Sunday Review: Two

Baby Jessica is rescued

A magazine article, and a medical progress

By Morris Dean

Paul Bloom's thesis, in his article "The Baby in the Well," published in the May 20 edition of The New Yorker, is that "Empathy has some unfortunate features [and] we’re often at our best when we’re smart enough not to rely on it." Indeed, the article's subtitle is "The case against empathy."
    Say what? Empathy is a good thing isn't it? Haven't we always supposed so? "The baby in the well" refers to a couple of news events that evoked huge empathy:

In 1949, Kathy Fiscus, a three-year-old girl, fell into a well in San Marino, California, and the entire nation was captivated by concern. Four decades later, America was transfixed by the plight of Jessica McClure—Baby Jessica—the eighteen-month-old who fell into a narrow well in Texas, in October, 1987, triggering a fifty-eight-hour rescue operation. “Everybody in America became godmothers and godfathers of Jessica while this was going on,” President Reagan remarked.

    Bloom asks and answers the question, "Why do people respond to these misfortunes and not to others?"

The key to engaging empathy is what has been called “the identifiable victim effect.” As the economist Thomas Schelling, writing forty-five years ago, mordantly observed, “Let a six-year-old girl with brown hair need thousands of dollars for an operation that will prolong her life until Christmas, and the post office will be swamped with nickels and dimes to save her. But let it be reported that without a sales tax the hospital facilities of Massachusetts will deteriorate and cause a barely perceptible increase in preventable deaths—not many will drop a tear or reach for their checkbooks.”

    I think you can see where Bloom is headed. Empathy doesn't help us much in the public sphere, to respond effectively to things like gun violence, problems with criminal justice, global warming, hunger, misdistribution of goods and services....
    Bloom concludes:

Our hearts will always go out to the baby in the well; it’s a measure of our humanity. But empathy will have to yield to reason if humanity is to have a future.

    I've taken the unusual step of reviewing one of this blog's "recommended op-eds" (listed at the top of the sidebar) simply in order to underscore the recommendation when it comes to this particular item. I urge you to read Bloom's article; it's only four pages long. The whole article is currently available to anyone, not just subscribers to The New Yorker.

Vitrectomy (this isn' my eye)

My recovery from eye surgery two weeks ago, to repair a detached retina, has begun to manifest a troubling symptom. The double vision I have suffered since brain-tumor surgery seventeen years ago may have worsened. Now that apparently about half of the gas has dissolved that was injected into my left eye during surgery, I can see the upper half of "the world" quite clearly. That's good news, even if the portion of the retina I'm using for that is the lower half—the half not directly affected by the detachment.
    The bad news is that "the world" as seen by my left eye now slopes significantly more to the right than it used to. Previously (since 1996), the horizon seen by my left eye sloped off at approximately 5° relative to the horizon seen by my right eye. The slope I'm seeing now appears to be almost twice that.
    Additionally, the point of intersection of the two horizons, which used to be pretty near center, has moved significantly to the right. The upshot of the two effects is that my right and left images seem to be significantly more askew now than they were—and maybe so askew that prisms in my spectacles will no longer be able to remedy much of my double vision.
    You too, of course, have two distinct images. If you didn't you'd have no depth perception. But your two images are well-aligned and your brain can easily fuse them into a single 3-dimensional image. For seventeen years, my own brain has had to labor mightily to do that trick—if I could stand for it to do it at all; the feat has at times exhausted me.
    As a layman—even if the layman more concerned about this case than any other—I can only surmise that the procedure to "flatten out" and reattach my detached retina resulted in the retina's being placed "off-center." I don't even know whether that's possible. It might (I can hope) just be a stage of my recovery that I'll have to go through before healing matures and I see just as well as I did before...We shall see what I shall see....
_______________
Copyright © 2013 by Morris Dean

Please comment

The story of my firing

When steam became a mineral

By Ed Rogers

Okay, about my firing from the Lake County Chamber of Commerce, which got mentioned in the comments on my article Tuesday ["Tuesday Voice: My time in Lake County, California"].
    But first some background. I have always believed growth did not mean you had to destroy everything and start over. I protested and marched against so many things in the sixties, I don’t remember them all, except that our protest never changed anything. However, once you start standing up for what you believe, it's hard to stop.
    I call my time in Cali my Republican years. I became a businessman in Clearlake, California for all the wrong reasons (my first wife), but I did very well. I owned two businesses, was Finance Chairman on the local Water Board, started and was elected president of the Business Association, and was a member of every organization in town. I tell you this so it will be easier to understand why the Chamber job was just the next step in the transformation of a street radical into a capitalist.

