Monthly Archives: August 2013

David Cameron, Mats Tunehag

Freedom of ReligionDavid CameronDavid Cameron: I believe a genuinely liberal country does much more; it believes in certain values and actively promotes them. Freedom of speech, freedom of worship, democracy, the rule of law, equal rights regardless of race, sex or sexuality.

Mats TunehagMats Tunehag: Freedom of religion includes the right to have a faith, to manifest it and propagate for it, alone or together with others, also in the public arena. It also gives the right to change beliefs and religious affiliation. This is what democracies would adhere to.
Freedom of worship is a definition practiced (sic) in countries influenced by Islam. You may be allowed to be a Christian, but you mustn’t take it into the public arena or share your faith with others. If you are a Muslim you are free to be a Muslim and display it publically but you can’t leave Islam.

David Koyzis

helmetgg2If, as Melanie Philips puts it, human rights is a religion for a godless age, then this edifice must be its temple: Human rights museum details unveiled. The magisterium for this new faith will be located in Winnipeg. Of course every ecclesial establishment must have its own website. Just how many Canadians can be expected to make the annual hajj to the holy city on the Red and Assiniboine Rivers is unclear.

HRmuseum1Human-Rights-Museum-1121128 aerial photo20 bm.JPG

Melanie Phillips

More seriously still, human rights law has been used to destroy control over the country’s borders. A series of court rulings laid down the right of illegal immigrants to welfare benefits — thus undermining the very basis of citizenship — and refused to allow the deportation of terrorist suspects to countries where there was any record of abuses of human rights.
The ideas that rights in Britain depend on human rights law is grotesque. England, after all, is the cradle of Western liberty as a result of English common law, which held that everything was permitted unless it was prohibited. Now, only what is codified and court-approved can be allowed.
Not surprisingly, liberty in Britain is now in fact much diminished. The universities close down politically incorrect debate. Anyone who criticises a minority group risks vilification and the loss of promotion or job prospects.
Freedom of religious conscience, the defining value of a liberal society, has effectively been abolished. Catholic adoption agencies will be forced to close if they refuse to place children for adoption with gay couples. But then “human rights” has come to be seen, in the words of one activist, as “a religion for a godless age“.
Human rights law has nothing to do with true liberalism. It is instead a judicial delivery system for cultural Marxism. In short, Britain’s human rights culture should more properly be known as a culture of human wrongs. Australia, be warned.

Michael J. Perry

The idea of human rights consists of two parts: the premise or claim that every human being is sacred (inviolable, etc.), and the further claim that because every human being is sacred (and given all other relevant information), certain choices should be made and certain other choices rejected; in particular, certain things ought not to be done to any human being and certain other things ought to be done for every human being. One fundamental challenge to the idea of human rights addresses the first part of the idea; it contests the claim that every human being is sacred. Another fundamental challenge, the one with which this article is principally concerned, addresses the second part of the idea. According to this latter challenge, whether or not every human being is sacred — and, so, even if every human being is sacred — there are no things that ought not to be done (not even any things that conditionally rather than unconditionally ought not to be done) to any human being and no things that ought to be done (not even any things that conditionally rather than unconditionally ought to be done) for every human being. That is, no putatively “human” right is truly a human right: no such right is the right of every human being; in that sense, no such right — no such “ought” or “ought not”–is truly universal. Before addressing this challenge, which shall be referred to as the relativist challenge to the idea of human rights, a comment on the other fundamental challenge, which contests the claim that every human being is sacred, is in order.

黄蕾, 钱江晚报

KnifeFork泰新马的行程,搭乘新加坡航空公司,客人来自郊县。
用餐后,全团客人把不锈钢刀叉全部收入囊中。空姐收拾餐具的时候,要求客人把刀叉拿出来,客人说搭乘飞机之前,家里人就告诉他们,飞机上的刀叉是可以带走的。空姐解释说:我们这一个航班的刀叉不是一次性的,不可以拿走。但是客人说,以前他们家里人也搭乘过这个航班的,都是可以拿走的,你们不要把我们当做乡下人,以为我们没有搭乘过飞机就欺负老实人!
SINGAPOREAIRLINES空姐很无奈,再一次耐心的进行解释,但是客人索性就不去理睬空姐。空姐后来也生气了,就找到了领队,告诉领队说:如果有一两个人客人拿走刀叉,她们也算了,但是像现在这样全团30多个客人把刀叉都带走,会影响到整个航空公司餐具的调配和运作的,这样的行为属于是擅自占有机上物品,是不允许的!
于是领队再次要求客人把刀叉拿出来,但是客人还是心很齐地以“法不责众”的姿态不作声。作为领队,原本应该是和颜悦色和客人对话,但是在这样的节骨眼,领队那一番和风细雨表达方式,客人一点也不领情,最后领队无奈开始放出狠话,一直说到“请你们不要给中国人丢脸好不好?”客人才很不心甘情愿地把刀叉拿出来。

Léonce Verny

Léonce Verny dirige le grand arsenal naval de Yokosuka, premiers chantiers navals modernes du Japon, de 1866 à 1875. Il crée, également, une école d’ingénieurs et une école d’architecture navale puis conduit un large programme de construction de phares, notamment ceux de Kanonzaki et de Jogashima. Le souvenir de Verny dure encore : sa statue existe toujours sur le port de Yokosuka et la ville célèbre chaque année sa mémoire en novembre.

