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Monday, 28 September 2009
1. Op-Ed: Rescuing Our Public Universities
Washington Post
September 27, 2009
Almost 150 years ago, in an effort to better serve a growing nation, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Morrill Land Grant Act, which gave struggling states federal land with which they could generate revenue to build colleges. The result of that bold action is a national resource: a structure for higher education that is admired, and copied, around the globe in places such as Japan, Germany and Canada....
Our private and public research and teaching universities have contributed greatly to American prosperity. Public universities by definition teach large numbers of students and substantially help shape our nation. The top 10 publics have more than 350,000 undergraduate students. By comparison, the eight Ivies educate less than a sixth of that number....
Yet over several decades there has been a material and progressive disinvestment by states in higher education. The economic crisis has made this a countrywide phenomenon, with devastating cuts in some states, including California. Historically acclaimed public institutions are struggling to remain true to their mission as tuitions rise and in-state students from middle- and low-income families are displaced by out-of-state students from higher socioeconomic brackets who pay steeper fees. While America is fortunate to have many great private universities, we do not need to add to the list by privatizing Berkeley, Illinois, Rutgers, etc. On the contrary, we need to keep our public research and teaching universities excellent and accessible to the vast majority of Americans.
Given the precarious condition of state finances, we propose that President Obama emulate President Lincoln by creating a 21st-century version of the Morrill Act.
Specifically, the federal government should create a hybrid model in which a limited number of our great public research and teaching universities receive basic operating support from the federal government and their respective state governments. Washington might initially choose a representative set of schools, perhaps based on their research achievements, their success in graduating students, commitment to public service and their record in having a student body that is broadly representative of society....
[Blogs on this op-ed appeared in the Chronicle of Higher Education (link by subscription only) and Inside Higher Ed] Full Story
2. College Officials Brace for Hit From Economy
New York Times & International Herald Tribune (*requires registration)
September 26, 2009
Baltimore — The talk this week at an annual gathering of college admissions officers and high school counselors included the usual topics, like how to deal with “difficult” parents and the names of hot student prospects. But the conversations — in panel discussions, in hallways and over crab cakes — always seemed to circle around to one subject: the economy.
High school counselors said that some parents who in other years worried mostly about whether their children could get into a particular college were now concerned about whether they could afford the price tag....
Not that state colleges are necessarily a refuge. As the conferees huddled here Thursday, thousands of students and faculty members were marching in protest 3,000 miles away, at the UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY. Their quarrel was with steep tuition increases and sharp cuts in offerings throughout the state system.... Full Story
3. Op-Ed: UC's Wall Street management style
Students and staff are asked to sacrifice more while the university system's top earners continue to receive pay raises.
Los Angeles Times
September 28, 2009
So there is a new plan by University of California President Mark Yudof, having been vested with emergency powers by the Board of Regents, to fix the greatest public university system in the world -- with a hammer....
Full disclosure: We are the products of the once-great public education system of California, K-12 and beyond. Between us we have five degrees from the UC system; we'll claim six when our daughter graduates from UC BERKELEY in two years, more or less, depending on which classes get cut because of a lack of funding....
Because our state is in deep fiscal trouble, appropriate sacrifices must be made to protect UC as an amazing resource for California. But the sacrifices that faculty, staff and students are required to make would be much more palatable if the top earners, including administrators, had not just earlier this year received pay raises, and if there were not such a huge salary discrepancy between the highest and lowest paid (see public salary information at http://ucpay.globl.org/). ...
The justification for this most untimely set of pay raises is the concern that the administration will lose top talent. ... When we toured the UC BERKELEY campus recently, our student guide was sure to point out the special parking spaces given to the Nobel laureates on the faculty with nary a word about the vice chancellor of this or that....
In the face of this crisis, Yudof has adopted a top-down management style that is completely demoralizing to those of us trying to keep things working at this world-class institution. Employees are expected to work even harder for significantly less, while students will pay significantly more for seriously diminished resources, including fewer classes, impacted enrollment and a smaller faculty and staff.
