Faith + Reason = Truth

Two "New to Me" Sites to Assist Your Quest for Self-Knowledge

Quora.com and goodreads.com have been popping up more frequently in online meanderings over the past couple of weeks.  Quora is basically a question and answer site, but not in the sense of querying Google or Wolfram Alpha.  It's not a search bar that spits out answers; Quora is to Google is as an essay test is to multiple choice.  The answers returned are ostensibly from "experts," but anyone can pose a question or answer.  Just try to know what you're talking about if you submit an answer, for the sake of the other users.

Goodreads is a place to discuss works you have read, or are reading.  It's got the requisite user-populated bookshelf, where you can add the titles that you have read, are reading, or would like to read.  Like Quora, users can pose a question, or "explore" works, among a group of other readers.  You may be "friends" with someone on the basis of their having read the same book that you are reading, or you may choose not to be friends with anyone.  In any case, the book explorations/discussions can quickly shoot off onto tangents expected or otherwise, with hours or days passing between contributions by others.  It's great!

What struck me about each of these (I believe I stumbled upon goodreads.com from a Quora question somehow, but I'm not entirely certain of that) is the quality of the communities.  There don't seem to be a large number of users yet, although Quora is gaining traction, but those who participate do so with thoughtful effort.  These discussions encourage thought and introspection, which can only advance the attempt to know thyself.

Reaching For Hands That Are Not There

Better never to have met you in my dream than to wake and reach
for hands that are not there.

- Otomo No Yakamochi

 

Mother Teresa actually conversed with Jesus, according to her.  Not surprising, considering her universally acclaimed saint-like existence.  The problem was, it happened almost 50 years before she died.  She spent the rest of her life after that communication in a desperate, fruitless attempt to be in communion with him again.  Excerpts from her letters convey such utter despair and spiritual emptiness, that one must come away from reading them with the impression that surely she must have ultimately turned her back on the Church, if not on God himself.

She did not, however.  Her unanswered prayers simply led to her searching, grasping, ever more intensely, which made the deafening silence all the more unbearable.  Still, she persevered and carried out the request that was made to her by the voice of Jesus all those decades earlier, a request to take care of the wretchedly poor and sick of Calcutta, which she did until she died.

Where is the happy ending for the saint?  It was not to be found here on earth during her bodily existence.  Like Jesus, her heartfelt questioning of why her father had forsaken her had no effect on her plight.  All she, all they, wanted, was to simply know that their father was with them, that it wasn't all a dream, that the hands were indeed there.  But that was not to be.  Not yet.  And still, their faith endured.

Remarkable.

Getting Started With What Matters

How long is "long enough?"

If you were born to do something that you only got to actually "do" for 3 years of your life, would it be worth it?  How about if you were offered the chance to do it for 20 years instead - would that be more worthwhile?

It depends on what that certain something is, obviously, but there are many, many people aged 35-45 who really feel called to do something different with their lives and are always defeated by the thought that it's somehow too late.  It may be something that takes a year or more to prepare for and transition to, and in their well-meaning, pragmatic minds, it simply doesn't make sense to start all over again since they're already 40 years into their lives' journeys and have bills to pay and mouths to feed and future college tuition looming.

Why bother, they may ask, if they only have another 20 years left to travel down that new path?  What could they possibly accomplish in such a fleeting blink of an eye?

I don't know what could be accomplished by a specific called and dedicated human being in a mere 20 years.  But I know that a fireman can save a life in a matter of minutes - don't you think the person that he saved, as well as that person's family and friends, would consider that fireman a success in his career, even if that was the only day he ever worked?  I know that Martin Luther King, Jr. changed the lives of all Americans in less than 20 years.  And I know that Jesus of Nazareth changed the entire world in just 3 years of doing what he was born to do.

20 years is a mighty long time to make a mark on the world and its inhabitants, even if that world is the size of an elementary classroom and the population is 25 9-year olds, and 40 years old is way too young to give up on a dream.

