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By Aaron Saenz
“When it comes to a successful group, the easiest way to ensure victory may be placing women on the team. MIT’s Center for Collective Intelligence seeks to understand how humans get better (or worse) at solving problems as they work together. They studied hundreds of people working in small groups and found that they could determine a “C factor”, a key statistic that would predict if a group could perform well in a variety of tasks. C factor was more important in determining group success than the individual IQs of the people in the group. In other words, having a successful team isn’t just about having smart people, it’s about having people who will work together well. And what gives a group a high C factor? Women. Well, to be more precise, a high level of social sensitivity and willingness to let everyone talk equally. As forms of collective intelligence grow in importance, as we see with crowd-sourcing projects like Wikipedia, social search engines, and the scientific community, the value of socially aware individuals is going to arise as well. Is the future going to be inherited by the peacemakers?”
To read the entire artcle go to http://singularityhub.com/2011/08/26/mit-unravels-the-secrets-behind-collective-intelligence-hint-iq-not-so-important/
Bear by Tim Hawkinson at UCSD
Washington Post-- Patrick Kennedy Marries
The Crossing - Abbey Road Studios -
Its 4:00 am in London and the #Beatles have long passed the crossing.
Leave it to the New York Times Sunday Book Review to consolidate three new books about Dylan in an all-in-one review by Vanity Fair’s Jim Windolf.
10 Years of the Media in Vietnam (2000-2010) and its Role in Reforming Vietnam -
Over the past 10 years in Vietnam, the media has played a profound role in influencing reform measures. Specifically, VietNamNet, one of the country’s most popular online news publication, has led the way. Mr. Nguyen Anh Tuan is a pioneer in internet entrepreneurship and online journalism over the last decade in Vietnam. His personal experience as editor-in- chief of VietNamNet includes helping to break a number of high-profile corruption cases and developing VietnamNet into a highly regarded site, known for its sophisticated analysis of Vietnam’s ongoing economic and political reforms. Mr. Tuan founded VietNet, the first internet service provider in Vietnam to provide email and web access, an achievement for which he was selected one of the ten outstanding young Vietnamese by the Prime Minister in 1996. Over the last decade, Tuan has founded VietNamNet Media Company and built VietNamNet into the most respected and widely read news and entertainment website in Vietnam. Today, VietNamNet is one of a handful of print and electronic publications that are at the vanguard of Vietnam’s increasingly vibrant and influential press.
Mitt Romney: I Will Never Impose My Awesome Massachusetts Law On The Nation | TPMDC -
VATICAN SCIENCE PANEL POINTS TO SEVERE CLIMATE CHANGE
On May 5, 2011, the Vatican released its study entitled “Fate of Mountain Glaciers in the Anthropocene,” written by a stellar panel of leading climate and glacier scientists. Commissioned by the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the report will be delivered to Pope Benedict XVI.
Scripps Institution of Oceanography scientist V. Ramanathan co-chaired the working group responsible for the report, along with SIO Professor Emeritus and Nobel Laureate Paul Crutzen and Lennart Bengtsson, Director Emeritus of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology. Co-authors include Dr. Charlie Kennel, Professor Emeritus and former Director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, and Dr. Lynn Russell, Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry at Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
The authors convened at the Vatican from April 2 - 4, 2011 to produce their report, which states that “the widespread loss of ice and snow in the world’s mountain glaciers is some of the clearest evidence we have for global changes in the climate system,” and provides a moral imperative for individuals and nations to take immediate action.
Read the full report at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences website.
Tim Hawkinson, Bear at UCSD
On December 10, 1948 the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights the full text of which appears in the following pages. Following this historic act the Assembly called upon all Member countries to publicize the text of the Declaration and “to cause it to be disseminated, displayed, read and expounded principally in schools and other educational institutions, without distinction based on the political status of countries or territories.” Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world, Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people, Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law, Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations, Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom, Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co-operation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms, Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge, Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.
