In an old Chinese story, a poet lost his ability of writing poems after his pen had been taken away in a bad dream. It seems that this tragedy has happened to JK Rowling too.

Last weekend, the Harry Potter and Half-blood Prince was greeted with a rousing fanfare worldwide. Millions of people wasted the whole weekend to explore the magic world. Me too.

The book is heavy. Rowling’s ability to write concisely seems not improved. This is not surprising. In fact, female writers in general like to elaborate details. For example, Virginia Woolf also had her thoughts wandering around in her writings with many unnecessary details. The volume of the book about the Bloody Queen Mary written by Margaret George was so formidable that I might never be able to finish it. A recent bestseller—The Historian, written by Elizabeth Kostova—also deterred my attempt to read it. Only Jane Austen avoided boring readers by her witty humors in the Pride and Prejudice. But her books were also full of details. Anyway, by reading the sixth Harry Potter book, most kids probably surpass their summer reading requirement, which is good.

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Economics can be fun, rewarding, and surprising. Steven Levitt has strived to tell us this in the book “Freakonomics,” coauthored with Stephen J. Dubner from New York Time. The book is indeed fascinating, full of interesting anecdotes and detective stories. How can you catch cheating among teachers? Where have all the criminals gone? What makes a perfect parent? Steven has answered all these questions in a vivid, scientific, and empirical way.

The structure of the book is unconventional. Topics and ideas are jumping all around. Stories are not internally correlated. Furthermore, some chapters (e.g., the last chapter on naming kids) are too loose and some tables are redundant. Consequently, the authors claimed that the book had no theme. Actually, it does promote one central dogma throughout the text. That is, theories and conventional wisdom should be subjected to empirical test. Let data speak themselves. We social scientists all know it. Now you morons should know it too.

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Mount Everest, or Mount Himalaya which I prefer, is more than 29,000 feet (8848 m) in height.With its formidable statue and intriguing myths, she is a sheer beauty of nature.Topping the Mount is a dream of human beings, and to some extent, national prides.

The first organized serial assaults on the Mount Himalaya were carried out by Britons from 1922 to1924.The first expedition was the reconnaissance phase to examine the Mount closely and to set up a feasible route to the top.The second expedition was the first attempt to climb the Mount.It failed due to severe weather and inadequate preparations.The third expedition was the last attempt before Tibet closed the Mount area.The mountaineers brought oxygen tubes, established more camps, and tried three times.They failed again.Two adventurous people: George L. Mallory, and Andrew S. Irvine, lost their lives. The epic of these earlier climbers was told in the free online book “the Epic of Mount Everest” by Sir Francis Younghusband.

The book is fascinating in that it not only vividly recounted how they organized the three expeditions, but also evaluated what decisions they made during the process. It showed that the expeditions were indeed tantamount tasks and everybody involved was responsible, invincible, and creditable. I will not repeat all those events as you can read them for free.But the last expedition during which the tragedy happened deserved comments.

In the beginning of May 1924, eight climbers, together with a couple supporters and almost a hundred porters reached the foot of Mount Himalaya.Unfortunately, the weather was terrible compared with that of the previous two expeditions.Nevertheless, nothing could deter these brave gentlemen.They struggled and finally established six camps up to almost 27000 feet.It was even more amazing that untrained porters successfully carried heavy loads to the farthest camp VI.There was no doubt that they could top the mountain if they wanted.They were also heroes in these expeditions.

The route to the Mount summit was sketched by Mallory based on the first two expeditions. It started from the camp VI, climbed over the North East Ridge, and then reached the summit.There were several hurdles along this route.The first is the Yellow Band which comprises layers of fragile rocks.The second is the First Step, a big rock cliff which needs careful maneuver to circumvent.The third is the Second Step which is an almost vertical 15 feet high rock cliff.It was impossible to climb without some tools. The Third Step and the summit pyramid were also difficult but nonetheless negotiable.

Eight climbers, two in each group, assaulted the Mount.The first two groups crossed 28000 ft line, overcome the Yellow Band, and even climbed over the First Step.However, they were extremely tired after climbing the First Step.Time and energy didn’t allow them to go any further.In a sense, they were also courageous to admit their limit and abandon the plan.However, they didn’t use oxygen which was thought to be the only way to reach the top.

The use of oxygen was debatable even within the team.People were skeptical about the apparatus.The oxygen tubes were unreliable, unwieldy, and most disastrously, heavy.Carrying 30 pounds on the back and climbing Himalaya was not much different from suicide. Nevertheless, after the first two attempts, Mallory and Irvine decided to give oxygen a try.

At the age of 38, Mallory was the ablest mountain climber in his time. He was the core of the three expeditions.He was the one who determined to set his feet on the top of Mount Himalaya. Irvine, on the other hand, was only 22 years of old and inexperienced.He never climbed above 20000 feet high.Because Irvine could manage the oxygen tubes, Mallory took him as a partner.With some determinations and little hope, they pressed on.The last time people talked to them was June 7^th, 1924.Only Odell, the supporting climber, saw two black dots moving on the ridge at 12:50pm the next day.Then they disappeared.

Did Mallory reach the summit?Odell thought he did but most people were not convinced.There were several reasons against Odell’s belief.Firstly, the Second Step on the Mallory’s route was impossible to climb with their primitive tools.In fact, when a Chinese team first climbed that stage, they had to step on each other’s shoulder to climb over the rock.It took them a long time to overcome this Step.Now people can climb it without difficulty due to a ladder left by a Chinese team. Secondly, even if Mallory overcome the Second Step miraculously, the next 800 feet was still out of his time limit.It might take him several hours to cover that distance, let alone there were still two more hurdles before them.Thirdly, as Odell had proved by himself, oxygen was not very useful.He could climb back and force twice to above 27000 feet in four days without using oxygen tubes.On the contrary, the heavy tubes might be too burdensome, thus hindering the climbing.Finally, later climbers never found any trace suggesting that Mallory reached the summit.Now people believed that they might reach the Second Step.After a few fruitless tries, they decided to go back.During the descending, tragically, they slid on the surface and died.

