Shedding light on daily life and habits of ancient Greeks

By Christina Sanoudou, Kathimerini, September 18, 2011

A parallel universe lies beyond the fence of the American School of Classical Studies on Souidias Street in the Athenian neighborhood of Kolonaki. Time takes on a new dimension at the Wiener Laboratory, where those who research the past study human remains and other archaeological findings dating back hundreds or even thousands of years.

A few meters away, in the school’s garden, a group of foreign students currently in Athens to conduct excavation work at the city’s Ancient Agora is busily trying to uncover the secrets of a human skeleton, taking part in an educational game under the guidance of the laboratory’s director, Dr Sherry Fox.

Over the last dozen years the American anthropologist has played a pivotal role in transforming the lab into a welcoming space, a place open to all those interested in using its infrastructure, which includes an X-ray machine, microscopes, a broad and comparative collection of both animal and human remains, along with a scientific library, which is unique for Greek standards. READ…

Anna Hazare – the Man of the Times

“It is experience that gives the direction but it is youth that gives the drive to every plan.” Anna Hazare

 

Photo Source(AFP) from DeccanChronicle.com

The Year 2011 seems to be the Year of the People. It saw the Arab World in turmoil courtesy the dissatisfied ordinary citizen. Among others there was Egypt whose people ousted Hosni Mumbarak and ended his thirty year rule.

In India it seems that the Time of Anna Hazare, who epitomizes RK Laxman’s humble citizen, has arrived. He seems even more relevant than Gandhi!

The guy was a truck driver in the Army and so is in sharp contrast to recent Army Chiefs who have been arraigned for moral turpitude amounting to corruption!

The current crises which put him on the National Stage is the fact that the Indian Anti Corruption Bill has been hanging fire since 1969 when the Rajya Sabha rejected it. Now on 5 April, Anna Hazare initiated a movement for passing a stronger anti-corruption bill. When his demand was summarily rejected by the Prime Minister, he began his fast.

According to Anna Hazare, “The dream of India as a strong nation will not be realized without self-reliant, self-sufficient villages, This can be achieved only through social commitment and involvement of the common man.”

This briefly then is Anna’s story.

In 1940, Anna was born into the family of an impoverished unskilled daily wage labourer who fought a losing battle trying to retain his meager land holding. By nature socially aware, he was involved in brawls with antisocial elements. He subsequently became a truck driver in the Indian Army.and during the Indo-Pakistan War of 1965, he was the sole survivor in an exchange of fire.

He has been inspired and has become a social activist courtesy the writings of Vivekananda,Gandhi and Vinoba Bhave. READ MORE…

Reign of the Tin Men

 

By Shoma Chaudhury, Tehelka Magazine dated Aug.27,2011.

Politics in urban India has come to mean a dirty word. But in truth, the loss of politics is among the worst calamities that can befall a society. The art of politics is the ability to understand human nature; come up with big ideas; read a situation astutely; anticipate events; manage situations; steer through minefields; build bridges; take widely diverse people and views along; be game for both soothing words and firm action; play both statesman and strategist. Display leadership. READ MORE

 

On one thing, Murdoch is right

If you still want newspapers that can uncover scandals, then what you need is skilled, determined reporters and rich men

by Christina Patterson, Wednesday, 20 July 2011, The Independent

Even Shakespeare might have paused. Even Shakespeare, looking at the long, long list of characters he’d set down on the page, and thinking about how he could raise some up, and knock them down, and about the circles that linked them, which meant there could be more twists to the tale, and then more, and then more, might have thought that this was enough. He might have thought that it was one thing to have a mad old man wandering around on a heath, whose children were vying for his kingdom, or to have a woman who put power way, way above the “milk of human kindness”, but that it was a bit too much to mix up the two, and then throw in a dozen more. Read More…

California’s hidden hunger strike

Editorial, July 20, 2011, Los Angeles Times.

Conditions in California prisons are so bad that a panel of federal judges ruled that they violate the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, but until recently the ensuing protests came mainly from lawyers rather than the inmates themselves. That changed on July 1, when thousands of inmates at one-third of the state’s prisons started a hunger strike.

