ENTANGLEMENT

 Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough
(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

The Age of Entanglement
By Louisa Gilder


Narrated by Walter Dixon

LOUISA GILDER (AMERICAN AUTHOR)
Louisa Gilder, in her first published book, offers a layman’s look at the science of quantum entanglement.

In the mind of a three-year-old, string can become tangled. String theory and The Age of Entanglement must have a relationship, right?

Physics is presently a mathematician’s art as much as science, particularly with the advent of quantum theory. As a non-mathematician, science’s pursuit of physics is fascinating because it tickles imagination. It offers insight to the mystery of how we got here, who we are, and where we are going.

Physics, pre- and post- Einstein, is a pursuit for the keys to the universe. Einstein’s “E=MC Squared” is a turning point. It focuses attention on unified field theory, the thought that there is a single formula that explains everything about everything.

Physics progresses from particles to waves to strings in its effort to unravel the key to the door of beginnings and endings. “The Age of Entanglement” brings a listener to 2006 without explaining how string theory relates to entanglement when they seem to have some important relationship. Gilder chooses not to include string theory (postulated in 1986 by Green and Schwarz) in her exploration of entanglement.

Nobel Prize winners in physics 2022.

Aside from that gripe, this is an enjoyable exploration of the world of physics; its theorists and experimentalists. The exploration is made better by the quality of Walter Dixon’s narration. Gilder cleverly delves into correspondence between physics legends–Einstein, Bohr, and later, John Bell and his contemporaries.

JOHN STEWART BELL (ENGLISH PHYSICIST 1928-1990) Even though Bell is not Einstein’s and Bohr’s contemporary, Bell is a critical change agent in the on-going argument begun by Einstein and Bohr about Quantum Theory. Bell changes quantum theory argument from a question of “if” to a question of “how” Quantum Theory is a valid construct of Physics.

Gilder reveals the humanness of the scientific community. She exposes the frustration and joy of discovery among scientists that think about the unknown and experiment with the unseen. The Age of Entanglement reveals the tensions that are created by strong beliefs and the utter devastation and human depression caused when beliefs are refuted by reproducible experiment.

Along the way Gilder offers a definition of entanglement; i.e. the idea that one minute quanta of existence affects other faraway elements of existence.

THE QUEST TO DEFINE QUANTUM ENTANGLEMENT

FAULTS OF HUMANITY

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

The Illustrated Man
By Ray Bradbury

Narrated by Paul Michael Garcia (this version not available at Audible)

Ray Bradbury (1920-2012, American Author and screenwriter)

Flights of imagination sparkle and spin in this updated 1950s classic by Ray Bradbury, “The Illustrated Man” and its accompanying short stories.

Bradbury writes stories that remind one of late night re-runs of Rod Serling’s “Twilight Zone”.  (Serling died in 1975.) Every episode sparkles with stars and planets, habitable by man but riddled with fear, death, and destruction. 

Bradbury grasps human nature and turns it against itself by writing stories that illustrate man’s selfishness, insecurity, wantonness, and aggression.

Tattoos come alive on rippling skin to act out a series of plays about mankind’s future.  Everyone fears the illustrated man because his tattoos expose the worst in man. 

Bradbury writes a story showing nuclear cataclysm will end life on earth.  Traveling to other planets changes mankind’s environment but man’s nature remains the same.

These are not happy stories but they are great flights of imagination.  Bradbury tells a story of human exile and deprivation that heightens human selfishness.

When personal reward is dangled in front of exiled and deprived human beings, the dangled reward is stolen by one to keep it from the many. In the end the reward is destroyed by the selfishness of each against the other.  

As the psychologist Erich Fromm notes: Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction. 

Insecurity and envy are devouring beasts in the story of a planet blessed by an appearance of a Visitor (presumably Jesus) just before a rocket ship lands on the planet that has been visited.

The ship’s captain disbelieves it has happened. The captain who lives here is living in paradise. He is driven to track down this Visitor rather than settle in the secure surroundings of a blessed world.  The captain is left to wander the universe, never to arrive in time to actually see the Visitor. 

Wantonness is illustrated by the husband that is unhappily married.  He duplicates himself.  His duplicate takes his place beside his wife so so the real husband can buy a ticket to Rio to exercise his fantasy. 

