Around the globe.

Most Asians living in the UK do not feel "British" - Interesting article about assimilation of Asians, mostly Indians and Pakistanis, who enjoy living in Britain and yet feel to be a true part of the culture they must be "coconuts" - brown on the outside and white on the inside. It's a dilemma for many youth who face the more traditional and conservative attitudes of their parents whilst at home and also the pressure of fitting in at school and having more liberal attitudes.

The Saami people of Russia's Kola peninsula, whose chief city is Murmansk, have increasingly seen their territory shrink over the decades. Mirroring the stories of countless other indigenous peoples, the expansive tundra they once roamed to feed their reindeer and provide subsistence for their pre-industrial way of life has been grabbed by Russian firms looking to exploits its natural resources. Some of these people under the days of communism were relocated to specially-built towns where they were promised good standards of living, which never materialized. Now they face the decision of assimilation into the modern world and abandoning their traditions and beliefs except in token form, or fighting a losing battle against a world that needs land and energy. Their story is the story of dozens if not hundreds of native peoples everywhere.

Here's something everyone knows already. Advances in technology have not made us a happier society. Efficiency and standards of living are relative terms, and there is evidence to indicate, as common sense would also dictate, that a radical swing of either ill fortune (the Great Depression) or Wheel of Fortune (the Internet Boom) will merely re-establish the norms at some other point, and people will still judge themselves against their peers, and not against previous lifestyles. The endless pursuit of leisure is one without a meaningful end, for work and reward are like ying and yang; neither can prosper at the expense of the other. Take away work and life becomes meaningless. Take away joy and work becomes pointless.

Orang-Utans, one of the most endangered of the great apes and once of our closest relatives genetically, are facing extinction in the Indonesian islands of Sumatra and Borneo, which is the only place left where they live freely. The exotic pet trade annually captures and ships baby orangs, often by killing the resisting mother, to people all over the world who delight in such rarities. The same can be said for "bush meat," a despicable idea that the cooked flesh of a gorilla, chimp, or orang-utan is a "delicacy." I feel anyone caught capturing, smuggling, delivering, owning, or eating any of these endangered and important species ought to be shot in a public square and made an example of. This is outright abuse and one step away from cannibalism.

In my opinion there is still as wide divide between physical neurology and cognitive science, the one being the study of the physical brain and its constituent biological components and the other being the study of how thought and self-awareness arises. Some pioneers in the field are finding it not unexpectedly difficult to marry the two together. For centuries there has been a debate about the nature of consciousness, and the reality of a soul, or a "mind." Strict materialists will say it's atoms (and quarks) all the way down, more liberal scientists might find some solace in the unveiled mysteries of quantum processes and other scientific frontiers to revitalize the idea that consciousness may indeed be a non-scientific subject; not in the interest of validating religion, but rather as a Gödelian viewpoint that an entity cannot by definition understand all of its parts. Douglas Hofstadter and Roger Penrose are two of my very favorite thinkers and authors, and they both subscribe to a somewhat liberal interpretation of the emergence of consciousness from ordinary matter, without bringing any New Age crap into the discussion. Look those two up if you really have your thinking cap on someday. They are challenging reads but worth it. Lesser minds but worthy of attention are David Chalmers, Stephen Pinker, Noam Chomsky, and the like. I will always trust the side going at the question from a hard-science stance over the eloquent but unprovable humanists. Call me an Asimov or a Clarke. I believe in "magic," but it is only apparatus behind a curtain to which we are not yet privy, not true magic I'm afraid.

Stories like this one remind one that Iraq is a real live country with a rich history and a profound sense of pride that cannot be shaken by war or poverty. It is not our sandbox to play in; people shop for groceries here, children go to school, and young engineers study physics at the few remaining universities. These people want to be a country again, united. Unfortunately, they also want to kill each other over different interpretations of that Great Satan: Religion. If only a virulent form of atheism could sweep over the Middle East we'd have countries emerging on the world scene as some of the most athletic, philosophic, and technically trained people in the "developing" world. To see that religion and gang warfare daily destroy that hope is maddening and sad.

Thanks for reading. I will hopefully continue to bring newsworthy stories (as opposed to sensationalism) to you from time to time, when I come across articles that interest me and which I think might interest a wider audience. Feel free to post on any of the stories and also to express you own particular interests if you want, so I can keep an eye out for development in those arenas.