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Modern times have come to China — religious teachers must now fill out a government application before they can be reincarnated.

The decree, passed in 2007, requires that applications be submitted to four different government bodies. “The selection of reincarnates must preserve national unity and solidarity of all ethnic groups, and the selection process cannot be influenced by any group or individual from outside the country.”

“Work out your own salvation,” said the Buddha. “Do not depend on others.”

| Religion · Society

Medical Brief

The story about Dr. Abernethy and his lady patient is a classic. He was a man of few words, and the lady knew it. Being shown into his private office, she bared her arm and said simply, ‘Burn.’

‘A poultice,’ said the doctor.

Next day she called again, showed her arm, and said, ‘Better.’

‘Continue the poultice.’

Some days elapsed before Abernethy saw her again. Then she said, ‘Well. Your fee?’

‘Nothing,’ said the doctor, bursting into unusual loquacity. ‘You are the most sensible woman I ever met in my life!’

— William Shepard Walsh, Handy-Book of Literary Curiosities, 1892

| Humor · Society

Street Marketing

Physicists Chen Ning Yang and Tsung-Dao Lee used to discuss their work over lunch at a Chinese restaurant on 125th Street in Manhattan. One day they made an important insight into parity violation, and the two received the 1957 Nobel Prize in physics.

After the award was announced, one of them noticed a sign in the restaurant window: “Eat here, get Nobel Prize.”

| Science & Math · Society

Misc

  • As Britain prepared for World War I, officers were required to have their swords sharpened.
  • Wordsworth’s “The Rainbow” has an average word length of 3.08 letters.
  • sin 10° × sin 50° × sin 70° = 1/8
  • WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE = I SWEAR HE’S LIKE A LAMP
  • “I have always thought that every woman should marry, and no man.” — Benjamin Disraeli
| History · Language · Poems · Science & Math · Society

State of Torture

Does living in Iowa constitute cruel and unusual punishment? Hughes Bagley thought so — in 1982 he was paroled from federal prison on the condition that he live in Sioux City and remain within the federal district of northern Iowa for 12 years. He asked the court to set this aside so that he could return to Seattle.

“Although we might share Bagley’s enthusiasm for the Pacific Northwest,” wrote judge Herbert Choy, “we believe, and so hold, that it is not cruel and unusual punishment to require Bagley to serve his parole term in Iowa.”

| Society

Word to the Wise

There is a tradition to the effect that Noel Coward once sent identical notes to the twenty most prominent men in London, saying, ‘All is discovered. Escape while you can.’

All twenty abruptly left town.

— Paul C. Sherr, The Short Story and the Oral Tradition, 1970

| Society

Hate Mail

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Jackie Robinson received this note on May 22, 1951, before a double-header in Cincinnati:

WE HAVE ALREADY
GOT RID
OF SEVERAL
LIKE YOU
ONE WAS FOUND IN RIVER
JUST RECENTLY
ROBINSON
WE ARE GOING
TO KILL YOU
IF YOU ATTEMPT
TO ENTER A
BALL GAME AT
CROSLEY FIELD

It was signed THE TRAVELERS.

Robinson hit a home run in the first game.

| Society

Private Line

In 1980, Morris Davie was accused of setting forest fires and brought to the headquarters of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to take a lie detector test. He was left alone in a room, where a hidden camera recorded him dropping to his knees and saying, “Oh God, let me get away with it just this once.”

At trial, his lawyer objected to this evidence, arguing that it violated a Canadian law that prohibited the interception of private communications “made under circumstances in which it is reasonable for the originator thereof to expect that it will not be intercepted by any person other than the person intended by the originator thereof to receive it.”

Is God a person? The trial judge thought so — he held the videotape inadmissible and Davie was acquitted. The British Columbia Court of Appeal disagreed, however, deciding that a private communication requires an “intended human recipient.”

“In my opinion,” wrote Justice J.A. Hutcheon, “the word ‘person’ is used in the statutes of Canada to describe someone to whom rights are granted and upon whom obligations are placed. There is no earthly authority which can grant rights or impose duties upon God. I can find no reason to think that the Parliament of Canada has attempted to do so in the enactment of sections of the Criminal Code dealing with the protection of privacy.” He ordered a new trial.

| Religion · Society

Unquote

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“You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it. From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, ‘Look at that, you son of a bitch.'” — Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell

(Thanks, Hugh.)

| Society

The Paradox of Self-Amendment

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A constitution can contain a clause that provides for its amendment. But can this clause be used to amend itself?

Article V of the U.S. Constitution requires that an amendment be ratified by three-fourths of the states. Could they change this requirement to 90 percent? Or declare that the president can amend the constitution at his whim? Or abolish amendments altogether?

“If legal rules that authorize change can be used to change themselves, then we have paradox and contradiction; but if they cannot be used to change themselves (and if there is no higher rule that could authorize their change), then we have immutable rules,” writes Earlham College philosopher Peter Suber. “Paradox and immutability should create an uncomfortable dilemma for jurists and citizens in western legal systems. It appears that we must give up either a central element of legal rationality or a central element of democratic theory.”

| Society