A core group of at least 400 inmates in four prisons continues to refuse food, protesting the way the state treats prisoners deemed to be gang members. The strike began in the Special Housing Unit at Pelican Bay State Prison, where 1,100 inmates are isolated in soundproof cells for 22 1/2 hours a day. Their sole reprieve: one hour a day outside in a small area with high concrete walls.

Prison officials say this treatment is necessary to discourage membership in prison gangs, to obtain information on gang activity and to prevent “shot-calling” — the passing of orders from gang leaders to members in other prisons or out on the streets. Moreover, they say the hunger strike is being organized by gang leaders, and some strikers who would rather not participate are being coerced. Prisoner advocates, meanwhile, say such prolonged isolation leads to mental illness and is tantamount to torture. READ…

Solved puzzle reveals fabled Cambodian temple

3 July 2011, AFP.

It has taken half a century, but archaeologists in Cambodia have finally completed the renovation of an ancient Angkor temple described as the world’s largest three dimensional puzzle.

Built around 1060 by King Udayadityavarman II in honour of the Hindu god Shiva, Baphuon was the country’s largest religious building at the time, 35 metres high (114 feet) and measuring 130 by 104 metres (426 x 340 feet).

In 1995, when the area in northwestern Cambodia was again safe to work in, the French government-funded project was restarted under the leadership of architect Pascal Royere from the Ecole francaise d’Extreme-Orient (EFEO).

“It has been said, probably rightly so, that it is the largest-ever 3D puzzle,” Royere told AFP.

The team carefully measured and weighed each block and then relied on archive photos stored in Paris, drawings and the recollections of Cambodian workers to figure out where each part fits. READ..

Scientists say lab-grown meat is ‘inescapable future’

Laboratory grown meat is the “inescapable future of humanity”, given foodbourne illnesses, pollution and animal welfare issues, say two leading scientists.

Writing in a recent issue of the American Journal of Food Technology , Indian researchers Z.F Bhat and H Bhat said that meat biofabrication would “ensure sustainable production of designer, chemically safe and disease-free meat” in controlled conditions.

Noting that standard meat production was a major polluter and consumer of fossil fuels and water resources, with 30% of the earth’s surface used for livestock, Bhat and Bhat also warned that antibiotics use was contributing to the rise of drug-resistant pathogens, with animal illnesses a growing threat to humans.

 With the world population due to hit 9 billion n by 2050, and global meat production rising from 228m (2000) to 465m tonnes, they said: “It no longer makes sense to contribute stable crops towards inefficient meat production, where 1kg of poultry, pork and beef represents 2, 4 and 7 of grain respectively.”

“With cultured meat, the composition, flavour and functional role of meat could be better controlled, the incidence of foodborne disease significant reduced and resources used more efficiently.”

Campaign group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) said it supported science examining lab-grown meat as an eco-friendly ‘methadone’ to the ‘heroin’ of meat eating for “people addicted from childhood to flesh”, given enormous animal suffering and environmental damage caused by the meat industry. READ…

Screen Time Driving Youth Obesity Epidemic

by Michael Smith, MedPage Today. June 27, 2011.

Too much time parked in front of the television or computer screen is driving the epidemic of childhood obesity in the U.S., according to a new policy statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics.

And it’s not just that many teens are couch potatoes, the academy argues in the July issue of Pediatrics: TV advertising drives sales of junk food, children and teens tend to snack while watching TV or online, and late-night use may interfere with sleep.

Currently, the researchers found, U.S. children and teens spend an average of seven hours a day using various forms of media – more time than they spend doing anything except sleeping. READ…

The Picasso of India

 

“M.F. Husain dies at 95; artist was called the Picasso of India”.  by Mark Magnier, Los Angeles Times. June 10, 2011.

M.F.Husain painted an estimated 25,000 works. His epic ‘Mahabharata: The Battle of Ganga and Jamuna’ sold for $1.6 million in 2008. Angered by Hindu hardliners, he left India in 2006 and later became a citizen of Qatar.

During his lifetime, he painted an estimated 25,000 works that in his later years were commanding record sums in keeping with his growing fame. His epic work “Mahabharata: The Battle of Ganga and Jamuna” sold at a 2008 Christie’s auction for $1.6 million.

