Insurance Coverage for Floods

In the light of the recent floods in Kampung Subang, Shah Alam and TTDI Jaya areas, there have been a number of inquiries regarding insurance coverage for floods.

My principal, American Home Assurance Company, is pleased to advise that there is NO RESTRICTION to obtain extension for this cover.

MOTORCAR INSURANCE
The basic Motor policy does not cover flood. In order to protect the vehicle against damage cased by flood, the policy has to be extended to include Special Perils. The rate is 0.50% of the sum insured. This rate applies regardless of whether the cover is taken from inception of the policy or mid-term, i.e. the rate is a flat-rate.

FIRE INSURANCE
The basic Fire policy also does not cover flood. Again the policy may be extended to include flood cover. The rate is 0.086% of the sum insured. Please note that this cover does not extend to include loss or damage caused by subsidence or landslip.

HOUSEOWNER/HOUSEHOLDER (HOUSEHOLD CONTENTS) INSURANCE
Flood cover is included under the basic policy. No further extension for flood is required. Storm/tempest is also covered. However, here too, damage caused by subsidence or landslip is not covered.

We urge all our clients to take up this cover in order to be adequately protected. Be it your cars, your homes or your household contents, it is better to be safe than sorry.

Copyright 2003-2006 Azlan Adnan Legal Notice

MGG Pillai

MGG Pillai's reputation was built on his
no-holds-barred reports and commentaries

Veteran journalist MGG Pillai dies of heart attack

PETALING JAYA: Veteran journalist MGG Pillai died of a heart attack at Universiti Hospital at 10.40 am yesterday. He was 67.

Pillai, whose reputation was built on his no-holds-barred reports and commentaries, wrote for several publications and radio stations, including Radio Netherlands, during his long career.

He was once expelled from Singapore and permanently banned from there since 1991 over his reports. Of this, he wrote: "It did not bother me since, as an Italian journalist wrote in his book, 'I had done my shopping'. I had written in an Indian paper of Israeli-made Singapore tanks and why they were bought. It was true, but local journalists could not write about it as they can never could get official confirmation. In defence matters, Singapore is touchy."

He occasionally wrote on the Vietnam War.

He was also among the pioneers of the country's online journalism.

His last posting on his website, www.MGGPillai.com, was "Globalisation, for Malaysia, means the foreigner will control what the local always did in the past," posted on April 20 at 11.48 am.

Bernama editor-in-chief Datuk Azman Ujang, in expressing his condolences to Pillai's family, said he wrote his articles without fear or favour.

Former New Straits Times group editor P.C. Shivadas said: "Journalism was in his blood and he also attempted to push the limits of press freedom and often got himself into trouble from which he never flinched."

Pillai leaves behind wife P.C. Jayasree and two sons Sreejit and Sreekant.

The cortege leaves Siewdor Apartments in Brickfields, Kuala Lumpur, at 10 am and is scheduled to arrive at the Cheras crematorium at 11 am today.

Copyright 2003-2006 Azlan Adnan Legal Notice

Public Appeal

A child with haemangioma:
before and after treatment

Man with Growth on Face off to Australia for Surgery
By Linda Khoo Hui Li

KUCHING, April 26 (Bernama) -- After 18 years of suffering from a growth which covers most of his face, Christopher Budol is hoping to lead a normal life although he would have to go through a high-risk operation in Australia.

For this 33-year-old, he would rather face death on the operating table than having to suffer and be forever dependent on his parents.

Diagnosed as having a blood vessel growth disorder called haemangioma, Christopher said small spots, which he thought were pimples, first appeared on his face when he was 15-years-old and the growths have since spread all over his face, including covering his nose, to the extent that he now has to breathe through the mouth.

Christopher also has difficulty eating.

"I have suffered long enough. I cannot work because no one wants to employ me and neither can I go out because where ever I am, people will stare at me," he told Bernama when met at a relative's house here recently.

Christopher, who is from Spaoh, about 275 kilometres from here, said he was informed that the growths could be removed after meeting Dr Selva Kumar Subramanian for consultation at the Sarawak General Hospital last year.

"Dr Selva told me that the surgery is dangerous because it involves a lot of blood vessels and that I can die, but I don't care.

"He also said that I would also die because the growths are getting bigger and may soon cover my mouth. So, I might as well go for the operation to remove the growths," he added.

Although the cost of his operation will be borne by the Royal Adelaide Hospital, Australia, Christopher said he still needs to raise about RM20,000 for his flight ticket and to pay for his accommodation at the hospital.

He is appealing to the public to help raise the money, adding that he would leave for Australia as soon as his travelling documents were finalised.

-- BERNAMA

---

Perhaps an airline could be persuaded to donate the airfare on humanitarian grounds and members of the public can donate some cash for his accommodation as well?

References:
Medical students are advised to refer to Hemangiomas and Vascular Malformations of the Head and Neck by Milton Waner (Editor), James Y. Suen (Editor)
and to publications listed here.

Quick Review for Clinicians

Notes:
A haemangioma is a non-malignant tumour which is made up of rapidly growing endothelial or vascular cells. They may be capillary, cavernous or mixed in origin. Usually these lesions appear at the time of birth, or shortly thereafter, as a small spot that appears pink or red. They may present on the face or elsewhere on the body.

Complications that may occur once these lesions have undergone rapid growth include bleeding, infection, mass effect and the possible obstruction of critical structures such as the mouth, nose, eyes or ears.

This obstruction would require early treatment which may include one or more of the following active therapies: laser treatment, injection and/or oral corticosteroids, the utilization of interferon, pressure dressings, or direct surgical excision.

So, who has pocketed the RM1,200?

According to an article in BERNAMA, which quotes the Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak as saying Malaysia is buying 100,000 Colt M4 5.56 mm Carbines; the first shipment of 14,000 is estimated to cost RM70 million, giving a unit cost of RM5,000.

However, according to www.globalsecurity.org, the US Army National Guard in 2006 is buying 60,943 M4 Carbines at a cost of US$1,000 (RM3,800) each.

This begs the question: So, who has pocketed the RM1,200?

That's RM120 million for 100,000 carbines and RM16.8 million for the first shipment of 14,000 alone.

Copyright 2003-2006 Azlan Adnan Legal Notice

Islam in Space

Malaysia considers Islam in space
By Jonathan Kent
BBC News, Kuala Lumpur

Malaysia's choice of astronaut will blast off with a Russian team in 2007

A two-day conference on Islam and life in space is under way in Malaysia, in a bid to answer questions faced by would-be Muslim astronauts.

Malaysia is due to send an astronaut into space with the Russians next year.

The country's first spaceman is almost certain to be a Muslim, which raises a number of practical issues.

For instance, Muslims wash before they pray but not only is water a precious commodity in space, but it is also impractical in weightlessness. Likewise, the faithful face Mecca to pray. However, that will mean pin-pointing a moving location while in zero gravity.

And Muslim prayer times are linked to those of the sunrise and sunset, but in orbit the sun appears to rise and set more than a dozen times a day.

Serious discussion
Malaysia's science ministry has called together a group of experts to thrash out these and other questions.

It is being billed as the first-ever serious discussion of the issues.

It is in keeping with the Malaysian government's mission to promote what it calls Islam Hadhari, or civilisational Islam, which encourages Muslims to embrace education, science and technology.

It will doubtless be hoping that a conference of Muslim scientists and scholars debating such cutting edge issues will not go unnoticed in the rest of the Islamic world.

Dynamism in Islamic Activism

Dynamism in Islamic Activism:
Reference Points for Democratization and Human Rights
(Translation of Summary by Kate Delaney)

Background
Since the 1970s there has been an increase in the significance of Islam as a political factor: so-called Islamic activism. Various manifestations of this phenomenon have led to considerable tensions and violent conflicts, not only within the Muslim world itself, but also in (relationships with) the West and the Netherlands. The interrelatedness of what occurs outside and inside national borders means that what takes place elsewhere may also have consequences for the internal relationship between segments of the population. A climate of distrust and fear has arisen between Muslims and non-Muslims, and also within the Muslim community itself at times. Communication about 'Islam' now only takes place through intemperate images and inflated words, such as a 'clash of civilizations' or an 'irreconciability of Islam with democracy and human rights.'

