Letters to the Editor
Chris Rywalt
Published Letters: 31 Editor's Choice: 6
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No One Arguing Against?
[Read the article: Covering up the trail of dead Iraqis]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I can't believe there isn't a single comment arguing against the numbers in this article. Okay, so the Lancet came up with a number and some experts say it's reliable. Science would never have a bias, would it? Of course it would. Eyewitnesses report more civilian deaths than the U.S. military -- again, of course.
We should realize that it's going to go this way: The U.S. military says 8 Iraqis have been killed since 2002. The anti-war doctor and the Iraqi Man on the Street say 65 billion Iraqis have been killed -- my god man, it's worse than the Holocaust!
How about we all take a deep breath and calm down and accept that, first, both sides are using numbers they've invented; and second, that THIS IS WAR. This is what war is. This is what war has always been. The difference in Vietnam was TV, and the difference now is the Internet. Any other differences you might see are imaginary.
Right now on Salon there's an ad for Ken Burns' The War. It reads "IN EXTRAORDINARY TIMES, THERE ARE NO ORDINARY LIVES." Right. No American committed an atrocity in World War II, no way, no how. No women, children, or old men were killed by Americans, not even by the first and only use of nuclear weapons in wartime. It was a totally noble war. Uh huh. Keep saying it over and over and maybe you'll believe it.
Or maybe repeat this to yourself: War means killing babies.
Arguing that Americans shouldn't be in Iraq is one thing; arguing that this death or that death was inappropriate is another, and not helpful.
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Feeling Better
[Read the article: Covering up the trail of dead Iraqis]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]What if our American tax dollars were responsible for the murder of only 10,000 innocent Iraqis; would y'all feel ever so much better?
Actually, yes, yes I would. I'd feel a lot better. I wouldn't feel good at all, but better? Certainly. No innocent deaths at all -- Iraqi or otherwise -- would be best. Not likely, but best.
I can't even begin to list the things my tax dollars fund of which I don't approve. It's enormous. The Iraq War is just the most recent, obvious, and huge misuse of resources on the American tally sheet.
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The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
[Read the article: Bonfire of the Bear-Stearns vanities ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Good lord, Andrew. I'm as low-class as they come and even I know what a valance is. Do you live in a cardboard box?
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Soccer Dad Says...
[Read the article: E. O. Wilson gives soccer moms a bum rap]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Give E.O. Wilson a break, wouldja? I mean, the guy's, like, nine hundred years old. He's just suffering from Cranky Old Man Syndrome. I dare you to spend half a century talking to ants and see if you can still be polite to humans.
And he does have a point. Kids should get their love of nature from being in it, not from being drilled on it. Same thing with pretty much every other subject. Imagine taking your kid to a Beethoven concert and continually saying to them, "Hear that? That's a bassoon!"
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@Electro Robot
[Read the article: E. O. Wilson gives soccer moms a bum rap]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I'm glad I wasn't the only one who immediately thought of the late, lamented Dr. Fun. He will forever be entwined with E.O. Wilson in my mind.
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Lousy Image
[Read the article: A look at Disney and Pixar's 3-D movie technology]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The only trouble with the new system is the actual film ends up looking like complete crap. I was excited to take my kids to see The Nightmare Before Christmas -- a film Disney tried so hard to disown when it came out, but which they're all too happy to embrace now -- in Real D. But because the polarization dims your view of the image, and because digital projectors still kinda suck, the result was mud. Not just too dark -- which would be bad enough -- but with LCD ghosting, really awful. My kids didn't notice, I don't think, but all I wanted to do was take off my damned glasses and see the movie properly.
Forget 3D. IMAX is where it's at, baby!
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Awesomely Insane
[Read the article: My Laughing Buddha is smirking]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I have no idea where this post came from, Andrew, but it's a great story.
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Good News!
[Read the article: Supreme Court restores habeas corpus, strikes down key part of Military Commissions Act]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]It's been a long time since I heard news this good. For once we got something right.
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Tangled Web of Steel
[Read the article: Made of steel: A globalization fable]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]This is one of those amaze-your-friends-at-parties stories. Really something else! Great research job, Andrew. This is what I tune in for. Well, and gloom-and-doom on housing.
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Phosphorus the Bottleneck
[Read the article: Peak safety matches?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Isaac Asimov wrote a column on phosphorus. According to his calculations, phosphorus is the bottleneck of life: It's the element that limits how much life there can be on Earth. He noted that we're allowing tons and tons of phosphorus to wash off into the ocean, where it won't be used for land-based life -- including food crops.
It's interesting that there'd be phosphorus shortages probably thirty years after Asimov wrote the column.
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More from asimov
[Read the article: Peak safety matches?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I wish I knew where the column originally appeared; I know I have a copy here somewhere, but it could be in any number of Isaac's books or in one of the many, many back issues of the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction I collected just for his column.
I'm sure he noted that sea birds are one way for phosphorus to cycle back onto the land. But compared to fertilizer runoff into the oceans, and our sewage treatment plants emptying into the oceans, the sea birds are just a drop of poop in the bucket.
The good news is, there's always the possibility someone will work out a way to mine the phosphorus from the oceans. Or maybe from meteorites and asteroids.
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Science Columnist
[Read the article: Peak safety matches?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]And, yes, Salon could use a really good science columnist, and not anyone like that Pablo guy they've got. A popularizer like Asimov would be wonderful.