The duplicate is so perfect it becomes as human as the husband.  When the wanton husband returns from Rio, the duplicate puts him in a box to die. The duplicate then buys a ticket for the wife to accompany him to Rio. 

Human kind is aggressive.  Humans conquer and destroy civilizations.  Bradbury creates a world of the future invaded by humans. The humans destroy its civilization.

The remnants of the destroyed civilization prepare for a second visit from mankind. The remnants of the city devour the humans of the second visit and assume their bodies. These doppelgangers plan to return to earth to destroy those who had destroyed them.

Bradbury is a master story teller.  Paul Michael Garcia’s narration is a tribute to Bradbury’s skill.

UNBRIDLED CAPITALISM

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

White Tiger

By Aravind Adiga

Narrated by John Lee

ARAVIND ADIGA, INDO-AUSTRAILIAN AUTHOR, Winner of the Booker Prize in 2008 for “White Tiger”.

“White Tiger” pictures the chasm between haves and have-nots. It reminds one of “Native Son”.  Like “Native Son”, “White Tiger” speaks about the ugly consequence of discrimination and poverty. 

A big difference between “White Tiger” and “Native Son” is in the tragi-comic rendition of “White Tiger” on Netflix. One wonders if “White Tiger” is meant to be satire or a reflection on a flaw of capitalist self-interest. Maybe both.

A visiting dignitary from China is given a note by a former Indian servant who describes his entrepreneurial success in India.  The servant tells the story of his rise from the second lowest caste in India to successful entrepreneur. He is from a lower caste of the poor, but now he is rich.

The caste system remains strong in India. Having traveled there in 2018, our tourist guide notes his family is from the warrior class.

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In speaking of his daughter, he explains that though he has limited control over whom she marries, his biggest concern is that she marry within her class. Caste ancestry still binds and defines much of India’s culture.

In “White Tiger”, Balram is the main character. Balram is an uneducated but clever observer of society. He is acutely aware of his position in life. 

Balram is destined to be a breaker of social convention. 

In India (and around the world) changing sociopolitical ideals, collapsing religious belief, deteriorating family ties, and human nature’s “good and evil” amplify the chasm between rich and poor.  

An irony of Balram’s story is that it is between two countries that have different political philosophies; i.e. one, democratic; the other communist. Their socioeconomic maladies are similar.  Both countries have dense populations, high industrial growth, and consequential environmental degradation. The common thread is China‘s and India’s drive toward capitalism.  

Balram considers himself a social entrepreneur who becomes a successful capitalist by breaking social convention. His broken convention is murder.

As the Indian servant’s story progresses, Richard Wright’s “Native Son”  and Adiga’s “White Tiger” metaphorically meet. Both carry out wanton murders of sociologically ignorant human beings. 

Bigger Thomas (the main character in “Native Son”) and Balram are one side of a capitalist’s coin, minted by poor education, poverty, and discrimination.  Their capitalist reality corrupts thought and action.

“White Tiger”, like “Native Son”, is a world warning about the consequence of the growing chasm between rich and poor; i.e. as long as societies believe that “a rising tide lifts all boats”, discontent and hostile action of the poor is the main thing that will rise.

Lack of prudent regulation of capitalism leads to the worst in human nature. Even though “prudent” is in the eyes of the beholder, ignoring the poor is a monumental failure of any society, whether capitalist or communist. Equality of education and opportunity are capitalism’s saving grace but grace is not natural to man; i.e. prudent regulation of human nature is required.

“White Tiger” is a credible warning of the danger of unbridled capitalism.

WINNERS AND LOSERS

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.com

Embracing Defeat
By John W. Dower

Narrated by Edward Lewis

JOHN W. DOWER (AMERICAN AUTHOR, HISTORIAN)

Victory is sweet; defeat is bitter.  Victory engenders responsibility for the defeated; defeat demands fealty to a victor. Fealty is not the goal of a victorious leader who seeks lasting peace.

Peace among nations has a price. John Dower’s reflection on WWII and Japan holds lessons for today’s American leadership and Putin’s folly.

John Dower, in “Embracing Defeat”, endeavors to picture Japan’s condition; i.e. the state of its economy and its people, after surrender in WWII. 

