Watching the World
Easter’s Ancestry
◆ In a recent issue of Natural History magazine, Cornell University professor Carl Sagan observes that many “religions have shamelessly” borrowed rituals from their predecessors. He said: “Consider, for example, the Christian festival of Easter, in which the ancient fertility rites of the spring equinox are today cunningly disguised as chickies, eggies, and bunnies. Indeed, the very name Easter is a corruption of the name of the great Near Eastern earth mother goddess, Astarte.”
New Historical “Benchmark”
◆ For decades before World War I, Bible students had warned that 1914 would be a critical point in history. “The trauma of World War I . . . is widely regarded as a benchmark in the evolution of modern America,” confirms a recent issue of U.S. News & World Report. And such changes were felt world wide. In more recent decades Jehovah’s witnesses have again noted what Bible chronology indicates, this time warning that the mid-1970’s would be critical for mankind. What does the record so far indicate? According to this article, “Historians compare . . . today’s upsets” with the “time of social and moral change” during World War I.
Strange Bedfellows
◆ To the world at large, differences between the Arabs and Israelis appear great. But “the relationship between Jews and Arabs in the underworld is the best,” asserts Jerusalem criminologist Menachem Amir. Since much of the Israeli police force is tied up with internal security, Jews and Arabs of the underworld are said to be using this “excellent relationship” to exploit the situation. A Tel Aviv criminal lawyer tells of five Jews and Arabs charged together with smuggling huge quantities of hashish from Jordan. “And we are supposed to be at war with Jordan!” he complains.
How Much Is It?
◆ Astronomical dollar figures are often cited to describe the revenues of oil-exporting countries since their fourfold price increase. But how much is it in terms we can understand? U.S. News & World Report asserts that a year’s estimated $125 billion in oil revenue would purchase any of the following: the “entire U.S. farm crop”; all U.S. production of steel for 4 1⁄2 years; “all the cars and trucks produced for 3 1⁄2 years”; or 3,200,000 houses.
Asian Quake Forecasting
◆ A severe February earthquake struck a densely populated area in northeast China. Monitored local news broadcasts are said to have claimed that, “based on the earthquake forecasts and notices issued by our country’s earthquake stations and posts,” authorities “mobilized the masses,” thereby reducing injuries “to a minimum.” If true, this would “mark the first time that a major quake has been predicted and a population warned in time to take precautionary measures,” asserts Time magazine.
Now Japan’s Earthquake Forecasting Liaison Council has “forecast that a major earthquake will occur in the Tokyo and Yokohama area in the next few years,” warns a recent Daily Yomiuri editorial. It also notes “the tragic eruption of Sakurajima volcano in Kyushu in 1914” when the meteorological observatory “assured them that there was no danger of an eruption. . . . However, in this age when forecasting techniques have greatly improved, it would be inexcusable to ignore a warning.”
Advertising Contrasts
◆ World merchants spend about $40 billion annually to advertise their wares. Who bears the brunt of this sea of words and pictures? A recent international study reveals that the average U.S. citizen was inundated with $110.78 worth in one recent year. Switzerland ranked second, with per person ad spending at $76.63, while, at the bottom of the scale, the average Ethiopian’s purchasing power was enticed with 2 cents’ worth of advertising.
Bulrushes Beat Pollution
◆ “The Biblical bulrushes that hid the baby Moses in the Nile marshes,” reports the New York Times, “are being employed today . . . to protect the health and lives of thousands of people in many parts of the world.” In 1957 a German scientist noticed that bulrushes grew better in polluted water than in clean water. Now a pioneering treatment plant in Krefeld, Germany, using reeds and bulrushes, is successfully producing water clean enough to drink. Thousands of similar projects are springing up around the world. The cost of this method is said to be far less than that of conventional systems. “And the only energy we need for the biological step is the sun to grow the bulrushes, and gravity to let the polluted water flow to them,” says the German scientist.
British Gamblers Undeterred
◆ “Hard-up Britain is gambling away the blues with the biggest-ever betting splurge in Europe—perhaps in the world,” declares The Sunday Express. Britain’s deep economic crisis did not keep her subjects from gambling about $6.75 billion in 1974, an average of over $120 each and about 20 percent more than in 1973. Says the National Association of Bookmakers: “Who can blame them? They look at their money and wonder how much will it be worth in six months.” U.S. gambling spots such as Las Vegas and Reno are also enjoying a bonanza of business.
