This is mainly an experimentation with soft bodies using toxi’s verlet springs.
The data refers to the evolution of the top 4 maritime empires of the XIX and XX centuries by extent. The visual emphasis is on their decline.

Visualizing empires decline on Vimeo.

In my over twenty years of experience at the large, very successful aerospace company where I labor, I have spent a great deal of time trying desperately to get the IT people to talk to the Engineering people. I haven’t, for the most part, been all that successful. Back in the day IT was truly an empire unto itself and it was pretty blind when it came to listening to the needs of the Engineering community. Furthermore, many of the systems that were used by various programs were dictated by the customers who were paying for our services and our products, basically NASA, the U.S. Air Force, and DOE.

This resulted in some very interesting problems with respect to systems, tools, and their use and subsequent development. What used to happen was Engineering would get an itch for a certain type of functionality but, since it hadn’t been contemplated in the original contract and since it might be some time before it could be renegotiated in order to get some money for developing the code required, Engineering would take it upon themselves to develop what they needed. You can imagine what happened many times. Though not an Engineer myself, I believe all Engineering students study one or more computer languages . .  . I’m fairly certain most of them  do.  Well, they would just get on the problem themselves, either writing code or – even worse – creating a tool in Excel.

So now we find ourselves in the interesting position of having something like a couple hundred tools, many quite useful, many overlapping in functionality. Many of them are unwieldy and kind of out-of-date, yet we don’t quite know how to get rid of them. This does seem to be changing somewhat as the tools of Enterprise 2.0 are gaining traction, i.e. blogs, wikis, user-generated content in general. Regardless, there are still numerous choices for how to deal with each of these as well. What wiki should we use? What about Open Source? (Anathema, btw, in my company – at least for now).

So the beat goes on. We keep adding tools, if at a slightly slower rate than previously (I think), and we seldom shed any. I suspect, as more and more content gets generated through the use of social media, and the ability to organize and make sense of it improves, we will eventually move away from many of the tools we’ve kind of grown up with. Data, too, will probably migrate toward a common format that can be accessed easily by anyone who wishes to and has authority to do so. It would be nice to see everyone on the same page, rather than pockets of people talking about the same thing in slightly different, and frequently incompatible, formats and locations.

So despite what some people like to say, no, America is not an empire (though American Empire: Blood & Iron is a very good book). We flirted with imperialism for a while back in the early 1900’s, and we still have some remnants of that today (Guam and Puerto Rico, for example), but we aren’t an empire. We’re not even close.

First, I’d say one of the neccessary parts of an empire is, well, an Emperor. It’s not a requirement, but it does help. We haven’t got one and we never have, nor ever will.

Second, we don’t actually have anything even close to an empire. Some people like to say that Afghanistan and Iraq are part of our empire, but they aren’t. We’re doing everything we can to keep them at least nominally independant, though I won’t deny that they’ll still be in our sphere of influence.

People like to toss around the phrase “American empire” for reasons of their own, usually to make a political point about us being an imperialist nation, but we just aren’t. The numbers just don’t add up. We’re not imperialist and we aren’t an empire. Period. Heck, these days there’s only one empire left, and that’s Japan, and frankly, as empires go, they’re an EINO.

For your entertainment: some visualization of empires through history!

(EN) Pedro Cruz created a visual experiment with Processing analyzing the rise and decline of top 4 maritime empires of the XIX and XX centuries. Looking at the video, biology and social phenomena seem closer than I thought.

———

(IT) Pedro Cruz ha creato un esperimento di visualizzazione con Processing analizzando la nascita e il declino di 4 imperi marittimi del 19° e 20° secolo.  Guardando il video, biologia e fenomeni sociali sembrano più vicini di quanto pensassi.

yeah, I couldnt hear any sound, yet, for history enthusiasts: it’s a treat! and its vimeo.

more creepy nerd-geek thingys at

boing boing

Here is an interesting site suggested to us with podcasts about the history of the Roman Empire:

http://thehistoryofrome.typepad.com/

Each week charts a major event of Roman history with occasional looks at everyday life, biographies of key figures and details of Roman related events you can roam along to!

Thanks to KS for suggesting.

I carefully stepped into the dingy confines of a used bookstore the other day, and quickly ascertained the location of the sci-fi/fantasy section. The books were facing exclusively spine-out, so I was skimming for any title that caught my eye, rather than cover (you can judge some books by their cover. Cover artists sometimes have niche markets on certain subgenres, and you can guess a lot of how a book will go based on recognizing the style of the artist. Then again, I would never have read Song of Ice and Fire by being inspired by the covers, so it’s double-edged).