Verny
Construction de l’arsenal Yokosuka

Rebecca Grant

The air operations of the early 20th century went from being a useful supporting force late in World War I to being “a determining factor” in the planning and execution of operations in World War II. It comes as no surprise, then, that when the radar game began to put the efficiency of air operations in jeopardy, scientists and airmen responded with vigor. The radar game is one that aircraft must play to maintain control of the skies and the freedom to attack and defend. The joint force has counted on their ability to win that game since World War II.
Winning the radar game has been and will remain central to future joint operations. As the US military moves away from decades of planning for a major war in Europe, the national military strategy still calls for the ability to intervene in regional conflicts that will vary in scope and intensity. Intervening on favorable terms will continue to require the air component to take direct and immediate action to control the air and the surface below. Air defense threats have increased throughout the 20th century and will continue to do so in the 21st century. Stealth is no magic panacea, but the edge it offers in the radar game is indispensable. Paired with other advantages from ECM to advanced munitions, the effects of low observables multiply, and will keep the edge of America’s airpower sharp.

Lee Sang Yong

KoreaThe Korean National Red Cross has sent North Korea the personal details of 250 candidates for the upcoming round of separated family reunions to be held at the end of September. The Chosun Red Cross Society also passed South Korea a list of 200 candidates.
The results of checks into the status of the individuals on the two lists will be exchanged on September 13th, and it is expected that three days later, on the 16th, the final registers of 100 people will be concluded.

NHK

PAVE_PAWS_Radar_Clear_AFS_Alaska防衛省は、中国やロシアがレーダーに探知されにくいステルス性能を持つ次世代戦闘機の開発・量産化を進めていることを踏まえ、防空態勢を強化する必要があるとして、ステルス機を探知・追尾できるレーダーなどの研究・開発に本格的に着手する方針で、来年度(平成26年度)予算案の概算要求に37億円を盛り込むことを決めました。

(写真はアラスカのフェーズド・アレイ・レーダー)

片岡愛之助

kataoka歌舞伎はマジック、現代劇はリアル。嘘と本当を極めたい。

歌舞伎では残酷なシーンでもいかに美しく見せるかが求められます。切腹のシーンでも苦しむどころか、私は一番気持ちのいい、色気のある顔をするように教えられてきました。しかし、それでは現代劇は成立しない。現代劇ではどうしたら本物のように見えるか、現場ではリアルに起きていることを追求するようにしています。

Arshad Mohammed, Marie Harf

ReutersArshadArshad Mohammed: Was the U.S. use of nuclear weapons resulting in the mass and indiscriminate killing of civilians in both Hiroshima and Nagasaki a violation of the same international law that you are referring to?
Marie Harf: I’m not even going to entertain that question, Arshad.
Arshad Mohammed: Can I —
Marie Harf: Moving on. Yes.
Arshad Mohammed: — ask you, and maybe you got an answer to my question from yesterday, which wasn’t, honestly, a trick question – you thought it was —
MHarfMarie Harf: You convinced me of that later.
Arshad Mohammed: Okay.
Marie Harf: I believe you.
Arshad Mohammed: All right. Good.
Marie Harf: Go on with your non-trick question.
Arshad Mohammed: But in terms of the precedent —
Marie Harf: Yes.
Arshad Mohammed: — is there, that you’re aware, a precedent for a U.S. administration, or any other government that you’re aware of —
Marie Harf: Mm-hmm.
Arshad Mohammed: — to use the use of chemical weapons as a justification to take some kind of retaliatory or punitive action?
Marie Harf: No. Not to that specific question.
Arshad Mohammed: So there is no precedent for this. This —
Marie Harf: Not that I am aware of, no.

rgbviews

John Kerry said “The indiscriminate slaughter of civilians, the killing of women and children and innocent bystanders by chemical weapons is a moral obscenity.”
Errr, John do you recall Hiroshima, Nagaski, (atomic bombing of civilians)? ….or Bagdad (cruise missles)? or Vietnam (agent orange)? ……or Gaza (phosphor bombing)?

Wikipedia, ウィキペディア

Extreme weather includes unusual, severe or unseasonal weather; weather at the extremes of the historical distribution—the range that has been seen in the past. The most commonly used definition of extreme weather is based on an event’s climatological distribution: Extreme weather occurs only 5% or less of the time. According to climate scientists and meteorological researchers, extreme weather events have been rare. Some extreme weather events have been attributed to man-made global warming, with a 2012 studies indicating an increasing threat from extreme weather.

気象庁では、「過去30年の気候に対して著しい偏りを示した天候」を異常気象と定義している。世界気象機関では、「平均気温や降水量が平年より著しく偏り、その偏差が25年以上に1回しか起こらない程度の大きさの現象」を異常気象と定義している。エルニーニョ現象や、これに南方振動を含めたENSOは、異常気象の原因となるとされているが、エルニーニョ現象は数年の周期で起こるものであり、「エルニーニョ現象=異常気象」ではない。
また、気象庁の異常気象レポートでは、「過去に経験した現象から大きく外れた現象で、人が一生の間にまれにしか経験しない現象」ともしている。そもそも異常気象の発生自体は当たり前の事象であり、地球が存在する以上、異常気象は必ず発生するものである。人間の寿命がせいぜい百年程度で、近代気象学に関わる文献が過去数百年~千年程度でしかないため、本来的には地球上で”普通”に発生し得る天候であっても、観察者である人類の寿命・歴史にとっては”異常”と定義したということになる。

