tag:theconversation.com,2011:/institutions/bowdoin-college-1813/articlesBowdoin College2024-03-05T14:00:11Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2210612024-03-05T14:00:11Z2024-03-05T14:00:11ZHispanic health disparities in the US trace back to the Spanish Inquisition<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578113/original/file-20240226-18-qx2l6e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=346%2C479%2C3693%2C2076&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Class, gender and religion influenced health care in early modern Spain and Latin America.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/diego-velazquez-christ-in-the-house-of-martha-and-mary">Diego Velázquez/The National Gallery</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Many of the significant <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2022/06/14/hispanic-americans-experiences-with-health-care/">health disparities and inequities</a> Hispanic communities in the United States face are tied to a long history of health injustice in the Hispanic world.</p>
<p>The health landscape of early modern Hispanic societies, particularly from the late 15th to 18th centuries, was a <a href="https://history.wisc.edu/publications/The-Gray-Zones-of-Medicine-Healers-and-History-in-Latin-america/">complex interplay</a> between professional and nonprofessional providers shaping health care. The convergence of Indigenous, African and European practices, both in Spain and the Americas, affected how clinicians treated their patients.</p>
<p>This all played out against the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/CHO9781139032698.009">backdrop of the Inquisition and colonization</a>, when the Catholic Church prosecuted heresy. Consolidating religious norms promoted health care through charitable activity, such as the creation of hospitals, but also created challenges between the authority of the Catholic Church and competing health care initiatives. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.bowdoin.edu/profiles/faculty/mboyle2/index.html">My research</a> focuses on how health and medical practices in early modern Latin America and Spain are represented through cultural artifacts, including literature, recipe books, the Inquisition and convent records. In our book, my colleague <a href="https://charleston.edu/spanish/faculty/owens-sarah.php">Sarah Owens</a> and I explore how <a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781487505189/health-and-healing-in-the-early-modern-iberian-world/">gender norms affected</a> medicine and health care. We also consider how popular representations of health and medicine in culture inform widely held beliefs and biases about these experiences.</p>
<p>Understanding the historical roots of health disparities in Hispanic communities can <a href="https://salud-america.org">help address them</a> both locally and globally today. </p>
<h2>Interplay of medical practices</h2>
<p>Latin America and Spain in the late 15th to 18th centuries were home to a <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Medical-Cultures-of-the-Early-Modern-Spanish-Empire/Slater-Lopez-Terrada-Pardo-Tomas/p/book/9780367669225">number of medical practices</a>, including traditional medical knowledge and remedies and the professionalization of medicine through new universities and licensing systems. </p>
<p>Early modern <a href="https://doi.org/10.4000/aes.3633">medical humanists</a>, or Renaissance clinicians, took up medical treatises by the ancient Greek and Roman physicians, including those of Galen and Hippocrates, and revived them in the context of “learned” medical instruction through European universities. The study of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139027649.015">Paracelsianism</a>, or the theories of Swiss physician Paracelsus, though more contested among practitioners because of its connections to the supernatural and occult, also affected a variety of health practices across early modern Spain and colonial Latin America. With the publication of anatomical treatises at the start of the 16th century, including the work of Renaissance physician <a href="https://lccn.loc.gov/2021667096">Andreas Vesalius</a>, the study of anatomy slowly and dramatically changed medical practice.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578303/original/file-20240227-28-t93eef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black and white engraving of four people surrounding the bedside of a man lying prone, with one of the people tending to a wound on his back by candlelight" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578303/original/file-20240227-28-t93eef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578303/original/file-20240227-28-t93eef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578303/original/file-20240227-28-t93eef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578303/original/file-20240227-28-t93eef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578303/original/file-20240227-28-t93eef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578303/original/file-20240227-28-t93eef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578303/original/file-20240227-28-t93eef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An 18th century engraving depicts a woman soothing a wound on Don Quixote’s back.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://wellcomecollection.org/works/yca32vbf/images?id=j557f5kw">William Hogarth/Wellcome Collection</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Traditional healing practices varied significantly but often provided accessible and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1089/heq.2021.0099">culturally compatible care</a>, including reduced language barriers. Many people in Hispanic communities still rely on these practices today. Discussions about the legitimacy and health effects of folk remedies in Latin America, such as varieties of herbal and holistic medicine and other <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/1746-4269-7-9">animal-based remedies</a>, are ongoing.</p>
<h2>Gender and medicine</h2>
<p>As health care became more professionalized during the early modern period, some women found ways to practice medicine in more formalized contexts, while others continued to work as healers or herbalists. These practices alternated between <a href="https://iberian-connections.yale.edu/articles/healing-in-madrid/">success and suspicion</a> during the Spanish Inquisition. Accusations of sorcery and witchcraft along with sexualities outside heterosexual norms often collided with practices of health and medicine. </p>
<p>But just as pregnancy and child–rearing are not the only medical events that shaped early modern women’s lives, women medical providers <a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781487505189/health-and-healing-in-the-early-modern-iberian-world/">weren’t only witches</a>. Nuns in Arequipa prepared treatments in convents, and mothers and daughters made medicine within households in Madrid.</p>
<p>From Fernando de Rojas’ 1499 tragicomedy “<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/1xhs-0330">La Celestina</a>,” about the go-between who crafts love potions and repairs hymens, to the 2019 Colombian TV series “<a href="https://www.netflix.com/title/80205595">Siempre Bruja</a>,” about a 17th century Afro-Colombian witch who finds herself in present-day Cartagena, the cultural legacy of witchy women healers in the Hispanic world continues to be deeply felt.</p>
<h2>Class, race, geography and language</h2>
<p>The transfer of plants, animals and diseases across the Atlantic also profoundly affected health outcomes. </p>
<p>European diseases <a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/latamcaribbean/2020/08/07/the-history-of-epidemics-in-latin-america-has-much-to-tell-us-about-covid-19/">such as smallpox</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-smallpox-devastated-the-aztecs-and-helped-spain-conquer-an-american-civilization-500-years-ago-111579">devastated Indigenous populations</a>. Meanwhile, plants from the Americas offered <a href="https://brill.com/display/title/34839?language=en">novel treatments</a> for a number of illnesses globally. Peruvian <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/1475-2875-10-144">cinchona bark</a> is a natural source of quinine that proved effective against malaria, a disease prevalent in both Europe and the Americas. Other plants <a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781487527204/chocolate/">such as cacao seeds</a> found various medicinal and ritual uses, including relieving exhaustion or anxiety or improving weight gain.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/5FpPpn086eI?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The Columbian Exchange was not mutually beneficial.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But access to this range of treatment methods was unequal, especially <a href="https://nursingclio.org/2018/02/22/health-care-in-colonial-peruvian-convents/">across social class and geography</a>. Wealthier nobility in urban centers often had much greater access to scarce resources across the Iberian empire. </p>
<p>Health outcomes were also often linked to <a href="https://uncpress.org/book/9781469630878/the-experiential-caribbean/">racial and ethnic hierarchies</a>. Patients were classified as Spanish, mestizo – mixed European and Indigenous – or African slaves in treatment records. These documents show evidence of uneven access to care, while there is also evidence that some exchanges in care practices <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-0424.12553">across these hierarchies</a> were possible.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578307/original/file-20240227-20-vpjsg8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Yellowed manuscript with written text inscribed in ink down the page" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578307/original/file-20240227-20-vpjsg8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578307/original/file-20240227-20-vpjsg8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=915&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578307/original/file-20240227-20-vpjsg8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=915&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578307/original/file-20240227-20-vpjsg8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=915&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578307/original/file-20240227-20-vpjsg8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1149&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578307/original/file-20240227-20-vpjsg8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1149&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578307/original/file-20240227-20-vpjsg8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1149&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">‘Grammar of the Castilian Language’ codified Spanish.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.loc.gov/item/2021667003">Antonio De Nebrija/World Digital Library via Library of Congress</a></span>
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<p>Forced displacement as well as language discrimination also affected health access and outcomes. Spanish wasn’t <a href="https://www.publicbooks.org/whose-spanish-anyway/">standardized as a language</a> until the publication of Antonio de Nebrija’s “<a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/44015843">Grammar of the Castilian Language</a>” in 1492, inscribed to Queen Isabel with the reminder that “language has always been the companion to empire.” </p>
<p>For example, while Arabic and Hebrew were widely spoken throughout the Iberian Peninsula before the forced expulsions of the Inquisition, politics around language resulted in centuries of stereotypes and discrimination against Muslim and Jewish medical providers, who had to navigate <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Medicine-Government-and-Public-Health-in-Philip-IIs-Spain-Shared-Interests/Clouse/p/book/9781138246379">alternative licensing methods</a> to practice medicine in Spain and its colonial territories. </p>
<h2>Understanding the story of medicine</h2>
<p>More than 400 years later, inequities in and commodification of Hispanic health and wellness continue. </p>
<p>Luxury travelers are sold wellness via <a href="https://oursoulfultravels.com/wellness-spas-in-mexico/">Mayan purification rituals</a>, among other assorted local remedies and practices that can be purchased, marketed and monetized. Wood from the Palo Santo tree, which healers have used for centuries for spiritual cleanings and pain relief, continues to be grown all over the Americas, including Mexico, Peru and Ecuador, and is now bought and sold globally to bring “<a href="https://www.womenshealthmag.com/life/a30793415/what-is-palo-santo/">good vibes</a>.”</p>
<p>Considering these early modern health practices and inequities allows for deeper engagement with health care systems today. Informed critical thinking about medicine and health care <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/10/16/2018-jefferson-lecture-focuses-contribution-humanities-medicine">across disciplines</a> is a powerful way to consider how these histories continue to shape current values and practices, including <a href="https://doi.org/10.5744/florida/9781683402619.001.0001">ongoing disparities in health care</a>.</p>
<p>One such discipline is <a href="https://theconversation.com/literature-inspired-my-medical-career-why-the-humanities-are-needed-in-health-care-217357">narrative medicine</a>. Using the tools of the humanities, physicians can broaden their view of their patients from simple metrics to human beings with stories to tell. This process involves perceiving and incorporating patients’ personal experiences, valuing narration of the past and recognizing the significance of the encounter between doctor and patient. While much of this research focuses on English-language narratives, cross-cultural and bilingual research <a href="https://www.lclark.edu/live/news/48656-neh-grant-to-support-bilingual-materials-for">in Spanish</a> is expanding the field. </p>
<p>It is estimated that by 2060 there will be more than <a href="https://latino.ucla.edu/research/latino-population-2000-2020/">111 million Latinos</a> in the United States. Understanding the historical legacies that have shaped wellness and care practices, including the factors that determine care quality and access, can promote more equitable and culturally nuanced health outcomes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/221061/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Margaret Boyle received funding from the Fulbright Program and the George A. and Eliza Gardner Howard Foundation Fellowship for this research.</span></em></p>Early modern societies in Latin America and Spain saw a convergence of traditional medical knowledge and the professionalization of medicine. The resulting differences in access to care endure today.Margaret Boyle, Associate Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures, Director of Latin American, Caribbean, and Latinx Studies Program, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2201332024-01-16T13:41:06Z2024-01-16T13:41:06ZLong after Indigenous activists flee Russia, they continue to face government pressure to remain silent<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568943/original/file-20240111-17-c8ekoo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Pavel Sulyandziga, a Russian Indigenous activist, poses with his family in 2017 in Yarmouth, Maine, where he awaits a decision on political asylum. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/pavel-sulyandziga-a-russian-indigenous-leader-is-filing-for-news-photo/669416946?adppopup=true">Derek Davis/Portland Portland Press Herald via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Pavel Sulyandziga, an Indigenous activist and member of the Udege people of Russia’s far eastern region, arrived in the United States in 2017 to seek political asylum.</p>
<p>Sulyandziga joined his wife and their five children, who were already living in Maine. They left following numerous threats to Sulyandziga’s personal safety, as well as to his family members and colleagues, because of his political activism. </p>
<p>Sulyandziga’s request for <a href="https://help.unhcr.org/usa/applying-for-asylum/what-is-asylum/">political asylum</a> in the U.S. is still pending, part of a large backlog of asylum cases before immigration judges. </p>
<p>Today, however, Sulyandziga, 61, and his family members continue to be harassed by the Russian government.</p>
<p>Sulyandziga is one of among <a href="https://www.iwgia.org/en/russia/4682-iw-2022-russian-federation.html">260,000 people who are recognized as Indigenous</a> and who are from Russia. Indigenous peoples living in Russia have <a href="https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501761317/galvanizing-nostalgia/">long fought for recognition</a> of their rights as native peoples and to protect their traditional territory, which is often located in areas that are used for natural resource extraction, such as mining. </p>
<p>But <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/1060586X.2021.2002629">recent research</a> shows that Indigenous activists are fleeing Russia because of growing repression. Sometimes, they are being charged with working on behalf of foreign governments, or they are facing false accusations of corruption. </p>
<p>Beyond repression at home, the Russian government is increasingly trying to silence activists like Sulyandziga even after they leave Russia. </p>
<p>This kind of harassment is called <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/report/transnational-repression">transnational repression</a>, and it means that Indigenous activists are vulnerable in exile as well as at home.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568945/original/file-20240111-15-xmdht8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man with a grey beard sits on a red couch and watches young children run around." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568945/original/file-20240111-15-xmdht8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568945/original/file-20240111-15-xmdht8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568945/original/file-20240111-15-xmdht8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568945/original/file-20240111-15-xmdht8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568945/original/file-20240111-15-xmdht8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568945/original/file-20240111-15-xmdht8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/568945/original/file-20240111-15-xmdht8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Pavel Sulyandziga watches his children play in his living room at home in Maine.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/pavel-sulyandziga-a-russian-indigenous-leader-is-filing-for-news-photo/669416920?adppopup=true">Staff photo by Derek Davis/Portland Press Herald via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Indigenous people of Russia</h2>
<p>The Soviet Union officially recognized the many identities and languages of Indigenous peoples living within its borders. But Soviet officials also pressured Indigenous people to abandon their <a href="https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9780801481789/arctic-mirrors/#bookTabs=1">traditional, religious and livelihood practices</a> in order to more easily incorporate them in the Communist regime. </p>
<p>Since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia has legally recognized <a href="https://docs.cntd.ru/document/901757631?ysclid=lmxoe1ky4c246489387">47 Indigenous peoples</a>, though <a href="https://www.iwgia.org/en/russia.html">more than 150 groups claim Indigenous status</a>.</p>
<p>There was a flowering of Indigenous activism in Russia during the more open politics of the 1990s. Between 1999 and 2001, the government passed several <a href="https://arcticreview.no/index.php/arctic/article/view/2336/4826">new laws</a> ensuring Indigenous rights, such as cultural autonomy and access to territories traditionally used for hunting and pastureland. </p>
<p>But Indigenous peoples remain among the most socially and economically marginalized groups in Russia. </p>
<p>Socioeconomically, their <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/IPeoples/SR/COVID-19/IndigenousCSOs/RUSSIA%20-%20Aborigen%20Forum%20position%20.docx">health</a>, <a href="https://online.ucpress.edu/elementa/article/8/1/445/116784/Socio-cultural-characteristics-of-the-Russian">educational and economic outcomes</a> are significantly worse than the average Russian citizen. They face <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2022/1/23/in-russia-indigenous-land-defenders-face-intimidation-and-exile">extensive dislocation and pollution from natural resource extraction</a>, including oil and gas drilling. </p>
<p>Many also live in areas particularly <a href="https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-arctic-indigenous-peoples-losing-traditional-way-life-climate-change/30973726.html">vulnerable to climate change</a>.</p>
<h2>Indigenous activism and Russia’s war in Ukraine</h2>
<p>Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has created new problems for Indigenous communities in Russia. </p>
<p>Driven by poverty and patriotic appeals, young men from Indigenous communities enlist in the military in <a href="https://www.iwgia.org/en/russia/5186-iw-2023-russia.html#_edn8">disproportionately high numbers</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://ideas.repec.org/p/osf/socarx/s43yf.html">Preliminary research</a> indicates that soldiers from impoverished and remote regions and from ethnic minority groups die in the conflict in disproportionately high numbers. </p>
<p>Government harassment of Indigenous activists from Russia has also <a href="https://batani.org/archives/2156">intensified since 2022</a>. </p>
<p>Like Sulyandziga, a number of Indigenous activists have left Russia over the past few years <a href="https://www.culturalsurvival.org/news/new-report-highlights-indigenous-rights-violations-russia">to protect themselves and their families</a>. </p>
<p>Some Indigenous exiles have exercised their new freedoms by <a href="https://indigenous.taplink.ws/">protesting Russia’s war in Ukraine</a>. Sulyandziga has also been vocal in <a href="https://polarconnection.org/international-committee-of-indigenous-peoples-of-russia/">his opposition to the war</a>. </p>
<p>However, an activist’s decision to go into exile to escape persecution does not always mean the end of repression. </p>
<h2>The Russian government’s pressure on Indigenous people</h2>
<p>The Russian government <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/report/transnational-repression/russia">uses the tools of transnational repression</a> against Indigenous activists who have left Russia. These include damaging activists’ reputations in media coverage, initiating spurious legal cases, confiscating their property and harassing relatives and colleagues who remain in Russia. </p>
<p>By increasing the risks of speaking out, the government discourages Indigenous activists from trying to influence the political situation back home and attempts to silence their concern about the survival of their people. </p>
<p>Ruslan Gabbasov, an activist from the Bashkir ethnic minority in the Russian region of Bashkortostan, left his homeland in 2021 due to increasing pressure on his activism. He was the leader of an organization to protect Bashkir cultural and language rights that the government labeled as “extremist.” </p>
<p>Gabbasov received political asylum in Lithuania, where he started a new organization – the Committee of the Bashkir National Movement Abroad. His half brother, Rustam Fararitdinov, has never been involved in political activism. </p>
<p>But in November 2023, Fararitdinov was <a href="https://www.rferl.org/a/bashkortostan-terrorist-list-russia-activist/32770297.html">arrested by Russian security agents</a>. Gabbasov <a href="https://kyivindependent.com/exiled-russian-activist-reports-detention-of-brother-in-bashkortostan/">reports that he has heard</a>, “If I return to Russia, they will release him; if not, they will imprison him.”</p>
<p>In Sulyandziga’s case, a Russian regional court charged him in November 2023 with an <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/08/1140147">increasingly widely used</a> charge of “discrediting the Russian military.” The court cited an <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaTSgj-cYtE">online lecture by Sulyandziga</a>, in which he criticized the Russian government’s historical treatment of Indigenous communities. </p>
<p>Following the charge, Sulyandziga said that his adult son, who lives in Vladivostok, has been chronically harassed by the Federal Security Service in relation to the case, subjected to repeated questioning and threatening language. </p>
<h2>A foreign policy concern</h2>
<p>What motivates the Russian government to continue to try to repress Indigenous activists abroad? In part, repression is a response to activists’ international efforts to <a href="https://www.hudson.org/events/new-architecture-northern-eurasia-sixth-free-nations-post-russia-forum">draw attention to their causes</a>, including through the creation of new organizations like the <a href="https://www.freeburyatia.org/">Free Buryatia</a> and <a href="https://www.instagram.com/freeyakutiafoundation/">Free Yakutia</a> foundations. These anti-war groups compare Russia’s violence toward Ukrainians with their own <a href="https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/indigenous-anti-war-initiatives-russia-are-inherently-anti">histories of oppression</a> and call for decolonization in the region. </p>
<p>Repression also is designed to <a href="https://polarconnection.org/international-committee-of-indigenous-peoples-of-russia/">drive a wedge</a> between Indigenous communities in Russia and activists abroad who maintain connections via online platforms such as Telegram. </p>
<p>Finally, <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/report/transnational-repression/russia">transnational repression</a> is a high-profile way to scare other Indigenous activists. </p>
<p>That tactic has not been effective, though, in intimidating Sulyandziga and others. </p>
<p>Sulyandziga, who also worked as an environmental activist in Russia, reestablished his <a href="https://batani.org/">nonprofit organization</a> in the U.S. The Russian government had labeled his original organization a foreign agent, even before he fled to the U.S. He now works to unite Indigenous communities across borders.</p>
<p>Sulyandziga also recently <a href="https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/russia-indigenous-communities-lobby-tesla-not-to-get-its-nickel-from-major-polluter/">participated in a campaign</a> to discourage Tesla from buying nickel for its cars from the Russian company Norilsk Nickel, <a href="https://www.iwgia.org/en/news/3790-russian-oil-spill-exposes-history-of-indigenous-peoples%E2%80%99-right-violations.html">a major polluter of Indigenous lands</a>.</p>
<p>Sulyandziga vows to continue his activism, despite the pressure. </p>
<p>Along with fellow Indigenous activist Dmitry Berezhkov, Sulyandziga continues to call for Indigenous citizens in Russia to have “access to their traditional lands and traditional resources, that Indigenous cultures and languages are preserved, and that Indigenous peoples have an opportunity to pursue the realization of their <a href="https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/09/09/what-decolonization-means-for-russias-indigenous-peoples-a82387">political, economic, and social potential”</a>. </p>
<p><em>Pavel Sulyandziga, president of the Batani International Indigenous Fund for Solidarity and Development and visiting scholar at Dartmouth College, contributed to this article.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220133/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Laura A. Henry does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>More than six years after Pavel Sulyandziga, an Indigenous activist from Russia, left the country to seek political asylum in the US, he continues to face harassment by the Russian government.Laura A. Henry, Associate Professor of Government and Legal Studies, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2084232023-09-22T12:29:56Z2023-09-22T12:29:56ZBiases against Black-sounding first names can lead to discrimination in hiring, especially when employers make decisions in a hurry − new research<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549130/original/file-20230919-23-y3ipbc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C116%2C5301%2C2563&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">What role will race play in determining who gets the job?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/everyones-grabbed-their-easiest-prep-tool-royalty-free-image/1174452924?phrase=hiring+job+candidates&adppopup=true">Cecilie_Arcurs/E+ via Getty Image</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Because names are among the first things you learn about someone, they can influence first impressions. </p>
<p>That this is particularly true for names associated with Black people came to light in 2004 with the release of a study that found employers <a href="https://doi.org/10.1257/0002828042002561">seeing identical resumes</a> were 50% more likely to call back an applicant with <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/2020/top-20-whitest-blackest-names/story?id=2470131">stereotypical white names like Emily or Greg</a> versus applicants with names like Jamal or Lakisha.</p>
<p>I’m a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=WJe3b0UAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra">behavioral economist who researches discrimination in labor markets</a>. In a <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4490163">study based on a hiring experiment</a> I conducted with another economist, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=vyGCfDoAAAAJ">Rulof Burger</a>, we found that participants systematically discriminated against job candidates with names they associated with Black people, especially when put under time pressure. We also found that white people who oppose affirmative action discriminated more than other people against job candidates with distinctly Black names, whether or not they had to make rushed decisions.</p>
<h2>Detecting racial biases</h2>
<p>To conduct this study, we recruited 1,500 people from all 50 U.S. states in 2022 to participate in an online experiment on <a href="https://prolific.com">Prolific</a>, a survey platform. The group was nationally representative in terms of race and ethnicity, age and gender.</p>
<p>We first collected data on their beliefs about the race and ethnicity, education, productivity and personality traits of people with six names picked from a pool of 2,400 workers whom we hired in an early stage of our experiment for a transcription task. Data from these individual responses made it possible for us to categorize how they perceived the candidates.</p>
<p>We found that the names of workers perceived as Black, such as Shanice or Terell, were more likely to elicit negative presumptions, such as being less educated, productive, trustworthy and reliable, than people with either white-sounding names, such as Melanie or Adam, or racially ambiguous names, such as Krystal or Jackson.</p>
<p>We were specifically studying discrimination against Black people, so we did not include names in this experiment that are frequently associated with Hispanics or Asians. </p>
<p>Participants were next presented with pairs of names and were told they could earn money for selecting the worker who was more productive in the transcription task. The chance that they would choose job candidates they perceived to be white because of their names was almost twice as high than if they thought the candidates to be Black. This tendency to discriminate against people with Black-sounding names was greatest among men, people over 55, whites and conservatives.</p>