Its current website image

    A manager of any Chamber of Commerce works for the board, which is elected by the members. You can never please everyone but you keep your job if you please 51%. This was something I learned early on in the game. I went through four board presidents, each of whom (unbeknownst to the others on the board) intended to undertake the job of getting me fired. They resigned in turn when they could not get the job done. I had 51% of the board on my side, but the other 49% spent long hours trying to come up with ways to get rid of me.

Satellite photo of Clear Lake and Indian Valley Reservoir

The members at the southeast end of Clear Lake—the name of the town was Clearlake—wanted condos to be built on the Pomo burial grounds...jobs, money, and growth. They and the builders were not happy with the hold-up, to say the least. I tried to tell the investors, with their three-million dollars, they could build somewhere else. There were some powerful (money) people in the group and none of them was my friend.
    Then there were the fish. A family lake needs fish that are easy to catch. Small Mouth Bass are very hard to catch. They require a special kind of fisherman, and the people who fish for them feel they are the elite. These people were no longer my friends.
    By now I’m sure you see where this is heading. I had found out that a street radical can never truly become a capitalist. I was in a position, for the first time in my life, where I could bring about change. I was pulled to the left each time, but to my surprise, I still had 51% of the board on my side.
    You see, the other part of the Chamber job was the promotion of Lake County as a tourist destination. I attended boat shows from LA to Seattle. I was on the road for two months and doubled the number of shows for less money than before. The 51% owned resorts and included a banker who financed the resorts. There was a county board, whose elected members oversaw the TOT money (Transit Occupancy Tax). If you stayed in a resort in Lake County, the county got a cut and the Chamber had always been the agency to use the money. Unlike those before me, I kept a record of the money I spent. The Chamber’s dues and the TOT were spent in different ways—one to advertise the county and the other for Chamber projects. The TOT board wanted a say in how all of the Chamber's money was spent. I refused and since a new board would be seated after the elections, I wasn't that worried about them.
    Then there were the farmers. They were big land owners and I’m sure they are the big developers around the lake today. But back then there was little development going on in the hills. The oil companies were the only developers and they were drilling geothermal wells in the hills south of the lake.

View of Clear Lake and Mount Konocti from CA Highway 175

    The farmers tried to get more money from the oil companies than the oil companies wanted to pay. Big Oil did an end-run around the farmers and had Congress declare geothermal a mineral. The government owned the mineral rights. The farmers had lost but they would not go without a fight. Every application was contested in court. The oil companies were losing millions of dollars because of delays and court costs. The Chamber had always stood with the farmers. My feelings: they were a bunch of greedy bastards and deserved what they got.
    Geothermal can be a clean source of energy or an environmental nightmare. The difference is a few million dollars. Once the steam is tapped there is no way to turn it off. Each well has a large cooling tower. The pollutants are removed and clean stream is released. The problem comes when the power plant is shut down. Then the steam is vented straight from the well head.
    I became friends with one of the oil people and began to discuss the problem of the vented stream, which had killed trees all the way to Oregon. She told me that a by-pass pipe could be laid to carry the steam around the power plant but it would add over two million dollars to each well and the companies would not spent the money.
    She was having a hard time getting a permit to drill and had been in court for months. I asked her, If the Chamber endorsed her efforts and spoke in favor of the permit at the next hearing, could she not point out to her boss that with the help of the Chamber they could use the money saved to build the by-pass pipe?
    They committed to the by-pass pipe, and the Chamber gave their endorsement. I spoke at the hearing where the permit was granted. It opened the door for the other companies to do the same. Everybody was happy but the farmers, who blamed me for allowing the oil companies to drill on their land.
    Then came the condos and the Indian burial site. It was what you might call the last nail in the coffin lid.

