since i'm still stuck on the topic of monogamy, here's 5 alternative hypotheses that James Wittenberger and Ronald Tilson summarised in the article The Evolution of Monogamy: Hypotheses and Evidence. (JSTOR Link)
1. Monogamy should evolve when male parental care is both nonshareable and indispensable to female reproductive success. A female may be unable to rear offspring without nonshareable male parental assistance, either because she cannot provide them with enough food alone or because continuous attendance of offspring is essential to their survival. Hypothesis 1 applies only if females cannot rear anyoffspring within the species-typical social system without male assistance. Males may still copulate with other females (68), but they maintain a prolonged pair bond with only one mate. Hypothesis 1 implies that monogamy is advantageous for both sexes. It resembles Lack's (1 11) hypothesis for monogamy in altricial birds.
2. Monogamy should evolve in territorial species ifpairing with an unavailable unmated male is always better than pairing with an already mated male. Any benefits females might gain by breeding in a superior habitat, mating with a superior male, or cooperating with other females on a shared territory may be too small to compensate for the costs of polygyny. Since a major cost of polygyny is often lost male parental care, Hypothesis 2 covers cases where parental assistance is important but not indispensable to female success. Hypothesis 1 could be treated as a subset of Hypothesis 2, but the distinction is useful for pointing out cases where monogamy is clearly advantageous for both sexes as opposed to those where it may be advantageous only for females. Hypothesis 2 is derived from the polygyny-threshold model of Verner (227) and Orians (145).
3. Monogamy should evolve in nonterritorial species when the majority of males can reproduce most successfully by defending exclusive access to a single female. Sequestering individual females should be especially advantageous for males when sex ratios are male-biased, because the majority of males would then achieve higher success by claiming sole possession of one female rather than taking their chances in a promiscuous "lottery" system. Females may or may not benefit from being sequestered, but the costs of resisting the male's continual presence must exceed the costs of accepting his presence.
4. Monogamy should evolve even though the polygyny threshold is exceeded if aggression by mated females prevents males from acquiring additional mates. The criterion for distinguishing between Hypotheses 2 and 4 in territorial species is the magnitude of the polygyny threshold. If the polygyny threshold is exceeded, Hypothesis 4 applies. If not, Hypothesis 2 applies. In social animals Hypothesis 4 applies when aggression by a dominant female can prevent breeding by sexually mature subordinate females. The occurrence of female aggression is not sufficient evidence for accepting Hypothesis 4, because females may be aggressive for reasons other than maintenance of a monogamous pair bond.
5. Monogamy should evolve when males are less successful with two mates than with one. The presence of a second female may substantially reduce the success of a male's first mate by increasing competition for resources or increasing her conspicuousness to predators. If the combined success of both females is less than that possible for a single female, the male should enforce monogamy by excluding additional females. This hypothesis was first proposed by Trivers (224).
i don't think that hypotheses 1, 2 and 5 really apply to humans, and no. 4 is really funny. 河东狮吼。。。
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Monday, August 06, 2007
had dinner at gluttons' bay with a friend, who left me for a show after dinner. so i was wandering around citylink and later raffles city. maybe i was too tired (from what? the paperwork i did today?), i found wandering and windowshopping very relaxing. being in this city is so easy. i don't have to think too much before getting onto a train, which will take me to shops and eating places in no time. and then i could choose from stall to stall what to eat, and roam from shop to shop aimlessly. the variety that singapore offers is quite unique really.
and i know that i know the city much better than any other. just a week ago, i was in shanghai, trying to get a visa for entry into sg. i felt so stranded. the subway was almost the same, and so were the shopping centers. but i didn't know how to go to places, i didn't know how to speak the tongue(even though our dialects came from the same linguistic branch), and i had to use single journey tickets for train rides. it was horrible. a few days later, the moment i got to the arrival hall of changi airport, i drew cash with my atm card, bought a prepaid sim card, took a cab to my friends' place. the second day i found out that my ez link card was still functioning and i was immediately walking all over this island, resuming my old activities, catching up with old friends. (and after all these years away, it was surprisingly comforting to find that some things never change. such as the fabulous smelling $10.90 rose scent foam bath at marks and spencer.) that was when i totally felt at home. i really appreciate the independence, which i had in san diego but not in suzhou, as well as the convenicence, which i might have had in suzhou, but definitely not in san diego. and when i smsed a friend about being relieved to be in sg, he told me "welcome home". and i was happy to read that.
i think i really do like sg very much. and i'm glad i do.
and i know that i know the city much better than any other. just a week ago, i was in shanghai, trying to get a visa for entry into sg. i felt so stranded. the subway was almost the same, and so were the shopping centers. but i didn't know how to go to places, i didn't know how to speak the tongue(even though our dialects came from the same linguistic branch), and i had to use single journey tickets for train rides. it was horrible. a few days later, the moment i got to the arrival hall of changi airport, i drew cash with my atm card, bought a prepaid sim card, took a cab to my friends' place. the second day i found out that my ez link card was still functioning and i was immediately walking all over this island, resuming my old activities, catching up with old friends. (and after all these years away, it was surprisingly comforting to find that some things never change. such as the fabulous smelling $10.90 rose scent foam bath at marks and spencer.) that was when i totally felt at home. i really appreciate the independence, which i had in san diego but not in suzhou, as well as the convenicence, which i might have had in suzhou, but definitely not in san diego. and when i smsed a friend about being relieved to be in sg, he told me "welcome home". and i was happy to read that.
i think i really do like sg very much. and i'm glad i do.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Gen Me in China: A Nintendo Wii comes way ahead of democracy
from the new article on Time:
The rise of China's Me generation has implications for the foreign policies of other nations. Sinologists in the West have long predicted that economic growth would eventually bring democracy to China. As James Mann points out in his new book, The China Fantasy, the idea that China will evolve into a democracy as its middle class grows continues to underlie the U.S.'s China policy, providing the central rationale for maintaining close ties with what is, after all, an unapologetically authoritarian regime. But China's Me generation could shatter such long-held assumptions. As the chief beneficiaries of China's economic success, young professionals have more and more tied up in preserving the status quo. The last thing they want is a populist politician winning over the country's hundreds of millions of have-nots on a rural-reform, stick-it-to-the-cities agenda.
read more on china's Me gen
The rise of China's Me generation has implications for the foreign policies of other nations. Sinologists in the West have long predicted that economic growth would eventually bring democracy to China. As James Mann points out in his new book, The China Fantasy, the idea that China will evolve into a democracy as its middle class grows continues to underlie the U.S.'s China policy, providing the central rationale for maintaining close ties with what is, after all, an unapologetically authoritarian regime. But China's Me generation could shatter such long-held assumptions. As the chief beneficiaries of China's economic success, young professionals have more and more tied up in preserving the status quo. The last thing they want is a populist politician winning over the country's hundreds of millions of have-nots on a rural-reform, stick-it-to-the-cities agenda.
read more on china's Me gen
Thursday, July 26, 2007
today AH sent me an article on how to choose good phd advisors from sciencemag. i think we know more or less the things it's talking about, but it is nicely organized and systematic. makes a good read.
To Choose an Adviser, Be an "Armchair Anthropologist"
To Choose an Adviser, Be an "Armchair Anthropologist"
Monday, July 23, 2007
impressions: guilin
i'm just back from the tour to guilin with my mom... a few take home points:
1. tour groups are terrible terrible things. they rush the tourists through places of interests like cattle.
2. traveling with mom is a bad bad idea. somehow the trip can get too depressing at times.
3. guilin is an extremely pretty place, but something needs to be done to this place to improve its economy. there's only this much it can earn by conning tourists, and the money is not going to its people.
4. zhang yimou is a fucking genius. we need more people like him to transform concepts and ideas, and create values.
more to come.
1. tour groups are terrible terrible things. they rush the tourists through places of interests like cattle.
2. traveling with mom is a bad bad idea. somehow the trip can get too depressing at times.
3. guilin is an extremely pretty place, but something needs to be done to this place to improve its economy. there's only this much it can earn by conning tourists, and the money is not going to its people.
4. zhang yimou is a fucking genius. we need more people like him to transform concepts and ideas, and create values.
more to come.
Monday, July 09, 2007
chinese tv stations are just getting worse and worse. i couldn't seem to find anything worth watching all day long. so today i was flipping channels forever as usual, until i stop at this weird taiwanese tv series called the eighth pawn shop.
it is about an imaginary pawn shop to which customers could pawn any possession including tangible things such as a leg and intangible things such as talent, soul, love. for an example, in the show, a mother pawned her love for the child for the success in fashion. the grown up child, agonizing over the lack of maternal care, in turn pawned her talent in fashion design for her mother's love. then, the guilty mother pawned her eyes to take back the child's talent. things like that. you get the point.
it is a very strange concept. almost shocking at first. can we really rank the things in our lives and decide which we could lose indefinitely in order to gain the other? can we really say, i don't want the love, i just want my career, and here, you can have my love, please give me a high flying career? how could we make any of these choices when we don't really know what is to come, and from which we are to gain more? it's tempting to think, if i were to go to such a pawn shop, what would i pawn for what? and i shudder as if it was such a terrible thing.
but a little more thought reveals that it is nothing new. we are defining priorities all the time. we are disgarding some things over others every time we make a choice. ordinary choices such as spending the night at the laboratory or a nightclub and whether or not to take our eyes off the computer monitor to pay more attention to our naggy moms. the pawn shop owner just lets his customers do it a more calculative, explicit and irreversible way. we in reality, might not even weigh things as carefully. we just go ahead and decide. on what basis are we making these decisions?
what would you pawn, and for what, my friend, if the 8th pawn shop really existed?
it is about an imaginary pawn shop to which customers could pawn any possession including tangible things such as a leg and intangible things such as talent, soul, love. for an example, in the show, a mother pawned her love for the child for the success in fashion. the grown up child, agonizing over the lack of maternal care, in turn pawned her talent in fashion design for her mother's love. then, the guilty mother pawned her eyes to take back the child's talent. things like that. you get the point.
it is a very strange concept. almost shocking at first. can we really rank the things in our lives and decide which we could lose indefinitely in order to gain the other? can we really say, i don't want the love, i just want my career, and here, you can have my love, please give me a high flying career? how could we make any of these choices when we don't really know what is to come, and from which we are to gain more? it's tempting to think, if i were to go to such a pawn shop, what would i pawn for what? and i shudder as if it was such a terrible thing.
but a little more thought reveals that it is nothing new. we are defining priorities all the time. we are disgarding some things over others every time we make a choice. ordinary choices such as spending the night at the laboratory or a nightclub and whether or not to take our eyes off the computer monitor to pay more attention to our naggy moms. the pawn shop owner just lets his customers do it a more calculative, explicit and irreversible way. we in reality, might not even weigh things as carefully. we just go ahead and decide. on what basis are we making these decisions?
what would you pawn, and for what, my friend, if the 8th pawn shop really existed?
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
back to square one
home, parents, reality check. i have probably mentioned this a thousand times but here it is again: moving always feels unreal. areoplanes make time space change happen too quickly, i can't adjust to it. one moment i was in a carpeted apartment in la jolla, the other i'm at home, taking care not to scratch the newly polished wooden floor(mainly so that mom doesn't scream at me). i was abruptly disconnected from the previous life, but am nowhere near being connected to the next. i feel like i'm still living in the void, just like when i was in the dark aeroplane cabin traveling in between countries but not really in any, my mind phasing in and out of state of wakefulness and sleep but dreaming of nothing.
but things need to be ended and things need to begin. for a start, i should probably stop drinking. alcohol merely leaves me with dulled and mistaken sensory system, uncoordinated motor sysem and utterly chaotic central nervous system. on the other hand, like marco said, i should probably start looking at groups now. and i need to get reading for the project with ingham started. and gre is around the corner. seems like a lot of things to do.
but things need to be ended and things need to begin. for a start, i should probably stop drinking. alcohol merely leaves me with dulled and mistaken sensory system, uncoordinated motor sysem and utterly chaotic central nervous system. on the other hand, like marco said, i should probably start looking at groups now. and i need to get reading for the project with ingham started. and gre is around the corner. seems like a lot of things to do.
