escape_artist's past comments

  • 0

    escape_artist

    When I first saw the headline my first thought was that maybe some customers or workers stole them to take home for dinner, given that common utterances I've heard in aquariums I've been to in Japan when people are looking at fish are"Kawaii!!" followed quickly by "Oishisooo...!!".

    Posted in: Newly released sardines disappear after 2 days in Kobe aquarium

  • 2

    escape_artist

    Restarting any reactors in Japan now is simply national suicide, and any so-called leaders who continue their blind insistence to restart any while none of the major issues (e.g. where to put the tremendously growing amount of radioactive waste, or the equally dangerously growing supply of plutonium, or how to guarantee safety in earthquakes) have been resolved from the ongoing Fukushima disaster and previous nuclear accidents in Japan should be charged with something, like endangering public welfare & peace of mind (not to mention food and water and air), or crimes against humanity, or even treason. Who's in control here anyway, the people, like in a true democracy? or the corporations?

    Well, now that was a rhetorical question, wasn't it?...

    Posted in: Some nuclear reactors may be restarted in fall, Motegi says

  • 1

    escape_artist

    Here are some links to the UC Berkeley research from 2011...

    VIDEOS

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsjDnYxJ0bo

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMA23JJ1M1o

    LAB DOING the RESEARCH

    https://gallantlab.org

    RELATED PAPER

    Reconstructing Visual Experiences from Brain Activity Evoked by Natural Movies

    Current Biology, Volume 21, Issue 19, 1641-1646, 22 September 2011

    https://www.cell.com/current-biology/retrieve/pii/S0960982211009377

    Posted in: Scientists say they can 'read' dreams

  • 0

    escape_artist

    Regge Life's previous films are worth checking out too. Here are more info and links about him for those interested...

    Reel Life & Real Life -- Filmmaker Regge Life on intercultural identity

    An interview by Stewart Wachs (from KJ#40, 1999)

    http://www.kyotojournal.org/media/life.html

    Regge Life's bio

    http://globalfilmnetwork.net/bio.html

    PREVIOUS FILMS:

    Struggle and Success: The African-American Experience in Japan (1993)

    http://www.globalfilmnetwork.net/struggle.html

    -- TRAILER: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d0tgYzHzrM

    Doubles: Japan and America's Intercultural Children (1995)

    http://globalfilmnetwork.net/doubles.html

    -- TRAILER: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6T0_BpCK0E0

    After America . . . After Japan (1999)

    http://globalfilmnetwork.net/after.html

    -- TRAILER: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHGlR0cNZIw

    A Good Return: Making the most of coming home (2000)

    http://globalfilmnetwork.net/good_return.html

    -- TRAILER: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eir4AMlcs7A

    Posted in: Filmmaker Regge Life honors American tsunami victim

  • 1

    escape_artist

    Amazingly sad and irresponsible tangled web of a system, and RIP to the man who got caught in it. The Japanese government somehow continually keeps pulling out oodles of money from its magic hat to give every other "less developed" country, like Burma and Kazakhstan (in other words, wherever Japanese businesses want to profit off the local people), yet... yet... they can't find enough money to fund basic services in Japan itself. Something is VERY very wrong here. As with any country, Japan needs to focus and clean up its own house before trying to take care of other countries. This kind of thing should never be allowed to happen if any country wants to call themselves "developed" or "advanced".

    Posted in: Saitama man dies after hospitals reject him 36 times

  • 4

    escape_artist

    How are kids going to learn important work & life skills unless they take on jobs such as this when young? Except maybe because of the early time, I think calling this "child labor" as if it's some kind of punishment or detrimental to them in some way is going too far, much like the idiotic zero tolerance mindset has in the States. There's too much control of every little aspect of people's lives these days.

    Posted in: Man arrested for having his kids work on his newspaper delivery route

  • 0

    escape_artist

    Regardless of what the data from this WHO report show, it's exactly the result to be expected by an organization that has made such a subservient pro-nuclear agreement with the IAEA. Data alone cannot change human behavior to obfuscate, lie, and corrupt when there's power and money to be had. To all the apologists for nuclear power, let's hope you never have to be anywhere near when a nuclear accident occurs, because there will surely be more, or the growing piles of nuclear waste with nowhere to go, a despicable and humongous problem selfishly being left for future generations.

