or corporate performance and involve people who are very well off helping themselves to larger salaries when private sector wages in many companies are being cut."

The stealth increases in basic pay took much of the sting out of falls in bonuses tied to the performances of their companies. Overall pay for directors of FTSE companies, including bonuses, fell by an average of 5%.

The average chief executive of a blue-chip company now earns a basic salary of £791,000. However, adding bonus payments, share awards and the value of perks ranging from cars and drivers to school fees and dental work, the average pay package rises dramatically. Nearly a quarter of FTSE chief executives received total 2008 pay packages in excess of £5m, and 22 directors now have basic salaries of more than £1m.

The survey is likely to spark renewed calls for shareholders to take a tougher line to control boardroom pay. Earlier this year, City minister Lord Myners accused shareholders of behaving like "absentee landlords".

In the wake of the banking crisis, there has been a wave of shareholder revolts over directors' remuneration. But even if investors vote against over-generous boardroom payouts, companies are not obliged to take their views into account.

Some of the City's biggest and most influential shareholders are also part of the problem – their bosses are among those raking in multimillion-pound salaries. Michael McLintock, a director of Prudential and the boss of its investment arm, which holds big stakes in thousands of companies, was last year paid £6.6m – putting him among the 25 best-paid bosses in the UK.

Brendan Barber, general secretary of the TUC, said: "The recession has done nothing to stop the gap between top directors and the rest of their staff getting wider every year.

"It is even more offensive when the Institute of Directors has called for spending cuts that would hit pensioners, the poor and low-paid public sector staff. We've already had the 1980s-style recession, it looks depressingly like we are going back to 1980s greed-is-good politics, too."

The highest paid boss last year was Bart Becht, the chief executive of Reckitt Benckiser, whose brands include Harpic, Veet and Strepsils. He was rewarded with £36.8m in pay, bonuses, perks and share incentive schemes. Becht, 53, has been a regular feature in the upper echelons of the annual survey for several years, earning more than £80m during the last three years.

The highest paid woman was Cynthia Carroll, the head of the mining giant Anglo American. The vast multinational also owns a big stake in the De Beers diamond business. Carroll, a 52-year-old American, earned a basic salary of more than £1m last year, but benefits, bonus payments and share awards took her total payout to nearly £4m. She was also paid another £93,000 sitting on the board of BP.

The glass ceiling, however, appears to be almost entirely intact. Just one in 15 boardroom seats are occupied by women – and most of those are non-executive, part-time directors. Only 22 women hold full-time executive director positions, involved in the day-to-day running of the business.

The best-paid boardroom last year was that of Tullow Oil, a London-based oil exploration business, where 11 directors picked up a total of £59m. Most of their gains came from share options, as they cashed in on a share price that had soared along with the oil price. The directors made much more from their cheap share handouts than the rest of the 470-strong workforce were paid in the year.

Despite the credit crunch, the best-paid employees are still those working for City-based firms. The average pay at money broker ICAP, which employs 4,330 staff, was more than £200,000. Hedge fund group Man had the second best-paid staff. Its 1,776 employees were paid a total of £353m in 2008 – an average £198,000 each. Five years ago the Guardian survey showed that the average salary at Man was £100,000. The chief executives of those two companies also feature among the highest-paid FTSE 100 chiefs. Man boss Stanley Fink, who has now stepped down, received £15m last year, while ICAP's Michael Spencer received nearly £7m.

At the other end of the spectrum, the worst-paid staff are those working in the retail and leisure sectors and for mining companies.

Chinese Translation - M. Ward

2009-09-14T02:24:00.001+01:00

UK Pay Scales: How earnings compare (2008 data)

2009-09-03T12:23:00.005+01:00

1. £0 to £10,000:
Cleaners, hairdressers, some agricultural labourers, people on benefits, fast food restaurant staff, school cooks, fine artists, holiday representatives, swimming pool attendants, broadcasting/film runners.

2. £10,001 to £20,000:
Manual workers, sewer cleaners, call centre staff, mortuary assistants, farmers, electronic assembly line workers, nursery and care workers, imams, Army privates, bus drivers, checkout staff, landscape designers, fishermen, charity fundraisers, junior civil servants, local government administrators, soil scientists, florists, counsellors, air cabin crew, miners

3. £20,001 to £30,000:
Junior MI5 officers, rabbis, vicars, social workers, NHS nurses, naval cooks, electricians, carpenters, binmen, international aid workers, health service managers, media buyers, plant breeders, textile designers, museum administrators, lorry drivers, map makers, journalists.

4. £30,001 to £40,000:
Newly qualified RAF pilots, London Tube drivers, some television presenters, London police officers, pole dancers, sandwich shop managers, bishops, London cab drivers, vets, paramedics, architects, diplomats, timber merchants, trading standards officers, zookeepers, probation officers, opticians, literary agents, immigration officers.

5. £40,001 to £50,000:
Air traffic controllers, solicitors, RAF Flight Lieutenants, theatre managers, office managers, foresters, engineers, TV producers.

6. £50,001 to £75,000:
Marketing and senior managers, senior police officers, commercial airline pilots, Royal Navy captains, education administrators, top PAs, fashion designers, town planners, MPs, senior social workers, tax inspectors, medical sales representatives.

7. £75,001 to £100,000:
Senior managers, senior civil servants, Army brigadiers, secondary school heads, celebrity stylists, some plumbers, advertising executives, senior PRs, distribution managers, accountants.

8. £100,001 to £500,000:
GPs, High Court judges, Prime Minister, business whizzkids, Cabinet ministers, Chief of Defence Staff, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, chief executives, senior company secretaries, NHS chief executives, private psychotherapists, financial advisers, quarry managers.

9. £500,001 to £1,000,000:
Director General of the BBC, heads of larger companies, including the managing director of Arsenal, and the chief executive of Sainsbury's (Justin King).

10. Over £1,000,000:
Chief executives of the UK's biggest firms, celebrities, footballers, bestselling authors, football managers, senior solicitors, investment bankers.

(see a detailed breakdown of salaries)

And here are the Tax scales in the UK (again based on 2008 data):

Starting Rate 10% 0 - 2,230

Basic Rate 22% 2,231 - 34,600

Higher Rate 40% Over 34,600

Disney buys Marvel comics

2009-09-01T16:44:00.002+01:00

The Walt Disney empire is to buy the superheroes stable Marvel Entertainment for $4bn (£2.5bn) in a star-studded Hollywood deal that unites family names such as Mickey Mouse with lucrative characters including Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk and the X-Men.
Disney hopes to put Marvel's 5,000 characters to work on its television channels and in video games, theme parks and movies. The agreed takeover is for a mixture of cash and stock, with Disney shares accounting for roughly 40% of the buyout price.

One wonders what the future holds.

Not all those who wander are lost (Camera Obscura)

2009-08-31T02:48:00.004+01:00

Camera Obscura are a Scottish indie band currently signed up with legendary record label 4AD. Comparisons with compatriots Belle and Sebastian are probably tired and irrelevant by now. Cambell's husky voice and compelling lyrics tie the music together and create a fast paced, quasi-psychedelic reverb landscape that is rather quirky but all too pleasant.

Here is "If looks could Kill" from the album "Let's Get Out Of This Country".

Mars as large as the Moon?

2009-08-27T18:53:00.009+01:00

This popular urban legend is also known as Two Moons.

The brief answer is, no, Mars will not look as big as the Moon.

Every year astronomers, including the one writing this article, get this question; and every year we have to debunk it. People's memories are short while the orbit of Mars is pretty stable.

Apparently this strange hoax first surfaced on the Internet back in 2003. The relevant e-mail went something like this:

The Red Planet is about to be spectacular! This month and next, Earth is catching up with Mars in an encounter that will culminate in the closest approach between the two planets in recorded history. The next time Mars may come this close is in 2287. Due to the way Jupiter's gravity tugs on Mars and perturbs its orbit, astronomers can only be certain that Mars has not come this close to Earth in the Last 5,000 years, but it may be as long as 60,000 years before it happens again.

The encounter will culminate on August 27th when Mars comes to within 34,649,589 miles of Earth and will be (next to the moon) the brightest object in the night sky. It will attain a magnitude of -2.9 and will appear 25.11 arc seconds wide. At a modest 75-power magnification

Mars will look as large as the full moon to the naked eye. By the end of August when the two planets are closest, Mars will rise at nightfall and reach its highest point in the sky at 12:30 a.m. That's pretty convenient to see something that no human being has seen in recorded history. So, mark your calendar at the beginning of August to see Mars grow progressively brighter and brighter throughout the month. Share this with your children and grandchildren. NO ONE ALIVE TODAY WILL EVER SEE THIS AGAIN

Or the Greek version (which actually gives an incorrect year - the original doesn't):

Αυτό γίνεται μόνο μια φορά στην ζωή μας
ΔΥΟ ΦΕΓΓΑΡΙΑ ΤΑΥΤΟΧΡΟΝΑ ΣΤΟΝ ΟΥΡΑΝΟ
Την 27^η Αυγούστου 2009, 30 λεπτά μετά τα μεσάνυκτα, κοιτάξτε στον ουρανό.
Ο πλανήτης Άρης θα είναι πολύ λαμπερός μέσα στον ουρανό
Θα είναι το ίδιο μεγάλος όπως και το φεγγάρι παρόλο που ο πλανήτης Άρης θα είναι 34,65 εκατομμύρια μίλια μακριά από την Γή.
Προσπαθήστε λοιπόν να μην χάσετε αυτό το γεγονός
Θα το βλέπουμε με γυμνό μάτι σαν να και η γη έχει δύο φεγγάρια!
Η επόμενη φορά που θα λάβει χώρα αυτό το γεγονός θα είναι το έτος 2287.
Μοιραστείτε αυτή την πληροφορία με όλους τους φίλους σας γιατί κανένας ζωντανός δεν θα μπορέσει να το δει για δεύτερη φορά...

This is plainly wrong. Mars isn't going to be making a close approach on August 27. The close approach this e-mail is alluding to happened back in 2003. It did indeed get closer than it had in at least 50,000 years, but this was a very small amount. On August 27th, 2003, Mars closed to a distance of only 55,758,006 kilometers (34,646,418 miles). The Moon, by comparison, orbits the Earth at a distance of only 385,000 kilometers (240,000 miles). Mars was close, but it was still 144 times further away than the Moon. The Moon's diameter is 3474 kilometres (2159 miles), a little more than a quarter of that of the Earth while that of Mars is 6,800 km, about half that of the earth.

[Here is a little experiment you can do. Put an orange 114 meters away from you and a golf ball at your feet, lie down and look at them. Do they look about the same size?]

So what happened was this: Instead of appearing like a huge red orb in the sky, Mars looked like a bright red star. Amateur astronomers around the world set up their telescopes, and had a look at this close encounter. But you still needed a telescope and it really didn't look that much different. And everyone was happy; because if Mars did actually come close enough to rival the Moon, its gravity would alter the Earth's orbit and raise terrible tides.

See what NASA has to say about this hoax.

What is a radio image?