Sunday, June 24, 2007
packing always leads to surprises. found a message zhu wrote me on a purple piece of paper when we left singapore in 04. the flip side has ai yazawa's manga drawings. zhu put a quote in the message:
all existing things are born without a reason, prolongs itself out of weakness and dies out of chance.
-jean-paul sartre
and zhu said, we are prlonging ourselves out of weakness right now aren't we. i probably didn't give much thought to the quote at the time i received it. i was as ambitious as any student preparing to start a scientific career at a university. my life was full of purpose then, and i had nothing but confidence in me. 3 years later, i'm sure that confidence has withered a little. while i still don't think we are prolonging ourselves out of weakness, a sense of losing control of my own life did sort of creep in. maybe that's what happens when you grow old, when more and more things start to set and fewer and fewer possibilities are left for you to contemplate. maybe when i am at the age when sartre wrote the quote, i would think exactly the same things.
all existing things are born without a reason, prolongs itself out of weakness and dies out of chance.
-jean-paul sartre
and zhu said, we are prlonging ourselves out of weakness right now aren't we. i probably didn't give much thought to the quote at the time i received it. i was as ambitious as any student preparing to start a scientific career at a university. my life was full of purpose then, and i had nothing but confidence in me. 3 years later, i'm sure that confidence has withered a little. while i still don't think we are prolonging ourselves out of weakness, a sense of losing control of my own life did sort of creep in. maybe that's what happens when you grow old, when more and more things start to set and fewer and fewer possibilities are left for you to contemplate. maybe when i am at the age when sartre wrote the quote, i would think exactly the same things.
Saturday, June 23, 2007
a couple of things i have been thinking about these days because i loaded my shuffle with all the music tagged "contemporary" from my library:
1. kieslowski should make movies out of kudera's books, and get arvo part to write the soundtrack.
2. the last 2 minutes of giger's tropus is haunting. the little violin voices layered at the back of the chorus sound like dead white winged creatures weeping. i want to say layered on top, but it really does sound like it occurs somewhere at the back of my mind. and the visual images i can't rid of are surprisingly the vampire maids from van helsin. that wasn't even that good a movie.
3. steve reich's after the war is brilliantly written. go listen for yourself. and his marimba pieces are just adorable.
4. i still think the poem i hide myself within my flower is very nice... (which eric whitacre set to music)
Emily Dickinson (1830–86). Complete Poems. 1924.
Part Three: Love
VII
I HIDE myself within my flower,
That wearing on your breast,
You, unsuspecting, wear me too—
And angels know the rest.
I hide myself within my flower,
That, fading from your vase,
You, unsuspecting, feel for me
Almost a loneliness.
fantacy of a pale sickly child. so lonely, yearning, with almost an erotic touch. and so clever. and reminds me of another one she wrote, from the same series.
XLVII
HEART, we will forget him!
You and I, to-night!
You may forget the warmth he gave,
I will forget the light.
When you have done, pray tell me, 5
That I my thoughts may dim;
Haste! lest while you’re lagging,
I may remember him!
1. kieslowski should make movies out of kudera's books, and get arvo part to write the soundtrack.
2. the last 2 minutes of giger's tropus is haunting. the little violin voices layered at the back of the chorus sound like dead white winged creatures weeping. i want to say layered on top, but it really does sound like it occurs somewhere at the back of my mind. and the visual images i can't rid of are surprisingly the vampire maids from van helsin. that wasn't even that good a movie.
3. steve reich's after the war is brilliantly written. go listen for yourself. and his marimba pieces are just adorable.
4. i still think the poem i hide myself within my flower is very nice... (which eric whitacre set to music)
Emily Dickinson (1830–86). Complete Poems. 1924.
Part Three: Love
VII
I HIDE myself within my flower,
That wearing on your breast,
You, unsuspecting, wear me too—
And angels know the rest.
I hide myself within my flower,
That, fading from your vase,
You, unsuspecting, feel for me
Almost a loneliness.
fantacy of a pale sickly child. so lonely, yearning, with almost an erotic touch. and so clever. and reminds me of another one she wrote, from the same series.
XLVII
HEART, we will forget him!
You and I, to-night!
You may forget the warmth he gave,
I will forget the light.
When you have done, pray tell me, 5
That I my thoughts may dim;
Haste! lest while you’re lagging,
I may remember him!
Thursday, June 21, 2007
first born smarter?
sciencemag seems to like this type of things, such as the index finger: ring finger ratio indicating maths ability and stuff that they posted some time back.
sciencemag seems to like this type of things, such as the index finger: ring finger ratio indicating maths ability and stuff that they posted some time back.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
from the urban dictionary
Internet
A vast tundra of knowledge, now corrupted and slowly imploding on itself. Those caught on the outskirts enter a void of stupidity and insecurity. Eventually, it will completely cave in on itself, and then explode with such force, we will all be sent to an information oblivion. Random bits of intelligence will float amongst vast oceans of idiocy, and all of man kind will commit suicide in a futile effort to repent for creating such a weapon of mass destruction. God will not accept their sacrifice, and everyone will go to hell, where Satan will get pissed off at the extreme overpopulation of his facilities, and send everyone to someplace copletely unihabitable, like Utah.
digital immigrant
Someone who grew up before the digital age and is fairly new to the internet. Basically anyone over the age of 28.
YouTube is foreign to the digital immigrant.
BCG
Birth Control Glasses. Generally a military term which refers to the large, blocky glasses issued to military personnel who require the use of corrective lenses.
Man, these BCGs make me look like a complete idiot.
programmer's tan
The pasty white tan of a person who works over eighty hours a week and never gets any sun.
Bill's been doing a lot of hours lately -- he's really working on his programmer's tan.
Computer
a machine for downloading porn
"oh no, the computer broke, i ejaculated all over the keyboard"
generation y
children of boomers born from about generation from about 1977 to age old enough to remember 9/11.
gen y began with corporate watered down versions of gen x music (hip-hop and heavy metal,) after the shit load of that swedish music and boy band phase of the early gen y kids. For this many gen y kids have turned to their parents old albums from the 60's and 70's.
pampered by our boomer parents to do good and go far in life sociologists predict a backlash.
gen y has been said to be a clone of gen x, but there are notable differences.
gen y rewrites the rules and works around authority rather than go against it like gen x. This will lead us to get higher in corporations and better paying jobs that gen x was forced to do. Also gen y knows the impact of money.
early failures are that of SUV's fuck those gas guzzlers that kill the air. Hummers and are for ass holes.
blah blah blah we grow up and die
then fertilize the world
we were raised by grand theft auto!
Internet
A vast tundra of knowledge, now corrupted and slowly imploding on itself. Those caught on the outskirts enter a void of stupidity and insecurity. Eventually, it will completely cave in on itself, and then explode with such force, we will all be sent to an information oblivion. Random bits of intelligence will float amongst vast oceans of idiocy, and all of man kind will commit suicide in a futile effort to repent for creating such a weapon of mass destruction. God will not accept their sacrifice, and everyone will go to hell, where Satan will get pissed off at the extreme overpopulation of his facilities, and send everyone to someplace copletely unihabitable, like Utah.
digital immigrant
Someone who grew up before the digital age and is fairly new to the internet. Basically anyone over the age of 28.
YouTube is foreign to the digital immigrant.
BCG
Birth Control Glasses. Generally a military term which refers to the large, blocky glasses issued to military personnel who require the use of corrective lenses.
Man, these BCGs make me look like a complete idiot.
programmer's tan
The pasty white tan of a person who works over eighty hours a week and never gets any sun.
Bill's been doing a lot of hours lately -- he's really working on his programmer's tan.
Computer
a machine for downloading porn
"oh no, the computer broke, i ejaculated all over the keyboard"
generation y
children of boomers born from about generation from about 1977 to age old enough to remember 9/11.
gen y began with corporate watered down versions of gen x music (hip-hop and heavy metal,) after the shit load of that swedish music and boy band phase of the early gen y kids. For this many gen y kids have turned to their parents old albums from the 60's and 70's.
pampered by our boomer parents to do good and go far in life sociologists predict a backlash.
gen y has been said to be a clone of gen x, but there are notable differences.
gen y rewrites the rules and works around authority rather than go against it like gen x. This will lead us to get higher in corporations and better paying jobs that gen x was forced to do. Also gen y knows the impact of money.
early failures are that of SUV's fuck those gas guzzlers that kill the air. Hummers and are for ass holes.
blah blah blah we grow up and die
then fertilize the world
we were raised by grand theft auto!
Friday, June 15, 2007
i was hungry after setting up a couple of reactions this morning, so i went to the price center for a cup of cheap cocoa and a piece of marble cake. the cocoa was a little too hot for the season, so i dont think i will get it any more this year. therefore i was sitting in the open, sipping my cocoa on a sunny and breezy la jolla morning for the last time, listening to arvo part's lamentate. i'm sure part didn't intend his music this way, but whenever i am not feeling much or don't know what to feel, the music feels emotionless. the sparse piano sounds just fills the blank spaces between my equally sparse thoughts. but it's quiet, like a whisper. and i like that. so for a moment, everything was perfect, the breeze, the sun, the sweet cocoa, lubimov's fingers on the keys, the ambient noises making its way through the earphones, and those that were coming from my roaming brain. everything coming through different channels, nothing is blocking anything else. and all was harmonious.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Gisele Bundchen
i was flipping through the latest vs catalogue (not sent to me) and i saw this woman:
she is HOT! there's something about her looks, which makes everyone else look like either bithes or country pumpkins. or little girls. goodness. i would rather quit my job if i had to compete with this woman..
(ok. i just googled. she is the highest-paid model alive. oh well... looks like my taste is quite mainstream :) )
she is HOT! there's something about her looks, which makes everyone else look like either bithes or country pumpkins. or little girls. goodness. i would rather quit my job if i had to compete with this woman..
(ok. i just googled. she is the highest-paid model alive. oh well... looks like my taste is quite mainstream :) )
boredom III
| What American accent do you have? Your Result: Boston You definitely have a Boston accent, even if you think you don't. Of course, that doesn't mean you are from the Boston area, you may also be from New Hampshire or Maine. | |
| The West | |
| The Midland | |
| North Central | |
| The Northeast | |
| Philadelphia | |
| The Inland North | |
| The South | |
| What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz | |
boredom II
Your results:
You are Spider-Man
Click here to take the Superhero Personality Test
You are Spider-Man
| You are intelligent, witty, a bit geeky and have great power and responsibility.  |
Click here to take the Superhero Personality Test
final week boredom
| Your dating personality profile: Funny - You laugh often. People never accuse you of lacking a sense of humor. You don't take yourself too seriously. Liberal - Politics matters to you, and you aren't afraid to share your left-leaning views. You would never be caught voting for a conservative candidate. Wealthy/Ambitious - You know what your goals are and you pursue them vigourously. Achieving success is important to you. | Your date match profile: Funny - You consider a good sense of humor a major necessity in a date. If his jokes make you laugh, he has won your heart. Adventurous - You are looking for someone who is willing to try new things and experience life to its fullest. You need a companion who encourages you to take risks and do exciting things. Conservative - Forget liberals, you need a conservative match. Political discussions interest you, and a conservative will offer the viewpoint you need. |
Your Top Ten Traits 1. Funny 2. Liberal 3. Wealthy/Ambitious 4. Big-Hearted 5. Adventurous 6. Intellectual 7. Outgoing 8. Practical 9. Romantic 10. Sensual | Your Top Ten Match Traits 1. Funny 2. Adventurous 3. Conservative 4. Big-Hearted 5. Wealthy/Ambitious 6. Outgoing 7. Practical 8. Sensual 9. Intellectual 10. Romantic |
Take the Online Dating Profile Quiz at Dating Diversions
Saturday, June 09, 2007
Friday, June 08, 2007
i have probably seen ig nobel prize before, or even blogged about it... but today my mentor was telling me about the mini-humans thing and it was damn funny.
