Scary propaganda has proved so successful that most Britons are now too frightened to leave their homes, either with or without a lockdown, an academic has warned.

Sir David Spiegelhalter, a statistician at the University of Cambridge, told BBC Radio 4s Today programme:

Many people are definitely overanxious about their chance of both getting the virus and the harm they might come to if they do get it.

He added that the British governments message for everyone to stay at home unless strictly necessary had been slightly too successful and that perhaps there should now be a campaign to encourage people to get out and start living again.

As Lockdown Sceptics reports, this problem has been confirmed by polling.

[The Government] has whipped up the public into such a frenzy of blanket-clutching fear, aided and abetted by the hysteria of the mainstream media, that a significant percentage may not dare venture outside for non-essentials. According to polling by Ipsos Mori, more than 60 per cent of people would feel uncomfortable going to bars and restaurants or using public transport after the lockdown is over, more than 40% would be reluctant to go shopping or send their children to school and more than 30% are worried about going to work or meeting friends.

Britains lockdown, it is becoming increasingly clear, is now driven more by political calculations than scientific ones. Boris Johnson and his nervous administration, crippled by their fear of opinion polls, lack the confidence to announce an end to the lockdown until they feel the public is ready for it.

This is the availability cascade of which economics professors Donald Siegel and Robert M Sauer warned in March, in one of the first major articles criticising British and U.S. lockdown policy.

Writing in the Jerusalem Post, they described lockdown as amisguided social experiment designed by unelected public health officials and driven by the dangerous interplay between media and policy makers.

The phrase availability cascade was invented by Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman to describe the vicious circle whereby public hysteria and craven politicians feed on one another with disastrous results.

According to Siegels and Sauers article:

An availability cascade is a self-sustaining chain of events which may start from media reports of a relatively minor event and lead up to public panic and large-scale government action. On some occasions, a media story about a risk catches the attention of a segment of the public, which becomes aroused and worried. This emotional reaction becomes a story in itself, prompting additional coverage in the media, which in turn produces greater concern and involvement.

The cycle is sometimes sped along deliberately by availability entrepreneurs, individuals or organisations who work to ensure a continuous flow of worrying news. The danger is increasingly exaggerated as the media compete for attention-grabbing headlines.

Scientists and others who try to dampen the increasing fear and revulsion attract little attention, most of it hostile: Anyone who claims that the danger is overstated is suspected of association with a heinous cover-up.

Britains mainstream media cheer-led by demagogues such as Piers Morgan has often appeared worryingly eager to play up the horrors of the pandemic, while doing little to raise concern about the economic and social damage of keeping an entire nation under virtual house arrest for weeks on end.

This is now beginning to change. The mainstream media, mindful of the massive damage being done to the economy and its own balance sheets by the hysteria it has itself generated, is working in coordination with the government to try to shift the public mood.

Here, for example, is the Sunquoting three former Chancellors, all warning that the UK economy may never fully recover from coronavirus crisis.

It begins:

Britains economy might never recover fully from the coronavirus crisis and Britain will not enjoy a V-shaped bounce, three former Chancellors have warned.

LaboursAlistair Darling, who was Chancellor during the last recession, said whether the economy recovers at all will depend on decisions the Government takes in the next three to four weeks.

And:

His predecessor Norman Lamont warned of mass job losses, with companies finding they can operate with fewer people, while some businesses will disappear completely.

One frustrated British businessman, Simon Dolan, is now seeking to challenge the governments measures in a judicial review, which he hopes to support with a crowdfund. It is already almost halfway to reaching its 30,000 target.

Among his reasons for launching the challenge:

Small businesses continue to be badly affected. Businesses have been forced to shut, furlough staff and make cuts just in an attempt to survive.

Lockdown is also taking a huge toll on mental health and family life. Calls to the National Domestic Abuse helpline are up 49%. Referrals for cancer tests have fallen by 76%. It is estimated that 18,000 more people with cancer could die because of the disruption.

We are depriving children of a proper education and instead teaching them to hide away from uncertainty rather than to confront it.

It is now universally accepted that the lockdown will cause enormous long-term damage to both the economy and the general health of the population. No-one will be untouched by its effects, but the poorest in society will be by far the most affected.

His concerns are echoed by an op-ed in the Daily Telegraph another MSM imprint now trying to dial down the hysteria and inject a note of pragmatism into public debate by Scott Atlas of Stanford Universitys Hoover Institution.

Atlas offers five facts that show lockdown is a mistake. They are:

But articles like this appeal to rationalism and not to the raw emotion now governing large swathes of Britain. The lockdown, it seems likely, still has some way to go.

Continued here:

Delingpole: Most Britons Still Too Scared to Leave Home - Breitbart

Now that most of us have been under lockdown for more than a month, how have we coped emotionally, economically, socially and politically?

For almost everyone, we have been stressed out of our minds. It is difficult to think rationally or objectively when we confront our own mortality, with very uncertain and tough choices in the months ahead.Online learning platform Course Hero vice president Tomas Pueyo puts the dilemmas simply when he contrasts the alternatives as Coronavirus: The Hammer and the Dance. We need a hammer to lock down the pandemic quickly and aggressively.

The mitigation option is too slow, threatening to overwhelm our hospital facilities, causing high death rates, as Wuhan, Lombardy, Madrid,New York and London have all faced.After you have hammered (suppressed the coronavirus spread), the tough part of the dance is how to keep the coronavirus contained until we find the vaccine. If we keep the infection rate R below one, the epidemic dies down. To do so means wearing masks, keeping social distance and living and working very differently.With the lockdown come massive economic costs.

We forget to our peril that we are social animals.Few of us do well as loners. In the enforced lockdown, we struggle desperately to get out to meet friends and familybut also to self-reflect and understand why we are in this terrible dilemma. It is catastrophes like this that changed the world through new ideas.French mathematician and philosopher Rene Descartes (1596-1640) abhorred the senseless destruction of the Thirty Years War (1618-1648) so deeply that he created not just the philosophy of rationalism, but also the mathematical foundations of modern science.His most famous statement, I think, therefore I am is that of an individualist aware of his will and consciousness to think and act rationally.

Rationality meant excluding emotions, forgetting that all emotions are reflexive, that our fears or anger are magnified socially, spreading virally.

This individualism was captured by neoliberals to argue that individual greed can create social good. But carried to its extreme, modern individualism has become narcissistic and venalthinking that individual freedom is absolute

whereas the pandemic revealed that we live in social networks in which everything is interconnected, interdependent and therefore relative. Individual freedom comes with social responsibility. You cannot be selfish at expense of other peoples lives.

Ethiopian cognitive scientist Abeba Birhane recently challenged the Cartesian premise of individualism.Going back to African roots, she quoted Kenyan philosopher John Mbiti: I am because we are, and since we are, therefore I am. None of us are self-contained because we are all permeated by genes and memes (ideas) through society. In the Zulu language, A person is a person through other persons.

Recognizing this and the fact that the economy is a social institution, the pandemic has exposed all the flaws and inadequacies of the current income-expenditure-debt model. We consume in excess because we are given credit in the form of debt. When we cannot pay, the government has to step in to create more debt. The Fed has just added US$2.4 trillion to its balance sheet to support the US economy.None of us, including central bankers, know how this will ever be repaid if the lockdown continues for much longer.

This is why smart re-opening of the economy will involve more testing, tracing and containment.But the honest truth is that the coronavirus is hiding in the weakest and poorest segments of society, as Singapore has found in its clusters of foreign workers. Rich countries can close their borders, but if the pandemic rages on in poor, over-populated countries, the pandemic will return through civil and border wars.

Thus, the hammer cannot kill the virus or the fly. We have to dance with the virus and prepare for its mutation and co-evolution with other viruses that will emerge with climate warming.

Many businesses are already adapting to the new online world of business transactions, in which many more of us will be working at home and interacting only digitally. The digital economy cannot be a one-way system in which the seller does not care about the income of the buyer.One reason why the Alibaba and Tencent platforms are much more user-friendly and sustainable than the Google and Amazon models is that the user can earn income so that they can also spend through these platforms.

The American models push sales through advertising and if you cant afford to buy, they can offer you credit cards. But the pandemic revealed that if you cant earn, you cant spend.Only when the platform is two-way and not debt-dependent, will it be sustainable.

Rather than thinking linearly that globalization will retreat, glocalization will accelerate with more localization of ideas and innovations that have global market appeal. Notice how in the United States, governors have performed better than the federal government. Spontaneous innovation is occurring in different communities to create diverse innovation in getting medical supplies, improving food chains and working on vaccines and other badly needed medicines. The virus spread through a one-size-fit-all globalization.Anyone can fly, so can viruses. Herd immunity is built through mass diversity.

But diversity also brings differences of opinion and therefore the polarization of politics, which is in a very dangerous blame-each-other phase. In the animal kingdom, all creatures large and small have a truce in equally going to the shrinking water pool during a drought. They do not hunt each other until after they had their share of water, and even then they kill only what they need for survival, not wantonly. Animals do not blame each other for the drought.

We must learn to dance with each other in harmony with our environment, rather than applying a hammer to each other and to every present and emergent problem. Not every problem is a nail nor is every person we disagree with an enemy.

The pandemic has opened up an important conversation that eluded us in our blind pursuit of individualism, freedom, democracy and money. The old era is gone with the virus.Whether we like it or not, we will have to reimagine and shape collectively what the post-coronavirus economy and society will entail.This can no longer be built top-down, but through a dialogue where everyone recognizes that we are all facing common and existential fates.

The coronavirus makes or breaks us as a community. That is the truce that we need before the dance.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official stance of The Jakarta Post.

Read more here:

Dancing around the COVID hammer - The Jakarta Post - Jakarta Post

Jessica Anthony: Both of us have written novels through the Trump administration, and both can be considered political. In 1962 James Baldwin gave a lecture called The Artists Struggle for Integrity, in which he said: The poets (by which I mean all artists) are finally the only people who know the truth about us. Soldiers dont. Statesmen dont. Priests dont. Union leaders dont. Only poets.

No novelist wants to be a didact and polemical fiction fails for all kinds of reasons. There is something subversive and radical, it seems, about the nature of the poetic truth, in that it has to live beneath the fiction, and can never be stated outright.

I know that youve written deeply in nonfiction about the myriad offences of egg production, which is extremely tough to read; your new novel, Barn 8, feels even more political in that we as readers recognise these truths in it, and are forced to examine the fact that the novel so deeply entertains us. Its political because its emotional.

Deb Olin Unferth: It does seem that artists and writers have a closer chance at grasping at some kind of truth, since artists are beholden to no one, unlike statesmen and union leaders, all of whom have constituents depending on them is told.

Barn 8 is told from many points of view, all circling around one event-the attempted theft of one million chickens. That structure made it feel democratic somehow, the web of all these connected people and animals headed toward this single moment. And the question was: Would they make it? I was rooting for them, I can tell you.

When I was reading your book, Enter the Aardvark, I was struck by how much our novels have in common because yours also features a disrespected creature an aardvark as totem and star and centre of the show. Were you surprised by that?

JA: I knew that I wanted to write about a politician, but when I began, I didnt expect the stuffed aardvark to take over in the way that it did! I knew this politician would find his entire career obliterated in roughly 24 hours, but thought the aardvark would sort of disappear and make room for other disasters. But I quickly realised that the aardvark, stuffed in a taxidermists shop in Leamington Spa, England in 1875, could sort of move through time, and was amused by the fact that this innocuous stuffed beast could, 150 years later, offer some illumination about the hypocrisy and intransigence of your modern day right winger.

DOU: Which goes back to the point James Baldwin made about poetic truth. I think that writers can be as subversive as they like with very little consequence, if they are good enough at what they do and can be funny. Irish writers have long shown us how to be radical and political, without skimping on the philosophical, emotional, and hilarious. Its hard to imagine contemporary literature existing without their influence.

