text:
Supposed first image of Galaxy S8 leaks on the network and generates suspicion
There are three steps in the coverage of a smartphone not yet released: pre-release, release, post-release. The first of these is where we tell tech fans what to expect about a new device. This is one of the steps I like best, especially because it is full of expectations. However, sometimes there are very forced rumors, and this supposed image of the Galaxy S8 is one of them.
The Galaxy S8 is one of the most anticipated smartphones of the year for many reasons, and some people can take advantage of it. At the beginning of this month, @ VenyaGeskin1 published a concept of Samsung's new flagship based on rumors already leaked about the device. The concepts, by the way, were very well created and give a good idea of what we can expect from the device:
Samsung Galaxy S8 (2017) Renders #Samsung # GalaxyS8 # S8
PS Smaller watermarks pic.twitter/6Px6pMCN6r
Veniamin Geskin (@ VenyaGeskin1)
After that, the image below came up on the site Slashleaks, which confirms that this is the first "supposed" image of the Galaxy S8 in gold:
This would be the Galaxy S8 / Weibo / Slashleaks
It turns out that besides looking like a poorly edited image of the Galaxy S7 Edge, there is something very inconsistent about it. Have you found it?
Yes, there are rumors that the Galaxy S8 will take great advantage of the front of the device for the screen, and the image above even represents that very well, but by removing the physical button and capacitive buttons, how to access them ? Yeah, the system navigation bar is gone.
Below you can see a screenshot of the Galaxy S7, which has one physical button and two capacitors, so it doesn't show virtual buttons like the Xperia Z2 (right side screenshot).
Galaxy S7 (left); Xperia Z2 (right) / AndroidPIT
Now, make the comparisons and tell me: is this image really from the Galaxy S8?
(tagsToTranslate) leaks Galaxy S8's first image


text:
\section{Introduction}

Like most cats, this one slipped into the room practically unnoticed.
Schr\"{o}dinger's cat \cite{Schrodinger1935a,Schrodinger1935b,Schrodinger1935c,Schrodinger1935d,Schrodinger1935e}, which is supposedly both alive and dead
at the same time, has by now attained a celebrated status in both
scientific and public spheres. In addition to its surprisingly frequent
mention in quantum physics articles, the quantum computation community
has bestowed it a permanent berth by coining a cat state in its repute.
The appearance of a cat's image adorning the jacket of a popular undergraduate
textbook \cite{Griffiths2004} as well as two popular science books on the subject \cite{Gribbin1984,Rowlands2015}
speaks volumes about its privileged place in scientists' fancy. It
has come to be the common metaphor for superposition so ubiquitous
in the quantum domain. Perhaps because of its somewhat melodramatic
character, it has also secured a place in popular culture
with appearances in literature, television, film, music, cartoons,
jokes, and video games. It would be rather fascinating to follow the
trail of this captivating story since in a real sense Schr\"{o}dinger's
cat is a conspicuous symbolic entity representing a profound reality,
namely: the manifest coexistence of the quantum and classical reality,
which appear so particularly different in their attributes.

At the very dawn of the twentieth century, Max Planck initiated the
quantum revolution by introducing the idea of a quantum \cite{Planck1901}. After years
of frustrating failure to work out an accurate formula for thermal
radiation of a black body, Planck postulated that radiation energy
is emitted and absorbed only in discrete packages he called quanta.
But he was, however, a reluctant revolutionary and did not believe
in the physical existence of the quantum, which so uniquely contributed
in formulating the correct equation for the black body radiation.

It was Albert Einstein who recognized the reality of a quantum and
suggested that radiation in space also consists of discrete quanta \cite{Einstein1905}.
With near unanimity, the entire physics community---including Planck
himself---remained very skeptical about the postulate since by then
Maxwell's theory of electromagnetic radiation in terms of continuous
wave motion had, through its numerous confirmations, become ingrained
in people's minds. It also evoked the counter intuitive idea of a
wave-particle duality. Nevertheless, Einstein unwaveringly persisted
almost for two decades as the sole champion keeping the nascent quantum
revolution alive. His tenacity was finally vindicated spectacularly
by the discovery of the Compton effect in 1923, which demonstrated
that X-rays could be deflected like billiard balls by an electron \cite{Compton1923}.

With an overwhelming support from Einstein, the young French graduate
student, Louis de Broglie galvanized the quantum revolution in 1924
by boldly postulating in his doctoral thesis that even matter particles
could have wave like properties. His hypothesis gained support from
the fact that it could explain the radius of the stationary orbits
of the electron in Niels Bohr's audacious model of the hydrogen atom,
offered in 1913 \cite{Bohr1,Bohr2,Bohr3}. The radius of a Bohr's conjectured orbit was an integral
multiple of de Broglie's proposed wavelength of the electron. Years
later, Einstein confided that he also came up with the idea of matter
waves but did not publish it due to a lack of any evidence. After
de Broglie submitted his thesis, Einstein ardently appealed to the
physicists to look for an experimental proof of the postulated waves.
Soon Clinton Davisson and Lester Germer provided the evidence in 1927
by observing a diffraction pattern in the beam of electrons scattered
by nickel crystals \cite{Davisson1927}.

In the meantime, through his correspondence with Einstein \cite[p.~412]{Mehra1987},
Erwin Schr\"{o}dinger became fascinated by the radical concept of de Broglie's
matter wave. At the request of Peter Debye, Schr\"{o}dinger gave a seminar
at ETH in Zurich toward the end of November 1925, enthusiastically
explaining how the matter waves gave support to Niels Bohr's atomic
model with stable electronic orbits. In the seminar, Debye expressed
some skepticism about how waves, which normally spreads out, could
confine itself in stable atomic orbits. He suggested that a relevant
wave equation of motion should be formulated to deal with a wave in
a proper way \cite[pp.~419--421]{Mehra1987}.

Schr\"{o}dinger took up the challenge, since apparently he was already
thinking about the subject himself, and promptly formulated his groundbreaking
equation of motion for matter waves in early 1926 \cite{Schrodinger1926a,Schrodinger1928}. With some
assistance from
his associate, mathematical physicist
Hermann Weyl, Schr\"{o}dinger found the solutions for the standing waves
of the discrete orbits of the hydrogen atom \cite[p.~1165]{Mehra1987b}. Schr\"{o}dinger stated in
his first paper
\begin{quote}
The essential thing seems to me
to be, that the postulation of ``whole numbers''
no longer enters into the quantum rules mysteriously, but that we
have traced the matter a step further back, and found the ``integralness''
to have its origin in the finiteness and single-valuedness of a certain
space function. \cite[p.~9]{Schrodinger1928}
\end{quote}

The astounding success of his
equation in giving precise explanation of the quantized orbital motion
of an electron in a hydrogen atom initiated a storm of activities
and the quantum revolution went into full swing.

\section{Trail to the Schr\"{o}dinger Equation}

As we have just described, after the demonstration of the Compton
effect, wave-particle duality of massless particles like photons was
established beyond a reasonable doubt. Louis de Broglie's profound
insight to extend the idea to massive particles was a feat of genius.
He correctly surmised that a massive particle like an electron would
have a characteristic internal frequency $\nu_{0}$ in compliance
with the Planck--Einstein relation
\begin{equation}
E=m_{0}c^{2}=h\nu_{0}
\end{equation}
that would obey the rules of special relativity to provide the length
of the matter wave $\lambda=h/p$ or equivalently $p=\hbar k$ analogous
to that of the photon. However, he struggled with a derivation of
the matter wave using the special theory of relativity to such an
extent that he portrayed the matter wave to be merely a fictitious
guiding wave to be used for the kinematics of the matter particle.
Consequently, the matter wave proposition received the moniker de
Broglie's hypothesis instead of a theory. We now know that the relationship
$p=\hbar k$ can be elegantly comprehended using the four-vector procedure
of the special theory of relativity.

In an earlier presentation \cite{Bhaumik2015}, it was shown that the wave packet
of a quantum particle could be deduced from an objective reality to
be given by
\begin{equation}
\psi(x,t)=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi}}\int_{-\infty}^{\infty}\tilde{\psi}(k)e^{\imath(kx-\omega_{k}t)}dk\label{eq:2}
\end{equation}
The group velocity of the wave-packet for a massless particle like
a photon is
\begin{equation}
v_{g}=\frac{d\omega}{dk}=\frac{d(kc)}{dk}=c
\end{equation}
For a massive particle like an electron, the group velocity of the
wave packet in Eq.~(\ref{eq:2}) is no longer equal to the constant
$c$, but a variable velocity $v$ depending upon its energy-momentum.
Accordingly, the spacetime dependence $e^{\imath(kx-\omega_{k}t)}$
must change frequently, which can be deduced from the special theory
of relativity.

The transformation of the momentum four-vector $(\frac{E}{c},\vec{p})$
and the wave four-vector $(\frac{\omega}{c},\vec{k})$ that keeps
their magnitude invariant is the Lorentz transformation. Considering
a laboratory frame $S$ and a rest frame $S^{\prime}$ with a boost
velocity $v$ in the $x$ direction, the Lorentz transformation relations
for the momentum four-vector and the wave four-vector are
\begin{eqnarray}
\frac{E^{\prime}}{c} & = & \gamma(\frac{E}{c}-\beta p_{x})\\
p_{x}^{\prime} & = & \gamma(p_{x}-\beta\frac{E}{c})\\
p_{y}^{\prime} & = & p_{y}\\
p_{z}^{\prime} & = & p_{z}
\end{eqnarray}
and
\begin{eqnarray}
\frac{\omega^{\prime}}{c} & = & \gamma(\frac{\omega}{c}-\beta k_{x}) \\
k_{x}^{\prime} & = & \gamma(k_{x}-\beta\frac{\omega}{c}) \\
k_{y}^{\prime} & = & k_{y} \\
k_{z}^{\prime} & = & k_{z}
\end{eqnarray}
where $\beta=\frac{v}{c}$ and $\gamma=1/\sqrt{1-\beta^{2}}$.

