Happy Confederation Day!
On this day, let's remember the Fathers of Confederation by going to the awesome interactive picture in the Canadian Encyclopedia!
Happy 141st Birthday, Canada!
Showing posts with label history. Show all posts
Showing posts with label history. Show all posts
Monday, February 25, 2008
Born at the wrong time
Well, today is my 31st birthday. I know of no better way to celebrate it than to recollect the tyrannical fashion dictatorship into which I was born. In honour of the year of my birth, I present the horrors that passed for fashion back then: the 1977 JC Penny catalogue!
Aaaah!!! My eyes!!! Ze googles do nuh-sing!
Well, today is my 31st birthday. I know of no better way to celebrate it than to recollect the tyrannical fashion dictatorship into which I was born. In honour of the year of my birth, I present the horrors that passed for fashion back then: the 1977 JC Penny catalogue!
Also, judging by the sheer amount of matching his/hers outfits, in 1977 it was apparently considered pretty stylish for couples to dress alike. These couples look happy, don't they?
Aaaah!!! My eyes!!! Ze googles do nuh-sing!
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Heartless War
Today is the 63rd anniversary of the firebombing of Dresden, Germany during World War II:
I've discussed the aerial bombardment of civilian population centres before, and Dresden is a particularly noteworthy part of the controversy. It has been immortalized in Kurt Vonnegut's most famous novel, Slaughterhouse-Five, which drew upon his experiences as a POW in Dresden during the attack, and how he and his fellow prisoners were drafted by the Germans to assist in the mass burials. Infamously, the chief authority of the devastation of the attack (even quoted by Vonnegut in his novel), was David Irving's The Destruction of Dresden. Irving's casualty figures cleaved closely to Goebbel's and for decades were considered authoritative. With Irving now largely seen as a Nazi sympathizer, much of his work is considered discredited by most historians.
This has spurred me to finish reading Frederick Taylor's Dresden: Tuesday, Feb. 13, 1945, which presents evidence that counters much of the conventional understanding about the bombing, notably:
I will post my own review of Taylor once I finish. Until then, let's all hope we are never the victims of such mass destruction like the citizens of Dresden, nor will we have to make a choice concerning a city full of the enemy's civilians.
Today is the 63rd anniversary of the firebombing of Dresden, Germany during World War II:
The bombing of Dresden by the British Royal Air Force (RAF) and United States Army Air Force (USAAF) between February 13 and February 15, 1945, 12 weeks before the surrender of the German Wehrmacht, remains one of the most controversial Allied actions of the Second World War. The raids saw 1,300 heavy bombers drop over 3,900 tons of high-explosive bombs and incendiary devices in under 15 hours, destroying 13 square miles (34 km²) of the city, the baroque capital of the German state of Saxony, and causing a firestorm that consumed the city centre. Estimates of civilian casualties vary greatly, but recent publications place the figure between 24,000 and 40,000.
The Allies described the operation as the justified bombing of a military and industrial target, which was a major rail transportation and communication centre, housing 110 factories and 50,000 workers in support of the German war effort. Against this, several researchers have argued that Dresden was a cultural landmark of little or no military significance, a "Florence on the Elbe," as it was known, and the attacks were not proportional for the commensurate military gains.
In the first few decades after the war, some estimates of the number killed were as high as 300,000, in part because of misinformation spread just after the bombing by Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's minister of propaganda. As a result, many charged that it was a callous slaughter of civilians comparable to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with some historians arguing that it was a war crime. Later assessments lowered the casualty figures by a factor of ten or more, yet the raids continue to be included among the worst examples of civilian suffering caused by strategic bombing, and have become one of the moral causes célèbres of the Second World War.
I've discussed the aerial bombardment of civilian population centres before, and Dresden is a particularly noteworthy part of the controversy. It has been immortalized in Kurt Vonnegut's most famous novel, Slaughterhouse-Five, which drew upon his experiences as a POW in Dresden during the attack, and how he and his fellow prisoners were drafted by the Germans to assist in the mass burials. Infamously, the chief authority of the devastation of the attack (even quoted by Vonnegut in his novel), was David Irving's The Destruction of Dresden. Irving's casualty figures cleaved closely to Goebbel's and for decades were considered authoritative. With Irving now largely seen as a Nazi sympathizer, much of his work is considered discredited by most historians.