JA: Flann OBrien is the perfect writer for right now. We need a mischievous rogue in our ranks. I wonder what Samuel Beckett would have made out of Donald Trump? I cant see Beckett being beholden to constituents. He would probably transport them all to a pig farm. There was always some lightness and humour in Obama, and obviously in Bill Clinton. Trump is too mean to be funny. Watching ancient Joe Biden rise up from the ashes makes me wonder what kind of truth you might tell if you wrote about a character like him nowadays.

DOU: The politicians of today are easy targets, begging for satire and fiction is absolutely the place to describe where we are now in terms of the absurd. All you have to do is be militantly realistic. The more carefully and precisely you describe what you see, the more the craziness of the situation lays itself bare. For me the place where comedy or satire becomes art is when it makes you laugh, but then crosses for a moment into grief or pain or revelation: Molloy dragging that bicycle across the countryside. The sermon in Portrait of the Artist.

JA: Militant realism is right. I keep hearing everyone saying its so surreal whether theyre talking about the virus or the political situation but there is nothing surreal about this moment. This is hard core rationalism. Of course you have to laugh at all the excess, or youre doomed. I feel like Im constantly watching America trip, and take a nasty tumble down the stairs.

DOU: There is nothing surreal about this moment, except perhaps this one thing: doesnt it seem eerie that in this time of extreme partisanship all over the world, that we are suddenly faced with this global crisis that is going to require multi-level unity for us all to get through it?

That is the sort of plot move we love in fiction bring the whole set of characters to the edge of a cliff, push them off, and then pull them back with a rope in such a way that they all get tangled and injured as they crawl their way back to solid ground.

And isnt it a relief and a shock to watch the internet turn from the villian-pest it has been for the past five years into this loving space where we are all cooking dinners together, having virtual cocktail hours, and talking to our parents more than we have in the past decade?

JA: It is extraordinary to watch how people are coping or not coping. It is good to see people being kind to one another but as a novelist, I cant help but wonder what awaits us when the novelty dries out.

Two main revelations from the virus so far: 1) Soulless politicians are really shit at handling a global pandemic, and 2) the everyday, mundane life of the novelist staying in, writing, cooking, reading, going online is not all that different from living through a pandemic. Still, there is as much to learn, I have to believe, in the lovely way a person walking their dog skirts six feet around you and glances at you apologetically. Maybe the coronavirus will bring back basic politeness? An era of new civility?

DOU: And there is something to be said for all of us for making space for quieting the mind and pondering deep thoughts. I dont meditate but reading and writing quiet my mind. I do think that that practice, of sustained concentration, essential to clear thinking, is the only thing that can save us at this point.

JA: What you say about slowing down resonates: speed and habits of consumption keep us from each other and from the natural world. Its about the fight for a reasonable speed, so theres room for a least the tiniest bit of empathy. I think this is what I was getting at earlier. Its vital that our leaders possess thriving imaginations, so they can put themselves in the position of the people they represent.

Ive been reading a lot of Grace Paley lately. She said way back in 1982: We are in the hands of men whose power and wealth have separated them from the reality of daily life and the imagination. We are right to be afraid. And for that, as you say, we need to quiet the mind. My novel began back in 2012 when the phrase enter the aardvark appeared in my mind, a little scrap of poetry that I sat with for three years.

DOU: I love that your book came from three words. Isnt it crazy that something so small as an image or a few words can blow up into a long project that tries to bring together everything weve ever thought about?

I feel like the novel, the novel form, is precisely that: a snapshot of the authors mind, but in such a way that all that is contained in the millisecond of the snapshot is spread out over pages and pages, explaining every connection, every side alley, every philosophical belief, every political rant, every fist-banging or head-smacking or drowning-love revelation that the author has.

Complexity: thats what we need. No more simply signalling approval or disapproval by a smiley face or a frown. Life is so much more.

JA: Thats one of the real privations of social distancing. I rely on observing the complicated ways people interact every day, and never feel nourished going online--human behavior online is typically born out of vanity or politeness. Like the way a child behaves when she knows she is being watched. Maybe forced isolation will thicken fiction.

DOU: I have been using social media for many years now, since the earliest days it existed, and still I feel as you do, that it is mostly just vanity and politeness. When I try to express complexity, empathy, intimacy, it feels essentially empty.

JA: Something Ive found simultaneously hilarious and terrifying is how powerfully Donald Trump uses Twitter. The more reductive we allow our politicians to become, the worse off well be. One of the reasons right-wing ideology and nationalism has become so globally rampant is that were now regularly communicating through such bytes. Somehow this was all made okay campaigning online without any examination for what it does to ideas, the complexity of policy.

Obama is famous for his defense of the scalpel, not the machete. The less space we make to speak to one another, the more we have to simply pick a side and dig in our heels. All of us could stand to be a little more wrong. What frightens me, and has always frightened me, is that so many people are drawn to binary thinking, and genuinely believe that the lack of complexity is a sign of strength or decisiveness.

DOU: People are drawn to binary thinking, yes. You capture that in your novel with your right-wing politician, who is constantly thinking about what plays. One of my favourite details in your book is when he is watching, with increasing anxiety, the number of emails and texts he is receiving. The number rises and rises and rises. It is hilarious and tension-inducing, all that cyberjunk scrolling and scrolling, so representative of our time. There is no way to stop it, it doesnt even really exist, its accumulation is in our brain, not in space. In a novel there is an end point: the author must stop the book at some point, one way or another. But in the world it doesnt have to end, the scrolling keeps going, infinitely, madly, wretchedly.

JA: Yes, its in your novel, too in the minds of the men behind the chicken barns. Think about the kinds of emotion you have to block out to be even remotely okay with piling cage upon cage of birds, making them live in a stinking din, watching what happens to their minds and bodies as they are deprived: in a particularly twisted revelation, we learn that these binary thinkers figured out that hens lay eggs only in light, and so constant light is shone upon them. Maybe calling the publics attention to the dangers of this way of thinking not only the actions, but the thoughts behind the actions is part of the answer.Enter the Aardvark by Jessica Anthony is published by Doubleday. Barn 8 by Deb Olin Unferth is published by And Other Stories and is reviewed in The Irish Times tomorrow

See more here:

Politicians beg for satire. All you have to do is be militantly realistic - The Irish Times

Having studied at Annamalai University when it was one of the greatest higher educational institutions in the State with some of the best minds, Dravidian stalwart K. Anbazhagan, who died on Saturday, struck a balance between his literary pursuits and politics.

He ran a magazine named Puthuvaazhvu, which was launched on a Pongal Day in 1948.

But unlike Murasoli [founded by former Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi], Puthuvaazhvu confined politics to the editorials of the magazine. The other pages were dedicated to literature, social issues and book reviews. But it had no reservations when it came to criticising the Congress government, recalled K. Thirunavukkarasu, a historian of the Dravidian Movement.

Anbazhagan, who served as the general secretary of the DMK for 43 years till his death, was a great admirer of poet Subramania Bharati, though Dravidian leaders regarded Bharathidasan as the poet of their Movement.

If western scholars delve deep into Tamil and bring out its greatness, we appreciate their efforts. Similarly, we have to appreciate Bharathiar, and the question of his caste or race never comes into the picture, Anbazhagan had once told Mr. Thirunavukkarasu.

The DMK stalwart was keen on writing commentaries for Tirukkua and read almost every single work on the subject.

DMK founder C.N. Annadurai, who was lodged with him in jail in 1963, had recorded what he had seen in the cell.

Anbazhagan was surrounded by Valluvar. Yes. There was Parimelazhagars Valluvar, Parithimarkaignars Valluvar, Varatharasanars Valluvar, Ilakkuvanars Valluvar, Namakkallars Valluvar, Ki.Va. Jagannathans Valluvar and Manakkudavars Valluvar. He was writing a research book. I had the opportunity to discuss it with him, Annadurai had reminisced.

Anbazhagan later gave up the idea of writing commentaries on Tirukkua, arguing that there were already enough books on the subject. He did, however, author 30 books on various subjects, including literature, Tamil marriages and the Dravidian Movement.

While working at Pachaiyappas College, he would ride a bicycle to the premises. Recalling one of his classes in a book, Mu. Sathasivam, a former student of the college, noted: He taught Villibharatham for 40 minutes and dedicated 20 minutes to a conversation with students, and inculcated in them the idea of rationalism.

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Anbazhagan struck a balance between literature and politics - The Hindu

Rajinikanth is realising that being in politics is much tougher than doing the cigarette flick. And he is not giving up. After coming under attack from both DMK and AIADMK for different statements, the 69-year-old superstar last week met the Rajini Makkal Mandram forum district secretaries in Chennai to show that he is serious about launching a political party. With Kamal Haasan already in the fray with his Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM), and Rajinikanth expected to make an announcement in a few months, Tamil Nadu will be carrying forward its legacy of crossover politicians from the tinsel world. And this, soon after the death of J Jayalalithaa and M Karunanidhi, which many thought would mark the end of the politics-cinema tango.

The difference, however, would be that the new stars on the political stage are novices in public life. While MGR and Karunanidhi straddled the two fields simultaneously, often finding a symbiosis, Jayalalithaa apprenticed in politics for seven years under MGR before taking over the reins of the party in 1989. Kamal, who launched his party in February 2018, has already showed his commitment to go with the grind. MNM polled just 3.72% votes in its electoral debut last year, but proved to be a force to reckon with in cities, garnering more than one lakh votes each in Chennais three Lok Sabha constituencies.

Despite their relative inexperience in politics, the two actors are seen as potential alternatives to the two Dravidian parties that have alternated in government since 1967. While Kamals centrist position that promises to look at issues impartially has an audience, Rajinikanths spiritual politics may find takers in a land where parties that took birth from rationalism are filled with god-fearing men and women. For the citizen, they hold out the common promise of rooting out corruption. Which may make them worth trying out.

This piece appeared as an editorial opinion in the print edition of The Times of India.

Original post:

A star promise: Rajinikanth, Kamal Haasan may find politics harder than doing the cigarette flick - Economic Times

From one of my blog comboxes: underneath my article,Dialogue w Orthodox on Why Catholics Become Orthodox.Words of Kshos23 will be in blue.

*****

With regards to Orthodox accusing Catholicism of rationalism I suspect the main reason behind that is that Orthodox and Orthodox spirituality does want to give the faith more mystery. I remember an Eastern Orthodox monk once said that most eastern Church Fathers dont speak of the Resurrection of Christ directly and exhaustively, unlike some other things of the faith, precisely because its too great a mystery, and there are only snippets which you can gather from multiple fathers to come up with a some sort of more definite explanation. I also remember you doing a high-school Catholic apologetics interview with some students, and when you presented the Orthodox position on the Real Presence as being we dont know how it becomes the real body and blood of Christ, but it does, one of them funnily but legitimately responded with Isnt it better that way?, precisely because there is a certain beauty to mystery that was recognized.

So I think what the Orthodox are saying is that the Catholic practice of explaining the mysteries of the faith somewhat deprives it of mystery and profundity and the experiential flavor and beauty, and that this desire and sense-of-fittingness to have the things of revealed truth which are gloriously mysterious, beautifully transcendent and beyond precise human understanding is fulfilled in Christianity and should remain with regards to the deepest and most profound Christian mysteries.

We acknowledge mystery as well, but we think we can understand relatively more than the Orthodox claim we can understand. They think were over-rational; we think they are under-rational. Only Scripture and Tradition can resolve that difference.

When the Orthodox want to get very rational assuredly they do, too: for example, regarding the fine points of thefilioquecontroversy.

Well, what I was trying to get at is that the sense of mystery in the sense of the unknown as being beautiful, in contrast to explaining everything which takes away the magic. To be more specific, the sense of mystery Im talking about is the one expressed in your interview with high-school Catholics, where you explained the difference between Orthodox and Catholic views of the Eucharist, and how a Catholic girl responded to the Orthodox mystical view as Isnt it better that way?. Her response likely reflects this.

