 
Roundtrip
back
Our engineers have been working around the clock to repair our round-trip
translation service,
which was broken. It's now almost entirely back in action.
31 MAY 08
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Golf : A Game of Life and
Death ?
. . . is to be published in a forthcoming edition of the Scandinavian
Journal of Medicine and Science in Sports.
Read
it here, and live 5 years longer.
Press release, from the Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden, here
30 MAY 08 ( late edition ) comments | permalink | back
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Non-improvised EDs
 Switzerland
has always had a reputation for high precision . . .
think : watches, surgical instruments, camera lenses etc etc.
And proudly maintaining this tradition is RUAG
“ Only by being precise ourselves can we maintain high
standards of precision. “
Here’s an example of
the kind of thing that can be achieved when Swiss precision is combined with " Target-driven
business activities '‘.
30 MAY 08
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Wanting research
New research from the Faculty of Business and Economics at the Katholieke
Universiteit Leuven, in Belgium, has shown that the old marketing mantra
that ‘ Sex
Sells ‘ may have been superceded - or at least could be in need of
some adjustment.
Their paper : ‘ Bikinis Instigate
Generalized Impatience in Intertemporal Choice ‘ has just
been published in the Journal of Consumer Research.
 A
series of four studies exposed groups of male experimental subjects ( students
) to so-called ‘ hot stimuli ‘ in order to determine
whether their desire for a reward of cash, cola or candy ( and their
impatience to get hold of it ) would be affected.
The ‘ hot stimuli ‘ in question were some bras, various photos
of females modeling lingerie, and even a commercial video which “ .
. . contained hundreds of young women, dressed in bikinis, running across
hills, fields, and beaches. "
When compared with control stimuli ( pictures of landscapes etc ) it was
found that not only “ sexual appetite induces
monetary craving “.
but also confirmed what many upscale multinational drink and snack manufacturers
have long suspected :
“ Sex cue exposure leads to impatience for candy bars and soda pops
as well. “
It should be underlined though that the experiments only involved male participants - what of the other 50% of the population ?
In fact, previous research with female subjects failed to
demonstrate similar effects ( Wilson and Daly 2004 ).
Though Briers et al. (2006), did find that “ an
increase in desire for food, instigated by the scent of freshly baked brownies,
leads
to monetary craving among a female population. “
So, to put the findings in context for the whole population ( or at least
a large part of it ) it could be said that :
“ . . . a greater appetite causes a greater urgency to consume anything rewarding. “
؟ ؟ ؟
Read the full paper here.
29 MAY 08
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As of today . . . the following
countries
have agreed a total ban on the production, stockpiling
and use of Cluster Bombs Albania
Algeria
Angola
Argentina
Australia
Austria
Bahrain
Belgium
Belize
Benin
Bolivia
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Botswana
Brunei Darussalam
Bulgaria
Burkina Faso
Burundi
Cambodia
Cameroon
Canada
Chad
Chile
Comoros
Congo
Cook Islands
Costa Rica
Côte d’Ivoire
Croatia
Czech Republic
Democratic Republic of Congo
Denmark
Djibouti
Dominican Republic
Ecuador
El Salvador
Estonia
Fiji
Finland
France
Germany
Ghana
Guatemala
Guinea
Guinea-Bissau
Holy See
Honduras
Hungary
Iceland
Indonesia
Ireland
Italy
Jamaica
Japan
Kenya
Kuwait
Kyrgyzstan
Laos
Lebanon
Lesotho
Liberia
Liechtenstein
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Madagascar
Malawi
Malaysia
Mali
Malta
Marshall Islands
Mauritania
Mexico
Moldova
Montenegro
Morocco
Mozambique
Nauru
Nepal
The Netherlands
New Zealand
Nicaragua
Niger
Nigeria
Niue
Norway
Palau
Panama
Papua New Guinea
Paraguay
Peru
Philippines
Portugal
Qatar
Samoa
San Marino
Sao Tome and Principe
Senegal
Serbia
Seychelles
Sierra Leone
Slovakia
Slovenia
Somalia
South Africa
Spain
Sudan
Swaziland
Sweden
Switzerland
Tajikistan
Tanzania
The Former Yugoslav
Republic of Macedonia
Timor-Leste
Togo
Uganda
United Kingdom
Uruguay
Vanuatu
Venezuela
Zambia
Still happy to keep stampin' 'em out.