Research question
This report investigates the characteristics and dynamics of Islamic activism. It poses the question of whether, and in what respect, the manifestations of this activism since the 1970s offer reference points for democratization and the improvement of human rights. It also investigates which policy perspective on the part of the Netherlands and Europe can reduce the tensions surrounding Islamic activism in the longer term and can support processes of democratization and the improvement of human rights.

Goal
With this report, the Council intends to formulate a policy perspective that will contribute to reducing the tensions with and within the Muslim world with regard to issues of Islamic activism. The Council considers it essential that this perspective be based on knowledge of the actual developments and characteristics of this activism. At the same time, the Council does not intend this report to be a description and analysis of all facets of this activism, including the well-known negative manifestations. The emphasis is on positive reference points for policy directed towards democratization and human rights in Muslim countries.

This report is directed towards the Dutch government. By their nature, the international developments discussed in this paper demand efforts of international policy. For this reason, the report primarily explores the policy possibilities available to the EU. It is precisely within this larger context that the Netherlands can exert influence. The starting points for the EU's external policy also have implications for relations with Islamic activism in the Netherlands.

Approach
The relationship between Islamic activism and democracy and human rights is examined along three dimensions, namely:
- Islamic-political thought,
- Islamic-political movements, and
- Islamic law.

Reference points
The report finds that Islamic activism does indeed offer reference points for democratization and human rights. Each of the three investigated dimensions shows, in this respect, great diversity and dynamism. Even though these are only tentative reference points and much uncertainty still exists, it is inaccurate to assume that 'Islam' in a general sense is at odds with the acceptance of democracy and human rights.

On the level of Islamic-political thought there are indeed many thinkers who reject important principles for the polity of the state, such as the separation of church and state, democracy, constitutional government, and human rights, as incompatible with Islamic principles and the supremacy of Islamic law. Yet, alongside these opinions, which shape much of the image of Islam, there are increasingly more thinkers who strive for these same principles precisely on Islamic grounds. They turn away from dogmatic approaches that claim that the precepts of the sacred sources should be followed to the letter. Rather, they are more concerned with the spirit and expressive power of these sources in relation to current circumstances. Thinkers holding such views can now be found in many Muslim countries - Indonesia, Malaysia, and Egypt, for example. This modernizing mode of thought can even be found in Iran, a country that has now had a quarter century of experience with Islamic theocracy.

The recent history of Islamic-political movements in the Muslim world also reveals a large degree of diversity and dynamism. Such movements do not form a homogenous, unalterably radical, and always violent threat. Transnational terrorism that concentrates on jihadist actions is, of course, threatening. Alongside this, however, there are a number of Islamic movements with very diverse aspirations, including groups seeking reforms within the existing political systems. Moreover, Islamic-political movements in many Muslim countries have abandoned their initially radical attitude in favor of a pragmatic political standpoint. The movements most strongly oriented towards the political arena, such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, have shifted the most in the direction of accepting democratic principles and norms. In doing so, they distance themselves from absolute truths and become familiar with the positive workings of democratic principles and human rights.

In the last few decades many Muslim countries have been exposed to the pressure of introducing elements of Islamic law. The views on what Sharia contains, however, are quite divergent, ranging from very general guidelines to concrete codes of behavior. Thus there are large differences not only in the laws based on Sharia, but also in how these laws should be put into practice. The Islamization of law since the 1970s has had limited scope in most countries; exceptions are countries like Iran, Pakistan, and Sudan. Additionally, the first wave of Islamization has not been not followed by a second; rather, there has been a decline in the influence of strict interpretations of Sharia on national law in the last fifteen years. Even when Sharia plays a formal role, it seems that this gradual modernization of the law is not excluded. Thus the reform of marriage laws has gone forward in most countries despite activism. In reaction to universal human rights, ideas about Islamic human rights have been developed in the Islamic world. In addition to sharing similarities, these two concepts also demonstrate important fundamental differences. Nevertheless, here, too, there appears unmistakably a tendency towards gradual rapproachment.

Policy Perspective
The member states of the EU cannot permit themselves to stand aloof. An inwardly focused Union which renounces external ambitions only creates an illusion of security that does not remove the existing vulnerability. Furthermore, aloofness means that Europe fails to make use of its chances, which indeed exist, for supporting promising developments in the Muslim world. For this reason, the WRR argues for an active and, wherever possible, constructive attitude on the part of EU member states. This policy encompasses the following points:
- taking into account the diversity of Islamic activism;
- recognizing Islamic activism as a potentially constructive political and juridical factor in the development of Muslim countries;
- associating with endogenous processes and courses of development which promote democracy and human rights;
- investing in an informed public opinion about Islamic activism and the main features of the policy in this area.

Diversity
Between and within Muslim countries there are many different interpretations of the way in which Islam relates to politics, democracy, and human rights. Whether Islam and democracy can coexist, and whether Islamic legislation is at odds with human rights, cannot be established in any general sense but differs according to particular views and/or practices of Islam or Sharia, and may also change over time. The Netherlands and the EU will have to invest in knowledge of these different views and practices as a foundation for a policy concerning Muslim countries.

Constructive or not
In the past, the EU, in its advocacy of democratization and the improvement of human rights in neighboring Muslim countries, primarily put its hopes on non-religious movements and parties, even if these groups had little political support within the local population. It becomes increasingly apparent, however, that ignoring the political and juridical agendas of religious activism offers no solution and may even be counterproductive. Not only does such a stance discourage Islamic groups with substantial followings who are prepared to pursue gradual political liberalization from within the existing system, but it also fuels the widely-held view amongst ordinary citizens in the Muslim world that secularism and (Western) democracy, by definition, serve anti-religious interests. This will only fan the demand for Islamization, either because radicals will receive more support from the population for their religious views, or because political rulers themselves will play the conservative 'Islamization card' in order to maintain political legitimacy.

The EU and the Netherlands should no longer rule out in advance Islamic movements as potential interlocutors, but should be guided by the concrete political actions of these groups. They should strongly support groups moving towards the acceptance of democracy and human rights and condemn groups which move away from this goal. In addition, they must develop more positive incentives to be able to encourage and reward reforms. Furthermore, they must be prepared to levy sanctions in the case of serious violations of human rights. In the case of Euro-Mediterranean policy, this may amount to the (temporary) suspension of a partnership agreement. In this way, the Union allows space for different courses of democratization and the progressive realization of human rights, while at the same time maintaining its own values in this area.

Endogenous dynamism
Democracy and human rights cannot be permanently imposed from outside. The Netherlands and the EU should influence without lecturing and accept the fact that within an Islamic frame of reference democracy and human rights may sometimes (provisionally) be worked out in a manner different from that which is customary in Western countries. In many respects, Muslim countries do not satisfy contemporary international standards regarding democracy and human rights. In this, for that matter, they do not differ from many (other) developing countries. Precisely because of this, the question of whether and how they wish to aim for improvement is crucial. Serious reforms in the direction of international standards deserve support, including those which proceed from an Islamic discourse. Progressive improvements of human rights in many Muslim countries are simply easier to accept if they can be imbedded in the local tradition and culture. This is illustrated by the new family legislation in Morocco; considerable improvement in women's rights has taken place under the banner of Sharia.

Implications for the Netherlands
Internal European and Dutch relations also demand attention to diversity and dynamism. This, however, will require a cultural shift. To date, political and public debate in the Netherlands demonstrates insufficient knowledge of Islam and the many Islamic-political movements and schools of thought. Governments should support active and especially structural initiatives which broaden the supply of information about these themes among Muslims and non-Muslims. Structural contributions may serve as an excellent counterbalance to the one-sided information and influence mechanisms, such as that of ?web Islam? practiced by radical factions.

In the Dutch situation, the formation of parties (partially) based on Islam or Muslim identity can offer a constructive contribution to political debate. Political parties inspired by Islam can give voice to those who do not feel themselves to be represented in the Muslim representative bodies. Such parties attest to the aspiration for participation in the existing institutions and according to the democratic rules that obtain.

Conclusion
A climate of confrontation and stereotypical thinking does not create stable conditions for security, democratization, and increasing respect for human rights. The only advisable alternative is to engage the reference points for democracy and human rights in Islamic activism itself. The analyses presented in this report demonstrate that these reference points, indeed, exist.

An English translation of the report Dynamism in Islamic Activism: Reference Points for Democratization and Human Rights will be published in July 2006. A PDF softcopy of this English translation of the report summary is available here.

