According to the Bush administration – which is, needless to say, strongly motivated to obscure – all things Afghan are flowing in just the right direction.

Struggling to find new ways of decribing chaos as shining progress must get very taxing after a while.

In Cursor, Prof. Marc W. Herold writes:

A growing disconnect exists between the daily reality of war experienced by the common Afghan and how this war is represented to the American general public by the corporate media, many non-governmental organizations favoring “humanitarian interventions” around the globe (e.g., Human Rights Watch), and the U.S. military and its defense minions. The war in Afghanistan – as most other wars beginning with Vietnam – is waged both on the ground there and in the living rooms here. The recent midnight assault upon the small village of Hajiyan (also called Alizi) along the Arghandab River in Panjwayi District of Kandahar Province provides a case study to explore this disconnect.1 No doubt many similar cases exist, but the U.S. military media strategy to contain, isolate and stonewall succeeded there.

A very graphic way – a picture is worth a thousand words – is simply to contrast photos of how the U.S. military is portrayed with Afghan children.

The above photo depicts U.S. Army Capt. John Pritchard of Combined Joint Task Force 16 giving a tee-shirt to a young boy in Panjwayi. Another type of interaction is shown in the following photo: the legacy of “precision fire” by A-10 Warthog attack jets upon the village of Hajiyan in Panjwayi, revealed on the body of three year-old Mohammad Imran (photo by Noor Khan, A.P.).

Both pictures are “true” and neither one alone represents reality. Both illustrate two images of modern war: the war to win hearts and minds and the war to kill the enemy. They are inseparable. But every effort will be made to keep images like that of Imran off pages and screens of America because the wars the U.S. carries out are represented as being the “good fights” where only the bad guys die in a hail of “precision” bombs and rockets… “in the rockets red glare.”

[...]

full at Cursor

It’s impossible, really, for me to do any sort of justice to the influence JG Ballard has had on my thoughts, on my ‘way of seeing’ (I apologize for the cliché).

Better to visit Ballardian on a regular basis and read the excellent material available there at your leisure.

There is one thing I can confidently mention however…Ballard, it seems to me, is a keen observer of instability, of the ways systems fall apart or mutate. “Empire of the Sun” for example, is a novel about many things but at its core, I think, is the story of disintegration – of a style of life, of a marriage of comfort, of belief in the future…

THE EVE OF PEARL HARBOR

WARS CAME EARLY to Shanghai, over-taking each other like the tides that raced up the Yangtze and returned to this gaudy city all the coffins cast adrift from the funeral piers of the Chinese bund.

Jim had begun to dream of wars. At night the same silent films seemed to flicker against the wall of his bedroom in Amherst avenue, and transformed his sleeping mind into a deserted newsreel theater. During the winter of 1941 everyone in Shanghai was showing war films. Fragments of his dreams followed Jim around the city; in the foyers of the department stores and hotels the images of Dunkirk and Tobruk, Barbarossa and the Rape of Nanking sprang loose from his crowded head.

To Jim’s dismay, even the Dean of Shanghai Cathedral had equipped himself with an antique projector. After morning service on Sunday, December 7, the eve of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the choirboys were stopped before they could leave for home and were marched down to the crypt. Still wearing their cossacks, they sat in a row of deck chairs requisitioned from the Shanghai Yacht Club and watched a year-old March of Time.

Thinking of his unsettled dreams, and puzzled by their missing sound track, Jim tugged at his ruffled collar. The organ voluntary drummed like a headache through the cement roof, and the screen trembled with the familiar images of tank battles and aerial dogfights. Jim was eager to prepare for the fancy-dress Christmas party being held that afternoon by Dr. Lockwood, the vice-chairman of the British Residents Association. There would be the drive through the Japanese lines to Hungjao, and then Chinese conjurers, fireworks and yet more newsreels, but Jim had his own reasons for wanting to go to Dr. Lockwood’s party.

