Wednesday, August 30, 2006
German Brain Drain?
Koerber is one of 145,000 Germans who fled the fatherland last year amid record postwar unemployment, pushing emigration to its highest level since 1954, Federal Statistics Office figures show. Last year was also the first since the late 1960s that emigrants outnumbered Germans returning home from living abroad, the statistics office said.
Even more troubling to German officials and business leaders, many were skilled workers like Koerber. The loss of such people, they say, may threaten Germany’s economic competitiveness in the future.
``Many highly qualified young people are leaving our country to seek their fortunes elsewhere, while only very few top people have been attracted to Germany in recent years,’’ said Ludwig Georg Braun, president of the Association of German Chambers of Industry and Commerce, which represents more than 3 million companies. ``This development is causing us growing concern.’’
link
Thoughts?
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
holidaze
I was just going to shoutbox this, but no box was provided. Hello from Corfu! My posslq Barbara and our daughter Rosi and I are enjoying the sun, the sheep yogourt, the ruins, the kalamari, and especially the friendly and generous Corfiots here in Agios Georgios. One more week and it’s back to the salt mines, but with photos and tans to remember it by. And a daughter who will complain for a few more years about how we kidnapped here away from her boyfriend, held her prisoner, and even demanded that she wash up after herself. Ah well- the joys of parenthood.
One somewhat disturbing thing- the water is clear, and there are practically no fish to see compared to, say, around Sardinia. And the fish in the restaurants comes almost exclusively from the mainland- the once thriving fishing industry here is practically wiped out. Two people have so far told me independantly that the fish disappeared after the war in Yugoslavia, when the Americans supposedly dumped huge quantities of munitions in the Adriatic. No idea whether this is true or not- the Italians and Greeks are quite capable of poisoning the sea without our help. Disconcerting either way.
Anyway, I hope all of you are doing well. Cheers and Jasos!
re-cycling
I don’t know why, but some pieces of paper are harder to throw into a recycling bin than others.
Ten days ago, a young man who lived 10 blocks from us disappeared. He had gone out to meet some friends at 10:30 pm, riding his bike on the trails near the river. The last he was heard from was an hour later when he text-messaged his girlfriend.
There have been posters plastered all over the place with his picture. People searched every day through the miles of brush and trails that weave through the river valley.
Yesterday, his body was found in the river. No foul play suspected.
His family has asked that people take down the posters. So, when I passed by a couple of them this morning, I took them down, folded them, and placed them in a recycle container.
Requiescat in pace.
new astromer…
Looks like the Catholics got themselves a new boss astronomer.
Pope appoints Argentine Jesuit to head Vatican Observatory
No idea what’s behind the change in leadership, but Pharyngula and cohorts point out the the gleeful comments coming from the Discovery Idiots (couldn’t resist…). Apparently the parting chief astronomer was not a friend of ID (and why should he be) and disagreed with Schonborn. I wonder where the new guy stands…
Monday, August 21, 2006
I just can’t go for that ... no can do
I’ll do anything that you want me to do,
But I can’t go for that, (No can do)
No, I can’t go for that (No can do) ...
hmmm .... an interesting new marketing trick .... went to see Hall & Oates tonight and they announced partway through the show that you can go online and get a CD of that performance ...
link
Although I enjoyed the music ... I’m not shelling out another $25 US for a recording of the show.
FOXholes
Picked up via Pharyngula: Beliefwatch: Foxholes
There are no atheists in foxholes,” the old saw goes. The line, attributed to a WWII chaplain, has since been uttered countless times by grunts, chaplains and news anchors. But an increasingly vocal group of activists and soldiersatheist soldiersחdisagrees. “It’s a denial of our contributions,” says Master Sgt. Kathleen Johnson, who founded the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers and who will be deployed to Iraq this fall. “A lot of people manage to serve without having to call on a higher power.”
I’ll side with P.Z. Myers - this tired old saw is an admission that religion is driven by fear.
It’s an ongoing battle. Just last month Lt. Gen. H. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau, said, “Agnostics, atheists and bigots suddenly lose all that when their life is on the line.” Atheist groups reacted swiftly, releasing a statement that “Nonbelievers are serving, and have served, in our nation’s military with distinction!” The National Guard said it received about 20 letters objecting to Blum’s statement, and said his comments were “intended to clearly illustrate the positive spirit of camaraderie, human understanding and inclusion of our fine men and women in the National Guard.”