History’s complexity is difficult to capture in words.  Dower makes an effort to explain the context of post war Japan by showing Japanese attitude in media reports and literature of the time.  The irony of Dower’s effort is that media reports and literature are censored by Allied forces, particularly the United States. This is not unlike Vladimir Putin’s control of Russian media during the Ukraine invasion. Putin will undoubtedly use that control to soft petal a hopeful settlement, though unlikely palliative acceptance by Ukraine.

MICHINOMIYA HIROHITO (124TH EMPEROR OF JAPAN 1901-1989)
Dower covers the history of an American white wash of Hirohito’s war complicity and responsibility.  The American government uses Hirohito to make occupation and influence in Japan more acceptable to its population.  It became politically expedient to hide Hirohito’s true involvement in Japan’s war plans. 

Dower reports on post-war trials of Japanese military and government leaders; i.e. Dower writes about trial testimony of Japan’s WWII’ atrocities but his history shows that victor’ justice is not necessarily victim’ justice.

Hideki Tojo as hero and/or goat–tried and convicted; sentenced to a prison in which he dies. Tojo refuses to implicate the Emperor in his actions during the war.

In spite of (partly because of) American military occupation of Japan, financial aid is misdirected and food goods and material are stolen, a black market develops, gangs are formed, and corruption thrives. (Sounds like Iraq after America’s invasion.).  Prostitution became a way of making a living, and immoral behavior became semi-acceptable because of rising poverty.

NICOLAS MADURO (PRESIDENT OF VENEZUELA SINCE 2013)
A case in point today is the President of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro. Are his actions a “crime against humanity” or is he fighting for his country’s independence?


Economic sanctions are as likely to punish the innocent as the guilty in countries that fight for their own identity. One’s interest is peaked by Japan’s experience after WWII because of the current Middle East muddle. 

Syria, Iraq, and Iran are challenged by domestic unrest and punitive actions by non-indigenous forces.  These three countries are particularly impacted by military and/or economic pressures from outsiders.  What is going to happen in those countries?  Are there any clues in the great change that occurred in Japan after WWII?

General MacArthur assumed the role of “Dear Leader”, treating the Japanese like 12-year-olds that were to be taught the ways of Democracy with a capital “D”.  This role by MacArthur in post war Japan is accepted by many Japanese because of centuries of Imperial control, exemplified by Emperor Hirohito.

BONNER FELLERS (U.S. ARMY OFFICER, SERVED AS A MILTARY ATTACHE IN WWII)
Dower also suggests that a large part of General MacArthur’s success is due to Major Bonner Fellers, a Japanese scholar that predicted Japan’s war several years before the attack on Pearl Harbor.  Major Fellers’ respect and understanding of Japanese culture and his influence contributes much to the success of American policy in post war Japan. 

One may hope for a similar go-between if a settlement can be reached between Russia and Ukraine.

Fellers recognizes Japan’s people, with new found freedom, are inwardly driven toward a capitalist philosophy inherent in democracy.  The Japanese did not abandon their ideas of production, the ideas of small business cooperation to achieve common goals.  Those ideas made them a military behemoth in the 1920s.  They redirected that belief system toward domestically driven capitalism. Japan became a dominant 20th century economic power. Japan’s experience suggests that freedom will not be denied but how it exhibits is a mystery wrapped in nation’s histories, beliefs, and practices.

Are there equivalents of “Major Bonner Fellers” to guide America’s policy toward other countries like Venezuela the Middle East, and today’s Russia/Ukraine conflict?

America can help or hinder a peoples’ drive for freedom but where it leads in Venezuela, Iraq, Iran, or Ukraine must be their peoples’ decision.

Nature abhors a vacuum (Spinoza).  The centralized governments and economies of Venezuela, Syria, Iraq, Iran, and Ukraine will be occupied democratically, autocratically, or some combination thereof, when domestic tumult subsides. 

A peaceful settlement of the Russia/Ukraine war will be difficult. Outside countries cannot mandate lasting peace within other countries; let alone their own country. Sovereignty should be recognized as an inalienable right. It is not America’s or other countries’ job to pick winners and losers.