In 1975, a Chinese climber, Wang Hongbao found an “English dead” around the Chinese camp VI.Unfortunately, Wang died in an avalanche the next day after he told his findings to a Japanese climber in 1979. Thus in 1999, PBS organized an expedition to solve the mysteries associated with the 1924’s expedition.They set out to determine who the body was: Irvine or Mallory.

It turned out, he was Mallory.He obviously fell from around the Yellow Band. There was no note in his pocket indicating that he reached the summit. Irvine’s body was never spotted.

There were still many myths surrounding Mallory and Irvine. On the other hand, their failure may be masked by many later successes, despite that many climbers also died in assaulting the Mount. In these days, the climbing is more like personal excursions rather than national or mankind exertions.

Why would human beings want to go up there?There is nothing on the summit of Mount Himalaya except for a grand view of Tibet plateau.Himalayans worship the mountain.They never think of climbing it even though they are capable of doing it.

To the least extent, however, human beings were born with courage and curiosity.The original humans colonized almost all lands long before any civilizations.On the other hand, we human naturally tend to avoid hash environment, thanking for the evolution.It was the renaissance that rekindled human spirit.The confidence of human beings grew rapidly.They crossed oceans and found America. Furthermore, the industry revolution made westerners believe that they could do anything.They climbed Alps, reached the North and South poles, and at the beginning of twentieth century, targeted the third pole of the earth—the Mount Himalaya.

In a sense, the existence of the Mount posed a challenge to the arrogance of human beings.We want to conquer it, not only out of scientific curiosity, but also of inner desire and ambition, as Sir Francis Younghusband put it: “the mount may be high.But he will show that his spirit is higher.And he will not be content until he has it in subjection under his feet.”

To me, climbing the Mount Himalaya is, not the “I came, I conquered,” but “I tried, I succeeded.”

Several months ago, the BTK, a serial murderer in Wichita, Kansas, had been captured. As we all know, all serial murderers are psychopath. But in what way?

Keith R. Ablow, who himself is a well-known forensic psychiatrist, gave us one example of psychologically damaged serial murderer in his book “Psychopath”. This is a book that will chill your bone, unease your nerve, and end up assessing yourself critically.

Not surprisingly, the murderer was also a gifted psychiatrist, so do the hunters.It was a war between an evil psychiatrist and good psychiatrists.

There was no mystery who the serial high way killer was. In fact, the first chapter detailed the cruel killing and mental distortion the murderer experienced and enjoyed.Readers could give their own psychoanalysis on the murderer.The book was more likely for teaching purpose—how a highly intelligent man turned into a serial murderer.

As a traveling doctor, Dr. Jonah Wrens cruised across country, filling short-term vacancies from one hospital to another.He enjoyed working with new people in different places every several weeks.However, driving in the middle of night, the physical isolation and emotional loneliness made him overwhelmingly angry and thirsty for blood.On the other hand, he never killed persons selectively.He would approach a stranger gracefully and deceitfully.He wanted to know every bit of his/her life. If satisfied, he would not kill him/her.There was one occasion during which he made sex with his victim instead of killing her because she was nice and opened her heart to him completely. Unfortunately, most people would shun him away when approached too aggressively. He would be agitated and then kill them.The random killing relieved his tension, and most importantly, integrated his victims into himself.

As a dedicated child psychiatrist, Jonah showed his exceptional sympathy to his patients.His charismatic appearance and hypnotic voice always encouraged them to open their mind.For example, when he counseled the daughter of his last victim, he cried with her and convinced her that although her mother was dead physically, she would live inside her heart forever because they loved each other.Indeed, he thought all his patients were related to himself in blood. He loved his patients and literally lived in their pains.

After Jonah noticed that the forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Frank Clevenger, was hired to trace him, he wrote a public letter to the New York Times to challenge Frank.He knew Frank recently adopted a boy who was a victim of childhood abuse.He surmised, correctly, that Frank also had traumatic experience during his childhood.He further inferred, correctly again, that Frank’s love of forensic psychiatry and the adoption of the boy reflected his desire to dark side.He concluded that Frank was not much different from himself.

Frank was a brave man.He fought back by revealing his own childhood and by acknowledging his dark side.However, he pointed out that the vital difference between he and Jonah was that he himself turned his dark desire for good purpose, while Jonah turned his to Satan.

Interestingly, Jonah believed that God had a purpose for him.The Lord would save him by sending him an angel.He pleaded Frank to heal him.He described that he was abused by his father. For instance, he was beaten up severely by his father after his fourth birthday party.His Hot Wheels were crushed and he felt helpless.His beloved mother was also crying in the other side of room.Although this seemed reasonable, Frank and his son, Billy, discovered that Jonah was lying.It was not his father but his mother who abused Jonah.Frank believed that Jonah’s mother had psychological problems.She behaved like half angel and half devil.The conflicting characteristics of his mother confused Jonah and made him wish he had only the angel side of his mother.Frank encouraged Jonah to be strong and face the reality.

Jonah was ferocious and hurt.He started to make mistakes.He decapitated an old woman near the hospital he stayed, which confirmed Frank’s hypothesis that he was troubling with his mother.Jonah made another mistake to let a patient’s family took him back home ignoring the possibility that the patient would be beaten up again by his mother, a psychotic mother whom Jonah insightfully discovered.The FBI psychiatrist, Dr. McCormick, later pointed out to Jonah that he was projecting his patient to himself, and wishing the patient’s father would stand up for the boy.He would not be forgiven for the patient’s death.

Dr. McCormick’s revelation finally pushed Jonah into a psychotic state.He fled home to confront his mother, with an intention to kill her, only to find that she was a pure angel now. She regretted her mistreatment to him and pleaded for his forgiveness.Meanwhile, his home was surrounded by FBI agents.Jonah felt desperate but also relieved.He believed that God finally saved him.He committed suicide in front of Frank.There goes the whole story.

