Return of the Native

From 5th November New Yorker book review section:

"There are nine personal vehicles per thousand eligible drivers in China and eleven for every thousand Indians, compared with 1,148 for every thousand Americans. ~ Were India and China to increase their rates of car ownership to the point were per-capita oil consumption reached just half of American levels, the two countries would burn through a hundred million additional barrels of oil a day".

Just as oil hits almost $100 a barrel, without seemingly anyone caring too much.

Big Sur

Maybe Mars once looked like this!

From a colleague currently in California.

A Vesak reflection

Vesak commemorates the birth, death and enlightenment of the Buddha, more simply "the Buddha's birthday". It is traditionally celebrated on the first full moon of the fourth month of the Chinese lunar calendar. In 2007, there are full moons on both 1st and 31st May - Malaysia chose the former, Singapore the latter. Today is thus a public holiday in Singapore. A much-needed cool breeze is blowing through the open window after a short afternoon storm.

One of the good acts one can do on this day is to liberate caged birds and animals. A time to reflect on some startling figures:-

"Killing for meat takes place on a scale difficult to comprehend. Britain alone killed 883 million animals for food per annum at the end of the century, made up of 792 million chickens, 35 million turkeys, 18 million ducks, 18.7 million sheep, 16.3 million pigs, around 3 million cattle, 1 million geese, 10,000 derr and 9,000 goats. The United States kills 8 billion chickens a year." In Britain that is about 2 million chickens killed every day.

(Source: The Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History since 1900. David Edgerton, Oxford University Press, 2007, p. 174).

In related vein, "as we multiply, so do all the things associated with us, including our livestock. At present there are about 1.5 billion cattle and domestic buffalo and about 1.7 billion sheep and goats. With pigs and poultry, they form a critical part of our enormous biological footprint upon this planet." In addition, it is estimated that methane production by ruminants contributes more to global warming than does transportation.

(Source: International Herald Tribune, editorial, Dec 28th 2006)

No easy answers.

Silence

"Came up to the hermitage at 4 a.m. The moon poured down silence over the woods, and the frosty grass sparkled faintly. More than two hours of prayer in firelight. The sun appeared and rose at 6:45. Sweet pungent smell of hickory smoke, and silence, silence."

From the Journals of Thomas Merton, March 27, 1964

Holy Week (2)

Timeless Orthodox Chant.

"The Divine Liturgy of St John Chrystostom"

Holy Week

Continued carnage in Iraq: last week the bombers surpassed themselves, slaughtering over 150 and wounding hundreds more, women and children, in Baghdad's crowded the markets. And in this week's New Yorker, under the heading "Betrayed", a grim reflection on the fate of the Iraqi interpreters and others who work for the Americans. Not good.

Years hence, perhaps, may dawn an age,
More fortunate, alas! than we,
Which without hardness will be sage,
And gay without frivolity.
Sons of the world, oh, speed those years;
But, while we wait, allow our tears!

From "The Grande Chartreuse" by Mathew Arnold (1822-1888)

From the wonderful Ionarts' piece called "Into the Great Silence", a review of a film about the Carthusians, which unfortunately does not seem to be available on DVD.

La Grande Chartreuse

On asking for permission to film:

"Since the pace of modern life does not mean much within a cloister, the monks considered the request and ultimately gave their approval -- 16 years later."


That seems about right to me.

New Year

Today is the first day of the Chinese New Year, the year of the Pig, especially propitious because it is the year of the Golden Pig, which occurs every six decades. I had not realised that I was born in the year of the Golden Pig six decades ago.

Almost all shops are closed, which is saying something for Singapore, and the next two days are public holidays. The festivities continue for a further fifteen days.

A Happy New Year to my Sangha friends.

Bracing times again

I am always amused by UK journalists "bracing" you for one calamity or another. Last week the poultry industry was bracing itself for a cull of birds, now according to the BBC,

"England is bracing itself for wintry weather with a blanket of snow forecast to fall across much of the country".

Must be in the training dictionary for young reporters. Drive safely!

Rational ignorance

“The world is large, information about it seems infinite, and even the most capacious minds must stringently limit their acquisition of information to matters that interest them either in the abstract or, more centrally, that they find otherwise useful to have on hand. Beyond this point, information costs are not worth paying, and ignorance is rational."

"Rational ignorance" – my excuse from now on!

From an issue of Critical Review on "The Nature of Belief Systems", (vol 18, no. 1–3, this by P. E. Converse, p. 300, via Shtetl-Optimized.

Bird Flu

Perhaps the problem begins in the Book of Genesis:-

1:28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

The UK outbreak of the Asian strain of the H5N1 flu virus reminds us, if we need reminding, of how we use living creatures for our ends — food making machines. No doubt we have always used animals for food, but now we can do it on an industrial scale unthinkable to our ancestors. Mr Matthews lost 159,000 turkeys, gassed within hours and "rendered" (what a word). But in commenting on the cost to the £400 million UK market, Charles Bourne, chairman of the NFU's poultry board, revealed that we produce 60 million chickens a week in the UK. (Guardian on-line).

