Yale Bulletin and Calendar

December 6, 2002|Volume 31, Number 13

In the News
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"Cell phones are a huge factor [in pedestrian/vehicle accidents] -- there's no way a driver can devote his full attention to the road when he's on the phone."

-- Dr. Thomas S. Renshaw, professor of orthopaedics, "Pediatrics: Childhood Pedestrian Injuries Are Preventable Tragedies," Health & Medicine Week, Nov. 18, 2002.

"Given that we are committed to taxing income, we are not taxing income fairly now. It is my belief that the wealthiest Americans are not paying enough."

-- Daniel Markovits, associate professor of law, "Yale Prof Talks Tax Reform With Treasury Officials," New Haven Register, Nov. 22, 2002.

"We'll be fighting the wrong war if we simply tighten the rules for boards and ignore their more pressing need to be strong work groups whose members trust one another and aren't afraid to challenge senior management."

-- Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, associate dean of the Yale School of Management, "Building A Board That's Independent, Strong and Effective," The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 19, 2002.

"People are very suggestible. We just don't remember what we see."

-- Steven Duke, law of science & technology professor, about the unreliability of eye-witnesses, "Cases of Misidentification Prompt Calls For Change; Witnesses: DNA-Based Exonerations Have Many Questioning A Key Tool In Criminal Investigations," The Baltimore Sun, Nov. 18, 2002.

"People with money, from the beginning, knew school as an institution wasn't enough."

-- Edmund W. Gordon, professor emeritus of psychology, about the expensive supplementary education received by privileged white students, "Intense Tutoring For The Suburban, Smart And Disadvantaged," The New York Times, Nov. 18, 2002.

"In the wake of Enron, the possibility is that regulation is going to go much too far and that we are going to create a kind of audit society in which there is the illusion that if there are enough regulations and if you check off enough boxes, everything will be fine."

-- Jeffrey E. Garten, dean of the Yale School of Management, "Will More Rules Yield Better Corporate Behavior?" The New York Times, Nov. 17, 2002.

"Things like investor confidences or consumer confidences jump around an amazing amount. It's not as if you told them their business hangs in the balance on this decision."

-- Robert J. Shiller, the Stanley B. Resor Professor of Economics, "Execs Say They're Optimistic On The Economy," Canadian Business, Nov. 11, 2002.

"Everyone does the remedial [summer school program] because everyone is concerned about that all-important test score. In some ways, that's fixing a problem when it's already too late to fix. It's easier to learn the right way the first time."

-- Michael A. Ben-Avie, research affiliate at the Child Study Center, "Weak Pupils Rise Above 'Summer Slide,'" The Washington Post, Nov. 11, 2002.

"Genetic engineering, stem-cell therapy, reproductive cloning, life-extending chromosomal manipulations -- these are all technologies of high promise and no fulfillment as yet. It will be years or perhaps decades before any of them becomes reality."

-- Dr. Sherwin B. Nuland, clinical professor of surgery, in his review of "Life, Liberty and the Defense of Dignity" by Leon R. Kass, "Send In No Clones," The New York Times, Nov. 17, 2002.

"There was a difference between perception and reality that I thought was greater in New Haven than in any other city I'd seen."

-- Bruce Alexander, vice president and director of the Office of New Haven & State Affairs, about a poll showing a rise in positive views of the city, "Survey: New Haven's Image Improving," New Haven Register, Nov. 22, 2002.

"We are always striving to find the coherence that great novels bring us and more and more psychologists are coming to understand that narratives are one of our basic cognitive instruments and shape our place in time."

-- Peter Brooks, Sterling Professor of Comparative Literature & French, "Don't Be The Turkey At a Family Reunion," The New York Times, Nov. 21, 2002.

"The best you can ever do is get the face value of the [pre-Mao Zedong Chinese] bond back."

-- Geert Rouwenhorst, professor at the Yale School of Management, "A Hope Chest Full of Bonds; A Lobbying Effort To Have Beijing's Present-Day Rulers Honor Notes Issued By China's Long-Gone Nationalist Government Is Gaining Allies," Business Week Online, Nov. 11, 2002.

