Two notes by Rosa Luxemburg on Revolution that are relevant to the Revolts of 2011

"During the revolution it is extremely difficult for any directing organ of the proletarian movement to foresee and to calculate which occasions and factors can lead to explosions and which cannot. Here also initiative and direction do not consist in issuing commands according to one’s inclinations, but in the most adroit adaptability to the given situation, and the closest possible contact with the mood of the masses. The element of spontaneity, as we have seen, plays a great part in all Russian mass strikes without exception, be it as a driving force or as a restraining influence. This does not occur in Russia, however, because social democracy is still young or weak, but because in every individual act of the struggle so very many important economic, political and social, general and local, material and psychical, factors react upon one another in such a way that no single act can be arranged and resolved as if it were a mathematical problem. The revolution, even when the proletariat, with the social democrats at their head, appear in the leading role, is not a manoeuvre of the proletariat in the open field, but a fight in the midst of the incessant crashing, displacing and crumbling of the social foundation."

The final paragraph "Organizational Questions...." Dick Howard's translation reads better, but I guess this one from the Marxist Archive will have to do. Too many of the Marxist Archive translations give everyone, including Luxemburg, a "Bolshevik" tone and style. Howard's translation are much preferred. Her friend and biographer, Paul Frolich included many substantial passages in his Rosa Luxemburg: Her Life and Work which is translated by Johanna Hoorweg.

"In Lenin’s overanxious desire to establish the guardianship of an omniscient and omnipotent Central Committee in order to protect so promising and vigorous a labor movement against any misstep, we recognize the symptoms of the same subjectivism that has already played more than one trick on socialist thinking in Russia.
It is amusing to note the strange somersaults that the respectable human “ego” has had to perform in recent Russian history. Knocked to the ground, almost reduced to dust, by Russian absolutism, the “ego” takes revenge by turning to revolutionary activity. In the shape of a committee of conspirators, in the name of a nonexistent Will of the People, it seats itself on a kind of throne and proclaims it is all-powerful. [The reference is to the conspiratorial circle which attacked tsarism from 1879 to 1883 by means of terrorist acts and finally assassinated Alexander II. – Ed.] But the “object” proves to be the stronger. The knout is triumphant, for tsarist might seems to be the “legitimate” expression of history. In time we see appear on the scene an even more “legitimate” child of history – the Russian labor movement. For the first time, bases for the formation of a real “people’s will” are laid in Russian soil. But here is the “ego” of the Russian revolutionary again! Pirouetting on its head, it once more proclaims itself to be the all-powerful director of history – this time with the title of His Excellency the Central Committee of the Social Democratic Party of Russia. The nimble acrobat fails to perceive that the only “subject” which merits today the role of director is the collective “ego” of the working class. The working class demands the right to make its mistakes and learn the dialectic of history.
Let us speak plainly. Historically, the errors committed by a truly revolutionary movement are infinitely more fruitful than the infallibility of the cleverest Central Committee."

[Howard: "Finally, we must frankly admit to ourselves that errors made by a truly revolutionary labor movement are historically infinitely more fruitful and more valuable than the infallibility of the best of all possible 'central committees.'" Rosa Luxemburg, Selected Political Writings, Monthly Review Press, 1971]

Spartacus Revolt

Cairo

Larry Evans, Chess Grandmaster, 1932-2010

I learned a great deal about chess from Larry Evans.  I still have my copies of his edition of  Modern Chess Openings (as well as Korn's 12th, the last to be printed in English Descriptive Notation) and Fischer's 60 Memorable Games.  My copy of New Ideas in Chess still finds its way into my bag for subway reading.
Here is something from New Ideas in Chess under the heading "A wing attack is best met by a reaction in the center".  It, like all of the examples in New Ideas, is drawn from his own tournament games.  This one is from Kagetsu v. Evans, Hollywood Open, 1954.

after ...P-Q4

Evans writes of this position: "This attacker does not always benefit from open lines.  He should try to close the center before embarking on a wing attack.  This cannot always be done.  The defender must keep his lines of communication open, and this requires a fluid center so that he may divert pieces from the other wing to the defense of the attacked wing".

Kagetsu    Evans
 White      Black
1. QxN     B-Q3
2. 0-0-0    R-N2
3. P-KR4  BxN
4. BxB      Q-N5
5. B-Q2    PxP
6. R-N1    Q-K3
7. B-K2    Q-R7
White Resigns

New York Times Obituary.  In the printed edition, the caption puts Evans on the left, but Fischer is on the left and Evans is on the right.
Gambit: the New York Times Chess blog on Evans, with reader's favorite games.

RUINS companion blog - Until Darwin: Science & the Origins of Race

Given that I am just finishing up this project, I thought it would be good to separate out the postings that relate to it from RUINS, which I intend as a more general blog. The "Until Darwin" blog will be for notes and materials deleted from the final work, as well as references consulted but not mentioned.
Here is the site
Until Darwin: Science and the Origins of Race

Thomas Jefferson and the Texas Board of Education

In terms of the Texas Board of Education's hostility to Thomas Jefferson, among all other people and artifacts having to do with Enlightenment, the "Founding Father" who rewrote the Bible by removing all religious references (The Jefferson Bible) left us with his views of such priestly tribes.

 

I promised you a letter on Christianity, which I have not forgotten. On the contrary, it is because I have reflected on it, that I find much more time necessary for it than I can at present dispose of. I have a view of the subject which ought to displease neither the rational Christian nor Deists, and would reconcile many to a character they have too hastily rejected. I do not know that it would reconcile the genus irritabile vatum [the irritable tribe of priests] who are all in arms against me. Their hostility is on too interesting ground to be softened. The delusion into which the X.Y.Z. plot shewed it possible to push the people; the successful experiment made under the prevalence of that delusion on the clause of the constitution, which, while it secured the freedom of the press, covered also the freedom of religion, had given to the clergy a very favorite hope of obtaining an establishment of a particular form of Christianity thro' the U.S.; and as every sect believes its own form the true one, every one perhaps hoped for his own, but especially the Episcopalians & Congregationalists. The returning good sense of our country threatens abortion to their hopes, & they believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly; for I have sworn upon the altar of god, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. But this is all they have to fear from me: & enough too in their opinion, & this is the cause of their printing lying pamphlets against me, forging conversations for me with Mazzei, Bishop Madison, &c., which are absolute falsehoods without a circumstance of truth to rest on; falsehoods, too, of which I acquit Mazzei & Bishop Madison, for they are men of truth. Letter to Benjamin Rush, Monticello, September 23, 1800

Placebo Effects and Policy Limits or what Olivia Judson can teach David Brooks

The May 4th New York Times Op-Ed section presented us with a great contrast between scientific thinking and pseudo-scientific ideology in the columns by Olivia Judson and David Brooks. I am sure you can already guess which one is which, but lets go through it anyway because when the Times inadvertently gives us such a useful contrast, it is well worth paying attention.

