"One hundred million dollars is an enormous estate to be accumulated over
a lifetime, and not what we think of as one year’s income for anybody.” §
“You see people who have gotten to the top of the ladder, and all of
a sudden they feel this emptiness. Like, hey, I got to the top, but maybe I
leaned my ladder against the wrong tree.” §
“We’re going to have to work at systematically recreating the
critical elements of community that once existed naturally. We can’t
go back to the past, but there was a time when people cared about each other
and would look out for each other.” §
“[Members of student Islamic organizations in the United States] are
not sitting around reading ‘How to Bomb Your Campus for Dummies.’” §
“People with schizophrenia have not been agents of terrorism attacks
to the best of my knowledge, so [if two women involved in a recent suicide
bombing in Iraq were schizophrenic, as some suggest] this would be a departure. … [P]eople
with schizophrenia oftentimes are very wary and, if anything, paranoid, and
to allow themselves to be strapped with a device and not question it and wonder
about it seems unlikely, but it is possible.” §
“You have to satisfy a number of conditions to get soft-tissue fossils.
You have to be buried quickly, you have to eliminate scavengers and you have
to have a certain set of chemical circumstances in the surrounding water.” §
“Mosaics, they glitter, they have visual firepower that plain acrylic
cannot have. That’s what’s wonderful about the subway mosaics.
They pick up light and motion of the trains.” §
“Sometimes, we’re able to readjust our goals and redefine what’s
important in our lives, but it’s hard to bring others along with us,
especially other people who may still be hanging on to unrealistic or high
goals who really don’t want to have to readjust. And it can cause a lot
of conflict in a marriage, in friendships, in your career if you make changes
and are, for heaven’s sakes, happy about the changes. It can be very
threatening to other people.” §
“[It is] imperative to engage in education during these times when some
national leaders and social movements call openly for the destruction of Israel
and its people in the most heinous manner, while other leaders and scholars in
other parts of the world do not want to fathom this rapidly changing reality.” §
“Little noticed by the world, Ethiopia is waging war against its own people
in the Ogaden desert. Long-simmering tensions erupted last April when separatist
rebels attacked a Chinese-run oil field. The Ethiopian government responded by
ejecting humanitarian agencies and launching a scorched-earth campaign in the
region. ... The U.S. has historically provided Ethiopian forces with arms, funding
and training. In recent years, the bond has deepened, with Ethiopia’s military
serving as a proxy for American interests in a region increasingly viewed as
a crucial front in the war on terrorism. ... Ironically, unbridled support of
Ethiopia’s army in the interest of combating terrorism may serve as a powerful
catalyst for anti-U.S. sentiment. ‘We hate the U.S.A. more than the Ethiopians,’ one
Ogadeni told me. ‘It is guns and money from the U.S.A. that are killing
our people.’” §
“As everybody knows, no person in the United States of America can be convicted
of a crime unless that person’s guilt is proven ‘beyond a reasonable
doubt.’ It would be hard to name a legal doctrine more familiar to the
general public. ... At its origins the rule was not intended to perform the function
we ask it to perform today: It was not primarily intended to protect the accused.
Instead, strange as it may sound, the reasonable doubt formula was originally
concerned with protecting the souls of the jurors against damnation. ... Convicting
an innocent defendant was regarded, in the older Christian tradition, as a potential
mortal sin. The reasonable doubt rule developed in response to this disquieting
possibility. It was originally a theological doctrine, intended to reassure jurors
that they could convict the defendant without risking their own salvation.” §
“The new environmentalism says, we can do better. We can have the lifestyle
that we’ve had, but we’re going to have to change the way we produce
things. And we’re going to change the way we are incentivizing people.
So the biofuel future is one that is very tricky. We probably do not want to
rely on corn-based ethanol, which is where Washington seems to be betting. … But
we could perhaps find ways to produce biofuels that are environmentally safe
and economically sensible.” §
“Throughout history, there have been only a tiny handful of hyperpowers:
societies that amassed such unrivaled economic and military might that they essentially
dominated the world. Rome, of course, is the most famous example. As today’s
hyperpower, the United States is frequently compared to the Roman Empire, which
also tried to wield its tremendous military power to pacify, ‘civilize,’ and
bring commerce and prosperity to weaker states and peoples. And yes, Rome practiced
torture. At the gladiator games, for example, criminals and slaves, including
children, were shredded by wild beasts for the entertainment of roaring crowds.
... The hyperpowers of old also inhabited a world in which the concept of human
rights was unknown. ... Ancient empires could engage in torture or brutality
without losing legitimacy. The United States cannot.” §
“Recently The Times disclosed that Blue Cross of California was asking
physicians to report patient conditions that could be used to cancel medical
coverage. ... Physicians hold a trust to protect the health of our patients.
We cannot abdicate this sacred trust. ... When patients are ill, they are at
their most vulnerable. That a person would allow me to take a scalpel and slice
into his body to extirpate disease is such an extraordinary act of trust. It
places me, the surgeon, in an enormous position of both privilege and responsibility.
The patient entrusts their health to the physician with the confidence that the
physician will advocate first for the patient’s health, not her pocketbook.
