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It was both sad and satisfying to bid farewell to the acclaimed Winnipeg-set comedy Less Than Kind, says showrunner Mark McKinney, who notes the last day for cast and crew included tears and champagne.
The trials of the fictional Blecher family come to an end with a final season beginning June 2 at 8 p.m. on HBO Canada, with McKinney promising "an interesting and an appropriate true-to-life kind of ending."
"I've never been so happy and not because it's ending, just because it felt like such a wonderful year," McKinney said last summer after shooting wrapped in the Prairie capital.
"It was really, really satisfying. I can honestly say my favourite couple of months in show business was shooting these last two seasons of Less Than Kind and I'm not even sure they're really great, you know. I just know that the cast kind of gelled, and that things kept breaking our way and that it felt special to everyone, and almost every single guest star we brought in was not only good but fantastic."
The final batch of episodes are set in the summer, with the fourth and final season opening on Sheldon Blecher's graduation day. The story then jumps forward eight weeks into the dog days of summer to catch up on the mishaps that have inevitably unfolded.
When we meet again with the beleaguered clan, all members are coping with upheaval in their own way.
Jesse Camacho's Sheldon is gearing up for a gap-year adventure with girlfriend Miriam, played by Brooke Palsson, and their pal Danny, played by Tyler Johnston. As fresh high school grads, they revel in the possibility the future holds, but tensions soon arise.
"(It) is a very poignant period of time because you're not going back to high school and life is kind of beckoning, and (Sheldon) runs into his first adult problems," McKinney added earlier this week in a round of interviews with Wendel Meldrum, who plays Blecher mom Anne.
"That excites all this emptiness, anxiety in Anne. And these two stories just kind of weave in and out of each other and then eventually collide in the last hour-long finale."
Newly engaged Josh, played by Benjamin Arthur, has a boring cubicle gig at Manitoba Labels where he's trying to ease into the life of a responsible family man. It's not easy, though, with his high-maintenance fiancée Shandra, played by Lisa Anne Durupt, becoming increasingly demanding.
Meanwhile, Anne's anxiety is rising at the prospect of an empty nest.
"I'm thrilled, thrilled, thrilled where it ended up," Meldrum says of her character's arc over the years, which most notably included becoming a widow when co-star Maury Chaykin died before Season 3.
"How Anne starts off as being a longtime wife and mother at the very beginning, Season 1, and how I end up after losing my husband and my children leaving home, and how I end up still being Anne, but a tiny bit more evolved, is I think just perfect."
McKinney says a tribute to Chaykin and his character is written into the very last scene, and Meldrum notes that his outrageous alter ego as the family patriarch was very much felt throughout the season.
"It's because he's gone that everyone's identities have kind of shifted in the way that they had and it's still an uneven, clunky family," she says.
"Especially for my part who was his widow, still feeling like I haven't got my stride yet. And I think you really feel the family is still new at coming together and I think it creates an extra character glitch for everybody."
Meldrum says equipment problems prevented the cast and crew from shooting the show's final scene last, and that her final day on set came four days before shooting actually wrapped.
It took place at about 4:30 in the morning with bleary-eyed cast members welling up with emotions, recalls McKinney.
"There was champagne at dawn," he says. "There was a toast and just a lot of hanging around, and reluctance to get into cars and get off the makeup. People hung around for a good couple of hours."
With bonds this tight, McKinney admits he may not be able to fully let go of the Blechers.
"We're in a brave new time in television land what with the Veronica Mars and all these shows kind of like having a second life, and I can think of one candidate (for a reunion), can you?" says McKinney, turning to Meldrum.
"Maybe like a Hanukkah movie?" she says. "I'd love that because there are no Hanukkah movies and this is the perfect family to lay it down."
McKinney says he's already drumming up new project ideas for the cast.
"I've assembled an ensemble in my head and all of the Less Than Kind people are in it."
The final season of "Less Than Kind" begins with two back-to-back episodes Sunday on HBO Canada. The Season 4 premiere, as well as the last episode of Season 3, are available as a free preview at hbocanada.com, or on demand and online via participating TV providers.


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Fun fact: Modern cars have a computer. They don't have a built-in laptop or iPad under the hood, of course. The computer in a car is very different. Its job is to monitor various aspects of operation. We'll explain the specific roles of modern car computers and how to identify signs of one which is worn out.
What Do Modern Car Computers Do?
Modern car computers regulate different controls in the engine and other components. These include the following, among others.
- Engine emission
- Idle speed
- Spark plug
- Fuel injection
Many modern vehicles—and some retrofitted classic cars—also have multiple sensors that gauge the engine temperature, oxygen levels, throttle position, and more. The sensor sends the information to the computer where it processes the data and adjusts engine output for peak performance.
Signs of a Faulty Car Computer
Like any other car part, the computer experiences wear and tear with age. If the "check engine" light switches on, then the computer likely has a problem. If the light is really dim, or blinks at inconsistent intervals, the computer is probably malfunctioning.
A car that won't start is another sign. Of course, this can be attributed to a number of other causes. When you turn on the ignition, does the check engine light come on? If the light is not coming on, then the computer may not be receiving power due to a blown fuse or broken wiring.
Also, if you smell a burning odor, then the computer may be overheating. An auto service technician can locate the car's engine control module and look for burn marks to confirm an overheated computer.
We Repair Car Computers
Bring your car to Bothell Way Garage if you notice any of the above symptoms. Repairs on modern car computers are just as essential as repairs for a transmission, suspension, or other vital component. Contact us today! We are equally adept at diesel repair.
Modern Car Computers Repair and Diagnosis in Bothell
Serving Customers in Bothell, Kenmore, Woodinville, Brier,
Kingsgate, Lake Forest Park & Juanita
Posted on May 14, 2020 | Published by Ignite Local | Related Local Business


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|"Koji Noguchi (JIRA)" <j...@apache.org>
|[jira] Created: (HDFS-1158) HDFS-457 increases the chances of losing blocks
|Tue, 18 May 2010 00:02:44 GMT
HDFS-457 increases the chances of losing blocks ------------------------------------------------ Key: HDFS-1158 URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/HDFS-1158 Project: Hadoop HDFS Issue Type: Bug Components: data-node Affects Versions: 0.21.0 Reporter: Koji Noguchi Priority: Critical Whenever we restart a cluster, there's a chance of losing some blocks if more than three datanodes don't come up. HDFS-457 increases this chance by keeping the datanodes up even when # /tmp disk goes read-only # /disk0 that is used for storing PID goes read-only and probably more. In our environment, /tmp and /disk0 are from the same device. When trying to restart a datanode, it would fail with 1) {noformat} 2010-05-15 05:45:45,575 WARN org.mortbay.log: tmpdir java.io.IOException: Read-only file system at java.io.UnixFileSystem.createFileExclusively(Native Method) at java.io.File.checkAndCreate(File.java:1704) at java.io.File.createTempFile(File.java:1792) at java.io.File.createTempFile(File.java:1828) at org.mortbay.jetty.webapp.WebAppContext.getTempDirectory(WebAppContext.java:745) {noformat} or 2) {noformat} hadoop-daemon.sh: line 117: /disk/0/hadoop-datanode....com.out: Read-only file system hadoop-daemon.sh: line 118: /disk/0/hadoop-datanode.pid: Read-only file system {noformat} I can recover the missing blocks but it takes some time. Also, we are losing track of block movements since log directory can also go to read-only but datanode would continue running. For 0.21 release, can we revert HDFS-457 or make it configurable? -- This message is automatically generated by JIRA. - You can reply to this email to add a comment to the issue online.
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Tale of Tails: Tino Hide & Seek
We haven't had a Tino "Tale of Tails" in quite some time, so I thought I'd dig into the archives for a Tino story. As I've said before, Tino was a real outdoor dog. He preferred to spend his days out in the yard even though he had free rein to come and go through the dog door. He would typically go out after breakfast and stay out there all day. He would usually come back in the house as it started to get dark – although in the summer, there were plenty of times he would sleep outside, or come in for awhile and then wander back outside.
He didn't have a doghouse although I though of getting one plenty of times, but he did have an uncanny ability to hide himself in the yard. Yes, he had his favorite spots, but he also managed to find really unusual spots too.
During the day, I would go out back to check on him a couple of times. My office window faces the yard, so frequently I would see him making his rounds along the property line, but if I hadn't seen him for awhile, I would go out to check on him, just to put 'eyes on' him – especially after he went blind and started getting dementia, I did this more frequently.
Today's post is a bit of a photo essay of some of the odd places I have found Tino over the years.
He loved climbing in under bushes and his favorite 'go-to' spot still shows the signs of where he dug out the dirt to make a bed.
Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of him there.
Here is is in just various spots around the yard. Totally arbitrary, let's just flop down here in the middle of the yard.
And of course he slept in the bed and on the outdoor lounges.
This is one of my favorite pictures of Tino. I know he's not 'hiding', he's actually waiting for Pete the mailman to come, but this is TIno in his prime, probably about 4 years old, about 75lb, strong and healthy. A far cry from the 35lb flea & tick infested, with a torn ACL and sick with distemper dog we rescued 2 years earlier.
Not much mischief, just a bit of silliness from Tino. He was a great dog with a capital D – O – G!
The Monday Mischief Blog Hop is hosted by Snoopy's Dog Blog, Alfie's Blog and My Brown Newfies
31 Comments
I love talking about dogs of the past. It warms my heart to know that people remember their past pets and keep the memories alive.
Dina Mom recently posted…Black and White Sunday
So happy to meet Tino. Memories of our dogs stay with us furever–and it's therapeutic to pull out some pix and share them.
My dogs love to hide under bushes, too, particularly when it's hot out.
–Woofs (and meows) from Life with Dogs and Cats.
Susan and the gang from LifeWithDogsAndCats.com recently posted…News: Why Dogs Do Doo Doo the Way they Do
He is a handsome fellow and you can sure tell he loved his yard…every inch of it. Great photos.
emma recently posted…How To Move A Large Object | GBGV | Monday Mischief
Wonderful pictures. In some of those pictures he really blends in.
2 brown dawgs recently posted…Monday Mischief–The Thief
Many thanks for sharing your memories with me. Tine was really such a fabulous guy. I wish they all would live forever.
easy rider recently posted…easyblog SILLY SUNDAY
It looks like Tino had a variety of sleeping positions too! I love how he is curled up in a tight ball in the one picture. What wonderful memories of him 🙂
Jen recently posted…Not On The Bed!
I love the photo with Tino right smack in the middle of the bed…taking up two pillows, no doubt! Sounds like he was quite a buddy!
Kris, Neighbor Chick recently posted…Funny joke, 2014
awww! Great photos!
So cool to see all the places Tino decided to flop in your yard!
((husky hugz))
Jenna,Mark "HuskyCrazed" Drady recently posted…OMD! Mondays!
I just love your Tino stories. What great memories. Thanks for sharing them with us!
Flea recently posted…Funny Great Danes, FBM, 55
I always love Tino stories… and they always make me think how good of friends he and Tynan would have been. Tynan also dug dirt beds and would just flop down any-old-place to sunbathe.
Bethany recently posted…Every Walk Is A Training Walk
Oh how I love your Tino stories. Sampson likes to lie in yard too, although now as he's getting older it's usually in the sun. But if his dad is outside, you can bet you'll find Sampson sitting or lying in the front yard, keeping close tabs on is street. 🙂
Jodi recently posted…A Visit to Risley Park
Aww, love all those sweet pics of him sacked out in the yard! Rita is funny – she almost never sleeps in our yard. She likes to go out there for a little bit and lay in the sun and survey "her domain" (we're on a canyon so there's a lot to see) but she never sleeps out there! Tino must have felt very safe and relaxed to just flop down anywhere.
(wow – that was an interesting "spam" message. It wouldn't let me post. It said I hadn't spent enough time on the page to have read the post so go back and read it! Gosh – I just got scolded by your blog! Thing is… I read the first text-y part earlier, but didn't have time to finish. So then I came back and just looked at the pics! Hopefully I've been here long enough now……….) 🙂
Jackie Bouchard recently posted…Monday Mischief: Apparently Beggars CAN Be Choosers
Did you ever worry because you couldn't find him? When Onyxx first started hiding under the couch, it freaked me out because I didn't know where he was.
Yes, there times I couldn't find him and would freak a little bit. Luckily he was very good about coming when he was called.
Slimdoggy recently posted…Black & White Sunday 1-5-14
Honey likes to hang out in the yard just for fun too. And, for that matter, so do I.
Thanks for sharing some Tino and Sunshine as our temps drop well below zero. 🙂
Pamela recently posted…The Daily Dog Blog – Pet Blogger's Gift Exchange
I love that you have pictures of all his favorite napping spots! He looks like he had a lot of personality! 🙂
Nailah Bone recently posted…Monday Mischief – Training? What training?
Love that picture of Tino at his prime and 'on duty' – I love to be outside too, only Mum doesn't need to check on me, cos I come and check on her about every 20 minutes, I knock on the door to make sure she's ok, when she opens the door I just run away! Tee Hee
I hope you're having a fun day,
Your pal Snoopy 🙂
snoopy recently posted…Monday Mischief – Hey Dude!
Those are some really beautiful photos that make great memories. He found the perfect spots to lay and rest.
Sand Spring Chesapeakes recently posted…Frozen Tundra And Snow Fun