China
India
Israel
Pakistan
Russia
USA
Source: Cluster
Munition Coalition.
At last, the cluster bomb ban treaty has been
signed, but three anomalies remain to be
resolved.
1) Countries which have agreed to the ban ( e.g. the UK ) will have to disallow
cluster munitions on military bases in their territory which ‘ belong ‘ to
other countries that haven’t signed up to the ban ( e.g the US )
2) Banks and financial institutions in the countries which have voted for
the ban ( e.g. those in the UK ) will break the law if they invest in companies
which still make the weapons. ( e.g. those in the US )
3) Don’t hold your breath for 1 & 2
28 MAY 08 ( late edition )
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He does it . . . o u r way
• How many 100 year-olds run their own architectural practice ?
• How
many 100 year-olds run their own cultural magazines ?
• And how many do both
?
Perhaps just one. For Oscar
Niemeyer has launched today the first issue of his thrice-yearly
magazine ‘ Nosso
Caminho ‘ ( loose translation ‘ Our Way ‘ )
The magazine will concentrate on architectural, cultural, scientific and
social issues on an international basis.
The slant is towards optimism. For Niemeyer points out that scientific progress
- though efficiently and relentlessly destroying ‘ phantasies ‘ – also
tends to promote pessimism.
We now know, for example, that the Sun will burn out in a few billion years,
leaving Planet Earth uninhabitable.
The new magazine will try to counter such unpleasantness.
And, in the meantime, Oscar will continue to promote his philisophy that “ Vida É um
Sopro “ ( Life’s
a Breeze ).
28 MAY 08 ( midday edition )
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Religion
on a chip.
Many thanks to New Scientist for pointing
us in
the direction of The Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation, the
current issue of which is carrying an article entitled :
‘ Is Religion an Evolutionary
Adaptation ? ‘
The research, which was carried out at Oakland University in Rochester,
Michigan, tries to unravel the complexities of religious belief – with
the aid of a computer programme – called Evogod.
The programme - which runs inside SciLab (
a freeware open source platform for numerical computation )
is a so-called ‘ agent-based ‘ simulation - and according
to the author :
“
The evogod simulation shows how a capacity to create religious ideas can
evolve by social selection. It reveals a selection process that can increase
genetically inherited capacities to communicate unreal, unverifiable information. “
But can 250 lines of computer code really simulate such fiercely complex
phenomena as the belief systems ( or lack of ) that have evolved
in human society
over several million years ?
Computer-simulation creators spend a great deal of time and effort
fine-tuning their programmes to balance properly – a tiny error in
scaling a variable here, or a misconceived or overlooked feedback loop there,
can render an
entire programme worthless.
And simulation programmers have to overlook the point
that other seemingly tiny effects – ones
which haven't been included in the programme – might very radically
affect the results. But they won't, because they're not there.
Simulations models are, in a sense, the opposite of mathematics – which
seeks to distill a phenomenon down to the simplest possible formula which
can describe it. Computer simulations on the other hand, need to be made
more complex in order to become
more accurate. Unfortunately, this also makes them more likely to be fallible
too.
Building a simulation which is as accurate as the real-world
would entail a programme which is not only as complex as the real-world -
but flawless as well.
Suggesting the question, ' Why build a potentially inaccurate simulation
when we are already surrounded by the results ? '
Computer simulations are very useful for estimating stress patterns in
reinforced concrete bridges - for the more complex stuff though, we
might have to be content just looking out of the window. ؟ ؟ ؟
Further reading :
Cargo Cult Cargo Cult Progamming
28 MAY 08
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Sic semper
It wouldn’t normally be considered newsworthy to learn that a university
accepts funds from industry to do research.
Many universities rely extensively on grant money – both from industry
and government – in order to survive financially.
And if the research is ‘ sensitive ’ , government grants sometimes
come with contractual restrictions which prevent the faculty and
the students from making it public.
But what of the corporate money ? Is it reasonable for a corporation to
make a grant to a university with similar restrictions ?
The New York Times thinks
not - and published this article late
last week alleging that Virginia
Commonwealth University (VCU) had accepted the terms of an unusually
restrictive research contracts with Philip Morris USA - America's
largest tobacco company.
