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The old and new guard of Danish badminton had a dream start to the first round matches in Odense, taking out seeded partnerships and impressing on a day of positives for Danish and European badminton.
Gade, Axelsen and Jorgensen Progress
A trio of Danes have all reached the last 16 safely, with Peter Gade impressively defeated Wang Zhengming in a one-sided match to book a second round clash against Germany’s Marc Zwiebler. Hans-Kristian Vittinghus has very close to making it four from four in the opening round by narrowly lost to the 5th seeded Taufik Hidayat in three games. Viktor Axelsen claimed his third victory over Przemyslaw Wacha in the opening round today to set up a match against Hidayat in the second round.
Lee Chong Wei and Lin Dan both came through their opening round matches without much resistance, whilst China claim four places in the last 16 with victories for Chen Long, Chen Jin and Du Pengyu, with the 8th seed taking on Jan O Jorgensen who won his opening round match in two games to set up the second round match.
Two Europeans Remain
The depth of European players in the women’s singles has been exposed this week, with just two making it through to the last 16 with a predominantly Asian feel to the draw. Tine Baun and Juliane Schenk hold the hope of Europe on their shoulders as both progressed into the second round with a pair of excellent victories. The Chinese juggernaut has six of the last 16, with an all-Chinese match in the second round set to decrease their quota to at least four.
Wang Yihan’s opening round match was as impressive as it was one-sided, her 21-13, 21-5 victory over the world number 10 Bae Youn Joo was a statement that the world number 1 is back to her best. There were wins Jiang Yanjiao, Li Xuerui, Liu Xin, Wang Xin and Wang Shixian to ensure a vast Chinese interest in the event going in the second round.
Seeds Topple In Doubles
If the singles events were business as usual for the world’s best, the doubles disciplines have been the complete opposite. The men’s doubles lost three seeds in the opening round with the biggest casualty being the Commonwealth champions and 5th seeded Koo and Tan, who were defeated by Cho and Kwon of Korea. There were victories for Cai and Fu as well as the second seeded Lee and Jung, who both claimed a berth in the second round with a routine two game victory.
There was Danish success in the women’s doubles, with Pedersen and Rytter Juhl defeating the 4th seeded Japanese pair of Maeda and Suetsuna in two tight games to reach the last 16. Kruse and Roepke ensured a second pair in the last 16 with a victory over Korea’s Eom and Jang. The Danes reward is another Korean pair in Jung and Kim who put out the 7th seeded Matsuo and Naito in the opening round.
There were no such shocks for the top seeded Wang and Yu, who progressed in a straightforward two game victory over Poon and Tse and take on the Singapore pair of Sari and Yao in the last 16. Tian and Zhao were equally impressive in their opening round match and take on the Indonesian pair of Marissa and Melati in their second round match.
Kamilla Rytter Juhl was the star of the day for the locals as she defeated another seed in the mixed doubles with partner Thomas Laybourn as the 2009 world champions rolled back the years as they defeated Prapakamol and Thoungthongkam in two games to reach the second round. Lee and Ha also produced a shock with a three game victory over the second seeded Ahmad and Natsir, who were the biggest casualties of the first day in Odense. The world champions Zhang and Zhao had no problem in reaching the second round with a two game victory over Triyachart and Yao of Singapore, whilst the world championship silver medalists Adcock and Bankier won their all-British first round match to reach the last 16.
The opening round was without one of China’s golden generation as the Olympics near ever closer as he became the first of a likely series of retirements. Bao Chunlai retired from international badminton today, citing continual knee injuries as the main factor in his decision.
The men’s singles is laden with players claiming this is their final year in the sport. Both Lee Chong Wei and Lin Dan have expressed their desire to retire after London 2012, this week they successfully progressed into the second round with Lin Dan needing three games to dispose of Lee Hyun Il of Korea. There were wins for Peter Gade, Chen Jin and Chen Long but the biggest casualty of the day was the 5th seeded Taufik Hidayat who lost to qualifier Chou Tien Chen in three games in easily the shock of the opening days play.
The usual Chinese contingent are still in the women’s singles, without Jiang Yanjiao whose China Masters retirement seems a genuine one to dispel the ideas of China “fixing” matches to get the maximum amount of players to London 2012. Wang Yihan leads the charge this week, with Wang Shixian, Liu Xin and Wang Xin also present in the second round. Only one seed fell in the draw today, Cheng Shao Chieh retired in her match against Sayaka Sato to allow the Japanese player to advance to the second round.
Boe and Mogensen continue their recent run of poor form with another first round defeat to Kawamae and Sato of Japan and will take on the partnership of Lee and Ko. The 5th seeded Jung and Yoo had to retire and allow their Chinese opponents of Liu and Qiu, whilst the top seeds Cai and Fu had little trouble progressing into the second round with a two game victory and will take on qualifiers Liao and Wu.
The women’s doubles has lost the top two seeds, with Wang and Yu pulling out pre-event and the defeat of 2nd seeded Maeda and Suetsuna at the hands of Yixin and Zhong of China. 3rd seeded Fujii and Kakiiwa progressed safely in the second round and the other Chinese pair left in the usual stronghold event is the 4th seeded Tian and Zhao who won in three games to reach the second round.
Seven of the eight seeds remain in the mixed doubles with the top seeded Zhang and Zhao taking on Lee and Ha in one of the matches of the second round. Ahmad and Natsir are safely into round two with a two game victory and take on the Chinese pair of Hong and Pan whilst the world championship silver medalists Adcock and Bankier are into the second round to take on the 3rd seeded Prapakamol and Thoungthongkam in the second round.
With the pending retirement of Lee Chong Wei looming after the 2012 Olympics, the Malaysian world #1 has focused all of his efforts this year claiming one of the few titles to elude him in his career. His performances this year has propelled him to the undoubted favourite for the title, even with Lin Dan in the draw. The Chinese 2nd seed has also allegedly set his retirement after the 2012 Games in London, with both players not even reaching 30. China’s big hope has hand picked the events he has played since his Olympic triumph in Beijing three years ago.
There is the European threat, with Peter Gade who never considered a retirement before the age of 30 but still looking to claim his first world title. He is seeded 3rd this year to break up the Asian dominance in the top seeds this year. The next generation could break through this year with the likes of Chen Long, Kenichi Tago and Du Pengyu all receiving seeds this year.
There are some players to watch also from the 48 unseeded players, Kazushi Yamada reached the last 8 in Paris last year, Shon Wan Ho was a top 16 this year and Spain’s Pablo Abian is one of the most consistent players on the EBU Circuit.
Lee Chong Wei
Seeded – 1
2010 Result – Quarter Finals
1st Round Opponent – Tanongsak Saensomboonsuk (Thailand)
Likely Threats – Park Sung Hwan (Last 16) Chen Long (QF)
His performances in the past 8 months have put him at a level of invincibility that Lin Dan had going into the 2008 Olympics. His opener against the world #32 Saensomboonsuk is s favourable start as Lee Chong Wei could have hoped for. He hold a 5-0 head to head advantage and has failed to drop a game in any of the five matches.
His 3rd round match if the seeds go according to plan is the world #9 Park Sung Hwan, who he holds an 11-1 head to head advantage against with that single victory for the Korean coming in 2004. Chen Long is a likely quarter final opponent, but the Chinese player has only claimed a single win over the Malaysian in five matches and that was in 2009.
This event is ultimately Lee Chong Wei’s to lose. With four Super Series victories in 2011 already to his name as well as winning two of their last three Super Series against Lin Dan.
Seeded – 2
2010 Result – Quarter Finals
1st Round Opponent – Kestutis Navickas (Lithuania)
Likely Threats – Peter Gade (SF)
The 2009 world champion tamely crashed out last year and controversy had surrounded the Chinese player since. Withdrawals before matches with Chinese players has been given as various injuries but losses to Sho Sasaki as well as Lee Chong Wei on numerous occasions have seen Lin Dan’s aura of invincibility disappear.
It will be his first meeting with Navickas on his opening round match, with a massive question mark looming over a potential quarterfinal match with Du Pengyu. Peter Gade should be his likely semi final opponent, who defeated him in the Swiss Open in 2010 but his overall record over the Dane is an impressive 14-3 in the Chinese players favour.
Lin Dan is capable of winning this event, if he turns up without the controversy that his plagued him for the past 12 months.
Seeded – 3
2010 Result – Semi Finals
1st Round Opponent – Rajiv Ouseph (England)
Likely Threats – Simon Santoso (Last 16) Lin Dan (SF)
The 34-year old goes into the event knowing that he is capable of reaching the final of the world championships, a feat he accomplished ten years ago in Seville. His record against the top two seeds is poor, to say the least but his sole victory of Lee Chong Wei resulted in his last Super Series victory (Korean Open, 2009).
His opening match against England’s Rajiv Ouseph is a favourable one, with the Dane holding a 6-0 head to head advantage and the Englishman failing to claim a single game in any of the six defeats. His 3rd round match against Simon Santoso will be his first main test, with the Indonesian claiming a victory this year against Gade in Korea.
Seeded – 6
2010 Result – Winner
1st Round Opponent – Raul Must (Estonia)
Likely Threats – Taufik Hidayat (QF) Lee Chong Wei (SF)
To say that Chen Jin was a surprise winner last year would be an understatement. It was so improbable that few could have believed that a Taufik Hidayat – Chen Jin final was possible. The two could potentially meet once again at the last 8 stage, with Chen Jin leading the head to head 3-1.
Raul Must is Chen Jin’s first opponent this week and their first meeting ever. Chen Jin’s recent form has been average, after inheriting the Singapore Open title with a Lin Dan withdrawal and three defeats to Sho Sasaki this year has seriously dented his credentials of retaining his world title.
Seeded – 4
2010 – Runner-Up
1st Round Opponent – Rodrigo Pacheco Carrillo (Peru)
Likely Threats – Chen Jin (QF) Lee Chong Wei (SF)
Taufik Hidayat took the decision to play the US Open and Canada Open in the build up to the World Championships and suffered a double dose of defeat from Marc Zwiebler, who defeated him in both tournaments.
His opening match against Peruvian Rodrigo Pacheco is one of the easiest matches the Indonesian could have faced and has already defeated the world #61 previously in the world championships, albeit eight years previously.
Hidayat has to prove he is capable of competing with the top 10 players once again and put the double disappointment of the US and Canada Open behind him.
Seeded – 14
2010 Result – 3rd Round
1st Round Opponent – Valeriy Atrashchenkov (Ukraine)
Likely Threats – Chen Long (Last 16) Lee Chong Wei (QF)
No player is coming into the event on a better run of form than the German, two victories in the US Open and Canada Open has put him well inside the top 20 in the world and with a very favourable opening two rounds before his biggest test against Chen Long.
2010 Result – Quarter Finals
1st Round Opponent – Daniel Paiola (Brazil)
Likely Threats – Du Pengyu (Last 32)
He appeared from almost nowhere in 2010 before losing out to Peter Gade in the quarterfinals, his run last year was a warning to all of the top players that the world championships is the premier event of the year and anyone can beat anyone on their day, can Yamada repeat the feat in 2011?
Seeded – 11
2010 Result – Did Not Play
1st Round Opponent – Brice Leverdez (France)
Likely Threats – Du Pengyu (Last 16) Lin Dan (QF)
His impressive 2011 has made him into a player that nobody wants to face, Lin Dan, Chen Jin, Boonsak Ponsana , Park Sung Hwan and Tien Minh Nguyen have all lost to Sasaki in 2011. His second round match could be easier than his opener against Leverdez, who Sasaki was ranked lower than 12 month previously.
Seeded – 15
2010 Result – 2nd Round
1st Round Opponent – Ajay Jayaram (India)
Likely Threats – Chen Jin (Last 16) Taufik Hidayat (QF)
His heroics in the 2010 All England proved he could play with the best in the world, his impressive wins over Zweibler and Santoso in the Sudirman was a reminder just a few months ago that he is a player not to be taken likely. His most recent match against his potential 3rd round opponent was a victory over Chen Jin in his run the 2010 All England final.
Play begins on August 8, with two days of first round matches.
Men’s Singles Draw:
Returning for it’s second annual run in it’s current form the Canada Open is underway now in Richmond, Canada. Also returning is marquee player Taufik Hidayat, ready to once again delight the local spectators.
Business As Usual For Taufik
The first day of the event proved relatively non threatening to the big names. Of the mens singles seeds only Michael Lahnsteiner of Austria fell with a 21-16, 21-19 loss to American Howard Shu. Pablo Abian struggled more than expected with Andrez Lopez but still managed to win 21-13, 19-21, 21-13. Crowd favourite Taufik Hidayat managed a fairly straight forward win over Switzerland’s Anthony Dumartheray 21-16, 21-13.
The womens singles seeds faced even less pressure with all of them progressing without dropping a single set. Top seeded Shao Chieh Cheng looked completely at ease during her first round match against Joycelyn Ko of Canada winning 21-16, 21-6. From here on out it’s quite possible that the top seed may play all Japanese players until the final unless Spanish youngster Carolina Marin has something to say about it. The Spaniard won her first match against Victoria Montero 21-7, 21-15.
Lee Yong Dae Ends Canadians’ Run
Lee Yong Dae may be a crowd favourite and favourite in both his respective events, however he wasn’t too popular yesterday when he easily ended the hopes of two Canadian pairs. Starting with the mixed doubles he paired with Ha Jung Eun to defeat Hao Li and Reshma Bhambhani 21-5, 21-15 in a mere 15 minutes. Next he went on to partner with Ko Sung Hyun to defeat Canada’s number 2 mens doubles pair Toby Ng and Jon Vandervet 21-8, 21-15. While Ko Sung Hyun might not be Lee’s regular partner there is no doubt that the pair are legitimate threats to win here this week. The last match of the day which kept all the volunteers at the Oval late was Juergen Koch and Peter Zauner’s mens doubles match against China’s sixth seeded Liu Xiaolong and Qiu Zihan. The Austrian pair were obviously no match for the Chinese in terms of raw speed, however they played incredibly smart and their anticipation made up for any lack of physical speed they may have had. Reading all of the Chinese pairs shots they pushed them in an incredible 3 game match, but eventually lost 21-15, 18-21, 21-15.
Canada’s Grether and Reid Crushed
The womens doubles provided numerous byes to several pairs and few matches were played as a result, however Canada’s top ranked international pair Charmaine Reid and Nicole Grether fell to Shu Cheng and Bao Yixin 21-11, 21-6 which was surely a disappointment to the local fans. However, national champions Alex Bruce and Michelle Li remain and today have an important match in their Olympic qualification run against Americans Eva Lee and Paula Obanana.
Whilst Japan have interest in all five events, China’s involvement this week had ended at the quarter final stage.
Taufik Crashes Out
The big news for Europe is that there is another player capable of defeating the world’s elite in Marc Zwiebler. After his run to the semi final at the All-England, big things were expected and his two game victory over the top seeded Taufik Hidayat only confirms his credentials at the highest level. Tien Minh Nguyen is Zwiebler’s opponent in the semi final, after the 3rd seed defeated Bao Chunlai in two games to reach the last 4.
Lower Seeds Surprise
Few expected the defeat of both Lu Lan and Li Xuerui at the quarter final stage, but that is exactly what took place as both Japanese players reached the last 4. Lu Lan lost out to Tai Tzu Ying by the narrowest of margins, with the Chinese Taipei player winning the deciding game 22-20 to set up a semi final against Eriko Hirose. The Japanese 5th seeded defeated Porntip Buranaprasertsuk in two tight games to reach the last 4. Sayaka Sato’s upset over Cheng Shao Chieh hung on a knife edge as both players had match points, before the 8th seeded Sato won the match on her 5th match point to progress 27-25 in the decider.
Japanese and Korean Interest In Doubles
With 2 pairs in the men’s and mixed doubles, as well as 1 in the women’s doubles for the Japanese, they narrowly have the most pairings remaining in the doubles disciplines. Korea are also well represented, mostly down to Lee Yong Dae and Ha Jung Eun who are in 3 of the 5 Korean matches in the doubles tomorrow. Lee and Ko take on their third Japanese pairing in the men’s doubles in the semi finals, with the 6th seeded Kawamae and Sato standing in their way to the final. The second Japanese pairing in the men’s doubles is the 2nd seeded Hashimoto and Hirata, who take on the American pair of Bach and Gunawan who received a walkover to the last 4.
Korea have interest in both the women’s doubles semi finals, with Ha and Kim taking on the Japanese 2nd seeds Maeda and Suetsuna whilst the 8th seeded Jung and Kim take on the top seeded Cheng and Chien of Chinese Taipei. Lee and Ha combine in the mixed doubles to take on another Japanese pairing, this time the 6th seeded Ikeda and Shiota. The other semi final sees the unseeded Japanese pair of Sato and Matsuo take on the 5th seeded pairing of Chen and Cheng of Chinese Taipei.
The big Japanese contingent that travelled to the US Open have impressed and have defeated several seeds on route to the quarter final stages whilst some of the biggest names in Japanese badminton struggled on day 3.
Top Seeds Safely Into Last 8
There was little trouble for the top seeds in their 3rd round matches, with top seeded Taufik Hidayat booking his quarter final place against Marc Zwiebler of Germany, seeded 6th this week. The other quarter final in the top half of the draw sees the 3rd seeded Tien Minh Nguyen take on the 5th seeded Bao Chunlai, with all four players progressing without the loss of a game in their 3rd round matches. Boonsak Ponsana’s reward for defeating Takuma Ueda is another Japanese opponent in the 7th seeded Sho Sasaki.
Four Nations Remain
The women’s singles has a symmetry at the quarter final stage, with two competitors from four nations remaining. Two from China, Japan, Thailand and Chinese Taipei with one player from each nation in either half of the draw. Eriko Hirose and Porntip Buranaprasertsuk fight it out at the last 8 stage to see who is the last seed remaining in the top half of the draw, whilst all four seeds remain in the bottom half, with 2nd seeded Cheng Shao Chieh coming through in three games against Ayane Kurihana to set up her quarter final against Sayaka Sato of Japan.
Aussie Delight in Men’s Doubles
The big shock of the day was the defeat of Cheng and Fang in the men’s doubles to Australia pair of Smith and Warfe in just two games to book their place in the last 8. The remaining 7 seeds progressed into the last 8 and the pick of tomorrow’s match sees Lee and Ko take on the Japanese pair of Endo and Hayakawa, whilst the American pairing of Bach and Gunawan take on the German 3rd seeds in Kindervater and Schoettler.
Fujii and Kakiiwa Out
The biggest casualty in the women’s doubles was the loss of the 3rd seeded Fujii and Kakiiwa to China’s pairing of Ying and Yu in two games, but there is still two Japanese pairs through to the last 8 with Suetsuna and Maeda progressing in two games as well as Matsuo and Naito having better luck against their Chinese opponents, defeating them in three games to reach the last 8 to take on the 5th seeded Ha and Kim of Korea.
Matuso and Sato Stun Robertson and Wallwork
Japan’s excellent day in the doubles was completed with Matsuo and Sato’s two game victory over the 4th seeded Robertson and Wallwork. Lee and Ha continued their run in the event with a two game victory and take on the Chinese pairing of Qiu and Yixin who defeated England’s Olver and Ellis to compound a poor day for the English.
Day 3 Results:
This years US GP Gold event has produced a very quality field, with the likes of Bao Chunlai and Tine Baun using the event as preparation for the world championships in just 4 weeks time.
Top Seeds Through In Men’s Singles
Top seeded Taufik Hidayat has been a regular player at this event for a number of years and is safely into the last 16 with a pair of straight forward wins to set up a 3rd round match against Chetan Anand of India, who defeated the 13th seed Brice Leverdez in two games to round the last 16. 3rd seeded Tien Minh Nguyen has a similar story to Hidayat, with two straight forward victories and a 3rd round match against an Indian opponent, only the 3rd seeded takes on the 12th seeded Kashyap who has also been impressive on route to the 3rd round.
Bao Chunlai is the third big man in the top half of the draw, the 5th seed defeated Carl Baxter of England in the 2nd round to set up a last 16 clash with Japan’s Keigo Sonoda who defeated the 10th seeded Kazushi Yamada in his 2nd round match. The bottom half of the draw is dominated by the Japanese, with 3 players of the 8 remain on that half of the draw. Boonsak Ponsana, the highest seed in the bottom half takes on one of the Japanese players, 14th seeded Takumi Ueda. Both players have been in good form this week and have failed to drop a game on route to the 3rd round.
Baun Crashes Out
Top seed Tine Baun was the main name of interest in the women’s singles, but her run lasted all of 40 minutes as she crashed out to Kaori Imabeppu of Japan in just two games to set up the biggest shock of the week to date. Imabeppu’s reward for defeating Baun is a second round match against Lu Lan of China. The 2nd seeded Cheng Shao Chieh had little trouble in reaching the last 16, where she takes on Ayane Kurihara of Japan in another draw that has a big Japanese contingent still in the draw.
Seeds Safely Into Second Round
The opening rounds of the doubles have been fairly easy for the seeded pairs in all three events. Top seeded Fang and Lee were tested in their opening round match against Austria’s Koch and Zauner but the Chinese Taipei pair came through safely in two games. Lee and Ko of Korea join forces for the first time just a month ahead of the world championships, with the 5th seeds taking on Hirobe and Kazuno of Japan in their second round match in their first main test of the new partnership. The 7th seeded Bach and Gunawan faught through a three-game opening round match to progress into the last 16, where they take on the English pair of Clark and Langridge.
Cheng and Chien progressed into the second round of the women’s doubles without much resistance, but have a tougher test against the Singapore pairing of Sari and Yao in the second round. Japan’s involvement is also apparent in this event also, with 2nd seeded Suetsuna and Maeda as well as 3rd seeded Fujii and Kakiiwa both progressing into the last 16, as well as the 4th seeded Matsuo and Naito, who take on the Chinese pairing of Yixin and Cheng in the second round.
Yixin is also in the mixed doubles, and with her partner Qiu YIhan defeated the 2nd seeded Fuchs and Michels in the opening round of the mixed doubles to set up a 2nd round match against Ellis and Olver of England. Lee and Ha are also in the field and they also defeated a seed in the opening round in the 7th seeded Jongjit and Amitapal of Thailand, they take on Shin and Kim in the second round in an all-Korean match.
Almost half of the matches played today had Indonesian interest but less than half had the desired success of the capacity crowd.
Gade Topples Taufik
The big match of the day seen two of the world’s best go head to head for a 17th time, Gade won the previous encounter but Hidayat held the overall lead in the head to heads. Gade was at his imperious best through the match, defeating Taufik in two games for the first time in four years to claim victory 21-17, 21-15. His opponent in the semi final will be Sho Sasaki, who stunned another Chinese player today in Chen Jin. The 71-minute match was widely expected to be a one-sided matchup, with the current world champion cruising into the last 4, but the unseeded Japanese player claimed his third consecutive victory over Chen Jin in three games to book his place in the semi finals. The other semi final sees the top two seeds remaining in the draw, as world #1 Lee Chong Wei takes on the 4th seeded Chen Long. Both players have played well to this point, with neither player dropping a game on route to the last 4 but their last three meetings have been one-sided victories for the top seeded Malaysian.
Cheng’s Unlikely Run Continues
Few expected a repeat performance from Cheng Shao Chieh against Liu Xin, but that is exactly what the Chinese Taipei provided in another stunning two game victory to book her place in the semi finals, winning 21-17, 21-15. Her opponent in the last 4 will be Saina Nehwal, who defeated the 6th seeded Tine Baun in two tight games to reach the semi final. The other semi final is an all-Chinese affair as Wang Yihan takes on Jiang Yanjiao in their 9th meeting, with the 3rd seeded Wang Yihan holding a slight advantage in the head to head, winning 5 of their previous 8 meetings.
Kido And Setiawan Stun Danes
The success story of the day was the 7th seeded Kido and Setiawan’s victory over the top seeded Danish pair of Boe and Mogensen in two games, winning 21-13, 22-20 to reach the semi final stage. Their opponents will be the 3rd seeded Cai and Fu of China, the current world champions defeated the 5th seeded Korean pair of Ko and Yoo to reach the last 4. There was yet more success as Ahmad and Septano defeated the current Commonwealth champions and 4th seeds this week Koo and Tan in two games to set up a semi final against the 8th seeded Chai and Guo of China, a pair that the Indonesian pair have never beaten in two attempts.
Wang and Yu Survive Scare
The all-conquering top seeded Chinese pair of Wang and Yu were under pressure in their quarter final match against the 5th seeded Ha and Kim after losing the opening game to the Korean pair. They fought back with the same qualities that have made them so unbeatable in their time as a partnership and erased the deficit before going on to clinch the match 13-21, 21-10, 21-11. They will face the Danish pair of Pedersen and Rytter Juhl who defeated the Indonesian 6th seeds of Jauhari and Polii in two games to book their place in the last 4. There is some Indonesian presence however in the second semi final as Natsir and Melati take on the 4th seeded Fujii and Kakiiwa in the last 4, with both pairs coming through three game matches to set up their first ever meeting.
Zhang and Zhao The Pair To Beat
The top seeded Zhang and Zhao have been outstanding this week in reaching the last 4 and have not dropped a game to date this week. Their opponents in the semi final are the Chinese Taipei pair of Chen and Cheng, but the current world #12 pair have failed to defeat the Chinese pair in two attempts, but did take them to three games in their previous meeting. The other semi final features the 4th seeded Ahmad and Natsir of Indonesia taking on the 8th seeded Danish pair of Laybourn and Rytter Juhl, with the Danish pair defeating the 2nd seeded Prapakamol and Thoungthongkam in the quarter finals in the tightest of matches, eventually winning 22-20 in the deciding game.
The first major shock of the tournament took place in the men’s singles as Lin Dan was defeated by Sho Sasaki in a tame two game defeat.
Lin Dan Out
Lin Dan’s defeat to Sho Sasaki was the only blip in a good day for the Chinese in the men’s singles. Sho Sasaki’s victory over Lin Dan set up a quarter final match against Chen Jin, which will stop the question about Lin Dan potentially pulling out of a second Chen Jin encounter within a week. Lee Chong Wei is safely into the last 8 where he will take on Tien Minh Nguyen, who narrow beat Wang Zhengming in the tightest of matches, winning 22-20 in the deciding game.
Chen Long and Du Pengyu face off in the quarter finals, to ensure at least one Chinese player in the last 4 but the match of the day for tomorrow will be 3rd on the main court on Friday as local favourite Taufik Hidayat takes on Peter Gade for a place in the last 4. Gade has been impressive in his two victories and Taufik has bounced back well from his three game opening round matchup. It will be their 17th meeting, with Taufik holding a 9-7 advantage on the head to head, but Gade took their last matchup in three tight games at the 2010 All England Championships.
Wang Shixian Out
There was further disappointment for the Chinese camp as top seeded Wang Shixian joined Wang Xin in an early round defeat today, after the world #1 lost out to Cheng Shao Chieh of Chinese Taipei in two games. Her prize for defeating the top seed is a quarter final match against another Chinese player, 7th seeded Liu Xin who defeated her team mate Li Xuerui in three games to book her place in the last 8. The other match in the top half of the draw sees Saina Nehwal take on Tine Baun in a match that both players will feel they can win as well as being their best chance at a Superseries Premier title with the early exits of the top two Chinese seeds. Juliane Schenk’s recent form since the Sudirman Cup has continued in her two game victory of Sayaka Sato to set up a quarter final match against Wang Yihan.
Qualifiers Stun Lee And Jung
Home field advantage was never more evident than in the shock 21-17, 21-17 victory for the Indonesian qualifiers Pratama and Saputra over the 2nd seeded Lee and Jung. Their reward is a quarter final match over Chai and Guo of China, seeded 8 this week. Top seeded Boe and Mogensen have returned to somewhere near the form that took them to the world number 1 spot and take on the 7th seeded Kido an Setiawan in the last 8 after both pairs recording two game victories.
Wang And Yu Storm Into Last 8
The top seeded Chinese pairing of Wang and Yu have been unstoppable through the opening two rounds, dropping just 33 points on route the last 8 and they take on the 5th seeded Ha and Kim in the quarter finals. There was another unlikely victory, with Marissa and Melati defeating the second seeded Cheng and Chien in two tight games to reach the last 8 where they will take on the unseeded Chin and Wong of Malaysia.
Asians Supreme In Mixed
Just the 2009 world champions remain for European interest in the mixed doubles. 8th seeded Laybourn and Rytter Juhl take on the 2nd seeded Thai pairing of Prapakamol and Thoungthongkam in their toughest match of the week so far. There were victories for the top seeded Zhao and Zhang as well as 5th seeded Jiaming and Tian, who face off against one another in an all-Chinese quarter final. There is more Chinese interest in the draw as He and Yu take on the 4th seeded Ahmad and Natsir in the quarter finals.
Lee Chong Wei Returns With Power
After skipping over the recent Singapore Super Series last week we are treated to the return of Lee Chong Wei to the Super Series circuit. A lot of speculation has been going around about whether Lee Chong Wei will be able to repeat his victory over Lin Dan at the All Englands or if it was an isolated incident of Lee not crumbling under pressure. So far the Malaysian shuttler doesn’t seem bothered as he easily brushed aside local hopeful Tommy Sugiarto 21-16, 21-8. Indonesia’s top player and local hero Taufik Hidayat had a scare in his first round against Daren Liew 30-28, 21-23, 21-12. Hidayat will have a greater test in his next match against Bao Chunlai. One of the few surprises of the day was Boonsak Ponsana’s withdrawal for unknown reasons.
China Smoothly Through
China’s womens shuttlers had mixed fortunes on day 1 with top seeded Wang Shixian moving smoothly passed Ai Goto 21-9, 21-17 while her compatriot Wang Xin fell in three games to Tai Tzu Ying 15-21, 21-15, 21-19. Korea’s fifth seeded Bae Youn Joo fell to Juliane Schenk 15-21, 22-20, 21-14 while the remaining seeds went through with only a few serious challenges.
Mogensen and Boe Return After Singapore Withdrawal
After pulling out in Singapore Denmark’s Mathias Boe and Carsten Mogensen are hoping to erase that memory here in Indonesia and are off to a good start. They ousted their Japanese opponents Hirokatsu Hashimoto and Noriyasu Hirata in two games 21-11, 22-20. While not an upset on paper the crowd was no doubt disappointed to see former Indonesian hero Tony Gunawan and his current American partner Howard Bach lose to Germany’s Johannes Schoettler and Ingo Kindervater 22-20, 21-15.
Womens Doubles Maintain Status Quo
The only upset in the womens doubles came in the loss of Japan’s Maeda Miyuki and Suetsuna Satoko. The Japanese pair fell to Korea’s Kim Ha Na and Jung Kyung Eun with little resistance 21-13, 21-12. China’s top seeds Wang and Yu made short work of their first round opponents Dewi and Gozali 21-11, 21-8.
Finally in the mixed doubles we’re seeing similar unsurprising results as all of the seeded pairs are through with limited challenges. Only seconds seeds Prapakamol and Thoungthongkam were stretched to three games against Germany’s Fuchs and Michele. | <urn:uuid:3a601164-71a6-4ad1-8b77-90b3a163954a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.badmintonlife.com/tag/taufik-hidayat/page/4/ | 2013-05-19T02:24:21Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970106 | 8,200 |
Our Destinations pages aim to give a hint of the great diversity of the country and its neighbours. Divided by area, they cover the main cities and sights, museums and galleries and suggest hotels and restaurants. They venture off the beaten track to discover wilderness, curiosities and half-forgotten ruins in the footsteps of Cornucopia’s intrepid correspondents. And readers are invited to offer their own suggestions by writing to email@example.com.
Istanbul is Turkey’s most populous city, and its cultural and financial centre. Located on both shores of the Bosphorus, the narrow strait between the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara, it bridges Asia and Europe physically and culturally.
Istanbul’s European hinterland is full of surprises: Edirne’s Renaissance architecture, Gallipoli’s historic beaches, Kırklareli’s wonderful weekly market, fish restaurants on the Black Sea and the Dardanelles – and exciting new wines.
The region around the Sea of Marmara was the Ottoman heartland, from Thrace across the Dardanelles to Bursa, the former capital, and Iznik, renowned for its ceramics. Today the region around the Sea of Marmara is a wine-producing area.
Turkey’s Aegean coast takes on many guises as you head south from the cool waters of the Dardanelles, across the Troad peninsula to classical Ephesus and Labraunda, with popular Bodrum – ancient Halicarnassus – as your final port of call.
The Mediterranean coast, littered with archaeological sights, is in two halves: to the west the Taurus mountains dramatise the Turquoise coast. To the east the plains stretch towards less visited Tarsus and Antakya.
Turkey’s heartland, with the capital at Ankara, is home to some of the world’s earliest civilisations. From the majestic Lakes District to the stony wastes of fairytale Cappadocia, the scene is dotted with monuments.
The Black Sea retains its mystique, thousands of years after Xenophon’s men retreated towards it shouting, ‘The sea! the sea!’ From Amasra to Trabzon, a wildly hostile coast conceals emerald mountains, rain forests and tea gardens.
Cornucopia knows no frontiers and explores all the countries around the eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea – the Aegean, the Balkans, the Levant and the Caucasus. Top of the list is the new 100-page portrait of Crimea.
Anatolian, Ottoman and Turkic cultures have left their marks across the world – from mighty mosques in Samarkand to small museums in Germany, country houses in Britain and art galleries and shops in the USA. Scattered, too, are relics of antiquity, mosaics of Byzantium, exquisitely woven carpets and bulbs of the brilliant Turkish tulip. | <urn:uuid:916e4df5-257c-4797-a89f-2bedb55ad79b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cornucopia.net/guide/turkeys-eastern-mediterranean-coast/ | 2013-05-19T02:16:40Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.905555 | 632 |
bringing 2 U events & happenings in and around Ipoh … & beyond…
Palong Tin Museum, located just next to the tin mine palong along Kinta River, opposite Kinta Riverfront Hotel & Suites in Ipoh, is owned and managed by Morubina Sdn. Bhd., the proprietors of the hotel. It is a mini museum and the set up is modest.
Even though there aren’t many exhibits yet, as it is a work-in-progress, a visit to Palong Tin Museum is still an educational outing, where visitors could read about tin mining history in Malaysia, tin mining in Kinta Valley, mining methods in Malaysia, including tin dredging, opencast tin mining and underground mining. Also, modern tin mining technologies currently adopted by mining companies around the world.
This February and March, visitors can watch a short film entitled “Time for Tin” nightly, at the basement of this Palong Tin Museum. Showtimes are at 8pm, 9pm and 10pm. Seats are limited.
The main attraction of Palong Tin Museum, however, is the operational palong, though I have no idea what time of the day it is operated.
Admission to Palong Tin Museum is RM2 per person, free-of-charge for children below 4 years of age. There will be a RM2 rebate at the neighbouring Häagen-Dazs and White Coffee outlets, therefore, admission is essentially free.
For more information on Palong Tin Museum, refer to its Facebook page HERE or call the MARCOM department of Kinta Riverfront Hotel & Suites at +605-2458888.
Note: View larger images by clicking on an image once this page has completely loaded. Then navigate by clicking on the right or left side of image. | <urn:uuid:c499a3f8-8c06-4ba1-90f7-ce2ef6f98a93> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.emily2u.com/palong-tin-museum/ | 2013-05-19T02:31:55Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950192 | 382 |
Natural gas is in the midst of a transformative moment. The advent of shale gas, the growth of seaborne liquefied natural gas (LNG), and a new "green" image for the old hydrocarbon brought more uses, attention and yes, even controversy, to global gas markets. But the world's most influential player in all this is neither the world's largest gas producer, Russia, nor the world's second-largest consumer, the United States. It's China. Despite being much more reliant on oil and coal, Beijing has nevertheless managed to become the most agile and active force in the global gas market.
The reason has just as much to do with geopolitics as geology. As China seeks to secure energy sources for its growing economy, it has expanded production at home and made strides at ensuring its access to gas abroad. That quest has displaced a two-decades-long shadowboxing match between the West and Russia -- a "Great Game" China is now poised to win.
China's recent reach into global gas opportunities is fueled by soaring domestic demand, as Chinese industry grows despite the global economic downturn. There are signs that Beijing's energy geopolitics ambitions cannot keep up: The onshore price of natural gas in China was just increased 25 percent. As a result, China is not only stepping up its own natural gas development, but also expanding its capacity to import LNG from places like Australia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, and Qatar.
Domestically, China's East-West pipeline brings gas from the energy-rich autonomous region of Xinjiang to the booming east coast. Xinjiang's proven reserves are about 700 billion cubic meters (about a tenth the size of U.S. reserves), but there might be a lot more. And PetroChina officials are exploring new shale gas and coal-bed methane opportunities all over the country. Eager to wean Beijing off of troublesome gas producers such as Iran, the Barack Obama administration recently signed a technology transfer agreement with the Chinese that would give Beijing the same revolutionary extraction capabilities that have created a shale gas bonanza in North America. One of Beijing's official goals is that China's coal-bed methane production should be 16 times higher in 2020 than it is today. Some analysts predict that China will reach 80 percent self-sufficiency in gas production by that time.
Further afield, Beijing has put into place infrastructure that would make Houston blush. Stretching 1,139 miles, the China-Central Asia pipeline connects Xinjiang with natural gas-rich Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and the biggest prize -- with potentially the world's fourth-largest energy reserves -- Turkmenistan. With the completion of this mammoth project, which was inaugurated in Turkmenistan by Chinese President Hu Jintao last winter, China became the most influential player in the struggle for resources in the energy-rich Caspian basin. Some analysts have even sounded the death knell for Russia's energy influence in Central Asia, Moscow's traditional back yard. | <urn:uuid:e3a0515c-3445-4760-8d68-b1db0c11c3ce> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/07/07/did_china_just_win_the_caspian_gas_war | 2013-05-19T02:23:55Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951109 | 609 |
Swiss company aims to fly satellites into space
By Ben Coxworth
March 15, 2013
If you want to launch a satellite in the usual way – on top of a rocket – it will typically cost you at least US$50,000,000. Newly-inaugurated aerospace firm Swiss Space Systems (S3), however, claims that it will be able to put your small satellite into orbit for about 10.6 million bucks. Why so cheap? S3 is planning on flying satellites into space, using an airliner and an unmanned shuttle.
The launch system would incorporate an Airbus A300, an existing commercial aircraft that’s already certified for zero gravity flights. Mounted on the back of the A300 would be the shuttle, and contained within it would be a satellite weighing no more than 250 kilograms (551 lbs).
The airliner would take off from a designated spaceport, and release the shuttle at an altitude of 10,000 meters (32,808 feet). The shuttle would then start its engines and climb up to 80 kilometers (50 miles), at which point the satellite would be launched from its cargo bay. From there, the satellite’s upper stage engine would take it into orbit, while the shuttle would glide back down to the spaceport for reuse.
According to S3, not only would its system require considerably less fuel than conventional rocket launches, but also – if need be – the launch could be called off at any point, with the shuttle returning to earth still carrying its payload. Additionally, because the A300 could take off from any runway capable of accommodating it, multiple spaceports could be established in a variety of locations around the world. This means that clients wouldn’t need to transport their satellites great distances in order to have them launched.
The first of these spaceports is planned to open in the Swiss city of Payerne by 2015, with the first test launches scheduled to take place by the end of 2017. Additional ports are planned for Malaysia and Morocco, with other locations pending.
Virgin Galactic is said to be working on a similar system, in which satellites would be flown to a launch altitude aboard the company’s WhiteKnightTwo aircraft. Stratolaunch Systems also has something in the works, although it will require the construction of the largest aircraft ever flown.
Just enter your friends and your email address into the form below
For multiple addresses, separate each with a comma | <urn:uuid:ad365a77-149d-4e77-82b6-b76150be322d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gizmag.com/swiss-space-systems-a300-shuttle-satellites/26679/ | 2013-05-19T02:01:20Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95954 | 497 |
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Wolves - Manchester City Preview: Three points essential for Citizens as they take on bottom side at Molineux
Relegation could be decided for the west Midlands club as Terry Connor's men tackle Roberto Mancini's buoyant troops, who are still harbouring hopes of clinching the title
By James Burford
Zubar, Johnson, Bassong, Ward
Kightly, Edwards, Henry, Jarvis
Richards, Kompany, Lescott, Clichy
Silva, De Jong, Barry, Nasri
Wolves goalkeeper Dorus de Vries is set to make his Premier League debut for the club after signing in January, in place of long-term absentee Wayne Hennessey.
The Welsh international underwent surgery on Wednesday for a torn cruciate knee ligament picked up in last Saturday's 0-0 draw at Sunderland.
Loanee defender Sebastien Bassong is available after serving a one-match suspension and Roger Johnson may make a return to the club following on-pitch altercations with Hennessey during the 3-2 home defeat by Bolton Wanderers.
Winger Matt Jarvis is in line for a return to the starting lineup.
Roberto Mancini is still without striker Mario Balotelli, who completes a three-match ban.
However, former exile Carlos Tevez is poised to make another start after bagging four goals in his last two outings.
The Italian manager has reported no further injury concerns.
|DID YOU KNOW?|
- Wolves have an impressive record against Manchester City, leading the overall head-to-head by 46 wins to 44, with 24 draws.
- Wolves won their last home game against Manchester City, with David Edwards scoring the winner in a 2-1 victory.
- Wolves have lost their last eight matches at Molineux, a club record.
- Terry Connor has only taken two points from nine games since his appointment as interim manager.
- Manchester City have the best goal-scoring and defensive records in the Premier League this season.
- City have only accumulated 12 points from their last 11 away games, winning three, drawing three and losing five.
- Together, Tevez and Aguero have scored and assisted eight goals in their last two games.
- Sergio Aguero is the Premier League's third highest scorer with 21 goals.
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Top 3 Predictions
Wolves 0-8 Manchester City FC
- 13.4 %
Wolves 0-3 Manchester City FC
- 10.62 %
Wolves 1-0 Manchester City FC
- 9.61 %
|England - Premier League (EPL)||Apr 22, 2012||Wolves 0 - Manchester City FC 2|
|England - Premier League (EPL)||Oct 29, 2011||Manchester City FC 3 - Wolves 1|
|England - Capital One Cup (CCUP)||Oct 26, 2011||Wolves 2 - Manchester City FC 5|
|England - Premier League (EPL)||Jan 15, 2011||Manchester City FC 4 - Wolves 3|
|England - Premier League (EPL)||Oct 30, 2010||Wolves 2 - Manchester City FC 1|
|May 4, 2013||Brighton 2 - Wolves 0||ENG2|
|Apr 27, 2013||Wolves 1 - Burnley 2||ENG2|
|Apr 20, 2013||Charlton 2 - Wolves 1||ENG2|
|Apr 16, 2013||Wolves 1 - Hull 0||ENG2|
|Apr 13, 2013||Wolves 1 - Huddersfield Town 3||ENG2|
|Returns:||Wolves £810.00||Sign up with William Hill for a free bet up to £25|
|Returns:||Draw £670.00||Sign up with William Hill for a free bet up to £25|
|Returns:||Manchester City £12.50||Sign up to Paddy Power for £250 in free bets|
|31||Dorus De Vries||Goalkeeper|
|34||Nigel De Jong||Midfielder|
The Republic of Ireland international may be looking on in jealousy as his former club Reading sealed promotion to the Premier League on Monday while his current club Wolves look consigned to the Championship, but the unpredictable striker is still tricky to deal with on his day. Terry Connor has employed Doyle as a lone striker in recent weeks and expect much of the same as Wolves will look to pack out the midfield and limit Manchester City's space. Doyle's work ethic will be key.
The diminuitive Argentine has made an explosive return to Premier League football following a self-inflicted exile, contributing an impressive four goals in two games, including a hat-trick last time out against Norwich City. It will take more than displaying a few impressive backheels to win back the hearts of City fans, though, but striking a successful partnership with fellow countryman Sergio Aguero isn't a bad way to begin. Prepare for more delicious link-up play all the way from Argentina, as Tevez looks to help City catch their fierce rivals at the top of the Premier League.
The malignant inevitability surrounding Wolves' relegation nightmare will prove too much for Terry Connor and his men, as they take on a free-scoring Manchester City side hell-bent on finishing the season as top dogs. Wolves' players have looked deflated, demoralised and dejected in recent weeks and it is expected that Manchester City will do nothing to aid their suffering, by pounding another impressive collection of goals past the hosts.
Times In BST
Live Final scheduled Suspended Cancelled Postponed | <urn:uuid:0505fef1-510b-4eea-bd63-2eb3d10718b3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.goal.com/en/match/60505/wolves-vs-manchester-city-fc/preview | 2013-05-19T02:11:55Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.839779 | 1,340 |
[76% Off] 1 Session of Photon Shuttle Slimming Treatment
- 30-min far infrared heat treatment burns up to 900 calories.
- Induces sweating, slimming and detoxification.
- Produces up to 500ml of sweat.
- Equivalent to jogging 20km.
- Strengthens immune system and slows down the aging process.
- Increases metabolism and improves blood circulation.
- FDA and CE certified.
- Waiting lounge with coffee, tea, biscuits and 2 computers.
- Free Wi-Fi available.
In ancient times, slimming was done when an entire village tread over bodies of wannabe stick figures. Today’s Groupon does the same, minus the footprints: for RM36, you get a one session of Photon Shuttle slimming treatment worth RM150 from Dynabeauty at IOI Boulevard in Puchong.
Upon entry, detox dynamos explain the ins and outs of the machine to customers to ensure the process is fully understood and approved in a quick consultation. Far infrared heat rays then make their way down dermis levels, inducing sweat which drains out toxins and other useless minerals. In addition to increasing metabolism, the 30-minute treatment slows aging while improving skin conditions. Immune systems receive boosts to increase disease fighting powers and reducing visits to mercenary medical monsters. Refreshments await patrons in waiting lounges, allowing the experience to be shared with other revellers.
Further deals in this category
Further deals in this city
Further deals in Malaysia
Further deals in other categories | <urn:uuid:edff9044-ed0a-4ec9-83ab-5498d5e2fe18> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.groupon.my/deals/klang-valley-selangor/groupon-my/715890940?jGroupSelector=true&GHIJKL=true | 2013-05-19T02:39:16Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.8535 | 319 |
Information contained on this page is provided by companies via press release distributed through PR Newswire, an independent third-party content provider. PR Newswire, WorldNow and this Station make no warranties or representations in connection therewith.
SOURCE Destination NSW
SYDNEY, March 21, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- The world's creative industries are set to flock to Sydney with the announcement of the annual Vivid Sydney program that will transform the city into a colourful canvas of light, music and ideas from 24 May to 10 June.
Now in its fifth year, Vivid Sydney is an established international event and will showcase its largest program to date, featuring more than 60 vibrant lighting installations around Sydney Harbour, over 100 creative industry workshops and seminars, and live music performances at Sydney Opera House.
Owned and managed by Destination NSW, the NSW Government's tourism and major events agency, Vivid Sydney is the largest light and music festival in the Southern Hemisphere, with over 500,000 people attending in 2012.
Australian creative innovators, The Spinifex Group, will design the centrepiece of Vivid Sydney, the lighting of the iconic Sydney Opera House sails, showcasing a playfully projected journey that celebrates the event in an immersive new way.
Announced today by NSW Deputy Premier Andrew Stoner, Vivid Sydney returns with the longest ever Light Walk featuring interactive light installations, illuminated skyscrapers and large-scale 3D mapped projections around Sydney Harbour's iconic foreshore. Light installations from Germany, France, Italy, United Kingdom, USA, South Korea, Malaysia and New Zealand will feature alongside Australian works.
Vivid LIVE at Sydney Opera House will feature local and international artists, including German electronic music legends Kraftwerk and the the world premiere album show of Australia's Empire of the Sun.
Vivid Ideas will explore new creative ideas and collaborations with over 100 industry and business events. Keynote speakers include renowned comedic visual artist David Shrigley (UK), digital artist and storyteller Jonathan Harris (USA), award-winning streetwear entrepreneur Johnny Cupcakes (USA) and urban design guru David Sim (UK).
Destination NSW CEO, Sandra Chipchase, said year-on-year increase in festival attendance was testament to Vivid Sydney's success and popularity with local and international audiences.
"With more than 45,000 people from interstate and overseas at last year's event, Vivid Sydney has proven itself as a major drawcard for creative industry practitioners, visitors and families who immerse themselves in light, music and ideas," said Ms Chipchase.
The full Vivid Sydney program is available at http://vividsydney.com
For full media kit and high res imagery, visit http://vividsydney.com/media-centre
©2012 PR Newswire. All Rights Reserved. | <urn:uuid:ad5100fc-1da6-4aae-958f-e2d3a9fe10fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.khq.com/story/21755542/vivid-sydney-2013-lights-up-australias-harbour-city | 2013-05-19T02:00:50Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.90176 | 582 |
Seabird Status and Conservation: A Supplement
Originally published as a supplement to ICBP/BirdLife's Status and Conservation of the World's Seabirds, this book can be used independently. Chapter by chapter, regional and national experts provide status and site information on the seabirds of Canada, Baja California, Brazil and Uruguay, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Bering Sea, Sea of Okhotsk and Sea of Japan, and Antarctica.
"This excellent volume treats areas which have received little attention in the past" - Ibis.
View other products from the same publisher | <urn:uuid:32251093-53c0-495d-8d84-b13780610c14> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nhbs.com/seabird_status_and_conservation_tefno_30903.html | 2013-05-19T02:16:54Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.910119 | 122 |
This data was produced by OpenAustralia from a variety of sources.
- Bills: Referendum (Machinery Provisions) Amendment Bill 2013; Third Reading (15 May 2013)
“The question is that this bill be now read a third time.”
- Questions without Notice: Malaysia (15 May 2013)
“Order! Interjections are disorderly. You need to ignore the interjections. Senator Xenophon has asked a question. You should be addressing Senator Xenophon and ignoring the interjections.”
- Questions without Notice: Budget (15 May 2013)
“On the point of order, there is a need to address the question that has been asked by Senator Fifield. I draw the minister’s attention to the question.”
Please note that numbers do not measure quality. Also, Senators may do other things not currently covered by this site. (More about this)
- Has spoken in 220 debates in the last year — well above average amongst Senators.
- People have made 4 comments on this Senator's speeches — well above average amongst Senators.
- 4 people are tracking whenever this Senator speaks — email me whenever John Hogg speaks.
- Has used three-word alliterative phrases (e.g. "she sells seashells") 324 times in debates — above average amongst Senators. (Why is this here?) | <urn:uuid:0d9834e3-a59b-47ae-b55c-09fd6509274e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.openaustralia.org/senator/john_hogg/queensland | 2013-05-19T02:31:26Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93845 | 287 |
The children come from the Father Ray Center for Children with Special Needs, a project managed by the Father Ray Foundation. The Center welcomes children with cerebral palsy, Down’s syndrome, autism and learning difficulties. It is the only center in the Pattaya area that offers an education, therapy and support to these children and their families.
The use of horses in therapy, or equine assisted therapy, was first written about by the Greeks in the 5th century as a way of rehabilitating wounded soldiers. In the early part of the last century the British were using horses and it became popular in the 1950s when treating soldiers injured in World War II.
Danish polio victim Liz Hartnell spent several years receiving this type of therapy, and went on to win a silver medal in the dressage competition at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics.
The children who attend the weekly sessions at Horseshoe Point are unlikely to ever win an Olympic medal, but the therapy they have received has greatly improved their lives.
The Able the Disabled Foundation was founded at Horseshoe Point in 2005. One of its members, Sandra Cooper, a qualified equine assisted therapist and formerly of the Riding for the Disabled Association in Malaysia, is the driving force behind the therapy sessions for children with special needs.
Sandra Cooper with one of her charges.
For a child who spends his or her life sitting in a wheelchair, approaching a large horse for the first time is a daunting experience. Climbing on to one is terrifying. But the support the children receive from Sandra, the volunteers and the local Thai grooms is invaluable in calming down a stressed child.
The benefits for the children attending these sessions are numerous. The children who regularly attend have shown improvements in their balance and posture.
Their confidence grows as they become more used to their new environment, and they have overcome their phobias towards heights and animals.
The organised activities whilst they are on the horse means they are multi-tasking; keeping their balance whilst using their motor skills, listening to commands, following orders and achieving goals gives the children a sense of accomplishment.
Volunteers, Thai and foreign, are needed. You do not have to have experience with children with special needs or horses. You do not need to be a qualified equine assisted therapist, just an enthusiasm to want to help others and to ensure they are safe. Sandra will instruct the volunteers in everything they need to know.
With help from the volunteers the youngsters are using their motor skills more efficiently.
Making sure the riding hat is secure. | <urn:uuid:ec2e91db-6aa2-4252-86a2-d0aaf9f01138> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pattayamail.com/ourchildren/equine-assisted-therapy-volunteers-needed-4484 | 2013-05-19T02:09:24Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966105 | 522 |
Sixty more minutes to midnight and Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim has yet to show hand. No defection from the Barisan Nasional camp is forthcoming. Looks like his plan to unseat Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and topple the Barisan Nasional government has fizzled out. Likewise, his promise of forming the next government with him becoming the Prime Minister of Malaysia on September 16 will not be realized. This failure to fulfill what he has been harping since March 8 will definitely dent his credibility. Whatever he is planning next, I hope it will not create even more uncertainty. I am truly fed up with all these politicking and bickering. It is not doing the nation any good, especially in times of economic turmoil.
Anwar Ibrahim has won the Permatang Pauh parliamentary seat with a whooping 15,671 majority. His entry into the parliament is accomplished. Next stop Putrajaya – the prime ministership of Malaysia. The whole of Malaysia is watching. The world is watching. September 16 is just 21 days away. Can he or can he not?
Last edited 10:32pm
Debat Khas “Hari ini membentuk kerajaan, besok turun harga minyak.”
Anwar Ibrahim was impressive in his debate, preferring not to get personal. The same cannot be said of his opponent. My vote goes to Anwar. | <urn:uuid:338ee2a9-c8fc-4b60-a11d-88aa2257e1e4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.petertan.com/blog/tag/anwar-ibrahim/ | 2013-05-19T02:01:13Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962612 | 295 |
Cape Town Restaurants Cape Town Overview
Cape Town based on 8 Reviews 4.75
- 40 - 60 people
- 80 - 100 people
- Wine Farm
- South African
Milnerton South African restaurant
This restaurant is a fantastic asset to the Lagoon Beach Spa Hotel and boasts a one-of-a-kind breathtaking view over the Atlantic Ocean, of Robben Island and of the world-famous Table Mountain.
The restaurant has a large wooden pool deck offering direct access to the beach. Here you can simply kick back and relax and enjoy a light meal or a sundowner, or both.
If you’re on the lookout for something light and tasty, while enjoying another glorious sunset, this is the place to be. La Mizu offers amazing food and a huge and well chosen selection of wines and beers. Awesome mixed cocktails can be enjoyed as well.
Enjoy a tasty fish and chips, an authentic Cape Malay curry or a deluxe cheese burger made to perfection.
La Mizu offers a laid-back dining experience with world-class views.
Bloubergstrand South African restaurant
Ons Huisie offers patrons quintessential Afrikaans hospitality coupled with West Coast warmth. The old fishing cottage that is Ons Huisie is over 150 years old, and is a South Africa heritage site. It has been transformed into a welcoming, homely restaurant that serves the best in South African, and particularly Cape cuisine. The dishes on the menu are inspired by days of old and by the fresh ingredients that are used to make them.
The cosy, homely kitchen offers the best in traditional South African fare. Located on the West Coast of the Western Cape, the menu at Ons Huisie takes full advantage of it location next to the sea with a plethora of fresh seafood dishes and traditional Cape Malay cuisine. Favourites like Aunt Baby’s pickled fish, oven baked snoek and a West Coast seafood potjie are among the favourites on the menu. There is also a buffet menu available, and patrons are advised to check with the proprietors when this is being served.
An ideal family restaurant, where kids can play on the grass where the old fishing boat rests as a reminder of days of old. There is also a kids menu, so there is no excuse not the make sure Ons Huisie is on the agenda.
Sea Point Continental restaurant
This unpretentious, quality restaurant is situated in the middle of Sea Point giving it a bustling and happening feel. The interior is plain but well thought out and the cuisine mirrors just that. A relaxed atmosphere ensures a pleasant dining experience every time and the menu has something for everyone. From delicious, perfectly grilled steaks to tasty seafood, you will find yourself spoilt for choice. The restaurant is licensed with a well stocked bar, so feel free to enjoy your favourite drink with your meal.
Did you know? Cape Town Restaurants is often misspelt. Here are some variations:
Capetown Restaurants, Kaapstad Restaurants, CPT Restaurants, Kapstadt Restaurants, Cape-Town Restaurants, Cape town centre Restaurants, CapeTown Restaurants, | <urn:uuid:0babc051-e9b7-48b3-8680-b9188d4dc771> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.safarinow.com/destinations/cape-town/restaurants/40-60-people-pax.aspx?fid=706%7C619%7C609%7C614%7C742%7C612 | 2013-05-19T02:17:19Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917457 | 658 |
Military planners from more than 24 nations are in Thailand making a plan to deal with aggressive Arcadian military forces that took over a portion of neighboring Khuistan and Free Mojave on the subcontinent of Pacifica.
The countries, timeline and scenario of the Arcadia situation are make-believe, but this staff exercise, part of Cobra Gold 2011, is as real as the 200-plus people working on just this portion of the overall event.
Participants in the STAFFEX are planning the operational exercise for Cobra Gold 2012. The plan they develop over the next two weeks will be the plan used in February 2012 when a new group of people congregate in Thailand to respond to the Arcadia situation.
The countries involved now are pretending it is November 2011, and they are writing a plan to implement on a subcontinent in the Pacific Ocean. The fictional continent is an exact geographical match of a cutout area of North America.
"We're not going there to fight a war with Arcadia," said Thai army Col. Suriya Eamsuro, the STAFFEX lead planner. "The plan shouldn't be to take people and weapons out, but to deploy forces and use information operations to help Arcadia to think what they did wasn't right, and we shouldn't have to fight at all."
The 25-year Thai army veteran said he is honored that Thailand is the lead nation for Cobra Gold, but he worries some of the benefits of the training will be lost in translation.
"It takes time to understand what is written and said in English," Colonel Eamsuro said. "I worry it will affect the STAFFEX mission. Misunderstandings can be minor to major; just like what happens in a real operation."
U.S. Marine Corps Maj. Vince Koopman, the coalition lead planner for Cobra Gold, said building partnerships is more important than the final product produced at the STAFFEX.
"The fact that we come from varying services, backgrounds and unique experiences should not be viewed as an impediment to our success, but melded to leverage the collective expertise of our cohesive multinational force team," Major Koopman said. "The most important aspect of CG 2011 isn't the products we produce, but the relationships we build between our multinational partners."
Lt. Col. Adrian Kinimaka, of STAFFEX Air Force Forces, said this is his first Cobra Gold, and he is still learning from other members of his section who have been to this exercise in years past.
"At this level, what I've seen is willingness to learn from each other," he said. "The United States has a lot to offer. Our partners are receptive and are taking initiative to work with us in certain key areas."
The outcome of the Arcadia situation won't be known for about year because the scenario won't be implemented until February 2012.
The nations gathered will develop a plan that will eventually bring peace and stability to entire Pacifica region, Colonel Eamsuro said. Friendships built now will also pay big dividends if the nations involved ever have to respond to a real crisis.
CG 2011 is the 30th time multinational forces have gathered in Thailand for this exercise. The annual Thai and United States co-sponsored joint and multinational event includes Thailand, the United States, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia and Singapore as participating nations. In addition, representatives from 18 multinational planning augmentation team nations and observer nations include Cambodia, China, Italy, Russia and South Africa.
Article by 1st Lt. Jason Smith, 15th Wing Public Affairs | <urn:uuid:d0a7afa2-ea6e-4286-a3f9-a7ee2e847744> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sofmag.com/print/multinational-officials-plan-cobra-gold-2012 | 2013-05-19T02:03:23Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964949 | 735 |
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia
Defending champion Hsieh Su-wei won two matches Thursday to reach the Malaysian Open quarterfinals.
Hsieh beat Kurumi Nara of Japan 6-7, 6-3, 6-4 in a match lasting 2 hours, 42 minutes. She had only a few hours of rest before defeating China's Zhang Shuai 6-2, 6-2. The Taiwanese player completed her first- and second-round matches on the same day after thunderstorms disrupted play earlier this week.
Patricia Mayr-Achleitner of Austria won 6-3, 6-2 against Wang Qiang of China, who ousted top-seeded Caroline Wozniacki in the first round.
Others moving into Friday's quarterfinals are fourth-seeded Ayumi Morita of Japan, wild card Bethanie Mattek-Sands of the U.S., Karolina Pliskova of the Czech Republic, Luksika Kumkhum of Thailand, Ashleigh Barty of Australia and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of Russia.
The Associated Press | <urn:uuid:c906e59b-1dab-4f33-9cac-8f0a41f9d923> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/feb/28/taiwans-hsieh-wins-twice-in-same-day-in-malaysia/ | 2013-05-19T02:16:38Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.883249 | 232 |
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Angkor and Beyond: the Asian tourism phenomenon
Angkor and Beyond: the Asian tourism phenomenon
Once a synonym for war and revolutionary terror, we wonder at the rebirth of Cambodia as tourist destination of choice. We wonder at the market forces that privilege an approach to travel keyed to providing the costly facilities and infrastructure required to enable large numbers of rich international tourists to descend upon places that were utterly inaccessible only a decade ago. We wonder, too, at the ability of the market to adjust to risk calculation as dramatized by the Asian tsunami of 2004 and the Bali bombings of 2002 and 2005.
Why Cambodia, why now?
Obviously, as Shibata Naoji suggests, push and pull factors are involved. Characteristically, from Bali in Indonesia to Phuket in Thailand to Laos, Western backpackers led the Southeast Asian tourist charge that began in the 1960s. Spending little but staying long, even the most chauvinistic destinations were able to accommodate this cohort into tourist planning. They were not, of course, the only tourists. Famously, as well, during the Vietnam war Bangkok emerged as the American military's "Rest and Recreation" destination of choice. Still, Thailand was then only attracting some 200,000 tourists a year with the figure for Cambodia at some 60,000 before 1970 when war closed in. But, as tourism massified with cheap air travel in the 1980s, countries such as Thailand and Indonesia began to cash in, upgrading infrastructure, offering visas upon arrival and other incentives. Mass tourism had arrived drawing in visitors in the millions. Westerners were soon joined by Japanese and other Asian travelers, including those from the rising middle classes of the Asian Newly Industrialized Economies. Today they are being joined by perhaps the largest wave of tourist-travelers to descend upon the region, those from China.
The concept of resort and package tour came to be replicated across the market economies of Southeast Asia, trading upon exoticism, tropical climate, and often the (false) promise of security offered under the mix of military/authoritarian regimes that ran these countries. The writer recalls being handed an emergency tourist police phone number at Manila airport during the Marcos dictatorship in the early 1970s. On the demand side, tourists were serviced by the production of increasingly informative and sometimes sophisticated guidebooks. Tourist dollars began to figure high in the economies of the region. Multiplier effects rippled through the service industry, rewarding investors but also often reaching into local communities such as Bali. International tourism became a matter of high-stakes state policy. Across Asia even language change was engineered to communicate with outsiders.
Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam were not part of this boom. The author of these lines was plausibly in August 1974 the last visitor to Siem Reap, site of the fabled Angkor temple complex before -- actually as -- the communist Khmer Rouge took over. Laos and its communist ally Vietnam long held the tourist invasion at bay by simply not issuing visas (The author was evicted in December 1975 though re-invited in 1980). In Laos that policy lingered into the mid 1990s. While pro-market Vietnam has gone even further than Cambodia in wooing foreign investment and rides an economic boom, tourism in Laos, albeit rising, pretty much languishes along with its economy.
But in Cambodia, it would take almost two decades -- three and a half years of death and trauma under Khmer Rouge rule (1975-1979) followed by several years of Vietnamese occupation and armed resistance and, commencing in 1992 a major UN peacekeeping operation, before even the basic security conditions were met for tourism recovery. Notoriously, the UN mission and accompanying aid workers -- the first returning tourists as it were -- also bequeathed unintended infrastructure in the form of "karaoke bars" and hotels or, veritably launching the organized prostitution that has in recent years given Cambodia the dubious reputation of premier sex tourist, even child prostitution, destination. A culture of corruption was also born out of international aid largesse, whether from loose accounting, naivety or other reasons. Still, the "peace" gave pause for pioneering restoration work on parts of the Angkor complex by Indian and Japanese experts leading to its inscription as a World Heritage monument in 1992. All that was missing were the expected tourists.
Just as post-conflict Cambodia ditched state socialism in favor of market capitalism, so the first foreign investments began to trickle in, including in the hotel and tourism industry. The expansion of tourism in the new-born Kingdom of Cambodia has matched the nation's political vicissitudes. By 1993 "tourism" had arrived, at least in Phnom Penh, the capital, still not without its dangers as more than one foreign entrepreneur met with "accident" or even execution, in one case by renegade Khmer Rouge. Memories are undoubtedly short but when, in July 1997, Cambodian strongman Prime Minister Hun Sen launched a preemptive coup against co-Prime Minister Prince Ranariddh and extra-judicial killings continued for over a week, certain categories of foreigners -- Japanese civilians included -- scrambled aboard Australian evacuation flights mounted from Malaysia. Thai visitors will, however, remember the rampage against Thai property in the Cambodian capital in January 2003 following the alleged national slight by a Thai movie actress who claimed that Angkor was stolen from Thailand. This time round Thai nationals were evacuated by Thai military aircraft.
The point is that tourists are notoriously risk averse. Following the terror attack in Bali of October 2002, hotel occupancy slumped from 70 percent to 5 percent and, following significant recovery, took another hit with the second terror bombing of October 2005. The impact upon the service industry was vast, leaving many of the local victims to lament the relative decline of agriculture and fishing which had sustained their livelihood and distinct culture since time immemorial. Notoriously, in the Bali case, outsiders, including the Suharto family and military interests, came to dominate prime land and hotels at the expense of locals. The World Bank, which pushed Indonesia to develop this industry in the early 1980s, would have no answer. The SARS outbreak in 2003 further depressed Asian tourism, just as the great Asian tsunami devastated the resorts and livelihoods around the Bay of Bengal. The benefits of tourism can also be counter cyclical such as demonstrated during the Asian economic crisis of 1997-98 when Western and Japanese tourist arrivals in such hard-hit countries as Thailand and Indonesia actually peaked in part taking advantage of cheaper currencies.
Having emphasized the increasingly Asian character of mass tourism, it is noteworthy that, in the case of Cambodia, it was only in 2002 that Japanese arrivals (at least as recorded in Phnom Penh International Airport), overtook those of the US, ASEAN, France and China. Out of a total of 1,421,615 international visitor arrivals to Cambodia in 2005, Japan registered 137,849, ahead of the US, France, UK and China (PRC) (59,153). Surprisingly, South Korea topped the list at 216,594 arrivals. To offer some perspective, the number of Japanese tourists visiting Indonesia peaked in 2000 at 643,794, eclipsing Australia (459,994), South Korea (213,762) and far ahead of the US (176,379). In that year foreign visitor arrivals in Indonesia exceeded five million. Thailand, which drew in over 11 million tourists a year before the tsunami, now actively targets Chinese tourists (one million in 2005), second only to Japan, long the dominant market.
The down side
The down side of international tourism, from environmental pollution to cultural loss to people trafficking to the spread of HIV/AIDS is now well established, the subject of international fora, public hand wringing and NGO activism. As the Shibata article points out, Cambodia and the Siem Reap area is no exception. Still the facts are stark in the case of Angkor tourism. Rescued by UN intervention from temple robbers -- or "tomb raiders" in the Hollywood version -- the fabled monument complex now risks being overwhelmed by human predators and their detritus along with degradation from auto emissions unless serious planning and policing kicks in. The same goes for environmental planning amidst a hotel construction boom. But policing and planning in Cambodia?
Consider the facts. Given that US$5 billion has been dispensed to Cambodia by international creditors over the past decade, the record is spotty. After the 1997 coup, some donors like the US suspended aid. Others like Japan continued existing aid programs but refused to initiate new ones. With aid resumed by 1998, donors meeting in Tokyo focused upon fiscal reform; public administration, demobilization; and forestry and environmental reform. Political reform was absent. It was only in 2004 that the World Bank called on bilateral and multilateral donors to link aid to Cambodia with economic and political reform. According to Ronald Bruce St John, growing donor attention to corruption merely addresses the symptoms of the problem rather than the causes. In this argument, the buck stops with the executive power and the political elite which has it in their hands to manipulate national resources.
Some analysis of who gets what, why and how in Siem Reap would also be illuminating in light of new top-end luxury hotel expansion and in light of the experience of Indonesia (Bali) where lack of transparency and accountability led to wide-ranging abuses across the development and class spectrum. As Matt Gross wrote of tourism development in Cambodia in the travel pages of the New York Times, "villagers are routinely evicted at gunpoint from their land by the wealthy and well connected..." Enjoy your stay, the natives are really nice, but don't ask too many hard questions.
For examples of recent convictions for these crimes see here.
See the author's "Prospects for Reform in Indochina" in Pacific Review, vol.1, no.4 1988, pp.374-384
See the website of the Cambodian Ministry of Tourism.
Number of foreign visitor arrivals to Indonesia by country of residence (2000-2004), Badan Pusat Statistik/Statistics Indonesia.
Ronald Bruce St. John, "Democracy in Cambodia -- One Decade, US$5 Billion Later: What Went Wrong?" Contemporary Southeast Asia 27, no.3 (2005), pp.406-28.
Matt Gross "Why is Everybody Going to Cambodia?" New York Times, 22 January 2006.
Geoffrey Gunn is Professor of International Relations, Nagasaki University and a specialist on Southeast Asia. He wrote this article for Japan Focus. | <urn:uuid:8de8cc7e-5223-491d-a18a-03b39cac5f29> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.zcommunications.org/angkor-and-beyond-the-asian-tourism-phenomenon-by-geoffrey-c-gunn | 2013-05-19T02:16:25Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957811 | 2,164 |
Jammu and Kashmir
Sunday, May 19, 2013
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Trip Start Feb 03, 2009
9Trip End Aug 05, 2009
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Where I stayed
in the van
well here it is people, the June edition of the Mike & Donna ROUND THE WORLD TOUR!!!
since we last posted, a LOT has happened, we have been here there and everywhere,
so without further delay let's see what happened to our heroes next:
after the Formula 1 day out in Sepang, Malaysia we bummed around in Kuala Lumpur then went down to Melaka to explore colonial architecture and old ruins.
then we headed over to Pulau Tioman for a taste of paradise in the South China Sea, but there were big monitor lizards, and not much beach, so we remedied this with a trip up to Pulau Perenthian Kecil, where we spent the best part of a week swimming with giant sea turtles, reef sharks (it tickles when they nibble your leg - kidding, just kidding mum) and hung out with some friends we met on Tioman
after this island we wanted to lay low and not spend too much money so we headed to Pulau Kapas, an island that hardly anyone goes to. it turned out to be a hidden gem , think long deserted beaches, no-one else around, chilling with books and snorkelling out on your own with puffer-fish, reef sharks and plenty of stuff! we stayed with a Malaysian 'family' which consisted of the 'Captain' a top bloke and his pirate henchman and they were all top blokes who made amazing food and we ate together each night. made some friends there and had to drag ourselves away, but not before having a day with the captain on the mainland where he took us to the most amazing little indian place where you eat everything off a massive banana leaf. eat as much as you can. ummmmmm.......
anyways, we bussed it all the way down the east coast of the Malaysian peninsula to Johor Bharu, and then on to Singapore!!!
when you arrive in Singapore transit bus terminal coming from Malaysia you will see posters everywhere about 'suspicious characters' in subways etc and which number to dial in the event that you see them
i would like to point out a fundmental flaw in the marketing of this message.
the picture of the 'suspicious' character is that of a fox.
a fox. in a bowler hat.
either Basil Brush has been very, VERY naughty in Singapore and has made the most wanted list... OR the guy that put the advert together was on crack.
you decide people, it's a tough one.
if you like eating, shopping, cinemas, and all things asian then Singapore is world class and often taken for granted nowadays by people travelling, as they don't appreciate how clean and diverse the city is.
you can get the best of indian, chinese, malay cuisine here, the best satay in the world can be grabbed off the hot coals in the street, it's makes your mouth water just writing about it. (there is drool over my keyboard)
the zoo in Singapore was cool, very big. Mike ate jellyfish amongst other things.
we went to Raffles and tried the Singapore Sling (the yummiest cocktail ever) - the world famous cocktail that was born here obviously, but in the hotel of British colonial entrepreneur Sir Stemford Raffles. it was a very classy treat for two sweaty backpackers we can tell you!
as we left the city, the rain soaked us to the bone, and we got some duty free chocs and got onboard our plane for .... AUSTRALIA!!!!
touched down in Brisbane, and then we caught our connecting flight the next day to legendary Sydney.
yes it was cool, we tried pie from the famous pie stall along the port-side, as well as hit Sydney Fish Market to eat Octopus and fresh calamari
we went to Manly and had a lovely meal as the sun went down, fresh fish accompanied by a bottle of chilled white wine (just realised how amazing that sounds and crying a river on the inside as i realise i have beans out the can for dinner tonight)
we went to the opera house of course! donna sang and melted the hearts (and ears) of all passing asian tourists and we made a few bob in the process.
went to bondi, it was kinda like bognor at night, so just go down there and squint after reading this and you'll get the idea guys.
manly was way lovelier. and then we picked up our van!!!
we got ourselves some groceries and then headed out in our little campervan to the Blue Mountains which were awesome.
lots of aboriginal history surrounding the rock formations; as a people they are inherently connected to the land and we were fascinated by the stories about how the landscapes were shaped by mighty animals, serpents, etc
from here we drove in the rough direction of Newcastle, hometown of Aussie-rockers 'Silverchair.'
we caught some pics of guys surfing Nobby's Point (oo-err) and chilled here for the day, nice beach.
from here we kinda trailed up the east coast of Australia, passing through Port McQuarie, Coffs Harbour and countless other places where there are so many nice beaches it's beyond a joke! the pics of us on what look like Mars or the Sahara are an amazing shifting set of sand dunes at Stockton Bight - no other tourists as you can only get there by van. IT WAS WKD. we watched the sun go down at which point we froze!
we took a couple of days out to explore the Hunter Valley Wine Region - not bad at all, you drive around and get rushed with free booze all day, as well as cheese and choc. hard bloody work i can tell you. for future ref if you go here get a taxi to wheel you around. you'd LOVE it.
after the heavens opened for like 3 days non stop we finally came out the rain to head to Brisbane!
we got our haircuts done and we looked human again which was nice, then we went to the park with Lin and her aussie fella Chris to play with possums. they are really friendly creatures.
i know i have forgotten to write about a whole tonne of other stuff as i write, but we'll catch up soon enough to tell more!!
anyways, on to the Glass House Mountains and then the one and only Australia Zoo!!!!!!
Australia Zoo is amazing. it's doen't cram every animal under the sun in there so you start yawning after an hour, it's really fun and interactive plus most of the animals are from Australia. they have got in asian elephants now and some tigers and it's great. they do some cool shows here and when you go see the kangaroos you can sit and chill with them before the hop off and leave you
we got to hold koalas too!! they areally docile and soft and cuddly and so so adorable you wanna steal them but you shouldn't (have)
and we fed elephants!
the next stretch after the zoo was about surfing!!
we had lessons down in Noosa and picked it up pretty quickly (the board not the skills - donz sucked, bless)
we then went up to Rainbow Beach and then Agnes Water for more surfing. truly addictive, so Cornwall is on the cards when we get home some time! (for Mike only - Donz really did suck)
after that we headed up north passing Hervey Bay and Fraser Island as the weather were sketch and the purse strings were tight.
we drove for thousands of kilometres it seemed, through Bundy, Rockhampton, Mackay and up to Airlie Beach, stopping at whatever national park was around - which reminds me - we went inland to Eungella National Park and trekked through tropical rainforest for the day (as the sun went down), stopping to watch Platypuses swimming in the river
i could feel my feet were not itching, but felt like it had syringes pricking all over them. i took off my shoes. and like the fully grown warrior man that i am - i wanted to cry.
our feet were covered in bloodsucking leeches that (ohmygodtheyarealloverme) we had to burn off with Mike's last cigarettes (god bless Singapore Changi Airport duty-free bulk buys). not only did we have run around freaking with our feet bleeding, we had to do it naked as the bastards had infiltrated our clothes! so alas, sitting naked and bloody in the front seat, accidentally burning our feet with cigarettes as the leaches resisted, we ended that day on a bit of a downer! but hey it's all experience and it's kind of a rite of passage moment - you haven't really done the tropical rainforest unless you have been half eaten by it in the process. that's what we tell ourselves anyway!
ANYWAY..... we are now residing up in Cairns, heading up to Port Douglas and Cape Tribulation to do a dive trip to the Great Barrier Reef! As we are now qualified divers how can we pass up on this! Lots of tins of beans and noodles for us for the next week!
.... hope you enjoyed our latest blog, lots of love everyone xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
oh and photos only go up to Brisbane as we are waiting to get the rest backed up onto CD, so more next time! | <urn:uuid:6f80b5da-b20d-4859-a4e0-5cc506bb781a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mikeanddonz/1/1243906200/tpod.html | 2013-05-22T00:29:14Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969893 | 1,992 |
|HomeAvian Influenza and EINetVirtual SymposiumHuman Avian Influenza CasesAbout APEC-EINetNewsbriefs> Browse• SearchAPEC EconomiesPeople DirectoryTeaching & LearningResearch ResourcesContact Us
Vol. VIII, No. 16 ~ EINet News Briefs ~ Jul 29, 2005
*****A free service of the APEC Emerging Infections Network*****
APEC EINet News Briefs offers the latest news, journal articles, and
notifications for emerging infections affecting the APEC member economies. It
was created to foster transparency, communication, and collaboration in emerging infectious diseases among health professionals, international business and commerce leaders, and policy makers in the Asia-Pacific region.
In this edition:
- South East Asia: Cumulative Number of Human Cases of Avian Influenza A/(H5N1)
- Viet Nam: Mekong province reports bird flu recurrence
- Indonesia: Signs of avian influenza near the home of victims
- Japan (Ibaraki): New bird flu outbreak on chicken farm
- Russia: More cases of bird flu in Siberia
- China (Sichuan): Pig disease (Streptococcus suis) kills 31
- Hong Kong: Swine virus fears mount
- China (Guandong): Death of 2 boys sparks rabies vaccine investigation
- Russia: 2 fatal rabies cases in Chechnya and 1 fatal case in Vladimir region
- Russia (Khabarovsk): Viral meningitis outbreak
- Russia (Udmurtiya): Lyme borreliosis, tick-borne encephalitis
- Russia (Ryazan): 6 Tularemia cases
- Indonesia: Chikungunya outbreaks hit Tangerang
- Indonesia: WHO Poliomyelitis update
- Malaysia (Penang): 6 malaria cases
- USA: USDA probes possible third case of mad cow disease
- USA (New York): More cases of legionnaires' disease announced
- USA (New York): Patient dies from listeriosis
- USA (Colorado): Two cases of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome
- USA (Montana): First hantavirus case in 2005
- USA (Multistate): Orchid Island Juice Co recalls unpasteurized orange juice
- USA (Utah): Viral meningitis shows up at double the normal rate in Utah
- USA (New Mexico): Human plague case confirmed in Santa Fe County
- USA (New York): Mystery AIDS Strain 'Patient Zero' Found
- Cholera, diarrhea & dysentery
- Viral Gastroenteritis
- West Nile Virus
- CDC EID Journal, Volume 11, Number 8-Aug 2005
- Primate-to-human retroviral transmission in Asia
- Virulence may determine the necessary duration and dosage of oseltamivir treatment for highly pathogenic a/vietnam/1203/04 influenza virus in mice.
- Characterization of a human H5N1 influenza A virus isolated in 2003
- Virulence differences between monkeypox virus isolates from West Africa and the Congo basin
- National, state, and urban area vaccination coverage among children aged 19-35 Months--US, 2004
- Immunization Information System Progress--United States, 2003
- APEC HTF Symposium on avian influenza and preparedness for a human health emergency
- APEC Workshop on HIV/AIDS Management in the Workplace
- Clostridium sordellii toxic shock syndrome after medical abortion with Mifepristone and Intravaginal Misoprostol--US and Canada, 2001-2005
- Revised recommendations for HIV Screening of adults, adolescents, and pregnant women in health-care settings
4. APEC EINet activities
- EINet distance-learning course to be launched 5 Aug 2005
5. To Receive EINet Newsbriefs
- APEC EINet email list
South East Asia: Cumulative Number of Human Cases of Avian Influenza A/(H5N1)
Cumulative number of confirmed human cases of avian influenza A/(H5N1), 16 Dec 2004 to present:
Economy / Unofficial (Official) Cases / Unofficial (Official) Deaths
Indonesia / 4 (1) / 3 (1)
Cambodia / 4 (4) / 4 (4)
Thailand / 0 (0) / 0 (0)
Viet Nam / 64 (60) / 20 (18)
Total / 72 (64) / 27 (22)
Cumulative number of confirmed human cases of avian influenza A/(H5N1), 3 Dec 2003 to present:
116 (109) / 59 (55)
(CIDRAP 7/27/05 http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/cidrap/content/influenza/avianflu/case-count/avflucount.html)
Viet Nam: Mekong province reports bird flu recurrence
Animal health authorities in the Mekong Delta province of Ben Tre recently killed more than 400 fowls infected with the H5N1 bird flu virus at a local farm. Animal health officials have disinfected neighboring farms and areas where the virus was detected. The province has reported 2 recurrences of bird flu so far, culling more than 16 700 fowls. Viet Nam's last HPAI follow-up report to the OIE was sent 27 Jun 2005, relating to 1 outbreak in Ben Tre province that started 10 Jun 2005. Reportedly, the causative agent was identified as highly pathogenic avian influenza virus type H5. Viet Nam was planning to start mass vaccinations against HPAI Aug 2005. Reportedly, vaccinations will begin 1 Aug 2005 at commercial poultry operations and smaller household farms in Nam Dinh province and Tien Giang province.
Indonesia: Signs of avian influenza near the home of victims
Authorities have found signs of avian influenza in chicken droppings near the home of 3 Indonesians who died from avian influenza A (H5N1) virus infection this month, but have not yet linked the discovery to the victims. The Health Ministry has been puzzled by the deaths of a government auditor and his 2 young daughters near Jakarta due to avian influenza, the first human fatalities in the world's fourth most populous country. The samples from the 38 year old father and older daughter (age 8) tested positive for the highly lethal virus. No test was done for the younger one-year-old daughter. "Our veterinarian researchers found a positive result from this [fecal test], but whether (the victims) were infected [from this source] is still unknown," said Agriculture Ministry spokesman Hari Priyono. The chicken droppings that contained the H5N1 avian influenza virus were found near the victims' family home in Tangerang.
Authorities killed more than 800 chickens in West Java province 26 Jul 2005, where signs of avian influenza infection were found. Indonesia has prepared 44 hospitals for the treatment of further possible victims. Avian influenza has spread to 21 of 33 provinces in Indonesia over the past 2 years. 9.53 million chickens have been killed by the virus in Indonesia. Also, avian influenza has been discovered in pigs on Java. Authorities will slaughter some 200 pigs infected by bird flu 24 Jul 2005 in a village close to the hometown of the victims.
The remaining 4 residents of the house remain healthy and show no symptoms. The Ministry of Health (MOH) is following over 300 contacts; none of them has shown any symptoms to date. An investigation is underway with members from MOH, Ministry of Agriculture, US Naval Medical Research Unit 2, and WHO to identify potential sources of infection. Samples have been collected from contacts of the cases, while any possible poultry contact is being investigated. Health education to health care workers has been continuing. Seminars and workshops to strengthen surveillance of influenza-like illness, outbreak investigation, and isolation and barrier nursing have been carried out. Stockpiling of personal protective equipment to protect health and veterinary workers, and procurement of antivirals is continuing. Information has been provided to assist the community with general health precautions.
(Promed 7/21/05, 7/24/05, 7/26/05)
Japan (Ibaraki): New bird flu outbreak on chicken farm
Japanese authorities have discovered a fresh outbreak of bird flu on a chicken farm in eastern Japan, close to where several cases of the disease have been detected since Jun 2005. Some chickens at the farm had tested positive for a strain of the H5 virus, an official in Ibaraki prefecture said 27 Jul 2005. Authorities will conduct further tests to confirm the subtype. All bird flu outbreaks discovered in Ibaraki since late Jun 2005 have been confirmed as the H5N2 strain. This is a less virulent type than the H5N1 strain found in previous avian flu outbreaks in Japan early 2004. Since June 2005, authorities have killed chickens at 7 farms, all located near the initial case, after they tested positive. The farm in the latest case has about 35 000 birds. Following the new case, authorities limited the movement of eggs and chickens in a 5km radius around the farm. Bird flu returned to Japan in 2004 for the first time in 79 years. Between Jan and Mar 2004, Japan had 4 outbreaks of the H5N1 type strain.
Russia: More cases of bird flu in Siberia
The head of Russia's Veterinary Monitoring Service says the bird flu virus has broken out in 4 rural districts of Siberia. The initial outbreak was discovered 15 Jul 2005 in the village of Suzdalka, in the western Siberian region of Novosibirsk, and significant mortality detected by 18 Jul 2005. More than 500 birds of various species died as result of the outbreak. No cases of the disease have been found in humans. Death was observed in domestic as well as wild birds, indicating the high pathogenicity of the virus. The avian influenza virus is an H5N2 type and is not dangerous to humans, said Alexander Shestopalov, an official at the Vektor State Research Center. H5N2 strains have been reported recently from Japan, Italy, USA (Texas), South Korea, and South Africa. Recently, cases among wild birds have been found in 3 more districts of Novosibirsk Oblast. Authorities in neighboring Kazakhstan have been informed, as the 3 districts lie close to the Kazakh border. The OIE said that the Russian authorities had notified a suspected outbreak of avian influenza in Siberia, but more tests were needed. The OIE said the Russian report said some clinical signs indicated the outbreak was a type of avian influenza, although some details -- no species specificity and the pattern of spread -- were not typical of the disease.
(Promed 7/22/05, 7/23/05, 7/24/05, 7/25/05)
China (Sichuan): Pig disease (Streptococcus suis) kills 31
The Ministry of Health announced 152 confirmed or suspected infections as of 28 Jul 2005, killing 31 people. 6 more towns in Sichuan province reported cases 27 Jul 2005, in addition to the 2 Sichuan cities Ziyang and Neijiang, where people first fell ill after killing sick pigs. All the victims were farmers who slaughtered infected pigs or others who processed or handled the pork and ate it. The victims had open wounds, which allowed the bacteria to get into their body, the health ministry said. There was a long tradition of farmers in the area eating sick pigs due to poverty. Reportedly, unscrupulous traders dug up day-old carcasses of diseased pigs and sold them for human consumption. The health ministry issued a national guideline 27 Jul 2005 ordering farmers to bury infected pigs deep in the ground or burn them. The ministry says there had not been any human-to-human transmission.
WHO has said it was baffled as the disease, caused by the Streptococcus suis bacterium, had never before stricken so many people at one time. Medical experts outside China said the unusually high mortality rate and reports that many of the victims died within a day of showing symptoms were inconsistent with what is known so far about human Streptococcus suis infection. Though endemic in swine, human infections are rare. And where they have occurred, mortality rates have been below 10 percent. On 28 Jul 2005, the director of the Ministry of Agriculture, Mr. Jia Youlin, said that testing affected swine for influenza and Nipah viruses, as well as "other pathogens", has ruled out these agents. According to the MOA, the vaccines for Streptococcus suis type II will soon be batch-produced in Guangdong and are expected to reach Sichuan in about 1 week after being inspected by the MOA. Ning Yubao, a researcher with the China veterinarian medicine monitoring institute, said the vaccine should help control the outbreak. The last outbreak of Streptococcus suis in China was in 1998, and involved 22 people.
Hong Kong: Swine virus fears mount
A case involving a Hong Kong man infected recently with the swine bacterium was reported 28 Jul 2005, deepening concern over the possible impact of the disease that has killed 31 people in Sichuan and bringing the number of local infections to 10 since May 2004. Only one of those infected has died. The Center for Health Protection said the latest local case of a human infection by the swine Streptococcus suis type 2 organism involved a 26-year-old interior decorator who has not traveled to the mainland recently and has had no contact with pigs. He was admitted to hospital 5 Jul 2005 and discharged a week later. It is unknown how he was infected. From 1983 to 1994, there were 25 cases of human Streptococcus suis infections in Hong Kong.
Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food, York Chow, insisted there is still no evidence to support a complete ban on pork imports despite the mainland suspending all pork, mutton and other meat exports from Sichuan. His stance outraged legislators who raised the specter of the early local response to the 2003 SARS epidemic. Food and Environmental Hygiene Department assistant director Thomas Chung told the panel that, so far this year, Hong Kong has imported more than 18 000 tons of frozen pork from Sichuan, of which 5000 tons came from the 2 most affected cities, Ziyang and Neijiang. "We will not trace the frozen pork that has been imported, or take samples for streptococcus tests, because the product has passed state inspection and the public need not panic," Chung said. But he warned that frozen pork must be thoroughly cooked and carefully handled. At the invitation of the ministry, 3 experts from Hong Kong arrived in Sichuan to help in the investigation.
China (Guandong): Death of 2 boys sparks rabies vaccine investigation
An investigation is under way following the deaths of 2 boys who received rabies inoculations in Guandong Province. Both deaths occurred less than 2 weeks apart in Wengyuan County, and now the Food and Drug Administration is looking into the batch of vaccine concerned. Zhong Yuwang died of rabies 28 Jun 2005 after being bitten by a dog. He had received a month long course of 4 injections against the disease, but the drug seemed to make him weaker. A few days after Zhong's death, another boy died of the same symptoms after he had received the same treatment at the same clinic. Initial investigations indicate that improper storage of the vaccine during transportation affected the vaccine, making it ineffective in fighting against the disease. The investigation has also uncovered that neither the medical service facility nor the drug wholesaler in Shaoguan were properly qualified to handle the vaccine. "The Ministry of Health will draft a national guideline on vaccination, requiring all doctors to be more careful how they buy and administer vaccines," Deng Haihua, director of the information office of the ministry, said. However, better coordination between health and drug supervision departments should be implemented to ensure safer vaccinations in the future, Deng noted. In China, supervision of the production and marketing of vaccines is done by the drug supervision department. The health departments are only in charge of managing doctors. While management remains split between 2 departments, problems can easily crop up as the vaccine goes from producers to the market and then to patients.
Russia: 2 fatal rabies cases in Chechnya and 1 fatal case in Vladimir region
2 fatal cases of rabies have been registered in the Shali district of Chechnya. The first victim was born 1989 and the second was a child born 2000. Both were bitten by stray dogs and were admitted to the city hospital, where they received anti-tetanus vaccine; however these measures did not save their lives [Tetanus vaccine protects against tetanus from dog-bites but does not protect against rabies]. A team has been organized to identify and eliminate the focus of infection. In addition, an 8-year-old girl died of rabies in Goose-Khrustalniy in the Vladimir region. Over a 2-month period 200 people have received medical treatment in hospitals in Goose-Khrustalniy due to animal bites. A rabies quarantine has been declared in the city. Moscow must cut its stray dog population to stop the spread of rabies, said Gennady Onishchenko, Head of the Public Health Agency and Russia's top public health doctor, after the 8-year-old girl died of the disease, 200 km east of Moscow. He said 11 Russians had died of rabies in the first 6 months of 2005. In Moscow 2 years ago, 340 000 stray dogs were registered.
(Promed 7/17/05, 7/26/05)
Russia (Khabarovsk): Viral meningitis outbreak
17 children in the age range 7 to 12 years have been admitted to hospital with viral meningitis [also known as serous or aseptic meningitis] in the Khabarovsk region. At present 9 cases of viral meningitis have been notified in Khabarovsk. The cause of the outbreak is thought to be bathing in local reservoirs, in particular in the Amur River. Reportedly none of the illnesses is life-threatening. Water samples were taken from the city beach and testing indicated unsatisfactory water quality. Epidemiologists have warned people not to bathe in the river and to avoid swallowing water if they disregard this advice. Physicians are also recommending that the population wash fruit and vegetables thoroughly and to drink only bottled or boiled water. 1/2 to 3/4 of cases of meningitis are caused by viruses. The etiologic agents are predominantly enteroviruses; cases of enteroviral infection are commonest in summer and in the first 10 years of life. Transmission of infection is predominantly by the fecal-oral route, or by ingestion of contaminated water. The prognosis for viral meningitis is good and recovery is usually complete.
(Promed 7/19/05, 7/24/05)
Russia (Udmurtiya): Lyme borreliosis, tick-borne encephalitis
During the first 6 months of 2005, 70 people, have been infected with Lyme borreliosis, the Republican Infectious Clinic reported. The level of morbidity of Lyme disease in 2005 is 1.8 times higher than in the similar period of 2004. Affected areas are the Kiyasovsky and Bolezinsky districts of Udmurtiya and the cities of Sarapul and Izhevsk. 17 cases of tickborne encephalitis were reported for 6 months in 2005 in the Republic, 1.6 times more than for the similar period in 2004. No fatal cases in Udmurtiya were reported. Both these diseases, Lyme borreliosis (a bacterial disease) and tickborne encephalitis (a viral disease) are spread by Ixodes ticks. Contamination of ticks with borreliosis in Udmurtiya ranges from 24 to 42 percent. The (current?) level of morbidity of borreliosis is the highest in Russia and is 6 times the average level of morbidity in Russia according to http://www.regions.ru/article/any/id/1596457.html.
Russia (Ryazan): 6 Tularemia cases
The town of Klepiki in the Ryazan region had 6 cases of tularemia in Jun 2005. Individuals in the rural area fall ill with tularemia more often, but due to the development of gardening companies and an increase in the number of rodents, sporadic morbidity among the townspeople has also been observed. Vaccination of the population is the most effective action for preventing the disease. In 2004, 9 cases more than in 2003 had been reported in the region (http://www.regions.ru/article/any/id/1743004.html). Tularemia is a zoonotic category A bioterrorism agent that can be spread by aerosolization but is not thought to be transmissible from person to person. At present, no licensed tularemia vaccine is available in the USA. However, the LVS vaccine (live vaccine strain) is available to military personnel.
Indonesia: Chikungunya outbreaks hit Tangerang
At least 98 residents of Bojong Renged village, Teluknaga subdistrict, Tangerang have been infected with chikungunya [virus disease], a mosquito-borne disease similar to dengue fever. Yuliah Iskandar, head of the disease prevention unit at the Tangerang Health Office, declared the outbreak an extraordinary incident that required immediate attention. Yuliah said the decision was made because the number of people infected had more than doubled in a week. Officials from the health office have sprayed to kill the mosquitoes spreading the disease. Having similar symptoms to dengue fever, chikungunya, however, is characterized by a briefer episode of fever, persistent arthralgia in some cases, and by the absence of deaths. Chikungunya is a self-limiting febrile virus disease that is transmitted through the bite of the Aedes aegypti or Aedes africanus mosquito. The illness usually lasts for 3 to 10 days, with arthralgia remaining a problem for weeks to several months after the initial phase. Since there is no antiviral available, prevention of the disease focuses on controlling mosquitoes and avoiding mosquito bites. The Tangerang regional health agency has sent a team of doctors to the village.
Indonesia: WHO Poliomyelitis update
2 new polio cases were confirmed in West Java province, bringing the total number of cases to 155. One case is from Cianjur, and the other is from a newly infected district, Kota Bekasi. These new cases are within the areas included during the two emergency vaccination campaigns held 31 May and 28 Jun 2005, but with onset of paralysis between the rounds. Plans are underway for National Immunization Days targeting 24.4 million children less than 5 years old throughout the country 30 Aug and 27 Sep 2005.
Malaysia (Penang): 6 malaria cases
A total of 6 patients have been diagnosed with malaria in Penang. The first case was 17 Jul 2005 when an 11-year-old girl died in the hospital due to malaria. Her grandfather also was admitted for malaria but is now in a stable condition. On 20 Jul, 4 men from the same area were admitted with malaria. 2 were Indonesians, 1 Burmese and 1 local Malaysian. On 22 Jul, 3 of them were confirmed to have blackwater fever. A foreign worker who was referred to Penang for treatment died from malaria. All patients that were affected were from the same area.
USA: USDA probes possible third case of mad cow disease
A 12-year-old animal suspected of having mad cow disease will be retested by animal health laboratories in Britain and Iowa for confirmation of what would be USA's third case, the U.S. Agriculture Department said 27 Jul 2005. USDA Chief Veterinarian John Clifford said the suspect animal, which was destroyed after having trouble giving birth Apr 2005 produced an inconclusive result in an initial round of testing for BSE. The suspect animal was U.S.-born. A veterinarian who submitted the cow's brain sample to the USDA first treated it with a preservative, making it impossible to test by western blot, Clifford said. USDA scientists can still conduct an immunohistochemistry test, but they cannot use the western blot test for a comparison. The veterinarian obtained the brain sample in April but did not send it to the USDA until recently, Clifford said, because he forgot to send it in. The suspect cow never entered the human food supply. The suspect animal's herd has not been quarantined. USA’s second case of mad cow disease--its first in a native animal--was confirmed last month. Both animals were born prior to the feed ban.
The latest incidents come as Bush administration officials had started to make optimistic comments about persuading Japan and South Korea to start buying U.S. beef once more. The USDA also recently won its appeal to start imports of live young Canadian cattle, arguing against protests from ranchers and consumer groups that Canada's safeguards against the disease were adequate. Criticisms of USDA's BSE surveillance are included in a letter sent 25 Jul 2005 by the Consumers Union (signed by Michael Hansen, Ph.D., Senior Scientist and Jean Halloran, Director Food Policy Initiatives) to Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns (http://www.yubanet.com/artman/publish/article_23199.shtml). The writers indicate the need for testing of all older dairy cows and fuller implementation of the existing requirement to test rabies-suspected cows which were found negative to rabies.
USA (New York): More cases of legionnaires' disease announced
The Westchester County Department of Health announced 19 Jul 2005 that 6 additional cases of legionnaires' disease have been identified in New Rochelle, bringing the total number of cases up to 18 since 21 Jun 2005. Other patients with pneumonia are also under investigation as possible cases. All patients thus far appear to have been exposed through an outdoor cooling tower located in Sound Shore Medical Center. In previous years only 7 to 10 cases of legionnaires' disease have been reported countywide annually. Investigation indicates that a possible source of contamination may be an outdoor cooling tower of the Sound Shore Medical Center. At this time, this cooling tower has been removed from the Center's premises and a replacement unit has been installed. Water samples cultured from the hospital's cooling tower indicated the presence of legionella, and follow-up testing is being conducted.
Additional measures by the Center included chlorination of the cooling tower and addition of biocide to reduce the biofilm level. The tower had been previously tested May 2005 and was negative for legionella.
The patients identified to date all have underlying medical conditions or risk factors for developing legionnaires' disease and range in age from 39 to 83 years. 12 of the 18 cases have been discharged from the hospital and are recovered or recovering at home. The other 6 cases remain hospitalized and are in stable condition. Physicians have been alerted to include testing for legionella in their evaluation of appropriate patients. Specific diagnostic tests now being performed may result in a larger number of cases than usual, since clinicians do not routinely test for this disease. Legionnaires' disease is most often contracted by inhaling aerosols from water sources such as whirlpool baths, showers, and cooling towers that are contaminated with legionella bacteria. Legionellosis is commonest during the summer because warm weather promotes the growth of the bacteria. There is no evidence that Legionellosis is spread person to person. Recent heavy rain fall with hot, humid weather are prime conditions for the bacteria. When legionella develop in a cooling system, the mist from the system can become a source of infection.
(Promed 7/15/05, 7/18/05, 7/19/05)
USA (New York): Patient dies from listeriosis
Health officials in the Syracuse area say one of 4 people infected in an outbreak of listeriosis has died. The Onondaga County Health Department says the adult patient died 19 Jul 2005 due to complications of the rare bacterial disease. Authorities established that 3 of the cases that surfaced July 2005 were caused by the same strain of Listeria and that they probably got sick from a single source of contaminated food. The fourth patient surfaced a week later. Investigators are trying to determine whether that case is from the same strain. Listeriosis can be fatal, but severe symptoms are unusual in healthy adults and children. The disease most often affects pregnant women, newborn babies, or people with weakened immune systems. Fatal listeriosis, predominantly meningitis, generally occurs in individuals with defects in cellular immune function. Disease may occur in normal hosts, however, usually in the elderly.
USA (Colorado): Two cases of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome
A second University of Colorado (CU) researcher studying rodents at several field sites in Boulder County contracted hantavirus in Jul 2005. The 22 year old woman's illness marks the county's second recorded human case of hantavirus infection. The woman works with the 24 year old man who was hospitalized with the county's first hantavirus case Jun 2005 after doing field research on rodents for CU, school spokeswoman Jeannine Malmsbury confirmed. The man checked into Boulder Community Hospital 15 Jun 2005. Doctors discharged the man, who never developed respiratory problems. The 22 year old woman went to hospital 6 Jul 2005; she ultimately developed hantavirus pulmonary syndrome. She has recovered and went home from the hospital 12 Jul 2005. Investigators are optimistic that a second case will increase their odds of pinpointing the source of the outbreak. Rodent researchers at CU are taking extra precautions to prevent additional infections. The Boulder County case marks the eighth in Colorado this year. The disease is likely to spike this year because there was considerable rainfall this spring, allowing for more vegetation and a larger rodent population. Officials recommend setting traps to control the rodent population. Areas infected with mouse droppings or nesting materials should be cleaned with a mixture of bleach and water. People should avoid stirring up dust while cleaning a rodent-infested area. Epidemiologists first documented hantavirus in May 1993; since then, there have been 396 cases in the US, 35 of which were in Colorado.
USA (Montana): First hantavirus case in 2005
A teenager from Beaverhead County is the first person in 2005 to have a confirmed case of hantavirus. He was hospitalized for a few days but has fully recovered, according to Jim Murphy, communicable disease surveillance officer with the Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services. This was the 25th case of the disease reported in the state. 6 Montanans have died of hantavirus, which is contracted by inhaling airborne particles from dried droppings, urine or saliva of infected deer mice. It is not contagious from person to person. Hantavirus is characterized by fever, muscle and body aches, chills, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and fatigue. Eventually, the victim's lungs begin to fill with fluid, causing shortness of breath. There is no specific treatment, cure or vaccine, but if infections are recognized early and patients receive medical care in an intensive care unit, they are more likely to do well. Murphy said people can help prevent hantavirus by keeping mice out of their homes and workplaces. "You should seal all openings in your foundation, even those as small as the diameter of a pencil," he said. "Keep food, pet food, and garbage in rodent-proof containers, and keep firewood at least 100 feet from your home and raised up off the ground." People working in enclosed places that may hold rodent droppings should wear an air-purifying respirator mask with an N-100 filter.
USA (Multistate): Orchid Island Juice Co recalls unpasteurized orange juice
Orchid Island Juice Company of Florida is voluntarily recalling all unpasteurized orange juice only with a code date of 7/25/05 or earlier and all unpasteurized frozen orange juice with expiration codes of 04-25-2007 through 07-08-2007 for Just Pik't and Natalie's Orchid Island Juice Company brands, 18-04-2008 through 10-06-2008 for Floridella brands, bottle codes S3.2007.04.27 through S2.2007.06.27 for Herders and St. Marc brands, and bottle code OE55 S1125 for the Sundecker brand. These products have the potential to be contaminated with Salmonella enterica serotype Typhimurium, a germ that can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and others with weakened immune systems. Otherwise healthy individuals may suffer short term symptoms, such as high fever, severe headache, vomiting, nausea, abdominal pain, and diarrhea. Orchid Island Juice Company distributes unpasteurized orange juice and unpasteurized frozen orange juice in numerous states and to Canada, France, and Japan. To date, there have been 15 suspected cases of illness.
USA (Utah): Viral meningitis shows up at double the normal rate in Utah
The Salt Lake Valley Health Department has confirmed 13 cases of viral meningitis between 1 and 19 Jul 2005. On average, the Health Department confirms an average of 5 cases during the same time period.
Viral meningitis is a common--but rarely serious--disease. Symptoms often include headache, fever, sensitivity to light, stiff or sore neck, and nausea and vomiting. Enteroviruses, the commonest cause of viral meningitis, are often spread through direct contact with respiratory secretions from an infected person. The virus can also be found in the stool of infected people. Cases of enteroviral infection are commonest in summer and in the first 10 years of life. There is no vaccine or specific treatment for viral meningitis in view of the heterogeneity of the causative agent. However, the prognosis for enteroviral meningitis in particular and viral meningitis in general is good and recovery is usually complete.
USA (New Mexico): Human plague case confirmed in Santa Fe County
The first case of human plague in New Mexico in 2005 has been confirmed in an adolescent from Santa Fe County. This was a case of bubonic plague. Rock squirrels collected in the vicinity of the patient's home were heavily infested with fleas, and fleas were collected from burrows in the area. The New Mexico Department of Health reports that the patient has been hospitalized and is recovering. The department is conducting an environmental assessment of the youth's home to determine whether there is any ongoing risk to the public. Plague is a bacterial disease that is usually contracted from bites from infected fleas but can also be transmitted by direct contact with infected animals. Symptoms include fever, swollen lymph nodes, chills and sometimes headache, vomiting and diarrhea. Plague can be successfully treated with antibiotics if promptly diagnosed. There were no reported cases of human plague in the state in 2004. The last plague fatality occurred in 1994 in a Rio Arriba County child. Y. pestis infection is endemic in the southwestern US.
(Promed 7/25/05, 7/26/05)
USA (New York): Mystery AIDS Strain 'Patient Zero' Found
U.S. doctors said they have identified the patient who is the source of a mystery strain of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that sent waves of alarm Feb 2005. Public-health officials in New York City issued a warning because the patient apparently had developed a virulent form of HIV that was resistant to virtually all drugs and caused a rapid destruction of the man's immune system. The original source of the infection is a patient in Connecticut who infected the New York man during anonymous rectal intercourse at a sex club in the city 22 Oct 2004. Within 3 months, the New York man was diagnosed with HIV, and his CD4 blood-cell count dropped dramatically. Dr. Gary Blick, a private-practice physician in Norwalk, Conn., reported that his patient, identified as CT01, is the so-called "Patient Zero". The new HIV strain appeared to be multi-drug resistant, but Blick said the alarm may have been overblown, because his patient now has a stable infection that is being controlled by 2 drugs. "We want to emphasize that our patient is not rapidly progressing. Nor is that patient's life partner, who is also infected with a similarly highly resistant strain, rapidly progressing," Blick said. He said the New York man's use of crystal methamphetamine and highly promiscuous lifestyle may be more of a factor in his low CD4 count than the strain of virus. The New York man had sex with at least 10 other partners before he discovered he was infected. Despite the multiple drug-resistance of this novel strain of HIV, there is no evidence so far to suggest that it has properties that allow greater transmissibility than other HIV strains, or that it is spreading widely in the community. The initial rapid progression of the disease in the New York patient appears to have been contained by treatment and was not a direct consequence of the multiple drug resistance of this strain.
Seasonal influenza activity for the Asia Pacific and APEC Economies, 20 July 2005
Australia. Influenza A activity continued to increase during weeks 26–27 but remained within normal seasonal limits. Influenza A predominated, with roughly equal numbers of A(H1) and A(H3N2) viruses identified. Majority of influenza B viruses were B/Shanghai/361/2002-like, with few B/Hong Kong/330/2001-like strains.
Canada. Localized influenza activity continued to be reported in Ontario in week 26, while in the rest of the country, influenza activity was low.
Hong Kong. After 15 weeks of high A(H3N2) activity, influenza activity started to ease in week 26 with a significant decrease in the number of viruses detected.
New Zealand. Influenza B viruses continued to cause widespread outbreaks in children and young adults, although the consultation rate of influenza-like illness (ILI) started to decline in week 26. The ILI consultation rate was still higher than during the same period last year, but similar to that of 2003.
Mexico. During weeks 26–27, low influenza activity was detected (H3 and B).
(WHO 7/20/05 http://www.who.int/csr/disease/influenza/update/en/)
Cholera, diarrhea & dysentery
The Centre for Health Protection has confirmed a local cholera case involving a 40-year-old woman, the second case in 2005. The patient was admitted to Princess Margaret Hospital 13 Jul 2005 in stable condition. The case was classified as 'local' as she had not traveled during the incubation period.
Dirty diapers may be the source of an outbreak of shigellosis in at least 5 people who swam at Beltzville State Park during the 4th of July weekend. 9 other cases of shigellosis, which causes fever, diarrhea, and stomach cramps, are suspected but have not been confirmed by lab tests. Dirty diapers discarded near the water's edge or on babies playing in the lake also were suspected in a 1995 outbreak that sickened about 70 people. Officials do not believe the bacteria was in food or came from the park's sewer system.
A 28-year-old Monterey County woman died of dengue hemorrhagic fever after returning from a visit to Mexico. She became seriously ill on a trip to Chacalapa in Guerrero and died 9 May 2005. Dengue fever is caused by a virus carried by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which is not found in California. The woman's 5-year-old daughter and 26-year-old sister, who traveled with her, were also diagnosed with mild forms of the illness. A 72-year-old family acquaintance who was visiting the same area also contracted dengue fever and has since recovered. This is the first fatal case of dengue hemorrhagic fever reported in California in 2005.
The number of dengue fever cases has risen dramatically this month, exceeding 300 cases per week. This is compared with 125 per week in Apr 2005. Singapore has experienced a resurgence of dengue fever over the past few years. In 2003, there were 4788 cases. It doubled to 9459 in 2004. The National Environment Agency (NEA) has set aside USD 3000 for each Citizens' Consultative Committee [CCC] and USD 30 000 for each Community Development Council to fund outreach programs on dengue fever. Next month, NEA plans to distribute new sets of dengue educational kits specifically designed for 70 000 families living in landed homes to remind them to reduce mosquito breeding sources.
More than 10 percent of fresh oysters imported into Hong Kong are contaminated with norovirus, a common cause of gastroenteritis found in human and animal feces. From 2000 to 2003, scientists at Hong Kong's Public Health Laboratory examined 507 oysters imported from 11 countries spread across the Americas, Europe and Asia. They found 53 tainted with norovirus. Wilina Lim said the tainted samples came from 6 countries. "It's not advisable to eat oysters raw. They may not only carry norovirus, but also hepatitis A [virus] and bacteria. But a lot of people like them raw, so they have to bear the risk," she said. Hong Kong imported 1.9 million kg of live, fresh and chilled oysters in 2004. Killing norovirus requires cooking in boiling temperatures for at least 3 minutes, Lim said. In recent years noroviruses have become associated predominantly with outbreaks of self-limited acute gastroenteritis in circumstances where large groups of people come together in close proximity. Greater awareness of the ubiquity of these viruses and greater attention to hygiene has diminished their prominence in food-borne disease. However, their association with gastroenteritis caused by shellfish consumption remains undiminished.