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Legal community platform launch
Opening of Crypto legaltech lab in Zug
Legal solutions of TGEs available on our marketplace and automation platform (e.g. white paper analysis, Howey test)
Additional legal products (e.g. tax advice, regulation & compliance, property protection)
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Open source crowdfunding platform
Automation of processes, legal documents and contracts for the financial and captal markets
Classification and rating model of token
Extend the marketplace to consumers with our legal app
Legal solutions for the financial services industry, crypto banking


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Of all the things you don't want to see in a rearview mirror, a marauding police car ranks pretty high. Especially if you have had a little too much to drink, which is something that Rocks Off knows just a little about. For our Washington Shore party Thursday night, here are some helpful suggestions of how to make the night a little easier on you, your liver, and possibly your criminal record. Parking on or off Washington is not a fun-filled adventure. Tow trucks loom like hungry sharks, and the Houston Police Department has taken quite a strong stance lately on drunk driving up and down the street (as well they should). You don't want a night out with friends to turn into a drunk-driving charge. A few bucks spent on a cab is a pretty good investment compared to a few years in jail and/or court and lawyer fees. The Washington Avenue Drinkery will give out taxi vouchers to folks at the Washington Shore party if they need a safe ride home. They will also call a cab for you if you do not want to use a voucher. The management of the Drinkery wants you to have a good time, but also wants you to be able to come back to the bar in one piece. During our recent research on Washington, we also got to know the Washington Wave, the city's only jitney service. The Wave is a shuttle bus you can ride up and down the avenue all night for $8. It makes stops at the area bars and restaurants, and a few of those establishments offer discounts on drinks and food if you show them your Wave wristband. You can park your vehicle and catch the Wave at its hub on Memorial near the downtown courthouse, and they will also call for a cab if you need it at the end of the night. If you still choose to be brave and park off Washington, we suggest one of two parking lots. A block or two down from Reign Lounge and the Drinkery, safe $5 parking spaces are manned by an attendant; we have used that location a few times to stow our car. There is also a field next to Pearl Bar that offers parking, albeit at $10. You can try to park on the street, but Thursday nights are in essence the first night of Washington's weekend, so spots may be scarce. The neighborhoods behind the Drinkery and Walter's On Washington are good bets if you're feeling lucky. Above all, make sure you have a good (and safe) time. We can't wait to see all your fake-tanned, fist-pumping faces.
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There was a possibility that if you were caught speeding or blasting through that red light you could get away without paying the ticket you received.
Sure, you would get a few phone calls, maybe an annoying letter or two and eventually a warrant, but that's about the most the city can do. And that's only if they catch you.
This is the kind of system 2,500 Galveston County residents with warrants from League City Municipal Courts took advantage of, but no longer.
Starting July 1, residents in Galveston County with unpaid traffic violations, fines and fees will be unable to renew their vehicle registration until they've paid what they owe.
"If they try to renew their registration there'll be a flag on it saying they cannot fully satisfy the fine at the Municipal Court," League City Municipal Court Administrator Shirley Murphy told Hair Balls.
League City created a three-way partnership with the Department of Motor Vehicles and the Galveston County Tax Office in the program that they believe could bring nearly $1 million into the city bank account.
"We do send notices... we have Warrant Round-Ups every year, we make phone calls, and there's the warrant officer that tries to do it, but he's one person and with 2,500 just in Galveston County, it's pretty hard for that one person," Murphy said. "I guess it's just something they'll disregard until their luck is gone."
Murphy said that while there is about a $23 fee attached to every file she sends, this is a small price to pay to collect the $993,000 the residents owe. These files will allow the defendants to be flagged. Once defendants pay the fine and the fees for paying late, they will receive a receipt they can present to the county to register their vehicles.
Texas Transportation Code Chapter 702 allows a tax assessor-collector or department to refuse the registration of the vehicle, and every charge sent to an offender will tack on another $20 fee.
We Believe Local Journalism is Critical to the Life of a City
Engaging with our readers is essential to the mission of the Houston Press. Make a financial contribution or sign up for a newsletter, and help us keep telling Houston's stories with no paywalls.
Support Our Journalism
Of course, there's still the chance that instead of opting to pay up, a driver could instead just fail to renew his registration -- counting on not being stopped by law enforcement.
"There are just some that are going to take the chances," Murphy acknowledged.
Murphy said that while the process has taken some time to develop software and work with the different departments, the city has been busy mailing and notifying defendants to give them the opportunity to take care of their fines before any flags are placed on accounts.
League City urges Galveston County residents with outstanding warrants to contact the League City Municipal Court to obtain the paperwork they need to renew their vehicle registration.