Again, we dontexplain everything. We explain as far as (we believe) the limits of human understanding of divine mysteries will allow. We just think the line is a bit further than Orthodox do. Who is to say who is right? We can only appeal to Scripture and apostolic, patristic tradition to make such a determination. I posted a chapter from my book about Orthodoxy on this issue today:Is Catholicism Unbiblically Rationalistic? (Orthodox Criticisms).

Im so much notagainst mystery and mysticism, that I edited a book of quotations of the great Catholic mystics.

The Catholic Catechismcontains the word mystery 183 times, and mysteries 33 times, andmysterious another 28 times.

Thats an awful lot of mystery for a communion that supposedly doesnt recognizeit (or to an extent less than it supposedly should).

See also, for example, #404: . . . the transmission of original sin is a mystery that we cannot fully understand. . . .

***

Photo credit:KELLEPICS(10-17-17) [Pixabay /Pixabay License]

***

The rest is here:

Dialogue: Relation of Mystery & Reason in Christianity - Patheos

One of several factors that has brought the Islamic World to its current sorry state is the fetishisation of Muslims daily prayers, or namaz.

Todays understanding of Islam has turned it almost into a religion of namaz, to such an extent that prayers take priority over the religion.

Firstly, we must interrogate the irrational and illogical approach to the religious duties that are known as the five pillars of Islam. Todays understanding of the religion says that these five bearing witness that Allah is the one true god, praying, fasting, giving alms and undertaking the pilgrimage to Mecca are the basic and mandatory requirements for Muslims.

Bearing witness is only required when one becomes a Muslim. Fasting for most Muslims is a tradition that comes once a year during the month of Ramadan. The haj pilgrimage only takes place for a short time. Zakat, the Islamic tax that is passed on to the needy, is collected annually. Prayer is the only one of the five pillars that is undertaken daily. In other words, of the five pillars of Islam, in daily practice there is only one prayer.

Can it be right to reduce a universal religion to what is, in the end, a series of ritual movements, rather than values like justice, freedom, equality, labour and love?

Let alone a religion, no human ideology can have a ritual as its essential norm. It is neither rational, nor Islamic to claim that prayer is more important than norms such as freedom and justice.

Prayers importance does not compare to these norms. A just person who does not pray is always superior to one who prays, but is unjust.

In fact, the five pillars of Islam are an apolitical innovation created for the religion long after its inception. Clearly, the centuries of investment in this innovation were made with a view to instilling todays view of piety a piety that does not give priority to morals, justice and freedom.

Let no one respond with the banal argument that focusing on prayer does not detract from other values. If you instil in a person the idea that gold is the most valuable thing in the world, but that apples are also important and then ask them to choose between the two, they will always take the gold.

We must understand that there is no causal link or even correlation between Muslim ritual worship and values like justice and freedom.

A striking example of this comes from the instances where people have been stampeded to death by their fellow Muslims during the practice of casting stones at the devil during the haj pilgrimage. Or, the reality that the Saudi Arabian government is neither just nor emancipatory despite its status as the guardian of Islams holy places.

A persons relationship with prayer is a subjective one. There is no universal correlation between prayer and any moral or political value.

A related topic is the characterisation of prayer as the sole marker of religion. People cannot imagine a religiosity that does not include prayer. Yet there are millions of people who never miss one of Islams five daily prayers, but still live their entire lives without reading a single book.

If we make prayer the focus of religion, then those who do not pray cannot be religious. But the Koran itself commands people to read, and if we focus on this, then it is the person who prays, but does not read who is irreligious.

We should take seriously the idea that it is those people who do not read or care for the environment and the world they live in who are not religious.

An understanding of piety centred solely on prayer is one that can achieve nothing beyond meaningless reassurances. The first volume of lmihal, the two-volume reference book on religion distributed to the public by Turkeys state Directorate of Religious Affairs is 584 pages long. Of these, 162 pages are on prayer. In the same volume, there are 24 pages devoted to faith in God, and 26 pages on cleanliness.

The second volume of lmihal is 558 pages long, and just two of these are on the environment. Another two pages are on ritual sacrifice. A single page refers to the correct way for Muslims to groom themselves, and an entire section related to work and labour rights takes just five pages. The section on the labour contract is roughly as long as the section on removing body hair.

Naturally, workers being shown the door by their bosses does not arouse as much interest in Muslim societies as the removal of body hair. Islam has been lowered to a collection of rituals and meaningless verses.

We all know that the point of this ritual-centred version of Islam is to manufacture a type of apolitical, anti-intellectual people who count obedience to the state or religious leaders as piety.

In this ritual-focused version of piety, prayer takes centre stage. With 162 pages devoted to it in a mundane religious manual, there are in fact many more literary tomes out there that delve further into the act of praying so much so that if the Sunni theologian Abu Hanifa himself were to rise from the grave, even he would be unable to carry out a prayer deemed proper according to all of the details.

What is even more tragic is that, with all those centuries and thousands of pages of scholarship devoted to the subject, it is said that nobody is able to properly perform prayers.

The idea that all our problems could be solved if we could only learn to pray in the right way has become commonplace. Apparently, Turkey, a country with 100,000 imams and just as many mosques, cannot solve its problems because it lacks the ability to pray correctly.

No one can criticise the view of prayer as a divine command, or its practice as a form of worship. This, in the end, is something that is up to Muslims themselves. But the fetishisation of prayer to the point where it defines Islam is causing great harm to the religion.

Muslims need to urgently decide whether their religions fundamental norms will be values such as freedom, justice and rationalism, or rituals like the act of praying and casting stones at the devil.

Ahval English

The views expressed in this column are the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of Ahval.

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Fetishisation of prayer is ruining Islam - Ahval

After 24 days of DNA evidence being heard in the Supreme Court triple murder trial, it took the states DNA expert Jonathan Whitaker just two hours to reduce the likelihood of the contamination theory to almost negate and very low with Mr Yovich unable to reference another example of a similar contamination having ever occurred in any DNA lab across the globe.

During his testimony Dr Whitaker considered the defences contamination theory, which related to the source of the contamination being either an intimate swab taken from Mr Edwards rape victim, known as HV1, or a sperm cell extract created from the swab, known as 11J7.

He said based on only two DNA profiles being found under Ms Glennons fingernail sample when it was tested in 2008, he could almost negate the swab contamination theory.

I would think its not the case and the reason I say that is that there's no presence of [the Karrakatta rape victim's] DNA in the ultimate fingernail sample," he said.

"I qualify that by saying I cant appreciate or cant accept that there will be a way for [the victim's] DNA to selectively disappear from that swab and for you only to end up with Mr Edwards' in the final result."

And while Dr Whitaker said the sperm extract would not have had the rape victims DNA in it, he considered it extremely unlikely it could have had an opportunity to be spilled in the lab and then been left undetected for 13 months before finding its way into the AJM42 container.

Another difference that I would be alert to is that the extract is now a liquid which is kept frozen in the laboratory and so that needs to be out. It needs to have thawed, he said.

DNA liquid form ... tends to degrade and dry out, so again it needs to have persisted in the environment. It needs to have evaded all our cleaning regimes and controls, etcetera.

Considering that it dried and now becomes a flaky residue, that itself then has still got to get by some mechanism into these pots.

Dr Whitaker said the source, mechanism and opportunity for the contamination to have occurred was very low.

But I stress, we cant say never which is why I positioned it on my subjective scale right down at the bottom end, he said.

Dr Whitaker said if any escaped DNA was present in the lab for 13 months, it didnt contaminate any other exhibits tested in the lab during that time.

Prosecutor Carmel Barbagallo said it was the states case Mr Edwards DNA was found underneath Ms Glennons fingernails because she had fought him in the moments before her murder.

The accused man's DNA has gotten into the mixed DNA profile ... as a result of Ms Glennon scratching the accused man, or otherwise engaging with him in a violent and physical altercation at the time of, or close to her death, she said.

Ciara Glennon

Dr Whitaker agreed Ms Glennons torn left thumbnail on an otherwise well-manicured hand suggested she had inflicted the scratch on her attacker with significant force.

The considerations under that scenario are that Mr Edwards is present at the scene together with Ms Glennon, scratching occurs and that involves force that will promote the transfer of DNA to the nails, that's a one-step transfer which we call primary transfer," he said.

"So comparing and contrasting the pathways, we've got a one-step pathway under the first proposition, but a multiple step pathway under the alternative [contamination theory].

"On the probability of the evidence, if Ms Glennon had scratched Mr Edwards ... I would couch this on my subjective scale as moderately high to high."

During the trial, 10 recorded instances of contamination within the Pathwest lab have been recorded in relation to the 17,000-odd Macro Taskforce exhibits tested over two decades.

Nine out of the ten contaminations were by Pathwest scientists either involved in, or regularly present in the lab, during examination and testing of the samples.

Of the nine occasions, at least seven of them occurred prior to staff having to wear hair nets during DNA testing, and at least four before staff were required to wear face masks.

The increases to personal protective wear required inside the DNA lab grew as DNA technologies advanced and became more sensitive over time.

The only proven example of an unrelated exhibit contaminating a Macro-related item was in 2002, when a twig from Jane Rimmers crime scene recovered the DNA of the female victim of an unrelated crime whose intimate swabs were tested days earlier in the lab.

An investigation concluded the contamination was likely linked to a tube batch which was used for both extractions.

Mr Yovich also referred to a contamination event that occurred in a UK lab in 2007, when an ex-employees DNA was detected on a DNA test negative control blank 16 months after they had resigned.

Justice Stephen Hall.

An investigation into the event concluded while the staff member didnt have access to the DNA lab, she had had regular access to its freezer, as did scientists.

Mr Yovich, during the two times he brought up the incident, failed to mention that it was not known when the contamination occurred, suggesting it had occurred 16 months after the employee had resigned.

Having read the incident report, Justice Hall clarified with Mr Yovich during his cross-examination of Dr Whitaker that the contamination could have occurred while the employee was still in the lab, but was not detected until later.

Dr Whitaker said he was not aware of any example of DNA lasting longer than a year in the lab environment before contaminating an exhibit.

A situation of a staff member in a cold room whose been in there frequently - so DNA might build up and be detected later - is different to a single forensic item that has very little DNA on it appearing over a period of time, Dr Whitaker said.

"We conceive they could happen, but we try to put it under a level of reasoning and rationalism as to whether or not it's probable."

Following Mr Edwards arrest in 2016, DNA testing carried out on his reference sample when compared to the male DNA profile found underneath Ms Glennons fingernails, matched at every loci.

Institute of Environmental Science and Research forensic scientist Susan Vintiner said her analysis of the samples in 2017 found Mr Edwards was at least 80 million times more likely to be the contributor of the DNA profile compared to any other white Australian male not related to him.

Mr Edwards has admitted the DNA recovered from Ms Glennons fingernails matched his profile, but claimed he did not know how it got there.

Mr Yovich, during his opening statement at trial in November, accepted the chance of contamination was remote, but not impossible.

We accept that a scratching event, a direct scratching event of the sort that the state will rely on in proving a connection between the DNA found on these samples and the death of Ciara Glennon is a more likely circumstance, maybe a much more likely circumstance than a chance social contact, he said.

And again, we do not put forward a specific chance, innocent, social contact to explain the DNA.

We accept as well that the chance of contamination in a lab is usually remote although secondary transfer is known and documented in the literature.

But in circumstances where other incidents of contamination are known to have occurred we say, known to have been undetected for some time, your Honour will have to consider just how remote the chance was here and whether it can be safely ruled out even if it was remote.

On the eve of his triple murder trial, Mr Edwards admitted to the 1995 abduction and rape of a 17-year-old girl from Claremont, and a 1988 Huntingdale sex attack carried out on an 18-year-old woman.

He originally pleaded not guilty to the charges and allegedly repeatedly feigned disbelief at his DNA appearing on items relating to the attacks during his police interview, Ms Barbagallo said.