West Nile Virus
The vast majority of people with West Nile virus have no idea they're infected, a study shows. Of 1200 blood samples submitted to a team of Manitoba public health workers and scientists, 3.2 per cent of people had antibodies to West Nile virus. Of those who tested positive, 85 per cent didn't know they were infected, and 62 per cent reported no fever symptoms. This doesn't mean people are developing immunity to the virus or those already infected will be immune to future infection, said Dr Neil Simonsen, an infectious disease adviser for the Public Health Agency of Canada. "We don't know how long the antibodies survive, and, if they do provide protection, how long they provide protection," he said. "Even if people know they have antibodies, protective measures are still important, because we cannot guarantee that they are immune, although the likelihood is that they are." The study found no correlation between infection rates and age or sex. 2 elderly Manitobans died after contracting West Nile virus in 2003, and others spent many months recovering from the virus.
CDC EID Journal, Volume 11, Number 8-Aug 2005
CDC Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal, Volume 11, Number 8-Aug 2005 issue is now available at: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/index.htm. The following expedited articles are available online:
- Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Death, United States, E.D. Belay et al.
- Protective Behavior and West Nile Virus Risk, M. Loeb et al.
- Potential Impact of Antiviral Use on Hospitalizations during Influenza Pandemic, R. Gani et al.
Primate-to-human retroviral transmission in Asia
Jones-Engel L et al. Emerg Infect Dis 2005; 11(7): Jul
Summary: "We describe the first reported transmission to a human of simian foamy virus from a free-ranging population of nonhuman primates in Asia. The transmission of an exogenous retrovirus, SFV, from macaques (Macaca fascicularis) to a human at a monkey temple in Bali, Indonesia was investigated with molecular and serologic techniques. Antibodies to SFV were detected by Western blotting of serum from one of 82 humans tested. SFV DNA was detected by nested polymerase chain reaction from the blood of the same person. Cloning and sequencing of PCR products confirmed the virus's close phylogenetic relationship to SFV isolated from macaques at the same temple. This study raises concerns that persons who work at or live around monkey temples are at risk for infection with SFV."
People in Asia have many contexts in which they come into contact with primates, including monkey temples, animal markets, primate pet ownership, urban performing primates, and zoos. Foamy virus of non-human primates has been regarded as a virus without a disease in humans from previous studies. This report has demonstrated substantial proof of transmission of SFV from a primate to a human in Asia.
Virulence may determine the necessary duration and dosage of oseltamivir treatment for highly pathogenic a/vietnam/1203/04 influenza virus in mice.
Yen HL, Monto AS, Webster RG, Govorkova EA. J Infect Dis. 2005 Aug 15;192(4):665-72.
Abstract: “Background. Control of highly pathogenic avian H5N1 influenza viruses is a major public-health concern. Antiviral drugs could be the only option early in the pandemic. Methods. BALB/c mice were given oseltamivir (0.1, 1, or 10 mg/kg/day) twice daily by oral gavage; the first dose was given 4 h before inoculation with H5N1 A/Vietnam/1203/04 (VN1203/04) virus. Five- and 8-day regimens were evaluated. Results. Oseltamivir produced a dose-dependent antiviral effect against VN1203/04 in vivo (P<.01). The 5-day regimen at 10 mg/kg/day protected 50% of mice; deaths in this treatment group were delayed and indicated the replication of residual virus after the completion of treatment. Eight-day regimens improved oseltamivir efficacy, and dosages of 1 and 10 mg/kg/day significantly reduced virus titers in organs and provided 60% and 80% survival rates, respectively (P<.05). Overall, the efficacy of the 5- and 8-day regimens differed significantly (death hazard ratio, 2.658; P<.01). The new H5N1 antigenic variant VN1203/04 was more pathogenic in mice than was A/HK/156/97 virus, and a prolonged and higher-dose oseltamivir regimen may be required for the most beneficial antiviral effect. Conclusions. Oseltamivir prophylaxis is efficacious against lethal challenge with VN1203/04 virus in mice. Viral virulence may affect the antiviral treatment schedule.”
Tamiflu is an orally deliverable compound and unlike the other influenza antivirals (amantadine and rimantadine) exhibits few side effects. In human trials, the greatest benefit is seen in those patients presenting <30 hours after development of influenza symptoms, those with severe symptoms, or those in high risk groups. In addition to treatment of the infection, neuraminidase inhibitors are effective prophylactically and have been shown to limit spread of infection in close communities. The mouse experiments are encouraging in that a recent isolate of avian influenza A (H5N1) virus from Viet Nam retains full sensitivity to Tamiflu as judged by assay in mice.
Characterization of a human H5N1 influenza A virus isolated in 2003
K Shinya et al. Virology 2005 Aug 1
"In 2003, H5N1 avian influenza virus infections were diagnosed in 2 Hong Kong residents who had visited the Fujian province in mainland China, affording us the opportunity to characterize one of the viral isolates, A/Hong Kong/213/03 (HK213; H5N1). In contrast to H5N1 viruses isolated from humans during the 1997 outbreak in Hong Kong, HK213 retained several features of aquatic bird viruses, including the lack of a deletion in the neuraminidase stalk and the absence of additional oligosaccharide chains at the globular head of the hemagglutinin molecule. It demonstrated weak pathogenicity in mice and ferrets but caused lethal infection in chickens. The original isolate failed to produce disease in ducks but became more pathogenic after 5 passages. Taken together, these findings portray the HK213 isolate as an aquatic avian influenza A virus without the molecular changes associated with the replication of H5N1 avian viruses in land-based poultry such as chickens. This case challenges the view that adaptation to land-based poultry is a prerequisite for the replication of aquatic avian influenza A viruses in humans."
Virulence differences between monkeypox virus isolates from West Africa and the Congo basin
Chen N et al. Virology. 2005 Jul 13
"Studies indicate that West African and Congo basin isolates of monkeypox virus (MPXV) are genetically distinct. Here, we show Congo basin MPXV-ZAI-V79 is more virulent for cynomolgus monkeys as compared to presumed West African MPXV-COP-58. This finding may explain the lack of case-fatalities in the U.S. 2003 monkeypox outbreak, which was caused by a West African virus. Virulence differences between West African and Congo basin MPXV are further supported by epidemiological analyses that observed a similar prevalence of antibodies in non-vaccinated humans in both regions, while more than 90 percent of reported cases occurred in the Congo basin, and no fatal cases were observed outside of this region. To determine the basis for this difference in virulence, we sequenced the genomes of one human West African isolate, and 2 presumed West African isolates and compared the sequences to Congo basin MPXV-ZAI-96-I-16. The analysis identified D10L, D14L,
B10R, B14R, and B19R as possible virulence genes, with D14L (ortholog of vaccinia complement protein) as a leading candidate."
The outbreak of monkeypox that occurred in the USA in summer 2003 was caused by the less virulent of 2 known strains of monkeypox. During the outbreak, there were 72 confirmed or suspected cases of human monkeypox, but no deaths. The disease usually kills about 10 percent of infected people. The outbreak was caused by a shipment of West African rodents imported for the pet trade. At a pet distribution center, the African rodents infected prairie dogs that were sold as pets.
National, state, and urban area vaccination coverage among children aged 19-35 Months--US, 2004
“The National Immunization Survey (NIS) provides vaccination coverage estimates for children aged 19--35 months for each of the 50 states and 28 selected urban areas.* This report summarizes results from the 2004 NIS,† which indicated nationwide increases in coverage with at least 1 dose of varicella vaccine (VAR), pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV), and the 4:3:1,§ 4:3:1:3:3,¶ and 4:3:1:3:3:1** vaccine series. These levels represent an important accomplishment by exceeding for the first time the Healthy People 2010 goal of >80% coverage for the 4:3:1:3:3 vaccine series….”
(MMWR July 29, 2005 / 54(29);717-721)
Immunization Information System Progress--United States, 2003
“One of the national health objectives for 2010 is to increase to at least 95% the proportion of children aged <6 years who participate* in fully operational, population-based immunization registries (objective 14-26) (1). Immunization registries are confidential, computerized information systems that collect and consolidate vaccination data from multiple health-care providers, generate reminder and recall notifications, and assess vaccination coverage (2,3). A registry with added capabilities, such as vaccine management, adverse event reporting, lifespan vaccination histories, and interoperability with electronic medical records (EMRs)†, is called an immunization information system (IIS). This report summarizes data from CDC's 2003 Immunization Registry Annual Report (IRAR), a survey of IIS grantees in 50 states, five cities, and the District of Columbia (DC) that receive funding under section 317b of the Public Health Service Act. The findings of the 2003 IRAR indicate that approximately 44% of U.S. children aged <6 years participated in an IIS. In addition, 76% of public vaccination provider sites and 36% of private vaccination provider sites submitted immunization data to an IIS during the last 6 months of 2003. Increasing health-care provider participation by linking EMRs to IISs is vital to meeting the national health objective….”
(MMWR July 29, 2005 / 54(29);722-724)
APEC HTF Symposium on avian influenza and preparedness for a human health emergency
More than 100 officials from 21 APEC economies will meet in San Francisco, California, July 28-29, 2005 to discuss how to build the capacity and marshal the resources to control Avian Influenza and to respond to any related human health emergency. The US is sponsoring the symposium along with APEC Member Economies Hong Kong and Chinese Taipei. The symposium will explore how AI can affect agriculture, human health, finance and trade in the APEC region, and provide an opportunity for Member Economy representatives to discuss domestic policies that might ease those effects. Participants will also identify resources needed to address AI; learn about the work of international standard-setting bodies and international organizations; and discuss barriers to controlling animal and human disease. They will review international recommendations on AI and pandemic influenza preparedness to identify what would work in the APEC economies and analyze their capacity to implement those recommendations.
(APEC 7/25/05 http://www.apec.org/apec.html)
APEC Workshop on HIV/AIDS Management in the Workplace
18-19 August 2005; Bangkok, Thailand
In 2001 at the 9th APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting, an initiative on "Infectious Disease in the Asia Pacific Region: A Reason to Act and Acting with Reason" was launched. The iniative aimed to encourage Member Economies to consider the issue of infectious diseases the impact of diseases on the growth of Member Economies. In 2003, the Health Security Initiative was agreed among Member Economies. This initiative aimed to help economies combat infection diseases. Following these two initiatives, in 2004 at the 12th APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting and 16th APEC Ministerial Meeting in Chile, an initiative on "Fighting against AIDS in APEC", which call for greater cooperation on the issue, was put forward.
Business, as the largest employer of human resources, still lacks adequate knowledge to effectively manage AIDS-related issues. Thailand has proposed a project: "APEC Workshop on HIV/AIDS Management in the Workplace", which aims to facilitate the exchange experiences, best practices and knowledge among Member Economies. The objectives are to encourage the business community in APEC to apply HIV/AIDS management practices in the workplace so as to give people living with HIV/AIDS a productive working environment free of discrimination and stigmatization. The Workshop will start with an expert presentation on HIV/AIDS in the workplace. Next, the practices and experiences of Member Economies in dealing with the issue, both from the government and private sectors, will be explored. A site visit will be organized with the aim of provide participants with hand-on experiences. Finally, a discussion and exchange of experiences among Member Economies will be encouraged.
Participants shall include: Senior policy makers, experts and private sectors from APEC member economies; Representatives from Health Task Force (HTF), Human Resources Development Working Group (HRDWG), APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) and APEC-CHRO; Representatives from International Organizations and NGOs, such as, ILO, UNAIDS, WHO, Thailand Business Coalition on AIDS (TBCA); Other stakeholders involved with HIV/AIDS issues.
Clostridium sordellii toxic shock syndrome after medical abortion with Mifepristone and Intravaginal Misoprostol--US and Canada, 2001-2005
“On July 19, 2005, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a public health advisory regarding the deaths of four women in the United States after medical abortions with Mifeprex (mifepristone, formerly RU-486; Danco Laboratories, New York, New York) and intravaginal misoprostol (1). Two of these deaths occurred in 2003, one in 2004, and one in 2005. Two of these U.S. cases had clinical illness consistent with toxic shock and had evidence of endometrial infection with Clostridium sordellii, a gram-positive, toxin-forming anaerobic bacteria. In addition, a fatal case of C. sordellii toxic shock syndrome after medical abortion with mifepristone and misoprostol was reported in 2001, in Canada (2)….C. sordellii previously has been described as a cause of pregnancy-associated toxic shock syndrome (3). Investigation by FDA, CDC, and state and local health departments into the two most recently identified U.S. deaths after medical abortion is ongoing….”
(MMWR July 29, 2005 / 54(29);724)
Revised recommendations for HIV Screening of adults, adolescents, and pregnant women in health-care settings
CDC and the Public Health Training Network will present a satellite broadcast and webcast, "Revised Recommendations for HIV Screening of Adults, Adolescents, and Pregnant Women in Health-Care Settings," Nov 17, 2005, 1 p.m. EST. The 2-hour forum will cover the rationale for expanded HIV screening in health-care settings, alternative procedures for normalizing screening in various health-care settings, and practices that facilitate routine HIV screening. Additional information will be available after Aug 15, 2005 at http://www.cdcnpin.org. The broadcast can be viewed live or later at http://www.phppo.cdc.gov/phtn. Videotapes and video CD-ROMs of the broadcast can be ordered.
(MMWR July 29, 2005 / 54(29);726)
4. APEC EINet activities
EINet distance-learning course to be launched 5 Aug 2005
On 5 August 2005 the updated "Emerging Infections of International Public Health Importance" course will be launched on the EINet Website. The course will include new lectures and is being made available without charge by the APEC EINET project. In early December 2005 EINet is planning to host a virtual symposium on biopreparedness. All APEC economies are welcome to participate.
5. To Receive EINet Newsbriefs
APEC EINet email list
The APEC EINet email list was established to enhance collaboration among health, commerce, and policy professionals concerned with emerging infections in APEC member economies. Subscribers are encouraged to share their material with colleagues in the Asia-Pacific Rim. To subscribe, go to: http://depts.washington.edu/einet/?a=subscribe or contact firstname.lastname@example.org. Further information about APEC EINet is available at http://depts.washington.edu/einet/. | <urn:uuid:176c3b44-66d7-430b-bbae-cf5471a39cfa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://depts.washington.edu/einet/newsbrief53.html?article=684 | 2013-05-22T00:14:26Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942565 | 12,520 |
Description from Flora of China
Dissochaeta sect. Diplectria Blume, Flora 14: 501. 1831.
Climbers or scandent shrubs. Stems squamose, glabrous or pubescent. Leaves shortly petiolate; secondary veins 1 or 2 on each side of midvein, margin entire. Inflorescences terminal or axillary, cymose paniculate, sometimes bracteate. Flowers small, 4-merous. Hypanthium tubular-campanulate to campanulate, squamose, glabrous or pubescent, apex truncate or inconspicuous. Petals white, ovate to oblong, glabrous. Stamens 8, whorls unequal in shape and length. Longer stamens with anthers oblong to linear-oblong, base abaxially 2-tuberculate and abaxially spurred or not, apex usually beaked. Shorter stamens abortive; anthers rhomboid-ovate, usually papery, abaxially long caudate-spurred, adaxially 2-setose at base. Ovary inferior, ovate, apex truncate. Style filiform; stigma apiculate. Fruit a berry, subglobular to ovate, apex often with persistent calyx lobes. Seeds numerous, cuneate, small, angular.
Diplectria is often considered as a synonym of Dissochaeta Blume (see Renner et al., Fl. Thailand 7(3): 419-420. 2001). Dissochaeta when including Diplectria has ca. 40 species and a similar geographic distribution.
Between eight and eleven species: China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, New Guinea, Philippines, Vietnam; one species in China. | <urn:uuid:58696c89-5f1a-4221-9f99-9e8ef66f4b00> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://efloras.org/florataxon.aspx?flora_id=3&taxon_id=110369 | 2013-05-22T00:21:43Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.747834 | 387 |
Trinidad Pardo De Tavera
From WikiPilipinas: The Hip 'n Free Philippine Encyclopedia
Trinidad Hermenegildo Padro de Tavera y Gorricho (b. April 13, 1857- d. March 25, 1925) was a physician, member of the Philippine Commission, and founder of the Federal Party. He was also a consummate scholar, as well as a bibliophile and bibliographer. Pardo de Tavera was considered a man of vast learning and probably the most versatile of the Filipino writers of his time (except for Rizal). He wrote on many subjects, from medicine to paleography, linguistics, numismatics, cartography, history, metrical romances, education, and social problems.
Early Life
Pardo de Tavera's family came from the urban aristocracy of the time and his family's creole status entitled them to reside in Intramuros. His father was Felix Pardo de Tavera, Sr., a distinguished lawyer and member of the Ayuntamiento of Manila, and his mother was Juliana Gorricho, founder of one of the first banks in the Philippines and a member of the prominent real estate family that owned the Escolta. His brother was Felix Pardo de Tavera, Jr., who became a renowned physician and sculptor and his sister was the renowned beauty Paz Pardo de Tavera, married to painter Juan Luna and fondly called Chiching. Trinidad Pardo de Tavera studied at the country's leading schools, attending the Ateneo Municipal, the Colegio de San Juan de Letran where he obtained his Bachiller en Artes in 1873.
Don Joaquin Pardo de Tavera, his uncle, a Spanish lieutenant married to Gertrudis Gorricho and the young Trinidad Hermenegildo became so close that his uncle treated him as his own son. Because of his uncle, "Trini" as he was fondly called, was exposed to liberal ideas and beliefs. These ideas and beliefs would have a great impact on the career and profession Trinidad would take.
Because of his stubborn clamor for reforms in the colony, Don Joaquin Pardo de Tavera was wrongly implicated in the 1872 Cavite Mutiny. Together with Maximo Paterno, Antonio Ma. Regidor and others, they were deported to Agana, Guam in April 1872. Since he was a Pardo de Tavera, Trini had difficulty adjusting after the conviction of his uncle. Family friends started to stay away from the Pardo de Taveras for fear of antagonizing the friars and Spanish civil authorities. Young Trinidad endured the ostracism while taking up medical studies at the University of Santo Tomas.
Migration to Paris
After three years in Guam, Don Joaquin and other deportados received a pardon from Spain. Deciding that they have no future in returning to the Philippines. Don Juaquin and his wife decided to migrate to Paris start a new life. After they have settled, Don Joaquin arranged to have Trinidad, his brother Felix and their youngest sister Paz migrate to Paris. Trinidad was only eighteen years old when he left Manila for Paris. The Pardo de Tavera settled in Rue Pergolese.
Don Joaquin's Parisian house became the venue to a number of Filipino ilustrado like Jose Rizal, Juan Luna, Graciano Lopez Jaena, Pedro Paterno, Maximino Paterno, Valentin Ventura, Mariano Ponce, Felix Resurrección Hidalgo, and others. Trinidad Pardo de Tavera frequently participated in spirited discussion about freedom, liberty, and reforms with South American and Filipino expatriates.
It was in this Parisian salon that Paz Pardo de Tavera, youngest sister of Trinidad Hermenegildo, would met and later marry the famous painter, Juan Luna. On December 7, 1886, at the Civil Court in Paris, Juan Luna and Paz Pardo de Tavera were married.
Education and Career
He held a Doctor of Medicine degree from the Sorbonne and a diploma in Malay language from the Ecole Nationale des Langues Orientales Vivantes. He published books on subjects such as medicine and linguistics which were translated into German by Dr. Ferdinand Blumentritt.
Trinidad was also a member of the Societe Academique IndoChinoise in Paris while in 1889, the Philippine Chamber of Commerce named him as its delegate to represent the colony at the Universal Exposition in Paris. He was given responsibility of organizing and cataloging the country's exhibit. He was also a member of the Royal Academy of Languages of Madrid and the Royal Academy of Science. He was also conferred by the University of the Philippines the degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa.
By virtue of a royal commission in 1887 to study Philippine medicinal plants, he returned to Manila. In Manila he met Concha Cembrano y Gonzalez-Calderon, the grand daughter of his mother's friend, Doña Carmen Barredo. He immediately fell in love with the rich heiress and they were married in Manila in 1887.
For the next two years, he solely devoted his time and energy to his wife. He did not write any books or had a public life. Trinidad and Concha had three children, Carlos, Alfredo and Carmen.
A Family Tragedy
Paz marriage to Juan Luna has become problematic when Luna in a fit of jealousy or anger would physically harm Paz. Juan Luna also frequently accused Paz of having other men. He falsely suspected that a certain Monsieur Dussaq had an amorous relations with Paz and threatened that he would kill Paz if he ever caught her with another man.
Trinidad Hermenegildo, her brother Felix and their mother Doña Julian combined all their efforts in preserving the marriage but due to the increased physical abuse suffered by Paz, they decided that divorce was the only choice left.
In September 21, Doña Julian frantically telegraphed Trinidad Hermenegildo and Felix to immediately come to Paris to save their sister. The two brothers together with Antonio Regidor went to the house of Juan and Paz. Upon seeing Antonio Regidor and explaining that they have come to dicuss the terms of separation, Juan Luna was became angry and went upstairs alone. To defuse the situation, the two brothers together with Antonio went to a nearby cafe but before they were served, the maid came running and told that something terrible was going to happen.
Upon arriving at the house, Luna was now brandishing a revolver in the first floor while Paz, her daughter and Doña Julian are in a room in the second floor. When Trinidad, Felix and Antonio started to approach the house, Luna fired a shot that hit Felix in the chest. Then before Trinidad could rush to the house, he heard three shots. When Trinidad entered the second floor room, he found his mother and sister shot in the head, his mother dead and his sister barely alive but unconscious. Paz died on October 8 at 6:15 pm without regaining consciousness.
Luna then handed his revolver to the maid and was promptly arrested by the police. Charges were filed against Juan Luna and in February 8, 1893, the court released the following decisions:
- Juan Luna is not guilty and that he is acquitted in any charges brought against him.
- Juan Luna was ordered to pay a one franc fine
- Juan Luna must pay Trinidad Pardo de Tavera and Felix Pardo de Tavera the sum of one thousand six hundred fifty-one francs and eighty-three cents, plus twenty-five francs for postage in addition to the interest of damages.
After his acquittal,Juan Luna, his son Andres Luna and her brother Antonio left Paris and went to Madrid.
Return to Manila
To escape the bitter memories of Paris, Trinidad and his brother together with their families left France. Felix and Doña Agustina Manigot settled in Buenos Aires while T.H. and his wife together with their sons, Carlos and Alfredo settled in Manila. In Manila, he joined the faculty of Medicine of the University of Santo Tomas and other governmental advisory boards.
When the 1896 Philippine Revolution broke out, T.H. Pardo de Tavera was spared from the similar fate shared by his uncle during the 1872 Cavite Mutiny. Unlike his uncle, his liberal ideas were not amalgamated to his official and scholarly work. His writings maintained a scholarly and intellectual discussion free of any liberal or reformist agendas or ideas. When fighting between Filipinos and Spanish forces broke out, he was commissioned as a major but he resigned from the army in April 1897. When the Americans declared war against Spain, Pardo de Tavera was one of the leading citizens in an consultative assembly seeking an alliance with the Filipinos against the Americans.
The American Period
In 1899, he launched the newspaper entitled La Democracia that advocated peace, the separation of the church and state, granting of autonomy to the Philippines and representation to US Congress and the eventual admission of the Philippines to the United States Union.
On 23 December 1900 he established the Federal Party and its adherents were called Federalista. He was joined by Jose Ner, Felipe Buencamino, Arturo Dancl, Angel Fabie, Teodoro Yangco, Florentino Torres and Cayetano Arellano. It was the first political organization to be recognized by the new colonizers. Pardo de Tavera at first enjoyed enormous prestige with the Americans. However one of the planks of the Federal Party was the immediate Americanization of Filipinos, which led to a very unpopular reception with the Filipino masses. Nevertheless 1 September 1901, Pardo de Tavera along with 2 Filipinos, Benito Legarda and Jose Luzuriaga were appointed to the First Philippine Commission, who won the confidence of Dean Conant Worcester, the most influential of the Commission members.
However Trinidad Pardo de Tavera's reputation greatly declined the more he advocated the amalgamation of the Philippines into the American federal government. He was the object of bitter criticism of the Nacionalista Party which advocated eventual Philippine independence. Gradually the party backed away from annexation in June 1904 upon seeing massive popular opposition. In anticipation of the elections of the first Philippine Assembly, the Federal Party changed its name to Partido Nacional Progresista. Hwever bereft of popular support, it was only able to win 16 seats, versus 32 seats for the Nacionalista Party and 20 seats for independent candidates. Repudiated by the electorate, Pardo de Tavera sensed that his time of public service was over. He resigned his membership in the Philippine Commission on 28 February 1909, and the Federal Party, according to his latter-day biographer E. Arsenio Manuel "virtually ceased to exist as a political organism."
In January 1923, he was appointed as director of the Philippine Library and Museum. Also during that year, he formed the Philippine Library Association and became its first president.
After serving in various government positions, Trinidad Hermenegildo Pardo de Tavera died in his sleep on March 25, 1925.
Books and Publications
In 1884, his "Medicine a l'Ile de Lucon (Archipel des Philippines)" published in the Parisian Journal de Medicine.
His linguistic articles include:
- Antiguos alfabetos filipinos
- El sáncrito en la lengua tagalog
- La nueva ortografia de la lengua tagalog: la K y la W
- Consideraciones sobre el origen de los nombres de los números
- Etimología de los nombres de las razas
His articles, especially Contribucion para el estudio de los Antigous alfabetos filipinos caused a stir among linguists and Filipino nationalists in Europe. Aside from these, he published Biblioteca filipina which many considered as a landmark book in Philippine bibliography.
T.H. also edited, annotated and published Fr. Juan Plasencia's study of the Tagalog society and a map of the Philippines drawn by Fr. Pedro Murillo Velarde. He also expanded his knowledge by studying the Tagalog language and developing theories along the line of approach now know as gluttochronology . In 1892 and 1893, he published a book on Philippine medicinal plants, printing, and printmaking in the Philippines. In 1895, he made a booklet on basic health and popular medicine.
In September 2005 Dr. Serafin D. Quiason, former chair of the National Historical Institute and former director of the National Library, delivered a lecture on "Pardo de Tavera: A Character Sketch and His Legacy to Philippine Scholarship and Librarianship."
Nick Joaquin wrote in "A Question of Heroes" that after the defeat of the Spanish colonial government Pardo de Tavera became a virulent advocate of everything American. Joaquin described him as " a man who came to loathe both the Malay and the Spaniard in himself so intensely he became the first of the sajonistas (Anglo-Saxonists) and, as a member of the Philippine Commission of the 1900s, fought for the implantation of English in the Philippines, in a virulent desire to uproot all traces of Spanish culture from the islands. For good or evil, Trinidad Pardo de Tavera, whom we hardly remember, was one of the deciders of our fate."
(“un hombre que llegó a odiar tan intensamente lo que tenía de malayo y de español que se convirtió en el primero de los 'sajonistas' y, como miembro de la Comisión Filipina en los primeros años del siglo XX, luchó por la implantación del inglés en Filipinas con un deseo virulento de erradicar toda traza de cultura hispana de las islas. Para bien o para mal, Trinidad Pardo de Tavera, a quien a penas se le recuerda, fue uno de los determinantes de nuestro destino.”) (Jose Rizal: July 19, 1861-December 30, 1896 in A Question of Heroes, Makati: Museo Ayala, 1977)
Cultural historian Resil Mojares wrote in "Brains of the Nation": "He was the turn of the 20th century, the country's most eminent man of science, the most ardent apostle of modernity. While Pardo's statue is ritually conceded, he is, by and large, unread and unstudied. Even in his own time, he was a figure rather distant and cold. He remains so to Filipinos today."
The eminent nationalist historian Teodoro Agoncillo simply remarked that "Pardo de Tavera should have been shot for his betrayal of the Revolution".
- Resil Mojares, "Brains of the Nation". Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2006.
- Nick Joaquin, "A Question of Heroes". Makati: Ayala Museum, 1977
- Alfred McCoy, "Anarchy of Families". Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1994
- Quirino, Carlos. Who's Who in Philippine History. Manila: Tahanan Books, 1995.
- E. Arsenio Manuel. Dictionary of Philippine Biography, vol. 1, pp. 317-350. Quezon City: Filipiniana Publications, 1955.
External Links
- Ateneo Press description of "Brains of the Nation" Accessed 5 September 2009
- El caracter de Rizal 1918 article written by T.H. Pardo de Tavera on Jose Rizal. An online publication by Filipiniana.net Accessed 5 September 2009
- Biblioteca filipina Biblioteca filipina of T.H. Pardo de Tavera integrated with the James Robertson's Bibliography of the Philippine Islands and Aparato bibliografico de la historia general de filipinas Tomo II of Wenceslao Retana. An online publication by Filipiniana.net Accessed 5 September 2009
- "Trinidad Pardo de Tavera: Otro cordero que era lobo" blog post by Jose Perdigon Accessed 5 September 2009 | <urn:uuid:4e586938-0a4b-4b84-b48a-97cda894aefa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://en.wikipilipinas.org/index.php?title=Trinidad_Pardo_De_Tavera | 2013-05-22T00:42:12Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948954 | 3,496 |
BARGAIN!! HARGA MURAH!
WE ARE REDUCING THE COST PRICE BY A QUARTER OF A MILLION RM from the estimated valuation
SALE PRICE NOW $1.4 million ringgit (or nearest offer!!)
for 5 bedroom house and 12,000 sq ft land area.
REDUCED FROM $RM 1,650,000.
Yep, our house is up for sale. (NOTE: click on photos to enlarge)
...because there are only two of us and this house is BIG and the garden is even BIGGER. We are downsizing our lives...
THE GENERAL AREA
- Within walking distance of a primary school and a secondary school -- our own kids attended both, many years ago.
- Within walking distance of mosque and Darussyifa
- 3 min drive to wet market (in fact, we walk)
- 5 or 6 minutes drive from Universiti Kebangsaan, the North-South Highway exit, the new shopping centre coming up at the moment.
- 9 kms from Kajang town
- 8 minutes drive to the Komuter Train stop at UKM
- Easy drive to Universiti Putra, University Tenaga and Putra Jaya
- Serdang Hospital a mere 10-15 mins away
- As with almost all land in the area, it is leasehold. However, the lease does not run out for another 74 years! (April 2086)
- The area is 12,004 sq feet. Yes, it's huge. You can't buy blocks that big these days.
- It's on a rise with a view, very stable solid soil (the house has no cracks!)
- The land over the back fence is a green area that belongs to the Bangi Golf course and has not been developed
- The house has large, established back and front gardens.
- The house outer walls are a minimum of 11 feet from the fence on both sides, offering privacy and quiet.
- Part of the back yards has been fenced off to provide a goose pen, complete with cement pond. It also contains two rambutan and one nangka, all trees that fruit prolifically.
- Other fruits include bananas, breadfruit tree (buah sukun), longan (another prolific fruiter), an avocado (starting to flower for the first time) and a number of passionfruit vines (buah markisa).
- The neighbours are great!
- Over the years 70+ species of wild birds have been sighted in or from the garden. You too can wake up to birdsong...
We built it one-storey, thinking it would last us into old age when our knees start objecting to steps...
Great house for young children too, when there is no upstairs.
- Four large bedrooms + large maid's room (or storage area)
- Three bathrooms
- Large lounge (Italian tile floor
- Large dining (will take a 10 or 12 person table) Italian tile floor
- Large dry kitchen (we eat in the kitchen)
- Family room (with servery from kitchen, room large enough for family dining table)
- Large laundry area/wet kitchen
- Long side verandah with built in flower boxes
- Wide front verandah
- Orchid/fern pergola built as part of the house
- Much of the house flooring is laminated tropical hardwood board
- Under-roof garage area will take two cars and there is room to park 3 more in the driveway. Street parking is also ample.
|BEDROOM 2 ( & BEDROOM 3 same size)|
|KITCHEN, AS SEEN FROM FAMILY ROOM|
|STORAGE AREA/MAID'S BATH|
|MAIN PASSAGE FROM FRONT DOOR|
Sophisticated day or night alarm system with an interior infra-red motion alarm, as well as alarm circuits on all grilles and doors and ceiling. All this will still function even if the power is off. Tripping the alarm will register on your handphones and can be activated or de-activated by your phones. | <urn:uuid:1a1ffa21-02aa-4281-8103-3e282a75ffb0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://glendalarke.blogspot.com/2012/03/house-for-sale-bungalow-in-bandar-baru.html?showComment=1330697814989 | 2013-05-22T00:43:16Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.906245 | 879 |
We have come AFAR from becoming the Investigative Journalists blogging our extraordinary investigations to the world about Tony Fernandez and his AirAsia together with his recent failure of secret share swap deal with MAS. He deluded the Malaysia Prime Minister of the advantages in collaborating with Malaysia Airlines where the Prime Minister later discovered the deal was to bail out AirAsia by pirating Malaysia Airlines most profitable entity i.e. MAS MRO and Pilot Training Simulators for AirAsia group to increase AirAsia’s yearly revenue. This was admitted by Tony Fernandez in his recent statement to STAR Publication claiming there is no other hidden agenda but merely trying to make more money. Yes, it is very true Tony Fernandez is trying to make more money and he found that ‘MORE MONEY’ in Malaysia Airlines and so his treasure hunt for Malaysia Airlines funds started and henceforth plotted MAS heist with the help of Dr. Evil Kutty.
Dr. Evil Kutty hence ill-advised the Malaysia Prime Minister to allow the secret share swap deal be approved for AirAsia to prepare its invasion into Malaysia Airlines.
How Tony Fernandez failed miserably in his recent share swap deal between Malaysia Airlines and AirAsia?
The truth is Tony Fernandez did own Malaysia Airlines for only 8 months under the share swap deal until the secret deal was withdrawn by the Malaysia Prime Minister after the Prime Minister discovered Tony Fernandez’s SECRET strategy for bailing out AirAsia poor financial status as reported by GUAMs.
Once again, we’re reprinting this very interesting article from Another Brick in the Wall (ABITW). Please enjoy reading this informative article about Tony Fernandez’s publicity stunts after he failed securing MAS & AirAsia Share Swap deal.
When Tony Fernandez said he is ‘glad’ after Malaysia Airlines deal failed, it was a face saving remark. Of late, he has been talking too much and creating fanfare to save face and detour attention on his problems.
At least he did not say thing like being maligned and vilified in the blogosphere and ask the Board of Directors to affirm he is not a skunk. That is for pampered cry baby Gen Y CEO wannabees (Danny Johnny Fernandez) who claimed himself as an aviation specialist and expert. Tony Fernandez is made of harder stuff.
Let Tony Fernandez pass the business to Jakarta. See whether he will get the kind of service he gets with MAS and MAB. If he doesn’t pay up, pray the Indonesian don’t cut his ears off.
He was reported by Reuter here saying, “I’m just trying to make more money. There is no hidden agenda.”
What a greedy pig he is. There should not be any sympathy if he goes around like Van Gogh.
Fell for his fanfare
Tony Fernandez is just being himself.
The stupid thing is why did some fell for his tricks and treachery to sacrifice the national airline. It is really stupid to attempt the CCF deal with a known low life character. How could anyone missed that?
Before looking at the numbers and all, an important step in dealmaking is knowing the personality. Can you trust the person? Do they have any sense of honour?
Even thieves have honour and code.
Malaysiaairlinesfamilies added even PIRATES have pride and dignity. If you failed, surrender your epaulette and retreat from the pirates’ world. However, Tony Fernandez has thicker skin than we thought.
More foolish is the revelation that all the Air Asia people that joined MAS have and will return back to Air Asia.
From Idris Jala to AJ, can’t they see that?
Why would they leave an Airline they are convince is where the growth is to go to a highly debted, losing profitability and lost its premium shine, MAS?
Tony Fernandez have been talking of Jakarta for many years. Indonesian market is the growth of tomorrow.
Yet when in MAS, Danny gave the Bandung route to Tony Fernandez. Is the Board of Directors so sure of his honesty and integrity?
Moving or not to Jakarta
Again, don’t fall for Tony Fernandez’s Jakarta talk.
It is obvious he tries to replicate Malaysian operational success abroad. At the moment, he dare not say he moved his headquarter. He still depend on the Malaysian market and would jump should it be open up soon.
But he is talking big as though he could grow profit by five-fold abroad. Can he get the same preferential treatment and political clout in Malaysia as he gets abroad partnering with former political despots? [Read The Star today here]
So he claimed Air Asia will only establish an AirAsia Asean office. Its role will be similar to the Dublin office of RyanAir as strategic planning office for Europe. Sure, is Ryan Air headquarter in Dublin too?
They made a big fanfare out of the announcement of Air Asia’s new young lady CEO, Aireen Omar for Malaysian Operations.
But it’s too soon to say hurrah for women’s liberation, Kak Ena.
Not from a man who used his stewardess as sex object like Sir Richard Branson used his Virgin ladies. See You Tube above of Air Asia advert.
It is only a fanfare. Just like the move to Jakarta. Read The Edge report below:
AirAsia Malaysia’s HQ not moving to Jakarta, says Fernandes
Written by Surin Murugiah
Wednesday, 13 June 2012 13:32
KUALA LUMPUR (June 13): AIRASIA BHD ’s group chief executive officer Tan Sri Tony Fernandes reiterated that AirAsia Malaysia’s headquarters was not moving to Jakarta.
He said the low cost carrier (LCC) was committed to upholding its “Now Everyone Can Fly” pledge to Malaysians that.
In a statement Wednesday, Fernandes said the establishment of the AirAsia Asean office in Jakarta as the LCC’s regional base was to help to more fully deliver on that pledge to all the people of Asean and beyond.
He said that shifting AirAsia’s emphasis to a regional strategy was not just good business, but also a move that will keep the LCC ahead of the inevitable competition that is heading its way.
“But while others focus largely on trying to gain market share in domestic markets, we seek to expand our footprint throughout the region.
“After all, no single domestic market in Asean, not even Indonesia, can match the potential of a regional Asean market of 600 million people and a combined East Asian market of 2 billion,” he said.
He said AirAsia Asean would serve as the “nerve centre” of the LCC’s regional expansion.
He said it would operate very much like how the Ryanair office in Dublin, Ireland, serves as the strategic planning centre of Europe’s largest LCC.
“AirAsia Asean will also help us to ensure that our voice, our concerns and our appeals are heard much more clearly in the corridors of power within ASEAN,” he said.
Fernandes said that one of the reasons for locating the office in Jakarta was to help AirAsia engage more closely with the Asean Secretariat, which was headquartered in Indonesia’s capital city.
“Locating our regional base in Jakarta is also likely to have the beneficial effect of helping raise the profile and branding of AirAsia Indonesia, which is heading for a listing on the Jakarta Stock Exchange by the end of the year,” he said.
Indons ain’t stupid
Ignore all the cock and bull story of Jakarta as Asean Secretariat for Tony to ready for Open Sky 2015 and the potential of Asean.
There are about 20 LCCs competing in Indonesia. The Indonesians are spoilt with choices and not to be easily bullied as the Malaysian customers by it’s one and only LCC.
Even that is not for long with a law allowing Airline not on time to be sued.
The only way way AirAsia Indonesia can increase passenger load is to stop the long list of hidden costs and surcharges which totals up to the same price as Garuda ticket but without the inconvenience and long wait.
Associate company, PT Indonesia AirAsia was founded in 1999 as Awair and was then 40% owned by former President Abdul Rahman Wahid before he relinquished it.
It became an associate when Air Asia took over 49% in 2004. It changed name to Air Asia Indonesia on December 1, 2005. Air Asia Indonesia has currently a fleet of 17 A320s and by the look, it is struggling to get listed.
Initially, it was planned for fourth quarter 2011. The company had appointed CIMB Securities Indonesia and Credit Suisse Securities Indonesia as joint-lead underwriters for the 20 percent IPO.
Tony Fernandez announced for third and fourth quarter 2012. The Reuters Monday here reported Tony have moved it again to first quarter 2013. He claimed time was slotted for listing of Air Asia-X but he has been on a wait and see. Many scheduled IPO have been shelved.
There is a big headache for Tony Fernandez. Air Asia started operations in 2001 and get listed in 2007.
Only Gus Dur is known. The other Indonesian partner is not but could be powerful too. They may have waited long enough on Tony Fernandez’s promise to list.
On March 23rd here, ABITW wrote of the potential problem of Air Asia and the Air Asia Thai listing delay. That problem look solved. Thanks to Thaksin’s sister, Yingluck being Prime Minister.
Air Asia Thai was listed on May 31st. Read The Sundaily news report here.
According to The Edge report here, Air Asia need to list off both it’s Thai and Indonesian associate in order to bring its gearing to below 1 from 1.4. Still, the transfer of aircraft funding to the associate will only be gradual.
AirAsia placed a then record order with 75 Airbus advanced A320-200 planes worth USD18 billion for delivery 2016. Tony Fernandez boasted of ordering another USD4 billion deal to buy another 50 Airbus A320s. In addition, Tony was reported to have ordered 200 Airbus 320 Neo and the option of another 100 more.
He’s plan to sign five more joint-venture agreements with regional airlines within the next two years. Read Business Times here.
To IPO or not?
Tony is telling the Malaysian media as though the Indonesiaan are sitting still.
Indonesia’s leading LCC, Lion Air has a USD21.5 billion deal for 230 Boeings 737 to add to their existing fleet of 92. Their order book is 400 airplanes. Lion Air has 51% market share of Indonesiaan domestic market and ambitous target of 60% market share, which some see as implausible.Lion Air had to announce delay of their USD1 billion IPO flotation plan due to poor market condition and safety ban by EU.Aside from Garuda and Lion, there is also Singapore Tiger Airways’s Mandala and Pacific Royale to contend with.
One can see how edgy he is but he can’t show that in Malaysia. He carries an image of being on the ball and like Ferguson of Manchester United or Branson of Virgin have the upper-hand in the war of words.
Two major IPO for Singapore and Hong Kong has been recalled due to market volatility stemming from the European debt crisis. He can’t play acting on this.
Women CEO distraction
With Tony Fernandez and Kamarudin Meranun leaving for Jakarta, flagbearer Air Asia Malaysia will be under 38 year old Aireen Omar. The announcement of a young woman as CEO seems to distract media from the headache Tony is facing.She joined AirAsia in January 2006 as Director of Corporate Finance and is now Regional Head of Corporate Finance and Treasury.Before that, she studied Economics and Political Science from the London School of Economics (LSE) and holds a Masters in Economics from New York University (NYU).
Started out as an Associate with Deutsche Bank Securities Inc, New York in September 1997 till August 2000.
Returned to join Maybank Investment Bank as Assistant Vice-President from March 2001 to November 2003. In December 2003 she joined Bumiwerks Capital Management as Director until December 2005.
Maybank Investment Bank and Bumiwerk; birds of the same feather flocks together. The link to Tan Sri Nor Mohamad Yakcop and Dato Kalimullah Masyerullah Hassan remains.
More management change in MAS as CFO Rozman Omar is set to leave. So too is Head of Engineering, Azhari Mohd Dahlan. Both are likely to return to Air Asia.
It seems former MAS Datuk Bernard Francis is rejoining as Head of Commercial for Air Asia Indonesia. Make your own conclusion.
All Tony Fernandez need to do is take in Danny.
Now that Tony Fernandez’s cards are opened, he has a game playing with MAHB. Will he continue with it or leave it to Aireen to handle.
With his move to Jakarta and his big plans known, Malaysia Airport can’t afford to blink in the eyeball-to-eyeball head-on between Tan Sri Bashir and Tony Fernandez.
His move to Jakarta is not about getting away from the tense of operations at the headquarter and a relax environment to plan and monitor the competition with 20 other staff.
It’s about making Air Asia Indonesia grab the Indonesian market share. This time they do not have a Khairy and Zaki Zahid. Neither a Tun Abdullah.
Even if they do, the market is the determinant. They can’t yelll unfaoir and at the same time, get all the preferential treatments.
MAB know that with the failure of his Air Asia-X long haul model, tough global economy, rising competition, and made worse by his bad boy image within industry, they can call his bluff.
If only, there is no politicians and Khazanah interference.
But Tony Fernandez knows that Khazanah only extend Bashir’s contract by a year and looks likely, Khazanah is looking for someone to put there.
Tony Fernandez will want to put his man. Hope they are not talking of Danny still.
With respect to another Khazanah company, Malaysia Airlines, they should look at Indonesia too. For that matter, MAS must be able to see beyond the obvious before they go.
Does Khazanah roar have MAS interest at heart? And what is in their heart for Penerbangan Malaysia Berhad? | <urn:uuid:7c6966d0-ad84-4ab3-9131-3af603218685> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://malaysiaairlinesfamilies.wordpress.com/2012/06/20/tony-fernandez-was-defeated-by-guams-over-t-share-swap-deal-with-mas/ | 2013-05-22T00:21:50Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954967 | 3,073 |
While naturally enigmatic, and with a body most of us would do just about anything for - Ukrainian Queen Diana tells Missosology about the hard-work that goes into her success. She speaks candidly about the highs and lows she has experienced from the pageant and her plans for the future, which includes shooting high-budgeted movies in the year to come.
How were you elevated from being a finalist to Miss Asia Pacific World 2011? Why was the original winner, Florima from France dethroned?
Last year Miss Asia Pacific World 2011 was held in South Korea. There were some mistakes in a pageant just due to lack of experience of hosting such events. So one of mistakes was problems with judgement and votes, mostly it was mistake of chaperons and hosts on the stage. That's why actually i am gonna co-host the pageant this year, because last year’s hosts really lacked experience and did lots of mistakes. From our Top 7 finalists only 2 girls were asked final questions. So due to these mistakes after the final organizers tried to correct it the best way. The winner was France and other 6 girls (including me) were just runners-up without ranking, same as in Miss Earth, all runners-up got same power. But practically after the final I was the only runner-up who stayed in Korea with winner for one month more for all the obligations. We did lots of visits, interviews and photoshoots. Also Miss Asia Pacific World Star Ingrid Fernandez from Puerto Rico stayed with us. On May 8, 2012, Florima was dethroned & MAPW Organization decided to appoint a new winner from the runners-up and they asked me if I would accept this crown. After that I was crowned as new Miss Asia Pacific World 2011 and started to fulfil my new obligations. Florima was dethroned due to attitude problem. Sometimes girls imagine that to be a queen means to have some wonderful life, when a lot of people serving you, and you are just seated in a limousine with a glass of champagne. In reality to be a winner of a big pageant means first of all to represent the Organization, to do your best. It is not about getting only, it is about giving: your energy, time, to work hard. When we stayed in Korea after the pageant and just a day before the photoshoot we asked organizers to go for manicure etc. MAPW Organization did their best actually. They took us for manicure, to dentist to whiten teeth and tried to make all queens’ desires come true. But when I heard that she asked for depilation for the legs: "Do you want me to pose with hairy legs on a photoshoot tomorrow???", I felt she may lose her title one day. Unfortunately it was just begging. There was a time when Florima went to a jeweller with her crown to check how much it cost. She blamed organizers that it doesn't cost 10,000 USD. Well, honestly to say maybe that crown really didn't cost that much money, but i really cannot believe that somebody aims to join a big beauty pageant to win a crown and later to take diamonds of it and sell it....Pardon...The pageant was filled with controversies last year. Can you summarize to me your whole experience as a participant?
Personally I absolutely enjoyed the competition, I enjoyed almost each single second of my stay in Korea. It is not my first international pageant and even if compare with others, I’d say that Miss Asia Pacific World was a great and nice experience. I loved Korea, people, our chaperons Ken and Sean, I met new friends in my life: Miss Malaysia, Miss Brazil and Miss Netherlands. I am so glad of our temple visit, that day I will remember all my life and absolutely will share my new knowledge with my friends and family. That's was unforgettable!!! What I didn't like is unfixed schedule, because we never knew the program and was difficult to manage clothes. Also I expected more from talent competition as I used to bring piano from Ukraine, I believed it is important part. Also I didn't like mistakes during the final, but thank God the organizers solved the mistakes and for sure better late than never! It really showed me the organizers are honest, just didn't have experience, which is normal for people who holds the pageant for the first time. I just want to say from my heart that Korea is now like my second home, and because of the pageant I discovered a new country, I enjoyed our program, I enjoyed the food and ate the most delicious cream-soup in the world - with broccoli in Daegu city. This journey is maybe one of the top-3 best events of my life!How’s life after the Miss Asia Pacific World pageant?
After the pageant in Korea, the organisation still took care of me even when I was just a runner-up. Also I got so many contacts and work after that.Before your participation in Miss Asia Pacific World, I’m sure you used to have perceptions about the pageant. At this present time, how would you define Miss Asia Pacific World in your own terms?
Miss Asia Pacific World is absolutely a great chance for the girls to make a career in showbiz industry. It is a pageant not about charity like Miss World etc. It is absolutely for girls who wants to be singers, actresses etc. MAPW is not just a show, it is a chance for the winner and the runners-up to actually even by just being a contestant, get a contact.We are wondering if you have beauty secrets. Please share this to us.
Well...i guess best beauty secrets I learned from Shandi Finnessey, Miss USA 2004. Let's say it is more not about the secret, but a general idea. She said that experienced beauty queens learn a lot of tricks to show themselves in a best way like to wear a right bra and high heels etc. As for me. I think it’s very important to have your style, to use the best cosmetic products like Kerastase for the hair, Shu Uemura lash curler and eye shadows, also brushes, Chanel lip pencils, Serge Lutens lipstick, Darphine skincare etc. This is just my list, but for sure each girl can choose the best for her. But biggest secret is to sleep enough it helps you look fresh and gives you energy to look good. Also I think sometimes you need to use service of some good professionals: to find right hairdresser, also make-up artist to shape the brows because it is architecture of the face. As for the body I prefer sometimes to have protein diet because it is a best way to lose weight, but to keep a toned body and great skin. I like also French vitamins Oenobiol, they have many different kind for all beauty problems. And of course very important is inner beauty, because honestly to say nobody can create an atmosphere which doesn't belong to him/her. So if you are beautiful inside, the people around you will absolutely feel it and see it in your eyes!What were your obligations & upcoming plans as Miss Asia Pacific World titleholder?
During my short reign I visited 8 countries, participated in Cannes Film Festival, turned from fashion model to an actress, received a main role in a film about Benazir Bhutto, which is planned to be applied for an Oscar awards next year. I played in two Ukrainian films as Miss Asia Pacific World, joined charity programs (despite it is not a concept of my title, but I took my chance to use my crown for these purposes too) and lots of other projects and photo shoots for magazines etc. On June 16, i will crown my successor in Seoul and at the end on June I will fly to Pakistan to play in a movie "Daughter of Destiny", it will be filmed in Pakistan, United States and England till December. I still have to do a big lingerie campaign for one Italian company as model, but mostly I seriously turned to an actress nowadays.What is your advice to this year's Miss Asia Pacific World contestants?
My advice to the girls is to be honest with themselves, the pageant is looking for various talents, just for talented contestants, who wants to be Stars, to work hard. MAPW can give lots of opportunities, but just the girl must understand if she wants to be a model, or actress or singer or TV host, no need to think what the pageant is looking for, very important to understand what you want! The pageant just needs a talented beautiful girl with good attitude, who understands that after coronation she will get a chance to travel around the world.Finally, your message to Missosology?
2. I am so glad that Missosology covered the pageant, because we can see all our pictures from all days. Also i am so glad to discover this new website for me and team of Missosology became good friends with many of us! I hope to stay in despite having a busy schedule. Also for those who interested, welcome to my website www.dianastarkova.com
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The list has been arranged, as possible, in reverse chronological order. I should note that the contents have been lightly edited to reduce entry length; almost all of these edits have removed references to recent sources in the outside literature which are not further identified. My apologies for this to the authors, but readers should of course consult the original sources to get the full picture, often extending well beyond Wallace studies per se.
. . . How is it that the memes of poetry remained a strong presence in the life of Wallace but disappeared from the life of Darwin even though both men were very much involved in scientific research that led both to the same revolutionary paradigm of natural selection? Perhaps the answer to this question may be found in a famous clash between the two scientific titans. For as Himmelfarb (1986) has remarked, 'Wallace not only had the distinction of being the first Darwinist; he was also the first renegade Darwinist'. And the issue on which Wallace became a 'renegade' was hardly trivial. Whereas Darwin believed that the science of evolution could completely account for the human species, Wallace had his doubts. His 'little heresy' as he called it was actually not so little, for he questioned whether the science of natural selection could account for 'the moral and higher intellectual nature of man' . . . --Bryce Christensen, October 2012. Changing English: Studies in Culture and Education 18(4): 400.
. . . The first author who expected mimicry by light was Wallace (1878) himself, who erroneously supposed click beetles for firefly mimics. Nevertheless, their light is different and they also appeared inedible too (Harvey 1956). Cockroaches are fat and tasty, so the mimic is at the place. One mimicry by light (aggressive, Batesian-Wallacian or Peckhammian) is actually known (Lloyd 1965, 1984): Predaceous fireflies Photuris (and also Bicellychonia) mimic the flash responses of females of other, up to five different (Lloyd 1983) species, attract males, and catch them, often during flight . . . --Peter Vršanský et al., September 2012. Naturwissenschaften 99(9): 748.
. . . Background matching prey coloration and its adaptive features have been recognized by biologists for a long time. The related idea that prey animals can decrease their probability of being detected through behavioural features was already discussed by Alfred Russel Wallace. . . . It has been shown experimentally that background matching effectively reduces predation risk imposed by predators, for example, in fishes and birds. Preference for backgrounds that reduce the risk of detection has thus been suggested to be an important and wide spread strategy among prey animals to decrease their predation risk. It is also a common assumption that prey animals have been selected to actively prefer visually matching backgrounds. However, considering the popularity of this idea, surprisingly few experimental studies testing it exist . . . --Karin Kjernsmo & Sami Merilaita, August 2012. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 279(1745): 4192.
. . . After planting doubts about sexual selection as the unique explanation, Wallace (1868) associated sexual dichromatism with the nesting habits of birds in relation to the risk of nest predation. He considered that, assuming that (i) incubation attendance by either sex promotes cryptic plumage in open nesters, but (ii) not in cavity or domed nesters, (iii) conspicuous sexual monochromatism should be associated with cavity or domed nesting, and (iv) sexual dichromatism with conspicuous males and cryptic females should be related to open nesting (Table 1). Wallace (1868) offered support for the two last predictions by listing 23 phylogenetically related groups of birds (i.e. families or genera) with conspicuous monochromatism nesting in cavities or domed nests and seven families with bright males and dull females with open nesting habits. Wallace (1868, 1889) also predicted that because of the higher phylogenetic lability of plumage colour, changes in nesting habits would come first and be followed by changes in coloration. Darwin (1871) disagreed with this view and forcefully argued that plumage coloration could select for changes in nesting habits while the opposite was less plausible. In nearly a century and a half elapsed since Wallace first presented his theory on avian sexual dichromatism in relation to nesting habits, few attempts have been made to empirically check its validity despite the attention that sexual dichromatism as variable reflecting the strength of sexual selection in different bird species has received during the last decades (see for instance, Amundsen & Pärn, 2006) and the huge increase in information on avian natural history and phylogeny . . . --J. J. Soler & J. Moreno, May 2012. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 25(8): 1615.
. . . In this article, we tested some assumptions and predictions of Wallace’s theory by analysing plumage conspicuousness and dichromatism, nesting habits and incubation attendance of European passerines as described in Handbook of Birds of The Western Palearctic (HBWP; Cramp & Perrins, 1988, 1992, 1993, 1994a,b). We have also corrected for phylogenetic relationships in all analyses as nesting habits, and to a lesser degree sexual dichromatism, may show a marked phylogenetic component as already argued by Wallace (1889). According to the fundamental assumption of Wallace that incubation attendance by either sex promotes cryptic plumage in open nesters, but not in cavity nesters, conspicuousness in either sex should be related to incubation attendance, nest type and their interaction (Prediction 1). Moreover, the predictions by Wallace that conspicuous sexual monochromatism should be associated with cavity or domed nesting, and sexual dichromatism with conspicuous males and cryptic females should be related to open nesting, were tested by relating degree of male and female conspicuousness to nest type and sexual dichromatism. . . . --J. J. Soler & J. Moreno, May 2012. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 25(8): 1615-1616.
. . . The world 's terrestrial zoogeographical regions were originally outlined by Sclater (1858) and Wallace (1876), primarily on the basis of vertebrates, because their distribution records were the most complete at the time. Since then, the completeness of records has improved dramatically for both vertebrates and invertebrates, and although invertebrates represent a far greater proportion of total animal diversity, tetrapod vertebrates remain the best group for comparatively testing biogeographical hypotheses, with a comprehensive data set having become openly available online (WWF 2010). Specifically, where the world's biogeographical regions are concerned, it makes sense to test their accuracy using the same groups of organisms used to delimit them in the first place . . . --Şerban Procheş & Syd Ramdhani, March 2012. Bioscience 62(3): 260.
. . . During his student days, however, Meyer had also encountered the works of the British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace. In 1869, when Wallace published The Malay Archipelago, describing his travels and observations in the region from 1854 to 1862, Meyer produced an authorised translation, Der Malayische Archipel, within the same year. In 1870, he added two collections on the origin of species and the theory of natural selection, translated from original essays by Wallace and Darwin. On 6 July of the same year, Meyer embarked for Batavia (Jakarta) and by the end of September was stationed in Menado (Manado, North Sulawesi). Clearly, his admiration for Wallace's work influenced his decision to go abroad; indeed, Chris Ballard counts him as one among a 'wave of naturalist explorers' who travelled to the Malay Archipelago during the 1870s in Wallace’s wake, 'each bearing copies of his book and consciously emulating his earlier feats' . . . --Hilary Howes, March 2012. The Journal of Pacific History 47(1): 25.
. . . Most species remain undescribed and unknown. Recognizing and describing them is, however, just the beginning of a process. For most of the species already described, we probably know little more than some morphological characteristics and a few, if not a single, locality (as a spot distribution within an unknown range). This shortfall was named by Lomolino (2004) as the "Wallacean shortfall". Compiling good distributional data is the first stage of any systematic conservation planning exercise (Margules and Pressey, 2000). Without reasonable information of where species live, it is impossible to know which are endangered and where to concentrate efforts to preserve them . . . --Pedro Cardoso et al., November 2011. Biological Conservation 144(11): 2651.
. . .Wallace's Line demarcates the most abrupt faunal transition in the world. To a seasoned naturalist like Wallace, this unique juxtaposition of dramatically different faunas, first noted by Müller (1846), was obvious, was anomalous, and begged explanation; so it is perhaps no accident that biogeographic study effectively began in the IAA. The range limits of many terrestrial taxa are coincident with the eastern edge of the Sunda Shelf, and the taxonomic compositions of communities on either side are distinctly different. Wallace advocated geological explanations for these biological differences. He suggested, for example, that Bali and Lombok were formerly widely separated and had only recently moved to their present positions <40 km apart; he also noted that faunal discontinuities were associated with deep straits (Wallace 1860). Wallace first described the Line in an 1858 letter to H.W. Bates (Marchant 1916, p. 66) before he mapped the Line (Wallace 1863) that was later given his name by Huxley (1868) and expounded upon these observations in books on the IAA and biogeography in general (e.g., Wallace 1869). The veracity of Wallace's observations was debated because the existence of such a stark faunal divide seemed improbable, and this spurred intense study of distribution patterns in the region (e.g., Weber 1902). . .–David J. Lohman et al., August 2011. Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics 42: 208.
. . . The processes governing the evolution of sexual dimorphism provided a foundation for sexual selection theory. Two alternative processes, originally proposed by Darwin and Wallace, differ primarily in the timing of events creating the dimorphism. In the process advocated by Darwin, a novel ornament arises in a single sex, with no temporal separation in the origin and sex-limitation of the novel trait. By contrast, Wallace proposed a process where novel ornaments appear simultaneously in both sexes, but are then converted into sex-limited expression by natural selection acting against showy coloration in one sex. Here, we investigate these alternative modes of sexual dimorphism evolution in a phylogenetic framework and demonstrate that both processes contribute to dimorphic wing patterns in the butterfly genera Bicyclus and Funonia . . . Our analyses support both hypotheses advocated by Darwin and Wallace for the origin of sexual dimorphism: some sexually dimorphic ornaments arise concomitantly with sex-limited expression, while others arise in both sexes but are subsequently lost in one sex. Thus both modes of evolution are applicable to the evolution of sexual dimorphism in butterflies . . . --Jeffrey C. Oliver & Antónia Monteiro, 7 July 2011. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 278(1714): 1981, 1985.
. . .Wallace (1889) was the first to propose that cuckoo-hawk resemblance was a form of mimicry, which Wyllie (1981) suggested might aid parasitic laying by frightening aggressive hosts away from the nest. In support of this idea, hawk-like plumage, with cryptic upperparts and pale, barred underparts, is more prevalent in parasitic than in nonparasitic cuckoos (Payne 1967) and most likely evolved after the evolution of brood parasitism (Krüger et al. 2007) . . . –Justin A. Welbergen & Nicholas B. Davies, May-June 2011. Behavioral Ecology 22(3): 574.
. . . While there were numerous previous philosophical treatises on the topic, stretching back to speculations about the origin of the universe in ancient times, scientific proposals are more recent. A well known one was biologist Alfred Russell Wallace, who wrote in 1904: "Such a vast and complex universe as that which we know exists around us, may have been absolutely required . . . in order to produce a world that should be precisely adapted in every detail for the orderly development of life culminating in man". But that was before modern cosmology was established; the idea of the expanding and evolving universe was yet to come . . . --George Ellis, 13 May 2011. General Relativity and Gravitation 43(11): 3213.
This brings us back to the Popp. et al. analysis of Empetrum. Their dating analysis shows quite convincingly that the relevant phylogenetic splits do not date to the Jurassic--not even close. Instead, they probably happened in the Pleistocene less than 1 Mya. We can, therefore, immediately rule out ancient vicariance, but it is not quite as easy to choose between a Darwin or a Wallace migration scenario and the long-distance dispersal favored by Popp et al. As Popp et al. point out, Empetrum is not currently known along the Andes, and its distinctive pollen grains have never been found there. However, as Wallace (1880) argued, this does not entirely rule out that they passed through the Andes and then disappeared as suitable habits shrank . . . --Michael J. Donoghue, 19 April 2011. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 108: 6341-6342.
. . . Although theories of animal colouration were developed principally in regard to terrestrial species (Wallace 1879; Poulton 1890; Cott 1940; Edmunds 1974), from early on they were applied to aquatic species too (e.g., Wallace 1889; Beddard 1895; Longley 1916, 1917). Nonetheless, colouration of aquatic organisms is subject to different selection pressures than those operating on land because scattering of light in water leads to an unchanging angular distribution of light direction; light only penetrates surface waters, the extent to which additionally depends on turbidity; light may be refracted at the surface; and species that use the water column may be viewed by prey, predators or conspecifics from almost any angle (Lythgoe 1987; Marshall 2000; Hanlon et al. 2009; Zylinski et al. 2009). These properties favour certain mechanisms of crypsis including transparency, counter illumination and countershading (Johnsen 2011; Johnsen et al. 2004; Ruxton et al. 2004) . . . –Tim Caro et al., April 2011. Evolutionary Ecology 25(6): 1232.
. . . More than 130 years on, the biogeographic scheme of Sclater and Wallace continues to form a basis for continental-scale geographic comparison of mammalian communities. Any observer of modern Africa can quickly recognize the stark ecological boundary delimited by the Sahara Desert, with the vast diversity of African-endemic taxa restricted to regions to its south. With almost no African fossil record to consult, scientists of the 19th and early 20th centuries could only speculate on the age or historical development of this continent's biogeography. In contrast, the last 100 years of paleontological exploration have provided a wealth of information that allows for an investigation into the developmental history of African endemism as a whole, and the Ethiopian biogeography realm in particular. Wallace's proposal of "long epochs" of isolating barriers can now be more precisely formulated and addressed . . . --Faysal Bibi, February 2011. PloS One 6(2): 1-10.
. . . Wallace noted the problem of incipient evolutionary stages. He argued that incipient and intermediate stages might have little selective survival advantage, as with a partially developed wing; yet evolution progressed to new forms and greater complexity as if teleologically guided. Wallace thus predicted the problem of "irreducible complexity" (Behe, 2004). A group composed of Paleo-anthropologists and Linguists similarly argued that the physical and cognitive articulations required for human speech are so sophisticated that it is difficult to imagine intermediary systems (Picq et al., 2008). They described as a Neo-Darwinian tautology the argument that if a human feature existed, then it must be adaptive, otherwise it would not have survived. This is a form of Panglossian, overly-optimistic), post-hoc reasoning . . . --Michael M. DelMonte, January 2011. The International Journal of Healing and Caring 11(1).
. . . the evolution of longer floral tubes forced the evolution of longer insect proboscides, which in turn forced the selection for even longer floral tubes. Wallace (1867) noted that this positive feedback system would continue generating longer and longer traits until it is balanced by an opposing selective pressure. Although he did not elaborate much on opposing selective pressures, Wallace (1867) implied that proboscis and tube lengthening would only be advantageous to a point, after which increased length may become a liability (e.g. Harder 1983; Kunte 2007). Insects with excessively long proboscides may have difficulty maneuvering them and inserting them accurately into the narrow gullets of flowers (e.g. Harder 1983) . . . --Allan G. Ellis & Bruce Anderson, 2011. In Sébastien Patiny, ed., Evolution of Plant-Pollinator Relationships (Cambridge University Press): 237-262.
. . . Inspired by evolutionary computation, artificial life, multi-agent systems and social cognition, we develop a more realistic distribution of environments. The basic idea is straightforward: intelligence is the result of evolution through millions of generations interacting with other live beings. Thus we define intelligence in this context, interacting with other agents of similar intelligence. We formalise the so-called Darwin-Wallace distribution for agents and environments. Despite the many options and the many sources of uncomputability, we claim that, conceptually, the notion of Darwin-Wallace distribution is useful to re-visit previous definitions of intelligence. The next step is how this notion can be used for AGI development and evaluation. We present a procedure which approximates a Darwin-Wallace distribution by using intelligence tests over environments such that 'certified' systems are incorporated into the environments, so making them socially more complex . . . --José Hernández-Orallo et al., 2011. 'On more realistic environment distributions for defining, evaluating and developing intelligence' (http://users.dsic.upv.es): 3.
Wallace's approach to cosmology shows how the consideration of the conditions necessary for the evolution of life is not wedded to any particular theory of star formation and development but must be used appropriately in any cosmology we pursue . . . --John D. Barrow, 2011. The Book of Universes: Exploring the Limits of the Cosmos (W. W. Norton).
. . . The term used to describe this type of speciation is allopatry, as opposed to sympatry, where ancestral and descendant species coexist in the same environment (or parapatry if they exist side by side, with a hybridisation zone in between). If two populations having evolved separately come back in contact later on, the intermediate phenotype of their offspring could make them unfit for either environment, and this would then provide the selective pressure for the selection of additional reproductive barriers, in a process called reinforcement, and often referred to as 'the Wallace effect'. Indeed, the earliest promoter of the view that reinforcement could occur under the pressure of natural selection was undoubtedly Alfred Wallace, who disagreed with Darwin's views that reproductive isolation could not possibly result from natural selection: "The sterility of first crosses and of their hybrid progeny has not been acquired through natural selection" (The Origin, Summary of Hybridism chapter). This point was a subject of written exchanges and arguments in private correspondence between the two around 1858 [[sic]], 10 years after their joint communication to the Linnean Society in July 1858, but Wallace formally published his views only in 1889, some twenty year later, in chapter VII of his book called Darwinism. On the subject of allopatry versus sympatry, I do take a very divergent view to that adopted by a majority of evolutionary biologists to this day. Rather, I choose to follow Wallace's path against Darwin's in thinking that natural selection plays a major role in the reproductive isolation that defines species, and I shall actually venture some steps further than Wallace, and will advocate in the following pages that natural selection can act on the very first stages of reproductive isolation, and not just on reinforcement after divergence has taken place . . . --Etienne Joly, 25 November 2010. Nature Precedings: 3.
. . . By the time he wrote Island life, Wallace (1881) knew of 21 species of Philippine mammals, most of which are either widespread species or Palawan endemics. Thus, he had virtually no knowledge of the highly endemic mammal communities in the oceanic Philippines. At the time, even less was known of amphibian and reptile diversity (Boulenger, 1894). Thus, Wallace's impression of the Philippine fauna, and his biogeographic delineations of it, were taken from a very small, biased sample of the diversity . . . --Jacob A. Esselstyn et al., November 2010. Journal of Biogeography 37(11): 2055.
. . . With growing knowledge about species distributions, updated summary information on species richness, endemism and faunistic resemblance has been assembled and analysed within the classic Wallace scheme (Chapin, 1923; Smith, 1983; Cole et al., 1994; Newton & Dale, 2001). Furthermore, various refinements have been proposed, many of them addressing delineations of subregions, districts etc. within classic Wallace regions (e.g. Chapin, 1923; Hagmeier & Stults, 1964; Hagmeier, 1966; Hershkovitz, 1969; Crowe & Crowe, 1982) or boundaries and transition zones between regions, e.g. between the Oriental and Australian realm (e.g. Mayr, 1944; Simpson, 1977; Vane-Wright, 1991; Beck et al., 2006b) . . . --Holger Kreft & Walter Jetz, November 2010. Journal of Biogeography 37(11): 2030.
. . . Few recognize, as Cronin (1991) documents, that the contemporary dominance of adaptive intersexual selection models, which assuming a controlling power of natural selection on mating preferences, represents a triumph of Wallace's view over the arguments of Darwin himself. Most contemporary researchers are the intellectual descendents of Wallace. Like Wallace, they are using the logic of Darwin's Origin to argue against Darwin's Selection in Relation to Sex. For one, Dawkins proudly embraces Cronin's label as a modern Wallacean, describing the theories of Zahavi, Hamilton, and Grafen as a "neo-Wallacean" triumph over the incomplete and muddled mate choice mechanism of Darwin and Fisher . . . --Richard O. Prum, November 2010. Evolution 64(11): 3097.
The key feedbacks that amplify change in the region are the reflectivity of the ground and the moisture in the air, factors that were discussed more than a 100 years ago by the geologist James Croll and the naturalist Alfred Russell Wallace. Wallace, for example, wrote as follows (1895, p. 157): ... the increased heat of summer could not be in any way stored up, but would be largely prevented from producing any effect, by reflection from the surface of the snow and by the intervention of clouds and fog ... Reflectivity (albedo) is now generally recognized as the dominant feedback factor. The net contributions of clouds and fog, although clearly important, are less obvious and are difficult to quantify . . . --Wolfgang H. Berger, Michael Schulz & Gerold Wefer, October 2010. International Journal of Earth Sciences 99, Supplement 1: 171-189.
For Wallace, the two processes of isolation in space and biological differentiation through time were inseparable, because one (isolation) led to the other (speciation). Wallace's view of what constituted natural--the dual criteria of biological and geological uniqueness--has some important implications for how natural biogeographical units are identified. Because Wallace was the first to suggest a geological/historical component to the identification of natural biogeographical areas. I propose to name such entities Wallacean biogeographical units . . . --Bernard Michaux, September 2010. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 101: 193-212.
. . . In my view there is a further step to take, and that is to confirm that areas of endemism are also Wallacean biogeographical units. These are the fundamental units for further biogeographical analysis because they are natural entities, not human constructs. For example, 'Sulawesi' is an area of endemism, but not a Wallacean biogeographical unit: it is a human geopolitical construct that has no biogeographical reality. Any attempt to use the area 'Sulawesi' in biogeographical analysis is doomed to failure . . . --Bernard Michaux, September 2010. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 101: 193-212.
. . . Roy Davies has assembled a convincing case that Darwin was much more cavalier with attribution, particularly with regard to Wallace, than commonly thought and in several instances failed to cite or give adequate credit to his antecedents. He concludes that Wallace has a stronger claim to the theory of evolution than commonly realized . . . --David Lloyd, Julian Wimpenny & Alfred Venables, September 2010. Journal of Biosciences 35: 339- 349.
That Wallace almost certainly solved the problem of divergence before Darwin did is, perhaps, not surprising. Wallace had much the greater experience in the field of biogeography, which was so fundamental to unravelling the relationships between species. But, even more importantly, he had the advantage that, unlike Darwin, he was looking actively for evidence of evolution while in the field, and could therefore tailor his data collection appropriately. By contrast, Sulloway has recently argued most persuasively that during the voyage on The Beagle Darwin was still a creationist in attitude; this blunted his appreciation of the evolutionary significance of the Galapagos fauna to the extent that he failed to collect a single tortoise specimen and neglected to label his finch specimens with their exact islands of origin . . . --David Lloyd, Julian Wimpenny & Alfred Venables, September 2010. Journal of Biosciences 35: 339-349.
. . . 'Muir went over to Darwinism with all the rest' (Worster, 2008, p. 204), stating 'Not that I would in any way oppose the discovered truths of evolution for I embrace them cordially' (Worster, 2008, p. 206). And so Worster (p. 207) suggests a 'glowing endorsement' of Darwinism, taking Muir 'far . . . from, the evangelical orthodoxy and towards a more liberal, science-based view of the world'. There is, then, a likely influence of Darwin in Muir's later life and reading. Moreover, books in the Muir collection at Pacific University show that he was also reading the works of Alfred Russel Wallace, whom he met, the two naturalists together visiting the Muir Woods of northern California (Wallace, 1905, p. 158) . . . --R. M. McDowall, September 2010. Journal of Biogeography 37(9): 1634.
. . .Biological barriers act throughout the lifecycle and are often classified according to the point in the life cycle that they are encountered (e.g. premating vs. postmating). Barriers at each stage can arise as byproducts of within lineage evolution as a result of natural or sexual selection or genetic drift, but natural selection against maladaptive hybridization itself can also drive evolution of reproductive isolation barriers (Wallace, 1889; Fisher, 1930; Dobzhansky, 1937). This process is usually termed reinforcement, and as the name implies, it requires the pre-existence of some degree of reproductive isolation, which is then 'reinforced' by the evolution of additional barriers. Studies of reinforcement have focused overwhelmingly on premating barriers. . . . Nevertheless, selection on postmating barriers is at least theoretically possible (Wallace, 1889; Coyne, 1974). Wallace argued that selection among demes could drive hybrid inviability by reducing the negative impact of low-quality hybrids (Wallace, 1889) . . . --E. Turner, D. J. Jacobson & J. W. Taylor, August 2010. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 23(8): 1642.
. . . He spent years living on his own in Amazonia and then in the Malay archipelago, making detailed and sympathetic observations about local peoples, practices and cultures. In the latter context his travelling companion and research assistant for many years was a young Malay man, Ali. At their parting, in 1862, Wallace commissioned a photograph of Ali to carry home to England and included it in his 1905 autobiography. Compare this to the erasure of non-white participation and assistance in other European explorers' accounts of the time . . . --Kathleen Bolling Lowrey, August 2010. Anthropology Today 26(4): 18-21.
. . . one must simply concede that during the 20th-century history of the discipline anthropologists have accumulated a huge wealth of data relating to question 3 for which no plausible explanation, general theory, or provisional hypothesis exists . . . And this is why, under present circumstances, I want to advocate for Wallace--a brilliant and unashamed crank--as an ancestor-figure for contemporary anthropology. In Wallace's articulation of the theory of evolution, he arrived at the same answers to questions 2 and 3, responding as follows: (1) common origin, endless divergence; (2) co-operation; (3) no . . . --Kathleen Bolling Lowrey, August 2010. Anthropology Today 26(4): 18-21.
Wallace quite rightly considered the lush complexity of human thought a serious mystery, one inexplicable within the necessity-driven framework of natural selection. As he put it, the human brain 'furnishes a surplusage of power--of an instrument beyond the needs of its possessor'. This sounds very much like Levi-Strauss's enchanting assertion that 'the universe is never charged with sufficient meaning [...] the mind always has more meanings available than there are objects to which to relate them' . . . --Kathleen Bolling Lowrey, August 2010. Anthropology Today 26(4): 18-21.
Wallace (1890) suggested that the primary function of egg coloration was to provide crypsis to avoid predation, although the experimental evidence supporting this hypothesis has been equivocal. One possible reason for this is that the experimental protocols typically involve painting eggs and comparing predation rates on painted versus natural eggs. With but one exception, all the egg-predation experiments cited in their review use painted eggs . . . --Michael I. Cherry & Andrew G. Gosler, August 2010. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 100: 753-762.
. . . Beatty et al. (2004) conducted another study, this time assessing the selection for mimicry using human predators and computer-generated prey. They found that when there are only 2 unprofitable prey types, selection for mimicry was weak. One reason for the results, they suggested, was that predators may not be sufficiently confused to generate selection for mimicry when just 2 different forms are involved. In an explanation for the evolution of conspicuous signals, Wallace (1889, p. 255) suggested that "not only do fewer individuals of each species need to be sacrificed in order that their enemies learn the lesson of their inedibility (in cases of mimicry), but they are more easily recognized at a distance and thus escape even pursuit. There is thus a kind of mimicry between closely allied species as well as between species of distinct genera, all tending to the same beneficial end." One explanation for Beatty et al's findings is that mimicry reduces confusion in visually complex environments. It has also been argued, in a theoretical treatment, that the mere coexistence of visually distinctive aposematic species can be mutually beneficial (Turner and Speed 1999). If predators that ingest members of one chemically defended species become risk averse with respect to further toxin ingestion, while their physiology copes with the toxins, it has been suggested that predators may heighten avoidance of species that could contain toxins, even in the absence of signal mimicry . . . –Hannah M. Rowland et al., July-August 2010. Behavioral Ecology 21(4): 851-852.
. . . Selection fundamentally acts on genes or individuals of distinct species. At the individual level, the success of a collection of interesting genes is mediated through the fitness of an individual phenotype. But what is the phenotype? What is a species? It may be worth remembering what Alfred Russel Wallace, natural selection's co- discoverer, published as species definition: 'A species . . . is a group of living organisms, separated from all other such groups by a set of distinctive character(istic)s, having relations to the environment not identical with those of any other group of organisms, and having the power of continuously reproducing its like'. Thus, it is the relation to the environment which is one of the features defining a species. The crucial role of many microbes in development demonstrates that environmental and genetic information interact . . . --Sebastian Fraune & Thoms C. G. Bosch, July 2010. BioEssays 32(7): 578.
. . . Darwin (at least, in the first edition of The origin of species) relied on selection as the main cause of evolutionary change, but saw that hybrid sterility could not be directly selected; instead, he argued that it arises as a side-effect of divergence. In contrast, Wallace's (1889) enthusiasm for selection led him to argue that not only could it strengthen prezygotic isolation, by what we now call reinforcement, but that group selection could even cause hybrid sterility. Then, as now, ecological divergence that allows distinct species to live together in sympatry received less attention than reproductive isolation . . . --N. H. Barton, 12 June 2010. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, Series B, Biological Sciences 365: 1825-1840.
. . . In the present study, we use all known non-African Charaxes species to explore the history of diversification in the Oriental and Australian region, especially the 'transitional' Wallacea. Several of these Charaxes species are poorly known and/or represent recently described taxa. Indeed, the highly distinctive C. marki Lane & Müller is known only from the holotype. This work forms part of a larger study that demonstrates Wallacea is not only a transitional zone, but also comprises a very unique area, with distinct geological and biogeographic histories . . . –Chris J. Müller, Niklas Wahlberg & Luciano B. Beheregaray, 1 June 2010. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 100(2): 458.
Despite Southeast Asia's abundance of organisms and islands, however, finding a repeated signal of geological events beyond the encroachment of the Indo-Australian plate has been difficult. A hierarchy of Southeast Asian landmass associations, expressed as a single area cladogram, would be a more intriguing pattern to extrapolate and explore. Just such a hypothesis was suggested by Wallace (1863) and used as a theoretical model by Nelson & Platnick (1981). Unfortunately, a convincing area cladogram for the region has been elusive, notwithstanding proposals for certain taxa . . . --Ronald M. Clouse & Gonzalo Giribet, June 2010. Journal of Biogeography 37: 1114-1130.
. . . While the distribution of many flora and fauna conforms to Wallace's line, the seafaring capabilities of human settlers to this region undoubtedly overcame this barrier to dispersal. Indeed, Asian ancestry exceeds 50 per cent as far as east as the island of Alor, which is well within Wallacea and approximately 1000 km east of Bali, as well as on the island of Sulawesi, which is located east of Wallace's line in the north. Curiously, Wallace himself noted this difference, positing a second line in eastern Indonesia corresponding to changes in human phenotype (Wallace 1869 . . . ). Wallace's second 'phenotypic' line broadly parallels the rapid decline in Asian admixture identified here . . . --Murray P. Cox et al., 22 May 2010. Proceedings of the Royal Society, Series B, Biological Sciences 277: 1589-1596.
. . . Wallace was scandalized by Darwin's sexual selection theory, considering it Darwin's greatest error, because it appeared to admit a subjective factor into evolutionary theory, because it appeared to admit a subjective factor into elocutionary theory. Indeed, it appeared to elevate aesthetic appreciation to the status of a significant factor in evolution. Wallace's alternative theory to account for exaggerated display traits relied instead on explanations that invoked incidental physiological mechanisms in males and the need to suppress their effects in females, to avoid predation . . . Wallace was of course wrong in his denial of the plausibility of sexual selection, although not completely wrong to doubt that aesthetic appreciation of combative prowess were the primary factors. It took a century to recognize that the theory needed to be based instead on asymmetries of parental investment in offspring care between the sexes. Today, sexual selection theory is again considered an important adjunct to the theory of natural selection; however, its reinstatement has not resuscitated the power of Darwin's account of language origins . . . --Terrence W. Deacon, 11 May 2010. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 107, Supplement 2: 9000-9006.
. . . Few scientists today accept Wallace's creationism, teleology, or spiritualism. Nonetheless it is appropriate to engage the profound puzzle he raised; namely, why do humans have the ability to pursue abstract intellectual feats such as science, mathematics, philosophy, and law, given that opportunities to exercise these talents did not exist in the foraging lifestyle in which humans evolved and would not have parlayed themselves into advantages in survival and reproduction even if they did? I suggest that the puzzle can be resolved with two hypotheses. The first is that humans evolved to fill the "cognitive niche," a mode of survival characterized by manipulating the environment through casual reasoning and social cooperation. The second is that the psychological faculties that evolved to prosper in the cognitive niche can be coopted to abstract domains by processes of metaphorical abstraction and productive combination, both vividly manifested in human language . . . --Steven Pinker, 11 May 2010. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 107, Supplement 2: 8993.
. . . Toward the end of their lives, Darwin and Wallace became estranged. Darwin argued that natural selection was sufficient to explain the origin of the existing biological world. Wallace believed that natural selection alone was insufficient to explain the existence of complex structures such as the human brain. From the bioenergetic perspective, Wallace's reservations were justified, as complexity can be generated only through the information- generating power of energy flow and the cumulative information storage capacity of nucleic acids. It took more than 3.5 billion years for these systems to amass sufficient information to generate the human brain. Thus the missing concept that Wallace sought to explain the ascent of man is the interaction between energetics and information . . . --Douglas C. Wallace, 11 May 2010. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 107, Supplement 2: 8952.
Wallace proposed to redefine Darwinism in a way that excluded Darwin's principle of sexual selection. The main result of the Darwin-Wallace controversy was that most Darwinian biologists avoided the subject of sexual selection until at least the 1950's, Ronald Fisher being a major exception. This controversy still deserves attention from modern evolutionary biologists, because the modern approach inherits from both Darwin and Wallace. The modern approach tends to present sexual selection as a special aspect of the theory of natural selection, although it also recognizes the big difficulties resulting from the inevitable interaction between these two natural processes of selection . . . --Jean Gayon, February 2010. Comptes Rendus Biologies 333: 134-144.
. . . Early evolutionary theories of senescence (Wallace, ca. 1865; Weismann, 1889) were group-selectionist in nature, proposing that individuals senesce and eventually die in order to make space and resources available for future generations composed of younger, more vigorous individuals. However, such arguments are circular because, if ageing is one of the reasons why individuals must be replaced, they presuppose that individuals must deteriorate over time. Moreover, they fail to explain how a population of altruistically senescing individuals would not be subject to invasion by more slowly senescing or even non-senescing invaders. Recent studies have placed group- selectionist arguments on a stronger theoretical foundation by emphasizing instances where senescence appears to be "selected for its own sake" as a result of kin- or group-level benefits including payoffs to close relatives, and reduced local extinction risk due to communicable diseases or chaotic population dynamics . . . --Robert A. Laird & Thomas N. Sherratt, February 2010. Biosystems 99(2): 130.
. . . Other questions, such as whether maternal emotions influence the fetus, have made a remarkable tour. Alfred Russel Wallace was co-originator of the theory of evolution by natural selection written in 1859 by Darwin. When Wallace (1893c) wrote the above quoted sentence in a letter entitled 'Prenatal influences on character' into Nature, the belief that a mother's emotions could affect the child she carries was seen as resting on old wives' tales. Wallace (1893a,b) was also publishing articles about the possibility of being able to study whether 'individually acquired characters are inherited'. Lamarck had incorporated this idea in his theory of directed evolution; it was seriously challenged in 1880 by Weismann's theory, on which the modern understanding of genetic inheritance became based, and since the turn of the 20th century it became widely rejected by the scientific community. However, this old question that had originated in ancient time, with Greek philosophers, recently got renewed interest with the discovery of epi-genetic variation between individuals and the finding that in some cases epigenetic variants can be inherited by the offspring, a biological inheritance that cannot be explained by changes in the DNA- sequence itself . . . --Bea R. H. Van den Bergh, January/February 2010. Infant and Child Development 19(1): 42.
The Wallace (1881) and Briggs (1966) lineage age hypothesis suggests that there are low levels of endemism in the Azores biota because the biota is of recent (post-Pleistocene) origin. Avila et al. (2008) challenged this hypothesis to explain at least mollusc diversity patterns by demonstrating that the endemic mollusc fauna of the Azores was largely unaffected by Pleistocene climatic oscillations and that the current endemic fauna is therefore not of post-Pleistocene origin. Evidence from phylogenetic relationships of Azorean plant lineages suggests that the lineage age hypothesis similarly fails to explain the distinctive patterns of Azorean endemic plant diversity . . . --Mark A. Carine & Hanno Schaefer, January 2010. Journal of Biogeography 37: 77-89.
. . . although it is sometimes argued that aposematic signalling is fundamentally about raised distinctiveness rather than heightened conspicuousness, the two often amount to the same thing (Wallace 1889). If this is generally true, the association between conspicuousness and aposematism in the primary evolution of warning signals, in our view, is not problematic . . . --Thomas J. Lee, Nicola M. Marples & Michael P. Speed, January 2010. Animal Behaviour 79(1): 70.
. . . Wallace's essay was remarkable for two reasons: First, it conveys a sophisticated understanding of the nature of selection among individuals belonging to a normal distribution of trait values. "The flowers most completely fertilized by these moths being those which had the longest nectaries, there would in each generation be on the average an increase in the length of the nectaries, and also an average increase in the length of the proboscis of the moths, and this would be a necessary result from the fact that nature ever fluctuates about a mean, or that in every generation there would be flowers with longer and shorter nectaries, and moths with longer and shorter probosces than the average" (p. 476). Second, Wallace actually mentions Xanthopan (Macrosila) morganii, the species of moth that is now considered the most likely pollinator of A. sesquipedale. Wallace was not aware of the long-tongued Malagasy race of this hawkmoth, but he had measured a specimen of the African mainland form in the British Museum and found that its tongue measured 7.5 inches [18 centimeters]. Wallace (1867) wrote "That such a moth exists in Madagascar may be safely predicted; and naturalists who visit that island should search for it with as much confidence as astronomers searched for the planet Neptune,--and they will be equally successful!" . . . --Steven D. Johnson & Bruce Anderson, 2010. Evolution, Education and Outreach 3(1): 34.
. . . In the 1890s an English linguist, S. H. Ray, pointed out that some of the languages of British New Guinea and the Solomon Islands were not Austronesian. A parallel discovery had already been made in the Moluccas by in the 1850s by the naturalist A. R. Wallace, when he collected vocabularies in these easternmost islands of the Indo- Malaysian archipelago. In a well-known book on his travels in this region Wallace proposed a distinction between 'Malay' and 'Papuan' languages in the Moluccas. Following Wallace's lead, Ray applied the name 'Papuan' to the non-Austronesian languages of Melanesia, as a convenient catch-all. Soon after, Wilhelm Schmidt observed that non-Austronesian languages were present on the north coast of the New Guinea mainland and in New Britain. What was striking about the various small groups of Papuan languages, was that, unlike the Austronesian languages, there was no evidence of common origin. Only in the last 50 years has the full extent of the diversity of the languages of Near Oceania become clear . . . --Jan Lucassen, 2010. In Migration History in World History: Multidisciplinary Approaches (Brill): 87-88.
. . . any system seeking to utilize all the energy or resources for its own purposes is bound to be challenged by other systems. The consequence of these interactions between self-organizing systems is a continuous stream of new things, or in the case of humans, new thinking. This is diversity. Bateson interpreted self-organizing systems as working together to sustain the existence of an evolving ecosystem. This approach has its roots in Alfred Russell Wallace's work. Wallace saw that the job of evolution was to maintain the constancy of something in his case, the entire ecosystem made up of all species and their environment--a process rather like the cruise control system or constant velocity transmission (CVT) on a motor car. We can also think of it in terms our bodies' ability to adapt to changes in the outside temperature, at least within a limited range. By shivering or perspiring, our body temperature remains more or less constant because we vary internal conditions in response to those changes in outside temperature . . . --Edward Moulding, 2010. In 5s: A Visual Control System for the Workplace (AuthorHouse): 129.
. . . Indonesia, the world's largest archipelago, is a chain of more than 17,000 islands that stretches between the continents of Asia and Australia . . . Early explorers noticed morphological differences from east to west that were dramatic enough to lead Alfred Russell Wallace to designate a human phenotypic boundary demarcating the transition between Asian and Melanesian features. Relative to his more well-known biogeographic boundary, this line lies slightly east, running between the islands of Sumbawa and Flores (Wallace 1869 . . . ). The languages of the region follow a similar pattern, with the majority belonging to the extensive Austronesian language family but with more distantly related Papuan languages occurring in the Far Eastern provinces, especially in areas where Melanesian features predominate (Wallace 1869). To explain these patterns, the prehistory of this region has often been framed as the story of two major range expansions: the initial Paleolithic colonization of Sahul ~45 ka ago and the much later Neolithic expansion of Austronesian-speaking farmers (4-6 ka ago) out of mainland Asia or Taiwan into Indonesia and the Pacific . . . --Tatiana M. Karafet et al., 2010. Molecular Biology and Evolution 27(8): 1833.
. . . Even within the technologist's definition of technology as dealing with mechanical artifacts alone, Wallace's insight has major relevance. The subject matter of technology, according to the Preface to History of Technology, is "how things are done or made"; and most students of technology, to my knowledge, agree with this. But the Wallace insight leads to a different definition: the subject matter of technology would be "how man does or makes." As to the meaning and end of technology, the same source, again presenting the general view, defines them as "mastery of his (man's) natural environment." Oh no, the Wallace insight would say (and in rather shocked tones): the purpose is to overcome man's own natural, i.e. animal, limitations. Technology enables man, a land- bound biped, without gills, fins, or wings, to be at home in the water or in the air. It enables an animal with very poor body insulation, that is, a subtropical animal, to live in all climate zones. It enables one of the weakest and slowest of the primates to add to his own strength that of elephant or ox, and to his own speed that of the horse. It enables him to push his life span from his "natural" twenty years or so to threescore years and ten; it even enables him to forget that natural death is death from predators, disease, starvation, or accident, and to call death from natural causes that which has never been observed in wild animals: death from organic decay in old age . . . --Peter Ferdinand Drucker, 2010. Technology, Management, and Society (Harvard Business Press): 41-42.
. . . What I have called here the "Wallace insight," that is, the approach from human biology, thus leads to the conclusion that technology is not about things: tools, processes, and products. It is about work: the specifically human activity by means of which man pushes back the limitations of the iron biological law which condemns all other animals to devote all their time and energy to keeping themselves alive for the next day, if not for the next hour. The same conclusion would be reached, by the way, from any approach, for instance, from that of the anthropologist's "culture," that does not mistake technology for a phenomenon of the physical universe. We might define technology as human action on physical objects or as a set of physical objects characterized by serving human purposes. Either way the realm and subject matter of the study of technology would be human work . . . --Peter Ferdinand Drucker, 2010. Technology, Management, and Society (Harvard Business Press): 42-43.
. . . By contrast, Alfred Russell Wallace, co-discoverer with Darwin of the principle of natural selection, believed that count words were essential for numerical cognition, in particular arithmetic: "if, now, we descend to those savage tribes who only count to three or five, and who find it impossible to comprehend the addition of two and three without having the objects actually before them, we feel that the chasm between them and the good mathematician is so vast, that a thousand to one will probably not fully express it" (Wallace, 1871, p. 339). The question of the role of language in arithmetic became the focus of recent experimental psychological studies in cultures with few number words, in particular the Pirahã and the Mundurukú, two cultures from the Amazon forest with an extremely limited number vocabulary . . . --Helen De Cruz, Hansjörg Neth & Dirk Schlimm, 2010. In Benedikt Löwe & Thomas Müller, eds., PhiMSAMP: Philosophy of Mathematics: Sociological Aspects and Mathematical Practice (College Publications): 74.
. . . Moreover, Alfred Wallace, co-inventor of the theory of the evolution by natural selection, doubted that evolution could produce anything like states of consciousness. This problem was later labelled the "explanatory gap". Individuals use different names for what it is that they are opposing to physical phenomena. Huxley and Romanes used "consciousness". Some use "sentience" . . . many now refer to "Phenomenal Consciousness" (PC) in contrast with "Access Consciousness" (AC), or, in the terminology of Chalmers, distinguish the so-called "Hard Problem" of consciousness from a (relatively) "Easy Problem". Such formulations presuppose a dichotomy: a binary divide between things that do and things that do not have the problematic extra feature over and above their physical features . . . –Stéphane Doncieux, 2010, in From Animals to Animats 11: 11th International Conference on Simulation and Adaptive Behavior (Springer).
One possibility is that Wallace was deliberately romanticizing his actual observations and experiences there. Nancy Stepan has noted that the popular success of The Malay Archipelago came from its fulfilment of contemporaneous readers' expectations of what an account of the tropics should be, in contrast to his 1853 account of his travels in South America, Travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro, which was not only "unromantic," but "unheroic," and did not sell well . . . However, I would like to put forth another possibility: what if Wallace's portrayal of the archipelago as paradise, and more specifically, his portrayal of interracial relations and "uncivilized" society as positively pre-lapsarian, resulted not from the impulse to romanticize, but rather, a stubborn fidelity to scientific accuracy? . . . --Tiffany Tsao, 2010. Australasian Journal of Victorian Studies 15: 28-41.
. . . I will show how Wallace arrived at his surprisingly favourable and anti-scientific" assessments of the inhabitant races and communities of the Malay Archipelago by applying the principles of taxonomic classification to the human realm. Given that Wallace's primary employment in the Malay Archipelago was to collect specimens of flora and fauna and classify them according to the principles of the Linnaean taxonomic classification system, his adoption of what I will term a "taxonomic perspective" in viewing the humans whom he encountered should hardly be surprising. Using these same principles of taxonomic classification, Wallace was able to achieve a perspective on the Malay Archipelago hitherto unachieved by authoritative accounts of the region, challenging the predominant scientific views of race held at the time and unsettling even his own views of the "uncivilized" races . . . --Tiffany Tsao, 2010. Australasian Journal of Victorian Studies 15: 28-41.
. . . for Wallace, feeling "that savages were in some respects superior, would not have necessarily made it true. I would argue instead that his positive portrayals of human life in the archipelago had just as much scientific basis as his opening portrayals of the archipelago's natural environment as an otherworldly Eden. If Wallace's construction of a paradisiacal natural environment relied on his utilization of scientific precedent and natural selection theory, it was his application of taxonomic classification that enabled him to see the human individuals and communities of the archipelago as uniquely paradisiacal as well. Wallace's taxonomic perspective enabled him to break away not only from dominant perceptions of the races as different stages on a single, linear scale of sociocultural evolution, but also from the social Darwinist tendency of his day to view interracial relations as an inexorable struggle in which the white races would prevail . . . --Tiffany Tsao, 2010. Australasian Journal of Victorian Studies 15: 28-41.
. . . Cloete's poetry does not shy away from inter alia "controversial scientific subjects" in a number of poems, and he contemplates the origin of creation and the development of life on earth. The reader is led to consider Cloete's views on creation and evolution. In this article the emphasis will be on the role of evolution in Cloete's poetry and how he uses a well-known observation by one of the main exponents of evolution theory in one of his poems, "toegedig aan Alfred R. Wallace", to present a text that expresses wonderment at a natural phenomenon . . . --Johann Lodewyk Marais, Desember 2009. Tydskrif vir Geeteswetenskappe 49(4): 548.
. . . This paper is divided into three parts. In the first part I will outline the development of the reciprocal nature of biology and geology. Surprisingly reciprocality had been proposed more than 50 years before Wegener by the biogeographer Alfred Russel Wallace, co-author of the theory of evolution by means of natural selection (Wallace, 1858). I will briefly outline Wallace's biogeographic ideas as they pertain to reciprocality, before examining Wegener's reconstruction hypothesis of the Cretaceous polar region in more detail . . . --B. Michaux, December 2009. Gondwana Research 16(3-4): 656.
. . . The female limitation of mimicry is usually explained by a combination of sex-dependent predation pressure and sexual selection: (1) female butterflies carry heavy egg-loads and are therefore aerodynamically constrained in their escape flights. Thus, females are thought to be more vulnerable to predation and presumably gain a greater fitness advantage from Batesian mimicry compared to males (Wallace 1865 . . . ), and (2) wing colour patterns are assumed to be constrained by sexual selection to a much greater extent in males than in females. Thus, male mimicry is selectively disfavoured when its natural selective advantage is overwhelmed by the sexual selective advantage of nonmimetic coloration that may be more successful during inter- or intrasexual encounters. However, these hypotheses do not explain the presence of and natural variation in female-limited mimetic polymorphism . . . --Krushnamegh Kunte, November 2009. Animal Behaviour 78(5): 1029.
. . . The behavior of females in search of a mate impacts the success of males in mate competition and, hence, the force of sexual selection on male phenotypic characters. The search behavior of females is also subject to selection because the search strategy used by a female determines the likelihood that she encounters a high quality male in the search process. This latter idea is germinal in the views of Alfred R. Wallace who argued that females would, had they evolved the cognitive ability, choose mates who provide them with a fitness benefit (Wallace, 1871, 1889; reviewed by Cronin, 1991). The search strategy favored by selection, in this situation, is the strategy that provides the highest fitness return to searchers. Janetos (1980) stimulated the study of search strategies when, more than one hundred years later, he showed that a fixed sample search strategy provides a higher fitness return to females than several alternative strategies. . . . --Daniel D. Wiegmann, Steven M. Seubert & Gordon A. Wade, October 2009. Journal of Theoretical Biology 262(4): 596.
. . . More than 150 years ago, Wallace had already recognized a profound connection between geology and the distribution of plants and animals, and many of his insights were based on his observations in Southeast Asia. Our understanding of the Earth has changed considerably since Wallace's time but an understanding of the geology of Southeast Asia remains fundamental to interpreting biotic distributions in the region. However, the links between geological history and life are not simple, and a great deal of work is still required to understand the complex interrelationships and feedbacks between plate tectonics, changing distributions of land and sea, emergence of land and rise of mountains, subsidence below sea level and formation of deep ocean basins, uplift and erosion, changing ocean currents, climatic impacts of all these changes, and their effects on plants and animals and their evolution and distribution . . . --R. Hall, October 2009. Blumea 54(1-3): 148.
. . . Because most butterflies can fold their wings together, hiding the dorsal surface, a dorsal-ventral partitioning of visual signals may present one solution to accommodating potentially antagonistic selective pressures. The speculation that dorsal wing patterns are important for mate signalling, while the ventral surface may be more subject to selection by natural enemies is, in fact, not new (Darwin 1871; Wallace 1889), although no study has directly tested this hypothesis in a comparative framework. In addition to a dorsal/ventral partition, butterflies may separate signals between forewing and hindwing, given their ability to hide the forewing behind the hindwing when at rest. These two surface axes, dorsal-ventral and forewing/hindwing, offer butterflies two spatial dimensions that may be partitioned to serve different, potentially antagonistic, signal functions . . . --Jeffrey C. Oliver, Kendra A. Robertson & Antónia Monteiro, 7 July 2009. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 276(1666): 2369.
Island radiations are thought to undergo evolutionarily short 'taxon cycles' of diversification and rapid demise, before being superseded by different lineages of colonizers. The archipelagos of Wallacea (eastern Indonesia), Melanesia (including New Guinea) and Oceania have long served as a natural laboratory to study the evolutionary dynamics of such colonizations and biological radiations (Wallace 1859 . . . ). Yet, the faunal origins and mechanisms responsible for the region's diversification as well as their contribution to global diversity remain poorly understood . . . --Michael Balke et al., 7 July 2009. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 276: 2359-2367.
Darwin (1862) and Wallace (1867) provided a possible explanation for such extreme elongation, suggesting that the long nectar spur of the Malagasy star orchid (Angraecum sesquipedale) evolved in a coevolutionary race with a giant hawkmoth. According to this model, selection on the hawkmoth favours longer tongues to better reach the orchid's nectar, while selection on the orchid favours nectar spurs that are longer than hawkmoth tongues because this ensures contact with the orchid's reproductive parts (thus maximizing pollen transfer) . . . Darwin was not proposing a general mechanism for the evolution of corolla tube length, but was specifically interested in the extreme case of A. sesquipedale (Darwin 1862). Furthermore, in expounding on Darwin's idea, Wallace (1867) actually envisioned that initial stages in tube elongation would involve pollinator shifts, and suggested that a coevolutionary race would begin only when the tube length corresponded to the tongue length of the largest hawkmoth in the habitat . . . --Nathan Muchhala & James D. Thomson, 22 June 2009. Proceedings of The Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 276(1665): 2147-2148.
. . . The classical view of reinforcement is that selection can only strengthen prezygotic isolation, not postzygotic because selection cannot favor a further reduction in the fitness of hybrids (Wallace 1889; Dobzhansky 1940). (Selection can favor a reduced fitness of juveniles where these compete with siblings, but the principle is the same). This argument applies where a single allele strengthens isolation, but not when isolation is strengthened by an association between existing incompatibilities. As we show below, the two different incompatibilities then do not have to be at different stages of the life cycle: each may have the same status, and we cannot say that one evolves "to" reinforce the other. The evolution of the association itself can be seen as adaptive, in the sense that (directly or indirectly) it raises the mean fitness of the population. However, it can involve incompatibilities at any stage of hybridization . . . --Nicholas H. Barton & Maria Angeles Rodriguez de Cara, May 2009. Evolution 63(5): 1172.
Two additional attributes that make islands lasting focal points for evolutionary studies--their relative youth and geographical isolation--were clearly identified by Alfred Russel Wallace, the co-originator of the theory of evolution by natural selection, in his 1881 book Island Life. First, many islands are either volcanic in origin or have been completely under water at some point in their history. These islands emerge above the ocean surface as blank slates for colonization and subsequent evolutionary diversification, on which the development of ecological and evolutionary systems can be observed from their beginnings. Each island represents a new opportunity for living forms to appear and proliferate. The first colonists, finding untapped resources and lacking the constraints of a resident biota, often diversify in novel directions. This evolutionary idiosyncrasy is enhanced by unbalanced colonization--strong dispersal abilities are not evenly distributed across the ecological spectrum of continental biotas--with the result that some ecological niches on islands are filled by diversification rather than colonization . . . --Jonathan B. Losos & Robert E. Ricklefs, 12 February 2009. Nature 457(7231): 830-831.
Wallace, who promoted Strickland's methods, wrote that every systematic work should include diagrams,"without which it is often impossible to tell whether two families follow each other because the author thinks them allied, or merely because the exigencies of a consecutive series compels him so to place them". In essence, Wallace claims that without diagrams the reader cannot know whether information is meaningful or is simply a product of the representational medium's limitations; Darwin capitalizes on this basic ambiguity within his diagram itself . . . --Heather Brink-Roby, Winter 2009. Victorian Studies 51: 247-273.
. . . Many questions are involved in Wallace's Line, but it represents a line of major faunal break between the Oriental and the Australian regions. According to Sweet & Pianka (2003), varanid species are diversified to the east of Wallace's Line while this side lacks carnivorous placental mammals. The diversity of varanid species and that of carnivorous mammals are virtually inverted to the west of Wallace's Line, a region that harbours nearly 20 mammalian carnivores and that lacks small varanid lizards. These observations suggest that the coexistence of mammalian carnivores and varanid lizards is limited because they are too similar as predators . . . --Marc Augé & Richard Smith, January 2009. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 155: 148-170.
The little that we have learned about the likelihood of reciprocal selection operating in this system helps to explain the observation of extreme trait exaggeration. However, directional selection for trait exaggeration does not act in isolation. In addition to escalating reciprocal selection, there are a theoretically infinite number of other selective forces that simultaneously act on proboscis and tube length and some of these must serve to balance the forces that favor trait elongation (Wallace 1867). Understanding some of these forces and how they vary in strength across the landscape will be important in explaining the observation of twofold variability in proboscis and tube length. For example, one of the many costs of longer proboscis might include increased handling time. It was observed that flies feeding on windy days required several attempts before succeeding in inserting their proboscides into flowers. Possibly windier conditions in the South might lead to stronger balancing selection at this latitude . . . --Anton Pauw, Jaco Stofberg & Richard J. Waterman, January 2009. Evolution 63(1): 275.
Floral trait recognition and pollinator consistency have been extensively studied, i.e., insect pollinators tend to exhaust one floral morph for resources before moving on to other floral morphs. Indeed, A. R. Wallace (1889) may have been the first to suggest that sympatric plant species pollinated by "flower constant" pollinators will profit from having different floral recognition traits. Consequently, we would expect statistically significant correlations among the first appearances of critical floral traits and the diversification of the flowering plants and their insect pollinators. As noted, the first appearances of floral traits and the diversification of flowering plant species are significantly correlated. Likewise, the first appearances of key floral traits and insect families in the fossil record are significantly correlated . . . as are angiosperm species number and insect family number . . . --William L. Crepet & Karl J. Niklas, January 2009. American Journal of Botany 96(1): 372.
. . . Despite of their seemingly large number, aerosol particles are true trace constituents of the atmosphere, their mass fraction typically being below one part per billion and thereby much below that of any important gaseous climate agent. Nevertheless they may have a profound influence on our climate. This perception is not at all new, only 20 years after Aitken discovered the importance of aerosols as condensation nuclei, Alfred R. Wallace noted in 1898: "But in all densely-populated countries there is an enormous artificial production of dust.. This superabundance of dust . . . must almost certainly produce some effect on our climate; and the particular effect it seems calculated to produce is the increase of cloud and fog, but not necessarily any increase of rain." . . . --J. Feichter & T. Leisner, 2009. The European Physical Journal, Special Topics 176(1): 84.
. . . Non-exclusive hypotheses have traditionally been proposed to account for spectacular woodiness examples in the neo-flora of oceanic islands (Wallace, 1878 . . . ). Selection for successful pollination with large, long-lasting inflorescences, niche competition among initial colonizers, and promotion of the outbreeding ratio to overcome inbreeding depression may be related to Echium longevity and woodiness. Irrespective of the causes generating woodiness, the trait utility of this character is manifested by the large number of woody plant groups that rapidly evolved from herbaceous ancestors not only in Macaronesia (Sonchus, Isoplexis, Aeonium group, Pericallis), but also in the Hawaiian (silversword alliance, Schieda), Galápagos (Scallesia), and Juan Fernández (Dendroseris) archipelagos . . . --Federico García-Maroto, 2009. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evoution 52(3): 572.
. . . The current extinction crisis and the extent of anthropogenic alteration of natural habitats have reached alarming proportions . . . Potential hindrances to global assessment of priority list candidates have been divided into eight categories: (1) the extreme heterogeneity of existing data; (2) the restricted availability of relevant data and lack of information exchange between scientists and conservationists; (3) the uncertainty in species number and taxonomic division of the given taxon (Linnean shortfall); (4) the fragmentary knowledge of distributions (Wallacean shortfall); (5) incomplete or erroneous red-listing across the entire distribution of a given taxon; (6) the lack of homogenous and reliable population trend data; (7) the lack of exhaustive information on observed and potential threats; and finally (8) the incomplete general biological knowledge of a given taxon (e.g., its reproduction biology, genetic diversity, dispersal parameters, etc.). It has been demonstrated that Linnean and Wallacean shortfalls are among the most serious problems in modern conservation biology and biogeography, and that the majority of deficits in knowledge during any global conservation status assessment results from these two shortfalls . . . --Gregor Kozlowski et al., 2009. Biodiversity and Conservation 18(9): 2308.
It has long been recognized that Thailand is subdivided into two zoogeographic subregions with the Indochinese subregion to the north and Sundaic subregion to the south with a transition zone in the Isthmus of Kra. Distribution patterns corresponding to this division have been observed in a range of biota including rodents, insects, reptiles and plants. Initially, Wallace (1876) had placed the transition zone at 13-14ºN, whereas Wells fixed the avifaunal transition zone at about 10º30'N, in the Isthmus of Kra. Subsequently, Hughes et al., based on forest birds, found a highly significant transition zone at 11-12ºN, in the north of the peninsula. The distribution patterns of the three species [considered here] were of considerable interest since they strongly support the existing concepts of a subregional division . . . --Pipat Soisook et al., December 2008. Acta Chiropterologica 10(2): 238.
The powerful effect of clinging on the emotional behavior of infant nonhuman primates had been known for many years. It was mentioned by Van Wagenen in her recommendations and in many other naturalistic accounts of primate infants. One of my favorite quotations is from Alfred Russel Wallace, who describes an "artificial mother" of buffalo skin he devised for an orphan orangutan (1869). All of us associated with the nursery project were impressed by the strength of the infants' emotional attachment to their cloths. When I suggested to Harlow that we devise an experiment pitting our monkeys' responses to the feeding station against their attachment to a claspable object, he urged me to proceed. Accordingly, I designed an experiment around two mother surrogates that were the functional counterparts of the diaper and the feeding rack. These prototypes had the bodies of the final versions, although they lacked the famous distinctive faces, which were added later . . . --William A. Mason, December 2008. Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science 42(4): 390-391.