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The Sanctity of Life and its Discontents
- David Brog Author
- 2010 19 Jul
EDITOR'S NOTE: The following is an excerpt from In Defense of Faith: The Judeo-Christian Idea and the Struggle for Humanity by David Brog (Encounter).
[I]t may be worth remembering that our present absolute protection of the lives of infants is a distinctively Christian attitude rather than a universal ethical value….[1] -- Peter Singer, Professor of Bioethics, Princeton University
The Romans were not the first anti-Semites. But they embraced, at times enthusiastically, this most ancient of hatreds. The Romans conquered most of Europe and the Mediterranean world. They pacified peoples far more powerful, numerous and wealthy than the Jews. But they could never fully subdue this small tribe in the far, southeastern corner of the Empire.
The Jewish rebellions were not merely military. The Jews also engaged in a determined cultural resistance. Unlike other conquered peoples who eagerly adopted Roman ways, the Jews clung with persistence to their ancient religion and distinctive morality. As Jews migrated to the Empire's leading cities, they even began attracting Roman citizens to their synagogues.
In the year 70 AD, Roman legions crushed a major Jewish revolt and destroyed the city of Jerusalem. Not long thereafter, the Roman senator and historian Tacitus tried to quash the Jewish cultural challenge. In his major work, the Histories, Tacitus attacks the Jews as "wicked," stubborn," and "lascivious." Turning his attention to the Jewish religion, he notes that:
Among the Jews all things are profane that we hold sacred; on the other hand they regard as permissible what seems to us immoral.
Tacitus then lists a number of these Jewish moral perversions. Among the beliefs he found particularly "sinister and revolting" was the fact that, for Jews, "it is a deadly sin to kill an unwanted child."[2]
The Romans were proud practitioners of infanticide. So were the Greeks before them. Both Plato and Aristotle recommended that the state embrace a policy of killing deformed infants. The Roman philosopher Seneca wrote approvingly of the common practice of drowning abnormal or weak children at birth. The earliest known Roman legal code, written in 450 BC, permitted fathers to kill any "deformed or weak" male infant or any female infant no matter how healthy.[3] Indeed, female babies were the primary victims of Roman infanticide.
The Roman approach to human life was strictly utilitarian. They believed that females and weak males were never going to grow up to be effective farmers, soldiers or leaders. They would therefore contribute little to the families and society that sustained them. With nothing in the Roman moral code to dictate otherwise, many parents decided that killing these babies made much more sense than raising them.
Infanticide became so common a practice in the Roman Empire that parents could discuss it without the slightest remorse or shame. Here, for example, is a letter from a Roman soldier to his wife:
Know that I am in Alexandria…. I ask and beg you to take good care of our baby son, and as soon as I've received payment I shall send it up to you. If you are delivered [before I come home], if it is a boy keep it, if a girl, discard it.[4]
The Jews embraced a different and quite revolutionary view of human life. They were neither utilitarian nor pragmatic. The Jews attributed a mystical value to every single human being. And they valued all humans equally regardless of their age, gender, health or ability. The Romans simply could not understand this Jewish fetish for human life, and they condemned it with the disdain they reserved for the most irrational of superstitions.
* * *
Culture forges morality. It is our culture that defines for us what is right and what is wrong.[5] We did not evolve our belief in the sanctity of human life along with our opposable thumbs. Nor are we moral geniuses who reasoned our way to this insight. Most civilizations throughout most of human history never arrived at this view. The only reason we in the West recognize the sanctity and equality of all humans today is because centuries ago a small tribe on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean injected this radical idea into our cultural thought stream.
Our culture is pervasive. It surrounds us as completely as the air we breathe. And, like the air we breathe, we often forget that it is even there. From the moment we're born, we are bombarded by our culture's unique moral code. Our first stories and books impart introductory lessons on right and wrong. Our parents and teachers communicate the culture's norms in every compliment they give and every criticism they level. The culture's prevailing morality permeates our workplaces, saturates our entertainment, and pursues us to our retirement homes. The culture never rests.
It is therefore easy to forget that so many of the things we think we "just know" were actually lessons we drank in with our mother's milk. In fact, many observers seem to believe that they arrived at certain Judeo-Christian insights through their own independent moral genius. Here, for example, is a popular contemporary critic of religion describing how humans can simply reason their way to recognizing the evil of slavery:
The moment a person recognizes that slaves are human beings like himself, enjoying the same capacity for suffering and happiness, he will understand that it is patently evil to own them and treat them like farm equipment. It is remarkably easy for a person to arrive at this epiphany.[6]
This reasoning forms a perfect circle. Yes, once people accept that slaves are human beings like themselves they may well oppose slavery[7]. But why on earth would people ever recognize that slaves are human beings like themselves? The author of these words seems to forget how very few people on the face of the earth have ever looked into their slave's eyes and seen a brother. The Egyptians never did. The Greeks never did. The Romans never did. Most of the Enlightenment philosophers never did.
Growing up in the heart of a Judeo-Christian society, such critics begin life on a high moral summit and believe that they have scaled a mountain. Yet such moral ingratitude is hardly new or rare. No less a figure than Thomas Jefferson made this mistake. Jefferson grew up in a Judeo-Christian culture that taught the equality of all men, and he enshrined this principle in the Declaration of Independence with the words "all men are created equal." Yet he famously introduced this piercing moral insight as one which is "self evident."[8]
The idea that all men are equal is anything but self evident. And while Jefferson may have been capable of paraphrasing the idea, even he famously failed to grasp its full meaning. When he spoke of men being created equal, Jefferson meant men, and not women. And he meant white men. When it came to slavery, therefore, Jefferson never fully arrived at the "remarkably easy" moral epiphany of this institution's patent evil. While he saw abolition as a worthy goal for some future generation, Jefferson never pressed the issue in his own day and he never freed his own slaves.
There are some critics of the Jewish and Christian faiths who reject their core morality. But in the modern West, the more popular critique of the Judeo-Christian tradition comes from those who fully embrace its morality but simply fail to recognize the source. These critics employ the ideas, values and vocabulary they have inherited from the Judeo-Christian tradition to sit in judgment on that tradition and find it wanting.
Discontents at Home
Carrie Buck was an 18-year old woman who gave birth to a child out of wedlock in the wrong place at the wrong time. The year was 1924, and the Commonwealth of Virginia frowned upon such behavior. The Commonwealth concluded that Carrie was "feebleminded" and ordered her sterilized so that she could not bring any more children into the world who might inherit her deficiency. The Romans killed babies of weak mind or body. The Commonwealth of Virginia wanted to prevent such babies from being born in the first place.
In seeking to sterilize those it deemed unfit to reproduce, Virginia was hardly alone. During the 1920's and 1930's, the eugenics movement was growing in prestige and popularity throughout the United States and Europe. Proponents of this pseudo-science taught that government could help build a better society by encouraging healthy citizens to reproduce while discouraging or even preventing those deemed defective from doing so. States across America responded by passing laws establishing forced sterilization programs. Those who advocated this practice did not believe themselves to be cruel or bigoted. On the contrary, most were self-professed progressives to end disease and poverty by applying the latest scientific insights.
The United States Supreme Court shared the nation's enthusiasm for eugenics. When Carrie Buck challenged the Virginia legislation under which she was to be sterilized, the Supreme Court upheld the law. Writing for the lopsided majority of eight of the nine justices, the legendary Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote that eugenics initiatives such as Virginia's were necessary:
…in order to prevent our being swamped with incompetence. It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes. Three generations of imbeciles are enough. [9]
Holmes' phrase "three generations of imbeciles" refers to evidence submitted at trial that both Carrie Buck's mother and daughter were, like Buck, "feebleminded." Proponents and practitioners of eugenics relied upon this horribly vague category to give them the freedom to sterilize pretty much anyone they chose. The evidence proffered to support the charge of a feeble mind often spoke more to the victim's conformity than to his or her intelligence.
Subsequent research has demonstrated that Carrie's mother was simply unconventional and, possibly, a little promiscuous. Carrie's only offense was having a child out of wedlock. The authorities ignored the fact that Carrie's pregnancy was most likely the result of a rape. The evidence that Carrie's infant daughter was feebleminded consisted of the most superficial of observations and was contradicted when she grew into a top student. [10] What Holmes called "three generations of imbeciles" would be characterized today as a single mother and a rape victim making the difficult choice to keep and raise their babies.
Justice Holmes was not bound by law or precedent to sanction this eugenics program. Instead, he took advantage of his position on the Court to further a cause he enthusiastically supported. Holmes, like Tacitus before him, had little sympathy with or patience for the Judeo-Christian fetish for human life. Holmes was a man of reason and a man of science, and he judged humans only by reference to their utility to society.
Holmes was by all accounts quite proud of his rejection of the sanctity of human life. Here, for example, is Holmes writing to a friend:
I think that the sacredness of human life is a purely municipal idea of no validity outside the jurisdiction. I believe that force, mitigated so far as it may be by good manners, is the ultima ratio, and between two groups that want to make inconsistent kinds of world I see no remedy except force. Every society rests on the death of men….[11]
In another letter, Holmes repeats the sentiment with even greater emphasis:
What damned fools people are who believe things… All 'isms seem to me silly - but this hyper-aethereal respect for human life seems perhaps the silliest of all.[12]
Elsewhere, Holmes waxes less eloquent on the topic. In a letter to a colleague he asks: "Doesn't this squashy sentimentality of a big minority of our people about human life make you puke?" [13]
Given his rejection of the sanctity of human life, it was easy for Holmes to not only embrace eugenics, but to take it to its logical conclusion. In a major address he declared:
I can imagine a future in which science shall have passed from the combative to the dogmatic stage, and shall have gained such catholic acceptance that it shall take control of life, and condemn at once with instant execution what now is left for nature to destroy. [14]
Far from being shocked by Virginia's sterilization statute, Justice Holmes may well have believed that it did not go far enough.
This Supreme Court ruling gave long-awaited legal sanction to the practice of eugenics in America. Eugenics proponents wasted little time capitalizing on this victory. Many additional states passed statutes similar to Virginia's, bringing the total number of states authorizing forced sterilization to twenty-nine. By 1941, over 35,000 American men and women had been forcibly sterilized or castrated. Most of these were found to be "feebleminded," "morally degenerate," or possessing some other deficiency vague enough to apply to almost anyone out of favor in his or her community.[15]
* * *
Even in America, our Judeo-Christian roots are sometimes not strong enough to hold us steady when we are buffeted by new cultural winds. The Romans were not the only ones to disdain the Judeo-Christian reverence for human life. We have had plenty of dissidents right here at home.
Since the supreme value we place on human life is not self evident but learned from culture, it can be challenged and replaced by less generous appraisals. Our values are not written on our minds or hearts with indelible ink; they have been penciled in. They are thus subject to being erased. America's record of practicing eugenics is but one small example of the fragility of our cultural norms.
When it comes to the mutability of our moral code, the past century has of course provided us far more terrifying cautionary tales. In Germany, the Judeo-Christian ethic was replaced by a Nazi race-based morality which narrowed the scope of the sacred from humans to Aryans. In the Soviet Union, the Judeo- Christian ethic was supplanted by a Communist class-based morality which narrowed the scope of the sacred from humans to the working class. In the former Yugoslavia, the Judeo-Christian ethic was rejected in favor of a nationalism-based morality which narrowed the scope of the sacred from humans to Serbians. The list goes on. In each case, those left outside of the newly narrowed zone of compassion were left vulnerable to the very worst that human nature can inflict.
These examples are not merely disturbing; they are obvious. We in America have heard these stories of slippery slopes before and we are quite confident that we will not slide down them. And we very well may not, especially if we as a nation continue to revere our Judeo-Christian heritage to the extent we currently do. But episodes such as our embrace of eugenics should remind us that even we are not completely inured against strange cultural winds. Sometimes the house sways, and the foundation is tested.
Scientific Discontents
James Watson is a scientific legend. In 1962, he won the Nobel Prize together with his partner Francis Crick for discovering the double-helix structure of DNA. He is the father of modern genetics.
On October 14, 2007, Dr. Watson's illustrious career came to an abrupt end. That day, London's Sunday Times published an interview with Dr. Watson in which he was quoted as saying that he was "inherently gloomy about the prospects of Africa." Watson then explained the reasons for his pessimism:
All of our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours - whereas all the testing says not really. [16]
Watson went on to add:
There is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so. [17]
Dr. Watson had not suggested killing anyone. Nor had he called for sterilizing anyone. He may well have made his statement out of a hope that confronting this scientific "truth" would convince us to do more to help the Africans of whom he spoke. And Watson was far from the first scientist to suggest the existence of intellectual disparities among the races despite all of the evidence to the contrary. [18]
Yet no matter what his intentions, Dr. Watson was giving modern sanction to one of the most dangerous ideas in history. The suggestion that there are significant and immutable differences between the various branches of the human family is a profound break from the Judeo-Christian belief in the fundamental equality of all humans. Theories emphasizing these alleged differences have been an excuse for slavery and a rationale for genocide. Human inequality has been the mantra of modernity's greatest murderers.
Dr. Watson may have thought that he was being scientifically honest. But he was in fact being morally reckless. This much should, by now, be elementary.
* * *
Before his controversial comments led to his suspension, Dr. Watson had been the director of the prestigious Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on New York's Long Island. This laboratory has a long and proud tradition of being on the cutting edge of biological research. And, it turns out, the laboratory also has a history of controversial directors questioning the Judeo-Christian ethic of the sanctity and equality of all humans.
During the early decades of the twentieth century, the director of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory was a biologist named Charles Davenport. Davenport was one of America's most prominent proponents of eugenics. Early in his tenure at the lab, Davenport opened the Eugenics Records Office. This institution became the intellectual and administrative heart of the eugenics movement during the height of its popularity in America.
The team at the Eugenics Records Office embraced a most ambitious agenda. They set out to identify the estimated ten percent of the American population who were believed to be too defective to reproduce.[19] At the same time, they sought to convince the states to pass legislation which would enable them to sterilize all those so identified. In 1914, the Eugenics Records Office drafted a model sterilization law to serve as a template for the states. This model law provided the foundation for the Virginia statue under which Carrie Buck was sterilized. This model later served as the basis for German legislation, the Law for the Prevention of Defective Progeny, under which the Nazis sterilized more than 350,000 people.[20]
Beyond sterilizing alleged undesirables here at home, the Eugenics Records Office invoked the principles of eugenics in a concerted campaign to block the immigration of supposed inferiors from abroad. Fully embracing the racist orthodoxy of their day, most eugenicists believed that northern Europeans were genetically superior to eastern and southern Europeans. They were therefore horrified that America's immigration laws had opened our doors to millions of Italians, Jews, Greeks and other allegedly inferior breeds. They concluded that all of their other efforts to improve America's gene pool would be overwhelmed unless they stopped this massive influx of poor genetic stock.
The experts at the Eugenics Records Office worked tirelessly to reverse American immigration trends. While they accepted the existing immigration levels, they demanded that Congress shift the source of these immigrants from southern and eastern Europe to the "Nordic" countries of northern Europe. The Director of the Eugenics Record Office, Harry Laughlin, championed these racial revisions in repeated testimony before the House Committee on Immigration and Naturalization. Laughlin so impressed Committee Chairman Albert Johnson that he was appointed the Committee's "Expert Eugenics Agent."
Embracing Laughlin's theories and recommendations, Chairman Johnson introduced and secured passage of a eugenics-based immigration bill. The National Origins Act of 1924 increased immigration quotas from northern Europe while severely restricting immigration from eastern and southern Europe. Under the new law, for example, the number of Italian immigrants permitted into America each year shrank from 42,000 to 4,000. Immigration from much of Asia was blocked altogether. With minor variations, these strict quotas remained in place until after World War II.[21]
It is of course an indirect link. But the eugenics movement had long arms indeed. They reached past Carrie Buck and well into the heart of Europe. There they held back millions of Poles, Russians, Jews and Italians who wanted to flee an increasingly dangerous Europe with mounting urgency. For the Jews in particular, the denial of an immigration visa was typically a death sentence. One wonders how many hundreds of thousands of Jews might have escaped Hitler's grasp by immigrating to America during these years had the eugenics movement not been so successful in shutting our doors to them at this crucial juncture.
* * *
Science has been the iron wedge by which the secular has penetrated the realm of the sacred. Science has been the sharp scalpel with which our most cherished ideas about humanity have been subject to dissection and doubt. Those who suggest that religion is the primary source of human conflict and bloodshed are not looking closely enough. If we examine the history of violence in modern times we will often find rationales rooted in science.
The idea that all human lives are sacred and of equal value is not a product of science. The sanctity of human life cannot be proven in a laboratory. When it comes to this most profound and foundational moral insight, we in the West have only one source: the Judeo-Christian tradition. This idea was first expressed in the Bible and it has survived throughout the centuries because of the ongoing authority of the Jewish and Christian faiths. If some of the Enlightenment thinkers later embraced and reiterated this concept, they cannot exactly be credited with an immaculate intellectual conception. It was right there in the Bibles most of them read.
The Judeo-Christian tradition has built a wall between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom. It has placed man on a pedestal and put a crown on his head. Modern science, on the other hand, has consistently sought to tear down this wall and treat man as just another species of animal. Science has sought to take that crown off our heads and measure the size of our skulls.
We are frequently warned these days about the great danger of religion expanding into fields where it does not belong. This concern is not without justification. There are areas of expertise, especially in the realm of science, where religion can contribute little. Religion cannot help us split the atom or map out our DNA. The Bible contains no insights which can help us cure cancer. As Cardinal Baronius is said to have phrased it in the sixteenth century, "The Bible teaches the way to go to heaven, not the way the heavens go."
But we must also recognize that there is an equal and possibly greater threat of science exceeding its proper boundaries. Especially when it comes to our morality, science can confuse, but it rarely enlightens. Science can enable us to split the atom, but it cannot help us decide whether it is justified to use an atom bomb. Science can help us map out our DNA, but it cannot help us determine whether it is moral to clone humans. Science can help us cure cancer, but it cannot help us cope with cancer.