To determine the proportionality constant between the two four-vectors,
we correlate their timelike components after multiplying the component
of the wave four-vector by $\hbar$:
\begin{eqnarray}
\frac{E^{\prime}}{c} & = & \gamma(\frac{E}{c}-\beta p_{x})\label{eq:5}\\
\frac{\hbar\omega^{\prime}}{c} & = & \gamma(\frac{\hbar\omega}{c}-\beta\hbar k_{x})\label{eq:6}
\end{eqnarray}
Subtracting Eq. (\ref{eq:6}) from Eq. (\ref{eq:5}), we find
\begin{equation}
\frac{E^{\prime}}{c}-\frac{\hbar\omega^{\prime}}{c}=\gamma(\frac{E}{c}-\frac{\hbar\omega}{c}-\beta p_{x}+\beta\hbar k_{x})\label{eq:7}
\end{equation}
Since the laws of physics are the same in all inertial frames of reference,
the Planck's law $E=\hbar\omega$ in frame $S$ should hold true in
frame $S^{\prime}$, giving us $E^{\prime}=\hbar\omega^{\prime}$.
Thus Eq. (\ref{eq:7}) reduces to
\begin{equation}
\gamma\beta(p_{x}-\hbar k_{x})=0
\end{equation}
According to the zero product property of algebra, either $\gamma\beta=0$
or $p_{x}-\hbar k_{x}=0$. Because $\gamma\beta$ is non-zero, we
obtain
\begin{equation}
p_{x}=\hbar k_{x}\label{eq:9}
\end{equation}
Or more generally, $p=\hbar k$ irrespective of the mass of the particle,
zero or otherwise. This relationship for a massive particle is the
celebrated de Broglie hypothesis. However, we now realize that the
relationship can indeed be derived from fundamental considerations
and does not need to be a mere hypothesis.

As presented earlier \cite{Bhaumik2016}, using the relationship in Eq.~(9) the
group velocity of the wave packet is $v_{g}=v$, which is the velocity
of the ``particle'' represented
by the wave packet. Therefore, the wave packet moves with the velocity
of either a massive or a massless particle. Steven Weinberg also confirms
this result using a slightly different consideration \cite[pp.~11--12]{Weinberg2013}.

\section{Kinematics of the wave packet}

Following Schr\"{o}dinger, the equation of motion for the wave packet
given in Eq. (\ref{eq:2}) can now be formulated using the relationship
in Eq. (\ref{eq:9}).

Schr\"{o}dinger's astute intuition was to express the phase of a plane
wave utilizing Eq. (\ref{eq:9}) to achieve
\begin{equation}
\Psi(x,t)=Ae^{\imath(kx-\omega t)}=Ae^{\frac{\imath}{\hbar}(px-Et)}\label{eq:10}
\end{equation}
and to realize that the first order partial derivatives were:

\noindent with respect to space
\begin{equation}
\frac{\partial\Psi}{\partial x}=\frac{\imath}{\hbar}pAe^{\frac{\imath}{\hbar}(px-Et)}=\frac{\imath}{\hbar}p\Psi
\end{equation}
or
\begin{equation}
p\Psi=-\imath\hbar\frac{\partial\Psi}{\partial x}
\end{equation}
thus the momentum operator is
\begin{equation}
\hat{p}=-\imath\hbar\frac{\partial}{\partial x}
\end{equation}
and with respect to time
\begin{equation}
\frac{\partial\Psi}{\partial t}=-\frac{\imath}{\hbar}EAe^{\frac{\imath}{\hbar}(px-Et)}=-\frac{\imath}{\hbar}E\Psi
\end{equation}
or
\begin{equation}
E\Psi=\imath\hbar\frac{\partial\Psi}{\partial t}\label{eq:15}
\end{equation}
thus the energy operator is
\begin{equation}
\hat{E}=\imath\hbar\frac{\partial}{\partial t}
\end{equation}
for any state of energy $E$.

Max Born generalized this relationship for any system described by
a Hamiltonian $\hat{H}$. The time dependence of any wave function,
whether or not for a state of definite energy, is then given by
\begin{equation}
\imath\hbar\frac{\partial\Psi}{\partial t}=\hat{H}\Psi\label{eq:16}
\end{equation}

The equation~(\ref{eq:16}) is known as the general Schr\"{o}dinger equation.
It is indeed quite general and used throughout quantum
mechanics, for everything from the Dirac equation to quantum field
theory, by utilizing various complicated expressions for the Hamiltonian $\hat{H}$.

If the Hamiltonian itself is not explicitly dependent on time, Eq.
(\ref{eq:15}) shows that
\begin{equation}
\hat{H}\Psi=E\Psi
\end{equation}
For a single non-relativistic particle of mass $m$, its energy in
a potential $V(x)$ is $\frac{p^{2}}{2m}+V(x)$ giving us
\begin{equation}
-\frac{\hbar^{2}}{2m}\nabla^{2}\Psi(x)+V(x)\Psi(x)=E\Psi(x)\label{eq:18}
\end{equation}
This is the time-independent Schr\"{o}dinger equation for a single non-relativistic
particle of energy $E$. The equation~(\ref{eq:18}) solved for the
hydrogen atom, with the three boundary conditions that: $\Psi(x)$ is single-valued,
$\Psi(x)$ returns to the same value if $x$ goes around a closed
curve, and $\Psi(x)$ vanishes as the magnitude of $x$ goes to infinity,
accurately reproduced Bohr's formula for the discrete energy levels
but without any assumption.

Einstein wholeheartedly endorsed the paper since he considered the
wave nature of particle gave a clearer intuitive picture as compared
to the rather abstract matrix mechanics introduced by Werner Heisenberg,
Max Born and Pasqual Jordan in 1925. In rapid succession within a
few months after his first paper, Schr\"{o}dinger was able to demonstrate
that the analytical solution of his time independent wave equation
indeed predicts the discrete energy levels of several other
non-relativistic quantum systems, among them, the quantum harmonic oscillator,
diatomic molecule, and Stark effect \cite{Schrodinger1928,Schrodinger1926b}. With Einstein's commendation
and the immense success of the wave equation, Schr\"{o}dinger equation
became the benchmark for wave mechanics at the time bestowing its
inventor an instant renown. The very following year, he was honored
with the venerable chair formerly held by Max Planck at the Friedrich
Wilhelm University in Berlin.

After the spectacular success of the time independent wave equation,
Schr\"{o}dinger focused his attention on developing a time dependent equation
for treating problems in which the quantum system changes with time
as in scattering problems. Using the total energy $H=\frac{p^{2}}{2m}+V(x)$
for a single non-relativistic particle in a potential $V(x)$, and
taking the square of the momentum operator, Schr\"{o}dinger soon unveiled
his time dependent equation of motion for a wave packet
\begin{equation}
\imath\hbar\frac{\partial\Psi(x,t)}{\partial t}=\hat{H}\Psi(x,t)=-\frac{\hbar^{2}}{2m}\nabla^{2}\Psi(x,t)+V(x)\Psi(x,t)\label{eq:19}
\end{equation}
Clearly, the plane wave in Eq. (\ref{eq:10}) is a solution of the
Schr\"{o}dinger equation~(\ref{eq:19}). However, the Schr\"{o}dinger equation
is a linear differential equation. So a linear combination of plane
waves is also a valid solution. The wave packet in Eq. (\ref{eq:2})
is just such a linear combination. The momentum wave function $\tilde{\psi}(k)$
appearing in the integrand is an integral of the position wave functions
since the position and momentum space wave functions are Fourier transforms
of each other. Therefore the kinematics of the wave packet described
in Eq.~(\ref{eq:2}) can be processed using the Schr\"{o}dinger equation
(\ref{eq:19}).

This distinctive aspect of superposition of solutions of the linear
Schr\"{o}dinger equation is its unique signature. It should not be surprising
since in our daily lives, we do see water wavelets superpose when
they come in contact. In the quantum domain as well, we see chargeless bosons like photons and gravitons exhibit superposition by producing
macroscopic classical waves. But the fermion wave functions, being
antisymmetric, in addition to some of them having different charges,
are not alike and do not produce classical waves. However, the bizarre
implication of superposition, especially as construed by the Copenhagen
interpretation for measurement, made both Einstein and Schr\"{o}dinger,
the pioneering leaders of the quantum revolution, enormously unhappy.

\section{Probability Amplitude}

In his initial studies involving the time independent wave equation
to predict energies of discrete quantum states, Schr\"{o}dinger did not
have to be too concerned about what exactly the wave function $\Psi(x,t)$
did represent. It would be tempting to think, as in fact Schr\"{o}dinger
originally did, that the wave function represented a smeared out charge
distribution of the electron. In an experiment involving the scattering
of electrons, Max Born realized that Schr\"{o}dinger's contention that
the wave function represented a charge distribution could not be sustained
\cite{Born1926}. Instead he suggested as it appears in his Nobel lecture
\begin{quote}
Again an idea of Einstein's gave me the lead. He had tried to make
the duality of particles---light quanta or photons---and waves comprehensible
by interpreting the square of the optical wave amplitudes as probability
density for the occurrence of photons. This concept could at once
be carried over to the $\psi$-function: $|\psi|^{2}$~ought to represent
the probability density for electrons (or other particles). \cite{Born1954}
\end{quote}
This is known as the Born's rule.

But recalling how the wave packet had come to be \cite{Bhaumik2015}, it would
have been obvious that Born was correct. The wave packet consists
of irregular disturbances, the sum total of which represents the mass,
energy momentum, charge of a particle like electron. Therefore, the
wave function is in fact a function of probability amplitude for finding
the particle.

It should be noted, however, that although the attributes of the various
irregular disturbances are mostly characteristics of their respective
quantum fields with different charge, spin, etc., they have one aspect
in common. The element of disturbance in energy is identical for all
fields. Energy density of a wave is given by the square of its amplitude.
Therefore, to get the probability density, we have to take the square
of the amplitude of the wave function, which usually involves a complex
quantity. Consequently, the square of the amplitude $\Psi^{*}(x,t)\Psi(x,t)$,
which is the probability density function $P(x,t)$, should represent
the probability density for finding a particle in position space at
time $t$. As discussed earlier, this is acknowledged as the renowned
Born's rule, which is a necessary hypothesis of quantum mechanics.
But as we have just presented, it is a natural consequence of the
reality of the wave function revealed in a previous article \cite{Bhaumik2015}
and does not need to be a hypothetical rule.