So, Brooks' piece first and he begins, of course, with the Northern European as a standard. Swedes in Sweden and Swedes in the United States have the same rate of poverty, 6.7% "Two groups with similar historical backgrounds living in entirely different political systems, and the poverty outcomes were the same." Brooks further notes that the average life expectancy of Swedes has not changed much since 1950 despite their commitment to build "a large welfare state with a national health service, while the U.S. did not." In 1950 Swedes lived an average of 2.6 years longer than Americans, and now live 2.7 years later.

Of course, the second thing to note is that Brooks is using averages rather than differences between the mean life expectancy. But this is not so much my problem with his piece, although it would be useful to compare the results of we used mean rather than average. Instead, the thing that can be pointed out in this little post is the stark contrast between the essays by Brooks and Judson.

Brooks tells us that:

"Ethnicity correlates to huge differences in how people live.....All we can say for sure is that different psychological, cultural, and social factors combine in myriad ways to produce different viewpoints. As a result of these different viewpoints, the average behavior is different between different ethnic and geographical groups, leading to different life outcomes.... So when we're arguing about politics, we should be aware of how policy fits into the larger scheme of cultural and social influences. Bad policy can decimate the social fabric, but good policy can only modestly improve it." [Notice that average has appeared again, as in the "average behavior" of the bodies that make up a population.]

So let's take three concepts that Brooks uses: ethnicity, culture, and politics. What exactly does he mean by these terms in this little article.

POLITICS: is for Brooks simply the means to institute social policy for the control of a population. The problem is that social policies can do very little to affect social change. Social change comes from elsewhere, if it comes at all, and it comes from the internal forces within populations, or "tribes of people," to use Brooks' phrase. Thus, politics and social policy can have only modest effects on the lives of the humans in a given population. Politics, on the other hand, is not about social change, it is about articulating the "viewpoints" of various "ethnic and geographical groups". Politics is about which group can enforce its "viewpoint" and the first rule of the policies that flow from these viewpoints is "don't promulgate a policy that will destroy social bonds" because these bonds are the foundation of politics. At bottom, all politics is rooted in ethnicity and emotion, as in "emotional bonds".

If each "tribe" is given a "basic level of economic and physical security" they will each "create a culture of achievement --- if you are lucky." And if the policy can strengthen the "emotional bonds" of a people, all the better. Brooks cites two examples of successful policies that have strengthen emotional ties: "preschool and military service" but in the end, "we should all probably calm down about politics. Most of the proposals we argue about so ferociously will have only marginal effects on how we live, especially compared with the ethnic, regional and social differences that we so studiously ignore."

So politics is in the end arguing from our ethnic, regional, and social "viewpoints" about policies that will not really help very many people, but might at least strengthen the "emotional bonds" that unite different tribes, or keep them in their place. It is a good argument for the status quo, and that is exactly the kind of argument one can expect from the "progressive conservatism" that Brooks claims to support.

CULTURE: is for Brooks, at least in this piece, about the habits of different ethnic, cultural, or emotional tribes or populations. But it exists in a tautology for him. Namely, Culture rests on ethnicity, but ethnicity is culture. Culture consists of the habits and material production of tribes, and you can define a tribe, an ethnicity, by its habits and material production. Emotional bonds are between families and tribes, and families and tribes are defined by the extent of their emotional bonds. None of this tell sus very much except again that acceptance or restoration of the status quo is always the point of Brooks'commentary.

ETHNICITY: Really, the talk of tribes and emotional bonds, of the importance of the status quo would not be so disturbing if it were not in the context of Brook's use of the concept of ethnicity as a stand in for race. Whenever Brooks discusses differences, he relates those differences to ethnicity and geographical differences, but ethnicity clearly is for him the most important factor. In fact, the Times accompanied the commentary with the blurb "How ethnicity swamps politics." When Brooks wants to talk about ethnic differences, he uses for his evidence data based upon racial differences, in particular the differences between what Cuvier called the three primary races of man, European, African, and Asian. Native Americans and Hispanics make appear only to to compared to the other three "ethnic... tribes".

One can not be sure of what Brooks means by ethnicity, but certainly it does at points stand in directly for race, just as "viewpoint" stands in for "ideology". "The influence of politics and policy is usually swamped by the influence of culture, ethnicity, psychology, and a dozen other factors." The other factors are not worth naming, as apparently culture, ethnicity, and psychology predominate.

And this takes us back to the Swedes that Brooks began with. There is something that makes a Swede a Swede whether they are in South Dakota or Stockholm. Policies, he says, will not change the basic "ethnic" disposition of a Swede.

But let us look just across the page to Olivia Judson's commentary on the placebo effect.

If policy and politics can not trump ethnicity, one might expect that the placebo effect would suffer a similar failure. Swedes in Sweden should respond to a placebo just as Swedes in the US, to follow Brooks' reasoning about ethnicity.
In fact, Judson does not mention Swedes, but she does mention Germans. However, the results are not what one would expect if we followed Brooks on ethnicity/race/tribe/nation. Let us allow her to speak for herself regarding the ethnic/tribal differences and the placebo effect.

Different studies of the placebo effect report wildly different results. One survey of 117 trials of two ulcer drugs found that, depending on the trial, patients in the placebo group had anywhere from zero to a 100 percent recovery rate.

The drugs also varied in their effectiveness from one trial to the next; sometimes patients on the placebo did better than those on the drug. Intriguingly, the results varied from country to country, with Brazilians showing no placebo effect and Germans having a strong one. Why? No one knows, but it doesn’t appear to be because of anything inherently German: trials of drugs for hypertension found a weaker placebo effect in Germany than in other countries.

The problem is that humans are not machines, and emotions are not abstractions. Hope and expectation, anxiety and fear, trust and suspicion — these cause physiological changes in the brain that can interact with drugs, changing their effects.

Given that Brooks wants to hide the workings of power behind the mask of culture and ethnicity, it is remarkable how Judson almost relpies to his avoidence of power. It is power, and not ethnicity, that has the strongest influence on the placebo effect.