When science ventures beyond its core areas of competence into the realm of morality, it often leaves corpses in its wake. Especially when scientists seek to opine on the value or equality of human beings, they invariably chip away at a key cultural support wall. With an authority to which they have no claim, scientists have called into question the key principles which protect humanity, especially the weakest among us, from annihilation. Before even grasping the danger, they can bring the whole ethical edifice crashing down. If religion does not belong in the science class, then it is equally true that science has no place in the ethics class. We need a wall of separation between science and morality every bit as much as we need one between church and state.
Philosophical Discontents
Peter Singer is a philosopher and writer who is currently the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. In 1993, Professor Singer released a book called Practical Ethics in which he set forth a series of controversial, and immediately infamous, views.
Singer's main thesis is that we in the West have drawn our moral lines irrationally. While we cherish human life, we do not extend similar respect to the non-human animals with which we share the planet. According to Singer, neither science nor philosophy can justify this distinction. We should not, he argues, value life according to which species it belongs. Instead, he urges us to value life on the basis of whether and to what extent it possesses certain positive attributes, such as rationality and awareness.
Singer then spells out the ramifications of his approach. He argues that we need to see beyond our Judeo-Christian obsession with human life to better value and treat so many of the animals we currently kill for food or sport. From this compassionate start, however, Singer's thesis proceeds to a dark converse. Overcoming our fetish for invade human life, he asserts, will also enable us to more clearly see that not all human life is of equal value.
In particular, Professor Singer seeks to wean us from what he sees as an irrational attachment to newborn human babies. Using his support for abortion as a starting point, Singer proceeds to make the case for infanticide:
I have argued that the life of a fetus … is of no greater value than the life of a nonhuman animal at a similar level of rationality, self-consciousness, awareness, capacity to feel, etc., and that since no fetus is a person no fetus has the same claim to life as a person. Now it must be admitted that these arguments apply to the newborn baby as much as to the fetus. A week-old baby is not a rational and self-conscious being, and there are many nonhuman animals whose rationality, self-consciousness, awareness, capacity to feel, and so on exceed that of a human baby a week or a month old. If the fetus does not have the same claim to life as a person, it appears that the newborn baby does not either, and the life of a newborn baby is of less value to it than the life of a pig, a dog, or a chimpanzee is to the nonhuman animal. Thus while my position on the status of fetal life may be acceptable to many, the implications of this position for the status of newborn life are at odds with the virtually unchallenged assumption that the life of the newborn baby is as sacrosanct as that of an adult. [22]
Given this clash between his views and the widely accepted view that infanticide is murder, Singer concludes that "these widely accepted views need to be challenged."[23] This is an assault which Singer is prepared to lead. He reminds his readers, quite accurately, that our ideas about the sanctity of human life are neither obvious nor universal, but a cultural anomaly. Singer notes that:
Infanticide had been practiced in society's ranging geographically from Tahiti to Greenland and varying in culture from nomadic Australian aborigines to the sophisticated urban communities of ancient Greece or mandarin China. In some of these societies, infanticide was not merely morally permitted but, in certain circumstances, deemed morally obligatory. [24]
And Singer is correct again when he identifies the source of our unusual reverence for human life:
If these conclusions seem too shocking to take seriously, it may be worth remembering that our present absolute protection of the lives of infants is a distinctively Christian attitude rather than a universal ethical value….
The change in Western attitudes to infanticide since Roman times is, like the doctrine of the sanctity of human life of which it is a part, a product of Christianity. Perhaps it is now possible to think about these issues without assuming a Christian moral framework that has, for so long, prevented any fundamental reassessment.[25]
To be fair to Professor Singer, he is not advocating that we euthanize adult humans. Nor is he suggesting that we implement the type of forced infanticide practiced by the Nazis. Singer is only suggesting that we permit parents to decide whether or not to kill their newborn babies. Furthermore, Singer has limited his actual policy advocacy to more extreme cases, such as supporting a parental right to infanticide in the case of terminally ill and severely malformed babies.
Yet, provided that parental approval is forthcoming, Singer seems quite willing to sanction a broader range of infanticide. He has argued in favor of killing babies with Down syndrome, although he now suggests that these babies should be spared if there are people willing to adopt them. Elsewhere, Singer has suggested that even a baby with hemophilia, a perfectly treatable blood disorder, could be morally killed so long as its parents would have another, healthy baby in its place.[26]
When it comes to whether or not to kill a baby, the only real moral limit Singer seems to recognize is the feelings of the parents. Thus while he favors "very strict" limitations on infanticide, he acknowledges that, "these restrictions might owe more to the effects of infanticide on others (i.e. the parents) than to the intrinsic wrongness of killing an infant."[27]
* * *
We in the West have benefitted enormously from secular philosophy. All of us who are fortunate enough to live in a liberal democracy owe a debt of gratitude to the Classical tradition as well as Enlightenment philosophers such as Locke, Rousseau and Jefferson. Those of us who benefit from the genius of the American Constitution and its system of separation of powers must thank the Classical philosophers as well as the Enlightenment thinker Montesquieu. Everyone who enjoys the protection of their human and civil rights must acknowledge the role played by the Enlightenment philosophers in embracing and popularizing these concepts. The list goes on.
Yet there are limits to what philosophy can teach us. And there are certain realms where philosophers should not tread. The fact is that philosophy, like science, has been a powerful wedge by which the profane has pierced the realm of the holy. Philosophy has been another means by which our most precious ideas about the sanctity and equality of all humans have been dragged down from their commanding heights into the muck of self-interested debate. The Judeo-Christian tradition attributes to humans a mystical value beyond our particular skills and contributions. Secular philosophy has too often sought to break this spell and subject us to far less benign systems of valuation.
The idea that all human lives are sacred and of equal value is not a product of philosophy. It is not a principle that is easily deduced or even logically defended. This is a belief we must place beyond the reach of the philosopher's pen as well as the scientist's probe. The sanctity of life is one idea we are better off not deconstructing.
* * *
When Professor Singer first arrived at Princeton in 1999, the University hosted a public debate between Singer and a colleague on the new professor's controversial views. Over the course of the evening, Singer shared some of his trademark lines, including his assertion that, "Simply killing an infant is never equivalent to killing a person."[28]
As she was leaving the debate, a Princeton senior was asked to share her reaction to Professor Singer. "I'm not all that disturbed," she replied, "because it's just philosophy. I'd be a lot more disturbed if he were trying to implement it."[29]
Despite this student's hopes to the contrary, the barrier between philosophy and policy is a most permeable one. Ideas have a way of trickling down from the academy to the halls of power. The Spanish conquistadores invoked Classical philosophy to justify massacring and enslaving the American Indians. The Enlightenment philosophers invented the concept of race and employed it to rationalize African slavery. Karl Marx was a philosophy student whose thought was heavily indebted to Hegel, Feuerbach and other icons of his discipline. The Marxism he developed formed the ideological underpinning for monsters as diverse as Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot. While Hitler was no great scholar, he pieced together his racist creed from the bits and pieces of German philosophy and social Darwinist dogma popular in his day.
There is a good reason for that Princeton student, and for all of us, to be disturbed when philosophers begin to question the sanctity and equality of all humans.
Discontents Abroad
On May 12, 2008, a terrible earthquake shook China's Sichuan province. Over the course of the next days and weeks, a familiar scene unfolded. Chinese crews worked around the clock to rescue their fellow humans from the wreckage. Some families rejoiced at finding relatives still alive in the rubble. And you could see in the terrified faces of others that their loved ones had yet to be found.
In watching scenes like these we are touched by something that seems to be truly wonderful and universal about humankind. In times of crisis, we forget our differences and rush to the aide of our fellow man. No matter what our culture, it seems, we humans will claw through rock and rubble to save our brother who is buried beneath.
Yet no matter how similar all people may appear to be on the surface, important differences remain. The differences that matter are not ones of race, gender or nationality. Our most significant differences are those of culture. The deep implications of these cultural variations are not always apparent in our day-to-day behavior towards those in our ingroup; they are often visible only at the margins. These differences are revealed in how we treat the weak, the very young and the rather old. They are manifest in how we behave towards the stranger in our midst and beyond our borders.
The Romans treated their fellow citizens very well. It was the way they treated their slaves, their enemies, and their infants that revealed something troubling at the core of their culture. The same goes for contemporary society. Infanticide, for example, did not die out with the Romans. Nor has it only recently begun to be rehabilitated by Professor Singer and others. The fact is that this practice never went away. People continue to kill their unwanted offspring down to the present day. Which brings us back to China.
In 1990, Nobel Prize winning economist Amartya Sen came across some statistics that deeply disturbed him. Sen found that in China, India and some other Asian and North African countries, men significantly outnumbered women. This is the opposite of what demographers would expect to find. In every other country across the globe, women outnumber men. While there are more male babies born on average, more female babies actually survive infancy. These females then tend to live longer lives.
Applying standard male-to-female ratios against the actual population statistics, Sen came to the shocking conclusion that there were 50 million "missing women" in China, and a total of over 100 million missing women in all of Asia and North Africa.[30] In a 2003 article in the British Medical Journal, Sen confirmed his earlier findings and concluded that, since his 1990 study, "the total numbers of missing women have continued to grow."[31]
While the estimates vary widely, a series of subsequent studies have confirmed Sen's primary contention that massive numbers of Asian women are in fact missing. A 2000 report funded by the United Nations concluded that in South Asia "79 million women are simply 'missing.'"[32] A 2002 article in The Journal of Assisted Reproduction and Genetics concluded that "Approximately 50 million women are 'missing' in the Indian population."[33] A 2005 United Nations Population Fund report noted that "at least 60 million girls are 'missing'" in Asia.[34] A 2007 study by Chinese researchers concluded that, "the estimated number of China's missing girls was 40.9 million" at the time of the 2000 census.[35]
These "missing women" were neither overlooked nor misplaced. They didn't pack their bags and move to sunnier climates. They were killed and aborted. The overwhelming consensus is that these gender disparities are primarily the result of the gross neglect of female babies, female infanticide and sex-selective abortion.[36]
The cultures of ancient China and India, just like those of Greece and Rome, were ones in which sons were typically preferred and daughters were often killed. Like so many other evils, infanticide has been a universal phenomenon. In the West, the spread of Christianity effectively ended these preferences and practices. In Asia, however, they have never been fully displaced. In many parts of India and China, a preference for sons and the disposal of daughters continue down to the present day.
Asia's rapid modernization has not narrowed this gender disparity. On the contrary, it may well have exacerbated it. For centuries, parents had to wait until a child was born to determine its sex and kill the females. Today, however, there is no need to carry an undesirable baby to term. Through readily available ultrasound technology, parents can determine a child's sex much earlier and eliminate unwanted children more easily through abortion. Yet even the most zealous defender of abortion rights recoils at the use of abortion as a sex-selection tool.
In China, furthermore, the government's one child-policy has also fueled the gender gap. Much of China's son preference is driven by the widespread belief that sons are better able to provide for their parents later in life, especially since custom dictates that daughters go to live with their husband's families after marriage. If a couple can have only one child to support them in their old age, then there is a stronger incentive than ever to make sure that this child is a boy.
This murder of so many millions of young girls has required that a new word be added to the English language. What is taking place in China and India is a "gendercide."[37]
As the scope of the tragedy has come to light, the governments of both India and China have taken steps to address it. In 1994, the Indian government passed a law which prohibits the use of ultrasound for identifying the sex of a fetus. In 2003, this law was amended to prohibit sex-selective abortion. In 2006, India launched a "cradle scheme" in which orphanages were opened throughout the country to raise unwanted baby girls.
In 1994, China outlawed both the sex identification of fetuses through ultrasound and sex-selective abortions. This law was strengthened in 2002. More recently, Chinese officials started a "Care for Girls" campaign to combat ongoing son preference. According to China's leading government paper, The People's Daily, the program seeks to end sex-selective abortion as well as "the criminal activities of drowning and abandoning baby girls…."[38]
Eliminating such deeply rooted practices will not be easy. When a reporter for the New York Times visited the city of Guiyang, China in early 2005, he noticed that the "Care for Girls" program was indeed being implemented. A bright red banner hung above the main street announcing that the government was going to "firmly crack down on the criminal activity of drowning and in other ways brutally killing female babies." Across the street however, in equally large letters, was an advertisement promoting ultrasound tests at a local medical clinic.[39]
Yes, the Chinese respond to their natural disasters the same way we do. But many millions of Chinese react to the news that they are expecting a baby girl very differently than we do. No matter how much we may share as humans, our cultural differences remain. These differences are not simply a quaint matter of custom or cuisine. They are very often a matter of life and death.
* * *
This book has a simple premise. It is a premise which runs counter to a deeply flawed conventional wisdom. It is a premise to which history lends its most compelling testimony.
The premise is that the Judeo-Christian tradition has introduced, preserved and promoted a key insight and a core commandment. The insight is the sanctity and equality of all humans. The commandment is to treat our sacred fellow humans with love - to love one another. These ideas -- what we will collectively call "the Judeo-Christian idea" -- have been neither obvious nor universal, and they are continually under assault.
The Judeo-Christian idea has been the powerful force that has enabled Western civilization to overcome many of the evils which have plagued it, evils which have been too widely accepted in too many cultures for far too long.[40] The Judeo-Christian idea is the reason - the only reason -- why we in the West rejected the custom of infanticide and shunned the practice of eugenics. This idea is what enabled us to finally, belatedly end the institution of slavery. This idea has empowered us to combat genocide with all of our moral force.
In asserting that the Judeo-Christian idea has enabled us to overcome these evils, we recognize that the converse is also true. Wherever we in the West have rejected the Judeo-Christian idea, we have fallen backwards. In such cases, the very moral weeds that this idea helped to extirpate have returned, taken root, and quickly choked out any moral progress that may have been made in their absence. In the twentieth century, the rejection of the Judeo-Christian idea by certain cultures enabled both slavery and genocide to return to the West, and to do so on a far greater scale than ever before.
Let us be entirely clear. In the West's moral progress, the Judeo-Christian idea has not been an effective force. It has been the effective force. The Judeo-Christian tradition has given the West a clear moral map. It has blazed and illuminated the path. And it has been the fire in men's souls that kept them walking down this path no matter how long or difficult the journey.
[2] Tacitus, Histories 5.5.
[3] Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity (San Francisco, CA: Harper San Francisco, 1997), 118.
[4] Ibid., 97-98
[5] In recognizing the centrality of culture to the transmission of morals, we do not seek to deny that there may be absolute moral truths fixed by God or inherent in nature. Rather, the point is simply that we humans tend to come to knowledge of these and any other moral codes by means of the cultures in which we live. When religious people worry about the movies their children watch or the lessons they learn in school, they are acknowledging this overwhelming cultural power.
[6] Sam Harris, Letter to a Christian Nation (New York: Knopf, 2006), 18-19.
[7] Even though the Judeo-Christian tradition has always recognized the full humanity of slaves, it actually took many centuries for this idea to translate into opposition to slavery.
8]Some scholars argue that the words "self evident" were actually added by Benjamin Franklin.
[9] Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927).
10] Edwin Black, War Against the Weak (New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 2004), 108-122
[11] Cited in part in Black, War Against the Weak, 120 and in part in Albert Alschuler, Law Without Morals (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 2000), 24.
[12] Cited in Alschuler, Law Without Morals, 26.
[13] Ibid., 27.
[14] Ibid.
[15] Black, War Against the Weak, 122-123.
[16] Cited in Charlotte Hunt-Grubbe, "The Elementary DNA of Dr. Watson," The Sunday Times, October 14, 2007.
[17] Ibid.
[18] Most leading experts strongly disagree with Watson and the others who assert such racial disparities. In the weeks following Dr. Watson's remarks, authorities such as Craig Venter and Dr. Elias Zerhouni issued public statements stressing the complete absence of scientific support for the claim that there are intellectual differences between the races.
[19] Black, War Against the Weak, 52.
[20] Paul Lombardo, "Eugenics Sterilization Laws," hosted in the Image Archive on the American Eugenics Movement of the Dolan DNA Learning Center of the Cold Springs Harbor Laboratory (www.eugenicsarchive.org).
[21] Black, War Against the Weak, 185-205 and John Higham, Strangers in the Land (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2007), 300-330.
[22] Peter Singer, Practical Ethics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 169-170.
[23] Ibid., 170.
[24] Ibid., 172.
[25] Ibid., 172-173.
[26] Ibid., 181-191.
[27] Ibid., 173.
[28] Paul Zielbauer, "Princeton Bioethics Professor Debates Views on Disability and Euthanasia," The New York Times, October 13, 1999.
[29] Ibid.
[30] Amartya Sen, "More than 100 Million Women are Missing," The New York Review of Books, December 20, 1990, Vol. 37, No. 20.
[31] Amartya Sen, "Missing Women - Revisited," British Medical Journal, December 6, 2003 , Vol. 327.
[32] Mahbub ul Haq Human Development Center, Human Development in South Asia 2000: The Gender Question (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2000), 6.
[33] Gautam N. Allahbadia, "The 50 Million Missing Women," Journal of Assisted Reproduction and Genetics, September 2002, Vol. 19, No. 9.
[34] United Nations Population Fund, "Gender-Based Violence: A Price Too High," State of World Population 2005, www.unfpa.org.
35] Shuzhuo Li, "Imbalanced Sex Ratio at Birth and Comprehensive Intervention in China," presented at the 4th Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Heath Rights held in Hyderabad, India in October 2007.
[36]In a 2005 article in the Journal of Political Economy, a Harvard graduate student named Emily Oster offered an alternative explanation for at least part of this gender disparity. She wrote that many of the countries which are missing women also have high rates of hepatitis B infection, and that women who carry this virus tend to have more male babies than healthy women. Yet a number of subsequent studies cast serious doubt on this explanation. Oster herself came to question her thesis and, in a 2008 working paper, concludes that, "hepatitis B cannot explain skewed sex ratios in China." (Oster, Chen, Yu, Lin, "Hepatitis B Does Not Explain Male-Based Sex Ratios in China," National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper No. 13971, April 16, 2008).
[37] Credit for coining this term is typically given to Mary Anne Warren , author of the 1985 book Gendercide: The Implications of Sex Selection.
[38] Cited in Eric Baculinau, "China Begins to Face Sex-Ratio Imbalance," MSNBC.com, September 14, 2004.
[39] Howard French, "As Girls 'Vanish,' Chinese City Battles Tide of Abortions," The New York Times, February, 17, 2005.
[40] It is worth reiterating that this is a book about Western civilization. There may well be other faith traditions which both embrace such humanitarian ideas and have motivated men to act on these ideas. These traditions may well have lifted other civilizations towards greater love and humanity. But when it comes to the West, only one such tradition - the Judeo-Christian - has had such an impact. This book is not, and does not claim to be, a work of comparative religion. It is, by design, a study of one civilization and the ideas that have shaped it.
[1]Peter Singer, Practical Ethics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 172.