However, it is of critical importance that the wave function is normalized
\begin{equation}
\int_{-\infty}^{\infty}\Psi^{*}(x,t)\Psi(x,t)dx=1
\end{equation}
since the equation describes one particle with the sum of probability
to be $1$. Born's probabilistic description of the wave function
was promptly taken over by Niels Bohr in Copenhagen who in essence
became the father of the long-reigning Copenhagen interpretation of
quantum mechanics.

According to the Copenhagen interpretation, physical systems in superposed
states do not possess real properties prior to being measured, and
quantum mechanics can only predict the probabilities that measurements
will produce certain results. The act of measurement using a macroscopic
device by an observer collapses the wave function, causing the set
of probabilities to reduce to only one of the possible values.

It is well known that both pioneers of quantum mechanics, Einstein
and Schr\"{o}dinger, were extremely troubled by the Copenhagen interpretation.
Much has been written on the famous Bohr--Einstein debates. The concerns
of Einstein have been discussed in greater detail in an earlier communication
\cite{Bhaumik2015}. His most strident objection was the almost cult-like denial
by the proponents of the Copenhagen interpretation of any reality
in a quantum system prior to measurement. Among others, in one noteworthy
sarcastic comment he states
\begin{quote}
The present quantum theory is unable to provide the description of a real state of physical facts, but only of an (incomplete) knowledge of such. Moreover, the very concept of a real factual state is debarred by
the `orthodox' quantum theoreticians. The situation arrived at corresponds almost
exactly to that of the good old Bishop Berkeley. \cite[pp.~73--74]{Jammer1982}
\end{quote}
He expected the proponents to be at least open, as he himself was,
to the possibility that quantum mechanics as currently formulated
might be incomplete.

Schr\"{o}dinger's main objection appears to be the rather fictional depiction
of the superposed states and their probability interpretation as well
as the collapse of the wave function. He envisioned that after a unitary
evolution of his wave equation, it could be somehow extrapolated up
to the macroscopic scale of the measuring device. Sometime later,
he sarcastically commented that
\begin{quote}
I don't like it, and I'm sorry I ever had anything to do with it.
\cite[p.~v]{Gribbin1984}
\end{quote}

\section{Quantum Entanglement}

Einstein expressed his dismay regarding the implications of quantum
mechanics very publicly through the famous Bohr--Einstein debates
beginning at the Solvay conference in 1927, of which Bohr was the
generally supposed winner. Bohr, meanwhile, was troubled by none of
the elements that appalled Einstein. He made his own peace with the
contradictions by asserting a principle of complementarity that emphasized
the role of the observer over the observed and placed limits on what
the observer could know about a quantum system. Given his disenchantment
with the Copenhagen interpretation, Einstein's attention shifted from
quantum mechanics primarily toward his interest in developing a unified
theory of gravity and electro-magnetism. After the well-known turbulent
times in Germany, Einstein left Europe and in 1933, permanently settled
down at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, where he finally
had the time and serenity to resume his thoughts on quantum mechanics.

In 1935, Albert Einstein together with Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen published
the seminal EPR paper in an attempt to show that the description of
reality as given by a wave function was not complete \cite{EPR}. Einstein tried
to illustrate that superposition of the quantum states of two particles
cannot be real. Because when the particles are separated by an arbitrarily
large distance, measuring a particular property of one of the particles
would instantly affect the other.
In a letter to Born, Einstein wrote
\begin{quote}
I admit, of course, that there is a considerable amount of validity
in the statistical approach which you were the first to recognize
clearly as necessary given the framework of the existing formalism.
I cannot seriously believe in it because the theory cannot be reconciled
with the idea that physics should represent a reality in time and
space, free from spooky actions at a distance. \cite[p.~158]{Einstein1971}
\end{quote}
Because of Einstein's repute, the EPR article generated some impressive
newspaper headlines. But the physics community essentially ignored
it for quite a while. Later, in the 1950s, David Bohm tried to show
that Einstein's desired element of reality could be supported by existence
of some local hidden variables. Bohm's ideas met with stiff resistance
from the scientists.

It was not until 1964, when John Bell started his seminal analysis
known as Bell's inequality that helped to discard the existence of
local hidden variables, proposed by Bohm, but indicated the existence
of nonlocality revealed in Bohm's investigation. Bell ingenuously
proposed an approach to experimentally verify nonlocality between
a pair of quantum particles in superposed states, which are now called
entangled states as coined by Schr\"{o}dinger. Numerous experimental verifications
of the existence of quantum entanglement beyond any reasonable doubt
have now been accomplished establishing that quantum superposition
is undoubtedly real. Using a satellite, Chinese scientists
have demonstrated entanglement over a distance as large as 1200 kilometers
patently attesting that Einstein's ``spooky action
at a distance'' is here to stay \cite{Yin2017}. He still might
have derived some satisfaction from knowing that in conformity with
his special theory of relativity, no meaningful signal can be sent
using entanglement and the spookiness of the action is circumscribed.

As explained by Narnhofer and Thirring, in quantum field
theory almost everything is entangled in the quantum and the mesoscopic
domains \cite{Narnhofer2012}. Penrose finds this extremely puzzling, stating
\begin{quote}
Since, according to quantum mechanics, entanglement is such a ubiquitous
phenomenon---and we recall that the stupendous majority of quantum
states are actually entangled ones---why is it something that we barely
notice in our direct experience in the world? \cite[p.~591]{Penrose2004}
\end{quote}
It is rather ironic that the very pivotal EPR thought experiment in
which Einstein attempted in effect to show the impossibility of quantum
entanglement would lead to one of the most astounding discoveries
of the twentieth century. It has opened a floodgate of activities
in quantum physics. The possible uses of quantum entanglement in a
variety of novel applications such as quantum cryptography, quantum
computation, and quantum teleportation have become areas of very active
research.

It has also provided an immense stimulus to basic scientific investigations.
Experts such as Maldacena and Susskind postulate that ER=EPR
implying there is an as yet unknown quantum mechanical version of
a classical wormhole that permits quantum entanglement \cite{Maldacena2013}. There is a
possibility that the quantum fluctuations of the fields are themselves
entangled facilitating a quantum mechanical Einstein--Rosen bridge \cite{Bhaumik2014}. Most
exciting perhaps is the intriguing prospect that spacetime
itself could be stitched together by entanglement \cite{vanRaamsdonk2010,Swingle2012}.

\section{Arrival of the Schr\"{o}dinger's Cat}

Like Einstein, Schr\"{o}dinger fled the rapidly deteriorating political
situation and left Berlin in 1933 for England to join the University
of Oxford. Soon after he arrived, he received the Nobel Prize, which
should have augured a very comfortable existence for him. Instead,
the glare that focused on his personal life and unconventional marital
arrangement outshone the Nobel Prize and caused him considerable difficulty
in securing a tenured position until 1939, when he became the Director
of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Dublin. In the midst of the
turmoil of his tenure issues in 1935, during extensive correspondence
with Albert Einstein, he proposed what is now called the Schr\"{o}dinger's
cat thought experiment.

As one of the doctrines of the Copenhagen interpretation, a system
stops being in a superposition of states and becomes one or the other,
only when an observation takes place, which collapses the entire wave
function. Both Einstein and Schr\"{o}dinger thought this to be downright
preposterous.

In the same period of time during which Einstein presented his EPR
paper, he also wrote to Schr\"{o}dinger comparing the absurdity of the
Copenhagen interpretation to the notion of a keg of gun powder that
is simultaneously both exploded and unexploded. In an attempt to take
Einstein's thoughts a step further, the famed creator of wave mechanics
conjured up the enigmatic Schr\"{o}dinger's cat,
which
by virtue of being unobservable inside a box and subject to
a random quantum trigger that may or may not kill the kitty, is put into a quantum
superposition of being alive and dead at the same time.

Einstein was
duly impressed and wrote in a letter to Schr\"{o}dinger a bit later:
\begin{quote}
You are the only contemporary physicist, besides Laue, who sees that
one cannot get around the assumption of reality, if only one is honest.
Most of them simply do not see what sort of risky game they are playing
with reality---reality as something independent of what is experimentally
established.
They somehow believe that the quantum theory provides a description of reality, and even a \emph{complete} description; this
interpretation is, however, refuted most elegantly
by your system of radioactive atom + Geiger counter + amplifier + charge of gun powder
+ cat in a box, in which the $\psi$-function of the system contains both
the cat alive and blown to bits. Nobody really doubts that the presence
or absence of the cat is something independent of the act of observation.\\
\cite[p.~39]{Einstein1967}
\end{quote}
Although Schr\"{o}dinger loved animals and apparently had a cat named
Milton at the time he devised his paradox, no one knows why he chose
a cat and not a dog or something else. Schr\"{o}dinger's thought experiment,
however, had little impact during his lifetime. From the time he proposed
it and till his death, it was scarcely mentioned in the literature.
Even Schr\"{o}dinger rarely brought it up. After its rather clandestine
appearance, Schr\"{o}dinger's cat went into a long slumber of nearly half
a century.

The absurd scenario portrayed in the thought experiment remained mostly
an academic curiosity until the 1980s, when it was realized that,
under suitable conditions, a macroscopic object with many microscopic
degrees of freedom could behave quantum mechanically, provided that
it was sufficiently decoupled from its environment. Such decoupling
is required because quantum superposition rapidly decoheres as a result
of complicated interactions with the environment and its inherently
irreversible thermal processes.

In the 1980s, there were also some other very exciting developments.
The French physicist Alain Aspect, in 1982, gave a
quite definitive experimental demonstration of quantum entanglement that led
to a burst of activities \cite{Aspect1982a,Aspect1982b}. In 1984, Charles Bennet and Gilles Brassard proposed a theoretical system for quantum cryptography using
photons in a superposition state to create a secure key distribution \cite{BB84}.
Achievement of a mesoscopic Schr\"{o}dinger's cat state allowing potential
studies of quantum decoherence generated considerable enthusiasm as well.

The explosion of publication of research articles on these subjects
is too voluminous to describe here. An extensive list of publications
on decoherence can be found in papers by its prominent investigator,
W.~H.~Zurek \cite{Zurek1,Zurek2,Zurek3,Zurek4}, as well as in the book by M.~Schlosshauer and his
other papers \cite{Schlosshauer1,Schlosshauer2,Schlosshauer3}. Only a selection of especially pertinent papers
on Schr\"{o}dinger's cat will now be discussed.

