Quotations and notes from "The Terror Factory" - Inside the FBI's Manufactured War on Terrorism by Trevor Aaronson
"A Senate oversight committee found in 1975 the FBI had 1,500 informants. In 1980.., 2,800 ...Six years later .. 6,000 .." Today, after the Moslem{Muslim} terrorist attacks on 9/11, the FBI has an "official roster" of 15,000 informants. The author, Trevor Aaronson, writes that the FBI has a "vast army of spies, located in every community in the United States with enough Muslims to support a mosque.."
"The FBI currently spends $3 billion annually to hunt an enemy that is largely of its own creation."
"According to government and federal court records, the Justice Department has prosecuted more than 500 terrorism defendants since 9/11."
"Of the 508 defendants, 243 had been targeted through an FBI informant, 158 had been caught in an FBI terrorism sting, and 49 had encountered an agent provocateur. Most of the people who didn't face off against an informant weren't directely involved with terrorism at all, but were .. small-time criminals with distant links to terrorists overseas."
"Of the 508 cases, I could count on one hand the number of actual terrorists .."
This is a very provocative book on a very controversial subject.
Saturday, March 30, 2013
Friday, March 22, 2013
Experimental Blog # 151
Comments on "The Terror Courts" - Rough Justice at Guantanamo Bay by Jess Bravin
President George W. Bush created the Special Military Commission by executive order in November of 2001 to deal with the captured foreign terrorists after the 9/11 attacks on America. It seems that neither he nor his administration had any confidence in the existing American judicial system.
The "offshore" commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba was authorized to use what might be called "torture lite" to obtain confessions and other useful information. The prisoners were not to be tortured to death or physically injured. It seems that they had to be in such condition that, after a day or two of rest, they could be brought into the courtroom and not appear to be injured or abused. Numerous times the author also mentions the "clandestine network" of CIA prisons that are secretly located in foreign countries, but not much seems to be known about what transpired in these places.
Jess Bravin apparently concludes that the Guantanamo military commission was actually much slower to produce results than the established American judicial system would have been. Very few convictions could be obtained because confessions or evidence produced under such allowed conditions could not be upheld. Several prisoners were released for political reasons to England and Australia.
For its own political reasons the administration of President Barak Obama has continued the military commission at Guantanamo Bay. However, substantial changes have been made; for instance, "torture lite" is no longer supposed to be used to obtain evidence or confessions. Besides that the author writes that if prisoners are actually convicted of anything, they seem to receive a more lenient sentence than they would receive from the established American judicial system.
President George W. Bush created the Special Military Commission by executive order in November of 2001 to deal with the captured foreign terrorists after the 9/11 attacks on America. It seems that neither he nor his administration had any confidence in the existing American judicial system.
The "offshore" commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba was authorized to use what might be called "torture lite" to obtain confessions and other useful information. The prisoners were not to be tortured to death or physically injured. It seems that they had to be in such condition that, after a day or two of rest, they could be brought into the courtroom and not appear to be injured or abused. Numerous times the author also mentions the "clandestine network" of CIA prisons that are secretly located in foreign countries, but not much seems to be known about what transpired in these places.
Jess Bravin apparently concludes that the Guantanamo military commission was actually much slower to produce results than the established American judicial system would have been. Very few convictions could be obtained because confessions or evidence produced under such allowed conditions could not be upheld. Several prisoners were released for political reasons to England and Australia.
For its own political reasons the administration of President Barak Obama has continued the military commission at Guantanamo Bay. However, substantial changes have been made; for instance, "torture lite" is no longer supposed to be used to obtain evidence or confessions. Besides that the author writes that if prisoners are actually convicted of anything, they seem to receive a more lenient sentence than they would receive from the established American judicial system.
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Experimental Blog # 150
Quotations and notes from "The Joy of X" - A Guided Tour of Math, from One to Infinity by Steven Strogatz
"... numbers have lives of their own. ..Even though they exist in our minds, once we decide what we mean by them,..They obey certain laws and have certain properties, .. and ways of combining with one another ...they are eerily reminiscent of atoms and stars, the things of this world ...except that those things exist outside our heads."
"The Babylonians ..numerical system was based on 60 ...Sixty is the smallest number that can be divided evenly by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6{besides 10, 12, 15, 20, and 30}. ..Because of its promiscuous divisibilty, 60 is much more congenial .. for any sort of calculation or measurement that involves cutting things into equal parts"{such as hours or minutes or circles}.
"Quantum mechanics describes real atoms, and hence all of matter, as packets of sine waves. Even at the cosmological scale, sine waves form the seeds of all that exists."!
"...vector calculus is helping to explain how dragonflies, bumblebees, and hummingbirds can fly - something that had long been a mystery to conventional fixed-wing aerodynamics."