Although many of Freud’s ideas have been dismissed by contemporary psychologists, in particular by behaviorists, one idea survives and is even accoladed.That is, one’s childhood experience will have life-long effects on his/her mental development including personality and emotion. Most criminals suffered childhood abuse or had no parents to love them.The lack of love turned to the hatred to innocent people.Many, like Jonah Wrens, found their internal tension relieved from violence.The weakness in their personality leads them to offensive behaviors.

In reality, I believe that the results of psychological analysis for BTK are more complicated that that of Jonah.Nonetheless, in terms of religious beliefs, there were stark similarities between Jonah and BTK in Kansas.Both were religious people believing that God used the victims to teach him and the world lessons.Both internalized their thirsty for blood through religion.Jonah constantly sought for redemption, and BTK diligently served his church and treated himself as God Himself.

Fortunately, it seems that everybody has a good part in his/her heart, even among criminals.Frank Clevenger turned his dark desire for good use.In reality, an Atlanta woman, herself just reborn from misery, saved a rapist and murderer from going down to the hell by reading a religious book to him.The criminal admired her and believed that she was an angel sent from God to save him.He turned himself to authority, which testified that the mighty God is still living within us, hopefully.

Having written thus far, I felt this essay is not complete without some reflections on our own lives. Have we done anything wrong to our children?What if…?

Thank God, for most families do not abuse their children.However, no one is a saint.As a father myself, I know that there are occasions when parents are so despaired and irritated that they could not control their emotion.Sometimes my son refused to sleep while both my wife and I had too much things to do (e.g., final exams).We went mad at him and he cried hopelessly.It always ended up so miserably that we all completely exhausted in the middle of night, back studying for the whole night, resenting each other, and wishing we never married.Even though my son is big now, similar incidences still happen.This is the life, as I always told my wife and myself.

Children are very sensitive.They can sense something is happening and parents are ignoring them.The fear of being abandoned grasps their minds but they don’t know how to express it.Parents don’t know how to communicate with him either (and often children could not understand it).I don’t know how this kind of impulsiveness will affect child’s development.However, I believe that if the traumas are severe enough, they may have unwanted effects.

When I looked inside my heart, back as far as when I was four years old, I find there are only very few incidences I can remember, and some are indeed heartbreaking.I remember that I was always very sad and lonely because no kid wanted to play with me partly because there were not many kids around, partly because I behaved differently from others. I didn’t like physical activities such as fighting and running around.I didn’t play dirty mud and stones which were almost the only stuff you could do in a rural place.I recall that I overreacted when my older sister started her school.We had a fierce fight in her first school morning.I tore her books and kicked her like a mad boy.Surely, my father spanked me but luckily I didn’t remember how badly he hit me.Superficially, I might be jealous of my sister because she could go to school while I had to stay at home.Deeply, I might fear of losing her because she was the only companion during most of the day. Retrospectively, this, I believe, may cause my forever longing for friends but always failing to establish and maintain friendship (I found this is a characteristic of many giants too, e.g. Benjamin Franklin and our Chairman Mao).

Fortunately, all my bad memories, beside unreasonable hunger, are at this level, not traumatic enough to trigger my dark side.Furthermore, there seems to be more happy moments than miserable ones.

Nevertheless, childhood traumas are not easy to heal.In fact, even happy memory can have profound influences.All my childhood memory, good or bad, are associated with extraordinary events.Those happy incidences were mostly resulted from indirect deprivation.For example, I still remember the joy of eating meats and trying new cloths at every new year eve and my parents’ hearty laughter during that time.It was registered in my memory as happy events not only because it was happy but also because it was the compensation for the lasting deprivation.They constantly remind me to be frugal.This further leads my inclination to the over-compensation to my son.I am now too liberal to my son’s desire for toys and books.Meanwhile, I kept warning him not wasting my money. I am not sure how this will affect my son (I am implementing money management training for him now).

I wish there will be no major traumas inscribed in my son’s mind.I recently threw a lavish birthday party for him (admittedly, it cost me almost $1000, which also left a memory in my mind).He seemed very happy about that.I hope that happy feeling will stay in his memory forever.

Many of us who earn a living by sitting in front of a computer barely notice the people who clean up the office mess, vacuum the carpet, and hand the lunch pack in the dinning service sector. When confronted, we usually offer a mindless greeting –“how are you” to them, and sure enough, we get a smile– “pretty good. How about you” and so forth. We then assume that they are really fine. They are always around, cheering, caring, and hard-working. Nobody bothers to ask how they are really doing. In a society maniacally protecting people’s privacy, an honest question (and/or an answer) poses great unease on both sides.

In the US, “working” is a sacred word. Having a job, no matter what kind of job, indicates you are not lazy. You are a respectful person pursuing your American dream. Work hard, and you will success.There are numerous people who rise from low class to middle or even upper middle class, such as the experience of Della Mae Justice reported in the Thursday’s New York Time.As Benjamin Franklin pointed out and indeed practiced during his whole life: diligence is the key to success.There is no doubt about it.

Well, everybody works hard, at least in their own eyes. But is hard-working enough?

Barbara Ehrenreich decided to give a test. Her trying experience as a low-wage worker was recorded in her little book– “Nickel and Dimed –On (Not) Getting By In America”. The book not only revealed the invisible working poor, but also raised many questions the rich never thought of. Although the book may have little impact on the government policy, the seed has been planted.

Raised from a working class family, Barbara understood and deeply concerned the life of the working class. During her investigation, she worked as a waitress in Key West, Florida; a maid in Portland, Maine; and a seller in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Her targeted living standard included a car, enough healthy foods, and an affordable apartment with kitchen and bathroom, which was actually better than that of most working class families. With her $6-7 per hour payment, she encountered enormous difficulties to meet these needs even though she had no additional mouth to feed. For example, she had to work on two jobs to pay the next month’s rent (but she discovered she could not do two labor intensive jobs within a day). The money was just not enough. Furthermore, to work on the low-paid jobs, one might spend more money on apartment. When she was a waitress, she had to move from a $500 efficiency to a more expensive trailer just to be closer to the work and accommodate work shifting. She also temporarily lived in cheap motels where many poor people lived forever. The costs of motels, unfortunately, were higher than that of some apartments.