The physics Nobel Laureates Serge Haroche and David Wineland have
allowed Schr\"{o}dinger's cat to roam the most prestigious halls by mentioning
it in their Nobel lectures \cite{Nobel1,Nobel2}. Wineland shared the Nobel Prize with Haroche
in 2012 ``for ground breaking experimental methods
that enable measuring and manipulation of individual quantum systems.''
They independently developed methods for measuring and manipulating
individual particles while preserving their quantum mechanical nature
in ways that were previously thought unachievable. The two researchers
have taken different routes to the study of some of the same phenomena.

Wineland and his group used a trapped beryllium ion, laser
cooled to its zero-point energy \cite{Monroe1996}. A Schr\"{o}dinger's cat state was ingenuously
produced by applying a sequence of laser pulses to create superposition
of the ion's internal hyperfine electronic states with its external
positional states resulting from its zero-point motion in the potential
well of the trapping electro-magnetic field. A mesoscopic distance
of more than 80 nm separating the individual wave packets of about
7 nm was accomplished creating a mesoscopic Schr\"{o}dinger's cat state
that could allow controlled studies of quantum decoherence and study
of the quantum-classical boundary. Quantum decoherence has received
great interest to find a realistic solution of the long standing measurement
problem and more recently for application to quantum computing \cite{Zhang2017,Song2017} and quantum cryptography \cite{Srik2017}.

Of necessity, to measure the outcome of any quantum system we have
to use a macroscopic device composed of many quantum particles interacting
in an incredibly complicated way, and also partaking in irreversible
thermal processes. Is it then surprising that the transition from
the quantum to classical domain is the most difficult as well as a
controversial subject in quantum physics?

Fortunately, with the help of many sophisticated contemporary experiments
accompanied by highly developed theoretical investigations, significant
progress is being achieved although a very substantial difference
exists between theoretically anticipated and experimentally observed
values of decoherence time. A consensus seems to be developing in
favor of the environmental decoherence model pioneered by Zurek
\cite{Zurek1,Zurek2,Zurek3,Zurek4}. According to his theoretical analysis, the decoherence time
of a macroscopic object with a mass of 1~g at a temperature of
300~K extended over a distance of 1~cm could be as short as $10^{-23}$~s.
This, however, appears to be far too short compared to some
recent experimental investigations.

Observation has confirmed that quantum coherence is sustained
for longer than a few picoseconds inside photosynthetic light harvesting
pigment-protein complexes at room temperature \cite{photo1,photo2,photo3,photo4,photo5,photo6,photo7,photo8}. Even more spectacular
are analyses of recent experimental studies of the avian compass \cite{Gauger2011}.
Quantum superposition and entanglement are sustained in this living
system for at least tens of microseconds. Similar time frames for
sustaining quantum superposition have been conjectured in the tubulin
molecules of microtubules in the cytoskeletons of living
organisms \cite{Hameroff2014}.

These observations are strikingly at variance with the view that life
is too warm and wet for such quantum phenomena to endure over such
a relatively long time. It would appear that living entities may develop
at least in particular locations some sorts of shielding mechanism
to protect quantum superposition from environmental decoherence. But
this leaves us in a quandary about how long quantum superposition
could last in a living cat weighing at least 5~kg and containing some
$10^{27}$ atoms. In the absence of any meaningful data, the best
educated guess would be that decoherence will perhaps occur in extremely
short time scale under ambient conditions.

The coherence of superposition in large quantum objects is usually
demonstrated by a double slit type diffraction experiment. Such studies
have been performed with molecules as large as 1 nm, namely carbon
60 Bucky balls \cite{Arndt1999}. Recently, a diffraction pattern has been
observed in experiment of superposed molecules containing 10~000 atomic
mass units \cite{Eibenberger2013}.

Most remarkably, using a rather sophisticated procedure, coherent
superposition has been demonstrated in a macroscopic object containing
an estimated 10 trillion atoms \cite{OConnell2010}. For this purpose, the investigators
used a 40~micrometer long mechanical resonator, just large enough to be
visible with the naked eye. The resonator with a resonant frequency
of 6.175~GHz to its first excited phonon state was cooled to a temperature
of merely 25~mK over absolute zero and put in a very high vacuum to
minimize environmental decoherence. Under these circumstances, the
resonator was confirmed to be in its ground state. Then a signal from
a coupled qubit possessing the resonance frequency of 6.175~GHz was
injected into the resonator thereby transferring the superposition
feature of the qubit to the macroscopic object. Superposition of the
ground and the first excited phonon state of the macroscopic resonator
lasted for the resonator relaxation time of 6.1~ns.

The above demonstration provides strong evidence that quantum mechanics
and its attendant aspect of superposition applies to macroscopic objects
and can be revealed under appropriate circumstances. Can it apply
to Schr\"{o}dinger's cat? The answer in principle should be yes---at least
at an extremely short time scale. But to prove it, the cat will surely
perish for other reasons! Because in order to conduct the experiment,
it would be necessary to remove all sources of environmental decoherence
by exposing the cat to exceptionally low temperatures and high vacuum
and perhaps stopping irreversible metabolic processes as well.

\section{Conclusion}

By now the Schr\"{o}dinger's cat has been in existence for over eight
decades surviving longer than the mythical cat's nine lives. Considering
the fact that quantum superposition has been convincingly established
in quantum, mesoscopic and a macroscopic domain, Schr\"{o}dinger's cat
is likely to live on, symbolizing a profound truth that quantum reality
exists in all scales. We do not observe it in our daily macroscopic
world because it is masked for all practical purposes, predominantly
by environmental decoherence possessing irreversible thermal effects.

It should be noted however, that the concerns, which brought the Schr\"{o}dinger's
cat into existence are on their way out. We have cogently pointed
out that the probabilistic feature of a quantum particle is an inherent
aspect arising out of the genesis of the particle as a wave packet
comprising a collection of irregular disturbances of the underlying
quantum fields \cite{Bhaumik2015}. This is in addition to the innate uncertainty
relation $\Delta x\Delta p\geq\frac{1}{2}\hbar$  of a real wave packet.
Comprehension of the reality of the wave packet acting as a particle
was possible only after the development of the standard model in quantum field theory
and was thus unavailable to both Einstein and Schr\"{o}dinger
and to the framers of the Copenhagen interpretation.

Bohr's contention that there is no evocative reality before measurement
collapses the wave function was not entirely without merit. But his
emphatic denial of any reality whatsoever appears unjustifiable. His
emphasis on the critical role of a conscious observer for measurement
is also untenable, since the universe developed to a fairly mature
state obeying quantum rules long before the possibility of emergence
of conscious beings. Einstein's insistence on the existence of reality
in all scales from quantum to classical would be correct, if only
we allow him the understandable failure to see that the quantum reality
is not necessarily the same as the classical reality. Had the Bohr--Einstein
debate take place today, it probably would have been declared a draw!

\section*{Acknowledgement}

The author wishes to thank Joseph Rudnick and Zvi Bern for helpful
discussions.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaArXiv


Scholarships can actually reduce the amount of financial aid you receive.
•	Mark Kantrowitz, a nationally recognized financial aid expert Pardieck: Colleges and universities construct "packaging" policies, which determine how much and what types of educational support each school will provide for individual students. When a student wins an outside scholarship (one that is not sponsored by the school), the Financial Assistance Office has to reconsider (and sometimes reduce) their initial financial aid package.
Kantrowitz: This may not seem fair but the school, at times, has no choice. The federal government has strict regulations concerning "over-award situations." If the financial aid from all sources exceeds the school's cost of attendance by more than $400, the school is required to reduce the aid package until it falls under this threshold.
Friedhoff: But the schools are not necessarily required to take money away. That decision rests with the individual college. We've seen almost as many different policies as there are institutions. In the worst-case scenario, the school "replaces" existing institutional grants and scholarships with the outside award. The result: The student's aid dollars remain the same even though the scholarship dollars have been added. Kantrowitz: But depending on the school's policy, the student can still derive substantial benefit from the outside scholarship. For example, if the school compensates for the scholarship by reducing the student's loans (instead of reducing grants), the student actually benefits. The resulting financial aid package contains fewer loan dollars (which must be paid back) and more free money (in the form of scholarships and grants). Pardieck: The bottom line? Be sure to ask the admissions and financial assistance professionals at your college how they treat external scholarship awards. In the meantime, we'd encourage you to explore as many scholarship possibilities as you can. You may not lose anything and you may gain a lot.