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Grades 9 – 12 | Lesson Plan | Standard Lesson
A Biography Study: Using Role-Play to Explore Authors' Lives
Students read biographies and explore websites of selected American authors and then role-play as the authors.
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Students' groans about studying poetry may disappear with this lesson in which students read poetry from various writers and use these poems to examine the sounds and sense of language.


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| 13.1°C Belfast
Mila Kunis has revealed that she would like to step behind the cameras to produce.
The Black Swan star said she wants to have a go and try out other aspects of the film industry.
"Listen, in five years I do hope to have a family, and who knows? I think in this industry people have such a short shelf life, truly, that I don't know what I'm going to be in five years in regards to acting. I mean, I'd love to produce," she told US magazine Interview.
"I can't form a sentence or write an email, so I know I'm definitely not going to go and become a writer, but I would love to explore other facets of this industry, for sure."
Mila - who next stars in X-rated comedy Ted alongside Mark Wahlberg - admitted to feeling disillusioned with the Hollywood industry.
"This industry can eat you alive. I think it feeds you a lot of bulls*** and then spits you right back out, and then you get caught up in it because so much of it is perception and opinion," she explained.
"The fact that there is no right or wrong is what I think is maddening. I think that you have to restrain yourself from Googling your name and have other hobbies and desires and wants."
The 28-year-old also revealed that she lives "a very mediocre lifestyle".
"I don't live lavishly, so it's not like I have 20 assistants and travel privately and shop every day," she admitted.