Scott R. Peppet

Technology allows prostitutes to advertise, screen clients, and be screened by clients in new ways that reduce transaction costs and allow prostitutes and clients to sort and signal each other more efficiently than before. Prostitution 2.0 seems safer, healthier, less socially visible or obnoxious, less coercive, and more rewarding than streetwalking or other forms of indoor prostitution. At the same time, concerns remain. In particular, Prostitution 2.0 does not eliminate all troubling information asymmetries between prostitutes and clients—particularly about health risks, criminal propensity, and trafficking.
To overcome the remaining problems in sex markets, Prostitution 3.0 requires four innovations: (1) verification of STD status; (2) verification of criminal history; (3) verification of anti-trafficking credentials; and (4) biometric identity verification. These four technologies could change prostitution from a market in which prostitutes and clients must guess at material information to one in which such information becomes routinely available.
The first three necessary technologies all require intermediated biometric identification to truly make Prostitution 3.0 succeed. Only if prostitutes and clients can be reassured that the physical person they are transacting with is the person that they digitally verified will Prostitution 3.0 improve prostitution markets.
What to do about street prostitution? The short answer is Prostitution 3.5—taking the improvements of Prostitution 3.0 to the street through location-based mobile technologies.

Prostitution 3.0? (PDF)

国家基本問題研究所

私たちは現在の日本に言い知れぬ危機感を抱いております。緊張感と不安定の度を増す国際情勢とは裏腹に、戦後体制から脱却しようという志は揺らぎ、国民の関心はもっぱら当面の問題に偏っているように見受けられます。
日本国憲法に象徴される戦後体制はもはや国際社会の変化に対応できず、ようやく憲法改正問題が日程に上がってきました。しかし、敗戦の後遺症はあまりにも深刻で、その克服には、今なお、時間がかかると思われます。「歴史認識」問題は近隣諸国だけでなく、同盟国の米国との間にも存在します。教育は学力低下や徳育の喪失もさることながら、その根底となるべき国家意識の欠如こそ重大な問題であります。国防を担う自衛隊は「普通の民主主義国」の軍隊と程遠いのが現状です。
「普通の民主主義国」としての条件を欠落させたまま我が国が現在に至っている原因は、政治家が見識を欠き、官僚機構が常に問題解決を先送りする陋習を変えず、その場凌ぎに終始してきたことにあります。加えて国民の意識にも問題があったものと考えられます。
私たちは、連綿とつづく日本文明を誇りとし、かつ、広い国際的視野に立って、日本の在り方を再考しようとするものです。同時に、国際情勢の大変化に対応するため、社会の各分野で機能不全に陥りつつある日本を再生していきたいと思います。

Richard Rorty

The eventual demarcation of philosophy from science was made possible by the notion that philosophy’s core was “theory of knowledge,” a theory distinct from the sciences because it was their foundation… Without this idea of a “theory of knowledge,” it is hard to imagine what “philosophy” could have been in the age of modern science.

Open-mindedness should not be fostered because, as Scripture teaches, Truth is great and will prevail, nor because, as Milton suggests, Truth will always win in a free and open encounter. It should be fostered for its own sake.

Marco Di Lauro

Iraqis Search For Relatives Among Mass Grave Remains
BBC1An Iraqi child jumps over a line of remains in a school where bodies had been brought from a mass grave discovered in the desert in the outskirts of Al Musayyib, 50 km south of Baghdad, May 27, 2003 in Iraq. People had been searching for days for identity cards or other clues among the skeletons to try to find the remains of family members, including children, from the grave that locals say contained the remains of hundreds of Shi’ite Muslims executed by Saddam Hussein’s regime after their uprising following the 1991 Gulf War. (Photo by Marco Di Lauro/Getty Images)

(The BBC is facing criticism after it accidentally used a picture taken in Iraq in 2003 to illustrate the senseless massacre of children in Syria.)
Marco di Lauro said he nearly “fell off his chair” when he saw the image being used, and said he was “astonished” at the failure of the corporation to check their sources.

宮田裕

復帰後、政府は「沖縄振興開発特別措置法」「一次~三次沖縄振興開発計画」(1972年度~2001年度)および「沖縄振興特別措置法」「沖縄振興計画」(2002年度~11年度)に基づき、2009年度までに8兆7885億円の振興開発事業費を計上した。その結果、道路、空港、港湾、ダム開発など社会資本の整備は急速に進み、沖縄の経済社会は着実に発展してきた。
しかし、政府の沖縄政策の目玉として実施されている「本土との格差是正」及び「自立的発展の基礎条件整備」のために投下された振興開発事業費は、経済自立には結びついていない。
政府の責任で沖縄の新興開発を実施しているが、財政資金は、途上国援助として投入されるODA資金と同様にその大半が日本企業の受注で日本に還流する「ODA援助」と形が類似しており、「ODA沖縄版」となっている。