Observe the back-breaking computing gear:

Because the client I’m currently servicing doesn’t have a computer to spare for me…and because I carry gigabytes of applications, utilities and sundry software objects with me (once upon a time it was a luxury, now it’s a necessity) I must lug a bag around that builds muscle even as it builds character.

In a better world, a world of peace, sugary sweet kisses, laughing children and ubiquitous computing, this laptop transport system wouldn’t be needed. Instead of carrying my computing platform with me, it would be everyware.

It is by petroleum alone I am able to travel, in (relative) comfort, from home to work. It is by petroleum alone.

But how long before my love abandons me. Or, as in the old dream, chokes me in my sleep (only this time with super typhoons, crippling temperatures and general mayhem).

So here I am, too busy to write the post I dream of writing. It starts as light and turns to dust.

Nevertheless, something comes to mind.

The Huge Entity’s Mr. Danieru writes:

Perhaps when our computers become powerful enough to aid in their own AI design we will have truly pushed our last evolutionary snow ball. Why would a universe need an organically evolved, ancient and primitive mind such as ours when it has minds which can participate in their own evolution?

Which reminds me that there are competing visions of super cognition – artificial intelligence and enhanced brains. Consider, for example, the Mentat, described in Wikipedia:

Following the Butlerian Jihad in the Dune universe’s back story, it was forbidden to create man-like machines

“Thou Shalt not make a machine in the likeness of the human mind”

- Rayna Butler, as told to her by the spirit of saint Serena.

Thinking machines were outlawed throughout the universe, and the mentat discipline was developed as a replacement. Mentats are humans trained to be able to mimic computers: human minds developed to staggering heights of cognitive and analytical ability. Ironically, the first Mentat was selected by a thinking machine. Gilbertus Albans, selected from the Corrin slave pens about 180 B.G. by the independent robot Erasmus, displayed the first cognitive thinking and computer-like calculation capacity necessary for a Mentat. The term ‘mentat’ was coined by Erasmus, created from the words ‘mentor’ and ‘mentee’.

The name mentat is derived from mentis, meaning ‘of the mind’ in Latin.

Unlike computers, however, Mentats are not simply human calculators writ large. Instead, the exceptional cognitive abilities of memory and perception are the foundations for supra-logical hypothesizing. Mentats are able to sift large volumes of data and devise concise analyses in a process that goes far beyond logical deduction: Mentats cultivate “the naïve mind”, the mind without preconception or prejudice, that can extract the essential patterns or logic of data and deliver, with varying degrees of certainty, useful conclusions. They are not limited to formulating syllogisms; they are the supreme counselors of the Dune universe, filling roles as menial as archivists and clerks, or as grand as advisor to the Emperor.

[...]

full at Wikipedia (didn’t I tell you it was my new god? I patiently await its inevitable crucifixion and resurrection).

In the final battle between luminous machines and super charged minds, what entity will prevail?

As mistresses go, blogging, I’ve found, is among the harshest.

Hence the schedule I’ve tried to enforce:

* Monday, neglected books from my bookshelf

* Tuesday, science news (usually astrophysics because, in my fantasies, I’m an astrophysicist who unravels the mysteries of an alien invasion like the clever, but ineffective scientist in George Pal’s 1953 version of War of the Worlds)

* Wednesday, politics or, our chaotic world

* Thursday, technology and gadgetry

* Friday, something whimsical

But even this attempt at self-discipline fails. No doubt, because of the “self” portion of that hyphenated formation.

However, once more into the breach…

Today’s science post swooshes, with a dramatic, Hollywood CGI flourish, from the massive stars burning hot in the depths of space to the realm of the very small: tree pollen. As I type these words my eyes are running, my body aches, my nose noisily expresses displeasure and other parts quietly marvel at the overall disintegration of my (fragile, oh so fragile) sense of well being.

Hay fever is the cause.

But what is hay fever?