Useful Links
PREAMBLE
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“For a Japanese like me, the Château de Versailles is one of the greatest symbols of Western history. It is the emblem of an ambition for elegance, sophistication and art that most of us can only dream of.
Of course, we are aware that the spark that set fire to the powder of the Revolution came directly from the centre of the building.
But, in many respects, everything is transmitted to us as a fantastic tale coming from a very distant kingdom. Just as French people can find it hard to recreate in their minds an accurate image of the Samurai period, the history of this palace has become diminished for us in reality.
So it is probable that the Versailles of my imagination corresponds to an exaggeration and a transformation in my mind so that it has become a kind of completely separate and unreal world. That is what I have tried to depict in this exhibition.
I am the Cheshire cat that welcomes Alice in Wonderland with its diabolic smile, and chatters away as she wanders around the Château.
With a broad smile I invite you all to discover the wonderland of Versailles.”
Takashi Murakami
Exhibition from 14 September to 12 December 2010, included in the tour of the Grand Apartments.
Patron of the exhibition
Partners of the exhibition
Biography of the artist
Takashi Murakami is one of the most thoughtful and thought-provoking Japanese artists of the 1990s. His works include cartoon-style paintings, almost minimalist sculptures, giant inflatable balloons, events, watches, t-shirts and other products manufactured in series, many of which bear his figure-signature, Mr. DOB.
Takashi Murakami was born in Tokyo in 1963 and holds a BFA, MFA and Ph D from the National University of Fine Arts and Music of Tokyo. He has performed one-man shows in the Marianne Boesky Gallery in New York (2003), the Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain in Paris (2002), the Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo (2001), the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (2001) and the Emmanuel Perrotin gallery in Paris (2001).
Alongside his artistic work, Takashi Murakami is a curator, an entrepreneur and a student of contemporary Japanese sociology. In 2000, Murakami was the curator of an exhibition of Japanese art called “Superflat” and representing a movement interested in mass entertainments and their consequences on contemporary aesthetics. Murakami is also known worldwide for his collaboration with the designer Marc Jacobs in the design of handbags and other products for the Louis Vuitton fashion house.
The work of Takashi Murakami has been exhibited in prestigious museums all over the world, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Tokyo, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and a recent one-man retrospective at Bard College Museum of Art.
Through his work Murakami plays on oppositions between East and West, the past and the present, high art and low culture, while remaining always amusing and accessible. His work depicts the worlds of popular contemporary Japanese cartoons and historic Japanese painting (he received a classic training in art and possesses a PhD in the traditional nihon-ga style). His recurring figure, Mr. DOB, appears on T-shirts, posters, key rings, etc. around the world and has even appeared as a 3-D sculpture. Murakami was also the curator of “Super Flat”, an exhibition grouping contemporary Japanese artists.
Sent from my iPad2
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We will have a vacancy in June. Justice Stevens is retiring. Obama will nominate the replacement and the Senate will confirm the nominee. Stay tuned!
Sent from my iPad0
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By THOMAS L. FRIEDMANPublished: April 20, 2010
I’ve been thinking about President Obama’s foreign policy lately, but first, a golf tip: I went to Dave Pelz’s famous short-game school this winter to improve my putting and chipping, and a funny thing happened — my long game got better. It brings to mind something that happened to Obama. The president got health care reform passed, and it may turn out to be his single most important foreign policy achievement.
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Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times
Thomas L. Friedman
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
In politics and diplomacy, success breeds authority and authority breeds more success. No one ever said it better than Osama bin Laden: “When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature they will like the strong horse.”
Have no illusions, the rest of the world was watching our health care debate very closely, waiting to see who would be the strong horse — Obama or his Democratic and Republican health care opponents? At every turn in the debate, America’s enemies and rivals were gauging what the outcome might mean for their own ability to push around an untested U.S. president.