2009-08-23T15:53:00.009+01:00

One of the great discoveries of the Renaissance was the theory of perspective. At the core of the theory is the realisation that a picture is a map of the directions from which light is coming as seen from a particular viewpoint. So every point on the canvas corresponds to a particular direction in space. The hue at each spot represents in colour and intensity the light arriving from the corresponding direction.

Now, colour is the eye's way of describing the spectrum of light; for instance, the colour blue tells us that the light coming from that direction contains a range of wavelengths in the visible band but is relatively strong at around 450 nm. Colour is actually a rather inaccurate measure of the spectrum; for instance, it is hard to tell a mixture of red and blue light (i.e. purple) from the very deep blue (i.e. violet). For technical work astronomers prefer to obtain a series of monochrome images through the use of coloured filters, much like the ones used in ordinary photography, so that each is a record of light with wavelengths within a specific narow band.

The astronomical B, V and R bands correspond roughly to the three basic colours, blue, green and red.
Combining the images in the different filters then allows astronomers to reconstruct a "false-colour" image of the observed object.Our images are then abstracted a futher step: the intensity of white light from our print (or computer monitor) is telling us about the insnsity of the red light on the sky.

There is no reason to restrict the wavelengths used to the tiny range that the human eye can detect. Visible light is just a tiny segment of the electromagnetic spectrum and with the appropriate technology we can make images, maps of "light" in a more general sense, at wavelengths far outside this familiar band; You are probably already familiar with such "invisible" colours like X-rays, ultraviolet, infrared and radio. In fact, the range of colours used by radio-astronomers would correspond to about twenty new colours (or bands) if we say that there are three basic ones in visible light! Fortunately, just as with monochrome images, we can use ordinary visible gray-scales to display these images of "invisible" light.

These composite images show M84, a massive elliptical galaxy in the Virgo Cluster, about 55 million light years from Earth. Radio data from the Very Large Array is shown in red. A background image from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey is shown in yellow and white.
(Credit: Radio (NSF/NRAO/VLA/ESO/R.A.Laing et al); Optical (SDSS))

The leftmost image is in radio wavelengths, the middle one in optical and the rightmost a combination of the two.

The Origin of Zero

2009-08-21T11:55:00.001+01:00

The number zero as we know it arrived in the West circa 1200, most famously delivered by Italian mathematician Fibonacci (aka Leonardo of Pisa), who brought it, along with the rest of the Arabic numerals, back from his travels to north Africa. But the history of zero, both as a concept and a number, stretches far deeper into history—so deep, in fact, that its provenance is difficult to nail down.

"There are at least two discoveries, or inventions, of zero," says Charles Seife, author of Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea (Viking, 2000). "The one that we got the zero from came from the Fertile Crescent." It first came to be between 400 and 300 B.C. in Babylon, Seife says, before developing in India, wending its way through northern Africa and, in Fibonacci's hands, crossing into Europe via Italy.

Initially, zero functioned as a mere placeholder—a way to tell 1 from 10 from 100, to give an example using Arabic numerals. "That's not a full zero," Seife says. "A full zero is a number on its own; it's the average of –1 and 1."

It began to take shape as a number, rather than a punctuation mark between numbers, in India in the fifth century A.D., says Robert Kaplan, author of The Nothing That Is: A Natural History of Zero (Oxford University Press, 2000). "It isn't until then, and not even fully then, that zero gets full citizenship in the republic of numbers," Kaplan says. Some cultures were slow to accept the idea of zero, which for many carried darkly magical connotations.

The second appearance of zero occurred independently in the New World, in Mayan culture, likely in the first few centuries A.D. "That, I suppose, is the most striking example of the zero being devised wholly from scratch," Kaplan says.

Kaplan pinpoints an even earlier emergence of a placeholder zero, a pair of angled wedges used by the Sumerians to denote an empty number column some 4,000 to 5,000 years ago.

But Seife is not certain that even a placeholder zero was in use so early in history. "I'm not entirely convinced," he says, "but it just shows it's not a clear-cut answer." He notes that the history of zero is too nebulous to clearly identify a lone progenitor. "In all the references I've read, there's always kind of an assumption that zero is already there," Seife says. "They're delving into it a little bit and maybe explaining the properties of this number, but they never claim to say, 'This is a concept that I'm bringing forth.'"

Kaplan's exploration of zero's genesis turned up a similarly blurred web of discovery and improvement. "I think there's no question that one can't claim it had a single origin," Kaplan says. "Wherever you're going to get placeholder notation, it's inevitable that you're going to need some way to denote absence of a number."

This article is by John Matson and appeared in the Scientific American (August 21, 2009)

Scientists Detect "Wrong-Way" Planet

2009-08-13T11:16:00.002+01:00

The Planetary Society
Article By Amir Alexander
August 12, 2009

An international team of scientists has detected the first extrasolar planet orbiting in the "wrong" direction. This means that the planet, designated WASP-17, is circling its star in a direction opposite to the rotation of the star itself. Such a motion, known as a "retrograde orbit," is very unusual since the motions of both star and planet were acquired from the swirling cloud of gas and dust that formed them both. As a result, the planets orbiting the same star almost always move in the same direction, which is the same as the rotation of the star itself.

A retrograde orbit is almost certainly a legacy of a planet's violent past, most likely dating to the planetary system's early days. "Newly formed solar systems can be violent places" explained graduate student David Anderson of Keele University, who is a member of the team that made the discovery. "A near-collision during the early, violent stage of this planetary system could well have caused a gravitational slingshot, flinging WASP-17 into its backwards orbit."

WASP-17 was first detected through the transit photometry technique by the Wide Area Search for Planets (WASP) consortium of British universities, using the WASP-South camera array in South Africa. But in order to detect its retrograde motion the WASP team needed an assist from planet hunters at the Geneva Observatory, who specialize in radial velocity measurements.

According to Darin Ragozzine of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics astronomers can identify the direction of a planet's orbit because of slight discrepancies in the radial velocity data when a planet transits a star. Because a star is rotating, one side of it is moving towards (or away) from Earth faster than the other side. During a transit, the planet covers first one side of the star and then the other, causing a slight but measurable shift in the radial velocity readings. If during the transit the star first appears to be moving relatively slowly towards the Earth, but then faster as the transit progresses, then the planet is orbiting in the same direction as the star's rotation. But if the reverse is the case – as it is for WASP-17 – then the planet is in a retrograde orbit.

WASP-17 is located about 1000 light years from Earth, and is unusual not only because of the direction of its orbit but also because of its size and low density. Although its mass is only half that of Jupiter, its diameter is nearly twice that of our giant neighbor, which makes WASP-17 the largest known planet. The reason, according to Coel Hellier of Keele University, is related to the planet's unusual orbit. Retrograde motion coupled with a highly eccentric orbit subject the planet to intense tidal forces. Such tidal compression and stretching would have the effect of heating up the planet, causing it to expand to its current bloated dimensions. As a result, Hellier noted, the density of WASP-17 is only one seventieth (1/70) of the density of Earth.

Just as there are moons in retrograde orbits in our solar system, it stands to reason that there are also planets in retrograde orbits, and the discovery of WASP-17 did not therefore come as a complete surprise to planetary scientists. Nevertheless, this highly unusual planet does contribute to our understanding of the birth and life of planets, and adds one more member to the menagerie of strange and wonderful worlds astronomers are uncovering in the depths of space.

Sigur Ros - Glósóli

2009-08-03T23:38:00.005+01:00

"Glósóli" (Icelandic for "Glowing Sole") is a song by Sigur Rós, released as part of their 2005 album Takk.

The name is a combination of gló- from the verb að glóa meaning "to glow, shine, glitter" and sóli meaning "sole." The second element of the name, sóli, shares its grammatical stem with the word "sól", meaning "sun". In combination "glósóli" can be understood as a childish way of saying "glowing sun".

The song is also praised for its artistic and highly cinematographic music video which consists of children dressed in old-fashioned Icelandic clothing, "migrating" towards an unknown destination.

Persistence

2009-07-30T09:39:00.003+01:00

2001 A Floyd Odyssey: Echoes

2009-07-29T00:35:00.008+01:00

During my late teen years, few bands had influenced me as profoundly as Pink Floyd had and Echoes was, and remains, one of my all time favourite songs. The album "Meddle" was released in 1971, three years after Kubrick's seminal film "2001: A Space Odyssey" but rumour has it that Kubrick first approached Pink Floyd to write the soundtrack to the film; a request which they refused. Upon viewing the film however, they regretted this decision and the rumour goes on to say that Echoes was recorded to score with the last section of 2001 as a sign of respect to the director's work. The video below shows that the two actually sync pretty well.

Of course the members of the band always denied that the synchronization was intentional and there's no reason to dispute that but it is true that Roger Waters is sometimes quoted as saying that the band's failure to contribute music to 2001's official score was his "greatest regret".

Echoes (Part 1) Lyrics:

Overhead the albatross
Hangs motionless upon the air
And deep beneath the rolling waves
In labyrinths of coral caves
The echo of a distant time
Comes willowing across the sand
And everything is green and submarine
And no one showed us to the land
And no one knows the where's or why's
And something stirs and something tries
And starts to climb toward the light

Strangers passing in the street
By chance two separate glances meet
And I am you and what I see is me
And do I take you by the hand
And lead you through the land
And help me understand
The best I can

And no one calls us to the Lord
And no one forces down our eyes
And no one speaks and no one tries
No one flies around the sun
Cloudless, everyday you fall
Upon my waking eyes
Inviting and inciting me to rise
And through the window in the wall
Comes streaming in on sunlight wings
A million bright ambassadors of morning

And no one sings me lulabyes
And no one makes me close my eyes
So I throw the windows wide
And call to you across the sky

Unusual teamups: Dalí & Disney

2009-07-26T18:56:00.005+01:00

In 1946, Walt Disney and Salvador Dalí, in one of cinema's oddest collaborations, teamed up on a short film called Destino. But Disney's studio ran into financial trouble and put the unfinished film on hold. Fast forward 57 years and a team of Disney animators took the project off the shelf and using traditional and 3-D animation techniques brought Dalí's paintings and sketches to life. The six-minute film, spearheaded by Walt's nephew Roy Disney, premiered at the Annecy Animation Festival in June 2003. An official home DVD release is expected in 2010 along with a documentary about the two artists' history together.

The film is sometimes oddly reminiscent of René Laloux's La Planète Sauvage.

Eric Shanower's Age of Bronze

2009-07-25T13:20:00.008+01:00

Eric Shanower's Age of Bronze is a retelling of the Homeric epic story of the Trojan war, including the events not covered in the Iliad. In fact, beyond the Iliad, it draws it's sources from major and minor works from classical Greece and Rome (such as the plays of Sophocles and Euripides), many Medieval European sources, and continues through Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida and beyond. There is an extensive list of the sources at the back of each issue, including a glossary and multithreaded genealogical charts for the main houses.