---

Dutch reconsider Islamic values
By Roger Hardy
BBC Islamic affairs analyst

A new report submitted to the Dutch government has sparked controversy by arguing that Islam does not conflict with either human rights or Dutch values.

Islam has been a hot topic in the Netherlands since the killing of a controversial film-maker, Theo van Gogh, by a young Muslim in 2004.

In a country traditionally seen as one of the most liberal and tolerant in Europe, Islam and Muslims are now viewed with suspicion.

The report is the fruit of three years' work by the Scientific Council for Government Policy (WRR), a think-tank in The Hague which advises the government.

It examines the evolution of thinking about democracy and human rights in a dozen Muslim countries, ranging from Egypt and Iran to Indonesia.

Jan Schoonenboom, a member of the council who supervised the research, says it highlights the variety and dynamism of Islamic activism.

While there are radical, jihadi trends, there are also more mainstream Islamic movements which are moving, albeit slowly, towards democratisation.

Us and them
The report has already been roundly attacked.

The Somali-born Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a well-known critic of Islam, has said it lacks professionalism and undermines free speech.

On the contrary, Mr Schoonenboom told the BBC, by discussing Islam in this way the report is opening up serious debate and challenging widely-accepted stereotypes.

He and his colleagues take issue with Ms Hirsi Ali and others who say Islam is not compatible with democracy or women's rights or Dutch values.

Such generalisations, he says, are not just wrong but dangerous - creating a divide between us and them.

The report also looks at the topical issue of how the world should respond to the growing influence of Islamist groups such as Hamas in the Palestinian territories, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Call for new stance
Rather than isolating these groups, it argues, the Netherlands and the European Union should reach out to them to encourage progress towards democracy.

By cutting aid to Hamas, says Mr Schoonenboom, the United States and EU have created a gap which countries like Iran and Qatar are rushing to fill.

The 250-page report was handed in to the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs on 12 April.

Supporters and opponents are now waiting for the government to submit its formal response to parliament.

Story from BBC News

Perodua Kedidi

You first saw it here thanks to Intan Safarina Pouzan (intan@gerbangperdana.com.my), Muzamil Hamidi (muzamilhamidi@gmail.com) and Autoworld.

Copyright 2003-2006 Azlan Adnan Legal Notice

I told him to piss off (but in a nice way)

4/21/06 3:48 AM
NUPARIEL CHRIS COMSTOCK (getsquirted@yahoo.com)
my band is 'WATER' and my newest album 'ICEBERG' is finally online- u can hear the whole thing for free and some of our first album as well at: http://www.pureformality.com/water/listen.html
thx for listening and any feedback is much appreciated

---

4/22/06 1:29 AM
The Absolutely Hilarious, Fabulously Wonderful Guy!
the words that come to mind are fluid, warm, sensual, daringly experimental, organically unstructured ~ in fact, very much like warm piss dripping down your trouser leg, leaving you with a heady, sickly sweet and sticky abundance of relief and warm satisfaction...

4/22/06 2:45 AM
FUNeral
this is your band?

4/22/06 2:47 AM
The Absolutely Hilarious, Fabulously Wonderful Guy!
no, but did you like the way i told him to piss off?

4/22/06 2:49 AM
FUNeral
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah
4/22/06 2:49 AM
hahahah
4/22/06 2:50 AM
cool

---

4/22/06 9:07 AM
NUPARIEL CHRIS COMSTOCK (getsquirted@yahoo.com)
wow
4/22/06 9:09 AM
anything else?
4/22/06 9:09 AM
piss?
4/22/06 9:09 AM
wait...
4/22/06 9:09 AM
what?
4/22/06 9:09 AM
u're a trip dude

Copyright 2003-2006 Azlan Adnan Legal Notice

Shall I tell him to go fuck his backside?

nelson12 (nelsonlindawilliams4@katamail.com) Wrote:

DEAR, WITHOUT ANY DOUBT I KNOW THAT THIS MAIL MAY COME TO YOU AS A SURPRISE BUT IT IS BORNE OUT OF GENUIE NEED FOR URGENT ASSISTANCE. I AM NELSON WILLIAMS THE ONLY SON OF FORMER FINACE DIRECTOR OF SIERRA LEONE GOLD AND DIAMOND CORPORATION MR JOHN WILLIAMS WHO WAS ASSASINATED BY THE REBEL FORCES LOYAL TO COPORAL FORDAY SANKOH DURING THE PEAK OF THE CIVIL WAR IN OUR COUNTRY SIERRA LEONE. BEFORE MY FATHER DIED,HE GAVE MY MOTHER A DEPOSIT SLIP AND CERTIFICATE FOR A SECRET DEPOSIT FOR THE SUM OF USD16,500,000(SIXTEEN MILLION FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND UNITED STATES DOLLARS) HE MADE WITH A BANK HERE IN ABIDJAN,COTE D\'IVOIRE IN A TRUST ACCOUNT.MY MOTHER WHO LATER DIED OF HYPERTENSION SIX MONTHS AFTER THE DEATH OF MY FATHER,ON HER SICK BED SHE HANDED ME THE DOCUMENTS WHICH THE BANK ISSUE TO MY LATE FATHER ON THE DAY HE DEPOSITED THE MONEY AND ADVISE ME TO LOOK FOR A TRUSTED AND RELIABLE FOREIGNER WHO WILL HELP US TO TRANSFER THE MONEY TO ABROAD AFTER WHICH I AND MY YOUNGER SISTER LINDA(19YEARS) WILL JOIN THE PERSON FOR THE INVESTMENT OF THE MONEY IN GOOD BUSINESS AND FOR ME AND MY YOUNGER SISTER TO CONTINUE OUR EDUCATION.THIS WAS THE INTENTION OF MY FATHER BEFORE HE DIED. I HAVE PRESENTED THE DOCUMENTS TO THE BANK AND THEY ARE AWAITING FOR THE FOREIGN BANKING DETAILS WHERE THE MONEY WILL BE TRANSFERRED TO.THIS IS ALSO IN LINE WITH THE AGREEMENT MY LATE FATHER ENTERED WITH THE BANK AT THE TIME OF DEPOSIT THAT THE MONEY WILL BE TRANSFERRED TO THE ACCOUNT OF THE BENEFICIARY WHOSE NAME HE DID NOT DISCLOSE TO THE BANK. YOU ARE REQUIRED TO PROVIDE AN ACCOUNT WHERE THIS FUND WILL BE TRANSFERRED .YOU WILL HAVE 10% OF THE TOTAL MONEY.YOU WILL STAND AS OUR GUARDIAN AND THE BENEFICIARY OF THE FUND IN LINE WITH WHAT MY LATE FATHER TOLD THE BANK AT THE TIME OF DEPOSITE. PLEASE DO NOT EXPOSE THIS TRANSACTION AS THERE ARE A LOTOF BAD THINGS HAPPENNING IN THE WORLD NOW.WE TRUST AND HOPE THAT YOU WILL NOT SEIZE THE MONEY WHEN IT IS TRANSFERRED TO YOUR ACCOUNT BEFORE WE JOIN YOU INYOUR COUNTRY. GOD WILL BLESS YOU FOR ASSISTING US. BEST REGARDS NELSON AND LINDA EMAIL US WITH THIS ADDRESS, nelsonlindawilliams4@katamail.com CALL ME WITH THIS NUMBER 225 07 13 80 34

Shall I tell her to go fuck her backside?

From: Mrs. Susan Shabangu (susan_shaba356@yahoo.ca)
Reply-To: susan_shaba356@yahoo.ca
Date: Apr 22, 2006 9:36 AM
Subject: Assitance Required.

Dear ,

Compliments of the season,

With warm heart I offer my friendship and greetings, and I hope this
mail meets you in good time. However strange or surprising this contact
might seem to you as we have not met personally or had any dealings
in the past, I humbly ask that you take due consideration of its
importance and the immense benefit if it will be to you. fter careful
consideration with my children, we resolved to contact you for your
most needed assistance in this manner. I duly apologize for infringing
on your privacy, if this contact is not acceptable to you, as I make this
proposal to you as a person of integrity.

First and foremost I wish to introduce myself properly to you. My name
is Mrs. Susan Shabangu, mother of three and the Deputy Minister of
Minerals and Energy of The Republic of South Africa for seven years
running.You can go through my profile
http://www.gov.za/gol/gcis_profile.jsp?id=1066

I will now give you a general overview of the situation. When I was
sworn in as Deputy Minister of Minerals and Energy in 1996, with my
influence, my husband Mr. Shabangu a very successful
businessman was awarded several contracts in my ministry and had
direct dealings with foreign investors in this field. Due to my political
status, I was not involved in my husband's business which was very
vast and successful. My beloved husband died whilst on an official
trip to Trinidad and Tobago in February 2001.