 

 

 

The Problem with Writing

Writing is entirely too dependent on the reader.  You can be the most talented, inspiring, grammatically perfect writer the world has ever produced, but the ability of your written words to convey what you intend to convey is completely subject to the limitations of the reader.  The skills of reading, the gift of empathy, a technical or literary or subject matter-specific vocabulary, the chance that the reader reads the language in which the message has been composed, are all determining factors in whether or not the recipient of the message will fully grasp the words on the page (or the screen, or the slab, or whatever the medium may be) in the intended manner.

Have you ever wondered why Jesus apparently left no writing from his own hand to be handed down through the ages, so that all may know his words directly?  Among the many possibilities:

• he could not write - ridiculous to even contemplate, but we'll do it anyway
• he did write, but none of his writings survived - also not worth consideration, in my opinion; anything he would have written down with his own hand for his disciples would have been protected, or at least copied, even if after the fact; instead, we are only left with "Jesus said..." or "Jesus did..." and nothing about "Jesus wrote"
• he could write, but knew of the limitless limitations of disseminating his word through writing, and chose instead to deliver the message via actions and the spoken word

Unlike writing, speaking is a two-way conduit.  If anything needs clarification, it can be handled on the spot.  And we all know of the importance of the way the words are spoken, the emphasis on certain phrases, the emotions involved, the facial and bodily expressions, and all of the other nuances that are lost when words are left to the hand-guided stylus alone.

Eventually, the teachings and witness of Jesus were written down to the best of certain people's abilities, for preservation as well as efficiency of delivery to as wide an audience as quickly as possible.

That, however, is not how he originally delivered his message to his disciples.  Perhaps he charged them with orally delivering his teachings as he himself delivered them; perhaps not.  And maybe each of them told others as they may have instructed to do, and those others told still others, which could have eventually resulted in a message every bit as confusing and unintended as the presently evolved written word and tradition can seem to be.

When God wants to communicate with us, he does it in a direct way, leaving out the middle man, leaving out the written word, speaking directly to our hearts and any other part of us that is capable of hearing, or showing us exactly what we need to see in order to be able to fully comprehend whatever it is that he needs us to understand.  For many, perhaps the Bible and/or going to church is all that is necessary for sending and guiding us along a perfectly acceptable path, a "good enough" life, an earthly existence which needs no redirection from God as long as the basic rules and regs are observed (especially the one about embracing Jesus as the Way, the Truth, and the Life).  For others, something more, or at least different, would be appreciated.

What might an example of that "something more or different" be?  I have no idea.  As always, I'm all ears.

We Hold These Truths To Be Self-Evident...But Why?

A respected professional acquaintance also happens to be an atheist.  Not of the agnostic persuasion, but of the "religious beliefs are ridiculous superstition" sort.  We see eye to eye on most topics besides this one, and each of us realizes that the other is entitled to his own beliefs.

I stumped him though.  Just once, but it stuck with me.  You see, he is a very rational man, as was Thomas Paine.  Thomas Paine was a "deist," a believer that there was a creator of the universe of some kind (which is more than I can elicit from my acquaintance), but not in God per se, and certainly not in any organized religious belief system.  Paine's greatest work was Rights of Man, which was, among other things, an extremely well-reasoned attack on religion (particularly "revealed" religion:  in a nutshell, though something may well be revealed to someone, anyone else to whom it is not directly revealed is merely subscribing to the revelation in a secondhand, word of mouth exercise that is entirely dependent upon the credibility of the source to which the thing was revealed; we are, in essence, believing in that source, more so than what that source alleged was revealed to him or her).

The deist movement had a great influence on some of the Founding Fathers; hence, although the United States of America was clearly founded as a nation of Christians rather than a Christian nation, it is still somewhat notable (at least to myself) that for all of the references to God in the Declaration of Independence, there is no mention of Jesus Christ.  Which brings me to the point.

One simple question to my friend and to all non-believers who are firmly and patriotically rooted in the tenets of our nation's founding documents and ethos:  if all men are endowed with certain unalienable rights, among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, who exactly endowed them with such?  And if the clear and correct answer of "their Creator" is rejected by these non-believers, then it should therefore follow (in their minds, not mine) that all men are not, in fact, endowed with these rights.

