Worth Nothing Research Articles

Architects, Bandits and Knights

Some quotations: «A new disaster has been added to pollution of the unique lake–it is cottage development of the coast». «The trouble is that the projects are realized without even being seen by architectural society. Including the objects on the coast of Lake Baikal. We took Sergey Kiselev to see one of such objects, it was a halfcompleted building. Like other Moscow colleagues he admitted that it was an obviously conceited excess. In general almost every object recently built in Listvyanka represents a burst of excess… What is happening here with architecture and urban planning is absolutely inadmissible». «Current capital development at Lake Baikal visually pollutes the coast, bringing alien elements to the landscape and view (for example, the cottages of pseudorussian style and cabin cars)». Acting as a client of architectural and design project Russian mafia has a number of individual characteristics. Firstly, an ordinary businessman is childishly confident that the architect's (or designer's) work is a very interesting and fascinating stuff. He believes that this work gives lots of pleasure and entirely consists of creative discoveries and triumph. By the way already ancient Greeks considered creativity to be a sort of Eros. So the mafia client is eager to take part in such a pleasant thing. In spite of expressing his wishes clearly and giving the way to the professional, the client strives for being both a participant and a coauthor of the project. At best he is constantly bothering the architect with many pieces of advice and «valuable suggestions ». At worst the project, which is already finished, approved and even paid, is altered by the client during the process of its realization, while the author is not even informed about it. The building completed, the shocked architect sees a monster that has arisen from his project as a result of «the editing». Secondly, any typical Mafioso finds it very important to persistently exhibit his aggressiveness and readiness to start the struggle end even to die. The cult of physical strength and defiance of danger is one of fundamental principles of the mafia corporate culture. The client's drive to provoke a quarrel and to explain «who is the boss» makes the relations between the architect and the client very peculiar. Thirdly, a productive labour interdiction is another important feature of traditional mafia culture. This view is a variation of the famous «idle class» ethos brilliantly described by Veblen Thorstein in his classic work. The ethics of the members of the idle class, which is also called by Veblen a «predatory class», forbids them to work or to be involved in any productive labour. Instead it allows them to fight, to govern the state and to go in for sport. From the point of view of the predatory culture there are only two types of people. The first one includes warriors, fighters and bandits, they arouse «fair» emotions of anger and fury as rivals or companionsinarms on the field of battle. The second type is represented by bastards, brutes and plough cattle, they are worth nothing but contempt. Most citizens' opinion on the building is of no importance. Only what the respected people of the same type, that is mafia «good guys», say (or think) about it is taken into account. The tendencies to erect such incongruous and ugly buildings on the coast of Lake Baikal can hardly be stopped easily and quickly. Those tendencies have very deep roots. They are based, though in a perverted and wry manner, on the old traditions of Siberian culture. So it is senseless to struggle, to forbid and to show anger and contempt towards an uncultured wilful client. As well as it is no good to have «what can I do for you?» attitude and to follow all the whims of the predatory class.