<p>Educational attainment, the level of racial diversity in the participants’ ZIP codes or whether they had personally hired anyone before didn’t influence their apparent biases. </p>
<p><iframe id="cju7c" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/cju7c/3/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<h2>Rushing can cause more discriminatory behavior</h2>
<p>Most real-world hiring managers spend <a href="https://careers.workopolis.com/advice/employers-view-resumes-for-fewer-than-11-seconds">less than 10 seconds</a> reviewing each resume during the initial screening stage. To keep up that swift pace, they may resort to using mental shortcuts – including racial stereotypes – to assess job applications.</p>
<p>We found that requiring the study participants to select a worker within only 2 seconds led them to be 25% more likely to discriminate against candidates with names they perceived as Black-sounding. Similar patterns of biased decision-making under time pressure have been documented in the context of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.92.6.1006">police shootings</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0022146512445807">medical decisions</a>.</p>
<p>However, making decisions more slowly is not a panacea. </p>
<p>We found that the most important factor for whether more deliberate decisions reduce discrimination was a participant’s view on <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/affirmative_action">affirmative action</a> – the consideration of race in a workforce or student body to ensure that their share of people of color is roughly proportionate to the general public or a local community. </p>
<p>White participants who opposed affirmative action were more than twice as likely to select an applicant with a white-sounding name compared with applicants perceived as Black – whether or not they had to make the simulated hiring decision in a hurry.</p>
<p>By contrast, giving white participants who favor affirmative action unlimited time to choose a name from the hiring list reduced discrimination against the job candidates with names they perceived as Black-sounding by almost half. The data showed that this decline had to do with people basing their decision more on their perceptions of a worker’s performance, rather than relying on mental shortcuts based on their perceived race.</p>
<p>We assessed the participants’ views on affirmative action by doing a survey at the end of this experiment.</p>
<h2>Discrimination hasn’t gone away</h2>
<p>A study published in 2021 <a href="https://www.nber.org/papers/w29053">suggested that hiring discrimination</a> based on Black-souding names had declined, although discriminatory practices remained high in some customer-facing lines of work, such as auto sales or retail. </p>
<p>Other research has suggested that once people learn more about someone, the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/722093">discriminatory influence that a name might have</a> begins to fade. Yet, other studies have indicated that racial biases can make the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1257/pandp.20231114">interactions needed for this learning process less likely</a>. For example, racial biases may lead employers to refrain from interviewing – or hiring – a job candidate of color in the first place.</p>
<p>There is ample evidence that people of color face discrimination in many important domains beyond employment, including finding <a href="https://doi.org/10.1257/app.20160213">housing</a> or <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/rfs/hhac029">obtaining loans</a>.</p>
<p>Our results suggest that slowing down the initial assessment of applicants can be a first step toward reducing this type of discrimination.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208423/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Martin Abel does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>People who object to affirmative action were more likely to discriminate against job candidates with Black-sounding names than those who supported it, whether or not they had to rush.Martin Abel, Assistant Professor of Economics, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2105092023-08-17T12:35:28Z2023-08-17T12:35:28ZImages of Jesus have always been complex and contradictory − this class looks at how pop culture imagines him, from cartoons to musicals<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/542837/original/file-20230815-31-gr7hrd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=16%2C7%2C1005%2C659&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Actor Dave Willetts as Jesus in a production of "Jesus Christ Superstar" in Zurich in 1992.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/jesus-christ-superstar-im-z%C3%BCrcher-corso-1992-news-photo/1174258162?adppopup=true">Philippe Rossier/RDB/ullstein bild via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Text saying: Uncommon Courses, from The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/uncommon-courses-130908">Uncommon Courses</a> is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.</em> </p>
<h2>Title of course:</h2>
<p>“Jesus in the Modern Imagination”</p>
<h2>What prompted the idea for the course?</h2>
<p>My only real exposure to religion while growing up was “Jesus Christ Superstar” – the 1973 film version of <a href="https://theconversation.com/best-easter-pageant-ever-half-a-century-of-jesus-christ-superstar-180628">the much-debated Broadway musical</a>. Every Easter, my parents would throw it on, and I listened to the soundtrack on repeat until I knew every word. </p>
<p>My journey to studying religion was really a happy accident. I had always been enamored by ancient history and planned to research gender and sexuality in the ancient Mediterranean. An adviser suggested I look to early Christianity – and from the moment I first read about <a href="https://faith.nd.edu/s/1210/faith/interior.aspx?sid=1210&gid=609&pgid=45213&cid=87041&ecid=87041&crid=0&calpgid=61&calcid=53508">Mary of Egypt</a>, a prostitute who became a saint in the desert, I was hooked. </p>
<p>When I finally started <a href="https://www.bowdoin.edu/profiles/faculty/j.sellick/index.html">graduate work in religious studies</a>, I knew next to nothing about the Bible. “Superstar” and other biblically inspired musicals like “<a href="http://www.guidetomusicaltheatre.com/shows_j/joseph.htm">Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat</a>” were my primary reference points. Drawing comparisons in class, I realized how much of my understanding of religious narratives had been shaped by pop culture.</p>
<p>I knew I probably wasn’t alone in this, so I designed a course that explores the relationship between religion and media.</p>
<h2>What does the course explore?</h2>
<p>Although the course has “modern” in the title, a lot of what students and I do is to look at ancient depictions of Jesus and compare it to more modern films, comics and music.</p>
<p>For example, I teach a unit on the “lost years” of Jesus’ life. The four canonical gospels in the Bible either completely ignore Jesus’ youth or basically jump from his birth to his adult life. This gap naturally leads to questions: What was Jesus like as a kid? Was he very pious? A troublemaker?</p>
<p>This is where apocryphal sources – early Christian literature that wasn’t included in official versions of the Bible – can start to fill in the gaps. Students discuss the <a href="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/infancythomas-hock.html">Infancy Gospel of Thomas</a>, a <a href="https://bibleodyssey.org/people/main-articles/infancy-gospel-of-thomas/">second-century narrative about Jesus’ childhood</a>. This text depicts Jesus disobeying his parents, talking back and even killing people with his divine powers, though he resurrects them all in the end. We read this alongside portions of novelist Christopher Moore’s book “<a href="https://www.chrismoore.com/books/lamb/">Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal</a>.” Moore’s 2002 comedy depicts a teenage Jesus traveling around the world in order to learn how to become the messiah. </p>
<p>But every time you try to fill one gap, even more questions pop up. For example, it may sound silly, but did Jesus, whom the canonical gospels portray as a bachelor, ever have a crush? If he did, would that change conversations about celibacy and sexuality? Once we start peeling back these layers of what we can and cannot know, and how different depictions of Jesus have imagined him, it always leads to really fascinating classroom conversations.</p>
<h2>Why is this course relevant now?</h2>
<p>Jesus is a perpetually contested figure. Is Jesus a teacher of peace or a warrior? A socialist or a capitalist sympathizer? Is he the manliest man to ever exist or a transgressively feminine figure? Depending who you ask, American Christians see Christ as all these things and more.</p>
<p>These are hot-button questions, ones that influence individuals and whole societies. But they cannot be easily answered – or sometimes answered at all – by the Bible. Understandings of Jesus are also deeply shaped by people’s cultures, norms and desires, which we see reflected in everything from <a href="https://wipfandstock.com/9781532656170/the-protevangelium-of-james/">second-century texts</a> to <a href="https://www.mrmarkmillar.com/comics/american-jesus">modern comics</a> and Monty Python’s “Life of Brian.”</p>
<p>This course does not attempt to answer the question, “Who was Jesus?” However, it examines how humanity has grappled with it, both historically and today.</p>
<h2>What will the course prepare students to do?</h2>
<p>Above all, this course gives students the tools to better analyze how interpretations of religious and historical figures are shaped by the communities that imagine and re-imagine them. It allows the class to see just how complicated religious figures like Jesus are and to analyze the motivations behind specific interpretations.</p>
<p>Oh, and students also get to make their own Jesus movies at the end of the semester – which is pretty awesome.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210509/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeannie Sellick receives funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. </span></em></p>Is Jesus a peacemaker or a warrior? A socialist or a capitalist? Depending on whom you ask, American Christians see Christ as all these things and more.Jeannie Sellick, Postdoctoral Fellow in Religion, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2109552023-08-04T12:30:01Z2023-08-04T12:30:01ZAre we alone in the universe? 4 essential reads on potential contact with aliens<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/541095/original/file-20230803-27-wa23kr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=39%2C0%2C8694%2C5617&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">UFOs usually have non-extraterrestrial origins, but many have urged the government to be more transparent about UFO data. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/long-exposure-of-andromeda-galaxy-royalty-free-image/1455373371?phrase=space&adppopup=true">Westend61/Westend61 via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The House subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs <a href="https://www.c-span.org/video/?529499-1/hearing-unidentified-aerial-phenomena">met in July 2023 to discuss</a> affairs so foreign that they may not even be of this world. During the meeting, several military officers testified that unidentified anomalous phenomena – the government’s name for UFOs – <a href="https://theconversation.com/whistleblower-calls-for-government-transparency-as-congress-digs-for-the-truth-about-ufos-210435">pose a threat</a> to national security. </p>
<p>Their testimony may have <a href="https://theconversation.com/whistleblower-calls-for-government-transparency-as-congress-digs-for-the-truth-about-ufos-210435">raised eyebrows in the chamber</a>, but there’s still no public physical evidence of extraterrestrial life. In fact, most UFO sightings <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-people-tend-to-believe-ufos-are-extraterrestrial-208403">have earthly explanations</a>, from tricks of the light to weather balloons. </p>
<p>Whether or not these testimonials hold any grains of truth, some scholars argue that simply by listening for signs of extraterrestrials, we’re already <a href="https://theconversation.com/first-contact-with-aliens-could-end-in-colonization-and-genocide-if-we-dont-learn-from-history-207793">engaging in the first phase of contact</a> with alien life. </p>
<p>These four articles from our archives dive into what went down during the subcommittee hearing, why perceived UFO sightings usually have human explanations, and how humanity can learn from history when it comes to engaging with extraterrestrials. </p>
<h2>1. Whistleblower allegations</h2>
<p>The most interesting testimony of the July 26 subcommittee hearing came from ex-Air Force Intelligence Officer David Grusch, who <a href="https://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Dave_G_HOC_Speech_FINAL_For_Trans.pdf">claimed that</a> the U.S. has nonhuman biological material recovered from a UFO crash site. The Pentagon has <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/house-oversight-plans-ufo-hearing-after-unconfirmed-claims/story?id=99899883">denied this claim</a>, and it has <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/house-oversight-plans-ufo-hearing-after-unconfirmed-claims/story?id=99899883">denied the existence of any program</a> designed to retrieve and reverse-engineer crashed UFOs. </p>
<p>All witnesses at the hearing advocated for more government transparency around reports of UFOs. Intelligence agencies and the Pentagon currently steward this data, most of which <a href="https://www.newsnationnow.com/space/ufo/pentagon-blocks-lawmakers-ufo-data-uap-hearing/">is not public</a>. While having access to more data may help understand what’s going on, as the University of Arizona’s <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=OrRLRQ4AAAAJ&hl=en">Chris Impey</a> put it, “the gold standard is physical evidence.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/whistleblower-calls-for-government-transparency-as-congress-digs-for-the-truth-about-ufos-210435">Whistleblower calls for government transparency as Congress digs for the truth about UFOs</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>2. Sociological explanations</h2>
<p>Again, while no physical evidence has been made public, anyone surfing the internet can see plenty of alleged UFO videos, photos and stories. <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ZEQu09wAAAAJ&hl=en">Barry Markovsky</a>, from the University of South Carolina, is a sociologist of shared beliefs and misconceptions who explained why UFOs seem to <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-people-tend-to-believe-ufos-are-extraterrestrial-208403">captivate the public</a> every few years.</p>
<p>People want explanations <a href="https://thedecisionlab.com/biases/ambiguity-effect">for ambiguous situations</a>, and they’re easily influenced by others. Social media enables a concept called <a href="https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v3i2.21">bottom-up social diffusion</a>. Say one user posts a blurry video claiming it depicts a UFO. It’s easy for that user’s network to see and repost the video and so on, until it goes viral. Then, when organized institutions like news outlets or government sources publish UFO-related information, that’s called <a href="https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v3i2.21">top-down social diffusion</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536695/original/file-20230710-15-14kf6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two circle-and-line graphics, the left showing several circles connected to one another with lines, while the right shows one circle at the top connecting several other circles" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536695/original/file-20230710-15-14kf6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536695/original/file-20230710-15-14kf6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536695/original/file-20230710-15-14kf6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536695/original/file-20230710-15-14kf6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536695/original/file-20230710-15-14kf6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536695/original/file-20230710-15-14kf6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536695/original/file-20230710-15-14kf6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The left image shows bottom-up diffusion, in which information spreads from person to person. The right shows top-down diffusion, in which information spreads from one authority.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Barry Markovsky</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“Diffusion processes can combine into self-reinforcing loops. Mass media spreads UFO content and piques worldwide interest in UFOs. More people aim their cameras at the skies, creating more opportunities to capture and share odd-looking content,” Markovsky wrote. “Poorly documented UFO pics and videos spread on social media, leading media outlets to grab and republish the most intriguing. Whistleblowers emerge periodically, fanning the flames with claims of secret evidence.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-people-tend-to-believe-ufos-are-extraterrestrial-208403">Why people tend to believe UFOs are extraterrestrial</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>3. Signature detection</h2>
<p>While UFOs might have traction on social media, it’s likely that the first trace of extraterrestrial life won’t come from a crashed alien spaceship. Instead, scientists could potentially <a href="https://theconversation.com/signatures-of-alien-technology-could-be-how-humanity-first-finds-extraterrestrial-life-191054">pick up signals</a> like radio waves or pollution from some distant galaxy that might indicate extraterrestrial technology. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.seti.org/">Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence</a> is a group of scientists all working on the search for extraterrestrial life. Part of what they do is listen for these “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S1473550419000284">technosignatures</a>”.</p>
<p>As two astronomers who work on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, Penn State’s <a href="https://sites.psu.edu/macyhuston/">Macy Huston</a> and <a href="https://sites.psu.edu/astrowright/">Jason Wright</a> wrote about how humans often <a href="https://www.doi.org/10.1126/science.199.4327.377">unintentionally broadcast signals</a> like radio waves into space. In theory, extraterrestrial civilizations could be doing the same thing – and if scientists can pick up on these signals, they might have their first hints at alien life. </p>
<p>“However, this approach assumes that extraterrestrial civilizations <a href="https://www.universetoday.com/149513/beyond-fermis-paradox-xvii-what-is-the-seti-paradox-hypothesis/">want to communicate</a> with other technologically advanced life,” Huston and Wright explained. “Humans very rarely send targeted signals into space, and some scholars argue that intelligent species may <a href="https://theconversation.com/blasting-out-earths-location-with-the-hope-of-reaching-aliens-is-a-controversial-idea-two-teams-of-scientists-are-doing-it-anyway-182036">purposefully avoid broadcasting</a> out their locations. This search for signals that no one may be sending is called <a href="https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.physics/0611283">the SETI Paradox</a>.” </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/signatures-of-alien-technology-could-be-how-humanity-first-finds-extraterrestrial-life-191054">Signatures of alien technology could be how humanity first finds extraterrestrial life</a>
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<h2>4. Ethical considerations</h2>
<p>While the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence hasn’t yet detected any extraterrestrial technosignatures, a <a href="https://escholarship.org/uc/item/2sq6f3b0">working group of interdisciplinary scholars</a> in Indigenous studies argued that the act of listening for these signals may already count as engaging in first contact with extraterrestrial life.</p>
<p>The Indigenous studies working group argued that first contact may not be just one event – rather, you can think of it as a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/2514848619862191">long phase</a> that begins with listening and planning. Listening can be an act of surveillance, and with that comes ethical considerations. </p>
<p>But research groups like the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence don’t often include perspectives from the humanities, even though there are many histories of first contact between groups of people here on Earth to draw from. </p>
<p>James Cook’s 1768 voyage to Oceania, for example, was planned as scientific exploration. But its <a href="https://doi.org/10.17953/aicrj.45.1.lempert">legacy of genocide</a> still affects the Indigenous people of Australia and New Zealand today. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">This BBC video describes the modern ramifications of Captain James Cook’s colonial legacy in New Zealand.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“The initial domino of a public ET message, or recovered bodies or ships, could initiate <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2010.0236">cascading events</a>, including military actions, corporate resource mining and perhaps even geopolitical reorganizing,” wrote <a href="https://www.wacd.ucla.edu/people/faculty/david-shorter">David Shorter</a>, <a href="https://www.bowdoin.edu/profiles/faculty/wlempert/index.html">William Lempert</a> and <a href="https://kimtallbear.com/">Kim Tallbear</a>. “No one can know for sure <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-your-religion-ready-to-meet-et-32541">how engagement with extraterrestrials would go</a>, though it’s better to consider cautionary tales from Earth’s own history sooner rather than later.”</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/first-contact-with-aliens-could-end-in-colonization-and-genocide-if-we-dont-learn-from-history-207793">First contact with aliens could end in colonization and genocide if we don't learn from history</a>
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<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210955/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Whistleblower allegations that the government possesses UFOs may not be backed up by public physical evidence, but some argue that listening for extraterrestrial life is the first phase of contact.Mary Magnuson, Assistant Science EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2077932023-07-19T12:23:49Z2023-07-19T12:23:49ZFirst contact with aliens could end in colonization and genocide if we don’t learn from history<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536178/original/file-20230706-15-uc6ukv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=44%2C0%2C4928%2C3260&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">SETI has been listening for markers that may indicate alien life -- but is doing so ethical?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/4TpL_oVkUcQ">Donald Giannati via Unsplash</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>We’re only halfway through 2023, and it feels already like the year of alien contact. </p>
<p>In February, President Joe Biden <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2023/02/16/remarks-by-president-biden-on-the-united-states-response-to-recent-aerial-objects/">gave orders</a> to shoot down three unidentified aerial phenomena – NASA’s title for UFOs. Then, the alleged <a href="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2021/05/19/ufo-navy-video-jeremy-corbell-orig-jm.cnn">leaked footage</a> from a Navy pilot of a UFO, and then news of a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/06/whistleblower-ufo-alien-tech-spacecraft">whistleblower’s report</a> on a possible U.S. government cover-up about UFO research. Most recently, an independent analysis <a href="https://douglasjohnson.ghost.io/senate-intelligence-bill-gives-holders-of-non-earth-origin-six-months/">published in June</a> suggests that UFOs might have been collected by a clandestine agency of the U.S. government.</p>
<p>If any actual evidence of extraterrestrial life emerges, whether from whistleblower testimony or an admission of a cover-up, humans would face a historic paradigm shift. </p>
<p>As members of an Indigenous studies working group who were asked to lend our disciplinary expertise to a workshop affiliated with the <a href="https://seti.berkeley.edu/">Berkeley SETI Research Center</a>, we have studied centuries of culture contacts and their outcomes from around the globe. Our collaborative preparations for the workshop drew from transdisciplinary research in Australia, New Zealand, Africa and across the Americas. </p>
<p>In its final form, our <a href="https://escholarship.org/uc/item/2sq6f3b0">group statement</a> illustrated the need for diverse perspectives on the ethics of listening for alien life and a broadening of <a href="https://doi.org/10.17953/aicrj.45.1.shorter">what defines “intelligence” and “life.”</a> Based on our findings, we consider first contact less as an event and more as a long process that has already begun. </p>
<h2>Who’s in charge of first contact</h2>
<p>The question of who is “in charge” of preparing for contact with alien life immediately comes to mind. The communities – and their interpretive lenses – most likely to engage in any contact scenario would be military, corporate and scientific. </p>
<p>By giving Americans the legal right to profit from space tourism and planetary resource extraction, the <a href="https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/COMPS-15975">Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act of 2015</a> could mean that corporations will be the first to find signs of extraterrestrial societies. Otherwise, while detecting unidentified aerial phenomena is usually a military matter, and NASA takes the lead on <a href="https://theconversation.com/blasting-out-earths-location-with-the-hope-of-reaching-aliens-is-a-controversial-idea-two-teams-of-scientists-are-doing-it-anyway-182036">sending messages from Earth</a>, most activities around extraterrestrial communications and evidence fall to a program called <a href="https://www.seti.org/">SETI, or the search for extraterrestrial intelligence</a>. </p>
<p>SETI is a collection of scientists with a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/earth-and-planetary-sciences/project-seti">variety of research endeavors</a>, including Breakthrough Listen, which listens for “<a href="https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-3881/abf649">technosignatures</a>,” or markers, like pollutants, <a href="https://theconversation.com/signatures-of-alien-technology-could-be-how-humanity-first-finds-extraterrestrial-life-191054">of a designed technology</a>. </p>
<p>SETI investigators are <a href="https://www.seti.org/become-pi-or-affiliate">virtually always STEM</a> – science, technology, engineering and math – scholars. Few in the social science and humanities fields have been afforded opportunities to contribute to concepts of and preparations for contact.</p>
<p>In a promising act of disciplinary inclusion, the <a href="https://seti.berkeley.edu/listen/">Berkeley SETI Research Center</a> in 2018 invited working groups – including our <a href="https://doi.org/10.17953/aicrj.45.1.atalay_etal">Indigenous studies working group</a> – from outside STEM fields to craft perspective papers for SETI scientists to consider.</p>
<h2>Ethics of listening</h2>
<p>Neither Breakthough Listen nor SETI’s site features a current <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119711186.ch13">statement of ethics</a> beyond a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2010.0311">commitment to transparency</a>. Our working group was <a href="https://bis-space.com/shop/product/do-no-harm-cultural-imperialism-and-the-ethics-of-active-seti/">not the first</a> to raise this issue. And while the <a href="https://www.seti.org/event/seti-live-ethics-outer-space">SETI Institute</a> and <a href="https://www.pseti.psu.edu/seminar/">certain research centers</a> have included ethics in their event programming, it seems relevant to ask who NASA and SETI answer to, and what ethical guidelines they’re following for a potential first contact scenario. </p>
<p><a href="https://seti.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/">SETI’s Post-Detection Hub</a> – another rare exception to SETI’s STEM-centrism – seems the most likely to develop a range of contact scenarios. The possible circumstances imagined include finding ET artifacts, detecting signals from thousands of light years away, dealing with linguistic incompatibility, finding microbial organisms in space or on other planets, and biological contamination of either their or our species. Whether the U.S. government or heads of military would heed these scenarios is another matter. </p>
<p>SETI-affiliated scholars <a href="https://youtu.be/1Op7AN0MeNw?t=1237">tend to reassure critics</a> that the intentions of those listening for technosignatures are benevolent, since “what harm could come from simply listening?” The chair emeritus of SETI Research, Jill Tarter, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1814k0q">defended listening</a> because any ET civilization would perceive our listening techniques as immature or elementary. </p>
<p>But our working group drew upon the history of colonial contacts <a href="https://doi.org/10.17953/aicrj.45.1.shorter">to show the dangers</a> of thinking that whole civilizations are comparatively advanced or intelligent. For example, when Christopher Columbus and other European explorers came to the Americas, those relationships were shaped by <a href="https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004421882_011">the preconceived notion</a> that the “Indians” were less advanced due to <a href="https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/nebraska-paperback/9780803253445/">their lack of writing</a>. This led to decades of <a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-other-slavery-andres-resendez?variant=39936147849250">Indigenous servitude</a> in the Americas. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537513/original/file-20230714-23-b71osm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A black and white engraving of a group of armed and armored men standing on the shore speaking to many naked men. Large ships sail in the background." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537513/original/file-20230714-23-b71osm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537513/original/file-20230714-23-b71osm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537513/original/file-20230714-23-b71osm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537513/original/file-20230714-23-b71osm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537513/original/file-20230714-23-b71osm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537513/original/file-20230714-23-b71osm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537513/original/file-20230714-23-b71osm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=603&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This 16th century engraving shows Christopher Columbus landing in the Americas, where he and his explorers deemed the Indigenous people there as ‘primitive,’ as they had no writing system.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Columbus_landing_on_Hispaniola.JPG">Theodor de Bry/Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