...It is not that UC is too big to fail, but that some things are worth saving. Surely we ... can do better than this. Full Story
4. The Week: College radicalism redux
Students are protesting again. This time the issue isn't war or civil rights. It's the cost of a decent education, and students have little time to spend on it.
Los Angeles Times
September 27, 2009
The campus protests of the 1960s happened long enough ago that the images filter through in black-and-white, the tint of television newsreels and newspaper photographs back in the day:
Mario Savio, ushering in the Free Speech Movement from atop a police car and exhorting fellow BERKELEY STUDENTS to block the arrest of their friend in the car below. The months-long student strike at San Francisco State, marked by the college president yanking out speaker wires to disrupt a rally. And as the 1970s dawned, the post-Kent State march at UCLA that disintegrated into scores of arrests and 10 injured cops.
Last week's college protests played out in color, and that was not the only difference. There were hundreds of students at various California campuses, generally not thousands, and no arrests. The students' concerns were not profound disputes like the war in Vietnam or the civil rights movement but something more prosaic: The relentlessly rising cost of education.... Full Story
5. Science Briefing
Los Angeles Times
September 26, 2009
...Scientists confirm new element
Ten years after Russian scientists first reported the discovery of element 114, researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have confirmed its existence.
However, the team found that the new element did not lie on the so-called island of stability, the group of super-heavy elements that are expected to survive for more than a fraction of a second.
To produce the element, the team at Berkeley, headed by [UC BERKELEY CHEMISTRY PROFESSOR] HEINO NITSCHE and Ken Gregorich, used a particle accelerator to fire ions of calcium-48 at a target of plutonium-242 for eight days almost continuously.... Full Story
6. USGS grants to boost earthquake monitoring
UPI
September 28, 2009
The U.S. Geological Survey says it is awarding $5 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grants to upgrade earthquake monitoring networks.
The money is being awarded to 13 U.S. universities.
"These stimulus grants will save lives as well as create jobs," Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar said. "More than 75 million Americans in 39 states face the risk of earthquakes. Through the modernization of seismic networks and data processing centers, scientists will be able to provide emergency responders with more reliable, robust information to save lives and reduce economic losses....
The universities receiving funding are the California Institute of Technology; the Universities of Montana, Oregon, Utah, California-San Diego, Washington, Nevada-Reno, CALIFORNIA-BERKELEY and Alaska-Fairbanks; Saint Louis University; the University of Memphis; Boston College and Columbia University. Full Story
7. UM, MSU, Wayne State rank 3rd nationally for startups created in 2008
Crain's Detroit Business
September 28, 2009
Michigan’s three research universities gained ground in cultivating new startup companies, but still lag their peer university clusters nationally in other technology transfer areas, according to a study released today....
The findings were released today in the East Lansing-based Anderson Economic Group’s third-annual “Empowering Michigan” study, which measures economic impact created by the state’s three research universities....
The Massachusetts-based cluster of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University and Tufts University spawned 34 startups and the California cluster of UCLA, Stanford University and UC-BERKELEY cultivated 31 startups.... Full Story
8. Texas got less stimulus money per resident than almost every other state
Dallas Morning News
September 28, 2009
Washington – Texas has received less funding per resident from the stimulus package so far than almost any other state, according to a Dallas Morning News analysis of federal grants and contracts....
The stimulus provided $8.2 billion to the National Institutes of Health to award research projects performed by universities, nonprofits and businesses. An additional $2.5 billion went to the National Science Foundation for science and engineering projects....
So far, California universities have landed about $453 million in stimulus grants and contracts for special projects, compared with $161 million for New York schools, $110 million in Pennsylvania, and $91 million in Texas, according to a News analysis of NIH data.
THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY, the flagship school of the California system, has been awarded more than $204 million in stimulus grants and contracts, much of it from the Energy Department.