Off we go to Wikipedia, my new god (the old one, Landru, having failed me for the final time):

Allergies are caused by an oversensitive immune system, leading to a misdirected immune response. The immune system normally protects the body against harmful substances such as bacteria and viruses. Allergy occurs when the immune system reacts to substances (allergens) that are generally harmless and in most people do not cause an immune response.

As noted above, hay fever involves an allergic reaction to pollen. A virtually identical reaction occurs with allergy to mold, animal dander, dust, and similar inhaled allergens. Particulate matter in polluted air and chemicals such as chlorine and detergents, which can normally be tolerated, can greatly aggravate the condition.

The pollens that cause hay fever vary from person to person and from region to region; generally speaking, the tiny, hardly visible pollens of wind-pollinated plants are the predominant culprits. Pollens of insect-pollinated plants are too large to remain airborne and pose no risk. Examples of plants commonly responsible for hay fever include:

* Trees: such as birch (Betula), alder (Alnus), hazel (Corylus), hornbeam (Carpinus), horse chestnut (Aesculus), willow (Salix), poplar (Populus), plane (Platanus), linden/lime (Tilia) and olive (Olea). In northern latitudes birch is considered to be the most important allergenic tree pollen, with an estimated 15-20% of hay fever sufferers sensitive to birch pollen grains. Olive pollen is more important in Mediterranean regions.

* Grasses (Family Poaceae): especially rye (Lolium sp.) and timothy (Phleum pratense). An estimated 90% of hay fever sufferers are allergic to grass pollen.

* Weeds:ragweed (Ambrosia), plantain (Plantago), nettle/parietaria (Urticaceae), mugwort (Artemisia), Fat hen (Chenopodium) and sorrel/dock (Rumex)

In addition to individual sensitivity and geographic differences in local plant populations, the amount of pollen in the air can be a factor in whether hay fever symptoms develop. Hot, dry, windy days are more likely to have increased amounts of pollen in the air than cool, damp, rainy days when most pollen is washed to the ground.

[...]

full at Wikipedia…

Let’s review:

The launch platform

The multiple targeted warheads

The pathetic resistance

The expensive countermeasure

As I recall, I bought Monkey, Folk Novel of China at Garland of Letters, a new age themed book store on Philadelphia’s South Street (which, once upon a time, was a haven for artists and assorted bohemians but is now a commercial theme park that uses a patina of what went before as a marketing angle – sic transit gloria mundi).

As it happens, Arthur Waley’s translation is rather heavily abridged, leaving most of the original novel, Journey to the West, on the editing room floor.

CHAPTER 1

There was a rock that since the creation of the world had been worked upon by the pure essences of Heaven and the fine savours of Earth, the vigour of sunshine and the grace of moonlight, till at last it became magically pregnant and one day split open, giving birth to a stone egg, about as big as a playing ball. Fructified by the wind it developed into a stone monkey, complete with every organ and limb. At once this monkey learned to climb and run; but its first act was to make a bow towards each of the four quarters. As it did so, a steely light darted from this monkey’s eyes and flashed as far as the Palace of the Pole Star. This shaft of light astonished the Jade Emperor as he sat in the Cloud Palace of the Golden Gates, in the Treasure Hall of the Holy Mists, surrounded by his fairy Ministers. Seeing this strange light flashing, he ordered Thousand-league Eye and Down-the-wind Ears to open the gate of the Southern Heaven and look out.

At his bidding these two captains went out to the gate and looked so sharply and listened so well that presently they were able to report, ‘This steely light comes from the borders of the small country of Ao-lai, that lies to the east of the Holy Continent, from the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit. On this mountain is a magic rock, which gave birth to an egg. This egg changed into a stone monkey, and when he made his bow to the four quarters a steely light flashed from his eyes with a beam that reached the Palace of the Pole Star. But now he is taking a drink, and the light is growing dim.’