I saw something by Dave Duncan, who I was introduced to in early teenage-dom through the King’s Blades trilogies. In which dudes get stabbed through the heart with their own swords to magically bind them with unbreakable loyalty to the wards they protect. Do we notice any familiar themes? Anyway, I saw “A Rose-Red City,” plucked it out of the pile, and was confronted with this cover:

What the hell?

The whims of chance are a fucking tease.

Seriously. Naked dude being subdued by minotaur, being defended by a woman(?) wielding a sparkly energy baton trailing a stream of light like a whip, with an apparent chemical dependency on make-up and hairspray. I read a couple of pages and nothing hooked me, so I put it away.

Skim, skim, skim–

Lady Pain.

What?

Read back cover. Oh. The Pain is bad. Of course. It wants to destroy the world. Of course. Eye roll.

I didn’t stay long to really dig for the jewels I’m sure were there, but I did put a lot of stuff back after reading, “[Name], [title] of [place] has lost [his/her] [symbol of divine right], and must now embark on a perilous journey to regain [his/her] [hereditary tyrannic rulership] from the [bad guys/pirates/communists/even WORSE hereditary tyranic rulership].” With a few exceptions, these days I am little interested in reading about someone’s fucking monarchy.

Hint to the sci-fi/fantasy community: There are other forms of socio-economic organization than democracy or monarchy. There are even, shockingly, societies where no one rules anyone else!!!

There are a lot of superb writers out there, and among them there are even some superb authors, and among them there are people who use cliches as a springboard for some kick-ass storytelling. No denying that. But where does this obsession with monarchies and empires come from? The sword-and-sorcery thing? Believing that those are the only “ancient” forms of socio-economic organization before the advent of Freedom (TM) and Democracy (TM)?

But that is completely random and not what this post was going to be about. I am still debating reading “A Rose-Red City” just because, seriously, that cover. Priceless.

or: slashing the staff like this could results in assault charges

or: Remaining News Staff required to perform miracles, also to cure cancer before fiscal quarter

Well, it is with a heavy heart and a cold sweat that I have to write this piece on the further death nell of the Newspaper industry. I say newspaper because all indications show that the online/television media are fairing relatively well. All signs point to the eventual demise of the printed paper on a wide scale and little can be done, it seems, but for industry leaders to continue to cut off fingers and limbs so as to slow the gangrene-like spread of the infection until they can find a cure for what ails news, the most valuable use of movable type in my humble opinion. With companies reporting massive ad revenue losses, circulation decline, and current business models failing like a bad monkey heart transplant, there has been no choice but to make sweeping layoffs, close reporting bureaus, and to close down papers all together. Though reporters and their families are the immediate victims of this necessary blood letting, the real victim here will undeniably be the American public with less diverse and more poorly researched and fact checked stories as the remaining reporting force is stretched thin to continue to deliver the same level of content with less resources and editorial oversight.

Recently the Times Co. issued a statement that they would be cutting some 100 jobs from now until Dec. 31, which accounts for 8% of it’s newsroom staff. This is only the first sign of how many jobs it will cut, being as this is only the first number since it cut 100 jobs in this same type of program last year. The Times Co. as of 2008 employed some 1,300 employees. That number today is difficult to calculate, but they have had regular rounds of layoffs, and with revenue dropping by the millions every quarter you can bet that the layoffs are going to come more rapidly in the coming year. Up to this point it was cutting in to their profits, stock dropping, but they didn’t have to make the severe cuts. Now it has become apparent that a company of this size, a company that was founded in 1851, is beginning to buckle under its own weight, its spindly legs of analog media can’t support its decrepit, obese form any longer. You have to understand that the Times Co. also owns the Boston Globe, the International Herald Tribune, and about 15 other regional publications as well as a minority stock holding in the Boston Red Sox, a fact that a lot of New York sports fans probably don’t know, if they did I think the circulation would fall through the floorboards over night.