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
JOVE-journal of visualized experiments
finally the scientific community decided not to waste their humangous servers and internet2 connection, but to catch up with youtubers. here's an exciting new journal that presents video demonstrations of visualized experiments... i would've been able to do IVF on zebrafish if this was in place 1 1/2 years ago...
Monday, June 04, 2007
poster
the nightmarish poster session is finally over. as usual, i feel no relief after it, but a sense of emptiness, just like how i feel after all the exams i took. but this time, it's particularly depressing.
many months of work looks tiny on a poster. when people come along i say, "eh.. i made that fly.. yeah.. it didn't work" and i shrug like i just spent a fortnight doing it and it was nothing much. or, i point at some data and say "this looks like it could be working, potentially", and when my listener doesn't show much expression on his face i shrug again to show that i wasn't convinced either. or when i say "if it worked, it could be revolutionary!" and i witness that statement drop down dead on the cold hard floor in front of me...
i'm beyond the age when i could still say at the end of the day "but it was fun", or "it was the experience that counts". i'm at a place where i need to see something happen, or i'd start to doubt if i was cut for science at all. i only care about the results. yeah. i'm that pathetic.
many months of work looks tiny on a poster. when people come along i say, "eh.. i made that fly.. yeah.. it didn't work" and i shrug like i just spent a fortnight doing it and it was nothing much. or, i point at some data and say "this looks like it could be working, potentially", and when my listener doesn't show much expression on his face i shrug again to show that i wasn't convinced either. or when i say "if it worked, it could be revolutionary!" and i witness that statement drop down dead on the cold hard floor in front of me...
i'm beyond the age when i could still say at the end of the day "but it was fun", or "it was the experience that counts". i'm at a place where i need to see something happen, or i'd start to doubt if i was cut for science at all. i only care about the results. yeah. i'm that pathetic.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Thursday, May 24, 2007
from time magazine:
The State of Divorce: You May Be Surprised
The annual national divorce rate has dropped to 3.6 per 1000 people, the lowest since 1970 and well off its peak of 5.7 in 1981. But marriage is down 30% since 1970, with the number of unnmarried couples living together up 10-fold since 1960.
The State of Divorce: You May Be Surprised
The annual national divorce rate has dropped to 3.6 per 1000 people, the lowest since 1970 and well off its peak of 5.7 in 1981. But marriage is down 30% since 1970, with the number of unnmarried couples living together up 10-fold since 1960.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
黄豆豆
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hRRS-rMvR4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cayXgQFlAZs&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cayXgQFlAZs&mode=related&search=
Saturday, May 19, 2007
Friday, May 18, 2007
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Dark Matter The Movie
"But the movie isn’t really about science.
As Mr. Chen, the director, said, “It’s about power, in a way.” That would be the nearly feudalistic power that a graduate adviser has over his student, who after 16 or more years sitting in a classroom listening and regurgitating information must now change gears and learn how to produce original research. That grueling process has been the crucible in which new scientists are made ever since Plato mentored Aristotle, and although it rarely leads to murder [adjoining article], it can often lead to disaffection, strife and lifelong feuds. "
Read the NYT article
and i can't help wondering why the university has refused to reveal the letters that Lu Gang wrote before action. maybe he should've sent it to NBC instead...
As Mr. Chen, the director, said, “It’s about power, in a way.” That would be the nearly feudalistic power that a graduate adviser has over his student, who after 16 or more years sitting in a classroom listening and regurgitating information must now change gears and learn how to produce original research. That grueling process has been the crucible in which new scientists are made ever since Plato mentored Aristotle, and although it rarely leads to murder [adjoining article], it can often lead to disaffection, strife and lifelong feuds. "
Read the NYT article
and i can't help wondering why the university has refused to reveal the letters that Lu Gang wrote before action. maybe he should've sent it to NBC instead...
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
everyone is blogging about the fun we had.. haha.. i only remember one thing :)
kayaking in the middle of the ocean!!! the best is to just lie there... the sky looks incredibly large and empty when its blue fills every pixel on your retina.. imagine.. nothing but the sky is in sight, nothing but the bobbing of water is in your ear, nothing is in your mind but the tiny hope that it lasts longer... while you're gently rocked by the water up and down. i haven't felt so much at ease for years...if i owned a kayak, i would go out there in the ocean every morning and just lie there for a whole day... :p
(yah but of course good things never last and i had to be pulled back to reality by some idiot who splashed cold seawater on my face.)
kayaking in the middle of the ocean!!! the best is to just lie there... the sky looks incredibly large and empty when its blue fills every pixel on your retina.. imagine.. nothing but the sky is in sight, nothing but the bobbing of water is in your ear, nothing is in your mind but the tiny hope that it lasts longer... while you're gently rocked by the water up and down. i haven't felt so much at ease for years...if i owned a kayak, i would go out there in the ocean every morning and just lie there for a whole day... :p
(yah but of course good things never last and i had to be pulled back to reality by some idiot who splashed cold seawater on my face.)
Sunday, May 13, 2007
i was shopping for mother's day cards yesterday.. and came across this card that says "coporate top, perfect homemaker, best mom!" and got a little scared by the enthusiasm people have over the newly emancipated female sex of the species... how is one supposed to do that?
another observation. as i was discussing this over dessert with a friend, i think witticism is highly related to the power relation in a conversation. i believe that 5 minutes into a conversation, even between strangers, the power relation is established. and from then on only the domineering party can afford to be witty all the time. probably just cos it takes a great deal of confidence to be witty. wonder if there is any, how the neural circuit for humour is like... definitely has a positive input from the "confidence center".
another observation. as i was discussing this over dessert with a friend, i think witticism is highly related to the power relation in a conversation. i believe that 5 minutes into a conversation, even between strangers, the power relation is established. and from then on only the domineering party can afford to be witty all the time. probably just cos it takes a great deal of confidence to be witty. wonder if there is any, how the neural circuit for humour is like... definitely has a positive input from the "confidence center".
Monday, May 07, 2007
recently me and my friends been talking a lot about relationships and stuff.. there's one thing i've been thinking about, which is the difference between the singaporean kids and american kids in the terminology for being "in a relationship". the singaporean kids say "so and so are attached", whereas the american kids say "so and so are going out", or "so and so are dating". the latter is clearly a verb reflecting the activity of the two people, while the former is a adjective, mainly reflecting the status of the two people. difference in mindset no?
Startle response
at a popping balloon (click image to learn more). from the current issue of journal of neuroscience.
Thursday, May 03, 2007
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
Stand up, all victims of oppression
For the tyrants fear your might
Don't cling so hard to your possessions
For you have nothing, if you have no rights
Let racist ignorance be ended
For respect makes the empires fall
Freedom is merely privilege extended
Unless enjoyed by one and all.
CHORUS:
So come brothers and sisters
For the struggle carries on
The Internationale
Unites the world in song
So comrades come rally
For this is the time and place
The international ideal
Unites the human race
Let no one build walls to divide us
Walls of hatred nor walls of stone
Come greet the dawn and stand beside us
We'll live together or we'll die alone
In our world poisoned by exploitation
Those who have taken, now they must give
And end the vanity of nations
We've one but one Earth on which to live
And so begins the final drama
In the streets and in the fields
We stand unbowed before their armour
We defy their guns and shields
When we fight, provoked by their aggression
Let us be inspired by life and love
For though they offer us concessions
Change will not come from above.
(c) Billy Bragg, circa 1990
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Monday, April 23, 2007
honors
after going to the lab to check on my experiments, went to a friend's honor's recital. when i came back, i saw photos of another friend's BA exhibit on facebook. recital.. exhibition.. thesis.. we are all wrapping up our honors, our bits of adult life, a taste of the professions that we are going to spend the rest of our lives in. undergraduate life is so finished and on ahead we move. someone told me that in college i would be half an adult.. it's quite true. we do all the things that adults do, only in the safe boundaries of the college, and with the certainty that only a student can afford to have. we sing, we paint, we do experiments, and we know that no matter what we do, we will have our recitals in the school concert hall, our exhibit in the school gallery and our posters at the undergrad research poster session. and now we move on to become full adults, hurling ourselves into the full struggles of life, to have a real recital, a real exhibit or a real scientific conference. it won't be easy. but here we come.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Saturday, April 21, 2007
i've no idea why the name jorge cham never rang a bell that he was asian. and of course the last thing to come to mind when i think about the guy who created the phd comic - a big geek with an extraordinary sense of humor- would be good looks. but seriously, i would say he's really good looking..
Thursday, April 19, 2007
UCSD Virginia Tech Vigil
Photos that a friend of mine took at the VT vigil yesterday... they are quite extraordinary.. tragic beauty..
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Monday, April 16, 2007
There is no means of testing which decision is better, because
there is no basis for comparison. We live everything as it comes, without
warning, like an actor going on cold. And what can life be worth if the
first rehearsal for life is life itself? That is why life is always a
sketch. No, "sketch" is not quite the word, because a sketch is an outline
of something, the groundwork for a picture, whereas the sketch that is our
life is a sketch for nothing, an outline with no picture.
kundera, the unbearable lightness of being
there is no basis for comparison. We live everything as it comes, without
warning, like an actor going on cold. And what can life be worth if the
first rehearsal for life is life itself? That is why life is always a
sketch. No, "sketch" is not quite the word, because a sketch is an outline
of something, the groundwork for a picture, whereas the sketch that is our
life is a sketch for nothing, an outline with no picture.
kundera, the unbearable lightness of being
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
genetics of romance?
from today's nyt
"It so happens that an unusually large number of brain-related genes are situated on the X chromosome. The sudden emergence of the X and Y chromosomes in brain function has caught the attention of evolutionary biologists. Since men have only one X chromosome, natural selection can speedily promote any advantageous mutation that arises in one of the X’s genes. So if those picky women should be looking for smartness in prospective male partners, that might explain why so many brain-related genes ended up on the X.
“It’s popular among male academics to say that females preferred smarter guys,” Dr. Arnold said. “Such genes will be quickly selected in males because new beneficial mutations will be quickly apparent.”
Several profound consequences follow from the fact that men have only one copy of the many X-related brain genes and women two. One is that many neurological diseases are more common in men because women are unlikely to suffer mutations in both copies of a gene.
Another is that men, as a group, “will have more variable brain phenotypes,” Dr. Arnold writes, because women’s second copy of every gene dampens the effects of mutations that arise in the other."
"It so happens that an unusually large number of brain-related genes are situated on the X chromosome. The sudden emergence of the X and Y chromosomes in brain function has caught the attention of evolutionary biologists. Since men have only one X chromosome, natural selection can speedily promote any advantageous mutation that arises in one of the X’s genes. So if those picky women should be looking for smartness in prospective male partners, that might explain why so many brain-related genes ended up on the X.
“It’s popular among male academics to say that females preferred smarter guys,” Dr. Arnold said. “Such genes will be quickly selected in males because new beneficial mutations will be quickly apparent.”
Several profound consequences follow from the fact that men have only one copy of the many X-related brain genes and women two. One is that many neurological diseases are more common in men because women are unlikely to suffer mutations in both copies of a gene.
Another is that men, as a group, “will have more variable brain phenotypes,” Dr. Arnold writes, because women’s second copy of every gene dampens the effects of mutations that arise in the other."