. . . Wallace wrote that "[i]n the equable equatorial zone there is no . . . struggle against climate. Every form of vegetation has become alike adapted to its genial heat and ample moisture, which has probably changed little even throughout geological periods". We now know that lowland tropical climates have changed substantially and relentlessly ever since species-rich forests resembling modern ones first occupied the lowland wet tropics in the mid-Tertiary. Although the notion of long-term constancy of tropical climates is now universally dismissed, Wallace's view of tropical climates as benign lingers on, underlying the apparently widespread conviction that "[m]any tropical species may well be able to withstand higher temperature[s] than those in which they currently exist." . . . --Robert K. Colwell et al., 10 October 2008. Science 322(5899): 259.
. . . we must consider the possibility that hominids in general and humans in particular have partially escaped from classic Darwinian selective control of some aspects of the genome, and that humans have even escaped the final stage of Baldwinian genetic hard-wiring of long-standing species-specific learned behaviors. This might in turn help to explain the unusual degree of exaptation displayed by the human brain, presented as 'Wallace's Conundrum' in Box 6. The advantages of such novel changes are flexibility, plasticity, more rapidly developing population diversity and greater opportunities--but the disadvantages are that genomes cannot recover what has been irrevocably lost, and cultural advantages can be sensitive to the whims of history and fate . . . --Ajit Varki, Daniel H. Geschwind & Evan E. Eichler, October 2008. Nature Reviews Genetics 9(10): 758.
The importance of avian egg coloration for crypsis, once accepted as a general principle (Wallace 1890, Cott 1940, von Haartman 1957, Harrison 1968), has recently been questioned because tests of this hypothesis have often failed to support a role for egg coloration in deterring predation. As a result, more recent work has emphasized the importance of nest crypsis as the primary mediator of clutch survival . . . --David Westmoreland, September 2008. Journal of Field Ornithology 79(3): 263.
Evolved mimicry of hawks by parasitic cuckoos. Wallace (1889) suggested that the resemblance was an example of protective mimicry, which might reduce attacks from hawks, noting that cuckoos were otherwise 'an exceedingly weak and defenceless group of birds'. Prolonged periods of surveillance for host nests, sometimes from exposed perches, might make parasitic cuckoos especially vulnerable to hawk attack. In Asia, drongo-cuckoos (Surniculus lugubris) may likewise gain from protective mimicry of drongos Dicrurus spp., which are extremely aggressive to larger birds, including birds of prey and crows (Wallace 1889). Alternatively, hawk mimicry might influence host behaviour, either by frightening or luring hosts away to facilitate egg laying or by inducing mobbing to help the cuckoo locate host nests, which may be especially advantageous in open country with few secret vantage points . . . --N. B. Davies & J. A. Welbergen, August 2008. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 275(1644): 1818.
. . . It has been argued that Ostriches lay white eggs because they are powerful enough to defend their nests (Wallace 1889). However, when nests are unattended, such big eggs are quite visible on the ground to both mammalian and avian predators. In our visibility study, a naturally white egg was seen first by the observer, suggesting that the brown eggs are better concealed. Ostriches would therefore have derived a selective advantage in the face of predators by having brown eggs. Our results therefore are consistent with the prediction, and support Bertram and Burger's conclusion, that white Ostrich eggs minimise overheating, but are prone to predation . . . --Flora John Magige et al., July 2008. Journal of Ornithology 149(3): 327.
Why there are so many species in tropical rainforests is one of the most complex and debated questions in evolutionary biology. Among the mechanisms that have been proposed to explain diversification in the tropics is the idea that mode of speciation might differ with latitude. A long-standing hypothesis, first proposed by Wallace (1878) and developed by Dobzhansky and Schemske, is that biotic interactions play a greater role in the adaptation of tropical populations than do abiotic factors, whereas the converse holds for temperate-zone populations . . . --G. Léotard et al., July 2008. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 21(4): 1133.
Within each of his major biogeographical regions, Wallace (1876) distinguished between four subregions. For the Palearctic he recognized a Northern European, Southern European, Siberian, and Manchourian subregion. However, it had already been pointed out by contemporary workers that Wallace's separation of the European and Siberian subregions, for example, was based on insufficient data and that the criteria used were more geographic than faunistic. Nevertheless, in later years Wallace's boundary between the European and Siberian subregions, running along the Ural Mountains and the Caspian Sea, has been used to demarcate western subsections of the Palearctic Region . . . --Mansour Aliabadian et al., 2008. Contributions to Zoology 77(2): 101.
. . . Wallace writes that, among human beings, there is no evident distinction between the mental powers of the most primitive and the most advanced . . . From this manner of observation it follows, Wallace argued, that characteristic human abilities must be latent in primitive man, existing somehow as an unopened gift—the entryway to a world that primitive man himself does not possess and would not recognize. But the idea that a biological species might possess latent powers makes no sense in Darwinian terms. It suggests the forbidden doctrine that evolutionary advantages were frontloaded, far away and long ago. It is in conflict with the Darwinian principle that just as useful genes are selected for cultivation and advancement, useless genes are subject to negative selection pressure and must therefore drain away into the sands of time. Wallace identified a frank conflict between his own theory and what seemed to him to be obvious facts about the solidity and unchangeability of human nature. That conflict persists; it has not been resolved . . . --David Berlinski, April 2008. Commentary 125(4): 35.
. . . Alfred Russel Wallace (1853) was perhaps the first naturalist to write about the white-water, clear-water, and black-water river types of the Amazon basin and to relate the color of tributaries to the nature of their drainage basins. Wallace astutely linked the sediment load of white-water tributaries to erosion in their steep Andean headwaters, and identified clear-water rivers with the crystalline "mountains of Brazil" (the Guyana and Brazilian shields). He knew that black-water rivers emerged from lowland sources, and he correctly attributed their dark coloring to leaching of "decaying leaves, roots, and other vegetable matter" (Wallace 1853) . . . --Michael E. McClain & Robert J. Nainan, April 2008. BioScience 58(4): 325.
While he maintained that 'social heredity' was consistent with the theory of evolution by natural selection, Baldwin followed Wallace in claiming that humans had evolved to such a degree of conscious intelligence that they had freed themselves from the pressures of natural selection, and surmounted instinctual constraints on behavior: 'intelligence and the social life which it makes possible so far control the acquisitions of life to limit the action of natural selection as a law of evolution.' In this fashion Baldwin defended human freedom against the hereditarian determinism of Darwin's theory of evolution, by claiming that thought and will had emancipated humans from the constraints of natural selection . . . --John D. Greenwood, February 2008. History of the Human Sciences 21(1): 114.
Later behaviorists rejected the role of consciousness and purpose in human and animal psychology and behavior--with the notable exception of Edward C. Tolman--but continued to stress the critical role of plasticity and learning in adaptive behavior. They also depreciated the explanatory role of inherited instincts, which became the object of sustained critiques by behaviorist psychologists in the 1920s. Like functional psychologists (and Wallace), behaviorists came to believe that humans had developed (through evolution by natural selection) to such a degree that they could surmount the constraints of their biological inheritance, and exploit their intelligence to create a scientific psychology devoted to the further advancement and improvement of the human condition . . . --John D. Greenwood, February 2008. History of the Human Sciences 21(1): 118.
. . . In other words, as Wallace so clearly realized, human symbolic reasoning is not simply an extrapolation of this extended history, simply a little bit more of the same. It is, instead, something truly new and unpredicted by what went before—even by the increase in the mass of metabolically expensive brain tissue that seems to have independently characterized several lineages within the genus Homo, though it was clearly dependent on this development. And while Wallace was regrettably unable to profit from our modern perspective, today it is possible to see that the origin of modern human consciousness must have been an emergent event, whereby an entirely unanticipated level of complexity was achieved by a sheer chance coincidence of acquisitions . . . --Ian Tattersall, 2008. Comparative Cognition & Behavior Reviews 3: 111.
Researchers of animal coloration have noted the perplexing nature of egg pigmentation in open-nesting birds (i.e., birds whose nests are not in cavities or enclosed by a dome). One of the founders of the theory of natural selection wrote "the colours of birds' eggs have long been a difficulty on the theory of adaptive coloration, because, in so many cases it has not been easy to see what can be the use of the particular colours, which are often so bright and conspicuous that they seem intended to attract attention rather than to be concealed" (Wallace 1890). Wallace went on to argue that bird eggs are well camouflaged when viewed from below via light penetrating the nest . . . --David Westmoreland & Richard A. Kiltie, November 2007. Journal of Avian Biology 38(6): 686-687.
Alfred Wallace, Darwin's contemporary and rival, argued that when species hybridize, natural selection favors individuals who are more fussy about whom they mate with, which therefore increases female discrimination of males from different species. Modern evolutionary genetics has questioned the importance of the "Wallace effect" (also known as "reinforcement") because genetic recombination between female discrimination and male trait genes would scramble combinations of loci that favor speciation. Several solutions to this have been proposed, including close genetic linkage of such loci. A simpler possibility is sexual imprinting, which causes a female to prefer males that resemble her father . . . --Michael G. Ritchie, 5 October 2007. Science 318: 54.
While Chamupati largely ignored Darwin, whose views of Hindu scriptures were hardly flattering, Chamupati was attracted to the ideas of Alfred Russel Wallace, codiscoverer of evolution. Chamupati noted Wallace's praise of the mind of the Vedic hymn makers who, despite the "very limited knowledge [of Nature] at this early period, . . . could not have been in any way inferior to those of the best of our religious teachers and poets—to our Miltons and our Tennysons." For Chamupati and other followers of Dayananda, Wallace was far more congenial than Darwin, for, despite Wallace's espousal of some of the most theologically challenging aspects of evolutionary theory, namely, random variation and natural selection, Wallace made considerable exceptions. He insisted on some sort of "spiritual influx" to account for the origin of life as well as of mind and morality. Accordingly, he was a much safer corroborator of Vedic insights, at least in Chamupati's views . . . --C. Mackenzie Brown, September 2007. Zygon 42(3): 718.
Using the theoretical framework of evolution by natural selection, Wallace developed Crawfurd's proposal that the two distinct aboriginal races were the Malays and Papuans. From his observations, Wallace postulated an ethnological line dividing the Malayan and Polynesian races. The position of this line east of the famous line dividing the Indo-Malayan and Austro-Malayan bioregions demonstrated Crawfurd's hypothesis that the civilized Malays were pushing the savage Papuans back from their natural border. Wallace's ethnological line functioned to support his representation of two races as radically different from each other, not only in terms of physical characteristics but also in what Wallace called 'moral characteristics' (1869: 588) . . . --Daniel P. S. Goh, September 2007. International Journal of Cultural Studies 10(3): 328.
Darwin's originality and priority are, strictly speaking, separate questions. One can be original and yet fail to achieve priority if, for example, someone else comes forward first in print with the same theory without one's knowledge. Such, in fact, is more or less the case with A. R. Wallace. No one, least of all Darwin, doubted that Wallace arrived at his theory independently of Darwin, but Darwin was proven by history to have brought the theory into print—if not exactly publication—first. Nevertheless, Darwin often conflated the two issues in his private correspondence, referring to his originality and priority almost as if they were interchangeable ideas . . . --Curtis N. Johnson, Fall 2007. Journal of the History of Biology 40(3): 533.
At a given latitude, the most striking feature of avian seasonality is the consistency with which the successive stages of reproduction, moult and migration take place each year—not only on a populational scale, but also within individuals. Day-length—the most consistent sources of temporal information about the environment—was suggested to play a role in the scheduling of avian annual cycles, in particular of migration, as early as 1876 (e.g. Palmén 1876; Wallace 1876) . . . --Timothy Coppack, 23 June 2007. Journal of Ornithology 148, Suppl. 2: S460.
[concerning the organization of a forest preserve] . . . Although Wallace's proposal is controversial and raises environmental concerns, it is important to recognize that he was focused on key ecological issues. He fought to preserve in an unsullied state the forests that had not been cleared. He also recognized that severe ecological destruction had been wrought on the state of nature. And in this, he contributed to a philosophy of ecological restoration by raising the issue of how we are to address anthropogenic environmental problems. In "Epping Forest," Wallace documented that environmental degradation had taken place, as profiteers and lords of manors had destroyed whole areas of the forest. He provided a reasoned discussion of the different temperate forests in the Northern Hemisphere and an argument that recognized how the species found in a particular location are, in part, influenced by the much longer, geological, and climate history of the earth. In this, Wallace provided important insights and helped open a realm of debate . . . --Brett Clark & Richard York, June 2007. Organization & Environment 20(2): 231.
Wallace found fault with two aspects of domestication as a heuristic for understanding adaptation in nature. He argued first that the analogy was flawed: artificial selection requires an intelligent selector, whereas no such force acts in natural systems. Additionally, he insisted that the selection itself was fundamentally different, leading to intrinsically different kinds of variation. Domesticated species, he wrote, "are abnormal, irregular, artificial; they are subject to varieties which never occur and never can occur in a state of nature: their very existence depends altogether on human care; so far are many of them removed from that just proportion of faculties, that true balance of organization, by means of which alone as an animal left to its own resources can preserve its existence and continue its race." Both Wallace's lines of argument find modern audiences, from those who see a fundamental difference between the conscious selection of humans and natural processes to those who argue that variation in domesticated species differs from that in nature . . . --Jeffrey Ross-Ibarra, Peter L. Morrell & Brandon S. Gaut, 15 May 2007. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 104, Suppl. 1: 8641-8642.
The coloration of this genus of weevils is among the most astonishing visual effects displayed in nature. Many animal species that are distasteful to predators have evolved aposematism (they have a distinctive, conspicuous coloration, which functions as a warning signal, advertising their inedibility to potential predators). Wallace notes in a passage on the genus Pachyrrhynchus that many weevils have excessive hard integuments, which render them inedible to most birds, and our own dissections of this species confirm their extremely tough exoskeleton. It seems likely, therefore, that the stark coloration of this species is a form of aposematism. Further evidence in support of this comes from the finding that a number of edible species, such as the longicorn beetles Doliops curculionides and Doliops geometrica and the cricket Scepastus pachyrhynchoides mimic various Pachyrrhynchus species weevils . . . --Victoria Welch et al., 30 April 2007. Physical Review E 75(4): 7.
Several features of the results give some reassurance because they support plausible notions and other evidence that most nonsynonymous mutations and many nonsynonymous polymorphisms are deleterious. Our analysis implies that some 19 of 20 new amino acid replacements are deleterious with an average fitness reduction on the order of five times the reciprocal of the effective population size. These estimates pertain only to the subset of nonsynonymous mutations whose effect are not so severe as to preclude their becoming polymorphic, but they support other evidence that selection against deleterious mutations plays in key role in shaping patterns of genetic variation in Drosophila. Likewise, we estimate that [about] 7 of 10 amino acid replacements that are polymorphic in samples are deleterious. One feature of our results that might animate some surprise is the high proportion of amino acid fixations between species that show positive selection, [about] 95% in our data. This finding seems to reflect what Wallace called the "overwhelming odds against the less fit" . . . --Stanley A. Sawyer et al., 17 April 2007. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 104(16): 6509.
Given that phenomena strive for reality--that is, to become distinct--then there must by default be a process whereby constitutive elements are demarcated as 'included' and, of course, an opposite process, whereby elements become the 'excluded'. According to [Charles] Fort: "It is our expression that nothing can attempt to be, except by attempting to exclude something else: that that which is commonly called 'being' is a state that is wrought more or less definitely proportionately to the appearance of positive difference between that which is included and that which is excluded." This process leaves a trace, however, in the sense that one cannot subsequently provide a full and comprehensive description of the thing in question. Even Darwin, Fort argued, 'was never able to tell what he meant by a "species".' Echoing Wallace's (1875) earlier concerns over the close-mindedness of modern science, Fort argued that this body of knowledge was itself but one instance of localization, wherein an attempt is made to separate out those explanations which are deemed acceptable and proper from those that are not. The raw material of the world becomes organized and interpreted to fit into preconceived notions of how things should work. Slowly but surely, this drive towards explanation causes a plethora of facts and events to emerge from this chaotic landscape, each of which is seen to form part of an overarching pattern. 'A theory feels its way through surrounding ignorance,' he suggested, like 'a wagon train feels its way across a prairie.' And yet, 'Science relates to real knowledge no more than does the growth of a plant, or the organization of a department store, or the development of a nation: that all are assimilative, or organizing, or systematizing processes that represent different attempts to attain the positive state--the state commonly called heaven, I suppose I mean' . . . --Deborah Dixon, April 2007. Cultural Geographies 14(2): 193.
The conspicuous displays that warn predators of defenses carried by potential prey have been of interest to evolutionary biologists from the time of Wallace and Darwin to the present day. Although most studies implicitly assume that these "aposematic" warning signals simply indicate the presence of some repellent defense such as a toxin, it has been speculated that the intensity of the signal might reliably indicate the strength of defense so that, for example, the nastiest prey might "shout loudest" about their unprofitability. Recent phylogenetic and empirical studies of Dendrobatid frogs provide contradictory views, in one instance showing a positive correlation between toxin levels and conspicuousness, in another showing a breakdown of this relationship. In this paper we present an optimization model, which can potentially account for these divergent results . . . --Michael P. Speed & Graeme D. Ruxton, March 2007. Evolution 61(3): 623.
. . . Kantian philosophers do not have the exclusive right to transcendental arguments, which can be and are used by philosophers and scientists alike. For instance, physicists such as Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose have invoked the anthropic principle, the weak version of which was anticipated by Alfred Russel Wallace (1904, pp 256-257): "Such a vast and complex universe as that which we know exists around us, may have been absolutely required . . . in order to produce a world that should be precisely adapted in every detail for the orderly development of life culminating in man." More recently, the biologists John Bonner and Richard Lewontin have offered transcendental arguments for the modular organization of development as a requirement for evolvability . . . --Werner Callebaut, March 2007. Acta Biotheoretica 55(1): 77-78.
In his extensive monograph of the genus, Talbot, building on the earlier work of Wallace (1867), Dixey (1894) and others, originally divided Delias into twenty species-groups, according to differences in form of the androconia, male genitalia and, to a lesser extent, wing pattern. Talbot noted, however, that the Australian endemic D. aganippe, provisionally placed in the belisama group, 'seems somewhat isolated' on structural grounds and is 'placed doubtfully in this group'. Wallace (1867: 349) similarly remarked that, 'It is difficult locate this common Australian species', and placed D. aganippe in the belladonna group . . . --Michael F. Braby & Naomi E. Pierce, January 2007. Systematic Entomology 32(1): 6.
. . . In his notes, essays and correspondence from the field, Wallace consistently emphasized species and genera, and separated these descriptions from his rarer and briefer discussions of individual organisms. The first passage above, from an 1857 article describing collecting in the Aru Islands, is typical: Wallace provides an enthusiastic litany of species, families and genera. It is easy to miss his distinction at the end of the passage, between families, species and individuals, in terms of "abundance." Yet this too is characteristic of Wallace's writings from the field. At a given locality, families contain more or fewer species, and species contain more or fewer individual organisms. Wallace did not collapse or confuse these levels, but carefully distinguished between different sorts of abundance. In general, his natural history writing emphasized species, with clear distinctions between individual organisms and groups . . . --Melinda B. Fagan, 2007. Journal of the History of Biology [electronic file].
The contrast in the two naturalists' writings from the field thus has two aspects. First, Wallace emphasized groups of organisms, while Darwin described many details of individual organisms. Second, Wallace clearly distinguished between groups and individuals, while Darwin was more ambiguous. Both aspects can be explained by differences in natural history practice. Wallace and Darwin's contrasting habits and working routines in the field were shaped in turn by their different circumstances and motivations. The two naturalists went to the field with different training and social connections, different finances and responsibilities, and different theoretical interests . . . --Melinda B. Fagan, 2007. Journal of the History of Biology [electronic file].
The use of soil animals as protein source in human nutrition is still widely represented in indigenous populations in most regions of the world and was first reported by Wallace (1853, 1889) more than 100 years ago . . . --T. Decaëns et al., November 2006. European Journal of Soil Biology 42 (Suppl. 1): S26.
. . . Knowledge about biodiversity remains inadequate and plagued by the so-called Linnean and Wallacean shortfalls (Lomolino, 2004; Whittaker et al., 2005; see also Brown & Lomolino, 1998). The first refers to the fact that most species living on Earth were still not formally described, whereas the second is defined by the fact that, for the majority of taxa, geographical distributions are also poorly understood and contain many gaps. As recently pointed out by Whittaker et al. (2005), these two shortfalls are scale dependent, both on evolutionary and on ecological dimensions. Although work done since the 18th century allows us to make general predictions of broad-scale diversity gradients based on current climate effects (see Hawkins, 2004 and references therein), we are far from a predictive theory capable of predicting species diversity based on complex environmental and historical factors acting at different scales in time and space . . . --Luis Mauricio Bini et al., September 2006. Diversity and Distributions 12(5): 475.
Here I present a critical review of the literature which, when combined with the results of some comparative analyses, suggests that just a few selective agents can explain much of the variation in egg appearance. Ancestrally, bird eggs were probably white and immaculate. Ancient diversification in nest location, and hence in the clutch's vulnerability to attack by predators, can explain basic differences between bird families in egg appearance. The ancestral white egg has been retained by species whose nests are safe from attack by predators, while those that have moved to a more vulnerable nest site are now more likely to lay brown eggs, covered in speckles, just as Wallace hypothesized more than a century ago. Even blue eggs might be cryptic in a subset of nests built in vegetation. It is possible that some species have subsequently turned these ancient adaptations to new functions, for example to signal female quality, to protect eggs from damaging solar radiation, or to add structural strength to shells when calcium is in short supply. The threat of predation, together with the use of varying nest sites, appears to have increased the diversity of egg colouring seen among species within families, and among clutches within species. Brood parasites and their hosts have probably secondarily influenced the diversity of egg appearance. Each drives the evolution of the other's egg colour and patterning, as hosts attempt to avoid exploitation by rejecting odd-looking eggs from their nests, and parasites attempt to outwit their hosts by laying eggs that will escape detection . . . --R. M. Kilner, August 2006. Biological Reviews 81(3): 383.
Wallace's hypothesis for egg colouring is intuitively appealing because it can explain why so many bird eggs are white or speckled or some shade of brown in colour, and because it is consistent with observations that more cryptic offspring are less vulnerable to attack by predators. Furthermore, Lack (1958) found that a species' nest site could explain some of the variation in egg patterning and colouring amongst the Turdinae. He found that hole-nesters were more likely to lay white immaculate eggs, whereas about 80% of birds whose nests were placed in exposed sites covered their eggs in red or brown speckling, which he interpreted as an adaptation for concealment. However, experimental evidence in support of Wallace's hypothesis is rather mixed . . . --R. M. Kilner, August 2006, Biological Reviews 81(3): 385.
Why do organisms age and die? This question has long vexed biologists. Alfred Russel Wallace first suggested that ageing and death might be adaptive (Weismann 1882, Wallace 1889). In the 1860s Wallace wrote "Natural selection . . . in many cases favours such races as die almost immediately after they have left successors." Despite some early support, this adaptive view of ageing and death was soon dismissed, to such an extent that in the 1920s it was labelled a "perverse extension of the theory of natural selection" (Pearl 1922). This has remained the case since with almost all biological gerontologists believing that "longevity determination is under genetic control only indirectly," and that ". . . ageing is a product of evolutionary neglect, not evolutionary intent." Today, there are three largely competing theories used to explain ageing; mutation accumulation, antagonistic pleiotropy and disposable soma . . . --Calvin Dytham & Justin M. J. Travis, June 2006. Oikos 113(3): 531.
When you ask beginning students why we age, they usually respond that physical decay culls the old to make way for the young, says evolutionary biologist Ophélie Ronce of the University of Montpelier in France. That explanation carries a long pedigree—it dates back to Alfred Russel Wallace the co-discoverer of natural selection—but most modern evolutionists spurn it . . . --Mitch Leslie, 3 May 2006. Science of Aging Knowledge Environment 2006 No. 8: nf12.
During his collecting expedition in the Rio Negro and tributary Rio Uaupés basins (1850 to 1852), Wallace collected and sketched a specimen that was most likely Tetranematichthys wallacei. His pencil sketch of the specimen (Wallace, 2002: fig. 122) clearly illustrated the elongate dorsal-fin spine, the ossified, curved maxillary barbels, the elongation of the anterior rays of the anal fin, and the overall form of the head and body characteristic of nuptial males of Tetranematichthys (note: the orientation of the fish in the illustration is such that the mandibular barbels are not apparent). Given that T. wallacei is the only species of the genus known to occur in the Rio Negro and Rio Uaupés basins, we identify Wallace's specimen as that species . . . --Richard P. Vari & Carl J. Ferraris, Jr., May 2006. Copeia 2006(2): 176.
. . . It was not just that science was monoparadigmatic; its monoculturalism extended beyond the surveillance of the gaze to the fact that the creation of the object had to deny the subjective self and its knowledge. In relating to the other, modern western science either eliminated, assimilated, ghettoized or museumized them. Science had no place for defeated knowledges; the idea of an alternative science arose as a charter to challenge the current politics of knowledge. It was that great dissenting scientist Alfred Wallace who formulated the problem long before Thomas Kuhn. In his Wonderful Century (Wallace, 1898), a portrait of the achievements of 19th-century science, Wallace begins with a celebration of western science and then observes that a science at its moment of dominance tends to be coercive and to ignore competing theories and hypotheses. Wallace believed that the success of science made it ethically and cognitively imperative for the scientist to invent and explore alternatives . . . --Shiv Visvanathan, March-May 2006. Theory, Culture & Society 23(2-3): 166.
Wallace's field practices fit best into the survey tradition, which flourished during the shift from the 19th-century armchair to intensive ethnographic fieldwork in the early 20th century . . . Both survey and intensive ethnography were attempts to shift knowledge production into the field. Long before researchers gave field ethnography rather than armchair theorizing the highest prestige, Wallace was developing a greater role for regional survey work . . . --Jeremy Vetter, March 2006. Journal of the History of Biology 39(1): 98.
For more than a century, a debate has raged as to whether death constitutes an intentional ontogenetic program, the so-called Wallace-Weismann hypothesis, or the passive result of an inexorable accumulation of defects. By accounting for benefits to kin, the former assertion becomes more plausible. The inability to identify definable discreet mechanistic pathways for programmed death has provided a major source for criticism of this theory. Although evolutionary dynamics and pluralism may both contribute to the Darwinian value of phenoptosis, intuitive appeal persists in the notion of an oligarchy of functional hubs underpinning the many proximate mechanisms of phenoptosis. Indeed, given its processes' central roles in apoptosis, the mitochondrion may represent an ideal candidate to serve as one such hub on the level of the organelle. The induction of cellular damage by reactive oxygen species has been noted to be a mechanism of self-termination that encompasses all scales of biology. However, we believe that identification of hubs that operate on the level of systems as opposed to that of subcellular components may afford greater potential utility for modification and correction. Endocrine pathways, particularly those involving reproduction and circadian rhythms, have already been implicated in this regard . . . --Anthony J. Yun, Patrick Y. Lee & John Doux, 2006. Medical Hypotheses 67(5): 1082.
Whewell (1853) was the first to propose that the Solar System has a habitable region comparable to the modern conception of the CHZ [Circumstellar Habitable Zone]. He termed it the "Temperate Zone." In an impressive treatise for the period, Wallace (1903) enumerated several planetary habitability factors, including obliquity, mass, distance from the Sun, atmospheric composition, and proportion of water to land . . . --Guillermo Gonzalez, December 2005. Origins of Life and Evolution of Biospheres 35(6): 556.
. . . In this paper, we describe individual-based evolutionary model of aposematism and defense in spiny and poisonous species. We show that with spines, aposematism is easy to explain by a route in which predator biases are not out of sequence. Thus, aposematism evolves in our simulations if predators: (1) can recognize spines as dangerous (because they are common in prey populations anyway), (2) can use conspicuous markings to better notice and evaluate the significance of spines (resulting in cautious handling), and (3) can use conspicuousness as a cue for distinctiveness such that animals with colourful spines are less easily confused with nonspiny edible prey (as Wallace, , originally suggested for the general function of aposematism). . . --Michael P. Speed & Graeme D. Ruxton, December 2005. Evolution 59(12): 2501.
. . . In the past, applying the logic of adaptationism to such central and seemingly unique human capacities has often triggered strong resistance. Wallace himself, although the co-creator of natural selection theory, considered self-consciousness as too complex to be one of its outcomes (Wallace, 1889). Note that his main argument was that the sense of self seemed to constitute a radical departure from other forms of phenomenal awareness. But this argument itself relied on the assumption that there is an integral self-system. Given that assumption, it seems indeed difficult to consider the self as the result of a slow, incremental process of natural selection, each step of which is conducive to better reproductive potential. It is by contrast more tractable to evaluate the potential evolutionary background of separate self-relevant systems . . . --Pascal Boyer, Philip Robbins & Anthony I. Jack, December 2005. Consciousness and Cognition 14(4): 653.
As is often the case in evolutionary ecology, mathematical models have outpaced empirical data and the theoretical basis of the Wallace Effect has been established in more than 100 mathematical models. Supporting field data are less common, however, and are rarely unambiguous. Part of the problem is in not knowing the origin of the supposedly split populations: the only way properly to test the basis for sympatric speciation would be to experimentally manipulate a population, but the timescales of speciation are too long for such a study to observe incipient speciation within the lifespan of a single research project . . . --Jeff Ollerton, 3 August 2005. Heredity 95: 181.
In between Mill and Edgeworth, the classical economists' notion of sympathy was attacked, and was largely overcome. The co-discover of the Law of Natural Selection, A. R. Wallace, had argued in 1864 that the doctrine of natural selection did not apply to humans because of ethical concerns generated by human sympathy. Our morals do not allow us to let the infirm perish (Wallace, 1864, clxii). In response, the co-founder (with Francis Galton) of eugenics, W. R. Greg, insisted that if sympathy blocked the 'salutary' effects of the survival of the fittest, such sentiments should be suppressed. So, when the 'law' of 'natural selection' failed for humans--because of sympathy and ethics--the eugenic thinkers who so influence post-classical economics proposed to rid humanity of sympathy. --Sandra J. Peart & David M. Levy, August 2005. Canadian Journal of Economics 38(3): 950.
Another English socialist of a very different temper, Alfred Russel Wallace, co-founder of the theory of natural selection, took a different tack. The humane Wallace was a reformer but also a stout defender of Darwinian inheritance. So, although he believed that English society was increasingly dysgenic, Wallace rejected compulsory eugenics as elitist and barbarous. Wallace proposed that eugenic ends could be realized by an expansion of women's education and their political and economic freedom. Like Mill, he believed that the law could reduce women's economic dependency, which, he argued, would work to reduce the incentive for women to make dysgenic marriages. "Progress is still possible, nay, is certain," said Wallace, "by . . . that mode of selection which will inevitably come into action through the ever-increasing freedom, joined with the higher education of women" (1892). He envisioned selection as "effected through the agency of female choice in marriage" (1890). In leaving "the improvement of the race to the cultivated minds and pure instincts of the Women of the Future" (1890), the idealistic Wallace partly anticipates the eugenic feminism of Charlotte Perkins Gilman . . . --Thomas C. Leonard, July 2005. American Journal of Economics and Sociology 64(3): 782.
. . . At present, this genus of tropical and subtropical America, distributed from the central part of Mexico to the north of Argentina, including the West Indies, consists of ca. 350 species and is confined mainly to humid forests or grows along the edges of rivers. Its accumulated species diversity may be explained by gradual addition through geological time. This process was proposed by Wallace (1878) and turned out to result in greater accrual of species in tropical zones than in temperate regions. This, as explained by the "museum model," suggests that a stable tropical climate permitted the buildup of species through time . . . --L. Calvillo-Canadell & S. R. S. Cevallos-Ferriz, July 2005. International Journal of Plant Sciences 166(4): 688.
Wallace (1878) was among the first to argue that the low diversity of the polar regions is largely a reflection of past episodes of glaciations and climatic change that repeatedly drove many high-latitude taxa to extinction, leaving little opportunity for diversity to recover, and this idea has had subsequent proponents . . . --Emma E. Goldberg et al., June 2005. American Naturalist 165(6): 628.
The conditions under which aposematism, the conspicuous coloration of unpalatable or otherwise defended prey, could evolve have long been a topic of speculation (Wallace 1867; Poulton 1890). A perceived roadblock to the initial establishment of rare, aposematic mutants is the intense predation to which they would be subjected by naive predators. Conspicuous prey, albeit defended, are much more likely to be seen by predators, and if predators are unaware of their defence (and do not show neophobia), then such prey are more likely to be attacked on encounter. This means that rare conspicuous mutants of defended prey should, on average, be attacked more frequently than their cryptic conspecifics. A possible solution to this problem, first suggested by Fisher (1930), is that gregariousness could facilitate the evolution of distastefulness (and hence aposematism). Thus, if prey are warningly coloured and aggregated, then an attack on one individual by a naive predator could lead to subsequent avoidance of others in the group, often relatives, that share the same trait (this proposal was the initial inspiration for Hamilton's (1963) theory of kin selection) . . . --Christopher D. Beatty, Roderick S. Bain & Thomas N. Sherratt, 23 May 2005. Animal Behaviour 70: 199.
The Darwinian theory and Wallace's original theory can be formalized in terms of what is called today the carrying capacity of the environment, usually denoted by K; in Wallace's words, this is the level at which "the population must have reached its limits, and have become stationary." Suppose that the carrying capacity of the parental form on its own is K, and that the carrying capacities of the parental form and the advantageous variation when they coexist are K1 and K2 respectively. Under Darwin's theory K1Z0, whereas K2 is equal to or perhaps slightly greater than K, so that the parental form eventually becomes extinct even in a constant environment. Under Wallace's theory both carrying capacities are greater than zero, with K1!K2, so that both forms can coexist; if the environment deteriorates, both carrying capacities decrease, and if the deterioration is severe K1 becomes 0, so that the parental form becomes extinct. When the environment recovers, the carrying capacities return to their original values so that both types can again coexist . . . --Michael Bulmer, 22 May 2005. Notes & Records of the Royal Society 59(2): 130.
It was Wallace (1855) who was the first to recognize the correlation between geographic distribution and evolutionary relationship. Wallace (1855) in fact described how a process akin to what is now called vicariance might have produced modern faunal differences in the Galapagos Islands if these now distinct islands were once joined. In effect, Wallace (1855) was arguing that one way the geological world impinges on the biological world is through the mechanism we now refer to as allopatric speciation. If speciation is allopatric, species can disperse over geographic barriers (that have geological or climatic causes) and become isolated, or geological or climatic changes can cause populations of species to become isolated from one another by creating barriers within formerly continuous ranges; the latter is termed vicariance. In either case, the isolated populations diverge and eventually speciate . . . --Bruce S. Lieberman, 11 April 2005. Palaeogeography, Palaeocimatology, Palaeoecology 219: 25.
Although these definitions vary, the common emphasis is on the provision of a more stimulating environment. Historically Alfred Russel Wallace may have been one of the first individuals to provide enrichment to captive animals (Wallace 1869). Upon receipt of an orphan orangutan in his camp, he fashioned an artificial mother from a buffalo skin that appeared to comfort the animal, served as a surrogate mother, and thereby enriched the animal's environment. Shortly afterward, Wallace received another animal in camp, a cynomolgus monkey, and the two animals were successfully paired. Thus Wallace's earliest attempts at enriching the animal's environment included the provision of both inanimate and animate exemplars of enrichment . . . --James L. Weed & James M. Raber, March 2005. ILAR Journal 46(2): 118.
A. R. Wallace originally invented the concept now known as aposematism to describe prey that combine warning displays with secondary defences (Wallace 1867, 1889). More than a century later, the evolution of aposematism remains a remarkably fertile and controversial area of research. Warning displays are still of interest to researchers, in part, because the proximate mechanisms by which they operate tell us much about predator behaviour and predator-prey coevolution. As originally envisaged by Wallace (1867) and Poulton (1890), warning displays function to enhance discrimination, to accelerate learning and perhaps slow down forgetting . . . --Michael P. Speed & Graeme D. Ruxton, 21 February 2005. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 272: 431.
. . . aposematic displays remain the focus of considerable attention because, for many researchers, their initial origins contain at least two important evolutionary paradoxes. First, it is generally assumed that before the first aposematic traits evolved, prey were both highly cryptic and had effective secondary defences. If secondary defences are costly (and they often are), then their presence in prey already highly protected by crypsis is paradoxical: why pay for repellent secondary defences if your enemy rarely finds you? Second, there is a better-known paradox of warning signals, which also emerges from commonly held assumptions about initial conditions. Ever since the seminal theoretical model of Harvey et al. (1982), it is widely taken that aposematic mutants must emerge from defended cryptic species. When this is the case, new aposematic forms suffer combined and highly effective barriers to survival because of their rarity and their conspicuousness . . . --Michael P. Speed & Graeme D. Ruxton, 21 February 2005. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 272: 431.
. . . as Wallace originally envisaged, warning displays might be conspicuous so as to be "very distinct from the protective tints of the defenceless animals allied to them" (Wallace 1889, p. 232). Hence a good reason that aposematism may evolve initially is to prevent confusion with undefended prey. On its own, behavioural conspicuousness itself may not be a sufficiently reliable signal of non-profitability to function as an aposematic display. As we found . . . prey can evolve some heightened levels of behavioural conspicuousness even when they do not evolve adaptive secondary defences. Hence, some additional discriminative cue may be necessary for defended prey to minimize erroneous attacks by educated predators . . . --Michael P. Speed & Graeme D. Ruxton, 21 February 2005. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, Biological Sciences 272: 436.
The language faculty is one component of what the co-founder of modern evolutionary theory, Alfred Russel Wallace, called "man's intellectual and moral nature": the human capacities for creative imagination, language and symbolism generally, mathematics, interpretation and recording of natural phenomena, intricate social practices, and the like, a complex of capacities that seem to have crystallized fairly recently, perhaps a little over 50,000 years ago, among a small breeding group of which we are all descendants--a complex that sets humans apart rather sharply from other animals, including other hominids, judging by traces they have left in the archaeological record. The nature of the "human capacity," as some researchers now call it, remains a considerable mystery. It was one element of a famous disagreement between the two founders of the theory of evolution, with Wallace holding, contrary to Darwin, that evolution of these faculties cannot be accounted for in terms of variation and natural selection alone, but requires "some other influence, law, or agency," some principle of nature alongside gravitation, cohesion, and other forces without which the material universe could not exist. Although the issues are framed differently today within the core biological sciences, they have not disappeared . . . --Noam Chomsky, Winter 2005. Linguistic Inquiry 36(1): 3.
. . . Rohde (1978, 1992) expanded earlier suggestions that high-energy levels may increase speciation rates (Wallace, 1878). Relationships between speciation/extinction rates and energy may arise directly through the influence of solar energy on mutation rates, and most literature on the diversification rate mechanism focuses on this relationship. Alternatively, both solar and productive energy availability may influence speciation/extinction rates indirectly through variables such as body size and reproductive rates . . . --Karl L. Evans, Philip H. Warren & Kevin J. Gaston, February 2005. Biological Reviews 80(1): 14.
. . . adaptationism is usually traced back to Alfred R. Wallace, one of the two great biological revolutionaries, who was also one of the forefathers of modern astrobiology with his intriguing and remarkably prescient 1903 book Man's Place in the Universe. This view is the scientific foundation of Schroeder's solution to Fermi's paradox. Intelligence is an adaptive trait, like any other. Adaptive traits are bound to disappear once the environment changes sufficiently for any selective advantage which existed previously to disappear. In the long run, the intelligence is bound to disappear, as its selective advantage is temporally limited by ever-changing physical and ecological conditions . . . --Milan M. Cirkovic, January-February 2005. Journal of the British Interplanetary Society (JBIS) 58(1-2): 65.
The first report of a tool-using parrot in the wild was in 1869, by Wallace (2000). He described a black palm cockatoo (Probosciger aterrimus) in New Guinea using a piece of leaf as a wedge while feeding from kanary nuts (Canarium commune). According to the author, after starting to groove the nut with its lower mandible, the bird held it in its foot and bit off a piece of leaf. This was retained in the deep notch of the upper mandible while the bird started to seize the nut once again, fixing the edge of the lower mandible in the notch and braking off a piece of shell by a powerful nip. Wallace suggested that the nut was prevented from slipping by the elastic tissue of the leaf (Wallace 2000) . . . --Andressa Borsari & Eduardo B. Ottoni, January 2005. Animal Cognition 8(1): 48.
. . . the Wakatobi Marine National Park includes all coral reefs, islands, and communities within its boundaries and is centered around the main islands in the Wakatobi archipelago. The area is considered "a geological and biological anomaly" and is located at a zone of transition between the two distinct faunas associated with the Asian and Australian continents. Wallace (1869) postulated that the islands of Sulawesi had been isolated far longer than the surrounding islands, giving evolution a much greater opportunity to shape a unique fauna . . . --Benjamin P. Horton et al., January 2005. Journal of Foraminiferal Research 35(1): 4.
Wallace's rhetorical world was as remote from Darwin's as their social worlds--they wrote up their theories differently. Although a colonial infrastructure made much of Wallace's fieldwork possible, the solitary English collector, living alongside natives and dependent on their knowledge and skills, eschewed the rich imperial language in which Darwin depicted evolving life. Wallace thought spatially and described his theories in ways appropriate to the Welsh mapmaking enterprise from which he first learned about native habitats. He wrote with artless clarity. One searches in vain for conquering colonial imagery in his major theoretical essays between 1855 and 1864. Here "organic beings" are continually "peopling" the earth and making it a "theatre of life." New species evolve under changed "physical conditions" in "an unbroken and harmonious system." The faunas of "neighboring countries" testify to their geological past, showing that new species were "gradually introduced" as the regions became isolated. The arrival of "chance immigrants" is often followed by "natural extinction and renewal of species," and those organisms with "greater powers of dispersion" and "a greater plasticity of organization" have "extended themselves" over continents. The "regular and unceasing extinction of species, and their replacement by allied forms" is an "established fact," contingent in every case on the quantity and quality of available food . . . --James Moore, 2005. In David N. Livingstone & Charles W. J. Withers, eds., Geography and Revolution (University of Chicago Press): 121-122.
In The Malay Archipelago, Wallace's most popular and widely read book, the only "empire" is Austrian, "imperial" is a common species name, and only the Dutch, the Portuguese, and ants have "colonies." "Aborigines" are always human, "natives" are established residents (also marsupials in the Moluccas and flowers in the Himalayas), and people wage "war," "conquer," and "exterminate" one another (also the flying opossum). "Competition" too is a human prerogative, but no "invasion" crops up, nor any of its cognates. Districts may be "overrun" and indigenous populations "supplanted"; "inhabitants" and "enemies" of different species may "struggle" and "migrate." Yet Wallace is remarkably consistent--startlingly so compared to Darwin in the Origin of Species--in omitting to cast living organisms in imperial Britain's image. . . . James Moore, 2005. In David N. Livingstone & Charles W. J. Withers, eds., Geography and Revolution (University of Chicago Press): 124.
What role, if any, natural selection itself plays in reproductive isolation in the earliest stages of speciation when populations first begin to diverge has been a contentious issue since the late 19th century when Alfred Russel Wallace (1889) advocated the idea that the low fitness of hybrids should select for reproductive isolation between diverging populations. This selective mechanism has been called the Wallace effect or (more frequently) reinforcement. Support for reinforcement waxed and waned throughout the 20th century, enjoying increasing popularity after Dobzhansky elaborated the theory in the 1940s, going out of favor in the 1980s when theory discounted it, only to recover more recently when new theoretical models turned in its favour. Prezygotic isolating mechanisms have now been investigated in over 100 mathematical models, firmly establishing a theoretical basis for the evolution of reinforcement under the right conditions . . . --J. Silvertown et al., 2005. Heredity 95: 198.
Accordingly, we summarize four macroevolutionary patterns exhibited by venomous snake mimicry as the Savage-Wallace Effects: First, mimicry is more likely among closely related organisms that share a common body plan (e.g., among lepidopterans, among fishes, and thus their specific similarities (e.g., wing color patterns in butterflies) are representative of evolutionary parallelism . . . Second, mimicry spanning distantly related organisms, representative of evolutionary convergence, is more likely to involve planarians, myriapods, fishes, snakes, and other groups with relatively simple body forms . . . Third, among vertebrates, snake mimicry is unusually widespread because of (1) and (2), and because venomous species can severely injure or kill predators . . . Fourth, the origin of noxious attributes can markedly increase diversity within a clade beyond that encompassed by unpalatable species; dangerous models thereby make otherwise "unprotected niches" possible for harmless relatives, and even for lifestyles not used by the models themselves . . . --Harry W. Greene & Roy McDiarmid, 2005. In Maureen Donnelly et al., eds., Ecology and Evolution in the Tropics: A Herpetological Perspective (University of Chicago Press): 205-206.
Proposed originally by A. R. Wallace in the mid 19th century (Wallace 1852), the riverine barrier hypothesis states that major Amazonian rivers significantly reduce or prevent gene flow between populations inhabiting opposite river banks, hence promoting speciation. In a phylogeographic framework, the main prediction of the riverine barrier hypothesis is that sister intraspecific clades and species will exist across major rivers rather than within major Amazonian interfluves; furthermore, phylogeographic and population genetics data can distinguish between primary divergence across rivers (predicted by the riverine barrier hypothesis) versus secondary contact along rivers between nonsister taxa that diversified elsewhere. A second prediction of the riverine barrier hypothesis comes from the observation that the upper reaches of all major Amazonian rivers are narrower than the lower reaches; therefore, a gradual reduction of the "river-barrier effect" is expected to take place from the lower to the upper part of the river's course . . . --Alexandre Aleixo, June 2004. Evolution 58(6): 1303.
. . . the possibility that at least some instances of similarity among distasteful species may have evolved through selection to deceive predators has been frequently raised. Even before the publication of the theory of Mullerian mimicry, Wallace (1871) proposed that "distasteful secretion is not produced alike by all members of the family and that where it is deficient, protective imitation comes into play" . . . -- Thomas N. Sherratt, Michael P. Speed & Graeme D. Ruxton, May 2004. Journal of Theoretical Biology 228: 217-218.
Alfred Russel Wallace was the first to suggest that aging and death might be evolved traits. In the 1860s, he suggested that individuals are programmed to die so that they do not compete with their offspring. His idea had some early support, notably from the influential German biologist August Weismann, but by the 1920s it had been dismissed as a "perverse extension of the theory of natural selection". By the middle of the last century, the focus of evolutionary theory on senescence had shifted to other theories such as mutation accumulation and antagonistic prejotropy . . . Recent discoveries in nematodes, insects, and mammals of genes that, when mutated, increase life span, have increased interest in the evolution of aging. In this article, I show that within a spatially structured population, programmed death does evolve and suggest that it is time to reconsider the "perverse" theories of Wallace and Weismann . . . --Justin Travis, April 2004. Journal of Gerontology A: Biological Sciences 59(4): 301.
Conspicuous and simple color patterns (often red, yellow, or white in combination with black) are common among animals that are distasteful, noxious, or otherwise potentially dangerous to their predators ( . . . Wallace, 1867). The common view is that conspicuousness has evolved because it constitutes a strong visual signal that is easy for receiving predators to detect, learn, and associate with unpalatability. However, conspicuous coloration may provide protection against predators even if the prey lacks chemical or structural defense mechanisms, because coloration may elicit spontaneous avoidance behaviors in naive predators. It has been suggested that bilateral asymmetry also may play a role in communication, but this has been studied primarily within the context of mate choice . . . --Anders Forsman & Joakim Herrström, January-February 2004. Behavioral Ecology 15(1): 141.
Although we have many species from most of the major species groups and subgroups related to D. melanogaster in our analysis, speciation patterns for independent species groups and subgroups need to be examined with a number of genes to generalize these inferences. Nevertheless, if the observed correspondence between the time of species divergences and paleoclimate changes is true, it supports Wallace's hypothesis for a rapid species change resulting from climatic change (Wallace 1870a, b). In the present case, the factor is postulated to be climatic cooling in the Cenozoic. A major consequence of this cooling was an extensive increase in aridification in the middle to low latitude regions, which lead to expansions of savannas and grasslands as well as the fragmentation of forests that were primary habitats of ancestral fruit fly species and populations. The adaptation to the newly arisen dry environment and the allopatry caused by the forest fragmentation are potential causes for stimulating fruit fly speciation. The former adaptation is supported by the distribution patterns of D. teissieri and D. yakuba, which are adapted to forests and savannas, respectively . . . --Koichiro Tamura, Sankar Subranmanian & Sudhir Sumar, January 2004. Molecular Biology and Evolution 21(1): 42.
For Wallace, the mind overarched natural selection. He believed there was a more daring, vertical movement that boosts life toward higher levels of complexity and consciousness. After all, if evolution were merely a matter of survival by adaptation, we might still be a planet of hearty bacteria. Those bacteria would have their history, an eons-long series of variations and adaptations, all responsive to selection, but without movement toward greater complexity. For that matter, if complexity beyond the unicellular level were rare and episodic, coming and going over the eons, we would still have evolution as Darwin explained it. But in the only example we have of evolving life--our own Earth--we see something more dramatic. We see a steady undeterred thrust toward a net gain in complexity. The microbes continue, but life has branched out into an amazing array of new species. It has been building itself up into ever more delicate, sentient forms. To ignore that fact would be to ignore the defining feature of evolution. . . . --Theodore Roszak, 2004. In David Rothenburg & Wandee J. Pryor, eds., Writing the Future: Progress and Evolution (MIT Press): 3-4.
Steven Pinker (How the Mind Works) and Daniel Dennett (Darwin's Dangerous Idea) speak for mainstream evolutionary theory when they insist that the mind was built up incrementally by way of small, selective advantages in the same way as a bird's wing. They see the growth of intelligence as wholly a matter of problem solving and toolmaking--practical talents to which natural selection easily applies. They simply ignore Wallace's dilemma, offering no reason why the mind should ever have developed beyond simple counting, toolmaking, and enough verbal ability to coordinate a hunting expedition . . . --Theodore Roszak, 2004. In David Rothenburg & Wandee J. Pryor, eds., Writing the Future: Progress and Evolution (MIT Press): 5.
One could argue that males can survive better by being smaller and more cryptic than females. The importance of predation to the evolution of sexual dimorphism was first stressed by Wallace (1889), who suggested that crypsis in females is favoured because bright colours potentially attract nest predators. Recent comparative studies, such as that undertaken by Martin & Badyaev (1996), seem to confirm this point. In tinamous, reversed sexual roles and predation risks incurred by incubating males may explain why they are less colourful than their conspecific females. Small size and cryptic coloration are probably complementary strategies to avoid predators . . . --P. L. Tubaro & S. Bertelli, November 2003. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 80(3): 526.
To understand why small monitor species have radiated so dramatically through Australia, New Guinea, and their adjacent islands, but not elsewhere, we examined the possible role of Wallace's Line . . . In contrast to its influence on the mammals, Wallace's Line is not a barrier to monitors--or is it? That depends on the adult size of the species . . . Large monitor species (in which adults are greater than four feet long) are just as diverse on lands east of Wallace's Line as they are to the west, or for that matter in mainland Asia and Africa. Small monitor species, however, occur only to the east of the line . . . --Samuel S. Sweet & Eric R. Pianka, November 2003. Natural History 112(9): 44.
It has long been recognized that prey that possess significant defenses against predators tend to be conspicuous in some way (Wallace 1867; Darwin 1871; Poulton 1890). The contemporary explanation for this phenomenon, termed "aposematism" (Poulton 1890), is that there is "something special" about the educational properties of conspicuous traits as a signal of defense. For example, it has been repeatedly shown that predators learn to avoid unpalatable prey more quickly when they are conspicuous than when they are cryptic. This theory for the evolution of aposematism is plausible, but there is an important caveat. Whatever the underlying cause of aposematism, it is likely that predators would evolve an enhanced psychological predisposition to learn to avoid conspicuous prey precisely because such prey tend to be defended . . . --Thomas N. Sherratt & Christopher D. Beatty, October 2003. The American Naturalist 162(4): 377.
'The Darwinian theory is wrong because random variations tend to worsen performance'. Thus wrote Fred Hoyle in his famous book 'The intelligent universe'. Hoyle pointed out three important things in this book. First, that the idea of natural selection had been around for several decades before Darwin wrote The Origin. Secondly, that it was Wallace's clear letter of 1858 that really clarified Darwin's mind on the matter. Thirdly, and more important, natural selection as conceived by Darwin and Wallace just won't work mathematically. The odds are stacked hugely against random change producing even one new protein . . . --Anthony K. Campbell, July 2003. Astrophysics and Space Science 285(2): 571.
With respect to the theory of sexual selection, Darwin (1859, 1872) developed this novel concept but did not describe the function of this behaviour (for instance, the role of the male peacock's tale). As Dawkins has pointed out, it was Wallace who speculated that a male with brightly coloured tail feathers is showing that he is a high-quality individual. Subsequent studies have shown that this idea is supported by experimental evidence. Hence, with respect to the second mode of selection in nature, Wallace developed the concept originally proposed by Darwin (1859, 1872) and did draw the correct conclusions . . . --U. Kutschera, 1 May 2003. Theory in Biosciences 122(4): 357-358.
Why do we believe Wallace when he writes about evolution yet ignore him when he turns to spiritualism? Part of the reason is the context in which we receive his writings today. Spiritualism is now out of fashion, hoaxes have been exposed, and there is no longer a social context for the idea of spiritualism. The experiments, while repeatable in Wallace's day, are no longer repeatable, and thus they fail one of the hallmarks of the scientific method. But they were repeatable then! When one reads Wallace's works, one is struck by how he acted with complete warrant in exploring spiritualism scientifically. As Kuhn has demonstrated, Wallace was operating under the social constructs of his day . . . --Steven L. Peck, March 2003. Zygon 38(1): 11.
As we shall show, the concept of the diorama emerged from the construction of biogeographical zones. Moreover, the concept of biogeographical zones not only triggered the vision of the diorama as its "musee imaginaire" but, from the very beginning, theorizing on biogeographical zones was captured by visual means such as maps and illustrations. These images had a strong impact on the emergence of dioramic displays by providing two-dimensional forerunners for what were later implemented as three-dimensional museum installations. As we show in this paper, the new mode of illustration introduced by Wallace in 1876 formed a crucial influence. In The Geographical Distribution of Animals Wallace elected to illustrate different biogeographical zones by the simultaneous display of animals from different taxa against an ecologically appropriate background. By and large, each animal was itself in some way unique to its zone and could potentially have been used as a surrogate for the zone . . . --Julia Voss & Sahotra Sarkar, February 2003. Philosophy & Geography 6(1): 61.
Wallace insisted that none of these suggestions went to the heart of the problem. None of these people had suggested anything more than some 'force'--but force is a cause of motion, not a cause of organization. There must be something more than merely a force. There must be some agency that guides and coordinates the process which builds up that infinitely complex machine, the living organism. Wallace thought of the cell as being not only self-repairing, but also self-renewing, self-multiplying, self-adapting to its ever-changing environment, so as to be, potentially, everlasting . . . --Roger Steer, 2003. In his Letter to an Influential Atheist (Authentic Lifestyle): 27.
The co-inventor of evolutionary theory, Alfred Russel Wallace, was aware of the significance of Darwin's views. In his book, Darwinism, (originally published in 1890) Wallace took pains to distance himself from Darwin on the question of human capacities. He pointed to the mistake that someone might make by conjecturing that all geological changes are due to factors such as flooding, volcanic activity, the action of the wind and the sun, and so on while overlooking the special contribution made by glaciation. Glaciation is an important cause of change, but is radically different from the other causes of geological change. By analogy, Wallace argues, "Because man's physical structure has been developed from an animal form by natural selection, it does not necessarily follow that his mental nature . . . has been developed by the same causes only (Wallace 1897: xx)." Our mental capacities and our morality, Wallace suggests, may be due to something quite different from natural selection . . . --Andrew Brennan, 2003. Worldviews 7(3): 276-277.
In the second edition of Primitive Culture, Tylor's doubts about psychic phenomena were suppressed and Spiritualism roundly denounced as a survival of animistic beliefs (Tylor 1873). Yet, even the formulations used in Primitive Culture betray an ambivalence within its scheme of mental evolution that seems fundamental to contemporary scientific politics. Tylor felt forced to class modern Spiritualism with "primitive" animism--the kind of arbitrary classification that Wallace was up against in his critique of Primitive Culture and in his earliest writings on botany. But Tylor also had to acknowledge that Spiritualism was not just a survival but an extraordinary revival of animism. He even went as far as to recognize the anomalous status of Spiritualism within his progressionist scheme, because the former "is a truly remarkable case of degeneration" (1873), the possibility of which Primitive Culture was originally intended to argue out of existence . . . --Peter Pels, 2003. In Birgit Meyer & Peter Pels, eds., Magic and Modernity: Interfaces of Revolution and Concealment (Stanford Univ. Press): 258.
. . . In Miracles and Modern Spiritualism, the argument about perception was developed after Wallace denounced the theoretical fallacy of assuming that because Spiritualist phenomena ran counter to our knowledge of the laws of nature, they cannot exist. He argued that the physical phenomena that occur during a seance, can only be explained by presuming invisible intelligences, which was only "another and more striking illustration than any we have yet received of how small a portion of the great cosmos our senses give us cognisance" (1874). He compared the force exerted by these intelligences with light, heat, electricity, and magnetism (ala "modes of motion" of a space-filling "ether") to show how these "diffuse and subtle" forms of matter can act upon "ponderable bodies" and become known to us only by their effects. The fact that we do not know this higher sense is no argument, Wallace wrote, because likewise the "faculty of vision" would be "inconceivable" to a race of blind men. "It is possible and even probably that there may be modes of sensation as superior to all ours as is sight to that of touch and hearing" (1874). The subject of divination, in particular, allowed Wallace to elaborate on this? The clairvoyance that is at the basis of divination led him to suppose a "new sense" that amounts to "a kind of rudimentary perception, which can only get at the truth by degrees." . . . --Peter Pels, 2003. In Birgit Meyer & Peter Pels, eds., Magic and Modernity: Interfaces of Revolution and Concealment (Stanford Univ. Press): 262.
. . . The lesson seems to be: if you think hard about species origins, then it does not matter how you travel, you will reach the theory of natural selection in the end. On closer inspection, however, the Wallace case offers at least a few openings to those sceptical about the independence of the theory from its history. One move would be to deny that Wallace did, in fact, 'co-discover' the theory of natural selection. Rather, he came up with a theory quite different from Darwin's, and Darwin's overreaction in 1858 has misled historians ever since . . . --Gregory Radick, 2003. In Jonathan Hodge & Gregory Radick, eds., The Cambridge Companion to Darwin (Cambridge Univ. Press): 150.
Three features of Wallace's account of the evolution of human mind and morals stand out. First, he conceived the selective environment to be other proto-human groups--which would have an accelerating effect on the evolutionary process, since social environments would rapidly change through responsive competition. Second, he proposed that selection worked on the group, rather than the individual--which allowed him to explain the rise of altruistic behaviour, that is, behaviour perhaps harmful to the individual but beneficial to the group. In his original essay on the transmutation of species (1858), Wallace conceived of the struggle for existence as occurring among varieties instead of individuals. He continued to think in such group terms when considering the evolution of moral behaviour. Finally, in a note to the published version of his talk to the Anthropological Society, he mentioned that he was inspired to develop his thesis by reading Herbert Spencer's Social Statics. Spencer's own early brand of socialism had pulled Wallace to his side. In Social Statics, (1851), Spencer had envisioned a gradual and continual adjustment of human beings to the requirements of civil society, with individuals accommodating themselves to the needs of their fellows, so that eventually a classless society would emerge in which the greatest happiness for the greatest number would be realised. Spencer assumed that the inheritance of useful habits would be the means by which such evolutionary progress would occur, while Wallace believed natural selection to be the agent of that progress . . . --Robert J. Richards, 2003. In Jonathan Hodge & Gregory Radick, eds., The Cambridge Companion to Darwin (Cambridge Univ. Press): 102-103.
On the basis of personal experiments and reliable reports from other scientists, Wallace concluded that the universe is populated with a hierarchy of spirit beings, some of whom are in contact with the human population on earth, usually through mediums. According to Wallace, the spirit beings lower in the hierarchy, acting through mediums, were responsible for a variety of paranormal phenomena, including clairvoyance, miraculous healings, communications from the dead, apparitions, materializations of physical objects, levitations, etc. More powerful spirit beings may have played a role in the process of evolution, guiding it in certain directions . . . --Michael A. Cremo, 2003. In his Human Devolution: A Vedic Alternative to Darwin's Theory. (Bhaktivedanta Book Publishing Inc.): 102.
. . . Hume appealed to uniform human experience in his refutation of miracles. For example, Hume observed "it is a miracle that a dead man should come to life; because that has never been observed in any age of any country" Wallace noted two flaws in this argument. First, the appeal to uniform human experience, granting the truly uniform nature of the experience, insures that no really new fact could ever be established. Second, Wallace questioned the veracity of Hume's version of uniform human experience. "Reputed miracles abound in all periods of history," wrote Wallace (1896, p. 8). And they continued up to the present, thus nullifying Hume's assumption. . . --Michael A. Cremo, 2003. In his Human Devolution: A Vedic Alternative to Darwin's Theory. (Bhaktivedanta Book Publishing Inc.): 116.
. . . The space-filling ether of nineteenth century physics is no longer with us. But there are modern scientific concepts that would allow Wallace's basic system to operate. According to deterministic chaos theorists, immeasurably small random perturbances of matter can rapidly propagate into large-scale effects that are not easily predictable. Scientists sometimes give the example of a Caribbean butterfly that by its wings sets off motions of air molecules. These movements might eventually amplify to steer a hurricane from open sea into the American coast. If the butterfly had flapped its wings slightly differently, the hurricane might not have hit land. According to this idea, Wallace's spirit beings might make infinitesimal adjustments on the subatomic level that would quickly propagate into observable spiritualist effects. One might also propose that they are somehow capable of manipulating the curvature of Einstein's space-time continuum. They could thus produce gravitational effects, for gravity is said to be the result of curvature in the continuum. Or one might propose that the spirit beings induce slight changes in the quantum mechanical vacuum, which in some ways resembles an ether. Of course, this approach is limiting, and rather than straining to find ways to explain spiritualist phenomena in conformity with currently accepted physical laws, it may make more sense to come up with a new theoretical system that more naturally incorporates both the normal and paranormal phenomena . . . --Michael A. Cremo, 2003. In his Human Devolution: A Vedic Alternative to Darwin's Theory. (Bhaktivedanta Book Publishing Inc.): 128.
. . . Wallace favored the latter course, but his system has certain puzzling features. Although a dualist, he does not appear to accept the existence of individual conscious entities before their earthly embodiment. According to Wallace, there is an original spiritual mind from which matter is generated. Individual spiritual minds, associated with spiritual bodies (souls), are only developed from and in material bodies, as they come into existence (Wallace 1885; in Smith 1991, p. 100). After death, the individual minds, as above stated, go to "the first grade of spirit life," where they experience progress or the lack of it based on their earthly habits. But if individual spirit souls can exist after earthly embodiment, why not before? And why is there any need at all for earthly embodiment, which is not an altogether pleasant experience? Why not skip that and go directly to the highest grade of spiritual life? . . . --Michael A. Cremo, 2003. In his Human Devolution: A Vedic Alternative to Darwin's Theory. (Bhaktivedanta Book Publishing Inc.): 129.
. . . Here is another problem with Wallace's system. In his works, Wallace details reports of varied spiritualistic phenomena, such as levitation, apparitions, and clairvoyance, from his own time and throughout history. But he ignores reports of transmigration of souls, which occur widely in almost all times and places. The reports of transmigration are just as credible as any other category of evidence he considers. The existence of this phenomena requires, however, certain modifications in Wallace's system. At death, souls would pass not necessarily into the first phase of spiritual existence but perhaps into new material bodies. According to religious systems that incorporate transmigration, such as the Vedic system, some souls, because of their strong attachment to their last embodiment, do not attain new material bodies, but remain for some time as ghosts. This actually fits in quite well with the observations of Wallace and other spiritualists, who found that the spirits they contacted often desired to communicate with living friends and relatives . . . --Michael A. Cremo, 2003. In his Human Devolution: A Vedic Alternative to Darwin's Theory. (Bhaktivedanta Book Publishing Inc.): 129.
Instead of unthinkingly placing English society at the top of the evolutionary tree, he argued that the evolutionary process had gone awry. In Wallace's hands evolutionary theory ceased to act as a rationalization of what was and became a promise of what could be. The key here was to hold up so-called savage societies as occasionally more civilized and more advanced than the West. Thus towards the end of his popular travel book The Malay Archipelago (1869), Wallace favourably contrasted primitive morality with the 'social barbarism' of Victorian England. If a savage society could attain a higher level of morality, then something must have disturbed England's evolutionary progression. The villain was laissez-faire individualism. Human evolution--the development of man's moral and intellectual faculties--depended upon the extent to which man was exempted from an individualist, physical struggle. Yet Victorian society celebrated individualism . . . --David A. Stack, 2003. In his The First Darwinian Left: Socialism and Darwinism 1859-1914 (New Clarion Press): 28.
Historians of science have raised the suggestion that Wallace's version of natural selection was not quite so Darwinian as Darwin himself believed. Wallace persistently used the word 'variety' as the level of entity at which natural selection acts. You heard an example in the long passage I have just read out. And some have suggested that Wallace, unlike Darwin who clearly saw selection as choosing among individuals, was proposing what modern theorists rightly denigrate as 'group selection'. This would be true if, by 'varieties', Wallace meant geographically separated groups or races of individuals. At first I wondered about this myself. But I believe a careful reading of Wallace's paper rules it out. I think that by 'variety' Wallace meant what we would nowadays call 'genetic type', even what a modern writer might mean by a gene. I think that, to Wallace in this paper, variety meant not local race of eagles, for example, but 'that set of individual eagles whose talons were hereditarily sharper than usual.' . . . --Richard Dawkins, October 2002. The Linnean 18(4): 20.
. . . Modern Wallaceans accept that peacocks' tails and similar bright organs are advertisements to females. But they want the males to be advertising genuine quality. A male with bright coloured tail feathers is showing that he is a high quality male . . . The late W. D. Hamilton, of Oxford University, was a prime example of a Wallacean in this sense. He believed that sexually selected ornaments were badges of good health, selected for their capacity to advertise the health of a male--bad health as well as good. One way to express Hamilton's Wallacean idea is to say that selection favours females who become skilled veterinary diagnosticians. At the same time, selection favours males who make it easy for them by, in effect, growing the equivalent of conspicuous thermometers and blood-pressure metres. The long tail of a Bird of Paradise, for Hamilton, is an adaptation to make it easy for females to diagnose the male's health, good or bad. An example of a good general diagnostic is a susceptibility to diarrhoea. A long dirty tail is a give-away of ill-health. A long clean tail is the opposite. The longer the tail, the more unmistakeable the badge of health, whether good health or poor . . . --Richard Dawkins, October 2002. The Linnean 18(4): 22-23.
. . . A significant positive correlation between the proportion of range area above 100 m and total range size for each species is used to suggest that past sea-level rises may explain smaller range sizes in low-lying regions and that riverine barriers have been important in shaping the current distribution of C. cleonus group species . . . Unfortunately, it is not clear exactly how important rivers have been or continue to be in the current distribution of C. cleonus group species because some of the central and lower Amazonian material is historical and the label data probably generalized; in such cases, uncertainty remains as to which bank specimens were really collected from, especially with the possibility of subsequent shifts in river course. Having said this, several lines of evidence do suggest that rivers have been influential in shaping the current distributions of C. cleonus group species . . . --Jason P. W. Hall & Donald J. Harvey, July 2002. Evolution 56(7): 1489, 1493-1494.
Some cosmologists, including Alfred Russel Wallace, Freeman Dyson and Paul Davies, have formed the opinion that, in the words of Fred Hoyle, "the universe is a put-up job". They are expressing their marvel that the values of its constants and the forms of its laws are just those which allow such phenomena as the formation of planets, complex chemistry, life and intelligence. Some of them--including Paul Davies--go further than this. They argue that the laws of the universe were somehow legislated with purpose so that planets, chemistry and life could develop . . . Wallace, Hoyle, Dyson and others have made the point that even slight changes in some values of fundamental or cosmological constants, or even in the laws of physics themselves, would imply a universe in which life as we know it would not exist. Here are a few examples: If the Universe were much less dense, then stars and planets might not form. If the universe were much more dense, then it would have stopped expanding and contracted back into a hot big crunch long ago, possibly before any supernovae had had time to generate the elements needed for life. What if the laws of physics were different? If the strong nuclear force were much weaker than it is, then the electrostatic repulsion between protons would prevent the formation of large nuclei--hydrogen might be the only element. If gravity were different, or if the geometry of space-time were different, then stars might not form or planets might not have stable orbits . . . --Joe Wolfe, http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/~jw/danish.html (accessed 3 March 2002).
The check that 'human nature' placed upon hopes of social improvement is illustrated by Malthusianism. This was popularly conceived of as an argument about the limits human nature--in particular the impulse to procreation--placed upon progress. Thus the transformation sought by Owen in social relations was predicated upon the malleability and educability of the individual. Human nature can be improved beyond the limits set by present-day social relations, and education and environmental reform both play a role in this. Did these ideas influence Wallace's views on nature? In one important respect they did. Wallace's views on instinct and its role in animal and human behaviour are different from those of Darwin and contradict much of what passed for Darwinian psychology after the publication of the Origin. When Wallace talks about instinct in nature, whilst not denying its existence, he tends to discount the role of preformed, inherited behaviour and to talk up the notion of learning. Moreover, he returns throughout his life to the same proposition: the role of instinctive behaviour is small, that of learning relatively greater . . . --Greta Jones, March 2002. British Journal for the History of Science 35(1): 81.
. . . Wallace saw many instances of mismatch between existing faculties and the environment. The natural world, like the social, was a site of dissonance between wants and the environment. The wants were relatively fixed points--the need for food and so on--but the behavioural responses to these were malleable. He noted a species of bird which in Africa and India 'eat only insects' whilst those in South America 'in great measure live upon fruits which they capture on the wing as they do insects. There is no difference in their structure but being in different countries surrounded by different circumstances they are led to adopt different habits'. In downgrading instinct Wallace introduced the idea there was always space for change, a potential for specialization or variability in behaviour even among individuals from the same species. Nature was not filled up with all that was possible for its full exploitation. The potential spaces in it were not necessarily occupied nor all the forms of behaviour found in natural organisms perfectly matched to their environment. Wallace constantly repeated this. In the case of the anatomy of birds wants and habits were limited by their structure, not structure by wants and habits, but even with the same structure behaviour differed. There is always room for modification and change. This contributes to the unsettled and evolving natural world . . . --Greta Jones, March 2002. British Journal for the History of Science 35(1): 83.
. . .The difference in approach between Darwin's and Wallace's views on population is discernible in their respective contributions to the Linnean Society in 1858. Darwin introduces Malthus almost immediately and proceeds to litter his text with phrases and analogies from the Essay on Population. For Darwin, nature at war is 'the doctrine of Malthus applied in most cases with tenfold force'. Along with the struggle for mates introduced in his closing paragraphs, death is a major selective factor and death is the consequence of this 'enormous multiplying power'. In contrast Wallace begins with the question of varieties and the instability of species. He does not mention Malthus in his paper but he does quickly turn to the 'struggle for existence' and to population. However, in Wallace's hands the force of population increase loses that all-encompassing ontological character it displays in Darwin's first public exegesis of his theory. Malthus is certainly present in Wallace's paper but it is Malthus read by an Owenite . . . --Greta Jones, March 2002. British Journal for the History of Science 35(1): 93.
Selection in favour of individuals that resemble the background has been invoked as the probable cause of cryptic coloration in prey species for over a century and there have been numerous demonstrations that predators preferentially feed on more conspicuous prey items. Our study is, however, the only work other than Endler's research on colour-pattern selection in guppies that has shown significant directional selection by predators over multiple successive prey generations when compared with a non-select control . . . --Alan B. Bond & Alan C. Kamil, February 2002. Nature 415(6872): 612.
The evolutionism of Darwin (1859) and Wallace (1875) is radically different from all previous lines of thought in that it uses the notion of contingency applied to living beings. Francois Jacob writing about this issue stated: "with the theory of evolution, as with statistical thermodynamics, the notion of contingency became established in the very heart of nature. Since Newton (1934), physics had been based on a rigid determinism, which extended to all sciences. Evolutionary theory and statistical thermodynamics completely transformed the way of looking at nature, mainly because they brought together and gave the same status of related and measurable quantities to order and chance--two concepts which until then had been incompatible." . . . --Bernardo Dubvrovsky, January 2002. Progress in Neuro-Psychopharmacology & Biological Psychiatry 26(1): 2.
The theories he worked out during and after his travels in the East Indies dwelled essentially on spatial relationships, the reason to consider Wallace as being, fundamentally, a geographer. Consequently, geographical information was instrumental for Wallace both for his biogeographical as well as evolutionary contributions to biology. In several seminal papers and books he developed innovations in the historical reconstructions of faunas and, thus, implemented zoological geography as a biological discipline within the framework of evolutionary theory. It is, as Smith correctly stated, usually little appreciated how strongly natural processes are constrained by the necessity of having to take place in a three-dimensional space, and Wallace's skill at spatial analysis is best illustrated by his contribution to the biogeography of the Australasian region . . . --Matthias Glaubrecht, 2002. Verhandlungen zur Geschichte und Theorie der Biologie 9(2): 265.
From Darwin's publication of Origin of Species until Wallace's publication of his autobiography in 1905, Wallace was perhaps the most influential critic of the idea that the bright coloration of animals could be the outcome of female mate choice. Wallace saw no reason to invoke what to him was an unsubstantiated assumption that females of non-human animals were capable of and inclined to discriminate among males based on the quality of their ornaments (Wallace 1878, 1889). Instead, Wallace searched for explanations of colorful plumage that would allow such traits to be understood as utilitarian, not ornamental and extravagant. In his studies of bird coloration, Wallace did not focus exclusively or even primarily on gaudy plumages. Rather Wallace focused much of his research on the subtle differences among species and individuals in explicitly non-ornamental traits like the buff, brown, gray, and green plumage of birds (Wallace 1878, 1889) . . . --Geoffrey E. Hill, 2002. In his A Red Bird in a Brown Bag: The Function and Evolution of Colorful Plumage in the House Finch (Oxford University Press): 7.
. . . Far more convincingly than Darwin, Wallace showed how most plumage coloration supported the theory of evolution by natural selection. Most species, most of the time, are colored in ways that appear to enhance their survival and fecundity. Wallace provided an explanation for sexual dichromatism and drab female plumage that stands today as a triumph of the power of the comparative method in addressing evolutionary questions. Through his knowledge of the nesting biology of birds, Wallace showed that species with exposed nests in which the female alone incubates almost invariably have drab female plumage whether the male is colorful or not. Retesting and confirmation of this idea have only lately occurred. Wallace also was the first to set forth the idea that colorful plumage functions as a signal of species recognition. This became the most widespread explanation for colorful plumage for over seventy years, and it remains a too-often-ignored hypothesis in modern treatments of plumage coloration. Wallace also foreshadowed the now popular and well-supported idea that ornamental plumage could serve as a reliable signal of condition in his discussions of vital energy (Wallace 1878, 1889) . . . --Geoffrey E. Hill, 2002. In his A Red Bird in a Brown Bag: The Function and Evolution of Colorful Plumage in the House Finch (Oxford University Press): 10.
Wallace never seems to have suffered from the abstract doctrine of Philosophical Necessity. Charting his intellectual progress toward science, he notes that Robert Owen provided his introduction to "advanced views." Owen's "fundamental principle, on which all his teaching and all his practice were founded, was that the character of every individual is formed for and not by himself, first by heredity . . . and second by environment." Here, as with Martineau, Mill, Galton, and Darwin, philosophy intersects moral vocation, for this view requires restructuring the moral and legal system, which is based on the view that "all men could be good if they liked." In a determinist system, people cannot be "deterred from future aggression" unless the conditions in which they develop are changed. Hence Owen's "successful" New Lanark. For Wallace, implicitly, the vocation of science and, one might hazard, the nature of his theory, grow from this insight into hereditary and environmental determinism . . . --George Levine, 2002. In his Dying to Know: Scientific Epistemology and Narrative in Victorian England (University of Chicago Press): 110.
. . . While Wallace defers to chance in amusing ways and exhibits a Darwinian modesty in relation to his career, he sees a pattern of happy accident that implies something other than mere material causation. For himself, he can argue that: "many of the conditions and circumstances that constitute our environment, though at the time they may seem unfortunate or even unjust, yet are often more truly beneficial than those which we should consider more favourable. Sometimes they only aid in the formation of character; sometimes they also lead to action which gives scope for the use of what might have been dormant or unused faculties (as, I think has occurred in my own case)." But often, he says, those circumstances are not favorable, and if they consistently lead to bad consequences, "the system of society" is at fault. Wallace's willingness to accept inconsistency, to refuse the totalizations of a system making, marks his autobiography and his scientific life, and surely was consistent with--either as cause or effect--his own strong leanings toward socialism . . . --George Levine, 2002. In his Dying to Know: Scientific Epistemology and Narrative in Victorian England (University of Chicago Press): 111.
Abstract: An annotated facsimile of those pages of Alfred Russel Wallace's notebook recording his consignments from the Malay Archipelago to his London agent, Samuel Stevens, is provided. Records of individual consignments are linked with the stages of Wallace's and Charles Allen's itineraries to which they relate and are amplified from data provided by Wallace elsewhere; wherever possible, dates and places of the despatch of consignments and of the dates of their receipt in London are noted; and the dates of material becoming available for study are established, chiefly from British Museum accessions registers. It is intended that this should provide readier access to scattered collection data and should in particular assist in determining what specimens may properly be regarded as types or syntypes of the many taxa described by numerous contemporary authors from Wallace's material . . . --Daniel B. Baker, December 2001. Zoologische Mededelingen 75(16-25): 251.
It was precisely this latter characteristic, and the way in which Wallace's radical positions intertwined--his faith that some kind of willpower or spirit, lying outside or beyond natural selection, was responsible for moral evolution in the human species; his rejection of the more crude, social Darwinian deductions from biological theory; and his attack on the wastage of nature caused by rampant industrialism--that make him a valuable exponent of both the potentialities and the limitations of evolutionism as a philosophy. I am particularly interested here, of course, in Wallace as a tropicalist, especially the concern he articulated for the despoliation of tropical nature, a theme that emerged in his mature consideration of his tropical experiences and which, though connected to the new evolutionary outlook, was not a necessary outcome of it (Darwin, for example, did not share Wallace's concerns about the consequences of tropical destruction). This is perhaps the most overlooked aspect of Wallace's multifaceted contributions (most histories of environmentalism make no mention of him). In this chapter, then, I approach Wallace as arguably the most interesting student of tropical nature in the second half of the nineteenth century, a writer of popular natural-history books who was also a philosopher of nature, someone whose evolving representations of tropical nature take us into the post-Humboldtian, evolutionary era, and into the beginnings of the ecological era properly speaking . . . --Nancy Leys Stepan, 2001. In her Picturing Tropical Nature (Cornell University Press): 59.
. . . It was in the tropics, especially the islands of the East Indies, that Wallace first became aware of the ambiguities of the human presence in nature, the fragility of the evolutionary balance and the threat posed to it by overweening domination for purposes of commerce and gain. In his mature writings, he expressed the ideas that nature had not, in fact, been created just for human appreciation or consumption; that plants, animals and human beings formed a network of mutual interdependence; and that it was Europeans' actions that had the most profoundly negative effects on nature and culture, effects which could not be repaired easily . . . --Nancy Leys Stepan, 2001. In her Picturing Tropical Nature (Cornell University Press): 80.
Wallace's Line, essentially based on information about birds and larger mammals, with later attempts to delimit the Oriental from the Australian realm, has had enormous heuristic value and may even have triggered much of the biogeographic research which has been carried out in the region. Even today, as exemplified by the conference from which this volume arose, interest in the Wallacean region persists and may even have increased. With the availability of new data in geology and new methods, in particular for phylogeny reconstruction and for the measurement of genetic distinctiveness, the area has become even more interesting for biogeographers . . . --W. R. Erdelen, 2001. In Ian Metcalfe et al., eds., Faunal and Floral Migrations and Evolution in SE Asia-Australia (A. A. Balkema Publishers): 129.
. . . there was undeniably an 'individualist' accent to Wallace's program of interventionist egalitarianism. Wallace was not a collectivist. His socialism was never an attraction to a great and organising state. "Socialism" was to Wallace 'the use by everyone of his faculties for the common good, and the voluntary organisation of labour for the equal benefit of all' (Wallace, 1905). The use of the word 'voluntary' in his definition of socialism is surely significant. Under Wallace's socialism industry would be run by enterprises composed of capital-owning workers. Land nationalisation would not amount to a system of state farms or agricultural collectives. Rather, the state would be the sole owner of land, and would rent out its land to a throng of individual tenants . . . --William Coleman, 2001. In John Laurent & John Nightingale, eds., Darwinism and Evolutionary Economics (Edward Elgar): 42.
. . . The previous sections have used the case of Alfred Russel Wallace to scrutinise the proposition that natural selection was a projection onto nature of a political economy apologetic for a dominant class interest. This proposition is just one manifestation of a general and familiar vision of science . . . Alfred Wallace's scientific achievement, we have argued, makes for a jarring disconfirmation of this theory. Rather than seeking to inscribe norms justifying the dominance of one class, one race, one genera, Wallace sought to overturn such conventional dominance: of the wealthy, of the white race and (we may add here) of men. And, rather than being 'organically connected' to science's ruling elite, few could be less connected than Wallace to the elite and its social formations . . . --William Coleman, 2001. In John Laurent & John Nightingale, eds., Darwinism and Evolutionary Economics (Edward Elgar): 44.
Our results find that Wallace's Line is supported by the data he collected in the field and suggest that Wallace's Line does indeed demarcate a major faunal break. These results are in keeping with modern geological evidence on the origins of the region, and hence with Wallace's original contention. Wallace's data conform with his suggestion that the modern distribution of species reflects the geological history of the land masses. Modern geological knowledge indicates that the islands west of Wallace's Line comprised the single land mass of Sundaland connected to mainland Asia until the Eocene. Similarly, many islands on the Sahul shelf were also connected to New Guinea/Australia. The central islands, however, have a far more complex and isolated history. Sulawesi, for example, seems to be an amalgam of a number of different islands with different biogeographic origins. Similarly, the northern Moluccan islands seem to have been very recent arrivals for the eastern Pacific Arc which may have had closer contact with Australia and New Guinea than their present location suggests . . . --D. Clode & R. O'Brien, 2001. In Ian Metcalfe et al., eds., Faunal and Floral Migrations and Evolution in SE Asia-Australia (A. A. Balkema Publishers): 118.
. . . With the complex geological history of this region increasingly being understood, we now stand a far better chance of assessing Wallace's real legacy--the extent to which species distributions are limited by underlying geological history. This is a far more interesting question than arguing over the placement of arbitrary and illustrative lines. Different taxonomic groups (with different histories and different dispersal abilities) will undoubtedly differ in the extent to which they adhere to different biogeographic boundaries (as foreshadowed in Wallace, 1877) including Wallace's Line. Such variations merely reflect our expanding knowledge of both the species and the effect their geographical history has had on them . . . --D. Clode & R. O'Brien, 2001. In Ian Metcalfe et al., eds., Faunal and Floral Migrations and Evolution in SE Asia-Australia (A. A. Balkema Publishers): 119.
The Amazonian tropical rainforest harbors a species diversity that is vastly disproportionate to its geographic area. Numerous hypotheses have been proposed to account for this, tending to emphasize aspects of the maintenance or origins of the megadiversity. The oldest such hypothesis has its roots in the works of Alfred Russel Wallace, who observed that the ranges of some closely related neotropical vertebrate species (primates, birds) abut at major rivers. Indeed, Wallace defined distinct areas within South America, bounded by major Amazonian rivers like the Negro, Madeira, and Amazon, which differed in species composition of communities. These and similar observations have prompted the suggestion that lowland Amazonian rivers, of which there are many, may function as effective barriers to the dispersal of organisms. This may have a variety of consequences for patterns of species diversity on the Amazonian landscape. First, major Amazonian rivers may have played a significant role in species generation by impeding gene flow between populations with the eventual evolution of sister species on opposite banks. Second the expansion of species from their centers of origin may be halted by the presence of large watercourses; therefore, they may be restricted to only one bank. Finally, compared with a species distributed across landscapes without barriers, the probability of subsequent recolonization of a species that has gone locally extinct on one bank will be lower because immigration from the opposite bank is less likely . . . All of these factors might be expected to accentuate differences in species composition of opposite-bank communities . . . --Claude Gascon et al., 5 December 2000. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 97(25): 13672.
Whether the great rivers of Amazonia have something to do with species origins or are simply biogeographic sutures, the biotas of opposite banks ought to differ if the riverine barrier hypothesis is correct. Characteristically, in Wallace's monkey paper, he not only presented his data on primate distributions in relation to major rivers in the Amazon basin, but also suggested a testable, quantitative hypothesis: that the composition of species assemblages would differ in relation to the width of the river, the difference thus increasing from headwaters toward the mouth . . . --Robert K. Colwell, 5 December 2000. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 97(25): 13470.
The part that natural selection plays in the origin of species has long been debated. It is easy to see that if two populations are kept separate--by mountains or ocean, for example--they will eventually become so different that they can no longer interbreed successfully. Their differences may have evolved by natural selection, but their reproductive isolation is merely a side effect of changes that emerged for other reasons. This view seems unsatisfactory to those who emphasize the positive aspect of selection in evolution. Both Alfred Russel Wallace and Theodosius Dobzhansky argued that natural selection would reinforce reproductive barriers between diverging populations. There has been little evidence, however, that selection has in fact contributed directly to the formation of new species (speciation) in this way. Reports by Higgie et al. and Hendry et al., on pages 519 and 516 of this issue, provide examples from fruit fly and sockeye salmon populations showing that selection can produce the kind of isolation that separates species in the wild, and moreover, that it can do so within a very short time (a dozen or so generations) . . . --Nick Barton, 20 October 2000. Science 290(5491): 462.
What is less explicable is why the differences between Wallace and Darwin over the origin of distributional patterns have been confounded. Apart from a single chapter in The Origin of Species, Darwin wrote little on biogeography, yet his views on the efficacy of dispersal dominated biogeographical theory until relatively recently. I think the answer lies in Wallace being too far ahead of his time. I have often wondered what Wallace would have thought about modern geological evidence concerning the origin of Indonesia, and I am convinced it would have given him the key to understanding the distributional patterns he described in Malay Archipelago. The problem, of course, was that this evidence was not available until a century later. Given the lack of credible alternative explanations and the pressure from Darwin to conform to accepted ideas, Wallace was unable to develop his own theory fully. Over time his original thoughts were lost and his name became associated with Darwin's idea of dispersal. A reappraisal of Wallace's work on its own terms seems long overdue and would be a fitting millennial tribute to an outstanding scientist . . . --B. Michaux, January 2000. Journal of Biogeography 27(1): 221-222.
. . . Florence Clemens was the first to show how Conrad made use of Wallace's work in his fiction. She demonstrated how, in Lord Jim, Conrad used Wallace's account of his visit to the Rajah of Goa as the basis of his description of Doramin's household; how he used Wallace's account of his friend, Mr. Mesman, in describing Stein; how he drew on Wallace's own experiences for his presentation of Stein's activities as a naturalist. She argued that Conrad used The Malay Archipelago, in particular, 'for backgrounds with which he was unfamiliar'. Conrad, for example, had never visited Bali or Timor: 'all the information which Dain Maroola of Almayer's Folly gave Nina Almayer about his country on Bali could have been gleaned' from Wallace; similarly, 'all that is told in Victory of the Timor scene and government' in the account of Morrison's experiences in Delli derives from Wallace also. The Malay Archipelago was acknowledged by Conrad as one of the sources for his Malay fiction . . . --Robert Hampson, 2000. In his Cross-Cultural Encounters in Joseph Conrad's Malay Fiction (Palgrave): 73.
The lowland forests of the Amazon Basin contain a disproportionately large fraction of global species diversity. A number of vicariant speciation mechanisms have been presented to explain this high diversity. These hypotheses share the idea that historical and geographically pervasive barriers to gene flow have facilitated speciation in allopatry across much of Amazonia, but obviously differ with respect to the identity, location and duration of these barriers. The oldest of these, the riverine barrier hypothesis, derives from observations of animal distributions made by Wallace (1849, 1876). It posits a role for major Amazonian water courses in impeding gene flow between populations on opposite banks. The predictions for this hypothesis include that (i) many recently evolved sister taxa occupy opposite banks of large rivers, (ii) levels of genetic differentiation between populations on opposite river banks increases with increasing river width and flow rate and (iii) taxa of the upland terra firme forest show higher levels of differentiation across rivers than taxa of the seasonally flooded varzea forests found adjacent to the river. This last prediction assumes that the strength of the barrier to gene flow is greater for exclusively terra firme species because it consists of both the river itself plus the varzea forests of both river banks . . . --S. C. Lougheed et al., September 1999. Proceedings of The Royal Society of London B 266: 1829.
. . .the "pan-selectionist" view that variation is potentially available in all directions from any given phyletic starting-point, and that selection determines which subset of variants prevails. The alternative is the "developmental constraint" view that many of the gaps we observe between different morphologies do not arise from the non-adaptiveness of the absent forms but rather from the difficulty of making them through an ontogenetic process. The pan-selectionist view can be traced back to Wallace (1870), who considered variation to be omnipresent and available in all phenotypic directions imaginable, apparently without even a quantitative bias in any direction. He refers to "Universal variability--small in amount but in every direction", and Mayo (1983) boldly states that "The major constraint on natural selection as an agent of change is natural selection as a stabilizing force", apparently relegating any kind of developmental constraint to a minor role at best . . . --Wallace Arthur & Malcolm Farrow, June 1999. Journal of Theoretical Biology 200: 183-184.
Under Wallace's scheme, the event that concerns Romanes--the initiation of the speciation process--already has taken place. Wallace deals with events subsequent to the process of reproductive isolation. The idea that the infertility he notes might relate to what Romanes proposed does not occur to Wallace. In a separate section of his book he describes physiological selection as "another form of infertility," and then proceeds to attack the theory . . . --Donald R. Forsdyke, Spring 1999. Queen's Quarterly 106(1): 121.
Wallace's first essay on the origin of the colour sense was published simultaneously with, but independently of, Gladstone's paper. He had presented a possible evolutionary route for animal colour vision, starting with perception of degrees of brightness, ending with perception of colours according to wave length. In his view, green and blue would have been the first colours to which the eye became specially adapted, in accord with their universal presence in foliage and sky, as well as their soothing influence. Reds, yellows and violets would follow, as present in small amounts, offering great contrast, and useful to animals hunting for food and mates. This essay was revised and republished a year later, with specific response to Gladstone (and through him, to Magnus and Geiger). 'These curious facts' wrote Wallace, with regard to Gladstone's Homeric data, 'can not, however, be held to prove so recent an origin for colour-sensations as they would at first sight appear to do'. He pictured brightly coloured structures as having evolved in response to an already present and well-developed ability of animals, especially birds, to see colour, long before the arrival of man. Wallace concluded that 'Man's perception of colour in the time of Homer was little if any inferior to what it is now . . . owing to a variety of causes, no precise nomenclature of colours had become established . . . --Elizabeth Henry Bellmer, 1 January 1999. Annals of Science 56(1): 38.
As the new century ripened and imperialist rivalries increased, Wallace became convinced that a vast civilizational crisis was at hand and that the very survival of the human species demanded the rapid overthrow of capitalism. A few months before his death in 1913, he wrote (The Revolt of Democracy), "There must be no further compromise, no mere talking. To allow the present state of things to continue is a crime against humanity." How ironic to recall his warnings today when billionaire arsonists have set almost the entirety of Wallace's Malay Archipelago ablaze with their greed . . . --Mike Davis, March 1998. Capitalism, Nature, Socialism 9(1): 77.
Wallace's major contribution to the literature of reform is his corrosive criticism of nineteenth-century society, through which he offered a human vision of social reformation. He advocated recognizing racial equality, nationalizing land, giving women equal opportunity for education and employment, decreasing military expenditure, and saving the environment. His friend James Marchant wrote in Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences (1916) that "his greatest ambition was to improve the cruel conditions under which thousands of his fellow-creatures suffered and died, and to make their lives sweeter and happier." . . . --Charles Blinderman, 1998. Alfred Russel Wallace. In Gary Kelly & Edd Applegate, eds., British Reform Writers, 1832-1914 (Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 190; Gale Research): 326-327.
. . . With other socialists Wallace believed that neither genetic endowment nor divine prescription was responsible for the behavior of men and women, that instead the prime agent of social discord was bad government. He argued that the state ought to provide equality of opportunity and that no one should get a head start through inheritance: "To secure equality of opportunity there must be no inequality of initial wealth. To allow one child to be born a millionaire and another a pauper is a crime against humanity." Andrew Carnegie would later share this view on the inheritance of wealth. Wallace further argued that the state ought to own and manage railways and pay the doctors. He envisioned a Ministry of Public Health, its doctors acting as servants of the state, that is, of people--and he added, perhaps mischievously, "they should be paid according as they keep people well and not ill." . . . --Charles Blinderman, 1998. Alfred Russel Wallace. In Gary Kelly & Edd Applegate, eds., British Reform Writers, 1832-1914 (Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 190; Gale Research): 330.
It is possible that the initial condition in the pheasant was plumage monomorphism, with the cryptic female-type plumage subsequently having evolved under natural selection from predators. In fact, this hypothesis, formerly defended by Wallace (1889), is generally applicable to those birds, like pheasants, with a polygynous mating system without male parental care, that nest on the ground in open habitats, and are sexually dimorphic in plumage throughout the year. Also, it has not yet been proven that maintaining a colourful and bright plumage is costly, nor that it is a handicap for survival . . . --Concha Mateos & Juan Carranza, November 1997. Animal Behaviour 54(5): 1211.
The approach taken by Gregorius for modelling and analyzing the population genetic basis of Wallace's theory of speciation will be extended to allow analysis of the opposite case, where speciation is prevented by the reinforcement of genetic coherence. In this approach, a mutant gene modifies the current mating preferences without implying any advantage or disadvantage in fitness (including mating success). The latter assumption is indispensable in order to avoid confusion of the secondary effects of mating systems on fitness with their primary recombinational effects. It also reduces the analytical problems resulting from having to disentangle effects of fitness and mating preference on the evolution of mating behaviour . . . --Wilfried Steiner & Hans-Rolf Gregorius, November 1997. BioSystems 43(2): 139.
In 1881 Wallace took the lead. He formed The Land Nationalization Society on his own lines, with himself as President. In Land Nationalization (1882) he laid out his program. The state was to assume title to all land. To meet a conservative debating ploy, he would compensate present landowners. However, he ingeniously minimized the amount in a manner that tells us he knew the nuts and bolts of his subject. Compensation was to be an annuity limited to the duration of lives in being. It was to be based only on the net income actually being derived from the land before nationalization--i.e. not from the highest and best use, and not from future higher uses. All men and women (Wallace, like Mill, was also a feminist) could bid to lease parcels from the state for actual use. In the socio-biological terms in which he thought, this would consummate the natural relation of man to nature. It would also let men alternate between industry and agriculture as Wallace, a loving gardener, himself did. Wallace's Land Nationalization was individualist, not collectivist. Individual lessees were to have secure tenure, and tenant-rights to improvements. Rents to the state would be used, not to engross the state, but to obviate taxes. These rents would be based on the assessed "inherent value" of land, dependent only on natural and social conditions. As a surveyor and a biogeographer, Wallace readily distinguished "inherent value" from man's improvements to land, which he saw as transitory. Tax assessors in most American states and other former English colonies distinguish land and improvements routinely today, and many did then, too, although in England itself the concept was somewhat novel . . . --Mason Gaffney, October 1997. American Journal of Economics & Sociology 56(4:): 613.
Wallace, on the other hand, explained evolution not in terms of competitive struggles between species and the environment, but in terms of the governor that regulates the speed of a steam engine by maintaining constancy in the angular velocity of a flywheel. As Bateson puts it, building on Wallace's idea, the job of evolution is to maintain the constancy of something--specifically, the survival of the entire system comprised of all species and the environment. Darwin, according to Bateson, focused on the wrong subject--the individual species--when in fact the real subject of evolution is the species plus environment. In fact, the species and the environment co-evolve, to use a term that is popular among management writers today. Moreover, if you add the remarkable findings reached in the past thirty years by biologist Lynn Margulis, this process of co-evolution sustains the total system through cooperative symbiotic relationships, not competitive knock-outs . . . --H. Thomas Johnson, 11 October 1997. Keynote Presentation, The Deming Institute Fall 1997 Meeting, Washington, D.C.
Perhaps the effect of Wallace's line most relevant to us is its possible role in a decisive step of human evolution. Paleontologists tend to stress Africa as the cradle of humanity, to view Cro-Magnon Europe as the site where late ice age human culture flowered, and to neglect Australia as a remote outpost occupied by supposedly primitive Aborigines. Human behavior took a Great Leap Forward sometime between 100,000 years ago, where there were still no signs of art or complex tools anywhere in the world, and the period around 40,000 to 30,000 years ago, when great art and complex tools began to abound in Europe. Paleontologists usually assume that this development began among humans in Africa or the Mideast, then spread to Europe and finally (in diluted form) to our poorer cousins in aboriginal Australia. But anatomically modern humans appeared in Australia before they did in Europe--probably by 60,000 years ago and possibly even earlier. To reach Australia, the protohumans who had reached Asia from Africa around one million years ago (as attested by the famous Java Man fossils) had to cross a dozen straits separating Australia from Asia. . . .Each next strait would have been a stimulus to improve our nascent watercraft technology; each new island, a stimulus to adapt to a new environment and to invent new technologies; each island's untapped rich resources, the basis for a new human population explosion . . . --Jared M. Diamond, August 1997. Discover 18(8): 83.
Wallace's writings of this period make free use of the contrast between 'savage' and 'civilized', he talks often of 'higher' and 'lower' races, and was clearly committed to a notion of long-run progressive change in organic evolution and in human history. Yet there is no easy or simple mapping of the higher and lower, civilized and savage onto the progressive evolutionary narrative. Social, moral and intellectual progress are differentiated from one another, and lack of harmony between them can be catastrophic in its consequences. The hierarchical ordering 'higher' and 'lower' is sometimes used by Wallace to refer to inherited differences between peoples, but is also sometimes used to denote levels of civilization, and to do so in ways which do not carry any obvious value connotation. The word 'civilization' carries a negative as often as a positive valuation in Wallace's writing. Whilst the civilized nations remain in a state of social and moral 'barbarism', uncivilized savages approach a 'perfect social state'. . . --Ted Benton, Spring 1997. Studies in Travel Writing No. 1: 109-110.
. . . It is here that we encounter the central intellectual and moral tension in Wallace's thought, a tension which was to bring about a growing gulf between his and Darwin's views on human origins and nature and which may, indeed, go some way towards explaining Wallace's later involvement in spiritualist activities. Wallace's radical political philosophy and his capacity to admire and respect the achievements, customs and social solidarity of the indigenous peoples of the Amazon and the Malay Archipelago were increasingly at odds with his version of evolutionary naturalism . . . --Ted Benton, Spring 1997. Studies in Travel Writing No. 1: 110.
It is not just Darwin's opponents who regard the analogy as evidence against the causal efficacy of selection. A. R. Wallace, the co-discoverer of natural selection, addresses the analogy in his opening comments of the Darwin-Wallace paper of 1858. "One of the strongest arguments which have been adduced to prove the original and permanent distinctness of species is, that varieties produced in a state of domesticity are more or less unstable, and often have a tendency, if left to themselves, to return to the normal form of the parent species; and this instability is considered to be a distinctive peculiarity of all varieties." For Wallace, modification by artificial selection is limited and temporary, and therefore causally inefficacious in the production of new species. If natural and artificial selection were truly similar, then the analogy suggests that natural selection is incapable of forming new species. Consequently, Wallace argues against the analogy by emphasizing the differences between domestic breeding and nature. "It will be observed that this argument rests entirely on the assumption, that varieties occurring in a state of nature are in all respects analogous to or even identical with those of domestic animals . . . But it is the object of the present paper to show that this assumption is altogether false" (emphasis added). Wallace's vow to argue against the analogy is inexplicable unless he has embraced the view that artificial selection is inefficacious in the formation of new species. Surely Darwin was aware of Wallace's views, expressed so forcefully in the Darwin-Wallace paper, as he wrote the Origin . . . --Richard A. Richards, March 1997. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 28(1): 76-77.
. . . Darwin recognized some important distinction between domestic and natural varieties, and happily agrees with Wallace on the distinction. Wallace, in the preface to his Darwinism, likewise emphasizes his agreement with Darwin, describing his views as complementary. "I have endeavoured, by means of a series of diagrams, to exhibit to the eye the actual variations as they are found to exist in a sufficient number of species . . . It will be found that, throughout the work, I have frequently to appeal to these diagrams and the facts they illustrate, just as Darwin was accustomed to appeal to the facts of variation among dogs and pigeons" (emphasis added). Wallace certainly seems to regard himself as doing something very similar to what Darwin is doing. That would be surprising if he had thought Darwin to be making an analogical argument--given his earlier rejection of the argument. Wallace argues against the analogical argument by emphasizing the negative analogy between domestic breeding and nature. Unlike natural selection, artificial selection does not maintain fitness. Consequently, domestic varieties are unfit. Wallace makes this point in the 1858 Darwin-Wallace paper . . . --Richard A. Richards, March 1997. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 28(1): 81.
One reference point, however, must be marked if Wallace's future path--to the Malthusian moment and beyond--is to be mapped. He embarked on a scientific career less a naturalist than a surveyor, less a biologist than a biogeographer, less an evolutionist than an ethnographer. For seven formative years his job had been prescriptive economic geography. Parish upon parish, field upon field, he had set limits to human livelihoods, marking boundaries, drawing lines. In later years he would become an exemplary naturalist, but always boundaries and borders, habits and habitats, concerned him. Once he even likened the "System of Nature" to a "dissected map," the pieces of which could be assembled in a "mosaic." The picture is of a crowded tithe map, where field presses on field, niche upon niche, until "all gaps have been filled". Such was a surveyor's view of evolution . . . --James Moore, 1997. In Bernard Lightman, ed., Victorian Science in Context (University of Chicago Press): 304.
To validate his inclusion of plants formerly excluded from bedded-out gardens, Robinson turned to the writings of the late nineteenth-century naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace. Wallace collaborated with Darwin on his theory of evolution and published his own Contribution to the Theory of Natural Selection in 1870. Robinson was intrigued by Wallace's 1869 account of his extensive travels in the Amazon region and the Malay Archipelago, especially Wallace's statement that "during the twelve years spent amidst tropical vegetation, I have nothing comparable to the effect produced on our landscapes by Gorse, Broom, Heather, Wild Hyacinths, Hawthorn, and Buttercups." Wallace's nationalistic preference for English scenery reportedly led Robinson to plant such flowers as asters and heather, formerly considered too coarse for fashionable gardens . . . --Anne L. Helmreich, 1997, in Nature and Ideology; Natural Garden Design in the Twentieth Century (Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection).
The principles regarding relations between organisms and their environment set forth by Wallace clearly informed Robinson's gardening practices. In an early essay, "On the Law which has regulated the introduction of new species," Wallace first developed his theory governing the distribution of organisms. His fourth stipulation--that "in countries of a similar climate, but separated by a wide sea of lofty mountains, the families, genera, and species of the one are often represented by closely allied families, genera and species peculiar to the other"--underlies Robinson's theory that plants from climates similar to England's could be naturalized in the wild garden . . . --Anne L. Helmreich, 1997, in Nature and Ideology; Natural Garden Design in the Twentieth Century (Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection).
It is evident that Conrad read and assimilated Wallace's observations of the Malay natural environment. Wallace as anthropologist seems to have had an equivalent influence. In terms of religious practices, Wallace describes how 'the old juragan repeated some prayers' just before one of his more successful voyages; on the Patna voyage, the leading Arab recites a prayer in similar fashion as they cast off. In The Rescue, Lingard's dead lacar is 'wrapped up decently in a white sheet, according to Mohammedan usage', in a way highly reminiscent of Wallace's response to the death of one of his Malay men: 'As my men were all Mohammedans, I let them bury him in their own fashion, giving them some new cotton cloth for a shroud" . . . --Amy Houston, 1997. In Gene M. Moore et al., eds., Conrad: Intertexts and Appropriations: Essays in Memory of Yves Hervouet (Rodopi): 37.
Bates, Wallace and Spruce belonged to a new breed of scientist. They were not sponsored directly by the government, like Huxley or Darwin, attached to Royal Naval survey ships; they were not salaried, like the plant-hunters employed by the nurserymen, or even promised a reward on their safe return, like Richard Lander. They were scientific entrepreneurs, trading in beetles and birds and monkeys and dried plants, who needed to collect extensively even to pay their expenses, let alone secure a possible income for the future, when they might hope to work up their private collections and live off a store of knowledge and fieldwork rich enough to last the rest of their lives. The British Museum assured them there would be a good market for their collections. They made arrangements with a London agent and dealer, Samuel Stevens, who had premises in Bedford Street, just round the corner from the British Museum--an excellent choice, as it turned out . . . --Peter Raby, 1997. In his Bright Paradise: Victorian Scientific Travellers (Princeton University Press): 79.
Wallace's earlier suggestion that a connection may exist between the perennial woody habit of island species and reproductive strategy deserves closer inspection. He argued that the perennial insular woody growth form primarily reflects selection for longevity (rather than for woodiness per se) of insect-pollinated species in an environment where insects initially should be expected to be rare, noting that the resulting increase in size may have provided additional advantage in niche competition among initial colonizers. Bramwell's studies of breeding behavior are generally compatible with that view, since in Echium species studied, the woody island forms were found to be outbreeding, setting only 0-11% fertile seed in selfings, whereas their continental sisters as well as the herbaceous island inhabitant E. bonnetii were preferentially inbreeding . . . --Uta-Regina Böhle, Hartmut H. Hilger & William F. Martin, October 1996. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 93(21): 11744.
. . . If outbreeding is the primary selective factor in island colonization, pollination pressure will subsequently favor rare, large, conspicuous inflorescences among outbreeders and, as a consequence, select perennial (and therefore woody) habits capable of producing them, in agreement with Wallace's salient arguments. Under this view, diversity of contemporary woody Echium forms reflects a multiplicity of selectable developmental pathways toward longevity, rather than selection for specifically environment-adapted variants of such woody perennial habits as schematically depicted in Fig. 3. In other words, insular woodiness in Echium might simply betray "survival of the founders," and many differences between perennial woody habits could be nonadaptive . . . --Uta-Regina Böhle, Hartmut H. Hilger & William F. Martin, October 1996. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 93(21): 11744-11745.
Alfred Russel Wallace foreshadowed much of the current thinking on adaptive mate choice. To Wallace colour was merely a correlate of 'vigour', by which he implied health. A female should choose a mate adaptively by picking the most vigorous male, and it would just so happen that he would also be the most colourful. We too found colour to correlate with a variable, plasma proteins, that may be indicative of vigour. In addition, female kestrels in our colony in mate choice experiments have consistently preferred males with high display rates (vigour?), irrespective of the degree of genetic relatedness or experimentally induced parasite infection . . . --Gary R. Bortolotti et al., September 1996. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B 263: 1175.
. . . The hypothesis that sexual dichromatism was nonfunctional and incidental to inherent 'physiological' differences between the sexes was proposed by Alfred Russel Wallace. Wallace (1895) recognized that whereas males of many birds are more brightly coloured than their mates, the degree of dimorphism varied greatly, with the most common case being for males 'to have the same general hue as the females, but deeper and more intensified'. Although it may be difficult to discount the role of sexual selection for extreme cases, such as house finches, the common, subtle patterns of colour variation between the sexes may be more difficult to explain except as non-functional consequences of other biochemical processes. If such processes are fundamental to avian physiology, it may explain why sexual dichromatism is so common in birds, and why reds, yellows and oranges are so pervasive . . . --Gary R. Bortolotti et al., September 1996. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B 263: 1175.
A final argument, "An Additional Argument Dependent on the Theory of Evolution," was added to the 1904 edition of Wallace's book. Especially interesting because Wallace was so closely involved with the evolution arguments of his day, it is independent of the three connected scientific arguments and may be seen as another aspect leading to the same conclusion. Wallace argued that since humanity is the result of a long chain of modifications in organic life, since these modifications occur only under certain circumstances, and since the chances of the same conditions and modifications occurring elsewhere in the universe were very small, the chances of beings in human form existing on other planets was very small. Moreover, since no other animal on Earth, despite the great variety of diversity of forms, approaches the intelligent or moral nature of humanity, Wallace concluded that intelligence in any other form was also highly improbable . . . --Steven J. Dick, 1996. In his The Biological Universe: The Twentieth-century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science (Cambridge University Press): 48-49.
. . . In conjunction with Barrow and Tipler's use of the Anthropic Principle, at the end of the century one could therefore choose from the full spectrum of possibilities in the context of the extra-terrestrial life debate: a positive argument, a negative argument, and the extraterrestrially neutral argument from design. But it is remarkable that just when anthropocentrism seemed irretrievably banished from the repertoire of reputable worldviews, it returned in a more sophisticated but remarkably similar form to that of A. R. Wallace, who in arguing against the plurality of worlds at the beginning of the century concluded that "the supreme end and purpose of this vast universe was the production and development of the living soul in the perishable body of man." . . . --Steven J. Dick, 1996. In his The Biological Universe: The Twentieth-century Extraterrestrial Life Debate and the Limits of Science (Cambridge University Press): 535.
. . . male-male competition was obvious to those who watched animals behaving in the field, and it coincided with the Victorian notion of how animals should behave, thus never becoming controversial. Female choice, on the other hand, was far from obvious in the field, and Darwin's contemporary, A. R. Wallace (1891), in particular, was unconvinced by it. He felt that the power of discrimination by females was too weak to distinguish subtle differences between males, and he also doubted whether female choice could be sufficiently constant over time to select for male attributes. As Geddes and Thompson (1889) put it, consistency of female taste was "scarcely verifiable in human experience." Female choice continued to be contentious until relatively recently, and although there is now abundant evidence that females often choose their partners, the way that female choice has evolved still remains a controversial area of sexual selection theory . . . --T. R. Birkhead, 1996. Current Topics in Developmental Biology 33: 104.