This has spurred me to finish reading Frederick Taylor's Dresden: Tuesday, Feb. 13, 1945, which presents evidence that counters much of the conventional understanding about the bombing, notably:
- The casualty figures were probably between 25,000 and 40,000, not 130,000 and 500,000
- Contrary to the conventional understanding, Dresden was home to several industries vital to the German war effort
- Far from being an "innocent" city, Dresden enthusiastically supported National Socialism and anti-Semitism before Hitler even came to power. The handful of Jews left in Dresden were scheduled for a likely death march a few days after the bombing
- Dresden was an important rail hub and supply trains to the Eastern Front went through it almost exclusively.
- There is no doubt spreading terror among the civilian populace was among the goals of RAF Bomber Command. However, as my earlier post noted, this was hardly a discredited tactic among bombing strategists--London and Paris were still targets of German V-1 and V-2 rocket attacks, so even among the many pilots who took issue with the bombing of a civilian population centre, most would have found a good reason to get past it
Taylor doesn't deny that the question of whether it was worth stooping to such tactics remains a painful one. His quarrel is with the notion that Dresden was exceptional, or at least intentionally so. He points out that previous and subsequent raids on other cities aimed to be just as destructive, but didn't succeed because weather or human error or some other unforeseen factor interfered. Hamburg, a larger city than Dresden, took more casualties when it was bombed in 1943, and the towns of Pforzheim and Darmstadt lost a greater percentage of their population when their turn came. Conditions in Dresden combined to create the firebombing equivalent of a perfect storm. That the same thing did not happen elsewhere wasn't because the Allies didn't try.
I will post my own review of Taylor once I finish. Until then, let's all hope we are never the victims of such mass destruction like the citizens of Dresden, nor will we have to make a choice concerning a city full of the enemy's civilians.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Playing it safe in space?
Sir Edmund Hillary, the New Zealander who first conquered Mt. Everest alongside Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, died a couple of weeks ago at the age of 88.
The New York Times ran a good obituary of Hillary, not excluding Tenzing's contribution like many accounts do. I was most struck by this passage:
I discussed this in my review of Matt Hern's Watch Yourself, where I postulated that progress requires risk. The space program (by which I mean the combined human endeavour to explore space, not any specific nation's efforts) has resulted in 22 deaths among astronauts/cosmonauts, or five percent of all people who've been in space.
Considering the high human cost that was involved in exploring this planet (which still occurs), is the human cost of space travel too high? This is a notion explored by Warren Ellis and Colleen Doran in their excellent graphic novel, Orbiter. The space program is dead, the last nail in the coffin being the disappearance of a space shuttle. Years later, the shuttle returns, and a group of out-of-work space scientists are brought together to learn its mysteries...
The cynic in me wonders if the "human cost" of space exploration is the factor, or if the monetary cost is as much to blame. Does our trepidation of space travel have as much to do with the failure of Pathfinder as with the Columbia explosion? Is the instant disintegration of hundreds of millions of dollars and years of research too expensive a blow to our immediate gratification, consumerist, rate-of-return culture?
Sir Edmund Hillary, the New Zealander who first conquered Mt. Everest alongside Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, died a couple of weeks ago at the age of 88.
The New York Times ran a good obituary of Hillary, not excluding Tenzing's contribution like many accounts do. I was most struck by this passage:
The imperial explorer is now an anomaly. Much energy has been expended in recent decades showing just how closely many adventurers have been associated with the more venal aspects of the past, how claims to territory and control have turned triumph into cruelty. In contrast, a new explorer is imagined. The postmodern pioneer is not heroic, but deferential, putting little at risk, desiring safety above adventure, consideration above assertion, breaking new ground by giving the old a different shape.
This has also affected notions of risk and safety. This is most evident in the once thriving United States space program, which, unlike almost every exploratory project in world history, is intensely sensitive to loss of life and mission failure, focused on a kind of hygienic pioneering. In "The Right Stuff," Tom Wolfe showed how early astronauts were seen by traditional test pilots not as heroes, but as capsule-enclosed, passive creatures, padded and protected and stripped of initiative.
...
Is it that we have become spoiled by so much being easy and safe that we believe everything must be? Is this also why lovers of extreme sport seek such bizarre thrills (snowboarding down Everest!)? Otherwise "danger" is reserved for contestants on reality shows like "Survivor" and expunged from reality itself, which we believe should be subject to rational control.