Monday, April 09, 2007
i just read on an old friend's blog that she got an offer from microsoft... it seems that it wan't even that long ago when i first heard her talk about that wish.(actually, that was probably 6 years ago or so.) so dreams DO come true... how exciting. and just the right motivation for me, especially for this week..
life feels great :)
life feels great :)
Friday, April 06, 2007
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
Sunday, April 01, 2007
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Escape!
the number "Escape!" from the soundtrack of "The Hours" is exactly Glass' "Metamorphosis Two"! ok, with some orchestration, minimal....
how lazy of Philip Glass.
how lazy of Philip Glass.
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Monday, March 26, 2007
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Major Book Review: Blood Road
ok here's my term paper for the history class chinese revolution 1911-1949. it came back today so i know there are no major mistakes or misunderstanding. but this is a really good book. chinese, you should read it.
Schoppa’s Blood Road
What a Communist official told the author on the Phoenix Mountain pretty much sums up what most in China or other Chinese communities think of Shen Dingyi. “We don’t know whether he is a good man or a bad man”(Schoppa, 252). One of the most prominent and controversial revolutionaries of the 1920’s, Shen Dingyi was a landlord-turned Communist, who later joined the Guomingdang (GMD). For the decades to follow his assassination in 1928, various names were added to him. Both parties find it difficult in positioning Shen, a man with multiple identities, in the revolution.
In his book Blood Road, The Mystery of Shen Dingyi in Revolutionary China, Schoppa investigates a wide array of materials surrounding Shen Dingyi’s life from late 1910’s to his death in 1928, ranging from historical records, his own writings and narratives from his family and associates. Upon Schoppa’s careful analysis of these materials, Shen’s exceedingly complicated social networks, political positions, ideological influences and actions emerged. In this book, as a result, a humanistic and biographical account of Shen as of 1920’s is presented, and the author’s thesis becomes clear: Because of the causality between a society’s development and an individual’s activities, changes in the society directly influences the individual’s identity, and vice versa, development of individuals determines the course of events in his social context. This is especially true during eras of drastic social and political changes, such as the revolutionary 1920’s in China, and that extremely dynamic and complex society results in an ever-changing face of the individual involved in the process.
With this overarching theme, Shen’s situation seems a little clearer to Schoppa. Since his identities and political positions and actions were an consequence of his social networks, Schoppa puts an emphasis on Shen’s social contacts in his three primary locales of actions, Hangzhou, Shanghai and Yaqian, and effectively reveals the changing sources of his ideologies, identities and his movements in the respective places. Like Shen, Schoppa realized that Chinese tendency of valuing a man’s names more than his deeds often results in oversimplifications and hinders just assessment of historical figures(Schoppa 253). “[I]n the great complexity of revolutionary change, the human mind brings order by naming and holding to that name as the key to the identity of the other”(Schoppa 253). Therefore in his analysis of Shen Dingyi, Schoppa aims to focus on what he actually did in the context of his social networks, such as his leadership in student and worker movement in Shanghai in 1919, his promotion of peasant protests in Yaqian in 1921 and 1928 and his political life in either the Provincial Assembly government of Zhejiang in late 1910’s or the GMD in Hangzhou in mid-1920’s, in order to elucidate the complex dynamics involved.
Shen’s thinking and action in solving China’s social crisis was deeply shaped by his social contacts. The change of social network in 1916 when Shen exiled to Shanghai catalyzed his acceptance of progressive ideologies. Unlike the Zhejiang Provincial Assembly where local elite of the province concentrated on the fate of the province struggling against the aggressive expansion of the Beiyang government, the young revolutionaries whom Shen met in Shanghai were concerned with a wider range of problems. In addition to Shen’s existing anit-feudalism and anti-militarism, he became more conscious of class struggles, women’s emancipation and education, and on a national level (Schoppa 86). The strong influence of Sun Yat-sen’s democratic ideologies and the youths who took part in May Fourth Movements all played a role in his intellectual growth. Identified as a journalist and writer, Shen was proactively working to find a solution to China’s problem, as his writings would indicate. With such inputs, Shen’s output back to the society was much liberated. He wrote for the press extensively about class struggles first and then, at the end of 1919, about a need for reformed social relationships in order (Schoppa 80). In practice, he organized discussion of Marxism where Communism was studied and women had short hair(Schoppa 82). Such actions in turn strengthened the Communists’ progressive presence in Shanghai and altered the intellectual climate there.
Returning to Yaqian in 1920 and coming into contact with the peasants, Shen Dingyi’s social reform thinking was mainly reflected in promoting the peasants’ protests. Applying Marxism, he tried to define the peasants as the proletarians of the countryside and advocated the union between peasants and urban workers to rise against landlords and capitalists. And in his writings, he advocates the ownership of land by the peasants. A network was soon built up, in which he acted as the protector of the peasant class. He encouraged the peasants to organize farmers’ associations and protest against rent collectors and landlords. In the practical endeavor of social reform, strengthened was his relationship with the network of students such as Xuan Zhonghua and Yang Zhihua, with whom Shen built village schools and educated peasant children. However, the protests failed in violent oppression in 1921 and 1922, which Schoppa reasoned to be caused by the influence by the extreme idealism of the May Fourth youths on Shen.
Consistent with Schoppa’s theory, we can also see with a new company and new theory, Shen turned from a local elite member and constitutionalist into a protector of the peasants with a touch of revolutionary thinking. His gentry background might have held him back a little - after all it was a revolution against his own class - but his thinking was very Communist then. After the peasant protests in 1921, although Shen’s political life was little affected by the movement, the failure shocked him strongly, emphasizes Schoppa, as Shen’s writings “betray[ed] considerable guilt, anger, and sadness”(Schoppa 119). In this light, Shen’s ideology in this period was consistently growing more progressive. His complete disregard to landlords’ interest made him target for attack by the rural elite.
With Com-intern's decision for Communists to join GMD in 1922, Shen became a Nationalist, entering a relatively new network in Hangzhou. Under Borodin’s direction in 1923, Shen raised the exclusivity of GMD membership in the way the Communists built their disciplined army, showing his commitment to the new Russianized party organization theories. Naturally Shen in turn made use of the power that he obtained and influenced his social environment by filling the provisional Provincial Party with people from his social network, hence shaping the policy making process. This tightening process of GMD registration and the concentration of power in the province to himself threatened to cause hatred and anxiety, sharpening potential partisan conflicts.
Shen’s switch to the GMD’s side as opposed to the CCP’s side where he came from was not surprising at all to Schoppa. This had much to do with the influence Shen received earlier in his life. Always a fervent follower of Sun Yat-sen’s, Shen Dingyi was genuinely interested in “Three People’s Principle”, even more so than in Communism. His slight reluctance towards class struggle, holding that members from the elite class can be benevolent to the peasants (Schoppa 157), indicated his parting from CCP. This is especially illustrated by his low-key leadership of the peasant protests in Yaqian in 1921. The established exclusivity of GMD and Shen’s complaints about Communist insistence on class struggle and refusal to migrate to Manchuria led naturally to his opinion of abolishing the first United Front. Now, although to Shen himself he was just a Nationalist seeking the best outcome for his party and country, in others’ eyes he was an inconsistent politician fiddling with power. His multiple identities had finally formed in its full complexity. He had enemies in a number of classes and circles, even in his own social networks such as the First Normal circle. The purge was just a trigger, which cut lose any remaining attachment that his old social networks still had with him.
From Schoppa’s narrative, judging from these historical facts combined with the various societal contexts that Shen sequentially put himself in, the course of development of Shen’s ideology and identity was quite consistent and nothing too surprising. Why then, was the assessment of Shen Dingyi all but impossible to do? Schoppa believes that it is because of the Chinese tendency to judge a historical figure by what “names” he is perceived to have, instead of what actual deeds he does. In addition, 10’s to 20’s in China was an era of ideology-mixing and partisan chaos. No viewpoint could be free of self-interest and class influence, resulting in a plethora of inconsistent descriptions of Shen Dingyi, concentrating seemingly disparate names - landlord, Communist, Nationalist, Leftist, Right-wing, revolutionary - onto the one person. This is precisely what makes the interpretation of his identity and the period of history extremely difficult. When comparing materials from a few sources, Schoppa at least solved a number of the inconsistencies.
Firstly, was Shen a local elite, landlord, or a revolutionary devoted to the emancipation of lower classes? Shen has been called all these names, and from his family background, his early political experiences and some aspects of his lifestyle, such as keeping servants, he was indeed a typical local elite in a dying feudal society. However, Schoppa points out that he was an active constitutionalist and reformist, fiercely protecting local government from militarism. Then he felt for the peasants, tried his best to be a protector. He was one of the first people to notice the potential of great power of the rural population in Chinese revolution. With Communist theories, he tried to lead the peasants into class struggle in 1921, and greatly promoted local self-governing experiments and drew up rent reducing documents in 1927. His cold attitude towards his fellow landlords was in stark contrast to that towards the farmers. His writings in this period were mainly singing high praises for the peasant class. In light of such evidence, Li Da’s categorization of Shen into simply “large landlord”(with some enmity) was quite ignorant and unfair. Shen’s hold-back in developing full scale and thorough class struggle came from his position as a member of the elite. To abolish the landlord class is to abolish his own class, his family and his primary social network. This he could not bring himself to do. The conflict within himself is reasonable and is not up to his choice, but a result of social context.
Secondly, his attitude towards militarism also seemed inconsistent, from his boyish love for the martial arts, to his anti-militarism struggle in 1916, to his embracing armed struggle again in early 1920’s. Schoppo shows that in the big picture of intellectual-oriented society in China, Shen’s love for the martial arts indicates something exceptional and revolutionary about him (Schoppa 31). Later during the expansion of the warlord Duan Qirui’s military expansion into the already independent provincially self-governing Zhejiang, the Zhejiang governors sat helpless, therefore Shen’s hatred for militarism seems natural. However, the practical need for military forces when revolution went into full development forced Shen to rethink the value of militarism. Therefore, there was nothing surprising about the his acceptance and even enthusiasm in using and advocating militarism. Again, such choices were a result of events in his social contexts and not so much of a subjective change of mind.
The third problem was his attitude towards Communism, and perhaps is the most puzzling of all. As one of the members of the first Marxism discussion group, he not only became a conservative Nationalist, but also was in charge of the purge of Communists from GMD, turning against all of his friends and associates within the First Normal School network. In 1919, Shen was in desperate pursuit of any strategy that would save the country from the chaos caused by an absence of government. Interaction with the May Fourth worriers naturally led him to both Sun Yat-sen’s theories and Communism. At the earlier stage, both theories were advocating anti-imperialism and anti-feudalism, and the general atmosphere was rather all-encompassing and tolerant. Partly the tolerance rose from incomplete formation of the theories and their lack of thorough understanding by the revolutionaries themselves. In this environment that did not have sharp conflicts between ideologies, Shen was on one hand trying to find a theory that suited him and on the other hand honestly was not bothered by the slight differences between theories. Here the common enemy was external of China, hence what was developed was Nationalism.
Only when political theories matured into full-fledged ideologies and practical power interests were involved between partisans did conflicts starte to appear. Early 1920’s, from the single-minded revolutionary China, partisan power struggles arose. Communists were backed by the Comintern in Russia, and Nationalists had the political and militant power. When the attention turned from foreigners or Manchu rulers started to point against each other, the two parties found fundamental ideological differences. Tolerance disappeared and party members, especially the double party members like Shen Dingyi, were forced to choose a side. And it so happened that his conviction to “Three People’s Principles” and reluctance towards class struggle turned him towards the GMD, and came to regard Communism as rigid. From a “revolutionary”, people’s perception of Shen rapidly turned into “politician” and rumors about him accepting bribes and criticism about him being “opportunistic” (Schoppa 162) rose from the blue. There are also records of him being arrogant, unfair, and unjust, but Schoppa cautions the readers that such documents might very well be forged due to the bitter political competition then. There were also inconsistent with Shen’s history (Schoppa 162). Due to this period in Shen’s life, some people, such as Shaozili, even recalled Shen Dingyi as a Nationalist in his Shanghai period (Schoppa 88), which was factually wrong.