...the most reliable source of a strong placebo effect appears to be: the doctor.
Placebo treatments are more powerful if your doctor believes in them. They are also more powerful if the doctor tells you so. In one study, for example, patients who had just come out of surgery were given a saline infusion, and — whenever they asked for it — the pain killer buprenorphine. However, some patients were told the saline infusion was a powerful painkiller, others that it might be one, while a third group wasn’t told anything. Over the course of three days, those in the “know-nothing” group asked for more buprenorphine than those in the “maybe” group, who in turn asked for more than those told they were getting a real drug.

Finally, Judson, whose blog is one of the best from the New York Times, comments on these differences

Differences in hopes and fears, and the resulting physiological changes, may explain why the placebo effect varies so much: individual experiences matter. Some people are more anxious than others, or may find the thought of a particular disease especially alarming. Moreover, in different cultures, similar diseases may be treated with different degrees of gravity.

So different cultures matter, but not in the way that Brooks would have it. And what matters most is the power relationship of those confronting a problem, whether medical or political, and not the ethnic differences between them, even if we could detach Brooks' use of ethnicity from his silent deployment of racialist thinking.

Only those in power would have the "viewpoint" that politics is not about power, or believe that social change is not possible.

Found Object: Note by Robert E. Tucker (illustrator, ornithologist, and forester) with chart of Birds common to Savannah, Georgia

Somehow I misplaced an old field guide and so replaced it with a 1980 edition of Peterson's A Field Guide to the Birds East of the Rockies. Folded in the back cover I found a note from Robert E. Tucker to Dorothy. In it, he describes this book, which appears to be a Christmas gift, as "the guide for learning birds. Most bird students cut their 'birding teeth' on it. I did - over forty years ago."

Robert Tucker was the illustrator of Louisiana Birds by George Hines Lowery (Louisiana Wild Life and Fisheries Commission by Louisiana State University Press, 1960). Lowery says that Tucker's "ably executed" illustrations are not for "mere" decoration, but "designed to facilitate species recognition" for the field observer. The Wilson Library Bulletin (1960) refers “to the superb drawings and water-colors”.

Tucker supplies a one and a half page chart of "those that will most probably occur in [Dorothy's] yard.... The list consists of those that seem to prefer living in the proximity of people and accept the hospitality of the feeding tray. Not included are such aerial species as Chimney Swifts and Nighthawks or Gulls, Hawks, and Owls."


Click on the picture to view it in full.










Tucker lists 45 species for Dorothy, noting whether they would be found in summer or winter, and on which page they can be found in Peterson. He also lists the photo number in an edition of "Bull & Ferrand" - which would be John Bull and John Farrand's National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Birds: Eastern Region (1977). In his note, Tucker makes clear that he feels illustrations are preferred to photos because "photographs are fine when they are good, but a poor illustration in many cases because of shadows, color shift in the film or development or position which fails to show key field marks."

According to a web search, Tucker is mentioned in Excelsior: memoir of a forester. by Laurence C. Walker (College of Forestry, Stephen F. Austin State University, 1995.)

He is also mentioned as manager of forest resources and manager of woodlands for the Southland Paper corporation in the 1960s.

This seems to be a nice little piece from a little known naturalist, and useful as historical data for its list of common species as identified by a naturalist in 1984. Of course, I would be happy to return the original to any relative that might want it.

Adorno and Music listening project

Adorno and Music

I have been on a little project to listen to the music that Adorno refers to in many of his works. I decided to use the new large collection Essays on Music, edited by Richard Leppert (University of California Press). I am also drawing from three of Adorno's longer works: Philosophy of Modern Music, Introduction to the Sociology of Music, and Alban Berg: Master of the Smallest Link.
It is a lot to listen to, of course, but as I read an essay or chapter, I am trying to listen to the music he is discussing. So I will add here little notices of things from time to time that seem of interest in the reading and link up to music, if I can (e.g., silence in Webern or Paul Whiteman's version of "jazz"). So far, listening to these works ---as well as some of the recently recorded works of Adorno himself--- has given me a better appreciation of Adorno in particular and Critical Theory in general.
See also this little video I put together on Adorno discussing popular protest music: Adorno, Popular Music, and Protest

Here is a list of pieces I found in Adorno. It is far from exhaustive and I have not yet listened to them all in the context of reading Adorno's writings.

Bach
The Art of the Fugue
The Musical Offering; Mass in B Minor; Well-tempered Clavier
Bartok
Out of Doors; String Quartet no. 4; Violin Concertos No. 1 & 2
Beethoven
Bagatelles, op. 33 & 126; Grosse Fuge; Leonore Overture; Mass in C major; Missa Solemnis;
Piano Sonatas 14,21,26,29, and 32; Symphonies 3,4,5,7,8,and 9; String Quartets op. 95, 127, 131; Diabelli Variations, op. 120; Violin Sonata no. 47
Alban Berg
Seven Early Songs; Piano Sonata, op. 1; Four Songs, op. 2; String Quartet, op. 3; Alternber-Lieder, op. 4; Clarinet Pieces, op. 5; Three Pieces for Orchestra, op. 6; Wozzeck, op. 7; Chamber Concerto; Lyric Suite; Der Wein; Lulu; Lulu Suite; Violin Concerto
Pierre Boulez
Structure 1A; Le Marteau sans maitre; Piano Sonata no. 3
Johannes Brahms
Symphoniy no. 1
Anton Bruckner
Symphony no. 7 and 8; Mass in F minor
Claude Debussy
Preludes, Book II
Hanns Eisler
Duke Ellington
George Gershin
Rhapsody in Blue
Paul Hindemith
"jazz"
Rene Leibowitz
Four Pieces for Piano
Gustav Mahler
Des Knaben Wunderhorn; Symphony 2,3,4,5,6,and 7; Das Lied von der Erde
Mozart
Marriage of Figaro; The Magic Flute; Symphony 39, 40, and 41
Giacomo Puccini
La Boheme; Madama Butterfly; Tosca;
Sergi Rachmaninoff
Prelude in C-sharp minor
Arnold Schoenberg
Gurrelieder; Verklarte Nacht, op. 4; Lieder, op. 6; String Quartet in D minor, op. 7; Chamber Symphony no. 1, op. 9; Das Buch der hagenden Garten, op. 15; Dance around the Golden Cafe from Moses und Aron; Funf orchesterstucke, op. 16; Erwatung op. 17; Die gluckliche Hand op. 18; Kleine Klavierstucke, op. 19; Hergewachse op. 20; Die Jakobsleiter; Pierrot Lunaire, op. 21; Lieder, op. 22; Klavierstucke, op. 23; Serenade, op. 24; Wind Quintet, op. 26; Suite, op. 29; Variations for Orchestra, op. 31; Von heute auf morgen, op. 32; Moses und Aron; Champber Symphony no.2 (op. 38a); Kol Nidre, op. 39; String Trio, op. 45; Phantasy for violin and piano, op. 47; String Quartets 1, 2, 3, 4
Franz Shubert
Symphony no. 8
Robert Schumann
Kinderszenen, op. 15; Kreisleriana, op. 16; “So oft sie kam” op. 90
Richard Strauss
Adriadne auf Naxos; Alpine Symphony; Elektra; Four Last Songs; Die Frau ohne Schatten; Ein Heldenleben; Der Rosenkavalier; Salome; Symphonia domestica
Igor Stravinsky
L'Histoire du Soldat; Petrouchka; Pulcinella; The Rake's Progress; Renard; Le Sacre du printemps; Symphony in Three Movements; Symphony of Psalms; Three Japanese lyrics
Richard Wagner
Die fliegende Hollander; Gotterdammerung; Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg; Parsifal;
Der Ring des Nibelungen; Seigfried; Tannhauser; Tristan und Isolde; Die Walkure
Anton Webern
Passacaglia, op. 1; Five Songs from Der siebente Ring, op. 3; Five Songs on Poems of Stefan George, op. 4; Five Movements for String Quartet, op. 5; Six Pieces for Orchestra, op. 6; Four Pieces for Violin and Piano, op. 7; Six Bagatelles for String Quartet, op. 9; Five Pieces for Orchestra, op. 10; Three Little Pieces for violoncello and Piano, op. 11; Orchestration of the Ricercare from Bach's Musical Offering
Kurt Weill
Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny; The Three-Penny Opera