BLACK FACE

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

Uncle Tom’s Cabin 


By Harriet Beecher Stowe

Narrated by Richard Allen

The meaning of words changes with the generations.  An “Uncle Tom” became a pejorative description of any oppressed minority that accepts slavery and maltreatment as a God given burden, a condition of natural life.  (See “Freedom and Equality”.)

The rise of black face minstrels and college party jokers carry through to the 20th century. The “Uncle Tom…” in Harry Beecher’s book is no minstrel and no joke.

In the context of the 20th and 21st centuries Beecher’s book is taken out of context.

“Uncle Tom’s Cabin” is written in an era, brutally described by Frederick Douglas (see “Frederick Douglas”), when human beings are traded as futures commodities. Douglas, a great American black leader, who personally knew Stowe, praises her for writing this book.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, the slave trade lines the pockets of slave traders, plantation owners, and industrialists.  Black degradation is reinforced by laws of the land; i.e. slave owners could shackle, whip, sell, rape, and murder slaves with little censure and no penalty. In that context, Harriet Beecher Stowe’s “Uncle Tom…” is a Black Saint.

This is not only a book about slavery; i.e. it is a book about humankind and how abominably one ethnic group can treat another. It is a story told many times in history and in the present day.

The apocryphal story of Abraham Lincoln having said “So this is the little lady who started this great war” is undoubtedly un-true, but for the 1850’s, “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” is a revolutionary book used to fuel the abolitionist cause in America and around the world. 

The role of religion has a mixed history in the story of slavery.  Religion plays roles in advancing and abolishing slavery.  Religion serves as a refuge for slaves by preaching the gospel of forgiveness and an afterlife while many Catholic and protestant religions promote slavery as a biblical right of the white race.

The irony of religion’s followers is that it mollifies Black resistance for those who believe in a Divine Creator. At the same time, biblical writings are used by white supremacists to justify unequal treatment. 

Some religions rose above religion’s ugly endorsement of slavery; most did not.  Quakers in the 1850s fought slavery in the United States, as is shown in Stowe’s story. Some Quaker households became a refuge for runaway slaves.

At bottom, Stowe shows commerce and greed are pillars of slavery.  The farmers, businesses, and industrialists that strove to improve their bottom line directly or indirectly abetted slavery, just as the temptation of cheap labor in China and India seduce today’s American entrepreneurs and consumers. 

More broadly, one realizes human nature is good and evil.  Most members of society succumb to temptation in life.  No human is purely good or evil but a mixture. Human nature blurs the line between right and wrong because every human is tempted by money, power, and/or prestige.

“Uncle Tom’s Cabin” is as relevant today as it was in the 1850s.

NEVER AGAIN?


(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

  Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough


Last Train from Hiroshima


By Charles Pellegrino


Narrated by Arthur Morey

CHARLES R. PELLEGRINO (AUTHOR, AMERICAN WRITER)

Putin’s Ukranian invasion raises the specter of nuclear war with the demented belief that it can be limited. Consider whether this history of nuclear cataclysm horrifies more than enlightens. “Last Train from Hiroshima” is not for the feint-hearted. It is a gruesome reminder of the horror of war.

Pellegrino has written a story of Hiroshima and Nagasaki’s bomb survivors.  Arthur Morey brings Pellegrino’s words to life. Pellegrino recounts survivor stories; i.e. what they saw, and what happened to them and their families in the aftermath of the world’s first use of a nuclear weapon.

Pellegrino is a wordsmith. He uses words that blow torch images on a listener’s mind.  His words capture the horror of nuclear war, the physical and mental effect of nuclear detonation on human beings.

After Nagasaki’s bomb, a young girl walks out of a tubular bomb shelter and sees a shadowy figure that she presumes is an escaped zoo animal. It has rough, blackened, mottled skin, and is crawling on four limbs. It is a human being, exposed to the flash and burn (pikadon) of the bomb.

Pellegrino describes this crawling man as one of the “alligator people”, a classification that repeats it self on the skins of anyone that survives direct exposure to the bomb’s flash and burn.

He tells the story of a “tap dancer” running down a street in Hiroshima; tap, tap, tapping the hard surfaced street because he has no feet.

Pellegrino recounts the story of a father greeting his lost daughter by asking “…do you have feet” because a Japanese aphorism believed ghosts are recognized as apparitions with no feet.