"With the notions of divergence and curl ...{Using mathematical maneuvers equivalent to vector calculus} Maxwell's equations .. express" the four fundamental laws of electric and magnetic fields: how electricity and magnetism are related to their sources of charged particles and currents and how they interact over space and time to produce undulating waves.
The laws of probability turn individual randomness into collective regularity.
"... numbers have lives of their own. ..Even though they exist in our minds, once we decide what we mean by them,..They obey certain laws and have certain properties, .. and ways of combining with one another ...they are eerily reminiscent of atoms and stars, the things of this world ...except that those things exist outside our heads."
"The Babylonians ..numerical system was based on 60 ...Sixty is the smallest number that can be divided evenly by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6{besides 10, 12, 15, 20, and 30}. ..Because of its promiscuous divisibilty, 60 is much more congenial .. for any sort of calculation or measurement that involves cutting things into equal parts"{such as hours or minutes or circles}.
"Quantum mechanics describes real atoms, and hence all of matter, as packets of sine waves. Even at the cosmological scale, sine waves form the seeds of all that exists."!
"...vector calculus is helping to explain how dragonflies, bumblebees, and hummingbirds can fly - something that had long been a mystery to conventional fixed-wing aerodynamics."
"With the notions of divergence and curl ...{Using mathematical maneuvers equivalent to vector calculus} Maxwell's equations .. express" the four fundamental laws of electric and magnetic fields: how electricity and magnetism are related to their sources of charged particles and currents and how they interact over space and time to produce undulating waves.
The laws of probability turn individual randomness into collective regularity.
Thursday, February 21, 2013
Experimental Blog # 149
Quotations and notes from "The Whole Story of Climate" - What Science Reveals about the Nature of Endless Change by E. Kirsten Peters
" ... most major climate changes in geologically recent times have occurred in a mere twenty or thirty years."
"No full climate crash has occurred in the span of written history."
" ... the Pleistocene ... alternated between long periods of cold - lasting roughly 100,000 years - and short periods of considerably warmer times - lasting about 10,000 years."
"If we think of climate change as our enemy, we will always be defeated."
" ... geologists ... realized that there must be diamond-rich rocks in Canada{in the Barren Lands about two hundred miles northeast of Yellowknife?!} that had sent a few gems thousands of miles to the south{New York, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Illionois?!} courtesy of staggering volumes of ice."
" ... from pollen studies all around the world in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, it became abundantly clear to geologists that regional climate changes are always occurring on Earth."
"The Vostock{Antarctica} ice record of 420,000 years covers four great cycles of climate change on Earth."
" .. the jury is still very much out on the idea that relates the history of agriculture to greenhouse gases and global climate."
"On long timescales, increases in temperature, controlled by the Earth's orbit around the sun, create more methane and carbon dioxide. ... from what most scientists can tell, greenhouse gases are not the primary driver of long-term climate change on Earth .."
" ... most major climate changes in geologically recent times have occurred in a mere twenty or thirty years."
"No full climate crash has occurred in the span of written history."
" ... the Pleistocene ... alternated between long periods of cold - lasting roughly 100,000 years - and short periods of considerably warmer times - lasting about 10,000 years."
"If we think of climate change as our enemy, we will always be defeated."
" ... geologists ... realized that there must be diamond-rich rocks in Canada{in the Barren Lands about two hundred miles northeast of Yellowknife?!} that had sent a few gems thousands of miles to the south{New York, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Illionois?!} courtesy of staggering volumes of ice."
" ... from pollen studies all around the world in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, it became abundantly clear to geologists that regional climate changes are always occurring on Earth."
"The Vostock{Antarctica} ice record of 420,000 years covers four great cycles of climate change on Earth."
" .. the jury is still very much out on the idea that relates the history of agriculture to greenhouse gases and global climate."
"On long timescales, increases in temperature, controlled by the Earth's orbit around the sun, create more methane and carbon dioxide. ... from what most scientists can tell, greenhouse gases are not the primary driver of long-term climate change on Earth .."
Saturday, February 16, 2013
Experimental Blog # 148
Notes and quotations from "Restless Empire - China and the World Since 1750" by Odd Arne Westad
This history of modern China begins with the Qing{also sometimes called Manchu} dynasty, which ruled for almost three hundred years, from 1644 to 1912. Even during the 15th century Chinese were emigrating along trade routes to other settlements in Southeast Asia; Vietnam, Cambodia, the Philippines, Java, Malaya, and Thailand. In the 19th and 20th centuries, besides the United States and Canada, Chinese also emigrated to Cuba and Peru. Eventually totalling about 20 million people, over 75% had gone to Southeast Asia.
Today, the author says, about 40 million people of Chinese descent live outside of China, compared to more than 350 million people of European descent who live outside of Europe.