text:
How Blood Of Coronavirus Survivors May Protect Others From Virus.
As U.S. scientists race to stave off a tidal wave of COVID-19 patients, they are showing renewed interest in a little-known medicine with ancient roots and many modern applications: convalescent plasma.
It's medicine now coursing through the veins of at least 86,690 people in China and elsewhere, all of whom have joined a fraternity of potentially powerful healers. These are people who have been infected with the novel coronavirus and survived.
Scientists believe the antibodies generated by these recovered patients' immune systems will protect them from reinfection, at least for a while.
And if those same antibodies can be harvested from their blood and repackaged safely for administration to others, they may do something more remarkable.
In patients afflicted with COVID-19, they could boost the immune system's response to infection, making their illness shorter and less severe.
When transferred to people who are not yet infected, those antibodies could act like a vaccine, teaching a recipient's immune system how to recognize and fight the SARS-CoV-19 virus.
In short, as this pandemic spreads across the globe, convalescent serum has the potential to save lives.
"This is not a proven treatment," U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephen Hahn cautioned at a White House briefing on Thursday. But he called it "a pretty exciting area" and described an effort crossing many federal agencies to explore it.
Chinese scientists also have acknowledged using the blood of recovered individuals as a potential treatment for COVID-19 infection.
With a U.S. vaccine as much as 18 months off and effective treatments still unidentified, some scientists believe that convalescent plasma could provide a bridge to safety.
They acknowledge that issues of safety, effectiveness and practicality still must be resolved. But they emphasize that this approach to both treatment and prevention could be fielded quickly and cheaply. They add that its risks can be minimized by the same rules and system that currently keep the U.S. blood supply among the safest in the world.
"We're working feverishly" to explore the potential of convalescent plasma for COVID-19, said Dr. Arturo Casadevall, an immunologist and public health expert at Johns Hopkins University. "This is the only option for this country."
In recent days, Casadevall and Dr. Liise-anne Pirofski, an infectious disease specialist at Albert Einstein School of Medicine, have been organizing a far-flung group of experts to design a medication based on convalescent plasma and conduct clinical trials to test its safety and effectiveness. More than 20 research institutions are involved in the effort.
Casadevall said he hoped to meet with officials from the FDA to obtain approval for three clinical trials of convalescent blood, and to gain the federal government's support for the effort.
Working with blood bank officials in New York, the researchers hope to collect the blood of U.S. residents who either had confirmed infections from which they've recovered, or who believe they have weathered an infection.
"It's not a new idea, it's a very old idea," said UC Irvine virologist Michael J. Buchmeier, who has studied the use of convalescent plasma for decades.
In an age where genetically engineered antibodies are the new norm, convalescent plasma seems quaint. And for drug companies that require a profitable market to justify the design and production of a new vaccine it is a distinctly unprofitable approach, he said.
"But the fact is, there is no reason that, if properly selected and screened, it can't work," he said. The only question, he added, is whether the current crisis is urgent enough to return to a tried-and-true approach that has gone out of favor.
In the early 20th century, convalescent plasma was used during outbreaks of polio, measles, mumps and flu, including the devastating 1918 influenza pandemic. Then, the process was often as primitive as putting two patients — one sick and the other recovered — on a pair of adjoining gurneys and running a blood transfusion line between them.
Today, the process would be far less simple.
First, researchers would have to discern when recovered patients' COVID-19 antibody levels peak, and how long it takes for them to completely clear the virus. Both require the use of tests that are used only in research labs today, a practical hurdle that would require FDA action. Next, they'd separate and extract so-called neutralizing antibodies from the donated blood. Then lab workers would aggregate those antibodies into large batches and purify the resulting serum.
On average, Casadevall said, the neutralizing antibodies harvested from one robustly recovered individual might treat, or induce immunity in, as many as two others. The therapy could be made in batches that would combine the plasma of as many as 1,000 recovered patients, producing many doses at once
Before it could be used, however, its safety and effectiveness would need to be rigorously tested.
In addition to the risk of transmitting unrelated viruses to recipients, the same concern raised by vaccines that use live attenuated virus pertain: that some people will develop COVID-19 infection.
A further concern is that recipients who are already sick might develop powerful immune system reactions that could cause further damage, or even death.
Johns Hopkins has already approved the broad outlines of a clinical trial of convalescent plasma therapy as a means to protect healthcare workers, Casadevall said. These are people who will be continuously exposed to the new coronavirus and need immediate help, he said.
Scientists also hope to test the therapy in newly infected patients who have begun to develop worrisome symptoms but do not yet need a ventilator. If that proves successful, it could be tested on critically ill patients, Casadevall said.
With luck, "we may have data by the end of June," said Casadevall, who with Pirofski recently made the case for convalescent plasma in the Journal of Clinical Therapy.
Such a therapy could not provide long-term immunity, he cautioned. But it could at least give healthcare workers a measure of protection until a vaccine is ready for broad use, he said.
The use of recovered patients to help the sick and not-yet-infected is widespread in modern medicine.
Anyone who's been bitten by a rabid animal, received a bone marrow transplant or given birth to a child has probably received a form of convalescent serum. They're used to boost the immune response to rabies infection, to protect cancer patients from acquiring the herpes virus during a bone-marrow transplant, and to protect babies from contracting cytomegalovirus from their mothers during childbirth.
Convalescent plasma was widely used during the three-year West African Ebola epidemic that ended in 2016, though its effectiveness was not rigorously studied. More recently, it has been used to treat people with Middle East respiratory syndrome, or MERS.
As protection against the coronavirus that causes MERS, neutralizing antibodies extracted from macaque monkeys that had recovered from the disease were able to protect healthy macaques and prevent them from becoming sick when infected, said Dr. Stanley Perlman, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at the University of Iowa.
There are many details to be worked out, said Perlman, who studies coronaviruses and their treatments. But convalescent plasma has a bird-in-the-hand quality that is just too good to pass up, he said.
"I think it's worth a shot to see what happens."
Tags:arizona coronavirus cdc coronavirus china coronavirus coronavirus cases coronavirus cure coronavirus map coronavirus new york coronavirus tips coronavirus vaccine coronavirus vs covid-19 covid-19 california covid-19 cases covid-19 cases in us covid-19 death toll covid-19 florida covid-19 live updates covid-19 map covid-19 symptoms covid-19 test covid-19 updates covid-19 usa cases covid-19 vaccine italy coronavirus sars us coronavirus cases
COVID-19: New Orleans Saints Coach Sean Payton Tested Positive For …
COVID-19: New Orleans Saints Coach Sean Payton Tested Positive For The Coronavirus
Senator Dianne Feinstein Urges Californians To Follow Local, State, Federal …
Senator Dianne Feinstein Urges Californians To Follow Local, State, Federal Public Health Advices

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Getting all the little details in order when moving into your dream home can be overwhelming. Especially if your house is more or less like this amazing Casa RO by Elías Rizo Arquitectos. The architectural studio based in Guadalaraja have completed this residential project 2 years ago.
The two-story home located in a residential neighborhood of Guadalaraja, Jalisco, Mexico, was originally built in the 60s, using straight design lines and details of that period that were revamped by the architects and the house received a new and exciting face. The double height foyer and the terrace are considered the main spaces – the first one because of its grandeur and the second one, thanks to all the time the young family spends here. Wood and stone were used as the primary materials to give the residential structure a warm, comfortable feeling but also keep it close to nature.