From Shen’s attitude towards Communism we clearly see the powerful tides of a time capable of directing an individual’s life and identity. Not only did changes in the Chinese political society cause changes in Shen’s identity, from Shen’s life in early 1920’s alone, we see the mirrored reflection of the society itself. The loss of tolerance in Shen’s policy in GMD directly reflects the loss of tolerance in the society; and that Shen started to put more emphasis in controlling the party than nationalistic concerns directly reflects a similar trend in the society too. Just like the metaphor used in the poem cited at the beginning of the book, the society was like a mirror where Shen saw himself in. When the society gets fragmented like a mirror gets broken, his identity, which was the reflection in the mirror, gets torn into pieces too. This powerful metaphor demonstrates the nature of identity being a social construct, which cannot exist without society, and instead of being constant, will change violently when the society does so.
Fourthly, whether Shen Dingyi was a Left-Wing or Right-Wing in GMD was even more confusing. Because Shen used to be an early organizer of CCP some conservative Nationalists fixed his identity as a Left-Wing, however, due to his effort in the Purge and differences of opinion, the Communists held that he was a Right-Wing. In fact, it is hard to say whether he was either. His ambiguous attitude towards class struggle and his seemingly active advocacy of revolution(Schoppa 181) both blur the line, and rendered Shen “moderate”(Schoppa 167). Furthermore, the general chaotic and inconsistent situation within the two parties makes even the definition of right and left ambivalent.
There are a few lessons we can learn from this book regarding methodology of historiography. First is causality. Based on all of his analysis, Schoppa makes a number of guesses as to who murdered Shen, and suggested that the most convincing option was the GMD, judging from the tension within the party around 1928. With these guesses and the entire course of analysis in the book, Schoppa demonstrates the reasoning power of historical causality, which remotely reminds us of the philosophical concept of determinism. To show that everything resulted from a trackable cause can result in greater accuracy and eliminate hand-waving arguments.
Secondly, on a related note, Schoppa tones down the importance of individuals’ subjective choices in the course of a revolutionary history, but emphasizes the irresistible power of societal change itself. Similar theme occurs in Schwarez’s article “The Crucible of Political Violence: 1925-1927”. It May be a shift away from Heroism and Great Man History and turn the attention to irreversible societal trends. In any case, such studies provides a more convincing picture to the period studied because it is definitely more conceivable that collective actions of large number of people propel the progress of a society. Even when a particular figure makes an immensely important decision that changed the society by a huge amount, such as the purge described in the book, the decision maker’s motivation was still the result of a battery of influences and events. Therefore, there could not be individual decision that came from nowhere, which changed the course of the history.
Thirdly, Schoppa proposes the importance of spatial venues in the investigation of a historical figure’s identities and actions. Due to the distinctive characteristics and the existing social networks of a specific location, historical figures often assume very distinct ideologies and actions in each location. Analysis of the subject by locations proves to be useful at least in the case of Shen Dingyi, and helps to reveal the reasons for some of the events that occurred.
Lastly but importantly, Schoppa warns us against the danger of “structured present”(Schoppa 260) in historical analysis. Historians knowing the present find it hard to avoid making judgments on the subject of analysis with information that is gained later, and result in skewed account of the events of the past. Some historians bear an intended structure that they try to fit the subjects in. This strategies are against the spirit of historical objectivity and should be avoided. In this book, Schoppa attempts to stand from the perspective of Shen Dingyi, analyzes his action on the ground of what he was exposed to at the time of the events, and makes guesses and weighs options for Shen Dingyi with the limited amount of information available then. As such Schoppa tries to prevent the retrospective account of what happened and fall into gross simplification or erred perceptions of some writers mentioned in the book.
In this book, Schoppa not only reveals the important historical development of the revolution, but also told the story from a refreshing new angle. Shen Dingyi’s assassination might have been a singularity in the 1920’s, but his story reflects valuable generalities about the time and space he was placed in. From his life and death, we see the course of Chinese revolution in the 1920’s, developing from its infancy with little theoretical support to maturity burdened with partisan power struggle, all reflected in Shen’s ideologies, actions and social relationships. Studies of this style should be carried out on more historical figures, especially those whose name are nearly erased or complicated by the studies that focus on “names” and “-isms”. The potential of revealing valuable new information is tremendous.
Reference
Schoppa, Keith. Blood Road, The Mystery of Shen Dingyi in Revolutionary China. University of California Press. 1995.
Schwarez. The Crucible of Political Violence: 1925-1927.
Schoppa’s Blood Road
What a Communist official told the author on the Phoenix Mountain pretty much sums up what most in China or other Chinese communities think of Shen Dingyi. “We don’t know whether he is a good man or a bad man”(Schoppa, 252). One of the most prominent and controversial revolutionaries of the 1920’s, Shen Dingyi was a landlord-turned Communist, who later joined the Guomingdang (GMD). For the decades to follow his assassination in 1928, various names were added to him. Both parties find it difficult in positioning Shen, a man with multiple identities, in the revolution.
In his book Blood Road, The Mystery of Shen Dingyi in Revolutionary China, Schoppa investigates a wide array of materials surrounding Shen Dingyi’s life from late 1910’s to his death in 1928, ranging from historical records, his own writings and narratives from his family and associates. Upon Schoppa’s careful analysis of these materials, Shen’s exceedingly complicated social networks, political positions, ideological influences and actions emerged. In this book, as a result, a humanistic and biographical account of Shen as of 1920’s is presented, and the author’s thesis becomes clear: Because of the causality between a society’s development and an individual’s activities, changes in the society directly influences the individual’s identity, and vice versa, development of individuals determines the course of events in his social context. This is especially true during eras of drastic social and political changes, such as the revolutionary 1920’s in China, and that extremely dynamic and complex society results in an ever-changing face of the individual involved in the process.
With this overarching theme, Shen’s situation seems a little clearer to Schoppa. Since his identities and political positions and actions were an consequence of his social networks, Schoppa puts an emphasis on Shen’s social contacts in his three primary locales of actions, Hangzhou, Shanghai and Yaqian, and effectively reveals the changing sources of his ideologies, identities and his movements in the respective places. Like Shen, Schoppa realized that Chinese tendency of valuing a man’s names more than his deeds often results in oversimplifications and hinders just assessment of historical figures(Schoppa 253). “[I]n the great complexity of revolutionary change, the human mind brings order by naming and holding to that name as the key to the identity of the other”(Schoppa 253). Therefore in his analysis of Shen Dingyi, Schoppa aims to focus on what he actually did in the context of his social networks, such as his leadership in student and worker movement in Shanghai in 1919, his promotion of peasant protests in Yaqian in 1921 and 1928 and his political life in either the Provincial Assembly government of Zhejiang in late 1910’s or the GMD in Hangzhou in mid-1920’s, in order to elucidate the complex dynamics involved.
Shen’s thinking and action in solving China’s social crisis was deeply shaped by his social contacts. The change of social network in 1916 when Shen exiled to Shanghai catalyzed his acceptance of progressive ideologies. Unlike the Zhejiang Provincial Assembly where local elite of the province concentrated on the fate of the province struggling against the aggressive expansion of the Beiyang government, the young revolutionaries whom Shen met in Shanghai were concerned with a wider range of problems. In addition to Shen’s existing anit-feudalism and anti-militarism, he became more conscious of class struggles, women’s emancipation and education, and on a national level (Schoppa 86). The strong influence of Sun Yat-sen’s democratic ideologies and the youths who took part in May Fourth Movements all played a role in his intellectual growth. Identified as a journalist and writer, Shen was proactively working to find a solution to China’s problem, as his writings would indicate. With such inputs, Shen’s output back to the society was much liberated. He wrote for the press extensively about class struggles first and then, at the end of 1919, about a need for reformed social relationships in order (Schoppa 80). In practice, he organized discussion of Marxism where Communism was studied and women had short hair(Schoppa 82). Such actions in turn strengthened the Communists’ progressive presence in Shanghai and altered the intellectual climate there.
Returning to Yaqian in 1920 and coming into contact with the peasants, Shen Dingyi’s social reform thinking was mainly reflected in promoting the peasants’ protests. Applying Marxism, he tried to define the peasants as the proletarians of the countryside and advocated the union between peasants and urban workers to rise against landlords and capitalists. And in his writings, he advocates the ownership of land by the peasants. A network was soon built up, in which he acted as the protector of the peasant class. He encouraged the peasants to organize farmers’ associations and protest against rent collectors and landlords. In the practical endeavor of social reform, strengthened was his relationship with the network of students such as Xuan Zhonghua and Yang Zhihua, with whom Shen built village schools and educated peasant children. However, the protests failed in violent oppression in 1921 and 1922, which Schoppa reasoned to be caused by the influence by the extreme idealism of the May Fourth youths on Shen.
Consistent with Schoppa’s theory, we can also see with a new company and new theory, Shen turned from a local elite member and constitutionalist into a protector of the peasants with a touch of revolutionary thinking. His gentry background might have held him back a little - after all it was a revolution against his own class - but his thinking was very Communist then. After the peasant protests in 1921, although Shen’s political life was little affected by the movement, the failure shocked him strongly, emphasizes Schoppa, as Shen’s writings “betray[ed] considerable guilt, anger, and sadness”(Schoppa 119). In this light, Shen’s ideology in this period was consistently growing more progressive. His complete disregard to landlords’ interest made him target for attack by the rural elite.
With Com-intern's decision for Communists to join GMD in 1922, Shen became a Nationalist, entering a relatively new network in Hangzhou. Under Borodin’s direction in 1923, Shen raised the exclusivity of GMD membership in the way the Communists built their disciplined army, showing his commitment to the new Russianized party organization theories. Naturally Shen in turn made use of the power that he obtained and influenced his social environment by filling the provisional Provincial Party with people from his social network, hence shaping the policy making process. This tightening process of GMD registration and the concentration of power in the province to himself threatened to cause hatred and anxiety, sharpening potential partisan conflicts.
Shen’s switch to the GMD’s side as opposed to the CCP’s side where he came from was not surprising at all to Schoppa. This had much to do with the influence Shen received earlier in his life. Always a fervent follower of Sun Yat-sen’s, Shen Dingyi was genuinely interested in “Three People’s Principle”, even more so than in Communism. His slight reluctance towards class struggle, holding that members from the elite class can be benevolent to the peasants (Schoppa 157), indicated his parting from CCP. This is especially illustrated by his low-key leadership of the peasant protests in Yaqian in 1921. The established exclusivity of GMD and Shen’s complaints about Communist insistence on class struggle and refusal to migrate to Manchuria led naturally to his opinion of abolishing the first United Front. Now, although to Shen himself he was just a Nationalist seeking the best outcome for his party and country, in others’ eyes he was an inconsistent politician fiddling with power. His multiple identities had finally formed in its full complexity. He had enemies in a number of classes and circles, even in his own social networks such as the First Normal circle. The purge was just a trigger, which cut lose any remaining attachment that his old social networks still had with him.
From Schoppa’s narrative, judging from these historical facts combined with the various societal contexts that Shen sequentially put himself in, the course of development of Shen’s ideology and identity was quite consistent and nothing too surprising. Why then, was the assessment of Shen Dingyi all but impossible to do? Schoppa believes that it is because of the Chinese tendency to judge a historical figure by what “names” he is perceived to have, instead of what actual deeds he does. In addition, 10’s to 20’s in China was an era of ideology-mixing and partisan chaos. No viewpoint could be free of self-interest and class influence, resulting in a plethora of inconsistent descriptions of Shen Dingyi, concentrating seemingly disparate names - landlord, Communist, Nationalist, Leftist, Right-wing, revolutionary - onto the one person. This is precisely what makes the interpretation of his identity and the period of history extremely difficult. When comparing materials from a few sources, Schoppa at least solved a number of the inconsistencies.