The groups came together with the TOT board. They sent a list of questions to be answered by the Chamber’s board (me). The night before the TOT meeting, where we were to answer the questions, the president of our board called a meeting. She said it was to discuss our answers, so few people showed up. I was asked to leave the room. Not long after, the banker who was the only friend I had at the meeting came out and said they were taking a vote whether to fire me and he was not going to be a part of it. But all they needed for a quorum was six members: they took the vote and came out and asked me for the keys to the office.
    The next day at the meeting, each question asked was answered with the statement, "Mr. Rogers no longer works for the Chamber of Commerce."
    I still had 51% of the board on my side and they wanted me back. But the fun had gone out of the battle and I was a little glad it was over.
    My marriage was pretty much over also, so I gave my wife the house on the golf course, the sports car, and the business and packed a suitcase and caught a Greyhound to Memphis.
    Sounds like a country song, doesn't it? If anyone might think it a sad song, don’t. I live in Costa Rica with my wonderful new wife and as I look back on things like what I just described, I realize they were but waystations along the trail. I can assure you, I’m happier than the people who fired me.
    Two of them lost their businesses the next year. The president who thought she would get my job didn’t, and she was fired by the owner of the largest resort in the county (a friend of mine). Another was in a bad car wrack. And the last two were old women who didn’t even know what was going on.
    That's the long and the short of my firing.
_______________
Copyright © 2013 by Ed Rogers

Please comment

Fish for Friday

When a male bird can't stand it anymore!

Thor's Day: A shimmering vision

Seeing through water-filled goggles

By Morris Dean

The retinal surgery I underwent last week involved a procedure (a vitrectomy) to remove the vitreous humor from my eye before the retina was reattached with lasers. Afterwards, the eye was filled with a gas to press against the operated area to promote healing. For a week I remained upright, including while sleeping at night, so that the gas (which of course rises) would continue to exert pressure on the healing area.

Ask Wednesday: The husband yet again on the calendar

Fourteen calendars in sestina

By Morris Dean

The last time we interviewed the husband who last month with his wife celebrated their 47th wedding anniversary, he explained why a particular date recurs on the same day of the week according to a pattern, using for example the date April 29, which occurred on Monday this year (see calendar above right). As you may recall from that interview, April 29 falls on Monday again in the years 2019, 2024, 2030, and 2041. Note the number of intervening years, or intervals:

2013 [6 yrs] 2019 [5 yrs] 2024 [6 yrs] 2030 [11 yrs] 2041

Tuesday Voice: My time in Lake County, California

Hand-colored postcard of Clear Lake & Mt. Konocti

By Ed Rogers

I recently googled Lake County and was surprised at how the place has changed. A lot of things I will mention here may be gone now. Lake County had large hotels as far back as the twenties that offered hot baths and cures for every kind of illness. There was a train, a small-rail, which brought thousands of people to the resorts in the hills around Clear Lake.

Second Monday Music

Reflections on musical signification

By Geoffrey Dean

During the first week of April I attended the 12th International Congress on Musical Signification (ICMS). The 2013 edition of this biennial forum of the International Project on Musical Signification took place in Louvain-la-Neuve and Brussels, Belgium.

Sunday Review: Divine Histories, a concert by the Seicento Baroque Ensemble

By Chuck Smythe

My last big concert series of the season was with the Seicento (17th Century) Baroque Ensemble, a semipro chamber chorus dedicated to early music. This is a somewhat intimidating group for an amateur. Evanne Brown, the director and proprietor, is the Kappelmeister of the downtown Methodist Church, as well as a journeyman soprano soloist.

