Couple of cool articles this week. This one is to do with Archimedes:
Highly focused X-rays produced at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center were used last week to begin deciphering sections of the 174-page text that have not yet been revealed. The X-rays cause iron in the hidden ink to glow."One of the delightful things is we don't know what it's going to say," said William Noel, head of the Archimedes Palimpsest project at the Walters Art Gallery.
Scholars believe the treatise was copied by a scribe in the 10th century from Archimedes' original Greek scrolls, written in the third century B.C. It was erased about 200 years later by a monk who reused the parchment for a prayer book, creating a twice-used parchment book known as a "palimpsest." In the 12th century, parchment -- scraped and dried animal skins -- was rare and costly, and Archimedes' works were in less demand.
The palimpsest was bought at auction for $2 million in 1998 by an anonymous private collector who loaned it to the Baltimore museum and funded studies to reveal the text. About 80 percent of the text has been uncovered so far.
"It's the only one that contains diagrams that may bear any resemblance to the diagrams Archimedes himself drew in the sand in Syracuse 2000 years ago," Noel said.
This other one is about creating universes in a lab.
Fun stuff!A radical new project could permit human beings to create a "baby universe" in a laboratory in Japan. While it sounds like a dangerous undertaking, the physicists involved believe that if the project is successful, the space-time around a tiny point within our universe will be distorted in such a way that it will begin to form a new superfluid space, and eventually break off, separate in all respects from our experience of space and time, causing no harm to the fabric of our universe.
The project takes as its starting point two basic theories about the foundations of our universe: the big bang and inflation theory. The big bang theory, as many readers are well aware, observes that all objects in the known universe appear to be moving away from one another, suggesting that the universe was jump-started when all matter and energy were concentrated in an inconceivably tiny space, allowing them to overcome binding forces and causing a cosmic explosion.
It is well-tested and consistent with all currently accepted models for general cosmology, as tested against advanced theoretical and observational physics. But it is only one piece of the puzzle. Inflation is a key theory, developed in 1981, when MIT physicist Alan Guth observed that there appeared to have been a period immediately following the big bang when the universe "inflated" rapidly, allowing distinct regions of matter and energy to function comfortably free from any forces that might cause them to collapse against each other or disrupt each other's evolution.
This project is not exactly theoretical physics at work. It is closer to a physical application of observed phenomena, in combination, with the aim of achieving an as yet untested physical effect. Inflation theory helps provide the means of understanding how that effect might be brought about.
My Fantasy Team Report
First, the big news. My AFL team which was on the brink of elimination from the Top-8 in the league pulled a massive win out of thin air and downed the 5th place Happy Hermits. Don't ask me how they did it, but a depleted team with 2 blank spots managed 1788 points, their highest score by 80 points in the season. I guess there's such a thing as finishing strong. I'm guessing all of 'my teams' (teams where my players have heavy representation) won. This was in spite of my keystone franchaise player Luke Hodge only managing a meager, meager, meager 33 points. - C'arn Luke!
So... onto the finals. The first opponent turns out to be Happy Hermits again. Oh well, I probably won't be that lucky again, but it's nice to have one fluke win when I've had 3 tough luck losses this season.
Meanwhile my Baseball Combat Wombats are in first. It's a tight race this year as all the top 5 teams are in a cluster above 100 points. In fact, there's no 10th place team as the battle to get off the wooden spoon rages on as well, as of this writing.
This trading season I was offered A-Rod by 'My Time To Shine' three times. I even counter-offered with a straight-up swap for David Wright which I think is a trade I'd rather NOT do, but it was the best challenge trade. He wanted Johan Santana. Indeed, Johan Santana who is my best pitcher was the target of many a trade offer this trade season. So after trade talks with me failed, 2 of the parties who were after Sanatana consumated a blockbuster trade: R.Howard-Soriano-A.Ramirez-Rincon forTexeira-A-Rod-Bonderman. Now, that's a BAD trade compared to getting David Wright straight up for A-Rod. more to the point I don't know why he's willing to do this at this point in the season as it doesn't make him better.
Mediot Watch
During the week there was a shooting in Seattle, and a mouth shooting off by a famous drunken Celeb, our very own Mel Gibson. Turns out Mel didn't haave much nice stuff to say about 'The Jews'.
Mel Gibson acknowledged making anti-Semitic slurs during a drunken driving arrest and begged Jewish community leaders Tuesday to meet with him to find "the appropriate path for healing." A sheriff's watchdog, meanwhile, said deputies appeared to have handled Gibson's arrest properly.Whew. Does anybody smell the foul stench of hypocrisy? And I do say this even as bombs fall in Lebanon - You don't hear this Rabbi Baron speaking up against that war. Speculation for a 'motive' for this alleged media-hate-crime is mounting, some claiming because Mel Gibson 's a radical Catholic and all, but there's this interesting article here.
It was the actor's second apology since sheriff's deputies stopped him for speeding early Friday on Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu, where officials said he was doing 87 in a 45 mph zone. He was arrested for investigation of drunken driving after a hostile, offensive confrontation with deputies.
The latest apology went far beyond the first - which spoke primarily to deputies - by addressing Jewish groups directly.