Evidence since heard in his murder trial has revealed Pathwest testing had concluded it 100 billion times more likely the DNA found on the rape victim's pants, and a semen-stained kimono left at the scene of the sex attack, belonged to Mr Edwards than any other person not related to him.

The mammoth murder trial on Tuesday adjourned until March 23, when the state will begin its fibre evidence, which it alleges links Mr Edwards to the murders of Ms Rimmer and Ms Glennon and his Karrakatta rape victim through common fibres found at the scenes.

The fibres allegedly originate from Mr Edwards' Telstra-issued work pants and the upholstery of his 1996 Holden Commodore VS Series I station wagon.

Mr Edwards has pleaded not guilty to the murders of Sarah Spiers, Jane Rimmer and Ciara Glennon.

The trial continues.

Follow WAtoday's live coverage of the trial, here.

Heather McNeill is the crime and courts editor at WAtoday.

The rest is here:

Accused Claremont killer's contamination theory in tatters as state wraps up its DNA evidence with a bang - Sydney Morning Herald

Three out of every four voters in Taiwan went to the polls on Saturday. On January 15 at 5pm PST, (January 16 at 9am in Taiwan, Hong Kong and China), the USC U.S.-China Institute will host a video conference looking at what the key issues were in the election and what the election means for Taiwan domestic policies, for cross-strait relations, and for U.S.-Taiwan relations. Please registerto join this online conference.

Taiwans President Tsai Ing-wen received a record 8.2 million votes, winning reelection with 57% of the ballots. Her Chinese Nationalist (Kuomintang) rival, Han Kuo-yu, received 39% of the vote. Tsais Democratic Progressive Party won 61 of the 113 seats in the legislature. The Kuomintang won 38 seats. Several small parties and independent also won seats. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued a statement congratulating Tsai on her victory and Taiwan for once again demonstrating the strength of its robust democratic system. Xinhua, Chinas state news agency described Tsais election as a temporary counter-current. Xinhua blamed DPP cheating and said anti-China political forces in the West openly intervened and supported Tsai to contain China.

The discussion will be moderated by Clayton Dube, the director of theUSC U.S.-China Institute.Panelists will include:

Tom Hollihan, USCHollihan heads the USC Annenberg School doctoral program and observed the Taiwan election as a member of a Ministry of Foreign Affairs delegation. He is a specialist on political communication and is the author of several books including The Dispute over the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands: How Media Narratives Shape Public Opinions and Challenge the Global Order and Uncivil Wars: Political Campaigns in a Media Age.

Daniel Lynch, City University of Hong KongLynch taught international relations at USC for two decades before moving to Hong Kong where he teaches international relations and Chinese politics. His books include Chinas Futures: PRC Elites Debate Economics, Politics, and Foreign Policy, Rising China and Asian Democratization: Socialization to Global Culture in the Political Transformations of Thailand, China, and Taiwan. In addition to observing this election, Lynch spent two months in Taiwan in summer 2019 for his current research.

Shelley Rigger, Davidson CollegeCurrently a Fulbright Scholar based in Taipei and Shanghai, Rigger is especially well-known for her book,Why Taiwan Matters: Small Island, Global Powerhouse,but shes also the author ofPolitics in Taiwan: Voting for Democracy, From Opposition to Power: Taiwans Democratic Progressive Party,andTaiwans Rising Rationalism: Generations, Politics and Taiwan Nationalism.

Ray Wang, National Chengchi UniversityWangworks as an Associate Professor at National Chengchi University, Taiwan. Rays major research interests focus on human rights, religious freedom, and transnational advocacy networks. Currently he serves as the executive editor of Mainland China Studies (TSSCI). He is the recipient of an Excellent Young Scholar Research Fund from the Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan (2018-2021) and a part of the research is published in the new book, Resistance under Communist China Religious Protesters, Advocates and Opportunists (Palgrave) in 2019.

Please register now to join the roundtable.

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Webinar on Taiwan's Election: What Happened and What's Next? - US-China Institute

In this series, The Week looks at the ideas and innovations that permanently changed the way we see the world. This week, the spotlight is on prison:

Oscar Wilde first saw the inside of a prison 13 years before he wroteDe Profundis, his famous 55,000-word letter to his lover, Lord Alfred Douglas, from his cell at Reading Gaol.

On seeing the state of the inmates at a jail in Lincoln, Nebraska in 1882, Wilde wrote of being confronted with poor odd types of humanity in striped dresses making bricks in the sun. All of the faces were mean-looking, which consoled me, for I should hate to see a criminal with a noble face.

By the time of his own incarceration for indecency, Wildes views had softened on those residing in prison. Reviewing a book of poetry composed behind bars by the anti-imperialist Wilfred Blunt, Wilde wrote that an unjust imprisonment for a noble cause strengthens as well as deepens the nature.

Wildes changing attitude to the jail population reflected a shift in the general perception of criminality. The prisons of Wildes Britain were a far cry from the rehabilitation-focused penal systems of the 21st century.

Prisons, which are often run by governments, are usually secure facilities (though not always) that constrain the movements and social interactions of prisoners. The notion was born out of the barbaric origins of the medieval torture chamber, but by the eighteenth centry it had shifted towards imprisonment with labour, according to the Howard League for Penal Reform.

This then changed again as prisons became more concerned with the concept of rehabilitation. This time prisons moved towards the modern mechanisms of criminal justice, what French philosopher Michael Foucault described as not a physical imprisonment, but an economy of suspended rights aimed at reshaping individual behaviour.

The earliest descriptions ofimprisonment corresponded closely with the spread of the written word and the formalisation of early legal codes. However, the earliest legal documents for example the Babylonian Code of Hammurabi dating from about 1750 BC focused on retribution from the victim, rather than state-led punishment as we now recognise it.

Plato began to develop ideas about rehabilitation and in Platos Lawsconsidered the laws role in making citizens virtuous. Plato dwelt on the suggestion that injustice is a disease of the soul that can be cured through punishment.

PlatosGreece did have prisons calleddesmoterion, meaning place of chains however they were used more for the holding of prisoners who had been condemned to death. The Ancient Romans also used imprisonment for the same purpose, and in 640 BC, the Mamertine Prison, known as the Tullianum, was erected.

The 400-year-old San Giuseppe dei Falegnami Roman Catholic church now stands on the site of the prison, but at the time it would have been a squalid series of dungeons in the sewers under Rome.

During the Middle Ages, prison conditions did not improve. Across Europe, brutal punishment was still prescribed to rule-breakers, with castles, fortresses and the basements of public buildings given over to housing the incarcerated.

As historian Patricia Turning writes inCrime and Punishment in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Age, by the 13th century the right to imprison criminals gave a certain legitimacy to political administrations, from the king to regional counts to city councils.

Up until the late 17th and early 18th century, justice mostly involved performative displays of violence against criminals. Public executions and torture were widespread, with the Bloody Code imposing the death penalty for hundreds of often petty offencesin the United Kingdom.

In the 18th century, there was a shift away from public executions as public perceptions of violence began to shift. The Howard League notes that a more complex penal system developed during the period, including the widespread introduction of houses of correction. The first of these in the UK was Bridewell Prison - a complex in London that was originally built as Bridewell Palace, a residence for Henry VIII.

What precisely prisons were for during this time was divided between two philosophical outlooks. In From Newgate to Dannemora: The Rise of the Penitentiary in New York, David Lewis notes that Enlightenment ideas of utilitarianism and rationalism clashed, leading to discussion of whether prisons should be a deterrent or a site of moral reform (an early description of rehabilitation).

This divide was embodied by two prison reformers of the time: John Howard after who the Howard League is named and Jeremy Bentham. Bentham, a utilitarian, believed that the prisoner should suffer a severe regime, while Howard advocated for the rehabilitation of prisoners so that they could be reintroduced into society.

Bentham would go on to design the panopticon (pictured below), in which prisoners were under observation at all times.Over 200 years later, Foucault would use Benthams panopticon design as a metaphor for the modern disciplinary society, in which acts of violence had been replaced with efforts to reshape the behaviour of individuals.

The first state prison in England was the Millbank Prison, established in 1816 on the site of the current Tate Gallery in London, with a capacity for just under 1,000 inmates. In 1842, Pentonville Prison in London opened, kickstarting the trend for ever-increasing incarceration rates and the use of prison as the primary form of crime punishment.

In 1786 the state of Pennsylvania in the US passed a law which forced all convicts who had not been sentenced to death to be placed in penal servitude to do public works projects such as building roads, forts and mines. This inspired the rise of so-called chain gangs.

The notion of moral reformation took on a religious bent in Pennsylvania around this time. According to the 2004 bookVoices from Prisonon the life histories of black male prisoners in the US, 1790 saw the Walnut Street Jail in Pennsylvania begin locking its prisoners in solitary cells to reflect on their sins, accompanied by nothing but religious literature.

By the 1800s, prisons as a means of rehabilitation were becoming more mainstream, though the methods for reforming those behind bars were still harsh. Mary Bosworth writes in The U.S. Federal Prison Systemthat the Auburn system developed in New York confined prisoners in separate cells and prohibited them from speaking.

First introduced at Auburn State Prison, the system was modelled on the strictness of a school classroom, where pupils would be shaped and moulded by their teachers. The method became famous and is mentioned by French diplomat Alexis de Tocqueville in his book Democracy in America, based on a visit to the US.

In the early 1900s, major reforms began in the UKs prison system, spearheaded by the Liberal Home Secretary Winston Churchill, who had been imprisoned himself during the Boer War. He said: I certainly hated my captivity more then I have ever hated any other period in my whole life... Looking back on those days Ive always felt the keenest pity for prisoners and captives.

His biographer, Paul Addison, would later add that more than any other Home Secretary of the 20th century, Churchill was the prisoners friend.

Churchills reforms - unpopular though they were at the time - aimed to make prison more bearable and more likely to rehabilitate prisoners.The policy left Britain with one of the most liberal prison systems in the Western world, but by the mid-20th century this had been far outstripped by the Scandinavian penal system.

Sweden was the first country to wholeheartedly embrace the idea of rehabilitation not incarceration.In 1965 it introduced a criminal code that emphasised punishments that reduced prison time. The hugely progressive move included a focus on conditional sentences, probation for first-time offenders and the more extensive use of fines.

This influenced a shift in imprisonment across Europe, with France and the Netherlands following Swedens example and experiencing a rapid fall in prison numbers as a result.

In 2014, Sweden was able to close four of its56 prisons, as only 4,500 people out of a total population of 9.5 million were being held in jail. At the time,Swedish politician Nils Oberg told The Guardian that prison is not for punishment in Sweden. We get people into better shape.

The same year, Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust, said that the UKs then Justice Secretary, Chris Grayling, was introducing measures that amounted to a ramped-up political emphasis on punishment rather than real rehabilitation.

The damming response suggested that despite Britain leading the world in liberalising prisons in the early 1900s, by the turn of the 21st century it had fallen behind.The number of deaths in the ten worst prisons in England and Wales are increasing year on year, withunderstaffing, drug use, crumbling infrastructure and overcrowding all playing a role.

More than 11 million people are currently held in prison around the world - ranging from incarceration in the liberal penal system of Scandinavia, to the hidden detention sites of China and North Korea from which many never return.

The concept of imprisoning people ushered in a type of justice that focused less on the violent retribution endorsed in Britain's Bloody Code and later allowed for rehabilitation to become a vital part of modern criminal justice systems.

Just as Oscar Wildes attitude to criminals tempered, so too has societys, with polling in the US which houses 22% of the worlds prison population showing that 40% of people believe rehabilitation is the most important function of a prison system.

In the same poll, 53% supported the abolition of solitary confinement, a stark comparison to the uncompromising rules of the Auburn system or the authoritarianism of Jeremy Benthams panopticon.