離島ドットコム管理人

「沖縄振興特別措置法」によって沖縄には本土に比べて優遇されたものが多いが、特に企業誘致に関する「特区」が多い。しかしその「特区」のほとんどが上手くいっていない現状。はっきり言えば「失敗」。
自由貿易地域 - 通称「フリートレードゾーン」。那覇空港と那覇市街の間にありるが、あれって稼働しているの?と言うぐらい人の流れも物流の流れもあの周辺で感じない。実際、目標の「6%」しか稼働していないらしく、存在の意味すら危ぶまれる。。。
情報通信産業振興地域 - 数値上は雇用を生み出しているかもしれないが、結局非正規雇用ばかり。コールセンターやIT系で働く人の多くが本土からの移住者が、沖縄移住をしたいために安い給料でもがんばっている。。。
金融/IT特区 - 認定企業はゼロ。看板だけの「特区」。条件がかなり厳しく、本土企業からするとそこまでする意味はない。。。
産業高度化地域 - 産業高度化といっても沖縄にまで進出するメリットがあまりない。製造品出荷額のうちのこの地域からの出荷額は2002年に76%だったものが2008年には50%まで落ち込んでいる。今後も上がる要素はほとんど無い。。。
結局どれも「看板だけ」で終わっているものばかり。

Andrea

I think internet is better than human – since humans tend to meet infrequently in person (1 X a week or 1 x a month) – and it is easier to “confess” when you don’t actually do it in person. Plus there is a much wider range of experience/suggestions available.

Jeremy Schiff

Jeremy SchiffRecent research has developed sensor networks, where tiny devices with processors, memory, and wireless communication can be deployed to collaboratively sense and reason about the environment around them. Sensor nets are versatile enough to be thrown out into some outdoor environment, or can be integrated into offices and homes to create “smart buildings.” We have begun investigating the concept of Actuator Networks, where we enhance these passive sensing devices with distributed actuation, such as emitting different amplitudes and wavelengths of light or sound, to affect an environment. The general idea is to generate a “potential field” of attracting and repelling actuators.

Scott Page

ScottPageWe all differ in how we see and interpret things.

Each of us sees the thing, whatever it is, in our own way. We commonly refer to the ways we encode things as perspectives.

The right perspective can make a problem easy.

We see how most scientific breakthroughs and business innovations involve a person seeing a problem or situation differently.

When forming committees and teams, we should choose people who come from different backgrounds and have diverse identities. If not, we’re shutting out perspectives.We’re slamming the door on potential savants.

Stephen Toulmin

Stephen ToulminOur intellectual grasp extends throughout the cosmos, and has brought to light the material processes going on at every scale-from the thermonuclear furnaces of the stars, down through the protein-factories of the cytoplasm, to the changes of wave-pattern which take place when an atom swallows a photon. And this intellectual grasp is paralleled and completed when we turn to the practical sphere. We have exceeded the dreams of the craftsmen, the alchemists and the medicine-men, and by now we have the means either to satiate or to destroy ourselves.

Daphne Koller

Daphne KollerAs a society, we can and should invest more money in education. But that is only part of the solution. The high costs of high-quality education put it off limits to large parts of the population, both in the United States and abroad, and threaten the school’s place in society as a whole. We need to significantly reduce those costs while at the same time improving quality.
(Daphne Koller is one of the founders of Coursera, an online education platform.)

Khan Academy

khan-logoA free world-class education for anyone anywhere.

Khan Academy is an organization on a mission. We’re a not-for-profit with the goal of changing education for the better by providing a free world-class education for anyone anywhere.

All of the site’s resources are available to anyone. It doesn’t matter if you are a student, teacher, home-schooler, principal, adult returning to the classroom after 20 years, or a friendly alien just trying to get a leg up in earthly biology. Khan Academy’s materials and resources are available to you completely free of charge.

Coursera

Courser1

Discover a course you’re interested in and enroll today

Choose from 300+ courses in over 20 categories created by 62 Universities from 16 countries.

courser2

Learn with 3 million Courserians

Watch short video lectures, take interactive quizzes, complete peer graded assessments, and interact live with your new classmates and teachers.

courser3

Achieve your learning goals and build your portfolio

Finish your class, receive recognition for a job well done, and achieve your goals, whether they be career, personal, or educational.

河添健

Kawazoe複雑化し、不確実性の高い現代社会において、既知の学問をよく習得できる人材だけでは不十分であり、新しい状況を的確に理解し、最適な状況を作り出すための技術や制度、組織の設計ができる人材が必要とされている。
環境との共生、活力ある長寿社会、貧困の解決など、よりよい世の中を実現していくためには、さまざまな分野の学問領域を取り込んでいかなければならない。法律や経済の仕組み、テクノロジー、場合によっては「心」の問題に直面することもある。そういった問題の本質がどこにあるのかを発見し、実際の現場に飛び込み、問題の解決に関わりながら学ぶことを重視する環境。幅広い視野と得意領域を併せ持った人材は、そういう環境から生み出される。

Alex Rosenberg, Tyler Curtain

AlexRosenberg2TylerCurtainUnlike the physical world, the domain of economics includes a wide range of social “constructions” — institutions like markets and objects like currency and stock shares — that even when idealized don’t behave uniformly. They are made up of unrecognized but artificial conventions that people persistently change and even destroy in ways that no social scientist can really anticipate. We can exploit gravity, but we can’t change it or destroy it. No one can say the same for the socially constructed causes and effects of our choices that economics deals with.
Another factor economics has never been able to tame is science itself. These are the drivers of economic growth, the “creative destruction” of capitalism. But no one can predict the direction of scientific discovery and its technological application. As the rate of acceleration of innovation increases, the prospects of an economic theory that tames the economy’s most powerful forces must diminish — and with it, any hope of improvements in prediction declines as well.
So if predictive power is not in the cards for economics, what is it good for?