Only three volumes have been published so far (the last one being part 1 of 2) and it already stands at a staggering 600 pages. The story is marvelously told and the writing and art are well within the spirit of the times and well deserving the 2 Eisner awards. The first installment, A Thousand Ships, opens with Paris as a cowherd on mount Ida, which grounds the series before launching into more fantastic adventures.

Equally impressive is Eric's artwork on the Age of Bronze. Not only is it finely drawn with exquisite attention to details and expressions, it is also historically accurate. It draws upon the archaeological excavations of the places where the story took place: Mycenae, Knossos, and Pylos, among others, and especially Troy itself. Eric Shanower has done amazing work researching and reconstructing the architecture and clothing of the time. Impressively, even the geologogical lay of the land is rendered quite closely, at least for the places that I have personally visited. Mycenae's ruins become gloriously alive in these pages with Agamemnon and Klytemnestra walking down the palace corridors.

The author-cum-artist has researched quite well the wide range of literature, art, and archaeology. . . . The clothing, hairstyles, pottery, frescoes, architecture, boat construction, and the settings in general are in such close agreement with current research that it makes one reflect how differently modern scholars envision the Late Bronze Age Achaeans than did past Homeric specialists. . . . Aegean prehistorians will appreciate how much archaeology has advanced our knowledge of the Mycenaean world to allow Shanower to reproduce it so faithfully.
—Thomas F. Strasser, American Journal of Archaeology

Beyond the awesome scope of the story — this is the closest thing in comics to a true generational saga, what with previously unknown princes, kidnappings, and the other schemes of the rich and powerful. The tragic element in Sacrifice is overwhelming and makes you feel like you're watching a Greek play. Shanower sticks to the sources and, as much as possible, downplays the theological elements.

I've chosen to downplay the supernatural element in order to emphasize the human element. The only fantastic details I've retained are dreams and visions. And when you think about it, these aren't necessarily as supernatural as they might first appear. Everyone draems. Many people have hallucinations. Others are convinced they've had visions. People the world over believe they communicate with gods - it's called prayer. So I've let dreams and visions remain - they're pretty human after all. But no gods in the flesh.

All things considered, a highly recommended read! I'm eagerly awaiting for the next volume.
Thank you Eric.
10/10

Wiring a web for global good

2009-07-23T12:22:00.003+01:00

We're at a unique moment in history, says UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown: we can use today's interconnectedness to develop our shared global ethic -- and work together to confront the challenges of poverty, security, climate change and the economy.

Caloric Restriction Delays Disease Onset and Mortality in Primates

2009-07-20T12:46:00.003+01:00

It’s been a big week on the longevity front: First, scientists found that an immunosuppresant drug called rapamycin extended the lifespan of mice. Now, a 20-year-long study reported in the journal Science shows that a diet 30 percent lower in calories than normal decreased the incidence of age-related diseases in macaque monkeys as the animals got older.

Half the monkeys were fed a low-calorie diet, and the other half a standard diet. All were closely monitored, with researchers regularly measuring their body composition, blood chemistry, endocrine function, and heart and brain function. When monkeys died, they were necropsied and the causes of death established [Wired.com]. Researchers found that monkeys on a calorie-restricted, nutrient-rich diet (on the left in photo) were three times less likely than monkeys on a full-calorie diet (on the right) to die from age-related diseases like cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. Scientists have hypothesized that calorie restriction triggers mechanisms that evolved to help organisms survive in times when food was scarce, but the exact process is still mysterious.

The anti-aging benefits even extended to the monkeys’ brains. MRIs reveal less shrinking with age in areas important for decision-making and controlling movement in the brains of calorie-restricted animals [Science News]. This corroborates previous studies that found calorie restriction helps mice, dogs, fruit flies, and yeast age more slowly and can even help them live longer. But because macaques can live to the age of 40, scientists cannot yet ascertain whether a low-calorie diet actually extends lifespan in monkeys.

Researchers speculate that further research will eventually show that humans, too, can benefit from a low-calorie diet. “Up until now, all the clear-cut evidence that caloric restriction slows aging has come from lower organisms,” said John Holloszy, … who studies caloric restriction in people and was not involved in the current monkey study. “This is the first study to show that caloric restriction slows aging in a primate species. And of course, we’re primates, too. It’s a lot more relevant to humans than the mouse”. In fact, a person who switches from the typical nutrient-sparse, high-calorie American diet to one that is high in nutrients and low in calories may benefit more than the monkeys did. That’s because even the macaques that ate a higher-calorie diet consumed plenty of nutrients.

Still, a lifetime of deprivation may not be feasible, much less enjoyable, for most people (although it’s estimated that a few thousand people already follow a calorie-restricted diet for its suspected anti-aging effects). Instead, scientists hope to deliver in a drug the anti-aging effects of a low-calorie diet, or of chemical compounds that seem to replicate the effects of a calorie-restricted diet. Several teams are hoping to harness the age-defying benefits of red wine. GlaxoSmithKline last year spent $720 million to buy Sirtris Pharmaceuticals, which has developed a souped-up version of the red wine compound resveratrol that has been found to make mice live longer and stay healthier [Reuters].

The article has been published in Science.

Trick Question

2009-07-17T09:47:00.004+01:00

Open-mindedness and the supernatural

2009-07-16T13:15:00.001+01:00

Sonata No.1, Op.5 in D Major (1/4) - A. Corelli

2009-07-14T01:42:00.001+01:00

Arcangelo Corelli (1653-1713) Sonata No.1 D Major from "Sonate a Violino e Violone o Cimbalo, Op.5, Parte Prima", Mov. I Rome, 1700

Ed's Teapots from Space

2009-07-12T13:36:00.002+01:00

The Teapots from Space perfect the art of teapot abduction to find out what astronomers are and why they like astronomy, and whether they take sugar.

Gordon Brown/Golden Brown

2009-07-10T16:23:00.000+01:00

USA: Why we fight (2005)

2009-07-09T22:44:00.008+01:00

The grim warning by Dwight D. Eisenhower on his farewell address sounds today like the prophecies of Cassandra. This documentary features interviews with many prominent individuals, including Senator John McCain, retired CIA experts, pentagon experts as well as ordinary citizens. The premise is, as the title suggests, to explore the reasons that have led the US to wage wars, although the main part of the movie concentrates on the decision to invade Iraq.
Trailer:

Full movie:

Things have certainly changed since 2005, with the Obama administration coming to power in 2008, but it's still worth a watch.

References:
Hiroshima. Was it necessary?
The Project for a New American Century
Iraq body count

The Pearl Fishers' Duet

2009-07-09T13:23:00.003+01:00

I first listened to this piece on Classic FM some years ago and loved it. This is a pretty old recording (1906) of a performance by Enrico Caruso and Mario Ancona. "Au fond du temple saint" from Bizet's Les pêcheurs de perles.

Anni Rossi

2009-07-04T23:21:00.008+01:00

Keep an eye out for this one! 23 year old Anni Rossi has been classically trained since an early age and her voice is smooth and lugubrious. She's been a performing solo artist for the past few years and has only recently signed with a record label. Here's a lyrically odd taster:

Method or Madness?

2009-07-03T22:11:00.004+01:00

Greece’s policy regarding illegal immigrants used to be very successful: People caught trying to sneak into the country were either forced back across the border or were abandoned to their fate, in the knowledge that the migrants would do all in their power to keep moving on toward more welcoming members of the European Union. Of the hundreds of thousands of people from places like Afghanistan and Pakistan, a small minority chose to seek their fortune in Greece – a country that provided no benefits but did offer more work than what these (mostly) unskilled young men could find at home. In the last couple of years, however, things have become more difficult for those trying to get to more western or northern EU countries, leading to a large concentration of illegal immigrants in some Greek cities, especially Athens and Patras. With minimal – if any – social services to rely on, the migrants formed their own support networks and gravitated toward areas where others of their kind had found lodging – whether in residential neighborhoods or shanties on vacant lots. As time passed and their numbers grew, the new arrivals became a problem for local residents, prompting calls for “something to be done.”

The pressure hit the Greek government in last month’s elections for the European Parliament, when the populist, anti-immigrant Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS), was the only party to gain votes – mostly at the ruling New Democracy party’s expense. At their recent summit, the EU leaders finally appeared to heed the cries of Greece, Italy, Malta and Cyprus, all in the frontline of illegal migration, and expressed “great concern at the dramatic situation in the Mediterranean area.” Among the measures Commissioner for Justice Jacques Barrot is preparing: permitting people to seek asylum in countries other than the ones of first entry, establishing new rules for reception procedures, reuniting minors with their families in other EU countries and setting up an EU office to support asylum seekers. Barrot, who was in Greece the past week, adopted a carrot-and-stick approach, demanding that Greece create a public administration capable of dealing with asylum applications, while also promising to press Turkey to take back migrants who entered Greece from its territory. Ankara refuses to honor a protocol signed with Athens in 2001, saying it does not want to become a dumping ground for unwanted migrants. Greece now says it will help push for repatriation agreements with Afghanistan and Pakistan, so that migrants can go home without staying in Turkey.

Barrot’s proposals aim at bridging the gap between the southern countries that bear the brunt of immigration and the more welcoming countries of Northern and Western Europe, which criticize their southern partners but would like to avoid getting involved in the problem. The problem of illegal immigration is a problem for all Europe, not just the countries that stand on the EU’s porous borders. But it is one thing to need support because a problem is too big for one country and another to force your partners to take over a large part of your duties because of your own incompetence.

The lack of a comprehensive policy over many years and the breathtaking incompetence of state employees charged with dealing with immigrants weigh on the government. The European Union has been forced to both warn Athens of serious consequences if it does not get its act together and to take over a large part of its responsibilities. Instead of this pushing Greece to formulate a serious policy, the government has brushed aside domestic criticism and passed a law that could lead to immigrants – both legal and illegal – being deported without trial, simply by being charged with any crime that carries a jail sentence of three months or more. We can only wonder if this madness is aimed simply at a domestic audience or whether its purpose is the abdication of even more of our responsibilities.

From an article in Kathimerini.

Arabesque No1 - Debussy

2009-07-03T01:53:00.001+01:00

Isao Tomita's eerie rendition of Debussy's Arabesque No 1.

Gift Silver poem

2009-07-01T08:20:00.003+01:00

GIFT SILVER POEM

I know that all this is worthless
and that the language I speak
doesn't have an alphabet

Since the sun and the waves
are a syllabic script
which can be deciphered only
in the years of sorrow and exile

And the motherland a fresco
with successive overlays
frankish or slavic which,
should you try to restore,
you are immediately sent to prison and
held responsible

To a crowd of foreign Powers
always through
the intervention of your own

As it happens for the disasters

But let's imagine
that in an old days' threshing-floor
which might be in an apartment-complex
children are playing
and whoever loses

should, according to the rules, tell the others
and give them a truth

Then everyone ends up
holding in his hand
a small

Gift, silver poem.