Working in low-paid jobs was not only physically damaging but also mentally challenging. For example, the activities working in retailer stores were unfortunately categorized as moderate physical activities in National Guideline. The Wal-Mart sellers, or “associates,” a word abused by the Wal-Mart, had to repeat the tedious work such as arranging and rearranging racks, folding and unfolding clothes, and picking up anything customers, or “guests,” had heedlessly dropped.Furthermore, Wal-Mart associates had to work 8 hours plus half an hour to stuff themselves and two 15 min breaks, thus rendering 9 hours in store but being paid for only 8 hours. They had to punch in and punch out every time they left their working zones. “Time-theft” was a “crime” which might cause a “write-up.” The author felt completely exhausted after 9 hours of constant position-on-move. But many of her coworkers held two or more jobs.Worse than that, the Wal-Mart intentionally brainwashed its associates. The new associates had to endure an 8 hour long and mentally demanding training session (and everyday there were new workers!). During the work, the associates had no power. The tension between manager and associates could be felt everywhere. The associates often had to hide away when caught a glance of an assistant manager.

Low-paid working people had no dignity. As a maid in Portland which is a mostly white town, she was distressed by the mistrust and demeaning behaviors from customers. She was even looked down by cashiers in convenient stores although they were paid similar wages and practically the same poor people. Scrubbing the floor, she figured, was a servant job.

The lost of dignity was also conspicuous in the Wal-Mart. The Wal-Mart had many job rituals which Barbara found ridiculous and irritable. There were meetings for associates in which people sometimes had to shout nonsense words such as “Gimme a W “. Sam Walton might believe that these rituals could bring associates together, establish their connections with the store, and boost their self-esteem for being working in the Wal-Mart. In fact, they were just brainwashing procedures. No matter how pride the associates felt, they still had to suffer the low payment.

What about the family lives of those real working poor? Barbara queried her coworkers. Not surprisingly, they all lived in poor. Some held two jobs to make a living. The physical damages from their demanding jobs were overlooked, and there was no or almost no health insurance for them. Most of her female coworkers were school dropouts, living with somebody and having a family to support.For example, one of her fellow maids had to conceal her pregnancy in order to keep working. Her husband “forced” her to work because they can’t afford one day off, despite that she felt physically unfit that day. After she had twisted her ankle, she had to pretend she was fine, and even angry with Barbara’s overreaction. She was particularly pleased when her boss allowed her to take the next day off.

Furthermore, it was ironic that many of those working poor believed that the tortuous jobs were their lives. They were used to their jobs and lived on them. When the author worked as a Wal-Mart associate, she also developed a psychological attachment to the woman cloth zone with a false impression that she was in charge of them.Many of her fellow maids in Maine also believed that the maid job was the best they could have—relatively secure and fairly paid. That’s the way of their lives, they concluded, subconsciously.

Is there a way out? The author reasoned that there should be a union to protect associates in the Wal-Mart. She also believed that the government failed to support the working poor, and the whole society largely ignored the existence of these people. However, the author didn’t give explicit answers on how to fix them except for alluring welfare systems such as those in Canada and Scandinavia countries. However, currently more than 12% of Americans are in poverty and more are the working poor. Some economists figured that $30,000 was the minimum to support a family of three, with no luxuries such as decent child day care. Given the average payment of $6-7 per hour, it seemed that the working poor had no way out!

Therefore, for most low-paid working people, they don’t see any future for them but just keep on working to meet their daily needs–feeding themselves and their families. Unfortunately, the author didn’t delve further about their family members. We don’t know whether they indeed had any hopes, or whether they put their hopes on their children.

What is the possible future for individuals, especially children to avoid the nightmare their parents are suffering? As far as I can see, the only route for the low class members to move up to the middle and above class is through education. People living in the US are fortunate enough to have free education till high school; and there are ways to replenish themselves with college education. In fact, people like Della Mae Justice did just that. She was a hard working student in public schools and obtained a law degree from U of Kentucky. She was now working decently and living comfortably.

However, there are problems in education. It is well known that poor children attend inadequate schools. They also hang out together which negatively reinforce their beliefs that there is no hope for them. They are doomed, as many have complained. They are rejected by the society and the government, which is probably true. The reality tells us that a large percent of children from working families end up no better than their parents.

Having said this much, I really don’t know whether the society is largely responsible for the oppressive situation in the working poor, or those poor individuals should be blamed. Maybe the working poor are structurally important in the society, as some sociologists would believe. There have to be some people working on things rich ones normally don’t do. The menial functions the poor people performed are indispensable for the stability of the society. That is, the lives of the working poor also have a purpose: SERVE THE PEOPLE!

Postscript:

I would like to give some reflections on myself. I am blessed to be born in a family that values education and never gives up hopes. In a once-small town, my family was different—in the sense that we sacrificed opportunities of earning ready money in a booming economical development. We did have financial trouble because education was never cheap. In fact, I was the most costly living creature in my family. I attended one of the best middle schools in my province which meant to live in a school twenty miles away from home. My older sister involuntarily terminated her education because she didn’t do very well and had no hope of entering a college. Even with that, she had more education than most of her peers. Another reason was (and my sister firmly believed) that because I did extremely well, my father had to sacrifice my sister and save money for my college, almost 100% sure in either Shanghai or Beijing. With a meager income, my parents managed to ensure my whole education, although retrospectively, they must have lived in a desperate life—or put in another way, a frugal life. Nevertheless, after having suffered for more than half of a century, my parents can finally enjoy their lives. They are still not rich but financially secure thanking to my fathers’ previous iron-bowl job and their children’s potential contributions. They are both physically and mentally healthy. In fact, given practically no health insurance for them, they can still afford expensive diagnostic exams before figuring out how much the exams will cost—a strategy actually save money in the long run.In particular, they don’t have to worry about their children and grandchildren. Their jobs are finished. As quoted from my aunties: they are the happiest and the most relaxed old people in the whole town.