When my husband died, I was contacted as next of kin by a private
finance/security firm in Europe to come forth with the Certificate of
Deposit and claim a safety deposit my husband had in their Vault in
his name. At that time, my children and I did not have an idea where
the Certificate might be. We then instructed the security firm to
continue holding the safety deposit until further instructions from me.
Whilst preparing for the second remembrance of my beloved husband,
I was going through his library collection and to my astonishment I
discovered a Certificate of Deposit for the safety deposit with this
private security firm, and other documents relating to the safety
deposit in a book. The safety deposit which is a trunk, is stocked
with hard currency (US Dollars) totalling $18,500,000 which was
generated from cash payments from his business associates in the
diamond trade from Antwerp, Belgium. Though I knew my late
husband was in the diamond business, I did not have the
knowledge that he moved funds in cash. This came as a shock
to me and my children.We have now decided to have this funds
invested immediately in commercial and residential properties
abroad as well as profitable ventures, as any member of my
family cannot hold such a huge amount in our name due to my
political status, hence we sincerely propose to you to render us
your most needed assistance in this regard.

If you agree to render us your assistance, your role in this
project will be to act on my behalf as a trustee to receive the
safety deposit containing the funds from the Security firm.
Though I believe this transaction should be based on
mutuality, my family's interest will be protected by a family
associate, who is a lawyer(attorney) attached to the South
African Embassy in the country where the finance/security
firm is located. He is now aware of the safety deposit, and I
have informed him that I am locating one of my husband's
business associates (you) to handle the funds and invest on
our behalf, as he might be opposed to our decision if he
found out that I barely know you.

For your reliable assistance, we are offering you
15% ($2,775,000) of the funds. I thank you in advance as
we anticipate your assistance in enabling us achieve this
goal. On hearing from you, I will forward your contact to the
gentleman lawyer who will be representing us, and also give
you his contact for both of you to communicate and proceed
with the transaction.

He will be working with you for a mutual conclusion of the
process and I look forward to a long lasting business relationship
with you. As you may understand, due to my sensitive position in
the present government, it is not safe to communicate with me
via phone or fax. This is why I have communicated with you with
my private email address, and I like us to keep it this way, for the
safety of this transaction. Please contact me at this my private
email address, whether or not you are interested in assisting us.
This will enable us make alternative plans, in the event of
non-interest on your part.

With warm regards,

Mrs. Susan Shabangu
Deputy Minister of Minerals and Energy
South Africa.

Of War and Peace

As with all things to do with war and violence, there are no real winners ~ even nations who win wars suffer deaths and injuries on their side.

The true winners of conflict are those who conquer their own anger, hatred and fears; those who surrender to peace, who strive to live in peace and harmony, tolerance, friendship and understanding. Of course, this is easier said than done ~ that's why there are so many wars in the world today.

We must all do our part and that's why I encourage each and everyone of you to voice your point of view so that others may understand your perspective. That is the first step in a journey of a thousand miles, I know, but every journey begins with but one step...

The alternative, as Gandhi says, is "An eye for an eye leaves everyone blind."

Please have a look at:
www.peaceisthewayglobalcommunity.org
and sign-up to commit to a life as a Peacemaker if you believe Unilateral Peace is the way forward for the Progress of Civilization.

"We must be the change we want to see in the World."
~ Mahatma Gandhi

Copyright 2003-2006 Azlan Adnan Legal Notice

Susan Blackmore

Susan Blackmore (born July 29, 1951)

Susan Jane Blackmore (born July 29, 1951) is a British psychologist, writer, broadcaster, and former academic, perhaps best known for her book The Meme Machine.

Career
In 1973, Susan Blackmore graduated from St. Hilda's College, University of Oxford, with a BA (Hons) in psychology and physiology. She went on to do a postgraduate degree in environmental psychology at the University of Surrey, achieving an MSc in 1974. In 1980, she gained one of the first PhDs in parapsychology in the UK (Surrey University), her thesis being entitled "Extrasensory Perception as a Cognitive Process".

In 2001, she left her position as Senior Lecturer in Psychology at the University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol, where she taught courses on parapsychology and consciousness. Her research interests include belief in the paranormal, astrology and divination, near-death experiences, the effects of meditation, evolutionary psychology and the theory of memetics. At UWE, she was Perrott-Warrick Researcher studying psychic phenomena in borderline states of consciousness. She has been awarded prizes by both the Society for Psychical Research and CSICOP (Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal). She is one of few researchers who have published work on Lucid Dreams.

She has done research on memes (which she wrote about in her popular book The Meme Machine), evolutionary theory, consciousness, and the paranormal.

She has also appeared on television a number of times, discussing such paranormal phenomena as ghosts, ESP, and out-of-body experiences, in what she describes as the "unenviable role of Rentaskeptic", and she has also presented a show on alien abductions. Another programme which she has presented discusses the intelligence of apes. She also acted as one of the psychologists who featured on the British version of the television show "Big Brother", speaking about the psychological state of the contestants. She was on the editorial board for the Journal of Memetics (an electronic journa, now defunctl) from 1997 to 2001, and has been a consulting editor of the Skeptical Inquirer since 1998.

One of her recent books, Consciousness: An Introduction (2004), is a textbook that broadly covers the field of consciousness studies. In it she covers a wide variety of topics such as the mind-body problem, the hard problem of consciousness, philosophy of mind, cognitive neuropsychology, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, evolution, parapsychology, altered states of consciousness, phenomenology, Buddhism, and meditation.

In sidebars of her book she has written brief profiles about various notable contributors to the field such as Daniel C. Dennett, John Searle, David Chalmers, Patricia Churchland, Francis Crick, Antonio Damasio, V.S. Ramachandran, John Carew Eccles, Rodney Brooks, Alan Turing, Francisco Varela, Rene Descartes, David Hume, William James, and the Buddha.

Susan Blackmore conducted interviews with leading scientists and philosophers in the study of consciousness for a proposed (but never realized) radio series, compiling their responses into lively, though slightly repetitive, Q&A interviews. The result, in book form, is her latest work, Conversations on Consciousness: What the Best Minds Think about the Brain, Free Will, and What It Means to Be Human, 2006.

Memetics
Susan Blackmore has made contributions to the field of memetics, with works aimed at the layman, though her writings are lacking in scientific foundation and are more cultural study than psychology or neuroscience. The term meme was coined by Richard Dawkins in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene and although the term has been widely used it is often misunderstood. Blackmore's book The Meme Machine is perhaps the most thorough introduction to memetics available.

In his foreword to this work, Dawkins said "Any theory deserves to be given its best shot, and this is what Susan Blackmore has done for the theory of the meme." Much more scientific treatments can be found in the works of Robert Aunger, such as The Electric Meme: A New Theory of How We Think.

Blackmore's treatment of memetics insists that memes are true evolutionary replicators, a second replicator that like genetics is subject to the Darwinian Algorithm and undergoes evolutionary change. Her prediction on the central role played by imitation as the cultural replicator and the neural structures that must be unique to our species necessary to support it have recently been confirm by research on mirror neurons and the differences in extent of these structures between humans and our closest ape relations.

In her work on memetics she has emphasized the role that Darwinian mechanisms play in cultural evolution and has helped develop the field of Universal Darwinism.

Personal life
In 1977, she married fellow academic Tom Troscianko, and they had two children: Emily Tamarisk Troscianko (born February 20, 1982), and Jolyon Tomasz Troscianko (born May 17, 1984). She is now the partner of the television presenter and scientist Adam Hart-Davis.

Blackmore is an active practitioner of Zen, although she identifies herself as "not a Buddhist". Blackmore is an atheist who has criticized religion sharply, saying of religious ideas: "I believe they are false".