Odysseas Elytis
"The Tree of Light and The Fourteenth Beauty"

Δώρο Ασημένιο Ποίημα

Ξέρω πως είναι τίποτε όλ' αυτά και πως η γλώσσα
που μιλώ δεν έχει αλφάβητο
Aφού και ο ήλιος και τα κύματα είναι μια γραφή
συλλαβική που την αποκρυπτογραφείς μονάχα στους καιρούς
της λύπης και της εξορίας
Kι η πατρίδα μια τοιχογραφία μ' επιστρώσεις
διαδοχικές φράγκικες ή σλαβικές που αν τύχει και
βαλθείς για να την αποκαταστήσεις πας αμέσως φυλακή
και δίνεις λόγο
Σ' ένα πλήθος Eξουσίες ξένες μέσω της δικής σου
πάντοτε
Όπως γίνεται για τις συμφορές
Όμως ας φανταστούμε σ' ένα παλαιών καιρών αλώνι
που μπορεί να 'ναι και σε πολυκατοικία ότι παίζουνε
παιδιά και ότι αυτός που χάνει
Πρέπει σύμφωνα με τους κανονισμούς να πει στους
άλλους και να δώσει μιαν αλήθεια
Oπόταν βρίσκονται στο τέλος όλοι να κρατούν στο χέρι
τους ένα μικρό
Δώρο ασημένιο ποίημα.

(από το Tο Φωτόδεντρο και η Δέκατη Tέταρτη Oμορφιά,
Ίκαρος 1971)

Football - The IT way

2009-06-25T11:25:00.002+01:00

House of Flying daggers

2009-06-21T17:09:00.004+01:00

House of flying daggers is admittedly on the same level as Crouching Tiger and Hero as far as the visuals are concerned - they are still stunning - and the acting & choreography of the fight scenes are superb. Where I found the film extremely lacking was the actual dialogue, which is the gist and soul of any movie, that even a clever twist of plot towards the end could not save.

Main themes are repeated and some things seem to be there just to have the character say something in their close up. But most ridiculous was the supposedly climactic fight scene in the end. The three main characters slash each other up over and over again losing tons of blood and piercing vital organs yet keep fighting with the same vigour and persistence, then they fall and you expect them to be dead but - lo! - they get up again and join the fray! Pierced liver, character down, two minutes later, hey,he's up again doing his thing. And then some. I couldn't help but laugh at the end. It brought to mind two scenes from Monty Python and the holy grail. That with the Black Knight: ............................. And the one with Launcelot and his horse that has just been pierced by an arrow: ............................. LAUNCELOT At last! A call! A cry of distress ... (he draws his sword, and turns to CONCORDE) Concorde! Brave, Concorde ... you shall not have died in vain! CONCORDE I'm not quite dead, sir ... LAUNCELOT (a little deflated) Oh, well ... er brave Concorde! You shall not have been fatally wounded in vain! CONCORDE I think I could pull through, sir... LAUNCELOT Good Concorde ... stay here and rest awhile. *He makes to leap off dramatically.* CONCORDE I think I'll be all right to come with you, sir. LAUNCELOT I will send help, brave friend, as soon as I have accomplished this most daring, desperate adventure in this genre. CONCORDE Really, I feel fine, sir... ...................................
I mean, come on!!
4/10

Herschel’s daring test: a glimpse of things to come

2009-06-19T13:33:00.004+01:00

19 June 2009
Herschel opened its 'eyes' on 14 June and the Photoconductor Array Camera and Spectrometer obtained images of M51, ‘the whirlpool galaxy’ for a first test observation. Scientists obtained images in three colours which clearly demonstrate the superiority of Herschel, the largest infrared space telescope ever flown.

This image shows the famous ‘whirlpool galaxy’, first observed by Charles Messier in 1773, who provided the designation Messier 51 (M51). This spiral galaxy lies relatively nearby, about 35 million light-years away, in the constellation Canes Venatici. M51 was the first galaxy discovered to harbour a spiral structure.

The image is a composite of three observations taken at 70, 100 and 160 microns, taken by Herschel’s Photoconductor Array Camera and Spectrometer (PACS) on 14 and 15 June, immediately after the satellite’s cryocover was opened on 14 June.

Herschel, launched only a month ago, is still being commissioned and the first images from its instruments were planned to arrive only in a few weeks. But engineers and scientists were challenged to try to plan and execute daring test observations as part of a ‘sneak preview’ immediately after the cryocover was opened. The objective was to produce a very early image that gives a glimpse of things to come.

To the left is the best image of M51, taken by NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, with the Multiband Imaging Photometer for Spitzer (MIPS), juxtaposed with the Herschel observation on 14 and 15 June at 160 microns. The obvious advantage of the larger size of the telescope is clearly reflected in the much higher resolution of the image: Herschel reveals structures that cannot be discerned in the Spitzer image.

Herschel’s glimpse of M51 at 70, 100, 160 microns.

These images clearly demonstrate that the shorter the wavelength, the sharper the image — this is a very important message about the quality of Herschel’s optics, since PACS observes at Herschel’s shortest wavelengths.

Produced from the very first test observation, these images lead scientists to conclude that the optical performance of Herschel and its large telescope is so far meeting their high expectations.

Within our Galaxy, the mission’s main science objectives are:

* To study Solar System objects such as asteroids, Kuiper belt objects, and comets.
Comets are the best-preserved fossils of the early Solar System, and hold clues to the raw ingredients that formed the planets, including Earth.

* To study the process of star and planet formation.
Herschel is unique in its coverage of a wide range of infrared wavelengths, with which it will look into star-forming regions in our Galaxy, to reveal different stages of early star formation and the youngest stars in our Galaxy for the first time. The telescope will also study circumstellar material around young stars, where astronomers believe that planets are being formed, and debris discs around more mature stars.

* To study the vast reservoirs of dust and gas in our Galaxy and in other nearby galaxies.
Herschel will study in detail the physics and kinematics at work in giant clouds of gas and dust that give rise to new stars and associated planetary bodies. Herschel is also well-suited to study astrochemistry providing fundamental new insight into the complex chemistry of these molecular clouds, the wombs of future stars.

Outside our Galaxy, the mission’s main science objectives are:

* To explore the influence the galactic environment has on interstellar medium physics and star formation. Most of what we have learned about the physics and chemistry of the interstellar medium, and of the processes there such as star formation, has been gained by studies in our own Galaxy. With Herschel, we can carry out similar studies in relatively nearby galaxies as well. For example, studies of nearby low- metallicity galaxies can open the door to the understanding of these processes in the early Universe.

* To chart the rate of star formation over cosmic time. We know that star and galaxy formation commenced relatively early after the Big Bang. We also know that when the Universe was about half its current age, star formation was much more intense than it is today. Herschel is ideal to study infrared-dominated galaxies at the peak of star formation.

* To resolve the infrared cosmic background and characterise the sources. About half the energy produced and emitted throughout cosmic history now appears as a diffuse infrared cosmic background. With its large telescope, Herschel will be able to resolve the far-infrared background and characterise its constituent sources to a degree never achieved before.

Porco Rosso

2009-06-18T23:55:00.006+01:00

Take a bit of the essence of Casablanca, hints of the Marx Brothers, the dream travels of the Little Prince and a healthy dose of Japanese wackiness and you've got Porco Rosso. Known in Japan as Crimson Pig (紅の豚 Kurenai no Buta) this was the sixth anime film by Hayao Miyazaki, released in 1992, about an unusual Italian World War I pilot, now living as a freelance bounty hunter in the Adriatic.

Inspired by the writings of Exupéry and infused with Miyazaki's love of flying, it is the story of a "pig" that refuses to join the Italian fascist movement in the '30s. There's lots to enjoy in this film though a younger audience might miss the allegories.

Here's the trailer:

Sometimes when being human has lost it's meaning, it is better to be a pig...
8/10

HTML forms & CGI C-Shell scripting

2009-06-15T17:00:00.005+01:00

HTML forms are used to select different kinds of user input (Here's a quick tutorial). For example, open your favourite text editor, copy-paste the commands from listing 18.6. HTML -- Form processing example from here) and save the file as text.html.

Then from your browser, open the file to see what the form looks like. It should look like this:

Reading the form data from your shell script is a bit more tricky. You will probably have encountered html pages that look like http://www.someaddress.com/somescript.cgi?param1=value1&param2=value2

value1 and value2 are the parameters that your HTML form has submitted when you hit the submit button (assuming your form only has 2 parameters).

To read them in your c-shell cgi script, use
set input = $<>param1=value1&param2=value2)

so then you will have to split the string and read the parameters individually in different variables:
set param1 = `echo $input | cut -d '&' -f1 | cut -d '=' -f2`
and the same for param2.

She and Her Cat

2009-06-14T12:53:00.008+01:00

"She and Her Cat" is a short black and white anime film produced by Makoto Shinkai (whose latest work I wrote about recently). The story is told from the Cat's perspective.

The Moon and the Melodies

2009-06-10T01:58:00.003+01:00

Cocteau Twins and Harold Budd: The Ghost has No Home.

U.S. President Obama's speech in Cairo

2009-06-06T11:35:00.003+01:00

U.S. President Obama's speech in Cairo, as delivered. Text provided by the White House.

Thank you very much. Good afternoon. I am honored to be in the timeless city of Cairo, and to be hosted by two remarkable institutions. For over a thousand years, Al—Azhar has stood as a beacon of Islamic learning; and for over a century, Cairo University has been a source of Egypt's advancement. And together, you represent the harmony between tradition and progress. I'm grateful for your hospitality, and the hospitality of the people of Egypt. And I'm also proud to carry with me the goodwill of the American people, and a greeting of peace from Muslim communities in my country: Assalaamu alaykum.

We meet at a time of great tension between the United States and Muslims around the world — tension rooted in historical forces that go beyond any current policy debate. The relationship between Islam and the West includes centuries of coexistence and cooperation, but also conflict and religious wars. More recently, tension has been fed by colonialism that denied rights and opportunities to many Muslims, and a Cold War in which Muslim—majority countries were too often treated as proxies without regard to their own aspirations. Moreover, the sweeping change brought by modernity and globalization led many Muslims to view the West as hostile to the traditions of Islam.

Violent extremists have exploited these tensions in a small but potent minority of Muslims. The attacks of September 11, 2001 and the continued efforts of these extremists to engage in violence against civilians has led some in my country to view Islam as inevitably hostile not only to America and Western countries, but also to human rights. All this has bred more fear and more mistrust.

So long as our relationship is defined by our differences, we will empower those who sow hatred rather than peace, those who promote conflict rather than the cooperation that can help all of our people achieve justice and prosperity. And this cycle of suspicion and discord must end.

I've come here to Cairo to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect, and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive and need not be in competition. Instead, they overlap, and share common principles — principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.

I do so recognizing that change cannot happen overnight. I know there's been a lot of publicity about this speech, but no single speech can eradicate years of mistrust, nor can I answer in the time that I have this afternoon all the complex questions that brought us to this point. But I am convinced that in order to move forward, we must say openly to each other the things we hold in our hearts and that too often are said only behind closed doors. There must be a sustained effort to listen to each other; to learn from each other; to respect one another; and to seek common ground. As the Holy Koran tells us, "Be conscious of God and speak always the truth." That is what I will try to do today — to speak the truth as best I can, humbled by the task before us, and firm in my belief that the interests we share as human beings are far more powerful than the forces that drive us apart.