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<p>The working group statement also suggested that the act of listening is itself already within a “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/2514848619862191">phase of contact</a>.” Like colonialism itself, contact might best be thought of as a series of events that starts with planning, rather than a singular event. Seen this way, isn’t listening potentially without permission just another form of surveillance? To listen intently but indiscriminately seemed to our working group like a <a href="https://doi.org/10.17953/aicrj.45.1.shorter_tallbear">type of eavesdropping</a>. </p>
<p>It seems contradictory that we begin our relations with aliens by listening in without their permission while actively working to stop other countries from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QI_rUsLT5Iw&ab_channel=WION">listening to certain U.S. communications</a>. If humans are initially perceived as disrespectful or careless, ET contact could more likely lead to <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-could-we-build-an-invisibility-cloak-to-hide-earth-from-an-alien-civilization-57092">their colonization of us</a>.</p>
<h2>Histories of contact</h2>
<p>Throughout histories of Western colonization, even in those few cases when contactees were intended to be protected, contact has led to brutal violence, pandemics, enslavement and genocide. </p>
<p>James Cook’s 1768 voyage on the HMS Endeavor was initiated by the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.1969.0003">Royal Society</a>. This prestigious British academic society charged him with calculating the solar distance between the Earth and the Sun by measuring the visible movement of Venus across the Sun from Tahiti. The society strictly forbade him from any colonial engagements. </p>
<p>Though he achieved his scientific goals, Cook also <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S1743921305001262">received orders</a> from the Crown to map and claim as much territory as possible on the return voyage. Cook’s actions put into motion wide-scale colonization and Indigenous dispossession across Oceania, including the <a href="https://doi.org/10.17953/aicrj.45.1.lempert">violent conquests of Australia and New Zealand</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537303/original/file-20230713-17-55wdsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A painting showing five men, two dogs, and a statue of a woman standing in a clearing near the ocean shore. The center man, James Cook, is holding his hat out." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537303/original/file-20230713-17-55wdsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537303/original/file-20230713-17-55wdsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537303/original/file-20230713-17-55wdsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537303/original/file-20230713-17-55wdsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537303/original/file-20230713-17-55wdsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=542&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537303/original/file-20230713-17-55wdsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=542&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537303/original/file-20230713-17-55wdsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=542&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The 1768 voyage of British captain James Cook, center, put into motion wide-scale colonization and Indigenous dispossession across Oceania.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-135646842/view">John Hamilton Mortimer via the National Library of Australia</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>The Royal Society gave Cook a “<a href="https://bigthink.com/thinking/star-trek-prime-directive/">prime directive</a>” of doing no harm and to only conduct research that would broadly benefit humanity. However, explorers are rarely independent from their funders, and their explorations reflect the political contexts of their time. </p>
<p>As scholars attuned to both research ethics and histories of colonialism, we wrote about Cook in our working group statement to showcase why SETI might want to explicitly disentangle their intentions <a href="https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/COMPS-15975">from those of corporations, the military and the government</a>. </p>
<p>Although separated by vast time and space, both Cook’s voyage and SETI share key qualities, including their appeal to celestial science in the service of all humanity. They also share a mismatch between their ethical protocols and the likely long-term impacts of their success.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/5gZwLGrJQrM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">This BBC video describes the modern ramifications of Captain James Cook’s colonial legacy in New Zealand.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The initial domino of a public ET message, or recovered bodies or ships, could initiate <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2010.0236">cascading events</a>, including military actions, corporate resource mining and perhaps even geopolitical reorganizing. The history of imperialism and colonialism on Earth illustrates that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/14623520601056240">not everyone benefits from colonization</a>. No one can know for sure <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-your-religion-ready-to-meet-et-32541">how engagement with extraterrestrials would go</a>, though it’s better to consider cautionary tales from Earth’s own history sooner rather than later.</p>
<p><em>This article has been updated to correct the date of James Cook’s voyage.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207793/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Delgado Shorter has received funding from the National Science Foundation, the University of California, and the California Community Foundation. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>William Lempert has received funding from Bowdoin College, the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, the Fulbright IIE US Scholar Program, the Lois Roth Endowment, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the American Council of Learned Societies.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kim TallBear does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Three Indigenous studies scholars draw from colonial histories and explain why listening for alien life can have ethical ramifications.David Delgado Shorter, Professor of World Arts and Cultures/Dance, University of California, Los AngelesKim TallBear, Professor of Native Studies, University of AlbertaWilliam Lempert, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2076182023-06-21T16:12:20Z2023-06-21T16:12:20ZApa yang menyebabkan gunung berapi meletus?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531541/original/file-20230613-27-n0c5iu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Pemandangan dari udara gunung berapi Mauna Loa, yang meletus di pulau Hawaii pada bulan Desember 2022.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/in-an-aerial-view-lava-erupts-from-the-mauna-loa-volcano-on-news-photo/1245459430?phrase=Mauna%20Loa%20volcano%202022&adppopup=true">Andrew Richard Hara/Getty Images News</a></span></figcaption></figure><blockquote>
<p><strong>Apa yang menyebabkan gunung berapi meletus? - Avery, usia 8 tahun, Los Angeles, Amerika Serikat</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<hr>
<p>Pada 27 November 2022, Mauna Loa - gunung berapi aktif terbesar di dunia - <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/hvo/news/volcano-watch-mauna-loa-reawakens-0">meletus di pulau Hawaii</a>. Selama berhari-hari, air mancur lava yang mendidih pada suhu lebih dari 2.000 derajat Fahrenheit (1.100 derajat Celcius), dimuntahkan ke atas dan mengalir ke sisi gunung. </p>
<p>Bagi puluhan juta orang di seluruh dunia, video tersebut merupakan pemandangan yang memukau. Kemudian, beberapa minggu kemudian, letusan berakhir. Untungnya, tidak ada korban jiwa, dan tidak ada kerusakan properti yang berarti. </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/F0tmu-zaXig?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Mauna Loa adalah gunung berapi aktif terbesar di dunia.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Sekitar seminggu kemudian, Gunung Semeru di Jawa Timur, Indonesia, <a href="https://volcano.si.edu/volcano.cfm?vn=263300">meletus dengan campuran abu, gas, dan bebatuan panas</a>. Awan panas membumbung setinggi satu mil di atas puncak gunung. Ribuan orang yang tinggal <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/new-eruption-of-indonesias-mt-semeru-unleashes-lava-river-volcanic-ash">di sekitarnya dievakuasi</a>); banyak yang memakai masker untuk melindungi diri dari udara yang dipenuhi abu. Gunung Semeru terus meletus selama berbulan-bulan.</p>
<p>Saya adalah seorang ahli geologi yang <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=4Q8uMqUAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">mempelajari mineral dalam batuan vulkanik</a>. Saya ingin belajar lebih banyak tentang apa yang menyebabkan gunung berapi meletus. Jutaan orang <a href="https://www.discovery.com/exploration/People-Live-Near-Active-Volcanoes">tinggal di dekat gunung berapi aktif</a> - yakni di salah satu dari 1.328 gunung berapi di seluruh dunia yang <a href="https://volcano.si.edu/faq/index.cfm?question=activevolcanoes">telah meletus selama 12.000 tahun terakhir</a>. </p>
<p>Pada waktu tertentu, 20 hingga 50 <a href="https://volcano.si.edu/gvp_currenteruptions.cfm">gunung berapi aktif meletus</a>. Kedekatannya dengan manusia dan bangunan membuatnya penting untuk mempelajari gunung berapi dan memahami bahayanya. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Gunung Vesuvius" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Gunung Vesuvius, sekitar 6 mil sebelah timur Naples, Italia, masih merupakan gunung berapi yang aktif. Pada tahun 79 Masehi, Vesuvius meletus dan menghancurkan kota Pompeii.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/travelling-in-italy-royalty-free-image/906204248?phrase=volcanoes%20mount%20vesuvius&adppopup=true">Antonio Bussello/Moment via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Bagaimana gunung berapi meledak</h2>
<p>Pusat Bumi <a href="https://earthhow.com/inside-earth-crust-core-mantle/">disebut sebagai <em>core</em> (inti)</a>; lapisan berikutnya adalah mantel; lapisan terluar adalah kerak. </p>
<p>Seiring berjalannya waktu, <a href="https://kids.kiddle.co/Magma">magma</a>- yang merupakan batuan yang meleleh bercampur dengan gas dan kristal mineral - terakumulasi di ruang bawah tanah di bawah gunung berapi. Magma di Mauna Loa terbentuk ketika <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/where-does-mauna-loa-lava-come-from/">bulu mantel panas</a> - bayangkan sebuah konveyor panas - melelehkan sebagian batuan di dalam mantel. </p>
<p>Gunung berapi pada dasarnya adalah sebuah <a href="https://www.natgeokids.com/uk/discover/geography/physical-geography/volcano-facts/">lubang yang mengeluarkan magma</a> ke permukaan bumi. Setelah dilepaskan dari gunung berapi, magma disebut lava. </p>
<p>Pada bulan-bulan menjelang letusannya, para ilmuwan mencatat <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/hvo">peningkatan gempa bumi dan menggembungnya Mauna Loa</a>, seperti balon yang sedang dipompa. Tanda-tanda ini menunjukkan bahwa lebih banyak magma yang naik ke atas, karena tekanan dari naiknya magma dapat memperluas sisi gunung berapi dan menyebabkan bebatuan bergeser dan patah yang menyebabkan gempa bumi.</p>
<p>Biasanya, agar letusan dapat terjadi, magma yang cukup harus <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/about-volcanoes">terakumulasi di dalam ruang di bawah gunung berapi</a>. Kemudian sesuatu harus memicu letusan. Hal itu bisa berupa suntikan magma baru ke dalam ruangan, penumpukan gas di dalam gunung berapi, atau tanah longsor yang menghilangkan material dari puncak gunung berapi.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XLF_lMY2gu8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Letusan di Gunung Semeru memaksa evakuasi hampir 2.000 penduduk di sekitarnya.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Jenis-jenis gunung berapi</h2>
<p>Mauna Loa adalah <a href="https://study.com/academy/lesson/shield-volcano-facts-lesson-for-kids.html#:%7E">gunung berapi perisai</a> yang terbentuk selama ribuan tahun melalui letusan lava. Sisi-sisinya melandai dengan lembut ke bawah ke segala arah. </p>
<p>Namun Gunung Semeru berbeda - gunung ini merupakan <a href="https://study.com/academy/lesson/composite-volcano-facts-lesson-for-kids.html#:%7E">gunung berapi komposit</a> yang juga dikenal sebagai gunung berapi strato, dengan sisi-sisi curam yang bertemu pada satu titik di bagian atas, seperti kerucut gula yang terbalik. </p>
<p>Letusan terakhir Semeru dimulai ketika hujan lebat <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/08/asia/indonesia-mount-semeru-volcano-eruption-cimate-intl/index.html">menghanyutkan bebatuan di dekat puncak gunung berapi</a>. Hal ini memungkinkan gas untuk keluar - dan abu mulai meletus. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="situasi setelah gunung semeru erupsi" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Setelah letusan Gunung Semeru, desa-desa di sekitarnya diselimuti oleh abu vulkanik.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/motorbike-is-covered-with-volcanic-ashes-after-mount-semeru-news-photo/1237024024?adppopup=true">Bayu Novanta/Xinhua News Agency via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Bahaya-bahaya dari letusan gunung berapi</h2>
<p>Banyak bahaya muncul akibat gunung berapi yang meletus: <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/cascades-volcano-observatory/lahars-most-threatening-volcanic-hazard-cascades#:%7E">aliran lahar</a>, gas asam, abu, dan lahar yang merupakan aliran air, abu, dan batu yang berbahaya yang mengalir <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/lahars-move-rapidly-down-valleys-rivers-concrete">dengan kecepatan bermil-mil</a> menuruni lereng gunung berapi yang curam, kadang-kadang dengan <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/lahars-move-rapidly-down-valleys-rivers-concrete#:%7E">kecepatan lebih dari 100 mil per jam</a>. Kekuatan lahar dingin dapat memindahkan batu-batu besar dan menghancurkan jembatan dan bangunan. </p>
<p>Letusan Gunung Semeru baru-baru ini <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/ashfall-most-widespread-and-frequent-volcanic-hazard">menutupi desa-desa di dekatnya dengan abu</a> - partikel-partikel kecil dari batu yang dapat masuk jauh ke dalam paru-paru, menyebabkan iritasi, dan membuat penduduk sekitar sulit untuk bernapas. </p>
<p>Ketika abu yang jatuh terakumulasi, abu dapat menutupi tanaman, mencemari pasokan air dan memicu runtuhnya bangunan. Abu kering yang baru jatuh memiliki berat <a href="https://mil.wa.gov/asset/5ba4200a0b533#:%7E:text=Ash%20accumulates%20like%20heavy%20snowfall,Wet%20ash%20is%20slippery.">10 hingga 20 kali lebih berat dari salju</a>. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3Jxeh-yAXek?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Di bawah permukaan, Bumi selalu bergerak dan berubah.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Umumnya, para ilmuwan tidak mencoba menghentikan gunung berapi agar tidak meletus. Mereka adalah bagian alami dari Bumi. Namun, memantau gunung berapi sangatlah penting. Masyarakat membutuhkan peringatan dini akan terjadinya letusan <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/understanding-volcanic-hazards-can-save-lives">sehingga mereka dapat menjauh dari bahaya</a>. </p>
<p>Meskipun kita tidak dapat memprediksi waktu yang tepat untuk erupsi, para ilmuwan mempelajari lebih lanjut tentang apa yang menyebabkan erupsi dan bagaimana melindungi orang-orang yang tinggal di dekatnya. </p>
<p>Yang sangat penting: sistem peringatan untuk lahar, rute evakuasi yang terencana di daerah-daerah yang terancam oleh gunung berapi, dan komunikasi yang sangat baik antara para ilmuwan di stasiun pemantau gunung berapi dan badan-badan pemerintah yang dapat memberi tahu orang-orang ketika gunung berapi akan meletus. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Demetrius Adyatma Pangestu dari Universitas Bina Nusantara menerjemahkan artikel ini dari bahasa Inggris</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207618/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rachel Beane terafiliasi dengan the Harpswell Heritage Land Trust. Dia menerima dana dari Bowdoin College dan the National Science Foundation . </span></em></p>Gunung berapi adalah “pasak bumi” yang menjaga semuanya tetap stabil. Namun erupsi gunung berapi menjadi sumber ketakutan bagi semua makhluk hidup di Bumi.Rachel Beane, Professor of Natural Sciences, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1955272023-05-08T12:19:14Z2023-05-08T12:19:14ZDebunking the Dunning-Kruger effect – the least skilled people know how much they don’t know, but everyone thinks they are better than average<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524681/original/file-20230505-17-7okuda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=535%2C93%2C4626%2C3682&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">David Dunning and Justin Kruger tested psychology students to see whether the least skilled were also the most unaware.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/electrotherapy-royalty-free-image/468877597?phrase=confused+test&adppopup=true">Rich Vintage/E+ via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>John Cleese, the British comedian, once <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvVPdyYeaQU">summed up the idea of the Dunning–Kruger effect</a> as, “If you are really, really stupid, then it’s impossible for you to know you are really, really stupid.” A quick search of the news brings up dozens of headlines connecting the Dunning–Kruger effect to everything from <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/markmurphy/2017/01/24/the-dunning-kruger-effect-shows-why-some-people-think-theyre-great-even-when-their-work-is-terrible/">work</a> to <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2023/04/27/steve-cuno-dunning-kruger-effect/">empathy</a> and even to why <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/mind-in-the-machine/201808/the-dunning-kruger-effect-may-help-explain-trumps-support">Donald Trump was elected president</a>.</p>
<p>As a math professor who <a href="https://www.bowdoin.edu/profiles/faculty/egaze/">teaches students to use data</a> to make informed decisions, I am familiar with common mistakes people make when dealing with numbers. The Dunning-Kruger effect is the idea that the least skilled people <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.77.6.1121">overestimate their abilities</a> more than anyone else. This sounds convincing on the surface and makes for excellent comedy. But my colleagues and I suggest that the mathematical approach used to show this effect <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.5038/1936-4660.9.1.4">may be incorrect</a>.</p>
<h2>What Dunning and Kruger showed</h2>
<p>In the 1990s, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=d5TrVQMAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">David Dunning</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ZU-_cC0AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">Justin Kruger</a> were professors of psychology at Cornell University and wanted to test whether <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.77.6.1121">incompetent people were unaware of their incompetence</a>.</p>
<p><iframe id="n0oJ0" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/n0oJ0/6/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>To test this, they gave 45 undergraduate students a 20-question logic test and then asked them to rate their own performance in two different ways.</p>
<p>First, Dunning and Kruger asked the students to estimate how many questions they got correct – a fairly straightforward assessment. Then, Dunning and Kruger asked the students to estimate how they did compared with the other students who took the test. This type of self-assessment requires students to make guesses about how others performed and is subject to a common cognitive mistake – most people consider themselves better than average.</p>
<p>Research shows that 93% of Americans think they are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/0001-6918(81)90005-6">better drivers than average</a>, 90% of teachers think they are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/he.36919771703">more skilled than their peers</a>, and this overestimation is pervasive across many skills – including logic tests. But it is mathematically impossible for most people to be better than average at a certain task.</p>
<p>After giving students the logic test, Dunning and Kruger divided them into four groups based on their scores. The lowest-scoring quarter of the students got, on average, 10 of the 20 questions correct. In comparison, the top-scoring quarter of students got an average of 17 questions correct. Both groups estimated they got about 14 correct. This is not terrible self-assessment by either group. The least skilled overestimated their scores by around 20 percentage points, while the top performers underestimated their scores by roughly 15 points.</p>
<p>The results appear more striking when looking at how students rated themselves against their peers, and here is where the better-than-average effect is on full display. The lowest-scoring students estimated that they did better than 62% of the test-takers, while the highest-scoring students thought they scored better than 68%.</p>
<p>By definition, being in the bottom 25% means that, at best, you will score better than 25% of people and, on average, better than just 12.5%. Estimating you did better than 62% of your peers, while only scoring better than 12.5% of them, gives a whopping 49.5 percentage-point overestimation. </p>
<p>The measure of how students compared themselves to others, rather than to their actual scores, is where the Dunning–Kruger effect arose. It grossly exaggerates the overestimation of the bottom 25% and seems to show, as Dunning and Kruger titled their paper, that the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.77.6.1121">least skilled students were “unskilled and unaware.”</a> </p>
<p>Using the protocol laid out by Dunning and Kruger, many researchers since have “confirmed” this effect in their <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2007.05.002">own fields of study</a>, leading to the sense that the Dunning–Kruger effect is intrinsic to how human brains work. For everyday people, the Dunning-Kruger effect seems true because the overly arrogant fool is a familiar and annoying stereotype.</p>
<h2>Debunking the Dunning-Kruger effect</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524683/original/file-20230505-17-zm461w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A hand filling out a test sheet." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524683/original/file-20230505-17-zm461w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524683/original/file-20230505-17-zm461w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524683/original/file-20230505-17-zm461w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524683/original/file-20230505-17-zm461w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524683/original/file-20230505-17-zm461w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524683/original/file-20230505-17-zm461w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524683/original/file-20230505-17-zm461w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">When students are asked to rate their ability objectively, they do much better than when they compare themselves with their peers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/exam-test-royalty-free-image/688307046?phrase=school%2Btest">greenwatermelon/iStock via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There are three reasons Dunning and Kruger’s analysis is misleading. </p>
<p>The worst test-takers would also overestimate their performance the most because they are simply the furthest from getting a perfect score. Additionally, the least skilled people, like most people, assume they are better than average. Finally, the lowest scorers aren’t markedly worse at estimating their objective performance.</p>
<p>To establish the Dunning-Kruger effect is an artifact of research design, not human thinking, my colleagues and I showed it can be produced <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.5038/1936-4660.9.1.4">using randomly generated data</a>. </p>
<p>First, we created 1,154 fictional people and randomly assigned them both a test score and a self-assessment ranking compared with their peers.</p>
<p>Then, just as Dunning and Kruger did, we divided these fake people into quarters based on their test scores. Because the self-assessment rankings were also randomly assigned a score from 1 to 100, each quarter will revert to the mean of 50. By definition, the bottom quarter will outperform only 12.5% of participants on average, but from the random assignment of self-assessment scores they will consider themselves better than 50% of test-takers. This gives an <a href="https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/critical-thinking/dunning-kruger-effect-probably-not-real">overestimation of 37.5 percentage points</a> without any humans involved.</p>
<p>To prove the last point – that the least skilled can adequately judge their own skill – required a different approach. </p>
<p>My colleague Ed Nuhfer and his team gave students a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1128/jmbe.v17i1.1036">25-question scientific literacy test</a>. After answering each question, the students would rate their own performance on each question as either “nailed it,” “not sure” or “no idea.”</p>
<p>Working with Nuhfer, we found that unskilled students are <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.5038/1936-4660.10.1.4">pretty good at estimating their own competence</a>. In this study of unskilled students who scored in the bottom quarter, only 16.5% significantly overestimated their abilities. And, it turns out, 3.9% significantly underestimated their score. That means nearly 80% of unskilled students were fairly good at estimating their real ability – a far cry from the idea put forth by Dunning and Kruger that the unskilled consistently overestimate their skills.</p>
<h2>Dunning–Kruger today</h2>
<p>The original paper by Dunning and Kruger starts with the quote: “It is one of the essential features of incompetence that the person so inflicted is incapable of knowing that they are incompetent.” This idea has spread far and wide through both scientific literature and pop culture alike. But according to the work of my colleagues and me, the reality is that very few people are truly unskilled and unaware.</p>
<p>The Dunning and Kruger experiment did find a real effect – most people think they are better than average. But according to my team’s work, that is all Dunning and Kruger showed. The reality is that people have an innate ability to gauge their competence and knowledge. To <a href="https://3starlearningexperiences.wordpress.com/2016/09/06/de-dunning-kruger-effect-a-poisonous-paradox/">claim otherwise</a> suggests, incorrectly, that much of the population is hopelessly ignorant.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/195527/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Eric C. Gaze does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The idea that the least skilled are the most unaware of their incompetency is pervasive in science and pop culture. But a new analysis of the data shows that the Dunning-Kruger effect may not be true.Eric C. Gaze, Senior Lecturer of Mathematics, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1957042023-05-01T12:10:20Z2023-05-01T12:10:20ZWhat causes volcanoes to erupt?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/501671/original/file-20221218-11129-2abr3x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C0%2C4985%2C3323&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">An aerial view of the Mauna Loa volcano, which erupted on the island of Hawaii in December 2022.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/in-an-aerial-view-lava-erupts-from-the-mauna-loa-volcano-on-news-photo/1245459430?phrase=Mauna%20Loa%20volcano%202022&adppopup=true">Andrew Richard Hara/Getty Images News</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/curious-kids-us-74795">Curious Kids</a> is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to <a href="mailto:curiouskidsus@theconversation.com">curiouskidsus@theconversation.com</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>What causes volcanoes to erupt? – Avery, age 8, Los Angeles</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<hr>
<p>On Nov. 27, 2022, Mauna Loa – the world’s largest active volcano – <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/hvo/news/volcano-watch-mauna-loa-reawakens-0">erupted on the island of Hawaii</a>. For days, fountains of lava, boiling at more than 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit (1,100 degrees Celsius), spewed upward and flowed down the mountain’s sides. </p>
<p>For tens of millions of people around the world, the videos were a mesmerizing sight. Then, a few weeks later, the eruption ended. Fortunately, there were no known deaths, and no major property damage. </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/F0tmu-zaXig?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Mauna Loa is the world’s largest active volcano.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>About a week later, Mount Semeru in East Java, Indonesia, <a href="https://volcano.si.edu/volcano.cfm?vn=263300">erupted a mix of ash, gas and hot rocks</a>. The plumes rose a mile above the mountain’s summit. Thousands <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/new-eruption-of-indonesias-mt-semeru-unleashes-lava-river-volcanic-ash">living in the vicinity were evacuated</a>; many wore masks to protect themselves from the ash-filled air. Mount Semeru has continued to erupt for months.</p>
<p>I am a geologist who <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=4Q8uMqUAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">studies minerals in volcanic rocks</a>. I want to learn more about what causes volcanoes to erupt. Millions of people <a href="https://www.discovery.com/exploration/People-Live-Near-Active-Volcanoes">live near an active volcano</a> – that is, one of the 1,328 volcanoes worldwide that have <a href="https://volcano.si.edu/faq/index.cfm?question=activevolcanoes">erupted over the past 12,000 years</a>. </p>
<p>At any given time, 20 to 50 of these <a href="https://volcano.si.edu/gvp_currenteruptions.cfm">active volcanoes are erupting</a>. The proximity of people and buildings makes it important to study volcanoes and understand the hazards. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A photograph of the city of Naples, Italy, with Mount Vesuvius in the background." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502804/original/file-20230102-22-tpygfq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mount Vesuvius, about 6 miles east of Naples, Italy, is still an active volcano. In A.D. 79, Vesuvius erupted and destroyed the city of Pompeii.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/travelling-in-italy-royalty-free-image/906204248?phrase=volcanoes%20mount%20vesuvius&adppopup=true">Antonio Busiello/Moment via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>How volcanoes blow their stacks</h2>
<p>The center of the Earth is <a href="https://earthhow.com/inside-earth-crust-core-mantle/">called the core</a>; the next layer up is the mantle; the outermost layer is the crust. </p>
<p>Over time, <a href="https://kids.kiddle.co/Magma">magma</a> – which is melted rock mixed with gas and mineral crystals – accumulates in an underground chamber beneath the volcano. The magma at Mauna Loa forms when a <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/where-does-mauna-loa-lava-come-from/">hot mantle plume</a> – think of a conveyor of heat – partly melts rock in the mantle. </p>