I discussed this in my review of Matt Hern's Watch Yourself, where I postulated that progress requires risk. The space program (by which I mean the combined human endeavour to explore space, not any specific nation's efforts) has resulted in 22 deaths among astronauts/cosmonauts, or five percent of all people who've been in space.
Considering the high human cost that was involved in exploring this planet (which still occurs), is the human cost of space travel too high? This is a notion explored by Warren Ellis and Colleen Doran in their excellent graphic novel, Orbiter. The space program is dead, the last nail in the coffin being the disappearance of a space shuttle. Years later, the shuttle returns, and a group of out-of-work space scientists are brought together to learn its mysteries...
The cynic in me wonders if the "human cost" of space exploration is the factor, or if the monetary cost is as much to blame. Does our trepidation of space travel have as much to do with the failure of Pathfinder as with the Columbia explosion? Is the instant disintegration of hundreds of millions of dollars and years of research too expensive a blow to our immediate gratification, consumerist, rate-of-return culture?
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
Book Review: Red Moon Rising by Matthew Brzezinski
October 4, 2007 marked an important historical anniversary. The 50th anniversary of humanity's exploration of outer space. On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial object launched by human beings to escape the Earth's gravity (for six months, but a milestone).
In Red Moon Rising, Matthew Brzezinski covers the intense rivalries that served as the catalyst to the great space race between the United States and the Soviet Union, which would eventually culminate in landing men on the moon, and laid the foundations for today's space program, including the International Space Station.
Although the obvious rivalry between the Americans and the Soviets plays out over the course of Brzezinski's account, many other more personal conflicts come to the front of the stage. For the USSR's head of missile development, Sergei Korolev, his childhood obsession to touch space drove him relentlessly. Even years spent in Stalin's gulag did not dash the dream from him. His drive to put a satellite in orbit allowed him to navigate the treacherous waters of the Soviet military community.
Rivalries were, if anything, were more pronounced on the American side of the missile race. The army, navy, and nascent air force all had ballistic missile programs in the works, though it was the Army's that would place the first American satellite in orbit, thanks largely to the stubbornness of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency's commander, Major General John B. Medaris, and ABMA's chief engineer, Wernher von Braun, the man behind the German V-2 rockets.
Brzezinski's book is a fast-paced, enjoyable read giving a lot of insight into the scientific and political environments of the USA and USSR of the late 1950s. The personalities involved leap off the page and come alive, shaping the course of the historical narrative. Highly recommended.
October 4, 2007 marked an important historical anniversary. The 50th anniversary of humanity's exploration of outer space. On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial object launched by human beings to escape the Earth's gravity (for six months, but a milestone).
In Red Moon Rising, Matthew Brzezinski covers the intense rivalries that served as the catalyst to the great space race between the United States and the Soviet Union, which would eventually culminate in landing men on the moon, and laid the foundations for today's space program, including the International Space Station.
Although the obvious rivalry between the Americans and the Soviets plays out over the course of Brzezinski's account, many other more personal conflicts come to the front of the stage. For the USSR's head of missile development, Sergei Korolev, his childhood obsession to touch space drove him relentlessly. Even years spent in Stalin's gulag did not dash the dream from him. His drive to put a satellite in orbit allowed him to navigate the treacherous waters of the Soviet military community.
Rivalries were, if anything, were more pronounced on the American side of the missile race. The army, navy, and nascent air force all had ballistic missile programs in the works, though it was the Army's that would place the first American satellite in orbit, thanks largely to the stubbornness of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency's commander, Major General John B. Medaris, and ABMA's chief engineer, Wernher von Braun, the man behind the German V-2 rockets.
Brzezinski's book is a fast-paced, enjoyable read giving a lot of insight into the scientific and political environments of the USA and USSR of the late 1950s. The personalities involved leap off the page and come alive, shaping the course of the historical narrative. Highly recommended.
Sunday, June 03, 2007
Hometown History
So this weekend I finally went to the annual reenactment of the Battle of Stoney Creek, a significant event in the War of 1812. I lived about 25 years of my life in Stoney Creek, but had never been to this event, so I took a day off work to finally catch it.