The University of Texas at Austin has won grants and contracts worth $22 million. ... Full Story
9. On the Media: Nonprofit news is good news
Philanthropists throughout California are stepping up to help fill the void left as advertising at traditional news outlets -- and the journalism that depends on it -- has withered away.
Los Angeles Times
September 28, 2009
Some of you have suggested that we ink-stained newspaper wretches seem like a bunch of charity cases. Now comes proof positive that you were (at least partly) right.
Every few days in recent weeks, there's been a new report about the advance of nonprofit journalism in California....
Sponsors announced the biggest and most ambitious of the new nonprofit reporting endeavors last week as San Francisco venture capitalist, philanthropist and bluegrass aficionado Warren Hellman pledged $5 million to create a new journalism operation in the Bay Area....
It's heartening to see smart people like Hellman -- whose donations have also supported free clinics, a killer bluegrass festival and the ballet -- acknowledge that good journalism represents another crucial thread in a city's social fabric....
Although Hellman's San Francisco venture is unnamed and potential editors are still being interviewed, the project has substantial partners in the UC BERKELEY GRADUATE SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM and KQED, the public television and radio station, both of which will provide reporters and expertise.... Full Story
10. Job Losses, Early Retirements Hurt Social Security
New York Times Online
September 28, 2009
Washington (AP) -- Big job losses and a spike in early retirement claims from laid-off seniors will force Social Security to pay out more in benefits than it collects in taxes the next two years, the first time that's happened since the 1980s....
What happened? The recession hit and many older workers suddenly found themselves laid off with no place to turn but Social Security.
''A lot of people who in better times would have continued working are opting to retire,'' said ALAN J. AUERBACH, AN ECONOMICS AND LAW PROFESSOR AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY. ''If they were younger, we would call them unemployed.''...
[This story appeared in more than 100 sources nationwide, including the Washington Post, USA Today, San Jose Mercury News, Contra Costa Times, and San Francisco Chronicle] Full Story
11. Your Money: Don't bank on your home as an ATM
The coming decades won't repeat the dramatic rise in real estate values that previous generations experienced, economists say. It may be time to return to viewing the home simply as a place to live.
Los Angeles Times
September 27, 2009
For generations of Americans, a home was seen not simply as a dwelling, but as an engine of personal wealth....
Now, however, the worst housing crash since the Great Depression may mean that a home purchase ought to be considered with the same warning issued to investors in securities: Past performance is not indicative of future results....
"We can no longer assume that housing will be as good an investment for the future as it has been," said ROBERT REICH, PUBLIC POLICY PROFESSOR AT UC BERKELEY and U.S. Labor secretary in the Clinton administration.
"We can expect a gradual rise [in home values], but not the bonanza we've become accustomed to between the end of World War II and 2006, and especially the last 20 years."...
Still, Reich isn't forecasting a catastrophe.
"People in the middle class, although stressed, will still want homes, and homeownership will still be part of the American dream," he said. "House prices will continue to rise, just more slowly than they did in the past 70 years."... Full Story
12. Shares of the Living Dead
Casual Investors Seem Hooked on Buying Zombie Stocks
Washington Post
September 27, 2009
To prove how astonishingly easy it is to make a dimwitted investing move, I logged into my online brokerage account the other day and bought stock....
I invested in General Motors....
A few clicks and my experiment made me the rather unproud owner of a zombie stock -- so known because its shares are almost certainly headed to zero due to bankruptcy proceedings or insolvency...
"Most people buy stocks impulsively," said Richard Peterson, a psychiatrist and founder of MarketPsych, which trains traders and personal finance counselors to handle the psychological side of investing. "But most people don't think about selling stocks. The easiest decision to make is to buy, and people are always looking for a buy opportunity, looking around the universe for things they have heard of."
TERRANCE ODEAN, A PROFESSOR AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY who studies trader behavior, said that's because when investors sell stock they typically have only a few choices, because most portfolios are not large. But buying a stock offers thousands of choices and "our cognitive limitations prevent us from considering hundreds, much less thousands of choices."...