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52 ideas that changed the world - 31. Prison - The Week UK

If such a conceit sounds heady, thats because it is. The book is the latest installment in Wrights ongoing effort to write a poetry of ideas, wherein matter takes on ritual proportions and Afro-Caribbean ritual thought responds to the exclusionary history of Western rationalism. His corpus is a formalist fantasia the way most rituals are. Every aspect of the page layout, typography, illustration, tense, soud, and symbol holds value in the divination process. To read Wright is to adopt the position, often thematized in his work, of the postulant, trembling into knowledge of Gods body, knowledge of his naming (Transfigurations 148). But if Wrights reader is a candidate seeking entrance into a rarified order, it is an ecumenical one, diasporic in scope. The name of the absolute is not written in the language of any single denomination or intellectual province. It is scrawled in a host of esoteric tonguestribal icon, variable equation, philosophical abstractionmaking the name less a stable thing and more an echo of entangled ideology.

Within this corpus one finds all the clear markings of phone-number chunking. There is the early, narrative-driven work of The Homecoming Singer (1971), the mature eight-book cycle collected in Transfigurations: Collected Poems (2000), and the prolific late-career output five books following Transfigurations. (Surely a collected late poems is in the works.) The premise for The Prime Anniversary is laid out in the preceding volume, Disorientations: Groundings (2013). There, we find Wright adopting the familiar posture of the late poet: I ask you now to consider the old poet / as he sits in his Bradford garden (6). From this vantage, the venerable poet of Vermont takes stock: The old poet has done a study / of exploration, of rhythm as ethos. If rhythm is ethos, its message is perseverance. I would fasten myself to that rhythm, says Wright, an anniversary of salt and serenity. This is the anniversary referred to in the title of Wrights recent collection. Rhythm, for the poet, becomes transportive, carrying him into an ethereal plane.

The opening long poem delineates the prospect of a post-late poetics.

Truth: names travel a watery route to heaven,

so says Concha Mndez, or so she would have said,

if she had any regard for physics. Seven

witnesses report that ether surely has failed,

a small erasure hardly noticed at Quito;

lines in that atmosphere seem to circle and flow

tangent to themselves. What does geometry know?

In the past Wright has identified a single biographical figure or perhaps two to guide him through a collection. Here no single figure rises above the others. We have references like the one in this poem to Concha Mendez, which point back to the poets and musicians of Spains Generation of 27. These names run up against the names of Greek natural philosophersEmpedocles, Ptolemy, and Cleonidesin paratactic fashion, demanding the reader play along by offering some interpretation of their relation. One such interpretation might be that what connects these figures is their shared status as explorers. Wright, after all, described himself in the previous collection as conducting a study of exploration. Another interpretation is that they all exist as names, and thus build upon Wrights fascination with nominalization. If there is a truthfulness to poetry, the opening line suggests that it lies in the function names have in life and in the watery beyond. The names reference distinct individuals, but the poem celebrates them in the light of their ongoing contribution to human understanding. By virtue of their names, these explorers exceed earthly expiration. They endure in the language of the poem at hand; where, against a sea of abstractions, they stand out like shimmering buoys, enticing the reader to set keel to breakers and depart on their own exploratory study.

One may think this is a long way of saying that poets attain immortality through virtue of their reputations. But Wright is up to something different. He is less concerned with the name in and of itself, its referential function, than in the medium through which names pass on their path to perpetuity. As the poem above suggests, if one is to understand infinity as heavenly afterlife, literary pantheon, or mathematical concept one must first understand the milieu through which a projective phenomenon passes. Taking Wrights lead, we recall that the failure of ether was the failure of scientific consensus in the 19th century, when physicists assumed that since sound waves pass through air, and ocean waves pass through water, light must travel through some similar atmospheric jelly, which they dubbed ether. While little is obvious in this poem, the profound presence of measure and rhyme suggests that Wright considers rhythm to be the milieu of continuity. Less jelly, more Jelly Roll. Each return of the beat is an anniversary, as the title would suggest, and with each anniversary comes an encounter with that which makes a post-late poetics possible: a transition overtaking a terminus.

When describing rhythm and its folding of finite sensory experience into infinity, Wright reaches for evidence in the objective realm physics, geometry, and chemistry finding in such propositions a parallel to world mythology.

Do not be astonished if you hear a drumming,

or meet an unattended leopard in the bush.

The mask half in shadow, half in sunlight will bring

you through death; you might think of this as pull and push

of an electron, orbiting its own demise.

We know our scholars speak too often in disguise,

embrace Abaku, always sit to improvise.

Here the death ritual of the Abaku dramatizes scientific thought. The images at the opening refer at least in part to the belief that when a sovereign dies in the Cuban initiatory fraternity, his body is buried without any announcement to the members. Once the death is announced, the members go out in search of the body, which, the ritual insists, has been transformed into a leopard. When the leopard goes undiscovered, the animals spirit is said to find its way into the form of the sovereigns successor. The dance of the members and their masking rhymes with the staggered route of the diminished electron. Scattered insights and embodied belief come together over a beat. The essential pulse of the body lives on through the pulse of the drum, which is the pulse of the poem, as Wright extolls, Nothing overcomes the radiant iambic; / no one forgets the geometry of lyric.

In another sense altogether, the book suggests that what lies beyond late poetics is that very thing that existed before lyric became the poetic norm. Recalling the Greek conception of poetry as largely a dramatic genre, modern poets have for some time been interested in recovering the lost dialogic basis of poetic expression. This is evidenced by the numerous poets who embed playwriting within their concept of poetic practice. Amiri Baraka, T.S. Eliot, Robert Duncan, and Lorine Niedecker are but a few examples. The second half of Wrights book features one of the many theatrical works he has written over his career. Entitled The Geometry of Rhythm, the one-act play returns us to the foundational question that undergirds the book: in what ways does poetry survive the poet?

Grogach: You taught me the fragile geometry of self

Bivio: And you have taught me to live with my ambiguous rhythm

Grogach: Shall we exchange names?

Bivio: Lets do.

The various threads of the book are here woven into a light, yet taut, textile. Selfhood is not particularly well-suited for perpetuity, rhythm is not mere regularity, and names find their meaning in the ongoing exchange.

The Prime Anniversary (2019) by Jay Wright is published by Flood Editions.

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Rhythm, Divination, and Naming in Jay Wright's Poetry - Hyperallergic

Published: January 3, 2020 8:14:10 pm

Savitribai Phule, the social reformer who is considered to be one of Indias first modern feminists, was born on January 3, 1831. Among her accomplishments, she is especially remembered for being Indias first female teacher who worked for the upliftment of women and untouchables in the field of education and literacy.

Phule was born in Naigaon, Maharashtra in 1831 and married activist and social-reformer Jyotirao Phule when she was nine years old. After marriage, with her husbands support, Phule learned to read and write and both of them eventually went on to found Indias first school for girls called Bhide Wada in Pune in 1948. Before this, she started a school with Jyotiraos cousin Saganbai in Maharwada in 1847. Since at that time the idea of teaching girls was considered to be a radical one, people would often throw dung and stones at her as she made her way to the school.

Significantly, it was not easy for the Phules to advocate for the education of women and the untouchables since in Maharashtra a nationalist discourse was playing out between 1881-1920 led by Bal Gangadhar Tilak. These nationalists including Tilak opposed the setting up of schools for girls and non-Brahmins citing loss of nationality.

Essentially, both Jyotirao and Savitribai Phule recognised that education was one of the central planks through which women and the depressed classes could become empowered and hope to stand on an equal footing with the rest of the society.

In his essay written for the Savitribai Phule First Memorial Lecture Hari Narke has written, In the social and educational history of India, Mahatma Jotirao Phule and his wife Savitribai Phule stand out as an extraordinary couple. They were engaged in a passionate struggle to build a movement for equality between men and women and for social justice. The Phules also started the Literacy Mission in India between 1854-55. According to Narake, the Phules started the Satyashodhak Samaj (Society for Truth-Seeking), through which they wanted to initiate the practice of Satyashodhak marriage, in which no dowry was taken.

Because of the role Phule played in the field of womens education, she is also considered to be one of the crusaders of gender justice, as one paper published in the International Journal of Innovative Social Science & Humanities Research has said. The paper also credits Phule as being one of the first published women in modern India, who was able to develop a voice and agency of her own, at a time when women were suppressed and lived a sub-human existence.

Even though her poems, which were written in Marathi, she advocated values such as humanism, liberty, equality, brotherhood, rationalism and the importance of education among others. In her poem titled, Go, Get Education she wrote:

Be self-reliant, be industrious

Work, gather wisdom and riches,

All gets lost without knowledge

We become animal without wisdom,

Sit idle no more, go, get education

End misery of the oppressed and forsaken,

Youve got a golden chance to learn

So learn and break the chains of caste.

Throw away the Brahmans scriptures fast.

Her books of poems Kavya Phule and Bavan Kashi Subodh Ratnakar were published in 1934 and 1982.

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Explained: Savitribai Phules impact on womens education in India - The Indian Express

Will Tehran and Washington let slip the dogs of war following last weeks aerial takedown of Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corpss IRGC) Quds Force? You could be forgiven for thinking so considering the hot takes that greeted the news of the drone strike outside Baghdad. For example, one prominent commentator, the Council on Foreign Relations Richard Haass, opined that the Middle East region (and possibly the world) will be the battlefield.

Color me skeptical. The apocalypse is not at hand.

Haass is right in the limited sense that irregular military operations now span the globe. Terrorists thirst to strike at far as well as near enemies in hopes of degrading their will to fight. They respect no national boundaries and never have. Frontiers are likewise murky in the cyber realm, to name another battleground with no defined battlefronts. The United States and Iran have waged cyber combat for a decade or more, dating to the Stuxnet worm attack on the Iranian nuclear complex in 2010.

The coming weeks and months may see irregular warfare prosecuted with newfound vigor through such familiar unconventional warmaking methods. Its doubtful Tehran would launch into conventional operations, stepping onto ground it knows America dominates. To launch full-scale military reprisals would justify full-scale U.S. military reprisals that, in all likelihood, would outstrip Irans in firepower and ferocity. The ayatollahs who oversee the Islamic Republic fret about coming up on the losing end of such a clash. As well they might, considering hard experience.

So the outlook is for more of the same. Thats a far cry from the more fevered prophecies of World War III aired since Soleimani went to his reward. To fathom Tehrans dilemma, lets ask a fellow who knew a thing or two about Persian ambitions. (The pre-Islamic Persian Empire, which bestrode the Middle East and menaced Europe, remains the lodestone of geopolitical successeven for Islamic Iran.)

The Athenian historian Thucydides chronicled the Peloponnesian War, a fifth-century-B.C. maelstrom that engulfed the Greek world. Persia was a major player in that contest. In fact, it helped decide the endgame when the Great King supplied Athens antagonist, Sparta, with the resources to build itself into a naval power capable of defeating the vaunted Athenian navy at sea. But Thucydides also meditates on human nature at many junctures in his history, deriving observations of universal scope. At one stage, for instance, he has Athenian ambassadors posit that three of the prime movers impelling human actions are fear, honor, and interest. The emissaries appear to speak for the father of history.

Fear, honor, interest. There are few better places to start puzzling out why individuals and societies do what they do and glimpse what we ought to do. How does Thucydides hypothesis apply to post-Soleimani antagonism between the United States and Iran? Well, the slaying of the Quds Force chieftain puts the ball squarely in the Islamic Republics court. The mullahs must reply to the strike in some fashion. To remain idle would be to make themselves look weak and ineffectual in the eyes of the region and of ordinary Iranians.

In fecklessness lies danger. Doubly so now, after protests convulsed parts of Iran last November. The ensuing crackdown cost hundreds of Iranians their livesand revealed how deeply resentments against the religious regime run. No autocrat relishes weakness, least of all an autocrat whose rule has come under duress from within. A show of power and steadfastness is necessary to cow domestic opponents.