Now part of this conviction is rooted in my own experience. I'm a Christian, but my father came from a Kenyan family that includes generations of Muslims. As a boy, I spent several years in Indonesia and heard the call of the azaan at the break of dawn and at the fall of dusk. As a young man, I worked in Chicago communities where many found dignity and peace in their Muslim faith.

As a student of history, I also know civilization's debt to Islam. It was Islam — at places like Al-Azhar — that carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe's Renaissance and Enlightenment. It was innovation in Muslim communities — it was innovation in Muslim communities that developed the order of algebra; our magnetic compass and tools of navigation; our mastery of pens and printing; our understanding of how disease spreads and how it can be healed. Islamic culture has given us majestic arches and soaring spires; timeless poetry and cherished music; elegant calligraphy and places of peaceful contemplation. And throughout history, Islam has demonstrated through words and deeds the possibilities of religious tolerance and racial equality.

I also know that Islam has always been a part of America's story. The first nation to recognize my country was Morocco. In signing the Treaty of Tripoli in 1796, our second President, John Adams, wrote, "The United States has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Muslims." And since our founding, American Muslims have enriched the United States. They have fought in our wars, they have served in our government, they have stood for civil rights, they have started businesses, they have taught at our universities, they've excelled in our sports arenas, they've won Nobel Prizes, built our tallest building, and lit the Olympic Torch. And when the first Muslim American was recently elected to Congress, he took the oath to defend our Constitution using the same Holy Koran that one of our Founding Fathers — Thomas Jefferson — kept in his personal library.

So I have known Islam on three continents before coming to the region where it was first revealed. That experience guides my conviction that partnership between America and Islam must be based on what Islam is, not what it isn't. And I consider it part of my responsibility as President of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear.

But that same principle must apply to Muslim perceptions of America. Just as Muslims do not fit a crude stereotype, America is not the crude stereotype of a self-interested empire. The United States has been one of the greatest sources of progress that the world has ever known. We were born out of revolution against an empire. We were founded upon the ideal that all are created equal, and we have shed blood and struggled for centuries to give meaning to those words — within our borders, and around the world. We are shaped by every culture, drawn from every end of the Earth, and dedicated to a simple concept: E pluribus unum — "Out of many, one."

Now, much has been made of the fact that an African American with the name Barack Hussein Obama could be elected President. But my personal story is not so unique. The dream of opportunity for all people has not come true for everyone in America, but its promise exists for all who come to our shores — and that includes nearly 7 million American Muslims in our country today who, by the way, enjoy incomes and educational levels that are higher than the American average.

Moreover, freedom in America is indivisible from the freedom to practice one's religion. That is why there is a mosque in every state in our union, and over 1,200 mosques within our borders. That's why the United States government has gone to court to protect the right of women and girls to wear the hijab and to punish those who would deny it.

So let there be no doubt: Islam is a part of America. And I believe that America holds within her the truth that regardless of race, religion, or station in life, all of us share common aspirations — to live in peace and security; to get an education and to work with dignity; to love our families, our communities, and our God. These things we share. This is the hope of all humanity.

Of course, recognizing our common humanity is only the beginning of our task. Words alone cannot meet the needs of our people. These needs will be met only if we act boldly in the years ahead; and if we understand that the challenges we face are shared, and our failure to meet them will hurt us all.

For we have learned from recent experience that when a financial system weakens in one country, prosperity is hurt everywhere. When a new flu infects one human being, all are at risk. When one nation pursues a nuclear weapon, the risk of nuclear attack rises for all nations. When violent extremists operate in one stretch of mountains, people are endangered across an ocean. When innocents in Bosnia and Darfur are slaughtered, that is a stain on our collective conscience. That is what it means to share this world in the 21st century. That is the responsibility we have to one another as human beings.

And this is a difficult responsibility to embrace. For human history has often been a record of nations and tribes — and, yes, religions — subjugating one another in pursuit of their own interests. Yet in this new age, such attitudes are self-defeating. Given our interdependence, any world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will inevitably fail. So whatever we think of the past, we must not be prisoners to it. Our problems must be dealt with through partnership; our progress must be shared.

Now, that does not mean we should ignore sources of tension. Indeed, it suggests the opposite: We must face these tensions squarely. And so in that spirit, let me speak as clearly and as plainly as I can about some specific issues that I believe we must finally confront together.

The first issue that we have to confront is violent extremism in all of its forms.

In Ankara, I made clear that America is not — and never will be — at war with Islam. We will, however, relentlessly confront violent extremists who pose a grave threat to our security — because we reject the same thing that people of all faiths reject: the killing of innocent men, women, and children. And it is my first duty as president to protect the American people.

The situation in Afghanistan demonstrates America's goals, and our need to work together. Over seven years ago, the United States pursued al Qaeda and the Taliban with broad international support. We did not go by choice; we went because of necessity. I'm aware that there's still some who would question or even justify the events of 9/11. But let us be clear: Al Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 people on that day. The victims were innocent men, women and children from America and many other nations who had done nothing to harm anybody. And yet al Qaeda chose to ruthlessly murder these people, claimed credit for the attack, and even now states their determination to kill on a massive scale. They have affiliates in many countries and are trying to expand their reach. These are not opinions to be debated; these are facts to be dealt with.

Now, make no mistake: We do not want to keep our troops in Afghanistan. We see no military — we seek no military bases there. It is agonizing for America to lose our young men and women. It is costly and politically difficult to continue this conflict. We would gladly bring every single one of our troops home if we could be confident that there were not violent extremists in Afghanistan and now Pakistan determined to kill as many Americans as they possibly can. But that is not yet the case.

And that's why we're partnering with a coalition of 46 countries. And despite the costs involved, America's commitment will not weaken. Indeed, none of us should tolerate these extremists. They have killed in many countries. They have killed people of different faiths — but more than any other, they have killed Muslims. Their actions are irreconcilable with the rights of human beings, the progress of nations, and with Islam. The Holy Quran teaches that whoever kills an innocent is as — it is as if he has killed all mankind. And the Holy Quran also says whoever saves a person, it is as if he has saved all mankind. The enduring faith of over a billion people is so much bigger than the narrow hatred of a few. Islam is not part of the problem in combating violent extremism — it is an important part of promoting peace.

Now, we also know that military power alone is not going to solve the problems in Afghanistan and Pakistan. That's why we plan to invest $1.5 billion each year over the next five years to partner with Pakistanis to build schools and hospitals, roads and businesses, and hundreds of millions to help those who've been displaced. That's why we are providing more than $2.8 billion to help Afghans develop their economy and deliver services that people depend on.

Let me also address the issue of Iraq. Unlike Afghanistan, Iraq was a war of choice that provoked strong differences in my country and around the world. Although I believe that the Iraqi people are ultimately better off without the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, I also believe that events in Iraq have reminded America of the need to use diplomacy and build international consensus to resolve our problems whenever possible. Indeed, we can recall the words of Thomas Jefferson, who said: "I hope that our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us that the less we use our power the greater it will be."

Today, America has a dual responsibility: to help Iraq forge a better future — and to leave Iraq to Iraqis. And I have made it clear to the Iraqi people that we pursue no bases, and no claim on their territory or resources. Iraq's sovereignty is its own. And that's why I ordered the removal of our combat brigades by next August. That is why we will honor our agreement with Iraq's democratically elected government to remove combat troops from Iraqi cities by July, and to remove all of our troops from Iraq by 2012. We will help Iraq train its security forces and develop its economy. But we will support a secure and united Iraq as a partner, and never as a patron.

And finally, just as America can never tolerate violence by extremists, we must never alter or forget our principles. Nine-eleven was an enormous trauma to our country. The fear and anger that it provoked was understandable, but in some cases, it led us to act contrary to our traditions and our ideals. We are taking concrete actions to change course. I have unequivocally prohibited the use of torture by the United States, and I have ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed by early next year.

So America will defend itself, respectful of the sovereignty of nations and the rule of law. And we will do so in partnership with Muslim communities which are also threatened. The sooner the extremists are isolated and unwelcome in Muslim communities, the sooner we will all be safer.

The second major source of tension that we need to discuss is the situation between Israelis, Palestinians and the Arab world.

America's strong bonds with Israel are well known. This bond is unbreakable. It is based upon cultural and historical ties, and the recognition that the aspiration for a Jewish homeland is rooted in a tragic history that cannot be denied.

Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust. Tomorrow, I will visit Buchenwald, which was part of a network of camps where Jews were enslaved, tortured, shot and gassed to death by the Third Reich. Six million Jews were killed — more than the entire Jewish population of Israel today. Denying that fact is baseless, it is ignorant, and it is hateful. Threatening Israel with destruction — or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews —is deeply wrong, and only serves to evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve.

On the other hand, it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people — Muslims and Christians — have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For more than 60 years they've endured the pain of dislocation. Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead. They endure the daily humiliations — large and small — that come with occupation. So let there be no doubt: The situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable. And America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own.

For decades then, there has been a stalemate: two peoples with legitimate aspirations, each with a painful history that makes compromise elusive. It's easy to point fingers — for Palestinians to point to the displacement brought about by Israel's founding, and for Israelis to point to the constant hostility and attacks throughout its history from within its borders as well as beyond. But if we see this conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be blind to the truth: The only resolution is for the aspirations of both sides to be met through two states, where Israelis and Palestinians each live in peace and security.

That is in Israel's interest, Palestine's interest, America's interest, and the world's interest. And that is why I intend to personally pursue this outcome with all the patience and dedication that the task requires. The obligations — the obligations that the parties have agreed to under the road map are clear. For peace to come, it is time for them — and all of us — to live up to our responsibilities.

Palestinians must abandon violence. Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and it does not succeed. For centuries, black people in America suffered the lash of the whip as slaves and the humiliation of segregation. But it was not violence that won full and equal rights. It was a peaceful and determined insistence upon the ideals at the center of America's founding. This same story can be told by people from South Africa to South Asia; from Eastern Europe to Indonesia. It's a story with a simple truth: that violence is a dead end. It is a sign neither of courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus. That's not how moral authority is claimed; that's how it is surrendered.

Now is the time for Palestinians to focus on what they can build. The Palestinian Authority must develop its capacity to govern, with institutions that serve the needs of its people. Hamas does have support among some Palestinians, but they also have to recognize they have responsibilities. To play a role in fulfilling Palestinian aspirations, to unify the Palestinian people, Hamas must put an end to violence, recognize past agreements, recognize Israel's right to exist.

At the same time, Israelis must acknowledge that just as Israel's right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine's. The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop.

And Israel must also live up to its obligation to ensure that Palestinians can live and work and develop their society. Just as it devastates Palestinian families, the continuing humanitarian crisis in Gaza does not serve Israel's security; neither does the continuing lack of opportunity in the West Bank. Progress in the daily lives of the Palestinian people must be a critical part of a road to peace, and Israel must take concrete steps to enable such progress.