The colors of the Amazon brought Wallace to investigate the sediment and substrata. He found the "almost perfect flatness" of the Amazon Valley its single most striking geological fact. No mountains or even slightly elevated plateaus rise from the plain until you reach the abrupt peaks of the Andes. Wallace's impression was that "here we see the last stage of a process that has been going on, during the whole period of the elevation of the Andes"--the gradual filling in of what was once the granite bottom of the sea with sediment brought down by rivers from the Andes Mountains . . . --Jonathan Maslow, 1996. In his Footsteps in the Jungle: Adventures in the Scientific Exploration of the American Tropics (Ivan R. Dee): 99-100.
In 1873, Alfred Russel Wallace posed a fundamental, and as yet unresolved, biogeographic puzzle: why should the tropics contain a disproportionately large amount of the Earth's biodiversity? Wallace (1873) suggested that the explanation for latitudinal variation of the diversity of plant species was directly related to climate. Wallace (1873) wrote "As we approach towards regions of polar cold and desert aridity the variety of groups and species [of plants] regularly diminishes; more and more are unable to sustain the extreme climatical conditions". However, in the case of animal distributions, Wallace (1873) believed that climatic change associated with glaciation was responsible for the impoverishment of the temperate faunas. In modern terms, Wallace proposed an 'equilibrium' hypothesis for vegetation, and an 'historical' hypothesis for faunal patterns. In the latter half of this century, these two schools of thought have diverged and undergone substantial specialisation, although no consensus has emerged . . . --D. M. J. S. Bowman, 1996. Australian Journal of Botany 44(5): 571.
Borrowing a line from Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner," there is "nor any drop to drink" anywhere today on the surface of Mars. Not so clear is whether there has ever been water, water everywhere. As was first demonstrated by Alfred Wallace (who concurrently with, but independently of, Charles Darwin proposed the idea of evolution by natural selection), the lifetime for liquid water under present Martian atmospheric conditions is measured in minutes. The former existence of Martian rivers or seas would then imply that the planet had a warmer, more Earth-like climate in its geologic past. Interest in Martian water also stems from the fact that we, like that famous canal enthusiast Percival Lowell, cannot envision any form of life existing without it. The red planet appears lifeless now, but evidence for a warmer, wetter planet in the past might make a search for Martian fossils plausible . . . --Harry Y. McSween Jr., December 1995. Sky & Telescope 90(6): 18.
. . . the nature of information conveyed by secondary sexual traits in mate selection has been hotly debated. Darwin (1871) believed that mate choice was solely based on arbitrarily chosen features that were aesthetically appealing to the members of opposite sex, although such chosen features did not confer any survival advantage to the animal. Wallace (1889), on the other hand, argued that natural selection would not allow the selection of merely ornamental features "unless the most ornamental always coincide with the 'fittest' in every other respect". The modern interpretation of the utilitarian view of Wallace, or the so-called good gene hypothesis, has commonly been invoked to explain human mate selection. Briefly, it is proposed that women, as a rule, can assess the "mate quality" of a man by attending to his resources or high status because these are usually achieved through competition with other members of the social and economical hierarchy . . . --Devendra Singh & Robert K. Young, November 1995. Ethology and Sociobiology 16(6): 483-484.
The theory of sexual selection by female choice, on the other hand, was greeted with interest mixed with skepticism (Wallace 1889; Huxley 1938). Wallace fully accepted intermale sexual selection but had serious doubts about the efficacy of female-choice sexual selection. His doubt concerned the adequacy of the proposed mechanism. Can female choice exert a selective pressure that is consistent and strong enough to produce secondary sexual characters of adornment and display in males? The status of sexual selection by female choice is still unsettled. Modern studies have confirmed the process for some types of male characters, but legitimate questions remain as regards other types of male characters . . . --Verne Grant, October-November-December 1995. Biologisches Zentralblatt 114(4): 320.
Wallace presented a very clear interbreeding species definition, then immediately dismissed it in his treatise on speciation of the Papilionidae of Indonesia. 'Species are merely those strongly marked races or local forms which, when in contact, do not intermix, and when inhabiting distinct areas are incapable of producing a fertile hybrid offspring. But as the test of hybridity cannot be applied in one case in ten thousand, and even if it could be applied, would prove nothing, since it is founded on an assumption of the very question to be decided . . . it will be evident that we have no means whatever of distinguishing so-called "true species" from the several modes of [subspecies] variation here pointed out, and into which they so often pass by an insensible gradation'. Wallace is first saying that it is practically impossible to make all the necessary crosses to test genetic compatibility. Second, since theories of speciation involve a reduction in ability or tendency to interbreed, species cannot themselves be defined by interbreeding without confusing cause and effect . . . --James Mallet, July 1995. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 10(7): 295.
The adaptive significance of cryptic female coloration in birds is an old and hotly debated issue in animal behavior, being a source of great disagreement between A. R. Wallace and C. Darwin, the co-founders of Natural Selection Theory . . . Darwin (1871) believed that dull female coloration was a non-adaptive consequence of sex-limited inheritance. Wallace (1889) proposed the hypothesis that cryptic female coloration functions to reduce predation risk at the nest. Wallace's evidence included the observation that in many cavity-nesting species females are brightly colored, and males are more cryptic than females in species with sex role reversal. However, these results are also consistent with sexual selection theory. Field tests of the nest predation hypothesis are rare, perhaps because extensive color variation among females within a sexually dimorphic species is uncommon . . . --Bridget J. Stutchbury & Joan S. Howlett, May 1995. The Condor 97(2): 559.
Aging is notoriously hard to explain in evolutionary terms. An early insight is due to Alfred Russel Wallace, the co-founder of evolutionary theory. The gist of his argument is contained in the following quotation (Wallace, 1865): "When one or more individuals have provided a sufficient number of successors, they themselves--as consumers of nourishment in a constantly increasing degree--are an injury to those successors. Natural selection therefore weeds them out." In the following it will be shown that this basic idea allows one to arrive at a quantitative prediction of species-specific aging. It also enables a qualitatively correct prediction of sex-specific differential aging in two species. The slower aging of human females becomes understandable in evolutionary terms . . . --Reimara Rossler, Peter E. Kloeden & Otto E. Rossler, May 1995. BioSystems 36(3): 179.
In Frank Tipler's newly published book (1994), The Physics of Immortality: Modern Cosmology, God and the Resurrection of the Dead, for example, the author claims "modern physics requires the God principle." By this Tipler means that the universe is structured in such a way that the laws of nature must give rise to intelligent life; and once formed, the resurrection of all intelligence--immortality--is inevitable. "Science now tells us," Tipler concludes, "how to go to heaven." While Tipler's science is modern, his argument is not. It is Wallace's argument for the necessity of a higher intelligence clothed in modern physics . . . --Michael Shermer, December 1994. Skeptic 3(1): 70.
. . . With the primary evidence missing in this historical mystery, we can only speculate on what really happened at Down. The extreme interpretation of a conspiratorial cover-up is not supported by the evidence. If Darwin were going to rig (or allow to be rigged) the editorial presentation of the papers to award him priority; or worse, plagiarize from Wallace certain needed ideas (such as the divergence of species, as Brooks suggests), why announce the arrival of Wallace's essay and submit it for publication in the first place? Why not either just take what was needed, or, if Wallace's essay added nothing new to the theory, just destroy the essay and letter and blame the loss on an inefficient postal service, or the mishandling of his mail at Down, or whatever? If one is going to accuse Darwin of such devious finagling as delicate arrangements or plagiarization, then would not the same guileful and scheming personality think of complete elimination of Wallace's essay as a successful strategy? . . . --Michael Shermer, March 1995. Skeptic 3(2): 83-84.
Several alternative explanations exist for the occurrence of symmetrical signals and symmetry preferences in nature. It has been suggested that some morphological symmetries arise inevitably from developmental processes. However, as Wallace (1889) observed, the symmetrical body markings of wild animals are often lost or degraded in their domesticated descendants. This suggests that certain symmetries are not inescapable consequences of development, but are maintained by other selection pressures in nature . . . --Magnus Enquist & Anthony Arak, 10 November 1994. Nature 372: 172.
The naturalists' concept of species as distinct reproductive units was carried over into the post-Darwin period. It was stated by Wallace (1889), Eimer (1889), and others. I will present Wallace's characterization of species in a paraphrased form. A species is an assemblage of individuals which: (1) are modified in structure, form, and constitution so as to be adapted to their particular conditions of life; (2) are differentiated from other allied assemblages; (3) reproduce their like: and (4) usually breed together (Wallace, 1889). Some students of species in the early post-Darwin period began to characterize species, not only as reproductive units, but as units of interbreeding. We see this in Wallace's fourth point above: species are individuals "which usually breed together" (Wallace, 1889). According to Poulton (1903) a species is "an interbreeding community". Karl Jordan (1905) stated that the individuals of a species occur together in an area and form an interbreeding community ("eine Paarungsgemeinschaft"). Wallace's first point listed above puts adaptation into the set of characteristics of species. This was an innovation at the time and one which did not become generally accepted until much later . . . --Verne Grant, October-November-December 1994. Biologisches Zentralblatt 113(4): 406.
In their recent TREE article, Polak and Trivers say that the study of symmetry and its fluctuations in biology was largely restricted to morphology and systematics until 1953. However, in 1889 A.R. Wallace remarked that coloration patterns of wild animals are more symmetrical than those of their domesticated descendants; he thought that symmetry would help specific recognition. In one respect Wallace's observation seems paradoxical. Domestic animals have less need to be cryptic than their wild counterparts, but, at least for humans, the presence of symmetry is a major failing of camouflage. Symmetrical patterning gives away animals that are otherwise superbly concealed. The few cryptic animals that are asymmetrically patterned maybe the exceptions that prove this rule, one example is the wryneck (Jynx torquilla), an unusual woodpecker . . . --D. Osorio, September 1994. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 9(9): 346.
. . . the Riverine Barrier Hypothesis was first advanced by Alfred Russel Wallace in 1849, when he argued that primate distributions were affected by river barriers and showed that the Basin was divisible into four major geographic areas bounded by the Amazon, Negro, and Madeira rivers. This hypothesis, although not mutually exclusive from others, has received recent attention and support. Ayres (1986) and Ayres and Clutton-Brock (1992) have confirmed Wallace's original observation by documenting the correlation between the degree of private community similarity on opposite banks of Amazonian rivers and river width, or flow rate. Additionally, Capparella has shown that the degree of genetic divergence among samples of understory bird species is related to river width. One explicit expectation of the Riverine Barrier Hypothesis is that increasing divergence should relate positively to river size (width, flow rate, etc.). Hence, differentiation should increase along both sides of a green river, from its headwaters to the mouth, as the barrier widens and the potential for cross-river gene flow diminishes. However, the expectation for any given taxon is likely to be complicated by the dynamic nature of floodplain rivers, because populations have the potential for passive transfer from one side to the other by river-bend cutoffs, or oxbow lake formation, through time . . . Consequently expectations of the potential force of riverine barriers are likely to vary among taxa that occur in the river floodplain (the seasonal flooded forest, or "várzea" of the Amazon Basin) as opposed to those that are limited to upland, nonflooded forest, or terra firme. The pattern and degree of divergence may also depend on other ecological characteristics . . . --James L. Patton et al., August 1994. Evolution 48(4): 1314.
. . . the argument has been made that aesthetic criteria in general are secondary and essentially in the service of a more fundamental process. Thus, Wallace has disputed Darwin's claim that female choices of maters reflect strictly aesthetic tastes, that is, beauty for beauty's sake (Wallace, 1889, 1892). Rather, Wallace insisted that beauty is likely to be associated with good health and vigor, which are deemed the primary bases for choice. The theoretical advantage that accrues to Wallace's position is that sexual and natural selection are parsimoniously working in unison. Within the classical Darwinian perspective, female choice of the most flamboyantly adorned or colored male can imply choice of a mate vulnerable to predators and likely to produce offspring with similar vulnerabilities. None of this is intended to imply that either Darwin or Wallace is right or wrong. After the passage of more than a century, the issue is still under debate, although new experimental studies testing predictions from the two theories offer hope of an eventual resolution of the issue . . . --Nathan Kogan, Spring 1994. Social Research 61(1): 143.
. . . in short, there are on every hand the most striking and conclusive evidences that the production and consumption of wealth have increased with even greater rapidity than the increase of population, and that, if any class obtains less, it is solely because of the greater inequality of distribution. What [Henry] George had done with this argument, Helfand argues, was to establish an economic equivalent of Wallace's theory that the human brain changed the nature of the evolutionary process by its ability to create tools and alter the environment. George had argued that labor is the source of wealth, on grounds that "the richest countries are not those where nature is the most prolific; but those where labor is the most efficient." . . . --Lamar B. Jones, April 1994. American Journal of Economics and Sociology 53(2): 252.
The earliest discovery of avian visual mimicry was Wallace's account of another case involving large aggressive models and smaller mimics that would otherwise have been expected to be among the models' victims. The models are friarbirds of the Philemon [moluccensis] superspecies which are among the largest members of a family (Meliphagidae or honey-eaters) notorious for pugnacious behavior; the models are orioles of the Oriolus [bouroensis] superspecies (family Oriolidae). Wallace was struck by parallel geographical variation in plumage between friarbirds and orioles on two Indonesian islands. Subsequent study expanded Wallace's observations in three respects . . . --Jared M. Diamond, 24 February 1994. Nature 367: 684.
The common idea that Darwin behaved like a perfect gentleman throughout the Wallace episode rests partly on the myth that he had some option other than those outlined above--that he could have rushed his theory to press without so much as mentioning Wallace. But unless Wallace was even more saintly than he seems to have been, this would have brought a scandal that left Darwin's name tainted, even to the point of endangering its connection to his theory. In other words: this option was not an option. The biographer who admiringly observes that Darwin "hated losing his priority, but he hated even more the chance of being suspected of ungentlemanly or nonsporting conduct" is creating a distinction where none existed; to have been thought unsporting would have threatened his priority . . . --Robert Wright, 1994. In his The Moral Animal (Pantheon Books): 306.
A major stumbling block for Darwinians was the absence of any fossil remains of humans in Europe during the Tertiary period. From this Wallace had argued a priori that the human species had not spread widely upon the earth and was of recent origin. Since fossil remains had been located only in the tropics, Wallace concluded that these warm climes had been the cradle of human evolution . . . --Nancy J. Christie, 1994. In Roy MacLeod & Philip J. Rehbock, eds., Darwin's Laboratory: Evolutionary Theory and Natural History in the Pacific (University of Hawai'i Press): 445.
Wallace is less well known for his lifelong insistence on the necessity for precise species distribution maps than he is for his much-disputed line. Detailed knowledge of species distribution was the basis for Wallace's efforts to formulate a general scheme of faunal regions. In one image, Wallace's map redefined and unified the various notions of biological regions current in the first half of the nineteenth century, embodied the evolutionary history of the diverse biota of the East Indian Archipelago, and participated in a genre of visual representation extending into the contemporary culture . . . Jane R. Camerini, December 1993. Isis 84(4): 727.
Fisher (1920) explains that the "essential difference" between plans such as those of Wallace and his own "is that between redeemability and irredeemability." But is there really an essential difference between always being able to "redeem" a gold certificate for a possibly varying quantity of gold, on the one hand, and always being able to purchase with irredeemable money a given quantity of gold at a possibly varying market price, on the other? So as an outsider to economics, Wallace was free from the attachment to gold and thus advocated a stabilization policy that was more in the spirit of the quantity theory. He was also explicit about what Fisher (in his definite-reserve system) left unspecified; namely, the role of the Treasury in injecting or withdrawing quantities of money from circulation. Here was a true anticipator of the Chicago School of the 1930s . . . --Don Patinkin, Summer 1993. Economic Quarterly 79(3): 18.
The second story is that the thin Martian atmosphere is but a remnant of a once much thicker atmosphere, most of which long ago escaped to space [cf., Wallace, 1907]. Other things being equal, because it is smaller, escape is easier from Mars than from Earth or Venus. Several escape mechanisms have been suggested, including some that could be operative today. A possibly important example of the latter is the nonthermal escape of nitrogen. Hydrodynamic escape and impact erosion of the atmosphere (a.k.a. atmospheric cratering) are two potentially much more effective escape mechanisms that should have been operative early . . . --Kevin J. Zahnle, 25 June 1993. Journal of Geophysical Research E 98(6): 10,889.
. . . the value of living organisms as an intellectual resource is another compelling reason for preserving biotic diversity. It provides the materials that allow us to understand the living world, whatever our reasons for doing so. Extinction is depriving us of much of the crucial evidence. Among the measures that Wallace advocated was the establishment of a system of strategically located forest reserves where a representative sample of the biota could be preserved and studied by naturalists . . . --Michael T. Ghiselin, Spring 1993. Pacific Discovery 46(2): 23.
Selection for genetic isolation has been called the Wallace Effect by Grant, in honor of A. R. Wallace who first suggested it (Wallace 1889). Control of a species' altitudinal boundary by a pathogen-environment interaction may provide an appropriate arena for the Wallace Effect. The scenario for speciation suggested above begins with a very unlikely event: establishment of a new disease-resistant population outside the normal habitat of the parent species. Though unlikely, such speciation across a "pathological barrier" requires no changes of climate, elevation of mountain chains, or other large scale phenomena. It suggests that the potential for the establishment of peripheral isolates in new ecological settings may exist at the margin of a great many species. This scenario is similar to the concept of the "upstart species" of Harper or of new species "budding off' from older species . . . --William Burger, December 1992. Biotropica 24(4): 569.
For both monochromatic and polychromatic species, pelage pigmentation would be helpful for identifying conspecifics, especially at distances where odor and vocalizations would be unreliable cues. In polychromatic species it would also narrow the range of choices within a herd when looking for the mother, particularly when her head cannot be seen clearly. Alfred Russel Wallace recognized the significance of body pigmentation when he wrote in 1889, under the subject of "Colour as a means of recognition": "If we consider the habits and life-histories of those animals which are more or less gregarious, comprising a large proportion of the herbivora, . . . we shall see that a means of ready recognition of its own kind, at a distance or during rapid motion, in dusk of twilight or in partial cover, must be of the greatest advantage and often lead to the preservation of life." Within a colour category, the young would have to rely on other cues, be they visual, auditory, or olfactory. For example, the length of pelage was one of the cues eliminated in this study by cutting the does' hair, because in a previous study I noticed that the offspring of long-haired females tended to solicit females with long hair like that of their mothers. Although cues present in the head are probably important for individual recognition, at a distance the fine detail of facial characteristics might not be as discernable as markings on parts of the body with more surface area. The specific visual cues used for recognition should depend on the characteristics of the group or species, the habitat in which the species is found, and the perceptual capabilities of the developing individuals . . . --Carlos R. Ruiz-Miranda, November 1992. Behaviour 123(1-2): 136-137.
For Paley, the epiglottis could not evolve in this manner; hence, some form of causality other than change origin is called for. Paley's answer was "an intelligent and designing Creator." Soon other thinkers followed Paley's lead concerning the impact of the argument from perfection. In one of the most amazing shifts in the history of ideas, Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) employed what may be considered an indirect use of the argument from perfection on an a fortiori basis against the very theory of natural selection that he had founded with Charles Darwin . . . --John T. Baldwin, April 1992. Harvard Theological Review 85(1): 112.
. . . On the one hand, motivated by the biological evidence discussed, but restricting themselves to a one-dimensional model of world reality, Goldschmidt and Gould (themselves standing outside the argument from perfection tradition) of necessity turn for an alternative model of origins to a refined concept of the "hopeful monster" theory wholly explainable by empirical principles within a materialistic framework. On the other hand, Paley, Wallace, Mivart, Bergson, Taylor, Kenny, Plantinga, and Polkinghorne, prompted by similar biological evidence but remaining open to a wider model of reality (one that can include a trans-empirical dimension) and to a dynamic relationship between God and the world, conclude that the evidence points more convincingly to some kind of originating causality that in the final analysis lies beyond the reach of "methodological naturalism." . . . --John T. Baldwin, April 1992. Harvard Theological Review 85(1): 119.
Alfred Russel Wallace developed a theory of evolution by natural selection at the same time that Charles Darwin did. He applied his theory to one of the earliest scenarios of human evolution. He related the split between the first human beings and the apes to the habitats in which they lived. Wallace proposed that hominids, our bipedally walking ancestors, arose on the great plains and high plateaus of Eurasia, isolated there by shrinking forests. His deduction was based on the fact that apes today live in dense forested areas. Wallace thought, therefore, that bipedally striding humans must have evolved in open, flat areas. Darwin disagreed on the geography, believing that a tropical environment with abundant fruit was our ancestral hominids' environment. He preferred an African origin for the human lineage. The chimpanzee and gorilla, he pointed out, were both African and the closest living primate relatives to humans . . . --Noel T. Boaz, March 1992. Earth 1(2): 37.
These findings show that Wallace's hypothesis can be verified for a broad category of population genetic models and that, therefore, the Wallace effect indeed deserves a central position in speciation theory. By outlining the effects of gametic phase imbalance, the findings also point at the forces which could possibly set up barriers to speciation: asymmetric gene flow between parapatric populations, and asymmetric cross-incompatibility in both parapatric and sympatric (sub-)populations. Asymmetry in cross-incompatibility describes the situation where in one population the rejection of cross-matings is markedly stronger than in the other population. However, whether these conditions actually suffice to inhibit speciation must be proven in each special case . . . --Hans-Rolf Gregorius, February 1992. Journal of Theoretical Biology 154(3): 397.
. . . Wallace's narrative eye, like Darwin's, allows him to transcend time through visual analogy, but it is the European model of cultural progress rather than biological history that flashes before the reader. The narrative motion of the European mind searching backward through its own memory is obscured, and the narrative motion of the tropical landscape advancing into the European landscape is foregrounded. Wallace's representation suggests than in looking at the trees he is not simply experiencing perceptual confusion; he is perceiving future forms in present ones. The link between trees and pillars, between tropical and European, is thus seen as a historical inevitability rather than an optical illusion or perceptual accident. Where Darwin's illusions increase formal variety, however, Wallace's limit it. Rather than a single form blossoming into multiple analogous forms, Wallace's eye perceives several different species in terms of a single European form. The distinction between Darwin's and Wallace's representational strategies roughly correlates to the differences in their evolutionary theories. Darwin believed in random competitive evolution while Wallace believed in adaptive, environmental evolution . . . --James Krasner, 1992. In his The Entangled Eye: Visual Perception and the Representation of Nature in Post-Darwinian Narrative (Oxford University Press): 114.
. . . In Wallace's nature all selection is purposeful and relatively precise; nature tends toward utility, and clears way all forms that are not useful. James's theory of vision can be seen as the perceptual corollary to Wallace's evolutionary theory. The Jamesian mind, like Wallace's evolutionary nature, establishes a formal standard that must be met, and all those forms that fail to meet that standard are eliminated; in Wallace's nature they die off, in James's vision they go unperceived. It is therefore appropriate that Wallace should use a Jamesian representational model. Where Darwin portrays visual forms mutating and multiplying as they compete for space in the reader's perceptual field, Wallace portrays the selection of forms according to an imageable standard of reference. Moreover, because this formal standard is European, the forms of nature are selected according to the standard of reference of European experience--the viewer perceives trees as pillars, and those trees that look less like pillars are ignored. Wallace's representation of evolution thus involves the reader in a more and more familiar world . . . --James Krasner, 1992. In his The Entangled Eye: Visual Perception and the Representation of Nature in Post-Darwinian Narrative (Oxford University Press): 115.
Until just before 1880 Wallace had firmly believed "that vaccination was a scientific procedure, and that Jenner was one of the great benefactors of mankind." As a young man he had voluntarily undergone vaccination and subsequent revaccination, just before leaving for South America on a naturalistic trip. He had never questioned the effectiveness of the operation until reading several anti-vaccination texts and meeting William Tebb, the 1870 successor of John and Richard Gibbs as leader of the Anti-vaccination League and founder of the Anti-vaccination Society of America. Convinced by Tebb's arguments, Wallace joined him in the battle for the new cause. Aware of his ignorance on medical matters, Wallace always based his arguments on statistic figures rather than on strictly sanitary aspects. Harry Clements, his biographer, writes: "no one was apparently able seriously to challenge him on the figures." . . . --Giacomo Scarpelli, 1992. Nuncius (Italy) 7(1): 115-116.
. . . These moral principles were also applied to another field of study, that of the so-called "Psychical Research" which caught Wallace's interest very early, in fact earlier than we might possibly think. Spiritism, in Wallace's mind, had a eudaemonist socratic meaning: ghosts were seen as moral and spiritual guides to man. Wallace then developed the idea of man as center of a pre-ordained universe, in which the pain which man is subject to being the most sensitive creature, and the evil which he must fight since he is capable of discerning, are seen as necessary steps towards the completion of moral rather than organic developments, necessary to enter into a superior spiritual sphere. We can now truly understand this sentence: "the whole purpose, the only raison d'être of the world [ . . . ] was the development of human spirit in association with the human body" . . . This conception of a pre-existing order and a synchronicity can explain the logic which backed Wallace's opinions and attitudes . . . --Giacomo Scarpelli, 1992. Nuncius (Italy) 7(1): 120-121.
. . . Wallace . . . brought forth an alternative explanation which involved totally different powers. Man has the faculty of artificially selecting vegetable and animal species; similarly a Higher Intelligence could have controlled and directed Natural Selection in the human development process, in a particular and highly ethical aim . . . Effectively, Wallace, induced by the moral ideal earlier mentioned, was trying to find a solution that would not clash with his vision of harmonia naturae and undermine the theory of Natural Selection with whatsoever extension or correction. His was not a denial of the theory but, paradoxically, the result of his excessively rigourous attitude. Wallace, the hyperselectivist, preferred to involve a Superior Intellect, in other words a deus ex machina, rather than admit that his primary theory might possibly have been less absolute . . . --Giacomo Scarpelli, 1992. Nuncius (Italy) 7(1): 126.
. . . Wallace was driven in his crusade by ethical and social issues, as well as the intention of preventing the disruption of the biological balance. This was altogether a kind of civil protest aimed towards a general reform of society, freed from imposition. Wallace believed that an improvement of the population's economic conditions would have resulted in higher hygienic standards and a richer diet, and consequently, in a decreased spread of diseases, smallpox included. He also envisaged the creation of a Ministry of Health employing teams of Doctors. These purposes, which seem so obvious today, were in his time little less than revolutionary. It can be said that Wallace foresaw the creation of National Health Service . . . --Giacomo Scarpelli, 1992. Nuncius (Italy) 7(1): 128.
Man's Place in the Universe. A. R. Wallace (McClure, Phillips, New York, 1903). A famous coauthor of Darwin's discovery anticipated in the last chapter of his book almost all versions of modern AP [the Anthropic Principle] . . . --Yuri V. Balashov, December 1991. American Journal of Physics 59(12): 1072.
Wallace did not try to explain distribution patterns by invoking the occurrence of unique events but rather by recourse to general principles. For Wallace that general principle was geological change. There are numerous passages in Wallace (1880) that confirm his appreciation of the importance of geological change in understanding distribution patterns in Indonesia. His discussion of the faunal relationship between the Malay Peninsula and the islands of Borneo, Sumatra, and Java is detailed and provides a clear statement of his position. Having noted the overall similarity of this area's flora and fauna to that of India, he continued on the greater similarity of the mammals and birds of Borneo and Sumatra than those of Borneo and Java, and on the high degree of endemism of the Javan fauna . . . --B. Michaux, September 1991. Australian Systematic Botany 4(1): 26.
. . . Although this is a rather brief summary of the distribution patterns that Wallace recognised in Indonesia, it does, I believe, accurately reflect the major patterns he observed. His interpretations of these patterns, based as they were on an incomplete understanding of the dynamic nature of the earth's surface, are only really of historical interest. Wallace's attempt to understand distributional patterns in terms of geological change was doomed from the start because neither he nor anyone else at the time realised that land could move laterally as well as vertically . . . --B. Michaux, September 1991. Australian Systematic Botany 4(1): 27.
Discrimination involves recognition in the signal receiver that a stimulus, or configuration of stimuli, belongs to some discrete category. The importance of design for discriminability has been recognized since Wallace (1867) suggested that distasteful insect larvae '. . . required some distinctive mark, something by which they may be contrasted with and separated from the agreeable larvae, in order that they might be freed from the attacks of birds' and that 'Brilliant colouration would be such a distinction as was required'. Warning colours and patterns should therefore look different from those of the prey for which predators normally hunt . . . --Tim Guilford & Marian Stamp Dawkins, July 1991. Animal Behaviour 42(1): 5.
Successive generations of evolutionary biologists, beginning with August Weismann and Alfred R. Wallace, have refined our understanding of the evolution of senescence to the point where we now have pretty good reason to believe that in a species like our own aging occurs because natural selection places higher priority on turning out progeny to carry our genes forward than on keeping individuals going; in effect, late survival is sacrificed for reproduction. Extending through a more diverse range of reproductive patterns, the burgeoning discipline of evolutionary life-history theory provides us with the intellectual framework to approach questions like why some species get only a single shot at reproduction (semelparity) while other get more (iteroparity) and why species differ in their longevities . . . --Caleb E. Finch, 28 June 1991. Science 252(5014): 1864.
. . . In Wallace there was support for the nationalization of land and for the economic emancipation of women. The latter reform he actually justified in evolutionary terms, thereby giving rise to a form of social Wallaceism. His point was that women were currently prevented, by their social and economic disadvantages, from fully exercising their selective role in the choice of mate. Although he sometimes felt that Darwin attached too great an importance to sexual selection in the mechanics of evolution, Wallace was nevertheless convinced that female emancipation could only benefit posterity . . . --John Hedley Brooke, 1991. In his Science and Religion; Some Historical Perspectives (Cambridge University Press): 294-295.
. . . The sheer improbability of the emergence of man deeply impressed Alfred Russel Wallace. Contingency had piled upon contingency with each critical stage in evolutionary divergence. In a book written late in life, Man's Place in the Universe (1903), he turned the argument against physicists and astronomers who were scouring the heavens for planets having a physical environment comparable with that of the earth and on which intelligent life might be presumed to have evolved. Properly understood, Wallace argued, the theory of evolution told against such a possibility--certainly against the emergence of intelligence akin to human. However close the physico-chemical environment to that on earth, it was inconceivable that the evolutionary process on other worlds could have followed the same nuanced path as on earth. One minor deviation at an early stage and the whole process would take an entirely different course . . . --John Hedley Brooke, 1991. In his Science and Religion; Some Historical Perspectives (Cambridge University Press): 315.
Wallace's scientific case rested on his conclusion that the human brain, including that of the most primitive peoples, was more powerful than was necessary for survival. For a large part of his early life Wallace had lived among primitive peoples in South America and Southeast Asia, an experience that convinced him that these people, simple as they have appeared in mind and action, were equal in intelligence to Europeans. As the modern anthropologist Loren Eiseley remarked, Wallace displayed "scarcely a trace of the racial superiority so frequently manifested in nineteenth-century scientific circles," in which were included Darwin and Thomas Huxley. If human beings possessed brain capacities beyond what was needed for survival, Wallace reasoned, then how could natural selection bring about its evolution? Where was the "survival value" of that capacity if that capacity was not fully used? After all, natural selection improved an organ only through its adaptation to the pressure of environment. In the case of the human brain, however, the capacity was greater than human beings really required or that the pressure of environment could account for. Wallace logically concluded on those grounds that "some higher intelligence directed the process by which the human race was developed." . . . --Carl N. Degler, 1991. In his In Search of Human Nature; The Decline and Revival of Darwinism in American Social Thought (Oxford University Press): 60.
. . . It will be recalled that Darwin could find no useful value in the physical (racial) differences among human groups. Thus he could not account for those differences through the operation of natural selection. He did, however, accept the common anthropological view of the time that the differences in levels of culture or civilization which occurred among the diverse peoples of the world derived from differences in their biological capacities. Some cultures were higher than others because the people in those societies were biologically superior. That was the opening in his theory of human evolution through which racism entered. It was that opening which Wallace closed with his conception of the intellectual equality and therefore the equal cultural capacity of all peoples. As things turned out, Wallace looked to other ways and matters in his effort to make evolution less competitive and threatening. He did not develop any further his assertion of the mental equality of all peoples, or at least few took notice of its relevance. Yet that was the precise argument, elaborated and tirelessly defended, that undermined in time the concept of racism in America. Its elaboration and defense underpinned the concept of culture, an idea that in the twentieth century became not only an alternative to a racial explanation for human behavioral differences but also a central concept in social science . . . --Carl N. Degler, 1991. In his In Search of Human Nature; The Decline and Revival of Darwinism in American Social Thought (Oxford University Press): 61.
. . . Wallace's supernatural explanation gained few followers among social scientists in the second half of the twentieth century, but his assertion of the special, indeed unique, nature of man, because of his brain, continued to influence many, directly or indirectly. The eminent modern American anthropologist Loren Eiseley, for example was among them. His sympathetic response to Wallace reflects the views of many other American social scientists today. Eiseley did not doubt that Wallace has a better understanding of the roots of human nature than Darwin. In his book Darwin's Century, Eiseley contrasted Darwin's conception with that of Wallace. "The mind of man, by indetermination, by the power of choice and cultural communication," he wrote, "is on the verge of escape from the blind control of that deterministic world with which the Darwinists had unconsciously shackled man. The inborn characteristics laid upon him by the biological extremists have crumbled away," he was relieved to report. In Eiseley's judgement, Wallace stood out among evolutionists of his own time because he recognized even then that human beings had escaped from biological evolution. "Wallace saw and saw correctly, that with the rise of man the evolution of parts was to a marked degree outmoded, that mind was now the arbiter of human destiny." . . . --Carl N. Degler, 1991. In his In Search of Human Nature; The Decline and Revival of Darwinism in American Social Thought (Oxford University Press): 330.
Wallace (1865) hypothesized that sex-limited mimicry, in which palatable females are the only sex to mimic unpalatable butterflies, arises because females fly more slowly than males and hence are more vulnerable to predation. Our results from the within-lineage analyses are in agreement with Wallace's hypothesis. Evolutionarily, palatable males have larger thoraces, maximizing flight muscle, and smaller abdomens, minimizing load on the wings, probably to maximize flight speed; whereas females have retained large abdomens, probably to maximize egg load. Counter-selection for fecundity may operate against faster flight speeds, and females may be reproductively constrained to evolve alternative means of avoiding predation, such as mimicry. If females fly more slowly, they may be predisposed to fly like an unpalatable model . . . --Robert Srygley & Peng Chai, 11 October 1990. Oecologia 84(4): 498.
. . . there simply weren't any lists of Darwinian tenets that would have been accepted by all the leading Darwinians and rejected by all the main non-Darwinians in the first decade or so following the publication of the Origin. Both the Darwinians Charles Lyell and Asa Gray and the non-Darwinians the Duke of Argyll and St. George Mivart, for example, thought that natural selection must be supplemented by some sort of "directing force" in order to account for the relevant phenomena, while Darwin consistently denied the need for such an additional mechanism (Argyll 1877; Gray 1884; Mivart 1871). Conversely, neither the Darwinians Alfred Russel Wallace and Charles Lyell nor the non-Darwinians St. George Mivart and William Whewell thought that human beings could be included under the same explanatory scheme (whatever this might be) that was used to account for the history and behavior of "lower" animals, while Darwin maintained that they could . . . --Doren Recker, September 1990. Philosophy of Science 57(3): 463.
The efforts to denigrate Darwin serve only to conceal the real differences between the two naturalists' approach to transmutation. Careful reading of Wallace's paper reveals that in several important respects his theory failed to duplicate the essence of Darwin's thinking. Wallace had no interest in artificial selection and refused to treat it as analogous to the natural process even in later years. His mechanism did not even address the basic question of how selection acts on individual differences to change a population, because he was interested in how one well-marked variety (what we now call a subspecies) could replace others. Once it is recognized that in writing of natural selection acting on varieties Wallace was thinking of subspecies rather than individual variations, it can be seen that his paper does not contain a description of what Darwin saw as the basic mechanism of change. Wallace simply assumed that species split into varieties--he did not seek to explain how this all-important first step occurs. It has also been suggested that Wallace failed to appreciate the full power of selection because he treated the varieties as struggling against nature, not struggling against each other . . . --Peter J. Bowler, 1990. In his Charles Darwin; The Man and His Influence (Basil Blackwell): 113.
. . . Wallace's Darwinism of 1889 provided a clear and comprehensive survey of the theory and of the relevant areas of biology. Except in the case of the origin of the human mind, Wallace was an extreme selectionist; unlike Darwin, he would have nothing to do with any other mechanism of evolution. This position soon became known as 'neo-Darwinism' to distinguish it from the more flexible form of the theory which Darwin himself had advocated and which had gained support precisely because it allowed selection to be relegated to the status of a secondary mechanism . . . --Peter J. Bowler, 1990. In his Charles Darwin; The Man and His Influence (Basil Blackwell): 210.
The good parent process is a mechanism for the evolution of epigamic traits that is distinct from the Fisherian process and the good genes process. In the good parent process, direct selection on females to discriminate among males on the basis of male parental quality leads to the evolution of a trait that provides female with honest (accurate and precise) information regarding the non-heritable component of parental quality in a potential mate. Wallace (1891, 1901) recognized the potential of such a mechanism, but he had no way to consider rigorously the effects of inheritance. The good parent process is also different from Darwinian sexual selection (Darwin 1871), because females are not necessarily attracted by a good parent trait. A trait that evolves via the good parent process only enhances the attractiveness of high-quality males . . . --Guy A. Hoelzer, December 1989. Animal Behaviour 38(6): 1075.
Since Wallace (1889), a number of authors have argued that isolating barriers could be positively selected for their isolating property to prevent the formation of hybrids and to actively promote divergence and speciation. However, being a second order effect, the selective forces are likely to be weak, and, as Levin points out, in practice it is going to be very difficult to distinguish this effect from other forms of competition and selection . . . --Mark R. Macnair, February 1989. Genome 31(1): 204-205.
Wallace, on the other hand, insisted on the validity of the "uniform and consistent testimony of our senses". It is complete fallacy, so he argued, that only propositions could be demonstrated and phenomena could not be. "The direct testimony of the educated senses guided by reason was of higher validity than any complex results of reason alone." According to Wallace, testimony was trustworthy if the witness was in full possession of the senses and in agreement with the reports of other witnesses. Was it really true, asked Wallace rhetorically, that a member of the House of Peers like Lord Lyndsay--who had recently converted to spiritualism--"can not be trusted as a faithful witness?" If the witness were insane or deluded, Wallace argued, they would also be unable to use Carpenter's mathematical reasoning . . . --Roy J. DeCarvalho, January 1989. Journal of Religion and Psychical Research 12(1): 22.
The modern Darwinian theory of evolution is defective in that it does not even recognize the extraordinary problem that is presented by living organisms acquiring mental experiences of a non-material kind that are in another world from the world of matter-energy, which formerly was globally comprehensive. The Cartesian solution is not generally acceptable, namely, that human beings have conscious experiences that are attributable to the Divine creation of souls, and that higher animals are merely machine-like automata devoid of mental experiences. Likewise the panpsychist evasion of the problem is not acceptable. It is disturbing that evolutionists have largely ignored the tremendous enigma that is presented to their materialistic theory by the emergence of mentality in the animal evolution . . . I believe that the emergence of consciousness is a skeleton in the cupboard of orthodox evolutionism. At the same time it is recognized that, although the holistic concept gives meaning to the emergence of consciousness, it provides no explanation of this emergence. It remains just as enigmatic as it is to an orthodox evolutionist as long as it is regarded as an exclusively natural process in an exclusively materialist world . . . --John C. Eccles, 1989. In his Evolution of the Brain: Creation of the Self (Routledge): 176.
. . . Nature still presented a gory spectacle; and people of faith still had to wonder at the divine power that would use such means. Hence, Wallace comes to repeat the position Darwin flirted with above: denial of pain and suffering as a means of vindicating the goodness of nature. In his 1911 chapter "Is Nature Cruel?" he offers again the answer that nature is not cruel because most animals simply do not suffer. Wallace cautions that one must not read one's own sensations into the animal world: that "anything approaching to what we term 'pain' was unknown" to most animals. They "probably suffer nothing at all when being devoured." He goes further to assert (very strongly) that "birds, mice, squirrels, and the like, do not get limbs broken by falls, as we do," and that, in sum, "whatever pain exists is not long-continued" (Wallace 1911, 404-405) . . . --David Oates, December 1988. Zygon 23(4): 445.
Darwin's response is, on the face of it, rather puzzling. Why did he not protest Wallace's assertion that selection works principally through the elimination of unfavorable variants? Historians generally agree that the acknowledgment of selection as a negative force--removing inferior variants and thus maintaining the "type"--long predated Darwin. In this perspective, Darwin's achievement lay in his recognition that selection was "a creative process and not merely a sieve." But there is no evidence that his dissents from Wallace's essentially negative view. Perhaps historians' radical distinction between natural selection as a creative force and as executioner of the unfit--that is, as "nature's broom"--was not recognized by Darwin . . . --Diane B. Paul, Fall 1988. Journal of the History of Biology 21(3): 417-418.
The Great American Interchange was first recognized by Wallace (1876), but it has taken another hundred years of intense paleontological study by Ameghino, Matthew, Scott, Patterson, Simpson, Webb, and others to clarify patterns of dispersal. It is only during the last decade, moreover, that greater precision in dating the sediments containing interchange taxa has provided a firm time frame for various aspects of the event. It is now possible to assess the interchange in detail, and to analyze the tempo and mode of dispersal and the rates of extinction and origination in successive faunas through time. As a result, the Great American Interchange represents the best-documented example in the fossil record of the intermingling of two long-separated continental faunas . . . --Larry G. Marshall, July-August 1988. American Scientist 76(4): 380.
. . . "I should be extremely glad now to publish a sketch of general views in about a dozen pages or so; but I cannot persuade myself that I can do so honourably. Wallace says nothing about publication, and I enclose his letter. But as I had not intended to publish any sketch, can I do so honourably, because Wallace has sent me an outline of his doctrine? I would far rather burn my whole book, than that he or any other man should think that I had behaved in a paltry spirit. Do you not think his having sent me this sketch ties my hands? I do not in least believe that that [sic] he originated his views from anything which I wrote to him" [Darwin's words] . . . --Barbara G. Beddall, Spring 1988. Journal of the History of Biology 21(1): 52.
. . . In the narrow focus espoused both by the participants in the events leading up to and including the "joint papers," and by their successors, priority in this case has been treated as a "single event," a zero-sum game with winners and losers, an occasion when "editorial manipulation" and "delicate arrangements" could be invoked. But, as seen above, the matter is far more complex than this approach would indicate. It requires a broader perspective in which the enormous contributions made by both Darwin and Wallace can be recognized. In game theory this would be a non-zero-sum game, where both Darwin and Wallace benefited from the work of the other, thus becoming codiscoverers of the theory of evolution by means of natural selection. If this interpretation of the events is rejected, the status of the matter reverts to a zero-sum game, which brings back with it not only its winners and losers, but also the problems of "editorial manipulation" and "delicate arrangements," as posed by Kohn and Nelson . . . --Barbara G. Beddall, Spring 1988. Journal of the History of Biology 21(1): 62.
Strangely enough, it was A. R. Wallace, not Darwin, who suggested an explicit associative hypothesis integrating learning theory with natural selection. In a paper entitled "On the Origin of Food Aversion Paradigms," Garcia and Hankins present the case for a Darwin-Wallace conditioning theory initiated in 1866 and experimentally verified by 1887. Their theory was actively generating research 2 decades before Pavlov began his studies in classical conditioning, and 3 decades before Thorndike presented his thesis on instrumental conditioning. This pioneer effort culminated in today's research area, narrowly labeled "conditioned taste aversion." More broadly considered, this paradigm is representative of homeostatic conditioning which Tolman (1949) called "cathexis"; when responding to survival needs, organisms come to cherish one particular type of food and drink, or one given type of mate, and to abhor others . . . --Robert C. Bolles & Michael D. Beecher, eds., 1988. In their Evolution and Learning (Lawrence Erlbaum Associates): 29.
. . . Wallace had traveled widely in South America and the South Pacific as a naturalist and collector of exotic specimens. His observations of native peoples had convinced him that the intellectual and moral faculties required by the aboriginal way of life were not markedly different from those needed by mammals generally to survive in their respective ecological situations. Yet aborigines brought to England and educated there had the capacity to acquire the behavioral sophistication of modern Europeans. Thus, aborigines had moral and intellectual capacities far exceeding the immediate requirements of the environments in which they had evolved. Therefore the intellectual capacities of primitive man, and by implication modern man, could not be the result of natural selection . . . --Robert C. Bolles & Michael D. Beecher, 1988. In their Evolution and Learning (Lawrence Erlbaum Associates): 41.
The adaptive nature of warning, or 'aposematic' colour patterns seemed clear a century ago (Wallace, 1867, 1878; Poulton, 1890), but recently it has been debated whether 'individual' natural selection may explain their initial evolution. Fisher (1930) had earlier suggested a similar problem with the evolution of unpalatability. Previous explanations depend purely on selection to explain the evolution of warning colours. Here we propose that drift, combined with natural selection, may also be important . . . --James Mallet & Michael C. Singer, December 1987. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 32(4): 338.
. . . Although mimicry strongly suggests that colour patterns are used as warning signals, there is only anecdotal evidence that warning colours are easier to learn than non-warning colours. Traditionally, it has been assumed that the bright colours of unpalatable insects are more efficient signals (Wallace, 1867, 1878). Birds seem to learn to avoid conspicuous prey more easily, and humans use bright colours in warning signs. However unpalatable insects could be brightly coloured for other reasons . . . --James Mallet & Michael C. Singer, December 1987. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 32(4): 338.
. . . In the pages of the Encyclopedia Britannica, over several editions, Alfred Russel Wallace argued the case for acclimatization. He was more careful than most, at that stage, in distinguishing between domestication, naturalization and acclimatization. And yet arguing from first evolutionary principles and from plant and animal biogeography, he urged that "numerous facts in the distribution of races show that man must, in remote ages at least, have been capable of constitutional adaptation to climate". In more recent times, the migrations of the Jews, and the settlement of the Dutch in South Africa, the English-speaking peoples in America and Australia, and the Spanish in South America all demonstrated that complete acclimatization was entirely possible . . . --David N. Livingstone, December 1987. History of Science 25(4): 381.
. . . But now that the monogenist thesis had triumphed, acclimatization followed as a natural consequence. Similar deductions were drawn by A.R. Wallace: "numerous facts in the distribution of races show that man must, in remote ages at least, have been capable of constitutional adaptation to climate" he urged. Hence, "if the human race constitutes a single species, then the mere fact that man now inhabits every region, and is in each case constitutionally adapted to the climate, proves that acclimatization has occurred." . . . --David N. Livingstone, December 1987. History of Science 25(4): 386.
Wallace's view was kindred in spirit to Henry George's Progress and Poverty (1879), although Wallace had less regard for the market. Both saw man as needing land. Their mutual disapproval of Parnellism brought them together, and both submerged methodological differences to further their common concept. Wallace gave him a platform when George toured Britain. Wallace cast George as a theorist who confirmed Wallace's inductive argument, perhaps underrating George's journalistic background. For many years single tax and land nationalization were closely linked by friend and foe . . . --Mason Gaffney, 1987. In John Eatwell, Murray Milgate & Peter Newman, eds., The New Palgraves: A Dictionary of Economics (Macmillan), Volume 4: 850.
According to both Spencer and Wallace, a natural principle of evolution inexorably led to the moral perfection of man. Wallace, of course, had a different principle in mind than Spencer's device of adaptation through the inherited effects of habit. He nonetheless believed that the principle of natural selection would add further support to Spencer's primary vision, the view that man's moral character was not only a goal of evolution, but also a chief means of progress toward the perfection of human nature . . . --Robert J. Richards, 1987. In his Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior (University of Chicago Press): 165-166.
. . . Evolutionary theory, as Darwin himself admitted in the Origin, remained mute concerning how life and consciousness first arose in the universe; it could only account for subsequent transformations. Just so, Wallace now proclaimed, natural selection brought no clear perception of the origins of specifically human intellect and moral feeling. He was persuaded that these distinctive capacities must have originated under the influence of higher powers, intelligences who shepherded the progressive development of mind through the ages . . . --Robert J. Richards, 1987. In his Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior (University of Chicago Press): 178.
. . . Contemporary primitives and our ancestors thus had latent mental qualities that could not be explained by natural selection, which demanded that selected traits confer immediate advantage, not simply promise it. Wallace's contacts with the spirit world convinced him that higher intelligences rather than natural selection controlled human evolution. Wallace forthrightly claimed that a conversion to spiritualism proximately caused his rejection of natural selection as an adequate principle to explain human evolution; and virtually all historians have taken him at his word. But we need not. For after all, Wallace might well have chosen to regard natural selection as the disposing instrument of higher spiritual powers and to have held survival of the fittest as a secondary cause . . . --Robert J. Richards, 1987. In his Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior (University of Chicago Press): 181.
. . . Huxley tarried only a short while over Wallace's demur about natural selection in the case of man. He derived from Wallace's own writings about savage life descriptions of the extraordinary mental feats such life actually required--knowledge of a vast territory, reading signs of game or enemies, discovery of properties of plants and habits of animals, and so forth. "In complexity and difficulty," Huxley estimated, "the intellectual labour of a 'good hunter or warrior' considerably exceeds that of an ordinary Englishman." Wallace had simply miscalculated the brain power the savage actually needed for survival; thus neither primitive man nor modern native likely had in excess what could be delivered by natural selection or augmented by entering into civilized life. On the question of the moral sense, Huxley could "find nothing in Mr. Wallace's reasonings which has not already been met by Mr. Mill, Mr. Spencer, or Mr. Darwin." . . . --Robert J. Richards, 1987. In his Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior (University of Chicago Press): 227.
And in The Growth of Biological Thought Ernst Mayr comments: "In his letter, Wallace said that if Darwin thought his paper sufficiently novel and interesting, he should send it to Lyell and, presumably, submit it for publication (the original Wallace letter is no longer in existence)." But it is clear that Wallace did not ask Darwin to arrange for publication. Unfortunately, as Mayr notes, the letter that accompanied Wallace'1s paper is lost. However, we have Darwin's word for it that there was no such instruction. On the same day that Wallace's paper arrived, Darwin wrote an anguished letter to Lyell, in which he refers to Wallace's "MS, which he does not say he wishes me to publish". Then, a week later, he wrote to Lyell again, to express his misgivings about Lyell's and Hooker's plan. One of his reasons for worrying was that "Wallace says nothing about publication". Why should such distinguished writers as Ruse and Mayr make this particular mistake? This is the kind of error that might perhaps follow from a moral presumption. It seems wrong to publish someone's work, without consulting him, in a forum he has not approved. Thus, if we are assuming that Darwin and his friends acted properly, it will be natural to assume that Wallace must have asked that his paper be published. But in fact he did not . . . --James Rachels, Summer 1986. National Forum 66(3): 24.
The concept of r- and K-selection is intuitively reasonable and indeed there is much circumstantial evidence from both macroecology and microbial ecology that it exists. The seminal ideas were contributed largely by Dobzhansky (1950), who compared evolution in the tropics and temperate latitudes. Actually, it is usually overlooked that the great naturalist Wallace (1878), in his remarks on tropical plant and animal life, anticipated many of Dobzhansky's conclusions. Dobzhansky surmised that adaptation in the species-rich tropics is primarily to a harsh biological environment, while the fewer species in colder realms have to contend mainly with the physical environment. Put simplistically, the outcome of different evolutionary pressures between the two regions is competitiveness (high K) or productivity (high r), respectively . . . --John H. Andrews & Robin F. Harris, 1986. Advances in Microbial Ecology 9: 104.
. . . there even continued to be one or two plebeians who became recognised leaders in a field. Most famously, though A. R. Wallace . . . was of impoverished gentle family, he had something of a craftsmanly formation, during which he became a life-long Owenite (he died in 1913). Had his fellow-FRSs borne this in mind, they might have been less puzzled by his left-wing politics, his anti-vaccinationism and his plebeian-type spiritualism. A recent historian has plausibly treated him as an import into the later nineteenth century from the 1840s, and we might also see him as an import into prestigious scientific circles from the world of self-taught scientists. His particular route to eminence involved much specimen-hunting but no diploma-hunting, much jungle-fever but no exam-fever . . . --Logie Barrow, 1986. In his Independent Spirits; Spiritualism and English Plebeians, 1850-1910 (Routledge & Kegan Paul): 153.
. . . Darwin and Wallace defended a programme of theoretical research by appeal to the superior coherence and fecundity of their programme. The appeal to superior coherence took place on two levels. At a substantive level they argued that their programme promised the discovery of relevantly similar natural forces for the explanation of relevantly similar natural phenomena. At an epistemic level they claimed coherence in their use of biogeographical and geological evidence and coherence in the application of the epistemic desideratum of scrutability. As Wallace had suggested, the appeal to coherence at substantive and epistemic levels is justified by the overall aim of science to construe its subject matter as maximally accessible to investigation and as maximally decidable by acceptable argument. The appeal to superior fecundity can also be justified as instrumental to the achievement of these aims . . . --Scott A. Kleiner, December 1985. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 36(4): 391.
The allopatric model of speciation proposes that populations diverge genetically during a period of isolation either by drift, differential selection or different responses to similar selection pressures. When the barrier to dispersal is removed, this divergence may have led to premating reproductive isolation, post-mating isolation or both. Only if there is complete assortative mating, hybrid inviability or hybrid infertility will the two new taxa be able to coexist without exchanging genes and only if there is at least some premating reproductive isolation will they be able to invade on another's territory. Otherwise a hybrid zone is expected to form. Premating isolation may evolve, or be strengthened, in the hybrid zone because heterogametic matings produce unfit offspring--as first proposed by Wallace (1889) and subsequently incorporated into speciation theory by Dobzhansky (1940). However, this 'reinforcement' of premating isolating mechanisms is a contentious idea . . . --R. K. Butlin & G. M. Hewitt, November 1985. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 26(3): 269-270.
In contrast, Alfred Russel Wallace (1864), the co-discoverer of natural selection, stressed that group selection (i.e. selection not between individuals, but between groups) played an important role, at least among human beings. Describing the process of human evolution, he wrote: "In proportion as physical characteristics become of less importance, mental and moral qualities will have increasing importance to the well-being of a race. Capacity for acting in concern for the protection of food and shelter; sympathy, which leads all in turn to assist each other; the sense of right, which checks depredation upon our fellows . . . are all qualities that from earliest appearance must have been for the benefit of each community, and would therefore have become objects of natural selection." . . . --Umberto Melotti, Summer 1985. The Mankind Quarterly 25(4): 324.
This is not meant to demean Darwin. In addition to his genius, Darwin was a warm, liberal man for his times: opposed to slavery, in favor of electoral reform, and concerned for the oppressed. But he was, in some areas, of his times and not very far ahead of them. For many scientists of the day, the existent native peoples were virtual "missing links." It was only through work in Wallace's tradition that "the Negro's skull is no longer placed on the lecturer's table between that of the gorilla and the Caucasian". At the time, Wallace's belief in the ultimate intellectual potential of native peoples must have seemed bizarre beyond reason . . . --Stephen E. Glickman, 1985/1992. In Sigmund Koch & David E. Leary, eds., A Century of Psychology as Science (American Psychological Association): 750.
. . . Less than a year later he wrote the first of two papers that together presented, in brief but complete form, a theory of evolution by natural selection. While the second paper, written three years later, postulated natural selection in variable populations as the mechanism by which species originated, the first paper (Wallace 1855) analyzed the significance of extinction within evolving lineages in producing all of the known patterns of organic distribution in time and space. It must be emphasized that this paper was the first published statement to appreciate the importance of the extinction of intermediates in a species lineage in creating the oft-observed gaps in taxonomic affinities, as well as those in distribution in both space and time. This meant that the observed placement of organisms in the regions of the globe was not the result of supernatural forces and divine objectives, but of the natural phenomena of extinction and species transmutation (or evolution.) . . . --John L. Brooks, 1985. Earth Sciences History 4(2): 115.
In his discussion of the debate between Darwin and Wallace, Mayr has claimed, "they used the term 'sterility' where we would use the term 'isolating mechanisms'." If this were the case, then Darwin advocated the incidental origin of reproductive isolation mechanisms, Wallace their origin by natural selection. Grant has gone on to suggest that it would be "fitting and desirable" to call the selective origin of reproductive isolation mechanisms the "Wallace effect". There can be no question that some late nineteenth-century naturalists did use the word "sterility" where evolutionists now use "reproductive isolation mechanisms". But I would argue that in their debate Darwin and Wallace meant what we do by "sterility". The distinction Wallace drew in point 6 of his 1 March 1868 letter between "disinclination to cross-unions" and "sterility" certainly supports his view. Consequently Wallace was not proposing the selective origin of reproductive isolation mechanisms in general, but rather the selective origin of the particular post-mating mechanisms of cross- and hybrid sterility. Since, according to current theory, these forms of sterility are precisely the types of reproductive isolation that cannot be produced by selection, the Darwin-Wallace debate provides little historical justification for the term "Wallace effect". The present view on the origin of sterility is essentially Darwin's view of an incidental origin. Furthermore, during the debate it was Darwin not Wallace who recognized the possibility of the selective origin of pre-mating reproductive isolation ("disinclination to cross"), while rejecting the selective origin of cross- and hybrid sterility . . . --Malcolm Jay Kottler, 1985. In David Kohn, ed., The Darwinian Heritage (Princeton University Press): 416-417.
Our idea--and the support for it we have found thus far--points to the need for renewed examination of the effects of avian parasites and diseases on their hosts. If females are indeed choosing males that appear to be advertising their freedom from parasites, and if showy plumes and melodious voices have evolved from such a prosaic and down-to-earth cause, perhaps even Alfred Wallace might be mollified . . . --Marlene Zuk, April 1984. Natural History 93(4): 34.
"That excellent results may be obtained from a consideration of the habits and characters of the living bird is, we think, shown in Mr. Wallace's arrangement of the order Passeres. His remarks were published in 1856; but, if we mistake not, many of his suggestions have been more or less adopted in that part of Professor Owen's classification which relates to the same group. His conclusions, moreover, generally harmonize with the improvements proposed by Eyton and Nitzsch before him, and Blanchard and others after him, on anatomical groups; as also with what we consider to be the best features in Bonaparte's scheme" [passage quoted from an anonymous author] . . . --John L. Brooks, 1984. In his Before the Origin (Columbia University Press): 124.
. . .The explanation of the virtual faunal identity was revealed by the discovery of clear physiographic evidence that the sea between Aru and New Guinea had been created by recent subsidence--recent in geological time. This discovery provided Wallace with a geographic situation of the kind he had sought since his Amazonian days. According to his theory, only a slight change in the organic world should be manifest following a recent physiographic change. The species of birds, mammals, and insects he found in Aru were identical to those described for New Guinea, with the sole exception of the Ornithoptera. The Aru form was distinct, but minimally so, from O. poseidon, described from New Guinea. Observation thus confirmed the theory . . . --John L. Brooks, 1984. In his Before the Origin (Columbia University Press): 172.
Wallace's demonstration that man's tools (including language) removed his body from the realm of evolutionary specialization that operates inexorably elsewhere was recognized immediately as a turning point in the scientific study of man. His paper was intended as a vehicle for applying natural selection to a wide range of concerns--the antiquity of man, racial superiority, man's taxonomic rank--with the clear implication that human mental and moral attributes would also be subsumed under a strict evolutionary naturalism . . . --Martin Fichman, 1984. In Everett Mendelsohn, ed., Transformation and Tradition in the Sciences; Essays in Honor of I. Bernard Cohen (Cambridge University Press): 475.
A final, important difference separates Wallace from Dyson and most modern supporters of the anthropic principle. Our contemporary advocates develop their arguments and then present their conclusion--that mind designed the universe, in part so that intelligent life might evolve within it--as a necessary and logical inference. Wallace was far too good a historical scientist to indulge in such fatuous certainty; he understood only too well that ordered and complex outcomes can arise from accumulated improbabilities . . . --Stephen Jay Gould, May 1983. Natural History 92(5): 38.
Avian selection on females might be stronger than that on males for a variety of reasons. First, birds might preferentially select females if they were larger, more valuable (e.g. because they contain eggs or embryos), or more easily captured than males. Wallace originally proposed a version of this hypothesis to account for female-biased polymorphisms in butterflies. He suggested that female butterflies might be more vulnerable to predators because they are laden with eggs and fly more slowly. Recently, it has been shown that birds do preferentially select female cicadas, which are less vagile and more nutritious than males. Even if birds did not discriminate between the sexes in prey species, selection on females might still be more intense if avian predators encountered or noticed more females than males. Female-biased encounter rates could result if the sex ratios of adult prey were heavily skewed towards females, if females occurred more often in microhabitats frequented by predators, or if females engaged in behaviors that made them more conspicuous than males. The differential predation hypothesis would be supported if birds ate females more frequently than males; it can be refuted if males completely lack protective patterns but are still eaten by birds . . . --J. A. Stamps & S. M. Gon III, 1983. Annual Review of Ecology & Systematics 14: 233-234.
After collecting briefly near Singapore, Wallace went to Sarawak to meet its celebrated White Rajah, Sir James Brooke. St. John, Brooke's secretary and biographer, has written: "We had at this time the famous naturalist, traveller and philosopher, Alfred Russel Wallace, who was then elaborating in his mind the theory that was simultaneously worked out by Darwin--the theory of the origin of species; if he could not convince us that our ugly neighbours, the orang-utans, were our ancestors, he pleased, instructed and delighted us by his clever and inexhaustible flow of talk--really good talk" (Life of Sir James Brooke, 1890). So much for the quiet, shy man . . . --Ralph E. Bernstein, 3 June 1982. New Scientist 94: 653.
I believe that study of specimens and field observations in New Guinea presently warrant two conclusions. First, orioles are indeed mimics of friarbirds, as Wallace postulated over a century ago. The case for mimicry is much stronger than Wallace realized: he had seen only two of the eight sets of populations that we now know . . . --Jared M. Diamond, April 1982. The Auk 99(2): 193.
. . . Spencer, wrote Wallace, was misconceiving natural selection. It does not work by favouring 'any special bone, or muscle, or limb . . . but by the selection of the capacities or qualities.' By 'capacities or qualities' Wallace meant things like strength or speed. Wallace maintained that artificial selection works in the same way. The breeder selects for qualities such as quickness, not for particular variations of bones. 'The two modes of selection are thus strictly analogous and strictly comparable.' He further insisted that natural selection is not limited by the supply of variation because 'as a matter of fact, there is a sufficiency of useful variation always present in each succeeding generation to increase any required life-preserving quality, all theoretical objections to the contrary notwithstanding.' Artificial selection is not the 'point after point' improvement of organs; both modes of selection transform structures as a whole, by selecting for a capacity. Each step in the selection of a capacity would produce an improvement so Romanes' and Spencer's criticism would not apply . . . --Mark Ridley, March 1982. British Journal for the History of Science 15(1): 61.
Careful consideration of both theories shows quite readily their differences in emphasis. Darwin was theorizing as to why males were brightly coloured. All Wallace (1891) could offer that pertained directly to this point was the vitalistic argument that male colour was due to "great vigour and health and generally higher vitality". Wallace in his Theory of Bird's Nests, had a perfectly reasonable hypothesis as to why females are dull--not the same question Darwin was trying to answer . . . --R. B. Aiken, 1982. Quaestiones Entomologicae 18(1-4): 8.
. . . But what of Wallace? He was not as involved in the question of aesthetic taste of females as he was in the question of animal colouration. Interestingly enough, criticisms from Wallace focused on ambiguity in the argument about female aesthetic sense. The process by which female choice was effected was not made clear. Most discussion revolved around the issue of whether females were exercising some conscious choice or were being excited by and yielding to a male. Was it selecting or succumbing? Darwin (1871) originally thought it was selection. He states: "No doubt this implies powers of discrimination and taste on the part of the female . . ." Wallace (1891, 1901) objected to this notion of conscious choice, returning again and again to the admonition that female choice could not be shown in nature. Wallace stated that while female birds may be excited by a display of decorative plumage, there was no reason to suppose that this conferred a mating advantage. It is difficult to understand Wallace's reasoning in the light of his own ideas. He stated that colour and ornament are concomitant with vigour and general health and that it is the most healthy, persistent males that will mate. Differences between Darwin and Wallace seem to be a matter of mechanism rather than basic principles . . . --R. B. Aiken, 1982. Quaestiones Entomologicae 18(1-4): 10.
To Wallace, Victorian scientists' failure to consider the implications their work held for moral behavior indicated severely misplaced priorities. In Spiritualism's demonstration of the reality of the soul, he himself found a basis for belief in moral as well as material evolution. Scientists' refusal to address so important a matter, Wallace believed, revealed an amoral materialism and, as such, outright dereliction of scientific duty . . . --John J. Cerullo, 1982. In his The Secularization of the Soul; Psychical Research in Modern Britain (Institute for the Study of Human Issues): 28.
Wallace states his thesis with extraordinary clarity: "There is a general principle in nature which will cause many varieties to survive the parent species, and to give rise to successive variations, departing further and further from the original type. The language in which this observation is presented is rather typological; Wallace's conclusion, however, clearly contradicts Lyell's claim that "varieties have strict limits, and can never vary more than a small amount away from the original type." The most important aspect of Wallace's analysis is that he carefully stayed away from the quagmire of the morphological controversy on species and varieties but based his conclusion on a rather strictly ecological argument. He concluded that population size of a species is not at all determined by fertility but by natural checks on potential population increase. An enormous number of animals must die each year to keep the number constant, and "those that die must be the weakest--the very young, the aged, and the diseased--while those that prolong their existence can only be the most perfect in health and vigour--those who are best able to obtain food regularly and avoid their numerous enemies." . . . --Ernst Mayr, 1982. In his The Growth of Biological Thought: Diversity, Evolution, and Inheritance (The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press): 495.
Wallace couched his new argument about evolution and man in 1869 not in terms of spiritualism, in which he was unable to interest seriously the majority of his fellow evolutionists, but in terms of utility. He used the essential principle of evolution to deny the evolution of man. To recapitulate, natural selection is a theory of usefulness--traits are selected in individuals because they confer some use to the individual in the struggle for survival. Wallace rejected sexual selection in the name of this principle. But applying now the same principle to man, Wallace argued that many of the traits characteristic of man were in fact of no use when they first arose, and therefore could not have been developed by natural selection . . . --Nancy Stepan, 1982. In her The Idea of Race in Science: Great Britain 1800-1960 (Archon Books): 71.
Interestingly, issues like these must have been a preoccupation of Alfred Russel Wallace a century ago. Wallace, the coauthor of the theory of evolution, reneged on the theory in excluding man from his rightful place on the evolutionary tree. He did so because he could not reconcile (see especially Wallace 1891) the incredible capacity for humans to process information (as evidenced by the accomplishments of a learned man of society in Victorian times) with the fact that such capacity went largely unused throughout the entire period of human evolution (extrapolation based on his observations of "primitive" peoples in what is today Eastern Indonesia.) Wallace's dilemma has never been completely resolved. . . --David F. Lancy & Andrew J. Strathern, December 1981. American Anthropologist 83(4): 790.
Lowell's books about life on Mars provoked Alfred R. Wallace, with Darwin the discoverer of the theory of evolution by natural selection, into analysing the likelihood of the evolution of an intelligent species elsewhere in the Universe. He concluded that it was essentially zero, and thus we are alone in the Universe. His arguments are worth repeating in detail, because although published in 1905 they are exactly the same as those given by modern evolutionists such as Dobzhansky, Simpson, and Mayr. Thus the biological arguments against the evolution of intelligence have not changed in 75 years. The great evolutionists have always been united against ETI. The biologists who have supported ETI have generally been biologists with the viewpoint of a physicist, and lacking the historical sense of the evolutionist. Such men often err in questions about evolutionary biology; in particular they err about questions concerning the probability of the evolution of a species with specified properties, as the recent recombinant DNA debate shows . . . --Frank J. Tipler, June 1981. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society 22(2): 140.
Wallace does not show a concern for Darwin's problem with the 'swamping effect', i.e., the dilution and loss of variants from crossing back into the unvaried population. Accordingly we don't find in Wallace's writings Darwin's attempt to explain speciation by isolation. Possibly Wallace concluded swamping could be ignored because by observation permanent varieties/species exist in nature. Thus he might have concluded backcrossing is in fact not significant in nature. Also, as he viewed the line between species as something other than a barrier preventing intermixing, he would not have felt the need to explain how such barriers are effective. Another consideration that subsequently supports Wallace's attitude is implicit in his approach to the theory of natural selection. Unlike Darwin, Wallace used the knowledge of domestic animals against the claim that species are permanent and not to support evolution, as did Darwin. In domestic animals, natural selection tends to favor reversion to original unvaried forms . . . --Scott A. Kleiner, April 1981. Synthese 47(1): 146-147.
. . . To consider now the main problem of concern to Darwin and Wallace, the origin problem, not only is there lacking a decision procedure for determining whether the goal state is reached, but also, as we have argued above, the goal state for why-questions cannot be fully described in advance without actually answering the question. Although Darwin cannot and does not specify in advance the kind of explanatory mechanism he is seeking he is able to say what kind of causal process he does not want, viz., the agent--teleological process of the creationist theories. His goal state can be described only in terms of a few desiderata, viz., a theory consisting of universal laws applicable to all organisms including humans and bringing together a wide variety of previously unconnected facts, and one in which the process of evolution is "gradual" in the sense that it is in conformity with Lyellian uniformitarianism applied to living organisms. Specifically, all large evolutionary changes are to be explained in terms of persistant small incremental changes occurring over a long time, and the law governing these changes are the same throughout geological time even though varying local conditions may produce happenings in the past that are not presently occurring or rather sudden and calamitous effects on local biota . . . --Scott A. Kleiner, April 1981. Synthese 47(1): 154.
A key process in speciation among sexual organisms is the evolution of reproductive isolation. There are essentially two views on the origin of isolating mechanisms . . . The first view, championed by Darwin (1872), holds that isolating mechanisms originate as an incidental by-product of genetic divergence in geographically isolated populations. The second view, argued by Wallace (1889), holds that isolating mechanisms are established by means of natural selection in zones of overlap between incipient species . . . The contemporary view, which holds that premating reproductive barriers (often behavioral) are built up by natural selection in areas of sympatry in order to supercede postmating barriers that arose allopatrically, has come to be known as the Wallace effect. The plausibility of the Wallace effect has been demonstrated by Knight et al. (1956) and by Kessler (1966), who showed that artificial selection could be successful in enhancing premating reproductive isolation in Drosophila. In light of the important role of the Wallace effect in modern speciation theory, it is surprising that the phenomenon has not been studied quantitatively . . . --Stanley Sawyer & Daniel Hartl, April 1981. Theoretical Population Biology 19(2): 261-262.
Some zoologists, like Raven in 1935, considered the validity of Wallace's line on the basis of the proportion of mammals that had crossed the line going east compared with those that had not and came to the conclusion that Wallace's line marked a boundary which was the eastern limit of the great majority of East Indian mammals, like rhinoceroses and elephants. Others made their assessment on the proportion of western and eastern elements to be found on each island in Wallacea. Thus, Rensch in 1935, following Mertens (1934), calculated that 88 per cent of the butterflies were of western origin which was a similar proportion to that found on Lombok and more than twice as high as for the Kai Islands. Following the same line of argument for Austral-Malayan birds, Ernst Mayr calculated that 67.6 per cent of the passerines were from the west and decided that 'there is no doubt, Celebes must be included with the Oriental region' (Mayr, 1944) . . . --Wilma George, 1981. In T. C. Whitmore, ed., Wallace's Line and Plate Tectonics (Oxford University Press): 5.
The notion that islands are somehow different stems from the concerns of naturalists. The observations by Darwin and others that the existence of islands permitted the development of significant variations in plant and animal life formed an important part of the intellectual underpinning of theories of evolution. Thus Wallace, in his study of island life (1880), points out that 'some of the most remarkable and interesting facts in the distribution and affinities of organic forms are presented by islands in relation to each other and to the surrounding continents'. He refers to 'the unexpected relations or singular anomalies which are so often found to characterize the fauna and flora of islands'. More recently, there has been a growing interest in the total ecological balance of islands (already hinted at in Wallace's work) . . . --Percy Selwyn, December 1980. World Development 8(12): 945.
. . . it is interesting to note that in this disagreement there are faint echoes of the other matter which separated Darwin and Wallace at this time: sexual selection through female choice. Darwin wanted to argue that the beauty of, say, the peacock as opposed to the peahen, is a function of the females choosing beautiful males. Wallace argued that the difference is essentially a function of the females being more drab than the males, this drabness coming through the female's need for camouflage from predators as they incubate their eggs and care for their young. In arguing this way, Wallace was certainly not invoking group selection. However, unlike Darwin, who was emphasizing the individual nature of selection by seeing the main competition (at this point) as coming from within the species, Wallace was deemphasizing competition within the group by seeing the threat coming from without . . . --Michael Ruse, November 1980. Annals of Science 37(6): 625.
. . . let us offer solace to the opponents of human sociobiology. If one uncomfortable with a rather extreme individual selectionism, particularly as applied to man, and if one yet wants historical precedent to legitimize one's yearnings, then no less than the sociobiologists can one find the most respectable of intellectual ancestors. One may not be able to claim one of the fathers of evolutionism, but one can claim the other: Alfred Russel Wallace. He was a group selectionist, and moreover he was not prepared to see man treated on a par with other organisms. I certainly do not want to pretend that today's biologists would find convincing the details of Wallace's doubts about the all-sufficiency of individual selection, or that those who criticize human sociobiology grind the same metaphysical axe as did Wallace (although interestingly, politically Wallace was fairly left-wing, as are many of today's critics). But, given Wallace's conclusions, it does seem true to say that the critics of human sociobiology are no less part of the evolutionary tradition than those they criticize! . . . --Michael Ruse, November 1980. Annals of Science 37(6): 630.
. . . this letter . . . reveals in clearer outline the professional relationship between Spruce and Wallace and their mutual but competitive interests in the Palmae: their meeting in the Amazon, the discovery that they had made similar collections in this important family, Spruce's offer to collaborate on the book and Wallace's subsequent refusal. It appears that Spruce was discouraged on learning that Wallace had discovered and intended to name and describe the same palms, primarily those along the Rio Negro, that he had studied. He writes of "relaxing" his study of the palms, in view of the fact that Wallace would return to England and publish his results before Spruce left South America. Clearly, in this instance, Spruce felt botanically somewhat overshadowed by Wallace, whom he considered a distinguished zoologist and friend . . . --Michael J. Balick, September 1980. Botanical Museum Leaflets 28(3): 265.
A major misconception about this debate has become fairly widespread. According to this misconception, Darwin was for sexual selection, while Wallace was against it and for natural selection instead. It is true that from 1876 on, Wallace gave up sexual selection--he rejected female choice completely and interpreted male combat as just a form of natural selection. But the debate between Darwin and Wallace took place in 1867 and 1868, with a brief resumption in 1871 after publication of the Descent of Man. During this earlier period, Wallace fully accepted female choice and male choice, at least in birds. Wherever Darwin invoked female choice or male choice in birds, Wallace invoked it too. In other words, Darwin and Wallace agreed that, in birds, sexual selection was the cause of the coloration of the more brilliantly colored sex. Thus the debate did not come down to all sexual selection on one side and all natural selection on the other. The disagreement with respect to birds centered on the cause of the coloration of the less conspicuous sex . . . --Malcolm Jay Kottler, June 1980. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 124(3): 203-204.
. . . The basic reason for their divergence was Darwin's belief that, although the most common form of inheritance was equal inheritance by both sexes, variations first appearing in one sex were fairly often sex-limited in inheritance from the first. Thus female choice alone, in conjunction with sex-limited inheritance from the first of the variations sexually selected in the male, would produce a conspicuous male and an inconspicuous female; in such cases, natural selection for the sake of protection of the sex in greater danger was unnecessary . . . --Malcolm Jay Kottler, June 1980. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 124(3): 204.
I cannot analyze Wallace's psyche and will not comment on his deeper motives for hewing to the unbridgeable gap between human intellect and the behavior of mere animals. But I can assess the logic of his argument and recognize that the traditional account is not only incorrect, but precisely backward. Wallace did not abandon natural selection at the human threshold. Rather, it was his peculiarly rigid view of natural selection that led him, quite consistently, to reject it for the human mind. His position never varied--natural selection is the only cause of major evolutionary change. His two major debates with Darwin--sexual selection and the origin of human intellect--represent the same argument, not an inconsistent Wallace championing selection in one case and running from it in the other . . . --Stephen Jay Gould, January 1980. Natural History 89(1): 35-36.
. . . Wallace's anthropology closely paralleled his interest in natural ecology. He asked very similar questions about the peoples he encountered to those he asked about other organic forms. These were questions on how well a region could support a population; what were the natural checks on its expansion; the relationship between subsistence and size of population. His other preoccupation was with the geographical distribution of peoples. He put much greater emphasis than Darwin upon the role of geographical isolation in the evolution of species and varieties. Similarly he attributed many of the human racial differences in the Malay area to geographical isolation. Wallace was also interested in the effect on human evolution of that other major plank of natural ecology--migration. He spent some time in the classification of the languages of the Malay region partly for the clues they might reveal about the migration patterns of the peoples in the area . . . --Greta Jones, 1980. In her Social Darwinism and English Thought; The Interaction Between Biological and Social Theory (Humanities Press): 26-27.
[William] James first anticipated some of his mature opinions on race and nationality in an 1865 review of A. R. Wallace's article, "The Origins of the Human Race." Agreeing with Wallace, James held that the races of humanity developed from a common ancestor through natural selection. Race differentiation antedated all but the most rudimentary forms of social organization. But soon every race evolved more elaborate social systems. Natural selection then became more complicated. The environment supported whichever groups acted together; each group protected whichever individuals it valued. Such social selection allowed physically weak people to survive and reproduce so long as they served community ideals. Survival of the weak checked physical evolution. Further progress then had to be mental and moral . . . --Larry C. Miller, Fall 1979. American Quarterly 31(4): 539.
A widely held generalization about tropical tree species is that most occur at very low adult densities and are of relatively uniform dispersion, such that adult individuals of the tree species are thinly and evenly distributed in space. If true, this generalization has potentially profound consequences for the reproductive biology, population structure, and evolution of tropical tree species. In this article the adequacy of this generalization is judged with respect to a particular tropical forest, a large tract of which has been mapped in detail. The origins of this generalization can be traced back at least to Wallace . . . --Stephen P. Hubbell, 30 March 1979. Science 203(4387): 1299.
This distinction reflected a general tendency of Spencer and his contemporaries to distinguish higher and lower stages in all development: barbarism and civilization, status and contract, militarism and industrialism. In this instance, he also joined the controversy that developed in the late sixties between Darwin and A. Russel Wallace as to whether natural selection altered bodily structure at all stages of evolution. Darwin believed it did. Wallace maintained that, with the attainment of a certain level of intelligence, mental changes superceded physical ones. Spencer preferred the thrust of Wallace's view. He himself had earlier identified the importance of cerebral development among the races of man. But he rejected Wallace's view that such cerebral development within societies resulted from the natural selection of spontaneous variations in the brain . . . --Robert C. Bannister, 1979. In his Social Darwinism: Science and Myth in Anglo-American Social Thought (Temple University Press): 47.
. . . Fiske's philosophy was inherently conservative in that he stressed the slowness of change, which he neither wanted nor urged. However, the context was also usually religious. His system would bring no religious revolution, no attacks on existing churches, he assured readers in the conclusion of the Cosmic Philosophy. In the one section in which he discussed social evolution--published earlier in the North American Review under the title "From Brute to Man"--Fiske differed little from the speculations of A. R. Wallace, whose work he described as "one of the most brilliant contributions ever yet made to the Doctrine of Evolution." Like Wallace, he believed that natural selection ceased operating on bodily factors with the appearance of the human brain. "And hence in the future as in the recent past," he told readers of the North American Review, "the dominant fact in the career of humanity is not physical modification but civilization." . . . --Robert C. Bannister, 1979. In his Social Darwinism: Science and Myth in Anglo-American Social Thought (Temple University Press): 65.
. . . Darwinism upset such happy assumptions. Throughout his career [Henry] George harbored suspicion of the theory, a suspicion that colored his thought no less than Carey's and Bowen's. In Progress and Poverty he attempted to evade the issue. How men had originated was not his concern: "all we know of him is as man." But his hostility was plain. During the 1880s he mellowed somewhat, comforted by the views of the British biologist A. R. Wallace (who early preached the "limits of evolution as applied to man," and who also befriended George during his English crusade), and of St. George Mivart, a leading Christian evolutionist who, more firmly than Wallace, denied that natural selection has shaped human faculties. By the 1890s George could manage grudging acceptance . . . --Robert C. Bannister, 1979. In his Social Darwinism: Science and Myth in Anglo-American Social Thought (Temple University Press): 120.
. . . His view of "mental and moral progress" (which sociologists would later call cultural evolution) also led to the conclusion "that the higher--the more intellectual and moral--must displace the lower and degraded races." But his process was again not analogous to struggle and selection in nature. Certain that improvement would come, Wallace would not attribute it to survival of the fittest. Following a popular usage of the day, he equated such survival with the success of "the mediocre, if not the low, both as regards morality and intelligence." Rather, as with mind itself, mysterious forces were at work. The "glorious qualities" of men were the "surest proof" of "higher existences than ourselves." The goal was not racial imperialism but the brotherhood of man: "a single nearly homogeneous race, no individual of which will be inferior to the noblest specimens of existing humanity." . . . --Robert C. Bannister, 1979. In his Social Darwinism: Science and Myth in Anglo-American Social Thought (Temple University Press): 185-186.
But, of course, it does matter who starts the trend. If it had been Wallace instead of Darwin, we would have had a very different theory of evolution today. The whole cybernetics movement might have occurred 100 years earlier as a result of Wallace's comparison between the steam engine with a governor and the process of natural selection . . . --Gregory Bateson, 1979. In his Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity (E. P. Dutton): 43.
. . . It was Alfred Russel Wallace who remarked in 1866 that the principle of natural selection is like that of the steam engine with a governor. I shall assume that this is indeed so and that both the process of individual learning and the process of population shift under natural selection can exhibit the pathologies of all cybernetic circuits: excessive oscillation and runaway. In sum, I shall assume that evolutionary change and somatic change (including learning and thought) are fundamentally similar, that both are stochastic in nature, although surely the ideas (injunctions, descriptive propositions, and so on) on which each process works are of totally different logical typing from the typing of ideas in the other process . . . --Gregory Bateson, 1979. In his Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity (E. P. Dutton): 148.
. . . [W. R.] Greg represented those who saw competitive individualism as the logical outcome of the operation in society of the law of natural selection; for him, naturalism in sociology was equivalent to the Hobbesian vision of a continual 'war of all against all'. But equally, Wallace was representative of a considerable number of people who claimed that man was unique in nature precisely because of his ability to transcend this state of affairs; by stressing the biological advantages of intelligent cooperation, he attempted to reconcile Darwinian principles with a very different moral and political vision. Thus, the dispute involved a fundamental conflict of ideologies, even though it was fought out almost wholly within a naturalistic framework. This conflict was to be a recurrent feature of Wallace's thought; and indeed it is still with us today in 'sociobiological' discussions of the legitimacy of the theory of 'group selection.' . . . --John R. Durant, 1979. British Journal for the History of Science 12(40): 45.
Wallace, who unfortunately never wrote a book on the subject, probed deeper into the nature of man than any of the circle immediately around Darwin. Because in the end science has so thoroughly accepted them, we have not only forgotten their source but also forgotten how heretical some of his views were at the time they were uttered. First Wallace postulated an erect, small-brained bipedal stage of human development, followed by a second phase in which the human brain and cranium assumed their present size and form. Only with the present-day discovery of the Australopithecine man-apes is the early stage beginning to be documented. Second, he quickly saw that the complete fossil history of man might well be prolonged far beyond Pleistocene times, and that the big-brained men of the upper Pleistocene, who were at that time troubling the evolutionists, need not be regarded as an effective argument against the reality of the human transformation. Rather, the scientists must cease confusing living races with grades or levels on the evolutionary scale of the past--something which was at that time exceedingly common . . . --Loren Eiseley, 1979. In his Darwin and the Mysterious Mr. X; New Light on the Evolutionists (E. P. Dutton): 197.
Wallace and many later biogeographers have proposed that tropical areas support more species than temperate zones simply because they have not been glaciated and are thus ecologically older. Although evidence is very scant, under this interpretation the observed high tropical diversity is a result of long-term undisturbed speciation. If so, the latitudinal trend in species numbers is partially attributable to a strictly geographic factor (latitude) . . . --Joseph J. Schall & Eric R. Pianka, 25 August 1978. Science 201 (4357): 681.
It is likely, for instance, that Wilde would have sympathized with Grant Allen's and A. R. Wallace's eugenic plans. Allen argued in his essays for free love as part of a eugenic proposal which encouraged women to choose for child-bearing purposes temporary mates from among the finest, healthiest, and most intelligent men. Wallace, in an essay which appeared in The Fortnightly Review, four months before "The Soul of Man Under Socialism," also outlined a nonauthoritarian socialist scheme for human improvement through sexual selection. Stating that education could not lead to permanent cultural improvement, Wallace suggested that once removed from economic competition, and totally free to choose a mate, women would be attracted to men who embodied what Victorians called "the higher qualities," and the cumulative hereditary impact of that sexual selection would therefore improve the culture of the race. In February 1891, when Wilde published "The Soul of Man Under Socialism," in The Fortnightly Review, he argued that marriage and family should be abolished in favor of a freer and more beautiful love relationship between man and woman. His suggestion can be understood as one of his proposals for a socialist utopia and, indeed, as his contribution to the debate among socialists and cultural critics over the eugenic role of sexual selection in cultural improvement . . . --Michael S. Helfand & Philip E. Smith II, Summer 1978. Texas Studies in Literature and Language 20(2): 211.
Must fantasy inevitably accompany speculation on the plurality of worlds? Fortunately not, for even the history of the question contains a few indications of sober deliberation. In this respect, two nineteenth-century dissenters on plurality, William Whewell and Alfred Russel Wallace, stand out as the first post-Copernican thinkers to rein in imagination by proposing sensible rules for thinking about such a provocative but thorny issue. When Whewell's Of the Plurality of Worlds was published in 1853, it challenged what had become, since the sixteenth century, a traditional belief in the existence of life elsewhere. Fifty years later, Alfred Russel Wallace, co-discoverer of the theory of natural selection and later Percival Lowell's most tenacious opponent, extended the dissenting tradition by writing the first study that successfully synthesized biological and astronomical perspectives on life in a plurality of worlds . . . --William C. Heffernan, January-March 1978. Journal of the History of Ideas 39(1): 82-83.
. . . However unkind it became, most criticism of Man's Place in the Universe was kept within the confines of the dissenters' strictures on reasoning. There was a gratifying irony in this, for while most of Wallace's peers found fault with the book, they unwittingly based their comments on the rules which Whewell and Wallace considered necessary for careful speculation on plurality. For instance, H. H. Turner, the Savilian professor of astronomy at Oxford, captured the thrust of the many unfavorable reviews of Man's Place when he insisted that the universe is probably not bounded in the sense of having an edge; that even if it were, there would be no center; and that even if the sun were at the center, such a position would not be uniquely stable. Like other critics, Turner was able to seize on the flaws in the argument of life beyond the solar system and thus ignore the strengths of Wallace's overall position--the banishment of theology when considerations of probability were at stake, the introduction of an explicitly evolutionary perspective, and the low likelihood of life within the solar system. Wallace had created a grand and only somewhat flawed synthesis, although few people remarked on this . . . --William C. Heffernan, January-March 1978. Journal of the History of Ideas 39(1): 92-93.
. . . And what about the climate itself? Lowell had claimed that although Mars receives only half the earth's heat, the absence of an atmosphere would actually mean that the sun's radiation would have a more direct effect on it than on the earth. Wallace was appalled that a respected scientist could be responsible for such an hypothesis. The opposite would have to be the case, as Wallace showed: because of its lack of sufficient atmosphere, Mars must retain heat more poorly than the earth. There would also have to be greater variations in temperature between the ground and the air a few feet above it, and Wallace pointed out that these would impede the development of advanced organisms . . . --William C. Heffernan, January-March 1978. Journal of the History of Ideas 39(1): 95.
. . . Since both the dissenters and their "majoritarian" opponents were moved by extra-scientific convictions, could it be said that the two traditions were methodologically indistinguishable? Certainly not. Precisely because they were dissenters, Whewell and Wallace had been forced to articulate their position with a degree of care that no pluralist had ever shown. Because they were inspired by different and unusual convictions about man's status, the dissenters had to take the scientific road to plurality; for their case would not otherwise have been heard. In this way, discussion of the possibility of life in other worlds was transformed; for in later years, the metaphysical context of the debate would fall away, leaving a core of scientifically grounded speculation for which Whewell and Wallace had prepared the way . . . --William C. Heffernan, January-March 1978. Journal of the History of Ideas 39(1): 100.
The idea of surplusage seems most directly traceable to Alfred Russel Wallace (1870). His belief that savages possessed brains far in excess of their requirements was the germinal idea of surplusage; consider, he would argue, that civilized humans use the same brain as that of savages to accomplish higher mental feats such as mathematical reasoning, a kind of reasoning never required of our primitive ancestors. If the potential for higher mental processes appeared before it was evolutionarily adaptive, what caused its presence? This is the dilemma posed by the notion of surplusage. As naive as the arguments about savages might seem today, surplusage remains an interesting consideration for psychologists studying animal intelligence in the laboratory . . . --Robert Boice, June 1977. Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society 9(6): 452.
Crolls' work played a critical role in the biologists' attempts to obviate the threats posed to evolutionary theory by Kelvin's argument for a shortened history of the earth. But Croll's ideas had an even broader significance for Wallace: they functioned as a catalyst for his magisterial formulation of zoogeography. The explanatory potential of glacial theory with respect to the question of the migration and distribution of animals and plants was considerably enhanced by Croll's speculations, and Wallace was alert to their implications for his work on geographical distribution . . . --Martin Fichman, Spring 1977. Journal of the History of Biology 10(1): 60-61.
. . . Wallace and Huxley disagreed about how humans evolved because they had different perceptions of non-western people and the working class. Those perceptions were informed by different social experiences. Wallace's was an unusual experience in the nineteenth century, and it led him to an interpretation of human development with which modern anthropologists generally agree, that the artifice of culture informs our perceptions. How our opinions and experiences can remain unaffected or uninvolved in a holistic theory like human evolution remains a mystery. Yet that is the working assumption of most scientists and bureaucrats of science . . . --Michael S. Helfand, Winter 1977. Victorian Studies, 20(2): 176-177.
A. R. Wallace's hypothesis that visual stimuli provided by the insect become a conditioned signal for predatory animals through association with its noxious taste was formulated 24 years before I. P. Pavlov was elected Professor of Pharmacology at the Military Medical Academy of St. Petersburg. Several years later, Pavlov was to begin his studies there on "psychic" reflexes, employing visual and auditory stimuli to signal the taste of acid or meat powder in the mouth of dogs. Poulton's summary of two decades of comparative animal research upon the positive effects of satisfying foods and the negative effects of annoying tastes was presented eleven years before E. L. Thorndike's (1897) doctoral thesis on animal intelligence and the law of effect. Pavlov and Thorndike went on to investigate conditioned responses more rigorously, and ultimately their students operationally defined a series of methodological "laws" . . . --John Garcia & Walter G. Hankins, 1977. In Lewis M. Barker et al., eds., Learning Mechanisms in Food Selection (Baylor University Press): 6.
. . . I want to suggest that the first step in any study of his contribution must be a careful analysis of how he actually presented his idea in the 1858 paper, concentrating especially on the kind of variation that was the basis of natural selection. Strangely enough, such a detailed analysis is provided neither by Beddall nor McKinney, both of whom simply assume that what Wallace eventually discovered was a straightforward equivalent of the Darwinian theory. This assumption is common to most general accounts of the history of evolutionism, and was shared by Darwin himself. But there are good reasons for suggesting that Wallace's initial concept of selection differed considerably from Darwin's, or at least was expressed in very different terms . . . --Peter J. Bowler, January 1976. Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 31(1): 18.
. . . It was only at a later stage in his thought--after he had discovered the principle of divergence--that Darwin actually came to realize that varieties would at some stage have to compete with one another. The essence of Wallace's mechanism was for Darwin a secondary insight gained some time after he had worked out the primary mechanism of selection acting on individual differences. Furthermore, when Darwin discussed varieties coming into conflict, he pictured this as a geographical effect caused by one form's invading and conquering the territory of the other. Wallace on the other hand, simply wrote of species splitting into varieties as though this occurred across the whole geographical range, with members of each variety in face-to-face conflict at all points. Wallace's failure to appreciate the role of geographical factors in the formation of varieties again suggests that he may not at first have recognized natural selection as the agency that created the varieties out of individual differences. Or, if he did recognize the action of natural selection on individual differences, he had certainly failed to work out its full implications for his own theory of selection acting among the varieties . . . --Peter J. Bowler, January 1976. Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 31(1): 22-23.
. . . It is clear that in the later stages of his career Wallace was fully aware of the importance of individual variation to selection. He was able to exploit both modes of representation employed by Darwin, using especially the range concept to make a notable contribution to the measurement of variation among wild populations. But all of this occurred after he had read the Origin of Species, with its clear descriptions of Darwin's primary conception of selection's acting on the individual differences first to form varieties and then species. His own first paper on natural selection had side-stepped this level of the mechanism and developed a theory of competition among the varieties after they had been formed. This was a valid Darwinian mechanism, but one which to Darwin himself represented a second level of selection which utilized the varieties formed from the selection of individual variations. It may be that from the beginning Wallace also recognized the primary action of selection upon individual differences, and simply preferred to describe the mechanism acting at the second level because he was more familiar with what he called permanent varieties. But even if this were so, there are certain points in the 1858 paper which suggest that he had at least failed to work out the consequences of the first level of selection for his own theory . . . --Peter J. Bowler, January 1976. Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 31(1): 28.
At one point Wallace reasoned logically and with telling effect that even if martians existed they could not have the high intelligence with which Lowell credited them. For the "canals" they were supposed to have built in many instances ran for thousands of miles across arid deserts and beneath clear cloudless skies, thus "losing enormously from evaporation, if we assume them to contain water. The mere attempt to use open canals for irrigation purposes would argue ignorance and stupidity. Long before half of them were completed, their failure to be of any use would have led any rational being to cease constructing them." . . . --William Graves Hoyt, 1976. In his Lowell and Mars (University of Arizona Press): 215.
Many suggestions have been formulated over the years to explain the evolution of vertebrate color vision. Most have dealt with possible modifications of photoreceptors and neuronal layers of the retina (see especially Edridge-Green, 1920; Ladd-Franklin, 1929; Willmer, 1949; Pickford, 1951) and have hardly considered function. Only Wallace (1891, p. 411) and Walls (1942, p. 463) appear to have seriously asked the question, "Why color vision?" Each suggested that color detection originated to provide for the strongest contrast and, therefore, to enhance the visibility of objects against the background. We believe that this simple and prescient suggestion is correct . . . --W. N. McFarland & F. W. Munz, October 1975. Vision Research 15: 1071.
. . . a major aim of Vestiges is to show that as good Newtonians we much accept a biological evolutionary theory. Wallace, I think, whilst rejecting as inadequate Chambers' own evolutionary theory, entirely accepted Chambers' research programme, to find the biological analogue of Newtonian astronomy. Thus I would suggest that Wallace like Darwin, may have reacted favourably to Malthus' ideas because he could then start to see his way towards a biological equivalent of Newtonian astronomy. Hence, I think that Darwin and Wallace quite possibly started from similar philosophical positions, although I have no reason to believe that they drew on exactly the same immediate sources for the philosophies . . . --Michael Ruse, June 1975. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 6(2): 172-173.
. . . By combining what he considered to be the reliable features of both the calculations, the more recent date for the ice age and a consequently accelerated rate of species change, Wallace arrived at a figure of 24 million years for the time since the beginning of the Cambrian. This estimate, he concluded happily, would fit easily within Kelvin's limits and still leave a period three times as long for the slow operation of natural selection during the Precambrian. Wallace was not finished, however, for it was in the application of Croll's hypothesis to biology that he showed the true measure of his ingenuity. Neither he nor Darwin had ever completely escaped from the Lamarckian dependence upon environment as a causal factor in species change. And now he saw in the radical changes of climate a mechanism whereby the continuously "altered physical conditions would induce variation." Furthermore, in alternating from one hemisphere to the other, the successive cycles of glaciation would stimulate a constant migration of plant and animal types, thus continually bringing allied species into competition and accelerating the process of extinction . . . --Joe D. Burchfield, September 1974. Isis 65(228): 317.
. . . As early as 1876, the naturalist and zoogeographer Alfred Wallace noted that "we live in a zoologically impoverished world, from which all of the hugest, and fiercest, and strangest forms have recently disappeared." He remarked especially on the "sudden dying out of so many large Mammalia, not in only one place but over half the land surface of the globe" (Wallace 1876). At the end of the Pleistocene in North America, there was a loss of 33 genera of large mammals (>50 kg), while only 13 genera had become extinct in the preceding 1 or 2 million years. Smaller mammals (<50 kg) were not similarly affected, nor were marine mammals, which we might also expect to show high extinction rates if the cause were environmental catastrophes. Wallace (1911) observed that these sudden extinctions were not correlated with major environmental changes, such as those responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs, but seemed to coincide with the arrival, on different continents at different times, of Stone Age man . . . --Richard S. Miller & Daniel B. Botkin, March-April 1974. American Scientist 62(2): 172.
This concept of the separation of the human personality from the human body meant that Wallace considered man and the relation of science to man in a context wholly different from that of the advocates of scientific naturalism. As William Irvine once described the evolution of Huxley's mind, "He became interested in man as a physical mechanism, as an anthropoid ape, as a social unit and a citizen, as a delicate machine for the discovery of scientific truth, but never to any appreciable extent in man as a personality and a human being." Wallace's development was exactly the reverse. He was originally interested in the physical mechanism of man for the sake of the moral personality encased therein. He studied the anthropoid ape because it resembled man. He wrote on social questions in the hope that society might be so organized as to allow the moral faculties to flourish. Throughout his long and varied scientific career, Wallace was primarily concerned with what Koestler has dubbed "the ghost in the machine" rather than with the machine itself . . . --Frank M. Turner, 1974. In his Between Science and Religion; The Reaction to Scientific Naturalism in Late Victorian England (Yale University Press): 82.
. . . In the London Anthropological Society address of March 1864, Wallace continued to discuss, though in a very different kind of forum, matters that had weighted upon his mind for over twenty years. He brought into the professional scientific sphere the scientific concepts and goals that he had learned in the provincial mechanics institutes. The address was his single most important comment on man and contained the latent seeds for all his later departures from scientific naturalism. The American evolutionist John Fiske recalled that the address "seemed to open up an entirely new world of speculation." Such speculation was indeed new to men who had known little or nothing of "physical puritanism" or the "belated rationalism" of the working-class culture in which Wallace had come to maturity. For Wallace the paper was simply a continuation of his earlier thought . . . --Frank M. Turner, 1974. In his Between Science and Religion; The Reaction to Scientific Naturalism in Late Victorian England (Yale University Press): 83-84.
. . . Spiritualism furnished Wallace with a scientific explanation for the development of man's moral nature and brought man's total being under the rule of rational cosmic law. In a curious manner, the theory of spiritualism provided a law for the moral world analogous to that provided by natural selection for the organic world. Natural selection removed the necessity for an arbitrary and interfering God of Special Creation. Spiritualism banished the arbitrary God of predestination and replaced Him with a uniform law of individual moral progress and of personal moral responsibility. . . --Frank M. Turner, 1974. In his Between Science and Religion; The Reaction to Scientific Naturalism in Late Victorian England (Yale University Press): 88.
. . . "Consistency," the tract by Robert Dale Owen, Robert Owen's son, particularly interested Wallace. The younger Owen, who himself also later converted to spiritualism, argued that the doctrine of predestination led to immoral living because it rendered one's eternal reward a matter of chance rather than a function of the virtue of one's life. Concurring in these arguments, Wallace moved very quietly and painlessly from faith to skepticism. His loss of faith grew directly out of a situation succinctly described by a writer later in the century: "God, and immortality, and the Bible have been so taught as to make scepticism the only refuge for morality to flee to." Wallace later identified this rational skepticism with agnosticism. His skepticism, however, more nearly resembled deism. He did not deny the possibility of religious knowledge or of pure religion but rather the validity and morality of the Christian religion. Most important, Wallace and the Owenites did not dismiss the moral significance of the questions that Christianity had addressed. The questions of religion remained valid even if the Christian answers were false. The Owenite criticism of Christianity made Wallace, as well as genuine Owenites, highly susceptible to a rational religion, such as spiritualism, that was based on empirical evidence and that emphasized social cooperation and benevolent individualism . . . --Frank M. Turner, 1974. In his Between Science and Religion; The Reaction to Scientific Naturalism in Late Victorian England (Yale University Press): 89-90.
The notion that man's first language was primarily gestural, carried on with hand and arm signals rather than vocal sounds, has been supported by a distinguished line of scholars: Condillac (1746), Tylor (1868, 1871), Morgan (1877), Wallace (1881, 1895), Romanes (1888), Wundt (1912), Paget (1944, 1963), and Johannesson (1949, 1950). The gestural theory seems to be the most attractive of the many glottogonic hypotheses advanced so far, and receives support from recent studies of chimpanzees and other primates, such as Gardner and Gardner (1969, 1971), Premack (1970a, b, 1971), and Menzel (1971), as well as from other sources. The fact that this evidence was unavailable to earlier proponents of the gestural theory explains some of the weaknesses in its former formulations . . . --Gordon W. Hewes, February-April 1973. Current Anthropology 14(1-2): 5.
Alfred Russel Wallace was the co-founder of the theory of natural selection and one of its most tenacious defenders. It is therefore of great interest that Wallace emphatically opposed a demarcation between ethical and scientific ideas and that he also resisted the breakdown of the common intellectual milieu with his own unified world-view. He endeavoured to combine notions of value with his scientific theory of evolution, particularly in relation to man. British biologists in the first half of the nineteenth century characteristically analysed their data in terms of the teleological framework of Natural Theology. Evolutionary theory supposedly demolished this framework. Nevertheless, Wallace incorporated a fundamental teleology into all his theories. He considered that he had thereby reconciled the tensions of scientific and ethical demands in his contribution to the evolutionary debate on man's place in nature . . . --Roger Smith, December 1972. British Journal for the History of Science 6(22): 177-178.
. . . Wallace traced the 'action of some unknown higher law' in the evolution of man and also in the origin of consciousness. As he commented, 'no physiologist or philosopher has yet ventured to propound an intelligible theory of how sensation may possibly be a product of organization; while many have declared the passage from matter to mind to be inconceivable'. While other biologists tended to avoid this question, Wallace believed in a spiritual purpose behind the phenomenon of consciousness. It was not clear to him that conscious actions could have any biological utility if they were merely parallel, or epiphenomenal, to automatic physiological actions. In particular, he believed that it was not possible to assign utility to the consciousness of volition if this consciousness was deceptive . . . --Roger Smith, December 1972. British Journal for the History of Science 6(22): 183.
For Lyell the challenge was to develop the continuous process, the gradual extinction and creation of species. The intermittent process was available in the fortuitous nature of the circumstances favorable for the preservation of fossil remains. Wallace on the other hand had for some years been attempting to validate the hypothesis of gradual species transformation. Although he had been examining the relationships between geographical distribution and affinity within affinity groups (general, families), there is no evidence that he had given any thought to the question of the origin of discontinuities within such groups until a few months before he wrote the 1855 essay. During that brief period several quite unexpected patterns of distribution and affinity came to his attention. Soon thereafter grew the appreciation that extinction, interacting with species transformation, could give rise to all known patterns of organic discontinuities . . . --John L. Brooks, December 1972. Transactions of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences 44: 26.
. . . A contemporary reader of Wallace's "Attempts at a natural arrangement of birds", should he be unaware of its date of publication, would probably find little to criticize in its presentation of the role of extinction in the genesis of observed patterns of diversity. So completely do we share Wallace's faith that "all gaps between species, genera, or larger groups are the result of extinctions of species during former epochs of the world's history" that this statement seems nothing unusual. It is only when it is clearly understood that this statement was published in 1856, three years before Darwin published the Origin of Species, that we appreciate that this essay carries the proclamation of a prophet's faith . . . --John L. Brooks, December 1972. Transactions of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences 44: 45.
"What think you of Wallace's paper in the Ann. N. Hist.? Good! Upon the whole! But how about such forms as the Giraffe, which has typical representatives in the Siwalik tertiary deposits? Or the true Elk (= Moose)? Can we suppose a lost series of gradations connecting these general with the Deer type, & ramifying off to them paulatim [gradually]? Wallace has, I think, put the matter well; and according to his theory, the various domestic races of animals have been fairly developed into species" [quotation from Edward Blyth letter to Darwin] . . . --Barbara G. Beddall, Spring 1972. Journal of the History of Biology 5(1): 155.
Wallace, in fact, proposed the first cybernetic model. Nowadays cybernetics deals with much more complex systems of the general kind; and we know that when we talk about the processes of civilization, or evaluate human behavior, human organization, or any biological system, we are concerned with self-corrective systems. Basically these systems are always conservative of something. As in the engine with a governor, the fuel supply is changed to conserve--to keep constant--the speed of the flywheel, so always in such systems changes occur to conserve the truth of some descriptive statement, some component of the status quo. Wallace saw the matter correctly, and natural selection acts primarily to keep the species unvarying; but it may act at higher levels to keep constant that complex variable which we call "survival." . . . --Gregory Bateson, 1972. In his Steps to an Ecology of Mind (Chandler Publishing Company): 435.
The importance of larval dispersal was already recognized by Alfred Russel Wallace in his work on The Geographical Distribution of Animals (1876). Wallace knew that the univalve and bivalve Mollusca have free-swimming larval stages and recognized that "they thus have a powerful means of dispersal, and are carried by tides and currents so as ultimately to spread over every shore and shoal that offers conditions favorable for development." . . . --Rudolf S. Scheltema, April 1971. Biological Bulletin 140: 285.
. . . Darwin (1859) and later evolutionists (especially Muller 1940, 1942) proposed that reproductive isolating mechanisms develop as by-products of divergent evolution and are purely incidental features of adaptive differentiation which confer no advantage to populations at the time they develop. Conversely, Wallace (1889), Fisher (1930), and Dobzhansky (1941, 1951) contended that isolating mechanisms could arise from selection against hybrids and hybridizers. Selection for reproductive isolation in areas of sympatry would reinforce previously existing barriers and thereby reduce gametic wastage, hybridization, and disruptive gene flow. Grant (1966) has suggested the term "Wallace effect" for this process . . . --Donald A. Levin, November-December 1970. The American Naturalist 104(940): 571.
The basic answer to the question--"Why does man occupy this worldwide and universally dominant niche?"--also given by Wallace, is that by the use of his greatly superior mind, man has continually modified the environment to meet his needs, so that "he would cease to be influenced by natural selection in his physical form and structure." As Dobzhansky (1962, 1967) has pointed out, this statement is an exaggeration. Nevertheless, the general conclusion of Wallace, that in early man the action of natural selection was largely transferred from the bodily structure to the mind, is still valid . . . --George Ledyard Stebbins, March-April 1970. The American Naturalist 104(936): 112.
The next questioner said the lecturer had termed Mr. [Henry] George a poet. He then called attention to the fact that Mr. George advocated nationalisation of the land as a remedy for poverty, and asked how it was that Mr. A. Wallace, an able man, came to the same conclusion. Professor Marshall said that Mr. Wallace's proposal was much more reasonable than that of Mr. George. He did not call Mr. George a poet because he said erroneous things. He was a poet because he was poetic, and he was not a man of science because he said erroneous things [report on a lecture by Alfred Marshall] . . . --Ronald H. Coase, April 1969. Journal of Law and Economics 12(1): 199.
. . . We next come to Mr. Wallace's plan. It proposed that the inherent value of the soil should become the property of the State, but that the buildings and other improvements on it should remain private property. He would give to the landowner an annuity equal to that part of the rent which corresponds to its present inherent value, for his life and the life of any descendants born in his lifetime, or in failure of such, for the life of anyone nominated by the landlord. He calls this full compensation, but of course it is only partial compensation; the State would confiscate, independently of any rise in its inherent value, the reversion of this inherent value some years hence. If we put the probable duration of the lives at forty years, this is equal to an immediate confiscation of 30 per cent of the inherent value, if we take interest at 3 per cent, or a confiscation of 20 percent if we take interest at 4 per cent. The question whether this is just or not must be looked at straight in the face [from the words of Alfred Marshall] . . . --Ronald H. Coase, April 1969. Journal of Law and Economics 12(1): 206.
. . . The principle may be extended to the generalization that a proportionately small percentage of any fauna will be fit as invaders, since any intervening barrier, however slight, will act as a kind of "filter" to at least some of them. Simpson has developed and supplemented this argument, demonstrating that Wallace's interpretation was essentially correct. The precise differences in approach between Darwin and Wallace need some additional study, but it would seem that Darwin tended to concentrate on the effects of different dispersal mechanisms on patterns of distribution, Wallace more on the influence of barriers in restricting faunas conceived of as units. Thus, Wallace was more orientated toward historical explanation for classes of phenomena, Darwin toward reasoning from the effects of the properties of individuals upon the overall pattern of distribution . . . --Michael T. Ghiselin, 1969. In his The Triumph of the Darwinian Method (University of California Press): 41.
. . . Darwin and Wallace merit particular respect for having developed the theory of natural selection through a process of "retroduction": that is, they were aware of a phenomenon, and successfully sought out an explanation in superficially unconnected processes. The method through which this insight was obtained would seem to have been orderly and rational . . . --Michael T. Ghiselin, 1969. In his The Triumph of the Darwinian Method (University of California Press): 77.
In a modification of the quinarian system of William Sharpe Macleay, Swainson divided the earth into five regions according to what he believed to be the five major races of mankind; animal groups were likewise divided into fives. The divisions were mathematical, the reasons not only unknown but unknowable. But Wallace questioned Swainson from the first, noting that "there appears not to be the slightest reason for believing a priori that all groups of animals are divided into the same number of types of forms or divisions" . . . --Barbara G. Beddall, September 1968. Journal of the History of Biology 1(2): 270.
. . . Lamarck had interpreted them in his own light, believing them to be the result of "the permanent disuse of an organ, arising from a change of habits, [which caused] a gradual shrinkage of ultimately the disappearance and even extinction of that organ." Wallace, like Chambers, thought that rudimentary organs showed relationships, but he misinterpreted them, confusing vestigial with nascent organs. He did, however, ask the right question: "If each species has been created independently, and without any necessary relations with pre-existing species, what do these rudiments, these apparent imperfections mean?" . . . --Barbara G. Beddall, September 1968. Journal of the History of Biology 1(2): 280.