David H. Autor

DavidAutorLabor-saving technological change necessarily displaces workers performing certain tasks — that’s where the gains in productivity come from — but over the long run, it generates new products and services that raise national income and increase the overall demand for labor. In 1900, no one could foresee that a century later, health care, finance, information technology, consumer electronics, hospitality, leisure and entertainment would employ far more workers than agriculture. Of course, as societies grow more prosperous, citizens often choose to work shorter days, take longer vacations and retire earlier — but that too is progress.
So if technological advances don’t threaten employment, does that mean workers have nothing to fear from “smart machines”? Actually, no.
Computerization is not reducing the quantity of jobs, but rather degrading the quality of jobs for a significant subset of workers. Demand for highly educated workers who excel in abstract tasks is robust, but the middle of the labor market, where the routine task-intensive jobs lie, is sagging. Workers without college education therefore concentrate in manual task-intensive jobs — like food services, cleaning and security — which are numerous but offer low wages, precarious job security and few prospects for upward mobility. This bifurcation of job opportunities has contributed to the historic rise in income inequality.

Josef Albers

In visual perception a color is almost never seen as it really is — as it physically is. This fact makes color the most relative medium in art.
In order to use color effectively it is necessary to recognize that color deceives continually. To this end, the beginning is not a study of color systems.
First, it should be learned that one and the same color evokes innumerable readings. Instead of mechanically applying or merely implying laws and rules of color harmony, distinct color effects are produced-through recognition of the interaction of color-by making, for instance, two very different colors look alike, or nearly alike.

interactionofcolor2
A color has many faces, and one color can be made to appear as two different colors. Here it is almost unbelievable that the left small and the right small squares are part of the same paper strip and therefore are the same color. And no normal human eye is able to see both squares — alike.

Arianna Huffington

arianna-huffingtonMainstream media tend to just mouth the conventional wisdom, to see everything through the filter of right and left.

We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes – understanding that failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success.

The fastest way to break the cycle of perfectionism and become a fearless mother is to give up the idea of doing it perfectly – indeed to embrace uncertainty and imperfection.

Bob Moorehead

BobMThe paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings but shorter tempers, wider Freeways, but narrower viewpoints. We spend more, but have less, we buy more, but enjoy less. We have bigger houses and smaller families, more conveniences, but less time. We have more degrees but less sense, more knowledge, but less judgment, more experts, yet more problems, more medicine, but less wellness.

愛知県飛鳥村

  • 政令市の名古屋市に隣接し、名古屋港の一角である南部の臨海地域に鉄鋼関連の事業所や発電所、輸出関係の倉庫などが林立している。そのため、事業所からの税収入が多く、財政力指数は全国で一番財政力指数が高い。
  • 昼間人口は約13,000人。臨海工業地帯への通勤者が多い。居住人口が約4,500人と少ないのは、水害を受けやすい場所であるというほかに、村域のほとんどが市街化調整区域であり、住宅・アパートなどの建設が困難なためという理由もある。
  • 飛島村には飛島村立小中一貫教育校飛島学園の飛島小学校と飛島中学校しかなく、各学年の多くが1学級。飛島中学校では、中学2年時に、村の費用全額負担でアメリカ合衆国サンフランシスコへの1週間の研修旅行が行われる。
  • 子供の医療費は、中学校卒業まで無料。
  • 住民が出産し、1年以上村内に在住した場合と、子供が小学校、中学校にそれぞれ入学した場合、村から10万円の祝金が支給される。
  • 90歳になると20万円、95歳になると50万円、100歳になると100万円が支給される。
  • 一人暮らしの老人に乳酸菌飲料を無料支給するなど、高齢者への無料サービスも多い。
  • 村内には鉄道はなく、飛島公共交通バスが公共交通の手段となっている。

James Surowiecki

surowieckiDiversity and independence are important because the best collective decisions are the product of disagreement and contest, not consensus or compromise.

If small groups are included in the decision-making process, then they should be allowed to make decisions. If an organization sets up teams and then uses them for purely advisory purposes, it loses the true advantage that a team has: namely, collective wisdom.

No decision-making system is going to guarantee corporate success. The strategic decisions that corporations have to make are of mind-numbing complexity. But we know that the more power you give a single individual in the face of complexity and uncertainty, the more likely it is that bad decisions will get made.

西垣通

グループで登山していて道にまよったとき、当地のガイドにしたがうか、それとも参加者全員の集約的意見を尊重するか、いずれを選ぶかについて投票してもらった。すると、ガイドにしたがうという意見が圧倒的だったのである。
つまり、自己言及パラドックスが生じたわけだ。みんなの意見が正しいとすれば、「みんなの意見は正しくない」わけだし、逆に、みんなの意見が正しくないなら、「みんなの意見は正しい」ということになる。
・・・これはちょっとした言葉遊びにすぎない。こんな実験で集合知仮説を否定するのは軽率というものだ。だが、本実験がしめすのは、人々は内心では相変わらず「みんなの意見より専門家の意見のほうが正しい」と信じているという厳然たる事実なのである。

Ivan Illich

スクリーンショット 2013-08-25 11.11.07I was recently told, ‘You’re a liar!’ when I said to somebody I walked down the spine of the Andes. Every Spaniard in the sixteenth, seventeenth century did that. The idea that somebody could just walk! He can jog perhaps in the morning, but he can’t walk anywhere! The world has become inaccessible because we drive there.

Carry a candle in the dark, be a candle in the dark, know that you’re a flame in the dark.

Man must choose whether to be rich in things or in the freedom to use them.

School is the advertising agency which makes you believe that you need the society as it is.