And finally, the Arab states must recognize that the Arab Peace Initiative was an important beginning, but not the end of their responsibilities. The Arab—Israeli conflict should no longer be used to distract the people of Arab nations from other problems. Instead, it must be a cause for action to help the Palestinian people develop the institutions that will sustain their state, to recognize Israel's legitimacy, and to choose progress over a self-defeating focus on the past.

America will align our policies with those who pursue peace, and we will say in public what we say in private to Israelis and Palestinians and Arabs. We cannot impose peace. But privately, many Muslims recognize that Israel will not go away. Likewise, many Israelis recognize the need for a Palestinian state. It is time for us to act on what everyone knows to be true.

Too many tears have been shed. Too much blood has been shed. All of us have a responsibility to work for the day when the mothers of Israelis and Palestinians can see their children grow up without fear; when the Holy Land of the three great faiths is the place of peace that God intended it to be; when Jerusalem is a secure and lasting home for Jews and Christians and Muslims, and a place for all of the children of Abraham to mingle peacefully together as in the story of Isra, when Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed, peace be upon them, joined in prayer.

The third source of tension is our shared interest in the rights and responsibilities of nations on nuclear weapons.

This issue has been a source of tension between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran. For many years, Iran has defined itself in part by its opposition to my country, and there is in fact a tumultuous history between us. In the middle of the Cold War, the United States played a role in the overthrow of a democratically elected Iranian government. Since the Islamic Revolution, Iran has played a role in acts of hostage—taking and violence against U.S. troops and civilians. This history is well known. Rather than remain trapped in the past, I've made it clear to Iran's leaders and people that my country is prepared to move forward. The question now is not what Iran is against, but rather what future it wants to build.

I recognize it will be hard to overcome decades of mistrust, but we will proceed with courage, rectitude, and resolve. There will be many issues to discuss between our two countries, and we are willing to move forward without preconditions on the basis of mutual respect. But it is clear to all concerned that when it comes to nuclear weapons, we have reached a decisive point. This is not simply about America's interests. It's about preventing a nuclear arms race in the Middle East that could lead this region and the world down a hugely dangerous path.

I understand those who protest that some countries have weapons that others do not. No single nation should pick and choose which nation holds nuclear weapons. And that's why I strongly reaffirmed America's commitment to seek a world in which no nations hold nuclear weapons. And any nation — including Iran — should have the right to access peaceful nuclear power if it complies with its responsibilities under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. That commitment is at the core of the treaty, and it must be kept for all who fully abide by it. And I'm hopeful that all countries in the region can share in this goal.

The fourth issue that I will address is democracy.

I know there has been controversy about the promotion of democracy in recent years, and much of this controversy is connected to the war in Iraq. So let me be clear: No system of government can or should be imposed by one nation by any other.

That does not lessen my commitment, however, to governments that reflect the will of the people. Each nation gives life to this principle in its own way, grounded in the traditions of its own people. America does not presume to know what is best for everyone, just as we would not presume to pick the outcome of a peaceful election. But I do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things: the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn't steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose. These are not just American ideas; they are human rights. And that is why we will support them everywhere.

Now, there is no straight line to realize this promise. But this much is clear: Governments that protect these rights are ultimately more stable, successful and secure. Suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away. America respects the right of all peaceful and law-abiding voices to be heard around the world, even if we disagree with them. And we will welcome all elected, peaceful governments — provided they govern with respect for all their people.

This last point is important because there are some who advocate for democracy only when they're out of power; once in power, they are ruthless in suppressing the rights of others. So no matter where it takes hold, government of the people and by the people sets a single standard for all who would hold power: You must maintain your power through consent, not coercion; you must respect the rights of minorities, and participate with a spirit of tolerance and compromise; you must place the interests of your people and the legitimate workings of the political process above your party. Without these ingredients, elections alone do not make true democracy.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Barack Obama, we love you!

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Thank you. The fifth issue that we must address together is religious freedom.

Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance. We see it in the history of Andalusia and Cordoba during the Inquisition. I saw it first-hand as a child in Indonesia, where devout Christians worshiped freely in an overwhelmingly Muslim country. That is the spirit we need today. People in every country should be free to choose and live their faith based upon the persuasion of the mind and the heart and the soul. This tolerance is essential for religion to thrive, but it's being challenged in many different ways.

Among some Muslims, there's a disturbing tendency to measure one's own faith by the rejection of somebody else's faith. The richness of religious diversity must be upheld — whether it is for Maronites in Lebanon or the Copts in Egypt. And if we are being honest, fault lines must be closed among Muslims, as well, as the divisions between Sunni and Shia have led to tragic violence, particularly in Iraq.

Freedom of religion is central to the ability of peoples to live together. We must always examine the ways in which we protect it. For instance, in the United States, rules on charitable giving have made it harder for Muslims to fulfill their religious obligation. That's why I'm committed to working with American Muslims to ensure that they can fulfill zakat.

Likewise, it is important for Western countries to avoid impeding Muslim citizens from practicing religion as they see fit — for instance, by dictating what clothes a Muslim woman should wear. We can't disguise hostility towards any religion behind the pretence of liberalism.

In fact, faith should bring us together. And that's why we're forging service projects in America to bring together Christians, Muslims, and Jews. That's why we welcome efforts like Saudi Arabian King Abdullah's interfaith dialogue and Turkey's leadership in the Alliance of Civilizations. Around the world, we can turn dialogue into interfaith service, so bridges between peoples lead to action — whether it is combating malaria in Africa, or providing relief after a natural disaster.

The sixth issue that I want to address is women's rights.

I know, I know — and you can tell from this audience, that there is a healthy debate about this issue. I reject the view of some in the West that a woman who chooses to cover her hair is somehow less equal, but I do believe that a woman who is denied an education is denied equality. And it is no coincidence that countries where women are well educated are far more likely to be prosperous.

Now, let me be clear: Issues of women's equality are by no means simply an issue for Islam. In Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, we've seen Muslim—majority countries elect a woman to lead. Meanwhile, the struggle for women's equality continues in many aspects of American life, and in countries around the world.

I am convinced that our daughters can contribute just as much to society as our sons. Our common prosperity will be advanced by allowing all humanity — men and women — to reach their full potential. I do not believe that women must make the same choices as men in order to be equal, and I respect those women who choose to live their lives in traditional roles. But it should be their choice. And that is why the United States will partner with any Muslim—majority country to support expanded literacy for girls, and to help young women pursue employment through micro—financing that helps people live their dreams.

Finally, I want to discuss economic development and opportunity.

I know that for many, the face of globalization is contradictory. The Internet and television can bring knowledge and information, but also offensive sexuality and mindless violence into the home. Trade can bring new wealth and opportunities, but also huge disruptions and changing communities. In all nations – including America – this change can bring fear. Fear that because of modernity we will lose of control over our economic choices, our politics, and most importantly our identities – those things we most cherish about our communities, our families, our traditions, and our faith.

But I also know that human progress cannot be denied. There need not be contradiction between development and tradition. Countries like Japan and South Korea grew their economies while maintaining distinct cultures. The same is true for the astonishing progress within Muslim—majority countries from Kuala Lumpur to Dubai. In ancient times and in our times, Muslim communities have been at the forefront of innovation and education.

And this is important because no development strategy can be based only upon what comes out of the ground, nor can it be sustained while young people are out of work. Many Gulf States have enjoyed great wealth as a consequence of oil, and some are beginning to focus it on broader development. But all of us must recognize that education and innovation will be the currency of the 21st century, and in too many Muslim communities there remains underinvestment in these areas. I am emphasizing such investment within my country. And while America in the past has focused on oil and gas when it comes to his part of the world, we now seek a broader engagement.

On education, we will expand exchange programs, and increase scholarships, like the one that brought my father to America. At the same time, we will encourage more Americans to study in Muslim communities. And we will match promising Muslim students with internships in America; invest in online learning for teachers and children around the world; and create a new online network, so a teenager in Kansas can communicate instantly with a young person in Cairo.

On economic development, we will create a new corps of business volunteers to partner with counterparts in Muslim—majority countries. And I will host a Summit on Entrepreneurship this year to identify how we can deepen ties between business leaders, foundations and social entrepreneurs in the United States and Muslim communities around the world.

On science and technology, we will launch a new fund to support technological development in Muslim—majority countries, and to help transfer ideas to the marketplace so they can create more jobs. We'll open centers of scientific excellence in Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia, and appoint new science envoys to collaborate on programs that develop new sources of energy, create green jobs, digitize records, clean water, and grow new crops. Today, I'm announcing a new global effort with the Organization of the Islamic Conference to eradicate polio. And we will also expand partnerships with Muslim communities to promote child and maternal health.

All these things must be done in partnership. Americans are ready to join with citizens and governments, community organizations, religious leaders, and businesses in Muslim communities around the world to help our people pursue a better life.

The issues that I have described will not be easy to address. But we have a responsibility to join together on behalf of the world that we seek – a world where extremists no longer threaten our people, and American troops have come home; a world where Israelis and Palestinians are each secure in a state of their own, and nuclear energy is used for peaceful purposes; a world where governments serve their citizens, and the rights of all God's children are respected. Those are mutual interests. That is the world we seek. But we can only achieve it together.

I know there are many – Muslim and non-Muslim – who question whether we can forge this new beginning. Some are eager to stoke the flames of division, and to stand in the way of progress. Some suggest that it isn't worth the effort – that we are fated to disagree, and civilizations are doomed to clash. Many more are simply skeptical that real change can occur. There is so much fear, so much mistrust that has built up over the years. But if we choose to be bound by the past, we will never move forward. And I want to particularly say this to young people of every faith, in every country – you, more than anyone, have the ability to reimagine the world, to remake this world.

All of us share this world for but a brief moment in time. The question is whether we spend that time focused on what pushes us apart, or whether we commit ourselves to an effort – a sustained effort – to find common ground, to focus on the future we seek for our children, and to respect the dignity of all human beings.

It's easier to start wars than to end them. It's easier to blame others than to look inward. It's easier to see what is different about someone than to find the things we share. But we should choose the right path, not just the easy path. There's one rule that lies at the heart of every religion – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. This truth transcends nations and peoples – a belief that isn't new; that isn't black or white or brown; that isn't Christian, or Muslim or Jew. It's a belief that pulsed in the cradle of civilization, and that still beats in the hearts of billions around the world. It's a faith in other people, and it's what brought me here today.

We have the power to make the world we seek, but only if we have the courage to make a new beginning, keeping in mind what has been written.

The Holy Quran tells us, "O mankind! We have created you male and a female; and we have made you into nations and tribes so that you may know one another."

The Talmud tells us: "The whole of the Torah is for the purpose of promoting peace."

The Holy Bible tells us, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God."

The people of the world can live together in peace. We know that is God's vision. Now, that must be our work here on Earth. Thank you. And may God's peace be upon you. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Types of civilizations

2009-06-05T19:28:00.002+01:00

Prof. Michio Kaku, a theoretical physicist and great populariser of science, talks about four types of civilizations.