In addition to one of the largest publishing organizations making cuts the Wall Street Journal is simply closing its doors on the Boston Bureau it has maintained for many years, try 100 of them, which generally contributed reports on New England, health care, education, and financial services. Yes, this is what we need, an industry leading, pulitzer winning bureau that covers these pivotal topics at a time like this. Dow Jones & Co., who on the Wall Street Journal have taken drastic measures recently with salary cuts, hiring freezes, completely closing some regional publications, and most recently cutting 50 jobs, leaving the company with only 750 employees world wide. 750, that is only 150 more employees than the LA Times currently employs; in 2007 the LA Times employed 1,200 employees. As you can see we’re not just losing ho-bunk back water papers, the leaders of this industry are failing every day as times get more and more complicated and good news coverage becomes critical.

Are you about to slit your wrists journalism students? A few hesitation cuts while you get the nerve up to pull it off? Well I’ve got exactly what you need to close the deal; The East Valley Tribune, after some 118 years of publication, is turning off the presses and calling it a day Dec. 31, 2009. Yes, a paper that has service Phoenix and the surrounding areas for more than a century could not survive despite cutting staff by 40%  and scaling production back to only four days a week. The problem might have come from their parent company claiming bankruptcy recently, but one can’t be sure. In putting the paper up for sale the closest thing they got to a serious offer was a oily haired jukebox salesman in an ’84 caddy who offered $500 dollars, a Wurlitzer at factory cost, and a buffalo head nickel. The deal fell apart when they wanted all of the 45’s thrown in for free and ol’ Neil commented that he wasn’t gonna get hosed like that without getting kissed first. You might say that who gives a shit about the Phoenix area? Well it has stood for a long time as the largest growing community in America, a growing readership pool to draw from every year, and the pulitzer prize winning paper continued to lose circulation and ad revenue. If a paper in a growing community with more potential readers moving there every year can’t survive, then who can?

This is only a portion of the bad news, a small sliver of the awful news coming from the financial front. Every single day bad news streams in and I just can’t publish all of it, for the mere fact that I can’t stand to analyze it as I try to break in to an industry that is hemorrhaging revenue and dropping employees like a pinata exploded. The WGA East (Writers Guild of America) issued some statements that echo my own concerns. I find that the most disconcerting fact that I think we are all failing to recognize is what the guild refers to as a difficulty to provide “reliable, informative material in the face of unrelenting budget cuts.” This is exactly how I feel as a journalist. What is occurring is news gathering organizations attempting to provide the same level of coverage with less staff to do so. What happens is now you have employed staff journalists required to now cover more ground, which will stretch them thin on accuracy and in depth, thoughtful coverage. Then, in a sick twist of fate, now there are fewer checks and balances as to the accuracy and quality of this writing in less research staff and editorial oversight leaving far too many wholes for poor journalism to fall through.

What we have here is maybe comparable to a regimen of men trying to hold a line, defend against an enemy and without warning half their force is called away, so now you have half the fighting force holding the same stretch of land; it is too much for too few to cover, no matter how hard they try and with whatever conviction they have, it will not be the same caliber as when they had more men. This thinning of the ranks leads to less accurate, and to a greater extent less thoughtful and in depth reporting. The 100 year old Boston Bureau I mentioned earlier won its Pulitzer prizes for investigative reporting on favoritism in university admissions to the children of Alumni as well as shady business practices of backdated stocks for company executives. The first casualty of this cut back will be the time consuming, heavily researched, and expensive practice of investigative reporting. The in depth kind of work that you don’t get without a company putting journalism first. Where we have ended up, and are heading to like a bat out of hell is now ‘bottom-line journalism’ on two fronts; basic, bare bones daily reporting coupled with cost first decision making on what gets covered and how.

Years ago journalism starting taking its cues from tabloids and sensationalizing stories. This is the time of the likes of Fox News coming to supremacy in the network battles. When you started listening to pundits and stopped watching the nightly news. The loudest voices and the most controversial personalities became the leaders in news, and then you have Glenn Beck in a league unto himself. News became about salacious headlines and quick witted propaganda, but to a greater extent it just became about entertainment. What was tolerable was that you had relatively legitimate news organizations to cover everything else and deliver unbiased news on a daily basis. Those that wanted real news coverage could get it. What also aided in the tolerability of the situation was that there were many voices, many sources, and great staff members checking and rechecking facts as well as layers of editors and publishers sifting through work to prevent bias and misinformation to greater extent. This slashing of staff and research budgets is now leaving fewer voices, 50% at some papers as other just close their doors. Now the diversity of coverage has been compromised, the quality of coverage has been compromised, and to a greater extent, the publics trust has been compromised.