text:
LAURA INGRAM - PHOTOBIA (CULTURAL ESSAY)
Laura Ingram is a tiny girl with large glasses. She loves Harry Styles and Harry Potter.
 Maybe you're like me, all skinny legs with split ends and skinned elbows, the girl who padded her pastel training bra with pink Kleenex in seventh grade, the girl who shops in the children's department at nineteen. Or maybe you've always been bigger than your best friend, your brother, your cousin with eyes like ink blots. Maybe you face ableism on a daily basis as you wheelchair or other mobility aid; maybe you struggle to justify self-care to a society that ignores your health condition because it is not obvious to the eye. Maybe you have acne scars on your chin, stretch marks on your hips, grass stains on your heart.
Let me offer you the simplest of secrets; when other people see your face, they don't notice blackheads or that birthmark you've always been embarrassed about. Other people notice the crinkles by your eyes when you crook your upper lip. When other people look at your legs, they don't see fat or skinny or scarred. They only see legs.
Consider this: not a single cell in your body can structurally exist without fat. Sixty percent of the human brain is fat. Adipose tissue is not a virus, bacteria, or tumor; it's integral as industry.
You, just as much as any platonic pedestrian, own some attributes of summer. Someone loves to see slabs of sunlight slice your hair. Someone's fever dreams are filled with the freckles on your forearms.
Your body is the basement where you counted down to your first kiss, the brownstone you cut from a catalog as a kid.
Your body is the blistered backyard swing, the auditorium where you got an honor roll award. It may be peeling or plastered, but it keeps keeping.
Your body is the tree you scaled as a child. Don't cut it down.
SANDY RASCHKE - NOVEL REVIEW: SCUDDER'S GEORGE BY GEOFFREY CRAIG
Sandy Raschke, Fiction Editor Calliope, A Writer's Workshop by Mail (a Writers' SIG of American Mensa, Ltd.)., Spring 2016 issue (#151)
www.Calliopeontheweb.org.Calliope,
REVIEW: Scudder's Gorge
Scudder's Gorge, by Geoffrey Craig, Prolific Press, 290 pages. ISBN #978-1632750556. Price: $16.95 paperback, $8.95 Kindle format.
Calliope's readers are familiar with Geoffrey Craig's short stories, as several have appeared in our pages over the years. Although he has had a verse novel and novella serialized in a literary review, Scudder's Gorge is his first full-length novel.
Scudder's Gorge is a masterfully told story of family, unrequited and romantic love, hate, secrets, joys and tragedy, and exposes the depths of what man is capable to doing to his fellow man.
Craig's elegant prose (evocative of the late Wallace Stegner), is impressive; he is like an artist, first using a broad brush to create the background, then employing a smaller one to fill in with details. The vivid imagery he uses to describe the Vermont landscape gives the story a genuine sense of place and atmosphere, and sets the tone for this family saga spanning almost one hundred eighty years and six generations. It is a history that sometimes repeats itself, with sadness and agony. Several themes are reiterated throughout Scudder's Gorge: tolerance vs. bigotry; peace vs. war; expiation for previous wrongs, and respect for all people.
An enigmatic Prologue begins the story, of an elderly Japanese man taking a walk in Hiroshima on the morning of August 6, 1945, stopping at a small temple after several air-raid sirens go off. But, unable to see any evidence of the bombers, he goes outside again...facing the bright flash in the sky...
Then moving back in time, Craig unveils the story of the Scudder family and others who settled on a land grant from the Territory of Vermont in 1795. Out of the wilderness, Lucas Scudder and ten settler families created farms and community. They live in peace, trading with nearby Native Americans, the Abenaki. That is until 1799, when Philomena, the daughter of Lucas Scudder, falls in love with a young Abenaki man she meets in the woods while picking berries with her sister Carrie. Eventually smitten by Susuph, she initiates a sexual relationship, which they carry out in secret places, unknowingly witnessed at times by Sean Reynolds, a mentally-challenged young man from the settlement. Philomena and Susuph want to marry, but an accident changes everything. After their last tryst, Philomena loses her footing and tumbles down a hill.
While Philomena lies unconscious at home, Lucas Scudder and eleven men from the settlement take revenge on the Abenaki, based upon their prejudices and Sean Reynolds' misperception—that Philomena was raped and battered by Susuph then dumped in front of the Scudder's cabin.
The settlers raid the village and are met with resistance; a shot is fired by one of the Abenaki, hitting one of the raiders in the shoulder. The ensuing carnage leaves twenty-one Abenaki dead: all the young men, five women and seven children. The few survivors flee to the north to another Abenaki village, but the reverberations of the massacre will last long into the future.
Philomena awakens two days after the raid, and when she discovers that Susuph has been killed along with the other Abenaki, calls her father a murderer and cuts off all communication with him. Months later, she delivers a healthy baby boy that she names "Remember," then dies within four hours of his birth. She has left her sister Carrie a letter, in which she describes the sins of her father and the responsibility of the family to see that such prejudice and violence never happen again.
Carrie marries and raises Remember as her own, and when she dies, she passes on Philomena's letter to him.
The story moves from the first generation of Scudders slowly into the future, through recessions and depressions, World War I and II, the postwar era and the atomic age, into the late 1960s, and ends during a demonstration against the Vietnam War. And through it all, Philomena's letter is passed on to each successive generation, a reminder to the Scudders of their responsibility to regard all of humanity without prejudice.
Craig's deft hand and sensitivity regarding controversial but important social matters draws the reader in and keeps one turning the pages. Highly recommended. @@
Calliope is the official publication of the Writers' Special Interest Group of American Mensa, Ltd.
M. J. IUPPA - ONE POTATO, TWO (LYRIC ESSAY)
M.J. Iuppa lives on Red Rooster Farm near the shores of Lake Ontario. Most recent poems, lyric essays and fictions have appeared in the following journals: Poppy Road Review, Black Poppy Review, Digging to the Roots, 2015 Calendar, Ealain, Poetry Pacific Review, Grey Sparrow Press: Snow Jewel Anthology, 100 Word Story, Avocet, Eunoia Review, Festival Writer, Silver Birch Press: Where I Live Anthology,Turtle Island Quarterly, Wild Quarterly, Boyne Berries Magazine (Ireland), The Lake, (U.K.), Punchnel's, Camroc Review, Tar River Poetry, Corvus Review, Clementine Poetry, Postcard Poetry & Prose, and Brief Encounters: A Collection of Contemporary Nonfiction, edited by Judith Kitchen and Dinah Lenney(Norton), among others. She is the Director of the Visual and Performing Arts Minor Program at St. John Fisher College.
One Potato, Two
Once again, in the south garden, in mid-May, we plant our fourth generation of red, white, and gold potatoes, wondering what this year will hold. The dirt mounds well in its thick crumble and, in a matter of seven days, green shoots begin to break through, soon to transform into sinewy branches that leaf out, lush and full. By end of July, clusters of white frilly flowers appear— a sure sign that a number of potatoes, smaller than a baby's fist, are growing obliquely below— nestled in pockets of soft- haired roots.
Bliss, one part quiet, two parts comfort, and a heaping plate of fried potatoes. It's a Sunday meal prepared by my father, the good doctor, who has spent the long sleepless week ushering babies into the world. Here, he is, apron tied around his waist, washing, drying, slicing potatoes; getting the Sunbeam electric skillet hot with just the right amount of oil, so when he slides the slices into the heat, a heavenly sizzle erupts into a cloud of steam.
We watch, closely, the way he turns the layers of potato in slow-motion, until they are cooked to a golden brown. Without being asked, we set out dinner plates on the counter near the skillet. In short order, he divvies up the hot slices and tells us to take the first plate to Mom, who's resting upstairs. We set the breakfast tray with fork, napkin, steaming plate, and side of ketchup; then, singing a few bars of "Pomp and Circumstance," we climb the winding staircase to present her dinner in bed. I love watching her take the first bite—her mouth savoring what we've been waiting for. When she says, "Go tell your father that it's delicious," we turn and fly downstairs, two steps at a time, to report his success and claim our servings that are waiting for us. My sister and I take our places at the table in the kitchen nook, and together, like Mom, we repeat the ceremony of first taste. No arguments. This is bliss.
Full-bellied, nearly nine months pregnant, and still waiting. Ask any woman how she feels at term, and her answer will concur with mine: planted, like a potato— ready to be pulled free.
Counting, that is, on your knowing how to read the garden's internal clock. Everything depends on a season of conditions. Yet, curled leaves on sagging branches signals the hour of ready, even if we're not. We stand squared off, hands on our hips. This is the start of hard labor. We work together, sinking our pitchforks into the base of the mounds to lift the caps of soil that hold the cache of potatoes. Once a plant is pulled away, we scoop up the small spuds; then dig with our hands, grabbing hold of the larger ones hiding in the earth's cool recesses. When we drag these potatoes up to the light, we are thrilled by the heft of their size and weight as we place them on the flats. Soon as the rows are picked clean, we look back over our shoulders at the horde drying in the noon sun, and boast about our remarkable accomplishments: What do you think? Have you ever seen such beauties? Everyone is going to love them.
MICHAEL MARROTTI - CHECK OUT MY BLOG: THE FALLACY OF CONTEMPORARY POETRY
Michael Marrotti is an author from Pittsburgh, using words instead of violence to mitigate the suffering of life in a callous world of redundancy. His primary goal is to help other people. He considers poetry to be a form of philanthropy. When he's not writing, he's volunteering at the Light Of Life homeless shelter on a weekly basis. If you appreciate the man's work, please check out his book, F.D.A. Approved Poetry, available at Amazon.
Check Out My Blog: The Fallacy Of Contemporary Poetry
I've been a part of the small press scene long enough to know that ingenuity and sincerity don't mean a thing. If they did, there wouldn't be this constant influx of superficial sycophants, and poetry that is synonymous with mediocrity.
I've recently gone through with a social media experiment where I'll 'like' someone else's writing, just to see where it'll lead me. It's led me to the path of reciprocation. Now all of a sudden this poet is 'liking' my poetry, where as before it wasn't anything but Facebook spam.
Ridiculous, right? Absolutely.
After that I tried the same experiment with a few other poets. The result was always the same: reciprocal. We've come to the point where a courtesy is a fallacy.
Chances are for the most part, if a poet gives you a little time on any of the social media outlets, it has nothing to do with sincerity. They're only out for their own best interest, which is: propagation.
As I mentioned earlier, mediocrity has prevailed. Shallow writing that stirs no emotion, based on a no life experience, equipped with boring mystical elements, leaves me sick to my stomach, as the accolades keep coming. Every now and then though, a poet does conceive a clever piece of poetry. Not that it matters, much.
They could churn out shit, or literary gold, the results are redundant so long as they partake in the fallacy of reciprocation. They're bound to receive the same amount of recognition either way, so what's the point? The point is to embrace cynicism, stop placating pseudo-poetry and label accordingly:
Merit does exist.
Optimistic, delusional poets will insist on the ridiculous notion that there is no such thing as bad art, only preference. The only thing more ridiculous than that, is believing poetry has the power to change the world.
If we all really did adhere to this notion, then every single person in the world would be an artist, when that is clearly not the case. It takes a special breed of human being to rip out the heart, and cleverly construct it into poetry.
For example: I personally don't know of any published poets in Pittsburgh. Then again, I live in a culturally bankrupt city. Talent is few and far between, to the point that almost anything passes as creative expression.
Mundane thoughts in this day and age are orchestrated into three stanzas, given a title, and labeled as poetry. The contemporary poet will praise this approach, all in the name of reciprocation.
It's a popularity contest for people who never evolved from high school.
The bottom line is: it's all bullshit. Poetry at one point endorsed the truth. Now it's just like anything else. If you plan on making it in this dying art form, you better bring a breath mint. And for those of you who refuse to kiss ass, mislead or simply acknowledge the 'greatness' of contemporary poetry, the road ahead will be tumultuous. You'll turn out to be another sentimental fool who wasn't invited to the after party.
On a positive note, I have no inclination to partake in a pretentious event. I'm not writing to impress the competition. I'm writing to expunge the agony of living in this callous world of redundancy. Check out my blog!!
SANKAR CHATTERJEE - CULTURAL HERITAGE MEETS GROSS NATIONAL HAPPINESS IN BHUTAN
A PhD-level scientist, Sankar Chatterjee possesses the passion for traveling worldwide to immerse himself in new cultures and customs to discover the forgotten history of the society while attempting to find the common thread that connects the humanity as a whole for its continuity. His most recent essays appeared in The Missing Slate and Travelmag - The Independent Spirit.
Photos courtesy: Rupankar Chatterjee