There was a number of vendors in period costume selling period items, but the real draw was the reenactment itself. There were two battles, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. These videos capture parts of the evening battle:
So this weekend I finally went to the annual reenactment of the Battle of Stoney Creek, a significant event in the War of 1812. I lived about 25 years of my life in Stoney Creek, but had never been to this event, so I took a day off work to finally catch it.
There was a number of vendors in period costume selling period items, but the real draw was the reenactment itself. There were two battles, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. These videos capture parts of the evening battle:
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Bring back those golden oldies...
Senator Vivienne Poy will be visiting our library system for Asian Heritage Month, the annual observance of the history and cultural contributions of Asian-Canadians to our country. Poy, as Senator, introduced the Senate motion for the federal government to recognize this event.
One of Senator Poy's goals is to amend the words to the national anthem, changing the line "True patriot love in all thy sons command" to the more gender-inclusive "True patriot love in all of us command". She produced as support for this measure, a recently-unearthed copy of Robert Stanley Weir's original 1908 English lyrics, where the line is question was rendered as "True patriot love thou dost in us command". (Weir revised the lyrics three times after writing these--one of the later versions is the official anthem.)
Reading over the original lyrics, I'd actually be in favour of instituting them as the official English language lyrics, since they are actually fully inclusive. Poy's change would leave the reference to God in the anthem (incidently, this never appeared in any incarnation of Weir's lyrics, but was added by the National Anthem Act of 1980), excluding the 16%+ of Canadians who are non-religious, not to mention polytheists, some Buddhists, and the like. The one potential stumbing block would be the line "May stalwart sons and gentle maidens rise", but that's in the third verse, so we could just omit it from the official anthem (the rest of that verse doesn't add anything not already said in the second).
As an aside, the French lyrics (which were written earlier) have never changed since their authoring. The French lyrics make explicit references to Christianity and militarism ("Car ton bras sait porter l'épée, Il sait porter la croix!"), though most contemporary Quebecois have little passion for either.
Senator Vivienne Poy will be visiting our library system for Asian Heritage Month, the annual observance of the history and cultural contributions of Asian-Canadians to our country. Poy, as Senator, introduced the Senate motion for the federal government to recognize this event.
One of Senator Poy's goals is to amend the words to the national anthem, changing the line "True patriot love in all thy sons command" to the more gender-inclusive "True patriot love in all of us command". She produced as support for this measure, a recently-unearthed copy of Robert Stanley Weir's original 1908 English lyrics, where the line is question was rendered as "True patriot love thou dost in us command". (Weir revised the lyrics three times after writing these--one of the later versions is the official anthem.)
Reading over the original lyrics, I'd actually be in favour of instituting them as the official English language lyrics, since they are actually fully inclusive. Poy's change would leave the reference to God in the anthem (incidently, this never appeared in any incarnation of Weir's lyrics, but was added by the National Anthem Act of 1980), excluding the 16%+ of Canadians who are non-religious, not to mention polytheists, some Buddhists, and the like. The one potential stumbing block would be the line "May stalwart sons and gentle maidens rise", but that's in the third verse, so we could just omit it from the official anthem (the rest of that verse doesn't add anything not already said in the second).
As an aside, the French lyrics (which were written earlier) have never changed since their authoring. The French lyrics make explicit references to Christianity and militarism ("Car ton bras sait porter l'épée, Il sait porter la croix!"), though most contemporary Quebecois have little passion for either.
Thursday, April 12, 2007
"Here we go!"
Today is the 46th anniversary of the flight of Vostok I. Its sole passenger was Yuri Gagarin, and Vostok I, a "tin can sitting on top of a bomb", would make him famous. On April 12, 1961, Gagarin became the first person in space.
Yuri Gagarin
Today is the 46th anniversary of the flight of Vostok I. Its sole passenger was Yuri Gagarin, and Vostok I, a "tin can sitting on top of a bomb", would make him famous. On April 12, 1961, Gagarin became the first person in space.