The aftermath of Japan’s nuclear blasts left thousands of people with few apparent injuries.  They wander in a fog of confusion, like ants in long lines following each other, single file to nowhere. They were, as Pellegrino explains, the “ant walkers”.

Days later, the “ant walkers” are stricken with fever, vomiting, loss of appetite, and internal bleeding; some survive to go through the same symptoms weeks or months later; some become crippled for the remainder of their lives; some die after the first onset of sickness; some die years later from leukemia or other maladies traced back to those two fateful August days in 1945.

The survivor stories in Pellegrino’s book are so vivid that one wonders where real history ends and his imagination begins. Regardless of the veracity of Pellegrino’s survivor facts, his description of nuclear weapon damage and radioactive exposure is verified by later scientific experiments and accidents.

One is left with the thought and fear of future world conflagration.  After all, “Never again” has been said before.

AN INNER COMPASS

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

Jane Eyre
By Charlotte Bronte
Narrated by Lucy Scott

CHARLOTTE BRONTE (ENGLISH NOVELIST AND POET, 1816-1855)

The story of “Jane Eyre” is an example of someone who relies on reason and moral certainty to believe and act on what is right, and to live decently. “Jane Eyre” replays the tautology of “life is not fair; i.e., it just is”.

In this era of “click bait” media, we can easily lose our way. The difference between a lie and truth is harder to recognize when bombarded by viral postings on the internet. We need to remind ourselves-there is no correlation between popularity and truth.

The author, Charlotte Bronte, captures life’s joy and hardship. The story emphasizes the importance of having a moral “inner compass” to guide one to choose between right and wrong. By making right choices, fulfillment comes from working through good and bad things in life.

Jane is an orphaned girl raised by an uncaring Aunt that feels burdened by her filial obligation. The orphaned girl directly confronts her Aunt’s resentment. To escape further confrontation and embarrassment, the Aunt boards Jane Eyre in an indigent’s school.

Jane Eyre is formally educated.  She becomes a teacher at the school. Later, she is hired by a wealthy landowner to tutor a young girl that is alleged to be the landowner’s illegitimate daughter. The wealthy landowner is revealed as a man with too many secrets who covets Jane Eyre’s mind and body. Jane Eyre, driven by her inner compass, flees to endure new hardship and temptation.

At the end, Jane Eyre returns to merry the wealthy landowner. She finds him blind, chastened, and older, but still in love with the Jane Eyre he had hired as his daughter’s tutor.

An ever present refrain in “Jane Eyre” is that all life decisions and actions have consequences. The many themes that run through Charlotte Bronte’s book are what make it a classic.

Every listener will identify with some part of Charlotte Bronte’s story. The audio version of “Jane Eyre” is a tribute to Charlotte Bronte’s story telling skill.

In the 21st century, an inner moral compass is needed to offset the blizzard of falsehood disseminated by a largely unregulated internet. Social media hides behind a distorted understanding of the meaning of free speech. Free speech in America has always been conditionally defined.

Peter Thiel (Trump supporter who believes fact checking of Facebook postings is an attack on the Constitutional Right of free speech.)

Unregulated free speech spreads hatred. People are seduced into believing truth is defined by social media’ clicks. Notoriety is as important as popularity or truth.

The next mass murder or school shooting lays at the doorstep of unregulated free speech.

CHINA

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

When China Rules the World


By Martin Jacques

Narrated by Scott Peterson

MARTIN JACQUES (AUTHOR, BRITISH JOURNALIST)

Martin Jacques has written an interesting book about China’s rise as a world economic power.  His overview of the geo-political and Realpolitik relationships of the east and west are interesting; particularly in light of the Trump administration.

“When China Rules the World” has interesting details that inform but do not convince one that China will rule the world.  The provocative title drives the bus but it does not reach its destination. 

World control is a myth that causes wars and destroys the best and brightest, as well as the mean and maniacal. 

What is happening in China is remarkable.  China’s transition from Maoist communism to capitalist communism is a caterpillar turning into a butterfly; i.e. China has grown wings but it still lives in a world constrained by its environment.

Though President Xi is re-instituting some Maoist mistakes, China’s world wide investment in infrastructure is based on capitalist beliefs. Xi has an internationalist focus, just like that which made America great; at least, until Trump’s Presidency.