The population of the UK in chickens killed each week.

End of the month

The clock really does tick more quickly as you get older. That the first month of 2007 has already passed I find almost unbelievable. As I get older I know less and less about more and more. Not good.

Robot vision

It affects me in a way I can't quite explain, looking through the eyes of this robot vehicle on Mars, wondering whether there is any sound in the thin atmosphere or do the rocks fall silently into the crater as nightime cooling cracks off another piece? Was there really a time when waves lapped on this far away shore and life was in its oceans? We are part of something very big that touches us but may be outside our understanding in the deepest sense. And that's nothing to do with religion!

Taken by the Opportunity rover on Mars at about midday local solar time on Sol 1071.

On earth "global warming" has been massaged by the spin-doctors into "climate change".

The same but different?

OK, not much of an image - taken through an open window with a compact digital camera - but what I cannot remember is whether the moon is so much on its side in the UK. I think not. That might imply that in, say, New Zealand, it might be a mirror image of what it is in the UK.

Maybe someone could take a look?

Back from the brink.

The Mars Exploration Rover "Opportunity" has been exploring the edge of a large crater "Victoria" on Mars, and is currently looking for a way to enter the crater. This image from the navigation camera was taken recently on Sol (a Martian Day) 1064, after three earth years on Mars.

Sometimes we need to look upwards to get a perspective on our own planet.

The Feta cheese sandwich.

From time-to-time I have dreams that leave me emotionally drained. Such was last night. Consciousness, the fifth skandha (or is it the sixth?).

BBC World Service

I tried the radio built into the iRiver mp3 player, and quickly found the BBC World Service: what a contrast to the "dumbed-down" news on the BBC web-site where, in a week when 70 or more young students were blown up at Mustansiriya University and 200 injured, I was offered day-after-day the mindless irrelevance that is Big Brother.

How teachers and doctors carry on their work in Baghdad is beyond me.

The UN estimates that 35,000 Iraqi civilians met violent deaths in 2006.

New Blogger

I am ambivalent about the new blogger. I have moved over, but have not implemented changes to the template as I don't see them as an improvement, certainly not without time spent recovering what I already have in place. The archive post changes are too computer-like for my taste, though I will have to do something soon as my archive list gets longer and longer. I had thought of moving wholesale to WordPress, which has some real advantages for scientific work, and that remains an option. I shall think more about this as my annual ISP contract comes up for renewal.

I read somewhere an estimate that 11% of the world's computers host 'bots', unseen pieces of software that can be woken up by their unseen masters to route spam or denial of service (DoS) attacks.

Science for communication

Tonight a Japanese colleague flew in, to work with me as a Visiting Professor for three months. This was his first trip outside Japan, and I'm pleased to be the means of achieving that. But, neither of us are sure how we will communicate. As a scientist he reads English with some effort, but speaking English will be tough. My Japanese is equally primitive and most of my lessons are forgotten. But I am saved by two things: first, science is a universal language believe it or not, and second, a very interesting student has joined me for a few months to do his final year project. He speaks some basic Japanese, and is already brushing up what he knows. He is a young man of unusual calm and maturity, most likely acquired (or enhanced) by his love of back-packing alone through SE-Asia. Last year he was in Tibet, well off the beaten trail, seeing one car a day at times, finding accommodation in private dwellings. After his exams and before joining me, he took two weeks in Cambodia and Vietnam. I'm looking forward to this, however it evolves - two very good (in the human sense) people.

I often feel my posts should end with the sound of a small bell or gong - not for their content, but that it ends a short meditation.

Home or lodgings?

I signed a two year lease when I moved here, after a week of looking, and so far, although big for my needs, the 2nd floor apartment overlooking much greenery and the pool, has served me well. Quiet and pleasant especially when a breeze blows through, and space for guests. It's in a condo(minium) (as the Americans and Singaporeans would say), is well-maintained and is convenient for my work (15 minutes), the MRT (train), and the City (30 minutes). Not bad, as these things go. But my landlord, a doctor, decides to sell and I have an stream of potential buyers which at first I could live with, but after three months it is becoming tiresome.

I don't attach much to the place, but I do value the peace, which seems generally undervalued in Singapore. Something will come up, it always does.

Meister Eckhart on Suzuki's fly.

Shunryu Suzuki's "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind", opens with the memorable line "In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few."

Meister Eckhart says:

"Were it the case that a fly had reason and could rationally seek out the eternal abyss of divine being, from which it came forth, we say that God, insofar as he is God, could not fulfill or satisfy the fly. Therefore pray God that we may be free of God."

Reflecting on a post and comments at Moving Mountains today.