<p>The volcano is essentially an <a href="https://www.natgeokids.com/uk/discover/geography/physical-geography/volcano-facts/">opening that lets magma out</a> onto the surface of the Earth. Once released from the volcano, the magma is called lava. </p>
<p>In the months leading to its eruption, scientists noted <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/hvo">increased earthquakes and a bulging of Mauna Loa</a>, like a balloon being inflated. These signs suggested that more magma was making its way upward, because pressure from rising magma can expand the sides of a volcano and cause rocks to shift and break, which leads to earthquakes.</p>
<p>Typically, for an eruption to occur, enough magma must <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/about-volcanoes">accumulate in the chamber under the volcano</a>. Then something needs to trigger the eruption. That could be an injection of new magma into the chamber, a buildup of gases within the volcano, or a landslide that removes material from the top of a volcano.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XLF_lMY2gu8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The eruption on Mount Semeru forced an evacuation of nearly 2,000 nearby residents.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Types of volcanoes</h2>
<p>Mauna Loa is a <a href="https://study.com/academy/lesson/shield-volcano-facts-lesson-for-kids.html#:%7E">shield volcano</a>, built up over thousands of years through lava eruptions. Its sides slope gently downward in all directions. </p>
<p>But Mount Semeru is different – it’s a <a href="https://study.com/academy/lesson/composite-volcano-facts-lesson-for-kids.html#:%7E">composite volcano</a>, also known as a stratovolcano, with steep sides that come to a point at the top, like an upside-down sugar cone. </p>
<p>Semeru’s most recent eruption started when heavy rains <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/08/asia/indonesia-mount-semeru-volcano-eruption-cimate-intl/index.html">washed away rocks near the top of the volcano</a>. That allowed gas to escape – and ash to start erupting. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A motorbike, and the ground around it, covered in ash." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517451/original/file-20230324-24-crlmkn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">After the eruption at Mount Semeru, nearby villages were covered in volcanic ash.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/motorbike-is-covered-with-volcanic-ashes-after-mount-semeru-news-photo/1237024024?adppopup=true">Bayu Novanta/Xinhua News Agency via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The dangers</h2>
<p>Many hazards are associated with erupting volcanoes: lava flows, acidic gases, ash and <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/cascades-volcano-observatory/lahars-most-threatening-volcanic-hazard-cascades#:%7E">lahars</a>, which are dangerous flows of water, ash and rock that <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/lahars-move-rapidly-down-valleys-rivers-concrete">run miles down the steep slopes of volcanoes</a>, sometimes <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/lahars-move-rapidly-down-valleys-rivers-concrete#:%7E">at over 100 miles per hour</a>. The force of lahars can move huge boulders and destroy bridges and buildings. </p>
<p>Mount Semeru’s recent eruption <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/ashfall-most-widespread-and-frequent-volcanic-hazard">covered nearby villages with ash</a> – tiny particles of rock that can go deep into lungs, causing irritation and making it hard to breathe. </p>
<p>As falling ash accumulates, it can smother crops, contaminate water supplies and trigger the collapse of buildings. Newly fallen dry ash weighs <a href="https://mil.wa.gov/asset/5ba4200a0b533#:%7E:text=Ash%20accumulates%20like%20heavy%20snowfall,Wet%20ash%20is%20slippery.">10 to 20 times more than snow</a>. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3Jxeh-yAXek?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Below the surface, Earth is always moving and changing.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Generally, scientists don’t try to stop volcanoes from erupting. They are a natural part of the Earth. But monitoring volcanoes is critical. People need an early warning of an eruption <a href="https://www.usgs.gov/programs/VHP/understanding-volcanic-hazards-can-save-lives">so they can move out of harm’s way</a>. </p>
<p>While we cannot predict the exact time of an eruption, scientists are learning more about what causes them, and how to protect people who live near them. </p>
<p>What’s critical: warning systems for lahars, planned evacuation routes in areas threatened by volcanoes, and excellent communication between the scientists at volcanic monitoring stations and government agencies who can let people know when a volcano is about to go. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to <a href="mailto:curiouskidsus@theconversation.com">CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com</a>. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.</em></p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rachel Beane receives funding from Bowdoin College and the National Science Foundation. She is affiliated with the Harpswell Heritage Land Trust. </span></em></p>As they shape the Earth, volcanoes inspire and terrify humans.Rachel Beane, Professor of Natural Sciences, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1995742023-04-05T12:27:28Z2023-04-05T12:27:28ZYour political rivals aren’t as bad as you think – here’s how misunderstandings amplify hostility<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518276/original/file-20230329-25-92m7td.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Misunderstanding can play a role in people's dislike of others who have different beliefs. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/id/1436162554/photo/polarization-in-the-united-states.jpg?s=612x612&w=gi&k=20&c=TTV0L6lt-9_cdIZRVfdJ6jqoygZpbYZ5_vSeawrgExA=">wildpixel/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene drew raised eyebrows when she suggested on Presidents Day that the United States pursue a “national divorce.”</p>
<p>Even in an era of seemingly ever-growing <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.abe1715">political polarization</a> – and despite Taylor Greene’s <a href="https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-technology-las-vegas-mass-shooting-media-social-media-700f28747d856a9bad22a59674a9afe6">record of making controversial statements</a> – the proposal <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/house/3870038-greene-stirs-up-political-storm-with-national-divorce-comments/">shocked members of both political parties</a>.</p>
<p>“The last thing I ever want to see in <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/representative-marjorie-taylor-greene-split-united-states-congress-twitter-2023-2">America is a civil war</a>. Everyone I know would never want that – but it’s going that direction, and we have to do something about it,” Taylor Greene said in a follow-up interview.</p>
<p>“Everyone I talk to is fed up with being bullied by the left, abused by the left, and disrespected by the left.” </p>
<p>It seems safe to say that most left-leaning people would be puzzled by these accusations. And Taylor Greene certainly didn’t indicate that she understands the left’s perspective on causes of U.S. political conflict. </p>
<p>It’s intuitive that misunderstandings – like these – and hostility often go hand in hand, in <a href="https://righteousmind.com/about-the-book/">both political</a> and <a href="https://www.mheducation.com/highered/product/interpersonal-conflict-hocker-berry/M9781260836950.html">nonpolitical conflicts</a>. </p>
<p>And yet people don’t usually think that their own emotions can be downright wrong, the way, say, their positions on a factual issue can be incorrect. Is it possible for a feeling to be a mistake? </p>
<p><a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=2WzjmrsAAAAJ&hl=en">I am a behavioral economist</a> who studies biases in belief formation, and in my forthcoming book, “<a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262047500/undue-hate/">Undue Hate</a>,” I argue that we indeed tend to excessively dislike people we disagree with – on both political and nonpolitical topics – for a variety of reasons.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518808/original/file-20230331-18-pa1ll9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two women stand in front of American flags and wag their fingers at a person standing close to them on the street." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518808/original/file-20230331-18-pa1ll9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518808/original/file-20230331-18-pa1ll9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=591&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518808/original/file-20230331-18-pa1ll9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=591&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518808/original/file-20230331-18-pa1ll9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=591&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518808/original/file-20230331-18-pa1ll9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=743&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518808/original/file-20230331-18-pa1ll9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=743&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518808/original/file-20230331-18-pa1ll9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=743&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Supporters of then-President Donald Trump clash with anti-Trump protesters in New York City in 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/id/679495258/photo/anti-trump-protesters-demonstrate-in-new-york-as-the-president-attends-event-on-intrepid.jpg?s=1024x1024&w=gi&k=20&c=bFgWnL0piyS_I4_UA3Rhafogt7wkLOwXqu24DzN2etc=">Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<h2>When disliking another person is a mistake</h2>
<p>Suppose Jane, a Democrat, overestimates the likelihood her Republican neighbor Joe takes bad actions or has bad opinions – by whatever Jane considers “bad.” For example, Jane might overestimate Joe’s opposition to gun control – or overestimate how much hostility Joe feels toward her. </p>
<p>These beliefs likely contribute to Jane’s negative feelings toward Joe. If so, since these beliefs are mistaken, then Jane would dislike Joe more than she should – by her own standards. </p>
<p>In fact, people in general have a tendency to make this mistake when disagreeing with others for many reasons. I call this tendency “affective polarization bias,” since it’s a bias toward excessive affective polarization. (“<a href="https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-polisci-051117-073034">Affective polarization</a>” is the technical term for emotionally hostile polarization.)</p>
<p>To look for evidence of this bias, I review studies of the accuracy of people’s beliefs about opinions held by members of the other political party. I also examine the accuracy of beliefs about the selfishness of choices by people in the other party in experiments with monetary stakes.</p>
<p>My research shows that people are indeed consistently too pessimistic about their partisan counterparts. On both sides, people tend to overestimate the other side’s extremism, hostility, interest in political violence and selfishness. And the most affectively polarized people make the biggest mistakes.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518294/original/file-20230329-26-xw21aq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A woman wears a red coat and a face mask that says 'end abortion.' She walks down a hallway with men behind her, also wearing masks." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518294/original/file-20230329-26-xw21aq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518294/original/file-20230329-26-xw21aq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518294/original/file-20230329-26-xw21aq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518294/original/file-20230329-26-xw21aq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518294/original/file-20230329-26-xw21aq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518294/original/file-20230329-26-xw21aq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518294/original/file-20230329-26-xw21aq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene walks in the U.S. Capitol in February 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://media.gettyimages.com/id/1300197674/photo/house-to-vote-on-removal-of-rep-marjorie-taylor-greene-from-committees.jpg?s=612x612&w=gi&k=20&c=THoB--L95402xltC07Clv0OQEti6np8E7Dn_uhqOPbA=">Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Explanations</h2>
<p>Although “affective polarization bias” is a new term, the concept of undue dislike is intuitive for most people. </p>
<p>The media environment – specifically <a href="https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/H/bo16468853.html">the proliferation of cable and online news</a> as well as <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/frenemies/00D051D46BC4CDB2D322EE6A1CEA6791">social media</a> – is a common explanation for recent growth in political hostility, and has likely also led to growth in undue dislike.</p>
<p>Citizens are exposed to more polarizing information today than in decades past – not just on <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10584600802426965">cable TV, online</a>, and on <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/23808985.2021.1976070">social media</a>, but also in person as our social networks <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjr044">offline are particularly ideologically segregated</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-021-01066-z">more so than ever</a>. As a result, people spend more time talking to others who are like-minded about politics, in addition to getting more like-minded news. </p>
<p>Although <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691178707/not-born-yesterday">people don’t believe everything they hear</a>, they do <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/pops.12797">err toward credulity</a>, especially when encountering information <a href="https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jep.30.3.141">they wish to believe is true</a> – like information about the opposition party’s character flaws, since this supports the superiority of our own party. </p>
<p>In the U.S., <a href="https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/U/bo27527354.html">strengthened partisan identity</a>
has been on the rise because of <a href="https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Why-Were-Polarized/Ezra-Klein/9781476700366">the merging of partisan identities with other identities</a> – like someone’s cultural or ethnic background. This has also increased people’s motivation to hold beliefs demonizing the opposition. </p>
<p>What’s more, there are several other important causes of undue dislike toward our rivals stemming from fundamental cognitive errors.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/perfectly-confident-don-a-moore?variant=32127540953122">Overconfidence</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691618769855">naive realism</a> – thinking our tastes are objective truths – make us overestimate the chance that those who disagree with us on just about anything are doing something wrong. As a result we overestimate the other side’s poor judgment and bad motives.</p>
<p>“<a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/002210317790049X">False consensus</a>” can make us overestimate how much others actually agree with us. This in turn makes us too skeptical of the sincerity of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/iere.12421">people who express different viewpoints</a>. </p>
<p>Last and not least, <a href="https://www.thebulwark.com/how-tit-for-tat-game-theory-has-hacked-politics/">strategic retaliation</a> in conjunction with our biases, limited memories and limited foresight is a recipe for escalating undue hostility.</p>
<h2>Correcting mistakes</h2>
<p>The good news is that mistakes can be corrected. We can undo hate. More and more <a href="https://polarizationresearchlab.org/">research efforts</a> are underway to better <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00573-5">understand these mistakes</a> – and to correct them, with <a href="https://www.strengtheningdemocracychallenge.org/paper">impressive success</a>. </p>
<p><a href="http://braverangels.org/">Many different</a> <a href="https://commongroundcommittee.org/">nonprofit groups</a> are also working to <a href="https://www.bridgealliance.us/">bring political opponents together</a> and to correct misconceptions about the other side. Other scholars and <a href="https://techandsocialcohesion.org/">organizations are working</a> to make social media less polarizing. </p>
<p>But as infeasible as it might seem, America may need a bipartisan, top-down effort to have a shot at significantly decreasing unwarranted hatred in the short run. </p>
<p>In the meantime, the next time you feel hate – remind yourself it’s probably partly undue.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/199574/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Daniel F. Stone does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>People tend not to think that their own emotions could simply be wrong. But research shows that people excessively dislike others who disagree with them.Daniel F. Stone, Associate Professor of Economics, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1919212022-11-21T13:16:48Z2022-11-21T13:16:48Z18th- and 19th-century Americans of all races, classes and genders looked to the ancient Mediterranean for inspiration<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/492894/original/file-20221101-26-7dbbw8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1024%2C651&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In a new land, the ancient past held special meaning.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://bcma.bowdoin.edu/antiquity/objects/1904-15/">'Temple of Aphaea, Aegina' by John Rollin Tilton. Courtesy of Bowdoin College Museum of Art</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The ancient world of the Mediterranean has <a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674314269">long permeated American society</a>, in everything from museum collections to <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=3a5PAAAAMAAJ">home furnishings</a>. The design of the nation’s public monuments, buildings and <a href="https://www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/2550/culture-classicism">universities</a>, as well as its <a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/first-principles-thomas-e-ricks?variant=33097718530082">legal system and form of government</a>, show the enduring influence of Mediterranean antiquity on American culture. </p>
<p>Until the late 19th century, <a href="https://bcma.bowdoin.edu/antiquity/objects/portraits-of-greek-and-roman-figures/">Americans encountered the ancient world almost exclusively through reproductions</a> – in books, artwork and even <a href="https://allthingsliberty.com/2013/12/george-washingtons-favorite-play/">popular plays</a>. Very few <a href="https://www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/10869/being-american-europe-1750-1860">could afford to travel abroad</a> to encounter Mediterranean artifacts firsthand. </p>
<p>Yet despite barriers to access, many Americans forged personal connections with the cultures of the ancient Mediterranean – not only the Greeks and Romans, but also the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/08905490902981879">Egyptians</a> and Israelites. Perhaps the newness of American culture inspired this deep interest in the ancient past. </p>
<p>One of the most fascinating aspects of Mediterranean antiquity’s influence on America, even before it officially became a country, is how it cut across cultural lines of race, class and gender. Far from being the preserve of a privileged few, the art and literature of the ancients was <a href="https://andscape.com/features/classics-is-a-part-of-black-intellectual-history-howard-needs-to-keep-it/">often embraced by Americans of all stripes</a> – including the enslaved <a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/phillis-wheatley">Black poet Phillis Wheatley</a> (circa 1753-1784) and <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/sculptor-edmonia-lewis-shattered-gender-race-expectations-19th-century-america-180972934/">Black and Native American sculptor Edmonia Lewis</a> (1844-1907). But the circumstances of these encounters and the way individual Americans thought about antiquity varied greatly. </p>
<p>I’m an <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Blli_yUAAAAJ&hl=en">art historian specializing in ancient Mediterranean art and culture</a>. I am particularly fascinated by the way Americans, from the earliest days, made creative connections between past and present, despite being separated by thousands of miles and millennia of history. </p>
<p>In researching and selecting works of art for the exhibit “<a href="https://www.bowdoin.edu/art-museum/exhibitions/2022/antiquity-and-america.html">Antiquity and America</a>,” on view at the <a href="https://www.bowdoin.edu/art-museum/">Bowdoin College Museum of Art</a>, I was excited to show an exceptionally diverse range of American encounters with the ancient world, especially in portrait painting.</p>
<h2>Marker of education</h2>
<p>Take, for example, <a href="https://www.library.dartmouth.edu/digital/digital-collections/occom-circle/occom">Samson Occom</a> (1723-1792), a member of the Mohegan nation, Presbyterian minister and one of the first Native Americans <a href="https://collections.dartmouth.edu/occom/html/normalized/768517-normalized.html">to pen an autobiography in English</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491951/original/file-20221026-19-95pfs8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Painting of a Native American man in a drapey shirt and cape looking to the right. Trees and sky are in the background." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491951/original/file-20221026-19-95pfs8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491951/original/file-20221026-19-95pfs8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=722&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491951/original/file-20221026-19-95pfs8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=722&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491951/original/file-20221026-19-95pfs8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=722&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491951/original/file-20221026-19-95pfs8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491951/original/file-20221026-19-95pfs8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491951/original/file-20221026-19-95pfs8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The portrayal of Samson Occom includes symbols of both the Indigenous identity of the sitter and his connections to Mediterranean antiquity.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://bcma.bowdoin.edu/antiquity/objects/1813-4/">Painted by Nathaniel Smibert. Courtesy of Bowdoin College Museum of Art</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>His unfinished portrait, painted <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Smibert">by Nathaniel Smibert</a> (1735-1756) in the mid-18th century, alluded to Occom’s Indigenous identity in the coloring of his skin and the styling of his hair. Simultaneously, it also referenced his training in classical literature and oratory, acquired <a href="https://www.dartmouth.edu/library/rauner/exhibits/matter-absolute-necessity-moors-charity.html">by studying with Eleazar Wheelock</a> (1711-1779), a Connecticut Congregational minister.</p>
<p>Occom’s pose and draped cloak recall those found on ancient statues of Roman senators – a portrait convention familiar in early America <a href="https://bcma.bowdoin.edu/antiquity/objects/portraits-of-greek-and-roman-figures/">from prints circulating at the time</a> – and one that would later become quite popular in American society. </p>
<p>While his learning in Greek and Latin was undoubtedly a source of great pride for Occom – and a way for him to level the playing field with the European colonists – it was used by others to demonstrate the “civilizing” effect of European culture and education in the British Colonies. </p>
<p>In 1776, Eleazar Wheelock sent his former pupil Occom to Great Britain to raise money for a Native American school – funds that were ultimately repurposed for the founding of Dartmouth College. Occom would later charge Wheelock with <a href="https://collections.dartmouth.edu/occom/html/diplomatic/771424-diplomatic.html">using him as a “gazing stock</a>” in Europe while planning all the while to use the funds for the benefit of white settlers. </p>
<h2>Shaping public opinion</h2>
<p>A portrait of Sengbe Pieh, also known as Cinqué, who led the 1839 <a href="https://dh.scu.edu/exhibits/exhibits/show/slave-ships-12h/rebellion">Amistad slave ship revolt</a>, is an example of Black Americans’ <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/african-americans-and-the-classics-9781350107830/">use of the classical world for political purposes</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491953/original/file-20221026-8248-i3sr1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Painting of a black man holding a bamboo staff in a toga-like outfit looking to the left. The background shows a landscape with a cliff, distant mountain, tropical trees and a moody, cloudy sky." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491953/original/file-20221026-8248-i3sr1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491953/original/file-20221026-8248-i3sr1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=727&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491953/original/file-20221026-8248-i3sr1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=727&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491953/original/file-20221026-8248-i3sr1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=727&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491953/original/file-20221026-8248-i3sr1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=913&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491953/original/file-20221026-8248-i3sr1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=913&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491953/original/file-20221026-8248-i3sr1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=913&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Portraying Sengbe Pieh, who led the revolt on the slave ship Amistad, in the pose and garb of an ancient Roman senator was an intentional way to influence public opinion.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://bcma.bowdoin.edu/antiquity/objects/2021-15/">Courtesy of Bowdoin College Museum of Art</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Commissioned by <a href="https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/purvis-robert-1810-1898/">Robert Purvis</a> (1810-1898), a Black Philadelphian and prominent abolitionist, this striking portrait by John Sartain (1808-1897) was intended to shape the popular image of Pieh and his fellow Africans during their <a href="https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/amistad#background">Supreme Court trial for mutiny and murder in 1840-1841</a>.</p>
<p>Pieh’s African identity is made evident not only in the tone of his skin, but in the bamboo staff he holds and the landscape in background depicting his homeland. The white cloak draped over his shoulder would have called to mind the white robes worn by Roman senators and, by extension, the Roman virtues of honor and dignity. </p>
<p>Pieh and his fellow Africans were <a href="https://www.nps.gov/people/sengbe-pieh.htm">ultimately acquitted and returned</a> to the Sierra Leone Colony in 1842. </p>
<h2>Feminist icon</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491958/original/file-20221026-21-e99mc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Woman posed outdoors in flowing robes holding a lute. In the background are hand written scrolls, the ocean and distant cliffs." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491958/original/file-20221026-21-e99mc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491958/original/file-20221026-21-e99mc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=755&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491958/original/file-20221026-21-e99mc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=755&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491958/original/file-20221026-21-e99mc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=755&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491958/original/file-20221026-21-e99mc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=949&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491958/original/file-20221026-21-e99mc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=949&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/491958/original/file-20221026-21-e99mc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=949&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">At the turn of the 20th century, a portrait of an American woman portrayed as the Greek poet Sappho connected the sitter to themes in the ancient work.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://bcma.bowdoin.edu/antiquity/objects/2000-10/">Painted by Jean-Léon Gérôme, 1899. Courtesy of Bowdoin College Museum of Art</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1940/02/02/92862982.html">Caroline Sanders Truax</a> (1870–1940), one of the first women admitted to the New York state bar, was so enamored by the ancient past she was portrayed as the Greek lyric poet Sappho by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-L%C3%A9on_G%C3%A9r%C3%B4me">painter Jean-Léon Gérôme</a> (1824–1904). </p>