But fear is an omnidirectional, multiple-domain thing for Iranian potentates. External threats abound. Iranians are keenly attuned to geographic encirclement, for instance. They view their country as the Middle Easts rightful heavyweight. Yet U.S. forces or their allies surround and constrain the Islamic Republic from all points of the compass with the partial exception of the northeastern quadrant, which encompasses the stans of Central Asia, and beyond them Russia.

Look at your map. The U.S. Navy commands the westerly maritime flank, backed up by the U.S. Air Force. Americas Gulf Arab allies ring the western shores of the Persian Gulf. U.S. forces remain in Iraq to the northwest, where Suleimani fell, and in Afghanistan to the east. Even Pakistan, to the southeast, is an American treaty ally, albeit an uneasy one. These are forbidding surroundings. Tendrils of U.S. influence curl all around the Islamic Republics borders. Breaking out seems like a natural impulse for Iranian diplomacy and military strategy.

And yet. However fervent about its geopolitical ambitions, the Iranian leadership will be loath to undertake measures beyond the intermittent bombings, support to militants elsewhere in the region, and ritual denunciations of the Great Satan that have been mainstays of Iranian foreign policy for forty years now. Iranian leaders comprehend the forces arrayed against them. A serious effort at a breakout will remain premature unless and until they consummate their bid for atomic weaponry. The ability to threaten nuclear devastation may embolden them to trybut that remains for the future.

Next, honor. Irregular warfare is indecisive in itself, but it can provide splashy returns on a modest investment of resources and effort. Having staked their political legitimacy on sticking it to the Great Satan and his Middle Eastern toadies, the ayatollahs must deliver regular incremental results. Direct attacks on U.S. forces make good clickbait; so do pictures showing IRGC light surface combatants tailing U.S. Navy task forces; so do attacks on vital economic infrastructure in U.S. allies such as Saudi Arabia. And headlines convey the image of a virile power on the move.

The honor motive, then, merges with fear. Iranians fear being denied the honor they consider their due as the natural hegemon of the Gulf region and the Islamic world.

And lastly, interest. Mischief-making must suffice for Iran until it can amass the material wherewithal to make itself a hegemon. Its fascinating that Thucydides lists material gain last among forces that animate human beings. After all, foreign-policy specialists list it first. Interest is quantifiable, and it seems to feed straight into calculations of cost, benefit, and risk. It makes statecraft seem rational!

Theres no way to know for sure after two millennia, but it seems likely the sage old Greek meant to deflate such excesses of rationalism. Namely, he regarded human nature as being about more than things we can count, like economic output or a large field army. For Thucydides cost/benefit arithmetic takes a back seat to not-strictly-rational passionssome of them dark, such as rage and spite, and others brightthat drive us all.

And indeed, for Iranians material interest constitutes the way to rejuvenate national honor while holding fear at bay. Breaking the economic blockade manifest in, say, the Trump administrations maximum pressure strategy would permit Tehran to revitalize the countrys moribund oil and gas sector. Renewed export trade would furnish wealth. Some could go into accoutrements of great power such as a high-tech navy and air force.

In turn Iranian leaders could back a more ambitious diplomacy with steel. They would enjoy the option of departing from their purely irregular, troublemaking ways and competing through more conventional methods. Or, more likely, they would harness irregular means as an adjunct to traditional strategic competition. Material gain, in short, not just satisfies economic needs and wants but amplifies martial might. In so doing it satisfies non-material cravings for renown and geopolitical say-so.

And the American side? Repeat this process. Refract U.S. policy and strategy through Thucydides prism of fear, honor, and interest, consider how Iranian and American motives may intersect and interact, and see what light that appraisal shines into the future. My take: perhaps World War III will come one daybut today is not that day.

James Holmes is J. C. Wylie Chair of Maritime Strategy at the Naval War College and the author of A Brief Guide to Maritime Strategy, out last month. The views voiced here are his alone.

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Why A U.S.-Iran War Isn't Going To Happen - The National Interest Online

Even if they kill the body,They cannot kill thought,O religious mercenariesCan you stop the wheel of progress?

This opening verse of Sachin Malis Marathi song, Sampvila Deh Zari, sets the tone for a poetic but scathing evaluation of Hindutva fascism in India. Sung evocatively by Malis partner Sheetal Sathe, the song is a tribute to rationalist activist Narendra Dabholkar, shot dead in 2013, and Communist leader Govind Pansare, killed similarly in 2015. Both are suspected to have been killed by Hindu fundamentalists, who had threatened the activists in the past.

Mali and Sathe are former members of Kabir Kala Manch, a cultural troupe from Pune that performs songs and poems about caste oppression, rationalism, resistance and revolution. The couple, along with other members of Kabir Kala Manch, had been arrested in 2013 for alleged involvement with Naxalites. They are now out on bail, while the charges against them are yet to be proven.

Mali wrote Sampvila Deh Zari in 2015, while still in prison, as a song of defiance. Its verses are full of references to icons of rational, scientific and secular thought throughout history from philosopher Charavaka and Bhakti saint Tukaram to Galileo, Copernicus, Gandhi and communist playwright Safdar Hashmi. Religious fundamentalists may have tried to destroy all of them, Mali writes, but the ideas and ideologies they stood for continue to thrive.

Read all the articles in the Art of Resistance series here.

Read more here:

The Art of Resistance: Kabir Kala Manch gives us a timeless song of defiance in times of repression - Scroll.in

Historians will write about this day, when the House of Representatives voted for just the third time in history to impeach a president. But history does not simply explode, it unfolds. The Dark Ages did not just happen, the Renaissance Era did not just dawn, and the Industrial Revolution did not just spark. Defining moments in history do not occur spontaneously. Their foundations are laid by disparate actors, crises, and movements.

When future generations look back at the state of our world, with the impeachment of Donald TrumpDonald John TrumpWhite House counsel didn't take lead on Trump letter to Pelosi: reports Trump endorses Riggleman in Virginia House race Lisa Page responds to 'vile' Trump attacks: 'Being quiet isn't making this go away' MORE in America and the sweeping victory of Boris Johnson in Britain, these events will most likely not appear sudden or surprising. They will instead be understood as a public response to frightening trends like global terrorism and financial inequality, a public response that will, over time, be accepted or rejected by the citizenry.

The impeachment vote today was triggered by two distant events that occurred on September 11, 2001 and September 15, 2008 that forever changed the world. The fall of the Twin Towers robbed America of its sense of security, as two oceans no longer protected us from dangers abroad. An anxious public was fertile ground for sensational journalism, and media outlets like Fox News capitalized on this. The cable networks made it seem like beheadings and Ebola would soon reach our shores.

The overwhelming fear stoked by politicians and reporting driven by ratings led us to a dangerous cycle of bungled foreign policy, sustained global terrorism, and xenophobia. Our catastrophic decision to plunge into the war in Iraq, propelled by anxiety and bad information, prolonged and complicated the war in Afghanistan. Mismanagement helped create the Islamic State, which fueled a refugee crisis that flooded Europe. The refugee crisis was met with alarm, and that alarm was translated into a sense of nationalism by European leaders like Viktor Orban in Hungary and Nigel Farage in Britain. A startling sequence was activated, in which many leaders encouraged the worse public impulses for political gain.

Meanwhile, the 2008 recession triggered by the fall of Lehman Brothers rattled our financial security. This radical economic change left working people with perpetual anxiety. Globalization, automation, and migration rapidly altered the job market. People woke up to neighborhoods whose landscapes transformed overnight, with fewer brick and mortar retailers, bookstores, and supermarkets. Suddenly people were told not to take a taxi, but order an Uber. At the same time, mechanisms to regulate our economy had failed us. Unchecked greed proved less than good. The middle class, the great stabilizing force in United States history, shrank and shriveled. This again created a panicked public eager for change.

In 2016, escalating frustration and fear mongering won the presidential election. Candidate Trump took advantage and used exaggeration to link Hillary Clinton to the wealthy elite, accusing her of rigging the economy against the working class, while falsely portraying himself as an outsider and a foil to the big banks. Trump spewed flagrantly racist language to blame immigrants for upheaval in the job market and fueled fears about domestic terrorism. A Democratic Party propelled by rationalism and five point proposals fell out of sync with an electorate moved by gut instinct.

In 2019, the latest victory for populism happened in the British election. But this does not guarantee the success of the movement it represents. The electorate in America is not Trumpian. It is swerving in search of the government it wants. In 2008, the electorate voted for change by electing Barack Obama as president. In 2010, it voted for change by electing a Tea Party Republican Congress to check him. In 2012, it voted for change by reelecting Obama to check the Tea Party Republican Congress. In 2014, it voted for change by adding more Senate Republicans to check Obama. In 2016, it voted for change by electing Trump in repudiation of both parties. In 2018, it voted for a Democratic House majority in repudiation of Trump.

This zigzagging shows us the degree to which change is responsive rather than rapid. Only when a movement and its consequences have come into the public eye do we choose to reject the status quo and move ahead with an alternative. Confronted by a future we do not care to contemplate, we are forced to consider how we got here and how to correct our course.

Steve IsraelSteven (Steve) J. IsraelThe Hill's Campaign Report: 2020 Democrats trading jabs ahead of Los Angeles debate The Hill's Morning Report - Sponsored by AdvaMed - House panel expected to approve impeachment articles Thursday Nancy Pelosi knows she needs to protect the Democratic majority MORE represented New York in Congress for 16 years and served as the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee from 2011 to 2015. He is now the director of the Institute of Politics and Global Affairs at Cornell University. You can find him on Twitter @RepSteveIsrael.

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How in the world did we get here? | TheHill - The Hill

Dr. Shriram Lagoo, who passed away on Tuesday aged 92, ruptured the complacency of the Marathi stage with his intelligence, logic and virtuosity. His contemporaries, many of them luminaries, describe him a complete actor who plumbed the depths of his roles to depict characters with subtlety.

His passion towards theatre coupled with his discipline, hard work and continual innovation of his craft throughout his nearly six-decade career invites comparison with the Holy Trinity of the English stage: John Gielgud, Ralph Richardson and Laurence Olivier, whilst his experimental roles echo exponents of the American method school of acting like Montgomery Clift and Marlon Brando.

I met him first in the early 1960s when I was 19, and he was playing an extremely demanding role in a play by Vasant Kanetkar I was immediately struck by his marvellous voice modulation and the brilliance of his application of logic to his craft, filmmaker Dr. Jabbar Patel told The Hindu. He observed how Dr. Lagoo had the method actors attitude towards humanity with the quest for truth forming the analytical base of the characters he essayed.

He was a keen observer of theatre in the West and diligently studied the greats of the British stage, as well as the American method actors. But his favourite was Paul Muni, the great 1930s actor of such films as The Life of Emile Zola and The Good Earth, said Dr. Patel.

Dr. Lagoos control over his craft, coupled with his intelligence, can only be rivalled by the legendary theatre pioneer Sombhu Mitra, he said. His voice had a great ring of melancholy and sadness. It was showcased to devastating effect in iconic roles consisting of long soliloquies like Udhwasta Dharmashala, where he essayed an embattled Marxist and in Kanetkars Himalayachi Saavli, where he made for a peerless Maharashi Karve, the renowned social reformer, says Dr. Patel. He said he was in awe of the late thespians 25-minute soliloquy as Socrates in Surya Pahilela Manus a role he tackled when he was well over 70 years of age.

Fondly recalling their days at Punes Caf Good Luck in the Deccan area, Dr. Patel spoke of Dr. Lagoos warmth. We used to meet there regularly, and he used to regale me with his stories and ideas over tea and bun maska we dubbed the place Good Luck University, said Dr. Patel, who directed Dr. Lagoo in Marathi films such as Samna (1974) and Sinhasan (1979). Both films featured the titans of Marathi screen and theatre: Dr. Lagoo and Nilu Phule. When Saamna, which dealt with grassroots corruption, was entered in the 25th Berlin International Film Festival, I recall the thunderous applause that greeted the performances of these two legends after the curtains came down, Dr. Patel said.