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Hello, foodie buddies. Today I am sharing a very special recipe. This one of the quickest yet delicious mutton curry recipes I have ever made. I made this for dinner tonight when we had guests at a very short notice. With very little preparation and slow cooking method, you do not need to worry much over the cooking process. Just toss everything in a skillet and let it simmer away for an hour and a half.
The meat we get here in India doesn't get done fast enough. It takes a long time. So, at the end of the simmering process I pressure cooked the curry to finish it off. If the meat you get in your country gets cooked fast, you can complete the cooking process in the skillet itself.
best mutton curry recipe
Let's start with the recipe of spicy mutton curry. This recipe yields 3 to 4 servings. For the purpose of measurement, 1 cup = 250 ml.
mutton curry recipe
Whole Spices
How to Make Spicy Mutton Curry


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I am a LHD LAND ROVER specialist.
I export cars Worldwide, mainly to USA market for cars produced before 1993 and to CANADIAN market for cars produced before 2003.
the Land Rovers in
my list are LHD with original chassis, Vin number
and engine, ready to be exported legally to North America.
I have the following models available:
- Land Rover 88 and 109 in different configurations
- Land Rover Half Ton and historical special 4x4 vehicle
- Land Rover 90 and 110 ( 19J engine 2500 TD or 2300 Petrol)
- Land Rover Defender 90 and 110 (built between 1990 and 1991)
- Land Rover Defender 90 and 100 in different configurations (200Tdi, 300Tdi, TD5, Puma) Not for USA export.
- Land Rover Santana 88 and 109 in different configurations (Spanish Version)
- Land Rover Santana 90 and 110 (Spanish Version) before 1991
- Special vehicles based on Land Rover or Santana
All the cars are offered with the correct documents and with shipping service to customer´s port of destination.
I have new Land Rovers every week and i ship every month cars to North America to NY, Miami, Baltimora, Houston Ports.
Here you can find the new website dedicated to our LAND ROVER DEFENDERS:
If you need any information please contact me at: email@example.com are the best supplier of LAND ROVERs in SPAIN and ITALY.