"In aggregate, this can lead to some surprising outcomes and could conceivably contribute to zombies trading above any reasonable expected value," Odean said.... Full Story
13. California GOP sees hope on the horizon
San Francisco Chronicle
September 28, 2009
Indian Wells, Riverside County -- California Republicans begin the 2010 campaign season with something many considered unthinkable just a few months ago - hope that they can win a major statewide race....
California Senate Republican Leader Dennis Hollingsworth urged party members to reach out to supporters of the anti-tax, anti-government tea parties that have been held across the country over the past several months....
But HENRY BRADY, A PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL SCIENCE AT UC BERKELEY, was skeptical of the strategy.
"I don't see where reaching out to the tea party people helps. That's the fringe of the far right," he said. "They need to reach out to the decline-to-state voters in the middle."...
Brady, of UC Berkeley, said that when times are difficult, the out-of-power party stands to gain in an election. But California remains solidly Democratic.
"I don't see the fundamentals changing in California," he said. "They (the GOP) may say they want to reach out to Latinos, but there is a lot of bad history there between the (Republican) party and Latinos."... Full Story
14. Analysis: Wrestling with how to talk about race
Washington Post
September 26, 2009
Washington -- For a while, it almost seemed as if President Barack Obama had soothed the angst over race in this country simply by taking office. The focus was on big issues facing a new president - one who just happened to be black....
And now passions over skin color are flaring again....
"I hear it as anger, but anger masking fear," says ROBIN LAKOFF, A LINGUISTICS PROFESSOR AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY whose books include "The Language War." She says people are afraid of just about everything these days - the economy, the government, private business included. And she says: "There's this racial element. It isn't exactly racism but otherness."...
[This story appeared in more than 100 sources nationwide, including the San Francisco Chronicle] Full Story
15. Online services let cities bypass the mailbox
San Francisco Chronicle
September 28, 2009
Last week, the city of San Francisco sent its first letter to residents using Zumbox, a secure e-mail service that allows senders to contact people online using their street address, which regular e-mail doesn't do.
If the experiment catches on with even a fraction of the population, San Francisco could save a chunk of the $3 million it spent last fiscal year on postage and associated labor costs. Although the service typically costs 5 cents per e-mail, Zumbox is not charging the city....
Adoption of these services would depend a lot on filling a real need and having a good pitch, said YALE BRAUNSTEIN, UC BERKELEY PROFESSOR OF ECONOMICS OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION.
"All they really are are integrated visual enhanced e-mail boxes," he said. "There are two questions for all of them: Do they have the right characteristics to attract users and do they have a financial model that makes sense?"... Full Story
16. 'Flocking' behavior lands on social networking sites
USA Today
September 28, 2009
The interconnected web of our friends, family, neighbors and acquaintances may dominate our lives more than we know.
They've always been there, making up our social support systems. But now, largely thanks to the burgeoning popularity of online social networks like Facebook, researchers are discovering what a powerful influence our connections — both online and off — really have over our lives.
"Those of us who study social networks believe they matter — that things do spread along social networks," says CLAUDE FISCHER, A SOCIOLOGY PROFESSOR AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA-BERKELEY.... Full Story
17. Blog: The glamorous life of Web 2.0 genetics
Linda Avey is leaving DNA-testing startup 23andme to start an Alzheimer's foundation. A look back at the industry she helped grow and the future of consumer genetics testing.
Fortune.com
September 25, 2009
New York (Fortune) -- In the autumn of 2007, Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki launched the era of pop genetics by going live with 23andme, their DNA testing startup....
Two years ago, the commercialization of DNA by 23andme and others seemed to stun geneticists and the medical research community, despite years of scientists downloading genetic discoveries on public databases.
...Ethicists and the American Civil Liberties Union fretted about the privacy questions inherent in companies holding this data.
