Article Notes

 [1] The life of John Nash the celebrated Princeton academic and Nobel winner for mathematics did not only give us the Hollywood masterpiece A Beautiful Mind he also bequeathed posterity with a framework for analyzing competitive human interaction such as war and politics: The Nash Equilibrium, a sub paradigm in game theory just like the prisoner’s dilemma was adopted by the military and strategic fields. [2-1] Nash equilibrium occurs when actors in a conflict choose what they consider as their best possible strategy and stick to it even when they are aware of the opponent’s strategy. This is the situation in Ukraine where all parties have war has their best strategy for the political disagreement. [2-2] Russia knows that the number one rule of military science is “Never March On Moscow”, and that whoever has marched on Moscow has seen the end of their career: Napoleon and Hitler are outstanding examples. They know the West will leverage on technology against their natural defense ...

1 Few sights are more pitiful than a child of three, hammer in hand, breaking big rocks into smaller ones to sell for pennies. Such scenes are considered so abhorrent in rich and poor countries alike that the convention of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) which outlaws “the worst forms of child labour” (including soldiering, slavery and prostitution) last year became the first to be ratified by all 187 of its members.  2 Between 2000 and 2016 the number of children working in factories, on farms and down mines fell by almost 94m, to 152m. Yet in the four years to 2020 progress has reversed, with an extra 8m children working, and some 6.5m more doing dangerous jobs. Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for all of the increase. The setback occurred before the covid-19 pandemic, but the ILO and Unicef, the UN children’s agency, reckon that the economic hit from the virus may push almost 9m more children into work by the end of next year. Many ...

Here's What to Expect 1. T his coming May, millions of people around the United States will have front -row seats to an extraordinary entomological event: Trillions of Brood X cicadas across 15 states will emerge almost synchronously after having spent the last 17 years underground. 2. The males will take up elevated positions, each buzzing as loud as a lawnmower to attract females. After mating, the adult cicadas will die off en masse just about as quickly as they arrived—likely sometime in late June or July—while their offspring tunnel underground, not to emerge until 2038, when the dance will begin anew. 3. Annual, or “dog day,” cicadas appear across the U.S. every summer, when their signature mating song becomes as much of the seasonal soundscape as a passing ice cream truck. 4. But the cicadas taking center stage in this year’s event—distinctive for their black bodies and red eyes—are part of a periodical “brood” of the insects that emerge in predictable cycles of 13 or 17 yea...

 1.Japanese Justice Minister Yoshihisa Furukawa recently announced that the government will start discussions with an eye to reviewing the Technical Intern Training Program. An expert panel will be set up by the end of the year. 2.Under the program, the human rights of foreign workers are being ignored. It should be abolished immediately, and a new system to accept international laborers should be established. 3.The program was introduced 29 years ago, and as of the end of 2021, some 280,000 foreign trainees were working in various fields in Japan. 4.At the same time, problems linked to the program have long been pointed out, including low wages, long working hours and poor working environments. Japanese labor laws are supposed to be applied to foreign trainees, but many employers are not following them. 5.In January this year, it emerged that a technical intern in the city of Okayama had been repeatedly assaulted by his Japanese coworkers for two years. There was also a case where...

Japan toilet poetry contest winners depict funny, cynical side of life 1. FUKUOKA -- Winners of a Japan toilet poetry contest announced on Oct. 13 have unveiled humorous and cynical sides of people's daily business in the form of senryu -- a three-line Japanese poem structurally similar to haiku. 2. Toilet manufacturer Toto Ltd., headquartered in the southwest Japan city of Kitakyushu, announced its pick of the 40 best poems in the 17th edition of its annual toilet senryu contest, in which composers condensed their experiences and thoughts about washrooms into roughly 17 syllables in Japanese. 3. Winning the top award was a poem reading: "Standing up / from the toilet / and carrying on living." 4. There were 35,307 entries in the contest, and copywriter Takashi Nakahata, who is also a judge of the Mainichi Shimbun's senryu section, selected the winning poems. 5. The "relieving and funny prize," newly established following the coronavirus pandemic, was given ...

