Danny's Pathologically Polymathic: August 2006

Can you really not see? Amira Hass asks her fellow Israelis - Haaretz [via RW]

golf courses or people? - Guardian

seems like a reasonable case for "eminent domain" expropriation to me

an obituary of Naguib Mahfouz - Guardian

my reviews: Akhenaten and Respected Sir, Wedding Song, and The Search

Han Shaogong's novel of rural China - A Dictionary of Maqiao [review]

stories from US soldiers who are conscientious objectors in Canada - Times [via SideS]

and "Over 2,000 members of Britain's armed forces have gone long-term Awol since the war in Iraq started, and most are still missing."

out of control laws against "child pornography" - BB

Nasrallah gives a polished television interview - Telegraph

"Nasrallah chose to give the interview to the liberal, secular New TV station, rather than to his propaganda outlet, al Manar, and the questioner was a woman journalist"

vale Don Chip, who liberalised Australian censorship in the early 70s - ABC [via EFA]

"When I first became Minister the list of banned books was banned."

the theory and practice of bullet lists - EdwardTufte [via RW]

boycott threats are forcing retailers to pressure suppliers - CSM

a personal survey of New Orleans, a year after Katrina - Kuro5hin

how long before the British lose an entire platoon in Afghanistan? - B+T

am I notable? Wikipedia is debating my deletion a second time

last time I thought "delete" was a no-brainer, but having seen some of the stuff Wikipedia covers it no longer seems quite so obvious

Nokia and Dell do best at e-waste disposal - Economist

running Linux on an iPod - MacWorld

this could almost tempt me to get one...

most Dutch women give birth without access to anaesthetics - CT

part of the explanation is midwife control of births

Pakistanis try to recover Islam from the extremists - Eteraz [via Majik]

in the US, Democrats have more children than Republicans - HalfSigma [via CT]

the average Democrat has 1.94 children and the average Republican has only 1.86 children

an overview of the politics, history and prospects of the DRC - HH

(that's the Democratic Republic of the Congo)

Tropical Storm Ernesto forms in Caribbean; Central Pacific Hurricane Ioke reaches Cat 5 - Wunderblog

weather model predictions for Ernesto are all over the place

ecotourism resources in China - SinglePlanet

tone deafness not an insurmountable problem for tonal languages - SinoSplice - Pinyin

"profound musical disability makes no real difference in understanding and talking a tonal language"

why western Himalayan glaciers are growing - Guardian

I've seen the Gilgit/Indus junction in the photo

foxes have established a foothold on Tasmania - NatGeo

scores of native species may be at risk

a longer piece on Perelman and the Poincare Hypothesis - NYer [via Cosma]

aid groups in south Lebanon can't avoid Hezbollah - NYT

they are the most trustworthy and effective local organisation

George Bush as narcissist - Informed [the comments are interesting]

"Narcissism, in its subtle but pervasive essence, has become a virtue in America."

an archivist's nightmare: NASA, Parkes, and the Apollo 11 tapes - Barista

Journal of Theoretical Biology publishes screwball stats - Columbia [via Freak]

falsely showing: "Engineers have more sons, nurses have more daughters"

Japanese orphans were interned in WWII?! - LAT [via Barista]

a war over water in Sri Lanka - Frontline

an Australian visits New Orleans - Elsewhere [5 entries so far]

the problems with company pensions - NYer [via RW]

Lebanon commmited to blocking Israeli rearmament and killing ~~Olmert~~Netanyahu - NYT

or did I get that the wrong way around?

what does it mean for a patent to be "fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory"? - CInfo [via OSWALKD]

Nokia asks a Delaware court for a ruling

are we living on a "failed planetary nucleus"? - Stross

Bertrand Russell was not a nice man? - CT

from his autobiography, he just comes across as brutally honest about himself

Catholic and private unis best at de-indoctrinating "born again" students - ProRev

Hezbullah didn't murder SLA collaborators - LRB

"Hizbullah's achievement, perhaps ironically for a religious party headed by men in turbans, is that it belongs to the modern age."

George Bush reads Camus' The Stranger - Prospect [via CR]

"My anger at The New York Times subsides somewhat as I skim Foucault and Sartre."

no surprise: Lebanon's army views Israel as the enemy, not Hezbollah - Guardian

"The UN's expected deployment of 15,000 troops is seen as an additional force to assist in Lebanon's defence against Israel."

India's Naxalite problem - Economist

nine months lost at sea, eating raw fish and the occasional seagull - Guardian

why Pluto is not a planet (Cthulhu notwithstanding) - Westerfield [via MLite]

Environmental Consequences of the Conquest of Mexico - A Plague of Sheep [review]

will Perelman turn down a Fields Medal and a Millenium Prize? - Guardian

his proof of the Poincare Conjecture seems to have held up

a critical look at the updated Loeb Classical Library - Slate [via CR]

no major changes in Israel's government are likely - HH

A False Sense of Insecurity - Cato [PDF] - BB

"Assessed in broad but reasonable context, terrorism generally does not do much damage. The costs of terrorism very often are the result of hasty, ill-considered, and overwrought reactions."

online: Innovation Happens Elsewhere: Open Source as Business Strategy - DreamSongs [via Link]