<p>This was a bold choice for a representation of an American woman in 1899. Sappho, whose writing is <a href="https://poets.org/poet/sappho">among the only surviving sources of female authorship from antiquity</a>, was already <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119122661.ch33">an icon of the first-wave feminist movement</a>, and the homoerotic themes of her poetry were well understood. Was the choice the artist’s – or the sitter’s? The most likely answer is it was by mutual agreement, perhaps inspired by Truax’s knowledge of classical language and literature – and her own <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119122661.ch33">interest in composing lyric poetry</a>.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://library.winterthur.org:8001/search/query?term_1=Eva+Purdy+Thomson&theme=winterthur">portrait was a sensation in New York society</a> when it arrived from the artist’s studio in Paris. It was featured in several portrait exhibitions and newspaper articles – and was hung with pride by Truax and her husband in their home. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/492895/original/file-20221101-26-omja7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Painting of a man and his daughter walking under an elaborately sculpted Roman arch." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/492895/original/file-20221101-26-omja7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/492895/original/file-20221101-26-omja7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=905&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/492895/original/file-20221101-26-omja7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=905&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/492895/original/file-20221101-26-omja7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=905&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/492895/original/file-20221101-26-omja7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1137&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/492895/original/file-20221101-26-omja7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1137&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/492895/original/file-20221101-26-omja7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1137&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882) walks with his daughter under the Arch of Titus in Rome, with the famed Colosseum in the background.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://bcma.bowdoin.edu/antiquity/objects/0000-2022-1/">Painted by George Healy. Courtesy of Bowdoin College Museum of Art</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>For generations of Americans, the history and literature of Mediterranean antiquity was fertile ground for contemporary comparisons. It was universal enough to be brought into debates about the Constitution and founding principles of democracy, slavery and abolition, and women’s rights and suffrage. It was also of great individual significance for Americans of many different backgrounds – a past they were on intimate terms with, despite the millennia and miles separating the United States from the ancient Mediterranean.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/191921/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sean Burrus previously worked for the Bowdoin College Museum of Art. He received funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. </span></em></p>Americans of all stripes have long embraced the culture of the ancient Mediterranean, using ancient ideals to navigate a new world.Sean P. Burrus, Post-Doctoral Curatorial Fellow, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1740112022-02-10T13:38:11Z2022-02-10T13:38:11ZThe shameful stories of environmental injustices at Japanese American incarceration camps during WWII<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444561/original/file-20220204-23-1u417w1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=547%2C395%2C2447%2C1994&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Dust storm on July 3, 1942, at the Manzanar War Relocation Authority Center in California.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://catalog.archives.gov/id/539961">Dorothea Lange/Courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When Japanese fighter pilots bombed the U.S. Navy base at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, Thomas S. Takemura was raising vegetables and raspberries on his family’s 14 ½-acre farm in Tacoma, Washington. </p>
<p>It wasn’t long after the United States declared war on Japan that Takemura and other people of Japanese ancestry were stripped of their rights and shipped off to incarceration camps scattered in small remote towns like Hunt, Idaho, and Delta, Utah. Scorching heat and dust storms added to the day-to-day misery. </p>
<p>Takemura’s incarceration began on May 12, 1942, just a week before he could harvest his lettuce. </p>
<p>“What a shame,” he later said. “What a shame.”</p>
<p>Takemura gave <a href="https://ddr.densho.org/ddr-densho-67-153/">this detailed account</a> in 1981 when he testified before the <a href="https://www.archives.gov/research/japanese-americans/hearings">Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians</a>. This commission investigated the wrongful imprisonment of Japanese Americans, one of the most egregious miscarriages of justice in American history. </p>
<p>All told, Takemura estimated he lost at least $10,000 in farm profits for each of the four years he was gone. But the total costs were not just about the money, he told the commission. </p>
<p>Takemura also lost “love and affection,” he testified, “and much more when a person is ordered to evacuate and leave his home without knowing where he is going or when he can return. … To me, words cannot describe the feeling and the losses.” </p>
<h2>Wartime hysteria</h2>
<p>Takemura’s wartime tragedy was the result of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s signing of <a href="https://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=false&doc=74&page=transcript">Executive Order 9066</a> on Feb. 19, 1942, 80 years ago this month. The order allowed for the creation of military areas from which people could be excluded. </p>
<p>It did not mention any specific racial group but Japanese Americans were the clear target because of widespread fear that they would become spies for the Japanese government or commit acts of sabotage within the United States. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A crowd of men gathers behind President Franklin D. Roosevelt as he signs a paper." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444560/original/file-20220204-17-keykob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444560/original/file-20220204-17-keykob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444560/original/file-20220204-17-keykob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444560/original/file-20220204-17-keykob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444560/original/file-20220204-17-keykob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444560/original/file-20220204-17-keykob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444560/original/file-20220204-17-keykob.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">On Dec. 8, 1941, a day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the U.S. declaration of war against Japan.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/cabinet-members-watch-with-mixed-emotions-as-president-news-photo/514080362?adppopup=true">Bettmann/GettyImages</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On March 2, Gen. John L. Dewitt, head of the Western Defense Command, created Military Area 1, which encompassed western Washington, Oregon and California and southern Arizona, and Military Area 2, which included the rest of these states. By the end of summer 1942, roughly <a href="https://densho.org/catalyst/how-many-japanese-americans-were-incarcerated-during-wwii/">110,000 Japanese Americans</a>, two-thirds of whom were United States citizens, had been expelled from their homes in <a href="https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/anthropology74/images/figure1.1.jpg">Military Area 1 and the California portion of Military Area 2</a>.</p>
<p>They were confined in 10 <a href="https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/japanese-relocation">hastily constructed camps</a> in California, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado and Arkansas. While some were allowed to leave camp for military service, college or jobs, many lived in these desolate places until the war ended three years later. </p>
<p>Japanese Americans’ wartime experiences have been the subject of numerous books, essays, <a href="https://encyclopedia.densho.org/Literary%20works%20on%20incarceration">memoirs, novels</a>, <a href="https://encyclopedia.densho.org/Dramatic%20films/videos%20on%20incarceration">films</a>, <a href="https://encyclopedia.densho.org/Museum%20exhibitions%20on%20incarceration">museum exhibits</a> and <a href="https://densho.org/campu/">podcasts</a> – all of which highlight their fortitude in the face of this blatant violation of their civil liberties. Because many survivors tried to move on with their lives quickly, the postwar period does not figure prominently in most of these narratives. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A black-and-white photo shows a woman standing in the doorway of one of a series of connected huts bordered by a muddy ditch." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444566/original/file-20220204-23-17w3dez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444566/original/file-20220204-23-17w3dez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444566/original/file-20220204-23-17w3dez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444566/original/file-20220204-23-17w3dez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444566/original/file-20220204-23-17w3dez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=561&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444566/original/file-20220204-23-17w3dez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=561&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444566/original/file-20220204-23-17w3dez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=561&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Japanese American families lived in these converted horse stalls at the Tanforan Assembly Center in San Bruno, California, shown in this April 29, 1942, photograph.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://catalog.archives.gov/id/537670">Dorothea Lange/Courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But there was a gathering wave of discontent among some Japanese Americans in the 1960s and 1970s. With the backdrop of the civil rights movement and anti-Vietnam War protests, leaders of the <a href="https://jacl.org/">Japanese Americans Citizens League</a> and many other activists began to push for redress. They sought the restoration of civil rights, a formal apology and monetary compensation from the U.S. government.</p>
<p>With the support of U.S. Sens. Daniel Inouye and Spark Matsunaga and U.S. Reps. Norman Mineta and Robert Matsui, the league’s redress committee, <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2020/03/24/820181127/the-unlikely-story-behind-japanese-americans-campaign-for-reparations">led by John Tateishi</a>, successfully lobbied Congress to create the <a href="https://encyclopedia.densho.org/Commission_on_Wartime_Relocation_and_Internment_of_Civilians/">Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians </a>in 1980. </p>
<p>Its nine appointed members were tasked by Congress to review Executive Order 9066 and other military directives that required the detention of U.S. citizens and permanent resident aliens. In addition to conducting archival research, they traveled across the country to take testimony from over 750 witnesses, <a href="https://digitalcollections.lib.washington.edu/digital/collection/tacomacomm/id/54">including Takemura</a>, between July and December 1981. </p>
<p>Over 20 days of hearings, Japanese Americans’ poignant stories of freedoms extinguished and indignities endured poured out like a flood and coursed through the hearing rooms. </p>
<h2>Environmental hazards</h2>
<p>As Takemura’s story suggests, many testimonies made clear that Japanese Americans’ wartime anguish was embedded in the natural environment, from the temperate lands of the Pacific coast to the arid deserts of the inland West. </p>
<p>In other words, the impact of Executive Order 9066 was not just political, economic and cultural. It was also environmental. When former farmers spoke of their displacement, they referred to specific plots of land and specific crops, their years of tending the soil lost to neglect or rapacious speculators.</p>
<p>Like Takemura, <a href="https://ddr.densho.org/ddr-densho-352-350/">Clarence I. Nishizu</a>, whose family farmed in Orange County, California, kept on planting vegetables after the war started, “since I thought that I, as an American citizen, would not be subject to evacuation and internment,” Nishizu later testified. </p>
<p>He was proved wrong, and his family members lost their crops and land. “I was uprooted just at the time when the bud of the rose started to bloom,” he testified. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A black-and-white photo depicts seven people squatting in a strawberry field holding harvesting boxes, with mountains and farm buildings visible behind them." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444569/original/file-20220204-501-3k4e9v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444569/original/file-20220204-501-3k4e9v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444569/original/file-20220204-501-3k4e9v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444569/original/file-20220204-501-3k4e9v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444569/original/file-20220204-501-3k4e9v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444569/original/file-20220204-501-3k4e9v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444569/original/file-20220204-501-3k4e9v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In this April 5, 1942, photograph, a Japanese American family harvests strawberries near Mission San Jose, California, just a few days before their forced removal.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://catalog.archives.gov/id/537837">Dorothea Lange/Courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Japanese Americans’ despair was also tied to the harsh environmental conditions of the camps, from blistering heat to blinding dust storms. In describing the trip to Manzanar, a “barren and desolate” camp in eastern California, <a href="https://ddr.densho.org/ddr-densho-67-359/">Dr. Mary Oda</a> recalled, “My first reaction to camp was one of dismay and disbelief.” </p>
<p>In addition to the emotional toll wrought by the bleak surroundings, the physical toll was considerable. Oda said her older sister developed bronchial asthma, “a reaction to the terrible dust storms and winds,” and died at the age of 26. Her father had “constant nasal irritation” and later died of nose and throat cancer. </p>
<p>Oda was not alone in enduring the untimely deaths of beloved family members. <a href="https://collections.carli.illinois.edu/digital/collection/nei_japan/id/1631">Toyo Suyemoto</a> testified about the environment’s devastating impact on her son’s health. Starting at the Tanforan Assembly Center, a racetrack where horse stalls housed humans, infant Kay developed asthma and allergies and struggled with these conditions until his death in 1958 at the age of 16. </p>
<p><a href="https://neiudc.neiu.edu/jarc-hearing/11">Her voice cracking</a> ever so slightly, she concluded, “I simply wonder, members of the commission, what my son, Kay, who would have been 40 years old this year, might be able to tell you today had he lived, for he was a blessing to me.” </p>
<h2>A formal US apology</h2>
<p>One year after the hearings, the commission published <a href="https://www.archives.gov/research/japanese-americans/justice-denied">Personal Justice Denied</a>, a nearly 500-page report that concluded Executive Order 9066 was driven by “race prejudice, war hysteria and a failure of political leadership.”</p>
<p>Even former Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson admitted, “to loyal citizens this forced evacuation was a personal injustice.” </p>
<p>The testimonies validated this point hundreds of times over, but they demonstrated that the incarceration was also an environmental injustice. </p>
<p>Japanese Americans’ losses and suffering did not emerge in an environmental vacuum. The federal government’s decision to wrest them away from their land and place them in unfamiliar and unforgiving places contributed to and amplified wartime inequities. </p>
<p>Based on the commission’s recommendations, Congress passed the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/100/statute/STATUTE-102/STATUTE-102-Pg903.pdf">Civil Liberties Act of 1988</a>, giving every living victim a formal presidential apology and $20,000. All told, <a href="https://encyclopedia.densho.org/Civil_Liberties_Act_of_1988/">82,219 people</a>
received redress.</p>
<p>The success of the redress movement, however, did not mark the end of political action. Takemura spoke about his wartime experiences in local high school history classes for several years before his death in 1997, recognizing that many young people were “completely ignorant” about the incarceration. </p>
<p>Survivors and their families, activists and scholars also remain vocal, and they continue to draw attention to the environmental dimensions of the Japanese American incarceration. Most years, they make pilgrimages to the former camp sites, some of which are administered by the National Park Service as national historic sites, landmarks and monuments. </p>
<p>As they speak about the fragility of civil rights, then and now, they gaze at the same lonely vistas as their forebears and feel the wind kick up the dust or the sun beat down on their faces. They experience, even for a brief moment, the isolation and devastation of exile and confinement. </p>
<p>Eighty years after Executive Order 9066, amid a sharp increase in <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/anti-asian-hate-crimes-342-203747678.html">Asian hate crimes</a>, the fight for justice remains as urgent as ever. </p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Connie Y. Chiang does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>When US President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, he caved to war hysteria and paved the way for the incarceration of Japanese Americans.Connie Y. Chiang, Professor of History and Environmental Studies, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1540332021-02-26T18:07:06Z2021-02-26T18:07:06ZPolar bears have captivated artists’ imaginations for centuries, but what they’ve symbolized has changed over time<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386719/original/file-20210226-21-uossmr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=152%2C177%2C4012%2C3067&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The giant predators were a deadly danger to early European explorers of the Arctic.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-engraving-from-a-book-by-gerrit-de-veer-a-crewman-on-a-news-photo/526746520">Chris Hellier/Corbis Historical via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Polar bears have long held visual artists in their thrall. Over time, the mythologies around these extraordinary animals have evolved – and so have the ways artists have depicted them in their work.</p>
<p>Reflecting a deeply respectful even symbiotic relationship between human beings and the natural world, likenesses of polar bears <a href="http://collections.fenimoreartmuseum.org/polar-bear-effigy">crafted within Indigenous communities</a> for thousands of years have long conveyed the awe-inspiring power of these mighty animals.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386693/original/file-20210226-17-1dlyp47.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A polar bear lunges at men near a ship frozen in ice" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386693/original/file-20210226-17-1dlyp47.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386693/original/file-20210226-17-1dlyp47.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386693/original/file-20210226-17-1dlyp47.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386693/original/file-20210226-17-1dlyp47.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386693/original/file-20210226-17-1dlyp47.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386693/original/file-20210226-17-1dlyp47.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386693/original/file-20210226-17-1dlyp47.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Illustration of a real polar bear attack on Dutch explorers in 1596.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://aradernyc.com/products/de-bry-johann-theodor-1560-1623-and-johann-israel-de-bry-1565-1609-part-iii-plate-43-two-bears-which-approached-the-ship-and-what-happened-to-them-from-the-little-voyages">Hand-colored engraving by Johann Theodor de Bry</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Towering above European adversaries in early 17th-century engravings, or bearing witness – alternately majestic and menacing – to whaling ships pictured in print and in paint, they testified to the expanding empires and commercial interests of western powers bent on exerting domination over new territories.</p>
<p>Conveying the bond of a <a href="https://www.picuki.com/media/2512718205208082900">resilient mother and her cub in a 21st century photograph</a>, they hint at the fragility of a changing climate.</p>
<p>Though polar bears can hover at the edge of invisibility under the right conditions, they’ve left their indelible imprint upon the imaginations of image-makers from many eras and regions. Their shape-shifting significance in the context of western art intrigues me from my perch at Bowdoin College in Maine – whose mascot just happens to be the polar bear. As co-director of the college’s <a href="https://www.bowdoin.edu/art-museum/">Museum of Art</a>, I’ve helped expand our collection of polar bear pieces and have become fascinated by this animal’s enduring hold on audiences.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386580/original/file-20210225-23-17flwo2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Engraving of many polar bears on ice with hunters in boats" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386580/original/file-20210225-23-17flwo2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386580/original/file-20210225-23-17flwo2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386580/original/file-20210225-23-17flwo2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386580/original/file-20210225-23-17flwo2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386580/original/file-20210225-23-17flwo2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386580/original/file-20210225-23-17flwo2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386580/original/file-20210225-23-17flwo2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=589&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An early 17th-century Dutch artist captured the fascination and terror polar bears sparked in European hunters and explorers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Johann Theodor de Bry, copper plate engraving, ca. 1601.</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Exploration, empire and polar bears</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.7183/0002-7316.79.4.89">Effigies and carvings created</a> as long as 2,500 years ago in Paleo-Eskimo Indigenous communities reflect a sense of deep interconnection between the people and the bears, with cosmological and spiritual significance.</p>
<p><a href="https://uwapress.uw.edu/book/9780295999227/ice-bear/">Westerners first encountered polar bears</a> over a millennium ago, when Norse explorers advanced into the Arctic. In contrast to Indigenous representations of the bears, by the 15th century western artists were positioning human beings in opposition to these fearsome hunters as they adorned maps and explorers’ written narratives.</p>
<p>Even Shakespeare may leave a legacy of the <a href="https://uwapress.uw.edu/book/9780295999227/ice-bear/">fascination polar bears held for Elizabethan audiences</a>. In one scene of “The Winter’s Tale,” a bear chases the character Antigonus from the stage. Historians have suggested that this dramatic exit may have been inspired by one of the live polar bears housed near the Globe Theatre, in London’s Paris Garden.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386695/original/file-20210226-23-1rb9wjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Whalers swarm the ice and water, killing whales and threatening polar bears" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386695/original/file-20210226-23-1rb9wjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386695/original/file-20210226-23-1rb9wjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386695/original/file-20210226-23-1rb9wjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386695/original/file-20210226-23-1rb9wjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=440&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386695/original/file-20210226-23-1rb9wjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386695/original/file-20210226-23-1rb9wjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386695/original/file-20210226-23-1rb9wjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=553&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">17th-century Dutch whalers dominate the natural Arctic landscape, even subduing harried polar bears.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.5523">Abraham Storck, 'Whaling Grounds in the Arctic Ocean,' Rijksmuseum</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With the rise of European exploration and exploitation, the cultural legacy of the polar bear spread rapidly among European nations and their colonial outposts. The bears became identified with political and technological prowess, and a triumphant march toward the future. Groups of these giants are called “celebrations,” and their images in art tended to celebrate the brute forces of western modernity.</p>
<p>They appeared in the decorative arts, including a 19th-century <a href="https://www.spencermarks.com/products/gorham-antique-sterling-silver-polar-ice-bowl-providence-ri-c-1870">silver Gorham ice bowl</a>, ostensibly marking the U.S. acquisition of the territory of Alaska from the Russians in 1867. Fierce and menacing polar bears stand guard above the frozen treasure within the vessel, simultaneously celebrating North American success in the ice industry.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.artnet.com/artists/alexander-phimister-proctor/polar-bear-DyCkEoIuK_xOFago74hMNQ2">Prominent polar bear sculptures</a> by Alexander Phimister Proctor at the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago connected the United States with the distant north. Placed upon a pedestrian footbridge, the bear’s attitude – head up, powerful, taking its bearings as if to move forward – mirrored the optimism of the nation during the <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/19th-century/gilded-age">Gilded Age</a> on the brink of the 20th century.</p>
<p>The polar bear also became a symbol of the conquest of the North Pole by American explorers in 1909. Despite controversy, <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/who-discovered-the-north-pole-116633746/">Robert E. Peary</a> was ultimately recognized for reaching it. Pants created from the fur of polar bears, which Peary described as “<a href="http://downeastbooks.com/books/9781608936434">impervious to cold… almost indestructible</a>,” helped make the feat possible. In the wake of this accomplishment, the <a href="https://dailysun.bowdoin.edu/2013/02/whispering-pines-bobcats-and-mules-and-bears%e2%80%a6oh-my/">polar bear became a popular college mascot</a> — with Peary’s alma mater and my home institution, Bowdoin College, leading the way.</p>
<h2>An icon transformed</h2>
<p>But if the polar bear thrived into the mid-1900s as a sign of human might and of the successful mastery of antagonistic forces, this symbolic association evaporated in the latter 20th century. Today’s polar bears are more closely tied to the demise of the mythic western belief in conquest and domination.</p>
<p>The drawings of such pop artists as <a href="http://www.artnet.com/artists/john-wesley/">John Wesley</a> and <a href="https://warholfoundation.org/legacy/biography.html">Andy Warhol</a> mark this shift in perceptions.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386691/original/file-20210226-21-3l31hv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="pencil drawings of polar bears" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386691/original/file-20210226-21-3l31hv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386691/original/file-20210226-21-3l31hv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=278&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386691/original/file-20210226-21-3l31hv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=278&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386691/original/file-20210226-21-3l31hv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=278&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386691/original/file-20210226-21-3l31hv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=349&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386691/original/file-20210226-21-3l31hv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=349&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386691/original/file-20210226-21-3l31hv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=349&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">John Wesley’s drawing contains a number of polar bears, with a somber mood.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">John Wesley, 'Polar Bears,' 1970, graphite on tracing paper. Museum Purchase, acquired through the generosity of Eric Silverman ’85 and an anonymous donor.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 1970, Wesley drew “<a href="https://artmuseum.bowdoin.edu/objects-1/info/38969">Polar Bears</a>,” depicting the intertwined bodies of polar bears seemingly enjoying a peaceful slumber. That same year, an international cohort of scientists published their conclusion that the bear stood a good chance of surviving extinction if people worked together to protect it.</p>
<p>Intriguingly, the artist’s cartoon-like renditions of the “great white bear” seems to echo the illustration included in the <a href="https://www.fws.gov/news/Historic/NewsReleases/1970/19700315b.pdf">press release published by the U.S. Department of the Interior</a> announcing this finding. But Wesley’s drawing raises questions about the fate of the motionless creatures it pictures: is this “celebration” in fact a tragedy?</p>
<p><a href="https://artmuseum.bowdoin.edu/objects-1/info/38238">Andy Warhol’s “Polar Bear”</a> (1983) struts across the paper. Likely inspired by the 10th anniversary of the <a href="https://www.fws.gov/endangered/laws-policies/">U.S. Endangered Species Act</a>, the drawing points to the very fragility of the bear. Its composition uses the white of the paper to evoke the animal’s coat and its polar environment, suggesting the imminent possibility of their collapse into nonexistence. It would take another quarter century for the polar bear to be <a href="https://www.fws.gov/alaska/pages/marine-mammals/polar-bear/polar-bears-and-esa">listed as threatened, in 2008</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386704/original/file-20210226-23-1jw0tpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Cover of Time magazine with struggling polar bear" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386704/original/file-20210226-23-1jw0tpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386704/original/file-20210226-23-1jw0tpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386704/original/file-20210226-23-1jw0tpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386704/original/file-20210226-23-1jw0tpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386704/original/file-20210226-23-1jw0tpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386704/original/file-20210226-23-1jw0tpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386704/original/file-20210226-23-1jw0tpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Time magazine’s cover helped solidify the iconography of a polar bear struggling in a melting Arctic.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://content.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,20060403,00.html">Time</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>By the early 21st century, pictures of the animal, such as on a seemingly diminishing ice floe, frequently associated it with catastrophic climate change and the endangerment of the species itself, as the <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=fagpY8kAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra">art historian Nicholas Mirzoeff</a> <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/23349848">has noted</a>.</p>
<p>Despite, or perhaps because of, their association with extinction, the allure of the polar bear seems only to have intensified. One curious reflection of this celebrity comes in the form of endearing anthropomorphic depictions of these <a href="https://youtu.be/47Dlkfg9Jhk">wild creatures pitching consumer products like Coca-Cola</a>.</p>