. . . The argument from design was teleological, presuming that a contrivance existed in accordance with a preconceived plan. Adaptation between structure and function was recognized, but it was thought that a structure was provided simply because a function required it. Wallace wondered, however, how an animal could have necessities before it came into existence? And how could it "continue to exist unless its structure enabled it to obtain food? He thought that the arguments brought forward as proofs of design were absurd; not only were they insulting to the intelligence of a Supreme Being, but they also placed narrow limits on His power . . .Barbara G. Beddall, September 1968. Journal of the History of Biology 1(2): 282.
. . . Looking back, it is interesting that Wallace, in 1880, thought that enough information was already at hand to make further expeditions and collecting redundant. What was needed, he said, was intensive study of selected islands, and since Britain owned most of the world's islands, the government should post naturalists on some of them to make such studies. Wallace's suggestion was good, though naturally nothing came of it, but his major premise was wrong. We still need to know a great deal more than we do about the species that make up island biotas, not merely for the sake of naming and cataloguing them, but because knowledge of the identities, relationships, distribution, behavior, and ecological roles and requirements of the species is essential for understanding both the evolution of the island biotas and the evolution and functioning of the island ecosystems . . . --Theodore H. Hubbell, May 1968. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 60(1): 22.
The hypothesis of a secondary and supplementary process of selection for reproductive isolation, considered as an advantageous situation in its own right for the species concerned, was advanced in the early period of evolutionary biology by Wallace (1889), who tried unsuccessfully to convince Darwin. It seems fitting and desirable to designate the process of selection for reproductive isolation as the Wallace effect. The Wallace hypothesis was proposed again in the modern period by Fisher (1930), Dobzhansky (1941; 1951), and Huxley (1943). The subject has been reviewed recently by Mayr (1963) and Grant (1963). It is argued that the individuals of two sympatric species populations which produce inviable or sterile hybrids will contribute fewer offspring to future generations than will sister individuals in the same parental populations which do not hybridize. Consequently the genetic factors determining some block or aversion to hybridization will tend to increase in frequency within each species over the course of generations. This process of selection is expected to lead to a reinforcement of the reproductive isolation which had developed as a by-product of divergence . . . --Verne Grant, March-April 1966. American Naturalist 100(911): 99.
Species of animals living on islands may have morphological characteristics not possessed by their mainland counterparts, a fact which was recognized by Wallace (1881). He remarked that in the Celebes: "Nearly thirty species of butterflies, belonging to three different families, have a common modification in the shape of their wings by which they can be distinguished at a glance from their allies in any other island or country whatever, and all these are larger than the representative forms inhabiting most of the adjacent islands." . . . --P. R. Grant, September 1965. Evolution 19: 355.
Wallace was one of the first to suggest that birds might build their nests on the basis of their previous experience. Although it now seems that nest building in birds is not solely a function of memory, the extent to which experience plays a role has not been determined . . . --Theodore D. Sargent, January 1965. The Auk 82(1): 48.
Wallace (1889), after summarizing the findings of Bates and Müller, proposed AN EXTENSION OF MÜLLERIAN MIMICRY WHEREBY SEVERAL MEMBERS OF THE SAME UNPALATABLE GENUS LOOK ALIKE IN THE SAME LOCALITY (e.g., 4 or 5 Heliconius having a yellow-banded forewing and radiating red stripes on the hindwing.) This really is somewhat different from Müller's case of convergence of widely unrelated species. Modern speciation theory predicts that closely related species when sympatric will diverge in appearance, habits, and season due to rigorous selection for the two main speciation sequelae: anti-hybridization mechanisms and niche diversification (anti-competition). Wallace's Müllerian extension explains an important deviant. He also suggested the possibility of a still different sort of mimicry, in which A SCARCE EDIBLE SPECIES CAN MINGLE WITH AND CLOSELY RESEMBLE AN ABUNDANT EDIBLE SPECIES AND THUS GAIN SOME FREEDOM FROM PREDATION . . . --Charles L. Remington, 1963. In Proceedings of the XVI International Congress of Zoology (The Congress), Volume 4: 148.
The general patterns of the distribution of mollusks in the Pacific, particularly those of the terrestrial forms, aroused attention because of the difficulties involved in transporting such forms to small and widely scattered islands. Suggested dispersal agents have included land connections, drifting vegetation, typhoons and migratory birds. The use of islands as stepping stones, including those now buried beneath the sea, was suggested by Wallace in 1881. In Wallace's time there was little geological evidence to support the idea of submerged islands. As late as 1950 it was pointed out that complete proof for island distribution was "hopelessly buried in the geological past." . . . --Harry S. Ladd, 1960. American Journal of Science 258-A: 140.
The occurrence of a number of river-like channels running across the group and dividing it into islands is beyond doubt the most remarkable geomorphic phenomenon of the Aru Islands. Numerous branch channels are also encountered. There are several theories concerning the genesis of these channels. Wallace (1857, 1869) tried to explain them as the remainders of the Pleistocene lower courses of New Guinea rivers preserved here by subsequent uparching of the Aru region, whereas elsewhere the river courses gradually disappeared during the transgression of the shelf associated with the postglacial rise in sea level . . . --Herman Verstappen, Summer 1959. American Journal of Science 257(7): 493.
The difficulty inherent in attempting to rid biology of normative concepts incapable of definition in purely biological terms became even more evident when Darwin and others tried to find a substitute for the term natural selection. Asa Gray and Alfred Russel Wallace objected to the expression because it seemed to imply an intelligent agent selecting according to pre-established standards . . . --John C. Greene, 1959. In his The Death of Adam (Iowa State University Press): 300.
Alfred Russel Wallace had lived for many years in tropical regions, first in the Amazon basin and later in the East Indies, where he had been especially impressed by the phenomena of animal distribution. He thus had a broader and more direct and intimate acquaintance with the subject than any other naturalist traveller of his century. He was continually at work on this subject from 1860 until 1876, the date of publication of his two volumes on The Geographical Distribution of Animals. He somewhat modestly refers to this work as an extension and amplification of the two chapters on the subject in the Origin of Species, comparing it with Darwin's own two-volume expansion of the chapters on animals and plants under domestication. The two principal sections of Wallace's work on contrasted as "zoological geography," a descriptive discussion of the land animals of the different zoogeographic regions, and "geographical zoology," a review of the distribution of vertebrates and certain invertebrates, group by group. Whatever their fate in a reclassification of regions and subregions, Wallace's scheme and nomenclature are the ones that appear most widely in zoological literature . . . --Karl Patterson Schmidt, December 1954. The Quarterly Review of Biology 29(4): 323.
After Dr J. Rae, the most notable contribution to the Gesture Theory came from Charles Darwin's rival, Dr Alfred Russel Wallace, who in 1895 pointed out, in Fortnightly Review, that, in English speech, it is common to produce words by an appropriate gesture of the tongue, lips or jaw, so as 'to bring sense and sound into unison'. Thus, in UP, the jaw makes an upward movement, while in DOWN, the jaw moves down. Continuing consonants, such as F, L, M, N, etc., symbolize continuing motions, such as fly, run, swim, move. On the other hand, words for abrupt motions end with a stopped consonant--e.g., B, D, G, K, P, T, in stop, hop, pat, stab, kick, etc. Dr Wallace considered it in the highest degree probable that the pantomimic use of the various parts of the mouth constitute 'a fundamental principle which has always been at work, both in the origin and in the successive modifications of human speech'. Dr Wallace did not recognize Dickens' observation of hand and mouth as exemplified by Sam Weller; but he was, I believe, the first to point out that the pantomimic principle may be still active in man's unconscious development of his spoken language, and that modern languages may be just as gestural as the older ones . . . --R. A. S. Paget, 1951. Science News (England) 20: 87.
"He [Conrad] loved old memoirs and travels--and I think Wallace's Malay Archipelago was his favorite bedside book." Again Mr. Curle wrote that Conrad read The Malay Archipelago "over and over again . . . It was his favorite bedside companion. He had an intense admiration for those pioneer explorers--'profoundly inspired men' as he called them--who have left us a record of their work; and of Wallace, above all, he never ceased to speak in terms of enthusiasm. Even in conversation he would amplify some remark by observing, 'Wallace says so-and-so,' and The Malay Archipelago had been his intimate friend for many years." [comments by Richard Curle] . . . --Florence Clemens, July 1939. South Atlantic Quarterly 38: 305.
Though born and bred in England, no snobbishness had ever touched him, he felt that the peasant's life, being richer in experience, was more interesting than the lord's. Yet he was of the finest courtesy, kindness and generosity; he loved to relieve any want or alleviate any misery; he said once: "The sole value of riches is the joy of giving." I knew him for more than a quarter of a century and can recall no fault in him--no flaw even. His temper was as patient and quiet and fair as his mind, and his health was almost perfect even in extreme age. In writing thus of him, I feel as if I were ladling out treacle to my readers; but I can't help it; I can't go outside the Truth. Looking back, I'm inclined to think he was the wisest and best man I've ever known. Fortunately this word may be added, I've met dozens of bad men who were incomparably more interesting . . . --Frank Harris, 1920. In his Contemporary Portraits (Third Series) (published by the author): 105.
. . . The illustrious names of Myers, Sidgwick, Gurney, Wallace, Crookes, Zoellner and many other prominent men, are associated with the rebirth and the rehabilitation of the ancient belief in spirits. Even if the real nature of the observed facts be disputed, even if the explorers may be accused of errors, and sometimes of self-deception, there still belongs to them the immortal merit of having thrown the whole of their authority on to the side of non-material facts, regardlesss of public disapproval. They faced academic prejudices, and did not shrink from the cheap derision of their contemporaries; even at a time when the intellect of the educated classes was spellbound by the new dogma of materialism, they drew public attention to phenomena of an irrational nature, contrary to accepted convictions. These men typify the reaction of the human mind against the senseless and desolating materialistic view . . . --Carl Jung, May 1920. Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research 31(79): 76.
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Daud, Siti Khalijah and Ang, K. J. (1995) Selection of Broodstock of Tiger Prawn, Penaeus monodon Fabricius, on the Basis of Morphometric Traits. Pertanika Journal of Tropical Agricultural Science, 18 (1). pp. 15-20. ISSN 0126-6128
Rahman, Md Motior and A., Ahad Miah (1995) Yield Detenninants of a Promising Mungbean Line under Various Planting Densities. Pertanika Journal of Tropical Agricultural Science, 18 (2). pp. 119-124. ISSN 0126-6128
Universiti Putra Malaysia Institutional Repository
Currently, the collections deposited in the IR consists of Master and PhD theses, Master and PhD Project Report, Journal Articles, Journal Bulletins, Conference Papers, UPM News, Newspaper Cuttings, Patents and Inaugural Lectures.
As the policy of the university does not permit users to view thesis in full text, access is only given to the first 24 pages only. | <urn:uuid:349d3ead-3879-45fa-8dd7-408f142afcbe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://psasir.upm.edu.my/view/divisions/SCI/1995.html | 2013-05-22T00:43:40Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.723444 | 240 |
Grassroots Movements Driving Back Coal Worldwide
The government's announcement marked the culmination of over half-a-decade of grassroots opposition to the project. Led by Greenpeace International, as well as Australian environmental groups Quit Coal and Environment Victoria, activists staged protests, sit-ins of government offices, direct actions at the proposed project site, and legal challenges. The withdrawal of public funding for the HRL plant -- thought to be Australia's last major coal plant project -- likely means the end of new coal plant construction in the country, as the upside-down economic model for coal-fired power has clearly been proven unviable.
On the heels of this victory, a new report shows that coal-fired generation in Australia fell by 10% in July of 2012 as compared to the same month the previous year. While lower energy consumption in the country due to the economic recession has some part to play in Australia's July coal decrease, it cannot account for the whole gap. Analysts link the shift away from coal to a combination of decreased energy demand, the rising price of coal due in part to Australia's new carbon tax, and increasing competitiveness of alternative fuel sources such as natural gas and renewables.
This news out of Australia marks another in a series of victories for grassroots anti-coal campaigners around the globe. The success of activists fighting the coal industry in the U.S. has been well-documented: coordinated grassroots campaigns against coal-fired power plants across the country have resulted in the retirement or cancellation of hundreds of existing and proposed coal plants with more retirements projected.Similar campaigns have been successful across the European Union, where coal consumption has decreased by nearly 50% over the past two decades. The recent SudWestStrom case out of Germany is representative of many battles throughout the EU: a hotly contested €3.2 billion, 1.8-gigawatt coal-fired power station, already beleaguered by economic concerns, was scrapped when it failed to obtain government clearance in the face of public opposition. The EU's Energy Roadmap 2050 calls for the complete elimination of coal in the coming decades, with much of that generation replaced by renewable energy.
The decline of the coal industry in developed countries in the last decade has shifted the battle to developing economies, triggering a global Amazing Race of sorts with King Coal dashing around the world seeking ever-wider and more desperately for any last-remaining markets in which to push its polluting product. The result has been an upsurge in coal exports on the international market and proposals for massive coal-fired power development in emerging countries like India and China.
But the Australian case is a prime example of the story that is being repeated around the globe: everywhere King Coal rears its ugly head, local communities and grassroots movements are cropping up to drive back the beast -- and they're winning. From China to India to Bangladesh, Burma, Colombia, Kosovo, Malaysia, the Philippines, South Africa, Thailand, and elsewhere, coal projects are coming up against surprisingly well-organized and vehement public opposition, facing strikes, 10,000-person protests, even kayak-blockades of coal ports.
Thanks to this strong and increasingly-coordinated network of anti-coal activists worldwide, fully half the world's continents are now on a path toward reducing coal consumption and the corresponding carbon emissions. With escalating campaigns in developing countries, it is becoming more and more difficult for the coal industry to maintain its foothold, bringing the inevitable global demise of coal ever closer.
-- Gordon Scott, Sierra Club International Program | <urn:uuid:8a8aad86-9a84-43e4-b483-3b740e8c7ecc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://sierraclub.typepad.com/compass/2012/08/grassroots-movements-driving-back-coal-worldwide.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+compass-main+%28Compass+-+Main%29 | 2013-05-22T00:17:12Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948275 | 721 |
Members of the United Nations
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Member states of the United Nations)
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All notes are based on Official list of member states
- Joined as Byelorussia. United Nations told of name change on 19 September 1991
- The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was an original Member of the United Nations. The Charter was signed on its behalf on 26 June 1945 and ratified (confirmed) on 19 October 1945. When Yugoslvia was dissolved the new countries of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia were formed.
- Zaire joined the United Nations on 20 September 1960. On 17 May 1997 it changed its name was to the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
- The Republic of Croatia was admitted as a Member of the United Nations by General Assembly resolution A/RES/46/238 of 22 May 1992.
- the Czech and Slovak Federal Republic was an original Member of the United Nations from 24 October 1945. The Czech and Slovak Federal Republic separated on 31 December 1992 and that the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic, as successor States, were thus admitted as Member States on 19 January of that year.
- Egypt and Syria were original Members of the United Nations from 24 October 1945. Following a plebiscite (vote) on 21 February 1958, Egypt and Syria joined together as the United Arab Republic . On 13 October 1961, Syria, became an independent country, resumed its separate membership in the United Nations. On 2 September 1971, the United Arab Republic changed its name to the Arab Republic of Egypt.
- The Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic were admitted as members on 18 September 1973. The German Democratic Republic stopped being a member on 3 October 1990, when the two Germancountries united to form one sovereign country.
- On 20 January 1965, Indonesia said it was leaving the United Nations “at this stage and under the present circumstances”. On 19 September 1966, decided "to resume full cooperation with the United Nations and to resume participation (start joining) in its activities". On 28 September 1966, the General Assembly invited Indonesia to take its seats in the Assembly.
- By resolution A/RES/47/225 of 8 April 1993, "Macedonia" became a Member of the United Nations. In the United Nations Macedonia is called "The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" because of arguments about its name.
- The Federation of Malaya joined the United Nations on 17 September 1957. On 16 September 1963, its name was changed to Malaysia, when the new states of Singapore, Sabah (North Borneo) and Sarawak joined the union. Singapore became an independent country on 9 August 1965 and a Member of the United Nations on 21 September 1965.
- On 4 February 2003, the official name of Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was changed to Serbia and Montenegro. Montenegro held a referendum (vote) on 21 May 2006 and declared independence from Serbia on 3 June. President of the Republic of Serbia told the Secretary-General that the membership of Serbia and Montenegro was being continued by the Republic of Serbia On 28 June 2006 Montenegro became a United Nations Member State by General Assembly resolution A/RES/60/264.
- The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was an original Member of the United Nations from 24 October 1945. On 24 December 1991, Boris Yeltsin, the President of the Russian Federation, told the Secretary-General that the Soviet Union's membership in the Security Council and all other United Nations organs was being taken over by the Russian Federation with the support of the 11 member countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
- The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was admitted as a Member of the United Nations by General Assembly resolution A/RES/55/12 of 1 November 2000. On 4 February 2003 the official name of the country was changed to Serbia and Montenegro. On 3 June 2006, the President of the Republic of Serbia told the Secretary-General that the membership of Serbia and Montenegro was being continued by the Republic of Serbia, after Montenegro’s declaration of independence.
- The Republic of Slovenia was admitted as a Member of the United Nations by General Assembly resolution A/RES/46/236 of 22 May 1992.
- "U.N. Admits South Sudan as 193rd Member". foxnews.com. Associated Press (FOX News Network, LLC). 2011-07-14. http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/07/14/un-admits-south-sudan-as-13rd-member/. Retrieved 2011-07-14.
- Tanganyika was a Member of the United Nations from 14 December 1961 and Zanzibar was a Member from 16 December 1963. After the ratification on 26 April 1964 of Articles of Union between Tanganyika and Zanzibar, the United Republic of Tanganyika and Zanzibar continued as a single Member, changing its name to the United Republic of Tanzania on 1 November 1964.
- Yemen was admitted to membership in the United Nations on 30 September 1947 and Democratic Yemen on 14 December 1967. On 22 May 1990, the two countries merged and have been one Member with the name "Yemen". | <urn:uuid:065d3290-f236-4567-ad81-71b2ff14e601> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_states_of_the_United_Nations | 2013-05-22T00:14:05Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971763 | 1,092 |
ThingsAsian stories are categorized by one or more Destinations and one or more Topics. Browse our content in either of those ways, and then share your own!
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Malaysia-Australia Cooperation in Psychiatry and Mental Health
This formal partnership between the Malaysian Ministry of Health and AAMH began officially in 2005 (read more). The partnership aims to further strengthen mental health reform in Malaysia by:
Since 2005, AAMH has hosted two delegations of mental health policy makers from Malaysia including Dato' Suarn Singh (Chief Psychiatrist). Several Malaysian mental health clinicians have received practical training through month long placements at St. Vincent's Mental Health.
AAMH has also delivered training workshops in Malaysia specifically designed to build the capacity of mental health professionals in community mental health care.
Malaysia is also an active partipant in the Asia-Pacific Community Mental Health Development Project.
Read more about the history of AAMH's collaboration with Malaysia.
Representatives of Asia-Australia Mental Health with Malaysian nursing staff during in-country training in Johor Bahru May 2006.
View a list of delegation members from Malaysia hosted by AAMH. | <urn:uuid:12c13b3a-cd2a-4ca9-a3a7-1f256452ca6b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.aamh.edu.au/projects/malaysia | 2013-05-22T00:29:16Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944977 | 204 |
This app brings you the major happenings in Malaysia in 2012. You will find videos you might not have seen before.
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On the final evening of the Democratic National Convention, the blogger Andrew Sullivan posted a picture of Congressman Barney Frank kissing his spouse. Frank is openly gay and what is striking about the picture is a total absence of reticence, and the swiftness with which our world has tumbled toward change. Sullivan noted that the picture would never had appeared at the GOP convention. This is true. But eight years ago, I doubt it would have appeared at a Democratic one.
Still it remains true that we have, as we always have had, two competing traditions toward human and civil rights in this country. One which believes in broadening those rights regardless of difference, and another which believes in restricting them to those who find the most favor among the body politic. That tradition is hewed to even in the extremes.
We all think of birtherism -- the belief held by many in the Republican Party -- as a kind of zany flight of fancy taken up by the kind of toothless eccentrics who also obsess over Area 51. In fact, birtherism has its historical roots much closer to home, in that same restrictionist tradition that would frown on Barney Frank, and has for much of this country's history directed its skeptical gaze at African-Americans. In 1790, when Congress first sat down to define citizenship it restricted it to "All free white persons."
The disreputable tradition continued afoot will into the 19th century with Stephen Douglas, in his famous debates with Abraham Lincoln, declaring that "this government was made on the white basis" and that our founding documents made "no reference either to the Negro, the savage Indians, the Feejee, the Malay, or any other inferior and degraded race, when they spoke of the equality of men."
After the Civil War, with the country reeling, and freedom on the march, newly minted President Andrew Johnson rejected blacks holding a stake in the country's politics noting that 'it must be acknowledged that in the progress of nations Negroes have shown less capacity for government than any other race of people. No independent government of any form has ever been successful in their hands. On the contrary, wherever they have been left to their own devices they have shown a constant tendency to relapse into barbarism."
And the tradition carried over right into the 20th century with William F. Buckley, intellectual godfather of the conservative movement, arguing that "the great majority of the Negroes in the South who do not vote do not care to vote, and would not know for what to vote if they could."
The right to lead one's country is the highest of all aspirations granted by (birthright) citizenship. That a black should wield such power still discomfits a certain portion of this country, just as it has for over 200 years. And while the particular history offered in this column focuses on the problem of the color-line, its applications are much broader. A similar history could be written of restrictionist attitudes toward the country's Latino, Asian-American and Native American populations. An even longer history could be written on the views of democratic societies toward women.
Doubtlessly, closeted gays and lesbians have served this country in powerful places and enjoyed their share of citizenship. But they did so under a shadow, mostly unable to fully display all aspects of who they were. What makes the picture of Barney Frank and James Ready (his spouse) caught in a kiss so profound is that the old prejudice is now beating a fighting retreat.
Looking at the two conventions of our major parties, you saw two visions: one of our restrictionist past, and the other of our increasingly open present. It is tempting to attack GOP leaders for fully embracing a tradition which, in a few years, even they will doubtlessly be forced to repudiate. But political parties represent actual people. Our past is with us and exerts a powerful hold over our politics. This is not to let Mitt Romney off the hook for the random birther joke. But what is most important isn't the joke -- it's the crowd in the background, raucously laughing.
(Ta-Nehisi Coates is a writer and senior editor for The Atlantic and its website. His blog can be found at http://www.theatlantic.com/ta-nehisi-coates.) | <urn:uuid:3d119397-ba36-47d1-8163-71be5bd5859d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/sns-201209071300--tms--amvoicesctnav-a20120907-20120907,0,98236.column | 2013-05-22T00:08:04Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969622 | 879 |
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Appleton Trophy, specializing in stainless steel engraving, provides wedding attendant gifts, unique bridesmaid gift ideas and groomsmen gift ideas. | <urn:uuid:3caa8a06-f093-4f0f-bf3f-a8c3c15facc9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.designed2bsweet.com/category/resources.resources_2/ | 2013-05-22T00:29:07Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.846695 | 1,621 |
On 27 May 2010, an Australian blogger and traveler commented on Blogger Indonesia of the Week’s Page thus:
I discovered your site for the first time today, and it’s very interesting to trawl through your past posts. I’m very interested in Indonesian culture, religion and people. I am a young Australian girl who moved to Indonesia at the end of last year and I have been blogging about my experience living in a small muslim fishing village in South West Java since I arrived. .. I’d love to be considered for your blogger of the week.
Unfortunately, the Blogger Indonesia of the Week’s feature has been inactive since then due to one or more reasons. Last night, when I thought to restart this program again, Sash’s blog came first to my mind.
The fact that she’s a cross-border and cross-culture traveler make her really suit the purpose behind the existence of this BOW feature: to introduce Indonesia and anything related to it to a broader world.
Shash has gone anywhere across continents you could only dream of: North America, England, France, India, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam. In 2010 she’s been living in Indonesia which was planned for 12 months. But at the end of her stay, she decided to carry on for another year. This is what she has to say:
17/12/2010: Back in Australia for Christmas, but no plans to remain on home soil. On Boxing Day 2010 I return to the village in Indonesia, the pull of Batukaras takes me home, like a magnet I am drawn to it… I don’t know for how long… I don’t know if forever. But for now, this chocolate beach surrounded by volcanoes is my home, another 12 months… another year of adventure.
What’s it that want her to stay longer for another year in Indonesia? Shah knows best. That’s said it reminds me of similar story of a British traveler who said to me back in 2006 thus:
I have been to all ASEAN countries. I stayed in each country as planned. Not for Indonesia. I planned living there for three months. It turns out I stay there for one year. The reason was I really love the warmth and easy-going Indonesian. I even planned to switch my citizenship to be Indonesian..
Does Sash have similar sweet experience with Indonesian people which motivate her to stay longer? Might be. In her latest post on March 4, 2011 she wrote:
…I am no longer just a traveler [in Indonesia], I’m no longer a temporary guest but its more real coming back here after Christmas at home… and in many ways its much scarier.
Commitment is always scary, leaving your comfort is terrifying… but isn’t that what we are all in this for? To feel alive… To truly feel alive. And even though I’m not always happy, I’m not always satisfied and I’m often trapped in a whirlwind of frustration, I can’t deny, I feel alive.
If she feels more alive in Indonesia than in her home country, we should warmly welcome her and wish her to live happily everafter here.
A Model of Good Blogging
Sash’s blog could also be a model of how a good blogging is all about: original content, blogging with passion and regularly updated.
There are people in Indonesia who are blogging in technical term but not in real sense i.e. they are called blogger only because they have website which are using such popular blogging platform as WordPress or blogspot. But the contents do not quite represent what blogging is.
Jennie S. Bev once complained to me why so many Indonesian bloggers are filling their blogs by copying other blog contents. I did not respond to her query back then. I thought then it’s ok for beginner. But now I think it’s time for Blogger Indonesia to be more dignified by not copy-pasting other’s blog content. It’s time for Indonesian bloggers to really write what they are good at and what they enjoy writing.
A good blog should start from original content. | <urn:uuid:b01badb5-5ec3-49d8-b6fa-4cfaa59d6460> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fatihsyuhud.com/blogger-indonesia-of-the-week-93-shash-milne/ | 2013-05-22T00:34:29Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949461 | 882 |
In the 20th century, this would have been a job for James Bond.
The mission: Infiltrate the highly advanced, securely guarded enemy headquarters where scientists in the clutches of an evil master are secretly building a weapon that can destroy the world. Then render that weapon harmless and escape undetected.
But in the 21st century, Bond doesn't get the call. Instead, the job is handled by a suave and very sophisticated secret computer worm, a jumble of code called Stuxnet, which in the last year has not only crippled Iran's nuclear program but has caused a major rethinking of computer security around the globe.
Intelligence agencies, computer security companies and the nuclear industry have been trying to analyze the worm since it was discovered in June by a Belarus-based company that was doing business in Iran. And what they've all found, says Sean McGurk, the Homeland Security Department's acting director of national cyber security and communications integration, is a “game changer.”
The construction of the worm was so advanced, it was “like the arrival of an F-35 into a World War I battlefield,” says Ralph Langner, the computer expert who was the first to sound the alarm about Stuxnet. Others have called it the first “weaponized” computer virus.
Simply put, Stuxnet is an incredibly advanced, undetectable computer worm that took years to construct and was designed to jump from computer to computer until it found the specific, protected control system that it aimed to destroy: Iran’s nuclear enrichment program.
The target was seemingly impenetrable; for security reasons, it lay several stories underground and was not connected to the World Wide Web. And that meant Stuxnet had to act as sort of a computer cruise missile: As it made its passage through a set of unconnected computers, it had to grow and adapt to security measures and other changes until it reached one that could bring it into the nuclear facility.
When it ultimately found its target, it would have to secretly manipulate it until it was so compromised it ceased normal functions.
And finally, after the job was done, the worm would have to destroy itself without leaving a trace.
That is what we are learning happened at Iran's nuclear facilities -- both at Natanz, which houses the centrifuge arrays used for processing uranium into nuclear fuel, and, to a lesser extent, at Bushehr, Iran's nuclear power plant.
At Natanz, for almost 17 months, Stuxnet quietly worked its way into the system and targeted a specific component -- the frequency converters made by the German equipment manufacturer Siemens that regulated the speed of the spinning centrifuges used to create nuclear fuel. The worm then took control of the speed at which the centrifuges spun, making them turn so fast in a quick burst that they would be damaged but not destroyed. And at the same time, the worm masked that change in speed from being discovered at the centrifuges' control panel.
At Bushehr, meanwhile, a second secret set of codes, which Langner called “digital warheads,” targeted the Russian-built power plant's massive steam turbine.
Here's how it worked, according to experts who have examined the worm:
--The nuclear facility in Iran runs an “air gap” security system, meaning it has no connections to the Web, making it secure from outside penetration. Stuxnet was designed and sent into the area around Iran's Natanz nuclear power plant -- just how may never be known -- to infect a number of computers on the assumption that someone working in the plant would take work home on a flash drive, acquire the worm and then bring it back to the plant.
--Once the worm was inside the plant, the next step was to get the computer system there to trust it and allow it into the system. That was accomplished because the worm contained a “digital certificate” stolen from JMicron, a large company in an industrial park in Taiwan. (When the worm was later discovered it quickly replaced the original digital certificate with another certificate, also stolen from another company, Realtek, a few doors down in the same industrial park in Taiwan.)
--Once allowed entry, the worm contained four “Zero Day” elements in its first target, the Windows 7 operating system that controlled the overall operation of the plant. Zero Day elements are rare and extremely valuable vulnerabilities in a computer system that can be exploited only once. Two of the vulnerabilities were known, but the other two had never been discovered. Experts say no hacker would waste Zero Days in that manner.
--After penetrating the Windows operating system, the code then targeted the siemens operating system that controlled the plant. Once that was in its grip it then took over the “frequency converters” that ran the centrifuges. To do that it used specifications from the manufacturers of the converters. One was Vacon, a Finnish Company, and the other Fararo Paya, an Iranian company. What surprises experts at this step is that the Iranian company was so secret that not even the IAEA knew about it.
--The worm also knew that the complex control system that ran the centrifuges was built by Siemens, the German manufacturer, and -- remarkably -- how that system worked as well and how to mask its activities from it.
--Masking itself from the plant's security and other systems, the worm then ordered the centrifuges to rotate extremely fast, and then to slow down precipitously. This damaged the converter, the centrifuges and the bearings, and it corrupted the uranium in the tubes. It also left Iranian nuclear engineers wondering what was wrong, as computer checks showed no malfunctions in the operating system.
Estimates are that this went on for more than a year, leaving the Iranian program in chaos. And as it did, the worm grew and adapted throughout the system. As new worms entered the system, they would meet and adapt and become increasingly sophisticated.
During this time the worms reported back to two mysterious servers that had to be run by intelligence agencies, one in Denmark and one in Malaysia. The servers monitored the worms as they infiltrated Natanz. Efforts to find those servers since then have yielded no results.
This went on until June of last year, when a Belarusan company working on the Iranian power plant in Beshehr discovered it in one of its machines. It quickly put out a notice on a Web network monitored by computer security experts around the world. Ordinarily these experts would immediately begin tracing the worm and dissecting it, looking for clues about its origin and other details.
But that didn’t happen, because within minutes all the alert sites came under attack and were inoperative for 24 hours.
“I had to use e-mail to send notices but I couldn’t reach everyone. Whoever made the worm had a full day to eliminate all traces of the worm that might lead us them,” Eric Byres, a computer security expert who has examined the Stuxnet. “No hacker could have done that.”
Experts, including inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency(IAEA,) say that, despite Iran's claims to the contrary, the worm was successful in its goal: causing confusion among Iran’s nuclear engineers and disabling their nuclear program.
Because of the secrecy surrounding the Iranian program, no one can be certain of the full extent of the damage. But sources inside Iran and elsewhere say that the Iranian centrifuge program has been operating far below its capacity and that the uranium enrichment program had “stagnated” during the time the worm penetrated the underground facility. Only 4,000 of the 9,000 centrifuges Iran was known to have were put into use. Some suspect that is because of the critical need to replace ones that were damaged.
And the limited number of those in use dwindled to an estimated 3,700 as problems engulfed their operation. IAEA inspectors say the sabotage better explains the slowness of the program, which they had earlier attributed to poor equipment manufacturing and management problems. As Iranians struggled with the setbacks, they began searching for signs of sabotage. From inside Iran there have been unconfirmed reports that the head of the plant was fired shortly after the worm wended its way into the system and began creating technical problems, and that some scientists who were suspected of espionage disappeared or were executed. And counter intelligence agents began monitoring all communications between scientists at the site, creating a climate of fear and paranoia.
Iran has adamantly stated that its nuclear program has not been hit by the bug. But in doing so it has backhandedly confirmed that its nuclear facilities were compromised. When Hamid Alipour, head of the nation’s Information Technology Company, announced in September that 30,000 Iranian computers had been hit by the worm but the nuclear facilities were safe, he added that among those hit were the personal computers of the scientists at the nuclear facilities. Experts say that Natanz and Bushehr could not have escaped the worm if it was in their engineers’ computers.
“We brought it into our lab to study it and even with precautions it spread everywhere at incredible speed,” Byres said.
“The worm was designed not to destroy the plants but to make them ineffective. By changing the rotation speeds, the bearings quickly wear out and the equipment has to be replaced and repaired. The speed changes also impact the quality of the uranium processed in the centrifuges creating technical problems that make the plant ineffective,” he explained.
In other words the worm was designed to allow the Iranian program to continue but never succeed, and never to know why.
One additional impact that can be attributed to the worm, according to David Albright of the Institute for Science and International Studies, is that “the lives of the scientists working in the facility have become a living hell because of counter-intelligence agents brought into the plant” to battle the breach. Ironically, even after its discovery, the worm has succeeded in slowing down Iran's reputed effort to build an atomic weapon. And Langer says that the efforts by the Iranians to cleanse Stuxnet from their system “will probably take another year to complete,” and during that time the plant will not be able to function anywhere normally.
But as the extent of the worm’s capabilities is being understood, its genius and complexity has created another perplexing question: Who did it?
Speculation on the worm’s origin initially focused on hackers or even companies trying to disrupt competitors. But as engineers tore apart the virus they learned not only the depth of the code, its complex targeting mechanism, (despite infecting more than 100,000 computers it has only done damage at Natanz,) the enormous amount of work that went into it—Microsoft estimated that it consumed 10,000 man days of labor-- and about what the worm knew, the clues narrowed the number of players that have the capabilities to create it to a handful.
“This is what nation-states build, if their only other option would be to go to war,” Joseph Wouk, an Israeli security expert wrote.
Byres is more certain. “It is a military weapon,” he said.
And much of what the worm “knew” could only have come from a consortium of Western intelligence agencies, experts who have examined the code now believe.
Originally, all eyes turned toward Israel’s intelligence agencies. Engineers examining the worm found “clues” that hinted at Israel’s involvement. In one case they found the word “Myrtus” embedded in the code and argued that it was a reference to Esther, the biblical figure who saved the ancient Jewish state from the Persians. But computer experts say "Myrtus" is more likely a common reference to “My RTUS,” or remote terminal units.
Langer argues that no single Western intelligence agency had the skills to pull this off alone. The most likely answer, he says, is that a consortium of intelligence agencies worked together to build the cyber bomb. And he says the most likely confederates are the United States, because it has the technical skills to make the virus, Germany, because reverse-engineering Siemen’s product would have taken years without it, and Russia, because of its familiarity with both the Iranian nuclear plant and Siemen’s systems.
There is one clue that was left in the code that may tell us all we need to know.
Embedded in different section of the code is another common computer language reference, but this one is misspelled. Instead of saying “DEADFOOT,” a term stolen from pilots meaning a failed engine, this one reads “DEADFOO7.”
Yes, OO7 has returned -- as a computer worm.
Stuxnet. Shaken, not stirred. | <urn:uuid:df04f521-4a8c-4593-b43b-d5e1f4433ea0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2010/11/26/secret-agent-crippled-irans-nuclear-ambitions/ | 2013-05-22T00:18:12Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974483 | 2,686 |
NEW YORK -- (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Anthony G. Viscogliosi, the Founder and Executive Chairman of Small Bone Innovations, Inc., (SBi), announced that he will relinquish his executive management duties at SBi after eight years as CEO and, for the past year, as Executive Chairman. He will continue as a member of SBi’s Board of Directors.
In taking the step to resume fulltime activities as a principal of Viscogliosi Brothers, LLC (VB), Mr. Viscogliosi emphasized the need to seize growing opportunities for VB in its merchant banking, venture capital and private equity business dedicated to the neuro-musculoskeletal orthopedics industry.
“Today, SBi is the only pure-play small bone and joint (SBJ) arthroplasty and reconstruction company - with critical mass in revenues, products, balance sheet and global distribution. The company is profitable and growing rapidly, having achieved leadership in the $3 billion SBJ space – the fastest growing segment of the orthopedic device market. VB identified and redefined SBJ treatment as a growth opportunity nearly a decade ago. Having actualized that potential it is time to focus on replicating SBi’s success with VB’s other investments in the neuro-musculoskeletal orthopedics industry,” Mr. Viscogliosi said.
VB formed SBi in 2005 by rolling up a few small companies with established products to complement a vision of global leadership in SBJ arthroplasty and joint-related trauma reconstruction. This vision was realized through the acquisition of the STAR™ total ankle that received Pre-Market Approval (PMA) from the US Food and Drug Administration in 2009 and has become the #1 selling ankle joint arthroplasty system for treating late-stage ankle arthritis.
As an initial step in this management transition, SBi recruited Michael P. Simpson as President and CEO in February 2012, with Mr. Viscogliosi moving up to Executive Chairman.
"Anthony has been instrumental in creating the SBJ franchise through his vision and tenacity in bringing SBi to the forefront. Our job now is to ensure the company and its products become synonymous with the gold standards for preserving the small bones and joints," Mr. Simpson noted.
Previously, Mr. Viscogliosi co-founded and acted as Chairman and CEO of Spine Solutions, Inc. that was sold in 2003 to what is now the DePuy Synthes Companies of Johnson & Johnson for $350 million. He was also a co-founder and board member of the company that subsequently became Ascent Healthcare Solutions, Inc. and was sold to Stryker Corporation for $525 million in 2009.
Mr. Viscogliosi has held board level and executive positions in approximately 40 orthopedics-focused companies. His more than 20-year career in investment banking includes stints at what is now Oppenheimer & Co. Inc., Rodman & Renshaw LLC, and Stifel Nicolaus & Co. Inc. During this period he became uniquely recognized for defining orthopedic and spine devices as a distinct branch of the health care industry. During the same period he served as an officer in the US Navy Reserve and helped create seven not-for-profit medical societies.
About Small Bone Innovations, Inc.
Small Bone Innovations, Inc. (SBi) was founded in 2005 by Viscogliosi Brothers, LLC (VB), the New York-based merchant banking firm that specializes in the neuro-musculoskeletal/orthopedics sector. SBi was the first company to focus purely on small bones and joints by integrating established companies and professionals in the field. It offers a broad, clinically proven portfolio of products and technologies to treat trauma and diseases in the small bones and joints. SBi has facilities in New York, NY, Morrisville, PA, Péronnas, France, Donaueschingen, Germany, and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and has sold its products in 41 countries.
For a notice on Forward Looking Statements and more information about SBi, please visit: www.totalsmallbone.com/us/press.php4 | <urn:uuid:d539feb7-2d3f-47f0-87ba-db608d571947> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.freshnews.com/news/754946/anthony-g-viscogliosi-founder-and-executive-chairman-small-bone-innovations-inc-returni | 2013-05-22T00:14:12Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967392 | 880 |
ALSO IN SEASON
Apricots, bananas, berries, cherries, currants, lychees, mangoes, mangosteen, melons, nectarines, passionfruit, peaches, pineapple, plums, rambutans, starfruit and tamarillo.
Asparagus, avocados, beans (butter, green, snake), capsicum, celery, choko, cucumber, eggplant, lettuce, okra, peas, radish, squash, sweetcorn, tomatoes, zucchini and zucchini flower.
Atlantic and Australian salmon, banded morwong, goldband snapper, bigeye tuna, roes abalone, Balmain bugs, blue swimmer and mud crabs, Sydney rock oysters, bay prawns and rock lobsters.
If your contact with coconuts has been largely confined to Piña Coladas and white Christmas, you may be surprised to learn that the coconut palm is one of the most useful plants known to man or beast. Indeed, almost every part of it can be used, from the leaves, which are woven for thatching in roofs or for baskets, to the coir from the husk, which becomes rope, brushes and matting. Here, however, we’re looking at the food applications of the coconut itself.
Technically speaking, it’s not a ‘nut’ at all, but a drupe, which is a fruit with a hard stone. What we think of as the coconut is really the stone – the husk having being already removed before shipping. As a food source the juice and flesh of the nut are very versatile. Coconut is used in dishes throughout palm-growing regions such as South-East Asia, India, Sri Lanka and East Africa in everything from curries, salads and rice dishes to sago and rice puddings. In the Caribbean, coconut juice is used by Jamaicans to cook peas and rice, while raw fish cured in coconut milk and lime juice appears in the Pacific. In Australia it coats lamingtons, and is often found in Anzac biscuits. And though the Piña Colada is the official drink of Puerto Rico, this cocktail delights rum drinkers wherever pineapple (the piña) and coconut milk are found.
The biggest producers of coconuts are the Philippines, Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, Mexico, Malaysia, Thailand and Papua New Guinea. And the name? According to The Oxford Companion to Food (Oxford University Press), Portuguese seamen termed the nut ‘coco’ in the 15th century, in reference “to a monkey’s or other grotesque face”.
Coconuts are seldom sold by variety – stages of maturity being of more import to buyers. The coconut palm produces up to 75 nuts annually, each taking six months to mature, and are harvested at different stages during this period. They don’t fall from the tree naturally until they’re completely mature, so for early harvesting, nimble climbers scale the palm or use hooked knives attached to long bamboo poles to cut the nuts free. In some parts of South-East Asia, pig-tailed monkeys are employed in this task.
Young (green or immature) coconuts are picked for their jelly-like flesh and for their refreshing juice. Mature coconuts have firmer flesh, called copra, and a smaller amount of juice. In processing, the copra is grated and combined with water – the first pressing produces cream and the second pressing milk. The flesh is also dried for desiccated and shredded coconut, and for producing oil, which then makes copha. The sap of the palm is refined into palm sugar or fermented for coconut vinegar or an alcoholic drink known as toddy.
How to buy, store…
Coconuts are grown year-round in northern Australia. Most young coconuts on the local market are imported from South-East Asia. In choosing young coconuts, often sold as drinking coconuts, look for an unblemished bright white husk that feels heavy with liquid; store in the refrigerator for up to three days. A mature coconut should feel heavy for its size, should contain a little liquid, and the eyes shouldn’t be sunken; it may be stored at room temperature for up to three months.
To open a young coconut, use a very sharp knife to cut open the inner shell beneath the white husk to access the jellylike flesh and juice. For mature coconuts, pierce two of the three eyes, drain and reserve the juice. To crack open the shell, tap firmly around its circumference with the back of a large cleaver or hammer. Or you can drain the juice from the coconut, place it in a 180C oven for 15-20 minutes until the heat cracks the shell (it also helps shrink the flesh from the shell, making it easier to remove), then prise the flesh from the shell using a small sharp knife. Remove any brown skin using a vegetable peeler. The flesh may be grated, shaved or eaten in pieces.
It’s important to note that Asian cooking uses coconut cream and milk, not juice. For homemade coconut cream and milk, cut the flesh from a mature coconut, remove any brown skin, process in a blender with an equal quantity of boiling water, then push through a fine sieve into a glass jug, discarding solids. Leave to stand for at least 20 minutes to cool and for the cream to separate from the milk, then skim the cream from the surface. Cream and milk need to be used within a day of making; freeze unused cream and milk in ice cube trays until needed.
*For coconut granita, process flesh and juice of young coconut with palm sugar and a few drops of rosewater to taste. Pour into a shallow metal container and freeze for 3 hours or until firm then, using a fork, break into flakes. Serve with sliced strawberries tossed with thinly sliced mint and caster sugar.
*For a prawn, green mango and coconut salad, combine cooked peeled prawns, julienne of green mango, Vietnamese mint and coriander leaves and thinly sliced mature coconut flesh. Combine peanut oil, coconut or rice vinegar, finely chopped small red chilli, fish sauce and palm sugar to taste, toss through salad and serve immediately.
*For a coco-banana split, combine 100gm brown sugar and ¼ cup coconut cream, 60gm coarsely chopped butter and 2 tbsp rum in a saucepan. Bring to the boil, reduce heat and cook for 3 minutes or until thickened. Cool. Slice banana lengthwise, top with vanilla ice-cream, drizzle with rum caramel, and scatter over toasted sesame seeds and toasted shaved mature coconut.
*For a coconut fruit salad, combine zested rind of a lime, ½ cup water and ½ cup finely grated palm sugar in a saucepan over medium heat, stir until sugar dissolves, simmer for 5 minutes, then cool. Combine diced mango, pineapple, red papaya, thinly sliced young coconut flesh and drizzle with lime syrup.
*For a coconut & pineapple cocktail, combine young coconut flesh and lime wedges, muddle using a muddling stick, add young coconut and pineapple juices, rum, crushed ice and stir to combine.
*For a coconut, lime and chicken salad, shred poached chicken breast and combine with thinly sliced young coconut flesh, very finely shredded kaffir lime leaves, finely sliced green chilli, thinly sliced snow peas, snow pea shoots, and coarsely torn Thai basil leaves. In a small bowl combine coconut juice, lime juice and palm sugar and season with fish sauce to make a dressing, toss salad and serve immediately.
*For a coconut fruit salad, combine zested rind of a lime, ½ cup water and ½ cup finely grated palm sugar in a saucepan over medium heat, stir until sugar dissolves and simmer for 5 minutes then cool. Combine diced mango, pineapple and red papaya, scatter with thinly sliced young coconut flesh and drizzle with lime syrup.
Coconut goes with
Bananas, green beans, beef, caramel, chicken, chillies, chocolate, citrus, eggplants, kaffir lime leaves, kiwifruit, lemon grass, papaya, pineapple, rice, rum, seafood, strawberries and turmeric. | <urn:uuid:9f79d606-2f5a-42a9-be5a-f53f6510fdfb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gourmettraveller.com.au/january_coconuts.htm?rcid=1409&mode=rcid | 2013-05-22T00:14:47Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.90961 | 1,742 |
Why? The probable reason is enterprise software and other technology tools that make U.S. products easier to design, produce and scrutinize than ever before. Even as there is a whiff of recession surrounding the technology sector when it comes to hardware, nobody sees a decline in software.
Indeed, the leaders in enterprise software such as Oracle (Nasdaq: ORCL), the No. 1 database developer; International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE: IBM), the No. 2 computer company and SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) all report strong demand for new factory software. New entrants are in the field.
One is General Electric (NYSE: GE), which as a manufacturing conglomerate, has plenty of experience in the field. Another is private Infor, the New York-based company that rolled up many other enterprise software companies and had planned an initial public offering this year.
This is a good way for us to use 'Big Data,' '' said Mary Grow, VP for enterprise technology at JHP Pharmaceuticals, which manufactures sterile injectable products and other health care supplies mainly for hospitals and medical centers.
JHP Pharmaceuticals, with head offices in Parsippany, N.J., runs a 24-hour-a-day factory in Rochester, Mich., that employs 350, including 200 on the production line. Using a computer network based mainly on products from Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ), Grow runs the entire operation on GE's Proficy software.
Using the technology software has transformed a 100-year-old plant into an ultra-modern drug and health products facility, Grow said. The enterprise software allows JHP workers to assemble injectibles but also eliminate clipboards and paper-based checks required for quality control.
As well, the software is merged with data analytics tools that measures the plant's temperature and atmospheric conditions, all crucial to know while putting together injectable supplies destined to top U.S. medical centers.
The Proficy software also monitors problems, so that there's a record of a stopped batch or the occasional error, so that shift managers at a 24-hour plant are never out of the loop, Grow said.
GE, based in Fairfield, Conn,. is a relative newcomer to the sector, but has already benefited from higher internal productivity: First- quarter operating income rose 1 percent as overall revenue rose 4 percent to $35.2 billion, but manufacturing revenue surged 14 percent.
Similarly, enterprise resource planning (ERP) software deployed throughout Detroit enabled the Big Three carmakers to report surging first-quarter results. Crucially for the U.S. carmakers: American cars are largely free of the defects that caused them to lose market share to Japanese brands a generation ago.
The suppliers of this software -- IBM, Oracle, SAP -- as well as smaller providers of the so-called middleware that wraps around it, have all reported higher quarterly net income, with higher expectations for the year. HP, which announced major charges and 27,000 worker firings, is a special case, as second-quarter net income fell 31 percent to $1.6 billion, or 80 cents a share.
This week, Redwood Shores, Calif.-based Oracle announced it had merged all its products into services that can be delivered by the Internet, or the cloud. CEO Larry Ellison hailed the advance as making his company the only vendor that offers a complete suite of modern, socially enabled applications, all based on a standards-based platform.
Not to be outdone, IBM, HP, SAP, GE and other ERP companies such as Citrix Systems (Nasdaq: CTXS) and BMC Software (NYSE: BMC) are also shifting as much as possible to the cloud. Given that many clients are multinationals, the benefits derived in Rochester, Mich., for JHP could just as easily be replicated in Malaysia or Argentina.
So the prospect is good that worldwide manufacturing will benefit. Indeed, multinationals like Dell Inc. (Nasdaq: DELL), the No. 3 computer maker, have all their factories on a single ERP system. That means workers in Texas, Malaysia, China and Brazil are all using the same productivity software.
Shares of GE rose 12 cents to $19 in Thursday trading, while IBM shares closed at $194.44, up 45 cents and Oracle's at $27.18, down 35 cents. | <urn:uuid:b0647a60-42aa-4f09-990a-8698acfe762d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ibtimes.com/why-has-us-manufacturing-productivity-surged-year-its-software-stupid-705549 | 2013-05-22T00:10:19Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949408 | 898 |
The man who saves turtles
04 April 2011 | News story
Dr Nicolas Pilcher - Malaysia
Nick saves sea turtles. In a nutshell that’s what he does. But he has to look far beyond their nesting grounds to make it work.
Nick has a PhD in turtle biology, but he says it did not prepare him for the real-world challenges of turtle conservation.
|“Knowing their biology may be one thing, but working with communities, fishermen and industry to make conservation happen is a whole different story,” he says.|
After an early career in Saudi Arabia, Malaysia and Palau as a marine biologist, Nick settled down in north Borneo and established his own non-governmental organization, the Marine Research Foundation (MRF), a non-profit entity geared to saving marine life across various countries and facing differing threats. MRF, an IUCN Member, now serves as a base from which Nick addresses turtle conservation at various levels, and with an ever-growing diversity of people.
Thank the turtles!
In Papua New Guinea Nick has brought together seven communities who all share one special thing in common: their beaches are nesting grounds for the Critically Endangered leatherback sea turtle. This community-based conservation project employs villagers to serve as rangers and protect the turtles, their eggs and their hatchlings.
But conservation in Papua New Guinea is tricky because natural resources are owned by the people and reaching consensus about conservation issues is a massive challenge. One of the greatest problems was that there were not enough ranger jobs to satisfy everyone in each village and the benefits of conserving turtles, rather than eating them, were not being felt by the entire community.
To overcome this problem, Nick provides a fixed lump sum ‘grant’ to each community to be used for village development or ‘legacy projects’ as he calls them, so that everyone benefits from having turtles around. These small projects range from repairing school roofs, organizing new church furniture, to the expansion of the fresh water system. And even if one does not get to be a ranger each season, at least there are benefits which all can enjoy.
Nick tells the communities to thank the turtles – and not the project – each time they pass by the new elementary school building, for it is they who bring them benefits. Judging by the continued involvement of all of the communities six years on, it appears to be a winning formula.
No head-butting with business
In India, Nick worked with the industry to get it right. Not more than 15km away from a proposed site for the development of a large port was a beach where hundreds of thousands of turtles nest in a wonderful natural phenomenon called an arribada.
But the Port needed to dredge a long channel for the ships to navigate safely, and lights were a concern as they could disturb nesting females and disorient the emerging hatchlings. Nick developed a plan with the Port authorities and the help of many IUCN Marine Turtle Specialist Group members (of which he, incidentally, is Co-Chair) to devise strategies to counter these potential threats. These were developed at an initial stage of port development, and so they did not cost the Port any major financial or time losses.
Nick and his team developed ways to stop the dredgers from ever sucking up any turtles, and designed a lighting scheme to overcome the concerns over light pollution. They even helped the port develop a world-class environmental management plan to address all kinds of other concerns and risks, so that the surrounding ecosystems upon which the local villagers depend are well protected long into the future.
|“Working with industry, rather than against them, and understanding that although industries have their own needs, much of what is needed for conservation can often be built into their plans, is a much more practical approach to conservation than continually butting heads with them,” says Nick.|
The fisherman's friend
In Malaysia, Nick helps fishermen keep turtles out of their nets. Shrimp trawlers often fish in areas where turtles feed, and the turtles drown accidentally in the nets. But the use of a simple metal grid and an escape flap called a Turtle Excluder Device can save the turtles and allow the fishers to continue to earn a living.
But convincing a fisherman to put a hole in his net for turtles to escape is not easy, as he fears he will also lose his catch. So Nick spends many days at sea with them, and shows them how to use the devices correctly, and showing that he is also concerned that they don’t lose any of their catch. Sitting on the back of a boat fixing nets and sewing in the grids makes Nick part of the fishing community, and allows him to gain their trust. Today this project is gaining momentum and spreading wings to Pakistan and even India.
The list of projects Nick has been involved with is long and the list of problems he has helped to solve – even longer. But he says that it is all worth it:
|“I look back on the projects I have been lucky to help with, and think of all the wonderful people that are now part of the solution when once they were the cause of the problem, and I am convinced we have to be optimistic. I certainly am!”|
Nick can be contacted at firstname.lastname@example.org | <urn:uuid:c4b33aa3-2dd2-4723-b575-a77bfe5a79af> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.iucn.org/news_homepage/news_by_date/2011_news_gb/april_2011/?7208/The-man-who-saves-turtles | 2013-05-22T00:22:45Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971245 | 1,097 |
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[ BEGIN EDIT ]
Oops. They have moved to CapSquare in KL (since Dec 2008).
I have not been to their new location.... so my review is pretty much completely obsolete but here are the new contact details for you (just in case):
(New) Name: Urbanattic @ KL
Address: G-46 CapSquare, No. 7 Persiaran Capsquare, Off Jalan Ampang, Capital Square, 50100 Kuala Lumpur
Website: Attic KL website
[ END EDIT ]
I love the ambience here.... It's arty, airy and modern with funky furniture and cool colours with a stark contrast of a bright red chandelier near the stairwell:
I have been there twice and noticed that they change the art pieces periodically, which is nice.
There are also some delicious desserts to try there:
I can't remember the names but they were all very yummy.
They usually have 2 or 3 different types of pastries at a time (priced at RM10 each) and the selection is changed daily... There is only a limited amount though, so if you're not lucky then it may have run out by the time you go there for drinks at night.
(They also have an ala carte menu of Spanish/ Italian food here but I haven't tried it yet)
There is also a range of classic drinks as well as interestingly named drinks (some of the names are quite naughty! *blush*). Generally, they taste pretty good and are moderately priced (not expensive but not cheap either) at around RM18++ to RM28++ for cocktails.
The major plus point for me is that they are a smoke free bar.
(Yay - no second hand smoke!)
Smokers will have to puff on their cancer sticks on the adjoining balcony area.
Sadly, this is probably the exact reason why it's always so empty on Saturday nights....
Still, you can call me weird if you want but I really enjoy having lots of space and clean, smoke free air which adds up to a comfortable and conducive environment to catch up with friends.
(As opposed to loud, crowded and smokey clubs/ bars/ lounges)
Overall: Nice restaurant/ bar in Bangsar area that is smoke free! It has nice tasting and reasonably priced drinks and yummy desserts.
The Attic @ Jalan Bangkung, Bangsar
Telephone No.: 03-2093 8842
Opening Hours: Weekdays (except Monday) - 12pm to 11pm, Weekends - 12pm to 1 am.
Parking : OK
TAGS: Food, Blog, Weblog, Malaysia, Bar, Restaurant, Cocktails, Alcohol, Bar, Lounge, Bangsar, Jalan Bangkung, The Attic, Chocolate Cake, Smoke Free | <urn:uuid:2e78ce6d-2435-4cfb-9056-d61e25cb7252> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.memoirsofachocoholic.com/2006/09/fun-in-attic.html | 2013-05-22T00:30:31Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947735 | 590 |
Monday, March 30, 2009
He's smooth, black and has one hell of a good reputation. I'm sure to be up til the wee hours, examining all of his best features.
In fact, i can tell this is the start of one long and intimate relationship.
I am falling in love.
But sorry ya'll, he's not the type to put a ring on my finger or fulfill the little revolutionary's wish to have a stepfather. That's cuz he's a phone.
He's a Blackberry Pearl Flip, fresh from the phone store. If i thought i was getting addicted to technology before, with the Facebooking and Twittering and the videophoning across the ocean, i was merely trifling. This astonishingly reasonable purchase (how does a free phone sound?) is the next big thing. Imagine it! Getting tweets and emails and surfing the web from your car! Playing music! Taking photos! Ok, i know i may be one of the last to get the memo on superphones, since i've had a free work phone for the past three years, but i have to say i am loving it now.
So later this spring i will be the ultimate contradiction, with my feet dirty, down in the garden, while my fingers are tweeting about it above.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
I've just gotten done telling her that she missed Pajama Day at her preschool, and she's pissed. Since her pops lives near Eugene, she misses a lot of school to go down and spend time with him. She's five months away from kindergarten, when missing school is not really an option, so for now we figure it's best to let her spend some extra dad-time out in the country. She's always eager to go back to Horton to spend some time with her three kitties and the mud and the man-house madness. Except when it means missing out on special days at school.
I explain the situation -- that next year she won't be able to spend as much time with her dad, since she has to go to school in one city or the other, and it's going to be immersion school in Portland. This triggers another round of crossed arms and teary eyes. So she's pissed about missing school on one hand, and on the other hand she's pissed about missing her kitties. It's a heartbreaking world where she can't have both -- even though she should be able to. These dramas may seem small when compared to all the trouble the world is in. But to her they are the world. She must learn about compromise at such a young age, and also disappointment and longing. She is a bit of a Drama Princess, with her tears and huffing and crossed arms over missing Pajama Day, but still, i feel for the things she has to go through.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Take my friend Sammy Prettyflowers, for example.
Mind you now, this is supposed to be a funny story.
He's a fisherman who spends his life alternating between 24-7 work on an Alaskan fishing boat, and 24-7 slacking on beaches in exotic locales like the Phillipines and Malaysia. And in the time in between those two, he lives in Portland.
He last left the Rose City in December, after months of unemployment and a few too many trips to Devil's Point. He hadn't planned on getting another fishing gig for the winter, but when the ten-buck an hour jobs at the corner store started being a hotter and hotter commodity around here, he had to go back to the old standby. Since then, he's endured the following calamities, which may or may not be due to the economic crisis:
- A broken-down truck, in the midst of our Arctic Blast . The shady repair shop he decided to go with made him wait a month to get his car back, so during the heavy snow, he was driving around a Daewoo. Or not driving around a Daewoo, since it couldn't be moved from its spot in front of the house.
- Two weeks of squalor and disappointment, fixing a broken boat while languishing in Seattle Harbor. He got the winter job and moved promptly to the harbor to set off for Alaska. But serious repairs caused delays and way too many a night stumbling home from the bars near the harbor.
- More disrepair and disgusting food. When they finally made it to Alaska, they had to hole up for a little while longer, because their refrigerator had broken down and they needed to get a new one. And all new food.
- Dismal fishing prices. This story tells a slightly different tale, but Sammy says their first trip out yielded them much less than in other years. This was in part due to their late start, because of the broken fridge and the spoiled vittles.
- Shitty Weather. When they made it for their second run, all was going along according to plan, when the boat broke down again. Sammy says they were already enduring some scary water and weather when the boat just crapped out again. But because of the stormy weather, no one would tow them back to town for ELEVEN days. Imagine sitting on the deck of brokedown boat for eleven days twiddling your thumbs and hoping you don't get tossed into the sea. You kind of have to laugh.
-Volcanic eruptions. You may have heard that the eruption of Mt. Redoubt shut down flights in and out of Anchorage. The same is true for all the puddle-jumpers too. So guess what? That boat that left them stranded out there in the ocean now can't be fixed, because none of the regional planes can bring in the part they need to fix it.
And then, to top it all off, he's got a broken truck to come home to. Sammy tells me it's still not fixed, even after all that fuss and trouble back in December.
Sometimes you just can't win.
But hopefully, come April, there will be cars that function and skies that glow a clear blue, and a home to look forward to, that looks so lovely in spring.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
These days, a lot more people are finding themselves defined not by their employment, but by their unemployment. I think it's got to be a life-changing experience for someone who's always had a title, a business card, and status. I've had a lot of contemplating to do about what my real goals are since the bosses dropped the bomb. Occasionally a ray of light shines through and i have a clear idea what the hell i am doing. Other times i think creating my own path is freaking insane.
So what's it all worth? Does having a so-called prestigious job have any bearing on your actual happiness? Does what you do for a living define you? And can you feel like a whole person when you're not defined by a job?
Friday, March 20, 2009
Whether for you the season means bunnies and colored eggs, or digging in the dirt, or just dusting off the sunglasses and the flip flops, i imagine most of us have something to celebrate at the change of the season. I know i am thrilled to start getting my hands dirty and to watch the beautiful buds of spring start popping. And to ride my bike, and push the kiddo on the swing, and welcome the sun...
A little on spring, from Efestivals.com:
"At some point before the eighth century AD, the strategians of the early Church superimposed the Resurrection of the Lord on the pre-Christian Eoster-based practice of celebrating spring around the spring equinox. This converted a pagan practice into a Christian one with a simple flick of the theological hand. "
However you look at it, today is a pretty good day...
Thursday, March 19, 2009
There are a few things that i can delight upon, if i must:
1. More time with my kiddo. When unemployment looms, i will not be able to pay for child care, but i won't need it. So i get more time to spend with the kid whose mom has worked full-time her ENTIRE life. I wonder how i will get to know her, when our time together is not squeezed in between errands and house cleaning and day to day discipline.
2. A break, to figure out who i really am. I wrote about this before -- how my friend asked me what i really wanted to do with my life and how it took some time to answer that question. So often we just plod along, not really evaluating whether we are really happy or not. A violent severance from every habit you've fallen into is good for the soul.
3. Solidarity with the jobless masses. Suddenly it's not so embarrassing to have lost your home or your job, since there are so many people out there dealing with the same thing. Getting laid off may make most people feel like crawling under the covers and never coming out, but with so many people in the same bed, at least there's some kind of solidarity going on. Those calls i get to pay the credit card i always seem to forget about seem a little funny to me now, since there are even jokey commercials about it. In one radio commercial, you hear a woman's voice say something like "we're not answering right now, so if you're a creditor, you'll just have to get in line, like everyone else we owe money to." It's not a noble position to be in, but like i said, at least there's some solidarity in it nowadays.
4. Testing my mettle as a farmer. When you have nothing but time and seeds and a pile of dirt outside, you will eventually have a Victory Garden. And this year i will be more compelled to pull all the weeds and remove all the slugs, because i will have both time and motivation. Hunger is a great motivator.
5. Learning about history. When our future looks gloomy, we turn to the past for answers. This humbles us, and reminds us too that all things pass.
Chances are you've been affected by the crisis in one way or another. Are you seeing any light at the end of the tunnel? How are you staying positive?
Monday, March 16, 2009
Today, in my way that automatically qualifies me for membership in the OMA (Overzealous Mothers of America), i did some sleuthing and found out before the six-week waiting period where my daughter is going next year. Ok, maybe you don't consider calling the school secretary and sweetly asking how many kids had made Bridger School their first choice necessarily sleuthing, but i don't know what else you'd call it. Overzealously inquiring, perhaps? Turns out, 27 kids made Bridger School their first choice. And since the kiddo was one of them, and since the school admits at least 28 kids, she is all but in. The OMA member in me is breathing a sigh of relief. Her fate is sealed and she is bound for a bilingual life from here on out. And judging by this NYT article, (thanks Saschi), there only needs to be more of this in our fair city and country-wide. At one of the mandatory meetings i attended as part of this process, the school staff told me that dual immersion programs don't cost the district any more money. And with English-speaking families clamoring for their children to join up in the spirit of multiculturalism, and non-English speaking families in need of a way to get their children up to speed, i see no reason why the program cannot be expanded.
Perhaps it's because i already have one important relationship that takes up so much of my time.
Perhaps the universe wants me to enjoy another adult's company -- naturally, right? -- but it knows i can only handle this much. Any more would seriously cut down on the time i spend having sweet moments with my child, and it's clear she needs that so badly. People have a way of behaving badly to get attention, and she is no exception. In fact this little revolutionary is a master at it. She will pull out all manner of tantrum and pout at just the moment i am trying to give my attention elsewhere. It ends up with me exasperated and giving her negative attention, but it's attention nonetheless.
Single parents have to juggle the child with the date any time there is a date to be had, and usually it's the child who wins out in the war for attention. Our society reveres this idea of a selfless mother who thinks nothing of themself, and somehow the children are privy to that ideal at a very early age. So am i all right with that role? The revolutionary in me says absolutely not; though i have already dealt with today's goodbye not with despair, but with a resolve that that is the way of the world, and my place is here with her. The child won out in this war for attention, because it is so.
I did learn one important lesson in this go-round of a fleeting relationship. Children are not necessarily something that those who come calling for a date will be threatened by, in terms of attention. The good ones will realize when the war for attention cannot be won, and will step back and let a single mama do her attention-giving. (By the way, Ms. Single Mama has some great tips on dating for you single mamas who need a little encouragement.)
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
The kiddo is five.
It's old enough for her to pick out her own clothes (sometimes matched) but not old enough for her to get going full-boar on the tree swing out back.
It's old enough for her to be trusted brushing her teeth, but young enough to insist on being snuggled to sleep each night.
It's old enough for her to be in kindergarten.
Old enough for me to think about joining the PTA.
When i'm lying down with her for that nightly snuggle i'm usually fighting off the sleep monster myself -- willing my brain to stay on and not succumb to the warm covers, at only eight at night. But other times my mind is racing. Tonight it was racing. I've committed to this new life where i'm gonna create my own destiny, and i'm finding that takes up a lot of headspace. I'm constantly wanting to dash to the notebook to scribble out a few new ideas. Tonight, among the reflections about the kindergarten meeting i attended tonight and the sweet full feeling of tacos in my belly, the thought that persisted was the thought that Raising a Revolutionary is going to turn into a book, when i get going on the immersion school posts next year. I can't promise it unfailingly to you, my four loyal readers, but i can say it is on my mind. I want to write each day about the progress she's making, because i there is almost nothing on this planet i find more fascinating than 1. my daughter and 2. people learning new languages. Tonight:
The kiddo holds out her hand to the maestra of the kindergarten, blurting out "Hola!" and beaming.
"Buenas noches!" Maestra Garcie beams back, "Quieres venir a nuestra escuela?" The kiddo droops, eases her hands, then feet, then entire body behind my knees. She gurgles out something that sounds like a word, then buries her head in my backside. The realization that only using "hola" is not going to cut it in this kindergarten...
Yeah i know that blogging is perhaps the plodding, lazy, easily-linear form of crafting a long-form story. Or perhaps we're going to see a lot more blogs-turned-books out there, so every wannabe novelist can feign to have their own little New Yorker. But hell, maybe the other parents about to embark on immersion schooling for the 12 years might find it entertaining. So let's make it a loose promise. It's a feather, balanced on the tip of a fork, held on by some hot sauce. Eso si que es.
This article sheds new light on the notion of sustainability and food revolution. While it doesn't rule out the personal urban farmer, it does question the viability of the organic and local movement:
"Consider our love affair with food miles. In theory, locally grown foods have traveled shorter distances and thus represent less fuel use and lower carbon emissions—their resource footprint is smaller. And yet, for all the benefits of a local diet, eating locally doesn't always translate into more sustainability. Because the typical farmers market is supplied by dozens of different farms, each transporting its crops in a separate van or truck, a 20-pound shopping basket of locally grown produce might actually represent a larger carbon footprint than the same volume of produce purchased at a chain retailer, which gets its produce en masse, via large trucks."
I am left saying "now what then?"... but good work, Mother Jones.
I have someone over for dinner and drinks and flirtations, and later in the night, my daughter ends up whispering in my ear, "so Mama, am I gonna have a stepdad now?"
And then let's say that same person comes over again for dinner and drinks and such and when he walks through the door, my daughter calls out "Hi Dad!"
I mean, seriously. I, of course, am not trying to put those thoughts in her head. Quite the opposite, in fact. I am happy in my independence. But the girl whose name is short for independence would rather see me strapped down, if only so she can live some archaic dream of having the family that looks complete in the frame on the wall. And i don't blame her. I would have given anything at one point to live an idyllic life with her father and not have her subject to the disagreements and disapproval and domestic violence that has been in her life. I'd also love to excuse her from having to figure out at such a young age what the rules of dating are, and how to regard her mother's love interests. And now apparently i have to somehow explain to this poor innocent that sometimes people just "hang out..."
...but that doesn't mean they're going to get married and perhaps they don't even love each other and just remember, dear, that you already have a father who loves you and just because Daddy's found someone else doesn't mean Mama is lonely... and you'll always be the most important person in my life, even when you invite someone over for dinner and drinks and flirtation and suddenly i'm whispering in your ear, "so daughter, am i gonna have a son-in-law now?"
Sunday, March 8, 2009
I balk at the 'conquered' part, but the rest is pretty insightful...
Thursday, March 5, 2009
"Freedom is just another word
for nothing left to lose..."
Sorry, Ms. Joplin, but i just have to disagree, in part. There's another kind of freedom, in having things, but not being afraid to lose them. I can enjoy my job and my home and my car and my well-fed lifestyle, but i am no longer afraid to lose them. I have no idea if
entering the world of the unjobbers is going to work. But the freedom i already feel from making the choice to try it is erasing the fear of losing things. Maybe i am crazy and being completely impractical and i should be frantically searching the want ads in all my off-hours. But then i remember that the things i really care about are the things that can't be taken away, and working in an office again is only going to take away my happiness and not really give me anything but lost time in return.
When the day is done, i have my daughter and my dog and my scribblings, i have a past filled with high adventure and lowbrow deviance; education, work experience... all these things that can't be taken away...
"Nothing don't mean nothing honey
if it ain't free, now now..."
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
"How To Counter Depression
To bring the depression down, first look at why you are depressed. Try to change the nature of mind & emotions. Trust life. When you are emotionally down, think of a happy incident. Always entertain healthy & positive thoughts. Insecurities indicate you to be creative & alert. Lots of people fear failure, death, insecurity & rejection. Understand that when one door closes another opens. Just think it is matter of time that failure is only postponed success. If you bring this energy into your life,
it will give you methods of handling any difficult situation. So when fear happens, do not get indentified with it. Just watch it. Witness your fear. Fear is actually just a thought or word. Explore yourself & learn to trust that insecurities, fear & failures are inviting you be creative & making you stronger. We should live in realistic world & stay away from the superiority complex, the inferiority complex & a mix of the both. A slightly clouded sky will get cleared with sunrise. But a sky, which is full of tornado and typhoon, will create terrible destruction before it gets cleared.
Control of thought waves in the mind is yoga. In the Yoga Sutra, Saint Patanjali states that our inner obstacles create mental distraction, which in turn leads to depression. These inner obstacles can be removed by the practice of Asana, Pranayama & Meditation. Yoga helps in providing freedom from the negative thoughts and creates an atmosphere of positivity all around. The entire nature is made up of three qualities of Sattva, Rajas and Tamas (purity, activity and ignorance). People with Tamasic Depression lack life force or Prana. Yoga postures will activate and move Prana in the body, open the heart center, stimulate and nervous system and balance the body-mind-spirit. Vigorous practices such as repeated Sun Salutation (Surya Namaskar), Flexibility Exercises, Sravangasana, Matsyasana, Halasana, Dhanurasana, Vajrasana, Ushtrasana, Shavasana poses can be therapeutic & stimulating and help fight Tamas. The body and mind are so occupied with the practice of these asanas that it's hard to brood."
Courtesy: Dr. Rita Khanna's Yogashaastra Studio via the Aura Wellness Center.
Photo Courtesy: Tennille Hensley, Salt Flats Utah, via Facebook.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
I don't know why it's taken me a month and a half of moping and railing about to come to the conclusion that my next career step should be doing something i really want to do. But it just occured to me only yesterday. Everyone has said to me that getting laid off is the perfect chance to figure out who you are, and i guess it just took me that long to remember. The monologue in my head went something like this yesterday:
I started working right after my baby was born, determined to be some demigod of a parent by having this cool career job and bringing home some cash. The hours were long and i had to miss out on a lot of her babyhood, but i just figured this gig as a producer was satisfying my ego and so what with the roaming writer gig i'd always wanted to have and why not just hang here for a while?
I started a new job in a bigger city with more hours and more responsibility and more stress. The noose got tighter.
I found myself single soon after, and found navigating a family with only one adult at the helm more difficult than i'd even dreamed. Had i even dreamed it? The noose became a permanent fixture.
For the first three weeks after finding that someone had cut the noose i struggled desperately at the gallows, scratching at my fingers, trying to keep the rope together. For what? Friends asked me "well what is it that you really want to do?" and i'd reply with a stare.
"You're just going along, plodding through your life and then one day someone ends it all," is what i would eventually muster. The noose was off, but it was taking me a bit to breathe again.
So on that car ride back up north, with the sun setting as it always does over the Coastal Mountains, the grass fields and vineyards lit up for one last gasp, and cool air flowing through the car, i started breathing again. I recognized that what i'd seen as security had made me colossally unhappy for the past five years. And life was too damn short to be stuck in a nine to five gig that keeps me from my child and from my real passions. I have always known what those are, but when you're in the throes of something else you tend to bury them for a while.
Now i remember again that what i really love is writing and telling meaningful stories through the lens, the page, and the recorded word. I need to try to make my living through those means or i fear that the next time i'm hanging there i may never come down again. So i am embracing the idea of doing other things, and having unemployment assistance when i can't make those things happen every week. It's a sort of safety net that i've earned through five years of sweat and tears and baby moments missed, so i am going to be happy to take it. Perhaps it will be the thing that brings me to my true calling, my corner of the world -- my niche, as they call it.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
I found this relic of a graphic from World War Two today in this article about urban farming. I am fascinated by the cycles of prosperity and squalor that swing around on this planet, and it just so happens that at this time, it's our turn to be squalid. But people have gotten through it by tapping their creativity and getting their hands dirty in the past, so i will do the same. I wrote a lot last summer about urban farming and being more DIY with your life. Now all those words just get more and more relevant.
I am about one month away from being unemployed. So in the midst of knocking out stellar cover letters (that get stolen by other bloggers) and polishing the resume time after time, i am scheming about freelance stories i'm gonna write and plotting an even bigger garden than i've had in the past. I mean, why not? All i have is time to dig and weed and sit in the sun and churn the compost. I suppose my life right now is a lot like making compost. You take a whole lot of discards and shit and dirt and turn it into fodder for a whole rainbow of bounty. Victory garden! | <urn:uuid:f3dd7133-ebb4-4d37-8b1a-8c0aaa0b0677> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nicolevulcan.blogspot.com/2009_03_01_archive.html | 2013-05-22T00:36:12Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969328 | 5,609 |
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Ninth infantry brigade plans museum to honour Rascom
SIBU: The Ninth Infantry Brigade here wants to set up a museum in honour of the Rajang Area Security Command or Rascom.
Its commander, Brig-Jen Datuk Stephen Mundaw, said today Rascom had been very instrumental in helping the government to successfully fight the threat from communist terrorists in the Sibu, Sarikei, Kapit and Bintulu divisions.
Rascom, a unique joint military, police and civil establishment and the first of its kind in the country's security history, was formed on March 25, 1972, by the federal government and was disbanded on April 6, 1995.
The brigade had now succeeded Rascom and its headquarters was the former Rascom building at Awang Ramli Amit Road, here, he told reporters after a parade to mark the 36th anniversary of the Ninth Brigade at the Sibu Town Square, here.
"We have quite a lot of collections on Rascom, from photographic records to physical exhibits like firearms and booby traps captured from the terrorists.
"We want to organise and display them to the public to enable them to know and appreciate the roles played by Rascom. We also appreciate contributions from all those who have served in Rascom too," he said.
He said the museum would be a wonderful reference centre for students and military folk wanting to know the government's successful strategies in the ending the communist threat.
On the Ninth Brigade, Mundaw said it had recorded many achievements as the people's army.
"We have taken part in many community and military projects. We have, for instance, helped in flood relief operations, policing the country borders with Indonesia, helping in rural road and homes construction and others.
Under our "Projek Jiwa Murni"(to win the trust and support of the local community), we provided free dental and health treatment last year to more than 17,000 rural folk in 66 locations statewide," he said.
He said such projects would be carried out soon in more rural locations.
Meanwhile, on Saturday a military exhibition and food sale, brass band performance, the army war dance, parachute jumps by army commando personnel and armed and unarmed combat demonstration will be held at the town square from 8 am as part of the celebration. -- BERNAMA | <urn:uuid:8e77af13-8ac8-49d9-a885-4db170b29e62> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nst.com.my/latest/ninth-infantry-brigade-plans-museum-to-honour-rascom-1.79546 | 2013-05-22T00:09:10Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964097 | 649 |
LOS ANGELES – People want to know when Chauncey Billups will return to the court.
He was asked Wednesday morning after the Clippers' shootaround.
The Clippers' DeAndre Jordan dunks the ball against the Spurs.
ROSE PALMISANO, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
"I'm not going to throw a date out, obviously," Billups said.
Less than six hours later, Billups appeared on ESPN's Countdown and told a different story.
"Barring any setbacks," Billups said, "I'm hoping in a month I'll be back out there."
He was asked about his return for a third time before the Clippers' game with San Antonio and gave a third answer.
"Write whatever you want," he said.
The main reason why Billups' return date is cloudy is because it's actually a mystery.
At this point, Billups said he's playing at game speed in practice without soreness in his Achilles' tendon.
"It's been nothing in my Achilles'. My Achilles' is great. It's strong, powerful," Billups said. "It's recalibrating the rest of my body, getting it up to speed, telling it 'It's time to go.'"
Since returning to full contact practice during the preseason, Billups' setbacks haven't had much to do with his surgically repaired left Achilles' tendon.
Instead, the setbacks have been stiffness in his back and a slight strain in his calf muscle.
Billups also wants to make sure once he comes back, he stays back.
"I could turn it on for a week or so and, boom, have to shut it down for a few days. I don't want to do that," he said. "I don't want to play two games and sit two games. I want to be back playing and be part of that team everyday."
Griffin still aching
In addition to the burst bursa sac in his right elbow, Clippers forward Blake Griffin is dealing with stiffness in his neck.
While the neck injury is expected to heal on its own, the elbow is more of a concern.
Because Griffin's had the elbow drained multiple times in the past, team doctors are reluctant to drain fluid again because of an increased risk of infection.
The swelling in the elbow remained the primary issue.
"It's more about swelling," he said. "There's pain, but it's not one of those things where it's going to get worse. That's a positive thing."
Visiting teams in the NBA have the preference of picking which way they'd like to start going offensively at the beginning of the game. Almost every team, save for the Utah Jazz, elect to start by shooting at the basket nearest to the visiting bench. However, San Antonio flipped things around Wednesday, starting the game going towards the Clippers' bench. ... Griffin echoed his respect for the San Antonio Spurs, a storyline that took shape during last year's conference semifinals. "They're a model for how you're supposed to run an organization," he said.
Contact the writer: email@example.com | <urn:uuid:679de1cd-3bc0-4088-b07b-1da1e5cf7848> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ocregister.com/sports/billups-377119-want-return.html | 2013-05-22T00:45:42Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982608 | 651 |
sail-world.com -- Phuket King's Cup Regatta - Weather Forecast
Phuket King's Cup Regatta - Weather Forecast
Wed, 5 Dec 2012
Weather Forecast for Phuket King's Cup Regatta
Synopsis: Latest satellite imagery shows areas of squalls moving w'ward across Far N'rn Malaysia, extending w'ward for some 80-90 nautical miles offshore across adjacent waters of the Andaman Sea and e'ward through much of the Central Gulf of Thailand. These squalls will move w'ward over the next 18-24 hours, moving across and north of Phuket and vicinity during that time.
The aforementioned squalls are associated with a broad west to east oriented trough of LOW pressure, which covers the S'rn Bay of Bengal, extending e'ward through N'rn Sumatra, much of Malaysia, and farther east across the South China Sea to N'rn Borneo. The trough will move very little over the next 2-3 days, with very little change in strength during that time. Latest satellite imagery shows a very weak surface LOW within the trough just off the North Central Coast of Borneo, which will weaken and dissipate as it moves w'ward toward the S'rn Malaysian Coast through the 06th.
Current Conditions: Local land observations show light and variable winds across Phuket and vicinity. Offshore winds over the past several hours have been from the NE-E at 10-15kts.
Severe Weather Potential/Advisories: Only a LOW risk of scattered squalls is likely across the race region over the next 2-3 days, with a minimal risk of severe weather likely during that time.
Conclusions: Gradients will remain very weak over the next 2-3 days, and these will only weaken further on the 06th as the aforementioned LOW (or is remnants) approach and pass to the south of the race region. Very little change is likely on the 07th as well as the aforementioned trough persists.
WINDS AND SEAS HIGHER IN SQUALLS
Hedge: Confidence in today's forecast is higher than average as NE-E winds persist, counterbalancing seabreeze effects for one more day.
However, confidence for the 06th/07th is slightly below average as the passage of the above-mentioned low (or its remnants) further reduces pressure gradients across the region. Within immediate coastal areas (within 01-02 nautical miles from shore), periods of SE winds are likely, mainly occurring during the late morning and afternoon (between 1000lt and 1600lt).
OziOpti is all about 'getting kids in boats' and the Australian company supporting the introduction to of the world’s most popular junior sailing yacht, the 'International Optimist Dinghy' [More info]
Performance Sailcraft Australia (Asia Pacific)
Laser builder Performance Sailcraft Australia has taken on the successful RS Sailboat range from Britain, and is now licensed to build and distribute all of the RS range in the Asia Pacific region. [More info]
Sealink Magnetic Island Race Week
Entries for the fourth annual Sealink Magnetic Island Race Week have opened! 4 days of racing, 5 days of fun – that is what you can look forward to from 3-7 September at Magnetic Island. [More info] | <urn:uuid:8bd3ba36-9eef-482b-9f1e-74989d2e5395> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sail-world.com/Asia/pda.cfm?Nid=104396&RequestTimeOut=180 | 2013-05-22T00:25:59Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934122 | 694 |
Man of the moment Riccardo Tisci's dark, sensual designs for Givenchy come straight from the heart, writes Jing Zhang.
Buffett isn't really a sage, and Soros is no philosopher
Hotshot investors have their areas of expertise, but are as clueless as anyone else on most matters
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These days Soros has become more of a philosopher and philanthropist, giving away US$8 billion to good causes. In his new role he brings decades of understanding about economies, currencies and markets and ways they dance with disaster.
SCMP, Back to Business, October 3
It's not often that a book review makes me laugh, but I laughed some years ago on reading a critique in The Economist of an attempt by George Soros to expound his philosophical point of view.
Soros had written that to get things right in philosophy, you had to take a little from all the previous great thinkers.
And that's what he did, wrote the reviewer. He took a little diced Schopenhauer, some shredded Nietzsche, and a pinch of Hegel, swallowed them and look what came out the other side.
Giggle, giggle. I renewed my subscription to The Economist on the basis of that review, despite the rag's warmongering ways.
Soros was at his best in the early 1990s, when he looked British prime minister John Major in the eye and placed a multibillion-dollar bet that Britain would bow out of European monetary union despite Major's pledges.
He didn't actually take that bet against the Bank of England. He took it against Bank Negara Malaysia, Malaysia's central bank, which was at the time one of the world's biggest foreign-currency speculators. (Yes, why indeed?) It was also one of Major's firm believers.
Soros netted a US$1 billion profit on that bet and Bank Negara went bust, wiping out years of savings that were meant to improve the living circumstances of native Malays. They may thank Soros, however, for stopping Bank Negara's madness before it became much worse.
He also helped stop the foolishness of other Asian central banks in 1997 by placing big bets that their currency manipulations would fail. The Asian financial crisis of that year came about when was he proved right, but it would have been much worse if currency speculators like him had not forced the inevitable showdown with reality at an early date.
However, there was also the time at the height of the internet bubble in 2000 when, after months of declaring internet stocks hugely overpriced, he let his subordinates bet on them just before they collapsed. The biter was bit. The market laughed.
There is a moral to this story. George Soros is best at doing what George Soros understands, and is no better than you or I at doing what he doesn't understand. What Soros understands is the foolish ways of governments in financial matters. He had object lessons on that score in his native Hungary and took them to heart.
What he doesn't really understand, in my opinion, are the normal doings of the born-in-the-USA American investor. He lost his way in the internet bubble because all he had was the usual tools of investment analysis, and not that finely-honed sixth sense that stood him so well against Major.
For an intuitive understanding of domestic investment in the US, you do better to go to the likes of the "sage of Omaha", Warren Buffett. How much more American can you get than Omaha? Mr Buffett, I understand, lives there at 123 Main Street, where, before dinner at 5.30pm, he reclines on a La-Z-Boy chair and drinks Coca-Cola.
Warren Buffett understands Coca-Cola because, in an investment sense, he is Coca-Cola. He has an intuition for stocks like that and has proved it with his win record.
But take Warren Buffett to investments that depend on worldwide trends, not American ones alone, to things like basic energy plays, and he stumbles. He has a line of howlers to his debit in oil stocks. The fact that he put money in Japan last year is no recommendation of Japan.
And that's the moral of the story. For a plumbing job get a plumber, for a gardening job get a gardener.
And keep your hand on your wallet if any one of them tells you he is a philosopher. | <urn:uuid:29a692b3-4fd7-4c83-99e6-70233fb85066> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.scmp.com/comment/insight-opinion/article/1055388/buffett-isnt-really-sage-and-soros-no-philosopher | 2013-05-22T00:12:19Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979911 | 970 |
Hindu Council: Unity in Diversity through Deepawali Festival
24 September 2012)
Hindu Council promotes ‘Unity in Diversity’ through Deepawali festival
Rotorua will once again celebrate the richness of Deepawali festival on Saturday, 6 October 2012 at the Rotorua Convention Centre. This year the theme of the festival is 'Unity in Diversity'.
In the first year, a message of healthy lifestyle and care for environment was promoted through Smoke-free, Alcohol-free and Meat-free festival, which is also in accordance with Hindu cultural practice. In the following years, the themes were Hindu Maori relations, Developing Youth Leadership, and Women Empowerment, respectively.
Deepawali, a well-known Hindu festival, is not only celebrated by people of India, but also by Hindu people of Nepal, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Indonesia, South Africa, Fiji and many other countries. In an increasingly multi-cultural New Zealand not only Hindus from all over the world, but all communities participate in events like Deepawali and share their cultures with each other.
Hindu Council of New Zealand made Deepawali a public festival in Rotorua in 2008. With the support of like-minded community oriented organisations and associations Rotorua Deepawali Festival has increasingly become an anticipated community event in the first weekend of October.
Each year, an increasing number of community organisations have supported the Rotorua Deepawali Festival (RDF) in the spirit of understanding and mutual respect, thereby developing and strengthening inter-cultural bonds. This year, in addition to those who have participated in the past years, RDF will see participation from Rotorua Nepalese community, Rotorua Malayali Association, Rotorua Chinese Association, Friends of India Society, and members from Maori Indian community. BAPS Swaminarayan Mandir (first Hindu temple in Rotorua) and Thiru Subramaniam Temple (Auckland) are also expected to join the festival.
A number of dance schools from different cities will perform, in addition to Rotorua based performers. This includes Anujay School of Dance, Indiance Dance Group, Padma School of Classical Dance, and Monisha School of Dance (all from Auckland), and Natraj School of Dance (Wellington).
This year Rotorua Deepawali Festival will incorporate a special celebration organised by Hindu Council of New Zealand.
Recently, the community work of Hindu Council of New Zealand was recognised by the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), and Hindu Council of New Zealand has been accorded a Special Consultative Status with them. It means Hindu Council of NZ is now a part of the Non-Governmental Organizations Branch of the United Nations.
This indeed recognises the constructive work and positive attitude of the Hindu community in New Zealand, and in particular of the Hindu Council of New Zealand.
To celebrate the recognition of Hindu Council by United Nation’s ECOSOC an official function (6.30 pm to 7.15 pm) will be organised before the Deepawali cultural programme. All the volunteers, supporters, performers, sponsors, guests and participants who have contributed to the growth of the Hindu Council of New Zealand over the past decade will be acknowledged in this function.
A number of government agencies, sponsors and other guests including Office of Ethnic Affairs, Human Rights Commission, NZ Police, Rotorua Trust, Waiariki Institute of Technology, and local Members of Parliament have confirmed participating in the official function of the festival.
This year, Hindu Council of New Zealand is raising funds from the Hindu community to organise the festival and the fireworks instead of going for public funding.
Entry to public to the cultural show, as in the past, is free; and it will be followed by a grand display of fireworks at 9.15 pm.
If you are interested in attending the free cultural show, please send an email to either firstname.lastname@example.org or email@example.com to reserve your place. Fireworks will be held in the open, and everyone is welcome to join.
The Hindu Council of New Zealand and the Rotorua Deepawali Festival committee welcomes volunteers genuinely interested in promoting Rotorua Deepawali Festival in the spirit of community well-being on the principle of “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam” (World is one family). | <urn:uuid:0aa425cc-7acb-478d-8b10-0dff36bcea0a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/CU1209/S00423/hindu-council-unity-in-diversity-through-deepawali-festival.htm | 2013-05-22T00:44:27Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935069 | 912 |
Company ProfileSPR Boracay Real Estate, Inc. is engaged in property sales, brokerage, assets management, construction, engineering and other real estate services primarily in Boracay Island, Philippines. Its expertise has led to the creation of Boracay Villas, a collective of luxury beachfront and holiday houses, apartments, and properties for long-term rental.
Within almost a decade, SPR has completed many projects within the Boracay Villas roster:
- Tropicana Ocean Villas and Apartments, Robinson Beach House, Mayumi Beach House, and more Vacation Houses
- Sunbird, Kingfisher Apartment and other Vacation Apartments
- La Dolce Vita, Palm Hill, Balinghai Villa, and luxury properties for Long-Term Rental
SPR is essentially a multinational entity. Its ownership structure is an equitable mix of 60% Filipino and 40% Swiss participation. Stewardship is vested in its Board of Directors.
The company is engaged in property sales, brokerage, property appraisal services, property and assets management, construction, engineering and other related transactions primarily concentrated on Boracay Island. Headquartered in Malay, Aklan since its inception, business dealings are concluded based on management's acute familiarity with the island's zoning requirements. This enables the company to negotiate for its client?s options to lease or buy selected properties at their convenience. As part of its comprehensive customer service, the company commits to secure all requisite legal documents pertinent to any transaction. Likewise, clients are assured of the company's dependable assistance whenever they need it.
For almost a decade in real estate services, many projects were completed such as Tropicana Ocean Villas and Apartment, Robinson beach house, Pinjalo Resort, Mabuhay beach house, Mayumi Beach House etc..
The company have 2-licensed Appraisers with PRC License Nos.: 1120 & 3250 and 2-licensed brokers with PRC License Nos.: 5422 and 7229 namely: Mr. Tommy G. Sarceno and Ms. Ernalyn Tosco who are with the company since January 26, 1998 and January 2007 up to the present respectively. | <urn:uuid:71f2719d-3c95-4d0d-83dc-03223c4e7063> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sprboracay.com/page.php?id=2 | 2013-05-22T00:29:16Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940498 | 444 |
"Private Tour and Accessible Tourism in Hong Kong and Macau"
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Whatever what kind of visit, Hong Kong is a well know and beautiful city you must visit, and China is a great country for you to travel, spend few days here, I can show you the very true of Hong Kong, and also Macau if you are interested. See you here in Hong Kong, Have a nice & Happy Holiday ^_^
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Contact aggiehs Now | <urn:uuid:4724f4a4-d90e-4414-bb5e-d5811d3c481b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.synotrip.com/aggiehs | 2013-05-22T00:43:31Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94528 | 354 |
McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton won the pole position Saturday for the Formula One Malaysian Grand Prix.
Hamilton made it back-to-back poles to start the season, clocking a time that was a tenth of a second faster than teammate Jenson Button, also making it an all-McLaren front row in successive races.
Mercedes driver Michael Schumacher was third fastest, ahead of Red Bull's Mark Webber and Lotus' Kimi Raikkonen, who will take a five-place grid penalty for changing his gearbox and will start Sunday's race tenth.
World champion Sebastian Vettel qualified sixth, Lotus' Romain Grosjean seventh, and Mercedes' Nico Rosberg eighth. Ferrari's Fernando Alonso and Sauber's Sergio Perez completed the top ten.
Rain held off throughout qualifying but is an ever-present threat at Malaysia and could well affect Sunday's race.
Hamilton had a skip in his step as he emerged from the car, in contrast to his post-race demeanor in Australia when he was very disappointed to have finished third after.
"I don't know if (pole) is the best place possible to start here, it's a long haul to turn 1," Hamilton said.
"It's about positioning, it's about tire management. It's a tricky circuit with the track temperatures and the humidity outside - it's going to be tough tomorrow."
Button was again second-best to his teammate in qualifying but the 2009 Malaysia winner will be bolstered by the memory of last weekend in Australia when he beat Hamilton off the line and went on to win the race.
"I can't complain too much - it's good for us as a team to be in the front row," Button said. "You want it the other way around, but Lewis did a great lap at the start."
"It'll be a long, hot afternoon tomorrow but I'm looking forward to it."
Schumacher came within two tenths of his first pole position for six years but Schumacher was enthused by the progress Mercedes is making.
"This was the maximum that was available," the seven-time world champion said. "It's a great achievement. When you think about who is behind us, who would have thought last year?"
Schumacher is a renowned strong starter in races, giving him a good chance of passing the two McLarens in the long drag to the first corner. The Mercedes is the fastest car on the long Sepang straights, but it remains to be seen if the team has cured it's problems in Australia when it was unable to convert qualifying speed into race pace.
Vettel's strategy of qualifying on harder tires will be negated if the tropical rains arrive Sunday and cars switch to wet-weather rubber. But should it stay dry, he could well leapfrog the leaders after the first set of pit stops.
"It's just a different strategy," Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said. "I don't think we had the single lap pace to take on McLaren. In the race we elected to do something different with the two cars so we'll see if it makes a difference tomorrow."
Ferrari improved marginally on a dire qualifying performance in Australia, and Alonso's renowned race craft and the possibility of showers will boost the Italian team's hopes of a good points haul despite its technical deficit in the early part of the season. Felipe Massa qualified 12th.
All 24 cars will start Sunday's race. The HRT cars just squeezed inside the threshold of being within seven per cent of the best time in the first qualifying session, having failed to do so in Australia.
The Associated Press | <urn:uuid:81007ecd-3e89-4ac5-a577-a5828af3a99d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2012/mar/24/hamilton-takes-pole-position-for-f1-malaysian-gp/ | 2013-05-22T00:38:53Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969603 | 752 |
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
First of Two New Series 400 Twin Otters Delivers to Papua New Guinea
(Singapore, February 14th, 2012): The Singapore International Air Show marks the delivery of the first of two new Series 400 Twin Otter aircraft sold to Ok Tedi Development Foundation of Papua, New Guinea. Despite a fleet of legacy Twin Otters operating within the country, this delivery will see Ok Tedi as the first Series 400 operator in the region.
The first aircraft on the Ok Tedi order is being handed over at the Singapore Air show prior to a three week demonstration tour throughout South East Asia, where the aircraft will be made available for viewing by commercial, military and government organizations, along with media. Stops will include Kuala Lumpur and Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, Jakarta and Surabaya, Indonesia, Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei, and Manila, Philippines. At the completion of the tour, the aircraft will transit through Cairns, Australia prior to final ferry flight to Papua New Guinea.
Both Ok Tedi aircraft will be utilized to support the company’s mining operations and as part of their community trust to service the local community in New Guinea, with the second aircraft set for delivery in mid-2012. The two-aircraft deal was coordinated through Loch Ard Otters International LLC. Loch Ard Otters was an original launch customer for the Series 400 Twin Otter program, and has a total of five aircraft with two option aircraft currently on order.
“We are very pleased to have placed these two aircraft with Ok Tedi. The Twin Otter 400 is an excellent aircraft and we are excited about offering lease and financing options for our additional positions,” said Matthew Lorentzen, President of Loch Ard Otters International LLC.
The growing popularity of the Series 400 Twin Otter around the world is largely due to its ability to operate from remote and unimproved airfields in any operating environment, due to its robust design and equalized maintenance program. It features many modifications that improve safety and increase performance over the Series 300 Twin Otter, the most notable of which is the integration of the Honeywell Primus Apex avionics suite. Other changes include upgraded Pratt & Whitney PT6A-34 engines, use of composite materials, light weight interior, simplified electrical and LED lighting systems, as well as value added options such as de-ice and air-conditioning.
Loch Ard Otters International LLC is a subsidiary of CAVU Management LLC, an aircraft investment and management group with headquarters in Palm Beach, Florida, USA.
Viking launched the new DHC-6 Twin Otter Series 400 production program in 2007, and currently has a production backlog estimated at over $350M. Viking provides OEM support for the worldwide fleet of de Havilland heritage line of aircraft (DHC-1 through DHC-7), and is part of Westerkirk Capital Inc., a Canadian private investment firm with substantial holdings in the hospitality, aviation and real estate sectors.
# # #
Robert Mauracher, Vice President, Business Development
Angela Murray, Marketing & Business Development | <urn:uuid:31acece8-e1a1-479f-8733-5d9bdb2e0c39> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.vikingair.com/content.aspx?id=6730 | 2013-05-22T00:22:28Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.922203 | 643 |
(CNN) -- As anti-American furor raged in the home of the Arab Spring, the top U.S. diplomat on Friday sternly warned countries where the unrest has been most pronounced: Stop the violence and seek justice against those attacking diplomatic missions, or else the United States will.
From Morocco to Malaysia, thousands of Muslims have taken to the streets in recent days.
Many have fumed over what Secretary of State Hillary Clinton described Friday as an "awful Internet video that we had nothing to do with" -- an inflammatory anti-Islam film posted online this summer and publicized in recent days.
The 14-minute film trailer, which was privately produced in the United States led by a man federal officials identified as Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, mocks the Prophet Mohammed as a womanizer, child molester and ruthless killer.
Protesters haven't all been violent, and they represent a fraction of their respective nations' populations: In Egypt, a nation of more than 80 million people, a few thousand have clashed with security forces outside the U.S. embassy in Cairo.
Still, confrontations have aggravated relations between the United States and other nations and led to several deaths -- including those of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three others killed in an attack Tuesday in Benghazi, Libya. The U.N. Security Council issued a statement Friday voicing "deep concern" over attacks on diplomatic posts, calling them "unjustifiable regardless of their motivations."
Clinton said such assaults are misguided and fly in the face of the better society many in these countries recently fought for when they overthrew authoritarian rulers.
"The people of Egypt, Libya, Yemen and Tunisia did not trade the tyranny of a dictator for the tyranny of a mob," she said Friday during a ceremony in which the bodies of the four killed in Benghazi returned to the United States.
"Reasonable people and responsible leaders in these countries need to do everything they can to restore security and hold accountable those behind these violent acts. And we will ... keep taking steps to protect our personnel around the world."
The contrast between then and now was especially evident in Tunisia, birthplace of the Arab Spring.
Two years ago, the self-immolation of street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi set off popular unrest that soon led to the downfall of Tunisia's longtime leader, President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
On Friday, hundreds of demonstrators -- some belonging to the Salafi movement -- were back on the streets of Tunis, setting their sights on the U.S. Embassy.
They burned cars, praised late al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, stormed the embassy complex and replaced the U.S. flag with their own black banner, according to witnesses. A nearby American school was "unusable" after being badly damaged, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.
Two people were killed and more than 20 wounded, interim Tunisian President Al-Munsif Al-Marzouki said later Friday on state-run TV.
While asserting the anti-Islam video that stirred outrage "cannot be justified by claims of freedom of opinion and speech" (and adding Tunisia plans to sue the filmmaker), al-Marzouki condemned the "irresponsible, unjustified acts of violence by protesters" who wrongly blamed the U.S. government for the film.
Anti-American protests -- some peaceful, some violent -- were hardly confined to Tunisia. Here's a breakdown of events Friday around the Muslim world:
-- In the Egyptian capital of Cairo, a running battle between police and protesters continued into its fourth day. There was a peaceful demonstration at Tahrir Square, though unrest erupted outside the U.S. Embassy as riot police continued to clash sporadically with protesters.
The Interior Ministry issued a statement saying 53 security officers were injured Friday, seven by birdshot. And birdshot was blamed for the death Friday of one protester, whom the Egyptian ministry described as an ex-convict with an extensive criminal record. Thirty of the 142 people arrested since the unrest began Tuesday remain in custody.
-- In Egypt's northern Sinai, Islamist Bedouins staged a protest, a security official said. Militants carrying automatic weapons breached a base housing international peacekeeping troops and burned trucks and a watch tower. The armed clashes injured at least four troops and an Islamist Bedouin. The 1,500-troop mission has supervised the security of the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty since 1979.
-- In Sudan's capital, Khartoum, protesters got inside the compound with Germany and Britain's embassies. They did not breach the British building, but some got into the German Embassy and pulled down a German flag before police with tear gas forced them to retreat.
At least two people died after being run over by a police vehicle, reported the state-run SUNA news agency, calling their deaths "an accident." Fifty policemen were injured and protesters set a police car on fire, the report said, citing police forces.
U.S. Vice President Joe Biden later Friday called his Sudanese counterpart, Ali Osman Taha, to "express his concern" and press Sudan to protect diplomats and their facilities in the African nation.
-- In Yemen, police opened fire to stop protesters from reaching the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa, eyewitnesses told CNN. Yemeni government forces were sent in and, by late in the day, surrounded the U.S. embassy compound, Nuland said.
-- Afghanistan saw its first demonstrations Friday. Hundreds in eastern Nangarhar province burned a U.S. flag and chanted "Death to America" and "We condemn the film." The demonstration lasted about an hour and ended peacefully, a local official said. The Afghan government has ordered an indefinite block of YouTube to prevent people there from watching the clips and staging violent protests.
-- In Gaza, several thousand gathered after Friday prayers and chanted anti-American and anti-Israeli slogans and burned effigies of U.S. President Barack Obama.
-- In Syria, hundreds of protesters outside the U.S. Embassy in Damascus waved placards condemning the film and blaming the U.S. administration for allowing it to be produced and broadcast, the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency reported.
-- In Lebanon, hundreds took to the streets in the northern city of Tripoli, attacking and burning down a KFC restaurant. One person was killed and 25 others wounded in scuffles between protesters and security forces.
There also were protests in Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Turkey England, Israel, Nigeria, Malaysia, Bangladesh and India among other locales.
Demonstrations were not unexpected: On Thursday, the FBI and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security warned there could be more violence "at home and abroad as the film continues to gain attention."
And days before violent protests Tuesday in Egypt, the U.S. Embassy in Cairo was warned by the U.S. intelligence community of concerns about the anti-Islam film that sparked the uproar, a U.S. official told CNN. The cable sent to the embassy did not mention a specific threat. It only warned about the existence of the online movie and the fact that it was gaining attention.
U.S. authorities have discounted as false a producer's claims to news outlets that the filmmaker was an Israeli who made the movie with financing from more than 100 Jewish donors. Israel's government denies that the film's maker is Israeli.
Despite the firm condemnation by U.S. government officials, some in the Muslim world -- especially those raised in regimes in which the government must authorize any film production -- cannot accept that a movie like "Innocence of Muslims" can be produced without being sanctioned by Washington, said Council of Foreign Relations scholar Ed Husain.
"They're projecting ... their experience, their understanding (that) somehow the U.S. government is responsible for the actions of a right-wing fellow," said Husain, a senior fellow at the New York think thank.
Latest on the investigation into U.S. ambassador's killing
Sources tracking militant Islamist groups in eastern Libya say the Tuesday attack that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens was most likely carried out by a pro-al Qaeda group.
Four people have been arrested in connection with the attack, although they were not directly tied to the killings, said Monem Elyasser, the chief aide to Libya's prime minister.
Elyasser did not release identities or detail the allegations against the four in custody.
The evidence leading to the arrests was based partly on witnesses, but "mostly pictures that were taken around the compound at that time," Libyan Prime Minister Mustafa Abushagur told CNNI's Christiane Amanpour.
Mohammed al-Megaryef, president of Libya's General National Congress, said he was "100% sure that (the attack) was preplanned, and it was carried out with the intention to inflict all this damage, all this havoc" -- including rocking relations between Libya and the United States. He called for "the international community" to help Libyan security control militant groups behind such violence.
Contrary to al-Megarye's assertion, White House spokesman Jay Carney said Friday that U.S. authorities know of "no actionable intelligence" that indicates the Benghazi attack "was planned or imminent."
The United Nations has asked its non-Libyan staff to temporarily leave Benghazi and head to Tripoli as a "precautionary measure," said Radhia Achouri, head of the U.N. Mission in Libya.
And since Tuesday's assault, the U.S. has announced it will fly unmanned drones over Libya and dispatch two warships carrying guided missiles -- the first of which has already arrived off the coast of Libya.
U.S. Marine teams have been dispatched to Libya as well as Yemen and Sudan to safeguard American diplomatic posts in those nations, according to U.S. officials.
"Although these security forces are equipped for combat, these movements have been undertaken solely for the purpose of protecting American citizens and property. These security forces will remain in Libya and in Yemen until the security situation becomes such that they are no longer needed," Obama said.
CNN's Harmeet Singh, Kareem Khadder, Mohammed Tawfeeq, Arwa Damon, Ben Wedeman, Hamdi Alkhshali, Brian Walker and Elise Labott, and journalists Masoud Popalzai, Zied Mhirsi, Isma'il Kamal Kushkush contributed to this report. | <urn:uuid:b414ead4-5962-4f31-8b6b-4869ecfc9659> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://asia.cnn.com/2012/09/14/world/meast/embassy-attacks-main/index.html?hpt=hp_t1 | 2013-05-24T08:29:42Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966318 | 2,160 |
Philippines – the coconut country
Philippines, in Southeast Asia, is also known as the Republic of the
Philippines. The country covers an area of 299,700 square kilometers
and has a population of 82.7 million, of which 85% are Malay. Other
groups include Indonesians, Chinese and so on. Residents are
Catholic. Filipino is the language, and English is also spoken. The
currency is the peso. The capital is Manila (Manila).
A white equilateral triangle is located to the side, inside of which
there is a yellow sun, with yellow five-pointed stars at the
corners. The right side of the flag is blue and red, usually blue
over the red after the last war. As the sun represents freedom,
eight represents the initial eight provinces and the rest represents
other provinces. The three five-pointed stars symbolize the three
regions: Lu case, Samar, and Mindanao. Blue symbolizes loyalty,
honesty, and integrity, and red symbolizes courage, while the white
symbolizes peace and purity.
The Philippines was originally a number of indigenous tribes,
separatists from the Kingdom of Malay. In 1521, Magellan led a
Spanish expedition to the Philippines. Spain occupied the
Philippines in 1565 and ruled the Philippines for over 300 years. On
June 12, 1898, the Philippines declared independence, establishing
the Republic of the Philippines. In the same year, the United States
and Spain, after their war, signed a "Paris Treaty" concerning the
occupation of the Philippines. In 1942, the Philippines were
occupied by Japan. After "World War II," the Philippines once again
became a U.S. colony. On July 4, 1946, the United States was forced
to agree to the independence of the Philippines.
Economic and Cultural Customs
The economy dominated by agriculture, with 20% of the population
involved in agriculture. Coconut, sugar cane, tobacco, and Ge Ma are
the four agricultural specialties of the Philippines. One fifth or
more of the population is directly involved in the coconut industry.
Ge Ma fiber is solid and resistant to seawater corrosion, an
excellent raw material for marine cables. Northern Luzon cigars are
made of tobacco leaf produced in the Phillipines and are
world-renowned. Industry is primarily in the manufacturing, mining,
fuel, and power sectors. Philippines flowers are said to be the
"Garden Island" and "Pacific fruit plate." Lush fruit, such as
coconut, mango, pineapple, durian and other fruits are delicious.
Filipinos love to wear bright colors and a simple skirt-like sarong,
and they also love to sing and dance, especially the opening and
closing jump of the bamboo pole dance. A popular pastime is cock
fighting on Sundays and holidays; it is legal in the cock-fighting
The Coconut Palace is a large modern building constructed using
coconut. Reclamation of the new district is located in Manila. Of
hexagonal roof construction, a total of 2000 trees were used for
more than 70 years of age at the completion of the palace. The roof
was built using coconut wood, while a coconut column was constructed
of dry wall made of coconut fiber (shell hair) and cement. Bricks
and doors are inlaid with coconut shell pieces in the composition of
4000 geometric patterns. Lamps, chandeliers, floor clocks, and the
dining table are made from coconut shell. The palace has a
restaurant with a dining table inlaid with 47,000 pieces of
different shapes of coconut shell. Using a coconut tree for the raw
material for carpet, furniture, handicrafts and so on is
fascinating. The palace has 150 coconut trees planted around it, and
with forest green grass, flowers and trees, it is a unique delight.
Bana Wei Titian
In Northern Luzon in the Philippines, in Ifugao province, there is a
mountain with rice terraces that are more than 2000 years old.
Ancient working people transformed this with their hands. The
mountain is steep, and the terraces were constructed through ancient
hard work. The two to four meters high outer terrace is built of
huge stone blocks, with a the total amount of material larger than
the pyramids of Egypt. With a total height of 2,400 meters, its
majesty is crazy. According to statistics, the total length of the
irrigation canals on the terraced mountain are thousands of meters
above 1.9, almost a half circle around the Earth's equator.
On the southeastern tip of Luzon is the Philippines largest active
volcano, one of the most famous in the world. Rising 2416 meters
above sea level, the perimeter is 138 km. The top of the conical
volcano was hailed as "the world's most perfect volcanic cone." It
stands in the middle of green rice fields and plains and is covered
with coconut trees. is the mountain is majestic, tall, and straight.