Cultural Heritage Meets Gross National Happiness in Bhutan
During a recent extended trip through several north-east Asian countries, cradled into the Himalayan Mountains, I along with my nephew and niece, had a chance to visit and explore the beautiful country of Bhutan for a few days. Though a small country of a less than a million of people, Bhutan, with its magnificent natural beauty, is as well rich in its cultural heritage. An early bastion of Buddhism, the arts here evolved around the religion and thus have a unique perspective as well as character. Accordingly, besides exploring and hiking in its various scenic mountain ranges, we thought of exploring the country's cultural past. We learned that the best place for such exploration will be the historical dzongs, especially found in Bhutan (also in some parts of Tibet). Over the centuries, a dzong with its distinctive style of fortress-like architecture, has been serving as the combined religious, administrative and social center of the local region. Thus, the interior of a dzong contains temples for praying, monastery for housing the monks as well as the offices for local government administration. Inside courtyard also serves as a religious festival place for people to gather.
As a part of our combined travel plan, first we visited the country of Nepal for several days, going there from India. Then, we flew out of Kathmandu in Nepal on one gorgeous sunny morning towards Paro, our first destination in Bhutan.
From our own research on the country's past, it appeared that the dzong in the district of Punakha might be the ideal place to begin exploring the country's cultural heritage. It has been described as the second oldest and second largest, but the most majestic of all. Thus, after meeting our local guide at the airport, we headed towards Punakha on Bhutan's only highway. Though the distance from the airport to Punakha was only 100 miles, due to the winding nature of the road, it took us more than four hours to arrive at our destination in the late afternoon. From a distance, we got our first glimpse of the majestic dzong, situated at the confluence of the Pho Chhu (male) and Mo Chhu (female) rivers, invoking the union of a male and a female for the creation of a life form on earth. We checked into a previously arranged hotel for the night.
Early next morning, we began our visit to the place. The dzong belongs to the Drupka lineage of the Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism in Bhutan. Originally built near the middle of the seventeenth century, the place, over the centuries underwent several modifications as well as maintenance to weather the forces of nature. While walking alongside the building, we noticed carved painted wooden art on the outer wall of the dzong.
After entering the complex, we passed by a gilded religious wheel of Buddhism at a corner, surrounded by decorative walls.
While standing on the inside courtyard, a gathering chamber supported by decorative pillars holding colorful panels came to our view.
At the same time, a magnificently painted cross-section of the interior of the building started to dazzle in the morning sun.
A closer look at one of the paintings on the wall revealed an intricately painted human life-cycle according to Buddhism.
Intricate nature of the painting with its color-coordination was also revealed in some displayed door frames.
After experiencing the historical architecture as well as the paintings inside the Punakha Dzong and enjoying the natural beauty of the two outside nearby rivers, we made our return journey to Paro. On the way, we stopped at the dzong in Paro that we passed by the day before. Entering its courtyard, we were dazzled by the decorative entrance to its temple.
While inside, an exquisite painting of a religious figure from Buddhism drew our attention.
In addition, the painting of a mythical figure, hitherto unseen in the previous dzong, came to our attention.
While wandering in the public places, we could not help but appreciate the smiling friendly faces of the citizens as well as their gorgeously colorful unique dresses. It has been said that the country's textiles represent complex, but rich repository of a unique art form. They are being recognized for their intricate dyeing and weaving techniques, thus producing abundance of color and variation of patterns offering exquisite sophistication. Thus, a decade ago, the government established the Royal Textile Academy of Bhutan. The major purpose of the place is to showcase to the world the historic progression of the art in textile field as well as the evolution of the nature of the dresses worn by the citizens depending on their social status. In a section of the museum, there were demonstration of various processes, the way these textiles were produced. Unfortunately, any kind of photography within the building was strictly forbidden.
While appreciating the heritage of the country, we wondered about the continuity of this cultural tradition in present-day Bhutan. It turns out that the government of Bhutan already thought about it and proactively established a center called the Folk Heritage Museum in Thimphu. Besides being a museum, a section of the building also serves as the vocational training center for the emerging sculptors, painters and textile artists who will practice the respective vocation while preserving the country's rich cultural heritage. So, we paid a visit there too.
First, we visited the section with rooms that showcased student-made multiple paintings and sculptures in various stages of completion in current training session.
In another section, needle works of the current students, at different stages of completion, came to our view.
From the display rooms, we headed towards the section inside the complex where young men and women were seen to be engaged in learning their crafts. We observed a young male sculptor was in the process of putting final touches on a statue that he had been working on for last several weeks.
In rooms, in another section of the complex, we observed the young female weavers were getting lessons in the various facets of producing colorful textiles.
Thus, even in these days of globalization and technological wonders, this small but beautiful country of Bhutan, with its motto of "Gross National Happiness (GNH)," found a way to maintain and propagate its rich cultural heritage, both for economic reason and preservation of its glorious traditions of producing fine arts and textiles. And what a lesson it was to learn from this trip!
SANKAR CHATTERJEE - A SERENDIPITOUS CULTURAL EXPERIENCE IN LEON, NICARAGUA
Photos courtesy: Shelley Chatterjee
A Serendipitous Cultural Experience in León, Nicaragua
"Should we or shouldn't we stop at León?" my wife asked.
"We should." was my response.
That was a part of the conversation between her and me during a recent road-trip from Granada, Nicaragua to Tegucigalpa, Honduras, in the week of Christmas. As the highway was winding up and down through the mountainous regions, we came to learn from our knowledgeable guide that we would pass by the town of León. The town had been historically the intellectual center of Nicaragua and recently served as the birthplace of the Sandinista revolutionary movement establishing the current government. In addition, León sits on the Pacific Coast offering a beautiful view of the ocean. The decision was made swiftly and we arrived in Leon around noon. For our accommodation for the night, we located an old convent (used to house the Christian nuns) currently being converted into a modern hotel, still decorated with various Christian artifacts all around. I wondered how well I had to behave staying in an ex-convent.
Once settled, we headed towards the central plaza of the town to visit León's famous Cathedral, a UNESCO World heritage Site. After a visit to its magnificent sanctuary, we were allowed to climb up to the top of the church to get a closer look at the architecture at the top as well as a panoramic view of the mountains, dormant volcanoes and lakes of the countryside.
On descending, we explored the market area bustling with Christmas week's business. For lunch, we grabbed a few local tamales (made up of rice, chicken, bean and some spices all mixed together and wrapped in a leaf to cook at a high temperature). While wandering around the plaza, we passed by a federal building bearing the sign Primeria Capital De La Revolution. Interestingly, in front of the building, a two-story tall colorful woman puppet stood on one side. Being new to the city, my initial impression was that it might have been a part of the street decoration for the upcoming Christmas, since various displays for the upcoming festival had already been set up throughout the area.
At day's end, we viewed a glorious sunset from the beach of the Pacific Ocean, a short distance away from the center of the town. Returning to the central plaza, we sat down for an evening drink in an outdoor café. Soon, we started to hear the sound of drums emanating from different directions. It turned out that, in the evenings of the Christmas season, the teenagers would come out to act out a folklore, known as "La Gigantona". According to a version of the folklore, the show evolved to project the assimilation of the Spanish culture and Catholic Christian traditions with the culture and beliefs of the indigenous mestizo people. Thus, La Gigantona, a tall woman puppet dressed with a colorful gown adorned with jewelries, carried by an unseen teenager, represents a big white Spanish woman with elegance and wielding power. She is surrounded and followed around by a few Pepe Cabezón (big-headed) characters wearing big black head-gears representing short but smart indigenous men.
As we watched, various groups started to crisscross the plaza stopping for a performance in front of the café. La Gigantona of the group danced wildly while Pepe Cabezón-s shook their huge heads up and down. Meanwhile, another member started to recite coplas (poetic sayings) in a loud voice to the spectators while the drums played on. Small donations were collected at the end and the groups then headed towards various local neighborhoods.
Interestingly, in another explanation of the show's theme, it could very well be a representation of the historic domination of the Spanish colonialism of the poor and marginalized mestizo population.
"So, was it about assimilation or exploitation?" She asked.
"Either way, it was quite a serendipitous cultural experience." I replied.
We were already on the road to Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
SUNIL SHARMA - BAUDELAIRE AND PARIS
Mumbai-based, Sunil Sharma writes prose and poetry, apart from doing literary journalism and freelancing. A senior academic, he has been published in some of the leading international journals and anthologies. Sunil has got three collections of poetry, one collection of short fiction, one novel and co-edited five books of poetry, short fiction and literary criticism.
Recipient of the UK-based Destiny Poets' inaugural Poet of the Year award---2012.
Another notable achievement is his select poems were published in the prestigious UN project: Happiness: The Delight-Tree-2015.
He edits English section of the monthly Setu, a bilingual journal from Pittsburgh, USA:
http://www.setumag.com/p/setu-home.html
Baudelaire and Paris
Modern Paris was discovered by Baudelaire in his avatar as the flaneur. And Walter Benjamin made this figure intellectually respectable as a field of study.
In a recent visit to Paris, I hovered between two allied states of being a flaneur and a gawking tourist. I had come as a sightseer from Mumbai, India, allured by the tales and well-crafted image of a mythic Paris, drinking in the street flavours on those May days, passively registering the wide monuments and boulevards and palaces and towers in one clean and clear sweep---almost like a wide-angle shot in a Stanley Kubrick film. Spring had set in and the Paris of May 2014 was full of eager tourists from nations as wide apart as China and the USA; Africa and Middle East and Latin America. A bouquet of the ethnicities strung together.
Then, I became a flaneur, making a neat switch, in a single instant.
I became Baudelaire.
Different terms can make you look differently at a similar set of things or a common setting.
Of course, I did not have any wish to write a New Millennium version of The Flowers of Evil. At best, you can parody a sacred text but you cannot re-write it, howsoever Borges-like you might be.
I am neither of the two.
Like Mallarme and Verlaine, you can carry forward an idea by expanding it further but cannot imitate with complete fidelity to the original.
So, not in a mood for a cheap replication of a master praised by Proust so profusely, I took on the stance of a flaneur and became a connoisseur of the street-life.
Assuming the role of a figure long dead or supposed to be dead? Replaced by a tourist? Solo or in a group?
Armed with a camera or a cell phone, in casuals, the tourist---guided by brochures and online info and a city map---looks at the urban skyline already overdetermined by the info- system on that city. Or a professional polyglot guide spewing bits of history like a typical street performer or amateur actor. A mass tourist consuming the city, architecture, culture, food, arts and clothes---public life---in a predictable way and sequence largely decided by the tourist industry. A few breaks are possible in that routine.
But to resurrect the role and agency of the classic flaneur, you have to take on a different position and way of seeing.
And what was/is that?
I cannot become a dandy---detached, arrogant, inheritor of a small fortune, an idler walking a tortoise on a Paris street of the nineteenth century. Even if I have got the means, I might get arrested for an act of animal cruelty!
Those were different times!
The clues lie in The Flowers of Evil, perhaps.
Will this title be acceptable today? With changing definitions of evil? With life becoming more liberal and open?
Baudelaire was a dandy and a cultivated flaneur---the painter of modern life; a gentleman stroller of the city streets. Part of, yet apart from the crowds.
But then, not every dandy is a flaneur and every flaneur, a dandy?
Again, dandy is a historical invention, a social-engineering, manufacturing of a social type for a particular age.