Beginning in the 1830s several European powers began incursions into China for their commercial advantages. By the end of the 19th century these European powers were joined by Japan. "In 1911 ... an army mutiny forced the mother of the last emporer, the four-year-old Puyi, to issue his abdication. By imperial decree, China became a republic ..."
The atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August of 1945 abruptly terminated Japan's occupation of China. However, the vigorous support of the Soviet Union gave the victory in the Chinese civil war to the Chinese Communist Party, or the CCP. There followed a very thorough "sovietization" of China, which possiblly cost an additional 4 to 5 million human lives.
However, the author calls the Great Leap Forward campaign, which ended in 1961, "the greatest man-made catastrophe in human history". Odd Arne Westad writes that an estimated 45 million people died from hunger, illness, or exhaustion.
"During the 1960s, China went through a period of isolation and increasing irrelevance in international affairs." "The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution was by far the largest and most intense government campaign in Chinese history. It killed fewer people than the Great Leap and it affected the economy less, but in terms of people's daily lives and of lives ruined and made meaningless it was far worse."
Odd Arne Westad writes over another one hundred pages to end his book on a somewhat more positive note.
This history of modern China begins with the Qing{also sometimes called Manchu} dynasty, which ruled for almost three hundred years, from 1644 to 1912. Even during the 15th century Chinese were emigrating along trade routes to other settlements in Southeast Asia; Vietnam, Cambodia, the Philippines, Java, Malaya, and Thailand. In the 19th and 20th centuries, besides the United States and Canada, Chinese also emigrated to Cuba and Peru. Eventually totalling about 20 million people, over 75% had gone to Southeast Asia.
Today, the author says, about 40 million people of Chinese descent live outside of China, compared to more than 350 million people of European descent who live outside of Europe.
Beginning in the 1830s several European powers began incursions into China for their commercial advantages. By the end of the 19th century these European powers were joined by Japan. "In 1911 ... an army mutiny forced the mother of the last emporer, the four-year-old Puyi, to issue his abdication. By imperial decree, China became a republic ..."
The atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August of 1945 abruptly terminated Japan's occupation of China. However, the vigorous support of the Soviet Union gave the victory in the Chinese civil war to the Chinese Communist Party, or the CCP. There followed a very thorough "sovietization" of China, which possiblly cost an additional 4 to 5 million human lives.
However, the author calls the Great Leap Forward campaign, which ended in 1961, "the greatest man-made catastrophe in human history". Odd Arne Westad writes that an estimated 45 million people died from hunger, illness, or exhaustion.
"During the 1960s, China went through a period of isolation and increasing irrelevance in international affairs." "The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution was by far the largest and most intense government campaign in Chinese history. It killed fewer people than the Great Leap and it affected the economy less, but in terms of people's daily lives and of lives ruined and made meaningless it was far worse."
Odd Arne Westad writes over another one hundred pages to end his book on a somewhat more positive note.
Sunday, January 27, 2013
Experimental Blog # 147
Quotations and notes from "Round About the Earth" - Circumnavigation from Magellan to Orbit by Joyce E. Chaplin
"Satellites were indeed the easiest way for nations to enter the space age, ... France{November 1965}, Japan{February 1970}, and China{April 1970} became the third, fourth, and fifth nations to put satellites in orbit." Post-colonial nations also put up satellites: India{briefly functioning in April 1975}, Indonesia{1976}, the Arab League{1985}, and Pakistan{1990}.
"Apollo 17 delivered .. the last person, so far, to have strolled the lunar surface. This expedition of 1972, the longest Moon stay, lasted 75 hours, about 11 percent of the 655.73 hours that it takes for the Moon to circle the planet."
"By 2012, over five hundred people had gone into space."
"The USSR established nine orbital outposts between 1971 and 1982. .. America's Skylab orbited from 1973 to 1979, .. A subsequent Russian station, Mir, orbited for fifteen years, a total of 86,000 times around the world, .. from 1986 to 2001. .. Finally, there is the world's current extraterrestrial outpost, the International Space Station{ISS}, first orbited in 1998, .."
At 569 kilometers above Earth, and higher, are the 'robotic emissaries'. "By the end of 2007, close to nine hundred satellites were in orbit, operated by authorities in over forty different countries."
Of course the earlier parts of the book were very interesting too.
"Satellites were indeed the easiest way for nations to enter the space age, ... France{November 1965}, Japan{February 1970}, and China{April 1970} became the third, fourth, and fifth nations to put satellites in orbit." Post-colonial nations also put up satellites: India{briefly functioning in April 1975}, Indonesia{1976}, the Arab League{1985}, and Pakistan{1990}.
"Apollo 17 delivered .. the last person, so far, to have strolled the lunar surface. This expedition of 1972, the longest Moon stay, lasted 75 hours, about 11 percent of the 655.73 hours that it takes for the Moon to circle the planet."
