I am a signatory and co-complainant in a formal complaint to the United Nations. We are waiting to receive a full response. (more…)
June 25, 2010
June 13, 2010
A 50th High School Reunion
Fifty years ago I graduated from Mount Hermon, a preparatory boarding school in the middle of nowhere in northwestern MA. They have since combined with their sister school across the Connecticut River, Northfield School, to form Northfield Mount Hermon. (more…)
May 19, 2010
Blumenthal’s dubious “Vietnam Service” political campaign
I posted the following Comment in the NYTimes in response to the Senate candidate’s misleading speeches (“lies” may be too strong a word for it) http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/19/nyregion/19veterans.html regarding service in Vietnam:
What bothers me even more than his inferences of having served in Vietnam is that Blumenthal’s Vietnam campaign strategy works directly against the nation’s welfare today, as he tries to generate anger over Vietnam so as to garner veterans’ votes. (more…)
April 10, 2010
Jury duty – a meaningful four-day experience
Although I often get called to report for jury duty, this week was the first time I have been selected to serve. Usually they are not interested in me; search Jury Duty on this site for possible reasons. This time I was selected even though I wore a button that said Wage Peace next to the button that said Juror and had indicated on a questionnaire that I could not promise to follow the judge’s instructions. My thinking on this issue is that I would have to follow my conscience first, if there were a conflict between conscience and the law. I am pleased that I was found suitable for jury duty. Things might have been different in a murder trial, because I cannot support capital punishment. It is appropriate to remove from society people who are a danger to others, but I wish to leave open the possibility of rehabilitation. The trial lasted four days, and to learn about the trial itself, read… (more…)
April 9, 2010
Why I love/hate Wright’s Fallingwater
It’s a fascinating structure, folks fawn over it, but there is a dark side.
April 3, 2010
Easter Anniversary of MLKing’s speech at Riverside Church, NYC.
On April 4 1967 at Riverside Church, MLKing delivered Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence. This was a moment of great moral courage. History now honors the man but not the message (something similar to Christianity going on here?). The speech was not just about Vietnam, but called for changes to insure a world with true peace and justice for all BEYOND Vietnam. Exactly one year later, he was killed. I have no doubt that the majority of Americans, although shocked at his death, were also relieved. At that time many Americans felt the need for a black American hero (to counter all the white ones), a black who was non-violent (to counter societal fears), but did not want to hear what he said would be required for a world with peace and justice. Denial of his message seems to be as true today as then. Happy Easter.
March 17, 2010
Student suicides in academe (NYTimes 3/17/10))
My published comment (#253) in response to this article on an apparent spate of suicides at Cornell is attached as a Comment. Many of the other comments related to the rigor of academic programs and the time that faculty spend with students. My response to this is as follows:
No one is super-human; we all face limits on our time and abilities. Research requires a lot of faculty time, and where universities particularly reward research, there will be reduced time for personal contact with the typical student. When you hear otherwise, you are hearing self-serving hype. This is partially resolved by insuring that researchers have few and small classes, but this generates financial issues if your institution is primarily tuition supported.
There is a wide range of academic challenge among various programs at any institution. Generally, the degree of academic rigor corresponds to who has the power and also whether the discipline has a clearly defined and measurable corpus. If you are faculty in a program with measurable content and more than enough students, you can afford rigor. If you have very few students and you keep with rigor, you will soon have almost no students, and soon no courses and no job.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/17/education/17cornell.html?th&emc=th
March 11, 2010
Mother Nature never sleeps.
The first week of March we spent a few days at Lake Nockamixon State Park while Villanova was on break. Hiking through the wintry snow was a lot of fun, particularly considering that this time we had rented a little cabin With Heat. We were the only ones there. We are amateur mycologists, and I was amazed to find a group of very fresh jelly-like mushrooms growing on a log almost buried in snow. Mushrooms can sprout and thrive at all times of the year, even in snowy winter. What a tribute to how Mother Nature never truly sleeps, but each species has its own time. How much fun, and how encouraging, to experience this on a wintry hike!
January 17, 2010
Healthy Aging, With Nary a Supplement (NYTimes 1/11/10)
I contributed the following post to the discussion that followed this NYTimes article http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/12/health/12brod.html?ref=health :
This is the best article in the magazine section today (and perhaps the only one to tell the unvarnished truth). My wife and I (in our 60’s) hike, camp, backpack outdoors, but most days simply walk. We eat relatively healthy (but don’t obsess over food choices) and take no medications. When I say we take no pills, most friends seem amazed. Sometimes their response feels critical or angry, because they see my behavior as implicit criticism of their lifestyle. Living healthy doesn’t mean you don’t get sick — I’m getting over a month of viral bronchitis. I’m usually surrounded by many young people, both healthy and sick, and we all get sick at times.
See Comment for my responses to two related NYTimes articles regarding healthy living.
January 1, 2010
As Honor Students Multiply, Who Really Is One? (NYTimes 1/1/10)
The following is my comment (#75) on the NYTimes article in the title above. Click my comment button for my second comment (#177) on this same article.
Honor societies often mean essentially nothing nowadays. I agree with the many comments that have already made this point. I disagree with #8 who says today’s students work harder. Number 8 and I are each expressing our own experience, but I expected much more work out of my students 40 years ago than I can expect today (and still keep my job). When I graduated from high school, there were four “recognitions” in the entire class of more than 100. My daughter regularly ignored various honor offers she received during her college years. I had to persuade her that $35 for a lifetime membership in Phi Beta Kappa was probably a worthwhile deal — she had dumped the letter.