Yuri Gagarin
In my youth, I was fascinated by outer space, and voraciously devoured books on space flight and astronomy. I read pretty advanced and detailed non-fiction on the subject. In fact, I remember when I was nine, I participated in my local public library's summer reading club, and that year's theme was outer space (timed for the arrival of Haley's Comet). I read several thick non-fiction books on the subjects of astronomy and space travel (one I recall was a detailed chronological narrative of the American space program up to that point), but the librarian would only accept fiction. Then the fiction I chose apparently wasn't advanced enough for her tastes, but I suppose my prepubescent self couldn't make her understand that I cared very little for "stories" back then and preferred history and science (I wouldn't start reading fiction with any sort of devotion until I was twelve). With all the stifling conditions she placed on me I still wonder to this day why I joined her profession.
Although my childhood dreams of becoming an astronaut, or astronomer, or aeronautical engineer have long since faded, I still have a soft spot for space travel and the men and women who have struggled and continue to struggle to increase the range of humanity's grasp just a little bit more. I continue to mourn the death of manned space exploration and become upset when governments disrespect the memories of our space-faring brothers and sisters.
Here we go, Comrade Cosmonaut.
Friday, February 23, 2007
Saturday, February 17, 2007
Two-fisted Science!
OK, to tide people over while I try and finish Why Darwin Matters and deliver that promised double-review, here's a little something.
I attended first aid training at work this past week, and the instructor showed us a video on hypothermia, featuring Gordon Giesbrecht, a professor at the University of Manitoba who is one of the leading experts on the topic. Mainly because, he experiments on himself! In this video we watched him ski into an icy lake to demonstrate the effects of hypothermia on the human body. What balls! Then he did it again, only this time on a snowmobile.
This reminded me of some of the scientific pioneers of past century, people with the courage and resolve to pursue their science with passion, heedless of danger.
First, there was Auguste Piccard, Swiss physicist, explorer and inventor. In the 1930s, Piccard developed an interest in ballooning, and built a series of pressurized gondolas that allowed him to explore the stratosphere. He set several altitude records, then retired from ballooning--to pursue deep-sea diving! Adopting several of the principles used in building his balloon gondolas to submersibles, he set several deep sea diving records as well, notably in the Bathyscaphe Trieste. He sold the Trieste to the US Navy , and soon afterwards his son Jacques and a Navy officer set the record for deepest dive, 10,900 m in the Challenger Depth, the deepest part of the ocean. No vessel has matched or beat this record, and nothing currently exists that could.
Piccard's whole family were scientist-adventurers: his twin brother Jean Felix was an organic chemist and balloonist, and Jean Felix's wife Jeannette was the first woman to hold a balloonist's licence, set altitude records for a woman that held for three decades, and was one of the first 11 women to be ordained Episcopalian priests. Auguste Piccard is believed to have been the inspiration for Professor Cuthbert Calculus/Professeur Tryphon Tournesol from The Adventures of Tintin and August and Jean Felix were believed to be a big inspiration to Gene Roddenberry for the character of Jean-Luc Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Next, Hiram Bingham III, a pilot and archaeologist who was probably the inspiration for Indiana Jones. The son and grandson of missionaries to Hawaii, Bingham also served as a US Congressman and Senator and was the shortest serving Governor in Connecticut history (one day). His most noteworthy act, however, was discovering the lost Inca city of Machu Picchu centuries after the European colonization of Peru.
His son Hiram Bingham IV, a diplomat during World War II, was later discovered to have helped many authors, artists and scholars escape German-occupied France, and protected Jews during this time, also arranged forged documents for those trying to make their way through Europe to a place of safety during the Holocaust.
Story Musgrave is a man with considerable credentials and is perhaps the most experienced astronaut ever to fly into space. Musgrave served as a pilot and electrical technician in the US Marine Corps, and was later tapped by NASA to become an astronaut. He became NASA's most experience astronaut, having flown more shuttle missions than anyone else, and is the only astronaut to have flown on all five shuttles. Believe me, this is a very condensed version of Musgrave's storied (ahem) career.
And while doing all this, he found the time to earn six degrees, including:
The last one seems out of place, eh? Musgrave claims he got a lit degree so he could properly express what space is like in literary language. This guy is just awesome.
Dian Fossey, of Gorillas in the Mist, spent years in Rwanda studying gorillas as one of "Leakey's Angels". The paleontologist Louis Leakey sent three female researchers to study primates in their native habitats: Jane Goodall studied chimpanzees; Fossey, gorillas; and Biruté Galdikas, the orangutans.