Ann-Ann Andover

There's not enough space between
fish and and and and and chips

By Morris Dean

When Ann-Ann Andover's parents named their daughter, they had no way of knowing she would be dyslexic and have difficulty writing her name, sometimes rendering it, for example, "And-And Anover."
    Her problem was exacerbated when she fell in love with and married the nearsighted Cockney Alan Anand, and she made a point of not telling him she was dyslexic.
    When Alan and Ann-Ann moved into their first home, they found themselves in a friendly community in which each of their neighbors had a sign at the front door identifying who lived there. For example, JOE AND SUE JONES HOME or BILL AND JOAN HILL.
    Alan purchased a nice piece of wood and asked Ann-Ann to make a sign for them. Ann-Ann foresaw a problem, but what could she do?
    Ann-Ann decided to lay the words out first in pencil. She quickly discovered that the piece of wood was too narrow for more than a single line but not long enough for the usual spacing of words, so she decided to squeeze them together.
    It turned out a beautiful, if curious sign:

ALANDANDAND-ANDANDANDHOME

Betty next door, in whom Ann-Ann had confided her dyslexia, explained to the other neighbors that Ann-Ann tended to add a "d" to "an" words. And Betty described the sign's space problem this way:

There's no space between Aland and and, and and and And-And, and And-And and Andand, and Andand and home.

    That clarified everything, especially when she repeated it several times, with pauses where I have inserted commas.
    As for Alan, he was fine. He was so nearsighted, he couldn't see the extra "d's," and he was used to London fish-and-chips shop signs. He was just thrilled that everyone admired his wife's 'andiwork.
_______________
Copyright © 2013 by Morris Dean

Please comment

Fish for Friday

The parrot Einstein at the Knoxville Zoo is really something! And she does all this for pumpkin seeds! [Video from Youtube courtesy Knoxville Zoo.]

Thor's Day: God really does exist...

...in certain imaginations

By Morris Dean

Last week's column provoked a reader named Kyle (a pseudonym) to pronounce of me that I have been hoodwinked by Satan, who "uses Education [capital E], as well as many other things [unfortunately, he didn't name them], to blind us to God's Truth [capital T]."
    And Kyle is praying for me—and not only for me but also for "all" of my friends. He prays that we will all [collectively or individually?] "realize how much God loves [us] and that He sent His son, Jesus, to die in [our] place so that [we] might have eternal life with Him."
    Aren't you just dying to have eternal life with Jesus?

Ask Wednesday: Rachel Zamorski on selling real estate

It's being of service

By Morris Dean

Driving in and out of our residential development, I virtually always see two or three front yards with a “For Sale” or a “Sold” sign that lists the name of Rachel Zamorski as the agent. The other day my wife commented that houses listed with Rachel seem to sell a lot sooner than ones listed with anyone else. My wife is very observant, so I accepted that that was likely true.
    I said, “I’m going to have to see whether Rachel would submit to an interview.” I’m delighted that indeed she would!

Tuesday Voice: A trip to the northwest coast of Costa Rica

The end of the beach

By Ed Rogers

Costa Rica is divided into territories not unlike our counties or states. We live in the Cannon of Alajuela, in the Central Valley. To the west is the Cannon of Puntarenas. Alajuela is mountainous, cool, and green. Puntarenas is on the down slope of our mountain range and runs along the southern coast. The terrain goes from the green forest to hot beaches within a few miles of each other.

First Monday with Characters

Untitled work by Susan C. Price

By Morris Dean

[Though the date above says Monday, it's Tuesday afternoon as I finish and publish this column. For an explanation, see the update on myself, the last "character" reported on below.]

Susan C. Price at the easle

why on earth would i want to update my character this frequently? i'm retired...the only BIG changes...can be icky

Blog offline for a few days

By Morris Dean

I'm having eye surgery today at one,
Forced leave from blogging won't be as much fun.
    We'll be back on hand
    When doc says I can,
With our usual daily posts to run.
_______________
Copyright © 2013 by Morris Dean

Please comment

Sunday Review: Titanic: Blood and Steel (TV)

History with some liberties

By Morris Dean

Last night my wife and I watched the twelfth and final episode of the dramatic TV series Titanic: Blood and Steel, now available via Netflix instant download. It was "one of two large-budget television dramas aired in April 2012, the centenary of [RMS Titanic's disastrous maiden voyage]." [Wikipedia]

First Saturday Green 101: Freak of nature

By motomynd

Forty years ago today, one of the greatest athletes in history began his quest to become legend. Two minutes later he had achieved just that, with a jaw-dropping performance that resonates even today. It previewed two dramatic follow-up victories that may have him ultimately remembered as the greatest of all time, until the end of all time.

