Hitler hated Jews? My head is spinning!

We are all used to historians changing the past. They could do it because they only create it! Through interpreting the 'records', they create 'evidence', From the 'evidence' thus created, they create the 'past'! No Gospel, no theologian, to my knowledge, has claimed that God could or would change what has already happened! But historians can! That is not a big deal, though. But, this is a more serious matter. They have brought to light a new record! Questions about interpretation, evidence and true past can wait. Is this record genuine?

According to a news report [http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/176781], Shimon Rahamim, an 'elderly Israeli', discovered an article in a Hebrew-language newspaper, Doar Hayom, dated August 8, 1924.

In the course of discussing Hitler's role as leader of the “nationalist Germans,” that article states that in an interview with a German publication, he had expressed “his warm feelings for the Jewish people.” It further says that Hitler had told the interviewer that all nations that had fallen in the past had suffered that fate because of their negative treatment of Jews. “He recommended that the entire world take stock” of their relations with the Jews, and adjust their behavior accordingly.

The given history of the context is that Hitler was in prison at the time, having been arrested the year before for attempting to start a rebellion in Munich, known as the “Beer Hall Putsch,”. He was sentenced to five years, but was released after only nine months, in December 1924.

Is this article authentic? Rahamim says yes, that it is indeed possible that Hitler did make those statements, "perhaps in order to impress upon the authorities that he had reformed." Hitler was writing his anti-Semitic manifesto, Mein Kampf, precisely at that time! Mein Kampf was published in 1925.

Rahamim has also this advice: "The Jews need to be very wary of those who claim to 'love' them.... If they could say this about Hitler, how much more careful must we be'!

Let the 'sacred' facts of history take care of themselves. What matters is the perception. Does this news bite wring familiar to those Indians who are holding their ears close to the not so distant 'past'?

Do we fear our own happiness?

We may feel jealous about others' happiness. But, do we fear our own happiness? Yes, say some recent studies. Here is the link to a report on that, which appeared first in Scientific American. It also features a quiz to measure individual's fear. A single quiz may not fit all heads. Still, one shot at it without trying to be too clever may not disappoint.

The main contention of the studies is that there is a co-relation between fear of happiness and mental illness. It does not, however, ignore the conditioning culture, religious beliefs or philosophical attitudes may have on groups and individuals. I would submit that age, as it advances, inhibits the capacity to break out into seamless joy. We are used to calling it 'wisdom'! May be, that too is a sign of mental illness!

The link is: http://www.salon.com/2014/01/27/are_you_afraid_of_happiness_take_the_quiz_partner/?source=newsletter

Why does life exist, or, more pointedly, how did life come into existence?

How did life begin? Undoubtedly the most fascinating question one could ask as of the present. But a definitive answer any time soon is most unlikely. 

Reproduction of life naturally and even artificially is not a big deal, but creating still is! If only we could give life to a lump of inorganic matter, it might at least help imagine how life first appeared on this planet, assuming that we are speaking only of 'life' as we know it only on this planet. We will certainly still not know how the first life, the Eve, came into being. And the creationists will still argue that 'reproduction' is not the same as 'creation'. Best way to engage them would be to leave them alone, for, belief is not amenable to reason. 

However popular and persistent the creation myths be, we do have some sophisticated guesses about the origin of life, all of which, incidentally, swim alongside the theory of evolution. Almost all such origin narratives have a common plot - of life springing from a primordial soup after getting struck by a bolt of lightning and a more potent bolt of luck. But, departing from this common line of thinking, a 31-year-old physicist at MIT, Dr. Jeremy England, claims that he has found the underlying physics driving the origin and evolution of life in which luck had no role. He thinks that the origin and subsequent evolution of life followed from the fundamental laws of nature 'as unsurprisingly as rocks roll downhill'!

To quote Natalie Wolchover ('A New Physics Theory of Life', Quanta Magazine, January 22, 2014): "From the standpoint of physics, there is one essential difference between living things and inanimate clumps of carbon atoms: The former tend to be much better at capturing energy from their environment and dissipating that energy as heat. Jeremy England ... has derived a mathematical formula that he believes explains this capacity. The formula, based on established physics, indicates that when a group of atoms is driven by an external source of energy (like the sun or chemical fuel) and surrounded by a heat bath (like the ocean or atmosphere), it will often gradually restructure itself in order to dissipate increasingly more energy. This could mean that under certain conditions, matter inexorably acquires the key physical attribute associated with life."