and to this I would add these:

John Cage
“She is Asleep” duet for voice and prepared piano;
As Slow as Possible; Music for Prepared Piano
Charles Ives
String Quartets; Songs, Vol. 1 and II.
Henry Cowell
Steve Reich
Octet; Nagoya Marimba; Music for 18 Musicians
Dagmar Krause
Songs of Kurt Weill; Tank Battles: Songs of Hans Eisler
Frank Sinatra A Hot Time in the Town of Berlin
Sidney Bechet High Society
Paul Whiteman

Darwin's Beagle notebooks go online, but the Galapagos notebook is missing.

Darwin's notebooks from the voyage of the H.M.S. Beagle are being placed online by the English Heritage society, which cares for Darwin's Down House. There is a problem, though, because one of Darwin's notebooks is missing and it is the Galapagos notebook. It is thought to have been taken from Down House sometime in the 1970s or 1980s. The BBC World Service story is here. The appeal from English Heritage can be read here.
Here is their description of the notebook.

Darwin used different types of notebooks and the missing Galapagos notebook is small, almost square, and bound in leather with a brass clasp. It is labelled on the outside with a rough itinerary in Darwin's handwriting, marked "Galapagos. Otaheite. Lima." It contains entries he made between March and November 1835 when he was in Chile, Peru, the Galapagos and Tahiti. Inside the front cover is written: "63.5 C. Darwin H.M. Beagle". About a third of the notes were written from the front with the rest starting again from the back of the book. Darwin usually crossed out each page when he had written up the contents, either in his diary or in one of his more formal notebooks. All the Beagle notebooks are mostly written in pencil.

David Attenborough's BBC Collection goes online.

Fifty of Attenborough's selected favorites are available to watch from the BBC.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/collections/p0048522
This is a great collection of work by an equally great naturalist.

Herculine/Alexina Barbin & Caster Semenya

"In the midst of the happiness that intoxicated me, I was frightfully tormented. What was I to do, my God, what was I to decide on?"
--Alexina "Herculine" Barbin

Thus wrote the mid-19th century hermaphrodite Alexina Barbin not long before taking her own life. At the time Barbin was born, it was customary for the child to have their sex chosen for them at birth, and to simply be raised as such. By the time Barbin died, the question was in the hands of legal and medical authorities. Barbin was raised as a girl in a convent orphanage and in the convent. When she reached maturity, she chose to go into teaching, a profession which required an initial medical examination. During the routine and invasive examination it was discovered that she had both male and female characteristics. These attributes had apparently been missed in all previous medical exams, but when it was time for her to leave the protection of the convent, the diagnosis changed and with it an entire social apparatus emerged. Ultimately, Alexina, as she referred to herself, was forced to live as a man. After writing her memoir, she committed suicide in a Parisian hovel.

It is certainly difficult not to think of the current controversy over the runner Caster Semenya when reading back over this text, and to consider how little distance there is between the Alexina and Caster in terms of how they are being diagnosed and regulated, at least by some. This BBC "World Have Your Say" is interesting in that regard.

Michel Foucault brought Herculine's story to light with his book Herculine Barbin, which collected Barbin's memoir and associated medical, legal, and literary documents.
He wrote in his introduction:

"Do we truly need a true sex? With a persistence that borders on stubbornness, modern Western societies have answered in the affirmative. They have obstinately brought into play this question of a "true sex in an order of things where one might have imagined that all that counted was the reality of the body and the intensity of its pleasures.