These days, I am rereading the book “Benjamin Franklin: An American life” by Walter Issacson. The witty Ben Franklin is a typical example who was born in humble but achieved greatness. Although Benjamin Franklin engraved himself as “a printer”, he was not only a successful businessman who retired at the age of forty-two, a success envied even by most people today, but also one of the most important figures in the American history—a deft diplomat, a great scientist, and an earnest patriot.

However, Benjamin’s human side is probably more inspiring than his great achievement. He had the same weakness we often find in ourselves; but he also possessed all merits we look up to. His intriguing characteristics serve as a mirror—everybody can find himself through it.Most importantly, his way to success is a practical and exemplary road for all humble people.

Probably the most admiring characteristic of Benjamin was his diligence. Born in humble, he had only two years of formal education. He taught himself almost everything including writing, and wrote a lot. His voracious reading made him one of the top scientists and thinkers of his era.

The key to Benjamin’s success lies in his practical mind, or unprincipled mind as some taunted. For example, he deceived his former employer so that he could start his own printing business. He would haul papers along the street to impress his neighbors. He wrote “letter to editors” to his own paper to critique or praise his own writing.

His practical attitude was the most conspicuous when negotiating with England about tax treaty and tea fight in Boston, establishing alliance with French which ensured the success of the independence war, and moderating the independence and constitution conferences. His vocabulary certainly didn’t include stubborn.

He was a weak man in heart but morality never bothered him. His attitude towards women was controversial if not ignoble. His illegitimate son was a product of his joyful experience before marriage. He wrote indecent letters publically defending adultery. His advice on why a young man should marry an older woman was certainly disgraceful.He also lived a dual life: one family in England and another in Philadelphia. To some extent, he was an irresponsible husband, father, and lover, despite he strongly advocated family values.

Furthermore, he always had a light mood to such extent that no one knew exactly when he was serious. He wrote a formal letter to a French friend requesting a scientific study on farting. He proposed a sermon before every session during the constitution conference although he himself was not a church goer. His way of negotiating with French irritated John Adams who was a steadfast puritan.

Nevertheless, Benjamin’s success was built on his belief that achieving wealth and helping others were God’s good wills. He valued outcomes more than process. He worked hard on his own way caring little about frivolous morality. His life had a purpose—serving himself and his fellow citizens.

Then where did this belief come from? One has to trace back to the Protestant reformation. The Calvinism believed that God’s grace was reflected in the worldly property. To glorify God, one had to work hard to achieve success. The more wealth, the more success. On the other hand, those poor were rejected by the God. No mercy to them.

Max Weber first attributed the origin of capitalism to this religious faith. According to Weberian view, “life chance” is related to hard work, education, and beliefs. In fact, this view is still held in most Americans. In a meritocratic society, everyone can live up to his/her potentials if he/she works hard enough.

“Equal opportunity” is essential in the American dream. However, all people are equal, but some are more equal than others (George Orwell). If one is born in an upper middle class, he/she will have better opportunities in education and family and network support than those born in low middle class. They start from different rungs in the social ladder. Some just have to work much harder than others to achieve the same level of success, and unfortunately many times that is not possible. Benjamin Franklin was a rarity. That’s why we admire him.

The ocean is fair, but only in the eyes of big fish.

The literate people are those who can read and write, while those illiterate ones are unfortunately labeled as ignorants. However, not many people realize that reading characters or alphabets are not biologically born to it. It is a technique we learn from rigorous training.

Research on reading difficulty, or dyslexia, can be traced back to nineteenth century. An English doctor reported several children who were extremely “stupid”–who could not be taught to read and write. However, the understanding of dyslexia is a modern science. It is not until 1970s and earlier 1980s that researchers fully understood the mechanism of reading. That is, one needs to learn how to link phonetic sound to visual written alphabets. A staging framework was proposed based on observations from children’s learning to read.

Basically, children first learn how to speak. Many sounds and associated meanings are processed and stored before they start to read. The broca’s area in dominant side (mostly left brain for right-hand people, not sure about left hand people, for example myself :-)) is actively involved in this stage. When time comes to learn to read, normal children will relate those characters or alphabets to the familiar sound–through sound to meanings and to text. For normal children, a word is visualized as a whole thing, and the related information such as pictures around the word help the mechanical process from sound to word, and word to meanings. It is not uncommon for parents to discover that a child who knows the word “that”, which has no visual meaning, in one picture book, but fails to recognize it in another book. Nevertheless, by mechanically associating the sound of “that” with the alphabets, children store a fairly large vocabulary before knowing how to pronounce the sound of each syllabus. That is why parents need to read aloud to their children, in particular read with them.

The breakthrough occurs when children realize that the alphabets have phonetic rules and intentionally apply these rules in reading. During this stage, the vocabulary expands exponentially. After grade 3, most normal children have developed to such a level that there is no explicit need to read aloud words to understand the meaning of the text. At the same time, the Wernicke’s area, the semantic processing area also develops progressively to facilitate the reading process. This new functional area in left brain and vast connections among brain areas which deal with sounds, text, meanings, and semantic process are established. A shortcut from text to meanings is created (presumably in werniche’s area). One should note that boys are more likely to activate only the left brain during the first stage of reading, while girls can activate both sides of brain, which is why there are fewer dyslexia children in females than in males.

However, for those dyslexia children, they have difficulty to associate the text with sound, in particular those words with no physical pictures such as “that” and “is” (as also the case for many normal children). Further, the semantic area is not well established in these children, although the understanding and thinking process (in other brain areas) are not impaired. It should be note that after carefully training, most of them will create somewhat compensation in the non-dominant brain. Therefore, many dyslexia children experience the slowness of reading, but are good at abstract thinking and visualization. Their intelligence is not impaired.