"This information by itself gives a very incomplete picture about a person's health," says GENETICIST STEVEN BRENNER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY. "I believe that it will be useful, but there is a danger that people might misinterpret it or take it more seriously than they should at this stage of the science."...
U.C. Berkeley's Brenner suspects that there will be a division of genetic testing in the future between DNA that is, in his view, medical and the more recreational uses, like genetic information about ancestry. "My sense is that people will want information about disease in a medical setting," he says....
[This commentary also appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle Online] Full Story
18. Midmorning: New site shows products' hidden impacts
Minnesota Public Radio
September 28, 2009
Consumers used to get most of their information about a product from the packaging. Now, the Web site GoodGuide can tell a shopper where a product was made, where its ingredients came from, even the conditions in the factory where it was produced. The site's co-founder says he wants to empower consumers to make better informed choices, and to push for more transparency in marketing.
Guests
DARA O'ROURKE: ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF ENVIRONMENTAL AND LABOR POLICY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA BERKELEY and co-founder of the Web site GoodGuide.
[Link to audio] Full Story
19. First Person: Staying the hand of God?
Politics and religion converge in end-of-life care
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
September 26, 2009
Jarvis," I asked my husband, "should we have a discussion about end-of-life care?"
"Yes," he said. "We need that discussion -- almost in religious terms."
I wasn't sure what he meant. The reason the whole subject comes up so much nowadays is political: Who would pay for end of life care? I reminded Jarvis that, according to a July Wall Street Journal article, most health care spending in general occurs in the last six months of life. And a recent UC BERKELEY report noted that health care accounts for 16 percent of our gross domestic product; it will increase if nothing is done, providing a huge drag on our country's economy.
"All the more reason we need that conversation," Jarvis said.... Full Story
20. LSD's long, strange trip back into the lab
San Francisco Chronicle
September 27, 2009
LSD, the drug that launched the psychedelic era and became one of the resounding symbols of the counterculture movement of the '60s, is back in the labs.
Nearly 40 years after widespread fear over recreational abuse of LSD and other hallucinogens forced dozens of scientists to abandon their work, researchers at a handful of major institutions - including UCSF and Harvard University - are reigniting studies. Scientists started looking at less controversial drugs, like ecstasy and magic mushrooms, in the late 1990s, but LSD studies only began about a year ago and are still rare.
The study at UCSF, which is being run by a UC BERKELEY GRADUATE STUDENT, is looking into the mechanisms of LSD and how it works in the brain. The hope is that such research might support further studies into medical applications of LSD - for chronic headaches, for example - or psychiatric uses.... Full Story
21. Your Health: Hand-to-face touch is crucial link to catching flu
USA Today
September 28, 2009
Have you heard? You should wash your hands to avoid swine flu. But there's a second part of that message you don't hear as often: Keep your hands off your face.
"Your hands can be laden with influenza virus, but if you're not touching your eyes, nose and lips, you are not transmitting that virus (to yourself)," says MARK NICAS, AN ADJUNCT PROFESSOR OF ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH SCIENCES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA-BERKELEY....
And, if you are a typical human, your finger will do just that, repeatedly.
"It's automatic," says Richard Wenzel, an infectious-disease expert at Medical College of Virginia. "Primates apparently do it all the time."
To be more precise, primates who happen to be BERKELEY STUDENTS left alone under video surveillance do it an average of 16 times an hour. That's according to a study Nicas published in 2008.
Over three hours, the number of eye, nose and lip touches per student ranged from three to 104 among 10 volunteers, Nicas says. Clearly, he says, face-touching is a common though highly variable behavior. But it's little-documented. The only similar published study, he says, was a 1973 observation of 124 adults seated in crowds for 30 to 50 minutes. Even in public, researchers saw 29 episodes of outright nose-picking and 33 eye rubs, Nicas says.... Full Story
22. Locust flight simulator helps robot insects evolve
New Scientist
September 28, 2009
A locust flight simulator could be the key to perfecting the ultimate surveillance machine: an artificial flying insect. The simulator can model the way wings of varying shapes and surface features beat, as well as how they change their shape during flight....