I want you to, for just a moment, imagine a world without the LA Times, NY Times, and USA Today. Where will you get the news? You can’t get there? OK, how about a more nefarious and dangerous situation, imagine only the NY Times, or the LA Times, or the USA Today. This is the great disaster you will have to come to terms with eventually. Imagine a world where everyone has gone bankrupt and one company, one news gathering organization stands as the only publication left. What if there was a bias, or if they decided to not cover certain things? Without other companies to compete with, without a need to fact check they could run rough shod over the world, and God forbid you get a publisher or owner with an axe to grind, bias could run amok upon it’s pages with no way for you, the reader, to compare facts and try to get the whole story. It would be a Stars and Stripes kind of situation during Vietnam; smooth over the bad news and beef up stories with false facts and embellishment whatever news fit your agenda (also see ex. FOX News). Absolute anarchy as the public can’t get the real story or be informed enough to make a decision about Presidential candidates, bills up for a vote, etc. You don’t want to be there, I know I don’t.

This is a scary situation that needs immediate attention as diversity and quality in reporting begins to deteriorate in the public sector. A bailout is out of the question, the newspapers didn’t get in line soon enough and with all of the healthcare reform spending a TARP money, there isn’t enough to go around, so papers are shit out of luck for Government help. Besides, if the Obama Administration got its fingers in to free press the effects and distrust by the public in reporting would go through the roof. A share of the Times Co. in the Obama back pocket would only fuel the flames of the communist and fascist sentiment some have for the administration. I have heard rumors that the companies I have spoken of in this piece may be considering creating a united front with other groups to team up and begin charging for premium content or online subscriptions all at once. This would not create an immediate flocking from those who charge to those who don’t. A kind of Newspaper Alliance to help everyone and hurt no one so that they can all try and move in to an era of online profitability that has been lacking ever since the 90’s.

I promise you that the fall of the news empires in this country is not over, it will be getting much darker before there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and I predict the fall of a titan Newspaper like the Boston Globe or a paper with a readership nearing one million on Sunday editions going down before people begin to take serious notice. It will take the fall of a news empire or the sale of the LA Times to bring the spotlight squarely on the industry. Can you imagine if the NY Times were put up for sale or eventually just had to claim bankruptcy. It is not entirely impossible as being a publicly traded company, if stock were to fall to a buck a share the company would crumble, massive closing of international bureaus, layoffs, etc., the company could be in ruin inside 90 days from the stock falling. A world without the NY Times would a be a terrible place given the fact it would shake confidence in others and possibly lead to a domino effect resulting in the ugly world I mentioned in the last paragraph.

Embrace of online media will help, but it is not going to fix the problem, you don’t make up 60% ad revenue declines by charging .99 micro-charges for weekly subscriptions to the Times. A complete restructuring of the business model will need to take place to find a profitable design for the 21st century paper. In the meantime you, the readers and general public need to be wary of reporting, check your own facts and dig deeper to find the information that you need to form opinions and make decisions. As the journalists are stretched thin and expected to perform miracles on a daily basis for less money on tighter deadlines without the needed support staff I ask that you forgive inaccuracies and instead pick up more than just the one paper. Take a cue from me, I read the LA Times, NY Times, USA Today, as well as my local papers to check facts and try to get the whole story as well as a wide array of different stories. I don’t subscribe to any of these papers, I read them online for free, bad aspiring journalist, I know, but I put in the leg work to be assured that I am as diversely informed as possible. What you now need to do is support papers more than ever by doing the job of research assistant, reporter, editor, and publisher at multiple papers to get your news. You now do the same job four people used to do at the paper…welcome to modern journalism, you have to get your own coffee, too, we had to fire Jimmy last week.

[I was planning to write this for quite a while]

Great Lake Swimmers are one of those bands you really have to know. They really do have their own sound. I would describe it as a mix of Fleet Foxes meets Wilco meets I don’t know what. It’s really a unique sound. I wonder what that is. The vocals? The lyrics? The instruments? I guess it’s just a mix of all. The latest and fourth record by Great Lake Swimmers is called Lost Channels. The album was released earlier this year.

Tony Dekker and co. are known for their intimate folk, alt-country and pop songs. Quite songs that bring you to another place, where it’s very peaceful. A place where you hear the wind and see the flowers dance in the sunlight. Or more a walk in a winter forest in the moonshine. Don’t expect too much of that on this record. On this album are more (nearly) upbeat songs and you’ll find more (electric) guitar. It even sounds somewhat louder. I think it’s good that they don’t do the same trick over and over. They may open up to a new audience this way, which is a good thing. They’re a great band.

