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Embryonic humanity It was with mixed feelings that I read your thoughtful and sobering article (“Calibrating hope”). So much hope is pinned on stem cell research. Still, I have to wonder how much this will cost our sense of humanity. Embryonic life replicates, grows, matures, and keeps on giving every sign that it is a living organism. As such, it ought to be treated with great care. Tampering with it can only lead to a transformation of what it means to be human. Yong Lee ’81 Nuclear reaction Preparedness is not going to get us where we want to go. It’s not just that the current administration isn’t going to act. The problem is systemic. Look at New Orleans. The city was at great risk due to inadequate levees. But an ounce of prevention was not affordable. Alan Dechert ’78 To wrap our minds around the proposed inevitability of a nuclear attack implies that all we can do is pick up the pieces. Woe unto us. Apparently, many in power are not clever enough to stop stockpiling nuclear weapons and work for preventative measures to head off such a disaster. Sharon Alexander Ph.D. ’76 I am appalled to read the opinion piece masquerading as a research report, starting with the editor’s comment about “Islamicists bearing backpacks” and continuing on to Mr. Dowie’s article. Nuclear proliferation and terrorism is a major threat, and all governments and peoples should unite to forestall this. Articles such as this that are used to support existing biases and deride a religion are not helpful. Alta Khan ’76 Kerry Tremain responds: As I felt the context made clear, the phrase “ghost dancing Islamicists bearing backpacks” referenced a destructive ideology based on a strain of radical Islamic belief, not the Muslim religion, to which no offense was or is intended. This type of writing promotes the agenda of the Defense Department/ Pentagon (Corporate America, too), preparing citizens for the “costs” of the “war on terror.” The interdisciplinary team apparently did not choose to articulate any recommendation for preventing such an attack. Jim Mullins MSW ’79 J. E. Baylie MSW ’78 Harold Smith and Steve Weber respond: We designed and carried out the “Big Bang Project” precisely to supplement, not in any sense replace or undermine, the critical efforts of the U.S. government and others to prevent nuclear terrorism. Yet it would be irresponsible to place all bets on the hopeful notion that prevention will necessarily succeed. A responsible government must also prepare for the possibility that prevention might fail. Arms control theorists in the 1960s said that there were three goals of arms control: reduce the risk of nuclear war, limit the cost of the arms race, and minimize the damage should nuclear war occur. We believe that an updated version of these goals applies to the threat of nuclear terrorism. All three are necessary. As a physicist formerly with the Livermore Theoretical Group headed by Edward Teller, I was struck by the totally false statement by composer John Adams: “In 1945 Teller was still a protégé of Oppen-heimer.” Teller never was Oppie’s protege! He had fresh ideas as early as 1945 on how Los Alamos should proceed on thermonuclear research and weapons. Oppenheimer did not agree in 1945, and later tried hard to slow or block such research. Fortunately for our national security, President Truman overruled Oppie’s opinion. Rethinking insomnia Although I am grateful to California Monthly for interest in my research, I am concerned about a number of inaccuracies in your report (Praxis: “Tired? Get over it”). It is not my view that people with insomnia should simply “get over it” or that the problem is people with insomnia “fret about their sleepless-ness.” Nor do I think that insomnia is “not caused by caffeine, exercising late in the day, or failing to use the bed only for sleeping”—all of which can be causes of insomnia. My view on all these issues is guided by the research literature, which indicates chronic insomnia is a prevalent and highly distressing condition associated with many serious adverse consequences for the sufferer. None of the five bullet points claiming to present my solutions to chronic insomnia are correct. There are no quick and easy solutions, but there are effective treatments. The current treatment of choice, cognitive behavior therapy (CBT), is typically delivered over six to ten 60-minute sessions. Because of the complexity of the condition, a portion of patients remain sleepless at night and fatigued during the day after being treated. Accordingly, my research group has been working to improve CBT by learning more about cognitive processes (e.g., expectation, worry, attention) that we have shown maintain insomnia but are not currently tackled in CBT. Allison Harvey, acting associate professor, Department of Psychology The editors respond: The writer’s interview notes and review of Harvey’s papers do indicate that she implicates clock-watching, obsessing about feeling lethargic, and other cognitive issues as possible causes of chronic insomnia, and describes them as alternative explanations to—not replacements for—the more traditional list (excessive caffeine, etc.). But in our editing and titling of the article, the impression was left that the cure for these problems is to simply stop doing them, which could be read as trivializing insomnia. This was not our intention, and we thank Harvey for clarifying the issue. As she points out, her research is directed towards improving specific cognitive therapies for this difficult condition. Wake up and smell the roses The Rose Bowl game of 1938 was not the last time the Golden Bears came home to Berkeley as a winner. I was in the Cal rooting section of the Rose Bowl stadium in Pasadena on January 1, 1949. Late in the fourth quarter Cal was ahead 14 to 13. A Northwestern running back carried the ball but was tackled on Cal’s 2-yard line. However, the referee ruled the Northwestern running back carried the ball across the goal line for a “touchdown.” The Rose Bowl game was filmed. In slow motion, the Northwestern running back obviously fumbled the ball on Cal’s 2-yard line, and it rolled across the goal line and into the end zone, where a Cal defense man recovered the ball. William Dye ’51 The last Rose Bowl for the Bears was January 1, 1959. I know we didn’t exactly cover ourselves with glory against Iowa, but at least we got there. Elizabeth Ansnes ’62 My dad took me to the Rose Bowl game in 1938. When the game ended—with our victory—the entire alumni section stood and sang. At the age of 12, I remember telling my dad that even though we lived in Seattle, the singing of “All Hail,” with everyone joining in, determined in a great way my desire to attend Cal. Bob Jackson ’52 Cheers Commendations on the high level of intellectual content. Keep this up and the California Monthly will go from a “skim” to a “must read.” Jim Creighton ’63 I have read every issue of California Monthly since I graduated. The last one reached a new high of quality, scholarship, and reader interest. Ken Hayes ’66 Corrections Reader Arthur Dunlop ’47 notes that in “Recipe for Disaster” we reported that yellowcake is “pure uranium.” It is, as he points out, a milled ore made mostly of uranium oxide.We also indicated that centrifuges were a “succession of fine, porous barriers.” In fact, uranium is purified through porous barriers and later centrifuged. Credit for last month’s Twisted Title, “Typothalamus,” belongs to Jack Messick. |
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