Fossey gained the trust of the animals and gained worldwide celebrity when her picture was featured on the cover of National Geographic magazine. She fought tirelessly against the extinction of the gorillas, and opposed poachers and zoos with equal vengeance. She even fought the notion of tourists visiting the gorillas in the habitat. It is believed that her brutal murder was motivated by elements of the Rwandan government who wanted to use the gorillas to attract tourists.
Her story was turned into the Oscar-nominated film Gorillas in the Mist, starring one of my favourite actresses, Sigourney Weaver as Fossey.
Speaking of Leakey, he is known for having said: "Nothing I've ever found has contradicted the Bible. It's people with their finite minds who misread the Bible."
Which should hopefully segue us into Darwin yet again.
OK, to tide people over while I try and finish Why Darwin Matters and deliver that promised double-review, here's a little something.
I attended first aid training at work this past week, and the instructor showed us a video on hypothermia, featuring Gordon Giesbrecht, a professor at the University of Manitoba who is one of the leading experts on the topic. Mainly because, he experiments on himself! In this video we watched him ski into an icy lake to demonstrate the effects of hypothermia on the human body. What balls! Then he did it again, only this time on a snowmobile.
This reminded me of some of the scientific pioneers of past century, people with the courage and resolve to pursue their science with passion, heedless of danger.
First, there was Auguste Piccard, Swiss physicist, explorer and inventor. In the 1930s, Piccard developed an interest in ballooning, and built a series of pressurized gondolas that allowed him to explore the stratosphere. He set several altitude records, then retired from ballooning--to pursue deep-sea diving! Adopting several of the principles used in building his balloon gondolas to submersibles, he set several deep sea diving records as well, notably in the Bathyscaphe Trieste. He sold the Trieste to the US Navy , and soon afterwards his son Jacques and a Navy officer set the record for deepest dive, 10,900 m in the Challenger Depth, the deepest part of the ocean. No vessel has matched or beat this record, and nothing currently exists that could.
Piccard's whole family were scientist-adventurers: his twin brother Jean Felix was an organic chemist and balloonist, and Jean Felix's wife Jeannette was the first woman to hold a balloonist's licence, set altitude records for a woman that held for three decades, and was one of the first 11 women to be ordained Episcopalian priests. Auguste Piccard is believed to have been the inspiration for Professor Cuthbert Calculus/Professeur Tryphon Tournesol from The Adventures of Tintin and August and Jean Felix were believed to be a big inspiration to Gene Roddenberry for the character of Jean-Luc Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Next, Hiram Bingham III, a pilot and archaeologist who was probably the inspiration for Indiana Jones. The son and grandson of missionaries to Hawaii, Bingham also served as a US Congressman and Senator and was the shortest serving Governor in Connecticut history (one day). His most noteworthy act, however, was discovering the lost Inca city of Machu Picchu centuries after the European colonization of Peru.
His son Hiram Bingham IV, a diplomat during World War II, was later discovered to have helped many authors, artists and scholars escape German-occupied France, and protected Jews during this time, also arranged forged documents for those trying to make their way through Europe to a place of safety during the Holocaust.
Story Musgrave is a man with considerable credentials and is perhaps the most experienced astronaut ever to fly into space. Musgrave served as a pilot and electrical technician in the US Marine Corps, and was later tapped by NASA to become an astronaut. He became NASA's most experience astronaut, having flown more shuttle missions than anyone else, and is the only astronaut to have flown on all five shuttles. Believe me, this is a very condensed version of Musgrave's storied (ahem) career.
And while doing all this, he found the time to earn six degrees, including:
- Bachelor of Science in mathematics and statistics (Syracuse University 1958)
- MBA in operations analysis and computer programming (UCLA 1959)
- BA in chemistry (Marietta College 1960)
- MD (Columbia University 1964)
- Masters of Science in physiology and biophysics (University of Kentucky 1966)
- MA in literature (University of Houston 1987)
The last one seems out of place, eh? Musgrave claims he got a lit degree so he could properly express what space is like in literary language. This guy is just awesome.
Dian Fossey, of Gorillas in the Mist, spent years in Rwanda studying gorillas as one of "Leakey's Angels". The paleontologist Louis Leakey sent three female researchers to study primates in their native habitats: Jane Goodall studied chimpanzees; Fossey, gorillas; and Biruté Galdikas, the orangutans.