So on this album more upbeat songs. Good. One of my favourite Great Lake Swimmers songs is ‘Your Rocky Spine’, which was upbeat too. ‘The Chorus In The Underground’ does somewhat reminds me of that song. Maybe it’s because there’s a banjo in it too. It’s a great song, pretty joyful for GLS-standards. Another song that I really like on this album is ‘New Light’. It’s a pretty interesting song. In someway it reminds me of the Dark Ages. I don’t know it’s in the melody line, in the instruments they picked or something else. To me, it would perfectly fit on an Age of Empires soundtrack. I keep listening to it and I really wonder what it is that makes me listen to it. Also ‘River’s Edge’ is a wonderful song. It reminds me of walking through the snow on a sunny winter day.

Anyhow, I don’t really like their change overall. I totally love their intimate, campfire, forest walk songs. That’s what’s attracts me most to the Great Lake Swimmers, their capability to bring you to another place. I just think Tony Dekker doesn’t really have the right sound for the more ‘upbeat’ songs. He got a pretty unique voice that isn’t meant to sing such songs. The ’upbeat’ songs just sound a little bit ‘flat‘ to me. The arrangements are ok, but they don’t sound (pretty) interesting to me (though, I might have high standers (thank you Andrew Bird)). These songs  just lost some of the GLS- magic. I like the second half of the album better, where the songs are more quite, calm and suck you in to Tony’s world. I miss that on the first (upbeat) half of the album.

Overall, it’s not a bad album, it’s actually a good one. Great Lake Swimmers’ sound slightly changed to more upbeat, which I don’t prefer, but I think some people will like it. There are also some little gems on it, such as ‘New Light’, which brings you not only to another place, but also to another age (or at least me). Tony Dekker’s vocals are still unique and capable of sucking you into his world. It’s not the best album this year, but absolutely one I’ll recommend you, simply because you might like their ‘upbeat’ stuff.

[7.5/10]

Zur Feier der Verkündung, dass es ein Epic Empires nächstes Jahr geben wird, hier ein Foto meiner Superstars. Saber Rider war in der Jugend, diese Mädels und Jungs sind es heute:

Alcyon All Stars

I always love to get newsletters from Andrew Bird. I don’t know why. Maybe because he’s the only musician I’m truly fan of. At the moment, mr. Bird is touring with St. Vincent. I wish I could be there (I wish it really badly.. damn!). I would love to see them on stage together, performing songs such as ‘Scythian Empires’, ‘Oh Sister’ and more. I’m really jealous of you people who gotta see that! Well, at least I’m going to see him in November (did also see him May and August this year.. be jealous!). I’m already looking forward ^^,

So what’s up with Andrew?

Well first of all, he announced some new tour dates. He’s going to Asia for the first time. Also, he’s doing a few very unique shows in Minneapolis and Chicago, which they’re calling the ‘Gezelligheid concerts’. These will be solo, mostly instrumental shows in acoustically lovely churches, and should be wonderfully uplifting and comforting concerts as we head into the cold and dark winter. When he’s done with all those dates, he’s taking some time off. I wonder if he’s still alive by then, but OK. (I mean, the guy is touring all the time!)

Now you are probably wondering what ‘Gezelligheid’ means, right?! According to the newsletter it means:  ‘it is a Dutch word for “intensely cosy” which doesn’t have a perfect translation in English – but it’s a warm and amicable atmosphere where everybody is cheerful and happy.’ Well lucky people you are, I’m dutch. I’m not totally content with this translation, so I’ll give you mine (skip to the next paragraph if you’re not interested). ’Gezelligheid’ is one of those annoying words that’s difficult to translate, mainly because it’s pretty abstract and has to do with a sort of state of mind. It’s not really ‘intensely cosy’, to me, cosy doesn’t seems the right word. It’s more something like ‘a very pleasant atmosphere (they got that right) with pleasant people around you (not necessary cheerful and happy)‘, those people aren’t necessary your friends too. I guess it’s not really that different. Also, I would say they are ‘Gezelligheids (with an -s) concerts’,  because concerts is plural. ‘Gezellig’ which comes from the word ‘Gezelligheid’ can mean multiple things. ‘Gezellig’ furniture/house, says you do have a cosy house. ‘Gezellige’ people are pleasant people (and you can have lot of fun with these type of people). Anyway, it’s OK, I’m probably the only one who’s bothered by it. I’m actually more interesting how he’s gonna pronounce it, with the dutch (dreadful) G.