“ The contract bars professors from publishing the results of their
studies, or even talking about them, without Philip Morris’s permission. “
Bearing in mind that the research covers tobacco-related nitrogen and phosphorus
runoff into rivers, and investigations into the onset of lung disease, some
might feel that the scientific results, being in the public interest, should
be
published
as soon as possible.
The next day, Eugene P. Trani published this
rebuttal from VCU explaining that research service agreements :
“ . . . provide for publication of research results while providing
protection for the intellectual property that the sponsor and other research
partners bring to the table. “
and further :
" VCU affirms a climate of academic freedom to pursue important questions
and expects industrially-sponsored research to be conducted responsibly and
with the highest ethical standards. "
* * *
Supplementary notes :
• Eugene P. Trani is
president of Virginia Commonwealth University.
He is also on the board of
the Universal Leaf Tobacco Company - “ the
premier leaf tobacco merchant in the world. “
• For a historical perspective on tobacco-related research
at VCU, there are
4,769 documents available
on the subject here at the Legacy Tobacco Documents Library.
27 MAY 08
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Kitsch; Love; Stupidity
Turn to the latest issue of the Quarterly Journal of Speech for an interesting
and unusual article on the subject of ‘ The love of rhetoric ‘.
Specifically :
‘ For
the Love of Rhetoric, with Continual Reference to Kenny and Dolly ‘
[ Keywords: Deception; Invitational Rhetoric; Irony; Kitsch; Love; Stupidity
]
 The author, professor Joshua Gunn from the Department of Communication
Studies at the University of Texas at Austin points out that :
“ Few contemporary scholars have explicitly discussed the relationship
between love and rhetoric. “
But why ?
Drawing on insights from Lacanian psychoanalysis, he
argues that there are two reasons:
“ . . . first, it is already implied in the widely accepted concept
of identification ; and second, any explicit discussion of love tempts kitsch. “
And what could be more kitsch than Kenny and Dolly – meaning of course
Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton – singing what the author calls
“ . . . one of the worst pop songs of all time, now a kitschy favorite
at karaoke bars across the country and a handy cultural reference for a superficial
and naive brand of puppy love “
Viz. ‘ Islands in the Stream ‘.
The song ( which was penned by the Brothers Gibb - a.k.a the Bee
Gees ( formerly Les Tosseurs )) opens
with an unusual lyrical phrase referencing a ‘ fine tooth comb ‘ .
And according to professor Gunn, gets off to a bad start.
“ . . . such romantic prose is like telling your partner you found
her or him much like one does fleas on a dog, or the hidden evidence of a
crime scene. “
Things get worse though.
For the author points out that, from a Lacanian viewpoint at least,
“ . . . love is simultaneously an indirect confrontation
with the Real and in inability to reckon with the Real, the promise of
unification
as an imaginary shield from Real a impossibility. In short, love
is a screen for sh*t, or more simply stated, love is sh*t. “ [
our asterisks ]
The temptation to view the essay as pessimistic has been dismissed here at Really
Magazine though. For we find that the original song lyrics – which
can be clearly heard in this
seminal demo-version of the song by the authors themselves
- run like this :
“ And we rely on each other, ah-ah
From one lover to another, ah-ah “
[ or
possibly “ hah-ah “ ? Ed. ]
And not the, surely more foreboding, “ uh-huh “ that
the professor cites.
The journal article is subscribers only, but the professor has made available
various drafts and extracts on his website / blog.
stupid love
love is
sh*t
concluding the love of rhetoric
؟ ؟ ؟
Some other works by the professor :
Cut It Out: Performing Self-Surgery . Published by the Cornhusker Press
(Ames, IA) ‘You Can Do It’ Self-Help and Home Improvement Series,
Vol. 38, 1995.
Love Slave: Original Poems. Joliet, IL: Illinois Dept. of Corrections/Art
Behind Bars Press, 1971.
“Calculating Socket Depth on Saddle Tees while Connecting to DWV Lines
with Rigid Plastic, when Existing Pipe Is Copper or Cast-Iron.” (Rpt.
of Senior Honor’s Thesis.) Monograph. Frackville, PA: Plumber’s
Friend Academy, 1961.
From the author’s
CV, here . . .