That is a terrible thought, one which could tear down the entire belief and value system of America and democracies everywhere.  If that is the case, if all men are not endowed by their Creator with something that makes us different from the rest of creation, then we must in fact be no different than the rest of creation, and therefore subject to the same "survival of the fittest" rules and procedures as the rest of the universe (take what you can get, enslave others, enrich yourself - in other words, the same thing that our current exercise of "Extreme Capitalism" is producing).  Clearly, there is something within many of us that rejects that possibility, the possibility that we are no higher than the animals in the scheme of things.  That "something" can be traced back to the Greeks of 400 BC and beyond, as well as to other cultures and eras in human history.  And if that "something" is not God-given, from where does it emanate?

And if you were wondering about the spoils of that great philosophical victory over my atheist friend:  nothing less than the utterance of his heartfelt "good point."

Did You Live, Or Die, in 2009?

1. Did you help someone that really needed it, or get such help from someone else, in a way that each of you will always remember?

2. Did you read a book in 2009?

How many:  1 or 2, 5 or 6?  Fiction or non?  Did you learn anything via the written word?

3. Did you visit a city you've never visited before?

For how many days?  Did you do something or see something new to you while you were there?

4. Did you start work in a different job, or at a different company or location, or take some new classes in 2009?  Did you spend your days with a different group of people than you did in 2008?

5. Did your relationship with anyone living with you noticeably improve?  Or worsen?

6. Did you try or experience something new?  Did you learn anything in a hands-on way?

Was it something you always wanted to try or know?  And even if it wasn't, did you still make the most of it?

In short, did you spend 2009 living, or dying?

Have Your Faith and Rip It Too

"Any religion that professes to be concerned about the souls of men and not concerned about the city government that damns the soul, the economic conditions that corrupt the soul, the slum conditions, the social evils that cripple the soul, is a dry, dead, do-nothing religion in need of new blood."

- Baptist minister Martin Luther King, Jr., excerpted from a sermon in Atlanta, 1962 (courtesy of Wired.com)

Happy Birthday, Dr. King

Nice Thing About Sam

"Your blog is refreshing because you're not afraid to just write what you think.  A lot of people might think that some of the stuff you write is kind of...controversial."  That's what Sam told me.

And since he did, I might infer that Sam doesn't agree with all of my viewpoints.  Yet he, somehow, can appreciate the fact that a person has viewpoints, even if he doesn't always agree with them.  That someone is for something, rather than against everything, which Republicans seem to be nowadays.  I think it just illustrates that the out of favor political party always realizes that this is a never-ending struggle between two centers of power, and even when you lose, you can just bide your time until you are once again in power.  And only when in power can a party actually try to ram through whatever it thinks it has the best shot at getting gone.

When out of power, the best a party can do is keep the other party from accomplishing anything.  ANYTHING.  If it's disastrous for the country, then obviously it would be opposed.  And if it's great for the country, then it would be opposed - why would one party do anything to help the other party get re-elected next time around?

Anyway, that was a digression.  The point is, Sam could be a musician, a scientist, a man of God, or whatever he wants to be.  But rather than choose just one to the exclusion of all others, he has chosen all of them at one time or another.  And rather than cling to his personal views or beliefs or values as the only truly valid ones, he recognizes that there are others out there; but then, he goes beyond the point where most would venture:  he actively seeks out the differing perspectives and tries to make sense of them, or at least to understand from where the other idea originates.

I think the best part of conversing with him is that, when you say something he obviously doesn't, or couldn't, agree with, he doesn't argue or debate.  He pauses, then says something like, "that's interesting," and then an actual discussion can ensue, which is so much more enjoyable than debates or arguments!

That's what I call refreshing.

Charity, or Love, in Truth

Pope Benedict authored an encyclical that was published last July and received a lot of attention due to its economic focus.  Encyclicals are issued infrequently; usually 1-2 years apart, sometimes more, sometimes less.