Books
The Adventures of a Parapsychologist, Prometheus Books (February 1987)
Dying to Live: Near-Death Experiences, Prometheus Books; Reprint edition (September 1993)
In Search of the Light: The Adventures of a Parapsychologist, Prometheus Books (May 1996)
Test Your Psychic Powers, Susan Blackmore and Adam Hart-Davis, Sterling; Reprint edition (June 30, 1997)
The Meme Machine, Oxford University Press, New Edition (May 16, 2000)
Consciousness: An Introduction, Oxford University Press (October 16, 2003)
Consciousness: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press (June 23, 2005)
Conversations on Consciousness: What the Best Minds Think about the Brain, Free Will, and What It Means to Be Human, Oxford University Press (January 1, 2006)
Contemporary Authors: Biography - Blackmore, Susan (Jane) (1951-)

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Richard Dawkins

Clinton Richard Dawkins DSc, FRS, FRSL;
born March 26, 1941

Clinton Richard Dawkins DSc, FRS, FRSL (known as Richard Dawkins; born March 26, 1941) is an eminent British ethologist, evolutionary theorist, and popular science writer who holds the Charles Simonyi Chair in the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University.

Dawkins first came to prominence with his 1976 book The Selfish Gene which popularised the gene-centric view of evolution, and introduced the terms meme and memetics into the lexicon.

In 1982, he made a major original contribution to the science of evolution with the theory, presented in his book The Extended Phenotype: The Long Reach of the Gene, that phenotypic effects are not limited to an organism's body but can stretch far into the environment, including the bodies of other organisms.

He has since written several best-selling popular books on evolution and appeared in a number of television programmes on evolutionary biology, creationism, and religion.

Dawkins is an atheist, Humanist, skeptic and ~ as a commentator on science, religion and politics ~ is among the English-speaking world's best known public intellectuals.

Personal life
Dawkins was born in Nairobi, Kenya, where his father, Clinton John Dawkins, was a farmer and former wartime soldier, called up from colonial service in Nyasaland (now Malawi). Dawkins' parents came from an affluent upper-middle class background. Both were interested in the natural sciences and answered the young Dawkins' questions in more scientific than anecdotal or supernatural terms.

Dawkins describes his childhood as "a normal Anglican upbringing," but reveals that he began doubting the existence of God when he was about nine years old. He was later reconverted because he was persuaded by the argument from design, though he began to feel that the customs of the Church of England were "absurd," and had more to do with dictating morals than with God. When he was taught about evolution at the age of sixteen, his religious position again changed because he felt that evolution could account for the complexity of life in purely material terms, and thus that a designer was not necessary.

He married his first wife, Marian Stamp, in 1967 but they divorced in 1984. Later that year, Dawkins married Eve Barham ~ with whom he had a daughter, Juliet ~ but they too subsequently divorced. He married his third wife, actress Lalla Ward, in 1992. Ward has illustrated a number of Dawkins' books.

Career
Dawkins moved to England with his parents at the age of eight. He studied zoology at Balliol College, Oxford, where he was tutored by Nobel Prize-winning ethologist Nikolaas Tinbergen. He gained a second class BA degree in zoology in 1962, followed by an MA and DPhil degree in 1966.

Between 1967 and 1969, Dawkins was an assistant professor of zoology at the University of California, Berkeley. In 1970 he was appointed a lecturer and then in 1990 a reader in zoology at the University of Oxford, before becoming the University's first Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science in 1995.

He has been a fellow of New College, Oxford, since 1970. In 1991, he delivered the annual Royal Institution Christmas Lectures, entitled Growing Up in the Universe ~ the lectures later formed the basis for his book Climbing Mount Improbable.

In 2005, Discover magazine referred to Dawkins as "Darwin's rottweiler," a description recalling the epithet "Darwin's bulldog" given to Darwin's nineteenth-century advocate Thomas Henry Huxley. It also suggests comparison with Pope Benedict XVI, who, as Cardinal Ratzinger, was known as "God's rottweiler."

Work

Evolutionary biology
Dawkins is probably best known for his popularisation of the gene-centred view of evolution ~ a view most clearly set out in his books The Selfish Gene (1976), where he notes that "all life evolves by the differential survival of replicating entities," and The Extended Phenotype: The Long Reach of the Gene (1982), in which he describes natural selection as "the process whereby replicators out-propagate each other."

As an ethologist, interested in animal behaviour and its relation to natural selection, he advocates the idea that the gene is the principal unit of selection in evolution.

In his books, Dawkins argues that the gene-centered view is a useful model of evolution for some purposes, but that evolution can still be understood and studied in terms of individuals and populations.

The gene-centered view also provides a basis for understanding altruism. Altruism appears at first to be a paradox, as helping others costs precious resources ~ possibly even one's own health and life ~ thus reducing one's own fitness.

Previously, this had been interpreted by many as an aspect of group selection, that is, individuals were doing what was best for the survival of the population or species. But W. D. Hamilton used the gene-centered view to explain altruism in terms of inclusive fitness and kin selection, that is, individuals behave altruistically towards their close relations, who share many of their own genes.

(Hamilton's work features prominently in Dawkins' books, and the two became friends at Oxford; following Hamilton's death in 2000 Dawkins wrote his obituary and organised a secular memorial service.)

Similarly, Robert Trivers, thinking in terms of the gene-centered model, developed the theory of reciprocal altruism, where one organism provides a benefit to another in the expectation of future reciprocation.

Critics of Dawkins' approach suggest that taking the gene as the unit of selection is misleading, but that the gene could be described as a unit of evolution. The reasoning here is that in a selection event, an individual either succeeds or fails to survive and reproduce, but over time it is proportions of alleles in a population which change.

In The Selfish Gene, however, Dawkins explains that he is using George Christopher Williams' definition of gene as "that which segregates and recombines with appreciable frequency."

Similarly, it is commonly argued that genes can not survive alone, but must cooperate to build an individual, but in The Extended Phenotype: The Long Reach of the Gene, Dawkins argues that because of genetic recombination and sexual reproduction, from an individual gene's viewpoint, all other genes are part of the environment to which it is adapted.

Recombination is a process which occurs during meiosis in which pairs of chromosomes cross over to swap segments of DNA. These sections are the "genes" to which Dawkins and Williams refer.

In the controversy over interpretations of evolution (the so-called Darwin Wars), one faction is often named for Dawkins and its rival for Stephen Jay Gould. This reflects the pre-eminence of each as a populariser of contesting viewpoints, rather than because either is the more substantial or extreme champion of these positions.

In particular, Dawkins and Gould have been prominent commentators in the controversy over sociobiology and evolutionary psychology, with Dawkins generally approving and Gould critical.

A typical example of Dawkins' position is his scathing review (1985) of Not in Our Genes by Richard Lewontin, Steven Rose, Leon J. Kamin. Two other thinkers often considered to be in the same camp as Dawkins are the evolutionary psychologist Steven Pinker, and the philosopher Daniel Dennett who has promoted the gene-centric view of evolution and defended reductionism in biology.

Memetics
Dawkins coined the term meme (analogous to the gene) to describe how Darwinian principles might be extended to explain the spread of ideas and cultural phenomena, which spawned the theory of memetics. While originally floating the idea in The Selfish Gene, Dawkins has largely left it to other authors, such as Susan Blackmore, to expand upon it.

Creationism
Dawkins is an established critic of creationism, describing it as a "preposterous, mind-shrinking falsehood." His book The Blind Watchmaker is a critique of the argument from design, and his other popular-science works often touch on the topic.

On the advice of his late colleague Stephen Jay Gould, Dawkins refuses to participate in debates with creationists because doing so would give them the "oxygen of respectability" that they want. He argues that creationists "don't mind being beaten in an argument. What matters is that we give them recognition by bothering to argue with them in public."

In a December 2004 interview with Bill Moyers, Dawkins stated that "among the things that science does know, evolution is about as certain as anything we know." When Moyers later asked, "Is evolution a theory, not a fact?," Dawkins replied, "Evolution has been observed. It's just that it hasn't been observed while it's happening."

Religion
Dawkins is an ardent and outspoken atheist. He is well known for his contempt for religious extremism, from Islamic terrorism to Christian fundamentalism, but he has also argued fiercely with liberal believers and religious scientists, including many who might otherwise champion his science and fight creationism alongside him, from the biologist Kenneth R. Miller to the Bishop of Oxford Richard Harries.

Dawkins continues to be a prominent figure in contemporary public debate on issues relating to science and religion. He sees education and consciousness-raising as the primary tools in opposing what he considers to be religious dogma.