"By 2012, over five hundred people had gone into space."
"The USSR established nine orbital outposts between 1971 and 1982. .. America's Skylab orbited from 1973 to 1979, .. A subsequent Russian station, Mir, orbited for fifteen years, a total of 86,000 times around the world, .. from 1986 to 2001. .. Finally, there is the world's current extraterrestrial outpost, the International Space Station{ISS}, first orbited in 1998, .."
At 569 kilometers above Earth, and higher, are the 'robotic emissaries'. "By the end of 2007, close to nine hundred satellites were in orbit, operated by authorities in over forty different countries."
Of course the earlier parts of the book were very interesting too.
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Experimental Blog # 146
Quotations and notes from "The Last Lost World - Ice Ages, Human Origins, and the Invention of the Pleistocene" by Lydia V. Pyne and Stephen J. Pyne
"As a geologic epoch, the Pleistocene lasted from approximately 2.6 million to 10,000 to 12,000 years ago. It includes an ice age, ...Earth's fifth great extinction event{the Toba eruption 73,000 to 71,000 years ago}, and the appearance and evolution of the hominins." "but Earth did not re-lay its tectonic tiles in any major way during the epoch."
There are 3 cycles{or "orbital forcings"}, orbital stretching, axis tilting, and axis wobbling, which coincide in extremely complex ways to cause Ice Ages. "80 percent of the Pleistocene was glacial, and no interglacial lasted more than 12,000 years."
"The saga of Homo was not unique within the Pleistocene for its evolutionary experience was characteristic of the times. What happened to hominins .. happened to clades of other taxa ..", such as the African bovids and the elephantids -- the proboscideans.
"An estimated 210 skulls of paleohumans exist".. Apparently in 8 species, so far.
"The earliest tendencies toward the modern sapients probably appeared 500,000 years ago in Africa with clear definitions both anatomical and genetic evident between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago."
"Some 22,000 years ago the last glacial reached its maximum ... But a consensus places the general collapse at 11,500 to 14,500 years ago."
"Between 3,000 and 50,000 years ago, some two-thirds of mammal genera and half of all species that weighed more than roughly one hundred pounds went missing."
"...most of the mammalian biomass in the world today is either human{40 megatons of carbon} or human domesticates{100 to 120 megatons of carbon}, while wild vertebrates claim only 5 megatons."
"The arts and humanities can no longer claim - even pretend to claim - that they can make valid statements about the material world and how it works. .. But philosophy, literature, and history can help explain how the sciences work. .. They can illuminate how we might understand and express the practice of knowing, and how we come to a felt sense of who we are and how we should behave."
Science "cannot, unaided, address what it means to live, what makes a life worth living, what purpose spans the narrative of a life or of humanity. It cannot say why a society should even engage in this kind of inquiry."
"As a geologic epoch, the Pleistocene lasted from approximately 2.6 million to 10,000 to 12,000 years ago. It includes an ice age, ...Earth's fifth great extinction event{the Toba eruption 73,000 to 71,000 years ago}, and the appearance and evolution of the hominins." "but Earth did not re-lay its tectonic tiles in any major way during the epoch."
There are 3 cycles{or "orbital forcings"}, orbital stretching, axis tilting, and axis wobbling, which coincide in extremely complex ways to cause Ice Ages. "80 percent of the Pleistocene was glacial, and no interglacial lasted more than 12,000 years."
"The saga of Homo was not unique within the Pleistocene for its evolutionary experience was characteristic of the times. What happened to hominins .. happened to clades of other taxa ..", such as the African bovids and the elephantids -- the proboscideans.
"An estimated 210 skulls of paleohumans exist".. Apparently in 8 species, so far.
"The earliest tendencies toward the modern sapients probably appeared 500,000 years ago in Africa with clear definitions both anatomical and genetic evident between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago."
"Some 22,000 years ago the last glacial reached its maximum ... But a consensus places the general collapse at 11,500 to 14,500 years ago."
"Between 3,000 and 50,000 years ago, some two-thirds of mammal genera and half of all species that weighed more than roughly one hundred pounds went missing."
"...most of the mammalian biomass in the world today is either human{40 megatons of carbon} or human domesticates{100 to 120 megatons of carbon}, while wild vertebrates claim only 5 megatons."
"The arts and humanities can no longer claim - even pretend to claim - that they can make valid statements about the material world and how it works. .. But philosophy, literature, and history can help explain how the sciences work. .. They can illuminate how we might understand and express the practice of knowing, and how we come to a felt sense of who we are and how we should behave."
Science "cannot, unaided, address what it means to live, what makes a life worth living, what purpose spans the narrative of a life or of humanity. It cannot say why a society should even engage in this kind of inquiry."
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