This one calls for a better economic existence for the people of the world.  It does so from a different perspective though:  the view of a Pope, who sees people not as economic units or Catholics or Muslims or Americans or Yemenis or Capitalists or Communists, but as God's creations, all of whom are to be charitably and truthfully loved and treated as equal parts of one whole.

Presently, humanity is a competitive lot.  Many would argue that that competitiveness has been the very thing that has driven us to our current state of development and wealth.  But what about cooperation?  Wouldn't that be an even more productive force?  If we draw a series of concentric circles around us, with ourselves at the center, then our immediate family, best friends, good friends, friendly acquaintances, people we don't know, people in other countries, people with other beliefs or customs, etc. in larger and larger circles that extend further and further outward, we would find that we would go to any lengths to assist those nearest us, and then to lesser and lesser lengths to help those away from us.  Why do this?  Well, in a selfish way, it does help us to have those nearest us in a state of well-being.  But we don't even get to that realization, because we don't think about it.  We just help our spouse, or our child, or our parents, if they need it and if we are able.  Or even if we are pretty much unable.

We don't economize the decision, because they ARE us.  And we are each better off for it.  But where should that stop?  Is the innermost circle the boundary, or is it the next circle out?  Or the next?  Who decides?  We do cut it off at some point, because it is after all a competitive world, and at some point, we would be taken advantage of.  But if the competition were to end, we would have no need for our defensive posture, and would be free to help whomever we could, regardless of how far their circles radiated out from us.

The ultimate reason that we cut it off, however, is because at some point, we stop seeing people in those outer circles as ourselves, as part of one whole, as members of our family, and instead see them as others, competing with us on some level.  It is within our power to choose to see ourselves and our self-interests as secondary to a higher purpose and authority.  We choose not to do this.  And even if we did make that unlikely choice and live our lives accordingly, we would most likely "lose" by all conventional methods of score keeping in this life.  Almost every single one of us is not ok with the prospect of that outcome.  I know I'm not, even though I wish I was.

It tells me something about myself that is hard to come to grips with:  that, given the choice between this world and the next, the demands of this world win out in almost every single case.  And unfortunately, there are probably over 6 billion separate individuals just like me in that regard, instead of a single One with 6 billion parts.

Almost There...

40 is still a week away, but last night was the night my BFFs (BFsF?) went out to celebrate.  With Italian food, the Cowboys whipping the Saints' bare bottoms on national tv for all to see, and a Bon Jovi cover band on stage, I could not think of a more perfect celebration - unless, of course, you throw in matching T's with a quote and my very own name printed on them.

This may seem like a goofy first post after 2 months of silence...and it is.  But the fact is, as much as 40 sucks, life, all things considered, is pretty damn good.

- Tom Worth (get it???)

Does the AP (Or Anyone Else) Know What "Victory" Is?

Slobodan Lekic has an AP story about the number of allied troops and security forces in Afghanistan outnumbering the Taliban 12 to 1.  In his words, "it hasn't led to anything close to victory."  Really?  By what definition?  I may be off, but I thought the intent of the mission in Afghanistan was to oust the Taliban from their rule in Afghanistan (check), deny them and Al-Qaeda a safe harbor in Afghanistan from which to conduct operations (check), establish a democratic process for the election of a representative government by Afghans (check), and raise and train an Afghan security force (a 200,000-strong Afghan security force has been raised and is still undergoing years of training - check).

What, exactly, does Mr. Lekic have in mind when he uses the term "victory?"  You'd have to ask him, because I'm stupefied by that opening statement.  The remainder of the article does contain some useful facts and figures, so it may merit a read.  And its closing, coincidentally, contains the figure of 600,000 as a potential correct number for an adequate security force in the country, given its population of 32 million (which is what any force should be based on with a security operation, as opposed to the number of insurgents operating within the population, which cannot be known, and which was used in the calculation of his 12-1 outnumbering ratio).