Perhaps, a metro-sexual male, now no longer fashionable.
Is s/he a voyeur?
Perhaps, we all are, given the nature of our society.
Or, a keen participant, an acute observer, a chronicler?
For me, the answer lies in the personality of Charles Baudelaire who in turn was influenced by Edgar Allan Poe. But that would be complicating things further.
Let us stick to our central figure Baudelaire. His genius lies in radicalizing the trope of the French flaneur. A trope that fascinated Walter Benjamin who, in the twentieth-century, tried to essay the same role done so well by Baudelaire in the industrialized Paris of the nineteenth century. The former could not capture the underlying passion of Baudelaire in this unfinished project.
In fact, by the late 1990s and start of the 21st century, author-flaneur proved an impossible figure.
Market forces, on global level, have incorporated author as a producer of kitsch or dystopia. Dissident got slowly and subtly disenfranchised by the mass society.
We are all sellers!
Baudelaire resisted this initial process in Paris. Beckett was next. Sartre and Camus too tried.
Then the flow stopped.
The Flowers of Evil mount a challenge to the order and morality of the Second Republic.
The poems challenge the bourgeois morality and conception of order and beauty and aesthetics in a radical way. It talks, the book, of evil and implies that the source of evil lies in its origins---capitalism.
In that simple gesture of observing, participating, recording of street life, Baudelaire liberates himself from his historical position and becomes a true artist. By talking of prostitutes and vampires, the poet shows the underbelly of capitalism and proves the material basis of these tropes and labels of the outcasts of the system that feeds on the blood of the innocent and the gullible.
The Flowers of Evil is the greatest indictment of the French bourgeoisie by a person deeply embedded in it as a bourgeois but a radical one that unveils the brutal face of a system that once talked of revolutionary slogan of liberty, equality, fraternity!
An evil society can produce evil flowers!
Vampires are for real!
That Baudelaire is not dead in 2014 is proved on a street near the Eiffel Tower on that memorable trip.
A Roma girl, bold and audacious, picks up the cell phone out of the shirt pocket of my son. She returns it after a cop intervenes.
I can smell evil in the air. The disenfranchised and the ethnic Roma are still the threat---like the prostitute and the vampire, the perpetual outsiders.
The Paris of Baudelaire is not safe.
The shoot-out at the Charlie Hebdo proves that.
The vampires are out.
This time around, no Baudelaire as a flaneur is there of warning us of their sinister presence.
GEOFFREY CRAIG - SECOND CAREER
Geoffrey Craig's fiction, poetry and drama have appeared in numerous literary journals, including the New Plains Review, Calliope, Foliate Oak, Spring – the Journal of the E.E. Cummings Society and The MacGuffin. He has received two Pushcart Prize nominations.
Second Career
Writing is my second career; banking was my first. I've been frequently asked if I would have liked writing to be my first – or only – career. In that case, my girl friend and I would be dining on cat food – if we were lucky. I also learned a lot as a banker: about people, about discipline, about writing – believe it or not – and about finance.
After graduating from Phillips Exeter Academy, Colgate University and Harvard Business School, I spent two years in the Peace Corps. This was a transformative experience as, coming from a comfortable background, I learned how most of the world lives. I also learned Spanish and how to live in an unfamiliar culture. With two travel interludes, I then spent a couple of years as a small business consultant and over twenty-five years as a banker. Along the way, I got a second master's degree: an MA in History in 1973 from Santa Clara University. In banking, I reached the level of Senior Vice President at Credit Suisse and retired from banking in 2002 with the title of Director at Credit Suisse First Boston.
I began writing in 2000 when a former girl friend sent me some poems satirizing the Florida election recount. They were funny and based on famous poems. Thinking I could do that, I sent back a poem based on Robert Frost's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" with a note saying that if Robert Frost could read this, he'd turn over in his grave. She replied that I was clearly wasting my time as an investment banker and that if he could, Robert Frost would sit up in his coffin and applaud. So I began to write.
At first, I thought of it as a kind of hobby – something to occupy my time when I retired. If this is a hobby, I need to find another hobby.
I'm a modestly, very modestly, successful writer and certainly not financially. I have had stories and poems published in literary journals; fourteen plays produced (full-lengths and one-acts with one co-authored) in festivals and community theaters; a novel in verse and a novella serialized in Wilderness House Literary Review and, most recently, "Scudder's Gorge", a prose novel, published by Prolific Press.
To achieve this modest level of acceptance, I've had rejections … rejections … rejections. I'm at the two thousand mark and counting. The only one that bothered me was when I submitted a dark play about a suicide in a camp and the rejection letter stated how the theater found my play, "appealingly good-humored".
I am a contemplative person. My mind never seems to take a breather, and much of my work relates to issues of our times and culture. Racism and prejudice are somewhat persistent themes. In my story, "The Snake", set in the South of the early Twentieth Century, a black veteran, coming home from service in France, is lynched because he's in uniform. Later in the story, a young black boy is bitten by a rattler and, refused treatment at the local clinic, dies. Both of these events are based on actual occurrences. Much has changed since then but not nearly enough. The evidence of lingering racism has surfaced all too clearly in recent years. Can it be completely eradicated from our society? Probably not, but the effort must be made.
I have written a play about climate change and one about harassment in a university setting. While this may suggest that my writing is purely theme-oriented, I, in fact, pay a lot of attention to character and plot. Without interesting, complex characters and engaging stories, you don't have much.
An early mentor and friend said that one of my strengths as a writer was my ability to listen to, absorb and utilize criticism. It was not an easy skill to acquire. It took hard work and self-examination as my natural tendency was to explain and argue when someone commented on my work. I did learn, however, and it has helped enormously in the development of my craft. Another friend once told me that when your work is published or produced, it no longer belongs to you but to your audience – to interpret as they see fit. I was astounded, but it's true … so true. You have to accept that people will see what they want to in your work, and there is precious little you can do about it.
After retiring from banking, I began to write full-time. I wrote the verse novel as a Christmas present for my then eleven-year-old daughter. Called "The Brave Maiden", it borrowed heavily from the Robin Hood legend except that the lead character was a young noblewoman; her family having been slaughtered by an evil count, she flees to the forest to seek revenge and conquest. She builds an army of diverse characters, some of whom distantly resemble characters from the actual Robin Hood story.
I moved on to short stories and novels. The novel, "Scudder's Gorge", begins with the day of "the bomb" in Hiroshima and then moves backwards in time to Eighteenth Century Vermont to a village founded by post-Revolutionary settlers. Nestled between pine-clad ridges, the valley is also home to a small band of Abenaki. The settlers and Native Americans trade and live in peace until a love affair blossoms between a young Abenaki and the daughter of a village elder. A crime is then committed which reverberates down the generations.
I started writing plays in 2007, and my first play was produced in 2008 at the Center for Performing Arts in Rhinebeck, NY. Based on a brief piece in the local newspaper, "The Medal" tells the story of a World War II veteran who was recommended for a medal but never received it. As he nears death over fifty years later, his wife determines to get him his medal. The veteran's widow attended a performance and was very complimentary.
In 2013, I directed one of my plays at the Manhattan Repertory Theatre and loved the experience. I've now directed a total of eight of my plays. I greatly enjoy, both as writer and director, the give and take involved in the collaborative work of the theater. The playwright needs to be able to revise – and quickly – when the director and / or actors identify problems with the script. The director needs to listen to the actors when they suggest ways of doing things. On a number of occasions, I've come up against a blocking problem only to have one or more of the actors come up with just the right solution. My style as a director mirrors the style I practiced as a manager in banking: listen to your staff and consider their ideas but make decisions when necessary. This give and take style generally produces the best results and makes the endeavor more fulfilling and enjoyable for all concerned.
I've had an enormous amount of fun and derived tremendous satisfaction from this second career. I feel very fortunate to have the opportunity to keep working. It keeps my brain active. While I had a great time in the first career, I would not have missed the second one for all the world.
For anyone interested in reading "Scudder's Gorge", it is available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, local bookstores and the publisher's own web site.
DONAL MAHONEY - INTERNMENT CAMPS IN THE UNITED STATES
Donal Mahoney, a native of Chicago, lives in St. Louis, Missouri. He has worked as an editor for The Chicago Sun-Times, Loyola University Press and Washington University in St. Louis. His fiction and poetry have appeared in various publications, including The Wisconsin Review, The Kansas Quarterly, The South Carolina Review, The Christian Science Monitor, Commonweal, Guwahatian Magazine (India), The Galway Review (Ireland), Public Republic (Bulgaria), The Osprey Review (Wales), The Istanbul Literary Review (Turkey) and other magazines. Some of his work can be found at http://eyeonlifemag.com/the-poetry-locksmith/donal-mahoney-poet.html#sthash.OSYzpgmQ.dpbs
(Photo: Carol Bales)
 Internment Camps in the United States
Miyuki is old enough to have been a child during World War II. Indeed, some of her students are that old as well but they are eager to learn and listen to her carefully.
She is a teacher of floral arrangements in the Japanese style of Ikenobo but her face always seems sadder than the flowers in the beautiful arrangements she makes. Her life has been a mixture of grief and joy.
Her parents emigrated to the United States from Japan before World War II and Miyuki was born in Seattle. Her parents owned a newspaper there but it was confiscated by the government when they and their children were sent to an internment camp during the war.
After the war Miyuki's parents did not get their newspaper back nor were they compensated for it. But they found another way to make a living. They opened a flower shop and their daughter Miyuki dealt with customers after school. Bilingual by then, she spoke beautiful English.
Between customers she would watch her parents make arrangements and in time learned the art of Ikenobo, arranging flowers in the spartan Japanese style that proves less can certainly be more. She has been teaching Ikenobo now in America for more than 50 years. She is certified as a professor of Ikenobo by the society that overseas the Ikenobo school in Japan.
Every once in a while Miyuki pauses in her classes to discuss different aspects of Japanese culture with her mostly Caucasian students, ladies of similar age and above-average means. They seem to enjoy these interjections as much as learning how to arrange flowers in the Ikenobo style.
One day Miyuki took time to explain that because she was born in America to Japanese immigrants she is classified in the Japanese community as Nisei. Her children, born here as well, are classified as Sansei and her grandchildren as Yonsei. She did not say much more about that but her students realize that she is often as spartan in her comments about Japanese-American life as she is in the Ikenobo arrangements she makes on her table in front of the class.
Some of her American students were children as Miyuki was during the war with Japan. They have a vague memory of President Truman's decision to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Many think Truman did the right thing, a few think it was a mistake, and the rest aren't sure.
But many of them wonder if putting Japanese Americans in internment camps during World War II had any merit. Perhaps they think about it even more now as the tumult in America grows over the conflict with ISIS and its verbal threats toward America.
In the aftermath of Nine Eleven, everyone remains wary. What next? But so far, there has been no talk of internment camps for Muslim Americans, which in effect would be an encore of what happened to Japanese Americans during World War II.
Perhaps some day a student will ask Miyuki what she would think as an American citizen about establishing internment camps for Muslims in America should the conflict with ISIS continue to grow and begin to present a very real threat to the United States. She might have mixed feelings as many of her students do now when they think about not only the atomic bombs dropped on Japan but also the disruption in the lives of Japanese Americans during and after the war.
It's obvious this small group of people interested in learning how to make beautiful flower arrangements has much to think about regarding what has happened in the past, what is happening now and what may happen in the future. In this respect they are no different than every other citizen in the United States today.
Laura Ingram
M. J. Iuppa
Sandy Raschke
Sankar Chatterjee


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