According to actor-director Amol Palekar, Dr. Lagoo was the Last of the Romans. He was a giant in retrospect, one realises what a stupendous actor, director and producer he was. On the one hand, he was a superstar of the commercial stage with his celebrated performances in plays like Natsamraat which ran to 400-500 performances. On the other, through his Rupaved Pratishthan, Dr. Lagoo produced only experimental plays. It took tremendous courage to achieve that, says Mr. Palekar.Speaking of Dr. Lagoos vision and commitment to theatre, Mr. Palekar said he admired the late actor most for his rationalism. He was an avowed atheist and despite enduring unending criticism, he had the guts to declare, Let God be retired, on a public platform He suffered censure, but he stood firmly by his principles and views, he said.

A sampling of three famous and controversial plays: Gidhaade, Garbo and Udhwasta Dharmashala, demonstrate Dr. Lagoos versatility and the complexity he brought to his craft, said Mr. Palekar.

In Vijay Tendulkars Gidhaade (Vultures), Dr. Lagoo, along with the plays producer Pandit Satyadev Dubey, fought a long and bitter battle with the censors. In the end, the two fought it with such conviction and courage that they succeeded in changing the rules of the game and virtually overhauled the Censor Boards diktats, said Mr. Palekar.

As an actor, Dr. Lagoo never flinched from controversial and taboo topics as in Garbo, which dealt with female sexuality, he said. His roles in the motion pictures were no less stellar as a young person, I was privileged to work with him closely and learn so much from him. The affection that he showered on me is to be cherished, said Mr. Palekar.

On the actors humility, Mr. Palekar recalled how he directed Dr. Lagoo in the Marathi version of Edmond Rostands classic 19th century play Cyrano de Bergerac in the mid-1970s in Mumbai. While directing him, I pointed out a few shortcomings in his gait and walk he listened to me patiently and with such humility and then embraced me and said: Why didnt I meet you before It is incredible that such a great actor as he had the capacity to accept objective criticism, says Mr. Palekar, who performed with Dr. Lagoo in films as Ankahee and Gharonda.

Dr. Lagoos connect with social activism was seen in his close association with the late rationalist Dr. Narendra Dabholkar and the pivotal role he played in the Maharashtra Andhashraddha Nirmulan Samiti (MANS). In 2000, well before the advent of gender activists, several activists, socially committed theatre and film artistes and grassroots leaders led by Dr. Dabholkar, Dr. Lagoo and farmers leader N.D. Patil had marched from Pandharpur to Shani Shingnapur to combat the ban on women entering temples.

While he was undoubtedly one of the greatest of all actors to grace theatre, he was an even greater individual and humanist. His social activities helped entrench MANS throughout Maharashtra. What is admirable is that a man with such a popular following fearlessly expressed and stood by unpopular beliefs throughout his life. He never compromised on them, says Dr. Hamid Dabholkar, son of the late Dr. Dabholkar.

Dr. Lagoos last rites will be performed on December 20. The thespian will be given a State funeral.

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Shriram Lagoo had courage to stick with the unconventional - The Hindu

Imagine there is a heavenits easy if you try.

That may not be the way John Lennon and Yoko Ono wrote the song, but in a way we cant blame them; Lennon and Ono were merely people constrained by the view of a modern age.

Today we tell our children, just use your imagination, in a way that betrays our dismissive attitude toward imagination. And why not? Imagination is not deep thinking, it is fantasya faerie romance that serious people, especially Christians, need not spend much time on.

Countercultural icons like Lennon and Ono embraced the concept of imagination because it gave them the freedom to paint a picture of something that cannot exist in our world. In doing so, imagination of this kind reached the end of the line.

There is more to imagination than fantasy. In fact, the church and its theology need imagination more than ever in the history of our world. Yet, as theologian Kevin Vanhoozer notes, we suffer today from imaginative malnutrition.

What is imagination? And why does the church and its theology starve for it today?

Imagination is not something that comes readily to mind when we open our Bibles. Before prescribing a hearty diet of imagination, some may say, The Bible is about real thingsfaith, love, sacrificenot idle human pursuits such as imagination. Others may wonder, Doesnt the Bible speak negatively of imagination in a few places?

Does the Bible talk about imagination? Not in any modern English version. But thats only half the story.

In all English versions, the word imagination only shows up notably in the King James Version (Genesis 6:5; Psalm 2:1; Romans 1:21), as well as in Bibles from that time period such as the Bishops Bible (1568). The word does not occur in Wycliffes Bible, the earliest English translation of the Bible from the late 14th century. And it doesnt occur in modern English translations after the King James Version, created in the early 17th century.

Before we look down on the King James Version, Luthers translation of the Bible into German in the mid-16th century also contains a word close in sense to our word imagination. All of these versions occur in a close time period. Confusion or conspiracy?

The meaning of imagination was changing. The Luther Bible, the Bishops Bible, and the King James Version came about in an age where the winds of philosophical change had blown. Swept away were the ideas held by Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus that undoubtedly influenced the thoughts of John Wycliffe; these new English versions were birthed in the age that produced the likes of Francis Bacon and Ren Descartes. Their perception of how people interacted with the world was brand new.

Francis Bacon, writing around the time as the King James Version, is indicative of this shift. Bacon believed that our imagination is tied to and limited by the physical senseswhat we see, touch, and taste. But imagination is a pleasure of the mind in Bacons words; it occurs when the mind links senses and experiences in a way not in the order of the natural world. And what does Bacon believe links our senses and experiences correctly ordered? Reason.

In Pauls powerful opening to his letter to the church in Rome, he explains how the invisible attributes of God are visible in the natural world, if people cared to look. Instead, people became vain in their imaginations as the KJV renders it. In early 17th century lingo: People chose to perceive the world through the falsity of imagination instead of the truth of reason.

John Lennon, welcome to the 17th century.

From there, Descartes created further separation between imagination and reason. In the 18th century, David Hume argued that unreasoned and unprovable ideas are fictions of the imagination. And by the 19th century, William James directly equates imagination with fantasy, which is why when my daughter Violet brings me her finely wrought colored scribbles, I pat her on the head and pronounce for all to hear that she has a good imagination.

Theres more to imagination than mere fantasy. What Hume doesnt grasp is what Plato already understood.

Plato may be the oldest philosopher in the Western tradition to reflect at length on imagination. He believed there were three instances of imagination that intruded on the minds of people. In one sense imagination is the ability to conceive new ideas out of old material. This is close to what we today call fantasy. When a great writer imagines faraway planets, she is conceiving of new worlds and new civilizations, but only in such a way as it relates to our old world and old civilization here on earth. It is new, but only to a degree.

In a second sense, Plato found that imagination is the ability to craft old ideas into new ideas. This is what we today might call reconceptualizing. When a great writer imagines a contemporary person loving others who are political enemies, he is crafting a new way of living, but only in such a way that is faithful and true to the original idea (Matt. 5:44).

This second type of imagination is what we long to return tofinding old truth in new expressions. It is what the modern master of true imagination J. R. R. Tolkien calls the power of giving to ideal creations the inner consistency of reality. It is the power to explain truth that defies simple explanation. Another master, Jesus, does this with his parables.

Let me give you a simple experiment you can try for yourself: Go and tell someone today why you chose to follow Jesus. Its a very old idea, and you will need to tap into your imagination to make it fresh for your audience.

Lets revisit the question: Does the Bible talk about imagination? Yes, it does.

John the Evangelist was an accomplished storyteller. His two main books, a gospel and an apocalypse, have attracted untold readers for two millennia. He natively understood what scriptwriters today tell their students: Show, dont tell.

John didnt write about imaginationhe imagined Gods engagement and invited us to be a part of it. Toward the end of his gospel, John recounts Jesus personal vision of the future for John and Peter. One to death and one to life. These are images that only become clear when lived out in close obedience and faithfulness to God. John and Peter are really no different from you and medisciples who follow the same yesterday and today and forever truth of God in a brand new direction in their unique time and place (Heb. 13:7).

Jesus also didnt speak about imaginationknowing Gods message, he applied imagination and taught it to his disciples. Jesus parables use both types of imagination to make his descriptions of Gods work more real than any reality any human can know. The kingdom of heaven? Human empiricism and rationalism are of little value here, but we hear the words of Jesus and know the kingdom is like a grain of a mustard seed. Even if we have never held a mustard seed in our hand, we get a glimpse of the kingdom by tapping into Jesus imagination.

From prophecy to apocalypse, from parable to origin story, the Bible speaks in a language brimming with imagination. For those with imaginations, let them imagine.

Back to Plato: There is a third instance of imagination, rarely discussed. Plato makes this remarkable admission: In moments of ecstatic vision, the imagination becomes the privileged recipient of divine inspiration. When God illuminates, we imagine.

We get a sense for what Plato means when we read the weird parts of the Biblethe prophetic and the apocalyptic. If we are tempted to think of Johns apocalypse as merely a kind of fantasy, we misunderstand it completely. Instead, it is exactly what Plato anticipated: a vision birthed of divine inspiration. Arguably, it is the most truly imaginativein all senses of the wordwork ever created.

The history of human philosophy from Plato to William James teaches us this: Imagination, rightly understood, is a way of knowingit sits between our senses, our experiences, our memory, and our heart, our intellect, our will. In order for us to know God well, and know our world well, we must engage our imaginations to inform our thinking and our actions.

We live in a world saturated with imaginationimagination of the fantasy sort. From virtual reality to sociopolitical echo chambers, we are awash in continual fantasies created by the world around us.

Many critical issues we face today are of the same form as those faced by previous generations of Christians: worshipping God effectively, loving our neighbors, living justly, building healthy family relationships, and making disciples. By using imagination, the church can develop a fresh voice on these issues while staying true to the cumulative wisdom of Scripture and the church over the last two millennia.

Is there a limit to the call to be imaginative? Yes. A fresh voice does not mean a new voice. Instead, it means using well the two types of imagination that we already see in use in the Bible: taking up old truth in new forms and living in a fresh way under the power of Gods Spirit.

Yet we face a world today that is accelerating away from the familiar issues faced by generations past. Science and technology bring a brave new world that requires a brave new Christians witness.

Should we use new technology such as a gene drive to cause the extinction of anopheles gambiae, a malaria-carrying mosquito species? Should we cause the de-extinction of woolly mammoths, and let those and other species repopulate the earth?

Should we edit the genes of babies, changing the human species? Should we self-edit our own genes, changing who we are? Should we alter the physical makeup of our bodies to become faster, smarter, more beautiful, more female, more male, more amphibian, more not?

It is our responsibility to engage in theological exploration of such imagined future, contends theologian Karen ODonnell, as part of our service to the public, both in the ecclesial community, and beyond.

To paraphrase Plato, we are best equipped to speak wisdom to these new challenges through moments of Holy Spirit illumination, during which our imagination becomes the privileged recipient of divine inspiration. And to paraphrase Tolkien, imagination gives us the power to bring the creations of human fantasy in line with the inner consistency of divine reality.

Lets look at an example: When we read about people biohacking their bodies, it is easy for us to engage our imaginationin Platos first sense, imagination as fantasy. We imagine a fantasy of what biohacking is, and we come to a conclusion about it. If so, we have only used the least important part of our imagination. What we want to do is engage the other two more important parts of our imagination: reconceptualizing the eternal truth of Gods message to people about what it means to be human in a new way, and awaiting a moment of inspiration from Gods Spirit to show us what biohacking might look like within the reality Scripture imagines.

As a result of the Enlightenment, we have expected God to inspire us only through our reason and our experiences. When we take off these filters, and we read the parables of Jesus, the writings of Johnin fact, much of the Biblewe begin to see that God wants to inspire our imaginations as well. When our imaginations are infused by the Spirit of God, we better see who God is and the challenges of the world around us.

With holy imaginations, we can see heavenits easy if we try.

Douglas Estes is associate professor of New Testament and practical theology at South University. He is the editor of Didaktikos, and his latest book is Braving the Future: Christian Faith in a World of Limitless Tech.