Following the September 11, 2001 attacks, when asked how the world might have changed, Dawkins responded:

"Many of us saw religion as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where's the harm? September 11th changed all that. Revealed faith is not harmless nonsense, it can be lethally dangerous nonsense. Dangerous because it gives people unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness. Dangerous because it gives them false courage to kill themselves, which automatically removes normal barriers to killing others. Dangerous because it teaches enmity to others labelled only by a difference of inherited tradition. And dangerous because we have all bought into a weird respect, which uniquely protects religion from normal criticism. Let's now stop being so damned respectful!"

In January 2006, Dawkins presented a two-part Channel 4 documentary entitled The Root of All Evil?, addressing what he sees as the malignant influence of organised religion in society.

Oxford theologian Alister McGrath, author of Dawkins' God: Genes, Memes, and the Meaning of Life, has accused Dawkins of being ignorant of Christian theology and mischaracterising religious people generally. In response, Dawkins criticises McGrath for providing no argument to support his beliefs, other than the fact that they cannot be falsified.

Other fields
In his role as professor of the public understanding of science, Dawkins has been a harsh critic of pseudoscience and alternative medicine. His popular work Unweaving the Rainbow takes John Keats' claim that by explaining the rainbow, Isaac Newton had diminished its beauty and turned it around. Deep space, the billions of years of life's evolution, and the microscopic workings of biology and heredity, Dawkins argues, contain more beauty and wonder than myths and pseudoscience.

Dawkins wrote a foreword to John Diamond's posthumously published Snake Oil, a book devoted to debunking alternative medicine, in which he asserted that alternative medicine was harmful, if only because it distracted patients away from more successful conventional treatments, and gave people false hopes. Dawkins states that "There is no alternative medicine. There is only medicine that works and medicine that doesn't work."

Dawkins has expressed a Malthusian concern over the exponential growth of human population and the issue of overpopulation. He is critical of Catholic attitudes to family planning and population control, stating that leaders who forbid contraception and "express a preference for 'natural' methods of population limitation," will get just such a method ~ starvation.

Books
The Selfish Gene (1976; 30th anniversary edition 25 May 2006)
The Extended Phenotype: The Long Reach of the Gene (1982; revised edition 1999)
The Blind Watchmaker (1986; reissued 1996)
River Out of Eden (1995; reprint edition 1996); Audio (2000) ISBN 0752839853
Climbing Mount Improbable (1997)
Unweaving the Rainbow
A Devil's Chaplain (2003)
The Ancestor's Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Life (2004); Audio (2005) ISBN 0752873210
Since 2004 Dawkins has been working on a new book, tentatively titled The God Delusion.

Books about Dawkins
Kim Sterelny, Dawkins vs Gould: Survival of the Fittest (2001) ~ Debates on evolutionary theory between Dawkins and Stephen Jay Gould.
Roger Steer, Letter to an Influential Atheist (2003) ~ A Christian critique of Dawkins.
Alister McGrath, Dawkins' God: Genes, Memes, and the Meaning of Life (2005) ~ A critique of Dawkins' attack on theistic religion.
Alan Grafen & Mark Ridley (editors), Richard Dawkins: How a Scientist Changed the Way We Think (2006) ~ A series of 26 essays on Dawkins and his work.

Michio Kaku

Professor Michio Kaku (born January 24, 1947 in the United States) is a Japanese American theoretical physicist, tenured professor, and co-creator of string field theory, a branch of String Theory. Prof Kaku received a BS (summa cum laude) from Harvard University in 1968 where he was first in his physics class. He went on to the Berkeley Radiation Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley and received a PhD in 1972. In 1973 he held a lectureship at Princeton University.

In addition to holding the Henry Semat Chair and Professorship in theoretical physics at City College of New York, he has taught there for more than 25 years. Presently, he is engaged in working on Einstein's "Theory of Everything," seeking to unify the four fundamental forces of the universe: the strong force, the weak force, gravity and electromagnetism. Additionally, he has been a visiting professor at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, as well as at New York University.

Prof Kaku is the author of several scholarly, PhD-level textbooks and has had more than 70 articles published in physics journals covering topics such as superstring theory, supergravity, supersymmetry, and hadronic physics. Based on the number of citations his work has received in the academic literature, Kaku has an h-index of 22, which is respectable but significantly below that of top-tier theoretical physicists.

He is, however, also known as an author of popular science books, including the best-sellers Beyond Einstein: The Cosmic Quest for the Theory of the Universe, Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century, Hyperspace: A Scientific Odyssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and the 10th Dimension, and Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos, which has been shortlisted for the 2006 Aventis Prize.

WBAI, a Pacifica radio station in New York City airs a weekly (syndicated) radio show featuring Prof Kaku related to science and ecology. Additionally, a podcast is available of the show at http://archive.wbai.org

Prof Kaku has become a popular figure in mainstream media, due to his knowledge, as well as his accesible approach to explaining complex physics, quantum mechanics and other topics from a layperson's point of view. His frequent guest spots on Coast to Coast AM and similar programs have earned him a mixed reputation as both a spokesman for successfully explaining theoretical physics, as well as something of a "fringe" scientist (due to the audience of Coast to Coast AM, for example).

While his books largely stay within the realm of mainstream theoretical physics, he takes a more liberal approach to public speaking. At such events, he has discussed topics ranging from the Kardashev scale to more esoteric subjects such as wormholes and time travel.

Prof Kaku's interests aren't completely confined to science. He is a noted researcher of the Kennedy assassination and US government covert operations.

His intellect was observed early on. During high school, Kaku built a homemade betatron.

Books
Beyond Einstein: The Cosmic Quest for the Theory of the Universe
Einstein's Cosmos: How Albert Einstein's Vision Transformed Our Understanding of Space and Time
Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century
Hyperspace: A Scientific Odyssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and the 10th Dimension
Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos
Introduction to Superstrings and M-Theory
Strings, Conformal Fields, and M-Theory
Quantum Field Theory: A Modern Introduction
Strings, Conformal fields, and Topology: An introduction
A Journey Through the Tenth Dimension
Nuclear Power: Both Sides
To Win a Nuclear War: The Pentagon's Secret War Plans

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Jared Diamond

Professor Jared Mason Diamond (born 10 September 1937) is an American nonfiction author, evolutionary biologist, physiologist, and biogeographer. He is best known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies (1997).

Diamond was born in Boston to a physician father and a teacher/musician/linguist mother. After attending The Roxbury Latin School, he earned a BA degree from Harvard in 1958 and his PhD in physiology and membrane biophysics from Cambridge University in 1961. During 1962-1966, he returned to Harvard as a junior Fellow. He became professor of physiology at UCLA Medical School in 1966. While in his twenties, he also developed a second parallel career in the ecology and evolution of New Guinea birds, and he has led numerous trips to explore New Guinea and nearby islands. In his fifties, Diamond gradually developed a third career in environmental history, becoming professor of geography and of environmental health sciences at UCLA, his current position.

Diamond is renowned as the author of a number of popular science works that combine anthropology, biology, linguistics, genetics, and history. While Diamond became a staunch opponent of the use of genetic and racial arguments to account for the differences in technological sophistication, in 1986 he wrote a commentary entitled "Ethnic differences: Variation in human testis size," in which he commented on possible relations between testis size, hormone levels, and rates of dizygotic twinning in various ethnic groups.

His best-known work is the Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies (1997), which asserts that the main international issues of our time are legacies of processes that began during the early-modern period, in which civilizations that had experienced an extensive amount of "human development" began to intrude upon simpler civilizations around the world. Diamond's quest is to explain why such advanced civilizations developed only in Eurasia, and to do so in ways that do not appeal to ethnocentric myths, but do away with them. Although it identifies the main processes and factors of civilizational development that were present in Eurasia, but not elsewhere, it does so by tracing commonalities between Eurasian civilizations, leaving the question open of why Europe came to supersede other Eurasian civilizations after 1800.

In his most recent book, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (2004), Diamond examines what caused some of the great civilizations of the past to collapse into ruin and considers what contemporary society can learn from their fates. It has been shortlisted for the 2006 Aventis Prize.

Books
Why Is Sex Fun? The Evolution of Human Sexuality
Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal
The Birds of Northern Melanesia: Speciation, Ecology, and Biogeography

Copyright 2003-2006 Azlan Adnan Legal Notice

2006 Aventis Prize Shortlist

The six books in the running to claim the 2006 Aventis General Prize for science books have been named:

Power, Sex, Suicide -
Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life
by Nick Lane (Oxford University Press)

Mitochondria are tiny structures within all our cells that do the essential task of producing energy. They are pivotal in power, sex, and suicide. In his book, Nick Lane shows how understanding mitochondria is of fundamental importance, both in understanding how complex life came to be, but also in order to be able to control our own illnesses, and delay our degeneration and death.