It’s a shame they only received 20 letters. The bigot in this picture is Blum himself.
Would a soldier really die without faith? Bowling Green State University’s Ken Pargament, a professor specializing in the psychology of religion and coping, says: “If someone is a committed atheist, they’re likely to stay a committed atheist.”
It is news articles like these that further lower my opinion of religion. It all comes back to the big lie of religion - that believing people are the better people.
the other type of homebrew
The Register: Homebrew chemical terror bombs, hype or horror?
If I read it right, their conclusion is that it’s way more hype than horror. Even with significant financial resources and plenty of research scientists, it seems like more hype than horror. Unless somebody can lay hands on weapons-grade stuff that somebody else already produced, in which case all bets are off.
That’s good to hear, but it misses an important point. The objective of a terrorist isn’t necessarily to kill people. The cynical bastards of the IRA walked a fine line by setting off real bombs, but trying hard to avoid casualties (read: bad publicity that would have eroded the financial support they receive from U.S. residents).
It seems to me that a couple of scares will do just as nicely to completely wreck the airline industry. If people aren’t too scared from taking a plane, airline security tackling conceivable threats may well do the rest. The same applies to other forms of public/mass transportation - subways, trains, buses, you name it.
justice served?
Judge’s ruling divides ‘big football town’
It was intended to be a prank: steal a decoy deer, place it on a country road and watch as motorists swerved to avoid it. It ended with two teenagers suffering serious injuries when their car hit the decoy and rolled into a ditch.
When a judge ruled this week that two boys—both high school football players—can complete the football season before they serve 60-day sentences at a juvenile detention center, it caused a division in this northwest Ohio city.
On one side are those who say allowing Dailyn Campbell, a 16-year-old quarterback, and 17-year-old teammate Jesse Howard to play shows that football players get preferential treatment.
On the other are those who say either the boys deserve another chance or that they will stay out of trouble if they’re part of the team.
Judges don’t like mandatory sentencing laws (or so I’ve heard), because they can’t exercise any discretion. In my opinion, justice is best served when judgements consider unusual circumstances - after all, there is a reason why we don’t switch to sentencing computer programs. I’m not familiar with all the known facts surrounding this case, but this makes me queasy:
When Judge Gary McKinley announced his decision Tuesday to delay the sentence, he said, “I shouldn’t be doing this, but I’m going to. I see positive things about participating in football.”
This does sound like preferential treatment. If applied as a principle, one could argue that any and all sentences can be delayed if the offender participates in a violent team sport - or is mandatorily signed up for it.
I have to disagree with the judge; while sports is a tamed sort of violence (some types of sport are more or less so), there is no good reason I can think of to give substitute warriors a break. Somebody who risks getting killed or maimed in defense of a community can reasonably expect a few breaks and one can argue where the limits are. Atheletes, however, do not deserve the kind of hero worship one can readily observe and there’s something wrong if they reap the benefits without the concomitant risk of a real warrior of times past. Well, ‘past’ in a wishful thinking way.
In case this isn’t obvious, the sports biz doesn’t make any money off me and I don’t participate in the idolatry of atheletes.
cell phones are hazardous
The Register:
FBI doubts cellphone terror scheme
Terror charges axed in 2nd cellphone bomb plot
Now that it’s become clear that the terror plot was not to be, Assistant US Attorney Janet Parker is planning to help the Caro police save face by bringing charges of trafficking in counterfeit goods and money laundering. It would not look good for the men to skate free, after all that crying wolf about al-Qaeda mayhem.
For all of The Register’s fair and balanced reporting, they may just have it right.
Sunday, August 20, 2006
Life in Texas (?)
From a news story on Yahoo: 3 officers, 1 trooper wounded
Kim Gladney, 25, who lives in the complex, said she heard 10 shots ring out.
“After the first five, I knew something was wrong,” she said as she stood just beyond the police barricades. “It just didn’t sound good.”
Uh ... 4 shots is nothing to get excited about, but 5 or more shots is a clue that something is wrong?
(on preview, the italics end after the first sentence, but the ‘end italics tag’ is placed after the end of Ms Gladney’s quote ... weird)
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