Readers of this site may recall that I had cited 600,000 as the number of U.S. forces sent to Iraq for the first Persian Gulf War in 1991, and that our current 68,000 troop level is woefully low for the task at hand - if, in fact, we want to be there at all, which I am still not convinced is the right action for these circumstances.  But if we are to be engaged there in a military capacity, then a number on the order of several hundred thousand allied forces above and beyond the 200,000 Afghan security forces is what we ought to be deploying, with a presence to last at least 10 more years and probably longer.

Surprise, Surprise - Iran's Not Cooperating

Voice of America News has just reported that "Iran has failed to accept a United Nations-backed proposal for uranium enrichment and has instead offered its own counter-proposal."  Is there anyone involved on either side of the negotiation that is even remotely surprised by this?  Good question.

The offer that was on the table was designed to remove Iran's supply of uranium from the country and, in return, ship them uranium in a form that could only be used for medical purposes, i.e., nuclear medicine.  This would have minimized the threat of Iran using their nuclear plants for non-peaceful purposes.  Instead, Iran has responded that they will go ahead and keep their own uranium, thank you very much, and when they need uranium for nuclear medicine, they will simply buy it from other nations.

Their counter, obviously, defeats the purpose of the whole negotiation, which was to persuade Iran to give up the pursuit of nuclear technology for non-peaceful objectives.  But it does more than that:  it gives Iran yet another victory in its ongoing war with the world.  Their war is not fought with infantry or ships or bombers; it is fought with words.  We are not battling over territory, we are battling over time.  Every hour of every day that goes by, Iran is working on developing nuclear technology.  Every extra minute they gain is a battle won.  When the world issues an ultimatum or an edict, Iran can now comply, refuse, or ask for bargaining time.  With President Bush, who the Iranians knew would never negotiate, they had only two courses:  comply or refuse.  So they refused.  But with President Obama, who is very open about pursuing dialogue, the Iranians are able to employ the third tactic of "negotiation," which is a victory in itself.  This way, they are able to buy themselves more time, which is a victory, and then refuse.

Ahmadinejad's refusal, though, is not presented as such; he is far too masterful for that.  It is instead proffered as a "counter-proposal."  Bush's administration, and every administration before his that had dealt with the Islamic Republic's regime, understood this game.  Obama and his team do not.  All Iran is looking for is time, so the best thing they could have ever hoped for in an American administration is someone who would grant them that gift on a unilateral basis while seeking absolutely nothing in return.  President Obama is the answer to their prayers.  He is the answer to Vladimir Putin's prayers in his similarly unilateral action to expose Eastern Europe to Russia's sphere of influence rather than extending our future missile shield to protect them.

Obama is bending over backward to accomodate Russia, Iran, Wall Street chieftains, and others who really don't need or deserve our assistance.  At what point will the whole of America earn, or shall I say "be entitled to," his good graces?  Good question.

Win Or Go Home

No, this isn't a post about the NBA Playoffs.  It's about Afghanistan.

Right now, there are roughly 68,000 U.S. troops in that country.  Maybe 100,000 total "coalition" forces there.  Military leadership is asking for...a number that's higher than that.  Is it an additional 20,000?  40,000?  No, it's actually 80,000 more, if General McChrystal is to get his way (we think).

Sound like a lot?  That would bring the total number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan from around 70,000 to around 150,000.  But does anyone recall how many were sent to Iraq for the first Persian Gulf War, back in 1991?

According to Josef Joffe in a piece for Foreign Affairs, "Washington dispatched 600,000 soldiers to fight the first Iraq war -- without reinstating the draft or raising taxes."  How can that be?  How can we have 68,000 soldiers in Afghanistan, perhaps 130,000 in Iraq (or a combined 200,000 for both countries, 1/3 of the the total we sent to just Iraq 18 years ago), and expect to win?  General Norman Schwarzkopf had a philosophy about war:  if you're going to fight one, make dang sure you have the odds so overwhelmingly stacked in your favor that the other guy has no choice but to turn and run (or, as it turned out in Iraq, drop their weapons in the sand and run TOWARDS you to surrender as fast as they can, to avoid being killed during the retreat).