Here is the link to Wolchover article: 
https://www.simonsfoundation.org/quanta/20140122-a-new-physics-theory-of-life/

Here is a PEW survey Report about How people in Muslim countries prefer women to dress in public, JANUARY 8, 2014, in FACTANK
BY JACOB POUSHTER 

Here is the link if the accompanying charts need to be seen: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/01/08/what-is-appropriate-attire-for-women-in-muslim-countries/#utm_source=mostpopularft&utm_medium=internal&utm_campaign=PR

An important issue in the Muslim world is how women should dress in public. A recent survey from the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research conducted in seven Muslim-majority countries (Tunisia, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey), finds that most people prefer that a woman completely cover her hair, but not necessarily her face. Only in Turkey and Lebanon do more than one-in-four think it is appropriate for a woman to not cover her head at all in public.
The survey treated the question of women’s dress as a visual preference. Each respondent was given a card depicting six styles of women’s headdress and asked to choose the woman most appropriately outfitted for a public place. Although no labels were included on the card, the styles ranged from a fully-hooded burqa (woman #1) and niqab (#2) to the less conservative hijab (women #4 and #5). There was also the option of a woman wearing no head covering of any type.

Overall, most respondents say woman #4, whose hair and ears are completely covered by a white hijab, is the most appropriately dressed for public. This includes 57% in Tunisia, 52% in Egypt, 46% in Turkey and 44% in Iraq. In Iraq and Egypt, woman #3, whose hair and ears are covered by a more conservative black hijab, is the second most popular choice.
In Pakistan, there is an even split (31% vs. 32%) between woman #3 and woman #2, who is wearing a niqab that exposes only her eyes, while nearly a quarter (24%) choose woman #4. In Saudi Arabia, a 63%-majority prefer woman #2, while an additional 11% say that the burqa worn by woman #1 is the most appropriate style of public dress for women.

In several countries, substantial minorities say it is acceptable for a woman to not cover her hair in public. Roughly a third (32%) of Turks take this view, as do 15% of Tunisians. Nearly half (49%) in Lebanon also agree that it is acceptable for a woman to appear in public without a head covering, although this may partly reflect the fact that the sample in Lebanon was 27% Christian. 

Demographic information, including results by gender, were not included in the public release of this survey.

Even as publics in many of the surveyed countries express a clear reference for women to dress conservatively, many also say women should be able to decide for themselves what to wear. This attitude is most prevalent in Tunisia (56%), Turkey (52%) and Lebanon (49%) – all countries where substantial percentages are open to women not covering their heads in public. But nearly as many in Saudi Arabia (47%) also say a women should be free to choose how she dresses. Smaller, but sizable percentages agree in Iraq (27%), Pakistan (22%) and Egypt (14%). What the survey leaves unanswered is whether respondents think social or cultural norms will guide women in their choice to wear more conservative or less conservative attire in public.

I commented: It is not coincidental that Tunisia, Lebanon and Turkey prefer to give more freedom to women to choose the way they would want to dress. They lead the predominantly Muslim majority countries preferring lesser cover for the female figure.
Left to themselves, what women would intuitively prefer might not be hard to guess, But why? To make themselves physically more attractive to the other gender?
That the human males, generally physically stronger, prefer to own and control their females, as immediate mates (spouses) and as prospective mates of other males (daughters) is the common notion. But, who has the last laugh? If women are ordained by nature to be owned and controlled, why should they try to be attractive? What difference will it make, whether the moth is beautiful or ugly, if it is only to be consumed by the flame! Or, are they trying to outwit other women in becoming a more attractive property or slave?

'Because' is the word of the year because. Period!

American Dialect Society has chosen 'because' as the word of the year for 2013 from among an impressive list of words that included slash, selfie, Obamacare, bitcoin and twerk, because change!

At the latest meeting of the Society, 'because' polled 127 out of a total of 175, pipping 'slash' at the last post because new popularity!

The days of using 'because' with a comma immediately before and a comma immediately after, followed by a full clause, as in 'I am ranting, because, I am mad', or an 'of', as in 'you are raving because of (my) madness' are passe because casual online usage!

Ben Zimmer, Chairman of the Society's new words committee, has explained: “No longer does ‘because’ have to be followed by of or a full clause.... Now one often sees tersely worded rationales like ‘because science’ or ‘because reasons.’ You might not go to a party ‘because tired.’ As one supporter put it, ‘because’ should be word of the year ‘because useful!’ ”. Wow! No wonder! The Dialect Society has voted 'because' as also the most useful word of the year. 

The leaders of some of the other word categories for 2013 are: 'catfish' (to misrepresent oneself online, especially as part of a romantic deception) in "Most Creative"; 'sharknado' (a tornado full of sharks as in the movie of that name) in "Most Unnecessary"; 'underbutt' (the underside of buttocks left visible by some shorts) in "Most Outrageous"; and 'least untruthful' (meaning the smallest necessary lie, used by the U.S. intelligence director James Clapper) in "Most Euphemistic".

The Society has been doing this ever since 1990 because?