[Links]
[links] Link salad hies off to the medical imaging unit
Writer Sonia Lyris corresponds with The Journal of Universal Rejection — That link is her initial post, there’s a whole, hilarious sequence from there under her tag “rejection saga”.
Magical Siberia: A Russian Take on Middle-earth — Strange Maps strikes again.
Long Lifespan Linked to Poor Church Attendance — Huh? That cannot possibly be a causative relationship.
Old open air voyagers — Freshwater eukaryotes may have ventured onto land nearly 500 million years earlier than fossil evidence previously suggested.
What Happens If You Get Sucked Out of a Plane? — In which our own Geoff Landis is quoted.
Nazi War Crimes as Described by German Soldiers — Going back to the primary sources. This is tough reading.
Lessons from Ivory Coast — Conservative commentator Daniel Larison on religious identity politics and the Peace of Westphalia.
The Great Debate — Ryan vs. Obama will be this year’s main event, if the president is up for it.
The Nostradamus Award Goes To… — The Heritage Foundation, which predicted that the 2001 Bush tax cuts would bring on an economic boom, increase household income and reduce federal debt: When you do the numbers on the alleged fiscal conservatism of the GOP, it’s an utter disaster for the nation as a whole as well as for individual households. That was true under Reagan, and it’s been true ever since. So why do the Republicans keep getting the credit for something that’s so objectively and abjectly untrue?
?otD: To CT or not to CT, that is the question.
4/14/2011
Writing time yesterday: 0.25 hours (WRPA)
Body movement: 30 minute stationary bike ride
Hours slept: 6.0 hours (interrupted)
Weight: 247.8
Currently reading: Nifft the Lean by Michael Shea
Posted: 4:47 am Thu April 14 2011 |
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You are reading the blog of Jay Lake, speculative fiction writer and author of hundreds of short stories, many novels, and winner of the John W. Campbell Award.
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Cora
April 14th, 2011 at 6:21 amThanks for the link to the Russian Hobbit map. As a child and teenager, I had several books from East Germany, often licensed reprints of Russian editions, illustrated in that very style. Interestingly enough, one of those books was an edition of Huckleberry Finn, the American classic that was always popular on the other side of the Iron Curtain.
As the Westfalian Peace, the 30-Years-War was a period of extreme chaos, violence and suffering for large swarthes of the European mainland. The Peace of Westfalia may not have been ideal from a modern POV and it certainly shouldn’t serve as a model for contemporary conflict resolution, but it was a great improvement over the alternative. For there was not much in the way of religious tolerance in individual states and principalities before 1648 either, dissenters from whatever the religion of the local ruler was were either expelled, if they were lucky, or bloodily executed as heretics, if they were not. And during the 30-years-war, territories were constantly conquered and reconquered and whole cities put under siege, so the ruler’s religious preference could change as quickly as the ruler. Never mind that the soldiers often behaved like pigs and raped, pillaged and plundered.
The Peace of Westfalia put a much welcome end to that situation by getting all powers involved to agree that while a ruler may decide upon the official religion in his pricipality, it’s no business of his which religious persuasion the ruler of the neighbouring pricipality prefers. It also gave dissenters the option to emigrate to a pricipality more welcoming to their religion rather than be burned at the stake. Of course, the situation was still bad for Jews and Christian minority groups that were not welcome anywhere, but it was much better than before.
Of course, as an American Daniel Larison is probably not as aware of the huge amount of suffering that the 30 years war brought to continental Europe. But in Germany in particular the 30-years-war is still very present in popular consciousness. Up to WWI, the 30-years-war was still considered the original catastrophe in Germany and was about as present in public consciousness as WWII is today, even though it had ended nearly 300 years ago by that time.
Jay
April 14th, 2011 at 6:26 amThank you for that. I do have some awareness of the impact of the 30 Years War on Europe, but then I’m a bit of a history buff.
One of the things I’ve understood about the Peace of Westphalia is that it initiated the modern model of sovereign statehood. Which is to say, the modern definition of a ‘country’ traces directly to the treaty provisions. I think that’s fascinating.
Cora
April 15th, 2011 at 10:58 amSovereignity and religious tolerance both, since the Peace of Westfalia also introduced the concept that what those people over there worship is none of my business.
The religious divisions resulting from the Peace of Westfalia persist into the modern day as well. I live in a majority Lutheran Protestant area that has been Lutheran since the 30-Years-War. But if I drive approx. 50 kilometers west, I cross one of the old pricipality borders and end up in a majority Catholic area. You can tell exactly where the old border was, because all of a sudden crucifixes and Virgin Mary statues show up by the roadside.
Cora
April 15th, 2011 at 11:02 amP.S.: Is it really spelled “Westphalia” in the US? Cause that looks very wrong to my German eyes. Here it is “Westfalen” and the VW Camper Van, a chain of gas stations and a hotel are all called “Westfalia”.