For a long time, however, such a demand was not made, as is proven by the history of the status which medicine and law have granted to hermaphrodites. Indeed it was a very long time before the postulate that a hermaphrodite must have a sex ---a single, a true sex--- was formulated. For centuries, it was quite simply agreed that hermaphrodites had two. Were they terror-inspiring monsters, calling for legal tortures? In fact, things were much more complicated. It is true that there is evidence of a number of executions, both in ancient times and in the Middle Ages. But there is also an abundance of court decisions of a completely different type. In the Middle Ages, the rules of both canon and civil law were very clear on this point: the designation 'hermaphrodite' was given to those in whom the two sexes were juxtaposed, in proportions that might be variable. In these cases, it was the role of the father or the godfather (thus of those who 'named' the child) to determine at the time of baptism which sex was going to be retained. If necessary, one was advised to choose the sex that seemed to have the better of the other, being 'the more vigorous' or 'the warmest.' But later, on the threshold of adulthood, when the time came for them to marry, hermaphrodites were free to decided for themselves if they wished to go on being of the sex which had been assigned to them, or if they preferred the other. The only imperative was that they had then declared until the end of their lives, under pain of being labeled sodomites. Changes of option, not the anatomical mixture of the sexes, were what gave rise to most of the condemnations of hermaphrodites in the records of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Biological theories of sexuality, juridical conceptions of the individual, forms of administrative control in modern nations, led little by little to rejecting the idea of a mixture of the two sexes in a single body, and consequently to limiting the free choice of indeterminate individuals. Henceforth, everybody was to have one and only one sex. Everybody was to have his primary, profound, determined and determining sexual identity; as for the elements of the other sex that might appear, they could not only be accidental, superficial, or even quite simply illusory. From the medical point of view, this meant that when confronted with a hermaphrodite, the doctor was no longer concerned with recognizing the presence of the two sexes, juxtaposed or intermingled, or with knowing which of the two prevailed over the other, but rather with deciphering the true sex that was hidden beneath ambiguous appearance. He had, as it were, to strip the body of its anatomical deceptions and discover the one true sex behind organs that might have put on the forms of the opposite sex.....
....
Here is a document drawn from the strange history of our 'true sex.' It is not unique, but it is rare enough. It is the journal or rather the memoirs that were left by one of those individuals whom medicine and the law in the nineteenth century relentlessly questioned about their genuine sexual identity. ---Michel Foucault, 1980 [1978]. Herculine Barbin: Being the recently discovered Memoirs of a Nineteenth-Century French Hermaphrodite. Pantheon Books.

from BBC News: "Makeover for SA gender-row runner"

'Dead' A-Bomb Hits U.S. Town, 1958.

Three years before I was born, an a-bomb happened to fall near my hometown in South Carolina. The pilots did not know that it had fallen until they landed at the nearby airbase and noticed that it was missing. My father took me by there a few times when I was a kid, and then I found this newsreel a few years ago at the Internet Archive (archive.org). One thing I like about the reel is that it is followed by a story about computer-assisted manufacturing, featuring Hughes Aircraft, who may very well have manufactured the bomb mounts in the plane. But not to worry in the computer-assisted factory of the future.
By chance we vacationed on Tybee Island last year, and I ran across this little story about another lost a-bomb somewhere just off the coast there. It seems that the proper authorities have never found this one!
It makes for a good reason to show Dr. Strangelove to my Intro. Cultural Studies students.

"Exhuming Rwanda's Gorillas: Fossey's Legacy"

NPR is currently running this series on its website. Researchers are at work ehuming the remains of the gorillas that were studied by Dian Fossey. Erin Marie Williams records the field dispatches available at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106843731

Interpreting Weill and Eisler: Dagmar Krause and Ute Lemper.

Once one of my students approached me and excitedly related how she had just heard Ute Lemper. My student (whose name I will not mention) was so happy to have found this new music that I only encouraged her to listen to more. Actually, what I wanted to tell her was to listen to Dagmar Krause's interpretations instead. It must be said that Ute Lemper's interpretations of Weill are very popular, and that they are just that, popular. They are finely tuned for the ear of the lover of a musical theater that is either without social content, or that has been, as in the case of her interpretations, often stripped of its social aspects.
This might seem too harsh a judgment, and it can be countered by:
1] the songs themselves always carry their social meaning; and
2] that the setting of these songs was in popular musical theater, and so to emphasize this aspect of the songs is more important than their intended content. The last objection is of course akin to those who make comments like "I never listen to the lyrics, I just like the beat." Such a level of interpretation seems legitimate and difficult to rebut precisely because it is so lacking in any worthwhile content.

Krause elevates what might be a mere show-tune to the level of a song. Lemper's emphasis is on the show-tune. Now one might say that these are show-tunes and so Lemper's performance is more "authentic." This is to a certain extent quite true, if one is looking for authenticity. But the authenticity of a time is also its illustrative of its ideological apparatus. And so to be more authentic is just as much to put on the ideological blinders of the period and place, and these affirmations of this period and place were beyond a doubt to be found on Broadway and in Hollywood.

Krause on the other hand brings out the negative, critical aspects of the songs, for Broadway was not the only context for the songs of Weill and Eisler. Some of course come before their engagement with Hollywood and the musical theater. All the songs have a negative, or critical, aspect that only Krause is able to reveal to the listener. The larger context for the songs are of course the era of the World Wars, with all its social and political upheaval. Krause's interpretation places the songs not in the theater, but in the social world.

The differences in Krasue's and Lemper's interpretation carries over into their voices. Krause again places these in a larger context by reminding the listener of her earlier performances with Henry Cow, and The Art Bears bands noted not only for their music, but for their politics as well. That some insist on referring to her voice as "highly original and idiosyncratic" or even "the voice of the angel of the Apocalypse" is due only to the distance these bands were from the conventions of popular music. Knowing these earlier associations, the very fact of her interpreting them moves the songs of Weill and Eisler away from the theater and back into the stream of music associated with Krause's earlier solo and group recordings. In doing so, Krause has changed what it means to authentically interpret these songs.

Below are to clips that illustrate the point.
For Ute Lemper you have to follow the link as it cannot be embedded.

Ute Lemper ~ Surabaya Johnny:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yxz81DtK_9k

Dagmar Krause ~ Surabaya Johnny: Unfortunately the only one from the records that I could find.


See Krause's
Supply and Demand: Songs by Brecht/Weill and Eisler (1986, LP, Hannibal Records)
Angebot und Nachfrage (1986, LP, Hannibal Records)
Tank Battles: The Songs of Hanns Eisler (1988, LP, Island Records)
Panzerschlacht: Die Lieder von Hanns Eisler (1988, LP, Island Records)
Voiceprint Radio Sessions (1993, CD, Voiceprint Records)

These is another performance of Lemper that shows the show-tune side of a Weill song: Ute Lemper "The Saga of Jenny" at the Internet Archive
http://www.archive.org/details/the_saga_of_jenny

BRBIII v. I.C. Wiley, c. 1977

White: BRBIII
Black: I.C. (Issac Cyrus) Wiley
c.1977
Opening: ELO A01 - Nimzowitsch-Larsen Attack

1.P-QN3 N-KB3 2.B-N2 P-Q4 3.P-K3 B-B4 4.N-KB3 N/1-Q2 5.B-N5 P-K3 6.0-0 B-Q3 7.R-K1 0-0 8.P-KR3 P-QR3 9.B-K2 N-K5 10.P-Q3 N-N4