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I for one can't wait to read what Jodi Meadows writes next!
Seriously, with the drama, betrayal, romance, fighting, skeletons, music, and great writing, this has everything you are looking for in a great series!
Click here to subscribe by e-mail
Canadian book blogger. Freckles. I❤ Supernatural, books, cookies, Nintendo, unicorns, Idlewild, BTS. #oncinemafamily


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Years ago, I read a book by neuroscientist William H. Calvin, called How Brains Think. In it, he outlines a theory in which consciousness emerges through a myriad of super-fast 'microevolutionary processes' inside of our brains. Put simply, every thought you have and decision that you make is the result of a ultra-quick competition among a vast 'population' of candidate ideas. This theory is known as Neural Darwinism, and has been put forward as early as 1978.
This idea seemed fascinating to me. It provided a lot of answers to questions that I had about my own creative process, and also seemed to suggest that we could make ourselves better thinkers by providing the most suitable mental environments for ideas to evolve within. I've written about some of these ideas in previous posts on this blog. Like the best theories, it also seemed to have a certain elegance to it – it makes sense that one of the most powerful optimization mechanisms known – evolution – would be at work inside of our brains.
Unfortunately, there was a problem. In order for any kind of true evolution to occur in the brain, there needed to be some mechanism for replication. The mind didn't seem to operate this way – from what we knew, ideas (or neural patterns) weren't copied. Evolution won't work, if the finches can't lay eggs. It seemed like an interesting theory might be dead in the water.
A week ago, though, a research team from Hungary and the UK posted a paper titled 'The Neuronal Replicator Hypothesis' which suggests that replication of neuronal patterns can (and does) occur within the brain using known neurophysiological processes. This would mean that, true to the ideas of Neural Darwinism, evolution could indeed play a role in cognition and consciousness. Furthermore, the paper also suggests that in combination with another known neural mechanism, Hebbian learning, this brain-based evolutionary process could be more powerful than the traditional Darwinist model.
This new development is exciting. Not only does it revive a once-promising theory, it also adds to it – perhaps giving us a workable model of how complex things like consciousness and creativity might arise. A better understanding of these processes is valuable not only at a scientific level, but also for anyone involved in creative endeavors. In the long run, it may be possible to actively 'optimize' our thinking processes – to have better ideas, to solve bigger problems – and be more creative.


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Banff Park Lodge takes pride in its range of services and practical amenities that help guests feel right at home.
Visitors travelling for business or leisure will appreciate the range of services that enhance the comfort, convenience and security of their stay.
Whether you need to escape after a long business meeting or relax after an exhausting mountain hike we offer a large Jacuzzi or, for something quieter, a large hot bath to ensure you are winding down. Follow that with an invigorating swim in the adjacent heated indoor pool and you will feel your body renew itself.
In addition you can feel the warmth and soothing comfort surround your body in our steam room. With temperatures up to 48 degrees Celsius (120 degrees Fahrenheit), our steam room is not only a pleasure on cold winter days, but everyday!
You don't have to miss out on your daily work out! Visit our exercise area and keep in shape on a treadmill, stationary bike, or with an elliptical trainer. While working through your routine, keep up with news, sports, or your favorite TV program on our flat screen television.
The recreation facilities are open daily from 6 am to midnight. Adult only time from 6 am till 8 am and again from 9 pm till midnight.
We offer two acres of heated underground parking space where the height clearance is 6 feet. You can choose to park your vehicle yourself or let us valet park it for you (daily fees apply). For larger vehicles we offer limited on-site parking behind the hotel. Winter plug-ins are available. As part of our commitment to the environment, Banff Park Lodge is proud to offer an electric vehicle charging station for your convenience.
Several on-site shops, including fashion outlets and newsstand shop (with limited postal service) are available for your shopping pleasure. A wide variety of international shops are available within a two-minute walk.
Concierge services are available 24 hours a day to help you with your luggage, take care of your holiday needs, and help you plan your day's activities.
Same-day dry cleaning service is available for your convenience (except on Sundays and Statutory holidays). The hotel has self service coin operated washers and dryers available on the premises for your convenience. Laundry detergent provided.
Complimentary secure ski, snowboard and bicycle storage is available in designated areas. Please ask our concierge for assistance with your sport equipment.
For transportation to and from the Calgary International Airport (YYC) we recommend the Banff Airporter. Visit www.banffairporter.com for further information.
During the ski season shuttle buses to the ski resorts are included with your hotel ski package. Convenient pick up and drop off at our front door is available several times each day in the ski season.
Taxis and limousines services are readily available; please contact the concierge if a booking is required.
We want our guests to feel secure when staying with us. For that reason we offer 24-hour security and duty managers on premises.
If you are traveling alone and wish to secure a room on a higher floor, please contact us in advance or let us know during your check in.
The entire complex has a sprinkler system, heat and smoke detectors, and meets the Alberta building standard requirements.
All guest rooms have complimentary in-room safes big enough to store a laptop and other valuables. Complimentary safety deposit boxes in various sizes are available at the Front Desk.
Sorry, we do not allow pets. However, our sister property the Homestead Inn does allow pets. Please follow this link to their pet information.


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Do you want to join the best tennis coaching programme in Auckland? No matter what your age or ability level our team of qualified tennis coaching professionals will teach you the game in a fun, easy to learn progressive programme.
Our schools tennis coaching programme is perfect for kids to learn all the skills and rules of the game. All of our coaches are fully qualified, Tennis New Zealand registered professionals who use modified tennis equipment to suit all ages and abilities.
Sign your child up to one of our amazing tennis holiday camps! During the week your child will learn all the fundamental techniques and tactics in the game whilst having a great time with our team of professional coaches.
The Kiwi Tennis team like to stay current with the latest news from around the tennis world. Keep informed and check out the latest happenings and personal insights from the team here. Latest News
Our pro shop offers a wide range of tennis racquets and accessories. You can view the online catalogue and check out our value packed deals here, or, if you prefer, you can drop in to one of the physical stores locations
Check out our fantastic events that we are running this year for both juniors and adults. Not only can you practice what you have learnt, but you will have a great time doing it! :-)


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24 Hour Emergency Lockout ServiceLocked out? We are ready to help day or night. Call our emergency line dispatch.
Automotive Services
We know you depend on your car and expect your keys and locks to function properly. Count on us to give quick and responsive service when you've lost or broken your key.
Residential Services
We understand how critical home security is for you and your family. That's why our team is dedicated to providing quick and affordable residential services to customers in Northern Utah.
Commercial Services
Our commercial lock experts have knowledge of a variety of lock systems, including high tech security systems. Let A-1 help you design the security that fits your needs and within your budget.
What Our Customers Are Saying
Experience for yourself what great customer service can accomplish.
I brought them a broken key and they were able to make a perfect copy. I also brought them a damaged key they were able to recreate it and then make a copy - magic I assume. Great prices too. Love these guys!
Brenda B.
Went in to get some lock cylinders keyed to match some keys. Very good and fast customer service. I also had them come out to a remodel job and rekey all the locks on the house. The were prompt and fast and everything turned out great.
Erik J.
We have many locations all around the Ogden/Layton area and have worked with A1 for many years. They have done an amazing job for us, often going well above and beyond what we expect from a locksmith service. They are HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
USA Cash Services
I have used A-1 Key in Ogden for several years. They are always fast, friendly and fairly priced. I recently had a situation come up on a rare motorcycle. The staff jumped right in and got me going again. Thanks guys!
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Happy A-1 Customers
Contact us today to see what A-1 Key & Security Solutions can do for your business.
Locksmith Services
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Emergency Services
Vehicle, residential, and commercial lockouts. 24 hour service you can count on. Prices given upfront.
Automotive Services
Key duplication, transponder key cutting and programming, high security keys, and key fittings.
Video Surveillance
Custom built systems that give you the coverage and image quality you need. Easy to use software and remote accessible systems.
Access Control
We design systems that can be easily managed locally or remotely. Standalone, entry level, or enterprise systems – every system is built so you can control secure areas more effectively.
Home Automation
Creating the smart home you dream of. Our standalone wireless systems allow you to control your lights, locks, thermostat, and electrical outlets. And best of all, there's only a small monthly fee with no contract.
Experience Unmatched Customer Service Now!We aim for excellence in all we do and strive to provide superior customer service and reliability.


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meowsa now known as Casey is a 6 year old Deaf white cat who came to me last week. She loves to get scritches behind the ears and loving her new home!!
View all entries in: NB for Cats 2015-12
Urgent Pets on Death Row - New Beginnings
"New Beginnings" - Stories About Saved NYC Shelter Animals


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The Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of the British armed services (and is therefore the Senior Service). From the early 18th century to the middle of the 20th century, it was the largest and most powerful navy in the world, playing a key part in establishing the British Empire as the dominant power of the 19th and early 20th centuries. In WWII, the Royal Navy operated almost 600 ships. During the Cold War, it was transformed into a primarily anti-submarine force, hunting for Soviet submarines, mostly active in the North Atlantic Ocean. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, its role for the 21st century has returned to focus on global expeditionary (blue water) operations.
The Royal Navy is the second-largest navy in NATO in terms of the combined tonnage[dubious — see talk page] of its fleet.[1] Its global power projection capabilities are deemed second only to the United States Navy.[2] There are currently 91 commissioned ships in the Royal Navy, including aircraft carriers, submarines, mine counter-measures and patrol vessels. There are also the support vessels of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary.
The Royal Navy is a constituent component of the Naval Service, which also comprises the Royal Marines, Royal Fleet Auxiliary and associated reserve forces under command. The Naval Service had 38,710 regular personnel as of November 2006.
The role of the Royal Navy (RN) is to protect British interests at home and abroad, executing the foreign and defence policies of Her Majesty's Government through the exercise of military effect, diplomatic activities and other activities in support of these objectives. The RN is also a key element of the UK contribution to NATO, with a number of assets allocated to NATO tasks at any time. These objectives are delivered via a number of capabilities:
- Maintenance of the UK Nuclear Deterrent through a policy of Continuous at Sea Deterrence
- Delivery of the UK Commando force
- Contribution of assets to Joint Force Harrier
- Contribution of assets to the Joint Helicopter Command
- Maintenance of standing patrol commitments; Atlantic Patrol Task (North), Atlantic Patrol Task (South), Persian Gulf patrols etc.
- Delivery of Mine Counter Measures capability to UK and allied commitments
- Provision of Hydrographic and meteorological capabilities deployable worldwide
- Protection of UK and EU fisheries
|This page uses content from Wikipedia. The original article was at Royal Navy. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WarWiki, the text of Wikipedia is available under CC-BY-SA.