高岡淑郎

doc2日米の医療制度、医学教育のギャップにとまどいを感じながらも、日本独特の文化がある限り米国の真似をしても意味のない事であり、むしろ 両者の良い所を少しでも地域医療の現場に生かすのが私の使命であると努力を続けて居ります。 特に脳外科領域の中でも頚椎、腰椎を含めた最もポピュラーな脊椎、脊髄疾患が、脳外科、整形外科の境界領域であるせいか、適応を正しく選べば良い手術成績が得 られ、日常生活の質の改善に大きく関与するにもかかわらず手術が行われていなかった事に気づき、積極的に手術を行い既に 800 例を超えました。残りの 300 例は、脳動脈瘤、脳動静脈奇形、脳腫瘍、顔面痙攣、三叉神経痛を全て網羅してい るのは云うまでもありません。

司馬遼太郎

10385大正二年(一九一三)九月、米村喜男衛氏がこの野に来たときは、駅と駅前にわずかに人家があるきりで、どこもかも原野のようだったという。
駅の裏が、網走川だった。橋は、架けられていた。米村喜男衛が、橋をわたって下流をめざすと、見わたすかぎりの草の原だったという。
河口の左岸が砂丘になっていることは、すでにふれた。川に面して断崖になっていて、その断崖いちめんに貝殻が露出し、幾重にも層をなしていた。
米村喜男衛が棒の先でそっと崩してみると、貝類のほかに、石器、骨角器、土器などが出てきた。やがて人骨も出る。どれもが、他に類例を見ないものだった。
日本史学に、“オホーツク人”が登場する瞬間である。

北海道新聞

5~13世紀にオホーツク海沿岸などで独自の文化を発展させたオホーツク人の遺伝子を解読することに北大の研究グループが成功した。オホーツク人のルーツには諸説があるが、 現在の民族ではサハリンなどに暮らすニブヒやアムール川下流のウリチと遺伝的に最も近いことが分かり、北方からの渡来説が有力となった。アイヌ民族との共通性も判明、同グループはアイヌ民族の成り立ちについて「続縄文人・擦文人と、オホーツク人の両者がかかわったと考えられる」と推測している。大学院理学研究院の増田隆一准教授(進化遺伝学)らのグループで、日本人類学会の英語電子版「アンスロポロジカル・サイエンス」に発表した。
同グループは、道東・道北やサハリンの遺跡から発掘されたオホーツク人の人骨102体を分析。うち37体から遺伝子の断片を取り出し、DNAを解読した。
その結果、ニブヒやウリチなど北東アジアの諸民族だけが高い比率で持っている ハプログループY遺伝子がオホーツク人にもあり、遺伝子グループ全体の特徴でもニブヒなど共通性が強いことが分かった。
現在、カムチャツカ半島に暮らすイテリメン、コリヤークとの遺伝的つながりも見られた。

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楡周平

Nire国や地方自治体が公共投資に力を入れても、新たな産業がなく雇用が生まれなければ、膨大な負債が残される。そんな街や国から、企業はさっさと逃げていく。民間企業としては当然の判断でしかない。そして街や国を出るに出られない人間が取り残される。あとは破綻へと一直線だ。

Robert Reich

ReichWe’re losing public goods available to all, supported by the tax payments of all and especially the better-off. In its place we have private goods available to the very rich, supported by the rest of us.

Wikipedia, 吉村和就

tsuyuharai元来、露払いは人の役割を指し、夜間や朝、長く伸びた草木が繁る草原や原野を集団で行く時、一列を成して徒歩や小走りで進行を先導したりまたは先頭を行く者のことである。先頭に立つ者は草や木を足や手で払いかき分け進み、草木に残る結露した露や雨水を払い落とすが、この時水に濡れ履き物や衣類に染み込み体が冷えるため好まれる仕事ではなく、一般に身分の低い者の役割とされる。後続の者ほど濡れる割合は少ない。

Chiracヴェオリア社、そしてスエズ社、2 つのフランス系企業は世界市場で大きなビジネスを展開している。各々の水部門の売り上げは、1 兆6 千億円、8千6百億円である。この成功の裏にあるのはフランス政府の外交努力である。2 社がビッグビジネスを締結する前には、常にシラク前大統領が各国のトップと会談し、「露払い」を行っている。

本多時生

まず必要なことは、「死」という現実を受け入れることです。死をイヤがったり恐れたりしている間は、冷静な考えも幸せ志向の考えも難しいのです。
「人は誰でも死ぬ」ということは変えようのないことです。現実を受け入れることは、幸せに生きる基本です。現実を嘆いたり、人のせいにしているだけでは、自ら幸せになることはできません。
「受け入れる」ことは、現実にあることを「ある」と認めることです。事実や存在を認めるのです。受け入れることで少しは気分がラクになります。そしてその先が考えられるようになります。
「受け入れる」と「あきらめる」は違います。現実を認めて「私にはどうしようもない」と考えてしまえば「あきらめ」になります。そこから前向きに考える方向性を持てることが「受け入れる」ことです。

Маргарита Троицына

telepathyКак известно, между близкими людьми часто существует такая тесная связь, что они способны чувствовать друг друга на большом расстоянии. Наибольшая вероятность таких чудес возникает в момент, когда кто-то попадает в критическую ситуацию или же в момент смерти, считают парапсихологи. Много таких случаев происходило, к примеру, во время войны.