The Jade Emperor condescended to take an indulgent view. ‘These creatures in the world below,’ he said, ‘were compounded of the essence of heaven and earth, and nothing that goes on there should surprise us.’ That monkey walked, ran, leapt and bounded over the hills, feeding on grasses and shrubs, drinking from streams and springs, gathering the mountain flowers, looking for fruits. Wolf, panther and tiger were his companions, the deer and the civet were his friends, gibbons and baboons his kindred. At night he lodged under cliffs of rock, by day he wandered among the peaks and caves. One very hot morning, after playing in the shade of some pine-trees, he and those other monkeys went to bathe in a mountain stream. See how those waters bounce and tumble like rolling melons!

Derelict ocean liners, that is.

A day or so ago, I drove a friend to an impound lot to retrieve his car. The car was seized by our fair city’s vehicle seizing apparatchiks because he owed quite a bit of money in the form of unpaid parking tickets. The lot, which is surrounded by a fence and guarded as if top secret work was being conducted, is very close to the Delaware River. There are many things to look at while you wait for bureaucratic wheels to turn: an IKEA (not pictured), a Home Depot (also not pictured) and a rusting ocean liner, the S.S. United States (yes, pictured above).

at the impound lot, security is tight

Wikipedia describes the S.S. United States this way:

The United States government was interested in constructing a large, fast merchant vessel capable of transporting large numbers of soldiers in time of war, similar to the exemplary war service provided by the British liners Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth during World War II. Designed by renowned American naval architect and marine engineer William Francis Gibbs, the liner’s construction was a joint effort between the United States Navy and United States Lines. Her construction was heavily subsidized by the U.S. government, underwriting $50 million of the $78 million construction cost, with the ship’s operators, United States Lines, contributing the remaining $28 million. In exchange, she was designed to be easily converted into a troopship in the case of war.

Built from 1950-1952 at the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company in Newport News, Virginia, the United States was built to exacting Navy specifications. Similar to other Navy ships, major requirements included a vessel that was inherently fireproof and also heavily compartmentalized should the vessel sustain damage while under attack in time of war.

Mindful that during World War II U.S. aircraft carriers, with wooden flight decks, tended to catch fire more readily than steel-decked British carriers, the designers of the United States didn’t use a single piece of wood in her framing, accessories or decorations. There were no wood interior surfaces. Fittings, including all furniture and fabrics, were custom made in glass, metal and spun glass fiber to ensure they were in full compliance with strict fireproof guidelines set by the U.S. Navy. Even the clothes hangers in the luxury cabins were made of aluminium. The only wooden equipment used in the construction of the vessel was in the bilge keels and butcher blocks in the galleys. The grand piano in the ballroom was even made of a rare, fire-resistant species of wood.

[...]

full at Wikipedia

It’s interesting enough, I think, that there’s a Wikipedia article devoted to a rusting ship I randomly took a digital image of while waiting for a friend.

But the interest level is increased by this Google Map image:

And a FLICKR photo set…

And a fan website…

All inspired by a ship I thought was merely the oxidizing and forgotten shell of one of Earth’s sea leisure era queens.

Of course, this doesn’t make the ship a spime (follow the link for knowledge) but it does show how the distributed enthusiasm network that is the Internet – or at least, a good portion of it – gives non-spime objects a certain, well, spime-osity. The S.S. United States doesn’t only exist as an actual thing, but as an electronically available information point.

Here’s a thought…

In America – and of course, many other places besides – religious activists are keenly concerned about the interface of entertainment – images and sounds – and minds.

A recent example is the effort directed against the movie version of the Da Vinci Code (about which, tangentially, I turn your attention to Barista’s thoughts on Dan Brown’s formula for success).

Is there any irony to be squeezed out of this? Perhaps. Let’s try. Religious and moral objectors use phrases such as ‘polluting the culture’, ‘leading youth astray’ and ‘blasphemy’ when denouncing entertainment products they dislike.