Chairman Mao’s cultural revolution and belief in enlarging collectivist ideology nearly destroys China’s path to prosperity

Xi is attempting to open new markets by financing infrastructure improvements in African, Middle Eastern, and Asian countries. He is creating customers for Chinese product.

Undoubtedly, Xi is also trying to seduce other nations into belief in Xi’s form of Communism. This is not unlike America’s intent to democratize the world.

Jacques argues that a 90% Han Chinese cultural domination of 1/5th of the world’s population will change the nature of the 21st century.  In a limited sense, that is undoubtedly true.  However, regardless of the type of government rule, human nature is the same.

Money, power, and prestige, are the primary motivations of humankind. Whether one is Han Chinese, Tibetan, Uighur, Indian, Hispanic, Black, or any singular ethnic group, all humans seek control of money, power, and prestige. These innate drives are the speedometer, brakes, and steering wheels of nation-state’ leaders and followers. 

There are dominant factions in every culture that are not necessarily the majority of a culture’s population.  Jacques’ early comments suggest China’s 5000 year history reflects a cultural conformity greater than any other country in history while later he acknowledges that the predominant Han population is highly diverse in its beliefs.

Cultural conformity is not the relevant issue; i.e., dominant cultures, whether a majority or minority of an indigenous population, are the game changers of a nation’s history. 

Jacques argues that China’s cultural history of familial respect and veneration will have profound affects on the future of world economies.  Jacques has a valid point. However, the history of modernization suggests that the fabric of extended filial obligation will be ripped apart in China just as it has in every industrializing nation. 

China, just as all modernizing nation-states, will see deterioration of familial bonds.

Human nature is immutable.  As an agrarian culture moves to the city and parents are compelled to work for wages, family structure and filial commitment deteriorates.

Of course, capitalism is not the same in China as it is in the western hemisphere.  As Jacques reports, major capitalist businesses are state owned in China.  They compete in the world market but government support mitigates much of the free enterprise ideal of capitalist economies.  However, no nation-state operates as a free enterprise capitalist country; i.e. government has always played a role in capitalist nations.  Government subsidy of industrialization is a matter of degree.   

It may be that China will change the way industrialized countries compete but global economic domination is no longer possible in a tech savvy world that recognizes knowledge is power and natural resources are limited.

All the world knows how each culture in the world lives. With that knowledge, countries will gravitate to systems of government that serve its dominant culture best. Best is defined as what is most important to the dominant culture in the context of either money, power, or prestige.

Long term, China is facing a tougher road to modernize because of population, environmental degradation, and dwindling natural resources, but their short term prospects look better than most other nations. 


New estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau put China in the lead with 1.34 billion residents, followed by India with 1.19 billion. The United States is a distant third with 311.1 million people.Jul 6, 2011

As Jacques points out, China’s savings rate is over 20%, with a GDP growth rate 3 times that of America.  The cost of dwindling natural resources is more affordable to China than most other modernizing countries.  However, all economies are closely tied to each other and a major failure in America or Europe will have great consequence for the world economy which will significantly affect China’s short term advantage. 

With a failure of a western countries economy, China’s drive toward modernization will be in danger. That danger is demonstrated today by America’s creation of a trade war with China.

Some argue this burgeoning trade war is hurting the Chinese economy more than the American economy. That may be true in the short term, but the efficacy of trade wars are questionable in the long term; particularly in our internet connected world.

Jacques’ book is worth its purchase price and a consumer’s time because he exposes some of the cultural biases of China that are not widely known.  His suggestion that discrimination is as prevalent in China as it is in the United States is reprehensible, and disgustingly familiar.  Globalization is real.  Human nature is immutable.  All mankind travels on the same space ship; i.e. our blue ball.  At the very least, China is proving that our environment is fragile and natural resources are finite.

PRISON REFORM

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough
(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing


By Ted Conover
Narrated by Ted Conover

TED CONOVER (AUTHOR, JOURNALIST)

On December 18, 2018, Congress approved a prison reform bill which is signed by President Trump. In this bill, Congress takes a first step in turning prisons into institutions of reform rather than isolation and punishment. The bill’s purported intention is to return prisoners to productive society by 1) improving prisoner treatment, 2) treating the drug addicted, 3) monitoring those put on probation to reduce recidivism, and 4) improving pretrial services for the arrested.