More here:

What Christians Miss When They Dismiss Imaginatio... - ChristianityToday.com

Alliance Party defeats DUP in first declared result in Northern Ireland

BelfastTelegraph.co.uk

The staunchly pro-Remain Alliance Party has taken Northern Irelands first Westminster seat in a major setback for the DUP.

https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/alliance-party-defeats-dup-in-first-declared-result-in-northern-ireland-38780711.html

https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/article38780708.ece/59c8e/AUTOCROP/h342/bpanews_25921351-e1fd-46dc-b151-ac5fb2095e0e_1

The staunchly pro-Remain Alliance Party has taken Northern Irelands first Westminster seat in a major setback for the DUP.

Deputy leader Stephen Farry cruised to victory with a majority of almost 3,000 votes in the affluent Belfast commuter constituency of North Down.

The seat had been a key target for the DUP after outgoing independent unionist MP Lady Sylvia Hermon decided not to run again.

Mr Farrys victory provides further evidence of the so-called Alliance surge, coming as it does after a series of positive elections for the middle-ground cross-community party.

The result landed another blow to the DUP on what is shaping up to be a very disappointing election for the unionist party.

The predicted Conservative majority at Westminster will see the party lose its influential position as Westminster kingmaker while North Down is unlikely to be its only electoral setback in Northern Ireland.

The DUP also looks destined to lose its seat in South Belfast to the SDLP and it appears party deputy leader Nigel Dodds is in grave danger of losing his North Belfast seat to Sinn Feins John Finucane.

Sinn Fein sources are confident Mr Finucane has triumphed, a result that would represent a huge psychological defeat for unionism in the regions most hotly contested battleground seat.

Meanwhile in Foyle, SDLP leader Colum Eastwood looked well positioned to win the seat from Sinn Fein.

Mr Farry hailed his resounding vote as a blow against Brexit and pledged to work in Westminster to frustrate the EU exit.

We believe that there is no such thing as a good or sensible BrexitStephen Farry

This is a victory for the values that this constituency has been known for for many years, those of moderation, rationalism and inclusion, he said.

He added: They have come together behind a single cause, of sending out a very powerful message that the North Down area wants to Remain.

We believe that there is no such thing as a good or sensible Brexit.

Indeed, all forms of Brexit are damaging to the UK and to us in Northern Ireland and in particular the Boris Johnson deal.

The DUP is vehemently opposed to Mr Johnsons Brexit deal, claiming it will create economic borders down the Irish Sea and weakened Northern Irelands place within the union.

Long-standing DUP MP Sammy Wilson, who is on course to retain his East Antrim seat, insisted his party could still secure changes to the agreement despite the predicted Tory majority.

Obviously wed have preferred to be in a situation we were in the last parliament where we did have the influence and where it was fairly marginal, however for the country it probably wasnt a great thing because no decisions could be made, he said.

I still wouldnt be totally dismayed insofar as a big majority could actually mean that Boris Johnson can go in and be fairly bullish with the EU when it comes to negotiations, and if he does do that then many of the problems the current deal is going to cause Northern Ireland could disappear.

The election comes ahead of the latest bid to resurrect the crisis-hit institutions at Stormont.

Ahead of an anticipated round of negotiations on Monday, Sinn Fein vice president Michelle ONeill said: Whatever the results, Sinn Fein will be in the talks on Monday morning to work to secure a genuine power-sharing executive which is credible and sustainable to deliver good government and properly resourced public services to all.

Sinn Fein will continue to represent people where it matters and stand up against Brexit.

Turning to West Tyrone, Sinn FeinsOrfhlaith Begley retained her seat as was expected.

Describing it as an election of a generation, Ms Begley said that the people of the border constituency have made their views on Brexit heard.

The 27-year-old is the first woman to hold the seat, which has been in the hands of Sinn Fein since 2001.

Speaking after her win, she said: People have been very energised in terms of this campaign and people came out in their thousands to reject Brexit but also to reject Tory austerity.

They sent a very clear message that they see their future in a new Ireland for all.

Sinn Fein has made its voice count where it matters, in terms of Brussels, we have been there, in Dublin and we also travel to London on a regular basis.

PA

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Alliance Party defeats DUP in first declared result in Northern Ireland - Belfast Telegraph

After a chaotic and surreal campaign, there was a comforting familiarity about the rituals of election night. Tories will rehearse their favourite fairytale that the party of Thatcher has finally rediscovered its 1980s mojo while Labour retreats to its own comfort zone, of bitter internal feuding. But amid all this drama, there is a danger that we might forget how deeply abnormal the Conservative election campaign has been, and how frighteningly unfamiliar the impending government could be.

The winning campaign strategy was simple: to make this the second referendum, to make it as exhausting as possible, and to make sure Labours offer of yet another referendum look more exhausting still. The Tories blank policy agenda beyond passing the existing Brexit deal in January was aimed directly at a group of voters who dont trust politicians, dont believe government can help them, and are done with listening to liberal elites bickering over the precise number of hospitals the Tories will or wont build.

For todays Conservatives, the collapse of trust in institutions isnt a problem its an opportunity. Get Brexit done, like Donald Trumps build a wall, was not a policy pledge so much as a mantra to identify with, for those who think the establishment is a stitch-up.

Two other ingredients were necessary. First, a rightwing big tent needed constructing, one that spreads all the way from Matt Hancock in the centre-right out to Tommy Robinson on the far right. Johnson repeatedly did just enough to communicate to former Brexit party voters that he was on their side. For the desperate men and women (but mostly men) living in the abandoned economic regions of the Midlands and north, for whom only a Trump figure would be enough to draw them to the polls, Johnson performed that role adequately. For well-off elderly voters, who had been seduced by Faragist visions of national identity, Johnsons dog whistles hit home. Study his apologies for past Islamophobic comments, and youll notice that theyre never apologies at all they are affirmations of his right to say what everyone is thinking.

Rebranded as the peoples government, there is no reason to expect it will embrace normal democratic scrutiny or opposition

Second, Johnsons media profile and contacts were leveraged to the hilt. By the end of the campaign, he was performing a kind of Jeremy Clarkson role obliterating any democratic dialogue or interrogation by dressing up as a milkman or driving a forklift truck. Boris began life as a construct of the Daily Telegraph and Have I Got News For You, but now exists as a genre of social media content. Unlike in the heyday of broadcast and print media, propaganda now has to be lively and engaging in order to work.

And so the election was not won by an ordinary political party, with policies, members and ideology. It was won by a single-issue new-media startup you might call it Vote Boris fronted by a TV star, which will now unveil a largely unknown policy agenda.

The 2016 referendum result, together with the Boris phenomenon, have created a Trojan horse, within which lurks who knows what. But the chances of it offering anything transformative to the former Labour voters of Blyth Valley or Bolsover, beyond the occasional culture-war titbit, are minimal.

One thing we do know is that the Vote Boris campaign was funded by hedge funds and wealthy British entrepreneurs just as they donated heavily to Vote Leave. But who knows what they get in return? It also seems safe to assume, on the evidence of Johnsons first few months in office, that his administration will be hostile to many basic norms of the constitution and the liberal public sphere. Meanwhile, a triumphant Dominic Cummings will have his eye on a drastic transformation of Whitehall and regulators, inspired by exotic forms of rationalism, game theory and the libertarian right.

If the new Johnson government sustains its unprecedented relationship with the media of the past six weeks threatening public service broadcasters, excluding the Daily Mirror from its campaign bus, seamless coordination with the conservative press, using Boris to distract from every unwelcome news item then it will be virtually impossible for it to be held to account for what it does. And having already rebranded itself as the peoples government, there is no reason to expect it will embrace normal democratic scrutiny or opposition.

A combination of Brexit, decades of neglect and political alienation in Labours heartlands, the new digital media ecology, and hints of frightening illiberalism could conspire to produce a form of democracy that looks more like Hungary or even Russia than the checks-and-balances system of liberal ideals. Its not that democracy will end, but that it will be reduced to a set of spectacles that the government is ultimately in command of, which everyone realises are fake but that are sufficiently funny or soothing as to be tolerated.

This may sound paranoid, but it is merely an extrapolation from the trends that are already in full sway. Just like Trump, Johnsons capacity to make headlines and change the subject means we can quickly forget how much damage he has already done, in less than six months instead we are locked in a perpetual present, squabbling over the details of what hes doing right now. Its important to keep track. Challenging this juggernaut will be a far larger and more complex project than anything Her Majestys opposition can do alone.

William Davies is a sociologist and political economist

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For Johnsons Tories, the collapse of public trust isnt a problem its an opportunity - The Guardian

William Bradley Pitt (conceived December 18, 1963) is an American on-screen character and film maker. He has gotten various honors and assignments including an Academy Award and a Primetime Emmy Award as maker under his own organization, Plan B Entertainment.

Pitt previously picked up acknowledgment as a rancher drifter in the street motion picture Thelma and Louise (1991). His first driving jobs in huge spending preparations accompanied the dramatization films A River Runs Through It (1992) and Legends of the Fall (1994) and blood and gore movie Interview with the Vampire (1994). He gave widely praised exhibitions in the wrongdoing spine chiller Seven and the sci-fi film 12 Monkeys (both 1995), the last acquiring him a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor and an Academy Award assignment.

Pitt featured in Fight Club (1999) and the heist film Oceans Eleven (2001) and its continuations, Oceans Twelve (2004) and Oceans Thirteen (2007). His most noteworthy business triumphs have been Troy (2004), Mr. and Mrs. Smith (2005), World War Z (2013), and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019). Pitt got his second and third Academy Award selections for his driving exhibitions in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008) and Moneyball (2011). He delivered The Departed (2006) and 12 Years a Slave (2013), the two of which won the Academy Award for Best Picture, and furthermore The Tree of Life (2011), Moneyball, and The Big Short (2015), which were all assigned for Best Picture.

As an open figure, Pitt has been refered to as one of the most persuasive and influential individuals in the American media outlet. For various years he was refered to as the worlds most alluring man by different news sources, and his own life is the subject of wide attention. In 2000, he wedded entertainer Jennifer Aniston; they separated in 2005. In 2014, Pitt wedded on-screen character Angelina Jolie. They have six youngsters together, three of whom were embraced universally. In 2016, Jolie petitioned for a separation from Pitt, which was concluded in 2019.

Pitt was conceived in Shawnee, Oklahoma, to William Alvin Pitt, the owner of a trucking organization, and Jane Etta (ne Hillhouse), a school guide. The family before long moved to Springfield, Missouri, where he lived respectively with his more youthful kin, Douglas Mitchell (brought into the world 1966) and Julie Neal (brought into the world 1969).Born into a traditionalist Christian household,they was raised as Southern Baptist and later oscillate[d] among rationalism and skepticism. Pitt currently expresses that he was simply being insubordinate and that he clingto religion. Pitt has portrayed Springfield as Imprint Twain nation, Jesse James nation, having grown up with a ton of slopes, a great deal of lakes.

Pitt went to Kickapoo High School, where he was an individual from the golf, swimming and tennis teams.they took an interest in the schools Key and Forensics clubs, in school discusses, and in musicals. Following their graduation from secondary school, Pitt joined up with the University of Missouri in 1982, studying reporting with an emphasis on advertising.As graduation drew closer, Pitt didnt feel prepared to settle down. He adored moviesan entryway into various universes for me and, since films were not made in Missouri, he chose to go to where they were made. Two weeks shy of finishing the coursework for a degree, Pitt left the college and moved to Los Angeles, where he took acting exercises and worked odd jobs.They has named his initial acting legends as Gary Oldman, Sean Penn and Mickey Rourke.

John Flint has interest in writing, Flint contributed to the school's newspaper and its humor magazine, eventually becoming the publication's editor, also he worked on some of social networking website. john is a best-author, he wrote number of books in his career and presently he is news editor on featureweekly.com

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American actor and film producer William Bradley Pitt Celebrate Their Birthday Today - Feature Weekly