Unusual Entertainment
◆ A record 30,000 Malaysians at Kuala Lumpur’s Merdeka Stadium watched this year’s world Koran-reading championships. “As they listen to international readers’ renditions of the Koran,” explains Malaysia’s Sunday Times Magazine, “intense pleasure comes from the myriad memories evoked” and “artistic delight at the excellence of diction, voice quality, and rhythm.” Television now carries the contests to outside audiences, together with translations. One devout Muslim recalled that in the past “it was the thing for audiences to cry ‘Excellent!’ over particularly well-rendered passages . . . I blush to think how many times our happy cries must have coincided with verses describing the tortures of hell.”
Too Little Space?
◆ Talk of overpopulation often leaves people with the impression that the problem is too little space. But if all the people in the world were gathered at one location, allowing four square feet for each to stand upon, they would occupy less than 600 square miles! That is much less than the metropolitan area of London, Tokyo or New York. Is the problem too little space—or are the selfish using too much space?
Two-Ton Patient!
In what is said to be the first major surgery ever attempted on a rhinoceros, veterinarians at Iowa State University recently removed a two-foot-long intestinal obstruction. The fourteen-year-old Indian rhino, “Tiny,” had lost about seventy pounds due to the obstruction, which doctors said was about the diameter of a football. Three hours of struggling were required to move the animal 100 feet to the operating location. The vets were not looking forward to removing the stitches.
Appreciated Parents
◆ Milton Eisenhower, brother of former U.S. President Eisenhower, in a recent issue of Modern Maturity magazine, recalls that “Mother and Father knew the Bible from one end to the other. In fact, Mother was her own concordance: Without using one, she could turn to the particular scriptural passage she wanted. . . . We had an ideal home for I never heard an unkind word between Father and Mother. They lived by the cardinal concepts of the Judaic-Christian religion.” The elder Mrs. Eisenhower (Ida) was one of Jehovah’s witnesses.
Parochial School Vices
◆ Parochial schools often claim to provide a superior education. Is their moral influence superior? A study of Chicago’s Catholic elementary schools by the Catholic Charities’ Central States Institute of Addictions indicates not. “The findings appear to parallel the drug and alcohol experience in other school systems,” says an Institute official. Twenty percent of eighth grade girls and 14 percent of the boys were reportedly using drugs.
Airline Paradox
◆ Although 1974 was the first year in world aviation history that the distance flown has declined, more passengers and freight than ever were still carried. U.S. airline experience may indicate why. Six million more passengers were carried on a billion gallons less fuel by eliminating, rerouting and slowing down various flights. The Air Transport Association says that a 20-mile-per-hour decrease to 500 m.p.h. by a Boeing 737 adds less than three minutes to a 500-mile flight, but cuts fuel consumption 7 percent.
Aging Advantages
◆ Now, with many unemployed executives in the market for jobs, businesses are not necessarily wise to look only for “new blood.” According to an Industry Week analysis, older managers “are among the last generations to retain the traditional work ethic. They also have better attendance records and are sick less often.” Additionally, “they are more experienced in the means of getting things done within ‘the system.’” And, unlike younger men, they “are less prone to view the job as a stepping stone to a better job within another company.”
Marriage Opportunities
◆ Though U.S. females generally outnumber males, there are a number of areas where the reverse is true. A recent issue of Statistical Bulletin reveals that, in Hawaii, for every 100 unmarried young women there are 146 available young men; in Nevada and Rhode Island, 120; in Virginia, 115; and in California, 111. In America’s last frontier, Alaska, each girl could have an average of more than two possible suitors. By contrast, in the East North Central states there are as few as 88 young unmarried men for every 100 unmarried girls.
Diseased “Healing” Shrine
◆ Two small children with cystic fibrosis were recently taken to the Catholic shrine at Lourdes, France, and then on to Rome for a blessing by Pope Paul. Rather than curing their ills, the trip added a rare strain of salmonella infection. “The bacteria was transferred to France from North Africa about a year ago,” says a Washington State Health Department official. He notes that since the Lourdes shrine attracts many ill people, the opportunity for disease transferal in that place is quite high.
Slaves of “Freedom”
◆ Just how good is the “good life” of sexual freedom? “People have found it [swinging sex life] to be more enslaving than freeing,” reported Dr. Robert Kolodny at the 141st annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Another study conducted by Columbia University sociology professor Amitai Etzioni revealed that many persons who formerly engaged in frantic sexual activity now look back on the experience with words like “fatigue, strain, effort, demand and work.”
To Stop Noise
◆ Too much noise was behind three murders that recently shocked Tokyo residents. One irate apartment-house dweller killed a neighbor because of her piano practice; another killed his neighbor in retaliation after she killed his squealing pet puppy; and a father killed his son because of loud, late radio playing. “Nobody experiencing the pressure of the extreme congestion of daily life in Japan’s woefully overcrowded cities . . . would pass off such happenings without a painful realization that they are in fact tragic glimpses of a cross section of modern urban society in Japan,” observes the Business Community quarterly of Japan.