Stormin' Norman had a lot to like about him, but this may have been his most likable trait.  I can picture him telling the first President Bush something along the lines of "I don't want to go there, but if you're telling me I need to go, then I'm bringing a half million of my heavily-armed buddies with me, just to be on the safe side."  And better still, I can picture the President saying in return, "you got it - and while we're at it, why don't we throw in another 100,000 just to make sure?"

Maybe it's me, but I don't see that kind of dialogue taking place now.  Should it?  I think so.  And if not, they need to just pack it up and catch the first Navy boats back to America.

Things That Make You Go "Hmmm..."

A sitting President of the United States, presiding over ongoing war operations in Afghanistan with military and civilian casualties on both sides of the conflict each and every day, winning the Nobel Peace Prize.  Hmmm...

A prize for which he was unanimously selected - and for which the deadline for nominations was 11 days after he took office.  Hmmm...

A prize that had, as one of its finalists, a true hero working in the midst of war, after having suffered through the brutally oppressive anti-female education policies of the Taliban in the country of - you guessed it - Afghanistan.

Slide shows about global warming, Yasser Arafat doing his utmost in Palestine, a Presidential victory and inauguration based on hope; these are the things that have earned recent Nobel Prizes for Peace.  Not decades of scientific work or literary toil, as are the cases for Nobel prizes in science and literature.  No, just a quick PowerPoint, some campaign posters, and launching rockets at Jews.

Actually, there is one thing that these winners have in common, and that is their shared aptitude for delivering a darn good speech about what OTHER people ought to do.  Their abilities to talk about action, rather than actually acting themselves.  Which is exactly what the world needs more of, if you think about it.  Isn't it?

Hmmm....

Oh, The Humanities!

If ever a title of a post could make people move along without pausing to read so much as the first sentence, this post's title would be up to the task.  Which is exactly the subject of a lengthy, yet lovingly drawn out essay by Leon R. Kass found in the new quarterly publication, National Affairs.

"Looking for an Honest Man" explores the author's search for truth and meaning (my words, not his; he prefers the term "human being," or better still, "mentsch") through his own exploration of the humanities:  philosophy, religion, and other stuff of the intellectually elite.  But it resonates for a reason, and that reason is that he tried and succeeded at "real life" first.  He went to Harvard, was a molecular biologist, worked for civil rights in Mississippi in 1965, and woke up to the realization that the life well-lived need not include Harvard nor advanced degrees nor the mental snobbery of Boston.  In fact, as Kass would discover, those very things can and do work against real happiness, real living, real life:

"In summer 1966, my closest friend had me read Rousseau's explosive Discourse on the Sciences and the Arts, for which my Mississippi and Harvard experiences had prepared me. Rousseau argues that, pace the Enlightenment, progress in the arts and sciences does not lead to greater virtue. On the contrary, it necessarily produces luxury, augments inequality, debases tastes, softens character, corrupts morals, and weakens ­patriotism, leading ultimately not to human emancipation but to human servitude."

Rousseau's work is near the top of my list, but I've first got to finish Thomas Paine's Rights of Man while barely having waded into Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics (which Kass admirably expounds upon for a few meaty paragraphs, serving to whet my appetite further).  The author drives home the shortcomings of a society's (our society's) humanities-less education and worldview, which will only drift further afield as it advances along the math and science-based continuum ad infinitum (how's that for mixing advanced mathematics and classical Latin in a single phrase?) as he compares the sagacity of ancient thinkers to the present-day average American mindset:

"We focus on condemning and avoiding misconduct by, or on correcting and preventing injustice to, other people, not on elevating or improving ourselves. How liberating and encouraging, then, to encounter an ethics focused on the question, 'How to live?'...How eye-opening are arguments that suggest that happiness is not a state of passive feeling but a life of fulfilling activity, and especially of the unimpeded and excellent activity of our specifically human powers — of acting and making, of thinking and learning, of loving and befriending."