Why don't scientists fear Hell?

2009-05-31T12:58:00.002+01:00

A nice little video on youtube treating the subject of science vs organised religion.

Global Perceived Corruption Levels

2009-05-29T14:52:00.006+01:00

Since 1995, Transparency International has published an annual Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) ordering the countries of the world according to "the degree to which corruption is perceived to exist among public officials and politicians". The organization defines corruption as "the abuse of entrusted power for private gain".

The 2003 poll covered 133 countries; the 2007 survey, 180. A higher score means less (perceived) corruption. The results show seven out of every ten countries (and nine out of every ten developing countries) with an index of less than 5 points out of 10.

Data from 2007 are presented below.

Waltz with Bashir

2009-05-28T23:26:00.004+01:00

Waltz with Bashir is an animated feature film written and directed by Ari Folman.

While in his late teens and doing his army service, Ari remembers that he took part in the Israeli operations in Lebanon during the '80s; But that is about all that his hazy memory can conjure up.

The film traces his journey as he seeks out old friends and acquaintances that took part in the war while he attempts to reconstruct his fragmented memories. The story is told in patches.

It's opening sequence involving 26 rabid dogs is a fitting preamble to the nightmares that follow.
Scenes, often surreal but always poignant maintain a safe distance from sentimentalism. The animation is impressive and the movement of the characters is very life-like.

All things considered, this is a very well done, powerful anti-war movie; but not for the faint hearted.

8/10

If it Be Your Will (Anthony sings Leonard Cohen)

2009-05-28T00:58:00.005+01:00

If it be your will is a song by the Canadian lyrical musician Leonard Cohen. Below is a link to a starkingly beautiful cover version by Anthony Hegarty (lead singer of Anthony and the Johnsons) from the soundtrack of Lian Lunson's movie Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man.

Editing multiple files with sed

2009-05-26T23:08:00.008+01:00

Sed is a very useful stream editor for Linux.
A stream editor is used to perform basic text transformations
 on an input stream, such as replacing a text string with another
 text string. While in some ways similar to an editor which permits
 scripted edits(such as ed), sed works by making only one
pass over the input(s), and is consequently more efficient. But it
 is sed's ability to filter text in a pipeline which particularly
 distinguishes it from other  types of editors.

For example, if you want to replace the text "a rainy day" with
the text "a bright and starry night" in a text file containing
the sentence "It was a rainy day outside.", you can do it from the prompt
like this:

sed -i "s/a rainy day/a bright and starry night/g" textfile.txt

This command will have changed the text in your file to "It was a bright
and starry night outside.". The nice thing is that you can use it to edit
the same string in multiple files at once. You can also use other
separators than "/". The above command would have been equally valid
 if it was written as:

sed -i "s|a rainy day|a bright and starry night|g" textfile.txt

All in all, sed is quite a powerful way to manipulate strings.

5 centimeters per second (Byousoku 5 Centimeter)

2009-05-16T10:42:00.008+01:00

"5 cm per second. The speed at which cherry blossom petals fall."
It looks like Makoto Shinkai has directed another little minimalist masterpiece. Bearing a distant resemblance to underground coming-of-age classics such as My Life as a Dog, 5 cm interweaves three short stories seen from the viewpoints of different characters. Each story revolves around a specific time period in the protagonist's life: his last days at primary school, graduating from high school, his early life as an adult.

Through the prism of an early sakura-blossom romance, the film primarily explores the themes of distance and loneliness, though it does so in a gentle way that is akin to recollecting your most beautiful sunrise memory rather than resorting to being dark and gloomy.

The music blends in very well with the movie, enhancing the emotional experiences conveyed, while passing almost unnoticed - as should happen in the best soundtracks. The animation is top notch and the quality of the drawings is just mesmerizing. You may often get the urge to pause the movie just to explore the richness of the tapestry.

If you can find it, it's well worth a watch - but be warned! See it in the original Japanese dialogue with English subtitles, not the cheesy English dub.

9/10

Timing program executions on Linux

2009-05-14T14:57:00.002+01:00

Linux has a useful command to do this: time

The time command runs the specified program command with the given arguments. When command finishes, time writes a message to standard output giving timing statistics about this program run. These statistics consist of (i) the elapsed real time between invocation and termination, (ii) the user CPU time (the sum of the tms_utime and tms_cutime values in a struct tms as returned by times(2)), and (iii) the system CPU time (the sum of the tms_stime and tms_cstime values in a struct tms as returned by times(2)).

For example, if your c-shell script is called blah.csh and takes two arguments (say, arg_1 and arg_2), you can find out how long it takes to run by executing it as:
> time source blah.csh arg_1 arg_2

The industry of science research in Britain

2009-05-13T01:07:00.003+01:00

Science research in Britain is now all about turning knowledge into business, rather than the beauty of exploration
George Monbiot - The Guardian

Why is the Medical Research Council run by an arms manufacturer? Why is the Natural Environment Research Council run by the head of a construction company? Why is the chairman of a real estate firm in charge of higher education funding for England?

Because our universities are being turned into corporate research departments. No longer may they pursue knowledge for its own sake: the highest ambition to which they must aspire is finding better ways to make money.

Last month, unremarked by the media, a quiet intellectual revolution took place. The research councils, which provide 90% of the funding for academic research, introduced a requirement for those seeking grants: they must describe the economic impact of the work they want to conduct. The councils define impact as the "demonstrable contribution" research can make to society and the economy. But how do you demonstrate the impact of blue skies research before it has been conducted?

The idea, the government says, is to transfer knowledge from the universities to industry, boosting the economy and helping to lift us out of recession. There's nothing wrong, in principle, with commercialising scientific discoveries. But imposing this condition on the pursuit of all knowledge does not enrich us; it impoverishes us, reducing the wonders of the universe to figures in an accountant's ledger.

Picture Charles Darwin trying to fill out his application form before embarking on the Beagle. "Explain how the research has the potential to impact on the nation's health, wealth or culture. For example: fostering global economic performance, and specifically the economic competitiveness of the United Kingdom … What are the realistic timescales for the benefits to be realised?" If Darwin had been dependent on a grant from a British research council, he would never have set sail.

The government insists that nothing fundamental has changed; that the Haldane principle, which states that the government should not interfere in research decisions, still holds. Only the research councils, ministers say, should decide what gets funded.

All the chairs of the five research councils funding science, and of the three higher education funding councils (which provide core funding for universities), are or were senior corporate executives. These men are overseen by the minister for science and innovation, Lord Drayson. Before he became a minister, Paul Drayson was chief executive of the pharmaceutical company PowderJect. He was involved in a controversy that many feel symbolises the absence of effective barriers between government and commerce.

Drayson doubtless rubs along well with the chairman of the Medical Research Council, Sir John Chisholm. He founded a military software company before becoming head of the government's Defence Research Agency (DRA). He was in charge of turning it into the commercial company QinetiQ, through a privatisation process that was completed while Drayson was minister for defence procurement. During this process, Chisholm paid £129,000 for a stake in the company. The stake's value rose to £26m when QinetiQ was floated. A former managing director of the DRA described this as "greed of the highest order". Lord Gilbert, a former minister of defence procurement, remarked that "frankly the money made by the leading civil servants was obscene … They did not contribute anything to the turnaround of the company, it was the work of the research staff that made the difference." Chisholm remains chairman of QinetiQ. Is there anyone outside government who believes that these people should be overseeing scientific research in this country?

In March Drayson told the Royal Society that "the science budget is safe … there will be no retreat from pure science". A month later this promise was broken, when the budget transferred £106m from the research councils "to support key areas of economic potential": which means exchanges of staff and research with industry.

Science policy in the UK is now governed by the Sainsbury review, which the government says it will implement in full. It was written by the Labour donor, former science minister and former supermarket chief executive, Lord Sainsbury. The research councils, the review says, should "be measured against firm knowledge transfer targets" to show that they are turning enough science into business. They have been told to fund £120m of research in collaboration with industry. This has been topped up with £180m from the regional development agencies. The government is also spending £150m "to change the culture in universities: boosting the work they do with a whole range of businesses and increasing commercial activity". All this is another covert bailout, relieving companies of the need to fund their own research.

The economic impact summaries they now write ensure that all researchers will be aware that the business of universities is business. As the white paper points out, universities are already "providing incentives (for example promotion assessment)" to persuade researchers to engage with business. If your research doesn't make someone money, you're not likely to get very far.

Even judged by its own objectives, this policy makes no sense. The long-term health of the knowledge economy depends on blue skies research that answers only to itself: when scientists are free to pursue their passions they are more likely to make those serendipitous discoveries whose impacts on society and the economy are both vast and impossible to predict. Forced to collaborate with industry, they are more likely to pursue applications of existing knowledge than to seek to extend the frontiers of the known world.

Knowledge is not just about impacts. It is about wonder and insight and beauty. Much might never have an application, but it makes the world a richer place, in ways that the likes of Lord Drayson would struggle to perceive.

High stakes, low finance

2009-05-07T02:20:00.000+01:00

Chasing Alpha: How Reckless Growth and Unchecked Ambition Ruined the City's Golden Decade
by Philip Augar
272pp, Bodley Head, £20

Fool's Gold: How an Ingenious Tribe of Bankers Rewrote the Rules of Finance, Made a Fortune and Survived a Catastrophe
by Gillian Tett
352pp, Little, Brown, £18.99

Meltdown: The End of the Age of Greed
by Paul Mason
192pp, Verso, £7.99

The Crash of 2008 and What It Means: The New Paradigm for Financial Markets
by George Soros
288pp, Public Affairs, £9.99

Gordon Brown will not think it, but in the politics of credit crunch he is a lucky man. His speech at the Mansion House on Wednesday 20 June 2007, days before he took office as prime minister, is one of the greatest political and economic misjudgments among postwar politicians. Yet very few have read or even recollect it. But then his political opponents, outbidding him at the time in their slavish praise of the City, have even more embarrassing quotes on the record. They are hardly in a position to attack him.

"This is an era that history will record as a new golden age for the City of London," Brown intoned. "I want to thank all of you for what you are achieving." Just weeks later the financial catastrophe burst, creating the "great recession" and leaving the UK taxpayer with a one-sided exposure of £1.3 trillion in loans, investments, cash injections and guarantees to the banking system, of which over £100bn may be lost for ever. Brown went on to hymn the City's "creativity and ingenuity" that had enabled it to become a new world leader. In language so purple it could make a cardinal blush, he praised London's invention of "the most modern instruments of finance" - the very instruments that were to bring it and the western banking system down.

Invoking Adam Smith, Brown declaimed: "The message London's success sends out to the whole British economy is that we will succeed if, like London, we think globally ... and nurture the skills of the future, advance with light-touch regulation, a competitive tax environment and flexibility." He even managed to boast that, after financial and accounting scandals in the US such as those that brought down Enron and WorldCom, which led the American government to introduce new regulatory reforms, "many who advised me, including not a few newspapers, favoured a regulatory crackdown. I believe we were right not to go down that road."