Fossey gained the trust of the animals and gained worldwide celebrity when her picture was featured on the cover of National Geographic magazine. She fought tirelessly against the extinction of the gorillas, and opposed poachers and zoos with equal vengeance. She even fought the notion of tourists visiting the gorillas in the habitat. It is believed that her brutal murder was motivated by elements of the Rwandan government who wanted to use the gorillas to attract tourists.
Her story was turned into the Oscar-nominated film Gorillas in the Mist, starring one of my favourite actresses, Sigourney Weaver as Fossey.
Speaking of Leakey, he is known for having said: "Nothing I've ever found has contradicted the Bible. It's people with their finite minds who misread the Bible."
Which should hopefully segue us into Darwin yet again.
Thursday, July 20, 2006
The aerial bombardment of civilians: a survey
Given its topic relevance right now, I thought I'd highlight some articles on the bombing of civilian populations in wartime.
This post from TomDispatch is a few years old, and asked the question why aerial bombardment is rarely covered by war journalists. During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the media made a big fuss over "embedded" journalists riding shotgun with Army and Marine units, and undertook detailed surveys and analyses of ground tactics and troop movements. However, the role of aerial bombardment, especially that of the United States Air Force, was practically ignored. No journalist embedded themselves for a B-52 run, for example. Given the central importance of air power in the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, and their continued significance during the occupations, why isn't it given more coverage?
Englehardt's article mentions the fascination aerial bombardment had with speculative fiction writers long before it became a reality. But once it did, many military theorists pondered its use as a weapon against enemy morale. Specifically, bombing the enemy's civilian population until they were so terrorized they pressured their government to surrender.
One of the pioneers of this school of thought was the Italian general Giulio Douhet. Douhet recognized the value of air power early on; first dirigibles, then fixed-wing aircraft. He put forth many "radical" ideas of the time: that air power should be represented by a separate branch of the military, and the use of air power in warfare. He put these ideas to the test during Italy's war with Turkey over Libya in 1911. In that conflict the Italians pioneered the use of aircraft in reconaissance, artillery spotting, transport, and bombing.
Douhet theorized that aerial bombardment could be used to cripple "the will of the people" to make war. This was a theory that gained much traction by the interwar theorists. The acceptance of this theory was seen in the Second World War, during the blitz of London by the Luftwaffe and subsequent German V-1 and V-2 rocket attacks, and its response by the Allies as personified by "Bomber" Harris.
Its effectiveness has been debated, however. Despite months--or even years--of bombardment, the morale of the British did not flag. There is every indication that German bombardment only served to stiffen the resolve of the British people. However, there is also evidence that the bombing of cities in Germany and Japan in the last few years of WWII did negatively affect civilian morale. This paper by a USAF major examines the topic thoroughly.
UPDATE (26-Jul-06): The UNITED STATES STRATEGIC BOMBING SURVEY of World War II Allied bombing has a section on the effects on German and Japanese civilians.
(Via The News Blog.)
Given its topic relevance right now, I thought I'd highlight some articles on the bombing of civilian populations in wartime.
This post from TomDispatch is a few years old, and asked the question why aerial bombardment is rarely covered by war journalists. During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the media made a big fuss over "embedded" journalists riding shotgun with Army and Marine units, and undertook detailed surveys and analyses of ground tactics and troop movements. However, the role of aerial bombardment, especially that of the United States Air Force, was practically ignored. No journalist embedded themselves for a B-52 run, for example. Given the central importance of air power in the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, and their continued significance during the occupations, why isn't it given more coverage?
Englehardt's article mentions the fascination aerial bombardment had with speculative fiction writers long before it became a reality. But once it did, many military theorists pondered its use as a weapon against enemy morale. Specifically, bombing the enemy's civilian population until they were so terrorized they pressured their government to surrender.
One of the pioneers of this school of thought was the Italian general Giulio Douhet. Douhet recognized the value of air power early on; first dirigibles, then fixed-wing aircraft. He put forth many "radical" ideas of the time: that air power should be represented by a separate branch of the military, and the use of air power in warfare. He put these ideas to the test during Italy's war with Turkey over Libya in 1911. In that conflict the Italians pioneered the use of aircraft in reconaissance, artillery spotting, transport, and bombing.