    The only reason nuclear power keeps getting shoved down everyone's throats, and its inherent dangers continually masked by propaganda of how "clean", "safe", and "inexpensive" it is -- none of which has ever been true -- is that it can be controlled at a high level and it makes oodles of money for those in control.

    Nuclear power has always been, and will always be -- regardless of the specific technology used -- the wrong technology in Japan for boiling water to make electricity. There are just too many earthquakes and the threat of tsunami to ever make Japan viable for nuclear power or nuclear waste storage, neither of which humans continually prove cannot be safely handled or its problems resolved. Those who conspired and continue conspiring to bring such a deadly technology to Japan -- be they in Japan, the US, France, or elsewhere -- never truly have had the good of Japan or her people at heart, only their own pocketbooks and oversized egos.

    Nuclear power might be viable elsewhere without earthquakes, that is if its true believers can ever come up with a safe way of storing its waste for tens of thousands of years or more, but in Japan it's just plain suicide. The nuclear technophiles among us need to look beyond their noses and try to take a long-range view. Scale down, develop & use energy sources that work better locally, and make things livable again. That's the best way forward.

    Posted in: WHO: Small cancer risk after Fukushima accident

  • -1

    escape_artist

    And @No Miso, what actually is the problem with re-evaluating the risks of radioactive pollution? That sounds pretty sensible to me, no? If that's "bias" as you say, then yeah, I guess I'm biased. Toward more sustainable life and health.

    Posted in: WHO: Small cancer risk after Fukushima accident

  • -1

    escape_artist

    @No Miso, instead of focusing solely on one website, try researching and you'll see the facts as they are, stated in the following two sites I listed. It's not living a life of fear as you condescendingly imply, but rather just an objective look at what's likely to be believable and what's not. We've still basically got the fox in charge of the henhouse here, including in the additional snippet from the IAEA Statute you provide. Do you actually feel safe with that situation in control?

    And why the fixation on deaths by those like yourself eager to keep on supporting nuclear power? Radiation has far subtler and more long-term effects too, like the damage to the overall environment. We humans are just one small part of that, yet depend on it for everything we know and have. We're all being bamboozled by pro-nuclear folks into believing that we have to have nuclear, or else. THAT sounds like living a life of (institutionalized) fear, wouldn't you say?

    Posted in: WHO: Small cancer risk after Fukushima accident

  • -1

    escape_artist

    How can anything the WHO says related to nuclear or radiation effects be trustworthy considering the agreement they signed in 1959 with the IAEA that essentially gives the IAEA veto power over any research WHO does into the effects of radiation?

    http://www.llrc.org/health/subtopic/iaeawhoagreement.htm

    http://www.crms-jpn.com/doc/IAEA-WHO1959.pdf

    It's in the IAEA's charter to support and promote the use of nuclear power (in their Statute (http://www.iaea.org/About/statute.html), ARTICLE II: Objectives... "to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy to peace, health and prosperity throughout the world"), so their 1959 agreement with the WHO sounds like a huge conflict of interest. I would much rather rely on independent sources of info and data, if these can be found.

    Posted in: WHO: Small cancer risk after Fukushima accident

  • 1

    escape_artist

    Asking those who cause a problem to at least help pay for the damages it unleashes upon others (and continues to unleash) seems like such a no-brainer. The fact that it's even debatable in most societies today shows how uncivilized and bereft of any common sense or justice we all are.

    Posted in: Nuclear reactor makers must share accident costs: Greenpeace

  • 2

    escape_artist

    That pet phrase how everything and anything can be found to be "unique to the Japanese" is getting really tiresome.