During the day, the volcano is continuously emitting white smoke
which covers the hills. At night, smoke Chenganhongse, the volcano
stands like a huge triangular candle holder in the night sky. Very
Also known as North Dye Falls, Pagsanjan is located within the Lake
province, south of Manila. Water rushes down the "giant waterfall,"
which is famous. Visitors can canoe down the river; the closer they
get to the bottom, the faster the water goes. Cliffs tower over the
sides, palms sweep past the vistors, and there are many small
waterfalls. To reach Great Falls, take a bamboo raft across the
Great Falls infiltration transfer holes. Great Falls falls hundreds
of feet down the mountainside into one lake. Very spectacular. | <urn:uuid:b4b38b7f-2f6e-4509-a387-674cdf0db95d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://countries.bridgat.com/Philippines.html | 2013-05-24T08:44:34Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933536 | 1,250 |
Date: February 8, 2012
Creator: Williams, Brock R.
Description: The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a proposed regional free trade agreement (FTA) currently under negotiation between Australia, Brunei, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States, and Vietnam. The negotiating partners have expressed an interest in allowing this proposed “living agreement” to cover new trade topics and to include new members that are willing to adopt the proposed agreement's high standards. This report provides a comparative economic analysis of the TPP countries and their economic relations with the United States. It suggests that the TPP negotiating partners encompass great diversity in population, economic development, and trade and investment patterns with the United States. This economic diversity and inclusion of fast-growing emerging markets presents both opportunities and challenges for the United States in achieving a comprehensive and high standard regional FTA among TPP countries.
Contributing Partner: UNT Libraries Government Documents Department | <urn:uuid:03263d9e-be11-4eee-878b-14aabf162a3d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://digital.library.unt.edu/explore/collections/CRSR/browse/?fq=str_location_country%3AChile&fq=str_location_country%3AUnited+States | 2013-05-24T08:56:47Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930921 | 193 |
Note to Students, Parents and Teachers:
This Educational Insight is Hinduism Today magazine's response to the controversy in California over the way Hinduism is taught in public-school history books. It is a 16-page lesson on Hindu history, beliefs and practices for sixth graders written from the Hindu point of view. It is historically sound and acceptable in content and tone to the various denominations of the Hindu community.
The problem with every existing textbook for this grade level is that Hinduism is presented negatively, incompletely and inaccurately. This lesson is patterned after a typical chapter on the other faiths in these same books. It deliberately does not follow the specific California standards for presenting the Hindu religion because we believe them to be deeply flawed and contrary to the State's own general rule that teaching material must: 1) be historically accurate, 2) "instill in each child a sense of pride in his or her heritage" and 3) avoid "adverse reflection" on a religion. It is our intent that this lesson will serve as a model for US textbooks, providing an authentic depiction of the eminent history and traditions of the faith while giving 10-year-old Hindu students justifiable pride in their religion.
In most states teachers are allowed to supplement the textbooks with additional material. This lesson may be offered as a more accurate basis for the classroom study of the origins and development of Hinduism in ancient India.
Hinduism Today's Teaching Standards: At the beginning of each of these chapters sections, we present our outline for Hinduism in 6th grade history books. It is intended to replace existing lists of required topics, such as those found in the California Standards.
1. Explain the similarities between Indus-Sarasvati civilization and later Hindu culture.
2. Discuss why the Aryan Invasion theory has been disputed by many scholars.
3. Discuss the social and political system and advancement of science and culture.
4. Explain the development of religion in India between 1000 bce and 500 ce.
What You Will Learn...
1. Many Hindu religious practices are seen in the archeological remains of the Indus-Sarasvati civilization.
2. The sacred texts of Hinduism are in the Sanskrit language and were originally memorized but unwritten.
3. Ancient Indian art and science were highly developed.
The Big Idea: Hinduism developed over thousands of years in India.
Key Terms: Indus and Sarasvati rivers; Vedas; Sanskrit
If YOU lived then...
Your house is built on a wide, waterless riverbed. Your father tells you it was once the giant Sarasvati River, five kilometers across. There is not enough rain to provide for the family's crops and cattle. Travelers tell of another great river, the Ganga, hundreds of miles away. Your father and other villagers decide they must move.
How would you feel about the long journey?
Building Background India's known history begins with the Indus-Sarasvati civilization, 5,500 years ago. We know from archeology that this culture shows many features of later Hindu practice.
Understanding Ancient Indian History
The early cities of India developed along the Indus and Sarasvati rivers starting around 3500 bce. They are called the Indus-Sarasvati civilization or, sometimes, the Harappan culture. It was the largest and most advanced civilization in the ancient world. But the mighty Sarasvati River dried up, and what was once a fertile area became a desert. The people of the region moved to other parts of India and beyond. By 2000 bce the civilization had entered a period of decline.
The Religion of the Indus-Sarasvati People
A great many artifacts have been discovered from the Indus-Sarasvati cities. These include pottery, seals, statues, beads, jewelry, tools, games, such as dice, and children's toys, such as miniature carts.
The flat, stone seals have pictures and writing on them. Scholars have not yet agreed on what the mysterious script on the seals means.They show deities, ceremonies, symbols, people, plants and animals. We learn from them that people at that time followed practices identical to those followed by Hindus today. One seal shows a meditating figure that scholars link to Lord Siva, while others show the lotus posture used by today's meditators. The swastika, a sacred symbol of good luck used throughout Hindu history, is common.
There are statues, including a small clay figure with its hands pressed together in the traditional Hindu greeting of "namaste."
A figurine of a married woman shows a red powder called sindur in the part of her hair. Hindu women today follow this same custom as a sign of their married status. The pipal tree and banyan tree are depicted often. These remain sacred to Hindus to this day.
The central holy books of Hinduism are the four Vedas. Hindus regard them as spoken by God. They are in Sanskrit. The Vedas were not written down but memorized. Students might spend twelve years learning these scriptures. Some would memorize one Veda, others all four. Even today there are priests who can chant an entire Veda--as many as 10,500 verses--from memory.
The relationship between the people of the Indus-Sarasvati civilization and those who composed the Vedas is not clearly understood. We know that the Rig Veda describes the Sarasvati as the "most mighty of rivers" flowing from the Himalayan mountains to the ocean. Therefore, the holy texts had to be composed well before 2000 bce--by which time the river had dried up. The Vedas describe a powerful and spiritual people, their clans, kings and emperors. Their society was complex. The economy included agriculture, industry, trade, commerce and cattle raising. The Vedas contain thousands of hymns in praise of God and the Gods. They describe a form of fire worship, yajna, around a specially-built brick fire altar. In several Indus-Sarasvati cities archeologists have unearthed what look like fire altars.
The Aryan Invasion Theory
Many school books present an "Aryan Invasion" of India. It is the theory that Aryan invaders came from central Asia in 1500 bce and conquered the indigenous Indus-Sarasvati civilization. It was these foreigners, the theory states, who wrote the Rig Veda in Sanskrit. The theory was proposed in the 19th century by scholars in Europe, based on language studies. In part, it tried to explain why Sanskrit is so closely related to European languages, including English. Many scholars now dispute this theory because all the evidence for it is questionable. Additionally, modern scientists have found no biological evidence, such as DNA, that people came from outside India in significant numbers since at least 6,000 bce.
Many common explanations about Indian history and culture are based on the Aryan Invasion theory. Those who defend it claim that Sanskrit, the caste system and Hindu ways of worship came from outside India. If you are studying India in school, you may read about this outdated theory.
As the Indus-Sarasvati culture declined, many of its people migrated to other places. They settled mostly in north and central India, especially along the Ganga River system. They interacted with tribes who had lived in those areas from ancient times. Around 1000 bce, the Tamil-speaking Dravidian people in the South had separately developed a sophisticated language and culture. Because of inadequate archeological research, we do not know a lot about this period. However, by 600 bce, India had developed a common culture from north to south and east to west. By this time the social, religious and philosophical ideas and practices central to Hinduism are fully evident. These are in continuity with the religion of the Indus-Sarasvati culture, the teachings of the Vedas, Dravidian culture and elements of the tribal religions.
Hindu public worship, described in the Vedas, took place in temporary shelters built for that purpose. The earliest mention of permanent temples for the worship of God is in the Grihya Sutras, around 600 bce.
A distinctive feature of India at this time was the varna or class system. Society was classified into groups with specific occupations. These groups tended to become hereditary. There were four broad classes--priests, warriors, merchants and workers (including craftsmen). The system provided order and stability to society. Later on, the varnas divided into hundreds of sub-sections called jatis (castes). Individual jatis developed a strong identity and pride in their occupation. From time to time people would move from one caste to another, or establish new ones. The evolving caste system became unfair to the people at the very bottom of the social order. Though caste is still an important factor in arranging marriages, caste discrimination is illegal in modern India.
Women have always been held in high regard in India. Some of India's foremost religious and political leaders are women. Hinduism is the only major religion in which God is worshiped in female form.
Life in ancient times was hard work for both men and women. The women were responsible for running the household; the men for their craft or farm, as well as security. In general, women had fewer property rights than men, but received lighter punishments for crimes and paid fewer taxes. They participated equally with their husband in religious ceremonies and festival celebrations. Some women were highly educated, and a few even composed several of the holy Vedic hymns.
The period from 1000 bce through the Gupta period up to the mid-6th century ce was a time of great advancement. Hindus discovered the zero and established the counting method, including the decimal system, we use today. Their astronomers knew that the Earth orbits the Sun and calculated the length of a year with great precision. Medicine was so advanced that doctors were performing complex surgery not equaled in Europe until the 18th century. In ancient times India was one of the most advanced and wealthy nations on Earth. Since ancient times, a quarter of the world's people have lived in India.
Impact Today: The disputed Aryan Invasion theory is still taught as fact in most books on India
continuity: unbroken connection or line of development
hereditary: passed from parents to children
Timeline: Early Indian History
5000 BCE: Beginning of Indus-Sarasvati cities
2600-2000 BCE: Height of Indus-Sarasvati civilization. The city of Lothal includes large buildings and an enclosed harbor.
2000 BCE: Sarasvati River dries up. People move to North and Central India.
600 BCE: India is a unified culture at this time. Large cities flourish in the Gangetic Plains. Indian physician Sushruta develops complex methods of surgery. Tamil language flourishes in the South. First mention of temple worship appears in the Grihya Sutras.
500 BCE: Magadha Empire in the North and Pandyan Kingdom in the South flourish. Buddhism and Jainism, offshoots of Hinduism, become prominent religions.
321 BCE: Foundation of the pan-Indian Maurya Empire. Time of great advancement in science, statecraft, economy, architecture, music and art.
200 BCE: Tiruvalluvar composes Tirukural, one of India's greatest scriptures on ethics
200 CE: Hindu influence starts to spread into what is now Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. In 1200 ce, the Hindu temple called Angkor Wat is built in Cambodia. It is the world's largest religious structure.
320 CE: Gupta Empire reigns over most of India, with Tamil kingdoms in far south. This is the Golden Age of India and Hinduism, with respect and tolerance for all religions.
Section 1 Assessment
Reviewing Ideas, Terms and People
1. a. Explain: What happened to the Sarasvati River?
b. Analyze: What customs from modern Hinduism are depicted in artifacts of the Indus-Sarasvati civilization?
2. Elaborate: What are the advantages of a hereditary occupation? What are the disadvantages?
3. a. Summarize: How are women regarded in Hindu society?
b. Recall: What are some of the great scientific achievements in ancient India?
4. a. Explain: How were the Vedas preserved?
b. List: What kind of information is in the Vedas?
c. Explain: Why is it important that the Rig Veda mentions the Sarasvati River as a "mighty river?"
5. Analyze: What does your school history book say about the Aryan Invasion? How does this lesson differ?
Section Two: Hindu Beliefs and Scriptures
Hinduism Today's Teaching Standards:
5. Explain the basic Hindu beliefs regarding God, the Gods and Goddesses, dharma, karma and reincarnation. Describe basic Hindu practices.
6. Discuss the Hindu principles of nonviolence and religious tolerance.
7. Describe the Vedas and their Upanishads, Ramayana, Mahabharata (including the Bhagavad Gita) and other important Hindu scriptures.
What You Will Learn...
1. Hindus believe in a one Supreme God and also many Gods and Goddesses.
2. Dharma, karma and reincarnation are central Hindu beliefs. There is a special emphasis on nonviolence.
3. Vedas are the primary Hindu scriptures. There are other important scriptures as well.
The Big Idea: Hindus believe every soul will ultimately achieve God Realization.
Key Terms: Sanatana Dharma, Brahman, deva, puja, karma, reincarnation,
If YOU lived then...
The king has passed a new law increasing the taxes on farmers. The farmers in your village have not had a good year. The harvest is smaller than usual. The new tax may mean people will go hungry. Some in the village want to attack the tax collectors. Others want to lie about the amount of harvest. Still others say a peaceful protest will cause the king to change his mind on the tax increase.
How would you respond to the tax increase? Why?
Building Background: From its beginnings, Hinduism has been an open-minded religion. It is a basic Hindu belief that there are many ways to approach God. Hinduism does not dictate one way as the only way. Hindus believe "Truth is one, paths are many" and that every person eventually finds spiritual salvation.
Religion Permeates the Hindu's Daily Life
Hindus base their way of life upon their religion. The Hindu culture comes from Hindu beliefs. The key beliefs are in a one Supreme God, subordinate Gods and Goddesses, heaven worlds, the divinity of the soul, dharma, karma, reincarnation, God Realization and liberation from rebirth. God Realization means the direct and personal experience of the Divine within oneself. The original Sanskrit name for Hinduism is Sanatana Dharma, meaning "eternal religion."
Belief in God and the Gods and Goddesses
Hindus believe in and worship a one Supreme God. In the scriptures, the Supreme God is called Brahman or Bhagavan, worshiped as both male and female. Brahman is all-powerful, all-knowing, all-loving and present in all things. God created everything in the universe out of Himself. This creation is not separate from Him. He guides the evolution of everything over vast spans of time. Ultimately, He absorbs the universe back into Himself. This cycle of creation, preservation and absorption repeats without end.
The Supreme God is both transcendent and immanent. These are two key philosophical concepts. As transcendent, God exists beyond the physical universe. As immanent, His divine form pervades all nature and humanity.
In Hinduism, the soul is called atman. God exists within each soul. The Chandogya Upanishad explains it like this: "What you see when you look into another person's eyes, that is atman, immortal, beyond fear; that is God."
Hinduism has different branches with varying beliefs and practices. The four major branches are Saiva, Shakta, Vaishnava and Smarta. Saivas and Shaktas call the Supreme God Siva, though Shaktas worship the female aspect of God. Vaishnavas call Him Vishnu. Smartas may choose one of six Deities to worship as the Supreme. By whichever name or form, He is the same, one Supreme God. The Rig Veda says, "The seers call in many ways that which is One."
Hindus may also worship Gods and Goddesses, called devas, such as Ganesha and Sarasvati. In Sanskrit, deva means "shining one." In some ways, these divine beings who live in the heaven worlds are like the angels and archangels in Western religions. Some Hindus consider the Gods and Goddesses as alternative forms of the Supreme God, and not as individual divine beings.
Each God and Goddess has particular powers and areas of responsibility. For example, Ganesha is the Lord of Obstacles. Before beginning a new project, a Hindu may pray to Ganesha to remove any obstacles blocking his way.
In the Vaishnava tradition, Lord Vishnu appears on Earth as a divine personality, or avatar, from time to time to restore morally right living. Of Vishnu's ten avatars, Lord Rama and Lord Krishna are the most important. Rama and Krishna are not separate Gods. They are two forms of the one Supreme God.
In temples and shrines, the Supreme God and the Gods and Goddesses are worshiped in a ritual called puja. Puja is a ceremony in which the ringing of bells, passing of flames, chanting and presenting of flowers, incense and other offerings invoke the Divine beings, who then come to bless and help the devotees. During the puja, through holy chants, gestures and sacred ritual, highly trained priests guide the worship. The priests treat the Deity with utmost care, attending to Him as the King of kings. The purpose of the puja is to create a high religious vibration and communicate with God or a deva through the murti, or consecrated statue, that is the focus of worship. Deity is the proper English word for murti. The word idol is often used, but it is incorrect.
Hindus also practice internal worship of God. Sitting quietly, they may repeat the name of God while counting on beads. Others may chant, sing or meditate upon God. In Hinduism, there are many ways to worship the Divine.
Dharma, Karma and Reincarnation
Dharma means righteousness, divine law, ethics, religion, duty, justice and truth. Dharma means the proper way one should live one's life. To follow dharma, one should be religious, truthful, kind, honest and generous. Dharma includes the practice of nonviolence, called ahimsa in Sanskrit. It is the ideal of not injuring others in thought, word or action.
Karma, a central Hindu belief, is the law of cause and effect. It means that anything you do will eventually return to you in this or future lives. If we do something selfish or hateful, we will in time experience the same pain and suffering we caused to others. If our acts are good and kind, we will receive goodness and kindness.
Reincarnation means literally to "re-enter the flesh." It is the belief that the soul, atman, is reborn in a new body, experiencing many lifetimes. The purpose of rebirth is to progressively achieve spiritual maturity and God Realization. Eventually each soul learns to live by religious principles and avoid creating negative karma. The process of reincarnation continues through many lives until the soul achieves liberation.
Hinduism's Sacred Scriptures
The four Vedas are the holiest scriptures for all Hindus. The Upanishads, an important part of the Vedas, explain the Hindu philosophy. The next most important scriptures, also in Sanskrit, are the Agamas. There are specific Agamas for each major tradition in Hinduism--Saiva, Shakta and Vaishnava. The Agamas explain philosophy, personal conduct, worship and temple construction. There are hundreds of other scriptural texts dealing with religious and secular law, government, social order, economics, ecology, health, architecture, science, music, astronomy and many other subjects. The Puranas are encyclopedic accounts of the forms and avatars of God, the many subordinate Gods and divine beings, creation, spiritual teachings, historical traditions, geography and culture. The Tirukural is a Tamil masterpiece on ethics and moral living. The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali explore yoga and meditation.
The Ramayana and Mahabharata are two sacred epic histories of India. The Ramayana is the story of Lord Rama, who is the seventh incarnation of Lord Vishnu, and his divine wife Sita. This 24,000-verse poem describes Prince Rama's birth, His banishment to a forest for 14 years, the abduction of Sita by the demon Ravana and Rama's victory over Ravana. The Ramayana remains immensely popular to this day in India and Southeast Asia.
The Mahabharata, "Great India," is a 78,000-verse story of a massive war that took place in ancient times between the Pandavas and their cousins, the Kauravas, for the throne of a great kingdom. It also describes the nature of self and the world, karma, important family lineages of India, human loyalties, saints and sages, devotion to God and the ideals of dharma. Lord Krishna, the eighth incarnation of Lord Vishnu, is a key figure in the epic. A central episode called the Bhagavad Gita narrates Krishna's dialogue with the Pandava archer, Arjuna, on the day of the battle. It is one of the most popular and revered among Vaishnava and Smarta scriptures. Hindu sacred music, dance, drama and the arts draw heavily on the Ramayana, the Mahabharata and the many Puranas.
The Hindu principle of ahimsa, or nonviolence, is important today. Mahatma Gandhi, a devout Hindu, said, "Nonviolence is the greatest force at the disposal of mankind. It is mightier than the mightiest weapon of destruction devised by the ingenuity of man." By nonviolent means Gandhi largely won India's independence, using peaceful protests, boycotts, strikes and speeches. In the 1950s, Martin Luther King, Jr. studied Gandhi's methods and went to India to meet his followers. He learned how India's nonviolent movement worked and applied the same methods to fight for and win civil rights for America's black minority. Aung San Suu Kyi, a devout Buddhist, has campaigned without violence for years to win democracy for the people of her native Myanmar (Burma). In 1991 she won the Nobel Peace Prize for her peaceful struggle against the country's military dictatorship. Another example is Cesar Chavez, who won rights for California farm workers using nonviolent methods.
Analysis Skill: What are the advantages of nonviolence over violence in bringing about social change?
subordinate:lower in rank, less important
pervade: to be present throughout
encompass: to surround and hold within
consecrated: made sacred through ceremony
invoke: summon a Deity; appeal to
secular: activities or things not related to religion
Section 2 Assessment
Reviewing Ideas, Terms and People
1. a. Define: What is Sanatana Dharma?
b. Explain: What is a deva?
c. Elaborate: What are the two key terms used by Hindus to describe the Supreme God?
2. Categorize: What are the four main branches of Hinduism?
3. a. Recall: Why do Hindus pray first to Lord Ganesha?
b. Identify: What are the two most popular incarnations of Lord Vishnu?
c. Explain: What is the purpose of the Hindu puja?
4. a. Explain: What is karma?
b. Illustrate: What are some examples of following dharma?
c. Explain: What is the purpose of reincarnation?
5. Summarize: Make a list of Hindu scriptures, starting with the Vedas.
6. Evaluate: Why do Hindus believe that there are many ways to approach the Supreme God?
7. Understanding nonviolence:
Write a paragraph explaining your way to deal with the tax increase example given on page six. Do you think a nonviolent approach would succeed?
Sacred Texts: An Excerpt from the Upanishads
Translated by Swami Prabhavananda
and Frederick Manchester
The Upanishads are the part of the Vedas that teach philosophy. The word upanishad means "sitting by devotedly," as a student sits near his guru to learn. This excerpt is taken from the Kena Upanishad. It explains the nature of the Supreme God, called Brahman in Sanskrit.
Try to sum up the meaning of each sentence in your own words.
Once the Gods won a victory over the demons, and though they had done so only through the power of Brahman, they were exceedingly vain. They thought to themselves, "It was we who beat our enemies, and the glory is ours."
Brahman saw their vanity and appeared before them as a nature spirit. But they did not recognize Him.
Then the other Gods said to the God of fire, "Fire, find out for us who this mysterious nature spirit is."
"Yes," said the God of fire, and approached the spirit. The spirit said to him: "Who are you?"
"I am the God of fire. As a matter of fact, I am very widely known."
"And what power do you wield?"
"I can burn anything on Earth."
"Burn this," said the spirit, placing a straw before him. The God of fire fell upon it with all his might, but could not consume it. So he ran back to the other Gods and said, "I cannot discover who this mysterious spirit is."
Then said the other Gods to the God of wind: "Wind, can you find out for us who he is?"
"Yes," said the God of wind, and approached the spirit. The spirit said to him: "Who are you?"
"I am the God of wind. As a matter of fact, I am very widely known. I fly swiftly through the heavens."
"And what power do you wield?"
"I can blow away anything on Earth."
"Blow this away," said the spirit, placing a straw before him. The God of wind fell upon it with all his might, but was unable to move it. So he ran back to the other Gods and said, "I cannot discover who this mysterious spirit is."
Then said the other Gods to Indra, greatest of them all, "O respected one, find out for us, we pray you, who he is."
"Yes," said Indra and humbly approached the spirit. But the spirit vanished, and in his place stood Goddess Uma, well adorned and of exceeding beauty. Beholding her, Indra asked:
"Who was the spirit that appeared to us?"
"That," answered Uma, "was Brahman. Through Him it was, not of yourselves, that you attained your victory and your glory."
Thus did Indra, and the God of fire, and the God of wind, come to recognize Brahman, the Supreme God.
philosophy: a theory or attitude that guides behavior
vain: excessively proud
consume: to destroy completely, as by fire
adorned: beautifully dressed
beholding: looking at something remarkable
attained: won; achieved
Understanding Sacred Texts
1. Analyzing: Hindus believe that the Supreme God is immanent. That means He exists everywhere in the universe, in everyone and everything. How does this belief appear in the story?
2. Comparing: What is the difference between Brahman, the Supreme God, and the other Gods introduced here--Indra, the God of fire and the God of wind?
3. One verse says that the Gods were vain. What test did the Supreme God put them through?
4. Indra took a different approach to finding out who the spirit was. Why did he succeed when the others failed?
Section Three: Hinduism in Practice
Hinduism Today's Teaching Standards
8. Describe the spread of Hinduism outside of India in ancient and modern times.
9. Describe the daily observances of Hindus, home and temple worship, religious teachers and the major festivals.
10. Explain how Hinduism has survived over the last 5,000 years.
What You Will Learn...
1. Hinduism has spread outside of India several times.
2. Hinduism is the third largest religion in the world.
3. Hindus practice religion at home and in temples and through the many festivals.
The Big Idea: Hinduism is the oldest world
religion flourishing today.
Key Terms: samskara, bindi, puja, swami, Kumbha Mela
If YOU lived then...
You are born in Fiji in 1910. Your parents were brought from India by the British to work in the sugarcane fields as indentured laborers. Now they are free of debt and own farmland. The public school is OK, but your parents want you to go to the best private school. The principal there says you must leave Hinduism and convert to his religion before you can enroll.
What do you think your parents would do?
Building Background: Hinduism is the only major religion from the distant past that is still vibrant today. It survived because of its tradition of home-centered worship, because of its rich teachings and many religious leaders, and because it is not merely tolerant of other religions but respects the validity of all spiritual paths.
Traditions and Holy Days
Hinduism is the oldest living religion in the world. There are today nearly a billion Hindus worldwide, 95 percent of whom live on the Indian subcontinent. Hinduism continues to thrive for many reasons. Its followers find answers to their deepest questions about the mysteries of life. With personal religious practices, pilgrimage to sacred shrines, temple- and home-centered worship, Hindus strive for God Realization. And through celebration of the yearly cycle of vibrant and colorful festivals, they experience great blessings and joy.
There are five basic practices, pancha nitya karmas, often observed by Hindus. They are to: 1) worship daily, 2) follow dharma, 3) observe the samskaras (rites of passage), 4) celebrate the holy days and 5) go on pilgrimage to sacred places. Other practices include meditation, chanting of mantras, study of scripture, hatha yoga and other yoga techniques, and simple austerities, such as fasting. There are many samskaras, including a child's name-giving ceremony, the first feeding of solid food, the beginning of formal education and marriage. It is a common practice for Hindu women to wear a bindi, a red dot on the forehead. A similar mark, called tilaka, is worn by men at the temple or on ceremonial occasions. This forehead mark symbolizes many things, especially spiritual vision.
Worship in the Home
Every Hindu home has a place of worship. It may be as simple as a shelf with pictures of God or an entire room dedicated to worship. Many families have a spiritual guide or guru whose picture is displayed in the shrine. There, the family may light a lamp, ring a bell and pray daily. The most devout hold a formal morning worship ritual. They offer flowers, incense, lights and food to God while chanting sacred verses. Individual members will often go to the shrine for blessings before leaving for school or work. At other times one may sit alone in the shrine, pray and chant the names of God, read from scripture, meditate silently or sing devotional songs.
Hindus prefer to live within a day's journey of a temple. The temple is a special building, revered as the home of God. The main Deity is enshrined in the temple's central sanctum. In India, there are hundreds of thousands of temples, most quite ancient. Temples in India can be enormous, covering many acres, having vast pillared hallways that can accommodate 500,000 devotees during a festival. Often one or more families of priests oversee the temple and conduct the worship over many generations. When Hindus migrate outside India, they build a temple as soon as possible. At first, community leaders themselves conduct the daily rituals. Later, professional priests are hired. There are now hundreds of Hindu temples in America. The largest are in New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Texas and California.
The temple worship ceremony, or puja, is usually performed by a priest from India. During the ceremony, he worships God by chanting Sanskrit verses from the scriptures and performing arati. Arati is the waving of an oil lamp in front of the Deity while bells are rung. The priest also offers flowers, sweets and fruit. These offerings are then distributed to the devotees as a blessing from God. Hindus may visit the temple throughout the day to worship and meditate.
Hinduism's Saints, Teachers and Swamis
Hinduism has a rich history of saints and sages, both men and women. Their lives are educational and inspiring. They come from all castes. Some saints, such as Adi Shankara, have written detailed explanations of the Vedas and other scriptures. Other saints, such as Mirabai, Tukaram and Sambandar, taught through devotional songs. Recent saints include Sri Ramakrishna and Anandamayi Ma. Their deeply religious lives have uplifted millions of Hindus and others worldwide.
There are hundreds of thousands of religious scholars and teachers, both men and women, known as pundits. Some give spellbinding discourses on sacred scriptures, including Ramayana and Mahabharata. Tens of thousands may attend such gatherings, which include storytelling, preaching, devotional singing and drama. These events often go on for days or even a month.
Hinduism has millions of swamis and other holy persons. Swamis are unmarried men (and some women) who have taken up spiritual life full time. Swami means "he who knows himself." Some live in monasteries; others wander as homeless mendicants. Swamis are the religious ministers of Hinduism. Many swamis teach, others run large institutions that perform social service for their communities, and still others live alone and meditate long hours each day in their pursuit of divine enlightenment. Special among these are the holy gurus. Gu means darkness and ru means remover. So guru literally means "the one who removes darkness." These men and women are great religious teachers, some with millions of followers. Several gurus have popularized the Hindu practice of yoga by establishing training centers all over the world. No one person or institution is in charge of Hinduism. Instead, there are thousands of independent spiritual traditions, monastic orders and religious institutions.
The Yearly Festival Cycle
There are many religious festivals celebrated by Hindus each year. They are observed at home, in temples and public places. Most Hindu festivals are observed according to an ancient solar-lunar calendar. Several festivals honor the avatars of Lord Vishnu. For example, Ram Navami celebrates the birth of Lord Rama in March/April. Krishna Janmashtami, in July/August, celebrates the birth of Lord Krishna.
Mahasivaratri takes place in February/March, when devotees fast and worship the transcendent Lord Siva all night in the temple. Diwali, or Dipavali, is the biggest festival of the year. It is dedicated to Lakshmi, the Goddess of Wealth, and takes place in October/November. Navaratri is the second largest festival. It lasts nine days and takes place in September/October. It is dedicated to the worship of the Goddess, Shakti. in her three forms: Durga, the Goddess of Protection; Lakshmi, the Goddess of Wealth, and Sarasvati, the Goddess of Knowledge.
Holi, in March/April, is a highly spirited festival where everyone sprinkles each other with colored water and powders. It signifies the triumph of good over evil and marks the beginning of the winter crop harvest. Vaikasi Visakham (May/June) is sacred to Hindus, Buddhists and Sikhs. Guru Purnima is a special festival to honor one's spiritual teacher, or guru. It takes place on the full moon day in July. There are also many social festivals in India, such as Pongal. It is held in January and celebrates the incoming harvest.
One special festival, the Kumbha Mela, takes place in a twelve-year cycle. Hindu saints and millions of devotees travel to certain sacred rivers at an auspicious time for worship. The 2001 Kumbha Mela was held at Prayag (modern Allahabad) in North India. It was attended by 70 million people, including 30 million on January 24 alone. This was the largest religious gathering ever held on the Earth.
Hinduism is the oldest world religion. It accepts that there are many ways to worship God. It has endured for so long because the religion and culture have instilled in each Hindu a unique and strong sense of identity and community. The Rig Veda concludes, "Let there be everlasting unity and peace among all human beings."
Hindu Migration Through the Centuries: Hinduism has spread outside of India in several waves. First it was adopted by cultures throughout Southeast Asia through the 12th century ce. Second, in the 19th century many Hindus moved to the various European colonies, such as South Africa, the Caribbean and Fiji. And most recently, Hindus migrated to more than 150 countries in the 20th century.
The biggest Hindu festival of the year is Diwali, or Dipavali, the Festival of Lights, celebrating the victory of good over evil, light over darkness. It takes place for five days around the new moon in October/November. It also honors the return of Lord Rama to Ayodhya after 14 years in exile. Lakshmi, the Goddess of Wealth is invoked for prosperity, and Her presence is felt in every home. Hindus thoroughly clean the house, take a special bath and put on new clothes. Thousands of small lamps, including traditional clay oil lamps (pictured at right), are placed everywhere and fireworks signal hope for mankind. It is a national holiday in India and in many countries with large Hindu populations. Some Hindu festivals take place mostly at home, such as Raksha Bandhan, which is on the full moon in July/August. Sisters tie a rakhi, or colored thread, around the wrist of their brothers. In return, the brother gives his sister a present and promises to protect her. The rakhi can also be given to anyone chosen as an "adopted brother."
Analysis Skill: How do festivals help remind people to be more kind and generous to one another?
The Impact Today: There are Hindu temples in nearly every country of the world
indentured: under contract to work for a certain number of years
austerity: a difficult practice of self-denial and discipline
meditate: think deeply about, go within yourself or seek God within
mendicant: a holy person who lives by begging
auspicious: a favorable time--for the Mela, as determined by the Hindu calendar
Section 3 Assessment
Reviewing Ideas, Terms and People
1. a. List: What are the five basic practices of Hinduism?
b. Define: What does the bindi, red dot, signify?
c. Explain: How do Hindus use their home shrine room?
2. List: What are the various kinds of priests and holy men and women in Hinduism?
3. a. Explain: What is the year's biggest Hindu festival?
b. Define: What is the meaning of the rakhi bracelet?
c. Recall: What is special about the Kumbha Mela?
d. Elaborate: Why has Hinduism lasted so long?
4. List: Make a list of three columns. In the first column write the name of a major Hindu festival. In the second, put the time of year it occurs. In the third list what it celebrates.
5. Understanding Hindu practices: Why do you think Hindus want to live near a temple?
Chapter One Standards Assessment
Directions: Read each question and circle the letter of the best response
1. Evidence for what form of worship in the Vedas was
found by archaeologists in the ruins of the Indus-
2. The Indus-Sarasvati civilization ended because:
3. The Aryan Invasion theory was based upon:
4. Which discovery was not made in ancient India?
5. Evidence of Hindu temple worship can be as early as:
6. Which of these descriptions does not apply to women in ancient India?
7. Which of these words does not describe the Hindu concept of the Supreme God?
8. Hindus believe that the devas, such as Lord Ganesha or Goddess Lakshmi, are like:
9. Which of the following is not used in nonviolent protests?
10. The Hindu scriptures include:
11. Hindus believe that every other religion:
12. How many countries do Hindus live in today?
13. The saints of Hinduism are:
14. The biggest religious event in the world is:
Internet Resources: Go to http://www.hinduismtoday.com/education/ for a PDF version of this lesson with clickable links to resources. Also at the same url are additional teaching resources and letters of endorsement from academics and community leaders. To order additional copies of this educational insight, go to http://www.minimela.com/booklets/. | <urn:uuid:a325e483-bc6f-4d6e-a4ec-e222078825a1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://hinduismtoday.com/modules/smartsection/print.php?itemid=5091 | 2013-05-24T08:43:59Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949371 | 8,768 |
Posts from the ‘Labor’ Category
UDON THANI – Earlier this year, the Ministry of Labor announced plans to increase the number of Thais employed overseas by 10% to more than 600,000 workers. In addition to maintaining existing markets for Thai labor (in countries such as South Korea, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei) and pursuing new markets (including Finland, New Zealand and South Africa), the Ministry hopes to encourage a renewed demand for Thai construction workers in the Middle East. But in some of Thailand’s first labor-sending communities, the effects of migrant labor programs have settled in and enthusiasm for working abroad has all but dried up.
Baan Na Tha Kai, situated some 14 kilometers outside of Udon Thani, is one such Thai community that began to send many men to work in the Middle East more than 35 years ago. There is little in Baan Na Tha Kai to signify the community’s rather exceptional history. Like most Northeastern villages, Baan Na Tha Kai is comprised of clusters of traditional wooden stilt houses, many of which have been modified with concrete to resemble conventional two-story homes. Yet, just beyond the houses, paddy land adjoins a military base through a battered, chain-link fence.
The base is one of seven which housed American Air Force units during the Vietnam War. The origin of many of the bombing missions which decimated Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, the base provided dollars and jobs for the villagers of Baan Na Tha Kai who previously had little opportunity to work off of their rice fields.
“Thirty, forty years ago, people were not working in Bangkok [like today]”, a retired 64-year-old former base worker and migrant to Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Israel recalled. “There was mostly farming. Some people worked in sawmills or in construction in Nong Khai, Khon Kaen and Udon Thani. Then the Americans came. People who had left the community came back to work and lots of people from other places came in.”
Having grown accustomed to the steady source of income that service, security, and manual labor jobs on the base provided for more than a decade, villagers suffered when the Americans suddenly withdrew in 1976. Even so, when a former American soldier tried to recruit labor for multinational construction and resource extraction companies in the Middle East, he found few takers. “We were scared,” the former base worker explained. “We didn’t know where these places were or what they would do to us there.”
The exception, many villagers recalled, was the late Noy Rawsiklao. According to village lore, Noy’s heavy debts rendered him receptive to the American’s proposal. When Noy returned home flush with money the following year, Baan Na Tha Kai took notice. It is unclear whether Noy spoke of the desert heat, the lack of amenities and women, the prohibitions on alcohol, or the exploitative working conditions about which other returned migrants would later complain. When villagers recall Noy and his triumphant 1977 return, they speak only of how rich he appeared. A 55-year-old former migrant explained, “Noy told us, ‘Next time someone invites you to go to Saudi Arabia, you go.’”
By and large, the men of Baan Na Tha Kai took Noy’s advice to heart. Villagers recalled that at the height of the Middle Eastern migration craze in the 1980s, men from nearly every household in three of the four villages that comprise Baan Na Tha Kai were working abroad. But now, as the government plans to rebuild the labor market for Thais in the Middle East, it will likely need to seek labor from other areas of Thailand.
In the mid-2000s, overseas migration began to fall out of favor in Baan Na Tha Kai. A village official estimates that, today, at most 30 people from Baan Na Tha Kai’s approximately 1000 families are working abroad.
“The trucks haven’t even run through here for the past two years,” a shopkeeper confided, referring to the employment agents who used to disrupt the quiet afternoon air with recorded loudspeaker messages about riches to be earned in foreign lands.
Villagers suggest that there is one main reason that migration has recently become so unpopular: Employment agencies have significantly raised their fees for arranging migration. “The word has gotten out,” explained the shopkeeper. “People pay well over 100,000 baht to go to Taiwan. Then in two years in Taiwan they only make [around the same amount]…It’s like you worked for free.”
Expenses required for migration have historically created a high barrier to success. An old Thai aphorism describes the plight of migrants whose earnings fall short of their spendings: “On going, you lose your rice field; on coming back, you lose your wife.” Many migrants are forced to mortgage their family’s land in order to pay the employment agencies’ exorbitant fees. And, while they are away, their marriages can sometimes fall apart. Upon return, the migrants who have been wronged by their foreign employers or have encountered other financial hardships rarely have the funds to buy back their land or the ability to win back their wives. Villagers estimate that those whose migration cost them their homes and families amounted to under 20% of migrants.
“Some of them literally went crazy upon return”, a successful migrant said, explaining the fate of the less fortunate. “But most would go down to Bangkok to work in construction after losing their rice land [and homes].” Construction work often offers on-site housing for laborers.
And, as employment agencies’ fees have steadily increased, the threat of returning home without savings today is far greater than it was three decades ago.
At the same time, economic opportunity is beginning to present itself at home, further discouraging interest in working abroad. “Now you can make 200 to 300 baht a day [in construction in Thailand], 500 to 600 if you have skills,” said the shopkeeper, pointing to construction work being performed on the nearby railroad. More than that, said another former migrant, “If you have 100,000 baht [to pay for agency fees], it would be better to start a business in Thailand.”
In early February, Department of Employment (DOE) director Prawit Kiengphon authorized the return of Thai workers to Libya. More than 10,000 Thai refinery and construction workers were evacuated from the North African nation in March 2011 after an uprising broke out which resulted in the overthrow of Mu’ammar al-Gaddafi’s authoritarian regime. As thousands of Thais are mobilized for employment in Libya, it is time to consider whether the state’s labor export program sufficiently represents the interests of Thai transnational migrant workers. Is it truly safe for Thais to be deployed to Libya? And should the state be doing more to protect the financial interests of its migrant citizens?
Profits come with mortal risks
The Thai state has been promoting the overseas employment of Thais, most of whom are drawn from the country’s poorest and least developed Northeastern region, for more than three and a half decades. It competes with more than a dozen Southeast and South Asian states for lucrative employment positions in overseas labor markets.
In January 2012, Sri Lanka permitted its migrant citizens to return to Libya. In response, Mr. Prawit asked the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) to hastily verify that conditions in Libya are safe before Thai jobs were lost to Sri Lankan workers. In his February announcement, Mr. Prawit made no reference to Sri Lanka. Instead, he simply stated that the Thai Embassy in Libya had determined that conditions had returned to a state of normalcy.
However, the DOE’s responsibility for verifying the safety of destination countries is potentially comprised by its duty to promote overseas labor migration. A new Ministry of Labor policy charges the DOE with increasing the number of Thais employed overseas by 10% in 2012 to a total of 600,000 workers. This goal would be farther from reach if the Libyan labor market was lost. Prior to last year’s uprising, Libya ranked as the sixth most common destination of the more than four dozen countries which receive Thai labor.
A recent Amnesty International report which depicted Libya as a troubled nation where “lawlessness” prevails stands in stark contrast to the Thai Embassy’s assessment of normalcy. The report details the continued existence of “hundreds of large militias” that are “largely out of control… their actions threatening to destabilize Libya”. In addition, it documents how “frequent armed clashes between different militia groups” have resulted in the death and injuries of “uninvolved bystanders”.
It is not only Amnesty’s report that casts doubt on the stability of the situation in Libya. The DOE’s new regulations which apply to Thai employment agencies supplying Libyan employers indicate that the DOE is concerned that Thai migrants may be affected by future unrest. Now, employment agencies must ensure that migrants sent to Libya are protected with life insurance policies. In addition, agencies must submit evacuation plans and written assurances that they will shoulder the costs of any future evacuations.
The new regulations ensure that the Thai government will not have to foot the bill for a costly evacuation as it did following the 2011 uprising. Yet while the regulations mitigate the financial risks that the Thai state incurs in the export of labor to Libya, they do nothing to lessen the financial risks assumed by Thai migrants. As became apparent when Thai workers returned unexpectedly from Libya last year, these risks for migrants are substantial.
Paying the price for labor export
Unfortunately, employment agencies generally charge Thai job-seekers under the table service fees in excess of the government stipulated limit. According to Mr. Daeng Phiwdam, an Udon Thani native who has worked in Libya for most of the past fifteen years, first-time migrants to Libya are charged approximately 90,000 baht in agency fees which they typically pay with money borrowed at high interest rates. Mr. Daeng estimates that it takes one and a half to two years for most migrants to recover their agency fees with their 10,000 baht per month Libyan salaries.
When migrants are forced to return home prematurely, they often come home saddled with debts that are difficult to recover in the domestic labor market. According to a Ministry of Foreign Affairs report, only 40 of nearly 10,000 Thai workers in Libya chose not to return home when the uprising broke out in February 2011. However, Mr. Daeng explained that the prospect of returning without money to pay an agency debt is often more daunting than that of remaining in a war-ravaged country. “If you stay you die, if you go home you also die because you are in debt and there is no way of recovering it,” said Mr. Daeng.
A second problem resulting from last year’s evacuation is that many migrants returned to Thailand with outstanding salary claims. Given that it is not uncommon for migrant workers in Libya to be paid once every three months, the amounts owed to many migrants were not insignificant. According to DOE statistics, nearly one year after the workers returned, roughly a quarter still have unresolved salary issues with their Libyan employers.
Returned migrants, especially those with outstanding employment agency debt, are likely anxious to resume work in Libya. Now the DOE has given them the green light to take up residence in the still-troubled African nation. The DOE has implemented measures to reduce the financial burden that it will incur in the event of future unrest in Libya. It should also do the same for migrants. The DOE should implement regulations which require employment agencies to refund most of workers’ agency fees if they are prematurely returned to Thailand through no fault of their own. In addition, the DOE should more aggressively pursue salary claims on behalf of Thai migrant workers. It should also consider implementing regulations which require Libyan employers to pay Thai migrants on a bi-weekly or a monthly basis. Finally, it is high time for the Thai state to reconsider whether its labor export program is truly in the best interests of its citizens. When unemployment is less than one percent domestically, why is the Thai state concerned about losing employment positions in a war-ravaged nation? The DOE’s efforts would be better directed toward creating more highly remunerative employment positions at home. | <urn:uuid:17e37305-800e-4118-8cca-114ffcb00216> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://isaanrecord.com/category/labor/ | 2013-05-24T08:37:09Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967763 | 2,616 |
……. (can we see the similarities between what happened years ago to what is happening now? A leopard cannot change its spots. A party doesn’t change its malicious ways no matter how much they are saying otherwise..)
In the 1970s the favourite political gimmick employed by DAP was to either ‘boycott parliamentary sessions and state assemblies’ or to stage ‘walk-outs’ even if the event was an important one such as Budget presentation. In 1970, 13 DAP MPs boycotted the Budget speech at the Dewan Bahasa on December 22nd, and the habitual boycotting of Parliamentary and State Assemblies became the norm of DAP’s political tactic and style for years to come.
Why is DAP adopting this irresponsible mode of representing the voters when it accused others of the same? Will such boycotting contribute to nation-building? DAP has an impeccable record of boycotts, the national education consultative council and numerous walkouts in Parliament and State Assemblies.
When DAP is not invited to give their views, the Opposition accused the BN of being undemocratic and dictatorial; but when they are invited, they have nothing to contribute. Instead they staged political gimmicks to obtain cheap publicity and political mileages. For once voters in the DAP constituencies should convey a strong message in protest against DAP’s trampling politics.
This contradiction is a typical example of DAP leadership since its founding years. Its wishy washy political policies are always subjected to the whims and fancies of its leadership depending upon the political moods of DAP leaders in exploiting the political circumstances of the day. In 1972, two DAP National Vice Chairmen left the opposition citing many of the current DAP leaders as “opportunistic, unprincipled and hankering for personal power and glory”. Many of the DAP staunched leaders like Goh Hock Chuan, Dr A. Soorian who had earlier condemned the policies of the Alliance, came to realise the ‘final truth’ of the DAP in later years.
By June 20th 1972, DAP lost four of its 13 MPs and twice that number of Assemblymen. The DAP was split in Perak, Negeri Sembilan, Selangor, Melaka (the whole committee of Melaka Branch resigned in August) and Penang. The DAP fell foul of old friends with whom it had an election understanding in 1969 and refused membership of the National Consultative Council (just as it boycotted the NECC in 1989) and boycotted KL City Day. The DAP was virtually in the ‘dumps’. Dr A. Soorian, former DAP national vice chairman was expelled because he was increasingly ‘critical’ of Lim Kit Siang for having betrayed the trust and ideal of the DAP as laid out by founder members such as Devan Nair. Lim Kit Siang’s leadership according to the former DAP leader, had no fixity of purpose or sense of direction, and “Kit Siang behaves as though the DAP belongs to him”.
4. DAP devoid of ideologies and principles
As early as 1967, precisely on 5th October, 28 years ago, current DAP Chairman Dr Chen Man Hin who held the same position then, said that the DAP was a multiracial party which would ‘never’ desert its cause by aligning itself with a racialist party, (quote): “… be it the Pan Malayan Islamist Party (currently PAS) or any other chinese or indian chauvinist party” (unquote). In 1971, DAP secretary general outdone his Chairman by saying (quote) : “The DAP must learn from the mistakes of compromising with political opportunists. The people must not repeat the mistakes of desiring on “opposition unity” at “whatever costs regardless..” (unquote).
Yet, seven years later in 1978, the same Lim Kit Siang made a generous offer to PAS to work together “in the name of benefitting all Malaysians”. The pertinent question we have to direct to Lim Kit Siang is that: “What benefits have all Malaysians received from the DAP-PAS political “marriage of convenience”? We know that DAP has played a key roe in assisting PAS in capturing Kelantan State government. We know that the Kelantanese chinese community is living in fear and apprehension of PAS in imposing the proposed Hudud laws and all types of restrictions in the name of PAS Islamic rules are being enforced, restricting Kelantanese chinese community’s rights and freedom to their economic and cultural practices.
Yet, DAP was willing to sacrifice those purported principles it so gallantly preaches by covering up PAS’ misdeeds and seeks electoral pact with PAS to fulfil Lim Kit Siang’s personal ambition of becoming Penang Chief Minister. In 1990, Lim Kit Siang stated openly in the Malaysian Press that DAP was more than willing to work with PAS to further “its own interests”. In other words, DAP National Chairman Dr Chen Man Hin’s open declaration not to align with PAS was meant either to ‘deceive’ the voters or that DAP is void of “principles”. Can Malaysian voters place their trusts upon DAP national leaders who have no principles, and having been exposed to have said something at a particular time but doing something else at another time!
Kit Siang realising his past follies and own lies had caused uneasiness within his own rank and file is trying to make amends by recently “covering up with another lie” that DAP will go to the polls “alone” suggest that DAP will distance itself from PAS. Should Malaysians voters believe again and again these lies? Should Malaysians in the coming general elections, increase DAP representation knowing that DAP rank and file are powerless to stop their “unscrupulous” Kit Siang’s lone ranger actions and absolute powers. Kit Siang being an old fox is bound to change his political tactics to woo public sympathies by “lying” that he is old and ought to be given a last term in Penang state. In the 1990 general elections, did Kit Siang give Lim Chong Eu a last chance to serve the constituents? The answer is obviously ‘no’., Kit Siang is too arrogant and in 1990, politically killed Lim Chong Eu.
Now that Koh Tsu Koon has replaced Lim Chong Eu for Gerakan in Penang, it is time that Lim Guan Eng should replace Kit Siang in DAP. What assurances are there to stop DAP from exercising “dictatorial rule” in Penang, exactly the way Lim Kit Siang runs DAP? Greater liberalisation in supporting DAP means a support of “tyranny” (unjust rule by a person or small group of people who have power over everyone else in the state or party).
5. DAP & educational policies
DAP has no constructive educational policies. Since its founding years, the party’s policy has been one of opposing for the sake of opposing. When MCA initiated the Tunku Abdul Rahman College, the DAP in 1968 “accused the MCA of using education to produce a race of fanatics who were prepared to sacrifice ordinary laws to the party machinery (source: NST 16th September 1968)”. [JMD - very much like the DAP law-breakers we have now..]
It further slandered MCA by saying that TAR College teachers would be “indoctrinated with the beliefs of MCA and that text books would be written to glorify MCA”. The DAP compared MCA’s proposed TAR College to schools in Germany turning out Hitler’s Youth who graduated into the Gestapo.
This is the type of opposition leadership within DAP of yesteryears and the quality of its leadership has since deteriorated by employing new political gimmicks, malicious methods and destructive means to keep the DAP afloat. Not only does DAP wants to do nothing to the cause of Malaysian education, the DAP leadership also wants “others” not to do anything worthwhile towards education our younger children. Envious and jealous of MCA initiating the TAR College in 1968, the DAP spread malicious lies, sowed seeds of suspicions and doubts among the community just to sabotage a beneficial community project. If DAP had been successful in sabotaging the TAR College project, hundreds of thousands of Malaysians would be deprived of educational opportunities and careers. To be exact, 40,500 TAR College graduates would be deprived by DAP of their educational opportunities and thousands of careers wiped out at the costs of nation-building.
Today, DAP lies have been proven to be malicious and has further proven that those DAP leaders who made such lies are liars. None of these graduates has been ‘indoctrinated” by MCA and not a single graduate turned out to be a Hitler Youth! [JMD - but these days it is alleged that most students in UTAR are pro-DAP. Irony.]
There is a mentality among voters who support the DAP for the very reason that the opposition was needed to “voice their grievances” and to provide “checks and balances” in government. In reality, DAP is “morally and ethically incapable of voicing your grievances for the very simple reason that DAP leadership is no longer capable to protect your interests. DAP is predominantly occupied by protecting its own political survival.
Recently the dAP has adopted “new political technologies” to survive. It has mastered the art of “claiming credits” to its name. Never mind, whether the achievements are economic, political or social related. Malaysia’s development progress is attributed to DAP’s existence! And DAP hopes to “hoodwink” the voter in the street even though it might be an insult of intelligence to the man on the street. Another “political technology” employed by DAP since Tanjong Two failed to materialise was to “beg” for sympathies by threatening to “resign”.
Lim Kit Siang during his 25 year political career as DAP Secretary General has threatened to resign no less than 50 times either within DAP or to the electorate, an average of two threats per 12 months of his political office. His practice of using “tricks and threats” to solicit sympathies is synonymous to Lim Kit Siang’s norm and childish prank he endears to, in order to keep absolute power.
DAP has been this way since its inception. Wither Malaysia should they are given another chance to wield power in Pakatan Rakyat. | <urn:uuid:6cb8f950-425c-4852-8d7d-048017220f8e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://jebatmustdie.wordpress.com/2012/06/07/ideological-weaknesses-of-dap-leadership-part-2/ | 2013-05-24T08:51:39Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963776 | 2,304 |
Andy's a good tennis player. Correction: Andy is a great tennis player. He loves the competition and intensity of the game and is known for his dominating serve.
Recently Andy developed a sharp pain in his elbow. At first he thought nothing of it and continued his training, but the pain became unbearable. The pain was so bad he went to see his doctor, who informed him he had elbow bursitis.
What Is Bursitis?
From your head down to your big toes, your body has lots of differently shaped and sized joints. Many have something in common near the area of the joint — a customized fluid sac that provides cushioning for movement and pressure. These small cushions are known as bursae (a single one is called a bursa). Bursitis is the term used to describe inflammation or irritation of a bursa. Bursitis can result from a direct hit or from repetitive joint movements (like a tennis serve).
If a bursa becomes irritated, either by a direct hit or from a nearby joint repeating the same movement (like a tennis serve), then bursitis can occur. People can also get bursitis when the body has to change its balance or movement to adapt to differences; for example, if a person has one leg that's longer than the other.
Bursitis, especially in teens, is often likely to happen because of sports-related injuries, usually from repeated use of a particular joint or trauma from a direct hit in a contact sport. It's not only sporty types who get bursitis, though. It can sometimes be caused by other problems, such as arthritis or a bacterial infection of the bursa.
Here are some of the areas in which teens most commonly get bursitis:
Elbow. Because the elbow is an essential part of many activities, like throwing a ball or swinging a tennis racket, elbow bursitis is one of the most common types of bursitis in teens.
Knee. Bursitis in the knee can be the result of falling directly on the knee or any activity that requires long periods of kneeling.
Hip. Bursitis of the hip is often associated with running injuries.
Shoulder. Bursitis of the shoulder can be the result of something as simple as an awkward fall or as complicated as a rotator cuff injury (the rotator cuff keeps the shoulder secure).
Ankle. Someone who goes overboard jumping, running, or walking can get ankle bursitis. Just wearing the wrong type of shoes for a particular activity can lead to ankle bursitis.
How to Detect Bursitis
Bursitis can cause a number of different symptoms:
Pain and sensitivity in or around a joint. This is the most common and obvious sign that a person may have bursitis.
Difficulty moving the affected joint. This happens because the bursa has swollen and made it tough to move the joint properly.
Reddening of the skin. The inflamed bursa may cause the skin around the joint to change color.
Burning. The irritated bursa can cause the skin to sting and feel warmer than usual.
In most cases, you will probably be able to treat bursitis at home.
The key part of at-home treatment, as with many injuries, is rest. Besides resting the affected joint or region, to help get rid of bursitis try:
Ice ice, baby. Ice should be used on the bursitis while the inflamed area is still warm to the touch. Ice can be applied several times a day for up to 20 minutes. Icing the area will also help to lessen the swelling that can occur with bursitis.
The heat is on. Putting heat on the joint when it is no longer warm to the touch can reduce the pain. As with ice, don't apply heat for more than 20 minutes at a time.
Elevation. Raising a joint that is swollen for any reason can help to reduce swelling. That goes for bursitis, too. If possible, elevate the affected joint so it is above the level of the heart.
Under pressure. Avoid placing pressure on the joint. This will aggravate bursitis rather than help it to heal.
Just like a pill. Anti-inflammatory drugs like ibuprofen may help.
Bursitis is often the result of a hard impact on a joint or overworking a joint, and sometimes these injuries are unavoidable. But there are some steps you can take to avoid getting bursitis:
Stay in shape. Working out regularly strengthens muscles and joints, which helps protect against bursitis.
Don’t overdo it. Too much of anything can be bad, and the same goes for overworking joints.
Start and stop workouts properly. One of the best ways to prevent bursitis is by working out properly. Warming up and cooling down are essential parts of working out and should never be skipped. Gradually starting and stopping your workout is less stressful for your joints and body.
Stretch it out. Stretching not only helps improve flexibility but it is also useful in preventing bursitis.
Mix it up. Whether you're rotating exercises while lifting weights or just taking a breather from a strenuous activity, your joints will thank you.
Better padded than sorry. Use cushions on wooden or metal chairs and kneepads when kneeling on hardwood or concrete floors to help reduce the risk of developing bursitis. Also avoid putting extreme amounts of pressure or weight directly on joints.
Keep it moving. Don't stay planted on your butt, knees, or other joints for long periods of time. Even if it's for a few minutes, get up and move around.
If you realize that a particular activity causes you to get bursitis, stop doing it and talk to your doctor or coach about safer methods.
Be on the lookout for bursitis if you participate in a sport. The best way to avoid it is by using the proper techniques and equipment. If your bursitis was caused by something like ill-fitting shoes or other equipment, replace that equipment with something that fits you better. | <urn:uuid:0cb4a7a5-044c-4f87-82bd-c55097a9ffbe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kidshealth.org/PageManager.jsp?lic=222&dn=LomaLindaUniversity_ChildrensHospital&article_set=53995&cat_id=20133 | 2013-05-24T09:05:30Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9553 | 1,280 |
Toyota, Mitsubishi, Honda, Mitsubishi, Subaru, Mazda, Nissan, and the other Japanese Makes
Toyota, Mitsubishi, Honda, Mitsubishi, Subaru, Mazda, Nissan, and the other Japanese Makes
In the previous post on Mitsubishi FTO, I’ve mentioned Japanese car maker’s reluctance on making affordable performance cars in the past decade or so. This painted a pretty bleak picture for sports car enthusiasts (who aren’t also super loaded).
There’s good news on the horizon. Apparently this trend might see a reversal with the news of the concept car from Toyota – the FT-86
The FT-86 is pretty much inspired by the popularity of AE-86 that is made popular by the comic series Initial-D. Nicknamed the tofu car, AE-86 has a huge cult following especially in the drift racing series, and still cheered upon whenever appeared at Autocross events.
A collaboration between Subaru and Toyota, the FT-86 is to come with a new 2 liter Toyota-Subaru “D-4S” Boxer engine. Targeted to cost around US $20,000 when it is eventually launched, that’ll place it cheaper than a fully loaded Honda Accord (or Toyota’s own Camry for that matter).
I, for one, welcome Japanese manufacturer’s return to this segment, 6 speed manual with 2.0 liter boxer sounds like a good combination to me.
Check out wiki page for more details.
In the early 1990s, the Japanese car makers offer quite a good lineup of pretty affordable sports cars. Cars that were geared towards enthusiasts who aren’t necessarily fixing their midlife crisis.
Mitsubishi had two models that fit into the category, the GTO (and Dodge Stealth), and the little brother, the FTO.
FTO stands for “Fresh Touring Origination”, and it is really a sleek little car that is rather capable. Equipped with a 2.0 liter MIVEC V6 engine with 24 valve. The car produces up to 200ps at 7500 rpm without an aid of a turbo. Quite impressive.
The 0-100 km/h speed is in the mid to high 6s mark, not quite as impressive as its closest rival, the Toyota MR2, but would still beat over 80% of the cars out there with it’s NA engine in FF configuration.
- Engine: 6A12 2.0 L DOHC 24v MIVEC V6
- Weight: 1200 kg
- Wheel base: 2,500 mm (98.4 in)
- Power: 197bhp
- 0-100 km/h: 6.5s (GPX version)
- Top speed: 225 km/h
The second (or third of many hand) FTOs are now trading in Malaysia for about RM 40-50k region. Since FTO was produced only from 1994 to 2000. There aren’t many of them around anymore, so if you can get your hands on one in awesome condition, I’m sure you won’t regret it.
After all, how many cars were in Jackie Chan’s movie Thunderbolt (1995)as one of the main characters? Check out the video below for some old time classic!
Not too long ago my Toyota MR2 was having a weird problem. The car would be able to start, but after running for a while it would stall, and have very bad air fuel mixture, black smoke and all. After consulting with several owners, one suggested that I check for leaked capacitors on the ECU as that might be one of the causes.
ECU located at the rear boot
The ECU on second generation Toyota MR2, in this case a 1991 3S-GTE version, is located at the rear boot wall that is seperating the boot from the engine, just behind the carpet. You will need a Philip screw driver and if I remember correctly, a 9 or 10 mm wrench to undo the mounting.
look at the 3 connectors at the bottom of the ECU
There are 3 connecting sockets located at the bottom part of the ECU. You should be able to disconnect them without much effort. The 3 connectors are of different sizes, you can’t go wrong when putting the thing back together. Do note that you should always disconnect the car battery and properly ground yourself before diving into such endeavour.
the 3 connectors
The ECU consists of two PCB boards, take off the 2 screws connecting both and you will be able to expose the innerds. In my case, I did not find any leaking capacitors. The problem was later found out to be caused by a faulty airflow sensor.
the capacitors on the ECU
More technical info on MR2 can be found on this page, including the Engine error code and how to diagnose them.
Mazda 6 is the Japanese car maker’s flagship sedan going head to head in the market dominated by Honda Accord and Toyota Camry. I was fortunate to test drive the 2.3 liter Mazda 6 a couple weeks ago at the Mazda showroom in Petaling Jaya during their launching of the long awaited Mazda 3 in this country.
the handsome Mazda 6
The 2.3 liter powertrain is good for around 166 hp, similar to the 2.4 liter iVTEC engine from Honda Accord. The Mazda, however, feels a lot more zippy during acceleration (8.9s to 100km/h). This might due to the curb weight of 1390kg, some 60 kg lighter than the Accord. As I floored the accelerator while in the fully automatic mode, the engine revved up to almost 7,000 rpm before switching gear, I guess the 6 does deliver some zoom zoom spirits.
a nice driver’s car
The 6 speed triptonic gives you the flexibility to change gears when you feel like having some spirited drive, and it is intelligent enough to not let the driver over-rev or bog down the engine. As I found out when putting the car on 2nd gear driving up hill, when the I stopped the car, it automatically dropped to 1st. Very nice. The car feels pretty good around the bend too, does not have too much body roll for a car it’s size.
the cockpit of Mazda 6
The car looks great on the outside, the interior does not dissapoint either. The 2.3 liter version comes with full leather interior, including all the seats, door panels, and even the shifter and handbrake. In dash 6 CD changer comes standard with a pretty decent in car steroe system.
6 speed automatic with tiptronic
The cockpit backlight is red in color and are pretty driver oriented. Other than the standard speed, techo, water temperature and fuel, the gear is also displayed, very useful while on tiptronic mode. Stereo and auto cruise controls are conviniently placed on the steering wheel.
the center console
Instead of the usual 2 air conditioning vents in the middle, the 6 comes with 3, this is pretty good for the rear passanger. However, there is no individual climate control like the one found in the 2.4 Honda Accord. There is only one single temperature control.
2.3 mazda 6, side view
Priced at around RM 160-170 thousands, the Mazda 6 2.3 is in direct competition with the 2.4 Toyota Camryand Honda Accord. While 2nd hand value of Mazdas might be lower in this country as compared to the other two Japanese brands, the Mazda 6 does offer a very good alternatives for it’s performance and arguebly higher asthetics. If only they offer the 2.3 turbo version that puts out 273 HP..
Extra: video of Mazda 6 on the mazda malaysia website here.
The Toyota MR2 club organised a convoy to Ulu Yam at Selangor on the New Year’s day. Though most of us had partied the night before, about 13 cars and over 20 people still managed to show up for the fun drive on the first morning of 2006. There were 3 MRS, an MK1 MR2 with super charger, 7 SW20 MR2s, an EVO, and an S2000. By about 11am, we have had our breakfast at McDonald’s near the Curve and was on our way to the Petronas petrol kiosk before heading off to Ulu Yam.
filling it up for the trip
I had some trouble starting up the car at the petrol kiosk, but after the guys removed and put back the relay, it seems to be fine again. So we started our journey to Ulu Yum. About 20 kilometers later, we regrouped at Selayang. It was there my car stalled at idle and refused to be started again, most probably due to some electrical problems. We left our car there and I followed another member to continue the convoy.
passing by Batu Caves
this was where my car stalled
By the time we regrouped again at another petrol station. Another MR2 faced with a mechanical problem and had to abort the convoy as the clutch would not engage. The car had to be towed back, it was lucky we weren’t at the hilly area of the jorney yet.
We then reached Ulu Yam and had lunch at Hock Lay restaurant. Ordered steamed fish, asam prawn in coconut shell, vege, deep fried squid, guiness chicken wing, and tofu. It was very good, and at RM 15 per person including drinks, pretty reasonably priced too. We then decided to go to Fraser’s Hill instead.
lunch at Hock Lay restaurant
negotiating the bend
At Ulu Yam the elevation was only 75 meters above sea level, by the time we reached the foothill of Fraser’s, it was already 800+ meters up and the temperature was pretty nice and cooling, feeling like air conditioned atmosphere. A very welcoming breeze especially when KL averages more than 30 Celcius.
As the road going up to Fraser’s hill (8km) is small and only wide enough for a single car, the authority sets up a system whereby the traffic is alternate every half an hour between going up and downhil. We waited at by the gate for quite some time before we got to go up to the top. The drive up the hill was curvey and very tight. The guys enjoyed it alot.
going up to Fraser’s hill
installing the spare tyre inside out
Well, 3rd time is the charm. Sure enough, we had the third casualty of the day. Another MR2 had a flat tyre on top of Fraser’s hill. We put in the spare tyre in the reverse way since it wouldn’t fit otherwise due to the rear brake. It had the maximum offset look that was rather hillarious. By then it had started drizzling and was pretty foggy. We decided to call it a day.
About an hour later we go back to where I left my car. Luckily, after resting for some 8 hours, I was able to start the car without too much trouble, and drove all the way back home pretty smoothly. However, the car stalled again in the car porch at home. Will have to get a mechanic to sort out the problem soon.
There are alot more photos at the Gallery. Enjoy! | <urn:uuid:15b7a455-be16-46bd-aca7-b5456fb96fec> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kydrives.net/category/cars/japanese-make/ | 2013-05-24T08:36:55Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958646 | 2,403 |
Facing criticism, biofuels industry forms new lobby group to influence lawmakers
July 25, 2008
The group, known as the Alliance for Abundant Food and Energy, was created by Archer Daniels Midland Co, DuPont Co, Deere & Co, Monsanto Co and the Renewable Fuels Association. Its initial budget is "in the multimillions", according to the group's executive director Mark Kornblau.
"There are critics who are trying to create an either-or decision between food and fuel," Kornblau was quoted as saying by Reuters. "We believe this is a false choice. Today, more than 90 percent of crops in the United States and around the world are used exclusively for food."
The group will promote genetically modified crops to improve crops yields as a solution to meeting global food needs. It does not aim to curtail biofuel production and will lobby Congress to keep subsidies for ethanol and biodiesel production in place.
The alliance says that the current run up in food prices is linked to high energy prices, not production of biofuels from feedstocks such as corn and soy.
The U.S. Agriculture Department estimates that one-third of the U.S. corn crop this year will be used to make ethanol. The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization says that biofuel production has consumed roughly 100 million tons of grains. Food prices have doubled in the past three years according to the World Bank. The International Food Policy Research Institute estimates that biofuels account for more than 30 percent of the increase.
Environmentalists say ethanol and biodiesel subsidies in Europe and the United States have caused market distortions that have displaced biofuel feedstock production into rainforests, tropical savannas, and other biologically-rich ecosystems.
Biofuels can reduce emissions, but not when grown in place of rainforests
(7/22/2008) Biofuels meant to help alleviate greenhouse gas emissions may be in fact contributing to climate change when grown on converted tropical forest lands, warns a comprehensive study published earlier this month in the journal Environmental Research Letters. Analyzing the carbon debt for biofuel crops grown in ecosystems around the world, Holly Gibbs and colleagues report that "while expansion of biofuels into productive tropical ecosystems will always lead to net carbon emissions for decades to centuries... [expansion] into degraded or already cultivated land will provide almost immediate carbon savings." The results suggest that under the right conditions, biofuels could be part of the effort to reduce humanity's carbon footprint.
Beyond high food prices, little to show for $11B/yr in biofuel support, says OECD report
(7/17/2008) Government support of biofuel production in rich countries is squandering vast amounts of amounts of money while exacerbating the global food crisis and failing to meaningfully curb greenhouse gas emissions and improve energy security, alleges a new report from the OECD, the club of industrialized nations.
Palm oil industry moves into the Amazon rainforest
(7/9/2008) Malaysia's Land Development Authority FELDA has announced plans to immediately establish 100,000 hectares (250,000) of oil palm plantations in the Brazilian Amazon. The agency will partner with Braspalma, a local company, to form Felda Global Ventures Brazil Sdn Bhd. FELDA will have a 70 percent stake in the venture. The announcement had been expected. Last month Najib said Malaysia would seek to expand its booming palm oil industry overseas. The country is facing land constraints at home.
Britain urges 'cautious approach' on biofuels
(7/7/2008) Britain and the E.U. should exercise caution in pushing for wider use of biofuels, warns a new study commissioned by the U.K. government.
Biofuel production on abandoned lands could meet 8% of global energy needs
(6/23/2008) Using abandoned agricultural lands for biofuel production could help meet up to 8 percent of global energy needs without compromising food supplies or diminishing biologically-rich habitats, reports a new study published in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.
U.S. may allow corn farming on conservation land
(6/23/2008) The U.S. Department of Agriculture may allow farmers to plant corn on million of acres of conservation land to bolster the food supply in response to flooding in the Midwest and record high prices spurred by demand for domestic ethanol production, according to a report in the New York Times.
Global Commodities Boom Fuels New Assault on Amazon
(6/20/2008) With soaring prices for agricultural goods and new demand for biofuels, the clearing of the world's largest rain forest has accelerated dramatically. Unless forceful measures are taken, half of the Brazilian Amazon could be cut, burned or dried out within 20 years.
Nestle Chairman: Biofuels are "ethically indefensible"
(6/14/2008) The emergence and expansion of biofuels produced from food crops has exacerabted world's agriculture and water crisis and is a bigger short-term threat than global warming, argued Peter Brabeck-Letmathe in an editorial published Thursday in the Wall Street Journal Asia.
Biofuels expansion in Africa may impact rainforests, wetlands
(5/28/2008) Biofuel feedstock expansion in Africa will likely come at the expense of ecologically-sensitive lands, reports a new analysis presented by Wetlands International at the Convention of Biological Diversity in Bonn.
Half of oil palm expansion in Malaysia, Indonesia occurs at expense of forests
(5/20/2008) More than half of the oil palm expansion between 1990 and 2005 Malaysia and Indonesia occurred at expense of forests, reports a new analysis published in the journal conservation Letters. Analyzing data from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, Lian Pin Koh and David S. Wilcove of Princeton University found that 55-59 percent of oil palm expansion in Malaysia and at least 56 percent of that in Indonesia occurred at the expense of forests. Given that oil palm plantations are biologically impoverished relative to primary and secondary forests, the researchers recommend restricting future expansion to pre-existing cropland and degraded habitats.
Global ban on biofuels would lead to immediate decline in food prices
(5/16/2008) A global moratorium on biofuels produced from food crops would result in a significant decline in the price of corn, sugar, cassava and wheat by 2010, reports the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
Record food prices to climb through 2010
(3/6/2008) The U.N. expects record high food prices to continue through 2010, driving hunger and poverty in the world's poorest countries, said a top U.N. official Thursday.
UN: biofuels are starving the poor by driving up food prices
(2/14/2008) Echoing sentiments increasingly expressed by politicians, scientists, and advocates for the poor, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization warned that the world's poorest people are suffering as a result of the push to use food crops for biofuel production. | <urn:uuid:a9d3d891-0bda-4139-9707-d8bfa5bd85ab> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.mongabay.com/2008/0725-biofuels.html | 2013-05-24T08:51:10Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.923324 | 1,458 |
All night program of exploratory music from Denmark & Japan curated by yoyooyoy & Jvtlandt::
FRISK FRUGT (DK) + MUNEOMI SENJU (JP, ex-BOREDOMS) + SCATAW (DK) + IKU SAKAN (JP, ex-MAHER SHALAL HASH BAZ)
in different constellations
An exclusive night of music combining electronic minimalism, homemade instruments, percussion heavy and danceable improvisation, psychedelic dobro and much musical mischief in general.
ANDERS LAUGE MELDGAARD (aka FRISK FRUGT), MARTIN VOGNSEN (aka SCATAW), MUNEOMI SENJU (ex-BOREDOMS), IKU SAKAN (ex-MAHER SHALAL HASH BAZ)
Anders Lauge Meldgaard: A founding member of the yoyooyoy collective, which also includes Yoke & Yohs, Lights People, Johns Lunds, Stof, Havens Fugle, and other projects. He is part of Slütspürt, co-founder of the eclectic big band Den Nørrejyske Ø’s Stororkester For Opløst Mønster Musik and has performed at the Roskilde Festival, Jazzjuice Festival, Transmediale Festival and toured Europe, USA and Japan. In 2010 Meldgaard released, as his solo project Frisk Frugt, the album “Dansktoppen møder Burkina Faso i det himmelblå rum hvor solen bor, suite” leading to great critical and audience acclaim, including a nomination for the Nordic Music Prize in 2011. His latest release is "Musik for seks elektriske guitarer", released on LP in late 2012. http://www.yoyooyoy.dk/friskfrugt.htm
Martin Vognsen: Guitarist/composer and co-founder of the Denmark/Japan-based micro label Jvtlandt. Currently plays out many of his musical fantasies under the moniker Scataw (State Changes According To A Wind), and has played with Katsura Yamauchi, Yasuhiro Yoshigaki (Emergency), Makoto Kawabata (Acid Mothers Temple), Tatsuya Yoshida (Ruins), Musik For Seks Elektriske Guitarer, a. o. http://www.martinvognsen.com
Muneomi Senju: Former member of legendary Japanese band Boredoms, including the period of the 2007 Europe tour, Senju is also an experienced solo performer and current member of PARA, led by ex-Boredoms guitarist Seiichi Yamamoto. Senju was also part of the eccentric pop group Urichipangoon and has performed with Otomo Yoshihide, Merzbow, Damo Suzuki, Kazuhisa Uchihashi, DoraVideo, as well as many other key members of the Japanese music scene. http://www.muneomisenju.com
Iku Sakan: Experimental sound performer, improvisor and DJ from Osaka, Japan currently based in Berlin, Germany. Since 2009, he has performed in Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, UK, Mexico, Malaysia, China & Japan, including important festivals in Europe as a member of several bands, such as All Tomorrows Parties in UK (with Maher Shalal Hash Baz) and Avantgard Festival in Germany (organised by Krautrock legends Faust, with Meeting of the Spirits). Iku Sakan explores music as 'Myth-Science' by combining computer processing, prepared recordings with a range of sounding objects (such as mini-masserger, measure & oscilator). He has collaborated, played with Frisk Frugt, Michael Northam, Muneomi Senju, Chie Mukai, Butchy Fuego, Kakawaka and others. http://www.soundcloud.com/ikusakan
Doors open 20:30 -
SICKOIDS are vastly becoming a strong and popular ushc powertrio since releasing their great debut lp on residue/hardware records,playing highly original style of hc punk mixing really harsh almost discharge style esque along with melodic mid eightys mid-west style stuff (think maybe die kreuzen/husker dü/later a.o.f.)
watch out for a brand new lp on grave mistake/sorry state/hardware recs
new amsterdam band consisting of of members of various other bands,just recorded tunes for an upcoming 12"?!
burly heavy on the rock side with a defintive hc punch
hardcore from italy..dunno too much about 'em yet..find some tunes/info here
€7 Doors open 20:30 - | <urn:uuid:0b64ad2d-ab81-4f96-8df9-03d742813354> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://occii.org/?wtpage=event&id=998&wt_month=03&wt_year=2012 | 2013-05-24T08:29:47Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.860155 | 1,039 |
What Message Will You Send on December 10?
16 Nov 12
What is special about your area or community? Do you have unique cooking or agricultural tradition that you want to uphold? Is there a burning political issue that is particularly relevant? Do you know of certain traditional foods being left behind by modern life? What do you want for your future? What is the message you want to send to the world?
Terra Madre Day - Slow Food’s worldwide celebration of local food held each December 10 - is the perfect moment to make your community’s voice heard, putting something that is important to you in the spotlight or sending whatever message you wish. All around the world on the same day, whoever and wherever we are, we celebrate in a myriad of different ways – from community picnics to food festivals, film evenings, rallies, farmers’ markets, or even a simple dinner with friends. With more than a thousand events, we send a strong collective message about the alternative future we want, but we also demonstrate a thousand individual messages through the diversity of our events.
With just under a month to go until Terra Madre day the events have started to roll in… In Mali, a local chef will teach young women to prepare sinassar, a rice flour flatbread made on special occasions, putting this near-lost tradition in the limelight. At the Farra refugee camp in Palestine, Terra Madre Day will send a message of hope. Along with preparing traditional dishes, workshops and folk dancing, participants will talk about their memories before immigration. “This day will be a beacon of new hope that they will return home,” said the organizers. Meanwhile the “Wonders of Ulam” event in the forests of Malaysia will celebrate Ulam, local forest herbs that are mostly used raw in local cooking. In Bolivia a 0km lunch will prove to 60 people that good, clean fair and food can be found at their doorstep. While in Norway, the SlowFood Røros Convivium will dust off the recipe books and make ginger beer together from an old local recipe. And five Slow Food Edmonton volunteer chefs in Canada will hold cooking classes with a local women's shelter, showing that everyone has the right to good food.
Many events are also bringing home the energy (and food!) from the Salone del Gusto and Terra Madre, Slow Food’s international event held late last month. From South Africa to Vietman and Belarus, events have been organized by visitors and delegates at the event to share their experiences in Turin.
Actions speak louder than words! Join the celebration on December 10 to shout your unique message to the world. Find an event near you or create one of your own, as simple or complex, big or small as you wish. Get inspiration from past editions and download graphics on the Terra Madre Day website. And don’t forget to register your event – you will join the world map and be published alongside all the other initiatives happening at the same moment in this globe-wide day of celebration.
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Uruguay | 22/02/2013 | When an important battle takes its lead from conviviality… | <urn:uuid:ad6f8e8c-ab21-467e-967b-a541acba2da7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://slowfood.com/international/food-for-thought/focus/157223/what-message-will-you-send-on-december-10-/q=314642 | 2013-05-24T08:38:23Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.923169 | 788 |
True to the title,on November 24th,my family took a trip to Korea.Our flight was at 2.15p.m and was scheduled to arrive at Incheon International Airport around 9.30p.m.Then we got on the bus to Seoul Western Hotel which took about 1 hour and 30 minutes and checked in.For dinner,the other family who had mostly adults and 2 young children were really nice.They asked us to follow them to eat and found a small Korean restaurant with two ahjummas. :]
I wasn't that hungry because it was midnight so I ordered dumplings. ;p Kimchi didn't agree with my family and I only ate some.The spice hit my ear. :/
At the airport waiting for our bags.
There is no breakfast restaurant in Korea so we went to a buffet style restaurant.Then,we went to the National Folklore Museum.
Father acting as the Korean President. :]
Gyeongbok Palace was next on our list which was a palace during the Joseon dynasty.
Trick of Eye Museum is a museum where you can see illusions.It was really cool and fun taking pictures there.My dad did really funny things.
Baby catching a boat. :] Its a painting if you haven't noticed.
Then,a long bus ride to Pyeongchang where the 2018 Winter Olympics would be held.It was the Ski Resort.Duke told me that the hotel where we would be staying at was the place they filmed Autumn in My Heart.We had to rent ski outfits to ski the next day.
Ate Korean BBQ for dinner which I LOVED. :]
Originally I didn't want to ski because it was damned expensive but I got a long lecture,that I would be here once and that I should make the best of it.So i did...most of the time,I fell down.
Duke taught us four how to ski and he was really funny.
Duke and Baby!
At around 10,we checked out of the hotel and went on a journey back to Seoul and arrived there at 2.
Lotte World! :] My family and I decided to go on a Sinbad ride.While in line,Duke grabbed me and baby and asked us to do a selca with him. :] He sat with Vaishwen and my dad,while the three of us sat behind them.When there was a drop,Vaishwen got freaked out and Duke thought it was adorable.Pssh.That was also when I first noticed that Korean girls my age started looking at Vaishwen and calling him cute.
I went on the Giant Loop a 360 degree ride which freaked me out.I thought I was going to die.At 7,we left Lotte World and went for dinner.
Oh,and now we had to make Kimchi.Again the spice was too much to handle and WE TRIED ON TRADITIONAL KOREAN OUTFITS. We took a family portrait and my parents took a traditional korean wedding photo.Freaky.
Making Kimchi which would be sent to a shelter. :)
Then checked in to the SAME hotel we slept in the first night! ;]
After Breakfast,Duke brought us to Myeongdong but since the Underground Shopping Centre wasn't opened yet,he took us into Lotte Duty Free which was a shopping complex.I got slightly excited looking at JYJ's pictures because they were one of the celebrity promoters there.Duke came over and gave me a JYJ Lotte Duty Free file which you couldn't buy.
Pictures of them in Star Avenue. <3
I touched it to compare.Yoochun's hand is the same size as mine! :]
We walked around all 10 floors then when Myeondong opened we went there.At 1.30p.m,we went to lunch.
Then it was off to Gimpo Domestic Airport to take a flight to Jeju Island.
Went to Dragon Head Rock and Mysterious Ghost Road.Then off to watch the funny jump show.It was pretty cool.Not much words just funny fights in a family.
The couple who got married in the show. :)
Visited Seongsanam Sunrise Peak where you can see all of Jeju and met diver woman.In Jeju,women are divers.Men stay at home.GIRL POWER!
Then,we went to the Glass Castle which had these amazing statues made of glass.This is where I heard Ill Protect You by Kim Jaejoong from Protect the Boss and I sang along.
O'Sulloc Tea Museum was next on our list.Duke told us the Greean Tea ice cream there is the best.We were looking through Green Tea products when he came licking the ice cream and offering it to me.I laughed and shook my head.I bought Green Tea BB Cream from Innisfree which was there and went to buy the Green Tea ice cream.My mum decided to buy a Green Tea and Black Tea Cake which was really tasty.
Then,my favourite place in the whole world,the Tuseum Safari! Its a place where they have teddy bears! SO ADORABLE.
We were supposed to leave Jeju Island in the morning,but because of haze,the earliest flight was 4pm.So Duke brought us to the Ginseng shop,Amethyst shop and Cosmetic shop in Jeju.
After lunch,we transferred to the airport for our flight back to Seoul.It was 5 when we arrived.
We were brought to the 40 minute foot spa and facial for our relaxation part.Bought some final souvenirs,got to try banana milk(YUM) and finally went to Incheon International Airport for our flight back to Malaysia.
Arrived in KL at 7a.m.Went to sleep immediately. :]
And that everybody was our amazing trip to Korea.People there were really nice and I had a good time.Im planning to go again after SPM.Hopefully! | <urn:uuid:3ec553c4-dc6a-4067-9de3-338247aa7465> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://tharsikaunspokensecrets.blogspot.com/ | 2013-05-24T08:58:38Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981386 | 1,262 |
US Suspends Constitution In Permanent World War On Terror
Two disturbing developments have occurred in the last couple of days that have gone relatively unnoticed. First, the senate is debating an expansion of the already broad powers of the 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force (AUMF) so the U.S. can essentially engage any area in the world in the war on terror, including America. Which brings us to the second development: the Pentagon has recently granted itself police powers on American soil.
‘It is hard to resist the conclusion that this war has no purpose other than its own eternal perpetuation. This war is not a means to any end but rather is the end in itself. Not only is it the end itself, but it is also its own fuel: it is precisely this endless war – justified in the name of stopping the threat of terrorism – that is the single greatest cause of that threat.’
A self-perpetuating permanent war against a shadowy undefinable enemy appears to be the future of American foreign policy. How convenient for the war machine and tyrants who claim surveillance is safety.
But perhaps most disturbing of all of this is the military’s authority to police American streets as if it was in civil war. For all those still in denial that America is a militarized police state, this should be the ultimate cure to your delusion. Read Article Here
Truth11 Films Perpetual War
We have been tricked into fighting perpetual wars of mass genocide for pointless profit. There is no enemy. The enemy is within the US government. All exterior enemies are created to justify the advancing military industrial complex.
There is only one way war will end. The masses must rise up, unite, and demand world peace.
Chemtrail Budget Exceeds Billions
A select group of diabolic oligarch globalists and their puppet cronies embedded within the United States government are heavily involved in crimes against humanity. These tyrants will stop at nothing to usher their hush, hush global aerosol agenda into full swing.According to a report prepared for the Air Force titled “Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the WeatherBy 2025 the U.S. Air Force wants to fully control the weather on earth by the year 2025.Far surpassing even the most horrific act of terror (real or staged), posing as literal gods, these globalists will stop at nothing to control the world by not only controlling the fraudulent banking systems but by owning the weather through a process (blanket term) called Geoengineering. It looks as if members of the government’s upper echelon and even members of the Senate will go to extreme lengths to suppress this vital information from reaching the American people. In regards to aerosol spraying into the earth’s atmosphere, a recent update to data assembled by The Carnicom Institute reveals the chemicals used and their respective levels of concentration. The toxic levels that are being used in these aerosols goes beyond shocking – it would appear that these levels are indeed criminal by EPA Standards; These figures indicate how many times they are over the allowable toxic limit:
- Aluminum: 15.8
- Antimony: 63.3
- Arsenic: 418
- Barium: 5.3
- Cadmium: 6.0
- Chromium: 6.4
- Copper: 9.0
- Iron: 43.5
- Lead: 15.7
- Manganese: 513.8
- Nickel: 10.7
- Zinc: 7.5 Read article here
Google – Bilderberg Merger = Planned-Opolis
This years agenda: Domestic Spying, Diffusing Social Protests, War On Syria and Iran + Lots More…
Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt is a regular Bilderberg attendee. his company is “merging” with Bilderberg. Google’s annual Zeitgeist conference, which has been based at the Grove since 2007, immediately precedes the Bilderberg Group conference by a matter of days.” Bilderberg’s “being recast as ‘Google-Berg’ – partly because of efforts on behalf of activists to tear away the veil of Bilderberg’s much cherished secrecy, and partly as a means of re-branding authoritarian, undemocratic secret gatherings of elites as trendy, liberal, feel-good philanthropic-style forums like Google Zeitgeist and TED. Eric Schmidt thinks “privacy is a relic of the past,” He “plans to turn Google into the ultimate Big Brother.” He and Bilderberg members share a common agenda. In part, it reflects a “collectivist, permanently networked world (without) individuality and privacy.” Bilderberg’s grand design is one-world government comprised of rulers and serfs. It wants total unchallenged global control. June issues for discussion:
- destroying Iran’s nuclear facilities within three years;
- prolonging war on Syria by arming anti-Assad elements;
- the threat of a global pandemic;
- controlling 3D printing;
- Internet control through “cyber resilience;”
- smart cities for mass surveillance;
- diffusing austerity induced social protests;
- preventing Britain from leaving the EU;
- propping up the euro to keep the Eurozone intact;
- minimal 2013 economic growth;
- increasing central bank power;
- transferring more wealth from ordinary people to corporations and super-rich elites
- establishing a ministry of truth; Orwell explained its mission and more, saying:
“The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation.”“These contradictions are not accidental, nor do they result from from ordinary hypocrisy: they are deliberate exercises in doublethink.”
In joining with Bilderberg, Google is preparing to enter this “Hybrid Age” of advancing technology and rapidly changing geopolitical landscapes with its hands gripped tightly on the reigns of power. With this merger, the world is set to be shaped into a highly surveilled and planned system at the direction of unelected elitists. This is the backdrop to the Google-Berg merger. Governments are going broke. Globalist influences have broken down national borders. Tax exempt foundations and mega corporations are filling the gap. These groups are essentially hijacking national government’s policies and advancing a top down, authoritarian system of control. Read article here
The Vaccine Hoax Is Over!
Freedom of Information Act in the UK filed by a doctor there has revealed 30 years of secret official documents showing that government experts have
1. Known the vaccines don’t work
2. Known they cause the diseases they are supposed to prevent
3. Known they are a hazard to children
4. Colluded to lie to the public
5. Worked to prevent safety studies
Those are the same vaccines that are mandated to children in the US. Read article here
Israel and US Lawless Aggression
Israel and America are longstanding imperial partners. They spurn international laws. They do so repeatedly. They ignore their own. They jointly plan and wage wars. Israel’s attack on Syria was a joint US/Israeli provocation.
Lawless Aggression | Peace is Law Not War
In August 1928, America, Germany France, Britain, Italy, Japan, and nine other nations signed on and promised wars would no longer resolve “disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or of whatever origin they may be, which may arise among them.” Violators “should be denied the benefits furnished by this treaty.” Article 8 of the 1933 Montevideo Convention of Rights and Duties says “No state has the right to intervene in the internal or external affairs of another.” Under Article 10, differences between states “should be settled by recognized pacific methods.” Article 11 calls sovereign state territory “inviolable….” The 1950 Nuremberg Principles defined crimes against peace to include: ”(i) Planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances; (and) (ii) Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of the acts mentioned under (i).” On June 26, 1945, the UN Charter was signed. On October 24, it became effective. It failed “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war….” Fundamental principles have been ignored. They require all Members to “settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered.” ”All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.” Article 51 permits armed force only in self-defense against externally generated aggression until the Security Council acts. It has final say. Under no circumstances may one nation, or combination thereof, intervene against another without lawful Security Council authorization. Doing so is lawless aggression.
Belligerents like America and Israel put their own priorities above international laws. They ignore their own as it suits them. Wars rage without end. New ones are planned. Washington wages permanent ones. Peace is a four-letter word. Israel’s a longstanding imperial partner. Attacking Syria is their latest provocation. They acted without justification. Doing so reflects naked aggression. Expect Washington, rogue NATO allies, and regional partners to take full advantage. Read article here.
Obama’s SS Is Here Now
The name which struck terror into the German people who still believed in freedom and wanted their nation to remain a peaceful, respectable member within the international community. Nazi Germany’s SS was a force for terror and intimidation, creating an aura of fear within the citizenry and horror for the remainder of the world watching the spectacle of a police state far more brutal than any in human history up to that time.Apparently this lesson has not been lost on the dictators of the world since that era as the communist leaders and rulers around the world learned that building an effective domestic spying and military police apparatus was the key to remaining in power. Welcome to modern America my friends, as Obama’s SS is here now. Read article here
Cell Phone Tower Hell On Apartment Roofs Springing Up Everywhere
Corrupt cell phone companies cowardly hiding their towers of hell on the roof of rental units. Corrupt property companies cashing in by selling out the health of their unit holders with no disclosure. Corrupt fascist government ignoring countless health studies and reports claiming their levels are safe, which are 6000 times less stringent than European standards. Thousands sick, and the number is growing. A massive nation wide scam that is affecting us all. Clinics are set up to treat the symptoms of exposure, medical industry acknowledges the health issues, while Canadian and US governments are ignoring them. Read article here
Liberty Was Attacked In Boston By the Nazis In Control
Ron Paul – Forced lockdown of a city. Militarized police riding tanks in the streets. Door-to-door armed searches without warrant. Families thrown out of their homes at gunpoint to be searched without probable cause. Businesses forced to close. Transport shut down.
These were not the scenes from a military coup in a far off banana republic, but rather the scenes just over a week ago in Boston as the United States got a taste of martial law. The ostensible reason for the military-style takeover of parts of Boston was that the accused perpetrator of a horrific crime was on the loose. The Boston bombing provided the opportunity for the government to turn what should have been a police investigation into a military-style occupation of an American city. This unprecedented move should frighten us as much or more than the attack itself.
Sadly, we have been conditioned to believe that the job of the government is to keep us safe, but in reality the job of the government is to protect our liberties. Once the government decides that its role is to keep us safe, whether economically or physically, they can only do so by taking away our liberties. That is what happened in Boston.
This is unprecedented and is very dangerous. We must educate ourselves and others about our precious civil liberties to ensure that we never accept demands that we give up our Constitution so that the government can pretend to protect us. Read article here
America is being absolutely consumed by fear, stress, anger and depression; by design
Most Americans live lives of “quiet desperation” that are punctuated by moments of great crisis. We spend our prime years working for others (making them rich) in order to pay off debts that we have foolishly accumulated (thus making the banks even wealthier). When most Americans reach the end of their lives, they look back and wonder what they actually accomplished. …. Jobs are modern-day slavery. We are paid just enough to live and not more. You are punished if you ask for more… The government gets up to 50% of your paycheck and then 10-20% of that goes to kill people on other parts of the planet…. Read article here
Controlled Economic Slavery
Throughout human history, most slavery has been enforced physically — with whips and chains. You either did what you were told or they beat you into submission.
Most modern people mistakenly believe slavery has been largely eradicated across our world. They don’t see people shackled in chains or being ordered what to do by their owners. Modern culture no longer accepts overt slavery, right? …Or does it?
As it turns out, slavery is alive and well on our planet, and its shackles are made of numbers, not steel. Read article here
11 Years of US Illegal Wars Of Aggression Against Muslim People
Our government told us for eleven years that we blew trillions of dollars on wars to protect Americans from al-Qaeda, endangering Social Security, Medicare, the social safety net, the dollar’s exchange value, the credit rating of the US Treasury, and our civil liberties in order to save America from al-Qaeda terrorists. So why is Washington now supporting al-Qaeda’s overthrow of the secular, non-Islamist government in Syria which has never ever done anything whatsoever to Americans!? Read article here
False flag attack, kill one patsy, nab another patsy, ship him off to Guantanamo and have a martial law training exercise
= Textbook Nazi Bullshit
Martial law has been declared in Boston to hunt for another patsy. One suspect dead, another kid has been nabbed and is being treated as a terrorist so no trial, straight to Guantanamo with him. Fucking bullshit it was this kid and not the trained mercenaries photographed with back packs with skulls depicting a stupid motto justifying in their pathetic minds the carnage they were about to ensue. False flag with cover up, resulting in martial law exercise. Textbook Nazi Bullshit.! read article here
Fukushima | A Continuing Nuclear Disaster
Massive radiation releases continue to spread in Japan and globally via the atmosphere, ocean, precipitation, contaminated food & manufactured goods. Calling for a global understanding of how to protect yourself and detoxify yourself from the harmful radiation that now affects us all. Life is not going to be the same, we must learn to fix any problems due to this nuclear fall out. Read article here
Chemtrials: Daily Global Geoengineering
Even as the mainstream media and a television-obsessed American public refuse to admit the existence of chemtrails and government sponsored weather modification programs, the evidence continues to mount with ever-incresaing speed that not only do these programs exist, but they are also effective and wide spread. Daily global efforts with an aim to dominate the weather completely while dumping disease causing chemicals on us daily. In addition to the recent study published in Environmental Research Letters entitled, Cost Analysis of Stratospheric Albedo Modification Delivery Systems, a 2010 study undertaken on behalf of the Belfort Group, a Belgian “environmental watchdog” organization, also corroborates much of the information compiled by citizens and activists the world over regarding the existence of chemtrails and stratospheric weather modification programs.
The study entitled, “Contrail Science, Its Impact On Climate and Weather Manipulation Programs Conducted By the United States and Its Allies”, seeks to highlight the specific problems associated with contrails emitted by aircraft, the manipulation for defence purposes of some of these by the United States government and the subsequent effect on quality of life. Read article here
In Amerika Law No Longer Exists
In the 21st century Americans have experienced an extraordinary collapse in the rule of law and in their constitutional protections. Today American citizens, once a free people protected by law, can be assassinated and detained in prison indefinitely without any evidence being presented to a court of their guilt, and they can be sentenced to prison on the basis of secret testimony by anonymous witnesses not subject to cross examination. The US “justice system” has been transformed by the Bush/Obama regime into the ”justice system” of Gestapo Germany and Stalinist Russia. There is no difference. Read article here
Have you ever wondered why most major municipal water utilities across America continue to artificially fluoridate public water supplies when inexpensive fluoride toothpastes are readily available for those who choose to use them? Or why governments and medical groups continue to force fluoridated tap water on the public in spite of the fact that it has many known and proven health risks? These and many other pertinent questions find their answers in the hard-hitting documentary Fluoridegate: An American Tragedy, one of the most powerful documentaries ever made about the fluoride fraud.
A sordid narrative that recaps the dirty history of fluoride and how it came to be an officially recommended water additive, Fluoridegate delves deep into the completely unscientific and blatantly corrupt process by which the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) forced fluoride onto the public via the National Program for Water Fluoridation. The film also exposes how Dr. William Marcus, a now-retired senior scientist at the EPA, was targeted and fired for leaking critical information back in the 1990s about the many dangers of fluoride, none of which were being publicly shared in accordance with the EPA’s mission and purpose. Watch movie here
11 Years 0f Torture
January 11, 2013, marked the 11th year that the infamous Guantanamo prison has been in operation by the United States. President Obama ensured the continued operation of Guantanamo for another year by signing the National Defense Authorization Act of 2013, and refused to challenge the Congressional mandated ban on transfers from Guantánamo to the federal court and prison system in the United States. Read article here
The Gun Control Issue = Freedom From Government Tyranny
It would be nice to think that the reason behind the gun control debate was the safety of the population. Although great lengths are taken to ensure the population are swayed by the news of horrible events, mass shootings, real, staged or provoked it is not the reason the guns are wanted out of our hands. It is simply the ease of martial law take over. In reality they are after our guns so we are defenceless against them. Even if they get a large chunk of law abiding citizens to hand in their guns it would be that many people that would not rise up against them armed when the hammer falls.
The definition of the Second Amendment: A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. Read article here
BAN GMO | Stop The Elites Global Domination Of The Food Supply
Hidden agendas, divide and conquer, controlling the narrative, and problem-reaction-solution. These are certainly time-honored and effective strategies for the political elites. To get simpler, we could just say lie-cheat-steal-kill.
A powerful elite group first forms a goal, an objective. It clarifies that goal. For example: domination of the global food supply.
With that goal in mind, and with the technology to genetically modify food crops, huge corporations like Monsanto, along with their politicians firmly in their pockets, decide to patent every kind of food seed possible.
Soon, they own food. They license/sell food seeds. They expand the number of GMO food crops.
But they also realize they have to deal with opposition. Read article here.
2013 NDAA Expands Power of Military to Detain Citizens
In response to widespread outrage over the National Defense Authorization Act passed last year, Congress is said to be working on a more Constitution friendly version of the legislation. The latest version was overwhelmingly approved by the House Armed Services Committee on May 8 and introduced the following week.
The new statute actually states that persons lawfully in the U.S. can be detained under the Authorization for the Use of Military Force [AUMF]. The original (the statute we are fighting in court) never went that far. “Therefore, under the guise of supposedly adding protection to Americans, the new statute actually expands the AUMF to civilians in the U.S.” Read article here
The Gates Of Wrath And Sorrow Open Wide Again In Gaza
Hell is coming. Hell is near. Thousands upon thousands of troops are massing for the ground invasion of a small patch of land crammed full with human beings trapped without any defense against the steel that will destroy them. Several children have already died in the preliminaries. Many, many more will die when the real feast of death begins. Read article here
The Reality Of The Lesser Of Two Evils
Obama has won reelection, and his supporters think that somehow things are going to be different. Fat chance.
While evil continues to envelop America, the public is focused on CIA director General Petraeus’ resignation. The FBI spied on him and found that he was having an affair with his biographer, a woman 20 years younger than his 60 years.
What is it with Americans and sex? Why is an illicit affair the ONLY reason for removing someone from political office? Why is it that government officials, presidents and vice presidents included, can violate US statutory law and torture people, spy on Americans without the necessary warrants, murder US citizens without due process, confine US citizens to dungeons for life without evidence and due process of law, start multi-trillion dollar wars on the basis of contrived allegations that have no basis in fact, murder civilians in seven countries, overthrow legitimate governments, and all of these massive crimes against humanity can be accepted as long as no one in Washington gets any sex out of it?
Why does Washington want hegemony over the world? Why does Washington want this hegemony so badly that Washington is willing to murder women, children, aid workers, husbands and fathers, village elders, anyone on earth including its own American heroes?
What is the evil that drives Washington? How can the evil that drives Washington be contained, stamped out, prevented from destroying the human race? What does the world do when it confronts unbridled evil, which is what Washington is? Read article here
Real history: Vaccines not responsible for halting infectious diseases of 20th century
A common misconception about vaccines purports that they are the primary reason why infectious disease rates saw a rapid and steady decline throughout the early-to-mid 20th century. But an honest look at the figures reveals that diseases like polio, typhoid, measles, and tuberculosis were already in significant decline long before vaccines were ever even invented, this being the result of improved hygiene and diet. Read article here
New Euphemism For State Murder:
Obama Administration’s ongoing effort to expand, entrench and “codify” the practice of murder and terrorism by the United States government. The avowed, deliberate intent of these sinister machinations is to embed the use of death squads and drone terror attacks into the policy apparatus of future administrations, so that the killing of human beings outside all pretense of legal process will go on, year after year after year, even when the Nobel Peace Laureate has left office.
The new “counterterrorism matrix” is “designed to go beyond existing kill lists, mapping plans for the ‘disposition’ of suspects beyond the reach of American drones,”
The sickening nature of this perpetual-motion death-machine — and the husk-like inhumanity of those who operate it and the sycophants who applaud it — are all too plain. These butchers — our bipartisan elites, our whole respectable, self-righteous establishment — have trapped us all in an Age of Hell. Read article here
11th Anniversary of 9/11
Fascism and the Fake War On Terror Remain Due To The Masses Living In Denial
We arrive at the 11th anniversary of the false flag attack that changed the world as we know it. The tactic was nothing new. The purpose clear: The false enemy, fake war on terror, enables the establishment to reign fascist terror upon the planet, and it has gone 11 years with no justice or main stream acceptance of the truth.
Many ask me why I still crusade for 9/11 truth. 11 years is no reason to stop fighting fascist propaganda. We must continue to educate and awaken the masses. For those still living in an 11 year bubble of denial.. WAKE THE FUCK UP!
Perpetual war, genocide, and fascist rule continue because the masses live with the assumption that if they ignore the fact that their government is against them, that it will not affect them. Well it does and it affects millions around the world. You cannot sit in denial any more. We have great strength in numbers and we must all rise up and resist this fascist government. A time comes when silence is betrayal. – Martin Luther King Jr. Read article here
What In The World Are They Spraying?
The Chemtrail/Geo-Engineering Cover-Up Revealed
This is a groundbreaking documentary discusses the reality behind the crisscrossing streaks of white clouds trailing behind jet aircraft, stretching from horizon to horizon, eventually turning the sky into a murky haze. The documentary discusses the developing industry called geo-engineering, driven by scientists, corporations and governments intent on changing global climate, controlling the weather, and altering the chemical composition of soil and water. See documentary here
Propaganda… In The Grocery Store?!
Food Rating Systems Discourage Consumer Empowerment
We have been hearing a lot about genetically modified food lately. Stories are coming out about their environmental impacts and the role they play in a war waged on our health and the health of our children. We have also been hearing a lot of other stories about our food – antibiotics and growth hormones in meat or radiation and chemicals in fish from the sea. From the news sources to which I subscribe the truth is clear and simple: we need to consume nutritious, whole foods that are grown organically. Our future and our family is worth it. It is a choice between weakness and strength for our bodies and our minds, an issue of black vs. white. We do not get the newspaper at my house, but I have been known to snag the occasional grocery store flyer from the recycling and have a look. The other day something was in there that made me think. Join me as I pick apart this PROPAGANDA TRASH which has been designed to make us blindly ingest without using our brains. Read article here
V Is For Victory When We Stand United Against The New World Order
The film V for Vendetta is a shining example of what we are facing and how we can overcome a fight against a corrupt fascist government.
For many this seems such a daunting task they would rather live in denial at the cost of their own health, freedom and economic situation.
Living in denial allows a perpetual state of war. Genocide that fuels the military industrial complex and advances the fascist government that plagues the US, Canada, The UK and Australia and so on..
The first rule of the elite was and is; to ‘Divide and Concur’. As the film V is For Vendetta illustrates we have great strength in unity. We must simply organize ourselves. The film shows a symbolic organization and unification of the populous to rise up at once to take control. This is what is required. But we cant stop there.
The same problem can occur when the new ones in control become corrupt. So the solution therefore is in unity we must stay. Not just for one event but to act in unison as a collective making decisions for the collective. Not anarchy, that is where individuals rule themselves without concern for others. I am talking about the individual making a decision that will benefit themselves and in turn everyone else. Read article here
The significance of this qualitative leap could be compared to the transition from cold steel to firearms, or from conventional weapons to nuclear weapons.
Located on an United States Air Force site near Gakona, Alaska, the High-frequency Active Auroral Research Project (HAARP) is the world’s largest and most functional ionospheric heater.
Construction began in 1993. Today, HAARP can generate super high powered beams of directed energy. HAARP is designed to shoot these energy beams 200 kilometers up into the sky; affecting an area known as earth’s ionosphere. In doing this, HAARP can perform a number of functions. The known uses of HAARP are: weather modification, power beaming, earth tomography (mapping of our planet’s interior), Star Wars-type defense capabilities, enhanced communications, communication disruptions, creating earthquakes and mind control. This mobile HAARP ship was used to trigger the March 2011 magnitude 9.0 Japan earthquake. Read article here
CFR + Google (This can’t be good)
Google will meet this Wednesday with the Council on Foreign Relations to discuss ways that they can use their dominant search engine to penetrate and disrupt international crime. Under the cloak of doing good by fighting international crime, Google will likely be given full reign to not only monitor but infiltrate people and organizations that the DoD, DEA, CFR and other alphabet agencies desire. Furthermore, many refer to the CFR as an international criminal gang due to their support for violent regime change, among other questionable behavior. If history is any indicator, the agents of the CFR will use Google as a tool to eliminate competition to their interests. Read article here
Truth11 Films The Enemy Within
Truth11 Films lastest film The Enemy Within discusses the fascist police state that surrounds us and is a wake up call for some to realize we are controlled by the same people who funded Hitler. The camps are built, the drills have been run. The police state is secured. Its time to wake up. Don’t get on the bus to the camps, resist Nazi Fascist control. We have great strength in numbers. We must unite and organize ourselves with self government through internet automation. See film Here
As Americans mindlessly celebrate another Memorial Day with cookouts, beer and burgers, the U.S. war machine keeps churning. As we brutally enforce our will on foreign countries, we create more people that hate us. They don’t hate us for our freedom. They hate us because we have invaded and occupied their countries. They hate us because we kill innocent people with predator drones. They hate us for our hypocrisy regarding democracy and freedom. Just when we had the opportunity to make a sensible decision by leaving Iraq and exiting the Middle East quagmire, Obama made the abysmal choice to casually sacrifice more troops in the Afghan shithole. We have thrown over $1.3 trillion down Middle East rat holes over the last 11 years with no discernible benefit to the citizens of the United States. George Bush and Barack Obama did this to prove they were true statesmen. The Soviet Union killed over 1 million Afghans, while driving another 5 million out of the country and retreated as a bankrupted and defeated shell after ten years. Young Americans continue to die, for whom and for what? Our foreign policy during the last eleven years can be summed up in one military term, SNAFU – Situation Normal All Fucked Up. These endless foreign interventions under the guise of a War on Terror are a smoke screen for what is really going on in this country. When a government has unsolvable domestic problems, they try to distract the willfully ignorant masses by proactively creating foreign conflicts based upon false pretenses. General Douglas MacArthur understood this danger to our liberty. “I am concerned for the security of our great Nation; not so much because of any threat from without, but because of the insidious forces working from within.” Read article here
Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld convicted of war crimes by international Tribunal
In the first verdict of its kind since former President George W. Bush left office, he and several members of his administration have been successfully convicted in absentia of war crimes in Malaysia.
A five panel tribunal delivered a unanimous guilty verdict after a week long trial that, unsurprisingly, was not covered by American media. The witnesses included several ex-Guantanamo detainees that gave testimony on the conditions and human rights violations that were systematically carried out under orders of the Bush administration.
Former President Bush, Former Vice-President Dick Cheney, Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and the legal advisers Alberto Gonzales, David Addington, William Haynes, Jay Bybee and John Yoo that crafted the legal ‘justification’ for torture that basically said, ‘we can if we want to even if it’s illegal’ were the defendants. None were present, of course, but international war crime trials do not require the presence of the accused. The trial was run according to the standards set by the Nuremberg Trials to convict war criminals after World War II. Read article here
Leaked U.S Army Document Outlines Plan For Re-Education Camps In America
A leaked U.S. Army document prepared for the Department of Defense contains shocking plans for “political activists” to be pacified by “PSYOP officers” into developing an “appreciation of U.S. policies” while detained in prison camps inside the United States. Read article here.
A project of immense secrecy, it is the final piece in a complex puzzle assembled over the past decade. Its purpose: to intercept, decipher, analyze, and store vast swaths of the world’s communications as they zap down from satellites and zip through the underground and undersea cables of international, foreign, and domestic networks….Flowing through its servers and routers and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of communication, including the complete contents of private emails, cell phone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal data trails—parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases, and other digital “pocket litter.”… The heavily fortified $2 billion center should be up and running in September 2013.” In other words, in just over 1 year, virtually anything one communicatesthrough any traceable medium, or any record of one’s existence in the electronic medium, which these days is everything, will unofficially be property of the US government to deal with as it sees fit. The codename of the project: Stellar Wind. Read article here
Radioactive Water One Year After The 3/11 Fukushima Attack
A few days after the one year anniversary of the Fukushima 3/11 attacks on Japan. The worlds largest man made ecological disaster continues to unfold. From ASR, a global coastal and marine consulting firm, The Radioactive Seawater Impact Map. Read article here
New World Order: Blueprint Of Madmen
A new documentary from Alex Jones definitively declares war against the attempts to control the population through a fear of false dangers. The facts are in– terrorism as a mass threat is a hoax. It is government, and the elite who control it, that pose the real threat to humanity. This new film will serve as evidence to the fact that government is history’s greatest killer– with various regimes claiming more than 262,000,000 unnatural deaths in the 20th Century alone. Now, a 21st century technocratic global corporate tyranny seeks to kill not mere millions but billions– through their superweapons, central banking warfare model and eugenics mindset. See movie here.
Nazification Of America Is Almost Complete
The United States of America is becoming more like Nazi Germany every single day. In fact, the Nazification of America is almost complete. The parallels between Nazi Germany and the United States of today are going to absolutely shock many of you. Most Americans simply have never learned what life was really like back in Nazi Germany. Under Adolf Hitler, Germany was a Big Brother totalitarian police state that ruthlessly repressed freedom and individual liberty. Read article showing 25 signs that Americas Nazification is almost complete here.