Fish for Friday

Editor of Moristotle & Co. (at 8-1/2)
flanked by his beautiful, lively sisters

I found a poor copy of this photo of you and your four sisters, Anna, Flo, me [Patsy], and Mary [L to R]. It's labeled, "Kings River July 28, 1951." I don't have the original that I can find. Maybe Steve has it? [Yes, he did.]

Thor's Day: Everyone's question about God

If God exists, how....?

By Morris Dean

A news article earlier this week recognized the anniversary of an American soldier's arrival at a Nazi concentration camp:

Ask Wednesday: On the first year of my retirement

Happy at the
University of North Carolina 

A year away from all that

By Morris Dean

Today marks the first anniversary of my retirement from UNC General Administration (UNC-GA), where I began working eight months after retiring from IBM at the end of 1996. A number of former colleagues at both places submitted questions for this interview, and other questions came from friends and current associates, none of whom is identified. Thanks to all who provided questions. I've used most of them, combining a few that overlapped. [Questions are in italics.]

Tuesday Voice: Walk of Hadrian’s Wall—Part 3

Last of the wall near Newcastle
[click to enlarge]

On to Newcastle

By James T. Carney

[Sequel to “From disasters onward”]

Anyway, when we got to Newcastle, we dumped our stuff in the hotel and caught the one bus (a day) which would take us to the section of the Wall where we had left off the previous day. Catching this bus was not easy because the woman in the hotel directed us to the wrong stop and the bus station operator doubted our ability to make it to the train station, where the bus we wanted would leave in the 15 minutes we had. Stonewall Jackson’s foot cavalry could not have moved faster and we caught the bus with some time to spare. This day was a rather easy hike and not terribly interesting except that my USS Border Patrol cap, which my son Dan had given me and which I was wearing, attracted the attention of three Americans—two of whom were from Arizona and worked for what was the Immigration and Naturalization Service. I thought it was appropriate to wear a Border Patrol hat because we were walking in the footsteps of the first Anglo-Saxon Border Patrol.

At least it can’t happen in America

By motomynd

Can you even begin to imagine the horror of living in a country where you could be falsely accused of trying to kill the president and other political leaders, surrounded by hooded men carrying machine guns, paraded in front of the public, and imprisoned? No trial, no hearing, no chance at rebuttal: Just snatched at gunpoint, and locked up.

Sunday Review: Gun Guys (a book)

By James Knudsen

Frequent visitors to Moristotle & Co. know that my handle is “The Loneliest Liberal.” I came up with the moniker a while back, not in the hope of gaining sympathy, I just found that my social views didn’t fly with the people I encountered at gun ranges and with being a gun enthusiast in a blue state...well, you get the picture. So when I heard about a new book titled Gun Guys, A Road Trip, by Dan Baum, and that the author was a liberal who grew up in New Jersey, I had a feeling that I had finally found a kindred spirit. I introduced the book in my column yesterday.

Fourth Saturday's Loneliest Liberal: How the NRA has changed

The new gun guys

By James Knudsen

There’s an old saying, “Be careful what you wish for, you might get it.” Put that to the side for a moment.
    I began my career at Moristotle & Co. with a piece about guns following the Sandy Hook shooting. The focus of that article was to make gun owners aware of their culpability in that tragedy. Dan Baum’s new book, Gun Guys (which I review in tomorrow's column), points out that that sort of finger-pointing makes the gun community, of which Mr. Baum and I are members, feel put upon for something that wasn’t really our fault. Well, fear not, fellow gun guys, this month I’m picking on the liberal anti-gun crowd of which Mr. Baum and I are members—at least, of its liberal part.

Fish for Friday

Currumbin RSL ANZAC Day Dawn Service

By Morris Dean

[As always, the items below were selected from my recent correspondence and are presented here anonymously. I do admit to concocting the Limerick of the Week, however.]

Yesterday was Anzac Day. Australia remembers this day every year. ANZAC stands for "Australian and New Zealand Army Corps." Australian and New Zealand troops landed at Gallipoli 98 years ago, where the two countries lost more soldiers in this conflict than at any other battle of World War I.

