(via Anja M.)

“Ich bin am Ziel, [...] hören Sie mich an. Ich liebe das Leben, – dies ist ein Geständnis. Nehmen Sie es und bewahren Sie es, – ich habe es noch keinem gemacht. Man hat es gesagt, man hat es sogar geschrieben und drucken lassen, dass ich das Leben hasse oder fürchte oder verachte oder verabscheue. Ich habe dies gern gehört, es hat mir geschmeckt; aber darum ist es nicht weniger falsch. Ich liebe das Leben … “

(aus “Tonio Kröger”, von Thomas Mann)

Derby Square Bookstore, 215 Essex Street, in Salem, MA – what a wonderful place!

And after browsing through these pictures, imagine how the owner of the shop looked like.

Exactly!
Wow.

Read the rest of this entry »

In August 2011, Dawkins posted a response in the Washington Post to a statement by presidential candidate Rick Perry about evolution. In it, he rants in typical Dawkins style about the republican party, creationism, intelligent design and the United States.

I think Dawkins gets more and more … readable, actually. I like his ideas, have always liked them, and agree with many of the things he says, although I feel he is not doing a very good political job by the way he states them. It is most certainly extremely condescending and arrogant.

However, this has reached a certain threshold of silliness for me that I can laugh about it. I find it amusing. He has become one of the old grumpy people, which does not invalidate his points.

“In any other party and in any other country, an individual may occasionally rise to the top in spite of being an uneducated ignoramus. In today’s Republican Party ‘in spite of’ is not the phrase we need. Ignorance and lack of education are positive qualifications, bordering on obligatory. Intellect, knowledge and linguistic mastery are mistrusted by Republican voters, who, when choosing a president, would apparently prefer someone like themselves over someone actually qualified for the job.

Any other organization — a big corporation, say, or a university, or a learned society – -when seeking a new leader, will go to immense trouble over the choice. The CVs of candidates and their portfolios of relevant experience are meticulously scrutinized, their publications are read by a learned committee, references are taken up and scrupulously discussed, the candidates are subjected to rigorous interviews and vetting procedures. Mistakes are still made, but not through lack of serious effort.

The population of the United States is more than 300 million and it includes some of the best and brightest that the human species has to offer, probably more so than any other country in the world. There is surely something wrong with a system for choosing a leader when, given a pool of such talent and a process that occupies more than a year and consumes billions of dollars, what rises to the top of the heap is George W Bush. Or when the likes of Rick Perry or Michele Bachmann or Sarah Palin can be mentioned as even remote possibilities.”

Read the whole thing!

Worth living today: The Iliac Crest

The journal Science announced the breakthrough of the year 2011 today: a study reported in the paper “Prevention of HIV-1 Infection with Early Antiretroviral Therapy“.

The study involved more than 1700 heterosexual couples, of whom one partner was infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and the other was not at the start of the trial. All those infected still had relatively intact immune systems. The study gave antiretroviral drugs to half of the infected people and delayed giving treatment to the other half until their immune systems declined to a dangerous degree. The results of this early treatment with a cocktail of antiviral drugs were dramatic, lowering the rate at which the HIV-free partner became infected 20-fold, while also improving outcomes for the infected partner. In combination with other promising clinical trials, the results have galvanized efforts to end the world’s AIDS epidemic in a way that would have been inconceivable even a year ago. “The goal of an AIDS-free generation is ambitious, but it is possible,” U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told scientists last month.

Bruce Alberts ends his summary about the year 2011 with very critical words:

Not all of the news for science has been good this year. Regrettably, we live in an age where “science denial” has become fashionable. For instance, in the United States, the pressure to conform has become so great that even many politicians who know better have become unwilling to speak out to support what science knows about climate change. Part of the reason is that politicians need to raise funds to compete effectively in elections, and the large amount of money spent by special interest groups distorts the public debate. To counter such science denial, I have repeatedly argued on this page that scientists need to pay much more attention to science education. Teaching is not the same as simply telling students what one knows—a common approach pursued through lecturing. Instead, the scientific community needs to strongly support evidence-based methods for improving how students learn science both in college and at lower levels, focusing on empowering all students with the reasoning and problem-solving skills of scientists [...]

– Source: Science Magazine

Opeth & Norway.
Now I need to find a conference in Norway so that I get my plane tickets reimbursed.

Toronto

It took about 5 hours to get from Ann Arbor to Windsor, and another 5 hours to get from Windsor to Toronto. Windsor is seperated from Detroit by the Detroit River, which is at the same time the border between the US and Canada. Usually, getting from Ann Arbor to Windsor should not take more than 2 hours, and the main reasons for the delay were: (1) the very unreliable US train system AmTrek. After 2 hours of waiting, I took the GreyHound bus to Detroit instead. (2) My cabbie, who was stopped at the border “because, yes Sir, your German documents are all in best order, but your driver is known for bringing illegal immigrants into the country, and we cannot let you continue your journey.”
The weather in Toronto was amazing. It wasn’t particularly warm, but sunny the whole weekend, leading to a complicated pattern of reflections of reflections (of reflections) of sunlight within the network of towers of steel, glass and mirrors. I walked around for three days, sometimes accompanied by my wonderful host (whom I met on couchsurfing. If you still haven’t signed up, you might want to).

Worth living Toronto: Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been here for 3 months now, and wanted to take a bus for the first time yesterday. So far, I have been getting around nicely with my bike or simply per pedes, but winter is coming – and it is coming a lot later than usually (I am not complaining).

I stood at the bus stop, waiting for my bus, which did not come. Another bus came, though. The ladybusdriverperson opened the doors, but I told her I was waiting for another bus, for my bus. I put my earphones back in, and after 20 seconds the same bus arrived again at the stop, this time from the other direction, driving backwards. The wonderful ladybusdriverperson told me that she had pondered about what I had said, and there was no other bus coming at this particular bus stop for another 5 hours (my bus apparently takes a prolonged fiesta between 10am and 5pm), but I could drive with her and she would explain me how to get to my destination.

And she did. In Ann Arbor, busses drive at an interval of around 30 minutes. The busdrivers have old black massive phones, connected to the machinery via cable, and before we arrived at the main transfer point, my wonderful ladybusdriverperson asked around which passengers were trying to catch which busses. After she had received this information she used her phone and told someone (I did not hear whom) that the other busses should wait.

People are special in the MidWest, my supervisor said. I am beginning to think this is true.