木田元

かねがね、わたしは、日本の哲学者の態度は、ちょっと違うんじゃないかな、という気がしてなりませんでした。哲学者の元祖のソクラテスなんて相当人を食ったふざけた人間なのですが、日本の研究者はみんな真面目一本槍で、自分があたかも西洋人であるかのように思い込み、「哲学」という学問は素晴らしいものだと信じきっています。わたしもも哲学研究者の一人ですが、、哲学をやっているのは、ちょっとこれは違うな、と感じる人ばかりです。わたしとは、哲学へのアプローチが、はじめから少し違っているのかもしれません。
もともと「哲学」という言葉自体が、西周による明らかな誤訳なんです。ですから、「哲学」を後生大事にありがたがっている方がおかしいわけなんです。
「哲学」の直接の原語は英語のphilosophyあるいはそれに当たるオランダ語で、これは古代ギリシア語のphilosophiaの音をそのまま移したものです。philosophiaは、philein (愛する)という動詞と sophia (知恵ないし知識)という名詞を組み合わせてつくられた合成語であり、「知を愛すること」つまり「愛知」という意味です。
しかし、「愛知」という言葉を日常的に使うことは、これはこれでかなり不自然なことで、「哲学」を「愛知」にすればいいというものでもありません。実は、philosophiaという言葉自体も、古代ギリシアの中では複雑な経路を経て生まれたものでした。
この言葉は最初、紀元前6世紀頃のピュタゴラス教団の創始者が、ho philosophos「知識を愛する人」という形容詞として使いました。hoは男性の定冠詞です。形容詞に定冠詞を付けると、その性質をもった人間ないし物を意味するというあれですね。ピュタゴラスは、世界にはho philargyros「商人のように金銭を愛する人」とho philotimos「軍人のように名誉を愛する人」と、自分のような「知識を愛する人」の3種類の人がいると言っているのです。

Christopher Moore

How did the name philosophos come to be? Two views are now popular. Some say it first meant “lover of wisdom.” Others say it first meant “intellectual curious person” before later acquiring a specialized disciplinary meaning defined by Plato. Two views were popular in ancient times. Both take it as Pythagoras’ selfapplied name. One has Pythagoras demurring that the name sophos is appropriate only for god. The other has him distinguishing philosophoi from the people who care for either honor or money.
This paper argues against these four views. It conjectures instead that philosophos was coined as a bemused, ironic, perhaps derisive name-calling name meaning “wanting to become sophos,” where sophos names the elite cultural status for which the Seven Sages are archetypes.

The name-calling origins of the philosophos (PDF)

Info-Cult

InfoCultWhen individuals integrate into the life of a group, they often adopt the values, norms and behaviours valued by the group in order to be accepted. People who model their behaviour on other group members can be described as conformist.
Unlike socialization, in which individuals adapt to group life while preserving their autonomy ¯ conformism requires individuals to accept a set of group requirements and modify their behaviour to duplicate that of the other members in order to be accepted.
Conformism can be described as a process of submission to the majority which can reveal a need for security, a search for identification through membership to a group or a strategy for avoiding conflict.
Here are three processes through which individuals adapt their behaviour to group norms: acquiescence, internalization and identification.

Arvind Singhal

As economic activity spreads throughout the system, the act of balancing and sharing the strain becomes more delicate; it require quicker reports from farther away and quicker orders to more scattered centers. Component must be in touch… knowledge must be gathered more broadly and more widely. Information must be transferred more swiftly… The developing nations must be prepared to support an enormous increase in the day-to-day communication within the system.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

82nd & Fifth

82_5th82nd & Fifth is the Met’s address in New York City. It is also the intersection of art and ideas. We’ve invited 100 curators from across the Museum to talk about 100 works of art that changed the way they see the world, and eleven Museum photographers to interpret their vision.

Jennifer Russell

MuttI don’t have a dog now because I’m never home. I shared a dog with my sister. I was really only allowed to have the dog on weekends, because she thought I spoiled him too badly. And he was a great dog. He was a mutt. He was abandoned as a puppy. My mother took one look at him and said, “Don’t feed this dog, don’t be nice to this dog, and this dog will go away.” And about five minutes later she and I ran into each other feeding the dog and giving the dog water. And this dog was quite homely. He had long legs and not much hair and a long tail, and he was your basic, awkward adolescent. And he turned into an absolutely great dog. He was one hundred percent devoted to my sister. And if she wasn’t around, I was an acceptable second. We had him for years and years and years, and I was so upset when this dog died, I think I was far more upset than when my mother died. Sorry, Mom! You get very close to animals and you’re very sad when they die. That’s where my affection for mutts came from.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Connections

ConnectionsConnections invites its diverse staff to offer their personal perspectives on works of art in the Museum’s vast collection. Their voices range from the authoritative to the highly subjective, and touch upon any number of themes and concepts.

Carrie Rebora Barratt

c2_Carrie_Rebora_Barratt_v002I’ve always liked small things. Diminutive, tiny things have always been much more appealing to me than large-scale things which everyone is meant to see. I always find that small things really require careful study, quiet and an intimacy with one’s self in order to truly appreciate it.