It remains to be seen whether, in the long run, America will be made physically healthier by the bill’s passage. But, in the short run, Obama definitely was made geopolitically healthier.
“When others see the president as a winner or as somebody who has real authority in his own house, it absolutely makes a difference,” Defense Secretary Robert Gates said to me in an interview. “All you have to do is look at how many minority or weak coalition governments there are around the world who can’t deliver something big in their own country, but basically just teeter on the edge, because they can’t put together the votes to do anything consequential, because of the divided electorate.” President Obama has had “a divided electorate and was still able to muscle the thing through.”
When President Dmitri Medvedev of Russia spoke by phone with Obama the morning after the health care vote — to finalize the New Start nuclear arms reduction treaty — he began by saying that before discussing nukes, “I want to congratulate you, Mr. President, on the health care vote,” an administration official said. That was not just rank flattery. According to an American negotiator, all throughout the arms talks, which paralleled the health care debate, the Russians kept asking: “Can you actually get this ratified by the Senate” if an arms deal is cut? Winning passage of the health care bill demonstrated to the Russians that Obama could get something hard passed.
Our enemies surely noticed, too. You don’t have to be Machiavelli to believe that the leaders of Iran and Venezuela shared the barely disguised Republican hope that health care would fail and, therefore, Obama’s whole political agenda would be stalled and, therefore, his presidency enfeebled. He would then be a lame duck for the next three years and America would be a lame power.
Given the time and energy and political capital that was spent on health care, “failure would have been unilateral disarmament,” added Gates. “Failure would have badly weakened the president in terms of dealing with others — his ability to do various kinds of national security things. … You know, people made fun of Madeleine [Albright] for saying it, but I think she was dead on: most of the rest of the world does see us as the ‘indispensable nation.’ ”
Indeed, our allies often complain about a world of too much American power, but they are not stupid. They know that a world of too little American power is one they would enjoy even less. They know that a weak America is like a world with no health insurance — and a lot of pre-existing conditions.
Gen. James Jones, the president’s national security adviser, told me that he recently met with a key NATO counterpart, who concluded a breakfast by congratulating him on the health care vote and pronouncing: “America is back.”
But is it? While Obama’s health care victory prevented a power outage for him, it does not guarantee a power surge. Ultimately, what makes a strong president is a strong country — a country whose underlying economic prowess, balance sheet and innovative capacity enable it to generate and project both military power and what the political scientist Joe Nye calls “soft power” — being an example that others want to emulate.
What matters most now is how Obama uses the political capital that health care’s passage has earned him. I continue to believe that the most important foreign policy issue America faces today is its ability to successfully engage in nation building — nation building at home.
Obama’s success in passing health care and the bounce it has put in his step will be nothing but a sugar high if we can’t get our deficit under control, inspire a new generation of start-ups, upgrade our railroads and Internet and continue to attract the world’s smartest and most energetic immigrants.
An effective, self-confident president with a weak country is nothing more than a bluffer. An effective, self-confident president, though, at least increases the odds of us building a stronger country.
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~The present legislation will not be overturned on a claim of unconstitutionality of the individual mandate;~That mandate will easily survive scrutiny based on the U.S. Constitution’s Commerce Clause;~Health care is an economic activity and touches on interstate commerce within the meaning of long-evolved Commerce Clause jurisprudence;~Imposition of a financial penalty for failure to buy health insurance is permissible sanction by Congress under its broad Commerce Clause powers even if that penalty is viewed as a tax;~ As part of a reasonable and legitimate governmental system to expand health care options and lower health care costs, the financial penalty does not constitute a bill of attainder, violating individual rights by imposing a sanction without trial; and~Finally, the legislation may not be perfect, but it is certainly constitutional.To read Harlow’s entire analysis please go to his blog;
David Harlow His blog, HealthBlawg::David Harlow’s Health Care Law Blog, is nationally recognized as a leading health care law and policy blog.