Архитекторы, бандиты и рыцари

Some quotations: «A new disaster has been added to pollution of the unique lake–it is cottage development of the coast». «The trouble is that the projects are realized without even being seen by architectural society. Including the objects on the coast of Lake Baikal. We took Sergey Kiselev to see one of such objects, it was a halfcompleted building. Like other Moscow colleagues he admitted that it was an obviously conceited excess. In general almost every object recently built in Listvyanka represents a burst of excess… What is happening here with architecture and urban planning is absolutely inadmissible».«Current capital development at Lake Baikal visually pollutes the coast, bringing alien elements to the landscape and view (for example, the cottages of pseudorussian style and cabin cars)».Acting as a client of architectural and design project Russian mafia has a number of individual characteristics.Firstly, an ordinary businessman is childishly confident that the architect's (or designer's) work is a very interesting and fascinating stuff. He believes that this work gives lots of pleasure and entirely consists of creative discoveries and triumph.By the way already ancient Greeks considered creativity to be a sort of Eros. So the mafia client is eager to take part in such a pleasant thing. In spite of expressing his wishes clearly and giving the way to the professional, the client strives for being both a participant and a coauthor of the project. At best he is constantly bothering the architect with many pieces of advice and «valuable suggestions ». At worst the project, which is already finished, approved and even paid, is altered by the client during the process of its realization, while the author is not even informed about it. The building completed, the shocked architect sees a monster that has arisen from his project as a result of «the editing».Secondly, any typical Mafioso finds it very important to persistently exhibit his aggressiveness and readiness to start the struggle end even to die. The cult of physical strength and defiance of danger is one of fundamental principles of the mafia corporate culture. The client's drive to provoke a quarrel and to explain «who is the boss» makes the relations between the architect and the client very peculiar.Thirdly, a productive labour interdiction is another important feature of traditional mafia culture. This view is a variation of the famous «idle class» ethos brilliantly described by Veblen Thorstein in his classic work. The ethics of the members of the idle class, which is also called by Veblen a «predatory class», forbids them to work or to be involved in any productive labour. Instead it allows them to fight, to govern the state and to go in for sport. From the point of view of the predatory culture there are only two types of people. The first one includes warriors, fighters and bandits, they arouse «fair» emotions of anger and fury as rivals or companionsinarms on the field of battle. The second type is represented by bastards, brutes and plough cattle, they are worth nothing but contempt. Most citizens' opinion on the building is of no importance. Only what the respected people of the same type, that is mafia «good guys», say (or think) about it is taken into account.The tendencies to erect such incongruous and ugly buildings on the coast of Lake Baikal can hardly be stopped easily and quickly. Those tendencies have very deep roots. They are based, though in a perverted and wry manner, on the old traditions of Siberian culture. So it is senseless to struggle, to forbid and to show anger and contempt towards an uncultured wilful client. As well as it is no good to have «what can I do for you?» attitude and to follow all the whims of the predatory class.

Here's Something Now, and: The Famous Dream of Sergius P., and: Lost Rudiments

Here's Something Now Songbird outside my window says: "Sweet enough. Sweet enough. Sweet, sweet, sweet." The artist's model, a florist from town, reclines on a broad window sill, facing the garden. Old sycamores, a sleeping owl, a neighbor tending his yard. From a distance, say where deer lie in shadows of tulip trees, she may seem a bowl of peaches, still life of terracotta, thatch and flowers. How much secret beauty there is in the world. There is the traveler in the tale who grew cold and sleepless on a stranger's couch, his spirit, thin. Who went barefoot and shaking to her bedroom door. If this were fiction, he might enter and be warmed. Might huddle next to her, her body kindling his heart and his groin. Might reach for her as if he cannot help himself. In such circumstances giants, heroes and others generously blessed may be overcome by sorrow. Might even ask their hearts to stop beating for the sake of the story. [End Page 90] On the first night home from his journey, a man looks at his wife on the other side of the bed. She has shaved her pudendum. She is weeping. What is the question here, and which of us will ask it? The Famous Dream of Sergius P. White wolves in the walnut trees and fresh cowflop to heal the princess' eczema. Miracle that a thousand sacks of rice fly after my darling in a flock, like geese. I have not slept in weeks for living in a fairytale; a neighbor wife is bending naked by a pool, the thief of peace. Call out the swan boats! Mine is the voice of Sancho Panza, pleading to be made governor of some small island. Or some bit of sky. In my tale the means of entry and escape is a small place in the wall disguised by watercress where a brook runs through. Clothe me in thrushes feathers. I will make a sound and call it singing. I will sigh, and call it prayer. [End Page 91] Lost Rudiments – for Nan Oslund Farady1942–1996 There was an ocean, everywhere. There was a turtle 12 feet long. No wonder stories linger of how the world began. Like fossils in arroyos of our songs. Outside the bitter river live horse-footed men. And infants, born clutching milky stones. There sits a man with a lion beside him. Giant fish swim through the trees. I come there sometimes in my heart to listen for your voice. St. Joseph of Cupertino, the aerial saint; you said he loved the Blessed Virgin, and so could fly, easy as Beryl Markham in her white silk blouse. The door of the temple is closed today, for there is war. I wonder if you see the tops of everything. And whether you look back to see yourself, asleep. Do you see how empty is this room where I sit by a window under stars, awake. The pond asleep, the endless mountains dark. Five million years ago on a bright morning, our kinfolk picked up pointed sticks and moved across the savannah from a dry lake toward a swift stream they had heard of. [End Page 92] Odor of sweat and dead fish filled their nostrils. A dollar was worth nothing. They had their sacred post, they were alive, and that was surely something as long as it lasted. They would not imagine, as you did, David Hume at prayer. Or Frollo the archdeacon falling from Notre Dame. Or us, teaching metal to fly and plastics to sing because we learned how. Do you know our hearts, you who are sky-clad now?