Shuntaro Tanikawa used to think poems came down like inspiration from the heavens. Now, at the age of 90, he sees them as growing from the ground. Tanikawa is among Japan's most famous modern poets, with over 100 poetry books. He rose to fame in the 1950s with his poem, "Two Billion Light-Years of Solitude." His works have been translated into several languages, and Tanikawa has worked as a translator himself, including for Charles Schulz's Peanuts comic. He also wrote the lyrics for the Japanese theme song of the TV series Tetsuwan-Atomu, known as Astro Boy in English. Now, poetry is no longer a job for Tanikawa. "Writing poetry has become really fun these days," he told The Associated Press at his home in Tokyo. He said he doesn't have projects anymore because of his age, which has made walking and going out more difficult. But he also said he is working with his musician son, Kensaku Tanikawa, on what they call "Piano Twitter." He's alre...

Japan's parliament on Monday passed legislation making "online insults" punishable by imprisonment amid rising public concern over cyberbullying sparked by the suicide of a reality television star who had faced social media abuse. Under the amendment to the country's penal code - set to take effect later this summer - offenders convicted of online insults can be jailed for up to one year, or fined 300,000 yen (about $2,200).  It's a significant increase from the existing punishments of detention for fewer than 30 days and a fine of up to 10,000 yen ($75). The bill proved controversial in the country, with opponents arguing it could impede free speech and criticism of those in power. However, supporters said the tougher legislation was needed to crack down on cyberbullying and online harassment.  It was only passed after a provision was added, ordering the law be re-examined three years after it goes into effect to gauge its impact on freedom of expression.  Under ...

 

Media desensitized consumers Because younger news consumers are exposed to graphic images online and through other new media, concerns journalists have about presenting highly graphic images of war to readers/viewers may be unfounded, finds a new University of Arizona study. At a time when journalists are still trying to closely monitor the amount and type of graphic images seen on traditional media such as television and film, young audiences or the "YouTube" generation in particular, might receive graphic visual images in a far different way. If this is the case, there might be serious implications for the media. In a study published in the recent issue of Visual Communication Quarterly, UA associate professor Shahira Fahmy examined whether the level of "graphicness" depicted in photos of conflict influenced viewers' perceptions. Fahmy and Christopher McKinley, a doctoral graduate from the UA department of communication and an assistant professor in the depart...

In the early summer of 1980, the Texas Congressman Charlie Wilson walked off the floor of the House of Representatives into the Speaker's Lobby. A Teletype at one end spewed out stories from AP, UPI and Reuters. Wilson was a news junkie, and he reached down and began reading a story datelined from Kabul. The article described hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing Afghanistan as Soviet helicopter gunships levelled villages, slaughtered livestock, and killed anyone who harboured guerrillas resisting the occupation. What caught Wilson's attention, however, was the reporter's conclusion that the Afghan warriors were refusing to quit. The article described how they were murdering Russians in the dead of night with knives and pistols, hitting them over the head with shovels and stones. Against all odds, there was a growing rebellion underway against the Red Army. It would have been a sobering insight for the Communist rulers if they could have followed what happened in the ...

Congressman Charlie Wilson was a champion for the covert op that affected the outcome of the Soviet-Afghan War. A former naval officer, Texas native, and 12-time elected member of the House of Representatives, Charlie Wilson was the man behind the longest covert CIA operation in American history. During the Soviet-Afghan War—which lasted from 1979 to 1989—Wilson channeled funds and weapons to Afghan insurgents, hoping the operation would result in a Soviet defeat. Considered a Cold War-proxy war, the Soviet-Afghan conflict began after Afghanistan's communist party gained control in 1978. Their Stalin-like policies quickly earned the support of the Soviet Union, though this alliance grew increasingly fraught as conflict arose within the party’s ranks. The murder of President Nur Murhammad Taraki in September of 1979—and the takeover of his partner-turned-enemy Hafizullah Amin—ultimately led to the Soviets’ intervention shortly afterwards. Their violent invasion and assassination ...

  geopolitics , analysis of the geographic influences on power relationships in   international relations . The word   geopolitics   was originally coined by the Swedish political scientist   Rudolf Kjellén   about the turn of the 20th century, and its use spread throughout Europe in the period between World Wars I and II (1918–39) and came into worldwide use during the latter. In contemporary discourse,   geopolitics   has been widely employed as a loose synonym for international politics. Arguments about the political effects of  geography —particularly  climate ,  topography , arable land, and access to the sea—have appeared in Western political thought since at least the ancient Greek era and were prominent in the writings of philosophers as  diverse  as  Aristotle  (384–322  BC ) and  Montesquieu  (1689–1745). The best-known body of geopolitical writings is the extensive literature of the late...