26 MAY 08
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Eudaimonia in Aberdeen
Company directors and academic business researchers have a new journal.
The International Journal of Business Excellence.
“ Business excellence is the application of quality management
strategies, techniques and tools to achieve the world-class performance
in managing business. “
The current issue is carrying an article from the Aberdeen Business
School and Westmont College, Santa Barbara, which encourages Excellence enthusiasts
to try to capture Aristotelian notions of meaning and purpose.
The authors try to show that : “ . . . Aristotle's
theory of virtue has useful contemporary relevance and can be developed
and used to understand
a fuller notion of business excellence. “
But Aristotle composed his
theories more than 2000 years ago - surely having given world-class
businessmen ample time to have implemented his ideas ?
Yet sadly, to date, there’s not all that much evidence that the first
instinct of a large corporation is to behave virtuously.
Perhaps the new research will change all that.
Or perhaps not. Wasn't it also Aristotle who pointed out that “ All
paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind. “ . . .
24 MAY 08
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Ex-sistence and Holes within Organisations.
Can Management Theory be advanced by applying techniques from psychoanalysis
?
Perhaps so, as a new research article from the Department of Organization
and Personnel Management at the Rotterdam School of Management explains.
Take for example the concept of ‘ Borromean Rings ‘
 If any one of the rings is removed , the other two become unlinked – or,
that is to say, the knot falls apart.
The psychoanalyst Jacques
Lacan believed
that the three rings could be used as a graphical representation of the human
mind - each ring representing the ‘ Symbolic ‘ ,
the ‘ Imaginary ‘ and the ‘ Real '.
However, after reading James Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake and
the Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Lacan realised that a broken knot
could be repaired with another ring – which he decided to call
a ‘ Sinthome ‘.
Further still, the voids surrounded by the rings obviously form spaces,
which Lacan called ‘ Holes ‘ – or even, in some
topographical foldings of the quad-knot ‘ False Holes ‘.
But what does all this have to do with Management Theory ? As the author of the new paper explains,
“ In light of the sinthome,
the Symbolic register as ‘ representation of holes ’ emphasizes
the themes of incompleteness and failure. “
All too familiar perhaps to many who work inside - or who are subject to
the administrations of - Organisations.
Lacan was also instrumental in defining Jouissance ,
which, despite its other connotations, he believed " is what serves no purpose
".
And how might Jouissance be distributed within an organisation ?
The author goes on to suggest that :
“ . . . any exploration of jouissance in an organizational
setting must ask this very question, and look at the way in which activity
that ‘ serves no purpose ‘ is sustained at work. “
By this, the author means possible time-wasting activities :
“ One can consider for instance employee pastimes such as gossip,
humour or aimless web surfing from the viewpoint of the jouissance obtained. “
Assuming, of course, that you are not currently at work within an
organisation of any kind, then why not continue your web-based actvities
and find out
more about Consistency, Holes ( Real and False ) , Ex-sistence, Jouissance
( Phallic and otherwise ) The Symbolic, The Imaginary, the Real,
and The Other - and how they may help to explain activities in your organisation
here, in the latest
issue of the journal ephemera ?
22 MAY 08
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Spot the sample.
No one guessed our sample number 8.
It was of course actor Peter Finch playing ' UBS Evening
News' anchor Howard Beale in the
film Network.
Watch the clip here (
or a longer version here )
Editor's comment : Although it was
made w
a y b a c k in
1976, if it doesn't induce 2008 goose-bumps, then there's an even chance
you're already [ deleted ] - or possibly
even [ deleted ].
On a lighter note, a new competion sample is posted here 21 MAY 08 (midday)
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Building otherness
The concept of Architectural Formlessness has, over the years, come in for
very little academic scrutiny.
 Until now that is.
Because the Associate
Professor of Architecture at Washington State University,
Spokane has recently published a paper on the subject - which probes
deeply into this largely uncharted territory :
“ Today, architecture finds itself in an awkward position in which
it both loves and hates formlessness. “
For readers wondering how, in fact, a building can ‘ not have
a form ‘ the
answer may be found not so much in the physical, concrete, steel and glass
constructional world per-se - but rather in the ‘ blur spaces ’ which
architects can sometimes fabricate.
In other words in the domain where building design might meet, say,
psychoanalysis.