Guest Editorial: Reinventing the Wheels

Guest Editorial: Reinventing the Wheels

Conceptualizing the Writer-Reader Relationship in Business Prose

Writers achieve an appropriate writer-reader relationship in business prose not by merely switching from their own to the reader's viewpoint but by artfully interweaving multiple rhetorical and linguistic elements. The writer-reader relationship is expressed through the many possible combinations of vision and voice, which originate in the textual identities of the implied writer, the implied reader, and, sometimes, other characters. By combining multiple visions and voices, writers create what Bakhtin called intentionally hybrid, internally dialogic language that fulfills a social purpose by reflecting human relationships even when the subject matter is impersonal and technical. You-attitude is but one instance of such language and is not always the best choice. Texts written by Sherron Watkins, former vice president of Enron, illustrate how a writer's decisions about textual identities, vision, and voice may affect the course of corporate events in dramatic, unexpected ways. Keywords: narrative theory; implied reader; implied writer; you-attitude; dialogism; voice; tone; point of view; perspective; Enron ********** am incredibly nervous that we will implode in a wave of accounting scandals, Enron Vice President Sherron Watkins wrote in an anonymous letter to Kenneth Lay, chairman of the corporation. My eight years of Enron work history will be worth nothing on my resume, the business world will consider the past successes as nothing but an elaborate accounting hoax (see Appendix A). (1) These words began a chain of events that revealed a dramatic corporate scandal and ultimately led to the demise of not only Enron but also Arthur Andersen, its auditor. Investors lost money, employees lost jobs, and the business world lost public respect. Watkins's prophetic words became famous as Enron collapsed. But what makes these words interesting to those who study business language and its impact is the extent to which they violate a central principle of business communication: you-attitude, the expression of a relationship in which writers or speakers intentionally subordinate their priorities to those of readers or listeners. In trying to influence Lay to investigate further, Watkins focuses squarely on her own concerns, fears, and self-interest. To explore the complexities of the writer-reader relationship, in this article I apply concepts from narratology and linguistics to business prose. I address three questions: How should we conceptualize the writer-reader relationship in business prose? What choices must writers make when they express this relationship in a text? Why are such choices important in business practice? I assert that a complete analysis of the writer-reader relationship in business prose must go beyond the traditional concept of you-attitude, which oversimplifies the writer's options. The conceptualization I propose juxtaposes the metaphors of vision and voice in written discourse. I argue that writers achieve an appropriate writer-reader relationship not by merely switching from the writer's to the reader's viewpoint but by artfully interweaving multiple rhetorical and linguistic elements. Writers must define the textual identities of the characters implied in the text: the I, the you, and, sometimes, the others. These identities then lead to choices about whose vision and whose voice the text will reflect. Vision includes not only point of view but also perspective, distance, and focus. Voice--the instantiation of vision in words--encompasses metaphoric parallels with each aspect of literal voice: pitch, inflection, intonation, articulation, pace, and volume. Juxtaposing the implied reader's vision and the implied writer's voice creates what Bakhtin (1981) called intentionally hybrid, internally dialogic language, one form of which constitutes you-attitude. Whereas you-attitude is often considered the quintessential characteristic of good business writing, I assert in this article that this expression of a writer-reader relationship is not always desirable. …