11.NxN QxN 12.B-N4 BxB 13.QxB QxQ 14.PxQ N-K4 15.P-N5 P-QB4 16.N-Q2 P-N4 17.R/R-Q1 N-B3 18.P-R3 R/R-N1 19.P-N3 R/B-Q1 20.K-N2 P-QR4


21.R-QN1 B-B2 22.R-KR1 R-N2 23.P-K4 N-Q5 24.BxN PxB 25.R/R-K1 PxP 26.RxP R-Q4 27.N-B3 B-N3 28.P-R4 R-B2 29.R-N2 P-N5 30.R-K5 R/2-Q2


31.R-N1 B-B2 32.RxR RxR 33.K-R3 K-R1 34.R-K1 K-N1 35.R-K4 B-N3 36.R-K5 RxR 37.NxR P-B3 38.PxP PxP 39.N-B4 B-B2 40.K-R4 K-B2


41.K-N4 K-N3 42.P-B4 P-R4+ 43.K-R4 K-R3 44.N-Q2 B-Q1 45.N-B3 B-N3 46.K-R3 K-R2 47.K-R4 K-R3 48.K-R3 K-R2

Draw Agreed ½-½

Louis Agassiz and the Timetree of Life

There is a resemblance between the representation of Natural History by Louis Agassiz and the Timetree of Life. Of course, there is a vast gulf that separates them. Agassiz comes at the end of the era of dominance of Natural History and of polygenism, the scientific theory that the "races" constitute separate species. Agassiz was a proponent of polygenism and one of the most powerful critics of Darwin. It is difficult to see, but at the apex of his representation is a crown that rests atop the entry for Man. in the center are the four elements and an indistinguishable mass (God). In the Timetree, the Earth is at the center of the table and humans are just one small line in a vast natural world. One can actually see the decentering of humans accomplished by Darwin's work.


The Timetree of Life.
Stephen Jay Gould had a nice little "unpopular" essay on this topic "Cones and Ladders: Constraining Evolution by Canonical Icons." Gould mentions too the enduring influence of Ernst Haeckel's Tree of Life ---which is topped by "Menschen"--- on the common understanding of nature. Gould also held the Louis Agassiz chair at Harvard. While writing his "Mismeasure of Man," Gould found in the Agassiz archive the full text of a letter from Agassiz to his mother in which he described is first encounter with Negros. In 1846 Agassiz had arrived in the United States a noted Naturalist and needing to avoid some debts back in Europe. He immediately traveled to Philadelphia to meet Dr. Samuel G. Morton. Morton was the leading scientific proponent of polygenism and had amassed one of the largest crania collections in the world. Gould spent a great deal of time replicating Morton's experiments measuring their cranial capacity.
This is the text of Agassiz's letter to his mother as first published by Gould:

It was in Philadelphia that I first found myself in prolonged contact with Negroes; all the domestics in my hotel were men of color. I can scarcely express to you the painful impression that I received, especially since the feeling that they inspired in me is contrary to all our ideas about the confraternity of the human type [genre] and the unique origin of our species. But truth before all. Nevertheless, I experienced pity at the sight of this degraded and degenerate race, and their lot inspired compassion in me in thinking that they are really men. Nonetheless, it is impossible for me to reprocess the feeling that they are not of the same blood as us. In seeing their black faces with their thick lips and grimacing teeth, the wool on their head, their bent knees, their elongated hands, their large curved nails, and especially the livid color of the palm of their hands, I could not take my eyes off their face in order to tell them to stay far away. And when they advanced that hideous hand towards my plate in order to serve me, I wished I were able to depart in order to eat a piece of bread elsewhere, rather than dine with such service. What unhappiness for the white race---to have tied their existence so closely with that of Negroes in certain countries! God preserve us from such contact!

It was during this time that Agassiz met Samuel Morton, whom Agassiz recognized immediately as a scholar who was “after Georges Cuvier... the only zoologist who had any influence on his mind and scientific opinions.”



Haeckel's Tree of Life

Electron microscope view of Ant (with zoom)

From the New Scientist "Short Sharp Science" blog
If you like ants, this will give hours of fun viewing. It might even be good for doing a bit of invertebrate zoology as well. I have sadly have not had an ant "farm" in many years. I once had one that was made from a tall window, about 5 feet tall, three inches wide, and 1 1/2 feet across. It was great but the thought that several thousands ants were living in my room really annoyed my house-mates at the time. Of course, it was great and I might build a new one sometime in the future.

The Hanging of Amy Spain in "the Beautiful Village" of Darlington, S.C., March 1865.

While reading the history of my home town, Darlington, South Carolina, I came upon a section of letters regarding the hanging of Amy Spain, a 17 year old slave, on March 10, 1865. It is a truly remarkable story about which I want to compile as much documentation as possible, perhaps for a small volume along the lines of Michel Foucault's Herculine Barbin. Of course, the difference being that Amy Spain never got to speak or write her side of the story. All that remains are the accounts of others. [Note (2026): The account has instead become the prologue to my manuscript War, Reconstruction, and Memory: the Lives and Times of Capt. Paul Whipple and Kate Rains of New Boston, N. H. and Darlington, S. C., 1840-1915.] 

 

The hanging was important enough to appear in Harpers Weekly of September 30, 1865, with aspects of the account then being disputed in the pages of Darlington's New Era newspaper. Amy Spain was enslaved by a prominent local lawyer and hero of the invasion of Mexico, Major A. C. Spain, who acted as her counsel at her trial before a rebel military commission. Amy Spain was entrusted with the care of the Major's two daughters, and he wrote that: "Amy's temper was hot, hasty, and ungovernable, yet to me, as her master, she was always dutiful up to the unfortunate time when she exhibited traits of character, adopted a line of conduct, used expressions, and committed acts which contributed to the violent termination of her existence at the early age of seventeen." 

A.C. Spain had been called up in the final days of the war and, he said, left the care of his plantation in the hands of his "aged" father. Upon the appearance in town of a scouting party of Sherman's forces (I have almost narrowed down and after a bit more research think that I can identify which Union and Sesech units were in the area at the time), Amy Spain and many others thought that liberation had come. Unfortunately, from what I have read in the Union records, the main body of Federal troops remained outside the town because of flooded river crossings and so only dispatched a small detail to scout and retrieve supplies. The troops then returned and continued on into Florence (the site of a large prisoner of war camp which they were no doubt anxious to liberate) and to pursue retreating forces. Amy Spain had in the mean time declare that she was free and promptly took possession of many of the household goods of the Major, taking them to her own home and declaring that the fruits of slavery now belonged to the freed slaves. Unknown to her, Confederate troops had returned to the town and, to help establish "order," arrested her for her "crime." The Harper's writer describes what happened next, though this is disputed by some.

