A few more Random Friday Links

Another challenging week, so not so many links.

Here's an article about the physics of viruses.  Key point: the contents of a virus capsid can be under about five atmospheres of pressure.  Creepy but interesting.

These days I mostly skim Crooked Timber, but once in a while a comment thread sucks me in.  This took way too much of my time in a week when I didn't have much time to spare. Does suggesting that a bloody handed authoritarian ruler was anything but pure evil make me an apologist for genocide?  CT commenters say yes!

The Onion says it all about the Super Bowl.

It's the end of the project and I'm discovering just how complicated closing a large project can be.  Remember a couple of months back, when I was chuckling about how to draft a misleading spreadsheet?  Turns out the joke was on me.  Pushing people out the door is no fun, let me add.

So let's talk about something else.  Claudia and I finished watching Firefly.  Go figure: the last ep was the best.  (That's the one with the existentialist bounty hunter.  No Wild West stuff at all.)

Oh, and I've been re-skimming T.H. White's Once and Future King books.  You know what?  They hold up really well.  You can certainly see White's particular hobby horses, and they're very much books of their time and place (1930s England).  But still.  If you haven't picked these up, give 'em a look -- the first one (The Sword in the Stone) is a Terry-Pratchett like comedy (it was made into a bad Disney movie), and then they get "higher and deeper and darker" as they progress.

And I'm reading Gumby comics to the boys.  Did you know there were Gumby comics?  New ones?  Well, there are, and they're damn good.  If you have a kid between 3 and 7, I highly recommend them.

Okay, poem time. 

When I was a young man, and very well thought of
There was nought I could ask that the ladies denied.
I nibbled their hearts like a handful of raisins,
And I never spoke love, but I knew that I lied.

But I said to myself, `Ah, there`s none of them knows
The secret I shelter, and savor, and save.
I wait for the one who can see through my seeming
And I`ll know when I love by the way I behave`.

The years they passed over like clouds in the heavens,
The ladies went by me like snow on the wind.
I charmed and I cheated, deceived and dissembled
And I sinned, and I sinned and I sinned and I sinned.

But I said to myself,`Ah, there`s none of them knows
There`s a part of me pure as the whisk of a wave.
My love may be late, but she`ll find I have been faithful
And I`ll know when I love by the way I behave`.

At last came a lady, both knowing and tender
Who said `You are not at all what they take you to be`.
I betrayed her before she had quite finished speaking,
And she swallowed cold poison, and jumped in the sea.

And I say to myself, when there`s time for a word,
As I gracefully grow more debauched and depraved.
`Ah, love may be strong, but a habit is stronger
And I know how I loved by the way I behaved`.

--  And have a great Super Bowl weekend.

Comments

[David Weman]

Doug, in the CT thread you said:

“I truly don’t know what sort of moral calculus should be applied in this case. Suharto was a mass murderer and a thief on an immense scale. But he also brought prospetity, human development, health and schools, electricity and medicine and clean water. I do think that calling him “one of the worst political criminals of [the 20th century]” is simplifying a complicated story. He wasn’t a cartoon villain.”
It’s as clearcut as any issue can be. The man was guilty of genocide. So, the economic wellbeing of his people was a 2nd order or 3d order priority of Suharto’s, as opposed to no priority for someone like Mobutu, but that’s it as far as redeeming qualities. And in any case, nothing could redeem genocide. Suharto was one of the worst political criminals of the 20th century.

[Doug M.]

"This was sort of an interesting discussion over at that blog" != "so I'd like to do it all over again on this one!"

Doug M.

[Nich Hills]

Mm-mm. Doug, you linked to the thread in question then restated your central argument. While I can see why you wouldn't want to re-create that debate here I can also see why David felt a rebuttal was permissible.

Commiserations on another challenging week. My better half collapsed while bushwalking on Monday and had to be taken by air ambulance to Canberra hospital. After rehydration and tests we now know what happened and what to do to avoid a recurrence.

Agree that despite its quirks _The Once and Future King_ is a top read.

[Doug M.]

Actually, I restated the other folks' argument, not mine.

I'm sorry to hear that about Mrs. Hills! But very glad she's okay. That must have been... alarming. Sorry you guys had to go through that, and best wishes for her swift and permanent recovery.

Doug M.

[Jasmine Pierce]

Doug

I agree with you - i hate how people like to reduce historical figures to one-dimensional caricatures with none of the shades of grey of reality.

[Nich Hills]

Thanks, Doug.