A long-form quarterly publication launching in this environment may not have a great chance at making it.  Honestly, there may not be a thousand people in America with the attention span to get through an entire issue.  But I will savor it while it's here, and hopefully some of you can find - no, make - the time to do the same.

Ideas vs. Beliefs

Ancient Alexandria in Egypt, "birthplace of the modern world," was the new Athens for close to a thousand years.  A place where new ideas held sway over dogmatic beliefs.  A place that America could have become, and in fact was - for about 5 minutes.  Yet once the nation was conceived and debated by brilliant men well-versed in what remained of the classics (many of which originated in Alexandria almost two thousand years before the Founding Fathers), and once its violent birth was complete with the defeat of the British, it quickly descended into just another power grab of the variety that the world has engaged in since the dawn of humanity itself.

The first few Presidents held fast to the ideal of "America," particularly George Washington.  Soon, however, the flow of new ideas, vigorously debated with intellectual fire and brilliance by classically trained citizens, slowed to a trickle, eventually mirroring the fading star of Alexandria herself when the battle of ideas turned into a battle of partisan roles, and attacks once crafted with reason and scholarship morphed into assaults on individuals, peppered with inaccuracies, allegations, and accusations that served to undermine the foe rather than his idea.  In that environment, no matter what merit the idea or proposition may possess, it is immediately relegated to obscurity at the very instant that its champion is discredited.

That is where we find ourselves today with policy decisions, be they domestic or foreign.  The ideas themselves are not debated or discussed; in fact, they are barely even understood.  Instead, the party of whomever advances the position is slandered, libeled, and otherwise disparaged by the opposing group, so that we are now no better than the state to which Alexandria had degenerated almost a thousand years after its founding by Alexander the Great, conqueror of the known world and conceiver of the world's greatest intellectual achievement, the magnificent city of Alexandria.

Unsolicited Medical Advice

My wife mentioned last night that our kids, aged 8 and 9, had annual checkups scheduled for today.  Somewhat surprised, I asked if it was "safe" to take healthy kids to the pediatrician's office [an office that would doubtless be full of flu-like symptoms and stricken victims in every corner of the place] for something non-essential like an annual checkup.

She called the doctor, and the assistant advised her to reschedule.  In fact, she suggested rescheduling for JANUARY, after flu season!  She also mentioned that they had no "normal flu" vaccines [and obviously the swine flu vaccine isn't available yet], but normal flu vaccine should be available at drug stores and other locations.

Be smart with your kids (and yourselves):

DON'T go to the doctor if you're not sick, and

DON'T accept "no" for an answer and go without a flu vaccine, if you want one.  Just check someplace else!

Dollar Value of a Life

"When I was 14, my life sold for $1.60 an hour.  At 18, an hour in the life of Roy H. Williams was selling for three dollars and thirty-five cents."

- Roy H. Williams

"Every life has a scoreboard and how you choose to keep score is up to you."

- Roy H. Williams (yeah, same dude)

Has your life been auctioned off to the highest bidder?  And what if you had a competing bid denominated in non-$ currency?  Time, for instance?  Or fulfillment?

It's a fact that the majority of Americans (I'm not sure if similar studies have also been done in other nations) feel more strongly about loss than about gain.  Also true:  fear is a greater motivator than reward.  So if presented with the exact same opportunity, but from different perspectives, people will be far likelier to choose one specific scenario over the other [again, even though the payoff is exactly the same], yet make a different choice when the tables are turned.  Here's an example:

You make $5,000 a year at your teaching job.  You are offered $7,500 a year as an accountant, due to a sudden shortage of accountants.  You know you would not enjoy the accounting job at all, that it would require far more hours per week and weeks per year (only 2 weeks vacation?  PER YEAR?  Are you kidding?), and that it would require a 1 hour and 40 minute round trip commute each day, instead of the 10 minute drive to the school.  And you love teaching.

But you would be increasing your salary by 50%!  What would you hypothetically choose?

Teaching.  Not everyone would stick with teaching instead of going to accounting, but under this scenario, the majority would.