Hanging of Amy Spain
Harper's Weekly
September 30, 1865, page 613
One of the martyrs of the cause which gave freedom to her race was that of a colored woman named Amy Spain, who was a resident of the town of Darlington, situated in a rich cotton-growing district of South Carolina. At the time a portion of the Union army occupied the town of Darlington she expressed her satisfaction by clasping her hands and exclaiming, "Bless the Lord the Yankees have come!" She could not restrain her emotions. The long night of darkness which had bound her in slavery was about to break away. It was impossible to repress the exuberance of her feelings; and although powerless to aid the advancing deliverers of her caste, or to injure her oppressors, the simple expression of satisfaction at the event sealed her doom. Amy Spain died in the cause of freedom. A section of Sherman's cavalry occupied the town, and without doing any damage passed through. Not an insult nor an unkind word was said to any of the women of that town. The men had, with guilty consciences, fled; but on their return, with their traditional chivalry, they seized upon poor Army, and ignominiously hung her to a sycamore-tree standing in front of the court-house, underneath which stood the block from which was monthly exhibited the slave chattels that were struck down by the auctioneer's hammer to the highest bidder.

Amy Spain heroically heard her sentence, and from her prison bars declared she was prepared to die. She defied her persecutors; and as she ascended the scaffold declared she was going to a place where she would receive a crown of glory. She was rudely interrupted by an oath from one of her executioners. To the eternal disgrace of Darlington her execution was acquiesced in and witnessed by most of the citizens of the town. Amy was launched into eternity, and the "chivalric Southern gentlemen" of Darlington had fully established their bravery by making war upon a defenseless African woman. 

A sort of vindication/sermon letter-to the editor like the following is typical of those offering an apology for the execution of Spain: 

W. A. Gamewell. October 10, 1865.  For The New Era.   https://historicnewspapers.sc.edu/lccn/sn84026895/1865-10-17/ed-1/seq-3/   

https://historicnewspapers.sc.edu/lccn/sn84026895/

 

Recently, The Fortress on Youtube produced a short video on Amy Spain:  

 

"The HORRIFIC Execution Of The Teenage Female American Slave"
https://youtu.be/w-NBm2dQ2-0?si=BDuAo4wX2gQU6jSL&t=332 

 

 
Note that the following story in the issue of the New Era details the Andersonville-like horrors at the POW camp known as the "Stockade" (officially the "Confederate States Military Prison at Florence") just a few miles away in Florence: "2,802 Union soldiers died there and most were buried in unmarked trenches in what would become the Florence National Cemetery after the war." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Stockade

One can draw a line connecting the general system of enslavement to the treatment of POWs in Florence to the system of justice that condemned and executed Amy Spain and to the justifications, forgetting, and rewriting of the stories of all of those events by people such as Rev. Gamewell. The historical truth is, of course, impossible to finally establish, but I think the story should be preserved. 

According to all accounts, Amy Spain was executed and then buried wearing the clothes of Spain's daughters.  Though she was supposedly executed by the Confederate soldiers as an example to the the enslaved... the spectacle of the scaffold to preserve the social order.  Jim Crow began before the Civil War ended, and there was an attempt to erase her from history, just as her grave was left unmarked.  Amy Spain, whose initials were those of her enslaver, revolted against her oppressors and proclaimed her liberty.  She spoke of the aspirations of many and for that she got the noose in the central square of the beautiful village of Darlington.  The Harper’s account concludes:

 

She sleeps quietly, with others of her race, near the beautiful village. No memorial marks her grave, but after-ages will remember this martyr of liberty. Her persecutors will pass away and be forgotten, but Amy Spain's name is now hallowed among the Africans, who, emancipated and free, dare, with the starry folds of the flag of the free floating over them, speak her name with holy reverence.

 

In 1868, Ridgway George Rowley published a collection of his work including a poem about the execution of Amy Spain.  Some bioigraphical detains abut Rowley are provide with this letter to his sister:  Ridgeway George Rowley to his Sister
https://sparedshared22.wordpress.com/2021/05/23/1861-ridgeway-george-rowley-to-his-sister/ 

 

Poetry and Prose Selections from the Works of Ridgway George Rowley, 1868.

 https://archive.org/details/poetryandprose00rowlrich/page/n19/mode/2up 

Amy Spain

(Amy Spain was a colored woman of Darlington, South Carolina, the center of a rich cotton growing district. At the time of the entrance of the Union army under Sherman into the town, this poor slave, unable to restrain her emotion, in the supreme joy of her heart involuntarily exclaimed: “Bless the Lord, the Yankees have come!” For this, and this alone, immediately after the troops had left, she was taken by the citizens of the town and hung to the limb of an old sycamore tree, which stood in front of the Court House. An auction block used in the monthly sale of “chattels”, served as a scaffold. From this Amy Spain was launched into eternity. She died in the firm spirit of a martyr, with a prayer up on her lips, which was rudely interrupted by the oaths of one of her executioners.)

Oh, stand old sycamore tree!
A long, long life to thee!
And ever keep from harm,
Neath thy sheltering arm,
That Hall of Justice free;
To teach proud Chivalry
That the name
And martyred fame
Of Amy Spain
Shall remain
Till trees shall cease to grow,
And streams of Justice flow.

Let birds above thee sing,
While maids beneath thee bring
Flowers sweet flowers of May,
Around thy limbs to lay;
Thus consecrate, of thee,
A shrine to liberty
That the name
And storied fame
Of Amy Spain
Shall remain
Till songs no more are heard
From maiden or from bird.

In the calm stilly night,
When the stars are shining bright,
Looking down with their eyes
From the mild blue skies,
Amy’s spirit then shall come
To the town of Darlington,
For the name
And quenchless fame
Of Amy Spain
Shall remain
As long as night shall be,
And stars shine brilliantly.

To the watchers of the dead,
To the weary in their bed,
Mid their dreams, and their sleep,
In the hour of midnight deep,
Shall be heard the voice of one,
“God bless them, they have come.”
So the name
And martyred fame
Of Amy Spain
Shall remain
On South Carolina’s shore,
Evermore! evermore!