"I want to apologize specifically to everyone in the Jewish community for the vitriolic and harmful words," Gibson said in a statement issued by his publicist Tuesday. "Please know from my heart that I am not an anti-Semite. I am not a bigot. Hatred of any kind goes against my faith. ... There will be many in that community who will want nothing to do with me, and that would be understandable. But I pray that that door is not forever closed."
Jewish groups generally said they wanted to see proof of Gibson's repentance before meeting with him.
"We always felt that there was another agenda, but we never called him an anti-Semite. I guess this moment in Malibu finished the circle, and so now it all comes together," said Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League.
"But I'd like to put it behind him, I hope he wants to put it behind him, but you need to work at it. You can't just say I'm no longer a drunk; you can't just say I'm no longer a bigot. You need to work hard at it, and we're ready to help him."
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Rabbi Baron added: "In our faith we are commanded to forgive when the offending party takes the necessary steps and offers an apology from the heart."
TMZ contacted Rabbi Baron, who is vacationing in Spain. He said: "Some members of the congregation were skeptical about Mr. Gibson's recent statement and felt he was absolute anti-Semite. My response was 'better a repentant anti-Semite than an unrepentant anti-Semite.'"
Gibson initially apologized for the drunken behavior, and conspicuously didn’t mention his “anti-Semitic tirade.” But once the tirade got out and the TMZ.com web site reported that the LA County Police were trying to downplay the anti-Semitism, the first statement didn’t seem to do much good.Shaheed Mel Gibson! Heh. Whether it's true or not, it's certainly funny.
Having sobered up quickly, and recognizing that Jew-bashing in a Jewish city like Hollywood isn’t the same as Jew-bashing in Tehran and can quickly undermine a career in acting, Gibson issued a second statement. This time he begged for forgiveness, asking Jewish leaders help him “find a path to forgiveness."
Actually, the original term probably was “beat a path” to forgiveness.
Gibson’s publicist released a statement that began, "Hatred of any kind goes against my faith … I'm not just asking for forgiveness. I would like to take it one step further, and meet with leaders in the Jewish community, with whom I can have a one-on-one discussion to discern the appropriate path for healing."
Ah, which faith is that? I thought anti-Semitism began in the Christian faith, didn’t it?
Of course, we don’t know which group of “Jewish leaders” Gibson was hoping to sit down with, the ones who lead the community or the ones that he sees heading up the ABC TV network.
Days after Gibson’s remarks were made public, ABC TV announced it was canning the Holocaust TV mini-series Gibson had signed a deal to produce about a Catholic family that protects a Jew during the Nazi Holocaust. Right, another let’s make excuses for the Catholics who some claim have institutionalized anti-Semitism in their religious teachings. ABC will release his other movie“ Apocalypto,” about the ancient Mayan empire.
What about Tehran?
Of course, Tehran declared Gibson “shaheed,” or martyr in Arabic, and announced they would supply him with katyusha rockets to fight the “Zionist infidels.” Ahmadinejad said that with fronts in Gaza, Lebanon and Hollywood, the Jews would really be under siege.
Surely the world is losing perspective when there's a war raging on in Lebanon again and the big news is "drunk actor mouths off obscene remarks when under the influence of alcohol". It doesn't excuse the behaviour of Gibson at all but, come on, who's excusing the behaviour of the Israelis?
Then of course we find this piece in The Age.
When it comes to anti-Semitic outbursts from a Hollywood celebrity such as Gibson, what's more interesting than the fading star's drunken prejudice is what it says about more important, if less sexy, matters.Well, the short answer is, we live in stupid times; the depth of which can only be measured in stacked lobotomies. It stands to reason that the most important issues of our times are stupid ones. Hate-mongering sells papers as it did in the streets of Munich in the 1930s. Gibson should have just thrown his mobile phone at the cop instead.
So here's what's so ironic about all this: Gibson's supporters - Jewish and non-Jewish - are among Israel's staunchest supporters. Evangelical Zionists such as Falwell and Robertson are fundamentalists who are opposed to Israel giving up even an inch of what they consider to be the Holy Land and that includes Gaza and the West Bank.
They believe that the return of all Jews to their ancient homeland is a pre-condition for the second coming of Christ - these people are a powerful force within the Republican Party. Somewhat reluctantly - because they know this fervour for Israel does not necessarily mean a love of Jews - most of the major American Jewish organisations in America have accepted the embrace of the Christian Zionists.
And so the loudest and fiercest supporters of Israel during this war between Israel and Hezbollah have been conservative evangelicals. Trust us, they say. "If we Christian Zionists reckon The Passion Of The Christ is not anti-Jewish and that Gibson deserves forgiveness and is a pretty good bloke with a drinking problem, we should be taken at our word. After all, look at our record on Israel."
On the other hand, most of those who have been most severe and uncompromising in their criticism of Gibson have, in the main, been equally severe in their criticism of Israel and not just in this present conflict.
They have taken the opportunity to hammer Gibson and in the process, establish once and for all, that any suggestion of even a scintilla of anti-Jewish feeling in their very harsh criticism of Israel and the so-called Jewish/Israel lobby is just totally outrageous.
About Mel Gibson, there can be little doubt about where he stands on the question of the Jews. He is an anti-Semite in search of a cure. As for his supporters and some of his detractors, who knows what they are on about?
One day they'll hang me for my studied ambivalence.
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