Nevertheless, the above theories, confirmed by numerous studies, are proposed and tested in people who speak phonetic languages such as English. An unsettled question arises: what about those who don’t speak phonetic languages, for example Chinese people?

A recent article in Nature examined this issue. Their functional magnet resonance imaging (fMRI) experiments concluded that there are culture differences in learning process and in activated brain areas. It is not surprising considering the great plasticity of brain. Although Chinese language has been developed into a morphosyllabic system, the segments of a Chinese character have no inherent meanings related to the whole character (for most Chinese characters). The reading process may require three different activities from sound to the meaning of words: phonology, orthography and semantic meanings, while the orthography is less important in English.

In that study, the reaction time for two homophonic characters was impaired in dyslexia Chinese children, thus confirming the phoneme theory that the link between sound and text is impaired among them. That there is no difference of accuracy of meaning between normal and dyslexia children further supports the theory that the understanding and thinking process is not impaired. In addition, brain imaging revealed that several brain areas involved in Chinese reading, and dyslexia Chinese children have several areas impaired, in particular the left middle front gyrus, the visual word form area that serves orthographic-to-semantic integration. Nevertheless, this research is a significant addition in understanding reading process and dyslexia.

What are the implications to common Chinese people who are struggling in English? Not much. If one can read and write Chinese without difficulty, one can read and write English with ease too. In fact, brain areas and activities for learning Chinese may be supersede the functional areas associated with learning English. All connections are well established in normal Chinese readers. It is possible that Chinese people may have more advantages in learning English than those English speaking people learn Chinese. In fact, most Chinese students in the US have no difficult listening, reading, and comprehending English within months after their arrivals.

Then why do many people feel so dismayed in learning English? Based on my experience, the difficulties lie in the semantic part during speaking and writing process. The large English vocabulary and mechanical composition of them should not be difficult for most normal people, as it is evident that many Chinese students can overcome the vocabulary hurdle in merely several months, although the subtlties of words are still difficult to master. However, English, and many other phonetic languages, have a very complicate grammatic system. Speaking and writing in English require one to pay attention to details such as plurals, small words, and grammartic consistency. The subtle differences in meanings among words are beyond the phonetic realm. Chinese adults literally reconstuct a whole new system to use English. There is a great confusion in brain areas that deal with semantic meanings. In addition, the fine details of wording and grammars take a life long time to overcome. Even for a proficient English native speaker, grammatic errors are unavoidable. Because adults’ brain areas are fixed to some extent, it takes a longer time to master these fine parts for Chinese. On the other hand, the grammar is not a big issue in Chinese language. Very few native Chinese speakers struggle with Chinese grammar.

Even though the outgoing brain part such as Broca’s area is normal, and indeed there is a lot of information inside the brain, because the confusion is inside the semantic part of brain, one typical problem in Chinese English is that all the words in a sentence are correct, and most are accurate, but the grammar is incorrect. This puzzles the native speakers because their brain can’t process the disconnected words without grammar. Many Chinese students find it frustrating and inhibiting after hopeless attempting to arrange the same words in different erroneous ways.

A few final words. I found the book “overcome dyslexia”, written by Sally Shaywitz is very interesting. Although my son is actually way ahead of his peers in reading, I still found the theories scientifically presented in this book are very informative and enlightening. In addition, the book prescribes a detailed process and associated materials to help normal children start to learn and be a proficient reader. I highly recommend this book to all serious parents. It clarifies many puzzling questions during Child’s learning process.

“Saturday” is not a light reading. In fact, I felt sort of relieved when I finally closed the book. Admittedly, I’ve never heard of Ian McEwan. My impression of British literature was from Shakespeare drama, Victorian writings such as from Jane Austin and George Elliot, or stuff like Twin Cities, Jude and so forth, but not many modern novels. Surprisingly, “Saturday” shared many elements with these traditional works: theatrical, mind probing, and dryly humorous.

“Saturday” is indeed a marvelous novel. Ian McEwan deftly directed readers through the seemingly trivial activities of a neurosurgeon, Henry Perowne, in February 15, 2003. The journey was accompanied by serious thoughts and viewpoints about politics, family, and life itself.

There were several interwinded threads or themes throughout the book. The first thread was politics. The novel opened with Perowne’s keen observation during the earlier morning. A problematic plane was heading towards the Heathrow airport. The instinct link between plane and 9/11 made him feel unease. Fortunately, it was nothing but an emergency landing. Nevertheless, the seed of politics was planted at the very beginning.

February 15, 2003 was also a special day. It coincided with the largest protest in London against invading Iraq. However, Perowne was not moved by the demonstration. He even felt somewhat irritated when crossing the blocked street. He drove a silver Mercedes, had a meaningful life, and enjoyed a happy family. He loved peace and hated terrorism. When arguing with his daughter about the incoming war in Iraq, he made it clear that invading Iraq might be good for the Iraqis. Saddam had to be removed sooner rather than later. The conclusion on this topic must reflect the author’s opinion. That is, if the war seemed beneficial in the current situation, we should go for it. Future problems should be addressed later.

The second thread was the dullness of middle life and fear of aging. Despite the wealth and achievement Perowne enjoyed, he felt something terrible growing relentlessly on him. For instance, after the plane illusion was resolved, the sex with his wife was quick and unromantic, with no preamble and in missionary position.

Furthermore, although the squash game with his colleague during the morning was boring, both participants took it seriously. As a middle age person, the exhausting exercise provoked his fear for the incoming frailty with age. It was strengthened during the subsequent visit to his mentally destroyed mother. He mused profoundly about life during the whole day.

The thread of family was also weaved intricately throughout the whole plot. Perowne was a rarity in modern society for his prolonged love with his post-menopausal wife who was also a successful lawyer for a newspaper. His son, Theo, was a talented musician, and his daughter, Daisy, was a prominent poet. She already had a poem book ready to be published. To Perowne, family was not an abstract concept.