Last month, DARPA contractor AeroVironment of Monrovia, California, demonstrated the first two-winged robot capable of hovering flight (see video at http://bit.ly/18LR8U). It achieved a stable take-off and hovered for 20 seconds. Other DARPA-funded projects by Micropropulsion and Daedalus Flight Systems are also thought to have achieved hovering robotic flight this year.
"Getting stable hover at the 10-gram size scale with beating wings is an engineering breakthrough, requiring much new understanding and invention," says RONALD FEARING, A MICROMECHANICS AND FLIGHT RESEARCHER AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY. "The next step will be to get the flight efficiency up so hover can work for several minutes."... Full Story
23. Oakland campus caters to refugees, immigrants
The international high school provides an alternative to newcomers, some of whom have never been in a classroom.
Los Angeles Times
September 27, 2009
Samuel Kanwea showed up for what should have been his freshman year in high school illiterate, malnourished and exhausted from years of living in a refugee camp in Ivory Coast. His family had never been able to afford the luxury of education, so he spent his early teenage years collecting firewood and selling fish....
New immigrants and refugees have long posed challenges for educators in the United States, but Kanwea and others like him present unique problems because they are often strangers to traditional schools. Academic issues are only one facet of their adjustment. Not only must educators teach them English and move them toward graduation, but they also must counsel many students grappling with the trauma of wars, persecution or poverty.
"Their needs are emotional, political, economic and social," said INGRID SEYER-OCHI, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF EDUCATION AT UC BERKELEY. "When we say that we are the land of opportunity and we welcome all people . . . these kinds of students and their families really put us to the test."... Full Story
24. Thinking literally
The surprising ways that metaphors shape your world
Boston Globe
September 27, 2009
When we say someone is a warm person, we do not mean that they are running a fever. When we describe an issue as weighty, we have not actually used a scale to determine this. And when we say a piece of news is hard to swallow, no one assumes we have tried unsuccessfully to eat it.
These phrases are metaphorical--they use concrete objects and qualities to describe abstractions like kindness or importance or difficulty--and we use them and their like so often that we hardly notice them. ...
Now, however, a new group of people has started to take an intense interest in metaphors: psychologists. Drawing on philosophy and linguistics, cognitive scientists have begun to see the basic metaphors that we use all the time not just as turns of phrase, but as keys to the structure of thought....
Like Nietzsche, GEORGE LAKOFF, A PROFESSOR OF LINGUISTICS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY, and Mark Johnson, a philosophy professor at the University of Oregon, see human thought as metaphor-driven. But, in the two greatly influential books they have co-written on the topic, “Metaphors We Live By” in 1980 and “Philosophy in the Flesh” in 1999, Lakoff and Johnson focus on the deadest of dead metaphors, the ones that don’t even rise to the level of cliche. They call them “primary metaphors,” and they group them into categories like “affection is warmth,” “important is big,” “difficulties are burdens,” “similarity is closeness,” “purposes are destinations,” and even “categories are containers.”
Rather than so much clutter standing in the way of true understanding, to Lakoff and Johnson these metaphors are markers of the roots of thought itself. Lakoff and Johnson’s larger argument is that abstract thought would be meaningless without bodily experience. And primary metaphors, in their ubiquity (in English and other languages) and their physicality, are some of their most powerful evidence for this.
“What we’ve discovered in the last 30 years is--surprise, surprise--people think with their brains,” says Lakoff. “And their brains are part of their bodies.”... Full Story
25. Obituary: Donald Fisher, Gap co-founder, dies
San Francisco Chronicle
September 28, 2009
San Francisco -- DONALD FISHER, who co-founded Gap Inc. with a single San Francisco blue jeans outlet in 1969 and turned it into a worldwide, 3,100-store casual-wear empire, died Sunday of cancer at his San Francisco home, the company said. He was 81.