Firstly, was Shen a local elite, landlord, or a revolutionary devoted to the emancipation of lower classes? Shen has been called all these names, and from his family background, his early political experiences and some aspects of his lifestyle, such as keeping servants, he was indeed a typical local elite in a dying feudal society. However, Schoppa points out that he was an active constitutionalist and reformist, fiercely protecting local government from militarism. Then he felt for the peasants, tried his best to be a protector. He was one of the first people to notice the potential of great power of the rural population in Chinese revolution. With Communist theories, he tried to lead the peasants into class struggle in 1921, and greatly promoted local self-governing experiments and drew up rent reducing documents in 1927. His cold attitude towards his fellow landlords was in stark contrast to that towards the farmers. His writings in this period were mainly singing high praises for the peasant class. In light of such evidence, Li Da’s categorization of Shen into simply “large landlord”(with some enmity) was quite ignorant and unfair. Shen’s hold-back in developing full scale and thorough class struggle came from his position as a member of the elite. To abolish the landlord class is to abolish his own class, his family and his primary social network. This he could not bring himself to do. The conflict within himself is reasonable and is not up to his choice, but a result of social context.
Secondly, his attitude towards militarism also seemed inconsistent, from his boyish love for the martial arts, to his anti-militarism struggle in 1916, to his embracing armed struggle again in early 1920’s. Schoppo shows that in the big picture of intellectual-oriented society in China, Shen’s love for the martial arts indicates something exceptional and revolutionary about him (Schoppa 31). Later during the expansion of the warlord Duan Qirui’s military expansion into the already independent provincially self-governing Zhejiang, the Zhejiang governors sat helpless, therefore Shen’s hatred for militarism seems natural. However, the practical need for military forces when revolution went into full development forced Shen to rethink the value of militarism. Therefore, there was nothing surprising about the his acceptance and even enthusiasm in using and advocating militarism. Again, such choices were a result of events in his social contexts and not so much of a subjective change of mind.
The third problem was his attitude towards Communism, and perhaps is the most puzzling of all. As one of the members of the first Marxism discussion group, he not only became a conservative Nationalist, but also was in charge of the purge of Communists from GMD, turning against all of his friends and associates within the First Normal School network. In 1919, Shen was in desperate pursuit of any strategy that would save the country from the chaos caused by an absence of government. Interaction with the May Fourth worriers naturally led him to both Sun Yat-sen’s theories and Communism. At the earlier stage, both theories were advocating anti-imperialism and anti-feudalism, and the general atmosphere was rather all-encompassing and tolerant. Partly the tolerance rose from incomplete formation of the theories and their lack of thorough understanding by the revolutionaries themselves. In this environment that did not have sharp conflicts between ideologies, Shen was on one hand trying to find a theory that suited him and on the other hand honestly was not bothered by the slight differences between theories. Here the common enemy was external of China, hence what was developed was Nationalism.
Only when political theories matured into full-fledged ideologies and practical power interests were involved between partisans did conflicts starte to appear. Early 1920’s, from the single-minded revolutionary China, partisan power struggles arose. Communists were backed by the Comintern in Russia, and Nationalists had the political and militant power. When the attention turned from foreigners or Manchu rulers started to point against each other, the two parties found fundamental ideological differences. Tolerance disappeared and party members, especially the double party members like Shen Dingyi, were forced to choose a side. And it so happened that his conviction to “Three People’s Principles” and reluctance towards class struggle turned him towards the GMD, and came to regard Communism as rigid. From a “revolutionary”, people’s perception of Shen rapidly turned into “politician” and rumors about him accepting bribes and criticism about him being “opportunistic” (Schoppa 162) rose from the blue. There are also records of him being arrogant, unfair, and unjust, but Schoppa cautions the readers that such documents might very well be forged due to the bitter political competition then. There were also inconsistent with Shen’s history (Schoppa 162). Due to this period in Shen’s life, some people, such as Shaozili, even recalled Shen Dingyi as a Nationalist in his Shanghai period (Schoppa 88), which was factually wrong.
From Shen’s attitude towards Communism we clearly see the powerful tides of a time capable of directing an individual’s life and identity. Not only did changes in the Chinese political society cause changes in Shen’s identity, from Shen’s life in early 1920’s alone, we see the mirrored reflection of the society itself. The loss of tolerance in Shen’s policy in GMD directly reflects the loss of tolerance in the society; and that Shen started to put more emphasis in controlling the party than nationalistic concerns directly reflects a similar trend in the society too. Just like the metaphor used in the poem cited at the beginning of the book, the society was like a mirror where Shen saw himself in. When the society gets fragmented like a mirror gets broken, his identity, which was the reflection in the mirror, gets torn into pieces too. This powerful metaphor demonstrates the nature of identity being a social construct, which cannot exist without society, and instead of being constant, will change violently when the society does so.
Fourthly, whether Shen Dingyi was a Left-Wing or Right-Wing in GMD was even more confusing. Because Shen used to be an early organizer of CCP some conservative Nationalists fixed his identity as a Left-Wing, however, due to his effort in the Purge and differences of opinion, the Communists held that he was a Right-Wing. In fact, it is hard to say whether he was either. His ambiguous attitude towards class struggle and his seemingly active advocacy of revolution(Schoppa 181) both blur the line, and rendered Shen “moderate”(Schoppa 167). Furthermore, the general chaotic and inconsistent situation within the two parties makes even the definition of right and left ambivalent.
There are a few lessons we can learn from this book regarding methodology of historiography. First is causality. Based on all of his analysis, Schoppa makes a number of guesses as to who murdered Shen, and suggested that the most convincing option was the GMD, judging from the tension within the party around 1928. With these guesses and the entire course of analysis in the book, Schoppa demonstrates the reasoning power of historical causality, which remotely reminds us of the philosophical concept of determinism. To show that everything resulted from a trackable cause can result in greater accuracy and eliminate hand-waving arguments.
Secondly, on a related note, Schoppa tones down the importance of individuals’ subjective choices in the course of a revolutionary history, but emphasizes the irresistible power of societal change itself. Similar theme occurs in Schwarez’s article “The Crucible of Political Violence: 1925-1927”. It May be a shift away from Heroism and Great Man History and turn the attention to irreversible societal trends. In any case, such studies provides a more convincing picture to the period studied because it is definitely more conceivable that collective actions of large number of people propel the progress of a society. Even when a particular figure makes an immensely important decision that changed the society by a huge amount, such as the purge described in the book, the decision maker’s motivation was still the result of a battery of influences and events. Therefore, there could not be individual decision that came from nowhere, which changed the course of the history.
Thirdly, Schoppa proposes the importance of spatial venues in the investigation of a historical figure’s identities and actions. Due to the distinctive characteristics and the existing social networks of a specific location, historical figures often assume very distinct ideologies and actions in each location. Analysis of the subject by locations proves to be useful at least in the case of Shen Dingyi, and helps to reveal the reasons for some of the events that occurred.
Lastly but importantly, Schoppa warns us against the danger of “structured present”(Schoppa 260) in historical analysis. Historians knowing the present find it hard to avoid making judgments on the subject of analysis with information that is gained later, and result in skewed account of the events of the past. Some historians bear an intended structure that they try to fit the subjects in. This strategies are against the spirit of historical objectivity and should be avoided. In this book, Schoppa attempts to stand from the perspective of Shen Dingyi, analyzes his action on the ground of what he was exposed to at the time of the events, and makes guesses and weighs options for Shen Dingyi with the limited amount of information available then. As such Schoppa tries to prevent the retrospective account of what happened and fall into gross simplification or erred perceptions of some writers mentioned in the book.
In this book, Schoppa not only reveals the important historical development of the revolution, but also told the story from a refreshing new angle. Shen Dingyi’s assassination might have been a singularity in the 1920’s, but his story reflects valuable generalities about the time and space he was placed in. From his life and death, we see the course of Chinese revolution in the 1920’s, developing from its infancy with little theoretical support to maturity burdened with partisan power struggle, all reflected in Shen’s ideologies, actions and social relationships. Studies of this style should be carried out on more historical figures, especially those whose name are nearly erased or complicated by the studies that focus on “names” and “-isms”. The potential of revealing valuable new information is tremendous.
Reference
Schoppa, Keith. Blood Road, The Mystery of Shen Dingyi in Revolutionary China. University of California Press. 1995.
Schwarez. The Crucible of Political Violence: 1925-1927.
Monday, March 19, 2007
merely looking at the appreance of a research laboratory, you have no idea how interesting the people working in there can be. sometimes, i look at the scientists and think... it is precisely because of their passion for and fascination with the beauty of the world, whether living or physcial, that they give up many pleasures and put themselves into the boring long hours of work and simplest of lifestyles. while the rest of the world pass judgement about them being either mad or boring.. oh well..
to annoy your roommate
Arrange your pillows and blankets every night to make it look like you are asleep. Do this for three weeks. Buy a cantaloupe and a knife. Stick the knife in the cantaloupe. Lay it on the pillow where your head should be.
As soon as your roommate turns the light off at night, begin singing famous operas as loud as you can. When your roommate turns on the light, look around and pretend to be confused.
Ask your roommate if Bob, your invisible friend, can stay the night. If s/he agrees, ask your roommate if s/he can turn down the music. Explain that Bob has a headache.
Ask your roommate if your family can move in "just for a couple of weeks."
Ask your roommate to pose for a portrait. Leave.
Become a mime. Nothing is more annoying than a mime.
read more...
As soon as your roommate turns the light off at night, begin singing famous operas as loud as you can. When your roommate turns on the light, look around and pretend to be confused.
Ask your roommate if Bob, your invisible friend, can stay the night. If s/he agrees, ask your roommate if s/he can turn down the music. Explain that Bob has a headache.
Ask your roommate if your family can move in "just for a couple of weeks."
Ask your roommate to pose for a portrait. Leave.
Become a mime. Nothing is more annoying than a mime.
read more...
Sunday, March 18, 2007
rebellious?
i was thinking. kids are supposed to be rebellious around, when, teenage? it doesn't make sense. you see, you are all rebellious, not doing what your parents ask you to do when you're really dependent on your parents. and think about it again, what is there to really do to protest against your parents? not studying? or, drink and party and destroy your future as a viable person? and what do kids really know?? you see there are so much more you can do after you grow up...you know so much more and can do things that challenge your parents so much more significantly...like, adopting a different religion, or changing your sexuality, or joining a different party. or marry a poet for that matter. and you're not afraid of losing food or the roof on top cos you have financial independence. so, the real sensible thing to do is grow up normal, and rebel when you have the ability. it's really like, securing military power before planning on an uprise.
Friday, March 16, 2007
Friday, March 09, 2007
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
in an interview by american foreign service diplomat John S. Service Mao Zedong said:
"Cooperation between America and the Chinese Communist Party will be beneficial and satisfactory to all concerned. . .
China must industrialize. This can be done—in China—only by free enterprise and with the aid of foreign capital. Chinese and American interests are correlated and similar. They fit together, economically and politically. We can and must work together. . .
We will not be afraid of democratic American influence—we will welcome it. . ."
My professor showed this quote and asked how best to read this man. Was he a pragmatist or communist ideologue merely lying to get aid? and then he said "Afterall Mao was a communist.. and communists are quite capable of lying, unlike capitalists, who never lie."
"Cooperation between America and the Chinese Communist Party will be beneficial and satisfactory to all concerned. . .
China must industrialize. This can be done—in China—only by free enterprise and with the aid of foreign capital. Chinese and American interests are correlated and similar. They fit together, economically and politically. We can and must work together. . .
We will not be afraid of democratic American influence—we will welcome it. . ."
My professor showed this quote and asked how best to read this man. Was he a pragmatist or communist ideologue merely lying to get aid? and then he said "Afterall Mao was a communist.. and communists are quite capable of lying, unlike capitalists, who never lie."