The Harlow Group LLC
Health Care Law and Consulting
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Hobbes, Locke, Jefferson, Rousseau and Audubon all believed that fundamental principles of natural law are at the root of an orderly and fair human society living in harmony with nature. Enjoy this photograph of the Torrey Pines environs where humans and nature have lived in harmony for an estimated ten thousand years or more.
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Thanks to Teri Pickett for sending me these helpful reminders from the MayoClinic.com
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It appears that multilateral meetings continued Tuesday at UCSD and at other locations on the Torrey Pines Mesa between U.S. representatives and representatives of North Korea, Japan, & China. Hopefully, these meetings are the prelude to full fledged peace talks. Apparently, discussions include possible deployment of a hospital ship to North Korea and other cooperative efforts between the parties. The meetings will proceed again today but it is unclear that the North Koreans will participate as weeks ago they declined the invitation to meet for a third day.It is fitting that the magical Torrey Pines Mesa is the site of these dramatic discussions. Surrounded by the majestic, ancient Torrey Pines and stunning cliffside views of the pacific ocean, delegates are inspired to work together in harmony with nature to bring about a significant reduction in tensions with North Korea.
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In today’s Times @nytimeskristof has written a brilliant piece taking the gloves off against the recalcitrance of a Congress that can not find its way to provide healthcare for all. If Abraham Lincoln could comment today on Congress and healthcare, he would likely write a column like Kristof’s invoking the moral right to healthcare. But, he would take the case one step further than Kristof and argue that healthcare is a constitutional right within the penumbra of the Bill of Rights and that it is also a right supported by a plain reading of the words of the entire Constitution. Lincoln would further argue that over the years, Congress’s failure to provide the people with services and programs to secure the right to healthcare is insidious behavior that, at its core, constitutes a pervasive denial of the promise of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/08/opinion/08kristof.html?ref=opinion
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October 3rd, 20095:49 am
UC BERKELEY DESERVES U.S. FUNDS RATHER THAN AFGHANISTAN.
Let’s cut funds and troops in Afghanistan and send the money saved to UC Berkeley. That would certainly be a better use of our resources in this economic maelstrom. If that war is really necessary, perhaps Brazil, India, Germany, Britain and the UN could supply the troops and fund the war in Afghanistan. The folks at Berkeley then can be free to come up with the needed research to develop the antidote to cure certain people of their insatiable appetite to fight more and more wars regardless of the immorality of sending young people to fight old men’s battles. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/03/opinion/03herbert.html
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On December 10, 1948 the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights the full text of which appears in the following pages. Following this historic act the Assembly called upon all Member countries to publicize the text of the Declaration and “to cause it to be disseminated, displayed, read and expounded principally in schools and other educational institutions, without distinction based on the political status of countries or territories.”
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,
Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law,
Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations,
Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,
Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co-operation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms,
Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge,
Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.
The Big Book of Social Media: Case Studies, Stories, Perspectives (Paperback)
The editor of this book is Bob Fine, social media evangelist, who is nominated for the Twitter Shorty Award, 2011 in the author category. Bob has compiled a brilliant study of pioneering uses of of social media by businesses and organizations to influence customers and followers. This book is instructive and riveting because it provides brick-by-brick examples of methods used by social pioneers to make the global village a reality. The case studies abound: from the ebullient Ted Nguyen who is getting everyone in Orange County, California to tweet about bus schedules and on-time arrivals to the cerebral Neal Shaffer who chronicles the detailed story of a jobs recruiter that built a Linked-In Group that boomed business and will likely result in lots of jobs. As Mirna Bard asserts in the Introduction, the social web “has redefined the rules of customer engagement by offering a new low cost avenue for communicating, educating, entertaining and collaborating.” Some 270 pages later, we readers are all convinced of that! No doubt, adapting the strategies in this book will give your campaign a boost.
Floating a new bridge in NYC and keeping the Apple connected to earth’s core!