Evaluation of the environmental contamination at an abandoned mining site

This paper reports the preliminary findings of an environmental survey carried out at an abandoned mining site. The wastes were stored in dumps with poor release control. The mining site had been active for over a century and was mostly exploited for its stibnite mineral. Quantitative analyses were performed on wastes, groundwater, surface water and air. Elements of concern were As, Cd, Hg, Pb, Sb, Sn and Zn. The results of tailing determinations indicated that Pb concentration remains almost constant in samples taken at various depths and that As and Hg levels are quite similar. Leaching tests demonstrated that element release was fairly low. With regard to element concentrations in surface water, particular attention should be given to As and Sb levels in the river and As concentrations in the pond. The high levels of As, Hg, Pb and Sb reported in tailings and groundwater may depend on both the presence of a geochemical aureole with elevated average background levels, and on the enrichment of metals in the stored tailings, due to processing. Among the airborne metal levels, the Hg concentration deserves attention. When considering element levels reported in solid and liquid matrices, particular emphasis should be given to As, Hg, Pb and Sb, since these are known to be long-lasting environmental pollutants that are toxic to most forms of life. They are also worth nothing as the disused mine is only a few km from the nearest town and close to areas used for agriculture and animal breeding. Exposure to the toxic agents can also occur for those workers still employed in the area near the mining site; this risk needs an adequate assessment.

‘Worth Nothing, but Very Wilful’; Catholic Recusant Women of Yorkshire, 1536–1642

In 1577 a survey of Catholics was taken by the Archbishop of York and the Queen’s commissioners. It recorded the name, place of residence, status and worth of those who refused to conform. Dorothy Vavasour of York was noted in these records as being ‘worth nothing, but very wilful’. It is this statement that provides the inspiration for an examination of the women of Yorkshire, as a group that were vital to the survival of Catholicism, yet who are often ignored.

The Execution of Civil Judgments in China

When judgements are not executed, the law is worth nothing. – “The masses”It is a staple of Chinese legal literature that the judgments of Chinese courts in civil and economic cases are plagued by a worryingly low execution rate. This perception should be taken seriously. When the President of the Supreme People's Court devotes significant space to it in his report to the National People's Congress, as did Zheng Tianxiang in 1988 and Ren Jianxin in subsequent reports, clearly something interesting is going on. Yet it would be a mistake to accept all reports at face value. A critical examination of the claims and the evidence can yield a richer picture of reality than has been presented by the literature so far.The issue of whether court judgments can be enforced is important for a number of reasons, among which is its bearing on the relationship between the legal system and the economic system. Laws, courts and court judgments are part of the institutional framework within which economic reform is being carried out in China. Obviously, the rules of the game have to change. But the move from a hierarchically administered economy to a primarily market economy means more than just changing the content of the rules. It implies a whole new way of rule-making and rule-enforcing.This article explores one particular way of making the rules mean something: the enforcement of a court decision that the implementation of a particular rule requires the performance of a particular act - typically, the delivery of money or goods.

Fluorescence Yield under X-Ray Surface Back Diffraction

Peculiarities of the X-ray standing wave technique, realized under two-wave and four-wave X-ray surface back diffraction are theoretically studied. It is shown that this technique, based on the registration of the yield of X-ray fluorescence or other secondary emission from the crystal due to the dynamical surface back diffraction of X-ray radiation, can provide both coordinate parallel to the surface in the crystal unit cell for impurity atoms deposited onto the crystal surface. Worth nothing is the ability of the technique proposed to fit not only perfect, but also mosaic crystals. [Russian Text Ignored.]