When physicians place the health of our patients as our first consideration,
we reclaim our autonomy, our morale, and ultimately, our dignity as a profession.” §
“Oftentimes, Latino voters are left out of voter mobilization drives because
they are considered low propensity voters, and campaigns want to talk to high
propensity voters; they want to persuade people who are very likely to vote.
But what differentiates low propensity voters from high propensity voters is
sometimes the attention that is paid to them over a series of elections.” §
“There is a feedback loop [in the brains of children who drink or do drugs].
Once they drink, their ability to assess long-term benefits of putting down the
drink never develops. The impaired judgment can become ingrained. ... They have
a problem in sustaining motivational sense [at school or work]. They work for
a period of time, but if it is too long and frustrating, they lose track of the
work they are trying to do.” §
“A metastasizing tumor is fairly mobile, and a surgeon’s knife can’t
get out all of the cells. A virus might be able to do that, because as a virus
kills a tumor cell, it could also replicate, and you could end up with a therapy
that’s self-amplifying.”
T H I S
— Michael Graetz, the Justus S. Hotchkiss Professor
of Law, about the list of the nation’s top 400
taxpayers, who reported an average annual income of $213.9 million apiece, “There’s Rich, and There’s the ‘Fortunate
400,’” The Wall Street Journal, March 5, 2008.
— David Miller, executive director of the Center
for Faith and Culture, “Devoted Workers,”
New York Post, March 3, 2008.
— Dr. James P. Comer, the Maurice Falk Professor of Child Psychiatry
and professor of psychiatry, citing a crucial step to repairing America’s
culture of violence, “America the Violent: The School Shootings,” East
Texas Review, Feb. 20, 2008.
— Zareena Grewal, assistant professor of American studies and lecturer
in American studies and ethnicity, race & migration, noting that such groups
are widening their doors to include women and those who want to work within
the American political system, “For Muslim Students, a Debate on Inclusion,” The
New York Times, Feb. 21, 2008.
— Dr. Ralph Hoffman, associate professor of psychiatry, “Files
for Suicide Bombers Show No Down Syndrome,” The New York Times, Feb.
21, 2008.
— Derek Briggs, the Frederick W. Beinecke Professor of Geology and Geophysics,
on the rarity of a 305-million-year-old fossil of a marine worm recently discovered, “Age-Old
Mystery Solved,” Irish Times, Feb. 21, 2008.
— Robert F. Thompson, the Colonel John Trumbull Professor of the History
of Art, “In Mosaics, an Artist’s Lasting Impression,” The
New York Times, Feb. 25, 2008.
— Susan Nolen-Hoeksema, professor of psychology, “Depression: A Midlife
Phenomenon,” “Talk of The Nation,” National Public Radio, Feb.
21, 2008.
— Charles Small, director of the Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study
of Anti-Semitism and lecturer in ethics, politics and economics, on the creation
of the new International Association for the Study of Anti-Semitism, “UK
Official: Koran Has Been Politicized,” Jerusalem Post, Feb. 24, 2008.
— Ronan Farrow, student at the Law School, in his article, “Ethiopa’s
War On Its Own,” Los Angeles Times, Feb. 25, 2008.
— James Q. Whitman, the Ford Foundation Professor of Comparative and Foreign
Law, in his article, “What Are the Origins of ‘Reasonable Doubt’?” History
News Network (WA), Feb. 25, 2008.
— Daniel Esty, the Hillhouse Professor of Forestry and Environmental Studies, “Michelle
Obama Makes Another Misstep,” “Headline News,” CNN, Feb. 25,
2008.
— Amy Chua, the John M. Duff Jr. Professor of Law, in her article, “No
Torture, No Exceptions,” Washington Monthly, March 2008.
— SreyRam Kuy, postdoctoral fellow in internal medicine, in his article, “Stand
Up for Patients,” Los Angeles Times, Feb. 28, 2008.
— Donald Green, the A. Whitney Griswold Professor of Political Science
and director of the Institution for Social and Policy Studies, “Why Have
Latinos Started Voting For Obama?,” InTheseTimes.com (IL), Feb. 29, 2008.
— Dr. John Krystal, the Robert L. McNeil Jr. Professor of Psychiatry, “Spotting
the Potential Addict,” Hartford Courant, March 3, 2008.
— Dr. Anthony Van den Pol, professor of neurosurgery, on his team’s
discovery of a virus that targets brain cancer, “Virus Versus Cancer,” Canada
Free Press, March 4, 2008.
W E E K ' SS T O R I E S
Tony Blair to teach Yale course on faith and globalization
Two alumni appointed as successor trustees
Lalli named next master of Jonathan Edwards College
Summit to focus on ways to make campus ‘greener’
Grant to support study of exercise program for women with cancer
Former Yale VP to share message about mentoring
Smelling food ‘fires’ different area of brain than eating it, says
study
Exhibition explores ‘mosaic’ of Mexico’s artistic traditions
Yale Rep to stage Oscar Wilde’s play about serial seducers and . . .
One of Italy’s ‘artistic treasures’ on loan to the
Yale Art Gallery
Differences in self-esteem and motivation explored in study
Conference to explore how epic heroes of old continue to inspire . . .
Role of scholar activists to be examined at annual . . .
Alumna athlete returns to oversee fundraising, outreach . . .
Winners of Friends of Music Recital Competition to perform . . .
Memorial service for R. Lansing Hicks
Campus Notes
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