Here’s what Bird says about the Gezelligheid shows: ‘What I hope to do with these shows is adapt my music completely to the atmosphere of the space and the season. I’m inspired to do this based on childhood memories of performing Handel’s Messiah in various churches on an annual basis. The music will be mostly original instrumentals using my voice only to intone. I want the audience to be both lifted and comforted as we head into another cold and dark winter. I feel the space should be sacred so the audience can experience my music in a different atmosphere.’

Aaah.. I wish I could be there. Though, I won’t complain. Seeing Andrew 3 times in a year is absolutely fantastic. I would almost think he’s ‘Netherlands’-obsessed. (Holland isn’t the same thing as the Netherlands, though I’m not gonna be annoying about that)

With a faltering economy, multiple wars, and the approaching demise of the dollar’s reserve status, there are more than enough problems to keep politicians in Washington working day and night.  In between handing out cash for clunkers and nationalizing healthcare, the administration is busy sending more troops overseas, escalating existing wars, and seeking out excuses to start new wars.  Congress is working on “urgent” legislation to address crises like healthcare reform and climate change.  The reforms are so very urgent that legislation must pass swiftly with no time to read the bills even though the new laws wouldn’t take effect for several years!  Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve is busy dealing with our dollar crisis by printing up more dollars.

Yes, there certainly is a lot for Washington to do these days.  Most, if not all, of what Washington is doing however, is more of what created the problems in the first place.  Capitol Hill is filled with politicians running around putting out fires – but with gasoline.  The truth is that all these fires keep so many powerful people employed and wealthy that it is not truly in many decision makers’ interests to be very effective problem-solvers.  If Washington ran out of problems, think how many lobbyists would be out of a job, and how many special interest groups would just disband?  Sadly, whatever is bad for the greater economy is good for the economy and job market in DC.

Of course, no form of government, not even one that respected its Constitutional restraints, would magically create a problem-free society.  The question is: how should a society deal with its problems?  The form of government that our founders envisioned, in which the federal government was strictly constrained by the Constitution, allows private citizens and communities to solve their own problems.  The role of the government should be to protect contracts, punish fraud and violence through appropriate laws, law enforcement and the courts.  Not a whole lot of laws or bureaucrats are really necessary to work on just that.  Instead, new laws are constantly needed to fix the problems that previous unconstitutional laws created.  We have ended up with an incomprehensible maze of laws and regulations that severely constrains the people and expands the government – the exact opposite of what our founders intended.

This is all because the Constitution is treated like a suggestion manual instead of the supreme law of the land.  Under the Constitution, politicians’ hands are supposed to be tied in most of the areas they involve themselves in today.  But somewhere along the line, politicians stepped out of Constitutional bounds and started pretending to solve our problems for us.  All we have to show for it is more problems.

Today, Washington politicians can busily “solve” one problem, knowing that unintended consequences from that “solution” will keep them and their friends all very busy tomorrow.  The people are ultimately left suffocating under the burden of Washington’s helping hands.  It is coming to a point where our economy, our dollar, and indeed, the rest of the world have had about all the help from Washington that they can stand.   The United States is headed the way of Rome and the Soviet Union, for the same reasons, unless we reverse the trend.

I continue to hope that enough Americans will realize that the true strength of our country doesn’t come from Washington, but rather the limitations placed on government in the Constitution.  We must resolve to reverse the destructive course that we are on and then never again let big government problem-solving take over our lives and our country.

Ron Paul

Islamophobia is anathema to rational thinking; (October 18, 2009)

            Islam is quickly becoming an integral religion in the Western world.  There is a growing sense of uneasiness for Islam devotees: they pray at least three times a day facing Mecca (the Kaaba) and take seriously the fasting month of Ramadan. The various Christian sects barely practice their religion; the “Christians” mostly use their religion as political platforms during voting seasons to discriminate among cultures for the “proper way of life”.  A recent scandal broke out in England: the government is wire taping the Moslems on ground of social study.  In France there was an attempt at disqualifying Arabs as carrier of any philosophical civilization that could have impressed on European Renaissance.  The Arabic media didn’t respond to “Aristotle on Mount St. Michelle” simply because the book talked of philosophical import and didn’t discuss the scientific aspects.