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Enjoy this collection of thoughtfully crafted bath bombs as each bomb blooms a relaxing aroma while you unwind in a soothing soak. Each scent lingers as the bomb diffuses a moisturizing blend of hand-picked ingredients to leave your skin feeling smooth and nourished after each use. Comfort your body and mind knowing these bath bombs are free from parabens, sulfates, phthalates and other harmful chemicals. Your purchase of this 5-pack also donates 5 bars of soap to someone in need, supporting our mission of soap=hope. Track your impact on our website by entering your Hope Code found on the back of your bath bomb pack.
The following handcrafted bath bombs are included in this therapeutic set:


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I Spy Artwork Scavenger Hunt
Gallery Hours:
Monday-Friday, 9:00am-5:00pm
Discover the details in a fun and challenging way! With two levels of difficulty this gallery activity invites participants of all ages to examine art work with a fine-toothed comb.
Give everyone a list of things to find in paintings. There are two ways to win the game. One way to win is to find everything on the list first. Another way is to find the most things in a single painting.
iSpy Is Available During the Following Exhibitions
Clay - Thursday, November 8, 2018 - Saturday, January 26, 2019
Selections - Thursday, February 14 - Thursday, April 18, 2019
On Paper - Thursday, May 16 - Friday, July 26, 2019


text: Big surprise…I'm lettering on something again… BUT I finally got to it and made my own DIY wrapping paper! I loved this so much. Pretty sure I'll be making my own wrapping paper every year from now on. Or at least I hope! It took me a bit to track down white wrapping paper, but I found a 36″ x 75″ roll of white banner paper at Hobby Lobby that worked out just perfect. With that, some black ink, paint brushes, and some ribbon, start lettering away to form your own custom wrap!


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Uganda: from beneficiaries to benefactors for IDPs
28-11-2006 Feature
Odonkara Phillips was only fifteen when his family of six was forced to leave their home. This was the beginning of his life as an internally displaced person (IDP) – a fate now shared by more than one million Acholi people in Northern Uganda. ICRC field officer Richard Opige reports on the situation in Tegot camp.
At the height of the activities of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in 1999, Phillips and his family fled to Tegot camp, only a few kilometres away from their village.
When they arrived in Tegot camp, they met only six other families who had built their grass-thatched huts next to a military detachment of less than 30 soldiers. After that, more and more people sought refuge in Tegot, until five years ago everyone in the vicinity was ordered to move to the camp for security reasons. Today, Tegot is home to 172 households in the new district of Amuru.
Survival for the healthiest ones
In April 2006, an ICRC team carried out a needs assessment in Tegot camp. Sanitary conditions in the IDP camp were very poor. As Phillips, now 22-years old and himself a father, recalls: " There were no latrines. Human faeces were a daily sight all over the camp, no garbage control, and children died from water borne diseases and malaria. Not to mention the HIV/AIDS scourge, no land for cultivation, no boreholes… nothing but survival for the healthiest ones. "
In response to these needs, the ICRC started its work: it began to fill gaps in the drug supply to the health centre, trained its staff and distributed mosquito nets to the camp population to prevent malaria. But it soon became clear that without an improvement in the camp environment, these activities would have limited impact.
For this reason, the ICRC turned to the Community-Owned Resource Persons (CORPs) for support. The CORPs are IDPs trained by the district health authorities to assist with simple medical tasks, e.g. during vaccination campaigns. Together with volunteers from the Uganda Red Cross Society, the ICRC began to teach CORPs on public health and hygiene and how to promote this in their camp.
Taking matters into their own hands
Phillips is now the leader of the four CORPs trained by the ICRC in Tegot camp. At least thr ee days a week, he and his colleagues Boniface (27 years), Philomena (48) and Doreem (42) go from hut to hut and sensitize their neighbours to hygiene and health issues. With improvized plays on how to prevent diseases, they have managed to convince the reluctant local leaders and the community to work every Sunday in a communal " keep our camp clean " action. " Community attitude is one difficult thing to change, but thanks to us CORPs, the camp environment is now a much better place to live, " Phillips says proudly.
The latest action Phillips and his colleagues undertook was " clearing the bathing shelters of mosquitoes – as transmitters of malaria, they are one of the main health hazards in the camp, " Phillips emphasizes. " Due to poor drainage, mosquitoes were breeding in the soak pit, and whenever somebody was washing, a cloud of mosquitoes would embrace the person, " he adds. His idea was simple but highly effective: pour burnt engine oil into the pit. The change was immediate, and Phillips and his neighbours now do not have to think twice when they need to wash.
Instead of leaving it to humanitarian organizations to " sort things out " , Phillips is working to improve the dire living conditions in the camp himself, and he is able to motivate others to do the same. " With a little support from the ICRC, myself and the other CORPs find ourselves going from people dependent on assistance to people whose actions benefit our whole community. It is as if we have moved from beneficiary to benefactor, " Phillips concludes.


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DJ Earworm unveils his "State of Pop 2015" megamix
His State of Pop mash-ups provide an overview of prevailing musical trends. The 2007 edition was full of vocoders and half-sung raps. 2008 was all about anthems - Leona Lewis' Bleeding Love, Alicia Keys' No-One, Coldplay's Viva La Vida. By 2011, EDM had taken hold, thanks to LMFAO and Lady Gaga's Born This Way, which formed the basis for Earworm's mix.
With music in a state of flux, last year's mix provided a challenge - with the downtempo musings of Hozier and Lorde having to co-exist with Iggy Azalea and Taylor Swift.
Having pulled that off, DJ Earworm set himself an even bigger challenge for 2015, trying to cram 50 tracks into his alotted 300 seconds. The result actually works better - he uses the songs in an almost impressionistic way, with synth hooks and vocal melodies appropriated into something that's simultaneously familiar and disorientating. Is Bruno Mars a backing vocalist for One Direction? Were Rihanna's Bitch Better Have My Money and Adele's Hello really written as a call-and-response? Are people still buying Maroon 5 records?
It's a clever, multi-movement medley that showcases a unique musical instinct. Can't wait to hear what he does for the 10th anniversary next year.
Here's the full list of tracks included:
Adele - Hello
AlunaGeorge and DJ Snake - You Know You Like It
Andy Grammer - Honey, I'm Good.
Ariana Grande ft. The Weeknd - Love Me Harder
Big Sean ft. E-40 - I Don't F*** With You
David Guetta ft. Nicki Minaj & Afrojack - Hey Mama
Demi Lovato - Cool For The Summer
Drake - Hotline Bling
Ed Sheeran - Photograph
Ed Sheeran - Thinking Out Loud
Ellie Goulding - Love Me Like You Do
Fall Out Boy - Centuries
Fetty Wap - Trap Queen
Fetty Wap ft. Remy Boyz - 679
Fifth Harmony ft. Kid Ink - Worth It
Flo Rida ft. Sage The Gemini - GDFR
Jason Derulo - Want To Want Me
Justin Bieber - Sorry
Justin Bieber - What Do You Mean
Major Lazer ft. MO & DJ Snake - Lean On
Mark Ronson ft. Bruno Mars - Uptown Funk
Maroon 5 - Sugar
Meghan Trainor - Lips Are Movin
Meghan Trainor ft. John Legend - Like I'm Gonna Lose You
Natalie La Rose ft. Jeremih - Somebody
Nick Jonas - Jealous
Nicki Minaj ft. Drake & Lil Wayne - Truffle Butter
Omarion ft. Chris Brown & Jhene Aiko - Post To Be
OMI - Cheerleader (Felix Jaehn Remix)
One Direction - Drag Me Down
Pitbull ft. Ne-Yo - Time Of Our Lives
R. City ft. Adam Levine - Locked Away
Rachel Platten - Fight Song
Rihanna - Bitch Better Have My Money
Rihanna ft. Kanye West & Paul McCartney - Four Five Seconds
Sam Smith - I'm Not The Only One
Selena Gomez ft. A$AP Rocky - Good For You
Shawn Mendes - Stitches
SIlento - Watch Me
Skrillex & Diplo ft. Justin Bieber - Where Are U Now
Taylor Swift - Blank Space
Taylor Swift - Style
Taylor Swift - Bad Blood
Taylor Swift - Wildest Dreams
Tove Lo - Talking Body
Walk The Moon - Shut Up And Dance
Wiz Khalifa ft. Charlie Puth - See You Again
The Weeknd - Earned It
The weeknd - The hills
The Weeknd - Can't Feel My Face
Labels: dj earworm, links, Music, video


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The tenth episode features Ms. Elizabeth Collett, Special Adviser for Policy and Strategy to the Director General of the International Organisation for Migration in Geneva.
The ninth episode features Mr. Massimo Bontempi, Central Director of the Central Directorate of Immigration and Border Police in Italy
No more upcoming events are available in the Calendar. Please click on the link below to browse to past events.


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Date: December 19, 2017
Location: 180 Turning Lives Around – Hazlet, NJ
Kiwanis Club Of Marlboro donated children's toys and home furnishings for victims of domestic violence.
180 Turning Lives Around is a private non-profit organization dedicated to ending domestic and sexual violence in our community. At 180, we have served individuals and families who have been affected by domestic and sexual violence since 1976. Our caring staff provides immediate and long-term support in assisting clients with the trauma they have experienced, while supporting them in obtaining services and making decisions that will turn their lives around.