田中宇

戦前の日本は、どこの国にも従属していなかった。敗戦は日米の国力差から見て仕方がなく、敗戦直後の対米従属もやむを得ないことと考えられるが、米国が日本に自立した防衛力を持つよう促した1970年代以降も、日本が官僚独裁を維持するために対米従属を続け、日本人が世界のことに無知な状態に(意図的に)しているのは、明らかに国益を損ね、日本人の精神をねじ曲げている。日本の対米従属は、自主独立を好む米国の精神にも反する。戦没者たちは、自国が対米従属の国になったことをあの世で嘆いているだろう。首相が英霊に謝罪するとしたら、それはまず自国が卑屈な対米従属を続けていることに関してだろう。

Darrell Huff

The secret language of statistics, so appealing in a fact-minded culture, is employed to sensationalize, inflate, confuse, and oversimplify. Statistical methods and statistical terms are necessary in reporting the mass data of social and economic trends, business conditions, “opinion” polls, the census. But without writers who use the words with honesty and understanding and readers who know what they mean, the result can only be semantic nonsense.

William C. Burns

My favorite example is to do the following:
1. Get data on all the fires in San Francisco for the last ten years.
2. Correlate the number of fire engines at each fire and the damages in dollars at each fire.
Note the significant relationship between number of fire engines and the amount of damage. Conclude that fire engines cause the damage.
The reason that I like this example is that the conclusion is so absurd. Anyone will quickly recognize that both variables result from and are correlated with the overall size of the fire. However, many spurious correlations do not seem absurd and some seem compelling.

R. Burke Johnson

Examples of Spurious Relationships

Observed Spurious Relationship Reason for the Relationship (the Third Variable)
Amount of ice cream sold and deaths by drownings (Moore, 1993) Season: Ice cream sales and drownings tend to be high during the warm months of the year.
Size of left hand and size of right hand Genetics: The size of both hands is due to genetic makeup.
Height of sons and height of daughters (Davis, 1985) Genetics: Heights of sons and daughters are both due their parents’ genetic makeup.
Ministers’ salaries and price of vodka Area (i.e., urban or rural): In urban areas, prices and salaries tend to be higher.
Shoe size and reading performance for elementary school children Age: Older children have larger shoe sizes and read better.
Number of doctors in region and number of people dying from disease Population density: In highly dense areas, there are more doctors and more people die.
Number of police officers and number of crimes (Glass & Hopkins, 1996) Population density: In highly dense areas, there are more police officers and more crimes.
Number of homicides and number of churches Population density: In highly dense areas, there are more homicides and more churches.
Number of storks sighted and the population of Oldenburg, Germany, over a six-year period (Box, Hunter & Hunter, 1978) Time: Both variables were increasing over time.
Number of public libraries and the amount of drug use Time: Both were increasing during the 1970s.
Teachers’ salaries and the price of liquor (Moore and McCabe, 1993) Time: Both tend to increase over time.
Tea drinking and lung cancer Smoking: Tea drinkers have a lower risk only because they smoke less.

渥美清

狂気のない奴は駄目だ。それと孤立だな。孤立してるのはつらいから、つい徒党や政治に走る。孤立しているのが大事なんだよ。

カイラス

Jainaジャイナ教は小さな宗教である。20世紀初頭、マックス・ウェーバーは、「人口わずか0.5%のジャイナ教徒が、インドの富の50%を所有している」と書いている。今日では、0.4%のジャイナ教徒が、税金の24%を納めているという統計もある。
なぜジャイナ教徒が裕福なのか。その理由は戒律の厳しさにある。ジャイナ教の戒律は、不殺生、真理、盗むな、執着するな、貞節の5つ。中でも最も厳しく戒めるのが殺生である。あらゆる生命を大切にしなければならない。僧職者は、虫を吸い込むことを防ぐため口と鼻を白い布のマスクで覆う。手に毛バタキを持ち、裸足で、地面の虫や空中の昆虫を追い払って歩く。一般の信徒も同じでつましく、菜食を守る。また、日没から夜明けまでの飲食も禁止である。
戒律の厳しさは職業選択にも大きな影響を与える。地中に何がいるかわからない以上、農耕はできない。動き回る仕事は生き物を踏みつける可能性が高い。原材料や製品を輸送したり、工場を動かすのも生き物を傷つける危険を伴う。よってほとんどのジャイナ教徒は大都市に住み、金、宝石の売買や結婚式の装飾品を作る仕事についている。

Matt Damon

matt-damon-disses-obama-he-broke-up-with-meHe broke up with me.
There are a lot of things that I really question — the legality of the drone strikes, these NSA revelations. Jimmy Carter came out and said we don’t live in a democracy. That’s a little intense when an ex-president says that. So you now, he’s got some explaining to do, particularly for a constitutional law professor.
You know, a one-term president with some balls who actually got stuff done would have been, in the long run of the country, much better.

Su Mwamba

Crafts – traditionally – were about using a handmade process to achieve an end result, usually something practical, like a rug or chair or clothing. Not to say that these items couldn’t also be decorative, but the main aim was function. Contemporary crafts are less about practicality and function, and generally something a crafter chooses to do because they enjoy the crafting process itself. It’s a leisure activity rather than a means to an end.
Art, in both traditional and contemporary terms, is generally about aesthetics rather than function. That burning question – “…but is it art?” – usually relies on some deeper layer of meaning being embedded in the piece. Whether the artist consciously or subconsciously has ‘something to say’, it is there within the finished piece.

Stacey Kole

Today, everyone’s a photographer, grabbing their iPhones for a quick snap. Pictures are posted at a moment’s notice on Facebook and Instagram, so there’s never a void of visuals. Perhaps this image saturation is why surreal photo manipulation is particularly intriguing; smartphone cameras and social networking can’t hold a candle to an artist’s vivid imagination.