Empire of the Stars -
Friendship, Obsession and Betrayal in the Quest for Black Holes
by Arthur I. Miller (Little Brown)

In August 1930, the young Indian scientist Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar calculated that certain stars could end their lives by collapsing indefinitely to a point - to nowhere. This idea brought Chandrasekhar into conflict with Sir Arthur S. Eddington, the grand old man of British astrophysics, who publicly ridiculed the idea. Empire of the Stars teases out the major implications of this infamous event, setting it against the backdrop of the turbulent growth of astrophysics.

Electric Universe -
How Electricity Switched on the Modern World
by David Bodanis (Little Brown)

For centuries, electricity was viewed as little more than a curious property of certain substances that sparked when rubbed. Then, in the 1790s, Alessandro Volta began the scientific investigation that ignited an explosion of knowledge and invention. In Electric Universe, Bodanis weaves the tales of romance, divine inspiration, and fraud that surround the story of electricity.

Collapse -
How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive
by Jared Diamond (Penguin Allen Lane)

Why do some societies flourish, while others founder? What happened to the people who made the long-abandoned statues of Easter Island or to the architects of the Maya pyramids? And will we go the same way? Bringing together new evidence and piecing together the myriad influences that make societies self-destruct, Collapse shows how, unlike our ancestors, we can benefit from our knowledge of the past and learn to be survivors.

Parallel Worlds -
The Science of Alternative Universes and our Future in the Cosmos
by Michio Kaku (Penguin)

Getting a grip on the creation and ultimate fate of the Universe is one of the great scientific stories of the 20th Century. In the 21st, the story is expanding to enfold many universes. Parallel Worlds tells that new story. Using the latest astronomical data, Prof Kaku explores the Big Bang, "theories of everything", our cosmic future and the human implications of this story.

The Truth About Hormones -
What's Going on when We're Tetchy, Spotty, Fearful, Tearful or Just Plain Awful
by Vivienne Parry (Atlantic Books)

Hormones rule our internal world: they control our growth, our metabolism, weight, water-balance, body clocks, fertility, muscle bulk, mood, speed of ageing, whether we want sex or not (and whether we enjoy it) and even who we fall in love with. In The Truth About Hormones, Vivienne Parry explains how, exactly, these mysteriously powerful things affect us.

The following books made the longlist but not the shortlist for the 2006 Aventis Prize:

Venomous Earth - How Arsenic Caused the World's Worst Mass Poisoning
by Andrew Meharg (Macmillan)

Seven Deadly Colours - The Genius of Nature's Palette and how it Eluded Darwin
by Andrew Parker (Simon & Schuster)

Stalking the Riemann Hypothesis - The Quest to Find the Hidden Law of Prime Numbers
by Daniel N. Rockmore (Jonathan Cape)

The Fruits of War - How War and Conflict have Driven Science
by Michael White (Simon & Schuster)

The Elements of Murder - A History of Poison
by John Emsley (Oxford University Press)

The Gecko's Foot - Bio-inspiration - Engineering New Materials from Nature
by Peter Forbes (Fourth Estate)

The Silicon Eye - How a Silicon Valley Company Aims to Make All Current Computers, Cameras, and Cell Phones Obsolete
by George Gilder (WW Norton)

US marines desecrate Babylon

Babylon was home to one of the ancient world's Seven Wonders

A senior US marine officer has admitted to damage caused by his troops to the ancient Iraqi site of Babylon.

US forces built a helicopter pad on the ancient ruins and filled their sandbags with archaeological material in the months following the 2003 invasion.

Colonel Coleman was chief of staff at Babylon when it was occupied by the First Marine Expeditionary Force.

Babylon's Hanging Gardens were among the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

Col Coleman hasn't actually apologised for this blatant act of wantonness but said that if the Iraqis wanted an apology for the destruction caused by his men he was willing to give one.

The 2,000 troops who were deployed there did immense damage as they set up camp amidst the ruins of old temples.

A helicopter pad was constructed at the site. The vibration from landings led the roof of one building to collapse.

The soldiers also filled their sandbags with archaeological artefacts, just because they were lying around and easy to pick up.

The head of the Iraqi State Board for Heritage and Antiquities, Donny George, is angry and says the mess will take decades to sort out.

Colonel Coleman's admission comes more than a year after the British Museum said that Coalition forces in Iraq have caused irreparable damage to the ancient city of Babylon. Sandbags have been filled with precious archaeological fragments and 2,600 year old paving stones have been crushed by tanks, a museum report claimed in January 2005.

The US Army says the troops based in the city, some 50 miles (80 km) south of Baghdad, are well aware of its historical significance.

Babylon's legendary Hanging Gardens featured water diverted from mountain streams cascading down artificial hills built upon stone vaults.

American troops occupied the site in April 2003, initially to protect it from looters and vandals. John Curtis, author of the museum's report, said this was "tantamount to establishing a military camp around Stonehenge".

"About 300,000 square metres of the surface of the site has been flattened and covered with compacted gravel and sometimes chemically treated," he said.

"This will contaminate the archaeological record of the site."

He added: "I noted about 12 trenches, one of them 170 m long, which had been dug through the archaeological deposits."

Mr Curtis, who is curator of the museum's Near East department, also found evidence of fuel leaks.

But US military spokesman Lt Col Steven Boylan said the base, which has around 6,000 troops under Police command, is needed to "further defeat terrorists and insurgents".

He claimed: "Any of the excavations or earth work that we have done in order to do our operations... was done in consultation with the Babylon museum director and an archaeologist."

At the height of its power, Babylon was an awe-inspiring sight, with two sets of fortified walls surrounding massive palaces and religious buildings. It became one of the most important cities in Mesopotamia, one of the cradles of human civilisation.

Iraq is home to 10,000 archaeological sites.

Rumsfeld must go

Rumsfeld resignation calls grow

Pressure is growing on US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, with more retired generals calling for him to resign over the Iraq war.

The White House has said it is happy with the way Rumsfeld is handling his job and the situation in Iraq, but the number of retired generals calling for Rumsfeld to be replaced has risen to seven.

It is being described as a rebellion led by those who know Rumsfeld's handling of the war from the inside.

Ex-Nato commander Gen Wesley Clark, who ran for the Democrat presidential nomination in 2004, backed calls for Rumsfeld to resign.

Six retired generals have recently spoken out against Rumsfeld's handling of the war in Iraq.

Frequent critic
Gen Clark said in a television interview: "I believe secretary Rumsfeld hasn't done an adequate job. He should go."

Gen Clark said he believed Rumsfeld, along with Vice-President Dick Cheney, had helped push the Iraq invasion when there was "no connection with the war on terror".

Gen Clark said the secretary had lost the confidence of some officers in the military who were asking for "somebody in the military chain of command who will listen".

Gen Clark has been a frequent critic of the Bush administration's Iraq policy.

Two other recent retired generals to voice their unease about Rumsfeld's handling of the war are Maj Gen John Riggs and Maj Gen Charles H Swannack Jr, both of the Army.

"I feel he has micromanaged the generals who are leading our forces"
Maj Gen Charles H Swannack Jr

In a radio interview Gen Riggs, a former division commander, said it was time for Rumsfeld to go because he fostered an atmosphere of "arrogance" among the Pentagon's top civilian leadership.

"They only need the military advice when it satisfies their agenda. I think that's a mistake, and that's why I think he should resign," he told National Public Radio (NPR).

Gen Swannack Jr, who led the 82nd Airborne Division in Iraq, went even further.

He questioned whether Rumsfeld was the right person to lead the fight against terrorism.

CRITICAL RETIRED GENERALS
Gen Wesley Clark, ex-Nato commander
Gen Charles H Swannack Jr, Army
Gen John Riggs, Army
Gen John Batiste, Army
Gen Anthony Zinni, Marines
Gen Gregory Newbold, Marines
Gen Paul Eaton, Army

"I really believe that we need a new secretary of defence because Secretary Rumsfeld carried way too much baggage with him," he told CNN.

"Specifically, I feel he has micromanaged the generals who are leading our forces."