"I think [Thornton Wilder's 'Our Town'] is a play that Americans have a deep, almost atavistic attraction to. There's something about the intimacy of this community, where everyone knows everyone and people are born, live and die in the same place that creates a kind of deep longing in us."

-- Elizabeth Diamond, adjunct assistant professor of drama, "In a Post-9/11 World, 'Our Town' Has a New Resonance," Boston Sunday Globe, Nov. 10, 2002.

"Nanotechnology is really nano science at this time. The people are learning how to do things better and eventually many applications are projected to move into industry, although there's going to be a learning curve."

-- Mark Reed, the Harold Hodgkinson Professor of Engineering & Applied Science, "Conference In New York Highlights Latest Nanotechnology Developments," Marketplace Morning Report, Nov. 19, 2002.

"We're going to end up speaking McSpanish, a sort of anglicized Spanish."

--Roberto Gonzalez Echevarria, Sterling Professor of Hispanic & Comparative Literature, about the increasing use of a hybrid of English and Spanish in the U.S., "'Spanglish' Speakers Mix Home Languages; Popular Trend Seen As Obstacle," The Washington Times, Nov. 21, 2002.

"High profile affects everything: the way the lawyers behave, the prosecutors behave, the cops behave, the witnesses, the judge, the jurors. There's the opportunity to get on television, the opportunity to write a book. It warps everything. Everybody is capable of doing mischief that screws up the case."

-- Steven Duke, law of science & technology professor at the Law School, "Leaks Could Hamper Va. Sniper Cases," The Boston Globe, Nov. 12, 2002.

"My suspicion is that [double majors are] more valuable to the seller than the buyer."

-- Mark Schenker, dean of academic affairs at Yale College, "For Students Seeking Edge, One Major Just Isn't Enough," The New York Times, Nov. 17, 2002.

"[Jewish students] can't look at the world through one lens. The world's too complex. It doesn't refract down to a clear point."

-- James Ponet, Jewish chaplain, "On Issue Of Israel, Campuses Can't Tell Left From Right," The New York Times, Nov. 17, 2002.

"[T]his is an era of candidate-centered politics, when party labels are becoming less prominent in political advertisements. The parties, which are more likely to spend money on TV advertisements than on traditional 'party-building' activities like phone banks or volunteer organizations, are themselves partly to blame. The typical citizen no longer has much interaction with political parties."

-- Donald Green, director of the Institution for Social & Policy Studies, and Eric Schickler, in their article "Winning a Battle, Not a War," The New York Times, Nov. 12, 2002.

"My view is that the traditional sources for a Christian sexual ethic do not lead to the conclusion that same-sex relationships should be forbidden. While there are biblical texts that can be cited in this regard, their interpretation is disputed. . . . You cannot get from the traditional sources an absolute prohibition of same-sex relationships. You can't get a blessing of them, either."

-- Margaret Farley, the Gilbert L. Stark Professor of Ethics at the Divinity School, "Gay/Straight/Nun of the Above," The New Haven Advocate, Nov. 14, 2002.

T H I SW E E K ' SS T O R I E S

Provost Alison Richard nominated as Cambridge University Vice-Chancellor

Course on disaster response inspired by Sept. 11 attacks

Curator helping to shape future of nation's most famous museum

Whiffenpoofs will serenade the staff of 'The West Wing'

Grant supports drug research-training project in Thailand

Scientists aim to create drug with impact of low-cal diet

Master watercolor artists are featured in exhibition

Classic Spanish tale dramatizes the struggle for faith

Researcher aspires to 're-create' medieval monastery's library

Scholar's talk illustrates how art can 'unlock the world around it'

Former Law School dean Eugene Rostow dies; helped revamp school

Shopping is an art at Yale's museums

Open house for faculty will showcase technologies for teaching

Campus-wide toy drive will benefit local children

Campus Notes