The author points out that Freud himself made observations
which linked “ the
desiring spatialities of infancy to adult ‘ oceanic ’ feelings
of oneness with the world “
Thus, from a designerly viewpoint :
“ . . . a major implication of Freud's observations is that architectural
preoccupations with formlessness hail quite logically from early infancy
and the oxymoronic logic of hallucinatory self representation in the oral
stage. “
Freudian allusions have been made regarding various high-end architects’ work
before of course - but this might be the first time that unconscious leanings
towards formless underpinnings have been concretized ?
Abstract here :
21 MAY 08
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One is what one eats ?
For those concerned about possible ill-effects of food additives, the US Food
and Drug Administration publishes an on-line list, with the satisfyingly
unequivocal title :
‘ Everything Added to Food in the United States ‘ ( EAFUS )
The list has several thousand entries, running from Acacia to Zingerone.
Eaters should note though that the appearance of a compound on the list
doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s safe – indeed many of
the chemicals have a BAN status.
For chemicals which are generally regarded as safe readers should turn to
the ‘ Generally
Considered As Safe ‘ list ( GRAS ) instead.
Oddly perhaps, this list doesn’t mention how much of the chemical
concerned is safe to consume.
Shouldn’t it be the Quantity Generally Regarded As Safe To Eat
Within A Certain Time-Frame list ?
For example, the highly dangerous gas carbon monoxide is
GRAS, and so is polyvinyl alcohol ( PVA, more familiar to carpenters
as wood glue )
And there are some items which Really Magazine simply can’t
understand.
Safe or not, why would food manufactures wish to add for example, Tasteless
Smoke ?
Can anyone clarify for us ?
؟ ؟ ؟ Supplement :
Any readers wishing to perspectivize fears regarding the amount of woodglue
they can safely eat might turn to the now-classic 1976 book ‘ Panic
in the Pantry ‘.
“ . . . the first consumer-oriented book to challenge
the popular wisdom that ‘ chemicals ‘ were inherently dangerous
and that natural was better. “
And inside, according to the publishers :
“ The contemporary back-to-nature mania is rejected
as a hoax perpetuated by opportunists intent on taking advantage of frightened
and impressionable
consumers. “
It was written by the founder / director of the American Council of
Science and Health (ACSH) *
[ * note : ACSH funding-partners
have included : the
American Cyanamid Company, Ciba-Geigy Corporation, Dow Corning Corporation,
DuPont,
the Ethyl Corporation,
Exxon Corporation , ICI Americas Inc., Johnson & Johnson, Merck Company
Foundation, the Monsanto Fund, Pfizer, Shell Oil Company Foundation , Sterling
Drug, Inc., Union Carbide Corporation, Uniroyal Chemical Co. ] ( source )
20 MAY 08
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There allure of Allure
The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Warwick in the UK asks :
‘ Why
are people attracted to goods ? ‘
and provides the answers in
the latest issue of the Journal of Cultural Economy.
Here we learn, for example :
• Goods are surfaces which are both active and inert
• Individuals can also be viewed as dividuals
• Persons are fractals
• They like shiny things ( especially coloured plastics ) • Celebrities are ‘ Somethings ‘
• Hair can be charismatic
• Artists sometimes rough-hew inherited phantasms
and, most importantly perhaps, • Glamour sells
Read the professor's article
here [ i6 page .pdf ]
19 MAY 08
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More on military swarmbots.
What can be achieved when you give BAE systems, the University
of New Mexico, and the Georgia Institute of Technology a hefty wedge of taxpayers’ cash
?
Why, something like this *
It seems the universities are happy to work alongside the UK's biggest
arms manufacturer to help develop autonomous swarmbots which ‘ might ‘ be
deployed in as little as three years ( or not as the case may be ) .
And not just robo-spiders, for according to a BAE spokesperson,
they're also
exploring :
“ . . . devices that slither and indeed fly “
Like
this one (
at present just a highly impressive computer rendering. )
Like
it ? Hope so. If you're a US taxpayer, you’re paying for it.
BAE alone
is trousering $38m for the project.
[ * Can anyone identify the music for us ? Ed. ]
16 MAY 08
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Right Happy Left Sad ?
A new research article from the Dept. of Psychology at New York University asks a disarmingly simple question.