The Copyright Office Is A Corrupt Raceteering Operation For Censorship
It is a known fact that the Copyright Office has been a fraud, does nothing to protect the original content creators, and has deprived America of it’s true creativity. When facts and informational material in newspapers can be copyrighted and lead to copyright infringement lawsuits the copyright office is a known corrupt fascist front for the giant mega corporations and mega banks. Copyrights are suppose to only apply to creative material in nature as Judge Philip Pro believes posting an entire article is Fair Use for non commercial entities online since copyright should only apply to content creative in nature and facts cannot be copyrighted. …The copyright office wants alternative media websites to disappear into a black hole. They are the biotch of the large Mega Corporations that put out propaganda for the Council of 300, the Bilderberg Group, and global power brokers. They know piracy is not the real reason for newspapers losing traffic and losing advertisement money. It is because they lie, distort, and omit the facts. The newspapers lie for the U.S. Government and banksters that really rule America and the rest of the world. Read article here
A Noble Lie: A New Film Exposing The Truth Of The 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing
Noble Lie: A myth or untruth knowingly told by the elite to maintain social harmony, or the social position of the elite. – The Republic, Plato The 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City was a direct blow to the heart of America. One hundred sixty-eight people were killed, including nineteen children. For those watching the nightly news, terrorism had come home. For years following the bombing, countless victims’ family members, survivors, rescuers and ordinary Americans have questioned the official accounts about that fateful day. Hoping to shed light on answers long ignored and censored, both by prominent media outlets and the U.S. government, A Noble Lie peels back what we thought we knew about the bombing and its perpetrators. This film exposes information never before examined or brought to the attention of the American public. See here
Model For Colonizing Nations (National Destruction) Banksters Handbook
Steps 1-8 from the handbook of the evil corrupt few that are running the planet. Their model; Force and Hypocrisy, used to destroy whole countries in the name of “freedom”, “democracy”, “human rights” and “free trade”. They use utmost force and violence to achieve their ends. “What did you say…? That you don’t want to be liberated and democratized?” “Then take this Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Hanoi, Berlin, Dresden, Bagdad, and Basra…” “Take that Vietnam, Tokyo, Gaza, Kabul, Pakistan, Tripoli, Belgrade, Egypt, El Salvador and Grenada…” “And that, Panama, Argentina, Chile, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Somalia, Africa…” Always bombing people to smithereens… Of course, always in the name of “freedom”, “democracy”, “human rights” and “free trade”. Read article and watch video from ex-IMF Economic hit man John Perkins here
Truth11 Films | Armed WithThe Truth, United We Stand
Truth11 Films latest release documents the reasons the 99% have risen. It outlines the subjects that need to be discussed, the areas of corruption and areas of government tyranny. Set to Famine, by Opeth. See the film here
11/11/11 Unite For World Peace
November 11 1918 was supposed to be the end of all war. Instead the propaganda machine continued and with its perseverance the concept of peace was lost as being normal. Perpetual war was created immediately as war was outlawed. By refusing to enforce the ban of the concept of war, perpetual war was born. All war is illegal murder. … November 11th was not made a holiday in order to celebrate war, support troops, or cheer in the 11th year of occupying Afghanistan. This day was made a holiday in order to celebrate an armistice that ended what was up until that point, in 1918, on of the worst things our species had thus far done to itself, namely World War I. ….. This November 11th 2011 is one where the truth is known by more people than ever before, 1500 plus cities are in protest and the world is awaking to the reality that we can choose world peace. We can choose prosperity. 11/11/11 Unite for world peace. Read article here
Rex 84 Vs. Globalist Shutdown
For many years the globalists, through the federal agencies they control, have treasonously planned to use devastating orchestrated events to suspend constitutional rights and implement martial law. The best-known plan for martial law/continuity of government is called REX 84. Despite their planning efforts, technology, and billions of dollars spent on martial law training, a handful of activists can utilize simple yet powerful tools to ensure martial law is never implemented. This plan is known as Globalist Shutdown. Read article here
From the creators of Esoteric Agenda and Kymatica , UNGRIP penetrates the illusions and delusions of the legal system with direct relation to the psychology of humanity. See movie here
The Pole Shift In Global Financial Power Is Almost Complete
The process of removing the cabal that has controlled most of the world for the past 300 years is almost complete, according to sources directly involved in the takedown. The takedown is being done by the world’s military, police and intelligence agencies. The group being taken down is the Thule Society, Skull&Bones Nazi conglomerate headed by George Bush Senior. This group was trying to start world war 3 in order to reduce the world’s population by 85% and start a fascist world government. Instead, they will be bankrupted and put in jail. Evidence of the takedown is now becoming visible for all to see. For example the IMF, supposedly the world’s lender of last resort, is saying they have no money to help the Euro. This is publicly available evidence that the post war power structure is ending. Read article here
The Rise Of The 9/11 Truth Movement and The Second Western Enlightenment
The growth of the 9/11 truth and justice movement throughout the world is unstoppable. The psychopathic elite and their moronic puppets in governments and media institutions cannot prevent the natural progress of freedom, peace, knowledge, truth, and love… All the establishment sources of information and news, whether television or print, are losing credibility and public trust by the day. They are beyond redemption. Their complicity in war crimes and crimes against democracy will never be forgotten. If they are not in the gutter of history already, they soon will be when 9/11 truth reaches critical mass. …9/11 truthers and conspiracy theorists are the vanguard of freedom of speech in the West and represent the intellectual resistance to the global totalitarian corporate state that got its big boost after the false flag 9/11 attacks. Read article here
Ten Years After 9/11
10 years after 9/11 the masses are still living in denial and their action of inaction continues to enable mass murder. This must end. We can not allow the masses to stay in their false reality bubble at the cost of millions of lives. We must all act upon the truth. Ten years ago to the day we were attacked by our own government. On September 11, 2001 the US government plans of pre-meditated mass murder were carried out on its own people. With the intent to enlist the population into perpetual wars of mass murder. And to further enslave the human population deeper into the fascist police state. An ever controlled life of servitude, enslaved to the same people who put Hitler in power. The same people put Bush and Obama into office and thus the Nazi rule still persists to this day. Read article here
Gandhi On Ending Injustice
US injustice in major policies will end when enough Americans speak the truth. The injustice is literal: US government policies with war and economics are in Orwellian violation of basic laws. The annual costs are millions of human lives, billions damned to suffer, and trillions of dollars looted. Anyone with intellectual integrity and moral courage can see and say these facts. Read article here
Open proposal for US revolution:
End unlawful wars, parasitic/criminal economics and expose corporate media as propaganda
Revolution is from the Latin, revolutio, a “turn around” of political power. The US public would revolt and end unlawful US wars and banksters’ rigged-casino fraud if they understood and embraced the central facts of these issues. This four-part series of articles provides the central facts, invites passionate public response, and proposes specific revolutionary public action. Read article here
The King family’s civil trial found the US government guilty of Dr. King’s assassination
US Corporate media refused to cover the trial or interview Dr. King’s wife. His family’s opinion is that the US government murdered Dr. King to end his protests against unlawful US wars and his call to end poverty. Read article here
Over 250 million human beings slaughtered by governments in war
The century within which we were all born witnessed over 250 million human beings slaughtered by governments in war and atrocities. War is used as a continuous “foreign policy,” with the US in present egregious and unlawful abuse of their superpower status. History will judge when Americans developed the education competence to evolve beyond endless wars. Read article here
Controlled Economic Collapse
Over 1 Million Deaths Annually, 62 Million People With Zero Net Worth, As The Economic Elite Make Off WIth $46 Trillion
The American public has sustained intensive economic attacks across broad segments of the population. While the attacks have been increasingly severe in scale over the past four years, they have been implemented with technocratic precision. They have been incrementally applied thus far, successfully keeping the population passive and avoiding any large-scale civilian unrest, while effectively reducing living standards for the majority of the population. Read article here
The Riots Of England Are Exactly What The Establishment Want = Don’t Play Into Their Hands = Riots Are Not The Solution
It then comes to a point in time when it is in the best interests of the powers that are in control to let the ponzi scheme they have created collapse. The math makes no sense any more, they need it to fail so they can start the next one hundred year pyramid scheme of fractional reserve banking. We are at 100% of GDP to service the debt. Income tax would have to be raised to 80% to cover the debt. Baby boomers are retiring in mass with nothing to show for their years in the slave system. The elite know its going down and they respond by furiously further robbing us blind, transferring even more wealth back to them in fast forward. Foreclosing on houses and taking vast land ownership, crashing markets and daily gouging the lemmings in the stock market corrupt trading system. When it all collapses you will not even have your house to hold up in… and thats their plan. Its not enough they want to enslave us and kill and rob us blind, they want to control us with a tight police state. So they instil riots and the masses cry for martial law and beg for a police state. We must not fall for this. Read article here.
9/11 International Hearings To Be Held In Toronto
A decade after the events of September 11, 2001, which resulted in the immediate deaths of nearly 3,000 people on American soil, countless victims from toxic dust, and hundreds of thousands of deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq, international hearings on this pivotal event will begin in Toronto in September. The events of September 11 provided a pretext for a War on Terror that has led to military invasions and occupations, and attacks upon civil and human rights throughout the world. The credibility of the official investigation into the events of September 11, 2001, carried out by the U.S. Government between 2003 and 2005, has been questioned by millions of citizens in the United States and abroad, including victim family members, expert witnesses and international legal experts. Read article here
There is no freedom, no democracy, and no government accountability in Amerika, a fascist state
Americans are a doomed people for many reasons. One reason is that they are disunited and at one another’s throats and, thus, cannot stand up the tyranny issuing from Washington. Read Article here.
A World Overwhelmed By Western Hypocrisy
As the second decade of the 21st century opens, those who oppose US hegemony and the evil that emanates from Washington risk being declared to be “terrorists” If they are American citizens, they can be assassinated. If they are foreign leaders, their country can be invaded. … And the American sheeple think that they have “freedom and democracy.” …. There is nothing left of the American character. Only a people who have lost their soul could tolerate the evil that emanates from Washington. Read article here
The Government Has Ordered The Media Not To Cover 9/11
The Pentagon Papers have finally been released by the government. Yet the statements from Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg about 9/11 have not been covered by the corporate media; what else is new. Read article here
Truth11 Films | Perpetual War
We have been tricked into fighting perpetual wars of mass genocide for pointless profit. There is no enemy. The enemy is within the US government. All exterior enemies are created to justify the advancing military industrial complex. There is only one way war will end. The masses must rise up, unite, and demand world peace. Here is Truth11 Films latest short film set to The Lotus Eater by Opeth. Perpetual War; See film here
Plans For A Permanent War Against Terror | A War Against A Fake Terror Al-CIA-da
By declaring a global war against nameless individuals, organizations and nations ‘associated’ with the Taliban and al Qaeda, as well as those playing a supporting role in their efforts, the Detainee Security Act would appear to grant the president near unfettered authority to initiate military action around the world without further congressional approval. Read articles here and here
Manufactured Reality + A Politically Constructed History
The American people are prisoners of state terror and victims of totalitarian propaganda. The American mind has been under a government and media siege ever since September 11, 2001 when the Bush administration committed the deadliest terrorist attack against America in U.S. history. But there are no cages, or military guards on the streets to signify that America is imprisoned. Guns are not needed to secure an illegitimate reign when people self-police their thoughts and police others by calling them conspiracy theorists if they champion a view of reality that is in stark contrast to the one that the men in power profess and the official ministers of propaganda publicize day and night. Read article here
Al Qaeda: A CIA Database | Not A Terrorist Group
Shortly before his untimely death, former British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook told the House of Commons that “Al Qaeda” is not really a terrorist group but a database of international mujaheddin and arms smugglers used by the CIA and Saudis to funnel guerrillas, arms, and money into Soviet-occupied Afghanistan. Read article here
Bilderberg Meeting 2011 – Swiss National Councillors Letter About This Corrupt Group
This Group unites a kind of European and global elite of Bankers, Industrialists, Diplomats, US and European NATO Brass, crowned heads, Media groups, their Moguls and Editors, as well as Heads of States, whether retired or not, which coordinates, exchanges, organizes and structures, out of all democratic control, the major guidelines towards economic globalization. Considering that the notions of sovereignty and independence are obsolete, if not hindrances to an open Market, this discreet Group develops an ultra-liberal, Free Trade society model, with a (unique) world currency and the IMF as Treasurer. Read article here
New Madrid fault line attack underway, 15 nuclear reactors targeted
The “once in 500 year” flooding of the Mississippi river over the New Madrid fault line is part of a campaign directed against the American people, according to multiple intelligence agency (MI6, CIA, FSB, Japan Security police) sources. The HAARP caused flooding is expected to be followed by an earthquake and then a “nuclear emergency” involving the 15 nuclear reactors located in the region. This will be a pretext for mass evacuations into FEMA camps, the sources say. The best way to derail this plan, apart from arresting the criminal cabal in Washington D.C., is to widely announce and denounce these plans in advance. Read article here
Fake Death Of Bin Laden + The War On Terror False Flag Operation
By now, you are probably worn out from all the speculation about the actual events in Pakistan that claim the death of the public enemy No 1. No photos of a dead Osama bin Laden, burial at sea, instant DNA results and changing versions with every new news report gets old quickly. Capturing him alive for interrogation would maximize the intelligence quest, if that were the real goal. If any significance should be assigned to this account, now is the time to re-evaluate the entire nature of the War on Terror that has destroyed America more in the last ten years than any attack on home soil. Read article here
The Collapse Of Our Modern World + The Birth Of A Better One
The root cause of most these problems that are bringing down our world right now is bad government. It is bad government (Big Government) that approved the GMOs. Bad government enforced the medical monopoly and allowed the pesticides to kill the honeybees. Bad government drove us into inescapable debt and costly foreign wars. Bad government outlawed health freedom and protected the monopolistic practices of the food companies, drug companies and chemical companies. The downfall of modern human civilization is, as you probably guessed, also the downfall of the very idea that Big Government creates a better society. Because if there’s one idea that needs to stay dead after the collapse, it’s the idea that We the People somehow need another group of people (government workers) to live off our hard work while hounding us with their false authority, directing every little detail of our lives. What we need in our world isn’t more government, but more freedom. If we had freedom, integrity and personal responsibility, we wouldn’t even be facing the global collapse that has already begun. Read article here.
The Global Economy’s Corporate Crime Wave
The world is drowning in corporate fraud, and the problems are probably greatest in rich countries – those with supposedly “good governance.” Poor-country governments probably accept more bribes and commit more offenses, but it is rich countries that host the global companies that carry out the largest offenses. Money talks, and it is corrupting politics and markets all over the world. Read article here
Sociapitalism: How the Government Became the Next Bubble | When This Bubble Bursts America Will Be Changed Forever
In the last thirteen years, a new financial order replaced capitalism in America. With cat-like tread, this transformation has caught most Americans unaware, let alone some of country’s best financial minds (many of them fascist anyway). This new order constitutes the socializing of risk. Read article here
Quantum Physics + Mind Over Matter
Quantum physics has proven that all matter at the subatomic level exists in wave form, and that matter only appears solid when we, as the observer, use our senses to decode and perceive the wave patterns in space and time. Significantly, thoughts, especially concentrated thoughts, also form measurable wave patterns. And thought waves have proven to affect observable matter in the physical world. Read article here
5 Words Used To Control + Enslave Us
These 5 words are the keys to casting the spell in the attorneys’ legal jargon trickery. All commercial transactions / contracts have been designed to remove the men and women from the equation and replace with a legal fictional entity in the matrix system. Read article here
Centralized government identity program dismissed as being too draconian for Communist China
Gets go ahead in United States
A new program being touted by the Obama administration as a solution to online identity theft actually increases the risk of identity theft while providing the government with a national ID system through the backdoor, paving the way for a world wide web in which users will need government permission to access the Internet. Read article here
Destroy The Globalists, One Fat Cat Corporations At A Time
Many may ask, “How exactly can we boycott the globalists when they control everything?” The answer is by systematically boycotting and replacing them with local alternatives. You can actually start today, by boycotting corporations you may not have even considered part of this nefarious agenda and corporations you not only can certainly live without, but would be better off for it. It requires absolutely no money at all, in fact, it will save you money in the long run and if you decide to replace them, you may learn a valuable skill-set in the process. Read article here
Suppressing Truth and Promoting War: A New York Times Tradition
During and since WW II alone, America killed millions of mostly civilian Japanese, Germans, Italians, Koreans, Southeast Asians, Central Americans, Africans, Iraqis, Afghans, Pakistanis, and now Libyans. Read how the New York Times is party to genocide. Just like the rest of the mass media circus. Here
Flying Saucer Technology Released
Nuclear Engineer, Mehran Tavakoli Keshe, has come forward as being the developer of the technology being used in Iran’s new “flying saucer.” His technology is claimed to harness magnetism and gravity to allow travel throughout the solar system and beyond. Read article here
Legalizing War With Secret Memos
Justice Department memos“legalizing” the crime of aggressive war were secret. Now they’re published quickly, and there’s a new one out on Libya (PDF). It begins:“The President had the constitutional authority to direct the use of military force in Libya because he could reasonably determine that such use of force was in the national interest. Prior congressional approval was not constitutionally required to use military force in the limited operations under consideration. April 1, 2011.” read article here
Obama’s Position On Assassinations
The Democrat in office has taken a position on unilateral murder so extreme as to be “profoundly troubling” in its legal reach and potential for future use. Read article here
9/11 Stand Down Orders
The 9/11 attacks have directly led to a dangerous interventionist US foreign policy based on preemptive military action that has transcended administrations and political paradigms. The key to understanding how 9/11 was possible can be found in a single government document, presented in context by Ventura in stunning detail. Just two short months prior to 9/11, then Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld oversaw a significant change to DoD procedures for dealing with hijacked aircraft, making it the personal responsibility of the Defense Secretary to issue intercept orders. Of course, on 9/11 no such intercept orders were issued to NORAD, and three of four hijacked airliners were able to hit their targets with precision accuracy, paving the way for literal modern military crusade into the middle east, and now into Africa. Read article here
Jesse Ventura’s New book, 63 Documents The Government Doesn’t Want You To Read, blows the lid off top secret black ops
Libya: Another War, Another Pack of Lies
The United States, Britain and NATO don’t care about bombing civilians to contain rebellion. Their militaries bomb civilians every day without mercy. They have destroyed most of the community infrastructure of Iraq and Afghanistan before turning their sights on Libya. Read 11 Articles on Libya in 1 here
“Support The Troops” Is One Of The Most Cruel Hoaxes In History
Support the troops” is a clever PR slogan that causes Americans to turn a blind eye to the brutal exploitation of our soldiers and military families for profit and for an evil ideology. Our soldiers and military families are paying for the Bush/Cheney/Obama/neocon wars with lives, limbs, post-traumatic stress, suicides, broken marriages, children without fathers, wives without husbands, and parents without sons and daughters. Read article here.
Japan Earthquake + Tsunami Caused By HAARP and Nukes In the Seabed
The horrific earthquake weapon attack on Japan, resulting in 10 meter tsunamis along much of Japan’s coast line came from rogue elements of the U.S. government located in underground bases in New Mexico and Nevada, according to pentagon and CIA sources. Read articles here and here and a video explanation here
Rothschild Bankers Looting Nations Through World Bank/IMF
The World Bank/IMF is owned and controlled by NM Rothschild & Sons plus 30 to 40 of the wealthiest people in the world. For over 150 years they have planned to take over the planet through money. The former chief economist of the World Bank, Joe Stiglitz, was fired in 2000. He pointed out to top executives that every country the IMF/World Bank forced their way into ended up with a crashed economy, a destroyed government, and some even broke out in riots. Read article here
The Connection Between Military Dominance + Planned Economic Crisis
The book Global Economic Crisis carefully ties militarization with the planned economic meltdown.The New World Order’s systematic destruction of the planet’s middle classes so as to concentrate wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer families. While global uprisings now threaten global governance under a single currency, scheming rulers have long anticipated this reaction. In The Global Economic Crisis, we learn exactly how a planet-wide military dictatorship plans to enforce its feudal vision. Read article here
Truth11 Films | Techno Revolution + Self-Government System
Truth11 films latest short film is a call to action for peaceful instant global techno revolution, followed by a system that is already in place for global self-government. We are highly connected, we are highly equipped to unite. United we stand for self-government over new world order tyranny. Watch here
Eliminating The Entire Federal Government Structure Is The Answer
The entire rationalization for the War of Terror against the American people rests upon the willful surrender of our most precious natural rights to a corrupt government. The Geheime Staatspolizei secret state police spawn the Homeland Security society. The criminal acts of the TSA are an affront to every citizen. In this new century, irrevocably harmed is caused by the phony domestic terror phobia. America is a mere shell of herself. Pile on the forced tax to fund socialized medicine over the intense opposition of regular people and you have a perfect storm. How can reform be a practical option when faced with such a perverse political system? The only sensible path for sincere and courageous souls is to work towards a replacement of the central government model of governance. Eliminating the entire Federal Government structure may seem to be impossible. However, aided in this task are the very actions of an evil system! All empires collapse. The United States is no more a monolithic union than the nations of the world are a global brotherhood. The myth that citizens owe an allegiance to a failed federation is absurd. Read Article here
Revolution Without Violence
The American power structure has been set reeling by something that is simply outside the boundaries of their mental universe: a non-violent, non-sectarian, non-ideological, leaderless revolution by ordinary people. Read article here
Self Sufficiency | Food Production
There are many gardening techniques that can produce an abundance of food for you and your family without requiring a lot of space, money or equipment. Read article here.
Self-Sufficiency: a universal solution to the globalist problem
Self-sufficiency and the harassing of technology in the hands of the people are the greatest fears of the global oligarchy – fears that oligarchs throughout the centuries have harbored. Simply boycotting the globalists’ corporations and replacing them with local solutions is something everyone can afford to do starting today. Read article here
United We Stand, Connected, Organized + Armed With The Truth
The ability of the social networks to organize a protest almost overnight, because people of similar beliefs and commitments are in close communication with others, has completely changed the nature of political resistance and revolution. This system of revolution toppled a middle eastern dictatorship in less than a month. It threatens to topple two more before the end of February: Yemen and Egypt. We have entered into a new period political resistance. Read Article Here
Thirty Little Known Facts About America
IRS, IMF, UN, US Treasury, FCC, CIA, FBI, NSA and Executive Orders… Read article here
Deconstructing The Sovereign United States
We the people are viewed as the greatest threat to a malevolent government and its partnering corporations and the expansion of what is becoming a full blown police state. The security the government desires is not from foreign terrorists, but rather, from us. Read Article Here
“[T]he occupier, by seeing this sign (V), always the same, infinitely repeated, [would] understand that he is surrounded, encircled by an immense crowd of citizens eagerly awaiting his first moment of weakness, watching for his first failure.” Read Article Here
The Council of Foreign Relations figured out how many news stations, radio stations and publications it would take to control the majority of opinion. They purchased them and put an editor in place in every one. See movie explaining how this elite group has controlled the big picture with propaganda from so many angles it has brainwashed a nation here.
The Collective Evolution
‘The Collective Evolution’ is a documentary aimed at showing the current state of the world, why it needs to be changed, and how each and every one of us can play a role in changing it. Watch Movie Here
Zeitgeist Moving Forward
“The world is going bankrupt, (whatever the hell that means), because of this idea called debt, which doesn’t even exist in the physical reality. Its only part of a game we have invented, yet the well-being of billions of people is now being compromised. Extreme lay-offs, tent cities, accelerating poverty, austerity measures imposted, schools shutting down, child hunger,and other levels familiar deprivation all because of this elaborate fiction…what are we fucking stupid” See the first 3 movies here, Read Truth11′s review of the movie: there are some mixed reviews of this movie, and for good reason. Don’t let the message get lost due to corruption of even the purest ideas and watch the New movie Zeitgeist Moving Forward here
Obama Is CIA
After eight brutal years of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, the nation was ready for any change. Unfortunately, the CIA, through LOOKING GLASS, MK-ULTRA, ARTICHOKE, PANDORA, and other behavioral science programs were ready to answer the call. The CIA answered the call with Obama and most of us bought him and his “Hope and Change” propaganda fecundity “nurtured” by CIA programs going back some sixty years. Read article here
Lets Reclaim History
This is not an American government at all. It is a gang.
The deceitful and manipulative leaders in the CIA, the Federal Reserve, the White House, the State Department, and the Pentagon are the most destructive force in the world, and pose the greatest existential threat to human civilization, and world peace. Read article here
10 New Year’s Re-Solutions For Non-Violent Rebellion
Because our representative democracy has become a fraud, and the media and courts are clearly shills for the oligarchs, our only action appears to be non-violent rebellion; one person and community at a time. We can expose the crimes and immorality of the corporate state through civil disobedience and conscientious objection. We can punish multinational companies who commit flagrant fouls on humanity and the environment by boycotting them. Additionally, we can peacefully regain our liberty by becoming less dependent on the system for our basic needs. Read article here
9/11 Billboards | We Need More Of These
If you are going to donate any money to truth organizations, may we suggest putting money into billboards. We need more of these. In what may be the first of it’s kind in the nation, a group of 9/11 Truth activists organized, designed and paid for a commercial billboard in which 1,200 Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth invite the public to “Examine the Evidence.” Read article here
Big Brother Watches You But You Are Not Allowed To Know Its Secrets
One of the hallmarks of an authoritarian government is its fixation on hiding everything it does behind a wall of secrecy while simultaneously monitoring, invading and collecting files on everything its citizenry does. Based on the Francis Bacon aphorism that “knowledge is power,” this is the extreme imbalance that renders the ruling class omnipotent and citizens powerless. Read article here
Secret Underground Shelters | Denver International Airport
Built by the Masonic New World Airport Commission. The Denver International Airport covers the US largest secret underground shelter. It is adorned with disturbing graphic images of burning bushes, people in coffins, children crying, and a soldier with an AK47 and sword killing the dove of peace. Images you would not expect to find in an airport. Put there to illustrate the purpose of the facility. Read article and watch documentaries here
Jesse Ventura | Conspiracy Theory | Seasons 1 and 2
Episodes covering; 2012, Secret Societies, HAARP, Big Brother, Plum Island, Area 51, Wall St, FEMA Camp | Police State, JFK Assassination, 911 / Pentagon, Manchurian Candidate, World Wide Water Conspiracy, Gulf Oil Spill, Global Warming and the Great Lakes. Watch the episodes here
The Rand Corporation: A top secret think tank has been pulling the strings of American government for at least 60 years
“We’re all the bastard children of RAND and we don’t even know it,” RAND started off as an organization centered around building new weapons for the military but ultimately expanded into politics, science, history and economics and was closely allied with the Ford, Rockefeller and Carnegie foundations. RAND was instrumental in developing the strategy behind the use of nuclear weapons, and how they actively promoting nuking the entirety of Eastern Europe as well as China in case of problems in Western Europe, a policy that could easily have sparked off a catastrophic nuclear holocaust. RAND researchers believed that as long as 10 million Americans survived a nuclear war, the war was won. Read article here
To Question The Official 9/11 Story Is Simply And Fundamentally Revolutionary
To question the government story about 9/11 is to question the very foundations of our entire modern belief system regarding our government, our country and our way of life…Bring on the revolution | Pentagon whistleblowers call for a new 9/11 investigation Read article here
The Deliberate Dumbing Down Of America
This is a very good film showing the systematic approach the government has taken to dumb down America. Covering the education system, poisoning of citizens, fluoridation, and over medication of the population. See movie here
Let The Banks Collapse and Free Us All From Slavery
The peoples of Ireland, Portugal, Spain etc. are looking at Iceland and realizing its is better for a country to allow banks to collapse that it is to take on generations of debt slavery. Ireland is now expected to be the first country to leave the Euro. They will not be the last. Read article here
Fly The US Governments True Flag and Judge Their Actions Accordingly
Look at the actions of the US government over the past 70+ years, and judge each action with the governments true flag flying. You will see the forest for the trees. Read Article Here
In America today, there are approximately five unemployed workers for every single job opening
The truth is that there are not nearly enough jobs out there for everyone that wants one. In fact, it isn’t even close. Read article here
Is WikiLeaks Going To Help The Government Kill The First Amendment and The Bill Of Rights?
Is This The Excuse They Need To Shut Down The Internet?
In order to convert the United States into a third world slave gulag with a high-tech police state overlay, the ruling elite will target and attempt to liquidate alternative media. Eventually extraditing and prosecuting Julian Assange as an enemy of the state is an important element in the effort to kill the First Amendment and the Bill of Rights. Read articles here and here and here.
The Chemtrail Cover-Up
Clandestine NASA-military programs are poisoning the environment. Read article here
The Big Picture Truth About The Global Warming Scam
Enough is enough of this complete bullshit
Several years ago, the sun was unusually active and all the planets in our solar system experienced a time of “global warming”. That is a fact which many global warming alarmists just conveniently ignore. If man was the primary cause of “global warming” then why were all of the other planets in our solar system experiencing increased temperatures as well? The green agenda is becoming increasingly linked to the population control agenda. Today there are literally millions of people who actually believe that we need to dramatically reduce the number of humans on the planet for the good of the earth. Read article here
Nazis, Eugenics, Floride and The Rockefeller Foundation
Depopulation programs forged by the Rockefeller foundation in association with the Nazis were the basis of modern day incarnations of eugenics like fluoride poisoning and vaccinations.
Blaylock explains how the eugenics movement began in America through Rockefeller, Ford and Carnegie funding and what originated as The Science of Man project, which was an effort to socially engineer humanity to weed out those deemed “undesirable” to the elite. “Fluoridation is the greatest case of scientific fraud of this century.”- Robert Carlton, Ph.D, former EPA scientist, 1992 The history of forcing fluoride on humans through the fluoridation of drinking water is wrought with lies, greed and deception. Governments that add fluoride to drinking water supplies insist that it is safe, beneficial and necessary, however, scientific evidence shows that fluoride is not safe to ingest and areas that fluoridate their drinking water supplies have higher rates of cavities, cancer, dental fluorosis, osteoporosis and other health problems. Read articles Here + Here
Here is an excellent movie by Noam Chomsky on the subject of using media to control the population. See movie here
Pol Pot Genocide of 2 Million Cambodian People in 1975
This movie also covers atrocities such as Pol Pot masacre of Cambodian people in 1975. Something the US Government and global media was complicit in.
The Game Is Simple | All Economies Will Fail + The IMF Will Enslave Us All
The current economic control system is a pyramid scheme that is coming to the end of its cycle globally. No surprises, just built to fail from inception. The false solution is to roll into a new pyramid scheme by the IMF. As each country falls the IMF steps in and when they do the country suffers to no end. Natural resources are sold off and the country works eternally to pay the debt. Read article on the latest countries for the math to fail here.
The Big Picture When It Comes To Naked Body + Behavior Scanners
Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano admitted yesterday that body scanners would eventually find their way into U.S. public transportation, trains and boats, but Big Sis is already beta-testing technology that goes even further, by forcing Americans to undergo a behavioral interrogation before they are allowed to enter sports events, rock concerts and shopping malls. … The use of such technology is not only a complete violation of the Fourth Amendment, it also eviscerates the notion of innocent until proven guilty, and therefore totally undermines everything America stands for. Read article here
Voting … is a poor substitute for democracy, which requires direct action by concerned citizens
The past has shown us when faced with tyranny and corruption, there is only one way for the masses to regain freedom : Rise up, resist, revolt, strike, defy and do it in mass. We have great strength in unity. United we stand. Read article here. See also this article on Europe rising up here
Marijuana Prohibition Is The Cornerstone Of The Police State
The simple truth about America’s marijuana prohibition: any law that allows the easy incarceration of any citizen any time those in power want to do it is the ultimate enemy of democracy. With 800,000 annual arrests over an herb used by tens of millions of Americans, it is the cornerstone of a police state. Read article here
Pearl Harbor Was An Inside Job
Robert Stinnett published his book “Day Of Deceit: The Truth About FDR and Pearl Harbor”in 1999. Stinnett, a decorated WWII veteran and author, requested files about the attack, and the events preceding it, through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). He discovered that FDR not only knew about the attack in advance, but that his administration did everything it could to cause a Japanese attack on America. Read article here
Words Of Truth From System Of A Down
The percentage of Americans in the prison system prison system, has doubled since 1985 | Why don’t presidents fight the war? Why do they always send the poor? | Modern globalization, Coupled with condemnations, Unnecessary death, Matador corporations, Puppeting your frustrations, With the blinded flag, Manufacturing consent, Is the name of the game, The bottom line is money, Nobody gives a fuck. 4000 hungry children die per hour, from starvation, while billions spent on bombs, creating death showers. | Read article here
Governments are the great mass-murderers of our world
Throughout human history, more human beings have been maimed, tortured and murdered by governments than by any other type of organization on the planet. And virtually all of that activity has been justified under the excuse that they were working to “make the world a better place.” Read article here
9/11 Truth Report in “Focus Money”
On 2010-09-08 Focus Money, an weekly mainly economic magazine, did a special take on 9/11 truth. This is a major breaktrough, as Focus Money is the second in the market for ecomomic magazines by numbers, edition about 140.000, views probably 50% more. This is the second time Focus Money printed an article about 9/11 truth, after a 5-page article back in January. The old one was titled “We don’t believe you” Read article here
The 911 pictures article has also been recently updated with new photos. Here
Eisenhower’s Warned Us Of The Military Industrial Complex
We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations. We must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together. See speech and read article here
De-classified Vietnam-era Transcripts Show Senators Knew Gulf Of Tonkin Was A Staged False Flag Event
Aug. 4, 1964 Gulf of Tonkin incident, where US warships were apparently attacked by North Vietnamese PT Boats – an incident that kicked off US involvement in the Vietnam war – was a staged event that never actually took place. Read article here.
Fluoridation is straight from the Nazi handbook | It must be stopped
Despite damning evidence on fluoride toxicity, bureaucracies and multinationals continue to pollute our drinking water and mess with our physical and mental health. Read article here | Also more articles in the Fluoridation category (right)
20 corrupt leaders planning global taxes, austerity, global government and expansion of government tyranny. Nazi police tactics, martial law, police in disguise and paid provocateurs = the black block; hijacking the peaceful protests, that were suspiciously left alone by police. Bait cars, illegal searches, torture and beating peaceful protestors and journalists. Welcome to the Toronto G20. New world order in full effect in police state Toronto. Read article and see photos and videos here. Update article here
Black Bloc… Paid Provocateurs And Police In Disguise
To justify the spending, a false flag attack by police and paid vandals aid the new world order agenda. See article and watch video here
A Right Is Not A Right If They Can Take It Away
Suspension of rights in Toronto for the G2o, If they get away with this, they will do it again. See call to action article here
Toronto G20 Update
Police violating rights, lying, beating, abducting, raping and torturing protestors. Fascist Police State. Multiple update articles in one here.
Toronto G20 Video By Truth11 Films | Fuck Everything You Stand For | Watch here
New Bill Gives Obama Kill Switch To Shut Down the Internet
The federal government is desperate to seize control of the Internet because the establishment is petrified at the fact that alternative and independent media outlets are now eclipsing corporate media outlets in terms of audience share, trust, and influence. Read article here.
Bill Approved | Obama can shut down the internet for 4 months under new emergency powers.. Read article here
Food and Depopulation
Since the Rockefeller family came to power (especially after gaining a monopoly with Standard Oil) they have manipulated our government into ruining our financial system by way of the Federal Reserve, energy through oil dependency and food with GMOs (Genetically Engineered Organisms). The intention is to rob us blind and kill us. It’s time to wake up. Read article here
Austerity fascism is the realization of the global elite’s agenda for a “post-industrial revolution”
Top historians, social and financial analysts are warning that the draconian austerity measures currently being prepared by governments in the west will cause riots and even revolutions as people react with fury in response to their jobs, savings, basic public services, pensions and welfare money being seized by the financial terrorists who caused the economic collapse in the first place. Read article here
Bilderbergers Have Failed and now are trying to activate plan B
The participants at the just ended Bilderberger meeting in Spain are scared they are going to be identified and eventually hunted down, according to an inside source at the meeting. For now Clinton, Bush, Baker and the other Bilderberg Nazi’s are trying to cut a deal with China that will allow them access to large amounts of funds which they plan to hide and use to re-assert their power after the current political storm blows over, the source says. Unfortunately for them, this is one storm that is not going to blow over to and allow them to resume their plans for world fascist dictatorship. Article, 2010 agenda, list of attendees and coverage videos here
The Truth About Alternative Energy and The Real Reason For the Iraq War… Oil
One of the world’s leading experts on trend forecasting says that producing our own energy for our homes and cars (called “micro generation”) will become ahuge trend in the next couple of decades.
…Alan Greenspan, John McCain, George W. Bush, Sarah Palin, ahigh-level National Security Council officer and others all say that the Iraq war was really about oil. Read article here
The writing is on the wall for the new world order
…The solution is really quite simple to reach now that the nightmarish Satanic plan to enslave humanity is coming to an end: live and let live. If you look at the situation objectively you will see there is no reason for conflict between these groups, all the fighting and strife between them has been artificially engineered. Read article here
Continuity Of Government | Suspension Of The US Constitution
The National Emergencies Act, one of the post-Watergate reforms that Vice-President Cheney so abhorred, specifies that: “Not later than six months after a national emergency is declared, and not later than the end of each six-month period thereafter that such emergency continues, each House of Congress shall meet to consider a vote on a joint resolution to determine whether that emergency shall be terminated” (50 U.S.C. 1622, 2002). Yet in nine years Congress has not once met to discuss the State of Emergency declared by George W. Bush in response to 9/11, a State of Emergency that remains in effect today. Read article here
Hunter S. Thompson | Multiple Quotes Of Truth: Life, Corrupt Politicians and Stupid Wars
“We are turning into a nation of whimpering slaves to Fear—fear of war, fear of poverty, fear of random terrorism, fear of getting down-sized or fired because of the plunging economy, fear of getting evicted for bad debts or suddenly getting locked up in a military detention camp on vague charges of being a Terrorist sympathizer.” Hunter S. Thompson. Article Here.
Satanists On The Run | Revolution Is Coming
Satanists who have participated in the plot to enslave humanity are worried and are starting to run. With 40% of Greece’s population revolting, the satanists are realizing we have great strength in unity. The masses are becoming aware and revolution is coming. Their plan was to kill at least 4 billion people and permanently enslave the rest of humanity. There is so much evidence for this now that only the fools still relying on Satanic corporate propaganda do not realize it yet. The plan involved a fake alien invasion, germ warfare, starvation, atomic war and artificially generated disasters like tsunamis and earthquakes. Read Article Here
Overpopulation Is A Myth
As these videos demonstrate, overpopulation is a myth. Globalists and their eugenic minions have misrepresented population statistics for decades in order to justify their agenda to wipe out large portions of the population. See article here
Police State Toronto and The G20 Summit
Events such as the G20 have become a testing ground for new police state measures and a trial run for a military style occupation. In June Toronto will be on lockdown with rights and liberties severely restricted. Article Here See Video Here
Understanding Deep Politics
Definition of deep politics: It refers to government in which two dimensions of action always coexist: Overt and covert, or benign and utterly ruthless. Ten distinguished speakers headlining the “Understanding Deep Politics” Conference in Santa Cruz this May 14-16—trace the era of deep politics to JFK’s assassination; to the aftermath of World War II, Hitler, Lenin, Weishaupt, or Machiavelli, from there to ancient secret societies, and even back to the dawn of human governance itself. We can trace it forward too; the ways of deceptive government did not end with the ascent of Obama. Quite the opposite. Read article here
Regime Change By Plane Crash
Nearly a month ago amateur footage was released ostensibly showing a Russian clean-up crew at the crash site killing off the few survivors of the Polish presidential plane crash. See video and read article here
Two Words Brought Down Building 7; “Pull It”
World Trade Center leaseholder Larry Silverstein, who collected nearly $500 million dollars in insurance on the basis that the collapse of building 7 was accidental, a 47-story structure that was not hit by a plane but collapsed within seven seconds on September 11; Was on the phone to his insurance carrier attempting to convince them that the building should be brought down via controlled demolition. How did Silverstein expect to demolish the building safely when such a process takes weeks or even months to properly set up. How could explosives have been correctly placed on such short notice inside a burning building that had already been evacuated – unless the explosives were already in place? Read article here.
Police State 4 | The Rise Of FEMA | Alex Jones
Another excellent documentary by Alex Jones. Extensively covering FEMA, and FEMA camps, executive orders and the growing police state. Watch movie Here or download at infowars.com
Jason Burmas New Movie | Invisible Empire | A New World Order Defined
This is a comprehensive guide to the new world order and should be watched by everyone. If anyone doubted the truth movement, after watching this movie I think the only skeptics that will remain are the liars who run or benefit from the system and those choosing to live in denial. This is the final frontier, take the truth pill. Watch The Full Movie Here Or download it from InfoWars.com
What The 9/11 Commission l Really Think
If you still don’t know what to believe about 9/11 or doubt the 9/11 truth movement and believe the official story, then please listen to the people that were on the 9/11 commission. This article should spark a doubt in the official story. Enough to have you look into it further, and when you do, you will find great truth. Read here
The Digital Economy Bill
A draconian Internet censorship bill that has been long looming on the horizon finally passed the house of commons in the UK yesterday, legislating for government powers to restrict and filter any website that is deemed to be undesirable for public consumption. Read article here.
Top Nazis Planned EU-Sytle Fourth Reich
US Military Intelligence report EW-Pa 128, also known as The Red House Report, which details how top Nazis secretly met at the Maison Rouge Hotel in Strasbourg on August 10, 1944 and, knowing Germany was on the brink of military defeat, conspired to create a Fourth Reich – a pan-European economic empire based around a European common market. Read Article here
Benjamin Fulford Articles
AIDS and SARS are bio-engineered weapons designed to reduce the African (“Black”) and Asian populations.
The 9/11 terrorist attacks were an “inside job” carried out by the US government as a false flag attack to bring about new imperial mobilization.
The Pentagon, the oil industry, banking elite, and the pharmaceutical industry suppress inventions including free-energy and anti-gravity technology to maintain power.
The US government, using a secret military program HAARP (High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program) has been altering the climate, and using high power microwave energy inducing earthquakes including the Asian Tsunami (2004) and earthquakes in Japan (1995), China (2008), Haiti (2010), Chile (2010).
Haiti Video here | Articles by Benjamin Fulford here, | Articles on HAARP + Induced Earthquakes here
HAARP US Military Weapon That Can Cause Earthquakes and Alter The Climate
13 reasons to suspect HAARP caused the Haiti earthquake here
The Truth Has Fallen And Taken Liberty With It
Today Americans are ruled by propaganda. Americans have little regard for truth, little access to it, and little ability to recognize it. Truth is an unwelcome entity. It is disturbing. It is off limits. Those who speak it run the risk of being branded “anti-American,” “anti-semite” or “conspiracy theorist.” Truth is an inconvenience for government and for the interest groups whose campaign contributions control government. Truth is an inconvenience for prosecutors who want convictions, not the discovery of innocence or guilt. Read article here
Pictures Worth A Thousand Words
They say a picture is worth a thousand words. When it comes to the truth, these pictures speak volumes. From 9/11 truth, to the new world order police state. Each picture says it all. They show your fellow citizens voicing the truth. Evidence of the Truth and graphical representations of examples of truth. See all the pictures Here
Bill Gates, Rockefeller Foundation, Neo-Eugenics, Vaccines and GMO for Population Reduction
In plain English, one of the most powerful men in the world states clearly that he expects vaccines to be used to reduce population growth.
The vaccine industry has been repeatedly caught dumping dangerous unsafe, untested or proven harmful—vaccines onto unwitting Third World populations when they cannot get rid of the vaccines in the West. The true aim of the vaccinations is to make people sicker and even more susceptible to disease and premature death. Read article here
Alex Jones Sticking it to the Propaganda Machine
The last time Alex Jones challenged Heraldo on 9/11 heraldos response was to give him the finger, twice. This time he has to respond to Alex Jones on TV . Alex rips into him and the establishments bullshit.. See video here
Wall Streets Bailout Hustle
The biggest robbery in history. The wall street bailout con jobs, outlined in detail in this Rolling Stone article. 1. The Swoop and Squat, 2. The Dollar Store, 3. The Pig in the Poke, 4. The Rumanian Box, 5. The Big Mitt, 6. The Wire, 7. The Reaload. Read article here.
Executive Orders: The Hallmarks Of Fascistic Tryanny
When a president tries to effect one of his Executive Orders into being a national law, he is attempting to circumvent congress, and contravene our Constitution, and move us closer to being a country ruled by men rather than a nation ruled by laws…. …In order to maintain the illusion of a democracy, we are still allowed a presidential election every four years; and no one president can serve more than two four year terms. But, it’s not any one president who has become a dictator, it is the Office of the Presidency, and those faceless autocrats who control the presidency that has become dictatorial, without many of us ever knowing it. No, we are hardly a democracy. Our beloved United States of America has become a fascist dictatorship, and will remain so, until the majority of Americans come to realize the sad state of our ship of state. Read article here.
US Government Abdicates
On February 3 2010, Dennis Blair, director of National Intelligence told the House Intelligence Committee that it was now “defined policy” that the U.S. government can murder its own citizens on the sole basis of someone in the government’s judgment that an American is a threat. No arrest, no trial, no conviction, just execution on suspicion of being a threat. Read article here.
Obama Declares He Will Rule By Authoritarian Decree
The Obama administration has announced it will now rule by fascist decree and ignore Congress and the American people. Read article here
Refuse To Pay Government Debt Incurred For Unlawful And Oppressive Purposes
In international law, odious debt is a legal theory which holds that the national debt incurred by a regime for purposes that do not serve the best interests of the nation, such as wars of aggression, should not be enforceable. Such debts are thus considered by this doctrine to be personal debts of the regime that incurred them and not debts of the state. Read article here
Conspiracy Theory VS Conspiracy Fact
Those who conspire for war, profit, and evil, cry conspiracy theory when their actions are questioned; The masses hear conspiracy theory and regurgitate it upon cue. Its time the masses stopped spewing the term conspiracy theorist and actually looked into the facts, if they did they would find conspiracy fact. Article here
Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth
Have now reached 1000 professional members, further legitimizing calls for a new investigation into the September 11th attacks based upon physical evidence and analysis that is completely inconsistent with the official story. Article here
New Arial Photos Released From 9/11
These clouds of dust were the result of pulverized concrete and thermite explosives. The bogus official pancake story would not do this. Take a look at these photos and see if you think this was a collapse layer by layer, on top of the other, compressing the damage, or buildings literally blown to particles of dust. See photos here
Fake wars, fake war on drugs, drugs peddled by hypocritical government, the military industrial complex set to kill and invasions continue
Whether it’s under Nixon, Carter, Reagan, Bush Sr, Clinton, Bush Jr, or Obama, the policies have remained the same and the damage to our bottom line has been mountainous. It’s time to ditch the policies we have come to tolerate for decades before they consume what is left of our moral core. Read article here
120 Years Of US Invasions here
Common themes of US Invasions here
13 Lies: An Abbreviated History Of U.S. Presidents Leading Us To War
Those of you who long ago figured out that George Bush lied about, and twisted, 9-11, the role of Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and Osama, and WMDs to justify the invasions of Afghanistan, and Iraq, and to create the War on Terror, will not be surprised to learn that our prior Presidents, and their complicit henchmen, have lied us into every war since our Revolution. Read article here
Obama Administration Orders World Bank To Keep Third World In Poverty
By preventing poor nations from becoming self-sufficient in blocking them from producing their own energy, the Obama administration is ensuring that millions more will die from starvation and lack of access to hospitals and medical treatment. Read article here
9/11 Truth From Mos Def and Immortal Technique
Man, you hear this bullshit they be talkin’, Every day, man, It’s like these motherfuckers is just like professional liars…YouknowwhatI’msayin? It’s wild… Listen…. | Lyrics and song Here
William Melvin Hicks Speaking Pure Truth
“Its just a ride, and we can change it any time we want, its only a choice, no effort, no work no job, job, no savings of money, a choice right now between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, and buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love instead see all of us as one. Heres what we can do to change the world right now to a better ride; Take all that money we spend on weapons and defence each year and instead spend it on feeding clothing and educating the poor of the world which it would many times over, not one human being excluded and we can explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.”
Video of the quote Here | Bill Hicks on The Global Elite Here | and more quotes and vidoes of Bills here
Fuck You I Wont Do What You Tell Me!…..
It hast to start somwhere, it has to start somehow, what better place than here, what better time than now? All hell can’t stop us now!,,,,
Rage Against The Machine Quotes of truth here
Truth11 Films | Propaganda vs Truth In Advertising
watch video here
1. The Hyperreality of a Failing Corporate Media System | 2. Inside the Military Media Industrial Complex and 3. Hope Fades for End of the American Empire under Obama
1. Hyperreality is the inability to distinguish between what is real and what is not.Corporate media, Fox in particular, offers news that creates a hyperreality of real world problems and issues. Consumers of corporate television news–especially those whose understandings are framed primarily from that medium alone–are embedded in a state of excited delirium and knowinglessness…..
2. Among the most important corporate media censored news stories of the past decade, one must be that over one million people have died because of the United States military invasion and occupation of Iraq.
3. There are still a large number of Obama supporters who are basing their opinion of him solely from his campaign promises. Others simply hear what he says and base their opininon on that. In order to properly asses Obama you must look at his actions. There are numerous articles on Truth11 discussing his actions. In two speeches at the close of the decade, the Nobel Peace Prize winner affirmed that peace was no longer peace, but rather a permanent war that extends well beyond Afghanistan and Pakistan to disorderly regions and diffuse enemies. He called this global security and invited our gratitude. Read all three articles here
False flag attack to usher in less rights
The general consensus from the corporate media is, if we want to travel, we have to just put up with our rights being violated. The government puts a man on a plane with no passport and a fire cracker in his shorts and we are supposed to put up with nazi style interrogation. Just another addition to the long list of diminishing human rights.
Evidence clearly indicates staged attack on Detroit flight. Article here
lluminati Vowed in 1969: “Travel Will Be More Difficult”
Like sheep, humanity had better adjust to constant harassment as long as it tolerates Illuminati control of all important government and social institutions. Read article here
Project Hostile Intent
Mind Scanners the next step if we accept naked body scanners. Under project hostile intent, everyone is remotely screened by passive scanners that pick up brain waves in order to to determine whether they intend to commit violent or terroristic acts. Article here
Environment, Eugenics and Quotes
“A reasonable estimate for an industrialized world society at the present North American material standard of living would be 1 billion. At the more frugal European standard of living, 2 to 3 billion would be possible.” – United Nations, Global Biodiversity Assessment
“A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal.” – Ted Turner, founder of CNN and major UN donor
Everyday I encounter people who doubt the plain truth that stares them in the face. The problems is they either can’t see the forest for the tress or they do not want to see. Many automatically doubt that big organizations like the Federal Reserve or United Nations could be involved in corruption or conspiracy, and they do it without looking into it at all. They blindly belive they are doing good things. Well for those people this article is for you. It is quotes from the people running those organizations, words from their own mouths, telling you the evil they are planning to do and are doing to you right now. Article here. See also bilderberg quotes here. See also the quote category here.
War Is Over | If you want it
John Lennon forwarded the peace movement by paying for billboards that spread a message of truth. ”War Is Over!, if you want it”. The government did not like the truth being told to the masses. The add campaign was really starting to cause problems, so they killed him. Read article and watch the movie The US vs John Lennon here
President John F Kennedy Secret Society Speech
…we are apposed around the world, by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy,
…I am asking for your help in the tremendous task of informing and alerting the American people. Confident with your help man will be what he was born to be, free and independent. Speech recording and transcript here
For years many scientists have been challenging the numbers put out by the Gore climate propaganda machine. Recently emails have been released outlining the deceit, conspiriacy and corruption. See the Climateate category here
Copenhagen, fake global warming propaganda, the Trilateral Commission, CFR and one world government
…“The philosophical underpinnings of the Trilateral Commission are pro-Marxist and pro-socialist. They are solidly set against the concept of the nation-state and in particular, the Constitution of the United States.
…“If the Council on Foreign Relations could be said to be a spawning ground for the concepts of one-world idealism, then the Trilateral Commission was the ‘task force’ assembled to assault the beachheads. Already the Commission had placed its members in the top posts the U.S. had to offer,”
…“A former science adviser to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher [Lord Christopher Monckton] says the real purpose of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen on Dec. 7-18 is to use global warming hype as a pretext to lay the foundation for a one-world government,” Read article here | See also this article
The Fed Is Running Scared
Bernanke’s Fed has meticulously sabotaged the economy in order to create a crisis in classic Hegelian fashion. The corporate media tells us the crisis is the result of ineptitude and mismanagement at the Federal Reserve. Au contraire. Like the Great Depression, the even Greater Depression now on the horizon was scientifically created.
The Fed is the primary instrument the bankers are now using to destroy the middle class, hand over all public assets and resources to them, implement a crushing austerity, usher in a new era of global corporatist feudalism and build a sprawling planet-wide slave plantation based on China’s totalitarian model.
It is the ultimate dream of the banking cartel. It will be used as the foundation to build world government. Destroying the dollar as the world’s reserve currency is only the beginning. Read article here
A brief history lesson and the economic crisis
The United States does not control its own destiny. Rather it is controlled by an international financial elite, of which the American branch works out of big New York banks like J.P. Morgan Chase, Wall Street investment firms such as Goldman Sachs, and the Federal Reserve System. They in turn control the White House, Congress, the military, the mass media, the intelligence agencies, both political parties, the universities, etc. No one can rise to the top in any of these institutions without the elite’s stamp of approval. Read article here |
A real solution to the financial crisis
Truth11′s suggested solution to the financial crisis 100% Guaranteed to work, first time. here
Evidence that George W. Bush had prior knowledge of 911
He states in these two videos that he watched the first plane hit on TV. There was no live coverage of the first plane hitting, there was no coverage on TV of the first plane until a video surfaced that evening. He had a private live video feed. The only way for that to be possible is prior knowledge. Read article and watch the video clips here.
Microbiologist speaks out:H1NI vaccine is actually a bio-weapon
Joseph Moshe is a microbiologist who had called a radio station, and stated that the H1NI vaccine is actually a bio-weapon, and is the DEPLOYMENT OF A PLAGUE. The official propaganda line is that he had threatened the President, although there is no evidence that this is true. The following day his car was disabled with a magnetic pulse and surrounded by tanks, robots, and a virtual army of Secret Service and FBI agents. Then bombarded with massive amounts of gas. Read article and watch here.
Media as enablers of Government Lies
If Americans wish to retain the remnants of their liberty, they cannot trust the media to warn them about government tyranny. In order to recognize government deceit, there is no substitute for more citizens to make more effort to find the truth for themselves. Read article here
George Bush Telling The Truth For A Change
This speech is created from clips of several speeches to tell us all what bush really thinks. Thanks to creators for allowing us to hear the truth for a change from this guy. Click here for the video
William Patrick Corgan | The Smashing Pumpkins
Flu Pandemic is Propaganda
If you follow some of the links I have been supplying as of late, you’ll notice many are focused on the propaganda build up to our day of reckoning with the Swine Flu virus. I say ‘propaganda’ because, in my heart, there is something mighty suspicious about declaring an emergency for something that has yet to show itself to be a grand pandemic. Our American President Obama has declared a national emergency about this virus, which he in his own words said was, at this point, a preventative measure. So, why declare an emergency if there isn’t one? Read article here
Truth Advertising Campaign
Truth11 photography exhibit here
Change… What Change?
The combined US troop deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan have now reached a higher level than existed at any time under the presidency of George W. Bush. This surge past the record set by its predecessor marks another grim milestone in the Obama administration’s escalation of American militarism. Read Article here
What Is Money?
Truth11 Films | 911 Truth to Ticks and Leeches by Tool
Government Propaganda To Infest Network TV Shows
An insidious brainwashing program set to be launched next week will “organically” weave the government’s political propaganda into prime time network television shows, with positive talking points about Obama’s environmental, bailout, health care and “servitude” agenda being seamlessly integrated into the content of dramas, reality shows and comedies. Read article here
One Mainframe to Rule Them All
One Mainframe To Rule Them All is a breathtaking rundown of the human microchipping agenda. Concise and effective, it breaks down the coming global information control grid in all its horrifying detail. Watch the movie here
End the Fed… The IMF and the rest!
We cannot let the End of the Fed victory be a false one. We can not let the efforts of Ron Paul and many others go to waste, by simply replacing evil with the same evil and a different logo. We cannot allow the IMF to take the place of the Fed. They are the same thing. The same people in control, the same effect on the human population. Read article 300 members of the house support audit the fed here
A private security force whose biggest role is helping the U.S. government to “combat terrorism” is now patrolling the streets of a town in Montana, acting as law enforcement but accountable to nobody and operating completely outside the limitations of the U.S. constitution in a chilling throwback to the brownshirts of Nazi Germany. Read article here See also these articles here and here
National Guard, police, and other military units attacked American citizens with tear gas and deployed sound cannons today in response to an “unpermitted protest” as bedlam hit the streets on the first day of the G20 summit in downtown Pittsburgh. Read article here
The First Amendment is officially dead in the United States. If this isn’t martial law then we don’t know what is.
United We Stand
2 million march on ending government tyranny | The largest protest in US history | Downplayed by the propaganda machine
The last thing the government wants is for the masses to rise up together and realize their power of strength in numbers. Thats why the corporate media reported the latest T.E.A. Party only had tens of thousands of participants. The actual number was the largest in US history, over 2 million. If the corporate media was really on the side of the people they would have reported the significance of the largest protest ever. Read article here | Watch time lapse video here
Charlie Sheen’s Video Message To Obama here
Charlie Sheen has confronted the president on public record about 9/11 truth and for going back on his campaign promises.
The transcript of that conversation is here
Stop The 9/11 Cover up
On the anniversary of the false flag attacks by our own government, the truth movement is stronger than ever. Polls, petitions and protests show that people know the truth and do not accept the governments ridiculous cover up story. Read article here
Lots of articles and movies on 9/11 truth here or in the categories section >right>
Documentary on the controlled demolition of the world trade centre on 9/11. Watch it here
Pancake theory? Would leave a steel core…
Lots more 9/11 pictures and links to articles below… scroll down
And tons of 9/11 articles here
Obama, Fairey and Propaganda
The Obama “Hope” campaign successfully detached the reality of who Obama is and what he stands for and bundled him up as a neat little answer to our problems; what most people hoped would be the deliverance from the countries empirical aims.
….As is taught in Buddhism; Suffering is ended by the light of awareness. So too is the influencing effects of propaganda… After all, what is propaganda; but a ploy to persuade through sensationalism and emotional triggers rather than logic and contextual insight? Read article here
The United Nations has called for the establishment of a new global reserve currency to be overseen by a bank of the world in an effort to reduce the role of the Dollar in international trade. Read article here.
Fall of the Republic: The Presidency of Barack Obama
Alex Jones latest documentary lays out in precise detail the long-running plot by a cabal of global elitists to take over the world and deliver humanity into grinding slavery and usher in a new Dark Age. It spells out how the elite have worked tirelessly to bankrupt a once proud, industrious, and self-reliant nation through financial terrorism. Fall of the Republic warns what is in store for us if we do not wake up and take back our country and restore its once cherished tradition of liberty and limited government. Read article here Watch movie here or download or order a copy at infowars.com, or prisonplanet.com
Click here for a large version
Big Brother Is Watching
UK has more CCTV cameras than China. Read article here
UK Government to install surveillance cameras in private homes. Read article here
Resist the New World Order
Click here to watch the Apple Commercial that aired only twice
New World Order Organizational Chart and the Pyramid of Power HERE
Global Power and Global Government
Part 1 | Evolution and revolution of the central banking system
Part 2 | Origins of the American empire: Revolution, World wars and World Order
Part 3 | Controlling the global economy: Bilderberg, the Trilateral Commission and the Federal Reserve
Scams and Bailouts Are The Cause Of World Depression
This is a great article summarizing all that has and is causing our current global economic crisis. Read article here
Understanding Law and the lies they tell us we must follow | Know your true rights | Article here
31 Questions and answers the IRS does not want you to know | Article here
North American Union
President Obama will attend the controversial Security and Prosperity Partnership meeting with Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper next month, it has been revealed. Read article here.
Resisting the new world order
9/11 activists at a July 4th parade. Read article here
One Global Currency
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev illustrated his call for a supranational currency to replace the dollar by pulling from his pocket a sample coin of a “united future world currency.” Read article here
NAFTA Superhighway and the North American Union
The Trans-Texas Corridor, part of the NAFTA Superhighway projected to link the United States with Canada and Mexico as an integral cog of the North American Union, is back on the agenda after Texas Governor Rick Perry lied in claiming that the proposal was dead earlier this year. Read article Here
Journalist Files Charges against WHO and UN for Bioterrorism and Intent to Commit Mass Murder
Read article here
Do Not Get The Swine Flu Vaccine
Lots of articles on this subject in the biological false flag attack category here
Congressman: Obama Could Use Pandemic To Declare Martial Law
Georgia Congressman Paul Broun warned attendees of a town hall event Tuesday that the Obama administration was planning to use a pandemic or a natural disaster to implement martial law in the United States. Read article here
D-Day, Obama and Hitler
Without the financial support of Bush, the Wall Street bankers, and multinational corporations Hitler would have remained an obscure former Gefreiter in the German army and hyperventilating leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party that would have fizzled out, as did so many other parties in the tumultuous years of the Wiemar Republic. Minus Hitler and his bankster and industrialist backers, 160,000 troops would not have landed on the beaches of Normandy and 10,000 American, British, and Canadian troops would not have died. Bush, Ford, General Electric, IBM, and the Wall Street bankers are responsible for more than 70 million people slaughtered during the Second World War, including about 12 million war-related famine deaths in China, Indonesia, French Indochina and India. Read whole article here
Also see the article Bush and Nazis here
The Anatomy of Blue State Fascism | Explaing the link of Hitler, Bush and Obama. Nazi Rule has been in place since ww2 | Read article here
For lots of excellent Truth Documentaries click here
Co-operation vs. competition / Competition is enslaving us all / Economics, slavery and the financial crisis
The human spirit will thrive with co-operation: far more than with competition. So why is our society based upon competition and not co-operation? The current economic system is based upon the masses competing with each-other for limited resources. For one reason, to keep them enslaved to the system. … The current economic crisis is being caused by the end of a pyramid scheme by the Federal Reserve Bank called the Fractional Reserve Banking System. Read article here
9/11 was an inside job
The top 40 reasons to doubt then challenge the governments official story of the events of September 11th 2001
Read article and watch Truth11 short film: “Ticks and leaches” here
Molten steel and thermite that burns much hotter than airplane fuel can burn being extracted weeks after 9-11
Cut columns are not caused by planes
9/11 was a Nazi false flag attack by our own Nazi government
Some excellent pictures from the Movie Loose change watch here
Plane hitting the pentagon?
IFC New World Order 2009 Documentary
From the Kennedy assassination, to waco and 911. Documentary covering the New World Order, The Bilderberg group and the truth movement and its crusaders. See movie here
I am as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this any more!
This speech and several others in the movie Network (1976) holds as true today as it did back then. See the article, clips and the full movie here
2012 | Pole Shifts | Planet X
Lots of articles and books on this subject that may or may not face us all. The key is if you believe it or not, it doesn’t hurt to be very prepared for anything.
2012 Survival Guide here
Survival Guides here
Pole Shift Information here
2012 Information here
Books and further resources here
Articles that feel 2012 will not bring any changes to our planet here
My thoughts on the subject here
Cybersecurity Is Framework For Total Government Regulation & Control Of Our Lives
The Obama administration’s new Cybersecurity system will only make the Internet more vulnerable to attack, while creating the framework for a massively upgraded government surveillance grid that will control and regulate every aspect of our daily lives through the implementation of “smart” technology. Read Whole Article Here
Projects to “master the internet” in full swing on both sides of the pond
The legislation would allow the federal government to tap into any digital aspect of every citizen’s information without a warrant. Banking, business and medical records would be wide open to inspection, as well as personal instant message and e mail communications. Read Whole Article Here
New World Order Definition and the US Dollar Explained here
One Giant Leap For Mankind | The Moon Explained
Read article here
Bail Out Pictures
Protesting the New World Order
Today we are all prisoners in the USA
As of today, June 1, 2009, even U.S. citizens are officially prisoners in the USA, or exiles barred from entering our own country without the government’s permission. Read More Here
John F. Kennedy | Shadow Government Speech
JFK addressing the American people about the shadow government that operates behind the scenes. He asks for the help of every citizen to expose the truth. This was his last speech before being assassinated by the CIA. Specifically ordered by George H. W. Bush.
Read speech here
Read about the George H.W. Bush connection to Kennedy’s assassination here
Zeitgeist movies, transcripts and related articles here
Zeitgeist movement and related articles here
The Venus Project here
Kymatica and An Esoteric Agenda
Movies here Transcript here
Pictures Worth A Thousand Words
HAS MOVED TO HERE
See here for all pictures worth a thousand words
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WICHITA, Kan. (March 8, 2012) – Hawker Beechcraft Global Customer Support (GCS) today announced it will open a new satellite Hawker Beechcraft Services maintenance facility at DeKalb-Peachtree Airport (PDK) in Atlanta this month. This new facility, which opens on March 12, will specialize in full piston engine aircraft services, offering annual inspections, routine maintenance inspections, avionics checks, recertification, oil changes, and performance and comfort upgrades, including the Bonanza Xtra package.
Although Hawker Beechcraft Services at PDK will focus on piston engine aircraft, the center is capable of servicing any aircraft in the Hawker Beechcraft fleet, including King Air, Premier and Hawker aircraft.
“DeKalb-Peachtree is one of the busiest general aviation airports in the country and this new facility positions Hawker Beechcraft Services to better serve transient operators as well as those based on the field,” said Christi Tannahill, senior vice president, Global Customer Support. “From unscheduled maintenance and aircraft-on-the-ground support to avionics checks and recertification, Hawker Beechcraft Services at PDK is the perfect complement to our existing full-service facility at the Fulton County Airport (FTY) on the west side of Atlanta.”
The facility at PDK consists of 12,000 square feet of hangar space and 2,300 square feet of office and shop space. Hawker Beechcraft plans to hire up to 20 technicians there in the next 18 to 24 months as the new maintenance facility ramps up. An open house is planned for May.
Headquartered in Wichita, Kan., Hawker Beechcraft Global Customer Support (GCS) is dedicated to improving the value of HBC aircraft by employing products and services to simplify aircraft ownership, reduce operating cost and increase resale value. GCS is comprised of five functional groups that include Support Plus (cost predictability/warranty programs), Hawker Beechcraft Parts & Distribution (genuine factory parts), Hawker Beechcraft Services (factory-owned service centers), Technical Support (Field Support Representatives, Hot Line specialists and Technical Publications) and Global Mission Support (government business and special mission maintenance/training support).
Hawker Beechcraft Corporation is a world-leading manufacturer of business, special mission, light attack and trainer aircraft – designing, marketing and supporting aviation products and services for businesses, governments and individuals worldwide. The company’s headquarters and major facilities are located in Wichita, Kan., with operations in Little Rock, Ark.; Chester, England, U.K.; and Chihuahua, Mexico. The company leads the industry with a global network of more than 100 factory-owned and authorized service centers. For more information, visit https://www.hawkerbeechcraft.com.
MNG Jet at Ataturk Airport in Istanbul, Turkey, provides EASA Part 145-approved line and base maintenance service on a 24/7 basis.
The Ardmore facility is the first HBC authorized service facility in New Zealand and joins an existing Hawker Pacific network, which includes Australia, Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines.
Its facility can accommodate any aircraft ranging from the high-performance single-engine piston, the Beechcraft Bonanza, to the company’s flagship super mid-sized jet, the Hawker 4000. | <urn:uuid:1e4b88d6-5565-44aa-bf67-0f4dfb7db77f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.aviationpros.com/press_release/10653110/hawker-beechcraft-services-opens-piston-focused-facility-at-dekalb-peachtree-airport | 2013-05-24T09:03:51Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.911641 | 708 |
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All about Sabah, tourist heaven The Land Below The Wind, marketing, web development and it's smiling people, progressing Sabah.
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The Customizers and Builders Guild is a group of Lego enthusiasts specializing in original creations and minifigure customization. Formerly known as the Clone Army Builders Guild.
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Sains Sukan: Semua perbincangan tentang Sains Sukan atau sukan Malaysia serta ICT ( Information & Communication Technology ) terutama bagaimana meningkatkan mutu sukan Malaysia
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Hello guys! This is the forum for the guild equinox! we are a very social guild in the game Tera. On this forum we will try to help our guild members as much as we can by posting threads about BAM, quests, nexus, dungeons, ... about anything u c
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Destiny is a cross game guild, while our main focus is making friends, world domination is a close 2nd priority.
destiny, guild, heroband, 9dragons, league, bardo, runes, magic, xian, celestial, destroyer, voyage, century, jade, dynasty, atlantica, online | <urn:uuid:92d04d3e-9e8b-4467-824c-53561076097d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.board-directory.net/en/tag/guild/borneo | 2013-05-24T08:30:59Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.795886 | 704 |
Heavy flooding in the Indonesian capital this week has killed 15 people, driven thousands from their homes and paralyzed the sprawling city -- and officials are warning that more water is on its way.
Caused by unusually strong monsoon rains, the flood waters -- often carrying trash and human waste -- have inundated the city's central business district, closed schools and offices, and entered the presidential palace.
With around 95,000 people affected in different areas of the city, authorities have declared a state of emergency to allow use of national funds and other resources. About 19,000 people have relocated from the worst affected districts to safer areas.
January is typically the wettest month in Jakarta, the political and economic capital of southeast Asia's largest country.
But the low-lying city has already experienced more rainfall since Tuesday than it usually gets in the entire month of January.
Amid about a foot of water, workers scrambled Friday to clean up the mess near where a dike had burst a day earlier, flooding the central business district.
Soldiers heaped sandbags on a railroad line to form a makeshift defense close to the dike.
The situation in the central district appeared to be improving, but some of the worst-hit areas of the city remained under water, with more flooding expected to arrive over the course of the day.
A lot of the water falling in the vicinity of Jakarta, which has a population of around 10 million people, must go through the city's rivers and canals before reaching the Java Sea.
Thousands of people have fled their homes in neighborhoods along the banks of the Ciliwung River, the cause of some of the worst flooding and considered by many to be one of the dirtiest waterways in Indonesia.
In Kampung Melayu, an eastern neighborhood near the Ciliwung, many people remained at home Thursday, sitting on top of roofs or wading inside to try to salvage belongings and secure the premises.
Large amounts of water were expected to flow down the Ciliwung on Friday, generated by rains over the hilly area around the city of Bogor, which lies south of Jakarta.
The Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Board has warned of more heavy rainfall in the next few days, the city government said.
Fresh flooding was likely to bring the risk of more casualties.
The National Disaster Mitigation Agency said nearly half of the 12 killed in the floods since Tuesday were electrocuted. | <urn:uuid:d538b6ed-738f-49f8-8202-cfae84952b08> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.click2houston.com/news/Floods-kill-15-and-cause-havoc-in-Jakarta/-/1735978/18181904/-/hsxlssz/-/index.html | 2013-05-24T09:05:05Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970483 | 503 |
The L'Adroit towers over the surrounding ships and exhibit hall at NavDex in Abu Dhabi. (Chris Cavas / Defense News)
ABU DHABI — The warships gathered here at NavDex, the naval component of the IDEX defense trade show, are an interesting collection of corvette and patrol-size small combatants, and while the ships’ overall size won’t dominate most working harbors, one high-rising, conical shape clearly stands out from the rest.
The prototype Gowind offshore patrol vessel (OPV) L’Adroit presents a striking profile — long and low fore and aft, a high, faceted superstructure amidships dominated by a conical tower mast. French shipbuilder DCNS, which funded construction of the OPV, hopes potential customers notice more than the profile and see in the L’Adroit and its associated Gowind family of designs an adaptable, affordable concept suitable for a variety of conditions.
The ship, still technically owned by DCNS, was transferred to the French Navy in October 2011 for three years of testing, evaluation and demonstration, and left Toulon in January for a six-month cruise to the Indian Ocean and Arabian Gulf operating areas.
Manned by two rotating crews, dubbed A and B, the idea, said Cmdr. Sacha Bailly, commanding officer of the L’Adroit’s B crew, is to see if the ship can operate underway for 300 days a year, and whether the small 32-person core crew can maintain two months of continuous, deployed operations.
“We’ve already operated 200 days at sea with the ship, and we’re pushing to 300,” Bailly said Feb. 18 during an interview onboard the OPV.
For the deployment, he said, “we wanted to see how the ship operates in the anti-piracy mission. I’m quite confident we can do more or as much in that role as a larger ship.”
The L’Adroit already has operated with a coalition task force in the Red Sea and off the Horn of Africa, and, after a visit to Muscat, Oman, will join up with the European Union’s Operation Atalanta anti-piracy task force in the Gulf of Aden. A crew swap is scheduled for late April at the French Indian Ocean island of La Reunion, and the ship is to return to Toulon in July.
The 1,000-ton, 87-meter-long ship is designed to be manned by a crew of 32 sailors although, for the deployment, seven additional sailors have been added to handle increased watch standing needs. The OPV is carrying six Marines for use in maritime inspection boarding parties, along with a four-person aviation detachment to tend to the small Schiebel S-100 Camcopter UAV.
Although on display on the flight deck for NavDex visitors, the tiny UAV was barely noticeable.
“It’s perfect for us,” said Lt. Cmdr. Charles-Eric Canonne, the ship’s executive officer. “It’s small and light, and easy to handle.”
Bailly, while expressing confidence in the ship’s ability to carry out constabulary missions and operate on the high seas, acknowledged his chief concern is crew fatigue, should operations prove too intense.
“If we’re boarding one ship a day, it’s no problem,” he said. “But if we’re doing three a day, for several days, that could become an issue.
“But we’ll see. It’s experimental; that’s why we’re here.”
The L’Adroit’s Gowind design provides a very high command view from the bridge level, four decks above the main weather deck. Large windows provide a 360-degree panoramic view, and a walkway circles the entire pilothouse.
The ship’s combat information center is located behind the bridge, and behind that, to starboard, is the flight control center overlooking the flight deck. Small-boat launch-and-recovery operations from the twin stern ramps also are visible from the bridge.
A large space directly below the bridge is used as a demonstration center for various systems, and the crew, Canonne said, is increasingly using the space for communications and to set up laptop computers.
The hangar can accommodate a small, 5-ton helicopter, Canonne said, while the flight deck can take a 10-ton helo.
The side-by-side launch ramps in the stern are not covered over, but DCNS points out the Gowind is the only current design able to simultaneously launch and recover two rigid-hull inflatable boats (RHIBs).
Unlike other recovery systems where a RHIB charges up the ramp and crew members secure a rope around a hook, the L’Adroit trails a rope which the RHIB crew picks up in the water and attaches to their craft, which is hauled up the ramp by a winch.
The ramps normally are configured to operate 9.35-meter and 7.8-meter RHIBs, but, Canonne said, boats up to 11 meters long can be accommodated.
Dedicated spaces just forward of the ramps and below the flight deck allow special operations forces to gather and stow weapons and gear close to the boats, and a special changing room is provided.
The L’Adroit is fitted with 59 berths, and, unusual in a modern naval ship, the hull is pierced with five portholes a side, most in the mess spaces.
“I like them,” Bailly proudly declared. “It’s good. We’re not exactly a warship,” he noted.
A number of commercial-standard design features, rather than heavier and more expensive naval fittings, are evident. The relatively light hatches aren’t spring-loaded, meaning some fitted at an angle need more muscle power to open or will slam shut if one isn’t careful, and steep naval ladders are replaced by more conventional stairwells.
“You make compromises, that’s clear,” Canonne said.
A Gowind Success
DCNS has yet to find a paying customer for the Gowind OPV represented by the L’Adroit. But a larger, 2,000-ton “Gowind Combat Corvette” version was chosen in late 2011 by Malaysia for that country’s littoral combat ship program.
A source at the NavDex show said contract negotiations between DCNS and the Malaysian Navy to build six of the ships were in the “final stages,” with agreement expected soon. | <urn:uuid:b314092e-2f79-462b-807a-0a96560e0c14> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.defensenews.com/article/20130218/DEFREG01/302180014 | 2013-05-24T08:43:12Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937713 | 1,435 |
SynopsisRobert "Mac" Dougal has an untarnished reputation as the world's greatest art thief. So when a priceless Rembrandt is stolen in New York, the evidence points to Mac. The insurance company decides to send their best investigator in pursuit of the master criminal.
Gin makes contact with Mac passing herself off as a burglar, but the old fox proves even more elusive, attractive and crafty than she expected. While engaging in an electric pas de deux of wariness and attraction, Mac and Gin form an edgy partnership that takes them from the luxury hotels of London to Kuala Lumper, the high tech capital of Malaysia. Together they come up with a daring plan for a multi-billion dollar heist tied to the dawn of a new millennium. But both have more than one trick up their sleeve and neither are short of new tricks.
Contacts and useful links
IGLOOLIK ISUMA PRODUCTIONS - CANADA | <urn:uuid:effc103c-ecdf-4caf-b570-b18f6fd50fbf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.festival-cannes.com/en/archives/ficheFilm/id/5309/year/1999.html | 2013-05-24T08:51:15Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.916529 | 194 |
Nine-time world champion Valentino Rossi says MotoGP is the worst it has been since he started racing
- October 24, 2012
Nine-time world champion Valentino Rossi has slammed MotoGP as "boring" and called for a change to the sport.
2012 MotoGP Standings
"Now is the worst moment in MotoGP since I joined in 2000," Rossi told BBC Sport on Tuesday.
"It is the most boring moment. Races are quite bad and it is very difficult to stay awake."
Spaniards Jorge Lorenzo and Dani Pedrosa have dominated this year's championship, winning 12 out of the 16 races so far between them.
Defending champion Casey Stoner, who is retiring at the age of 27 next month, is the only other rider to win this season and seven-time MotoGP champion Rossi believes the sport needs to change.
He said: "You look at Moto3, the races are very exciting, Moto2 is fantastic and then MotoGP is boring. So they have to change the product."
Is Rossi right: do you think MotoGP is boring? Leave your comments below.
Rossi, 33, hopes he can get back to winning ways next season with Yamaha.
He won four world championships with Yamaha before leaving for Ducati at the end of 2010, but has not won in the last 37 races.
"This is not the time in my career to be struggling every weekend like this," said Rossi, who has managed just three podium finishes in his two seasons for Ducati with his last win in Malaysia in 2010.
"It will be difficult but I think that I have the potential to win some races next year. It is a great pity for me at Ducati.
"It was a dream, it was a great and important bet to try and win for Ducati but unfortunately we have no way. It has been two very difficult seasons.pe"We try lots of things but we were never able to fix the problems. We had some good races and a few good results but not what everyone expects. We lose the bet."
Rossi will be second rider in his Yamaha team next season, as he partners Lorenzo, who is on course to win his second championship this season.
"I am at a certain age and I don't know how many years I will continue in MotoGP, so I have to race with the best bike that I can," said Rossi.
"Fortunately during my career I have won more or less everything so I need to enjoy it to have the right motivation.
"I need to arrive at the circuit every weekend with the chance to fight for the victory. It will be difficult but that is why I change teams."
Rossi won the 125cc championship in 1997 and the 250cc championship in 1999 before moving up to MotoGP where he was world champion seven times between 2001 and 2009.
Follow our LIVE blog of the AirAsia Australian MotoGP, Oct 28 at 12:30pm EDT.
Follow the action. Like Fox Sports. | <urn:uuid:01a04f8c-c295-47fc-975c-fb7d93e27065> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.foxsports.com.au/motor-sports/moto-gp/nine-time-world-champion-valentino-rossi-says-motogp-is-the-worst-it-has-been-since-he-started-racing/story-fn2ms4i4-1226501989406?from=public_rss | 2013-05-24T09:05:13Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970825 | 623 |
Three Courses of Authentic South African Cuisine and a Cocktail for £19.50 instead of £52 at Shaka Zulu
- Enter a theatre of food and experience an authentic taste of South Africa
- Choose from dishes including rooibos smoked salmon, bobotie and traditional melktert
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- Voucher valid from 24th January 2011 until 20th April 2011 (excludes Saturdays)
- Advance telephone booking essential, please call 020 3376 9911 have voucher and security codes ready
- Please remember service charge is not included
- Not valid with other offers, set menus or chef's table
The food of South Africa is often referred to as 'rainbow cuisine' because
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- Sirloin steak, peri peri fries & spiced chutney
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Shaka Zulu is a new theatre of food and drink that brings a taste of Africa to the heart of London. Based over two floors, it combines some of the culinary specialities of South Africa in one venue by having both a Seafood & Oyster Bar and authentic South African Braai restaurant. The Braai restaurant is where your the food comes alive with a line-up of world class chefs stoking the fires and creating a multitude of dishes with the freshest ingredients available.
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What an incredible place! The attention to detail is just stunning. We really enjoyed our evening here - amazing cocktails and great food. | <urn:uuid:f602083e-024a-4e36-9581-a6a1a270e18a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.groupon.co.uk/deals/london/ShakaZulu/220360?jGroupSelector=true&STUVWX=true | 2013-05-24T09:04:28Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.921358 | 624 |
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International Journal of Chemical Engineering
Volume 2012 (2012), Article ID 316891, 2 pages
Advances in Mixing Technology: Recent Advances in Mixing Research and Development
1Division of Chemical Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering Science, Osaka University, 1-3 Machikaneyama, Toyonaka, Osaka 560-8531, Japan
2Department of Chemical Science and Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, Kobe University, Rokkodai, Nada, Kobe 657-8501, Japan
3Department of Mechanical Design Engineering, Andong National University, Songchon-Dong, Kyungbuk, Andong 760-749, Republic of Korea
4Department of Civil Engineering, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Received 2 October 2012; Accepted 2 October 2012
Copyright © 2012 Shunsuke Hashimoto et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Mixing has been one of essential unit operations for chemical engineering processes. Among a number of mixers, stirred tanks that are available in a wide variety of tank sizes and impeller shapes are the most frequently adopted to homogenize different substances and to conduct chemical reactions in industrial chemical processes. In addition, there are various technologies for fluid mixing: static mixer, micromixer, unsteady agitation, eccentric agitation, and so on. Recently in various industrial processes, a wide range of operation for stirred tank is required depending on purposes and conditions, and high efficiency on mixing has been strongly required. In addition, the techniques of computer simulation analyses by the use of CFD software have been dramatically developed, which is essential to analyze the mixing mechanism. The main goal of this special issue was to gather contributions dealing with the latest breakthrough of mixing techniques. There is a collection of twelve papers in this special issue focused on mixing fundamental (2 papers), multiphase mixing (3 papers), chemical reactive mixing for metallurgical industry, and biotechnology (4 papers), and new technology of mixing (3 papers) ranging in topic from laminar-to-turbulent mixing by means of both experimental analyses and numerical simulations. The highlights of each paper are introduced as follows.
In the paper entitled by “Design mixers to minimize effects of erosion and corrosion erosion”, E. E. Janz and J. Fasano from Chemineer, Inc. provide techniques for minimizing the wear on impellers cover the choice of impeller, size and speed of the impeller, alloy selection, and surface coating or coverings. An example is provided as well as an assessment of the approximate life improvement.
In the work entitled by “Effect of impeller agitation on preparation of tetra-n-butyl ammonium bromide semi-clathrate hydrate slurries”, S. Hashimoto et al. from Osaka University, which shows the effect of impeller agitation on particle size distribution and aggregation of tetra-n-butyl ammonium bromide (TBAB) semiclathrate hydrate slurries. The slurries containing TBAB solution and its semiclathrate hydrate have attracted a lot of interest as latent heat transport media. First of all, the effects of impeller rotational speed and impeller type on the particle size and frequency of aggregation are investigated. The results suggest that the particle size distribution and the frequency of particle aggregation are strongly affected by the intensity of shear rate and its uniformity, which is controllable with impeller type and its rotation speed.
In the research entitled by “Correlation of power consumption for several kinds of mixing impellers”, Y. Kato et al. review the correlations of power consumption in nonbaffled and baffled agitated vessels with several kinds of impellers, which are developed in a wide range of Reynolds numbers from laminar-to-turbulent flow regions. The power correlations are based on Kamei and Hiraoka’s expressions for paddle and pitched paddle impellers. The calculated correlation values agree well with experimental ones, and the correlations will develop the other types of impellers.
In the paper entitled by “Effect of temperature change on geometric structure of isolated mixing regions in stirred vessel”, N. Ohmura et al. show the effect of temperature change on the geometric structure of isolated mixing regions (IMRs) in a stirred vessel by the decolorization of fluorescent green dye by acid-base neutralization. The step temperature-change can dramatically reduce the elimination time of IMRs, as compared with a steady temperature operation. During the transient process from an initial state to disappearance of IMR, the IMR showed interesting three-dimensional geometrical changes, that is, simple torus with single filament, simple torus without filaments, a combination of crescent shape and circular tori, and doubly-entangled torus.
In the work entitled by “Phosphorus removal from wastewater using oven-dried alum sludge”, S. A. Rashid and W. T. Mohammed deal with the removal of phosphorus from wastewater by using oven-dried alum sludge (ODS) as an adsorbent that was collected from Al-Qadisiya treatment plant (Iraq). The results show that the percent removal of phosphorus increases with the increase of oven dried alum sludge dose, but thr pH of solution has insignificant effect. In addition, the oven-dried alum sludge was effective in adsorbing phosphorus, and percent removal of phosphorus reaches 85% with increasing of contact time.
In the paper entitled by “Laminar mixing in stirred tank agitated by an impeller inclined”, K. Takahashi et al. show the mixing performance in a vessel agitated by an impeller inclined itself, which is considered one of the typical ways to promote mixing performance by the spatial chaotic mixing. The effect of eccentric position of inclined impeller on mixing time was also studied and a significant reduction of mixing time is observed. To confirm the experimental results, the velocity profiles are calculated numerically and two novel numerical simulation methods are proposed.
In the research entitled by “Characterization of minimum impeller speed for suspension of solids in liquid at high solid concentration, using gamma ray densitometry”, P. A. Tanguy et al. exhibit the limitations of applying conventional measurement techniques for the accurate characterization of critical impeller speed for just off-bottom suspension (Njs) at high solid concentrations. Subsequently, the Gamma-Ray Densitometry technique for characterizing Njs is introduced, which can overcome the limitations of previous experimental techniques. The theoretical concept of this method is explained and experimental validation is presented to confirm the accuracy of the Gamma-Ray Densitometry technique. By utilizing the similarity to the incipient movement of solid particles in other systems, a theoretical model for Njs prediction is presented.
In the work entitled by “The effects of mixing, reaction rates and stoichiometry on yield for mixing sensitive reactions—Part I: model development”, S. M. Kresta et al. provide the model and design of the effect of mixing, reaction rates, and stoichiometry on yield for mixing sensitive reactions: competitive-consecutive and competitive-parallel reactions. A detailed investigation of the effects of initial mixing condition (striation thickness), dimensionless reaction rate ratio and reaction stoichiometry on the yield of desired product shows that the stoichiometry has a considerable effect on yield. All three variables are found to interact strongly. Model results for 12 stoichiometries are used to determine the mixing scale and relative rate ratio, needed to achieve a specified yield for each reaction scheme. The results show that all three variables need to be considered when specifying reactors for mixing sensitive reactions. Incidentally, Professor S. K. also organizes another paper.
In the paper entitled by “Effect of mixing on microorganism growth in loop bioreactors”, A. M. Al Taweel et al. show the impact of mixing on the promotion of microorganism growth rate using a multiphase forced circulation pipe-loop reactor model capable of identifying conditions under which it is possible to convert natural gas into single cell protein (SCP). The impact of mixing in the interphase mass transfer is found to exert a critical role in determining the overall productivity of the bioreactor, particularly at the high cell loadings needed to reduce the capital costs associated with the large-scale production needed for the production of relatively low-value SCP in a sustainable manner.
In the paper entitled by “Investigation of the pulsed annular gas jet for chemical reactor cleaning”, C. V. Fedorovich et al. provide the study of aerodynamic efficiency of the impulse system carried by numerical modeling and experimentally with the help of a specially created experimental facility. The characteristics of the pulsed jets mixing are investigated and designed pulsed peelings system has shown high efficiency and reliability in functioning that allows us to recommend it for wide spreading in chemical industry.
The research of S. Ibrahim entitled by “Zwietering’s equation for the suspension of porous particles and the use of curved blade impellers” reveals Njs of porous palm shell activated carbon (PSAC) particles for a few impeller blades. Specific power per unit mass for all three impellers showed reduction towards minima as the concentration of particles increased. The result means that the Zwietering equation can be used to predict suspension for porous particles with adjustment to the solid particle density. S values for curved-blade impellers are presented for the first time.
In the work entitled by “The effects of mixing, reaction rates and stoichiometry on yield for mixing sensitive reactions—part II: design protocols”, S. M. Kresta et al. provide the design strategy of the effect of mixing, reaction rates, and stoichiometry on yield for mixing sensitive reactions.
The guest editors are also sincerely thankful to the editorial staff for the support, guidance, and efforts in welcoming this series of papers on a timely subject. We hope that this special issue will be available for the future innovation of mixing technology.
Shaliza B. Ibrahim | <urn:uuid:c01562e4-6fdf-4702-8fad-58578bed83d5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijce/2012/316891/ | 2013-05-24T08:51:18Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.920724 | 2,235 |
Natalie's greatest passion outside of golf is helping children. Find out more >>
5’9”...Started playing golf at the age of 4...Credits her father John Gulbis as the individual most influencing her career...Hobbies include working out and running...Has her own calendar...Created The Natalie Gulbis Foundation in 2005…Qualified for the Tour on her first attempt…Has her own Web site, www.nataliegulbis.com.
2012 in a Nutshell
- 22 events, 16 cuts made, $321,472 (42)
- 3 top-10 finishes including a season-best tie for fourth at the Evian Masters Presented by Societe Generale
In 2011, best finish was a tie for 15th at the LPGA State Farm Classic.
In 2010, best finish was a tie for 12th at the Sime Darby LPGA Malaysia.
In 2009, qualified for her third U.S. Solheim Cup Team after finishing 10th in the points race, posted a 1-1-1 record for her winning squad; best finish was a tie for seventh at the Michelob ULTRA Open at Kingsmill; also finished tied for 10th at the SBS Open at Turtle Bay.
In 2008, best finish was a tie for ninth at the RICOH Women's British Open; received the William and Mousie Powell Award.
In 2007, became a Rolex First-Time Winner at the Evian Masters, where she defeated Jeong Jang in a one-hole, suddendeath playoff; crossed the $3 million mark in career earnings with her victory; made her second appearance on the victorious U.S. Solheim Cup Team.
In 2006, best finish was runner-up at the Jamie Farr Owens Corning Classic Presented by Kroger, where she lost to Mi Hyun Kim on the third hole of a sudden-death playoff; crossed the $2 million mark in career earnings at the Kraft Nabisco Championship, where she tied for third and recorded her best finish in a major championship; one of only two players (Lorena Ochoa) to finish in the top 20 in all four major championships; recorded her second LPGA career hole-in-one during the second round of the Michelob ULTRA Open at Kingsmill.
In 2005, best finish was a tie for third at both the Michelob ULTRA Open at Kingsmill, where she crossed the $1 million mark in career earnings, and State Farm Classic; qualified for her first Solheim Cup and scored three points for the victorious U.S. Team; earned more than $1 million in a season for the first time in her career and set an LPGA record for most money earned in a season without a victory with $1,010,154 (record has since been broken).
In 2004, best finish was a tie for seventh at the Chick-fil-A Charity Championship hosted by Nancy Lopez; carded her first LPGA career hole-in-one during the final round of the Safeway Classic Presented by Pepsi.
In 2003, tied for 12th at the Chick-fil-A Charity Championship hosted by Nancy Lopez for her best finish of the season; carded a career-low 63 in the third round of the Welch’s/Fry’s Championship.
In 2002, tied for fifth at the ShopRite LPGA Classic and the Giant Eagle LPGA Classic; finished second to Beth Bauer in the Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the Year race.
In 2001, turned professional in July; tied for third at the LPGA Final Qualifying Tournament to earn exempt status for the 2002 season; won the LPGA Sectional Qualifying Tournament in Venice, Fla., by eight strokes.
At the age of 14, Gulbis won the California Women’s Amateur Championship. That same year, she became the youngest player to Monday qualify for an LPGA tournament (1997, Longs Drugs Challenge), a record that stood until Michelle Wie Monday qualified at the 2002 LPGA Takefuji Classic at age 12. Gulbis represented the state of California in two USGA team championships and was the U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship medalist in 1998. She won four collegiate tournaments while at the University of Arizona, including the NCAA West Regional. She was named a First-Team All-American in 2001. | <urn:uuid:0a2e18b1-9439-4f73-8f53-56a0bd71602d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lpga.com/golf/players/g/natalie-gulbis/bio.aspx | 2013-05-24T08:29:11Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963157 | 924 |
The story started when six of the local university colleges requested the dropping of the word ‘college’ in their names as they felt their current description had an inferior connotation. Then, they were being asked to upgrade their status. In April 2006, Higher Education Minister, Datuk Mustapa Mohamed had said that he was looking into their request. Finally, our government has agreed to rename 'university college (kolej universiti)' to 'university (universiti)' back in October 2006. The Star Online reported that January 1, 2007 will be the official date for the name-change for six university colleges:
- Kolej Universiti Kejuruteraan Utara Malaysia (KUKUM) to Universiti Malaysia Perlis
- Kolej Universiti Sains dan Teknologi Malaysia (KUSTEM) to Universiti Malaysia Terengganu
- Kolej Universiti Kejuruteraan dan Teknologi Malaysia (KUKTEM) to Universiti Malaysia Pahang
- Kolej Universiti Teknikal Kebangsaan Malaysia (KUTKM) to Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Malacca
- Kolej Universiti Islam Malaysia in Nilai, Negri Sembilan to Universiti Sains Islam Malaysia
- Kolej Universiti Teknologi Tun Hussein Onn in Batu Pahat to Universiti Teknologi Tun Hussein Onn
The change of name is because people especially employers have misconceptions about the status of 'university college' (Kolej Universiti) and also to satisfy public requests. The misconceptions among employers possibly make life difficult for graduates from these university colleges to be hired. Actually, those university colleges have the status of 'university college' are due to their specialization in limited disciplines compared to those full-fledged universities. Moreover, the number of undergraduates in a university college is less than 10,000.
Malaysia Students blog contributor, Reign226 who is currently an undergraduate of KUTKM (soon to be Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Malacca) has a good write-up on this. He wrote:
As a result of this, classes in KU [Kolej Universiti] usually have a very desirable teacher:student ratio. In my own class, we only have 18 students, so the teachers are able to devote time for each student. Lecturers also have a comparatively open schedule and can be approached easily as their responsibilities are only towards a small pool of students.
Indeed, the more established KUs are virtually indistinguishable from other universities both in terms of diversity and student population. As my own KU is relatively new, there are some annoying inconveniences that I have to put up with, chiefly the lack of a proper campus for my own faculty.
Personally, I believe most or at least half of the undergraduates in the university colleges did not choose those university colleges when filling in Bahagian Pengurusan Kemasukan Pelajaran (BPKP, which was formerly known as Unit Pusat Universiti, UPU) online registration form. Well, I think the most obvious reason is that most students, when choosing public institutions of higher learning, believe that old is gold (isn’t it? ;-) and hence would choose well-established universities rather than those relatively new university colleges. Furthermore, most local public universities have been well-known for being specialized in certain disciplines while University of Malaya (UM) being the most prestigious university in Malaysia.
Some questions come to my mind as I read this news: Does it mean that by renaming these university colleges to universities, they become full-fledged universities? Can they each support more than 10,000 undergraduates? Once they admit more undergraduates to achieve the full-fledged university status, will lecturer:undergraduate ratio be reasonable? Will teaching materials and resources be sufficient?
Only time will tell. ;-)
Update: Berita Harian Online reported that the official date for the name-change has been postponed to February 1, 2007. Secretary of Ministry of Higher Education, Datuk Dr Zulkefli A Hassan said that it was postponed after considering a few legal processes which need some time to be completed.
Even though these university colleges will be renamed to universities, the courses and degree programmes offered by them will remain the same. Besides that, the enrollment of these soon-to-be universities will be between 10,000 and 15,000 undergraduates, which means no increase compared to their previous enrollments. Meanwhile, the administrative positions like Rektor and Deputy Rektor will be renamed to Vice Chancellor and Deputy Vice Chancellor respectively.
► Read more on Six New Local Public Universities in 2007 | <urn:uuid:f8090387-839c-4352-ae36-1f84f8bdbefb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.malaysia-students.com/2006_12_01_archive.html | 2013-05-24T08:51:02Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94321 | 979 |
For Immediate Release
November 11, 2009
Canale Communications for Orion Genomics
The Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) and Orion Genomics today announced that a consortium co-led by the Advanced Biotechnology and Breeding Centre of MPOB and Orion Genomics has sequenced three oil palm genomes from two oil palm species, an important food and biofuel crop. This genome sequencing effort provides a comprehensive genetic blueprint of E. oleifera and E. guineensis including the pisifera and dura palms. In commercial seed production, the pisifera is frequently used as the paternal line and the dura serves as the maternal palm.
Oil palm plantations on average produce 3.9 tons of oil per hectare per year, nearly ten times more than other productive oil bearing crops. Therefore, it has the potential to meet growing demand for food and renewable fuel. Used in cooking oil, margarine, baked goods and other foods, palm oil is the most consumed edible oil in the world. It feeds more than 3 billion people in 150 countries worldwide, and it is also a common ingredient in soaps and cosmetics. In 2008, Malaysia produced 17.7 million tons of crude palm oil and exported RM65.2 billion (US $17.6 billion) of palm oil products. New technologies are now enabling palm oil to be transformed into biodiesel, a promising renewable fuel.
The oil palm family has two species, the E. guineensis which originates from Africa and the E. oleifera, which is native to South America. Because of its high productivity, the E. guineensis is the commercial variety planted in Malaysia. However, the E. oleifera has many interesting traits such as low height increment, increased resistance to disease and produces higher quantities of unsaturated fats - traits that will add value if incorporated into commercial E. guineensis lines.
"Knowledge of the genomic sequence of these oil palm varieties enables researchers to understand genetic differences between trees that are, for example, higher yielding or more resistant to disease than usual," said Datuk Dr. Mohd Basri Wahid, the Director-General of MPOB. "Our goal in completing the oil palm genome sequence is to dramatically improve oil yields both for the production of food, feed and fuel."
The consortium included St. Louis, Missouri-based Orion Genomics, MOgene LC and The Genome Center at Washington University, South Korea-based Macrogen Inc., and Adelaide, Australia-based GeneWorks Pty Ltd. In addition to sequencing and assembling the genomes of the three oil palm varieties, the consortium sequenced the expressed genes (or transcriptome) from multiple tissue types for all three types of oil palm. Transcriptome sequence will aid oil palm researchers as they seek to understand the genes responsible for yield, disease resistance and resistance to environmental stress. The initiative generated the most comprehensive genetic and transcriptional maps to date of this important crop.
MPOB and Orion, along with MOgene, LC, also unveiled plans to study the epigenetic makeup of oil palm in 2010 in an effort to improve yields.
"Epigenetics is the study of the pattern of chemical groups that influence whether specific genes are turned on or off", said Nathan Lakey, President and Chief Executive Officer of Orion Genomics. "We theorize that by studying oil palm epigenetics, we may be able to help to speed the development of varieties of oil palm that produce more oil, rapidly increasing the per acre efficiency of this crop, which already is the single largest producer of edible oils world-wide."
The Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) was established on May 1, 2000 with the principal objective of promoting, developing and advancing the Malaysian palm oil industry. As the steward of the nation’s palm oil industry, MPOB is responsible for providing the scientific and technological support to the Malaysian palm oil industry. MPOB’s commitment to the industry is not limited to Research and Development (R & D), but also encompasses dissemination of information, technology transfer, commercialization, registration, licensing and enforcement activities.
Orion Genomics, the Second Code Company, develops epigenetic research tools and molecular diagnostic products to fulfill the promise of personalized medicine. Orion's lead product is a simple blood-based test that is being developed to identify people at elevated risk for colorectal cancer. The company has active biomarker discovery programs in cancers of the bladder, breast, lung, ovaries and colon, and the company offers genomics services to the medical, agricultural and bio-fuels research communities. Orion Genomics is located in the Center for Emerging Technologies in St. Louis. For more information, visit the Orion Genomics website at http://www.oriongenomics.com.
Macrogen is a Korean bio-venture company established in 1997. As a leading biotechnology company, Macrogen has provided high-quality DNA sequencing service to more than 10,000 researchers in over 100 countries worldwide with sequencing platforms such as 3730xl, GAIIx, SOLiD3, and GS-FLX. It also has subsidiary laboratories in USA, Japan, and Netherlands for more localized and customized service. Macrogen fully sequenced and annotated the whole genome of a Korean individual, which was published in Nature on 20th August, 2009. NGS (Next Generation Sequencing) and capillary sequencing platforms were combined to accomplish the project. With these accumulated experiences, Macrogen has shown its successful performances in numerous large scale sequencing projects. In addition, Macrogen has also launched 'Asian 100 Genome Project' in June this year to identify Asian specific markers related to diseases. For more information, visit the website of Macrogen Inc. at http://www.macrogen.com. | <urn:uuid:06ec3e1b-66e7-4585-b700-5f50ad652f7f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.oriongenomics.com/press/pr_20091109.html | 2013-05-24T08:51:40Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940047 | 1,184 |
About Penang Culinary Tour
Penang Culinary Tour was founded in January 2009 by Bee Yinn Low of Rasa Malaysia and her elder brother CK Low. Both are huge foodies constantly in search of the best and most authentic local eats in Penang. Eating well has always been a passion of the Low's family and with Penang Culinary Tour, they share and introduce Penang's culinary gems to their guests and clients. The award-winning Penang Culinary Tour has been featured in Budget Travel USA and SilkAir Singapore.
"CK’s three day exploration of George Town and the island of Penang satisfied all my culinary and cultural yearnings. Penang is a dreamy place for eaters like me and CK got me right to where I wanted to be–at the table, on sidewalks, in stalls, on the beach and in restaurants."
Food Writer, San Francisco Examiner and author of the second edition of the “San Francisco Food Lovers’ Pocket Guide.
Penang Culinary Tour © 2011 | Design and Concept by Ximin Yeh | <urn:uuid:a358c36a-088f-49cd-ac34-ef3555a418b6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.penangculinarytour.com/about_us/index.html | 2013-05-24T09:05:34Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947978 | 223 |
The assorted galleries of Bursa’s covered bazaar and lesser hans sell clothes, silk goods, towels, bolts of cloth and furniture, all Bursa province specialities. The nearby bedesten is given over to the sale and warehousing of jewellery and precious metals.
The centrepiece of the bazaar is the Koza Hanı, or “Silk-Cocoon Hall”, flanking Koza Parkı. Built in 1490, when Bursa was the final stop on the Silk Route from China, it’s still filled with silk and brocade merchants (plus a few jewellery stores). On the lower level, in the middle of a cobbled courtyard, a minuscule mescit (small mosque) perches directly over its şadırvan, while a subsidiary court bulges asymmetrically to the east; there are teahouses in both. | <urn:uuid:d321b51e-5e51-43ea-bed6-6f90791e1c83> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.roughguides.com/destinations/europe/turkey/around-sea-marmara/southern-marmara/bursa/koza-hani/?wpfpaction=add&postid=57585 | 2013-05-24T08:31:21Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.915813 | 193 |
The Rough Guide to Southeast Asia on a Budget is the ultimate guide for budget-conscious independent travellers visiting this fascinating region. Updated by young, enthusiastic writers, the guide has detailed practical information that will help readers make the most of their time and money, whether it’s taking a slow boat down the Mekong, or catching the “Jungle Railway” through Malaysia’s interior.
Our extensive coverage includes all of the most popular Southeast Asian destinations, alongside less “discovered” places, with information on getting off the beaten track – whether to hike through the rainforest, visit remote hill tribes or just find a quiet stretch of white sand. The itineraries provide a great starting point for travellers to the region, while the “Ideas” section focuses on some of the region’s many highlights, illustrated by beautiful photographs.
Make the most of your time with The Rough Guide to Southeast Asia on a Budget. | <urn:uuid:6fc8ac5a-63bc-4076-b479-e1ba19bd59af> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.roughguides.com/shop/rough-guide-southeast-asia-budget/book/?wpfpaction=add&postid=71022 | 2013-05-24T08:58:25Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.879219 | 194 |
Asian shares climbed to a three-month high on Monday, joining a global rally triggered by better-than-expected U.S. economic data and optimism that European leaders will be able to resolve their debt crisis.
The U.S. Labor Department report showed stronger than expected job growth in July, with non-farm payroll employment increasing by 163,000 jobs in the month following a downwardly revised increase of 64,000 jobs in June. However, the unemployment rate edged up to 8.3 percent in July from 8.2 percent in June, surprising economists, who had expected the unemployment rate to come in unchanged.
Concerns about Europe's debt-ridden economies eased after inspectors and Greek government officials said that significant headway had been achieved on further spending cuts that Greece must adopt to secure a EUR 31.5-billion tranche of new aid that is vital to keep the country afloat.
Commodities edged lower and the euro weakened against the dollar after reports said U.S. banks have reduced their exposure to troubled eurozone countries using hedges such as credit default swaps.
Japanese shares rallied in thin trading, with the Nikkei average climbing 2 percent to hit a near three-week high as strong U.S. jobs data eased concerns over the global economy. The broader Topix index of all First Section issues on the Tokyo Stock Exchange finished 1.6 percent higher. Financials led the rally, with Nomura Holdings up 4.1 percent and Daiwa Securities rising 2.2 percent.
Euro-sensitive Canon advanced 3.5 percent and Nikon added 4 percent, benefiting from a weaken yen after Greece and its creditors agreed on the need for more budget cuts to comply with bailout terms. Sony ended flat after Moody's Investors Service placed its long-term credit rating under review for a possible downgrade, citing the yen's strength, weak demand and "structural challenges" at the company.
Sharp plunged 5.7 percent after Taiwan-based Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. said it would renegotiate the price for purchasing a stake in the Japanese consumer electronics maker. Toyota Motor rose 2.5 percent as the automaker posted its largest quarterly net profit in four years and revised upwards its 2012 global sales target. Shares of Honda Motor rose 2.8 percent, while Isuzu Motors jumped 6.4 percent on robust Q1 earnings. Asahi Glass jumped 7.3 percent after Nomura Securities raised its rating on the stock.
China's Shanghai Composite index added a percent after recent sell-offs despite caution ahead of domestic inflation and trade data due out later this week. Hong Kong's Hang Seng index advanced 1.7 percent to end near a three-month high.
Australian shares rose sharply on optimism about the health of the U.S. economy. Both the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 and the broader All Ordinaries index gained about 1.2 percent each, with metal stocks rallying after copper futures climbed by more than 2 percent on Friday.
Rio Tinto jumped 4.1 percent, BHP Billiton rose 2.2 percent and gold miner Newcrest Mining added 2.1 percent. Fortescue Metals rose 1.9 percent after the iron ore producer obtained a $1.5 billion loan to help fund the expansion of its operations in Western Australia.
Shares of Integra Mining soared 27 percent after Silver Lake Resources offered to buy the company for $426 million in shares to create a gold miner with a market value of nearly $1 billion. In the financial sector, Westpac, NAB, Commonwealth and ANZ ended up less than a percent each. Retailer Harvey Norman rose a modest 0.3 percent after it blamed deflationary price pressures in television sets and computers for an expected 40 percent drop in fiscal-year profit.
In economic news, Australian inflation rose 0.2 percent in July from the previous month amid a rise in energy costs due to the imposition of the carbon tax from July 1, according to the TD Securities - Melbourne Institute monthly survey.
South Korea's Kospi average jumped 2 percent to a seven-week high, buoyed by upbeat U.S. data and continued hopes for near-term ECB bond intervention to bring down high borrowing costs for Spain and Italy. The ECB and the Fed didn't announce any new stimulus measures last week, but hinted at future policy action to tide over the current difficult economic situation.
Among the prominent gainers, market heavyweight Samsung Electronics and rival SK Hynix soared about 4 percent each. Shares of STX Group affiliates rose, with STX Offshore & Shipbuilding gaining 4 percent on reports of a stake sale in an affiliate company.
New Zealand shares rose modestly, joining a regional rally as strong U.S. non-farm payroll employment data eased global growth worries. The benchmark NZX-50 rose 0.4 percent, with heavyweights Telecom and Fletcher Building pacing the gainers. Telecom, the largest listed company on the exchange, rose 1.1 percent to its highest level since August 2008, while shares of Fletcher Building, the nation's largest construction company, gained 1.6 percent to close at a one-month high.
Rural services firm PGG Wrightson rallied 3.2 percent, outdoor clothing and equipment company Kathmandu Holdings advanced 2.6 percent and carpet maker Cavalier added 2.5 percent. Exporter Fisher and Paykel Healthcare led the decliners, falling 2.6 percent as the kiwi dollar held near a three-month high. Fishing company Sanford ended unchanged after the U.S .government withdrew one of the claims in its US Federal District Court case against the company.
Elsewhere, India's benchmark Sensex was up 1.5 percent, Indonesia's Jakarta Composite edged up 0.1 percent, Malaysia's KLSE Composite gained 0.3 percent, Singapore's Straits Times index was rising 0.7 percent and the Taiwan Weighted average added a percent.
U.S. stocks soared on Friday, thanks to an encouraging report on services sector activity and better-than-expected jobs data. The Dow jumped 1.7 percent to a three-month high, the tech-heavy Nasdaq advanced 2 percent and the S&P 500 added 1.9 percent.
by RTT Staff Writer
For comments and feedback: email@example.com | <urn:uuid:88273f80-29a7-4b4b-9ce2-7a5f6c5c4e4e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rttnews.com/1940071/asian-stocks-rally-on-u-s-data.aspx | 2013-05-24T08:56:58Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935964 | 1,293 |
Keen international talent for ChildAid
At least 100 applications have come in from India for a slot to perform in this year's ChildAid concert for and by young people.
The strong interest there was sparked by a publicity drive initiated by Ms Payal Nayar, 50, and Ms Shalaka Ranadive, 40, co-founders of an events management company in Singapore, through their network in India.
They worked with a web-based company to publicise the talent search online, and in short write-ups and listings in newspapers there last month.
'We think that there is a lot of talent in India which can be tapped into. If we can make a difference to the lives of a handful of kids as two individuals, it would mean a lot to us,' said Ms Nayar, who is originally from Mumbai and is a Singapore permanent resident.
The eighth edition of ChildAid, the annual showcase here of young talent aged six to 19, will again include talent from overseas.
Organised by The Straits Times and The Business Times to raise money for two children's charities, it has featured guest performers from countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia, China and Japan in past editions.