Another way of putting this might be to say they’re objecting to the evolutionary potential of entertainment – the cultural morphing possibilities (which, to give credit where it’s due, they take more seriously than neutral observers who fail to understand the mind shaping potential). Their fears of losing influence (that is, dominance of the idea pool) as a consequence of pop culture can be re-interpreted as a realistic assessment of the prospects and not, as those of us who don’t share their preoccupations so often think, merely anti-intellectual or anti-sexual expression or anti-fun paranoia.

In a way (and here, I’ll admit, comes a bit of a stretch but there’s a gossamer thematic thread linking the religious objectors to what I’m about to present) the fretful pop culture watchers are accidentally echoing a thought Gene Youngblood expressed in his book, Expanded Cinema

a work brought to my attention by DataIsNature:

The Intermedia Network as Nature

The point I wish to make here is obvious yet vital to an understanding of the function of art in the environment, even though it isconsistently ignored by the majority of film critics. It’s the idea that man is conditioned by his environment and that “enviromnent” for contemporary man is the intermedia network. We are conditioned more by cinema and television than by nature. Once we’ve agreed upon this, it
becomes immediately obvious that the structure and content of popular cinema is a matter of cardinal importance, at least as serious as most political issues, and thus calls for comment not from journalists but from those who work at the matter, artists themselves.

The cinema isn’t just something inside the environment; the intermedia network of cinema, television, radio, magazines, books, and newspapers is our environment, a service environment that carries the messages of the social organism. It establishes meaning in life, creates mediating channels between man and man, man and society. In earlier periods such traditional meaning and value communication was carried mainly in the fine and folk arts. But today these are subsumed amongst many communicating modes. The term ‘arts’ requires expansion to include those advanced technological media which are neither fine nor folk.
[...]

full at Ubu.com

Of course, you remember what it was like.

In the United States – and, with varying amounts of heat, other places in the west – following 11 Sept 2001 it was, if not officially forbidden, socially discouraged to speak of Jihadists as existing within time; as being people whose actions could be analyzed using the tools of historical inquiry and perspective; or any other sort of systematic reasoning. They were evil and the terrorism we witnessed or fell victim to was the fruit of this evil (which, we were told, has as its primary target the destruction of “freedom”). In retrospect, it was an astounding thing to see really, this rapid descent into abstraction.

Time for a course correction.

Fawaz A. Gerges writes…

What does a historian bring to the study and understanding of Islamism and jihadism? History provides complexity, rich narrative, comparative perspective, and a healthy degree of skepticism. Let me illustrate what I mean. Most of the books written on September 11 by commentators dealt with Al Qaeda without contextualizing its rise and evolution (or devolution) within the internal turmoil that has roiled the jihadist movement since the mid-1990as. This shortcoming is not just academic; it goes to the very heart of where Al Qaeda came from, its historical development, its social and power base, and why it brought war to the American heartland.

A central thesis advanced by my book, “Journey of the Jihadist: Inside Muslim Militancy,” is that September 11 was a monstrous mutation within the jihadist movement. That one cannot understand why September 11 had occurred without appreciating the tensions, contradictions, and fissures that split jihadists along local and international lines. That the story of September 11 cannot be fully narrated without examining the rise and evolution of the jihadist movement. In this sense, history is critical to understanding the jihadist journey.

“Journey of the Jihadist” does just that; it closely follows the journey of three generations of jihadists, including Al Qaeda’s, and narrates their story in their own words. I intervened as little as possible. The first generation were the pioneers and founding fathers of the movement in Egypt in the 1970s – inspired by the 1966 hanging or “martyrdom” of Sayyid Qutb, a radical Islamist dissident. The second generation are the Afghan Arabs who fought Soviet troops in Afghanistan in the 1980s and were militarized by their experience in Afghanistan. In addition to Sayyid Qutb, Sheikh Abdullah Azzam played a pivotal role in influencing the journey of this second generation. The third generation is what I call the Iraq generation born after the American-led invasion and occupation of Iraq.

[...]

full at the History News Network