“ Why Are Conservatives Happier ? “
Really Magazine didn't know they were, but the study was
inspired, in part, by the findings of a 2006 Pew
Research Center survey which found that ( in the US )
nearly twice as many right-wingers described themselves as ‘ Very
Happy ‘ as
compared to left-wingers.
But . . . why ?
With the aid of System Justification Theory, the three-part project endeavoured
to find out.
“ System-justification theory provides a powerful means of analyzing
and appreciating the palliative effects of rationalizing various forms of
inequality in social relations, as well as the costs of failing to do so. “
But . . . what was the final answer to the 'why?'?
Really Magazine has read and
re-read the report, but hasn’t
been able to quite grasp the intrinsic subtleties of the answer.
The paper is published in the June 2008 edition of Psychological Science.
[ Editor’s note. The study appears to have
missed the opportunity to point out the important differences between
the happiness-levels that people might say they have – and reality ]
15 MAY 08
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dB at the BMB
What exactly is a musical instrument ? Defining one is a far from easy task.
 Now
the question has been augmented still further by the out-of-the-box thinker/artist/musician
David Byrne.
For, opening at the end of the month is his exhibition ‘ Playing
the Building ‘ -
in which case the featured musical instrument is : the Battery Maritime
Building in Manhattan, New York.
Visitors will be encouraged to sit at a centrally placed 'organ',
the keys of which will control a set of electrical actuators that will
vibrate, strike , and blow across various parts of the building – metal
beams, plumbing pipes, conduits etc.
Mr. Byrne successfully mounted a similar show in Stockholm, Sweden, in 2005
- here’s a soundclip of visitors playing the buidling at that event.
‘ Playing the Building ‘
opens 31st May 2008 at the
Battery Maritime Building
10 South Street, New York, NY
Open Friday, Saturday, Sunday: Noon – 6PM (Free)
and runs until 10 August 2008
full details here
13 MAY 08
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‘ There’s a hole
in my NPD ‘
New Product Development ( NPD ) is difficult.
As a rule of thumb :
• Only about one in ten of a corporation’s new ideas for products
ever get as far as being prototyped.
• And somewhere around nine out of ten
of those
don’t get past the R&D phase to become a viable, manufacturable,
product.
• And just 10% of newly launched products are a commercial success.
To sum up, the chances of an average corporation’s idea becoming a
winner are about 1 in 1000.
How can this lamentably low success rate be improved ?
Perhaps with Strategic Buckets ?
The idea has been around for some time now – here’s an article explaining
how they might be implemented.
Rather than expressing one’s ‘ distilled objectives ‘ as
a list of ‘ bullet points ‘ ( as so many corporations do ) why
not consider those bullet points instead as Strategic Buckets ? Now the company’s
project ideas are placed ‘ into ’ those buckets ( taking care
not to force projects which don’t quite fit ).
Hopefully, misalignments of the NPDs with regard to commercial realities
may begin to show up ?
If this approach seems, well, a little vague, bear in mind that it was written
way back in 2003, when Strategic Buckets were in their infancy.
Things have advanced quite a bit since then, and now the Darden School
of Business, at the University of Virginia, has published a
new theoretical framework describing exactly ( that is to say mathematically
) When and How to
Use Strategic Buckets.
The article draws attention in particular to the Environmental Complexity and Environmental
Instability within the R&D framework of the company
concerned.
However, we should perhaps bear in mind what Shane and Ulrich pointed
out in 2004 :
“ A substantial body of research has been focused
on the question of which innovation projects to pursue... Surveys have
shown that these models
have found very little use in practice. If 50 years of research in an area
has generated very little managerial impact, perhaps it is time for new approaches.”
Can Strategic Buckets (SBs) hold the answer ? Can they really dip into the
Well Of Corporate Creativity (WoCC) and come up overflowing with Strategically
Meaningful Viable Product Initiatives (SMVPIs) ? Or will the Porosity
of Objective Misalignment (PoOM) continue to leak away Return
on R&D Investment (RoR&DI)
?
؟ ؟ ؟ The
full paper can be found here
12 MAY 08
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Abscents.
Moving swiftly away from the cess-lagoons of Iowa, Eastwards, across the
Atlantic, we arrive in Sunderland, in the Northern UK.