Douhet theorized that aerial bombardment could be used to cripple "the will of the people" to make war. This was a theory that gained much traction by the interwar theorists. The acceptance of this theory was seen in the Second World War, during the blitz of London by the Luftwaffe and subsequent German V-1 and V-2 rocket attacks, and its response by the Allies as personified by "Bomber" Harris.
Its effectiveness has been debated, however. Despite months--or even years--of bombardment, the morale of the British did not flag. There is every indication that German bombardment only served to stiffen the resolve of the British people. However, there is also evidence that the bombing of cities in Germany and Japan in the last few years of WWII did negatively affect civilian morale. This paper by a USAF major examines the topic thoroughly.
UPDATE (26-Jul-06): The UNITED STATES STRATEGIC BOMBING SURVEY of World War II Allied bombing has a section on the effects on German and Japanese civilians.
(Via The News Blog.)
Monday, December 06, 2004
Beware of Greeks bearing litigation
The Greeks are angry because the new Oliver Stone film on Alexander the Great portrays the Macedonian conqueror as bisexual. And the rest of the world tries very hard to keep from laughing. Come on, guys! Do you read about your own history? Plato, the teacher of Aristotle (who was Alexander the Great's tutor for a time), wrote a whole freakin' dialogue on gay love called the Symposium. It was an accepted practice of the time, and should be accepted in our time as well. I recommend William Percy Armstrong III's Pederasty and Pedagogy in Archaic Greece for a far more convincing argument than I could ever express here.
I had high hopes for this film. Stone's primary inspiration for the film is Robin Lane Fox's seminal biography of the conqueror, and he secured Fox's services as consultant on set. I did a book report on Fox's Alexander the Great in my first-year classics class and really enjoyed it.
Fox's book takes the form of a historical narrative that will have you turning pages. Right from the first chapter, Fox draws you in with the mystery of Philip II of Macedon's assassination? Who killed the king at the celebration of his wedding to his seventh wife? Was it his jealous first wife, Olympias? Was it his wrathful half-brother, pushed aside in his quest for the throne? Was his son Alexander involved at all? And that's just the murder mystery at the beginning, folks! Wait until he gets to the war...
...unfortunately, the film was not nearly as compelling as Fox's book. It had potential, but ultimately was laid low by four things:
The Greeks are angry because the new Oliver Stone film on Alexander the Great portrays the Macedonian conqueror as bisexual. And the rest of the world tries very hard to keep from laughing. Come on, guys! Do you read about your own history? Plato, the teacher of Aristotle (who was Alexander the Great's tutor for a time), wrote a whole freakin' dialogue on gay love called the Symposium. It was an accepted practice of the time, and should be accepted in our time as well. I recommend William Percy Armstrong III's Pederasty and Pedagogy in Archaic Greece for a far more convincing argument than I could ever express here.
I had high hopes for this film. Stone's primary inspiration for the film is Robin Lane Fox's seminal biography of the conqueror, and he secured Fox's services as consultant on set. I did a book report on Fox's Alexander the Great in my first-year classics class and really enjoyed it.
Fox's book takes the form of a historical narrative that will have you turning pages. Right from the first chapter, Fox draws you in with the mystery of Philip II of Macedon's assassination? Who killed the king at the celebration of his wedding to his seventh wife? Was it his jealous first wife, Olympias? Was it his wrathful half-brother, pushed aside in his quest for the throne? Was his son Alexander involved at all? And that's just the murder mystery at the beginning, folks! Wait until he gets to the war...
...unfortunately, the film was not nearly as compelling as Fox's book. It had potential, but ultimately was laid low by four things:
- It was too freakin' long.
- The dialogue was extremely clunky.
- The action sequences in the film suffer from "Braveheart syndrome," i.e. big battles are filmed as blurs of colour and action, with lots of shaky-cam work and motion-blurring. While this might be a realistic depiction of pre-modern warfare, it sure as hell isn't compelling from a dramatic standpoint.
- It was too freakin' long.
Someone remarked to me that, recently anyway, period dramas are very good at doing their research and making everything historically accurate, every costume and set checked and rechecked down to the last detail. But they emphasize the superficial elements so much, the filmmakers forget we're there to watch a movie. An accurate depiction of an historical setting does not absolve you of the task of writing a compelling story.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