His fulfillment of family obligations was excellent if not impeccable. He made sex with his wife and called her during the day. He attended his son’s rehearsal and appreciated his son’s new song. Even though he didn’t like literature, he read many books his daughter assigned to him. He visited his old mother despite that she could not recognize him. He hid his dislike to his father-in-law and showed respect to him. In addition, he prepared a hearty dinner enthusiastically for the family reunion.He was indeed a family man.

Another interesting theme was Perowne’s view about literature. As a surgeon, he never had time sit down and read novels. He found that even those masterpieces Daisy assigned to him wasted his time and slowed his mental process. He did read her poems but failed to recognize the poem she was reading. However, during the life-threatening moment when the street guy, Baxter, was about to destroy his family, the power of literature, illustrated by his daughter’s poem, saved his family. It also changed Perowne’s view about literature.

The central theme in “Saturday” was about a man whose personalities were sure the most interesting. Perowne was a calm, intelligent and resolute man. In handling a car accident during the detour to his squash game, he escaped a physical threat using his medical knowledge.However, his authoritative manner humiliated the unfortunate street guy Baxter.

Baxter had Huntington disease which made his emotion in a constantly shifting mode. He traced his car to his home and kidnapped Perowne’s wife. At this critical time, Perowne stayed in calm. His eye contacts towards his wife, his son, his daughter, and his father-in-law assured them that he had a plan in his mind. The climax of the novel unraveled when Baxter forced Daisy to undress herself and read a poem to him. Miraculously, Baxter was completely transformed by the touching poem. He requested Perowne to show him the paper about a new trial on Huntington’s disease. Perowne, with the help from Theo, grasped the opportunity to defeat Baxter. However, Perowne felt that it was his responsibility to save Baxter who had severe brain injury during the fight. In his heart, he inclined more to forgiveness rather than to revenge.

A busy Saturday ended with another quick sex and more thoughts. Perowne’s view of life and world was strengthened. The future would be just fine. The only thing we needed to do was to adapt ourselves to this changing environment.

Is that true?

Ha Jin is one of few oversea Chinese who deserve my sincere admiration for their incomparable experience, hard work, and the celebrated achievements. Last week, his new book—“War Trash” won the PEN/Faulkner prize, which firmly established him as one of the most prominent writers. His novel “Waiting” also won this prize in addition to the National Book Award four years ago.

Similar to his previous works, Ha Jin successfully depicted a tragedy in the “War Trash”. This time it was POW life experienced by a Chinese in the Korea War. Yu Yuan, a graduate from the prestigious Huangpu Military Academy, participated in the Korea War without knowing much about Korea. Frozen dead bodies, regular bombs, and ruthless killings frightened the unwilling soldier. Yu Yuan was in the unfortunate 180 division which entered the war in later stage but was completely smashed by U.N. allies due to misleading commands from high-ups and also its incompetent commanders. He was wounded and captured by U.N. allies. Unlike most of his comrades who were illiterate, he was college educated and proficient in English. He developed a good relationship with a (female) doctor who saved his left leg. Even in the prisoner camp, both communists and pro-nationalists valued his abilities. He was treated relatively well during his POW life.

Under the illusion that he would reunite with his fiancée and take good care of his mother, Yu Yuan had a strong mind to return home. Therefore, he was tattooed by pro-nationalists and was enticed to go to Taiwan, while the communists instructed him to stay with them. Even though he involved in many fights in the communist-controlled camp, he was considered useful but not indispensable because he was not a party member and another communist prisoner also knew English. He was marginalized and eventually sacrificed by the communist party. Nevertheless, Yu Yuan managed to grasp the last opportunity to return China. As we all know, those who repatriated (about 7,000 out of 20,000 POW) were treated as “dregs of society”. Thanks to his education, Yu Yuan was able to live as a middle school teacher and uneventfully survived the following “revolutions”.

The story had a sense of reality due to its well mixed facts and imaginations. The conflictions between communists and pro-nationalists, the mistreatment of prisoners by guards, and the camp riots were heartbroken.For instance, for fear of being abandoned by the home country and to attract international attentions, the communist POWs hopeless organized many camp rebellions: the kidnap of a US general, the rise of national flag in National day, and many (not-so-) trivial conflictions between guards and prisoners. In this novel, Ha Jin did a marvelous job to make the story look real.

I was also impressed by the author’s treatment on issues such as the justification of the war itself. The author was apparently reluctant to show his opinion on the involvement of Chinese army during the Korea War.

Although this novel was intended to probe the weakness of human beings, unfortunately, the author opted not to reveal the mind of communist prisoners. From my point of view, it is more interesting to understand how a communist prisoner can manage to hold the communism ideology while struggling against the unfortunate reality. In this novel, there were ample opportunities to explore this issue. For example, in the episode of raising the national flag during the National Day, you may wonder why the communists wanted to organize this fruitless rebellion in the oppressive camp. Why was everybody so enthusiastic about raising flags? How did people maintain high spirits when facing unnecessary deaths? Many communists were brainwashed to such extent that they indeed believed that non-communists were bad people. Many had accepted that their lives were not important compared with the grand aim of liberating the whole world. Many communists and their followers were more than willing to sacrifice their lives for purposes beyond their comprehensions, as a famous slogan goes: “everybody is a nail in socialism revolution”. In this sense, the reflection by Yu Yuan was superficial and sometimes ridiculous. The author’s choice might reflect his dislike of communism (and China in general), as was evident in his writing.

Reality is crueler than petty thoughts. POW experience, particularly those in the foreign wars, is on top of most people’s heads. Ha Jin has provided us a compelling story in an unusual perspective.

It is said that the “War Trash” may be Ha Jin’s last novel about China. I hope this is not true, for his novels are apparently well received by western society.

“Oh man, what a dumb question. Everybody knows it is for fun.”

Hey, I hear your laughing. Cut it out! My topic is hard science, OK? If you are not comfortable with this topic or anti-evolution, please feel free to entertain yourself with something else in my blog such as diet and physical activity.