    Posted in: Why Japanese women go for fake crooked teeth

  • 2

    escape_artist

    See what they all look like here... http://www.casio.co.jp/release/2013/0110_mw-c12a/

    Posted in: Cute color calculators

  • 0

    escape_artist

    Although "just" movies, these kinds of realistic portrayals do indeed have an affect on people, such as of making such blatant viciousness appear as just another ho-hum aspect of everyday life, feeding many people's already enveloping apathy to the growing militarization & violence around us, and enticing the crazies among us to see torture as moral and enriching when it's anything but. Of course, one can't see any of that unless they step outside the rah-rah military bubble they're in. This movie may not advocate torture but it sure makes it seem normal or acceptable, when it never is and never should be (not in civilized society, anyway).

    It's becoming natural that a film like "Zero Dark Thirty" would emerge from the minds of people in the States, who are becoming ever more used to increasing militarization with war after war after war abroad as well as at home, not to mention an attitude about guns that's just plain psychotic. Just because some media folks want their films -- any films, no matter the social effects -- to bring them oodles more money (the obvious theme underlying any corporate executive's rant), and just because more and more Americans are becoming accustomed to militarism as a solution to everything, doesn't mean the rest of those who want a more livable society have to act like sheep and follow them.

    Posted in: Sony Pictures exec: 'Zero Dark Thirty' does not advocate torture

  • -4

    escape_artist

    No company should ever be able to usurp the laws and desires of a nation or regional group of nations, especially a company from another culture. In the guise of "free trade", we've allowed corporations to control our lives. Enough is enough. If Panasonic can't sell them in Europe, then maybe they should make products that people there do want to buy.

    Posted in: Panasonic to appeal against European Commission decision on cathode ray tubes for TVs

  • 3

    escape_artist

    Anyone who says or thinks that the daily assault of violent images from films, TV shows and video games, all termed "entertainment", has absolutely no effect on its users or is somehow enlightening or beneficial to individuals or society over the long-term is living in a dangerous fantasy land. Their fear-based obsession with guns and other weapons is a serious illness, and is affecting all of us. Oh yeah, there definitely is a mental health problem in the States... it's with those who believe in the illusion that guns, guns and more guns will somehow keep them and everyone else safer. The fear feeds upon itself and ends up creating a monster that only becomes harder to control.

    Ultimately, though, it's the underlying ethos of violence in America that has to be solved, guns or no guns. The US is the world's number one buyer, maker and seller of weapons, fueling violence not just at home but also worldwide. Weapons makers and the government routinely put profits over safety and peace of mind. America has a president who keeps a kill list and demands the right to assassinate anyone anywhere at his discretion, even American citizens, without any trial or presumption of innocence. Where is the humanity, the common sense, the pride, in all of that?

    Posted in: School shooting victims were shot multiple times

  • -1

    escape_artist

    Basic question.... why? It's also not completely clear whether GMOs are involved.

    Posted in: Australian scientists develop coconut-tasting pineapple

  • 1

    escape_artist

    The latest Terrie's Take highlights this among other cases of bureaucratic ineptitude/corruption in Japan now...

    http://www.japaninc.com/tt685_bureaucrats--enough_is_enough

    Posted in: Tanaka under fire for canceling plans to open 3 new universities

  • 0

    escape_artist

    Bullies by their very nature depend on childish & petulant actions to somehow make up for their own insecurities. The Chinese government is nothing but a bully here, as well as on many other occasions (the recent IMF meetings in Tokyo come to mind), and the international community should diplomatically put them in their place. To the Sinophiles here, yes, of course, other countries' governments act childishly too at times, but first, that doesn't make it right, effective, or productive; and second, we aren't talking about the actions of other countries here (like Japan), now are we?

    Governments around the world (and unfortunately by extension, the people they represent), namely China once again, need to grow up and earn the global respect they so dearly want. Bullying their way to get it will never work.

    Posted in: China denies visa to 3 Japanese in Taiwan orchestra

  • 2

    escape_artist

    A Japan Times article today on this stated how an LDP member who opposed the referendum commented that letting people vote could affect the "national energy policy". Oh my!! Oh dear!! Shudder to think what would happen if the people themselves were allowed by the mandarins to dictate their country's directions. Welcome to democracy, Japanese style (and American style, and other so-called countries' "democratic" styles).

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