Antecedents of the Jewish‐Druze alliance in Palestine

Ever since the revival of the Jewish settlement in Palestine, connections between Jewish colonies and the adjacent Druze villages had developed on the local level. Country-wide and institutionalized Jewish-Druze dialogue commenced, however, only in 1930, following the establishment of the 'Joint Bureau for Arab Affairs' by the Jewish Agency and the Jewish National Council. The Joint Bureau was responsible for encouraging Jewish-Arab relations, and soon embarked upon creating bonds with the Druze in Palestine in the hope of eventually extending them to their brethren in Syria and Lebanon. In July 1930 the Bureau's agent in Damascus, Tuvia Ashkenazi, travelled to Jabal Druze and the Hauran to report on the situation in these regions. His principal impression was that a strong and stable French rule in the district was a paramount Zionist interest. The Druze, he wrote, do not like the Moslems, but they are likely to assist any Arab revolt and 'without the Druze, the Arabs are worth nothing'.1 The contacts of the Joint Bureau with Palestinian Druze notables began almost simultaneously. In July 1930 an Arab policeman was murdered by a Druze bandit in the Galilee. The district police, whose personnel was purely Arab, brutally raided the Druze section of the mixed village, Mrar, in a reaction reminiscent of the Ottoman era. Upon the advice of local Jewish friends, the Galilee Druze sent a deputation to complain to the chief inspector of police. While in Jerusalem the delegation, headed by Sheikh Salman Tarif, was welcomed and assisted by Itzhak Ben-Zvi, chairman of the National Council and co-director of the 'Joint Bureau'. Ben-Zvi introduced the emissaries to the senior police staff and other officials.2 Upon their departure, he wrote to Colonel Kisch, the director of the Jewish Agency political department:

Philosophy as I remember it: Locke

Locke was an English appearancist. An appearancist is one who believes that it is more important to look good than to be good because things are nothing but what they appear to be. The truth of an idea, like the beauty of a person, is only skin deep, superficial, and therefore, one never needs to go below the surface to get at it. Locke hoarded his ideas; he saved all of them, even those that were spent. He continuously inflated those that others devalued and therefore eventually placed infinite value on those that were worth nothing. He believed that all of us were born with completely blank minds and that they got filled by experience. His, however, had a slow leak. He argued that our senses pick up everything they come in contact with-that they see, hear, taste, feel, smell, or write about. Ideas, he said, arise from reflecting on all the junk that the senses collected. Whenever an idea came up, Locke put it down, usually on paper (Fig. 1). This was quite easy because none of them had a leg to stand on.

Costs of Treatment of Patients with Laryngeal Cancer

Increasing medical costs have become in Japan, as in other developed countries, a social problem of some importance. Knowledge of treatment costs is necessary to minimize these constantly spiraling fees. We studied costs of treatment of laryngeal cancer patients who were treated by various methods during a three year survival period. For radical treatment, the total costs for out patient and hospital treatment was less than or slightly over \1, 000, 000. One patient with recurrence, who died 18 months after the onset, had two or three times the expense of those who survived for three years. Laryngectomies in the United States cost more than three times the Japanese rate. At present 10% of the G. N. P. goes for medical expenses in the U. S., while in Japan the current figure is 5%. The basic hospital fees account for 30 to 50% of the total costs in both Japan and the U. S.. The out patient clinic costs are about 10% of the total, including follow-up for three years. Treatment costs which include surgery, anesthesia, radiotherapy and daily treatment, account for 20 to 30% of the total, which is lower than we expected. In order to decrease treatment costs we must emphasize vigorous radical treatment and shorter hospital stays. The patients evaluated in this study did not receive chemotherapy or immunochemotherapy, which would have raised enormously the treatment costs. It is worth nothing, perhaps, that the economic damage done to patients and their families by certain cancer treatments is greater than their benefit.

Parents' Time Is Worth Money

To the Editor.— I was delighted to see Donn's letter about the cost effectiveness of home management of bronchopulmonary dysplasia.1 Such contributions are vital in helping to curb the rapidly rising costs of neonatal intensive care. However, his economic analysis is flawed. By tacit assumption, he omits any consideration of the opportunity costs to the parents. To omit this presumes that the parents' time is worth little or nothing, as we often seem to indicate by the long patient waiting times in our offices.

