June 2007

It appears that Mr. Slim has changed his mind (Thursday, 6/28/07)
Not long ago, Carlos Slim was quoted as saying that poverty can't be cured by making donations.

At the time, he was being fairly critical of what Bill and Melinda Gates are doing with Warren Buffett through the Gates Foundation. Mr. Slim was in the news because Forbes magazine had to revise its ranking of the world's billionaires, which had been published only a short time earlier, in order to indicate that Mexico's Carlos Slim had passed Warren Buffett as the second-richest individual in the world. It's unclear at this point whether Mr. Sliim also has passed Bill Gates to become Number 1.

Now, though, as Elisabeth Malkin writes from New York, Carlos Slim is increasing his giving too, with health and education most on his mind. He's apparently decided that, while simply handing out money isn't likely to make much long-term difference, helping people to become healthier and better educated can be enormously important.

Meanwhile, many persons who are only rich, rather than super-duper rich, are choosing to do very different things with their money. Maya Roney tells about how the houses of many wealthy persons are getting bigger and BIGGER.

Also, if you're only a mere millionaire, rather than a billionaire, you had a lot more company in 2006 than during the previous year. It appears that there are about 9.5 million persons in the world now with at least $1 million worth of financial assets. Of course, a million dollars certainly isn't what it used to be. It won't even mean that you're particularly rich.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Latinos and the Transformation of American Religion (Thursday, 6/28/07)
Many Americans use the terms "Latino" and "Hispanic" interchangeably, but they're not identical. Strictly speaking, if you want to emphasize language and include persons from Spain as well as the Americas, you will want to say "Hispanic." On the other hand, if you want to confine your reference to persons from the Americas whose first language or the first language of their Latin American ancestors is Spanish, you will want to say "Latino."

Also, in popular usage, some persons from the Americas are offended when referred to as "Hispanic," but not when called "Latino." Others aren't. Do you have all of that straight now?

But, wait a minute--there are "African American" caucasians, aren't there, if they or their ancestors are from the Saharan region? Moreover, the term "native American" can refer to some Hawaiians, can't it? In either case, of course, Americans usually don't use these terms in this way. Does it make a difference?

Moreover, many people of European ancestry in the United States feel it's more correct to refer to indigenous people here as "native American," rather than "Indian," because the latter term arose in the first place simply because Christopher Columbus believed that the world is much smaller than it really is and believed he was in Asia when he arrived in what is now called San Salvador or Cat Island (Nobody knows for sure which island he landed on). Nonetheless, many "native Americans" themselves prefer to call themselves "Indians."

We don't believe that it makes much difference what we call each other, so long as we don't use the hate language, which had its origins in hate and has no current function but to express hate. Moreover, the odds are that many Americans who think of themselves as "white" also have black African ancestry, either because of mixing that occurred over centuries in the Americans or earlier in Europe. Of course, given our best available evidence, if we go back far enough, we're all Africans.

As we've said a number of times, former Secretary of State, Colin Powell, often is referred to as "black" or "African American." He says that this is not really correct, because his ancestry is a mixture of African, Caribbean, native American, and Irish. We think it's easier simply to call him "Colin Powell." Anyway, we do hope that we've clarified all of this for you once and for all.

At any rate, Latinos now make up the largest minority in the United States and are continuing to have a profound effect on nearly every aspect of American culture, including religion.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: The Great War (Wednesday, 6/27/07)
Is peace something "that never has been and never will be?" Maybe; maybe not. Nonetheless, historians say that there have been only a very few years during the past several centuries when organized armed conflict of some sort has not been going on someplace in the world. Typically, several wars are going on at the same time. It's just that many aren't covered in news reports.

Interestingly, it does appear that war, as we understand it, is largely a creation of what we commonly refer to as "civilization," beginning with recorded history several thousand years ago. There's not much evidence of wars during prehistoric times, although genocide seems to have been relatively common.

Those who first referred to World War I has "the great war," because there had never been anything quite like it before, didn't know that an even greater war was only a few years away. Even though the First World War wasn't the last war of its type, it was the first, and it can even be said that 20th century warfare provided the first evidence of growing "globalization." Emory University's Harry Rusche has assembled poetry from The Great War.

Another way in which the Internet is changing the world (Monday, 6/25/07)
It used to be that only savvy broadcasting executives emphasized that nobody should ever say or do anything anywhere near a studio, microphone, or camera that they don't want to share with thousands, even tens of thousands of people. Now, it's a good idea to take that advice anywhere there might be a cellular phone, which is nearly anywhere. You could end up starring on YouTube all over the world.

Moira Herbst writes in BusinessWeek about the backlash that has resulted from a commonly-available video of a lawyer telling employers how they can get around immigration laws and hire cheap foreign workers.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Surprising Jobs With Six-Figure Pay (Saturday, 6/23/07)
It is true that many teachers don't make much money and seem underpaid. However, this is not true of some, particularly in mathematics, and particularly at the university level.