Bill Gates speaks out on HIV and womens rights - Guardian

Robert Fisk reports from the rubble of southern Lebanon - Independent

"the 30,000-strong Israeli army reported to be racing north to the Litani river never existed. It is unlikely that there were yesterday more than 1,000 Israeli soldiers left in Lebanon"

An Interdisciplinary Approach to Designing Fast Networked Devices - Network Algorithmics [review]

what has happened to the Israeli army? but its failure may be a blessing - AntiWar - Haaretz

understanding chess expertise - SciAm [vi RW]

"motivation appears to be a more important factor than innate ability in the development of expertise"

(see also my review of Genius Explained)

with warming and overexploitation of fish, the jellyfish are taking over - Independent

a depressing overview of Somalia and the broader Horn - Economist

beautiful Mongolian women [photos]

the libertarian analytical vice: assuming fixed quality of government - Marginal [via CT]

the Israelis will bomb hospitals that treat Hezbollah soldiers - Seattle

Tibor Fischer - Voyage to the End of the Room [review]

Roosevelt University bans discussion of Palestine in "world religions" class - Guardian

"nothing to be mentioned in class, textbooks and examinations that could possibly open Judaism to criticism"

problems with China's semi-privatised education system - Economist

in US exile, Ngugi wa Thiong'o still writes in Gikuyu - Independent [via 3q]

so far I've read his novel Matigari

an Israeli remembers 1982 as a 12-year-old - Guardian

Israel is blocking humanitarian aid to Lebanon - Independent

the French are getting supplies in, using a warship with anti-aircraft defenses

(I think Lebanon should offer a military base in Tyre to the Chinese - or anyone else capable of protecting the country)

an immortal parasitic dog? infective cancers - Loom [via RW]

strongest Chinese typhoon in 50 years forces evacuation of millions - Guardian

Israel threatens Lebanon's very existence - Guardian [via Informed]

Israel commits to to expansion of the war - FT

but it seems the US has called them off

chess players cheating in World Open - ChessBase [via RW]

A Prehistory of the North: Human Settlement of the Higher Latitudes [review]

polo in northern Pakistan - CSM

in 1999 I saw a polo game in Chitral, and the Shandur Pass polo ground

an overview of cognitive differences between men and women - Economist

an account of the leadup to the Israeli attack on Lebanon - Guardian [via AntiWar]

generalised life-cycle of scyphozoan jellyfish - UNSW [via Dinets]

Israeli government analysis of Hezbollah attacks, May 2000 to June 2006 - gov.il [via TBray]

hardly reads like an "existential threat"

interesting book on British administration of southern Iraq - CSM - Amazon

an amusing account of a Harry Potter conference - Guardian [via RW]

a mix of slash porn and lit crit to put Postmodern Pooh to shame

Magnum Photos is changing with the times - PhysOrg [via RW]

there are no public bomb shelters in Arab Israeli communities - Haaretz

Symantec takes out the Church of England's "Virtual Liturgy" - ZDnet [via SideS]

the passive voice needs better PR - Lang

bug found in well-known implementation of binary search - GGresearch

"the binary search program that Bentley proved correct and subsequently tested in Chapter 5 of Programming Pearls contains a bug"

a look at NORAD's tapes from 11 September 2001 - Vanity [via Barista]

tale of woeful organisation: the passengers on United 93 had crashed it before North East Air Defence even knew the plane had been hijacked

last week, Sweden lost control of a nuclear reactor for 20 minutes - Spiegel [via ProRev]

"officials have taken half the country's nuclear power plants offline until it can ensure their safe operation."

the US Democratic Party is all aboard for World War III - Billmon [link fixed]

"While the party nomenklatura is finally, after three blood years, making dovish noises about the Iraq fiasco, I think their loyalty to Israel will almost certainly snap them back into line during the coming 'debate' over war with Iran."

Tony Blair is an ignorant bigot - CP [via RW]

but maybe not as ignorant and bigoted as his master

father of Australian Federation Henry Parkes supported terrorism - Crikey

new discoveries about spirochete flagella - Panda

Sunni/Christian/Shia/secular Arabs across the Middle East are united for once - Guardian

"admiration for Hizbullah stretches beyond disaffected militants to take in teachers, writers, broadcasters, and doctors"

an overview of the computer Go situation - Guardian

calling for help when the house is burning down - Blood+Treasure [via RW]

before and after bombing photos of Beirut from above - EI

all about stromatolites - fossilmall

brief overview of pharma/journal conflicts of interest - IHT

which nine languages have over 100 million native speakers? - hint+answer

50,000 people in Tyre with dwindling food, water, and power - Guardian

the US tries to expand control of Ramadi - WP [via AntiWar]

"be polite, be professional, and have a plan to kill everyone you meet"

some basic sleep science - Science [via 3q]

tip: "Put the clock under the bed or turn it so that you cannot see it."

new estimates of marine bacterial diversity - mongabay [with photos]

can one righteous man save Israel? - Guardian

Limbaugh and bin Laden: it's ok to kill civilians who support evil governments - Billmon

Jean-Philippe Toussaint's novel - Television [review]

a procrastinating academic in Berlin gives up watching tv