 Specifically,
at the Reg Vardy Gallery at the University of
Sunderland. Which is currently hosting an exhibition that focuses
on odours – or
rather, their absence . . .
For the ‘ If there ever was ‘ exhibition
is ‘ An exhibition of extinct and impossible smells. ‘ “ Scent is the essence of physical presence and lends proof to our
surroundings. “
The work of at least 11 aromartists will be available for sniffing – and
include :
• The surface of the Sun
• The smell of communism
• The smell of the Mir spacestation.
( full
list here )
The show runs until 6th June 2008.
[ note : The exhibition was made possible in part by the generous
sponsorship of Northern Gas Networks Ltd. ]
10 MAY 08
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Down on the Containment Unit.
The Department of Sociology at Colorado State University has just published
a research paper into ( one of the ) problems caused by intensive animal
farming.
“ Specifically, its empirical focus is on how residents living near
a large-scale hog facility within the state of Iowa actively ‘do’ smell. “
A farm containment unit
with 10,000 hogs can produce about the same amount of sewage sludge as
a city of 40,000 humans – and, worse still, many
farms containment units
have no effective sewage treatment systems at all. The effluent is simply
pumped into open ‘ lagoons ’.
To put it bluntly, if a large-scale hog farm containment
unit opens in your neighbourhood, and your home is downwind – it can
rapidly acquire a market-value of zero.
With the new insights, help might be on the way though :
“ . . . an understanding of agricultural odor is provided that is
both active ( in that it is something we ‘do’ ) and historical
( recognizing that such ‘doing’ always occurs within a particular
sociohistorical milieu ). “
See ‘ When good smells go bad: a sociohistorical understanding
of agricultural odor pollution ‘
Pubished in the current issue of the journal ‘ Environment and
Planning A ’
Also see, from the same author : ‘ Making Scents out of Changing
Spatial Geographies: A Closer Look at the Animal-Human-Faecal Relationship ‘
Published in the journal Local Environment, August 2007
09 MAY 08
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YOUprison
If you’re going to be in or around Turin, Italy in mid June, why not
check out the inauguration of a new architectural exhibition ?
Subject : The ( architecturally speaking ) oft-neglected field of prison
cell design.
11 specialist international architectural studios have been invited to submit
designs for a ‘ living unit ‘ of a correctional facility,
Visitors will be able to :
“ . . . physically experience a space designed for isolation and confinement.
The cell thus becomes a tool for reflecting on the system it is the smallest
functional unit of. “
One of the most captivating of the schemes - organised StudioNOWA from
Sicily - may highlight any possible conflicts in the requirements of prison
governors
and those in their care.
For the project will feature a suite of cell-designs
based solely on ideas submitted by the current inmates of the Turin
Correctional Facility. Inauguration of YOUprison :
Thursday June 12, 2008, 7 p.m. at the Sandretto
Re Rebaudengo Foundation, Via Modane 16, Turin The exhibition will run until September 21
( our in-house artist's impression )
08 MAY 08
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War : Men’s fault ?
The latest issue of the journal Men and Masculinities carries an
article from the London School of Economics which attempts
to Make Sense of Masculinity and War.
The piece argues that ( on examination ) :
“ . . . the link between masculinity and war does not depend on the
substantive meanings of either masculinity or war, or on a causal or constitutive
relation between the two; rather, masculinity is linked to war because the
formal, relational properties of masculinity provide a framework through
which war can be rendered both intelligible and acceptable as a social practice
and institution. “
The article is ‘ subscribers only ‘ - but a free-to-read follow-up
conclusion to the piece can be found here. ( in .doc format )
Noting :
“ The crucial characteristic that is shared by
all masculinity discourses, is that they are not feminine. “
؟ ؟ ؟ Really Magazine is sticking though with a more succinct approach
to the subject as encapsulated by Richard
Buckminster 'Bucky' Fuller
" Either war is obsolete, or men are."
07 MAY 08
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Thesmology Exclusive.
Thesmologists - those who study institutions - have been offered a swathe
of new research opportunities with the election of Boris Johnson as Mayor
of London.
Confidential documents obtained by Really Magazine have revealed new plans
under consideration for the capital.