In the January-February 2011 issue of British cultural magazine Standpoint, critic Nick Cohen said Husain “may be the world’s greatest living artist.” “Husain embodies the spirit of his country,” Cohen added. “The struggles, the optimism and glories of India flow through his work.” READ MORE

 

 

India Simmering

Why the Arab Spring Hasn’t Spread to India – But Should-  by Ranjani Iyer Mohanty. The Atlantic.   May 30 2011

Last summer in Delhi, when a new overpass was built where the massive Outer Ring Road goes over Aruna Asaf Ali Marg, I would see a small family of four taking shelter under the arches. Now that family has grown. There is a community of about 50 people, including more than a dozen children, and their meager belongings. There are two makeshift tents and clotheslines strung across. There are plastic containers of water and a stove. Several women busy themselves tying flowers into small bundles and pointing the children to vehicles that stop at the intersection. The children look into the cars, show the red roses, and plead with the occupants to buy their wares. The more persistent ones tap softly for attention on the closed windows of air-conditioned SUVs. I often wonder what stops them from breaking the glass and shouting “It’s not fair!”

The Indian poor’s apparent willingness to accept neglect at the hands of those in power raises a poignant question that Edward Said asked in a different context: What happens when you are the victim of the victim? Something similar has happened in India. Here, all politicians present themselves as freedom fighters and Gandhians who have suffered long, fought hard for their country, and overthrown the yoke of imperialist rule for the sake of the common man.

Indian farmers, themselves mostly poor, are increasingly agitated. To build a highway to Agra, the government has purchased their farming land for a pittance, but then has resold parts to developers for a hefty profit. This is only the latest of a long list of grievances suffered by farmers whose utter desperation has contributed to thousands of suicides over the past decade. READ MORE….

Health concerns raised over nanoparticles

Titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles, widely used in sun creams and cosmetics, provoke similar inflammatory effects on the lungs as asbestos, new research has found.

A Swiss-French team of scientists warns of future health hazards  caused by nanoparticles. But some doubts have been cast on the findings. The Swiss authorities are set to publish a strategy report on nanomaterials later this year.

Around two million tonnes of TiO2 nanoparticles are produced every year worldwide. They are used as a white pigment in many everyday products like paint, cosmetics, sun cream, vitamins, food colouring and toothpaste.

They found that TiO2 nanoparticles cause similar effects to asbestos and silicone, activating the inflammasome NLRP3 – a complex mechanism responsible for activating inflammation processes – and releasing molecules capable of attacking DNA, proteins and cell membranes.

“With titanium dioxide you accumulate, like asbestos, particles in the lung. You get chronic inflammation and this can last ten or 15 years and the next step is cancer,” Jürg Tschopp, the lead researcher and professor of biochemistry at Lausanne University, told swissinfo.ch.

Tschopp, who was awarded the 2008 Louis-Jeantet Prize for Medicine for his pioneering work in the fields of cell death and inflammation, said he was concerned that nanoparticles could become “the asbestos of the future”.

“Forty years ago we were at the same point with asbestos. There were some indications it was dangerous and could cause cancer, but the data and information was not solid,” he noted. “We cannot exclude at the moment that nanoparticles are as dangerous as asbestos.” READ MORE…

What happens when the mining boom goes bust?

by Mark Horsburgh. April 8, 2011. Sydney Morning Herald.

There is no doubt that Australia is a resource-based economy. We dig, we grow, and then we send the results overseas. But there is no value to be added to what we send. The resource-based product Australia exports is used to create consumer goods, which we buy back. The model works so long as the value of the products we buy back is less than what we sell. And with population growth that could significantly increase import demand, and resources that will eventually wane, support is mounting to look further afield for our next “economic weapon”.

If Australia generates enough new ideas, we can licence for a share of the value generated by the licensee. Of course, to do this it’s essential to create a large number of new ideas compared to the small population. Sweden and Finland are countries with even smaller populations than ours, yet they have created large revenue streams from their intellectual property – in either products sold to the world or licensed intellectual property.

It’s a matter of playing to our strengths. Australia has some of the greatest innovative minds in the world. What we need to do is capture that innovation and commercialise it in the most productive way. READ MORE …