Thor's Day: Cultivate your negative capability

Richard Foreman in 2009

From "Negative Capability Is a Profound Therapy"

By Richard Foreman

[Published in John Brockman's 2012 book, This Will Make You Smarter: New Scientific Concepts to Improve Your Thinking, p. 225]

Mistakes, errors, false starts—accept them all. The basis of creativity.

Ask Wednesday: The husband again on when a date repeats on the same day of the week

Leaping calendar in sestina

By Morris Dean

We wanted to follow up today with the husband interviewed last week (in "Anniversary in sestina"). That interview mentioned that the couple's wedding anniversary follows a pattern in the day of the week on which it recurs year after year. We realized that the same applies to all other dates: they'll recur in certain future years on the same day of the week. By what pattern will they recur? [Our questions are in italics, but the interviewee starts talking first.]

Walk of Hadrian’s Wall—Part 2

Birdoswald Fort

From disasters onward

By James T. Carney

[Sequel to “Thirteen years later”]

We then went on from Landercost Priory Church to Birdoswald Fort, where we encountered another disaster. We missed the last bus back to Carlisle. We were marooned in the middle of the wilderness by a Roman remains with the shop closed down by that time of day. By our good luck, another two hikers were coming from the opposite direction and landing there at the same time. They had a mobile phone with them and called a taxi, which dropped them off and put us on the major bus line, where we caught a bus back to Carlisle only to face more disasters the next day.

Fourth Monday Susan Speaks

Working out

By Susan C. Price

Let me talk about a topic much less “freighted” than ethics…as part of my ongoing series, “Ok, I’m retired, what can i obsess about today?”
    Specifically, why does my energy/interest totally flag at EXACTLY 1 hour with Zumba class, and exactly 1.5 hours for Treadmill and Free Weights?

Sunday Review: Barbara

A German Huckleberry Finn?

By Jonathan Price

Most of you, if you’re like me, will not have seen or have heard of Barbara (2012, directed by Christian Petzold), a film I saw recently at an art house (or what used to be called an art house, but is now a multiplex with an occasional “art house” film) in Berkeley near the University of California. It’s one of those small, simple, slight, unprepossessing but troubling films that don’t make it into the list of the same 15 films that are spread around every multiplex in your medium-size city and involve vampires or cars or teenagers or space travel or apocalypse or Presidents.

A tour of California's Central Coast (Part 5)

One last view from the balcony

Pismo to LAX: Wishing we could spend another day...or another lifetime

By motomynd

[Sequel to “Atascadero and beyond”]

outside our room, what seems
to be a domestic rabbit

We begrudgingly leave Pismo Beach on a beautiful, sunny, palm-tree-adorned morning, and drive south toward LA. We drove as close to the coast as possible coming north, and have firmly established we will not be buying acreage near the beach unless we win the lottery, so we are exploring a bit further inland on the way back.

Fish for Friday

Senator Harry Reid

The vote in the Senate to block expanded gun sale background checks is a glaring example of dysfunction in democracy. No matter if you are personally for or against increased gun control measures, the polls show 90% of Americans are in favor, so you have to wonder what it says about our political system when elected officials vote against the wishes of such an overwhelming majority.

Thor's Day: Ages of faith perpetuate

From "An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish"

By Bertrand Russell (1872-1970

The Ages of Faith, which are praised by our neo-scholastics, were the time when the clergy had things all their own way. Daily life was full of miracles wrought by saints and wizardry petpetrated by devils and necromancers. Many thousands of witches were burnt at the stake.

Ask Wednesday: A husband on what he and his wife did Monday

Near Southport's Provision Company

Anniversary in sestina

By Morris Dean

What did you and your wife do on Monday?
We drove over to Southport, on the coast,
To spend a night away to celebrate
This year's marking of all our married time
Together. Not to approach platitude,
But the day was our anniversary.