Oft, that same block of wood
Fore thee in terror stood;
But now its fears are gone
Tis a mercy-seat alone,
Since, through eternity,
It gives thee liberty,
While thy name
And gloried fame
Oh, Amy Spain
Shall remain
A beacon of the past.
To the people of thy caste.

Thou poor old slave to die.
And neath the sod to lie!
Green be the grass that grows,
And lightly lay the snows
Upon the honored grave
Of a most loyal slave.
Yea! the name
And martyred fame
Of Amy Spain
Shall remain
In story and in song
As the ages roll along.

 

It is often noted by locals of the day that there were no Sycamore trees around the Court House (though there was a Darlington Oak (Quercus hemisphaerica) and other trees) often using this detail to cast doubt upon the accounts of Spain's execution.

 

The courthouse where Spain was executed was Darlington's second, it was soon destroyed by fire in 1866 and replaced by this similar third courthouse in 1870.

 

 

 https://www.knowitall.org/photo/darlington-county-courthouse-around-1890-history-sc-slide-collection

  

See also: 

A short story based on the life of Amy Spain: 
“Searching for Amy Spain” by Merry Speece [2007 revisited]
https://deadmule.com/searching-for-amy-spain-by-merry-speece/

 

The Hanging of Amy Spain
https://uk.forceswarrecords.com/subject/653593521/the-hanging-of-amy-spain

Stumbled upon: An incident from Reconstruction Era South Carolina

[Updated May 2021, September 2026] 

A Small Game of Chess

I do not usually win against my many chess programs. That being said, I also do not believe that Chess programs "think". The problem with the computer is that, unlike a human, it can access every game ever played. It is like a human having access to every book ever written and every game ever played, and you have only what you can remember and tactics and strategies that you have learned. However, I play almost every day. The best program I have found is GnuChess and the engine associated with it called Phalanx. The following game was played against a weaker, but still passable, program.

Chess,MS - BRBIII [B50]
April 25, 2009

1.P-K4 P-QB4 2.N-KB3 P-Q3 3.P-QN4 PxP 4.P-Q4 N-KB3 5.B-Q3 P-K3 6.B-KN5 Q-R4 7.BxN PxB 8.N/1-Q2 P-N4 9.P-Q5 N-R3 10.N-N3 Q-R5

11.N/B-Q4 N-B2 12.Q-B3 B-K2 13.N-Q2 B-Q2 14.N/2-N3 R-QN1 15.0-0 P-KR4 16.R/B-K1 Q-R3 17.R-K3 Q-B1 18.K-B1 P-K4 19.N-KB5 BxN 20.PxB Q-R3

21.B-K4 K-Q2 22.Q-R3 P-R5 23.K-K2 Q-N3 24.R-Q1 R/N-N1 25.R-QB1 K-Q1 26.R-Q1 N-R3 27.R-KB1 B-B1 28.K-K1 B-R3 29.R-Q3 B-B5 30.B-B3 N-B4

31.R-Q1 N-R5 32.B-K2 N-B6 33.R-Q3 NxRP 34.R-R1 P-R4 35.R-B1 P-R5 36.N-Q2 N-B6 37.Q-B3 P-QR6 38.N-N3 P-R7 39.N-R1 R-N4 40.P-N3 PxP

41.RPxP B-B8 42.RxN PxR 43.QxP P-N5 44.Q-B4 Q-B4 45.QxQ PxQ 46.B-Q3 R/4-R4 47.K-K2 R-R8 48.RxR RxR 49.B-B4 B-N7 50.BxP BxN

51.P-N4 R-R7 52.P-Q6 K-K1 53.B-N3 B-Q5 54.B-R4+ K-Q1 55.K-Q3 R-N7 56.P-KB3 R-B7 57.K-K4 R-K7+ 58.K-Q5 R-K6 59.K-B6 RxP 60.K-Q5 R-B5 61.B-N3 RxNP 62.K-B6 P-K5 63.B-Q5 P-K6 0-1

Two New Sources: history of the disciplines

Two new sources that I have come across recently. One, The Journal of the International Society for the History of Islamic Medicine may be on hiatus, but some of the articles are very interesting in terms of both Natural History and the Sciences of Life, with articles such as "Balneology: A Concept of Public Health –Bath Houses in Arabian Life" Vol.5 , No.9 - April 2006. Arish M.K. Serwani, Mashkoor Ahmed, et al.

The other is an archive of French books and materials on phrenology and degeneracy.
Cite - Scientifica: Bibliothèque Histoire des sciences has a great collection on both subjects, as well as 19th century advice on infant and child behavior.

Who Knew? "Not too much, and not none at all."

Given my new found hobby of reading cancer literature and contemplating the nature of the thymus, I stumbled upon this piece of knowledge that was just too good to pass up. It is from WebMD. So it is bad for you when you are young but good for you when you are old. I am sure that this will be duly explained by evolutionary psychologists (as it is a field that is usually not humble about advancing explanations). But until then, one might ask about the reliability of the responses to the question "So how often do you masturbate?"

Masturbation Frequency Linked to Prostate Risk in 20s, Protection in 50s
By Daniel J. DeNoon
WebMD Health News
Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD
Jan. 27, 2009 -- Frequent masturbation in young men is linked to higher risk of early prostate cancer, but it lowers prostate cancer risk for men in their 50s, a study shows.
"Frequent masturbation during men's 20s and 30s increased their risk of prostate cancer," Dimitropoulou tells WebMD. "But men in their 50s who masturbated frequently had decreased risk."
Of course, masturbation frequency is relative.
For men in their 20s, "frequent masturbation" was two to seven times per week. Compared to same-age men who reported masturbating less than once per month, 20-something frequent masturbators had a 79% higher risk of prostate cancer by age 60.
For men in their 50s, "frequent masturbation" was one or more times per week. Compared to same-age men who reported never masturbating, 50-something frequent masturbators had a 70% lower risk of prostate cancer.
What's going on? The study wasn't designed to answer that question. But Dimitropoulou and colleagues have some theories. .........
Meanwhile, Dimitropoulou, now at England's University of Cambridge, advises moderation for both younger and older men.
"It is kind of logical that a moderate level of masturbatory activity has to be maintained," she says. "Not too much, and not none at all."


The graphics are from From Searchlights on Health: The Science of Eugenics by B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols, 1920. Gutenberg