Mr. Fisher, a lifetime San Francisco resident, was a retail industry pioneer whose impact was felt far beyond malls and main streets. Along with his wife and business partner, Doris Fisher, he became a philanthropist and a major political donor, helped keep the Giants in San Francisco and amassed one of the world's great collections of modern art....
Donald George Fisher was born to middle-class parents on Sept. 3, 1928. He attended Lowell High School and UC BERKELEY, where he starred on the swimming and water polo teams.
In an incident that he described in a 2002 memoir, he was once caught cheating on an industrial-relations exam by CLARK KERR, THEN A PROFESSOR and later the university president. Kerr gave him an F but didn't expel him, Mr. Fisher said, an "act of mercy" for which he was forever grateful....
"I didn't plan to go into the clothing business. I was just fortunate to have a bit of bad luck," Mr. Fisher said in an article in UC BERKELEY'S ALUMNI MAGAZINE AFTER BEING NAMED ALUMNUS OF THE YEAR IN 2007.
With CAL FOOTBALL PLAYERS among its first salesmen, the business filled a gap, in both the retail pants market and the booming base of customers age 12-25. Gap Inc. thrived in the early 1970s, issued its first public stock offering in 1976 and grew into a worldwide chain.... Full Story
26. Trial beginning in El Cerrito slayings
Contra Costa Times (*requires registration)
September 27, 2009
Martinez — Jury selection is under way in the capital murder trial of a Sacramento County man accused in the grisly 2006 killings of a prominent El Cerrito couple — his sister and brother-in-law.
Prosecutors intend to seek the death penalty if defendant Edward Wycoff, 40, of Citrus Heights, is convicted....
The 6-foot-5-inch, 300-pound Wycoff broke into the El Cerrito home his sister Julie Rogers shared with her husband, Paul, and their three children before dawn on Jan. 31, 2006, and killed the couple with a knife and a wheelbarrow handle, authorities have said. Two of the children were home at the time.
PAUL ROGERS, 47, was a San Francisco corporate attorney and LECTURER AT UC BERKELEY'S HAAS SCHOOL OF BUSINESS. Julie Rogers, also 47, was a stay-at-home mom and El Cerrito planning commissioner who volunteered on local political campaigns. Hundreds of people attended the funeral for the couple, whom friends and colleagues described as warm and altruistic.... Full Story
27. Sunday Book Review: Algorithm and Blues
New York Times & International Herald Tribune (*requires registration)
September 27, 2009
Logicomix
Written by Apostolos Doxiadis and Christos H. Papadimitriou
Illustrated by Alecos Papadatos and Annie Di Donna
347 pp. Bloomsbury. $22.95
Well, this is unexpected — a comic book about the quest for logical certainty in mathematics. The story spans the decades from the late 19th century to World War II, a period when the nature of mathematical truth was being furiously debated. The stellar cast, headed up by Bertrand Russell, includes the greatest philosophers, logicians and mathematicians of the era, along with sundry wives and mistresses, plus a couple of homicidal maniacs, an apocryphal barber and Adolf Hitler.
Improbable material for comic-book treatment? Not really. The principals in this intellectual drama are superheroes of a sort. They go up against a powerful nemesis, who might be called Dark Antinomy. Each is haunted by an inner demon, the Specter of Madness. Their quest has a tragic arc, not unlike that of Superman or Donald Duck.
So, at least, the creators of “Logicomix” would have us believe. First published last year in Greece (where it became a surprise best seller), the comic book — er, graphic novel? — is the brainchild of Apostolos Doxiadis, previously the author of a not-bad mathematical fiction called “Uncle Petros and Goldbach’s Conjecture.” For expert assistance on logic, Doxiadis called on his friend CHRISTOS PAPADIMITRIOU, A PROFESSOR OF COMPUTER SCIENCE AT BERKELEY and the author of a novel about Alan Turing. The art was done by Alecos Papadatos (drawings) and Annie Di Donna (color).... Full Story