<p>But what are the implications of conflating the polar bear with human beings today?</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386721/original/file-20210226-19-zla8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Activists in polar bear costumes outside the White House" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386721/original/file-20210226-19-zla8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386721/original/file-20210226-19-zla8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386721/original/file-20210226-19-zla8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386721/original/file-20210226-19-zla8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386721/original/file-20210226-19-zla8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386721/original/file-20210226-19-zla8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386721/original/file-20210226-19-zla8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Climate activists have adopted the iconography of the polar bear because of their habitat’s precarious status in a warming world.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/activists-remove-polar-bear-costumes-on-pennsylvania-avenue-news-photo/181933180">Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The question has particular resonance as people reflect upon the fragility of our own species in the midst of a global pandemic that has already cost millions of lives.</p>
<p>Contemplating new strategies to promote healing – including science and social and political policies – perhaps there is something yet to learn from these exceptionally adaptable creatures, at home on solid ground and in the water. As people examine the broader implications of this current human crisis, and consider a lasting commitment to promoting global health, might there be room to hope that the polar bear might eventually become a new icon, this time of resiliency and recovery?</p>
<p>[<em>You’re smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation’s authors and editors.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=youresmart">You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/154033/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anne Collins Goodyear does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Do you see a fearsome predator? A fragile icon of impending extinction? What these arctic giants have stood for in art has continually evolved.Anne Collins Goodyear, Co-Director of the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1531292021-02-12T13:18:10Z2021-02-12T13:18:10ZHow US Education Secretary nominee Miguel Cardona can stop the teacher shortage<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/383819/original/file-20210211-21-8qlx3t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C22%2C5020%2C3314&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">U.S. Secretary of Education nominee Miguel Cardona testifies during his confirmation hearing.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/secretary-of-education-nominee-miguel-cardona-testifies-news-photo/1230952226?adppopup=true">Susan Walsh/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Editor’s note: <a href="https://hechingerreport.org/who-is-the-new-u-s-education-secretary-miguel-cardona/">Miguel Cardona</a> – President Joe Biden’s choice for secretary of education – faces <a href="https://joebiden.com/education/">several urgent and contentious priorities</a>, including reopening schools safely, addressing systemic racism within schools, and reversing the ever-growing teacher shortage. Here, four experts explain how to recruit more people to become educators in the nation’s public schools.</em></p>
<h2>1. Increase pay and reduce class sizes</h2>
<p><strong>Bob Spires, associate professor of education, University of Richmond</strong> </p>
<p>The <a href="https://tsa.ed.gov/#/home/">teacher shortage</a> has <a href="https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/coming-crisis-teaching">become a crisis</a> in the United States. In 2018, there was an estimated <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/low-relative-pay-and-high-incidence-of-moonlighting-play-a-role-in-the-teacher-shortage-particularly-in-high-poverty-schools-the-third-report-in-the-perfect-storm-in-the-teacher-labor-marke/">shortage of over 100,000</a> K-12 teachers. Meanwhile, the demand for K-12 teaching jobs is expected to continue to increase <a href="https://www.educationcorner.com/job-outlook-for-teachers.html">5% per year</a> through 2028.</p>
<p>Part of the reason for the shortage has to do with pay and working conditions. On average, teachers make <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/low-relative-pay-and-high-incidence-of-moonlighting-play-a-role-in-the-teacher-shortage-particularly-in-high-poverty-schools-the-third-report-in-the-perfect-storm-in-the-teacher-labor-marke/">roughly 20% less</a> than other college graduates, according to research from the Economic Policy Institute, a think tank that focuses on worker issues. A majority of teachers <a href="https://www.epi.org/press/59-percent-of-teachers-take-on-additional-paid-work-to-supplement-their-pay/#:%7E:text=News%20from%20EPI%2059%20percent,work%20to%20supplement%20their%20pay&text=For%20these%20teachers%2C%20moonlighting%20made,teachers%20in%20high%2Dpoverty%20schools">work additional jobs</a> – either within or outside their schools – to supplement their pay. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, class sizes continue to grow, which teacher unions say <a href="https://www.cta.org/our-advocacy/class-size-matters">negatively affects teachers and students</a>, despite statements to the contrary <a href="https://educationpost.org/betsy-devos-wants-larger-class-sizes-and-fewer-teachers/">by former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos</a>. Peer-reviewed research bears out that smaller classes are <a href="https://nepc.colorado.edu/newsletter/2016/06/class-size">academically, socially and economically beneficial</a>, especially to low-income and minority students.</p>
<p>To curb the shortage, I believe educational leaders and policymakers must take proactive steps at the local, state and federal levels to increase pay and resources for teachers, and alleviate pressure by reducing class sizes.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Teacher at desk in school classroom" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382280/original/file-20210203-15-5vp7oh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=33%2C6%2C4415%2C2955&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382280/original/file-20210203-15-5vp7oh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382280/original/file-20210203-15-5vp7oh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382280/original/file-20210203-15-5vp7oh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382280/original/file-20210203-15-5vp7oh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382280/original/file-20210203-15-5vp7oh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382280/original/file-20210203-15-5vp7oh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Even before COVID-19, teachers were reporting ever-increasing levels of dissatisfaction.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/judy-chan-a-teacher-at-yung-wing-school-p-s-124-prepares-news-photo/1271416170">Michael Loccisano/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>2. Improve morale and recruit diverse teachers</h2>
<p><strong>Doris A. Santoro, professor of education, Bowdoin College</strong></p>
<p>During the pandemic, teachers’ work has been filled with <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2021/02/07/reopening-schools-debates-teachers-fear-covid-19/4413729001/">uncertainty and anxiety</a>. Their ways of finding <a href="https://www.edweek.org/teaching-learning/opinion-teacher-demoralization-isnt-the-same-as-teacher-burnout/2020/11">meaning and value</a> as educators have been upended through necessary safety measures that have radically altered their work. </p>
<p>There are no romantic “before times” for most public school educators. Before COVID-19, teachers were reporting <a href="https://pdkpoll.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/pdkpoll51-2019.pdf">ever-increasing</a> levels of dissatisfaction. Schools were already facing continuing teacher shortages, with one estimate as high as <a href="https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.27.3696">109,000 teachers working without certification</a> in the U.S. in 2017-18. <a href="https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/teacher-turnover-brief">High teacher turnover</a> both <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/brown-center-chalkboard/2019/04/29/teacher-turnover-and-the-disruption-of-teacher-staffing/">disrupts student learning and can degrade the work environment</a> for those who remain.</p>
<p>These conditions may indicate the demoralization of a profession. And yet the profession could become better appreciated as a result of this pandemic. Families are <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2020/03/27/teachers-deserve-make-billion-dollars-shonda-rhimes-plus-other-homeschooling-parents-appreciating-educators/">learning firsthand</a> about the demands of teaching as many students learn from home.</p>
<p>Significant <a href="https://www.ecs.org/50-state-comparison-teacher-recruitment-and-retention/">state and local efforts</a> are underway to recruit educators to eliminate the teacher shortage. Some of these efforts focus on <a href="https://ccsso.org/resource-library/vision-and-guidance-diverse-and-learner-ready-teacher-workforce">attracting teachers</a> who are Black, Indigenous or other people of color. Nationwide, <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/08/27/americas-public-school-teachers-are-far-less-racially-and-ethnically-diverse-than-their-students/">only 20% of teachers</a> identify as people of color, while the population of students of color is over 50%. </p>
<p>Policymakers, education leaders and teachers will need to confront the historic and current reasons for these shortages, including the <a href="https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/65-years-after-brown-v-board-where-are-all-the-black-educators/2019/05">mass dismissal of Black teachers and principals</a> after Brown v. Board of Education, and classroom practices that leave many teachers of color <a href="https://www.edweek.org/leadership/black-teachers-feel-pigeonholed-report-finds/2016/11">feeling devalued and alienated</a>.</p>
<h2>3. Bring back joy</h2>
<p><strong>Diane B. Hirshberg, professor of education policy at the Institute of Social and Economic Research, University of Alaska Anchorage</strong></p>
<p>For several decades now, teachers have been judged on how well their students do <a href="http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar08/vol65/num06/Testing-the-Joy-Out-of-Learning.aspx">on standardized tests</a>.</p>
<p>These efforts have led teachers to use lessons that are <a href="https://nepc.colorado.edu/newsletter/2015/12/reversing-deprofessionalization">narrow and often scripted</a> and that focus mostly on core subjects.</p>
<p>For many teachers, this has <a href="https://www.today.com/parents/teacher-quits-over-emphasis-standardized-tests-it-takes-joy-out-2D79439972">taken joy</a> out of what they do.</p>
<p>Giving teachers a canned curriculum and requiring them to follow a schedule and materials developed by people from a different state – or by a big publishing house – can leave teachers feeling as if their own expertise is <a href="https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ986817">not recognized or valued</a>. Also, this takes the creativity out of teaching and connecting with students, and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2015/11/20/why-todays-college-students-dont-want-to-be-teachers/">diminishes the gratification</a> that comes from seeing their efforts and expertise transform the lives of their students. </p>
<p>Reversing the teacher shortage, in my view, will require Secretary Cardona to push for a system that fosters innovation, rewards expertise in teachers’ careers and uses standardized tests to inform – but not dictate – teacher practice. This requires collaboration among teacher education institutions, states and the Department of Education to transform both teacher preparation and classroom practice. It will require significant investment and patience, but I believe the payoff both for students and the economy will be profound.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382534/original/file-20210204-14-1nqume2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C20%2C6876%2C4879&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Teacher hugs a young student outside a classroom" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382534/original/file-20210204-14-1nqume2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C20%2C6876%2C4879&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382534/original/file-20210204-14-1nqume2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382534/original/file-20210204-14-1nqume2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382534/original/file-20210204-14-1nqume2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382534/original/file-20210204-14-1nqume2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382534/original/file-20210204-14-1nqume2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382534/original/file-20210204-14-1nqume2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">For some teachers, standardized testing regimes have taken some of the joy out of classrooms.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/kelly-harper-left-one-of-four-finalists-for-the-national-news-photo/1137246325?adppopup=true">Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>4. Build education leadership</h2>
<p><strong>Richard L. Schwab, professor of educational leadership and dean emeritus, University of Connecticut</strong></p>
<p>To boost student achievement and teacher morale, <a href="https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/pages/how-leadership-influences-student-learning.aspx">research shows</a> you need highly educated and experienced school principals and district leaders. </p>
<p>Thriving businesses invest heavily in <a href="https://www.harvardbusiness.org/what-we-do/leadership-development-training-what-we-do/">leadership development</a>. They commit to training employees who show leadership potential. As in business, effective leaders in education require the right skills and proper support. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/pages/launching-redesign-university-principal-preparation-programs.aspx">Researchers have identified</a> five components of effective principal training programs. They include a coherent curriculum, supervised experiences, active recruiting, cohort structure and continuous engagement with participants.</p>
<p>Examples of programs working with local school districts to do it differently include ours at the University of Connecticut <a href="https://ucapp.education.uconn.edu/">Administrator Preparation Program</a>, University of Washington’s <a href="https://www.danforth.uw.edu">Danforth Educational Leadership Program</a>, University of Denver’s <a href="https://morgridge.du.edu/programs/educational-leadership-policy-studies/certificate">Ritchie Program for School Leaders</a> and the <a href="https://education.uic.edu/academics/programs/school-leadership">Urban Educational Leadership Program</a> at the University of Illinois at Chicago. They are highly selective and seek to recruit high-potential district educators. Their faculty includes university scholars teaching alongside seasoned practitioners, and they offer extensive clinical placements for participants, who must demonstrate competence as instructional leaders.</p>
<p>Secretary Cardona – who was himself an adjunct professor in Connecticut’s APP program – can help expand such programs nationally, for example by creating seed grants that encourage school-university partnerships and making graduate student loans forgivable to help qualified teachers pursue leadership positions.</p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/153129/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Diane B Hirshberg's research on teacher supply, demand, turnover and salary issues in Alaska has been supported by the Alaska State Legislature and the University of Alaska. Other research on education policy issues has been funded by the U.S. Department of Education, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Ford Foundation.
Diane Hirshberg was founding director of the Center for Alaska Education Policy Research.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Doris Santoro is a Fellow with the National Education Policy Center. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard L. Schwab is faculty member with the Department of Educational Leadership in the Neag School of Education where the UCAPP program mentioned is located. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bob Spires does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Four experts weigh in on ways to replenish the US teacher workforce and curb burnout.Bob Spires, Associate Professor of Education, University of RichmondDiane B Hirshberg, Professor of Education Policy, University of Alaska AnchorageDoris A. Santoro, Professor of Education, Bowdoin CollegeRichard L. Schwab, Raymond Neag Endowed Professor of Educational Leadership and Dean Emeritus, University of ConnecticutLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1493272020-11-07T16:44:21Z2020-11-07T16:44:21ZBiden wins – experts on what it means for race relations, US foreign policy and the Supreme Court<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/368123/original/file-20201108-13-b8xjok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C0%2C5697%2C3807&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President-elect Biden promises a new White House agenda and style.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/Election2020Biden/63f55822214f40d7b3efd886e544102d/photo?Query=biden%20harris%20stage&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=114&currentItemNo=31">AP Photo/Andrew Harnik</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The American public has had its say and for the first time in a generation denied a sitting president a second term.</em></p>
<p><em>President Donald Trump’s tenure lasted just four years, but in that time he dragged policy on an array of key issues in a dramatic new direction.</em></p>
<p><em>Joe Biden’s victory, <a href="https://twitter.com/AP/status/1325112826072084480">confirmed by the Associated Press late morning on Nov. 7</a>, presents an opportunity to reset the White House agenda and put it on a different course.</em> </p>
<p><em>Three scholars discuss what a Biden presidency may have in store in three key areas: race, the Supreme Court and foreign policy.</em></p>
<h2>Racism, policing and Black Lives Matter protests</h2>
<p><strong>Brian Purnell, Bowdoin College</strong></p>
<p>The next four years under a Biden administration will likely see improvements in racial justice. But to many, it will be a low bar to clear: President Donald Trump <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmaZR8E12bs">downplayed racist violence</a>, <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/09/30/metro/trumps-american-horror-story-proud-boys-stand-back-stand-by/">egged on right-wing extremists</a> and described Black Lives Matter as a <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-canada-53261067">“symbol of hate”</a> during his four-year tenure.</p>
<p>Indeed, according to polls, most Americans agree that <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/poll-shows-views-on-race-relations-under-trump-are-generally-bad-2019-07-16">race relations have deteriorated</a> <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/06/05/871083543/americans-say-president-trump-has-worsened-race-relations-since-george-floyds-de">under Trump</a>.</p>
<p>Still, Biden is in some ways an unlikely president to advance a progressive racial agenda. In the 1970s, he <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/15/us/politics/biden-busing.html">opposed busing plans</a> and stymied school desegregation efforts in Delaware, his home state. And in the mid-1990s he <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2020/08/28/did-the-1994-crime-bill-cause-mass-incarceration/">championed a federal crime bill that made incarceration rates for Black people</a> worse. He <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/441408-timeline-a-history-of-the-joe-biden-anita-hill-controversy">bungled the hearings that brought Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court</a> by allowing Republican senators to dismiss Anita Hill’s damning testimony of Thomas’ sexual harassment and by failing to allow other Black women to testify.</p>
<p>But that was then.</p>
<p>During the 2020 campaign, President-elect Biden consistently spoke about problems stemming from systemic racism. Many voters will be hoping that <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/8/19/21372408/joe-biden-racial-justice-policy">his actions over the next four years must match his campaign words</a>.</p>
<p>One area that the Biden administration will surely address is policing and racial justice. The Justice Department can bring accountability to police reform by returning to practices the Obama administration put in place to <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/the-obama-justice-department-had-a-plan-to-hold-police-accountable-for-abuses-the-trump-doj-has-undermined-it">monitor and reform police departments</a>, such as the use of <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/justice-department-has-a-tool-to-make-police-forces-better-its-not-using-it/2020/06/02/96caf940-a451-11ea-8681-7d471bf20207_story.html">consent degrees</a>. More difficult reforms require redressing <a href="https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/locked-out-2020-estimates-of-people-denied-voting-rights-due-to-a-felony-conviction/">how mass incarceration caused widespread voter disenfranchisement</a> in Black American and Latino communities. </p>
<p>“My administration will incentivize states to automatically restore voting rights for individuals convicted of felonies once they have served their sentences,” Biden <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/voting-changes/felon-disenfranchisement/">told The Washington Post</a>.</p>
<p>The killing of George Floyd earlier this year <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/george-floyd-systemic-change-conservatives-090050841.html">reinvigorated talk of addressing systemic racial discrimination through fundamental changes</a> in how police departments hold officers accountable for misconduct and excessive force. It is unclear how far President-elect Biden will walk down this road. But evoking the words of the late civil rights icon and Congressman John Lewis, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEnwjnsnpHc">he at least suggested at the Democratic National Convention</a> that America was ready to do the hard work of “rooting out systemic racism.”</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A portrait of George Floyd is seen during a Black Lives Matter protest on June 17, 2020 in the Manhattan borough of New York City." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367836/original/file-20201105-21-5li2pu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367836/original/file-20201105-21-5li2pu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367836/original/file-20201105-21-5li2pu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367836/original/file-20201105-21-5li2pu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367836/original/file-20201105-21-5li2pu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367836/original/file-20201105-21-5li2pu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367836/original/file-20201105-21-5li2pu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">After George Floyd’s death, how far will Biden go to address systemic racism?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/portrait-of-george-floyd-is-seen-during-a-black-lives-news-photo/1220775276?adppopup=true">Jeenah Moon/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Biden can help address how <a href="http://kirwaninstitute.osu.edu/research/understanding-implicit-bias/">Americans think about and deal with unexamined racial biases</a> through reversing <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-combating-race-sex-stereotyping/">the previous administration’s executive order</a> banning anti-racism training and workshops. In so doing, Biden can build on <a href="https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/faqs.html">psychological research on bias</a> to make American workplaces, schools and government agencies equitable, just places. </p>
<p>Making progress fighting systemic racism will be a slow, uphill battle. A more immediate benefit to communities of color could come through <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/10/28/928392673/coronavirus-is-a-key-campaign-issue-whats-joe-biden-s-plan">Biden’s COVID-19 pandemic response</a> – the Trump administration’s failure to stanch the spread of the coronavirus has <a href="https://www.apmresearchlab.org/covid/deaths-by-race">led to deaths</a> and economic consequences that have disproportionately fallen on racial and ethnic minorities.</p>
<p>On matters of race relations in the U.S., most Americans would agree that the era of Trump <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/318851/perceptions-white-black-relations-sink-new-low.aspx">saw the picture worsen</a>. The good news for Biden as president is there is nowhere to go but up. </p>
<h2>The Supreme Court</h2>
<p><strong>Morgan Marietta, University of Massachusetts Lowell</strong></p>
<p>Despite the fact that American voters have given Democrats control of the presidency, the conservative Supreme Court will continue to rule on the nature and extent of constitutional rights. </p>
<p>These liberties are considered by the court to be “<a href="https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/usrep/usrep319/usrep319624/usrep319624.pdf#page=15">beyond the reach of majorities</a>,” meaning they are intended to be immune from the changing beliefs of the electorate.</p>
<p>However, appointees of Democrats and Republicans tend to have very different views on which rights the Constitution protects and which are left to majority rule.</p>
<p>The dominant judicial philosophy of the conservative majority – <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-originalism-debunking-the-myths-148488">originalism</a> – sees rights as powerful but limited. The protection of rights recognized explicitly by the Constitution, such as the freedoms of religion, speech and press and the freedom to bear arms, will likely grow stronger over the next four years. But the protection of expansive rights that the court has found in the phrase <a href="https://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5238&context=ylj">“due process of law” in the 14th Amendment</a>, including privacy or reproductive rights, may well contract. </p>
<p>The Biden administration will probably not agree with the <a href="https://theconversation.com/3-ways-a-6-3-supreme-court-would-be-different-146558">court’s future rulings</a> on voting rights, gay rights, religious rights or the rights of noncitizens. Ditto for any rulings on abortion, guns, the death penalty and immigration. But there is little President-elect Biden can do to control the independent judiciary.</p>
<p>Unhappy with what a strong conservative majority on the court may do – including <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-democrats-and-health-policy-experts-believe-the-barrett-confirmation-rush-is-about-getting-rid-of-the-affordable-care-act-3-essential-reads-148438">possibly overturning the Affordable Care Act</a> – many Democrats have advocated radical approaches to altering what the court looks like and how it operates, though Biden himself has not stated a clear position. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Judge Amy Coney Barrett talks with Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas during her ceremonial swearing-in ceremony to be U.S. Supreme Court." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367839/original/file-20201105-21-jynrci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367839/original/file-20201105-21-jynrci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367839/original/file-20201105-21-jynrci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367839/original/file-20201105-21-jynrci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367839/original/file-20201105-21-jynrci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367839/original/file-20201105-21-jynrci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367839/original/file-20201105-21-jynrci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">How will President-elect Biden respond to the appointment of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/judge-amy-coney-barrett-talks-with-supreme-court-associate-news-photo/1282403922?adppopup=true">Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Suggested options include <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/2020/09/house-democrats-to-introduce-new-bill-for-supreme-court-term-limits/">term limits</a>, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/09/supreme-court-retirement-age/616458/">adding a retirement age</a>, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-06/to-rein-in-supreme-court-some-democrats-consider-jurisdiction-stripping">stripping the jurisdiction</a> of the court for specific federal legislation, or increasing the size of the court. This strategy is known historically as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/19/us/politics/what-is-court-packing.html">court packing</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/07/24/744633713/justice-ginsburg-i-am-very-much-alive">Ruth Bader Ginsburg</a> opposed expanding the court, telling NPR in 2019 that “if anything would make the court look partisan, it would be … one side saying, ‘When we’re in power, we’re going to enlarge the number of judges, so we would have more people who would vote the way we want them to.’”</p>
<p>The Constitution does not establish the number of justices on the court, instead leaving that to Congress. The number has been set at nine since the 1800s, but Congress could pass a law <a href="https://theconversation.com/packing-the-court-amid-national-crises-lincoln-and-his-republicans-remade-the-supreme-court-to-fit-their-agenda-147139">expanding the number of justices</a> to 11 or 13, creating two or four new seats. </p>
<p>However, this requires agreement by both houses of Congress. </p>
<p>The GOP seems likely to <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/04/politics/senate-election-results-frustrated-democrats/index.html">maintain a narrow control of the Senate</a>. A 50/50 split is possible, but that won’t be clear until January when Georgia holds two runoff elections. Any of the proposed reforms of the court will be difficult, if not impossible, to pass under a divided Congress.</p>
<p>This leaves the Biden administration hoping for retirements that would gradually shift the ideological balance of the court.</p>
<p>One of the most likely may be <a href="https://www.oyez.org/justices/clarence_thomas">Justice Clarence Thomas, who is 72</a> and the longest-serving member of the current court. <a href="https://www.oyez.org/justices/samuel_a_alito_jr">Samuel Alito is 70</a> and <a href="https://www.oyez.org/justices/john_g_roberts_jr">Chief Justice John Roberts is 65</a>. In other professions, that may sound like people soon to retire, but at the Supreme Court that is less likely. With the other three conservative justices in their 40s or 50s, the Biden administration may be fully at odds with the court for some time to come.</p>
<h2>Foreign policy and defense</h2>