"The Buried Life"--The Contrasting Views of Arnold and Clough in the Context of Dr. Arnold's Historiography

If historical testimony be really worth nothing, it touches us in one of the very divinest parts of our nature, the power of connecting ourselves with the past. For this we do and can do only through knowledge which we must call historical . . . [without it] our life would be at once restricted to the span of our own memory; nay, I might almost say to the span of our actual consciousness. For if no other man's report of the past is to be credited, I know not how we can defend the very reports of our own memories. 1

The Nationalism of Abraham Lincoln

THE NATIONALISM OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN James A. Rawley Abraham Lincoln is the supreme nationalist in die history of die United States. His greatest service to die nation was not freeing its slaves but preserving its body poUtic. When Lincoln became President in 1861 four score and five years had passed since his nation had been "conceived and dedicated"—years marked by phenomenal growth and an attendant theorizing over die exact nature of die Federal Union. Lincoln's concept of American nationalism differed not only from die Soudiern interpretations he waged war to refute, but also from Nordiern interpretations in the formative years preceding his election as die nation's chief executive. His nationalism was a mid-century bridge between die earUer diought of die Founding Fatiiers, Henry Clay, and Daniel Webster, and die later diought of Francis Lieber and John W. Burgess. In his hierarchy of values he placed die nation uppermost—above peace, above abolition, above property rights, and even above the Constitution. Surprisingly, though it is well-known that Lincoln was a nationalist, historians have not subjected die nature of his concepts to extended, systematic analysis. Before he took die oatii of office in 1861 Lincoln had developed a nationalism notable for its quiet fervor, its avoidance of spread-eagle expansionism, of strident Americanism, of cultural chauvinism, and of excessive legalism—differing markedly from die fervid sentiments of many mid-century nationalists. His pre-Presidential diought is best separated into its poUtical, cultural, and economic components. Lincoln's political nationalism stemmed from a beUef in die uniqueness of the United States. Its government and society were an unexampled experiment—a successful experiment, indeed, but onewhich had yet to demonstrate its success to skeptical and less happy nations. What was die root of this distinctive national character? It was nodiing less than a system of free government. Here was the source of American James A. Rawley, professor of history at Sweet Briar College, is the author of a biography of New York's Civil War governor, Edwin D. Morgan. 283 284J AMES A. RAWLEY poUtical prosperity; without this living principle the state was worth nothing. The incarnation of the spirit of American nationalism was for him the Declaration of Independence. "I have often inquired of myself," he reflected at Philadelphia in 1861, what great principle or idea it was that kept this confederacy so long together . It was not die mere matter of die separation of die colonies from the mother land; but something in diat Declaration giving liberty, not alone to die people of this country, but hope to die world for all time. In tiiis statement Lincoln put to one side many conventional explanations of nationalism—language, common descent, cultural tradition, foreign perils, and historical territory—in favor of an idea.1 This central concept found legal embodiment in die Constitution— "the only safeguard of our Uberties," as he put it. The American government , held in restraint by the Constitution, offered hberty and equaüty for aU. "Free speech and discussion and immunity from whip and tar and featiiers, seem impUed by die guarantee to each state of a repubücan form of government," he deliberated. Through the pubUc press our repub ücan institutions "can be best sustained by die diffusion of knowledge and die due encouragement of a universal, national spirit of inquiry and discussion of pubüc events. . . ." He deemed religious and civü liberty "the noblest of causes," and found American political institutions more conducive to tiieir maintenance tiian any in human history.2 Lincoln would not proscribe immigrants, would not make diem less eUgible for the freedom of the Declaration than those descended by blood from the Revolutionary fathers. ". . . They have a right to claim it as though they were blood of die blood, and flesh of die flesh of die men who wrote that Declaration . . . ," he insisted. His conception of the place of die Negro in American society flowed from his faith in the Declaration. UnUke Stephen A. Douglas, he beUeved die Declaration embraced Negroes as weU as white persons, but that the commitmentwas to be reaUzed in die future. Just as the Declaration did not decree immediate aboütion of slavery, neither...