However, many university professors are quick to point out that their job description has only a superficial resemblance to that of public school teachers, who are not obligated to conduct and publish research, for instance. Genuine universities have multiple responsibilities, and teaching is only one of them.

Also, the job of university professor has a major barrier to entry: It's called "years and years of tough postgraduate school." Still, many teachers at all levels finally reach a salary level after many years which is essentially equivalent, say, to where many young lawyers start with less professional education after college.

Nonetheless, as Steve McGookin reports in his article, Surprising Jobs With Six-Figure Pay, some teachers are among the surprising ones. There are other surprises on the list too, though.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Emergency Management (Tuesday, 6/19/07)
In Minnesota, people who are authorized to carry handguns can bring them into a public building unless there is a sign indicating that they are specifically prohibited from doing so. It can be a bit startling to see a sign outside the hospital door or the St. Paul Cathedral telling people that they can't bring their guns in with them. Are those signs necessary? Under current law, we can be sure that some people really would take their guns with them to church or into a hospital if they weren't told that they cannot. Some probably do anyway.

Schools can experience a wide variety of different kinds of emergencies for which they need to be prepared, but it might be discouraging to recognize that these might include violence. In today's climate, we can't assume that even churches, hospitals, or schools are places of safety.

The General Accounting Office has released a 25-page paper dealing with school district emergency planning and preparedness.

Resistance to merit pay declines among teachers (Monday, 6/18/07)
According to Sam Dillon in Minneapolis, teachers and teachers unions are becoming somewhat less opposed to merit pay.

Incidentally, while research has clearly established the power of "positive reinforcement" in influencing behavior, so-called "piecework" remuneration systems have not worked well in factories. The reason seems to be that most humans work as part of social systems, not in individual isolation, and social factors must be taken into account when assessing the influence of reward procedures.

Also, in education, it's likely that some of the most effective and most dedicated teachers will be offended by any implication that they work for financial reward, and are likely to see efforts on the part of management to link remuneration to performance as manipulative and an assault on their fundamental values.

Many of these teachers regard their work as a calling, not simply an occupation, and have attitudes similar to those of missionaries in impoverished areas of the world. Is it likely that we could have gotten more out of Mother Teresa by offering her money? Many of America's best teachers feel that those who are motivated by money shouldn't be in the profession in the first place.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Center for Gender and Refugee Studies (Monday, 6/18/07)
Forty years ago, it was fashionable on many American college campuses to be a cultural relativist. The attitude still makes sense as an antidote to ethnocentrism or extreme nationalism. On the other hand, it's hard to say "It's just their culture" when it comes to the way women routinely are exploited or abused in some cultures because of traditional attitudes. Since 1999, the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at the Hastings College of Law in San Francisco has supported women who are fleeing gender-based violence in its many forms.

What you can do if you have so much money you don't know what to do (Saturday, 6/16/07)
We agree that it isn't what we have but what we do that matters, and that this includes what we do with what we have. However, Anne D'Innocenzio in New York tells what people with lots of money and no sense of value or priority are doing.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Probability Tutorials (Saturday, 6/16/07)
You should know about probability, because you should know about inferential statistics, which is based on it.

The modern world we see all around us is largely a consequence of our learning more about underlying natural processes, as well as about social and economic phenomena that couldn't be studied systematically at all under fairly recent years. Both depend on two very important related branches of mathematics: calculus and statistics. Statistics also quickly became a key tool in manufacturing process, making possible almost infinitely more consistent quality control than during the first several decades of the Industrial Revolution.

Before the development of modern statistics, developments in many fields of inquiry were stifled because there was no effective means of studying what a scholar could not personally observe or what seemed to be "common knowledge." In fact, one might say that statistics made it possible for humanity to move from August Comte's abstract to positive stage of intellectual development.

With sampling based on underlying probability theory, it's now possible to make greater and more systematic use of other people's experience, as well as one's own, and to "cast a net" over broader areas of concern, as well as systematically measure variability and uncertainty.

Here are a number of probability tutorials from Noel Vaillant, a scholar from the UK.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Baths in Bath (Thursday, 6/14/07)
As we've said so many times, history isn't dead. We respond to things in terms of how they look to us, and context and perspective influence how they look. Historical perspective is particularly important.

The Romans were very big on baths and built elaborate places where they could socialize, conduct business affairs, argue about politics, and much more, while also soaking, luxuriating, and washing up.