            The main confusion in Europe or in the Arab/Islamic world is about what Empires we are alluding to: Arabic Empires (culture) or Islamic Empires (civilization) and how to discriminate among the cultures of each one of the Empires.  The modern nationalistic models (brainchild of emerging Europe) could not correspond to ancient models of thinking and thus, the attempts to explaining past Empires with modern models of what constitute a nation is confusing research and biasing facts with awkward interpretations.

            In all periods, elites of Empires needed an ideology to assure the articulation of various heritages (Arab, Persian, Byzantium, Roman, Greek, and Aramaic).  The unstable structure of ancient Empires frequently pressed upon its elites to rethink the new culture of the emerging Empire and re-construct it via a mould where diverse elements were poured in (ethnicity, community, belief systems, and language).  Thus, social thinkers struggled to present a coherent understanding of the new Empire; the purpose was not an erudite analysis for posterity but to get the new Empire functioning properly.

            This post is meant to investigate the allegation that European civilization is fundamentally the heritage of ancient Greece civilization.  I have examined the contention that “Europe civilization is because of Christianism”, a proposal that I refuted in a previous post (read “The Barbaric Catholic Church of Rome”) where the centralized church prohibited the influx of “heretic” scientific manuscripts to Europe from the Near Eastern Byzantium Empire and later from the Islamic Empire till way the 16^th century.

            The best route for this examination is to consider two civilizations that imbibed the Islamic Empires.  The first Umayyad Arabic Empire 650 to 800 AC had for Capital Damascus; the culture in the Near East in that period was principally Hellenistic in the sense that scholars and educated people wrote in two languages, the Greek and Syriac languages (Aramaic dialect developed in Edesse, current Turkey) ; the common people spoke the language of the land or Aramaic.  Aramaic is the root language for Hebrew and the various local languages, especially the two Arabic branches that were spoken in Mecca and in Yemen.  It is in this period that lasted 150 years that translation of Greek and Syriac manuscripts into Arabic received its impetus.  Translation of Greek works to Syriac continued way into the 9^th century. The people easily assimilated the spoken Arabic of Mecca and gave Arabic its proper alphabet and grammar.

            The second period can be called the Islamic Empire when the Capital was re-located to the newly erected city of Baghdad (Baghdad was to become the largest metropolis in this Empire of over one million inhabitant); this Islamic civilization was marked by the Persian culture and language with high import from India: trade was cut off with Europe for many centuries first during the Mamluk Empires after kicking out the last remnant of the Crusaders and later the early Ottoman Empire as Constantinople fell in around 1450. 

            The Umayyad Dynasty exported to Islamic Persia the embryo of the current scientific works and the nascent Islamic philosophy (falsafa); the more developed scientific works were later mostly written in Persian language; the same scholars wrote the disciplines that were related to religion, philosophy, rhetoric, legal, mathematics, and algebra, in Arabic because they were needed for the proper function in the administration of the Empire.  Educated and cultured people who were familiar with Greek works met in “salons” (majalis) to discuss on various subjects, philosophical incursions into the possible, the intellect, the sensibility and the soul. 

            Schools of learning were erected and knowledge was no longer the prerogative of the initiation of master to disciple for rich people. By the first century of Islam (8^th century), schools were exploding everywhere with targeted practical disciplines (algebra, geometry, arithmetic, trigonometry, jurisprudence, theology (kalam), science of tradition (hadith), history, linguistic, lexicography, math combinatorial analysis, cryptography, and grammar) mainly to support the functions of the Empire administration and train cadres for offices such as fiscal, heritage, religious calendar, and army logistics. The schools were inspired by different traditions such as Greek, Persian, Indian, and Syriac).  By the second century of Islam specialized schools in theoretical mathematics, medicine, physics, optics, and astronomy were booming.

            The first acknowledged Moslem philosopher Al Kindi (9^th century) admitted that Aristotle was the most eminent Greek philosopher and wrote: “We have to thank the prior thinkers who shared with us what is right; they made it more accessible to us researching the truth and they provided the premises that leveled the way for what is true.  Offering reasons and demonstrations are part of the acquisition process in the sciences for veracity. Those strangers to scientific inquiries are trafficking in religion even though they have got no religion: indeed the one who sells one thing does no longer belong to him.”

            Personally, I tend to attribute the name of Islamic civilization for the import of scientific disciplines such as mathematics, astronomy, medicine, physics, optics, and chemistry.  Arabic civilization should be restricted to the Umayyad Dynasty period in matters of rhetoric, legal, practical mathematics, Kalam (reflection on the world according to the Koran paradigm), grammars, language, and the import of any outside scientific knowledge that the Old World reserved in Constantinople, Persia, India, and China.