1) The central London traffic control scheme ( known as the Congestion
Charge ) will be kept, but with special exemption for Aston
Martins and Bristols.
2) The London
Eye will be retrofitted with a Swiss-designed musical-box mechanism
attached to the central rotor pivot. The amplified signal ( which will
play as the wheel turns ) will be broadcast around the Southbank.
( Possible music programmes include Edward Elgar’s Pomp
and Circumstance,
and the theme from The
Magic Roundabout. )
3) The public transport tracking device travelcard known as the ‘ Oyster
Card ‘ will be retained, but will be complimented by the ‘ Champagne
and Strawberries ‘ card ( to be available only for first-class rail
travellers )
4) All graduate students in central London will be required to wear academic
black gowns and mortarboards at
all times when off-campus.
5) The façade of the controversial central London architectural icon
Centrepoint is to be rebuilt in mock-Tudor style.
( an artist's impression )
Quote of the day
" My friends, as I have discovered myself, there are
no disasters, only opportunities. And, indeed, opportunities for fresh disasters. "
From Boris, the Mayor of London ( source: Boris's column
in the Daily
Telegraph )
03 MAY 08
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Celebrity Burnout : the Math(s)
Celebrities are often viewed as ‘ Social Leaders ‘ .
But from the celebrities’ point of view, the pressures and costs (
social, emotional and sometimes financial ) can be extremely severe.
So severe that many succumb to exhaustion, psychosomatic illnesses and drug
abuse.
So called Celebrity Burnout.
New research from the Dept. of Economics at Clemson University has ( for
the first time ) applied a mathematical model to attempt to explain and quantify
the burnout.
The author draws attention to the touring careers of Led Zeppelin, Metallica, and Amadeus
Mozart.
There are two basic premises :
• Firstly, that performers will often extend their touring schedule
way beyond the length they would be comfortable with.
• Secondly, they ( try to ) keep going if ‘ the revenue
derived from the performance is less than the cost. ‘ ( viz. they’re
making money )
The tour schedule can be described thus :
But, when mind altering substances are introduced into the equation, things
become considerably more complex :
Despite the new mathematical insights, the author does point out though
that more research is still required : “ The question of why celebrities appear so inclined to burn-outs
and self-destructive behavior is a problem not inclined to a simple solution. “
For example, one puzzling, and as yet still unexplained aspect is that
there are some other very well-paid occupations which would appear to be
just as
stressful, and yet workers in these areas don’t ( generally ) turn
to copious quantities of illicit drugs and other full-on excesses.
Really Magazine wonders if that might be because they think they
wouldn't be able to get away with it ? The study is published in the May 2008 edition of the Journal
of Economic Behavior & Organization
Non-subscribers can read a full
copy here.
02 MAY 08
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01 May
[and] Digital Sugar
Two researchers from the School of Art History, Cinema Studies, Classics & Archaeology at
the University of Melbourne are working on a soon-to-be-published
book on Digital Maypole
Theories.
These are theories which “ . . . engage the non-textual
maypole life and pursue the trails of sugar, copy the hieroglyphic gestures,
and participate
in the seasonal dances that make up digital life. “
For a taste of the forthcoming book, turn to the authors’ essay on
the subject published in the journal FibreCulture in 2005. ( link
below )
Here, parallels are drawn between :
• The ritualistic Maypole Dances of Western and Northern Europe,
and :
• SMS messaging, computer games, gesturing, and what they term ‘ Digital
Digits ‘
Noting :
“ The maypole seems unsolicited for the comprehension of self-organised
networks and socially self-regulating information technologies “
For example, the ribbons connected to a traditional maypole vibrate – they ‘ contain
noise ‘ – ( Kahn, 1999: 72). Could this ‘ active
resonance ‘ be meaningfully compared to electromagnetic
( digital ) transmissions ?
And is there perhaps a darker underside to an electronic/digital maypole
?
“ Cancers developed by the atomic specificity of a vibrationary milieu
are related by blood to the ' critical moments ' that lie on the opposite
end of the scale of vibration. “
To sum up then, unravelling the non-trivial complexities of Digital
Maypole Theory
“ . . . begins the process of reorganising conceptions
of modalities of communication around the absent centre and the affective
realms
that form
through the movement of information-energy, like sugar in a hurricane. “
Read the essay here
01 MAY 08
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