Much of what is now called the United Kingdom was a Roman province for more than 350 years, so it should be no surprise that the Romans brought their culture with them, including their baths. One of the best preserved Roman baths is located in the southern English town of Bath. Here's the Official Roman Baths Museum Web Site in the city of Bath.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Life Kiosk (Tuesday, 6/12/07)
There are dozens of types of cancer, and many do correlate with age, with older people more likely to develop malignancies than younger people. As a consequence, as the populations of the rich industrial countries age, the incidence of cancer increases as well. Fortunately, it is an exciting time for cancer treatments too, and, for many, instead of being a death sentence, cancer has become a chronic, manageable disease, much like diabetes, with which people often live for many years. Here's the American Cancer Society's Life Kiosk.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Global Corruption Report 2007 (Sunday, 6/10/07)
In many parts of the world, the poor can't get anything done on their behalf because they don't have the money to pay bribes to government officials or others in power. Also, in many countries, a government position is seen, not as an opportunity to serve the public, but as an opportunity to enrich oneself. Transparency International is an international organization known for investigating corruption throughout the world. You can learn a great deal about their work and their findings by reading their 429-page Global Corruption Report 2007.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: The State of Americašs Libraries (Thursday, 6/7/07)
As Larry Ellison's Oracle Corporation has said, "The Internet changes everything." In fact, it's not unreasonable to expect that the Internet--very high-speed and much of it wireless--soon will be the preferred distribution medium for all types of information--words, pictures, video, everything. Moreover, before long, we can expect that nearly everything will be available nearly everywhere because nearly everything will be connected to nearly everything else.

What will this mean for libraries, which, traditionally, have been central repositories where people can go to read or borrow books, magazines, or newspapers printed on paper? You can be sure that the American Library Association has been thinking about such issues, and you may be interested in their new report: The State of America's Libraries.

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Nuclear Energy (Monday, 6/4/07)
The United States faces several major issues having to do with energy. One is energy independence, and things have been trending in the wrong direction during recent years. The current enthusiasm with ethanol from corn can help reduce America's dependence on foreign energy sources, but it's also reducing the supply of corn as human and animal food, which is driving up food prices.

However, ethanol from any source doesn't help with the other big problem: the role of greenhouse gas emissions in climate change. A reduction in America's gluttonous appetite for energy could help considerably, but Americans don't seem inclined to change their inefficient consumption habits at the moment, particular when many of their leaders have been telling them that there's no need for them to do so.

The world's appetite for energy is increasing. In fact, according to the International Energy Agency, energy consumption on Earth will increase 53 percent by 2030. So, if you think the world has a climate change problem now, stay tuned.

Understandably, there is great emphasis right now on the development of energy sources that don't put so much pressure on the natural environment in ways that will accelerate climate change even more.

For instance, many people are taking another look at nuclear energy in the United States, while other nations, such as France, are largely depend on it now. The technologies are safer presently than before, it is said, but there remains the problem of what to do with the growing quantities of radioactive waste that will remain hazardous far longer than modern humans have occupied the planet so far. Here's what the U. S. Department of Energy's Office of Nuclear Energy has to say on the subject.

America has lots of oil reserves of its own, but it has even more coal, on which the country already relies to a considerable extent, particularly in the production of electricity. Nonetheless, while increased use of coal can contribute even more to climate change, some persons, such as the current Governor of Montana, claim that alternative technologies could more vigorously tap America's huge coal reserves while restoring the land and putting the carbon back into the Earth where it came from, rather than pumping it into the atmosphere.

Speaking of coal, a recent analysis of Department of Energy data conducted by the Associated Press found that, with its heavy use of this form of fossil carbon, Texas alone is responsible for more C02 emissions than most of the world's countries, as reported by Wyoming's Casper Tribune. Incidentally, Wyoming is America's largest coal producer and also ranks high among U. S. states in its production of "greenhouse gases."

Today's NewWork News Web Tip: Alternative Farming Systems Information Center (Sunday, 6/3/07)
Although the definitions aren't yet entirely consistent, it appears that "alternative farming" to many persons who use the term refers to something other than contemporary agricultural procedures which rely heavily on technology, while "organic farming" means the production of farm products without the use of industrial chemicals, such as pesticides or fertilizers.

In other words, it appears that these terms refer to traditional procedures largely in use before the agricultural revolution that made possible the feeding of a global population that is several times as great now than it was at any time before the mid-19th century or so. It should be noted, though, that many modern organic farmers make use of knowledge not available to our remote ancestors.

However, many of the people who are most enthusiastic about these traditional approaches seem to be some of the same persons who reject scientific or technological advances in other areas as well, or who often confuse "science" with "technology."

In our judgment, "science" refers to the CREATION of knowledge, while "technology" refers to the USE of knowledge. Moreover, we believe that the only alternative to genuine knowledge is ignorance, and it has had a catastrophic record over many centuries. We also believe that the solution to the ineffective use of knowledge is is the EFFECTIVE use of knowledge, not a rejection of knowledge itself or its use.

In some countries, "organic farming" is now defined by law, reflecting popular attitudes, but there is no internationally accepted definition of the term "organic" at this point. Moreover, some scholars, such as Anthony Trewavas in his article in the noted scientific journal Nature, have called the notion that so-called "holistic farming" is kinder to the environment or the soil than reductionistic approaches to be an "urban myth."

At any rate, with the growing popularity of "organic farming," even the United States Department of Agriculture maintains a site called Alternative Farming Systems Information Center.