            A follow up post will demonstrate that European Renaissance in the 16^th century was fundamentally Islamic scientifically; the decentralization of the Christian power away from Rome was also inspired by the decentralization nature of Islam as a religion.  The title is “Europe’s Renaissance is Islamic”.  It is worthwhile for researchers not to confuse the recent period of Islamic radical decadence with early Islamic civilization that lasted from 650 to 1100 AC in the Orient and then re-surfaced in Andalusia (Spain) from 800 till 1400 AC.  After 1400 AC Christian Spanish monarchs chased out the Moslems and Jews from their kingdom; the Catholic Church in Rome instituted the Inquisition to harass the new converts to Christianity.

The old cliché states “history always repeats itself” but have you ever wondered why this is true?

It is because of us. That is, mankind.And history bears this out in the fact that there are so many years of war as opposed to so  few years of peace.

First – James 4:1-3 defines wars coming from the internal mechanism that bypasses God’s desire. Therefore it is our lust and need to temporarily satisfy that lust that causes conflict.

Second – Mankind has an incredible ability to mess up a good thing, starting with Adam and Eve all the way up to the very present moment. Some empires start off good and go bad, some are evil from the onset but that self destructive nature always overrides morals and ethics.

Assyria, Persia, Greece, both the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, Arab Empire, Mameluke Ottoman Empire, Spanish, Romanov Russia and the Empire of Great Britain all had common bonds. Every world superpower made advances in every area possible: arts, education, engineering, and science.

All of the above world powers had another parallel, they lasted an average of 238 years. Time always works against any entity, nation or political force that does not keep God at the center of its operation, because we are by nature children of wrath – Eph. 2:3

That’s why I pray for Jesus’ Kingdom to come because His government will never end and it will be righteous and equitable for all.

Attila could be the worst movie that the late Anthony Quinn ever starred in.

Quinn stars as the world’s second most famous barbarian who also tried to takedown the Roman Empire. The story focuses on Attila sitting outside the border of Italy waiting to pounce but his diplomatic brother, Bleda, would rather negotiate a treaty than kill Romans. Atilla will have none of that so he has his brother killed.

Meanwhile idiotic and cowardly Roman emperor, Valentinian III, panics about what to do about the barbarian. His smarter more cunning sister Honoria (Sophia Loren) offers herself up as a bride to Attila if he will spare her brother and Rome.

The movie has one of the worst scripts I have ever seen with this kind of rich tapestry for a story.

Attila was wild, crazy, debonaire, relentless and brave. Quinn gives the barbarian a bravado like John Wayne gave many of his western heroes but without the scruples. The performance is credible to all the over-acting and silliness from his supporting players. Some of the performances reminded me of “mimes on speed.” Except these mimes shovel the garbage that is this script.

Then in Rome, a 70s porno without, well, the porn. It is an interesting contrast but felt wrong.

The wardrobe on this film tried to be epic but I found the spandex very distracting, especially the spandex behind Attila’s huge codpiece. Then there was the makeup. How come the Huns look like Mongols? Did Huns look like Mongols? It’s just bizarre.

The seduction scene where Loren goes to Quinn is the best scene of the film. Loren is looking her best and the seduction is very Samson and Delilah-esque. Loren looks ravishing in a revealing white gown as Quinn’s barbarian is caught off guard and speechless. Loren’s gown in that scene is the best of the film, hands down.

The scene ends with the hysterical line, “How I have longed for your lips!” Why this is so funny is that he just slobber kissed her with his mouth still half full of food. His cheeks look like a gopher. It’s these kinds of silly things that make this film rich for parody. Or think about it, is this already a parody?

The film never really reaches the tone it needs to be. They wanted it to be epic, historic, sexy and starring two giant stars. What they got was an 80-minute movie, with super silly dialogue and over-blown performances.

If you want to laugh at the film, I give it four stars. But the film wants to be taken seriously.

1.5 out of 5

So Says the Soothsayer

Side note: You can find this film on the Sophia Loren DVD collection from Lionsgate. The best film of collection is Sunflower, watch for that review on future edition of Foreign Fridays.

New image in the guard photoshop contest

One outside source. …
AGE of EMPIRES photoshop picture

B-fast

Almost forgot to mention that there will be a really amazing show tomorrow in Madison – The Dear Hunter, The Felix Culpa, Empires, and The Conductors will be at The New Loft starting at 6.

Be there!