The boastfulness, the wholesale endorsement of the philosophy that was to bring the world to the economic edge and the sheer ignorance are painful to read - tribute to the way the bankers completely pulled the wool over the eyes of the political and regulatory establishment in one of the greatest heists the world has witnessed. The IMF now calculates that there are $4.1 trillion of losses in the world financial system, less than half of which has been formally written off. Without massive government support, the scale of the banking collapse that would have followed such losses would have induced a global depression. Even as it is, world trade will this year decline by 9%. Alistair Darling's budget has already passed into legend as the most depressing since the war. The credit-crunch-ravaged, post-recession British economy will be unable to shoulder the size of the current British state. In the most challenging decade since 1945, a way has to be found of shrinking its size while still finding new ways to grow and alleviate mass unemployment.

It is a disaster, or, as BBC Newsnight's Paul Mason would have it, a financial Krakatoa. It is the economic and financial story of our times, and he, the Financial Times journalist Gillian Tett and financial author Philip Augar have all been inspired to write "crash" books. Each is gripping and revelatory, with sometimes breathtaking quotes or new facts, and each adds a different dimension to our understanding of the crisis. Their subtitles tell of greed, recklessness and catastrophe - and all three writers are as good as their promise. What has happened to finance and the financial system since London's Big Bang in 1986 is an astounding story of ideology, greed and lack of restraint - sanctioned by our politicians who, like Brown, marvelled at the apparent results without beginning to understand how they were achieved. Moreover, they built regulatory systems to suit the bankers' interests. You might have hoped that politicians of the left would have been savvier and more suspicious of the bankers' claims. One of the tragedies of New Labour is that the party leadership bought the story so completely - Brown becoming as much of a zealot for free-market financial innovation as the free-market fundamentalist neocon Alan Greenspan, whose knighthood he organised.

The books leave no doubt that it is the bankers and their greed who were the authors of the crisis. True, there were dollars spilling out of Asia and the Gulf in huge volumes in the 2000s, and low interest rates created an appetite for taking risks. But bankers seized the opportunity to lend unprecedented amounts on ever smaller amounts of capital, with the risk apparently abolished by the invention of new financial instruments and tradeable insurance contracts. This is Tett's original contribution. Her blow-by-blow story of how these were developed during the 1980s and 90s, and the motivations of those who did it, is an impressive piece of detective work. She pulls back the curtain on a closed, unaccountable world of finance - a "silo in its own right detached from society". My only cavil is that I wish she could have got as much access to top British bankers as she got to American ones, and in particular those in JP Morgan: her locus is too much New York.

That is made good by Philip Augar, a former investment banker who has made it his mission to reveal the systemic and destructive way that British finance works. He understands both the people and the processes - and Chasing Alpha is his best book yet. He even devotes a chapter to Brown's Mansion House speech. Together, he and Tett make it clear beyond peradventure that it was the structure of the financial system that created the havoc, and that it was firmly embedded in the intertwined London and New York markets from the 1980s onwards. Similar-scale dollar surpluses in the 1970s did not create such financial problems; but that was before the Thatcherite and neoconservative revolutions.

In 1933 Senators Glass and Steagall, prompted by Roosevelt, had sponsored the Glass-Steagall Act, prohibiting investment bankers betting deposits on the buying and selling of tradeable financial securities that can create huge losses. Banking and investment banking should be separate. For 50 years the act kept American banking honest. But after Mrs Thatcher decided in 1986 that banks could own stockbrokers and market-making stock jobbers in her new anything-could-go casino City of London - the "Big Bang" - American banks complained to the US central bank, the Federal Reserve, that they could do things in London not possible in New York. Paul Mason explains how in 1987 the Fed relaxed Glass-Steagall to allow 5% of a bank's deposits to be used for investment banking, further relaxed to 25% in 1996. The act's abolition in 1999, which opened the floodgates for today's financial catastrophe, was inevitable - even if it cost the banks $300m in lobbying fees.

Tett shows how the regulators rolled over in another core area. In the late 1990s they accepted the banks' argument that their alchemy in creating collateralised debt obligations (bundling up income-generating assets of varying quality into one security) and then insuring against the risk of default (credit default swaps) both merited the triple A credit scores the credit agencies were awarding and, crucially, needed less capital to stand behind them. By 2000 the stage was set for what was to follow: investment banks having balance sheets 30 times or more larger than their core capital, refinancing as much as a quarter of their trillions of dollars of liabilities every day from the so-called wholesale money markets, and lending/investing in a range of highly risky financial instruments. The system could not insure against its own systemic failure. It was an edifice built on sand: $1 trillion of sub-prime debt had been bundled into various categories of structured, tradeable debt; when American house prices began to crumble in 2007, the whole interlinked pyramid came crashing down.

Mason's first three chapters are a page-turning account of September and October of last year, when it did look as though the American and British financial systems were about to collapse - the fateful weekend in September when Lehman Brothers went bust and America's top insurance company AIG only survived courtesy of an $80bn loan, and later, in early October, when Britain's RBS and HBOS were hours away from implosion. Mason, I think correctly, emphasises the highly risky way some British commercial, and other, mortgage lenders had become reliant on the money markets to support their lending, so that RBS and HBOS were in an analogous position to the US investment banks Lehman and Bear Stearns, both of whom went bust. At the root of the crisis were the interaction of money market-financed balance sheets, too much consequential borrowing and the new "weapons of mass financial destruction".

Mason is refreshingly clear-eyed about the operation of today's finance-driven capitalism - and angry. It wasn't only that the banks and insurance companies campaigned to have the law changed to serve their interests with such disastrous results. Sometimes, as with AIG, they began to transgress the law. AIG admitted in 2005 that it had faked $500m of transactions to fool the auditors, and "misclassified" another $3bn to inflate its profits. I have no doubt that there are more instances that may never come to light. Britain has insured £585bn of bank loans. It is hard to believe that every penny of bad debt on such a scale was just honest misjudgment. Do we believe that the British were angels and the only frauds American?

George Soros, successful hedge fund entrepreneur and famous beneficiary of the pound's expulsion from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism, has been trying for decades to explain that the axioms of free-market economics do not apply to the financial markets. Brown and Greenspan were always wrong to believe that free financial markets would tend to optimal outcomes. Rather, markets feed on themselves, so that financial values have a permanent tendency to swing between boom and bust - they are never rational. The crash of 2008, Soros explains, was an accident waiting to happen. Recovery will require regulation that compels banks to carry more capital and lend more judiciously. But until the international financial system is fairer to the less-developed countries on "the periphery", the core of the world economy will always be at risk of being flooded by hot money fleeing from that risky periphery.

This quartet of books indict modern finance. They cannot be read without wishing for something different. Yet even now I am not sure that the politicians and officials get it. The support for British banks is disgracefully one-sided. The taxpayer will lose at least £50bn, if not £100bn, but there has been no concomitant willingness on the part of the bankers to restructure their business model - or accept that their pensions, bonuses and pay should be seriously qualified. They want to get back to the glory days, and if once in every 30 or 40 years the rest of us suffer recessions and a £100bn bill while they make personal fortunes - so be it. It is not a fair bargain. These books set out why, and how it could be changed.

• Will Hutton is executive vice-chair of the Work Foundation

Bill Maher on Swine Flu, Evolution and Texas

2009-05-06T01:06:00.002+01:00

The guy behind Religulous. Funny as hell even though he usually goes for the easy targets.

Ken Wilber on Ray Kurzweil's Singularity

2009-05-04T23:57:00.003+01:00

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic". - Arthur C. Clarke.

As the gap between today and tomorrow is closing at a staggering rate, the future continues to become more and more surreal. A good example comes from the work of inventor/futurist Ray Kurzweil, who often talks about a point sometime in the next few decades when our rate of technological progress begins to approach the infinite—an event he calls "the Singularity." This essentially represents the event horizon of our own technological evolution, beyond which we simply cannot imagine. Is there actually something to the concept of the Singularity, or is it just a sort of mythical Rapture for tech geeks? What are the implications of such exponential advancement of technology to human consciousness?

Philosopher Ken Wilber shares his thoughts on the subject

(What is?) Gravitational Lensing

2009-04-29T14:21:00.009+01:00

This is quite a rare phenomenon but occurs naturally. It happens when two astronomical bodies of extreme mass (like stars, galaxies or free-floating planets) are almost perfectly aligned as we, the observers, see them from our standpoint. What you then observe, when one star passes in front of the other, is not a dimming of the light or an eclipse, but multiple distorted images of the background star appearing in a "ring" like structure around the edge of the gravitational influence of the foreground star!

The reason that happens is because the gravity of the star that is closer to the observer bends the light rays from the further away object, acting as a kind of astrophysical "lens". This phenomenon is called gravitational lensing.

Astronomers take advantage of this rare effect to look for new exo-planets orbiting other stars.

Creating simple plots with Python

2009-04-28T12:27:00.006+01:00

Making plots with Python is easy provided you've downloaded the matplotlib plotting library. You will also probably need Numpy for the numerical routines it provides.

The following code example will produce two interactive figures. The first one demonstrates how to overplot curves, the second one shows how to get two separate plots on the figure.

#First, import the libraries as plt and np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np

#Define a function
def f(t):
return np.exp(-t)*np.cos(2*np.pi*t)

# Set up two arrays
t = np.arange(0.0, 5.0, 0.1)
t2 = np.arange(0.0, 5.0, 0.02)

#make single plot with overplots
plt.plot(t, f(t), 'g^', t, f(t*t), 'r--', t, f(t*t*t), 'bs')
plt.plot(t2, f(t2), 'g', t2, f(t2*t2), 'r', t2, f(t2*t2*t2), 'b')

# add labels
plt.ylabel('y values')
plt.xlabel('x values')

# Example of how to get math characters.
# Not that the format is the same as TeX markup but you don't need to have
# TeX installed since matplotlib has it's own parser, layout engine and fonts.
# For example, to print the greek letter sigma as the x title, use:
# plt.xlabel(r'$\sigma$')
plt.title(r'$\Delta\chi^2$')

# add some text on the plot at location 2, 0.6
plt.text(2, 0.6, r'$\alpha_i=100,\ \Delta\chi^2=15$')

# use gridmarks
plt.grid(True)

#make second plot with 2 subplots
plt.figure(2)

#first subplot
plt.subplot(211)
plt.plot(t, f(t), 'bo', t2, f(t2), 'k')
plt.ylabel('y values')
plt.xlabel('x values')
plt.title('blah')
plt.grid(True)

#second subplot
plt.subplot(212)
plt.plot(t2,np.cos(2*np.pi*t2), 'r--')
plt.ylabel('y2 Values')
plt.xlabel('x2 values')
plt.grid(True)

# realise plot
plt.show()

This snippet will produce the following figures:

AlloSphere, a stunning new way to see scientific data

2009-04-25T12:51:00.006+01:00

Dr. JoAnn Kuchera-Morin is the director of the Center for Research in Electronic Art Technology (CREATE) at UC Santa Barbara.