Clanging prison doors and simmering discontent are evident in Ted Conover’s book but it is not a polemic for prison reform.

Conover surreptitiously becomes a Corrections Officer at a storied New York prison called Sing Sing (30 miles north of NYC).  He enters a seven week boot camp and four week “On-Job-Training” program to become a C.O. for one year, including his 11 week training period.

Conover exposes many dysfunctions that are inherent in a system that isolates human beings from society. The American prison systems’ principle function is to punish the convicted with confinement. Criminals are then released into society based on time served.  What Conover’s experience shows is that Corrections Officers are as likely to be changed by their roles as gate keepers as prisoners are by their confinement.   

Both C.O. and prisoner roles increase human frustration.  Corrections Officers, by training and experience, become martinets that focus on control of human nature, their own and the prisoners.  COs are directed to control their emotions regardless of verbal abuse they hear from internees.  Prisoners are treated like herd animals to be corralled, fed, and released at a master’s discretion.  

A Correction Officer enforces rules, written and unwritten, and prisoners break rules. Both factions vie for respect.  It becomes a “zero-sum” game with marginalized losers and short lived winners.  The losers are prisoners and the winners are COs.   

Rules become symbols of authority and control rather than guidelines for human reform.  Conover gives the example of a rule that says a Correction Officer, under no circumstance, is to assist a prisoner with his duties.  When a prisoner is told to carry a bundle of laundry that is too big for him to carry, the CO is not to assist him because it violates a code of conduct that might compromise security.  Offering help may engender friendship which may lead to collusion, corruption, and/or escape.  Cognitive dissonance causes some COs to question their humanity.  Outside of prison, man is encouraged to help his fellow man; inside prison, it is a sign of forbidden vulnerability.

Prisoners are being taught to believe that helping one’s fellow man is not a societal benefit. Prisons do not reform prisoners; i.e. prisons warehouse human beings and return most of them to society after time served.

MEN

Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough

(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.blog

The Sports Writer
By Richard Ford
Narrated by Richard Poe

JOHN FORD (AMERICAN AUTHOR)

Selecting books from book lists like Random House’s Modern Library is not a full proof method for making good choices.  The decision to listen to Richard Ford's “The Sportswriter” came from one of those lists.  "The Sportswriter" deserves its place on the list because it offers societal insight.
The initial impression of "The Sportswriter" is that it is a story about wandering through life.  But as it progresses, the listener begins to realize that Richard Ford is writing about men and how some view life.
The main character is a guy's guy because he has the ability to charm women into thinking he is the man of their dreams.  He does not convince every woman of his commitment and interest but he manages to touch all the bases before he is called out.     
This is not a story that makes one proud to be a man but it offers insight to why the cliché "men are from Mars" has some truth. Ford's main character is a guy's guy named Frank Bascombe.  He is a traveling sports writer and a divorcée of his own making, a fool that fails to understand what is important in life.  After his marriage break up, he is cast adrift to find the next best thing which never turns into anything important.
Relationships for Bascombe become momentary escapes from real life, real life where good and bad things happen.  Real life for Bascombe is romance and break up without commitment.  What he does not understand is commitment helps humans work through the bad things in life to get to the next good.  Women seem to understand that better than men.  Women may wonder why men think seduction skill is the key to paradise.  Some would say it is 3000 years of genetic inheritance and experience.  Of course, that is a Martian's perception of reality.
The irony of a guy's guy skill to seduce is that it leads to a lonely and empty life. David Riesman characterized this phenomena as people becoming "other directed" rather than "inner directed"; i.e. looking to society to determine who you are; rather than looking within oneself. 
 
In Ford's story, “The Sportswriter”, Bascombe drifts through life from relationship to relationship to nowhere.  He never comes to grips with what is wrong with his life.  He drifts to Retirementville, Florida to think about the next best thing.  That is how the story ends.  It is a rather depressing exploration of how vacuous life can be. 
This is a book that gives a concrete explanation of what some men are looking for in life.
When listening to The Sportswriter, you may find someone you know; hopefully not you.