graffiato

Sadly, the artwork adorning the formerly longest remaining stretch of the Berlin Wall, at a location known as the East-Side Gallery is being dismantled and relocated to make room for luxury apartments along the Spree, despite massive protests and celebrity support. Seeing an exhibit posted to Atlas Obscura about the mysterious Minoan artefact, discovered in 1908, known as the Phaistos Disc, I saw some resemblance to this graffiti in Berlin. I wonder if the disc was the inspiration. Although its provenance is debated, some archeologists think that the disc of raised hieroglyphs may be an ancient press for making moveable type. Some statements are not, I think, meant to be moved.

# baker-zebra

Chess and its associated stratagems has pretty interesting etymological, if not instantly recognizable rather shallow and bursting through languages’ foundations, roots. The game, as it is known in English, comes from the French term eschequier, after the Latin name for a the table of a counting-house that bore a signature checked pattern, whose contrast may it easier not to miss a coin strayed from the pile.

Such parquet is reduplicated in the gracious marble lobbies of financial institutions and in officers of the Exchequer. A checkmate, of course, refers to a move that keeps the opponent’s king in check, helpless and few alternatives, and the German name of the game and term, Schach and Schachmatt, reveal more about the Persian origins—sheik, shah and such—for ruler or king paired with an even older association than matched or müde (tired, a Yiddish derived folk-etymology but not something without meaning) for the second part, maat, meaning bedded or retiring. For players physically separated from one another, the pound-sign became telegraph notation for a checkmate situation whose shorthand was an important precursor for code later developed, the hash-marks of programming language. Baker-Zebra, or rather Bravo-Zulu in modern parlance, is an old naval semaphore designation, arbitrary, but filed under B housekeeping and the last register to signify a job well-done.

poor-mouthing and paradigm-shift

The rather myopic policies adopted and expressed in various ways throughout the European Union threaten to reintroduce much longer-lasting consequences from internal and external pressures across the economic landscape. Once lauded as the most ambitious and effective ways to curb climate change and promote good stewardship for the environment, the cap-and-trade scheme and carbon-emission is failing and a united-front is reverting to nationalistic policies.

Allowances for polluting have become affordable to the point of investing in further innovation no longer makes good business-sense. Much of the decline is due, of course, to a slow-down in demand and production and the relationship is not without reciprocation but in the longer term, such splintering and attitudes represent a very big set-back in terms of solidarity. What do you think? Is reform something negotiable in the face of immediate perceptions—or is it something to sacrifice, to recalibrate? Environmental policy should not be driven solely by the dictates of the markets, but consumers also have a choice to make.

stirring the cauldron or strongly-worded letter

The a reporter on the International Desk of Der Spiegel spied a curiously counter-productive example of outreach on the public website of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Demonstrating the work that the FBI’s Cryptanalysis and Racketeering Records Unit does, the website depicts an image of hieroglyphs that make up a simple substitution cipher, which when cracked, gives instructions for preparing the toxin ricin—a protein of the castor bean (Rizinussamen, the German word does not hide its source very well either), which can be decoded without much bother. The example image is even captioned “Enciphered instructions for making ricin poison found in the notebook of a lone bomber in Virginia.” The methodology set forth is apparently basic but complete and an interested party could produce, with some easy kitchen-witchery, a deadly concoction.

smart suzy-sunset and i are on the case

Demonstrating that hindsight is sometimes the sharpest lens, the Washington Post has a curious article about an Iranian factory with strangely potemkin qualities in a town called Dinslaken in the Ruhrgebiet, an industrial area near Essen.

Although the quiet day-to-day operations may have been completely innocent and above-board (as Iran says of its nuclear ambitions, perhaps unfairly sullen), since being month-balled just late last month, the closing inventory and performance record has again caught the notice of inspectors and authorities, believing that the factory may have been a front for developing the nuclear programme of their home-country. Iran has been quite forthcoming with concessions and transparency, it seems and more so than is expected of other members of the nuclear club—to whatever purpose. Everyone is entitled to whatever threshold of scepticism that suits them but a coalition of preconceptions do not establish nefarious behaviour nor the strictures of imagination that may have contributed to past oversights—sins of omission. What do you think? Is the suspicion justified or should every do-nothing Döner stand or under-patronized enterprise stand be subject to the same kind of scrutiny?

real and present oder perspektiv

One major news service, incidental to the reporting on the Boston Marathon finish-line bomb attacks, raised an interesting, if not back-handed, sociological question by entertaining one report’s questions concerning the whether the event and terrible carnage were staged as a false-flag operation.

Conspiracy theories pander to the lower denominator, in accordance with the theme of the article and citing terrible school-shootings that seem to proceed at their own accord and without the prompting of policy and agendas, and as historical precedent, the sabotage of the Reichstag in Berlin during Nazi times—overlooking Hawaii or the Gulf of Tonkin Invasion that were too close for comfort. What do you think—are such suggestions (since they’re begging the answer) out-of-line and too raw for the present or does a sort of fearful patriotism and solidarity dismiss questioning?

honey-comb hideout continued or pesticides versus pollinators

Correspondence leaked to Corporate Europe Observatory suggests the furious extent of the lobbying campaign on the part of at least two major chemical and pharmacological concerns against a proposed ban of substances that may be responsible for the widespread decline in the bee population.

Although might be several other likely culprits behind colony-collapse, from parasites, cellular masts to genetically modified crops, and the verdict is not final, British and French field research seems very conclusive that even trace amounts of the pervasive pesticide have devastating effects on beneficial insects. There is currently a moratorium on such treated crops, introduced ab ovo, as seeds, and lingering in the mature plant with the same deleterious effects. The leaked litany of contraindications from the business-sector try at various angles, blaming the farmers for overdosing, badly skewed studies that insist agriculture cannot survive otherwise, and even that the EU is being held ransom by a lobby of hobby apiarists hell-bent on protecting their past-time. Industry pressure may convince European Union member states to rescind the ban and ignore stern warnings and grave consequences.