<p><strong>Neta Crawford, Boston University</strong></p>
<p>President-elect Biden has signaled he will do three things to reset the U.S.’s foreign policy. </p>
<p>First, Biden will change the tone of U.S. foreign relations. The Democratic Party platform called its section on military foreign policy “<a href="https://democrats.org/where-we-stand/party-platform/renewing-american-leadership/">renewing American leadership</a>” and emphasized diplomacy as a “tool of first resort.” </p>
<p>Biden seems to <a href="https://joebiden.com/americanleadership/#">sincerely believe in diplomacy</a> and is intent on repairing relations with U.S. allies that have been damaged over the last four years. Conversely, while Trump was, some say, too friendly with Russian President Vladimir Putin, calling him a “<a href="https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/g20-june-2019-intl-hnk/h_0ac0caf83fde21799a2600d58fedea54">terrific person</a>,” Biden will likely take a harder line with Russia, at least rhetorically. </p>
<p>This change in tone will also likely include rejoining some of the treaties and international agreements that the United States abandoned under the Trump administration. The most important of these include <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/25/climate/biden-climate-change.html">the Paris Climate Agreement</a>, which the U.S. officially withdrew from on Nov. 4, and restoring funding to the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.</p>
<p>If the U.S. <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/russia-ready-to-freeze-total-number-of-warheads-for-one-year-to-extend-nuclear-pact-with-us/2020/10/20/2c0b06c0-12bc-11eb-a258-614acf2b906d_story.html">is to extend the New START nuclear weapons treaty</a>, the arms control deal with Russia due to expire in February, the incoming Biden administration would likely have to work with the outgoing administration on an extension. Biden has also signaled <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/13/opinions/smarter-way-to-be-tough-on-iran-joe-biden/index.html">a willingness to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal</a> jettisoned by Trump, if and when the Iranians return to the limits on nuclear infrastructure imposed by the agreement. </p>
<p>Second, in contrast to the large increases in military spending under Trump, President-elect Biden may make modest cuts in the U.S. military budget. Although he has said that <a href="https://www.stripes.com/news/us/biden-says-us-must-maintain-small-force-in-middle-east-has-no-plans-for-major-defense-cuts-1.644631">cuts are not “inevitable</a>” under his presidency, Biden has hinted at a <a href="https://www.defensenews.com/congress/2020/09/11/biden-not-planning-defense-cuts-but-they-may-come-anyway/">smaller military presence</a> overseas and is likely to change some priorities at the Pentagon by, for instance, emphasizing high-tech weapons. If the Senate – which must ratify any treaties – flips to Democrats’ control, the Biden administration may take more ambitious steps in nuclear arms control by pursuing deeper cuts with Russia and ratifying the <a href="https://www.un.org/disarmament/wmd/nuclear/ctbt/">Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="US soldiers arrive at the site of a car bomb attack that targeted a NATO coalition convoy in Kabul on September 24, 2017." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367831/original/file-20201105-15-5rgot6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367831/original/file-20201105-15-5rgot6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367831/original/file-20201105-15-5rgot6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367831/original/file-20201105-15-5rgot6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367831/original/file-20201105-15-5rgot6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367831/original/file-20201105-15-5rgot6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367831/original/file-20201105-15-5rgot6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Could Biden be the president who finally pulls all US troops out of Afghanistan?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/soldiers-arrives-at-the-site-of-a-car-bomb-attack-that-news-photo/852855218?adppopup=true">Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Third, the Biden administration will likely continue some Bush, Obama and Trump foreign policy priorities. Specifically, while a Biden administration will seek to <a href="https://www.stripes.com/news/us/biden-says-us-must-maintain-small-force-in-middle-east-has-no-plans-for-major-defense-cuts-1.644631">end the war in Afghanistan</a>, the administration will keep a focus on defeating the Islamic State and al-Qaida. Biden has said that he would reduce the current 5,200 U.S. forces in Afghanistan <a href="https://www.stripes.com/news/us/biden-says-us-must-maintain-small-force-in-middle-east-has-no-plans-for-major-defense-cuts-1.644631">to 1,500-2,000 troops</a> operating in the region in a counterterrorism role. The Biden administration is likely to continue the massive <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-nuclear-modernize-specialreport/special-report-in-modernizing-nuclear-arsenal-u-s-stokes-new-arms-race-idUSKBN1DL1AH">nuclear weapons modernization</a> and air and naval equipment modernization programs begun under the Obama administration and <a href="https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Releases/Release/Article/2079489/dod-releases-fiscal-year-2021-budget-proposal/">accelerated and expanded</a> under Trump, if only because they are <a href="https://insidedefense.com/insider/pentagon-analyzes-defense-spending-all-50-states">popular with members of Congress</a> who see the jobs they provide in their states.</p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>And like the Bush, Obama and Trump administrations, the Biden administration will prioritize the economic and military threats it believes are posed by China. But, consistent with its emphasis on diplomacy, the Biden administration will likely also work more to constrain China through diplomatic engagement and by <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/22/world/asia/biden-china-election-trump.html">working with U.S. allies</a> in the region.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/149327/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Scholars of race, foreign policy and the Supreme Court give their informed predictions of what to expect under a Biden administration.Brian J Purnell, Associate Professor of Africana Studies and History, Bowdoin CollegeMorgan Marietta, Associate Professor of Political Science, UMass LowellNeta C. Crawford, Professor of Political Science and Department Chair, Boston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1456232020-09-16T11:21:05Z2020-09-16T11:21:05Z5 ways the COVID-19 pandemic could affect your college application<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/358209/original/file-20200915-22-t34v0c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C387%2C258&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Remote learning poses challenges for some students.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/african-american-college-student-works-on-research-royalty-free-image/1155064220">SDI Productions/ E+ via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The coronavirus pandemic has intensified college application anxiety. I make this observation as an <a href="https://www.bowdoin.edu/profiles/staff/esoule/index.html">admissions dean</a> who, as of late, has not just been answering emails and questions from parents. Instead, I’m also responding to media inquiries about how my school plans to manage our selection processes in this crisis.</p>
<p>All of these questions hint at an underlying concern that the disruption could be an automatic disadvantage. In reality, <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2020/06/30/admissions-deans-release-statement-what-students-and-colleges-should">many colleges</a> already take a student’s circumstances into account. </p>
<p>Based on what I know about how college admission works, here are five things I believe that students and families ought to know when they apply to colleges during the pandemic. </p>
<h2>1. Admissions officers will understand if grades are incomplete</h2>
<p>In the emergency pivot to online learning in the spring of 2020, some schools <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/montgomery-county-grades-coronavirus/2020/04/25/7bbfd8ce-7b3d-11ea-b6ff-597f170df8f8_story.html">stopped grading students</a>. In many cases, these schools adopted <a href="https://www.greatschoolspartnership.org/high-school-grading-reporting-during-a-time-of-pandemic/">other measures</a> to show that students completed the academic year. </p>
<p>Many members of the class of 2021 and other college applicants are afraid that the absence of grades – from all or part of the 2019-2020 school year – could hurt their admission chances, when at least some other applicants have those grades.</p>
<p>This is not necessarily new. Some high schools don’t ever assign grades, so colleges review a transcript that consists purely of their teachers’ comments. Other students have attended multiple high schools, which means that their transcripts have different grading scales. </p>
<p>Bottom line: All of the academic work leading up to the pandemic still matters and can help frame the work in the past couple of months.</p>
<h2>2. Entrance exams could be less important than usual</h2>
<p>Since the spring, the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2020/08/18/the-august-sat-is-cancelled-for-nearly-half-of-students/#1ccbcc817972">SAT</a> and <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2020/08/03/act-shuts-down-registrations">ACT</a> canceled test dates, and most students have limited options if they want to take rescheduled tests. With the uneven availability of the two most common entrance exams, hundreds of colleges and universities are at least temporarily taking the <a href="http://archive.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2011/07/20/colleges_drop_sat_but_still_buy_names_of_high_scoring_students/">test-optional approach Bowdoin College first introduced</a> in 1969. The University of California system is going even further by becoming <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2020/09/08/injunction-bars-u-california-using-sat-or-act-scores-admissions">test-blind</a>, meaning the school won’t review SAT or ACT scores, even if students do submit them.</p>
<p>Yet students are still worried that without SAT or ACT results they won’t be competitive. Or if they took a test, and didn’t have a chance to try again, their scores don’t seem strong enough. They can take some comfort in that almost 400 colleges have stated that the <a href="https://www.nacacnet.org/news--publications/newsroom/test-optional-means-test-optional/">lack of test scores is not an admissions disadvantage</a>.</p>
<p>Likewise, Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate testing was disrupted. Students who had dedicated nearly a year to their AP classes lurched into the spring <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-p-exams-in-the-coronavirus-era-online-and-just-15-to-45-minutes-long-11589208916">facing tests that were quickly reconfigured in online format</a>. The <a href="https://www.ibo.org/news/news-about-the-ib/covid-19-coronavirus-updates/">IB tests scheduled for May were canceled</a>. I’m hearing that many students are worried about whether their test results, if they got them at all, will hold up to admissions scrutiny. </p>
<p>Again, they may be able to take comfort from the fact that hundreds of colleges recognize this predicament. Specifically, these colleges have <a href="https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5b7c56e255b02c683659fe43/t/5f0deed10aa54222ebe4e9cc/1594748626173/FINAL+Statement_+TTT+Deans+20200629a.pdf">signed an agreement</a> that states the absence of AP or IB results will not put applicants at a disadvantage, and that they will “view students in the context of the curriculum, academic resources and supports available to them.”</p>
<h2>3. It’s OK if students get a letter of recommendation from teachers they know only online</h2>
<p>Many colleges require a <a href="https://www.nacacnet.org/globalassets/documents/publications/gcap2018final.pdf">recommendation from a teacher</a>. Admissions officers rely on these recommendations for insight into the student’s learning style and strengths. Since many schools have gone to remote learning, teachers may not get as much insight into a student as they did when they were teaching in person.</p>
<p>But even in that situation, teachers can characterize the student as a learner in an online environment, which is a valuable insight. As Lee Coffin, dean of admissions at Dartmouth College, told me via text message: “These cyber-relationships are another type of new normal, so we are interested in the teacher’s view on how this works for a student.”</p>
<h2>4. Personality may count more than before</h2>
<p>Student activities such as <a href="https://www.ncsasports.org/coronavirus-sports/high-school-sports-coronavirus">sports</a>, <a href="https://www.newscentermaine.com/article/news/education/the-coronavirus-and-school-music-activities/97-ad3aee21-dbb1-493f-a899-1cc47f3e2630">performing arts</a>, community service and jobs <a href="https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/how-coronavirus-is-upending-high-school-extracurricular-activities">aren’t immune to the pandemic</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two students play the saxophone while reading sheet music." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/358213/original/file-20200915-16-xkh4tw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/358213/original/file-20200915-16-xkh4tw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358213/original/file-20200915-16-xkh4tw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358213/original/file-20200915-16-xkh4tw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358213/original/file-20200915-16-xkh4tw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358213/original/file-20200915-16-xkh4tw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358213/original/file-20200915-16-xkh4tw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Because the pandemic has halted many extracurricular activities, colleges are now considering student character in their admissions process.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/teenage-boy-playing-saxophone-in-high-school-band-royalty-free-image/522737829">FangXiaNuo/ E+ via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>For some students, the challenges of COVID-19 are just an interference with their daily lives. For others, the disease and its consequences are absolutely traumatic, with sick family members and financial crises. Depending on circumstances, some students might be able to list all of their activities because they were not interrupted. For others, the list could look blank since March.</p>
<p>Fortunately, even before the pandemic, there has been a movement among college admissions officers to begin to consider factors such as <a href="https://character-admission.org/about/">empathy and persistence</a>, which we could notice in the hours a student commits to a school commute, or a teacher’s testament to working well with classmates, or maybe as seen through an essay.</p>
<p>Some have followed specific recommendations for new ways to admit students that were made by <a href="https://mcc.gse.harvard.edu/resources-for-colleges/character-assessment-college-admission-guide-overview">Harvard’s Making Caring Common project</a>. This is good news for students because it signals that admissions officers value students’ unique qualities beyond their academics and extracurricular activities. </p>
<h2>5. The effects of gap-year students will vary</h2>
<p>As colleges rolled out their plans for fall semester, many incoming first-year students – anywhere from <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/08/06/metro/harvard-other-elite-colleges-more-students-deferring-their-first-year/">4% to 20%</a> at various schools – <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/08/06/metro/harvard-other-elite-colleges-more-students-deferring-their-first-year/">chose to take a gap year</a>.</p>
<p>In most cases, those gap-year students intend to enroll at colleges and universities that already accepted them in the spring of 2020. As a result, schools will hold their place and let them begin as first-years in the fall of 2021. While that is good news for students who want to wait, it also means that there may be fewer spaces available for students graduating from high school in 2021 who intend to begin their college educations in the fall of 2021. </p>
<p>The degree to which this situation changes the outlook for admissions will vary from school to school. Some of my counterparts – such as Jeremiah Quinlan, admissions dean at Yale, and Liz Creighton, admissions dean at Williams College – have told me they’re just planning to welcome larger first-year classes in the fall of 2021.</p>
<p>At Bowdoin, our small number of deferring students won’t significantly impact the spaces we can offer.</p>
<h2>Going forth</h2>
<p>These disruptions might alter the way college applications are evaluated, but – in my view – colleges are up for the challenge and prepared to be sensitive and flexible.</p>
<p>I would suggest that students and their families accept the disruptions for what they are, instead of getting too worried about them. High school seniors should devote their energy and time to the parts of their college applications that they can complete, not those that are impossible to do because of ongoing disruptions to everyday life.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/145623/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Whitney Soule receives funding from Jack Kent Cooke foundation. The Bowdoin admissions office, where she works, has received grant funds from the Jack Kent Cooke foundation to help support work with low-income, first generation college students.
Soule serves on the boards for the Enrollment Management Association, the Coalition for College, and is a member of the Enrollment Leader Advisory group for College Board.
Bowdoin admissions is a member of the Character Collaborative and a signatory to the Making Caring Common - Turning the Tide, both are referenced in the article.</span></em></p>An admissions dean seeks to take the worry out of applying for college when traditional things like grades, standardized tests and extracurricular activities have been disrupted by COVID-19.Whitney Soule, Sr Vice President, Dean of Admissions & Student Aid, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1334232020-03-18T12:08:29Z2020-03-18T12:08:29ZHow Chinese people came together when separated by quarantine, creating hope, humor and art<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/321115/original/file-20200317-60932-1pu7h6h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=42%2C0%2C5646%2C3701&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Zuo Ansheng, a flour figurine master, makes flour works related to the coronavirus in Yinan county in Shandong province, Feb. 7, 2020.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/zuo-ansheng-a-flour-figurine-master-makes-flour-works-news-photo/1199162198?adppopup=true">Feature China/Barcroft Media via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Fear and blame appear to be fast becoming Americans’ defining emotions around COVID-19. Headlines seem to offer either <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/us/coronavirus-deaths-estimate.html">worst-case estimates</a> or <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-campaign-accuses-bidens-team-of-spreading-conspiracy-theories-2020-3">government leaders’ mutual accusations</a>.</p>
<p>Amid the bewildering figures and contradictory political narratives, it is important to recall that numbers and governments are abstractions – whereas people actually live with and through disease. By fixating on the former, we risk losing sight of the human dimensions of epidemic life.</p>
<p>As a scholar researching the <a href="https://u.osu.edu/mclc/journal/abstracts/belindakong/">cultural aspects of the 2003 SARS epidemic</a>, I too initially focused on <a href="https://prism-journal.org/2019/10/18/prism-volume-16-no-2-special-issue-method-as-method-table-of-contents/">geopolitics and biosecurity</a>. But what I discovered in addition – rarely discussed but vitally humanizing – were the vibrant forms of everyday communal life generated by SARS at its very epicenters.</p>
<p>Under conditions of obligatory isolation and social distancing, common people invented new kinds of sociality and new genres of epidemic expressions. With COVID-19 now even more than SARS, the Chinese internet and social media offer a cornucopia of examples of epidemic communities brought together by heart, humor and creativity.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Residents of Wuhan encourage each other while under strict quarantine.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Pandemic solidarity</h2>
<p>One early set of viral videos surfaced in Wuhan just five days into the city’s lockdown. On the night of Jan. 27, <a href="https://www.bilibili.com/video/av85302428">residents shouted “jiayou”</a> – literally “add oil,” meaning “hang in there” or “don’t give up” – out their apartment windows, in a spontaneous burst of solidarity. It was a demonstration of collective strength and defiance, of people’s refusal to be quelled by the virus and the quarantine, and their desire to cheer each other on.</p>
<p>One of these clips, <a href="https://youtu.be/t_PSSTP8ROg">uploaded onto YouTube by the South China Morning Post</a>, has received over a million hits, with netizens from numerous Asian countries echoing “Wuhan jiayou!” in encouragement. Indeed, the refrain has flourished into a rallying cry among an international public on social media, despite the Chinese government’s attempts to <a href="https://s.weibo.com/weibo?q=%23%E6%AD%A6%E6%B1%89%E5%8A%A0%E6%B2%B9%23&from=trendtop_api&refer=index_hot_new">co-opt it as a slogan for ethnonational patriotism</a>.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">A man in Wuhan dropped off masks, despite exposing himself to risk.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Pandemic care</h2>
<p>This spirit of reciprocal support extends to the care of animals. The Wuhan lockdown has stranded tens of thousands of residents outside the city, leaving an estimated 50,000 pets trapped in unattended homes. Through social media, some pet owners connected with <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-health-pets/in-virus-stricken-wuhan-animal-lovers-break-into-homes-to-save-pets-idUSKBN1ZX1I2?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews">Lao Mao (“Old Cat”), who heads a team of volunteer animal rescuers in Wuhan</a>. These rescuers now roam the city and sometimes break into deserted homes to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2020/feb/14/catman-of-wuhan-the-man-rescuing-pets-abandoned-amid-coronavirus-outbreak-video">feed abandoned cats and dogs</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://youtu.be/34_5ewbxWAw">Outside Hubei</a>, other animal lovers likewise help those stuck inside the province look after their pets at home. These tales of animal caretaking, even in times of human crisis, can usefully offset perceptions of Chinese culture as simply one of cruel and unbridled animal consumption.</p>
<p>Another unexpected focal point for communal care is the face mask. Across China, masks have become a powerful vehicle for enacting goodwill, generosity and fellowship during the epidemic. In <a href="https://youtu.be/tJ0uOCqKWcY">one viral video from Anhui</a>, an anonymous Good Samaritan was captured on surveillance camera <a href="https://read01.com/d0LOjgK.html">dropping off 500 masks at a local police station</a>. As he hurried away, two officers ran outside to salute him.</p>
<p>This video in turn inspired the Hong Kong-based singer G.E.M. (Gloria Tang/Deng Ziqi) to compose “<a href="https://youtu.be/N-xQLlNftXQ">Angels</a>,” a song that garnered <a href="https://www.mpweekly.com/entertainment/focus/local/20200203-181364">nearly 600,000 hits within the first day of its upload</a>. A tribute to ordinary people’s small acts of fortitude and kindness during the outbreak, the music video opens with the Anhui clip and then splices together other moving scenes, including a train employee gifting a mask to an elderly woman passenger and a man distributing free masks to travelers in an airport abroad.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Chinese play mahjong with plastic bags over their heads.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Pandemic humor</h2>
<p>This creative energy has also spurred China’s folk humor culture. In locked-down sites across the country, social media is spawning a new genre of quarantine humor. On Weibo, WeChat and Douyin, memes of quarantine boredom and stir-craziness proliferate. Netizens record themselves <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@prostage/video/6788145850708184325">singing the lockdown blues by rescripting classic tunes</a>, <a href="https://youtu.be/glo04YwirMY">fishing from home aquariums</a>, <a href="https://youtu.be/6XHehv3C2rA">playing mahjong with plastic bags over their heads</a>, <a href="https://www.bilibili.com/video/av85019480/">playing solo mahjong</a>, <a href="https://youtu.be/fbhfBSXW9Jk">playing living-room badminton</a> and <a href="https://youtu.be/1ydlZwJzdxA">choreographing wacky dance moves</a>.</p>
<p>People also showcase their creative flare in donning protective gear and venturing out to neighborhood convenience stores and parks in inflatable costumes of <a href="https://youtu.be/tNz-xAuXQ9Y">T-Rex dinosaurs</a>, <a href="https://youtu.be/2NdnYiiLqIo">green aliens</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/manyapan/status/1225425296838529024">Christmas trees</a>. When they run out of face masks, some half-jokingly substitute with <a href="https://youtu.be/iI70CtND16s">bras, sanitary pads, and orange rinds</a>.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://www.whatsonweibo.com/the-coronavirus-on-chinese-social-media-the-trending-topics-in-times-of-the-2019-ncov-crisis/">Manya Koetse reports</a> from Beijing, these social media trends allow people to “mock neighbors, their friends or family, or even themselves in the extreme and sometimes silly measures they are taking to avoid the coronavirus.” But more than mockery, the very sharing of these memes is a constructive and healing social act. In times of high stress and distress, to sustain these virtual communities is to deliver shared recognition, concern and laughter.</p>
<p>This is not to say that China’s epidemic experience is solely lighthearted or affirming. Yet neither does life at epicenters have to be apocalyptic, defined by epic heroes and villains or horror scenarios of collapse and conflict.</p>
<p>Indeed, in other countries that have since become COVID-19 epicenters, social media offer similarly inspiring examples. <a href="https://youtu.be/wamoQYVI0ww">Frontline health workers in Iran</a> dance in hospital hallways to buoy their patients as well as themselves, and <a href="https://youtu.be/Q734VN0N7hw">Italians in lockdown</a> sing from their balconies to boost each other’s morale – in turn prompting a string of “Italy jiayou” videos from Chinese netizens.</p>
<p>Collectively, these chronicles attest to the idea of pandemic resilience – the possibility that disease outbreaks can be lived through with empathy, ingenuity and sheer human ordinariness.</p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/133423/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Belinda Kong received funding from the NEH and the Andrew W. Mellon Leave Fellowship from Bowdoin College for this project.</span></em></p>The human spirit is tested during difficult times, but a scholar already has found examples of how people found ways to support one another in China. Other countries have shown similar resilience.Belinda Kong, Professor of Asian Studies, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1237442019-10-21T12:17:22Z2019-10-21T12:17:22ZWhy don’t evergreens change color and drop their leaves every fall?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297827/original/file-20191021-56242-1wgq120.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=51%2C0%2C3399%2C2291&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">What's happening with the trees that stay green?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/beautiful-fall-foliage-golden-yellow-aspen-1503622133?src=Hr3x35_H4DbsNorTrIHA5Q-1-7">BingHao/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>It’s autumn in the Northern Hemisphere – otherwise known as leaf-peeping season. Now is when people head outside to soak up the annual display of orange, red and yellow foliage painted across the landscape.</p>
<p>But mixed among those bright, colorful patches are some trees that stay steadfastly green. Why do evergreen conifers sit out this blazing seasonal spectacle?</p>
<p>Like so many other challenges, the problem of winter can be solved by trees in more than one way.</p>
<p>As temperatures begin to dip, broad-leafed temperate trees – think maples and oaks – withdraw the green chlorophyll from their leaves. That’s the pigment that absorbs sunlight to power photosynthesis. Trees store the hard-won minerals, chiefly nitrogen, they’ve invested in chlorophyll in their wood for reuse in a future growing season. Yellows and oranges and reds are left fleetingly visible before the leaves drop for winter.</p>
<p>Evergreen conifers – cone-bearing trees – retain their foliage year-round and have a different strategy for withstanding winter’s stresses.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297828/original/file-20191021-56215-2mmbil.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297828/original/file-20191021-56215-2mmbil.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297828/original/file-20191021-56215-2mmbil.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297828/original/file-20191021-56215-2mmbil.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297828/original/file-20191021-56215-2mmbil.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297828/original/file-20191021-56215-2mmbil.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297828/original/file-20191021-56215-2mmbil.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297828/original/file-20191021-56215-2mmbil.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Green starts to stand out in the fall woods.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/wonderful-autumn-landscape-evergreen-pine-tree-1531872623">Michele Ursi/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Return on investment in leaves</h2>
<p>Staying evergreen is not about continuing to conduct photosynthesis throughout the winter. Cold temperatures affect conifers’ metabolism just as they do any other organism’s. In fact, on cold wintry days, evergreen conifers <a href="https://doi.org/10.1641/0006-3568(2004)054%5B0041:PSOOE%5D2.0.CO;2">perform no more photosynthesis</a> than their leafless neighbors.</p>
<p>The best way to understand the benefit of evergreenness is by considering the construction costs of leaves. Needles are really just modified leaves, after all. How do trees balance the energy it takes to grow a leaf with the energy that leaf produces via photosynthesis? In other words, how long do the leaves take to repay their construction costs and offer the tree a return on its investment?</p>
<p>Deciduous trees must recoup their investment in their leafy canopy in only a single growing season. In contrast, evergreen conifers, by hanging onto their needles, grant those needles multiple growing seasons to contribute to their tree’s balance sheets. That’s the real benefit to staying green.</p>