Now let's reverse it.  You make $7,500 a year as an accountant.  You don't enjoy it at all, the hours are long, and the commute is bad.  An administrator friend offers you a position as a teacher, due to a sudden shortage of teachers, and knowing that you've always wanted to be a teacher.  But it only pays $5,000 a year.  Do you take it?

For most people, the answer would be no.  They would feel that they could not afford to take such a large income hit, even though they'd love to do it and the quality of life would be far better - not to mention the summers, spring breaks, and winter breaks at home with the kids.

To be sure, a good deal of the decision comes down to sticking with what you know, being a typically risk-averse human.  But if you would make the decision to stay a teacher, due to the high value of the non-$ currency that goes with that sale of your life, why would you stay with accounting for merely extra $ with none of the non-$ currency offered by the teaching profession?  Is your life really valued in $ and nothing else?  If so, then it can have a concrete value assigned to it (pathetic and disheartening, yet still true).  But if not, if it can only be properly valued with a combination of $ AND intangibles, then it could be argued that its value is immeasurable (ask any accountant how impossible it is to value "intangibles" for accounting valuations).

For all the talk about how under-valued teachers are, I think we don't consider the most critical part of the valuation process.  We only account for the $ value of teachers, since that's what we most readily understand and assess.  But the non-monetary value to society, to the kids, to the family of the teacher, and most of all, to the teacher her/himself, is priceless.

About Face for Russia

Pravda did a nice job yesterday with a short piece on Russia throwing its support to the West, in regards to possible sanctions against Iran for their newly discovered nuclear facility.

Actually, it's not newly discovered, which is where the behind-the-scenes stage setting begins.  One must always consider timing in announcements and headlines, whether they involve uncovered terrorist plots in downtown Dallas or uncovered nuclear facilities beneath a mountain in Iran.  Recall a couple of weeks ago, when the big deal in the news was that President Obama was scrapping the missile defense in Eastern Europe.  This came as a shock to most observers, experts who were unable to fathom why he would unilaterally remove a major thorn from the big bear's paw.  Surely, there must be something in return from Russia, mustn't there?

As the hours and days went by, it quickly became apparent that all eyes were on what Russia would do to reciprocate, in spite of the rhetoric from both sides that there would be no quid pro quo.  But in a staggering display of just how well-thought Obama's (and/or his team's) strategy can be, they played a several-year-old ace in the hole at the perfect time.  Knowing for years that Iran had the undisclosed, clandestine facility, and knowing that Ahmadinejad would be at the U.N. in New York, Obama took the extraordinary step a couple of weeks ago to "unilaterally" stop the missile shield in Eastern Europe, which the Russians wanted more than just about anything.  Then, to save the Russians the embarrassment of blatantly offering something in return, which they simply could not do and still appear to be as powerful as they like to appear, Obama dramatically revealed the presence of the facility when all the world's eyes were trained squarely on him, which in turn was quickly followed by Obama, Sarkozy, and Brown threatening sanctions against Iran (which could not actually be enacted without Russia's approval, an approval which would never come since Russia has resolutely stood against any such sanctions due to Russia's loss of revenue from building nuclear facilities in Iran), which in turn was immediately supported by Russia in light of the "newly disclosed facility" (which Russia likely knew of, and helped supply, all along).

The only question I have about the way these interactions play out is to what degree they are orchestrated beforehand, as opposed to each side taking leaps of faith that the other will know exactly what to do and when to do it.  Did Obama's team communicate with Medvedev's (sorry - Putin's) team before Obama called off the missile shield, and offer to do so only if Russia would back the sanctions?  And did Russia then say, "ok, we will back them, but ONLY if you provide reasonable cause for us to do so - say, for instance, the public disclosure of Iran's illegal facility under the mountain near Qom?"  Or did Obama's team bring that up as part of the initial gambit?  Or, as any Tom Clancy novel would have us believe, did a person on Obama's or Putin's/Medvedev's team simply know the counterpart on the other side so well, that all that needed to be done was for the first dancer to make a soaring leap and the rest of the ballet would gracefully, masterfully play out as it must?