Tuesday Voice: Walk of Hadrian's Wall—Part 1

[click to enlarge]

Thirteen years later

By James T. Carney

I first saw Hadrian's Wall in 1996 when I drove around England with some friends on an eleven-day trip. Driving north from York, we saw the old forts at Chesters and Housesteads before turning south to Penrith. I felt greatly disappointed as we left the Wall without further exploration and vowed to come back. The next summer my older boy, Jim, and I made an abortive effort to walk the length of the Wall but on the third day of the trip, just as we started to get to the most interesting part of the Wall (which really only exists in the middle portion of the 80-Roman-mile length), his feet gave out. He then told me that he had been having foot problems all summer—something which I would have preferred to know earlier. So our trip ended in disarray. Like McArthur, I vowed to return. Thirteen years later, in September 2010, I did. Along with my good friend Rich Gainar—from the old U.S. Steel Pension Fund days—we walked the length of the Wall from Browness on the Solway to Wallsend outside of Newcastle.

Third Monday Random

Mark the day

By motomynd

Next Monday, April 22, is the 43rd Earth Day. Do you remember the first one—how old does that make you feel? More importantly, do you remember the idealism of that first Earth Day, and all the things you resolved to do to help save the planet? So how have you done—does your resume make you an eco warrior, or just another backslider?

Sunday Review: The Sparrow (a novel)

Theological sci-fi

By Morris Dean

Only today do I have in my hands a printed copy of Mary Doria Russell's 1996 novel, The Sparrow—a large-print edition I borrowed from a public library to check the spelling of a few things, like the name of the planet Rakhat, four lightyears away from Earth in the binary star system Alpha Centauri.

A tour of California's Central Coast (Part 4)

For wildlife photos you need
a long telephoto lens...

Atascadero and beyond

By motomynd

[Sequel to “Mountain meander around Santa Margarita”]

...or maybe not

Backtracking from Santa Margarita, we are again on Highway 1/101 and heading north. We like the scenery in this region so we detour into Atascadero for a look around. Could this be the biggest surprise of the trip? Yes, it turns out.

Fish for Friday

Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady

Limerick of the Week:

Margaret Thatcher died this week, obits were varied:
In some of them she's praised, in other's harried;
    In the long run
    We'll all have done
And be like Mrs. Thatcher dead and buried.

Thor's Day: The belief of an unbeliever

From "Why I Am an Unbeliever"

Carl Van Doren (1885-1950)

Let us be honest. There have always been men and women without the gift of faith. They lack it, do not desire it, and would not know what to do with it if they had it. They are apparently no less intelligent than the faithful, and apparently no less virtuous. How great the number of them is it would be difficult to say, but they exist in all communities and are most numerous where there is most enlightenment. As they have no organization and no creed, they can of course have no official spokesman. Nevertheless, any one of them who speaks out can be trusted to speak, in a way, for all of them. Like the mystics, the unbelievers, wherever found, are essentially of one spirit and one language. I cannot, however, pretend to represent more than a single complexion of unbelief.

Ask Wednesday: Maria Napolitano Fish on the Killington Music Festival

View of Killington Peak with the
Festival's performance place
(Ramshead Lodge) in the foreground

It's the outreach

By Morris Dean

Maria Napolitano Fish is the executive director of the Killington Music Festival. My wife and I occasionally have the pleasure of speaking with her when we go up to Vermont of a summer to attend concerts and visit our son, who has been the Festival's dean of students for a number of summers. Knowing how important the Festival is not only to the students who participate but also to the community that comes out to enjoy its concerts or is the beneficiary of student outreach, we decided to see whether we could interview the Festival's executive director. [Our questions are in italics.]

Tuesday Voice

Milke

By Jim Rix

On March 14th 2013, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the murder conviction of Debra Jean Milke. Milke has been on Arizona’s Death Row for 22 years.

Second Monday Music

In pursuit of ecstasy

By Chuck Smythe

“The Tao of which one can speak is not the Tao.” Thus Lao Tzu began the Tao Te Ching—then went on to speak of the Tao at great length.

Sunday Review: The Magdalen Martyrs (a Jack Taylor movie)

Compassionate attraction

By Morris Dean

Iain Glen seemed perfectly cast as the hard, conniving newspaperman Sir Richard Carlisle to whom it looked for a while that Lady Mary of Downton Abbey might be married. His mad ex-commanding officer Madoc Faulkner stole his episode of Ripper Street with his eloquent delivery of beautifully phrased language designed to seduce Inspector Reid's officer Drake into Faulkner's scheme to redress the ill treatment of ex-soldiers.