Sunday, March 04, 2007
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Huns
i'm in the library reading a book called "the invasion of Europe by the barbarians" which describes the clash between northern nomads such as the Germans and the southern European empire namely Rome. and this bit of information is interesting:
The Huns belong to the Mongolian division of the great group of races which also includes the Turks, the Hungarians, and the Finns. It may be called the Ural-Altaic race Group, and is divided into two great sections, the Uralic and the Altaic. The Uralic Section falls into three classes: (1)the Finnic, of which the Finns are the best known representative: (2) the Permian (3) the Ugrian, of which the Hungarians are the most important. The Altaic section falls into several classes , of which one is the Turkish and another the Mongolian. This classification is based on a comparison of the Language of these People.
...
Our knowledge, such as it is, of the early history of central Asia is derived from the annals of China. From these records we know that in the third and early fourth centuries the dominating people in these regions was the Sien-pi, and that towards the middle of the fourth century their power was overthrown by the Zhu-zhu, who succeeded them to the dominion of Tartar Asia, and finally founded a great empire extdnding from the coast of the North Pacific, from Corea to the borders of Europe. It may be suppose that it was events connected with the rise to power of the Zhu-zhu that disturbed the Huns and induced them to move westward.
...
The name Huns, Greek ounnoi, is generally supposed to be a corruption of the word Hiung-nu-the name, meaning common slaves, that was given by the Chinese to all the nomadic people of Asia.
so what, did chinese give the name Hun to the Hungarians? i'd always thought all these weird words were transliteration from the babarian tongue. this is new to me. isn't it interesting?
The Huns belong to the Mongolian division of the great group of races which also includes the Turks, the Hungarians, and the Finns. It may be called the Ural-Altaic race Group, and is divided into two great sections, the Uralic and the Altaic. The Uralic Section falls into three classes: (1)the Finnic, of which the Finns are the best known representative: (2) the Permian (3) the Ugrian, of which the Hungarians are the most important. The Altaic section falls into several classes , of which one is the Turkish and another the Mongolian. This classification is based on a comparison of the Language of these People.
...
Our knowledge, such as it is, of the early history of central Asia is derived from the annals of China. From these records we know that in the third and early fourth centuries the dominating people in these regions was the Sien-pi, and that towards the middle of the fourth century their power was overthrown by the Zhu-zhu, who succeeded them to the dominion of Tartar Asia, and finally founded a great empire extdnding from the coast of the North Pacific, from Corea to the borders of Europe. It may be suppose that it was events connected with the rise to power of the Zhu-zhu that disturbed the Huns and induced them to move westward.
...
The name Huns, Greek ounnoi, is generally supposed to be a corruption of the word Hiung-nu-the name, meaning common slaves, that was given by the Chinese to all the nomadic people of Asia.
so what, did chinese give the name Hun to the Hungarians? i'd always thought all these weird words were transliteration from the babarian tongue. this is new to me. isn't it interesting?
Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Lin Zexu (LinTse-hsu) writing to Britain's Queen Victoria
to Protest the Opium Trade, 1839
This selection is from Wallbank, et al, Civilizations Past And Present, 1992. Most scholars do not believe that the letter ever reached the Queen.
[Wallbank introduction] Lin Tse-hsu saw that the opium trade, which gave Europe such huge profits, undermined his country. He asked Queen Victoria to put a stop to the trade.
"After a long period of commercial intercourse, there appear among the crowd of barbarians both good persons and bad, unevenly. Consequently there are those who smuggle opium to seduce the Chinese people and so cause the spread of the poison to all provinces. Such persons who only care to profit themselves, and disregard their harm to others, are not tolerated by the laws of heaven and are unanimously hated by human beings. His Majesty the Emperor, upon hearing of this, is in a towering rage. He has especially sent me, his commissioner, to come to Kwangtung, and together with the governor-general and governor jointly to investigate and settle this matter.
"All those people in China who sell opium or smoke opium should receive the death penalty. If we trace the crime of those barbarians who through the years have been selling opium, then the deep harm they have wrought and the great profit they have usurped should fundamentally justify their execution according to law. We take into consideration, however, the fact that the various barbarians have still known how to repent their crimes and return to their allegiance to us by taking the 20,183 chests of opium from their storeships and petitioning us, through their consular officer [superintendent of trade], Elliot, to receive it. It has been entirely destroyed and this has been faithfully reported to the Throne in several memorials by this commissioner and his colleagues.
"Fortunately we have received a specially extended favor from is Majesty the Emperor, who considers that for those who voluntarily surrender there are still some circumstances to palliate their crime, and so for the time being he has magnanimously excused them from punishment. But as for those who again violate the opium prohibition, it is difficult for the law to pardon them repeatedly. Having established new regulations, we presume that the ruler of your honorable country, who takes delight in our culture and whose disposition is inclined towards us, must be able to instruct the various barbarians to observe the law with care. It is only necessary to explain to them the advantages and disadvantages and then they will know that the legal code of the Celestial Court must be absolutely obeyed with awe.
"We find that your country is sixty or seventy thousand li [three li equal one mile] from China. Yet there are barbarian ships that strive to come here for trade for the purpose of making a great profit. The wealth of China is used to profit the barbarians. That is to say, the great profit made by barbarians is all taken from the rightful share of China. By what right do they then in return use the poisonous drug to injure the Chinese people? Even though the barbarians may not necessarily intend to do us harm, yet in coveting profit to an extreme, they have no regard for injuring others. Let us ask, where is your conscience? I have heard that the smoking of opium is very strictly forbidden by your country; that is because the harm caused by opium is clearly understood. Since it is not permitted to do harm to your own country, then even less should you let it be passed on to the harm of other countries - how much less to China!"
Friday, February 16, 2007
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
anne frank's dad's letters to an american were uncovered, mainly communicating his desperate effort to get to america. in this age, when few write letters, what will be left for the coming generations to uncover? nothing. our civilization will become unreadable inaccessible hidden information, the bits on harddiscs, cds and servers. with the rise of the digital age, the intellectual side of us becomes more and more concealed. when we get buried by volcano ashes there will be nothing for the archeologists in the future to interpret, because the virtual world where all information is stored will crash more cleanly than the physical world. maybe that's why we don't find evidence for past advanced civilizations. maybe all of their intelligence eventually got into some kind of abstract storage which vanished with their creator, leaving no remains.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
esherick also propose that the communist revolution in china shouldn't be looked at as a peasant revolution, or proletarian revolution, but a bourgeois revolution. the first thing that the communists did was land reform, which ensures that individual peasants own a share of land. this promoted private property. and they were highly supportive of market economy in the rural area. such action won them support from the peasants. it was later in the 50's when they started establishing communes and practised collectivism that they touched upon real communism, but such policies caused them to lose support from the peasants. it is a fresh angle certainly. i need to think about it...
i had a revelation today during esherick's lecture.
think about the late 19th century around the time of opium war. huge amount of products, mainly tea and also porcelain, was exported from china to britain. naturally huge amount of silver (actually mined in the new world) flowing into the middle kingdom. apparently, as much as 50% of the mexican silver that the europeans obtained ended up in china. to balance the trade, the british tried very very hard to pursuade the Qing emperors to open up ports so that they could sell the products of their industrial revolution, such as textile, knives and forks and clocks. but self sufficient as the Qing empire was in the nineteenth century, the chinese people wouldn't buy any, cos obviously they didn't need any. so the british smuggled in opium, a product that had a promoting demand, and, when challenged by the chinese prohibition of opium, waged a war. thus modern chinese history starts.
and then i thought, look at the trade. tea into britain and opium in to china. the former is a neuro-stimulant and the latter a neuro-depressant. it is no wonder why the former nation grew and the latter fell. how lousy a trader is britain!
think about the late 19th century around the time of opium war. huge amount of products, mainly tea and also porcelain, was exported from china to britain. naturally huge amount of silver (actually mined in the new world) flowing into the middle kingdom. apparently, as much as 50% of the mexican silver that the europeans obtained ended up in china. to balance the trade, the british tried very very hard to pursuade the Qing emperors to open up ports so that they could sell the products of their industrial revolution, such as textile, knives and forks and clocks. but self sufficient as the Qing empire was in the nineteenth century, the chinese people wouldn't buy any, cos obviously they didn't need any. so the british smuggled in opium, a product that had a promoting demand, and, when challenged by the chinese prohibition of opium, waged a war. thus modern chinese history starts.
and then i thought, look at the trade. tea into britain and opium in to china. the former is a neuro-stimulant and the latter a neuro-depressant. it is no wonder why the former nation grew and the latter fell. how lousy a trader is britain!
Monday, February 12, 2007
Looking at this, there's no reason i should move to the east coast for grad school.
according to National Georgraphic "Cities with More Single Men than Women: Los Angeles/Long Beach/Santa Ana urban area (Largest plurality: 40,000 more single men than women) Seattle Las Vegas Phoenix Houston
Cities with More Single Women than Men: New York/N.J./Conn. urban area (Largest plurality: 185,000 more single women than men) Washington Philadelphia Chicago Baltimore"
from 1010 wins
according to National Georgraphic "Cities with More Single Men than Women: Los Angeles/Long Beach/Santa Ana urban area (Largest plurality: 40,000 more single men than women) Seattle Las Vegas Phoenix Houston
Cities with More Single Women than Men: New York/N.J./Conn. urban area (Largest plurality: 185,000 more single women than men) Washington Philadelphia Chicago Baltimore"
from 1010 wins
Monday, February 05, 2007
the chinese seem to have retained the coherence of our identity largely through the preservation of the language and cultural system, specifically the confucian values. this is why the various foreign rulers of china have failed to strip the chinese of our chineseness, and instead have become sinified on various levels. the mongols, turks and other nomads came and went without causing much change in the chinese societal structure, while the manchus got assimilated into the chinese society themselves and are not to be distinguished from the general han population. i believe the reason why the chinese were able to do all these things was their wariness and on some level suspicion and hostility against the foreigners, which all resulted in a strong urge to maintain the cultural self. similar to the jewish identity that have been kept through the ages of banishment and insults. the more a group is against its enemies, the more the groups sticks together.
the embrace of foreigners by the chinese in recent years is going to change the situation. the new attitude is formed mainly due to the advances in the west and the contrasting backwardness of china's own economy. this is a reality learnt through harsh defeats and treaties. the people have come to wordship the affluent west and grown tired of the improverished motherland. this change in attitude breakes the cultural great wall and is going to bring an end to the lifeline of the chinese, its culture. the ernest study and proper use of the chinese language is already on a decline. traditional art forms struggles to keep alive and are failing more and more to do so. people's focus is more and more on the economical development and expansion, much like the west. the study of western languages with its obvious profitability rises in priority. and with the study of western culture, western values come to infiltrate the society with much ease, replacing the traditional values. maybe soon the word chinese will be merely a political term, describing things and people found within the current chinese border. much like egypt, whose content has nothing much to do with the original connotations of the name.
it's not that i'm emotionally attached to confucian values. such old principles are very very outdated and impedes the development of a healthy modern society. i just want to point out, the changed that occured in the last century seems to be the first time that the chinese are systematically abandoning the values that have held the country together for two thousand years and more. china and the chinese race seem to be on the verge of unprecedented and irreversible change. oh well, old things die and new things come. it's no big deal. and who knows. maybe in the process of developing a modern globe, all cultures would lose its original contents as a result of mixing sooner or later. my attitude on the issue of chinese culture is like that on any other thing. while i'm excited to see what's to come, such as all the modernity, freedom and fantastic possibilities, i can't help but feel a little pity for the old dying thing. because the interesting and beautiful half and the dull and ugly half necessarily die together.