Gen Riggs, who has been an outspoken critic on problems facing the US military before, served in the army for 39 years and became a three-star general.

He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for his actions as a helicopter pilot during Vietnam, but retired with the loss of one of his general's stars after the army said he had misused contractors, according to the NPR website.

Gen Swannack Jr commanded the 82nd Airborne Division in Iraq from 2003-4.

The fresh resignation calls add to those already made by four other retired generals directly involved in the Iraq war and its planning.

Retired Marine Gen Anthony Zinni told CNN Rumsfeld should be held responsible for a series of mistakes, beginning with "throwing away 10 years worth of planning, plans that had taken into account what we would face in an occupation of Iraq".

The embattled defence secretary, had earlier twice offered to resign over the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal - offers which US President George W Bush rejected.

Further Reading
Pieces of Intelligence: The Existential Poetry of Donald H. Rumsfeld
Rumsfeld's War: The Untold Story of America's Anti-Terrorist Commander

Cocoa and Chocolate

Originating from the foothills of the Andes in the Amazon and Orinoco basins of South America, the cocoa tree was introduced into Central America by the ancient Maya, and was cultivated in Mexico by the Toltecs and later by the Aztecs.

Cocoa was an important commodity in Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica. Spanish chroniclers of the conquest of Mexico by Hernan Cortes relate that when Montezuma II, emperor of the Aztecs, dined he took no other beverage than chocolate, served in a golden goblet and eaten with a golden spoon. Flavoured with vanilla and spices, his chocolate was whipped into a froth that dissolved in the mouth. No less than 50 pitchers of it were prepared for the emperor each day, and 2,000 more for nobles of his court.

Chocolate was introduced to Europe by the Spaniards and became a popular beverage by 1700. They also introduced the cocoa tree into the West Indies and the Philippines. The cocoa plant was first given its name by Swedish natural scientist Carl von Linne (Latinized in scientific publications as Carolus Linnaeus), 1707-1778, who called it "Theobroma cacao" or "food of the gods".

The use of chocolate, cocoa and related products is world-wide. The United Kingdom has the highest per capita consumption of cocoa at 10 kg, 20 times the world-wide average, with Belgium second at 5.5 kg. Prices for the commodity reached a five-year high in November 2004; this is because exports from Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) were cut due to escalating violence in the region.

The world's leading producers of cocoa in descending order are: Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Ghana, Indonesia, Nigeria, Brazil, Cameroon and Ecuador. World production in 2004 was 3.6 million tonnes.

The cocoa fruit is called a pod. Each pod has a rough leathery rind about 3 cm thick and is filled with sweet, slimy pulp, enclosing from 30 to 50 large almond-like seeds or "beans" that are fairly soft and pinkish or purplish in colour. As soon as the pods are ripe, they are harvested from the trunks or branches of the cocoa tree with a curved knife on a long pole.

Processing
The harvested pods are then opened with a machete, the pulp and cocoa beans are removed and the rind is discarded. The pulp and beans are then either piled in heaps, placed in bins, or laid out on grates for several days. During this time, the beans and pulp undergoes "sweating", where the thick pulp liquifies as it undergoes fermentation.

The fermented pulp trickles away, leaving cocoa beans behind to be collected. The quality of the beans, which originally have a strong bitter taste, depends upon sweating. If it is overdone, the resulting cocoa may be ruined; if underdone the cocoa seed maintains a flavour similar to raw potatoes and become susceptible to mildew. The liquified pulp is used by some cocoa producing countries to distill alcoholic spirits.

The fermented beans are then dried by spreading them out over a large surface and constantly raking them. This is done on trays under the sun or by using artificial heat. Finally, the beans are trodden and shuffled about and sometimes, during this process, red clay mixed with water is sprinkled over the beans to obtain a finer colour, polish, and protection against moulds during shipment to factories in the United States, the Netherlands, United Kingdom, and other countries. About 3 million tonnes of cocoa are grown each year. The Netherlands is the leading cocoa processing country, followed by the United States.

Chocolate
To make 1 kg of chocolate, about 300 to 600 beans are processed. In a factory, the beans are washed and roasted. Next, they are de-hulled by a "nibber" machine that also removes the germ. The nibs are ground between three sets of stones until they emerge as a thick creamy paste. Cocoa powder is made from this "liquor" by removing part of its fatty oils (the "cocoa butter" used in confectionery, soaps, and cosmetics), either with a hydraulic press or by using the Broma process. With starch and sugar added, the liquor is churned and beaten in a "Conges" machine to produce sweet chocolate.

Adding an alkali produces Dutch process cocoa powder, which has less acidity and is what is generally available in most of the world. Regular or nonalkalized cocoa is lighter in colour and sharper in flavour. It is acidic, so when added to recipes with an alkaline ingredient like baking soda, the two react and leaven a product. Dutch processed cocoa is less acidic, darker and more mellow in flavour.

The uses of cocoa are numerous. It may be used in cakes, creams, drinks and toppings. Cocoa has about twice the antioxidants (thought to prevent cancer) of red wine, and up to three times those found in green tea.

For more information, click on the links below:
The Food of the Gods
International Cocoa Organization
Malaysian Cocoa Board
Chocopaedia
Lindt
Hauswirth
Easter Bunny Chocolate

Copyright 2003-2006 Azlan Adnan Legal Notice

Golden Oldies

When the husband finally died his wife put the usual death notice in the paper, but added that he died of gonorrhea.

No sooner were the papers delivered when a friend of the family phoned and complained bitterly, "You know very well that he died of diarrhea, not gonorrhea."

Replied the widow, "I nursed him night and day so of course I know he died of diarrhea, but I thought it would be better for posterity to remember him as a great lover rather than the big shit he always was."

~~~::(",)::~~~

An elderly couple were on a cruise and it was really stormy. They were standing on the back of the boat watching the moon, when a wave came up and washed the old woman overboard. They searched for days and couldn't find her, so the captain sent the old man back to shore with the promise that he would notify him as soon as they found something. Three weeks went by and finally the old man got a fax from the boat. It read: "Sir, sorry to inform you, we found your wife dead at the bottom of the ocean. We hauled her up to the deck and attached to her butt was an oyster and in it was a pearl worth $50,000 . please advise."

The old man faxed back: "Send me the pearl and re-bait the trap."

~~~::(",)::~~~

A funeral service is being held for a woman who has just passed away. At the end of the service, the pall bearers are carrying the casket out when they accidentally bump into a wall, jarring the casket. They hear a faint moan. They open the casket and find that the woman is actually alive! She lives for ten more years, and then dies. Once again, a ceremony is held, and at the end of it, the pall bearers are again carrying out the casket. As they carry the casket towards the door, the husband cries out, "Watch that wall!"

~~~::(",)::~~~

When I went to lunch today, I noticed an old lady sitting on a park bench sobbing her eyes out. I stopped and asked her what was wrong.

She said, "I have a 22 year old husband at home. He makes love to me every morning and then gets up and makes me pancakes, sausage, fresh fruit and freshly ground coffee."

I said, "Well, then why are you crying?"

She said, "He makes me homemade soup for lunch and my favorite brownies and then makes love to me for half the afternoon.

I said, "Well, why are you crying?" She said, "For dinner he makes me a gourmet meal with wine and my favorite dessert and then makes love to me until 2:00 a.m." I said, "Well, why in the world would you be crying?"

She said, "I can't remember where I live!"

~~~::(",)::~~~

Two elderly ladies had been friends for many decades. Over the years they had shared all kinds of activities and adventures. Lately, their activities had been limited to meeting a few times a week to play cards.

One day they were playing cards when one looked at the other and said, "Now don't get mad at me....I know we've been friends for a long time... but I just can't think of your name! I've thought and thought, but I can't remember it. Please tell me what your name is."

Her friend glared at her. For at least three minutes she just stared and glared at her. Finally she said, "How soon do you need to know?"

~~~::(",)::~~~

Two elderly women were eating breakfast in a restaurant one morning. Ethel noticed something funny about Mabel's ear and she said, '"Mabel, do you know you've got a suppository in your left ear?"

Mabel answered, "I have a suppository in my ear?" She pulled it out and stared at it.

Then she said, "Ethel, I'm glad you saw this thing. Now I think I know where to find my hearing aid."

~~~::(",)::~~~

THE SENILITY PRAYER
Grant me the senility to forget the people I never liked anyway, the good fortune to run into the ones I do, and the eyesight to tell the difference.