ChildAid executive producer Colin Goh said: 'We hope that non-Singaporeans living here will also come forward to contribute to this cause. We have many other nationalities living in cosmopolitan Singapore. At the end of the day, we hope for a good representation of diversity in ChildAid.'
The call for entries in Singapore, which started on April 26, has also drawn interest from international students here.
Jeniffer Park, 10, a fifth grade student at the Singapore American School, sent in a video clip of herself playing the song Italian Polka on the flute.
She said: 'I like this song because it has lots of emotion.'
The American-born Korean, who is a Singapore permanent resident, said she was impressed by an online video clip of ChildAid 2010 flautist Nikolai Song, then seven, performing a solo piece backed by an orchestra.
Said Jeniffer: 'It's going to be a good opportunity to share my talent with other people and help other people who are less lucky than me.'
ChildAid raises money for The Business Times Budding Artists Fund and The Straits Times School Pocket Money Fund. Both help underprivileged children. Since ChildAid started in 2005, it has raised $5.86 million for the two charities.
The Electric Edition is the theme of this year's concert, which will be staged on Dec 7 and 8 at the Marina Bay Sands Grand Theater.
Show director Jeremiah Choy from Orangedot productions said of applicants: 'It'll be good if they can do something that is electrifying. If not, do what they can do best.'
That was what Ananya Samuel, a ninth-grade student from United World College of South East Asia, did. The 15-year-old sent an audio clip of herself singing Colors Of The Wind.
She said: 'I chose this song because I think it has a beautiful melody and a meaningful message.'
In response to requests from applicants for more time to prepare their entries, the organisers have extended the application deadline from last Friday to this Sunday.
Those interested in performing in this year's show can send their applications to email@example.com.
They must send in a video of their performance (of no more than 15MB) and include a short write-up on why they want to take part.
The deadline is Sunday.
Shortlisted participants will be invited to audition. | <urn:uuid:235e6f92-ad7d-4f9a-866a-ff1b4ca5b54a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.straitstimes.com/microsites/childaid/story/keen-international-talent-childaid | 2013-05-24T08:59:04Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960047 | 748 |
Here in Australia where the sun shines brightly, the wind blows fresh and strong across our sweeping plains, where the waves crash into our never-ending shoreline and where a bunch of truckies spurred on by a radio shock jock gathered in our nations capital to try and depose the minority federal government.
Why you might ask? it would seem that the truckies and shock jocks didn’t like the result of the last election much and kind of don’t like they way our political system is governed, as enshrined in the constitution. The organizers of the event, who refer to themselves as the “Convoy of No Confidence” in the days preceding the protest predicted that thousands would join the protest on the lawns of parliament house Canberra.
I don’t want to be too picky but the “Convoy of No Confidence” isn’t a very good name for a convoy me thinks but that’s activism Australian style for ya. There was an eloquent poem on the organizers website. Please wait while I clear my throat…ok.
There is movement in Australia, the word has passed around,
A bob tailed truck is leaving Darwin NT on the 17th, Canberra bound.
Now the truck will bolt from Katherine yards on the 18th of August 2011,
No doubt the mob will be joining him, on his journey down.
A progressive Convoy is what he has sent the message for far and wide,
The call will be answered without a moment’s hesitation from all who can drive.
So down your tools, put your leave notice in - for today we become part of Australian history together.
At the end of the day, about 80 trucks and about 100 odd ancillary vehicles made the trip and weren’t actually authorized to drive their rigs to parliament house itself. The protesters, lead by dis-endorsed Liberal candidate, Mick Pattel, called for a new election and had a multitude of concerns: the carbon tax, the ban on live cattle exports, the Malaysia refugee people swap deal, pokies reform and more.
The lower than expected turnout lead MC Alan Jones to come up with conspiracy theory in which he was reliably informed that a convoy two kilometers long had been stopped by police at ACT/NSW border and therefore was a threat to democracy. Police and the Mick Pattel himself debunked within the appalling threat to freedom and to the Australian way within minutes.
The protestor’s major beef though seemed to be with the political system that allows independents to negotiate with both major parties to determine a minority government. With the next federal election two years away it looks like at this stage as though the disgruntled view that adorned the lawns of Canberra will have to wait.
Governments are elected to govern; our election terms (3 years) are short enough as it is. The 24 hour news cycle and the rise of punditry often passed of as journalism means that the venom, relentless political analysis and criticism gives governments of all pusuasions very little room to breathe life into their policies.
The frenzy whipped up means that elements of the population believe that things are in such a dire state that the government should be thrown out just after 12 months after being re-elected. Maybe we all just need to take a chill pill and let the democratically elected parliament do its work and if the electorate doesn’t like it then it will have the opportunity to vote in a new parliament in two years time.
In the meantime we can watch Alan Jones rant about the death democracy trying to create a smokescreen for the woeful turnout. | <urn:uuid:426ab38c-6011-4e24-9aef-fb6e3590f4b1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thesimpleton.com.au/politics/2011/8/22/revolution-australian-style.html | 2013-05-24T08:38:01Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961864 | 746 |
Rio Tinto (NYSE:RIO) has received a binding offer from HIG Capital, a U.S. private investment company, for its European specialty alumina business. Last October, the company announced plans to sell part of its aluminum business as part of its strategy to trim non-core and high cost assets and create value through iron ore.
In addition, the company has scrapped its deal with Malaysian company CAHYA Mata Sarawak (CMS) to develop a $2 billion aluminum smelter in Malaysia citing failure to finalize power supply terms. Rio Tinto’s product portfolio spans across basic metals like iron ore, copper and aluminum to energy products like coal and uranium. Its competes with mining giants such as BHP Billiton (NYSE:BHP), Vale (NYSE:VALE) and Freeport McMoran (NYSE:FCX).
Receives interest for alumina assets in Europe
Rio Tinto is in talks with HIG Capital, which has expressed interest in the company’s European specialty alumina business. HIG Capital has prior experience with aluminum when it invested in an aluminum extrusion company Signature Aluminum in Pennsylvania. While term have not been disclosed, Rio Tinto is consulting with unions and will respond after these meetings.
This certainly is a good news for Rio Tinto whose aluminum business has suffered significantly due to recession. The company had written down nearly half of its investment in Alcan, which it acquired in 2007 for $38 billion. Last year, as part of its aluminum divestiture, the company spun off its higher-cost aluminum assets in Australia and New Zealand into Pacific Aluminum, a distinct entity from Rio Tinto Alcan and put many aluminum assets on the auction block. The company has so far closed one aluminum smelter in the UK and is considering capacity cuts at other plants.
Aluminum contributes to nearly 20% of our price estimate for the company. Any significant development towards selling off aluminum assets will have significant effect on that.
Scraps plans to develop aluminum smelter in Malaysia
The company has scrapped its deal with CMS, a Malaysian construction and building materials firm to develop a $2 billion aluminum smelter plant in Malaysian state of Sarawak. They could not agree on power supply terms with Sarawak Energy. Many are speculating if China’s oversupply in the aluminum market to keep its input costs lower could have prompted the company to take such steps.
Had the company decided to go ahead with the project as opposite to its recently announced strategy to get rid of non core aluminum assets, it would have sent contradictory message and raised more questions among investors.
We are in the process of revising our price estimate for the company.Notes:
- Rio Tinto receives binding offer for its specialty aluminas business, Rio Tinto Press Release, Mar 28 2012 [↩]
- Rio Tinto, CMS scrap $2 bln smelter project in Malaysia, Reuters, Mar 27 2012 [↩] | <urn:uuid:33b47e51-44f8-45d2-9997-017e56d87051> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.trefis.com/stock/rio/articles/111166/rio-tinto-looks-to-sell-european-alumina-assets%E2%80%8E-scraps-malaysia-smelter-plans/2012-03-30/companies/people/company/faq/accountInfo/terms/pricing/companies?sector=5 | 2013-05-24T08:37:54Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958764 | 623 |
Foreigners and a few Singaporeans streamed to card and dice tables and slot machines Sunday at 12:18 p.m. - the lucky minute when tightly controlled Singapore opened its first casino.
The city-state is counting on the Resorts World Sentosa casino and another opening in May to lure tourists and expatriates without besmirching Singapore's hard-earned reputation as corruption-free.
The line for foreigners was long and deep at the midday opening, while few Singaporeans and permanent residents appeared eager to pay the fee required of them to enter. Chinese consider eight a lucky number because it sounds like prosper or wealth in the Mandarin dialect.
The casino is part of Resorts World Sentosa, built by Malaysia's Genting Bhd for 6.6 billion Singapore dollars ($4.7 billion) on an island just off Singapore's coast.
The government expects the two casino-resorts - Las Vegas Sands opens its Marina Bay Sands in May - to increase the country's gross domestic product growth by up to 1 percentage point and add 35,000 jobs.
Singapore also is trying to broaden its tourism appeal, part of a gradual shift toward a services-based economy and away from labor-intensive manufacturing that its poorer Asian neighbors can do more cheaply.
"They recognize they have to evolve," said David Cohen, an analyst with consultancy Action Economics in Singapore. "Some of their traditional industries are no longer going to be competitive as Singapore climbs the ladder into a higher income, higher cost location."
Genting Chairman Tan Sri Lim Kok Thay said he expects 13 million visitors to Resorts World this year - 60 percent foreign and 40 percent Singaporean. He declined to say how many visitors he expected at the casino alone.
The casino proposal hit stiff public resistance when it was debated in 2005 as opponents worried about gambling-related problems such as loan-sharking and bankruptcy and a possible undermining of the country's values of discipline and hard work.
The government decided to go ahead with the projects for their economic benefit while implementing measures to minimize social harm.
All Singaporeans and permanent residents must pay SG$100 a day or SG$2,000 a year to enter a casino, while foreigners are not charged. More than 34,000 residents - including those on welfare, in bankruptcy, with criminal records or flagged by family members - are barred from the casinos.
"It's a way to mitigate and ameliorate, to have the goodness without all the badness," said Lim Hock San, chairman of the National Council on Problem Gambling.
Singapore, an island of 5 million people, has gained notice in the past for its ban on chewing gum sales, caning sentences for minor crimes such as vandalism and executions of drug smugglers. | <urn:uuid:e66224e8-ee6b-49f7-8097-b2183363cc3a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2010/feb/14/singapore-tries-luring-foreigners-as-casino-opens/ | 2013-05-24T08:43:37Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956644 | 563 |
WESTERN UNION® "$25,000 Sweepstakes"
NO PURCHASE/TRANSACTION NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN.
A TRANSACTION WILL NOT INCREASE YOUR CHANCES OF WINNING.
TWO WAYS TO ENTER: 1) Automatic Entry: The first time each day that you send a Western Union Money Transfer® transaction from the United States to any of the following participating countries (Andorra, Australia, Austria, Bahrain, Belgium, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Malta, Morocco, Netherlands, Norway, Pakistan, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, UAE and Vietnam) from westernunion.com or the Mobile Application during the Promotional Period from 12:00:00 A.M. Eastern Time (“ET”) on October 1, 2012 to 11:59:59 P.M. (ET) on November 12, 2012 (each a “Qualifying Transaction”), you will automatically receive an entry into the Western Union® “$25,000 Bank to Bank” Sweepstakes (“Sweepstakes”). Entrant is deemed to be the person whose name appears as “Sender”. A transaction will not increase your chances of winning. 2) Mail-in Entry: NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. To enter the sweepstakes without sending a Qualifying Transaction hand print your complete name, address, phone number and email address on a piece of paper and mail to: Western Union “$25,000 Bank to Bank” Sweepstakes, P. O. Box 647, Lynbrook, NY 11563-0647. Entries received without all of the information requested above will be void. Mail-in entries must be postmarked by November 12, 2012, and received by November 16, 2012. Limit of one entry per envelope. No copies, facsimiles or reproductions of mail-in entry will be accepted. Sponsor is not responsible for late, lost, damaged, incomplete, illegible, postage-due or misdirected mail. Proof of mailing does not constitute proof of delivery. All material submitted becomes the sole property of Sponsor and will not be acknowledged or returned. Limit of one entry per person per day regardless of method of entry.
DRAWINGS: On or about Monday, November 19, 2012, one (1) Grand Prize Winner will be selected in a random drawing conducted from all Qualifying Transactions and eligible No Purchase Necessary entries received. The sweepstakes random drawing will be held under the supervision of Marden-Kane, Inc., an independent judging organization whose decisions are final on all matters relating to the Sweepstakes. Odds of winning depend upon the number of eligible mail-in entries received and Qualifying Transactions sent during the Promotional Period.
PRIZE: One (1) Grand Prize: $25,000 Cash (awarded in the form of check payable in U.S.D). Retail Value (“RV”): $25,000. All taxes, and other expenses not specified herein, including without limitation, income taxes, associated with the prize and its receipt are the sole responsibility of the Grand Prize Winner. Prize is non-transferable; no substitution allowed except at the sole discretion of the Sponsor due to prize unavailability. Sponsor reserves the right to substitute the prize with prize(s) of equal or greater value. Cash Prize to be awarded in the form of a check in U.S. dollars (payable only to sender/winner).
PRIVACY: The personal information you submit when you enter the Sweepstakes is collected by Sponsor and will be subject to Sponsor’s Privacy Statement (“Statement”). Sponsor may disclose your personal information to third parties as explained in the Statement. To obtain a copy of the Statement, visit Sponsor’s website at www.westernunion.com or call 1-800-562-2598 and ask for a copy of Sponsor’s Privacy Statement. Information disclosed may include financial background; identification, such as name and address; transaction information; and other information relating to financial matters. Recipients may include financial institutions; retailers; companies that process transactions or provide other services for Sponsor; government agencies; and direct marketers. You may opt out of (direct Sponsor not to make) certain disclosures. If you do not opt out, Sponsor will assume that you agree that your information may be used as the Statement describes. To opt out, call 1-800-562-2598.
GENERAL RULES: Sweepstakes is open only to legal US residents having a valid Tax Identification Number (TIN) or Social Security Number (SSN), who are 18 years of age or older as of October 1, 2012. Employees of Western Union, its Agents, Judges, their affiliates, subsidiaries, advertising and promotion agencies, or any other suppliers to Western Union and their immediate families and/or those living in the same household of each are not eligible to participate. All Federal, State and local laws and regulations apply. Void where prohibited by law. If a winner is deemed a minor in his/her state of residence, prize will be awarded in the name of the winner’s parent or legal guardian. The potential Grand Prize Winner will be contacted by mail, email and/or telephone, utilizing information the entrant provided for the transaction or mail-in entry. The potential Grand Prize Winner will be required to execute an Affidavit of Eligibility/Liability Release, a W9 Form, and Publicity Release (except where prohibited by law) within seven (7) days of notification. Noncompliance within this time period will result in disqualification. Should the potential Grand Prize Winner decide to decline the prize for any reason whatsoever, Sponsor shall have no further obligation to that potential winner, and an alternate potential winner will be selected. Return of any prize/prize notification as undeliverable will result in disqualification. By accepting a prize, Winners irrevocably grant to Sponsor, its affiliates, agents and licensees the right to unconditionally and perpetually reproduce, copy, store, transmit, publish, display, adapt and/or otherwise use or reuse their name and/or likeness, statements, biographical material, and any other materials arising out of their participation in the Promotion and acceptance of prize, including without limitation their personal information provided at time of Entry or information oral/visual provided after acceptance of award, in any manner or media whatsoever (whether known or hereafter devised), worldwide, without notice or compensation, for advertising and promotional purposes, unless prohibited by law. By accepting a prize, winner agrees to hold Western Union, its Agents, Judges, their affiliates, subsidiaries and their respective directors, officers, employees and assigns, harmless against any and all claims and liability arising out of the acceptance, possession, use, misuse or nonuse of prize. Winners assume all liability for any injury or damage caused, or claimed to be caused, by participation in this promotion or use or redemption of any prize. By participating in this promotion entrants agree to be bound by these Official Rules and the decisions of the Judges which shall be final and binding. This Sweepstakes and these Official Rules shall be interpreted in accordance with the laws of Colorado without regard to its principles of conflicts of law. Jurisdiction and venue shall be solely within the State of Colorado.
ENTRIES: All entries become the property of the Sweepstakes Sponsor and will not be returned. Sponsor and its affiliates, subsidiaries, representatives, Agents and employees are not liable for lost, late, stolen, illegible, delayed, garbled or misdirected transactions; technical hardware or software failures of any kind; lost or unavailable network connections; failed, incomplete, or damaged transactions; or for garbled or delayed computer transmissions even if the foregoing limits an entrant’s ability to participate in the Sweepstakes in any way or to win. Sponsor and its affiliates, subsidiaries, representatives, agents and employees are not responsible for any problems or the technical malfunction of any telephone network or lines, computer on-line systems, servers or providers, computer equipment, software, failure of any e-mail on account of technical problems or traffic congestion, or any combination thereof, including any injury or damage to entrant’s or any person’s computer or other property relating to or resulting from participation or downloading any materials in connection with the Sweepstakes.
WINNERS LIST AND OFFICIAL RULES: For the Grand Prize Winner’s name or a copy of the Official Rules, send a stamped, self-addressed envelope postmarked by November 12, 2012 to: Western Union $25,000 Bank to Bank Winners or Western Union $25,000 Bank to Bank Rules, c/o Marden-Kane, Inc. 1055 Franklin Avenue, Suite 300, Garden City, NY 11530 Attention: MM. Vermont residents may omit return postage. The name of the Grand Prize Winner and Official Rules will also be posted at http://www.westernunion.com/us/campaigns/bank-to-bank-sweeps.page and will remain posted for 30 days after the Sweepstakes ending date.
SPONSOR:Western Union Financial Services, Inc., 12500 E. Belford Avenue, Englewood, CO 80112.
JUDGES: Marden-Kane, Inc., 1055 Franklin Avenue, Suite 300, Garden City, NY 11530. | <urn:uuid:1eb5ca79-eccf-49a0-b08a-c399cac975ee> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.westernunion.com/us/campaigns/25ksweeps.page | 2013-05-24T08:57:32Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.908891 | 1,968 |
Hardware news tagged 32nm
Monday, May 6, 2013
First Images of AMD Fusion A-Series “Richland” APUs Hit the Web.
AMD to Assemble Chips in China, Not Only Malaysia
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
AMD Cuts Prices of Desktop Microprocessors Ahead of New Introductions.
AMD Slashes CPU Prices by 10% - 19%, Removes Select Phenom II from Price List
Monday, April 29, 2013
AMD Quietly Adds Two New Processors into FX Lineup.
AMD Officially Rolls-Out FX-4350 and FX-6350 Products
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
Intel: Foundry Business Will Not Have Substantial Revenue Impact for Two to Three Years.
Intel Is Collecting Serious Customers for Its Custom Foundry Division
Friday, April 12, 2013
AMD Readies Limited Edition “Centurion” FX Microprocessors to Compete with Intel’s Extreme Chips – Rumour.
AMD to Launch Limited Edition 5GHz FX Processor at $795 Price-Point
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Apple Excludes Samsung from New Chip Development Flow – Report.
Apple Reportedly Works with TSMC on New Application Processor
Thursday, April 4, 2013
AMD to Expand “Never Settle” Free Video Game Bundles to Select Fusion APUs.
AMD to Provide Free SimCity Video Game with Select APUs Starting This Month
Wednesday, April 3, 2013
Intel Custom Foundry to Manufacture Chips for Cisco.
Intel Reportedly Lands Chip Orders from Cisco
Monday, April 1, 2013
AMD A-Series “Trinity” Accelerated Processing Units Can Drop Clock-Speed Under High-Loads [UPDATED].
AMD Admits: A-Series “Trinity” APUs Reduce Their Clock-Speeds During High-Loads
Sunday, March 31, 2013
AMD: We Are On Track With Steamroller Micro-Architecture in 2013.
AMD Implies on Plans to Deliver Opteron Chips with Steamroller Cores This Year
Thursday, March 21, 2013
AMD Preps Significant Price-Cuts on Current Products Ahead of Product Refreshes – Rumour.
AMD to Lower Pricing of APUs, CPUs Next Month to Prepare for June Roll-Outs
Tuesday, March 12, 2013
AMD and Partners Start to Sell Fusion A-Series “Richland” APUs.
PCs with AMD’s S-Series “Richland” APUs to Bring Exclusive Features
Monday, March 11, 2013
AMD Quietly Starts to Sell Two New Six-Core and Quad-Core FX Processors.
AMD’s Partners Accept Orders on New Chips
Monday, February 25, 2013
Intel Announces Clover Trail+ Mobile System-on-Chip for Smartphones and Tablets.
Intel Launches Dual-Core Chip for Tablets and Smartphones
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
Apple Readies MacBook Air Notebooks with Retina Screen.
Apple Reportedly Plans to Introduce MacBook Air with Retina in Q3 2013
Thursday, February 7, 2013
Qnap Introduces Multi-Bay SMB NAS with XBMC Support.
Qnap’s Mid-Level NAS Devices Support XBMC
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Asustor Unveils Intel Atom Based Enterprise-Level Rackmount NAS.
Asustor Supercharges Enterprise-Level Rackmount NAS with New Atom Processor
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
Globalfoundries Expected to Apply for Permission to Build Fab 8 Module 2.
Globalfoundries to Start Making Preparations for Assumed 450mm Fab Shortly
Desktop AMD A-Series “Richland” APUs to Offer Higher Performance Thanks to Frequency Boost
AMD Adds FX-4130 Microprocessor into Lineup
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Safaricom Launches World’s First Cost-Efficient Yolo Smartphone with Intel Inside.
Intel Atom Z2420-Based Safaricom Yolo Smartphone Available for $125 in Kenya | <urn:uuid:5b61d99f-5281-44f6-932d-2dc777ce0d2f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/tag/32nm?page=-4 | 2013-05-24T08:32:03Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.809822 | 860 |
I'm Ahmad Al-Hafidz bin Musa, aged 28 years old and I'm a Muslim, I was born in December 20th, 1983 at Hospital Tapah, Perak, Malaysia. I'm the elder of five. Since I was a kid I love to draw, my grandpa, every time he went out, he always bought me a Manila Card (type of paper) - so that i wouldnt draw onto the wall. it's so funny to think how i get scolded by my grandpa for staining the wall...haha... I still kept all drawings until now and since that I never stop to draw. And after finished my secondary school at Sekolah Menengah Trolak, I was pursuing my studies in Diploma of Fine Art, Faculty of Art & Design at University Technology MARA, Manjung, Perak(Malaysia). After graduated, I've got the chance for furthering my study to the next level - Degree in Graphic & Media Digital Majoring in Digital Multimedia Illustration, it took two and a half years to complete my degree.
After graduated, I'd the opportunity to work in a production company/agency - Vision Animation(http://www.visionanimation.net) And currently I am working as a Lecturer at UiTM Kedah in Graphic & Media Digital. I'd been involved in photography since 2002 until now. | <urn:uuid:a1b66358-95ee-47f8-8e3a-62f4ee58caca> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://500px.com/HafidzMusa | 2013-06-18T22:59:16Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96932 | 291 |
Forrest Trial: Girl 'Stayed When Wife Away'
Police in New Mexico say Gene Hackman was acting in self-defense when he slapped a homeless man who had become aggressive toward the Oscar-winning actor and his wife.
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Famous UFO photo taken near Edwards Air Force Base in 1954 (Video) | Openminds.tv
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Girl And Friend Killed On Rail Line Named
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This Week?s Hype
Moors Murderer Ian Brady Walks Out Of Hearing
Does Bigfoot Roam In Malaysia?
Ghost Hunters Beware!
Bieber's Collision With Photographer 'No Crime'
Forrest Trial: Wife Found Message From Girl
WWII Crop Circles Discovered
G8: Syria Statement Omits Anti-Assad Calls | <urn:uuid:f7896af8-5980-45b0-8a75-d6e3a3715158> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://altnews.blogdig.net/archives/articles/October2012/31/Police__Gene_Hackman_slaps_homeless_man_in_NM.html | 2013-06-18T22:30:53Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.808848 | 230 |
The 3.2 update for the Iconia A500 promised for 25th August never showed, but Acer haven’t left us out in the cold instead going public on why the date slipped.
Posting on the Acer Malaysia Facebook page, the update now looks set to land on September 10th. Apparently they’ve been suffering some issues with the GPS settings, so thought better to put the update back than let it out in the wild with bugs.
Updates are always welcome, so hopefully Acer will manage to work out all the kinks before September 10th. They have promised to update earlier if there’s…
Continue Reading Here
Acer Iconia A500 3.2 update now landing September 10th
Richard Devine – androidcentral.com
Category: Android News | <urn:uuid:8167a11b-537a-4272-bf7a-b71ec407e333> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://androidheadlines.com/2011/08/acer-iconia-a500-3-2-update-now-landing-september-10th.html | 2013-06-18T22:37:37Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.887969 | 164 |
(For more market insights, including options activity, click on
; for The Day Ahead newsletter http://link.reuters.com/mex49s;
for the Morning News Call newsletter, http://link.reuters.com/faq23t)
March 5 (Reuters) - Some U.S. stocks on the move on Tuesday:
MARKET UP AFTER SERVICES DATA, DOW SETS RECORD
U.S. stocks extended gains as the Dow set an intraday record
high and the Nasdaq briefly gained more than 1 percent after
data showed the pace of growth in the U.S. services sector grew
at its fastest rate in a year. The Dow Jones industrial average
gained was up 0.81 percent, the Standard & Poor's 500
Index up 0.82 percent, and the Nasdaq Composite Index
up 0.98 percent.
** IMPAX LABORATORIES INC, $15.02, down 25 pct
Impax Laboratories said U.S. health regulators raised fresh
concerns related to manufacturing practices at the drugmaker's
Hayward, California facility.
Canaccord Genuity cut its rating and price target on shares
of Impax, while Guggenheim Securities reduced its stock-price
** ACELRX PHARMACEUTICALS INC, $5.33, up 7 pct
AcelRx Pharmaceuticals said its experimental drug-device
combination to manage post-operative pain met the main goal of a
late-stage study on patients who have undergone major open
** TRANSOCEAN LTD, $52.91, up 1.37 pct (0941 ET)
Activist investor Carl Icahn affirmed plans to propose a
$4.00 per share dividend at Transocean annual meeting, after the
world's largest drilling contractor said it will restart payouts
at a lower rate.
** FACEBOOK INC, $27.97, up 1 pct (0942 ET)
A Facebook shareholder has sued the social networking
company's Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg and others over its
troubled IPO, potentially reviving legal claims that a different
court dismissed in February.
** J.C. PENNEY CO INC, $15.90, down 5 pct (0943 ET)
** VORNADO REALTY TRUST, $83.41, up 2.5 pct (0944
Vornado Realty Trust is selling nearly half its stake in
U.S. retailer J.C. Penney, a source familiar with the matter
** CREE INC, $49.70, up 11 pct (1000 ET)
The maker of light-emitting diodes (LEDs) raised its
forecast for revenue and earnings for the third quarter ending
March 31 after launching a new range of LED bulbs. The company
increased its revenue forecast range to $335 million to $350
million, from $325 million to $345 million. It expects to earn
between 16 cents and 21 cents per share, higher than its prior
target of 15 cents to 20 cents.
** ASCENA RETAIL GROUP INC, $18.39, up 11 pct (0945
The women's apparel retailer posted better-than-expected
second-quarter results on Monday as the acquisition of Lane
Bryant and Catherines brands boosted sales, which rose 44
** SANTARUS INC, $14.97, up 8.47 pct (0946 ET)
Stifel Nicolaus & Co raised its price target on shares of
Santarus to $15 from $13, saying the company's inflammatory
bowel disease drug - Uceris - is off to a strong start, and
gained positive reception from physicians. The company on Monday
reported better-than-expected fourth-quarter results.
** SEARS HOLDINGS CORP, $46.45, up 5 pct (0948 ET)
Chief Executive Edward Lampert purchased 1.2 million of the
retailer's shares for $44.36 per share on March 4, according to
a regulatory filing.
The company last week reported a higher-than-expected
quarterly profit, helped by cost cuts.
** CITIGROUP INC, $43.40, up 1 pct (0949 ET)
A Manhattan federal judge on Monday rejected a bid by the
Abu Dhabi Investment Authority to overturn an arbitration
panel's ruling favoring Citigroup in a dispute over a $7.5
billion investment by the fund in the bank.
** GOOGLE INC, $833.75, up 1.48 pct (0950 ET)
The company's shares hit an all-time closing high on Monday
and some securities analysts are already forecasting the search
company could soon be a $1,000 stock. Its surge to new highs has
come as its Android software dominates the mobile phone market
and it continues to lead in mobile advertising.
** DEPOMED INC, $5.80, down 1.52 pct (0954 ET)
Advisers to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration voted
against approval of two drugs designed to reduce the frequency
and severity of hot flashes associated with menopause,
concluding that neither conferred enough benefit to offset their
The panel voted 12-2 against a drug made by Depomed, sending
the company's shares down 9.8 percent to $5.89 on the Nasdaq.
Depomed's shares fell as low as $5.12 immediately after they
resumed trading following a halt pending the results of the
** BOYD GAMING CORP, $6.93, down 6 pct (0956 ET)
Malaysia's Genting Bhd said it would purchase an
unfinished resort on the Las Vegas strip from Boyd Gaming for
$350 million, marking the Asian gaming group's first push into
the U.S. gambling mecca.
** MBIA INC, $12.16, down 5 pct (0958 ET)
** BANK OF AMERICA CORP, $11.55, up 1 pct (0958 ET)
MBIA on Monday won the dismissal of a lawsuit by Bank of
America and Societe Generale SA challenging its 2009
restructuring, sending the bond insurer's shares up 24 percent. | <urn:uuid:4d722efe-71bb-4e7c-9475-c493c522b47a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2013-03-05/news/sns-rt-markets-usa-stockspulsel4n0bx65h-20130305_1_cree-uceris-impax-laboratories | 2013-06-18T22:26:05Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.885324 | 1,359 |
Shark Tank (8pm, ABC) - An emotional pitch by a stylist from Santa Monica, who started her own slip business. Also, a Denver couple try to sell the sharks on their frozen yogurt for dogs.
Kitchen Nightmares (8pm, Fox) - In the Season 6 premiere, Chef Gordon Ramsay visits La Galleria 33, an Italian restaurant run by two sisters in Boston's North End, to help the owners improve their bland menu, reverse a dire financial situation, and mend broken relationships with staff and customers.
Mockingbird Lane (8pm, NBC) - This revamp of the mid-1960s series "The Munsters" was supposed to be a new series, but it's not likely that NBC will pick it up for a series run. Instead, the pilot airing tonight is being sold as a Halloween special. It stars Jerry O'Connell as Herman, Portia De Rossi as Lilly and Grandpa is played by Eddie Izzard. The show is by Bryan Fuller, who gave us "Wonderfalls" and "Pushing Daisies," so even though I've heard bad things about it, I have to check it out for myself.
20/20: All Access Nashville with Katie Couric (9pm, ABC) - Katie Couric interviews Taylor Swift, Carrie Underwood, Miranda Lambert, Luke Bryan, Martina McBride and Jason Aldean.
Fringe (9pm, Fox) - The Fringe team wonder if a recently surfaced Broyles can be trusted when they find themselves in hostile territory.
Nikita (9pm, CW) - Nikita tries to rescue a brainwashed girl before she can detonate a bomb aimed at a high-level target.
Blue Bloods (10pm, CBS) - A detective gets abducted shortly after getting an award for his undercover work in Malaysia, so Frank has Danny search for the Malaysian drug lord who's holding the detective hostage. | <urn:uuid:9de0071b-761a-40e4-b4ac-a59a8fdd8bfe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.newsobserver.com/tv/what-to-watch-on-friday-mockingbird-lane-a-rebooted-munsters-on-nbc | 2013-06-18T22:25:29Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946634 | 396 |
Fortune Cookiesby Dian Vujovich
It’s graduation time. A time like no other in a young person’s life when high school graduates typically leave their homes to join the work force, enlist in one of the armed services, travel or continue their education. And it’s a time when college grads choose to do basically the same.
Over the Memorial Day weekend, I was a guest at the Triple Creek Ranch in Darby, Mont. It’s an incredible spot that lives up to all the accolades and awards received and then some. Owned by Craig R. Barrett, the recently retired chairman of the board of Intel, like a microprocessor the place is magical.
I sat next to Barrett at dinner one evening and he told me about the commencement speech he’d given to the graduates of University of Montana in Missoula earlier in the week. I liked what I heard because instead of crafting his speech around the words of wisdom from say scholars, philosophers or scientists, he went for the simple advice that everyone can understand — that found in fortune cookies.
A fan of those folded little cookies, Barrett offered the following fortune cookie advice:
- Fortune cookie No. 1 came from the Stanford graduate’s favorite Chinese restaurant in Silicon Valley, Chef Chu’s: “The world will always accept talent with open arms.”
Barrett: “Translated that means that education is the key that opens doors of opportunity. With a good education you can have the chance to move to the next level.”
To be successful, he told the Montana Grizzly grads that each would need to continue to learn as they progress through life. “The easy part of your education is now over. The tough part will start in the professional marketplace.”
- From The Golden Phoenix Chinese Restaurant in Phoenix, Ariz., came advice from fortune cookie No. 2: “You cannot win unless you choose to compete.”
Understanding the realizations of a global economy, Barrett said, “How do we (the United States) compete with the likes of China and India? How do we create the smart people and the smart ideas necessary for the 21st century and success? … We are currently struggling with these issues. But fundamentally, we are hampered by the feeling that we have always been No.1, that we will always be No.1 and that we don’t really need to do anything different. I think nothing could be further from the truth… If you want to win, you must choose to compete…”
- And from a restaurant in Malaysia came the last bit of fortune cookie wisdom: “A small deed done is better than a great deed planned.”
Barrett reminded his audience that “individual actions carry much more importance and impact than the great deeds planned.”
He closed by wishing all good luck and added, “There are only two things that once gained can never be taken away from you. They are your education and your personal integrity.”
Perhaps that ought to have been fortune cookie No. 4.
The full speech is at: www.tinyurl.com/nvtule. | <urn:uuid:1e45a0b4-f305-47c6-9e26-02896ea0132b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.palmbeachpost.com/palmbeachmoney/2009/05/31/fortune-cookies/ | 2013-06-18T22:39:17Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961418 | 665 |
Although its national football setup is experiencing its darkest days since the era of apartheid and FIFA bans, South Africa has nevertheless hit on a magic formula for qualifying for major tournaments: offer to host them.
It’s a scheme that got them into the 2010 World Cup, for which they would have failed to qualify (the World Cup campaign doubled as Africa Cup of Nations qualifying in 2010—they didn’t make the latter tournament, either), and most recently the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations, which almost certainly would have been played without South Africa had the matches not been hosted in its stadiums.
As hard as it is to believe two decades on, the team that emerged from international suspension quite quickly rose up the FIFA charts and, after winning the 1996 Cup of Nations (which it hosted), found itself ranked 16th in the world. Going into the 2013 tournament, which kicks off January 19, Bafana Bafana are 84th on the list and on their seventh manager since 2006.
In the run-up to the 2010 World Cup it was thought a Brazilian manager, particularly one with an international title to his name, would be best suited to whip South Africa into shape for the finals it was about to stage, but after Carlos Alberto Parreira resigned in April 2008 Joel Santana assumed the position for an 18-month spell that was comical at best, disastrous at worst, and after Parreira was re-hired to save face the South African Football Association reverted to hiring domestic managers.
Gordon Igesund is the third of those to have been appointed, and in his brief time in charge South Africa have started to turn things around, if ever so slightly.
A narrow loss to Brazil in Sao Paulo marked the start of Igesund’s tenure, after which Bafana Bafana managed to win three of its next six matches. On Tuesday they lost 1-0 to Norway in Cape Town, but rather than wallowing in defeat the atmosphere among the squad remained optimistic. They felt they had performed well enough to win—that with one last friendly to play before raising the Cup of Nations curtain against Cape Verde there had been enough recent progress to suggest a place in the quarterfinals wouldn’t necessarily be a stretch.
Thankfully, the group stage draw was kind to South Africa. Although 1976 champions Morocco are likely to top the bracket, tiny Cape Verde are making their first appearance in a major tournament and will struggle to win a single match, leaving South Africa and Angola to scrap over Group A’s other quarterfinal berth. That contest will take place January 23 in Durban, after which the picture will be somewhat clearer for a group of players looking to contest a first, meaningful knock-out game since 2002.
Following is a look at Groups A and B of the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations. Previews of Groups C and D will appear in this space a week today.
Group A: South Africa, Angola, Morocco, Cape Verde
South Africa in a sentence: The tournament hosts have been steadily declining since 1996 and will be looking to arrest their slide with, at the very least, a spot in the last eight at this Cup of Nations.
How they got here: Hosts.
Scouting report: Diminutive playmaker Thulani Serero was graduated from Ajax Cape Town to the parent club in the Netherlands in 2011. He made a quick start to the season, scoring three times in four outings for Ajax before suffering a groin injury in late September. He hasn’t played for his club side since but is expected to play a part for Bafana Bafana at this tournament, even, as manager Gordon Igesund says, he is operating “at 60 per cent.”
Hot seat: Katlego Mphela. The Mamelodi Sundowns striker will be charged with doing the business up front for South Africa, and given the team’s well-documented struggles in front of goal it’s hardly an insignificant responsibility.
Forecast: Second in Group A.
Angola in a sentence: Powered by Real Valladolid striker Manucho, the Sable Antelopes progressed to the quarterfinals in both 2008 and 2010 and have been one of the more watchable sides in recent installments of this competition.
How they got here: Eliminated Zimbabwe on away goals following a two-legged play-off thanks to a Manucho brace inside the first seven minutes of the return leg in Luanda.
Scouting report: Djalma Campos, 25, has a Portuguese League winners’ medal from his time with Porto (he’s currently on loan at Turkish side Kisimpasa) and will work the channels on the right-hand side of Angola’s attack.
Hot seat: Manucho. “One-man team” is a harsh term, but when you’ve scored five of your side’s last seven Cup of Nations goals is tends to stick. Angola’s strength is in the attacking third, and the big 29-year-old is its best player there.
Forecast: Third in Group A.
Morocco in a sentence: The sort of team that wins big or not at all (they’ve won just five of their last 10 matches, but by a combined score of 17-1), Morocco will be counting on its significant, accomplished contingent of foreign players to earn a first quarterfinal berth since 2004.
How they got here: Overturned a 2-0 aggregate deficit against Mozambique in the return leg in Marrakech to progress by a 4-2 scoreline.
Scouting report: Younes Belhanda was one of the top midfielders in France last season as Montpellier won Ligue 1. A playmaker as equally adept at putting a teammate through to score as he is at finding the back of the net himself, the 22-year-old’s presence immediately turns each of Morocco’s attacking players into a threat, and he stands to be one of the stars of this Cup of Nations.
Hot seat: Mehdia Benatia. The Udinese defender is the key man of the back four—a group that all too often concedes simple goals because of careless mistakes. It’s up to the 25-year-old to finally take ownership of Morocco’s defensive corps.
Forecast: First in Group A.
Cape Verde in a sentence: The archipelago nation off the coast of West Africa has only been independent from Portugal for 38 years, but its national football team—nicknamed the Blue Sharks—has risen up the FIFA rankings of late (they’re currently 63rd) and will be looking to make a splash in South Africa over the next few weeks.
How they got here: Hammered Madagascar 7-1 over two matches before ousting four-time champions Cameroon 3-2 on aggregate thanks largely to a 2-0 home win in September.
Scouting report: On the books at Benfica, 21-year-old striker Djaniny is one of Cape Verde’s least experienced internationals but managed to find the back of the net against both Madagascar and Cameroon in Cup of Nations qualifying. A towering forward at six feet, three inches he’ll operate alongside Lille’s Ryan Mendes in what should be a fascinating tandem.
Hot seat: Ryan Mendes. He was something of a late-bloomer when he joined Le Havre as a 19-year-old, but after impressing with the Upper Normandy side he joined Lille last summer and has since scored a pair of goals for Les Dogues. Now 23, he opened the scoring in both matches against Madagascar.
Forecast: Fourth in Group A.
Group B: Ghana, Mali, Niger, Congo DR
Ghana in a sentence: One of the bigger names in African football, Ghana are in something of a rebuilding cycle and without a handful of their more high-profile players at this Cup of Nations (Michael Essien; John Mensah; André Ayew) as they look to claim a title they haven’t won in 31 years.
How they got here: Eliminated Malawi 3-0 on aggregate.
Scouting report: Christian Atsu is widely regarded as one of the top young players in Portugal and will operate on the left-hand side of Ghana’s attack in South Africa. Twenty-one years old, he has yet to score for Porto this season but bagged six goals while on loan at Rio Ave last term.
Hot seat: Asamoah Gyan. He hasn’t exactly been all that noticeable since joining UAE side Al Ain from Sunderland a year ago, and his series of fall-outs with Ghana’s national team are well documented. But he remains the Black Stars’ most lethal option in attack and could win back some of his former admirers with a standout performance at this tournament.
Forecast: First in Group B.
Mali in a sentence: The third-place finishers a year ago, Mali will once again be one of the harder teams to break down at the Cup of Nations and will need to rely on that sturdiness in defense and midfield to offset the lack of offensive punch that cost them in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea.
How they got here: Beat Botswana 7-1 over two legs thanks to a pair of goals from both Cheick Diabaté and Modibo Maïga.
Scouting report: Cheick Diabaté scored five goals for his country in 2012 and is one of 13 Mali players attached to French clubs. He scored eight goals for Bordeaux last season but has been limited to just two so far this term.
Hot seat: Seydou Keita. He left Barcelona in the summer for Chinese side Dalian Aernin and returns to the Cup of Nations as Mali’s captain and most important player at the age of 32. Few players in this tournament are as accomplished at club level, and most of the teams in South Africa would give anything for a central midfielder of his ability.
Forecast: Second in Group B.
Niger in a sentence: They lost all three matches and scored just a single goal in their Cup of Nations debut in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea last January.
How they got here: After losing 1-0 in the first leg away to Guinea they scored twice in the final 16 minutes of the tie in the return match in Niamey.
Scouting report: Olivier Bonnes, 22, played for Nantes and Lille’s second team before moving to FC Brussels during the summer. He’ll look to plant his imposing frame directly in front of the back four. Niger may not have created much offensively at the 2012 Cup of Nations, but defensive organisation and attention to detail kept them in every match they played.
Hot seat: Moussa Maazou. Once a big-money signing by CSKA Moscow, the 24-year-old striker now plays his club football in Tunisia for Étoile du Sahel and will lead the line for Niger in South Africa. If his side manage to find the back of the net over the three Group Stage matches, chances are it’ll be his name on the scoresheet.
Forecast: Fourth in Group B.
Congo DR in a sentence: African champions as Zaire in 1968 and 1974, Congo DR make their return to the continent’s premiere tournament after an eight-year absence, boosted by a cast of talented foreign-based players, an improving domestic league and an experienced coach and keen to progress to the knockout stage for the first time since 2006.
How they got here: Shellacked Seychelles 7-0 over two matches before ousting last year’s co-hosts Equatorial Guinea 5-2 on aggregate.
Scouting report: Dieumerci Mbokani scored four times in qualifying and will play up top with Trésor Mputu at this Cup of Nations. Like Mputu, Mbokani played for TP Mazembe before embarking on a European career that took him from Belgium to France to Germany. Now back in Belgium, the 27-year-old is one of the go-to forwards at Anderlecht.
Hot seat: Claude Le Roy. The 64-year-old is something of an international managerial guru. Born in France, Le Roy has managed Senegal, Cameroon (twice), Malaysia, Oman and Syria. In 2011 he was appointed to his second spell in charge of Congo DR, having taken them to the quarterfinals in 2006 during his first stint with the team. He’s expected to deliver a similar result this time around.
Forecast: Third in Group B. | <urn:uuid:16f5f0ed-1cb4-4174-ab7c-9d540950140b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.thescore.com/counterattack/2013/01/11/preview-africa-cup-of-nations-groups-a-b/ | 2013-06-18T22:31:23Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966327 | 2,663 |
What do you do in a place that’s new and unfamiliar to you?
How do you kill boredom of waiting and how do you deal with anxiety on a trip?
I shoot photos.
Here are some captures I took aimlessly when I went on a whirlwind trip to Selangor.
Apparently, I chose to ride the KTM commuter train from Serdang, Selangor to KL Sentral in Kuala Lumpur. The first and the last I rode this train was when we went to Batu Caves last Chinese New Year holiday with my family. It only took me less than 2 ringgit (<PhP 28) and around 20 minutes to get to my destination. The waiting time was less than half an hour however, since I was not with Tina and Gabby, it seemed like forever. I while away time by shooting photos on a whim.
Thankfully, things went smoothly despite everything’s on a rush. From KL Sentral, I rode a cab to Pudu Sentral to buy bus ticket for my return to Penang. It was almost 3PM when I reached the counter and booked a seat on the bus ride at 5PM that same day. I had not have any lunch yet at 3PM, but I needed to run an errand for my mom in Chinatown, KL. After doing so, I finally grabbed a bite on my sandwich for lunch inside the taxi cab en route to Petronas Twin Towers. I did not wish to waste my time waiting for 5PM bus ride to Penang at Pudu Raya, hence I had to give in to relax and cool down a bit by spending time inside Suria-KLCC Shopping Complex. I went inside boutiques I like – Zara Men, Uniqlo and Marks and Spencer. There was an on going sale at the latter and it’s my favorite brand ever since. I so like their non-iron and easy care long sleeve shirts and I honestly have a collection of M&S silk ties which I brought to Malaysia from home. The purchase was a sweet and reasonable reward that compensated my fatigue.
With only short of an hour stay inside Suria-KLCC Shopping Complex, I headed back to Pudu Sentral to catch my bus to Penang. Lady luck was on my side when I reached the terminal around 4:45PM despite heavy traffic on the streets of Malaysia’s capital.
During this trip, I vividly remember one foreigner who learned that I do medical lectures for a living, asked me randomly, “Do you consider yourself popular?” I was astonished with his query and instantly replied with a smile, “I think it’s inappropriate and unethical to consider myself popular to students because I am really not, however, I’d like to be considered as an effective lecturer rather than famous.” | <urn:uuid:def558bf-62f4-4718-ac16-bf9e98ed22e8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://docgelo.com/tag/taxi/ | 2013-06-18T22:37:00Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971913 | 589 |
Conscription is the compulsory enlistment of people in some sort of national service, most often military service. Conscription dates back to antiquity and continues in some countries to the present day under various names. The modern system of near-universal national conscription for young men dates to the French Revolution in the 1790s, where it became the basis of a very large and powerful military. Most European nations later copied the system in peacetime, so that men at a certain age would serve 1–3 years on active duty and then transfer to the reserve force.
In China, the State of Qin instituted universal military service following the registration of every household. This allowed huge armies to be levied, and was instrumental in the creation of the Qin Empire that conquered the whole of China in 221BC.
Conscription is controversial for a range of reasons, including conscientious objection to military engagements on religious or philosophical grounds; political objection, for example to service for a disliked government or unpopular war; and ideological objection, for example, to a perceived violation of individual rights. Those conscripted may evade service, sometimes by leaving the country. Some selection systems accommodate these attitudes by providing alternative service outside combat-operations roles or even outside the military, such as Zivildienst (civil service) in Austria and Switzerland. Most post-Soviet countries conscript soldiers not only for Armed Forces but also for paramilitary organizations which are dedicated to police-like domestic only service (Internal Troops) or non-combat rescue duties (Civil Defence Troops) - none of which is considered alternative to the military conscription.
As of the early 21st century, many states no longer conscript soldiers, relying instead upon professional militaries with volunteers enlisted to meet the demand for troops. The ability to rely on such an arrangement, however, presupposes some degree of predictability with regard to both war-fighting requirements and the scope of hostilities. Many states that have abolished conscription therefore still reserve the power to resume it during wartime or times of crisis.
Around the reign of Hammurabi (1791-1750 BC), the Babylonian Empire used a system of conscription called Ilkum. Under the system those eligible were required to serve in the royal army in time of war. During times of peace they were instead required to provide labour for other activities of the state. In return for this service, people subject to it gained the right to hold land. It is possible that this right was not to hold land per se but specific land supplied by the state.
Various forms of avoiding military service are recorded. While it was outlawed by the Code of Hammurabi, the hiring of substitutes appears to have been practiced both before and after the creation of the code. Later records show that Ilkum commitments could become regularly traded. In other places, people simply left their towns to avoid their Ilkum service. Another option was to sell Ilkum lands and the commitments along with them. With the exception of a few exempted classes, this was forbidden by the Code of Hammurabi.
Universal conscription in China dates back to the State of Qin, which eventually became the Qin Empire of 221BC. Following unification, historical records show that a total of 300,000 conscript soldiers and 500,000 conscript labourers constructed the Great Wall of China
In the following dynasties, universal conscription was abolished and reintroduced on numerous occasions.
As of 2011[update], universal military conscription is theoretically mandatory in the People's Republic of China, and reinforced by law. However, due to the large population of China and large pool of candidates available for recruitment, the People's Liberation Army has always had sufficient volunteers, so conscription has not been required in practice at all.
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Under the feudal conditions for holding land in the medieval period, most peasants and freemen were liable to provide one man of suitable age per family for military duty when required by either the king or the local lord. The levies raised in this way fought as infantry under local superiors. Although the exact laws varied greatly depending on the country and the period, generally these levies were only obliged to fight for one to three months. Most were subsistence farmers, and it was in everyone's interest to send the men home for harvest-time.
In medieval Scandinavia the 'leiðangr' (Old Norse), 'leidang' (Norwegian), 'leding', (Danish), 'ledung' (Swedish), 'lichting' (Dutch), 'expeditio' (Latin) or sometimes 'leþing' (Old English), was a levy of free farmers conscripted into coastal fleets for seasonal excursions and in defence of the realm.
The bulk of the Anglo-Saxon English army, called the fyrd, was composed of part-time English soldiers drawn from the landowning minor nobility. These thegns were the land-holding aristocracy of the time and were required to serve with their own armour and weapons for a certain number of days each year. The historian David Sturdy has cautioned about regarding the fyrd as a precursor to a modern national army composed of all ranks of society, describing it as a "ridiculous fantasy":
The persistent old belief that peasants and small farmers gathered to form a national army or fyrd is a strange delusion dreamt up by antiquarians in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth centuries to justify universal military conscription.
Medieval levy in Poland was known as the pospolite ruszenie.
In the middle of the 14th century, Ottoman Sultan Murad I developed personal troops to be loyal to him, with a slave army called the Kapıkulu. The new force was built by taking Christian children from newly conquered lands, especially from the far areas of his empire, in a system known as the devşirme (translated "gathering" or "converting"). The captive children were forced to convert to Islam. The Sultans had the young boys trained over several years. Those who showed special promise in fighting skills were trained in advanced warrior skills, put into the sultan's personal service, and turned into the Janissaries, the elite branch of the Kapıkulu. A number of distinguished military commanders of the Ottomans, and most of the imperial administrators and upper-level officials of the Empire, such as Pargalı İbrahim Pasha and Sokollu Mehmet Paşa, were recruited in this way. By 1609, the Sultan's Kapıkulu forces increased to about 100,000.
In later years, Sultans turned to the Barbary Pirates to supply their Jannissaries corps. Their attacks on ships off the coast of Africa or in the Mediterranean, and subsequent capture of able-bodied men for ransom or sale provided some captives for the Sultan's system. Starting in the 17th century, Christian families living under the Ottoman rule began to submit their sons into the Kapikulu system willingly, as they saw this as a potentially invaluable career opportunity for their children. Eventually the Sultan turned to foreign volunteers from the warrior clans of Circassians in southern Russia to fill his Janissary armies. As a whole the system began to break down, the loyalty of the Jannissaries became increasingly suspect. Mahmud II forcibly disbanded the Janissary corps in 1826.
Similar to the Janissaries in origin and means of development were the Mamluks of Egypt in the Middle Ages. The Mamluks were usually captive non-Muslim Iranian and Turkish children who had been kidnapped or bought as slaves from the Barbary coasts. The Egyptians assimilated and trained the boys and young men to become Islamic soldiers who served the Muslim caliphs and the Ayyubid sultans during the Middle Ages. The first mamluks served the Abbasid caliphs in 9th century Baghdad. Over time they became a powerful military caste. On more than one occasion, they seized power, for example, ruling Egypt from 1250–1517.
From 1250 Egypt had been ruled by the Bahri dynasty of Kipchak origin. Slaves from the Caucasus served in the army and formed an elite corp of troops. They eventually revolted in Egypt to form the Burgi dynasty. The Mamluks' excellent fighting abilities, massed Islamic armies, and overwhelming numbers succeeded in overcoming the Christian Crusader fortresses in the Holy Land. The Mamluks were the most successful defense against the Mongol Ilkhanate of Persia and Iraq from entering Egypt.
On the western coast of Africa, Berber Muslims captured non-Muslims to put to work as laborers. They generally converted the younger people to Islam and many became quite assimilated. In Morocco, the Berber looked south rather than north. The Moroccan Sultan Moulay Ismail, called "the Bloodthirsty" (1672–1727), employed a corps of 150,000 black slaves, called his Black Guard. He used them to coerce the country into submission.
Invention of modern conscription
Modern conscription, the massed military enlistment of national citizens, was devised during the French Revolution, to enable the Republic to defend itself from the attacks of European monarchies. Deputy Jean-Baptiste Jourdan gave its name to the 5 September 1798 Act, whose first article stated: "Any Frenchman is a soldier and owes himself to the defense of the nation." It enabled the creation of the Grande Armée, what Napoleon Bonaparte called "the nation in arms," which overwhelmed European professional armies that often numbered only into the low tens of thousands. More than 2.6 million men were inducted into the French military in this way between the years 1800 and 1813.
The defeat of the Prussian Army in particular shocked the Prussian establishment, which had believed it was invincible after the victories of Frederick the Great. The Prussians were used to relying on superior organization and tactical factors such as order of battle to focus superior troops against inferior ones. Given approximately equivalent forces, as was generally the case with professional armies, these factors showed considerable importance. However, they became considerably less important when the Prussian armies faced forces that outnumbered their own in some cases by more than ten to one. Scharnhorst advocated adopting the levée en masse, the military conscription used by France. The Krümpersystem was the beginning of short-term compulsory service in Prussia, as opposed to the long-term conscription previously used.
In the Russian Empire, the military service time "owed" by serfs was 25 years at the beginning of the 19th century. In 1834 it was decreased to 20 years. The recruits were to be not younger than 17 and not older than 35. In 1874 Russia introduced universal conscription in the modern pattern, an innovation only made possible by the abolition of serfdom in 1861. New military law decreed that all male Russian subjects, when they reached the age of 20, were eligible to serve in the military for six years.
The range of eligible ages for conscripting was expanded to meet national demand during the World Wars. In the United States, the Selective Service System drafted men for World War I initially in an age range from 21 to 30 but expanded its eligibility in 1918 to an age range of 18 to 45. In the case of a widespread mobilization of forces where service includes homefront defense, ages of conscripts may range much higher, with the oldest conscripts serving in roles requiring lesser mobility. Expanded-age conscription was common during the Second World War: in Britain, it was commonly known as "call-up" and extended to age 51. Nazi Germany termed it Volkssturm ("People's Storm") and included men as young as 16 and as old as 60. During the Second World War, both Britain and the Soviet Union conscripted women. The United States was on the verge of drafting women into the Nurse Corps because it anticipated it would need the extra personnel for its planned invasion of Japan. However, the Japanese surrendered and the idea was abandoned.
Conscription, which was called "Service Duty" (Dutch: dienstplicht) in the Netherlands, was first employed in 1810 by French occupying forces. Napoleon's brother Louis Bonaparte, who was King of Holland from 1806 to 1810, had tried to introduce conscription a few years earlier, unsuccessfully. Every man aged 20 years or older had to enlist. By means of drawing lots it was decided who had to undertake service in the French army. It was possible to arrange a substitute against payment.
Later on, conscription was used for all men over the age of 18. Postponement was possible, due to study, for example. Conscientious objectors could perform an alternative civilian service instead of military service. For various reasons, this forced military service was criticized at the end of the twentieth century. Since the Cold War was over, so was the direct threat of a war. Instead, the Dutch army was employed in more and more peacekeeping operations. The complexity and danger of these missions made the use of conscripts controversial. Furthermore the conscription system was thought to be unfair as only men were drafted.
In the European part of Netherlands, compulsory attendance has been officially suspended since 1 May 1997. Between 1991 and 1996, the Dutch armed forces phased out their conscript personnel and converted to an all-volunteer force. The last conscript troops were inducted in 1995, and demobilized in 1996. The suspension means that citizens are no longer forced to serve in the armed forces, as long as it is not required for the safety of the country. Since then, the Dutch army is an all-volunteer force. However, to this day, every male citizen aged 17 gets a letter in which he is told that he has been registered but does not have to present himself for service. The Dutch army allowed its male soldiers to have long hair from the early 1970s to the end of conscription in the mid-1990s.
Even though it is generally thought that conscription has been abolished in the Netherlands, it is compulsory attendance that was abolished, not conscription. The laws and systems which provide for the conscription of armed forces personnel still remain in place.
Britain introduced conscription for the first time in 1916 (halfway through World War I) and abolished it in 1920, and reintroduced it again in 1939 on the outbreak of World War II. It remained in force until 1960.
In all, 8,000,000 men were drafted, as well as several hundred thousand women. The introduction of conscription in May 1939, before the war began, was largely due to pressure from the French, who emphasized the need for a large British army to oppose the Germans. Starting in early 1942 unmarried women age 19–30 were conscripted. Most were sent to the factories, but they could volunteer for the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) and other women's services. None were assigned to combat roles unless they volunteered. By 1943 women were liable to some form of directed labour up to age 51. During the Second World War, 1.4 million British men volunteered for service and 3.2 million were conscripted. Volunteers comprised 20% of the Army, 40% of the Royal Navy, and 50% of the Royal Air Force.
In the United States, conscription, also called "the draft", ended in 1973, but males between 18 and 25 are required to register with the Selective Service System to enable a reintroduction of conscription if necessary. President Gerald Ford suspended mandatory draft registration in 1975, but President Jimmy Carter reinstated that requirement when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. Selective Service registration is still required of all young men although the draft has not been used since 1973.
Colonial and Early National
In America before 1862, combat duty was always voluntary, but white men aged 18 to 45 were usually required to join local militia units. Colonial militia laws—and after 1776 those of the states—required able-bodied white men to enroll in the militia and to undergo a minimum of military training, all without pay. Colonial Pennsylvania (controlled by Quakers) did not have such laws. Members of pacifist religious denominations were exempt. When combat troops were needed some of the militiamen volunteered for short terms of service, for which they were paid. Following this system in its essentials, the Continental Congress in 1778 recommended that the states draft men from their militias for one year's service in the Continental army; this first national conscription was irregularly applied and failed to fill the Continental ranks.
In 1814, President James Madison proposed conscription of 40,000 men for the army, but the War of 1812 ended before Congress took any action. An 1840 proposal for a standing army of 200,000 men included conscription, but it never passed and military service was voluntary before 1862.
Although both North and South resorted to conscription during the Civil War, in neither region did the system work effectively. The Confederate Congress on April 16, 1862, passed an act requiring military service for three years from all males aged eighteen to thirty-five not legally exempt, and it later extended the obligation. The U.S. Congress followed on July 17, 1862, with an act authorizing a militia draft within a state when it could not meet its quota with volunteers. This state-administered system failed in practice and on March 3, 1863, Congress passed the first genuine national conscription law, setting up under the Union army an elaborate machinery for enrolling and drafting men between twenty and forty-five years of age.
Quotas were assigned in each state, the deficiencies in volunteers to be met by conscription. But men drafted could provide substitutes or, until mid-1864, avoid service by paying commutation money. Many eligibles pooled their money to cover the cost of anyone drafted. Families used the substitute provision to select which man should go into the army and which should stay home. There was much evasion and overt resistance to the draft, especially in Catholic areas. The great draft riot in New York City in July 1863 involved Irish immigrants who had been signed up as citizens to swell the machine vote, not realizing it made them liable for the draft. Of the 168,649 men procured for the Union through the draft, 117,986 were substitutes, leaving only 50,663 who had their personal services conscripted.
The problem of Confederate desertion was aggravated by the inequitable inclinations of conscription officers and local judges. The three conscription acts of the Confederacy exempted certain categories, most notably the planter class, and enrolling officers and local judges often practiced favoritism, sometimes accepting bribes. Attempts to effectively deal with the issue were frustrated by conflict between state and local governments on the one hand and the national government of the Confederacy.
World War I
In 1917 the administration of Woodrow Wilson decided to rely primarily on conscription, rather than voluntary enlistment, to raise military manpower for World War I. The Selective Service Act of 1917 was carefully drawn to remedy the defects in the Civil War system and—by allowing exemptions for dependency, essential occupations, and religious scruples—to place each man in his proper niche in a national war effort. The act established a "liability for military service of all male citizens"; authorized a selective draft of all those between twenty-one and thirty-one years of age (later from eighteen to forty-five); and prohibited all forms of bounties, substitutions, or purchase of exemptions. Administration was entrusted to local boards composed of leading civilians in each community. These boards issued draft calls in order of numbers drawn in a national lottery and determined exemptions. In 1917 and 1918 some 24 million men were registered and nearly 3 million inducted into the military services, with little of the resistance that characterized the Civil War.
World War II
In 1940 Congress passed the first peace-time draft legislation, which was led by Grenville Clark. It was renewed (by one vote) in summer 1941. It involved questions as to who should control the draft, the size of the army, and the need for deferments. The system worked through local draft boards comprising community leaders who were given quotas and then decided how to fill them. There was very little draft resistance.
The nation went from a surplus manpower pool with high unemployment and relief in 1940 to a severe manpower shortage by 1943. Industry realized that the Army urgently desired production of essential war materials and foodstuffs more than soldiers. (Large numbers of soldiers were not used until the invasion of Europe in summer 1944.) In 1940 to 1943, the Army often transferred soldiers to civilian status in the Enlisted Reserve Corps in order to increase production. Those transferred would return to work in essential industry, although they could be called back to active duty if the Army needed them. Others were discharged if their civilian work was deemed absolutely essential. There were instances of mass releases of men to increase production in various industries. Blacks and Asians were drafted under the same terms as whites. Over ten million men were drafted for combat in World War Two, more than double the amount drafted for World War One, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War combined.
One contentious issue involved the drafting of fathers, which was avoided as much as possible. The drafting of 18-year olds was desired by the military but vetoed by public opinion. Farmers demanded and were generally given occupational deferments (many volunteered anyway, and those who stayed at home were not eligible for postwar veteran's benefits).
Later in the war, in light of the tremendous amount of manpower that would be necessary for the invasion of France, many earlier deferment categories became draft eligible.
Drafting of women
Traditionally conscription has been limited to the male population. Women and handicapped males have been exempted from conscription. Many societies have traditionally considered military service as a test of manhood and a rite of passage from boyhood into manhood.
As of 2013[update], countries that were drafting women into military service included Benin, Chad, Cuba, Eritrea, Israel, Libya, Malaysia, North Korea, Taiwan,[(see discussion) verification needed] and Tunisia. In the United Kingdom during World War II, beginning in 1941, women were brought into the scope of conscription but, as all women with dependent children were exempt and many women were informally left in occupations such as nursing or teaching, the number conscripted was relatively few.
In 2002, Sweden considered female conscription on the grounds that excluding them goes against the ideology of equality.
In June 2013, Norway the parliament of Norway made a principal resolution to introduce female conscription, being the first country in NATO and Europe to do so.If further laws are passed, female consciption may be implemented in 2015.
In the USSR, there was no systematic conscription of women for the armed forces, but the severe disruption of normal life and the high proportion of civilians affected by World War II after the German invasion attracted many volunteers for what was termed "The Great Patriotic War". Medical doctors of both sexes could and would be conscripted (as officers). Also, the free Soviet university education system required Department of Chemistry students of both sexes to complete an ROTC course in NBC defense, and such female reservist officers could be conscripted in times of war. The United States came close to drafting women into the Nurse Corps in preparation for a planned invasion of Japan.
In 1981 in the United States, several men filed lawsuit in the case Rostker v. Goldberg, alleging that the Selective Service Act of 1948 violates the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment by only requiring that men register with the Selective Service System (SSS). The Supreme Court eventually upheld the Act, stating that "the argument for registering women was based on considerations of equity, but Congress was entitled, in the exercise of its constitutional powers, to focus on the question of military need, rather than 'equity.'"
On October 1, 1999 in the Taiwan Area, the Judicial Yuan of the Republic of China in its Interpretation 490 considered that the physical differences between males and females and the derived role differentiation in their respective social functions and lives would not make drafting only males a violation of the Constitution of the Republic of China.[(see discussion) verification needed] Though women are conscripted in Taiwan, transsexual persons are exempt.
A conscientious objector is an individual whose personal beliefs are incompatible with military service, or, more often, with any role in the armed forces. In some countries, conscientious objectors have special legal status, which augments their conscription duties. For example, Sweden used to allow conscientious objectors to choose a service in the "weapons-free" branch, such as an airport fireman, nurse or telecommunications technician.
Most refuse such service, as they feel that such roles are a part of the military complex. The reasons for refusing to serve are varied. Some conscientious objectors are so for religious reasons — notably, the members of the historic peace churches, pacifist by doctrine; Jehovah's Witnesses, while not strictly pacifists, refuse to participate in the armed forces on the ground that they believe Christians should be neutral in worldly conflicts.
Evading the draft
||The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with the United States and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. (August 2010)|
The New York Draft Riots (July 11 to July 16, 1863; known at the time as Draft Week), were violent disturbances in New York City that were the culmination of discontent with new laws passed by Congress to draft men to fight in the ongoing American Civil War. The Central Asian Revolt started in the summer of 1916, when the Russian Empire government ended its exemption of Muslims from military service. The conscription also became unpopular in Grand Duchy of Finland during the reign of Nicholas II and was suspended; instead Finland paid a levy tax, "military millions" as compensation for abolition of conscription.
In the USA and some other countries, the Vietnam War saw new levels of opposition to conscription and the Selective Service System. Many people opposed to and facing conscription chose to either apply for classification and assignment to civilian alternative service or noncombatant service within the military as conscientious objectors, or to evade the draft by fleeing to a neutral country. A small proportion, like Muhammad Ali, chose to resist the draft by publicly and politically fighting conscription. Some people resist at the point of registration for the draft. In the USA around 1970, for example, the draft resistance movement has focused on mandatory draft registration. Others resist at the point of induction, when they are ordered to put on a uniform, when they are ordered to carry or use a weapon, or when they are ordered into combat.
In the United States, especially during the Vietnam War, some used political connections to ensure that they were placed well away from any potential harm, serving in what was termed a Champagne unit. Many would avoid military service altogether through college deferments, by becoming fathers, or serving in various exempt jobs (teaching was one possibility). Others used educational exemptions, became conscientious objectors or pretended to be conscientious objectors, although they might then be drafted for non-combat work, such as serving as a combat medic. It was also possible they could be asked to do similar civilian work, such as being a hospital orderly.
It was, in fact, quite easy for those with some knowledge of the system to avoid being drafted. A simple route, widely publicized, was to get a medical rejection. While a person could claim to have symptoms (or feign homosexuality) if enough physicians sent letters that a person had a problem, he might well be rejected. It often wasn't worth the Army's time to dispute this claim. Such an approach worked best in a larger city where there was no stigma to not serving, and the potential draftee was not known to those reviewing him.
For others, the most common method of avoiding the draft was to cross the border into another country. People who have been "called up" for military service and who attempted to avoid it in some way were known as "draft-dodgers". Particularly during the Vietnam War, US draft-dodgers usually made their way to Canada, Mexico, or Sweden.
Many people looked upon draft-dodgers with scorn as being "cowards", but some supported them in their efforts. In the late years of the Vietnam War, objections against it and support for draft-dodgers was much more outspoken, because of the casualties suffered by American troops, and the actual cause and purpose of the war being heavily questioned.
Toward the end of the US draft, an attempt was made to make the system somewhat fairer by turning it into a lottery, with each of the year's calendar dates randomly assigned a number. Men born on lower numbered dates were called up for review. For the reasons given above, this did not make the system any fairer, and the entire system ended in 1973. By 1975, the draft was no longer mandatory. Today, American men aged 18–25 are encouraged to sign up for the Military, but there has not been a call-up since the Vietnam Era.
In Israel, the Muslim and Christian Arab minority are exempt from mandatory service, as are permanent residents such as the Druze of the Golan Heights. Male Ultra-Orthodox Jews may apply for a deferment of draft to study in Yeshiva, and the deferment tends to become an exemption, while female religious Jews can be exempted after presenting "religious declaration" to the IDF authorities, and some (primarily National Religious or Modern Orthodox) choose to volunteer for national service instead. Male Druze and Circassian Israeli citizens are liable, by agreement with their community leaders (Female Druze and Circassian are exempt from service). Members of the exempted groups can still volunteer, but very few do, except that Bedouin have a relatively large number who tend to volunteer (usually for financial reasons).
Countries with and without mandatory military service
|Country||Land area (km2)||GDP nominal (US$M)||Per capita
|Albania||27,398||$11,800||$3,693.27||2,994,667||Ermiging Democracy||No (abolished in 2010)|
|Angola||1,246,700||$85,810||$5,003.43||13,338,541||Republic; Multi-party Presidential Regime||Yes|
|Argentina||2,736,690||$351,000||$8,662.99||41,769,726||Republic||No. Voluntary; conscription may be ordered for specified reasons; per Public Law No.24.429 promulgated on 5 January 1995.|
|Australia||7,617,930||$1,220,000||$44,474.51||21,766,711||Constitutional Monarchy that is also a Parliamentary Democracy and a Federation||No (abolished by parliament in 1972)|
|Austria||82,444||$366,300||$45,598.77||8,404,252||Federal Republic||Yes (alternative service available)|
|Bahamas||10,070||$7,538||$21,547.17||313,312||Constitutional Monarchy with a Parliamentary system of government||No|
|Belgium||30,278||$461,300||$43,648.01||10,431,477||Federal Parliamentary Democracy under Constitutional Monarchy||No (Conscription was abolished as of 1 January 1994 under the so-called Delacroix Bill of 6 July 1993)|
|Belize||22,806||$1,431||$4,327.67||321,115||Parliamentary Democracy||No. Military service is voluntary.|
|Bolivia||1,084,390||$19,180||$1,839.61||10,118,683||Republic||Yes (when annual number of volunteers falls short of goal)|
|Bosnia and Herzegovina||51,197||$16,320||$4,246.54||4,622,163||Emerging Federal Democratic Republic||No (Abolished on January 1, 2006.)|
|Bulgaria||110,550||$44,840||$5,409.09||7,093,635||Parliamentary Democracy||No (abolished by law on January 1, 2008)|
|Canada||9,093,507||$1,564,000||$42,886.91||34,030,589||Constitutional Monarchy that is also a Parliamentary Democracy and a Federation||No|
|Croatia||56,414||$59,920||$11,430.32||4,290,612||Presidential/Parliamentary Democracy||No (abolished by law in 2008)|
|Czech Republic||77,276||$195,200||$17,137.98||10,190,213||Parliamentary Democracy||No (abolished in 2005)|
|Denmark||42,394||$311,900||$57,039.71||5,529,888||Constitutional Monarchy||Yes (alternative service available)|
|El Salvador||20,720||$21,800||$3,520.10||6,071,774||Republic||No. Legal, not practiced.|
|Estonia||43,211||$18,800||$16,171.29||1,282,963||Parliamentary Republic||Yes (alternative service available)|
|Finland||304,473||$238,000||$46,769.47||5,259,250||Republic||Yes (alternative service available)|
|France||640,053||$2,555,000||$35,240.62||65,102,719||Republic||No (suspended for peacetime in 2001)|
|Germany||349,223||$3,306,000||$40,315.05||81,471,834||Federal Parliamentary Republic||No (suspended for peacetime by federal legislature effective from 1 July 2011)|
|Grenada||344||$645||$6,201.92||108,419||Parliamentary Democracy||No (no military service)|
|Hungary||92,340||$132,300||$13,901.01||9,976,062||Parliamentary Democracy||No (Peacetime conscription abolished in 2004)|
Yes, selective conscription (FWCC)
|Italy||294,020||$2,037,000||$33,599.20||61,016,804||Unitary Parliamentary Constitutional Republic||No (suspended for peacetime in 2005)|
|Jamaica||10,831||$13,740||$5,077.93||2,868,380||Constitutional Parliamentary Democracy||No|
|Japan||374,744||$5,391,000||$34,402.26||126,475,664||Constitutional Monarchy with a Parliamentary government||No|
Yes. The government decided in 2007 to reintroduce conscription, which had been suspended in 1999.
|North Korea||120,538||$28,000||$1,800.00||24,720,407||Communist state one-man dictatorship||Yes|
|Lebanon||10,230||$39,150||$9,259,70||4,143,101||Sources differ||No (abolished in 2007))|
|Libya||1,759,540||$77,910||$12,259.64||6,597,960||Provisional Parliamentary Republic||Yes|
|Lithuania||65,300||$35,730||$10,725.96||3,221,200||Parliamentary Democracy||No (Suspended on September 15, 2008)|
|Macedonia||24,856||$9,170||$3,646.55||2,077,328||Parliamentary Democracy||No (abolished in 2006)|
|Netherlands||33,883||$770,300||$46,389.35||16,680,500||Constitutional Monarchy||Yes. Compulsory attendance suspended. Legal, suspended since 1997 (except for Curaçao and Aruba).|
|New Zealand||268,021||$138,000||$31,124.18||4,290,347||Parliamentary Democracy||No, Conscription Abolished in December 1972.|
|Poland||304,459||$470,000||$12,307.90||38,441,588||Republic||No (ended in 2009)|
|Romania||230,340||$158,400||$7,451.95||21,413,815||Republic||No (ended in 2007)|
|Russia||16,995,800||$1,477,000||$9,124.49||138,739,892||Federation||Yes (alternative service available)|
|Sweden||410,934||$444,600||$50,414.75||9,088,728||Constitutional Monarchy, Unitary Parliamentary Representative Democracy||No (ended in 2010)|
|South Africa||1,219,912||$354,400||$7,089.23||49,004,031||Republic||No (ended in 1994, formalized in 2002)|
|Spain||499,542||$1,375,000||$35,576.38||46,148,605||Parliamentary Monarchy||No (abolished by law on December 31, 2001)|
|Switzerland||39,770||$522,400||$66,408.19||7,639,961||A Confederation only in name, legally and structurally a Federal Republic||Yes (Alternative service available)|
|Syria||184,050||$59,630||$1,954.98||21,125,000||Republic under an authoritarian military-dominated regime||Yes|
|Taiwan||32,260||$427,000||$16,768.11||23,071,779||Multi-party Democracy||Yes (alternative service available)
An all-volunteer force is planned by the end of 2014, but conscription will remain in practice thereafter.
|Trinidad and Tobago||5,128||$21,200||$16,088.47||1,227,505||Parliamentary Democracy||No|
|Turkey||770,760||$729,100||$9,889.72||78,785,548||Republican Parliamentary Democracy||Yes|
|United Kingdom||241,590||$2,259,000||$45,626.38||62,435,709||Constitutional Monarchy and Commonwealth Realm||No (abolished December 31, 1960, except Bermuda Regiment)|
|United States||9,161,923||$14,620,000||$45,958.70||311,705,000||Constitution-based federal republic||No Draft abolished in 1975 by President Gerald Ford; however males between 18–25 need to register with the U.S. Selective Service System.|
Conscription by jurisdiction
- Conscription in Australia
- Conscription in Brazil
- Conscription in Cyprus
- Conscription in Canada
- Conscription in Egypt
- Conscription in Finland
- Conscription in Germany
- Conscription in Gibraltar
- Conscription in Greece
- Conscription in Israel
- Conscription in Malaysia
- Conscription in Mexico
- Conscription in New Zealand
- Conscription in Russia
- Conscription in Serbia
- Conscription in Singapore
- Conscription in South Korea
- Conscription in Switzerland
- Conscription in the Netherlands
- Conscription in the Ottoman Empire
- Conscription in the Philippines
- Conscription in the Republic of China (Taiwan)
- Conscription in the Russian Empire
- Conscription in the United Kingdom
- Conscription in the United States
- Conscription in Turkey
- Conscription in Western Sahara
Arguments against conscription
Historically, the vast majority of conscription measures involve male-only participation. Even today, most countries mandating conscription only do so for males. Men who opt out of military service must often perform alternative service, such as Zivildienst in Austria and Switzerland, whereas women do not have even these obligations.
Nominally gender-equal societies such as Finland and Denmark also employ male-only conscription, as have the Netherlands and Sweden in contemporary times. The onerous time and other commitments involved with conscription, spanning two years in many cases, raises serious questions about the fairness of such programs and how they fit in with expectations of equal treatment irrespective of sex.
While women, almost always exempt from conscription, are free to pursue work, study and other activities, men's early career and life prospects can be impeded by conscription.
American libertarians oppose conscription and call for the abolition of the Selective Service System, believing that impressment of individuals into the armed forces is involuntary servitude. Ron Paul, a former leader of the Libertarian Party has said, "Conscription is wrongly associated with patriotism, when it really represents slavery and involuntary servitude." The philosopher Ayn Rand opposed it because "Of all the statist violations of individual rights in a mixed economy, the military draft is the worst. It is an abrogation of rights. It negates man’s fundamental right—the right to life—and establishes the fundamental principle of statism: that a man’s life belongs to the state, and the state may claim it by compelling him to sacrifice it in battle."
In 1917, a number of radicals and anarchists, including Emma Goldman, challenged the new draft law in federal court arguing that it was a direct violation of the Thirteenth Amendment's prohibition against slavery and involuntary servitude. However, the Supreme Court unanimously upheld the constitutionality of the draft act in the case of Arver v. United States on January 7, 1918. The decision said the Constitution gave Congress the power to declare war and to raise and support armies. The Court emphasized the principle of the reciprocal rights and duties of citizens:
- "It may not be doubted that the very conception of a just government in its duty to the citizen includes the reciprocal obligation of the citizen to render military service in case of need and the right to compel.".
It can be argued that in a cost-to-benefit ratio, conscription during peace time is not worthwhile. Months or years of service amongst the most fit and capable subtracts from the productivity of the economy; add to this the cost of training them, and in some countries paying them. Compared to these extensive costs, some would argue there is very little benefit; if there ever was a war then conscription and basic training could be completed quickly, and in any case there is little threat of a war in most countries with conscription. In the United States, every male resident must register with the Selective Service System on his 18th birthday and is available for a draft.
The cost of conscription can be related to the parable of the broken window. The cost of the work, military service, does not disappear even if no salary is paid. The work effort of the conscripts is effectively wasted, as an unwilling workforce is extremely inefficient. The impact is especially severe in wartime, when civilian professionals are forced to fight as amateur soldiers. Not only is the work effort of the conscripts wasted and productivity lost, but professionally skilled conscripts are also difficult to replace in the civilian workforce. Every soldier conscripted in the army is taken away from his civilian work, and away from contributing to the economy which funds the military. This is not a problem in an agrarian or pre-industrialized state where the level of education is universally low, and where a worker is easily replaced by another. However, this proves extremely problematic in a post-industrial society where educational levels are high and where the workforce is highly sophisticated and a replacement for a conscripted specialist is difficult to find. Even direr economic consequences result if the professional conscripted as an amateur soldier is killed or maimed for life; his work effort and productivity is irrevocably lost.
Arguments for conscription
Political and moral motives
Jean Jacques Rousseau argued vehemently against professional armies, feeling it was the right and privilege of every citizen to participate to the defense of the whole society and a mark of moral decline to leave this business to professionals. He based this view on the development of the Roman republic, which came to an end at the same time as the Roman army changed from a conscript to professional force. Similarly, Aristotle linked the division of armed service among the populace intimately with the political order of the state. Niccolò Machiavelli argued strongly for conscription, seeing the professional armies as the cause of the failure of societal unity in Italy.
Other proponents, such as William James, consider both mandatory military and national service as ways of instilling maturity in young adults. Some proponents, such as Jonathan Alter and Mickey Kaus, support a draft in order to reinforce social equality, create social consciousness, break down class divisions and for young adults to immerse themselves in public enterprise.
Economic & resource efficiency
It is estimated by the British military that in a professional military, a company deployed for active duty in peacekeeping corresponds to three inactive companies at home. Salaries for each are paid from the military budget. In contrast, volunteers from a trained reserve are in their civilian jobs when they are not deployed.
- Civil conscription
- Civilian Public Service
- Economic conscription
- Impressment and the Quota System
- Indentured servant
- Involuntary servitude
- National Service
- Bevin Boys
- Ephebic Oath
- List of countries by number of troops
- Men's Rights
- Military history
- Military recruitment
- Timeline of women's participation in warfare
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- War and state formation in ancient ... – Google Books
- "Seeking Sanctuary: Draft Dodgers". CBC Digital Archives.
- "World War II". The Canadian Encyclopedia.
- Postgate, J.N. (1992). Early Mesopotamia Society and Economy at the Dawn of History. Routledge. p. 242. ISBN 0-415-11032-7.
- Postgate, J.N. (1992). Early Mesopotamia Society and Economy at the Dawn of History. Routledge. p. 243. ISBN 0-415-11032-7
- Great Wall
- Sturdy, David Alfred the Great Constable (1995), p153
- Bernard Lewis. "Race and Slavery in the Middle East". Chapter readings for class at Fordham University.
- "In the Service of the State and Military Class".
- "Janissary corps, or Janizary, or Yeniçeri (Turkish military)". Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
- "The Mamluk (Slave) Dynasty (Timeline)". Sunnah Online.
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- Conscription was abolished by law in 1973. But the Defence Act 1903 as amended retained a provision that it could be reintroduced by proclamation of the Governor-General. Potentially all Australian residents between the ages of 18 and 60 could be called up in this way. However, the Defence Legislation Amendment Act 1992 further provided that any such proclamation is of no effect until it is approved by both Houses of Parliament. Though actual legislation is not required, the effect of this provision is to make the introduction of conscription impossible without the approval of both the Senate and the House of Representatives, Gary Brown (October 12, 1999). "Current Issues Brief 7 1999–2000 — Military Conscription: Issues for Australia". Parliamentary library; Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Group. Retrieved 2007-08-10.
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- "Croatia to abolish conscription military service sooner". Southeast European Times. May 10, 2007. Retrieved 2008-05-30.
- Note: a separation of the two ethnic communities inhabiting Cyprus began following the outbreak of communal strife in 1963; this separation was further solidified after the Turkish intervention in July 1974 that followed a Greek junta-supported coup attempt gave the Turkish Cypriots de facto control in the north; Greek Cypriots control the only internationally recognized government; on 15 November 1983 Turkish Cypriot "President" Rauf DENKTASH declared independence and the formation of a "Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus" (TRNC), which is recognized only by Turkey
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- "Værnepligtsloven (Law on conscription)" (in Danish).
- "Lov om værnepligtens opfyldelse ved civilt arbejde (Law on fulfilling conscription duties by civilian work) (in Danish)".
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- sources differ regarding the precise type of government
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- Six Youths Conscripted into Burmese Army. Narinjara News. August 4, 2009.
- Arakanese Youth Arrested and Conscripted by Burmese Army. War Resisters' International. June 19, 2009.
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- "1987 Constitution of the Republic of the Philippines". Chan Robles Law Library.
- Section 4 Article II of the Philippine constitution reads, "The prime duty of the Government is to serve and protect the people. The Government may call upon the people to defend the State and, in the fulfillment thereof, all citizens may be required, under conditions provided by law, to render personal, military or civil service." Section 4 Article XVI of the Philippine constitution reads, "The Armed Forces of the Philippines shall be composed of a citizen armed force which shall undergo military training and serve as may be provided by law. It shall keep a regular force necessary for the security of the State."
- "Poland's defence minister, Bogdan Klich, said the country will move towards a professional army and that from January, only volunteers will join the armed forces.", Matthew Day (5 August 2008). "Poland ends army conscription". London: telegraph.co.uk. Retrieved 2009-02-11
- Informations about National Defense Day (in Portuguese)
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- End Conscription Campaign (ECC). South African History Online. Retrieved 2011-03-13
- "Cuenta atrás para que el último recluta vaya a la mili". November 9, 2000
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- The United States abandoned the draft in 1973 under President Richard Nixon, ended the Selective Service registration requirement in 1975 under President Gerald Ford. In 1980, Congress reinstated mandatory registering with the U.S. Selective Service System.
- Selective Service System. WHO MUST REGISTER. Accessed 20 January 2012.
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|Look up conscription in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.|
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- Burk, James (April 1989). "Debating the Draft in America," Armed Forces and Society p. vol. 15: pp. 431–448.
- Challener, Richard D. The French theory of the nation in arms, 1866–1939 (1955)
- Chambers, John Whiteclay. To Raise an Army: The Draft Comes to Modern America (1987)
- Fitzpatrick, Edward (1940). Conscription and America: A Study of Conscription in a Democracy. Richard Publishing Company. ASIN B000GY5QW2.
- Flynn, George Q. (1998 33(1): 5–20). "Conscription and Equity in Western Democracies, 1940–75," Journal of Contemporary History in JSTOR
- Flynn, George Q. (2001). Conscription and Democracy: The Draft in France, Great Britain, and the United States. Greenwood. p. 303. ISBN 0-313-31912-X.
- Kestnbaum, Meyer (October 2000). Citizenship and Compulsory Military Service: The Revolutionary Origins of Conscription in the United States. Armed Forces & Society. p. vol. 27: pp. 7–36.
- Levi, Margaret (1997). Consent, Dissent and Patriotism. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-59961-0. Looks at citizens' responses to military conscription in several democracies since the French Revolution.
- Linch, Kevin (2012). Conscription. Mainz: Institute of European History (IEG).
- Krueger, Christine, and Sonja Levsen, eds. War Volunteering in Modern Times: From the French Revolution to the Second World War (Palgrave Macmillan 2011)
- Leander, Anna (July 2004). Drafting Community: Understanding the Fate of Conscription. Armed Forces & Society. p. vol. 30: pp. 571–599.
- MacLean, Alair. The Privileges of Rank: The Peacetime Draft and Later-life Attainment. date= July 2008. p. vol. 34: pp. 682–713.
- Mjoset, Lars and Stephen Van Holde, eds. (2002). The Comparative Study of Conscription in the Armed Forces. Amsterdam: JAI Press/Elsevier Science Ltd. p. 424.
- Pfaffenzeller, Stephan. 2010. “Conscription and Democracy: The Mythology of Civil— Military Relations.” Armed Forces & Society April Vol. 36 pp. 481–504, doi:10.1177/0095327X09351226 http://afs.sagepub.com/content/36/3/481.abstract
- Sorensen, Henning (January 2000). Conscription in Scandinavia During the Last Quarter Century: Developments and Arguments. Armed Forces & Society. p. vol. 26: pp. 313–334.
- Stevenson, Michael D. (2001). Canada's Greatest Wartime Muddle: National Selective Service and the Mobilization of Human Resources during World War II. McGill-Queen's University Press. p. 235. ISBN 0-7735-2263-8. | <urn:uuid:68c6df92-db17-4404-bec4-94435db2e9cb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_draft | 2013-06-18T22:58:46Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.915344 | 13,980 |
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Zain, R B; Ikeda, N; Gupta, P C; Warnakulasuriya, S; van Wyk, C W; Shrestha, P; Axéll, T (1999) Oral mucosal lesions associated with betel quid, areca nut and tobacco chewing habits: consensus from a workshop held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, November 25-27, 1996. Journal of oral pathology & medicine : official publication of the International Association of Oral Pathologists and the American Academy of Oral Pathology, 28 (1). pp. 1-4. ISSN 0904-2512
Ghani, WM; Razak , IA; Yang , YH; Talib , NA; Ikeda , N; Axell , T; Gupta , PC; Handa , Y; Abdullah , N; Zain , RB (1990) Factors affecting commencement and cessation of betel quid chewing behaviour in Malaysian adults. Anales de Medicina Interna (Madrid, Spain : 1984), 7 (10). pp. 546-7. ISSN 0212-7199 | <urn:uuid:1646dd6b-c2e6-4d31-bd83-d8f9381fe063> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://eprints.um.edu.my/view/creators/Ikeda_=3AN=3A=3A.html | 2013-06-18T22:26:38Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.709818 | 261 |
The Ecological Research & Development Group (ERDG), founded in 1995, is a 501(c)3 non-profit wildlife conservation organization whose primary focus is the conservation of the worlds four remaining horseshoe crab species.
Our mission is to seek solutions that prevent or mitigate damage to native wildlife populations and habitats due to human activities. ERDG accomplishes this goal through scientific research & development, environmental planning & management, and public education. ERDG works to inspire and assist individuals, communities and organizations to solve problems, change behaviors and promote sound decisions in order to achieve sustainable ecosystems.
ERDG believes environmental stewardship can thrive within a growing economy through healthy partnerships between industry, government, environmental groups and communities.
On September 28, 2000, ERDG received from the Partnership for the Delaware Estuary, Inc., the Excellence in the Estuary Award for Living Resources, "for their tireless work to protect the Delaware Estuary’s horseshoe crab population."
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In the absence of human interference, horseshoe crabs have successfully evolved for over 455 million years. ERDG has made a commitment to protect this remarkable mariner who plays a vital role in nature's delicately balanced food web and whose life-sustaining contributions to humanity have yet to be fully realized. We believe that the foundation of a successful conservation program is effective public education and coastal community support, in conjunction with conservation initiatives, both terrestrial and aquatic, that preserve essential habitat and minimize human impact.
In 1998, ERDG launched its highly successful Just flip 'em!® Program to bring attention to the high mortality horseshoe crabs (Limulus polyphemus) incur from being stranded up-side-down during spawning and to encourage, through a simple act of compassion, an appreciation for this remarkable creature who will not survive public indifference.
"The common occurrence of stranded horseshoe crabs during breeding season spurred the Just flip ‘em! ® program on Delaware beaches; beyond this being a ‘humane’ action, the Botton & Loveland (1989) study provides the rationale."
- Dr. Carl N. Shuster, Jr., 1999
In collaborated with scientists from the USGS Biological Resources Division, ERDG actively participates in the annual horseshoe crab spawning survey, designed to compile reliable population data along the shores of Delaware Bay.
ERDG was responsible for initiating the first study to test the effectiveness of bait bags in reducing the demand on horseshoe crabs as bait in the conch fishery. ERDG working with the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) and a select group of Virginia conch fishermen, demonstrated that bait needs could be reduced by half without a measurable loss in catch if placed within a bait bag. This is possible because bait bags significantly reduces secondary predation on the bait. With a coast-wide harvest of horseshoe crabs as bait exceeding 3.5 million animals annually, a potential reduction of 50 percent represents a significant conservation measure and one that ERDG will work to see adopted throughout the industry. As a result of this study the state of Virginia now requires the use of bait bags throughout its conch fishery. Continuing our goal to see the use of bait bags throughout the conch fishery, which extends from Virginia to Massachusetts, ERDG has distributed free of charge over 15,000 bait bags to conch fishermen along the Atlantic Coast. In addition to our bait bag initiative, ERDG is conducting research on alternative baits.
- Alternative Gear and Supplemental Bait Workshop, March 3, 2004 (pdf)
- Decrease in Crabs Raises Concerns
- ERDG completes Phase II of its bait bag initiative
- Horseshoe Crab Bait Bags are adopted by the Virginia Conch Fishery
- ERDG begins Phase I of its Bait Bag Initiative
- Alternative Bait Workshop (minutes)
The future survival of the world’s four remaining horseshoe crab species will ultimately depend upon the preservation of its spawning habitat — a challenging prospect in light of the ever-increasing human density along the same inland beaches horseshoe crabs have relied upon for thousands of years.
To respond to this challenge, ERDG launched its community based "Horseshoe Crab Sanctuary Program" in 1999, designed to encourage coastal communities to declare their shared habitat a horseshoe crab conservation area or sanctuary. On June 13th, 2000, then Delaware Governor Thomas Carper visited Broadkill Beach, Delaware to recognize this community for working with ERDG in establishing Delaware’s first community based horseshoe crab sanctuary. (For more, see the News article about Carper's visit to Broadkill Beach.)
ERDG is the only organization that has been successful in convincing residential landowners to designate their private beaches as horseshoe crab sanctuaries. In addition to Broadkill Beach, ERDG has also enrolled the communities of Kitts Hummock, Pickering Beach, Slaughter Beach and Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge (Fowler Beach) Delaware and is currently working to establish additional horseshoe crab conservation areas within communities throughout the Atlantic Coast of the United States. To date over 12 miles of prime horseshoe crab spawning habitat has been protected through this program. Ultimately, our goal is to protect the horseshoe crab spawning habitat throughout out the species spawning range worldwide.
You can assist ERDG in this important effort, by encouraging your community to participation in our program. For more information please contact Glenn Gauvry at firstname.lastname@example.org
- Communities Create Horshoe Crab Sanctuaries
- Broadkill Beach Delaware Becomes a Horseshoe Crab Sanctuary
- Carper calls for horseshoe crab preservation
- U. S. Secretary of Commerce announces plans to establish Delaware Bay horseshoe crab preserve
- Kitts Hummock forms sanctuary for horseshoe crabs (pdf)
We strive through our educational programs to create an atmosphere of learning that will both inspire and nurture curiosity about the world’s four remaining horseshoe crabs species and their habitat. The success of our horseshoe crab education programs and conservation initiatives have received national recognition as well as support from the Governors of New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland.
We believe that our web site is a key component in overcoming public indifference and promoting sound conservation initiatives. It is our goal to develop this site into the worlds definitive source of information on the four remaining horseshoe crab species. The awards we have received to date would indicate that we are well on our way towards achieving our objective.
Our annual student contest, which encompasses poems, tales and images, has received broad participation from students throughout the Atlantic Coast. Through art, our future environmental stewards have a voice. Our ultimate goal is to engage students around the world and encourage them to express their appreaciation for this remarkable creature through their art.
Our in-school workshop uses the art and science of paper-making as a vehicle for learning about horseshoe crabs. These classroom visits are designed to introduce students to the many wonders of horseshoe crabs. Looking briefly into the history, physiology and social/economic aspects of this amazing creature we strive to awaken student curiosity and motivate children to learn more about Limulus polyphemus.
For more information, see our In-School Program.
Horseshoe Crab Model:
ERDG developed the worlds first museum grade model of a female horseshoe crab. Not only is her exterior surfaces complete in every detail, the top separates from the bottom to reveal the internal organs, egg distribution and circulatory system. Our model, which complements the Anatomy section of our website, is rapidly becoming the cornerstone of horseshoe crab classroom education. It not only permits the study of the horseshoe crab throughout the year, but also provides an internal view never before available.
Horseshoe Crab Natural History Brochures:
The quality of our horseshoe crab natural history brochures has lead to requests from public libraries, school programs, tourist centers, state parks, federal refuges and the eco-tourism industry. Our goal is to keep our educational materials freely available and widely distributed throughout the spawning range of the world's four remaining horseshoe crab species.
Active Public Education Schedule:
ERDG maintains an active public education schedule — visiting schools, universities, civic groups, clubs and attending community functions. We believe that in order to gain support for horseshoe crab conservation, one must listen to the concerns of the community, establish trust, and form working partnerships. This takes time and must be constantly reinforced.
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ERDG has helped wildlife rehabilitators, industry, and state and federal agencies develop response equipment, processes and protocols to prevent or mitigate impact to wildlife from oil spills. Our years of experience in oiled wildlife incident response, research and development are particularly relevant to our horseshoe crab shorebird conservation initiatives. Many of the world's remaining horseshoe crab spawning sites and migratory shorebird stop-overs are vulnerable to the effects of oil contamination.
The Delaware Bay, second largest oil-shipping channel in the United States, is home to the world's largest concentration of horseshoe crabs. The Bay is also a vital rest and refueling stop for hundreds of thousands of migrating North American shorebirds. The effects of an oil spill in this body of water during spring shorebird migration and horseshoe crab spawning could be devastating.
In 1999, ERDG introduced governmental agencies responsible for oil spill contingency planning in the mid-Atlantic region to the importance of developing protocols to protect or mitigate damage to the Atlantic horseshoe crab species, Limulus polyphemus. Once in place, these plans will complement existing protocols designed to protect migrating shorebirds in the Delaware Bay.
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ERDG has developed an international network of professionals with whom it consults on a wide variety of issues. As each project evolves, ERDG assembles a multi-disciplinary team of individuals whose skill levels and training backgrounds are best suited to solving the current problem. This case-by-case approach assures that the best possible talent is utilized to accomplish a project’s goals. Because each team is assembled on an as-needed basis, the majority of ERDG's financial resources are directed to the project at hand and not expended on maintaining a large full-time staff.
Board of Directors
Glenn Gauvry, ERDG President
ERDG Inc. Little Creek, DE
Leonard Rippa, ERDG Chairman
Lt. Colonel USAF ret., Smyrna, DE
Joyce Ponsell, Ornithologist, ERDG Secretary
Mount Joy, PA
Venerable Zhaxi Zhuoma Rinpoche
Xuanfa Institute, Sanger, CA
Winnie Radolin, Artist
W.Clement Smith, President
Clement Global Options Inc., Philadelphia, PA
Susan Symes, President
Technigraphics Inc., Newark, DE
Kion Yap, CEO
Bart and Associates Inc., Mclean, VA
Dr. Carl N. Shuster Jr., Marine Scientist
Virginia Institute of Marine Science, VA
Dr. Jane Brockmann, Professor of Zoology
University of Florida, Gainesville, FL
Dr. David R. Smith, Biological Statistician
USGS Leetown Science Center, Kearneysville, WV
Dr. Ruth H. Carmichael, Senior Marine Scientist
Dauphin Island Sea Lab, Dauphin Island, AL
Gary Kreamer, Aquatic Education Specialist
DNREC, Aquatic Resources Education Center, DE
Dr. Anil Chatterji, Marine Biologist
Government Research Institution, Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia
Mariko Sai, Translator, Cultural Liaison, Japan
Dr. Paul Shin, Marine Scientist, Associate Professor
City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Dr. Chang-Po Chen, Research Fellow
Biodiversity Research Center, Taipei, Taiwan
Dr. Jayant Kumar Mishra, Associate Professor
Pondichery University, Port Blair, Andamans, India
Dr. Annie Christianus, Marine Biologist
University Putra Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia
Dr. Jaime Zaldivar Rae, Biologist
National Autonomous University, Mexico
Saikai Pearl Sea Center
Marine Conservation, Sasebo City, Japan
Media Productions, Wilmington, DE
Kate Maskar, President
Maskar Design, Philadelphia, PA
Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico | <urn:uuid:3460de9f-04d1-4ba1-977d-c52362e1b566> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://horseshoecrab.org/misc/erdg.html | 2013-06-18T22:56:41Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.911929 | 2,612 |
August 30, 2010
by Richard Weitz
Turkey is rapidly expanding its military forces by domestically producing many weapons and importing many more. The country is currently the world’s fourth largest arms importer, but the Turkish government is vigorously seeking to reduce its dependence on foreign arms suppliers while still retaining the capacity to wage conventional warfare in cooperation with its NATO allies. Turkish companies have also begun to assume the position as leading international arms sellers, making Turkey the world’s twenty-eight largest national arms exporter. In 2008, Turkish defense companies spent 228 million US Dollars on research and development. If continued, this trend will further reduce Turkey’s need to purchase foreign arms, and enhance Ankara’s strategic autonomy.
BACKGROUND: Overall, Turkey spends about $5 billion on arms procurement annually. The Turkish Armed Forces need modern conventional weapons to maintain interoperability with NATO and EU allies as well as to meet the changing demands of countering asymmetrical threats from terrorists and guerillas. Ever since the 1947 Truman Doctrine designated Turkey as a key U.S. ally, the United States has been the Turkish military’s main foreign arms supplier, providing billions of dollars in foreign assistance to enable Turkey to purchase U.S.-made weapons. After the Turkish military intervened in northern Cyprus in 1974, the U.S. Congress amended the Foreign Assistance Act and imposed an arms embargo—a traumatic event that spurred Turkish planners to seek ways to reduce their dependence on American-made weapons in the future. In 1978, Congress lifted the embargo, and in 1980, the two countries signed the Defense and Economic Cooperation Agreement (DECA), which facilitated further arms transfers while allowing for continued U.S. access to bases within Turkey. The DECA has been renewed numerous times. During the early 1990s, the volume of Turkey’s arms imports from the United States reached record highs. Deliveries included aircraft, missiles, helicopters, battle tanks, and ships, and other items.
Turkey’s subsequent alleged use of U.S.-made weapons in human rights abuses against its Kurdish citizens constrained further sales of U.S. attack helicopters to Turkey. In the late 1980s, the Congress phased out military aid for Turkey (and Greece) on the grounds that these countries’ economic development had “graduated” them from grant aid and direct loans. Furthermore, the war in Iraq that began in 2003 substantially weakened Turkish-American security ties and brought about a precipitous collapse in Turks’ previously favorable opinion of the United States. Even Turkish military commanders traditionally close to Washington criticized U.S. policies for creating an autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq that Turkish analysts believe has facilitated Kurdish-linked separatism and terrorism in Turkey.
Nonetheless, Turkey has continued to buy sophisticated weapon systems from American companies that Turkish firms cannot yet manufacture domestically. In 2000, Turkey ordered 145 King Cobra helicopters, worth $4 billion, from Bell Helicopter Textron. In 2005, Ankara purchased S-70 Seahawk helicopters from Sikorsky. In 2009, Turkey announced its readiness to buy U.S. Cobra Whiskey AH-1W Super Cobra (“Whiskey Cobra”) attack helicopters. In general, the decline in the relative importance of the Turkish-U.S. arms trade has just as much to do with Turkey’s own burgeoning defense industry as it has with strained U.S.-Turkey relations.
The Turkish Armed forces have purchased some weapons from European countries that it might earlier have bought from the United States. Turkey has become a leading importer of German-made arms. In 2009, fourteen percent of Germany’s arms exports went to Turkey. Another important purchase from Europe in recent years has been the Casa CN 235 helicopters acquired from Spain. Yet, Turkey has increasingly sought joint ventures rather than turn-key sales with European firms in order to acquire valuable defense technology. In 2007, the Italian company AgustaWestland gave Turkish Aerospace Industries the technology for the T-129 ATAK helicopter. Turkey plans to domestically manufacture as many as one hundred of these helicopters by 2013, some of which may be exported to Pakistan, Malaysia, or the UAE.
As with Washington, human rights issues have also constrained Turkey’s defense industrial ties with Europe. The enactment in several EU parliaments of resolution marking the “Armenian Genocide,” which Turkey denies have occurred, has made Turkish officials fearful that European governments would try to impose unacceptable conditions on arms sales to Turkey, such as requiring changes in Ankara’s policies towards Armenia or Turkey’s Kurdish minority. They also would worry about EU-imposed arms embargos in response to some future Turkish action opposed by EU members. These considerations have led Turkish policy makers to seek out new defense suppliers outside of NATO.
IMPLICATIONS: Starting in the 1990s, Turkey developed an important arms supply relationship with Israel. The value of these transactions has exceeded one billion dollars in some years. The Turkish government awarded Israeli defense firms $700 million worth of contracts to upgrade about one hundred Turkish F-4 and F-5 fighter jets as well as provide rockets and electronic equipment to the Turkish Armed forces. In 2002, Turkey gave Israeli Military Industries another $700 million contract to modernize 170 Turkey M60 tanks. Israel Aerospace Industries partnered with Turkish firms in a joint venture that in 2005 won a contract worth almost $200 million dollars to supply Turkey with 10 unmanned aircraft and related surveillance equipment.
Although the AKP government initially continued the close Turkish-Israeli defense relationship, political relations between Turkey and Israel were severely strained after the Gaza war in late 2008, with the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan publicly lambasting the Israeli president Shimon Peres at the World Economic forum in Davos.. These tensions have adversely affected the weapons trade between Turkey and Israel. In April 2010, the Israeli government suspended the sale of advanced military platforms to Turkey except on a case-by-case basis. The strained bilateral relationship has not impaired the long-delayed sale of Israeli Heron unmanned air vehicles, four of which were delivered in March 2010. Turkey threatened to pursue international arbitration if Israel sought to invalidate this already signed contract. The state of the Turkish-Israeli relations deteriorated further--indeed came close to the point of a rupture--when Israel used force to intercept a flotilla sailing from Turkey to Gaza, killing eight Turkish nationals and one American citizen of Turkish origin. It seems likely that Turkey will seek to manufacture at home more of the weapons systems that its armed forces previously imported from Israel. Turkey might also seek to acquire the systems from another foreign supplier. Other NATO countries, including the United States, provide an obvious source, but so does Russia, whose defense companies have launched a vigorous campaign to expand their military sales to Turkey.
During the 1990s, Turkey began purchasing Russian arms, helicopters, and armored personnel carriers for use against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants in southeastern Turkey and in northern Iraq. These initial purchases were not seen as a great success. The Turkish military complained about the inferior quality and shoddy maintenance of the Russian weapons. For example, the Russian suppliers did not provide sufficient spare parts or after-sale service for the Russian-made BTR infantry vehicles and M-17 helicopters that they sold Turkey.
Nonetheless, the Turkish government has demonstrated renewed interest in buying Russian arms in recent years; the bilateral relationship has indeed flourished, especially in the energy realm. In September 2008, Turkey purchased 80 laser-guided anti-tank missile systems from Russia for US $70 million, the first Russian weapons sale to Turkey since 1997. More recently, the Turkish government has expressed particular interest in buying Russian combat helicopters, notably the Mi-28 (useful for fighting Kurdish insurgents), and Russia’s most advanced air defense system, the S-400 Triumf (SA-21 Growler). The Growler is considerably more capable than the S-300 systems that Israel and its allies are trying to prevent Moscow from selling to Iran. According to its stated specifications, the S-400 can destroy airborne targets within a 400-kilometre radius, over twice as far as the S-300PMU-2.
CONCLUSIONS: Nonetheless, several factors limit the potential growth of future Russian-Turkish arms sales, as well as Turkey’s purchase of arms from other foreign countries. Like other foreign arms sellers, the Russians are reluctant to sell Turkey the S-400 and their other most advanced systems for fear that Turkish firms can use the newly acquired technology to become more formidable competitors and improve their own defense exports. The Turkish government is eager to obtain weapons from indigenous defense firms rather than from less reliable foreign suppliers. In September 2008, Prime Minister Erdo?an stated that, “We have set as our primary target meeting the requirements of the Turkish Armed Forces from national industry and thus minimizing their dependence on other countries.” Until 2004, about 85 percent of the weapons in service with the Turkish military were acquired from foreign sources. By 2009, the share of domestically produced systems had risen to 42 percent. The target for this year is 50 percent.
Turkey’s defense industries and government are also aggressively seeking to increase their own share of the world’s arms market. With over 200 defense firms and 1,000 subcontractors engaged in $3-4 billion worth of business, Turkey ranks as the world’s 28th largest national arms exporter. The majority of Turkish arms exports since 1995 have gone to Malaysia, Iraq, and Pakistan. Most of the items have been armored vehicles, but naval products are becoming increasingly important. Turkey’s largest export deal to date is an agreement to sell 250 armored personnel carriers to the Malaysian Army. The United Arab Emirates is also testing this vehicle as a prelude to a possible purchase. Turkish defense companies are increasing their spending on research and development in order to develop superior systems for export as well as possible domestic use. In 2008, Turkish defense companies spent 228 million US Dollars on research and development. If continued, this trend will further reduce Turkey’s need to purchase foreign arms, and enhance Ankara’s strategic autonomy.
This article was first published in the Turkey Analyst (www.turkeyanalyst.org), a biweekly publication of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program Joint Center.
Richard Weitz is a Senior Fellow and Director of the Center for Political-Military Analysis at Hudson Institute.
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Photo of the Week: Leos in Malaysia Organize Food and Recycling Drive
This month, there’s so much for Lions and Leos to celebrate. In April, we mark Leo Club Awareness Month, and it’s also the month that many of our clubs will conduct environmental projects as part of our Global Service Action Campaign. Our more than 6,000 Leo clubs around the world often work to beautify their communities and improve the environment. This week’s photo comes from the New Straits Times.The Leo Club of Penang City organized a canned food drive for those in need and collected recyclable items. The proceeds from the recycled items were donated to another non-government organization in the area. The club organizes this event each year to celebrate the Chinese New Year.
See other Photo of the Week posts. | <urn:uuid:6d3ac178-0f24-4c37-9767-e3f6186da1b3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://lionsclubs.org/blog/2012/04/02/photo-of-the-week-leos-in-malaysia-organize-food-and-recycling-drive/comment-page-1/ | 2013-06-18T22:51:45Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949557 | 173 |
Do you see this? This is not okay.
UMG (Universal Music Group) is going around and blocking all Kpop videos to keep kpop strictly in Korea. Apparently, they don’t approve of the hallyu wave and just want kpop to stay Korean. Cube, so far, has had a lot of their videos blocked in certain countries, starting with the US and UK. Other countries will soon follow until all kpop videos are blocked in every country except for Korea.
What does this mean for our groups that strive overseas? Big Bang and 2NE1, Girls’ Generation, BoA, U-KISS, etc.
What’s going to happen to them?
I know one thing is for sure. International fans are going to be missing out on everything. Maybe we could still buy their albums or change our proxies so that Naver and Daum can’t tell our servers from a Korean one. But that’s all difficult and expensive stuff that we don’t want to do.
UMG is trying to keep Kpop from us, the people who make it popular in the first place. This means that kpop fans outside of Korea aren’t going to see those concerts in their cities/countries anymore. This is literally going to make all of those companies lose money, too.
What’s going to happen if UMG is successful is that international kpop fans are going to start decreasing little by little. The companies are gonna notice this and we’re going to start to see a decrease in promoting internationally like concerts in Indonesia, Malaysia, UK, US, South America, etc. With that, the online stores might even start to shut down which could make it nearly impossible to be able to buy kpop online. Then what? Kpop becomes non-existent? Not to those fans, like me, who will stay by their groups no matter what.
But do we really want that to happen? NO!
We are international fans and we are proud. Kpop has done miraculous things for us! It’s put smiles on out tear stained faces. It’s healed our emotional wounds, if not, it’s made us forget about them for a little while. It’s kept us from doing things we know we shouldn’t and things we know we should (like homework?). It’s given us joy, happiness, love, sadness, anxiety and most of all, life.
Our music taste isn’t just an opinion, it’s what makes us unique.
We are international fans and we will bring UMG down!
Go on any website that you are able to hashtag and always write #GiveUsKpop !!
Together, we can keep what we deserve!
Please reblog to help spread awareness! | <urn:uuid:19724216-dc91-4347-b44c-d78a470b0387> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://littlecheonsa.tumblr.com/ | 2013-06-18T22:39:44Z | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947502 | 590 |