the embrace of foreigners by the chinese in recent years is going to change the situation. the new attitude is formed mainly due to the advances in the west and the contrasting backwardness of china's own economy. this is a reality learnt through harsh defeats and treaties. the people have come to wordship the affluent west and grown tired of the improverished motherland. this change in attitude breakes the cultural great wall and is going to bring an end to the lifeline of the chinese, its culture. the ernest study and proper use of the chinese language is already on a decline. traditional art forms struggles to keep alive and are failing more and more to do so. people's focus is more and more on the economical development and expansion, much like the west. the study of western languages with its obvious profitability rises in priority. and with the study of western culture, western values come to infiltrate the society with much ease, replacing the traditional values. maybe soon the word chinese will be merely a political term, describing things and people found within the current chinese border. much like egypt, whose content has nothing much to do with the original connotations of the name.
it's not that i'm emotionally attached to confucian values. such old principles are very very outdated and impedes the development of a healthy modern society. i just want to point out, the changed that occured in the last century seems to be the first time that the chinese are systematically abandoning the values that have held the country together for two thousand years and more. china and the chinese race seem to be on the verge of unprecedented and irreversible change. oh well, old things die and new things come. it's no big deal. and who knows. maybe in the process of developing a modern globe, all cultures would lose its original contents as a result of mixing sooner or later. my attitude on the issue of chinese culture is like that on any other thing. while i'm excited to see what's to come, such as all the modernity, freedom and fantastic possibilities, i can't help but feel a little pity for the old dying thing. because the interesting and beautiful half and the dull and ugly half necessarily die together.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Saturday, January 13, 2007
finally saw the first emperor on the met live hd broadcast. my overall feeling is that it is a rather risky project for tan dun. while fusion is more and more becoming the trend in the arts, he does it too deliberately. he seemed to be trying to please too many people, throwing all available musical elements in there, be it chinese, romantic, or contemporary... while there was no particularly memorable meoldy line for it to really sound chinese or puccinian, it was too concrete to be minimalistic. somewhat neither here nor there. and it was unnecessarily long. could be easily compacted into 2-2 1/2 hours long. it dragged on and on, losing much of the audience's attention and in the end weakening the climax's strength, although i did like the ending very much.
visually it was satisfactory. the set was very nice. domingo was very good. yueyang could've been prettier. the least they coul do was to give everybody chinese dance training to get the mannerism right. not quite there. costume was nice. dance was good.
ha jin sucked. the libretto was a joke. they should've gotten gao xingjian to write it in chinese. lol. or get an english speaker to write it in english.
need to go. more to come
visually it was satisfactory. the set was very nice. domingo was very good. yueyang could've been prettier. the least they coul do was to give everybody chinese dance training to get the mannerism right. not quite there. costume was nice. dance was good.
ha jin sucked. the libretto was a joke. they should've gotten gao xingjian to write it in chinese. lol. or get an english speaker to write it in english.
need to go. more to come
Friday, January 12, 2007
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Monday, November 27, 2006
Helsinki Complaints Choir
dude. this is funniest thing i've seen in a while.. lol. and the most true to the lyrics singing i have ever seen haha... they really look like they mean it. of course they do.
also from the composers' website:
The First Complaints Choir of Birmingham became a surprise success and soon after we received many requests from people who hoped for a complaints choir in their hometown as well. They expressed (almost with a certain pride) that in their particular town people are especially talented complainers: either by quantity (Belgrade), existentialism (St. Petersburg) or sophistication (Buenos Aires).
enjoy!
Sunday, November 19, 2006
Women of the world, raise your right hand.
Ad campaign by A Diamond Is Forever has been around for a while. It says:
Your left hand says 'we.' Your right hand says 'me.' Your left hand rocks the cradle. Your right hand rules the world. Women of the world, raise your right hand. A Diamond is Forever. The New Diamond Right Hand Ring. Romantic, Modern Vintage, Floral and Contemporary Styles at ADIAMONDISFOREVER.COM
How clever.
Far from being the rarest stones in nature and certainly not able to last forever (try burning that stone), diamonds are just another not-so-apt embodiment of some constructed ideology. The invention of engagement ring in the early twentieth century was a huge commercial success. Now that feminism is in, the diamond giants have to move along too. Hence the right hand ring campaign, and finally the corporations have sussessfully captured 90% of the world's affluent women. It is ironic that in this case feminism is being rubbed into the one of the most prominent symbols of capitalist exploitations. Diamond mining and cutting have often been associated with slavery for good reasons. A feminist would be an idiot to buy that ring from adiamondisforever to MAKE A STATEMENT. What kind of statement would come out of that?
All said, I would not hesitate to raise my right hand. But just not with a stone from de Beers or adiamondisforever. For decoration, my fingers would at the most have on them a blinding cubic zirconia from Icing for 5 bucks.
Your left hand says 'we.' Your right hand says 'me.' Your left hand rocks the cradle. Your right hand rules the world. Women of the world, raise your right hand. A Diamond is Forever. The New Diamond Right Hand Ring. Romantic, Modern Vintage, Floral and Contemporary Styles at ADIAMONDISFOREVER.COM
How clever.
Far from being the rarest stones in nature and certainly not able to last forever (try burning that stone), diamonds are just another not-so-apt embodiment of some constructed ideology. The invention of engagement ring in the early twentieth century was a huge commercial success. Now that feminism is in, the diamond giants have to move along too. Hence the right hand ring campaign, and finally the corporations have sussessfully captured 90% of the world's affluent women. It is ironic that in this case feminism is being rubbed into the one of the most prominent symbols of capitalist exploitations. Diamond mining and cutting have often been associated with slavery for good reasons. A feminist would be an idiot to buy that ring from adiamondisforever to MAKE A STATEMENT. What kind of statement would come out of that?
All said, I would not hesitate to raise my right hand. But just not with a stone from de Beers or adiamondisforever. For decoration, my fingers would at the most have on them a blinding cubic zirconia from Icing for 5 bucks.
Friday, October 27, 2006
Saturday, October 21, 2006
Thursday, October 19, 2006
monogamy is evolutionarily advantageous
formation of monogamy ensures diversity in the human gene pool.
my reasoning is as follows.
a human male in the case of reproduction is in the position of choice because females are limited by pregnancy. given the freedom, a human male will spread his sperms as far as possible, which is the seen today as the animcal instinct, and have multiple children concurrently. females however will have the burden of waiting for one child to come before having another. without monogamy, only the strongest and smartest guys get laid. soon the human gene pool will be filled with the traits of a small fraction of males. therefore the species would be less adaptive towards the changing environment.
when monogamy is enforced through cultural and social structures, however, a great many more guys can get laid due to removal of monopoly.
this also explains another problem that i have been thinking about for a long time. that is, why humans have evolved to wear clothes. by covering up the private parts, humans are less aroused sesually when they meet the opposite sex. on one hand, this may shift our attention to more "constructive" activities such as the development of civilization, which will benefit the survival of the species. (although i do not see how we could have known this before we created civilization). on the other hand, this could also be a by-product of the desire to keep monogamy, so that each person is only aroused by his or her partners in designated situations. and therefore benefit the species.
there might be a nother reason for clothing. maybe it acts like a dam, so that a human only conducts sexual acts when they meet the most desirable partner. this is because?
my reasoning is as follows.
a human male in the case of reproduction is in the position of choice because females are limited by pregnancy. given the freedom, a human male will spread his sperms as far as possible, which is the seen today as the animcal instinct, and have multiple children concurrently. females however will have the burden of waiting for one child to come before having another. without monogamy, only the strongest and smartest guys get laid. soon the human gene pool will be filled with the traits of a small fraction of males. therefore the species would be less adaptive towards the changing environment.
when monogamy is enforced through cultural and social structures, however, a great many more guys can get laid due to removal of monopoly.
this also explains another problem that i have been thinking about for a long time. that is, why humans have evolved to wear clothes. by covering up the private parts, humans are less aroused sesually when they meet the opposite sex. on one hand, this may shift our attention to more "constructive" activities such as the development of civilization, which will benefit the survival of the species. (although i do not see how we could have known this before we created civilization). on the other hand, this could also be a by-product of the desire to keep monogamy, so that each person is only aroused by his or her partners in designated situations. and therefore benefit the species.
there might be a nother reason for clothing. maybe it acts like a dam, so that a human only conducts sexual acts when they meet the most desirable partner. this is because?
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
it's good to get up in the morning. (although i didn't really sleep much.) after my vector calculus midterm, i am sitting at sierra summit savoiuring a good omlette with the company georges brassens' adorable songs. and i'm looking at the pretty picture i took yesterday. and i think to myself, life can't be better :)
Sunday, October 15, 2006
squared circles
touring bike
Originally uploaded by LeoL30.
seeing people's fascination about squared circular object is fascinating.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Thursday, October 05, 2006
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Monday, October 02, 2006
kongerei.
have you ever heard any overtone singing? have you heard tuvan and mongolian singings, like singing into the mountains and the grassland? i have only heard overtone singing once and have only heard mongolian long songs, but not throat singing. it's overwhelming.
kronos quartet got the throat singers from the land of Tuva to sing this kongerei for them, and for us. the ancient and sorrowful yearning therefore rings in my headphones. the strings keep a stead pulse, with the cello crying like the horse head fiddle alongside. immediately visible to me is a picture of vast plateau, on which a shepherd and his herd move steadily. he sings a low fundamental tone, heavy and coarse. suddenly there's this other sound. a whistle, a bird song, or a flute, floating indeterminably at the top. and then his sound becomes part of nature. and he moves on, a person without home. a people without home. a lonely people in the midst of the vastness. singing, and moving.
have you ever heard any overtone singing? have you heard tuvan and mongolian singings, like singing into the mountains and the grassland? i have only heard overtone singing once and have only heard mongolian long songs, but not throat singing. it's overwhelming.
kronos quartet got the throat singers from the land of Tuva to sing this kongerei for them, and for us. the ancient and sorrowful yearning therefore rings in my headphones. the strings keep a stead pulse, with the cello crying like the horse head fiddle alongside. immediately visible to me is a picture of vast plateau, on which a shepherd and his herd move steadily. he sings a low fundamental tone, heavy and coarse. suddenly there's this other sound. a whistle, a bird song, or a flute, floating indeterminably at the top. and then his sound becomes part of nature. and he moves on, a person without home. a people without home. a lonely people in the midst of the vastness. singing, and moving.
Sunday, October 01, 2006
maybe great people shouldn't get married. maybe each great man should marry a housewife and each great woman should get herself a househusband. or, a great couple should just get a maid. damn.
»Clara has composed a series of small pieces, which show a musical and tender ingenuity such as she has never attained before. But to have children, and a husband who is always living in the realm of imagination, does not go together with composing. She cannot work at it regularly, and I am often disturbed (Oh Really?)to think how many profound ideas are lost because she cannot work them out.«
—Robert Schumann in the joint diary of Robert and Clara Schumann.
»Composing gives me great pleasure...there is nothing that surpasses the joy of creation, if only because through it one wins hours of self-forgetfulness, when one lives in a world of sound.«
—Clara herself on composing.
»I once believed that I possessed creative talent, but I have given up this idea; a woman must not desire to compose — there has never yet been one able to do it. Should I expect to be the one?«
—Clara Schumann at 20
-wikipedia
»Clara has composed a series of small pieces, which show a musical and tender ingenuity such as she has never attained before. But to have children, and a husband who is always living in the realm of imagination, does not go together with composing. She cannot work at it regularly, and I am often disturbed (Oh Really?)to think how many profound ideas are lost because she cannot work them out.«
—Robert Schumann in the joint diary of Robert and Clara Schumann.
»Composing gives me great pleasure...there is nothing that surpasses the joy of creation, if only because through it one wins hours of self-forgetfulness, when one lives in a world of sound.«
—Clara herself on composing.
»I once believed that I possessed creative talent, but I have given up this idea; a woman must not desire to compose — there has never yet been one able to do it. Should I expect to be the one?«
—Clara Schumann at 20
-wikipedia
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