<p>Evergreens’ greater leaf longevity means they can survive in environments that just don’t work for their deciduous cousins. At higher latitudes and elevations, shorter and cooler growing seasons can limit photosynthetic activity. Drought can further interfere with photosynthesis. In these harsher conditions, a year may not be long enough for a leaf to produce enough energy to pay back its growth costs to the tree.</p>
<p>This may explain why evergreen conifers dominate mountaintops and the boreal forests that stretch across high latitudes in Alaska, Canada and Northern Europe. Deciduous broad-leafed trees largely drop out of such habitats – conditions mean they can’t balance their accounts with respect to investments in leaves and leaves’ photosynthetic return in a single season.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297829/original/file-20191021-56207-5szf6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297829/original/file-20191021-56207-5szf6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297829/original/file-20191021-56207-5szf6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297829/original/file-20191021-56207-5szf6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297829/original/file-20191021-56207-5szf6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297829/original/file-20191021-56207-5szf6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297829/original/file-20191021-56207-5szf6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297829/original/file-20191021-56207-5szf6d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">White pine needles need to withstand only one winter.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/white-pine-branch-118531429">Candia Baxter/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Evergreen needle longevity varies widely and maps onto the degree of growing season stress. Some temperate trees common to southern New England, such as white pine, retain needles for only two growing seasons. Any individual white pine needle overwinters only once, minimally meeting the definition of evergreen.</p>
<p>Some conifers, such as larch, do not achieve even that, instead shedding their entire crown of needles each autumn in a luminously golden display that can be a highlight of the autumn foliage splendor where they are found.</p>
<p>In contrast, bristlecone pines, inhabitants of high elevations in the arid Southwest, hang onto individual needles for almost 50 years. It may take nearly that long for bristlecone pine needles to achieve a photosynthetic return on the investment in their construction, given the growing-season stresses they confront.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297830/original/file-20191021-56220-nv8teh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297830/original/file-20191021-56220-nv8teh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297830/original/file-20191021-56220-nv8teh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297830/original/file-20191021-56220-nv8teh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297830/original/file-20191021-56220-nv8teh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297830/original/file-20191021-56220-nv8teh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297830/original/file-20191021-56220-nv8teh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297830/original/file-20191021-56220-nv8teh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tough bristlecone pine needles last for decades in their harsh habitat.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/bristlecone-pines-oldest-living-things-on-54172333">Darren J. Bradley/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Adapting to deal with winter stresses</h2>
<p>Overwintering is profoundly stressful for trees.</p>
<p>Subzero temperatures bring the risk of cellular freezing in evergreen needles – which would be lethal. To prevent freezing, evergreen conifers accumulate high concentrations of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.01730">dissolved substances</a> <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15660165">known as cryoprotectants</a> that <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691612638/biochemical-adaptation">lower the freezing point</a> of water in their cells and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-3040.1998.00309.x">protect key cell structures</a>, while not interfering with metabolism.</p>
<p>Cold, snow and blowing ice, along with the demands of longevity, lead evergreen conifers to invest their energy in the toughness of needles. Conifer needles vary in toughness; for instance, relatively short-lived white pine needles are more delicate. The fibrous materials that make needles more durable further deepen coniferous trees’ investment, extending the period required to achieve a return on needle construction costs.</p>
<p>Heavy loads of snow can result in broken branches, a prevailing risk of evergreenness. Thin, often drooping conifer needles catch less snow than the broad leaves of deciduous trees. Indeed, when deciduous trees lose branches to snowstorms, it is generally during storms on the edges of the snow season – in autumn or spring – not midwinter storms, when the crowns are leafless. If you’ve ever wondered why deciduous trees are taking so long in spring to leaf out, missing out on some excellent growing days as a result, keep in mind that trees don’t want to risk the damage that could result from a freak spring storm.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297831/original/file-20191021-56194-p4ls9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297831/original/file-20191021-56194-p4ls9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297831/original/file-20191021-56194-p4ls9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297831/original/file-20191021-56194-p4ls9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297831/original/file-20191021-56194-p4ls9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297831/original/file-20191021-56194-p4ls9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297831/original/file-20191021-56194-p4ls9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/297831/original/file-20191021-56194-p4ls9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Evergreen branches are built to let snow slide off them so they don’t snap under the weight.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/snow-covered-fir-trees-heavy-snowfall-764380549">Melinda Nagy/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Conifer branch architecture is also adapted to shedding snow. Conifer branches generally sweep outwards and downwards from the trunk: Think of a Christmas fir. Not only that, conifer branches are generally more flexible than their counterparts on deciduous trees. Collecting heavy snow weighs down conifer branches until they reach an angle where it sloughs off. </p>
<p>No matter the species, at midlatitudes, where the snow flies in winter and growing seasons are generally mild and favorable, trees need strategies to make it through. Some recreate a crown of leaves each spring. Evergreens equip their needles and branches with features necessary to survive winter and thus live to see another spring – and, for some, many springs thereafter.</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Barry Logan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Many deciduous trees put on a dazzling fall foliage display. But coniferous evergreens hold on to their needles and stay green. A biologist breaks down these different survival strategies.Barry Logan, Professor of Biology, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1195842019-07-12T12:05:31Z2019-07-12T12:05:31ZLong before Armstrong and Aldrin, artists were stoking dreams of space travel<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/286101/original/file-20190729-43136-1e9y4p6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Chesley Bonestell’s detailed drawings of space travel inspired millions.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/x-ray_delta_one/9147209285">James Vaughan/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the midst of the space race, Hereward Lester Cooke, the former co-director of the NASA Art Program, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=Ep-gswEACAAJ&dq=eyewitnesses+to+space&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjw2vTR-KrjAhVKnFkKHX3oC7AQ6AEIKDAA">observed</a>, “Space travel started in the imagination of the artist.”</p>
<p>If the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landing was an opportunity to celebrate a remarkable technological achievement, it’s also a good time to reflect on the creative vision that made it possible.</p>
<p>Long before Neil Armstrong set foot on the Moon, artists and writers were crafting visions of extraterrestrial exploration that would make space flight possible.</p>
<h2>Cultivating possibility</h2>
<p>For centuries, the dream of human travel into the cosmos has fired imaginations. </p>
<p>Ancient mythologies teemed with deities who suffused the skies, glimmered from stars and rode the Sun and Moon. Pythagoras, Philolaus and Plutarch <a href="https://www.amazon.com/2001-Building-Travel-John-Zukowsky/dp/0810944901">each contemplated the Moon as a world of its own</a>. Leonardo da Vinci <a href="https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/leonardo-da-vinci-and-flight">famously imagined</a> flying machines that would take their occupants skyward. Authors such as Cyrano de Bergerac – <a href="http://authorscalendar.info/bergerac.htm">who’s credited</a> with being the first to imagine a rocket being used for space travel – fed a growing appetite for stories of celestial exploration. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283745/original/file-20190711-173325-1v78ms2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283745/original/file-20190711-173325-1v78ms2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283745/original/file-20190711-173325-1v78ms2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283745/original/file-20190711-173325-1v78ms2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283745/original/file-20190711-173325-1v78ms2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283745/original/file-20190711-173325-1v78ms2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283745/original/file-20190711-173325-1v78ms2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283745/original/file-20190711-173325-1v78ms2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An illustration from Jules Verne’s novel ‘From the Earth to the Moon,’ drawn by Henri de Montaut.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/%27From_the_Earth_to_the_Moon%27_by_Henri_de_Montaut_31.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 1865, the French writer Jules Verne published his novel, “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=Zq9PDAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=from+the+earth+to+the+moon&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjT9a7fqa3jAhXGW80KHZOeCt8Q6AEIKDAA#v=onepage&q=from%20the%20earth%20to%20the%20moon&f=false">From Earth to the Moon</a>,” followed five years later by its sequel, “<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/83">Round the Moon</a>.” </p>
<p>Verne’s tale provides an uncannily prescient account of the development of space travel: Three astronauts blast off from Florida in a small aluminum capsule, fired from the end of an enormous cast iron gun. After orbiting the Moon and making observations with a pair of opera glasses, the three men return to Earth, splashing into the ocean as heroes. </p>
<p>Almost a century later, RKO Pictures would release <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051638/?ref_=nv_sr_3?ref_=nv_sr_3">a film</a> inspired by Verne’s adventure story, while <a href="https://www.kcet.org/shows/blue-sky-metropolis/space-in-the-imagination-how-comic-books-envisioned-the-moon-landing">a comic book version of the tale</a> went through multiple printings <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_the_Earth_to_the_Moon">between 1953 and 1971</a>. </p>
<p>In the 1950s, the painter Chesley Bonestell further stoked the imagination of future space-farers with his visions of space stations, published in Collier’s. <a href="https://history.msfc.nasa.gov/vonbraun/disney_article.html">Walt Disney would follow</a> with three made-for-TV movies that illustrated the ways people might one day be able to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omWRxonewL4">fly into space</a> and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZImSTxbglI">land on the Moon</a>.</p>
<h2>After touch down, artists inspired anew</h2>
<p>In 1969, Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins would realize the vision that Verne and others had instilled in the mind’s eye of millions.</p>
<p>This accomplishment would, in turn, inspire artists anew. </p>
<p>“Nothing will already be the same,” <a href="https://www.rauschenbergfoundation.org/art/art-in-context/stoned-moon">reads the text</a> along the right edge of Robert Rauschenberg’s collage “Stoned Moon Drawing.” Published in the December 1969 issue of Studio International, Rauschenberg’s work combined images of the Apollo 11 moonwalk, Cape Canaveral and the Gemini print shop. Rauschenberg wanted to draw attention to the deep collaboration required in the worlds of art and science, whether it was for print-making or lunar landings.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283752/original/file-20190711-173325-9ypx5l.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283752/original/file-20190711-173325-9ypx5l.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/283752/original/file-20190711-173325-9ypx5l.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=826&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283752/original/file-20190711-173325-9ypx5l.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=826&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283752/original/file-20190711-173325-9ypx5l.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=826&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283752/original/file-20190711-173325-9ypx5l.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1038&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283752/original/file-20190711-173325-9ypx5l.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1038&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/283752/original/file-20190711-173325-9ypx5l.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1038&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Alma W. Thomas’ 1970 painting ‘Blast Off.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://airandspace.si.edu/sites/default/files/images/collection-objects/record-images/A19761790000CP01.JPG">National Air and Space Museum</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In the 1970s, the color field painter Alma Thomas explored what she described as “the vastness and incomprehensibility of space” in abstract paintings like “<a href="https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/blast">Blast Off</a>,” “<a href="https://i.pinimg.com/originals/51/9e/2f/519e2fead6a9e9d5c9ce5cb56bcd75eb.jpg">Launch Pad</a>” and “<a href="https://www.wikiart.org/en/alma-woodsey-thomas/new-galaxy-1970">New Galaxy</a>.” </p>
<p>“When I paint space, I am with the astronauts,” <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=eb5222HXmzoC&lpg=PA7&dq=alan%20w%20thomas%20retrospective%20paintings&pg=PA7#v=onepage&q&f=false">she said</a>.</p>
<p>The artist <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/06/arts/design/red-grooms-marlborough-tribeca-ruckus-.html">Red Grooms</a>, who attended the Apollo 15 launch, turned to official NASA photographs to create a gigantic sculptural installation of astronauts David Scott and James Irwin exploring the lunar surface with cameras and a lunar rover. </p>
<p>“I wanted,” <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/relationship-of-art-to-science-and-technology-in-the-united-states-1957-1971-five-case-studies/oclc/54053244">he explained</a>, “to do the sort of thing the [NASA] people were doing – build something incomprehensible then try to get it off the ground.” </p>
<h2>Pioneers of the imagination</h2>
<p>What can be gleaned from this tale of outer space visionaries?</p>
<p>Perhaps, most simply, it is the power of the arts to cultivate the imagination – to render possible in the mind what has not yet been tangibly realized. As the Canadian theorist Marshall McLuhan observed in his 1964 classic, “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=TcsSvgAACAAJ&dq=%22Understanding+Media:+The+Extensions+of+Man%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiQ3tPLu63jAhWPdt8KHWPJDVQQ6AEIKDAA">Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man</a>”: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The artist is the [person] in any field, scientific or humanistic, who grasps the implications of [their] actions and of the new knowledge in [their] own time. [The artist] is the [person] of integral awareness.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In recent years, American education policy <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/22/business/a-rising-call-to-promote-stem-education-and-cut-liberal-arts-funding.html">has increasingly emphasized</a> the value of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, often at the expense of support for the arts. </p>
<p>At what peril does education policy drift away from the arts? What sort of navigational cues might go missing?</p>
<p>Scientists, the essayist Rebecca Solnit <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Field-Guide-Getting-Lost/dp/0143037242">noted</a>, certainly play an integral role in human discovery. They “transform the unknown into the known, haul it in like fishermen.” </p>
<p>But it is the artist, she writes, who gets “you out into that dark sea” in the first place.</p>
<p>It was artists <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Photography-Theory-Seminar-James-Elkins/dp/0415977835">who first envisioned and produced photographic technologies</a>. It was artists <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2012/jun/29/flight-exhibition-artistic-imagination-exhibition">who first foresaw a world in which individuals might fly</a>. And it will be artists who continue to shatter the perceived limitations to our own intellectual frameworks. </p>
<p>In 2018, the Japanese tycoon Yusaku Maezawa paid an undisclosed sum of money to become the first person to orbit the Moon since 1972. If all goes according to plan, he’ll depart in 2023 with companions of his choosing. </p>
<p>I find his selection fitting: <a href="https://phys.org/news/2018-09-japanese-billionaire-businessman-revealed-spacex.html">He intends to take along a group of artists</a>.</p>
<p>[ <em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/119584/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anne Collins Goodyear does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landing is an opportunity to celebrate a remarkable technological achievement, it’s worth reflecting upon the creative vision that made it possible.Anne Collins Goodyear, Co-Director of the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1111302019-04-23T10:44:13Z2019-04-23T10:44:13Z‘I’m not a traitor, you are!’ Political argument from the Founding Fathers to today’s partisans<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/270278/original/file-20190422-28090-1f3bt50.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">How partisans argue tells a lot about how the public sees democracy</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/download/confirm/461048545?src=fN-CyDBk5Z02yUiDirK4dA-1-7&size=huge_jpg">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>President Trump is <a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/democracy/reports/2018/12/17/464235/following-the-money/">working with the Russians to enrich himself</a>. The <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2018/12/21/republicans-are-responsible-trump-fiasco-now-must-fix-it/?utm_term=.97ea09c9deda">Republican Party is shielding him</a> from accountability.</p>
<p>The Democrats want to win elections by <a href="https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2018/08/03/kris-kobach-democrats-long-term-strategy-is-importing-foreign-voters-to-replace-americans/">repopulating the country</a> with foreigners. Then they’ll be able to <a href="https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/01/15/exclusive-mo-brooks-democrat-strategy-of-importing-foreign-voters-will-turn-america-into-california/">permanently transform</a> the racial and cultural makeup of American society.</p>
<p>These are versions of stories told by, first, Democrats, and second, Republicans. Let’s set aside the merits of these stories – at least for the moment (I know, it’s not easy to do!).</p>
<p>These stories are, essentially, allegations of disloyalty. And they foretell national ruin if the other side achieves its goals. </p>
<p>I teach and study U.S. politics and I have researched the way partisans in America argue about major issues.</p>
<p>American history is filled with examples where one partisan side alleges that some idea embraced by the other side threatens to compromise American national strength or sovereignty – and even threatens the existence of the country.</p>
<p>But it’s unusual to see what is happening in America today. </p>
<p>Now, it’s not just one side of the partisan divide accusing the other of disloyalty and disdain for American safety and values. It’s both sides. One need look no further than the cable news networks for evidence of how entrenched this form of partisanship has become.</p>
<p>It turns out that the way partisans debate has an impact on how Americans view democracy itself. </p>
<p>So what does it mean to America that both sides are accusing each other of betraying their country?</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/270286/original/file-20190422-1403-q3759q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/270286/original/file-20190422-1403-q3759q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/270286/original/file-20190422-1403-q3759q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270286/original/file-20190422-1403-q3759q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270286/original/file-20190422-1403-q3759q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270286/original/file-20190422-1403-q3759q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270286/original/file-20190422-1403-q3759q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270286/original/file-20190422-1403-q3759q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President Donald Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have each used apocalyptic accusations against the other.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Trump: AP/Pablo Martinez Monsivais; Pelosi: AP/J. Scott Applewhite</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Patterns of partisan debate</h2>
<p>As I discuss in my book, “<a href="http://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/15520.html">Embracing Dissent: Political Violence and Party Development in the United States</a>,” it was common in the past for accusations of disloyalty to be lodged by partisans. </p>
<p>For example, during the Civil War, <a href="https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Union_Divided/sJqfMGRh2d0C?hl=en">the principle</a> that “every Democrat may not be a traitor, but every traitor is a Democrat” was a familiar refrain in the Republican North. </p>
<p>During the Cold War, <a href="http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/Classroom%20Materials/Curriculum%20Packets/Cold%20War%20&%20Red%20Scare/II.html">Republicans questioned whether Democrats were sufficiently anti-communist</a> to protect the country. </p>
<p>Democrats often responded to these attacks, both in the 19th and 20th centuries, in a cautious and defensive manner. </p>
<p>Instead of counter-attacking, Democrats often tried to change the subject by focusing public debate on other issue areas. In many cases, Democrats attempted to defend themselves by echoing the positions and talking points of their more nationalistic rivals.</p>
<p>Similarly, in American political history, when accusations about loyalty to America erupted, it’s usually been one-sided. The “accused” side remains on the defensive, protesting its commitment to the country without advancing an accusatory counterclaim. </p>
<p>This pattern tends to consolidate public opinion. One party accuses, the other denies, but both sides publicly appear in relative agreement about the nature of the national threat. </p>
<p>In the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, Republicans labeled Democrats as <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Enemy_at_Home.html?id=EcufLyb4Bo8C">“soft” on terrorism</a> and claimed that their reluctance to increase the number of troops committed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/27/world/middleeast/27cong.html">embolden</a>” America’s enemies.</p>
<p>Democrats <a href="https://www.google.com/books/edition/Stand_Up_Fight_Back/v5X0PYgrjc4C?hl=en">backpedaled</a> in response. They asserted that they too were committed to fighting terrorism, but that they would use a different approach to address this threat. </p>
<h2>Both sides then – and now</h2>
<p>In my research I found that the partisan politics of the 1790s featured a pattern of mutual recrimination that is comparable to today’s polarized political debates. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.history.org/foundation/journal/autumn12/election.cfm">Federalists who supported George Washington’s presidency</a> accused the new party in opposition, the Jeffersonian Republicans, of <a href="https://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/french-revolution">advancing the French revolutionary cause</a>. </p>
<p>Jeffersonian Republicans alleged that if Federalist leaders had their way, <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/early-us/federalist-party">the U.S. would be recolonized by the British</a>. </p>
<p>During this period, there were few policy disputes that were considered safe from these incendiary suspicions. Disputes ranging from trade and immigration to fiscal and monetary policy all seemed to trigger accusations among partisans that their rivals were <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Age_of_Federalism.html?id=9RyG29bER3QC">under the spell of foreign interests and ideas</a>.</p>
<p>As a new generation of partisan newspapers took center stage, the media abetted the conflict. A rising class of “<a href="https://www.upress.virginia.edu/title/2944">printer-editors</a>” forged new partisan channels for the circulation of political news. These printer-editors expanded their newspaper readership by increasing coverage of political scandals and public controversy. Sound familiar?</p>
<p>Many of the leading political controversies conveyed in the partisan press of the 1790s, moreover, stirred up apocalyptic fears. Partisan opponents accused each other of national disloyalty. They said the republic would be irreversibly damaged if their opponents were not stopped. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/270283/original/file-20190422-28106-6em1sx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/270283/original/file-20190422-28106-6em1sx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/270283/original/file-20190422-28106-6em1sx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270283/original/file-20190422-28106-6em1sx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270283/original/file-20190422-28106-6em1sx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270283/original/file-20190422-28106-6em1sx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270283/original/file-20190422-28106-6em1sx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/270283/original/file-20190422-28106-6em1sx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">1798 cartoon shows Congressman Matthew Lyon, a Jeffersonian Republican, and Roger Griswold, a Federalist, fighting in Philadelphia’s Congress Hall after Griswold insulted Lyon.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.loc.gov/item/2008661719/">Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Partisans conceive of irreparable consequences in different ways. The idea of surrender to a hostile foreign power is one way of envisioning national ruin. Partisan accusations in the 1790s that the other side would submit to the control of Great Britain or France fit this pattern. <a href="http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/Classroom%20Materials/Curriculum%20Packets/Cold%20War%20&%20Red%20Scare/II.html">The Cold War accusation</a> that left-leaning Americans took orders from the Kremlin followed a similar logic.</p>
<p>Today’s version of the foreign influence accusation is the alarm raised in recent months by many of Trump’s <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/opinions/wp/2018/11/30/was-trump-compromised-is-he-still/?utm_term=.9e0038a7d1b9">critics</a> that President Trump may have been <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-gop-has-become-the-pro-russia-party/2019/01/21/9960f0d4-1dbf-11e9-8e21-59a09ff1e2a1_story.html?utm_term=.1117afbef757">under Vladimir Putin’s thumb</a>. </p>
<p>Contemporary conservatives are focused on a different national security threat – and a different partisan culprit.</p>
<p>Liberal Democrats, they argue, are hellbent on repopulating the country with “<a href="https://www.claremont.org/crb/basicpage/the-flight-93-election/">Third World foreigners</a>.” </p>
<p>Such accusations often include reference to the problem of permeable borders. This is the belief that an otherwise whole or united country will be penetrated by foreign gangs and other “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AneeacsvNwU">bad hombres</a>,” in the president’s phrase.</p>
<h2>Apocalyptic partisanship’s consequences</h2>
<p>Apocalyptic narratives raise the stakes of partisan disputes. They induce opposing sides to dig in when engaged in public negotiation. They also deny the legitimacy of their opponent’s participation in the political process. </p>
<p>Without a shared understanding of the opposition’s legitimacy, political competitors treat one another like enemies. This doesn’t necessarily lead to political violence or civil war. </p>
<p>This pattern of debate does, however, come with a key drawback. </p>
<p>The resulting maelstrom of suspicion and distrust undermines the standing of professionals in vital fields like science and journalism and in institutions like the courts, the military and intelligence agencies. Experts, in this context, can’t be completely apolitical, impartial and above the political fray, can they? After all, if politicians of the opposing party can’t be trusted, then their allies in other institutions can’t be either. </p>
<p>It may not be evident to partisans in the thick of the fight, but apocalyptic narratives alter the hopes and aspirations Americans have for democracy itself. </p>
<p>Should Americans hope for a politics that allows for compromise and mutual adjustment? Or is democracy little more than a forum where rivals draw lines in the sand and hurl recriminations at one another? </p>
<p>Should Americans expect and accept a political process that yields incremental policy change over time? Or does the republic face challenges so great that nothing short of a dramatic course correction will suffice to save the country? </p>
<p>Much depends on the nature of issues that are up for debate. But much also depends on how Americans choose to debate them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/111130/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeffrey Selinger does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>US history is filled with instances where one partisan side charges that the other side’s positions will lead to national ruin. Now, both sides accuse the other of betraying their country.Jeffrey Selinger, Associate Professor of Government, Bowdoin CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.