A cursory reflection on human sexuality tells us that our human beings live mostly in monogamy (even among most traditional tribes in Africa), and can enjoy sex at almost anytime anywhere (what a great pleasure). In addition, most women are willing to engage in sexual activity even during infertile periods, for example during pregnancy, lactation, or after menopause. The purpose of sex seems more likely for recreation rather than for reproduction.

It is instructive to compare human sexual behaviors with those of our closest relatives—gorillas and chimpanzees whose ancestors were the same as ours about 9 million years ago. In African jungles, gorillas live in small groups in which one male fertilizes several females (called harem), while chimpanzees live in big groups in which both male and female chimpanzees can freely copulate with the opposite sex (called promiscuity).Furthermore, both female gorillas and female chimpanzees accept sex only during ovulation periods. It seems that gorillas and chimpanzees copulate solely for reproduction. Additional analyses in other primates yield a more confusing picture: some live like gorillas while others live like chimpanzees.

There is another not so obvious phenomenon in primate sexuality. Without modern knowledge and techniques, human beings–both men and women– lack the instinct to detect the exact time of woman’s ovulation, while many female primates can show some visible signs to attract males during their ovulation periods, such as swollen or red derrieres.

Critical readers may wonder why I target woman’s ovulation and sexual receptiveness instead of something about man. Well, we must hold the assumption that men are “cheaper” in dispersing their genes at anytime. In fact, almost all male animals tend to philander with other females after discovering their successful fertilization. On the other hand, women invest much more than men do in this gene transmission business. Pregnancy, lactation, and daily caring for her kids consume too much time and energy in women.

Anyway, in human beings, the concealed ovulation and continuous sexual receptiveness in women, together with monogamy must have something to do with kids because it takes many years of growth for a kid to be independent. Mothers are unlikely able to raise children without some aids. Since men are such irresponsible creatures, it falls on women to figure out ways to retain their men. One naive theory postulates that if a woman can offer sex to his man whenever he wants, the man is likely to stay with her to protect kids. However, this sex-for-family theory is overtly superficial because primates like gibbons don’t need continuous sex to maintain monogamy, while others such as chimpanzees and bonobos have more sex than human beings do, but they live in promiscuity.

Furthermore, human species were evolving towards large groups in which all couples have to cooperate to survive. Adultery is always a challenge in large groups (even in modern society, 20% Americans acknowledged this type of sin). The concealed ovulation in women must have some merits in evolution.

Therefore, some theorists started with the concealed ovulation in women to examine human sexuality. One theory (proposed by Alexander and Noonan) suggests that without knowing a woman’s exact ovulating time, a man has to have sex continuously with her until she gets pregnant. He also has to stay home to guard his mate because any intrusion may yield fertilization. On the other hand, if he himself intrudes other couples, his effort is likely wasted because the chance that the other women ovulate at the time of copulation is low, while he left his mate unguarded. Therefore, the best strategy is to stay at home and focus on one woman.This facilitates the development of coparenting which greatly increases the survival of their offspring.

Keen researchers also notice that infanticide is common in animals. A non-biological father may abandon or kill his stepchildren because they don’t bear his genes. For example, imagining a human tribe in which infanticide is a social norm, if a man died of accidents, diseases, or fights, his children would be killed or abandoned by his successors. It is a big waste for both the tribe as a whole and the mother’s heavy investment on the kids. However, if every man may be the kid’s father, the kid is likely to be protected by the whole tribe. To accomplish this, a woman needs to have sex with as many men as possible before pregnancy. Therefore, by hiding her ovulatory signs, she can copulate with many men. Every copulation may lead to fertilization, and thus every involved man may think the kid has his genes. This theory (suggested by Sarah Hardy) explains the concealed ovulation and promiscuity very well. Unfortunately, our human beings live in monogamy.

Is it possible both theories have some elements of truth? We need data to test them.

Let’s take a look at our relatives again. Among 68 high primate species, ten of eleven monogamous species have concealed ovulation and the rest one only exhibits slightly visible ovulatory signs. Does concealed ovulation lead to monogamy? No. Out of thirty-two species with concealed ovulation, twenty-two species don’t live in monogamy but instead in promiscuity or harems. Further cross-sectional analyses suggest that ovulatory visibility may have nothing to do with mating system, and vice versa. Now we stuck.

A better analysis suggested by Sillen-Tullberg and Moller is to construct a family tree for these primates. It turns out that both mating system and ovulatory visibility switched back and forth several times over the evolution process in primates. By timing these switches, we can conclude that concealed ovulation evolved from promiscuity or harems, while monogamy never evolved in species with boldly visible ovulation. It is possible that the pathway to monogamy is from promiscuity/harems to concealed ovulation and then to monogamy.

Inferred from the family tree, the common ancestor of human beings, gorillas, and chimpanzees might have harem mating system and slightly visible ovulation. Because human species were evolving towards big society, women evolved concealed ovulation, thus permitting them to mate with many men to ensure the survival of their babies. This trait might lead to the ability of continuous sexual receptiveness in women. Armed with this weapon, women might then entice and lock strong men to protect their children. Continuously copulating with the strong men also assured them that they were endorsing their own genes. Families were then born. Together with fast intelligence development, monogamy was on the way.

On the other hand, chimpanzees might reinvent the promiscuity with visible ovulatory signs, while gorillas might keep the tradition of our ancestors. It serves them well.

Natural selection has no specific goal except for preserving genes. As the flip-flops of mating system and ovulatory visibility have demonstrated, a trait developed in one situation may be used for other purposes or may be dropped in other situations. Evolution is never a straight line.

Thank you for reading thus far, I hope you appreciate the origin of recreational sex. Needless to say, there is more to learn why sex is fun. Why don’t men nurture babies? Why do women live for a long time after menopause? I recommend the little book “why is sex fun? — the evolution of human sexuality” by Jared Diamond. For a general idea of genes and evolution, the book “the selfish gene” by Richard Dawkins may be of your interest.