To those who aren't fans of the game — and some who are — soccer is indelibly associated with hooligans, the British tabloids' term of choice for young male fans who engage in rowdy, violent behavior. This phenomenon has been studied extensively, but one research report stands out as particularly vivid. Writing in the British Journal of Social Psychology, a trio of researchers led by the University of Liverpool's Clifford Stott reported that during the 1998 World Cup finals in Marseilles, fans of the English team got into numerous brawls, while fans of the Scottish team managed to ... Read More
World Cup Rarely Meets Lofty Economic Goals
June 10, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment
When South Africa was chosen as the first nation on its continent to host the World Cup, national leaders told The New York Times the monthlong event would "add several billion dollars to the economy and create about 150,000 jobs." But economic analyses of previous tournaments suggest such estimates may be wildly overstated. A paper published in the journal Regional Studies reported that, rather than the windfalls they had been hoping for, "host cities experienced cumulative losses of $4.5 to $9.3 billion" when the World Cup was held in the United States in 1994. "The apparent negative ... Read More
Is the World Cup Bad for Your Health?
June 9, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment
Is watching the World Cup hazardous to your health? Well, let's put it this way: If your country's team is losing, keep a defibrillator handy. A British Medical Journal analysis found the risk of being admitted to an English hospital for acute myocardial infarction on June 30, 1998 — the day England lost to Argentina in a particularly tense World Cup match, decided by a penalty kick shoot-out — was 25 percent higher than average for that day of the year. The spike in hospitalizations for heart attacks — about 55 more than otherwise would be expected — continued for two more days, ... Read More
The U.N.’s Death Squad Watchdog
June 3, 2010 • By • 5 Comments
In a troubled African nation one morning not long ago, Philip Alston was driven in a convoy of three white SUVs, with armed escorts front and rear, to a town south of the capital. Alston, the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, was going to meet with eyewitnesses to, and victims of, a violent crackdown by local police on political opponents of the government. An Australian native who now lives in New York, Alston has spent more than three decades working in human rights and international law. He was in the country (which Alston asked not be ... Read More
The Right Notes
May 4, 2010 • By • 1 Comment
As a composer who fuses technology and the orchestra, I think the blending of the two is a great thing ("Triumph of the Cyborg Composer," March-April 2010). It's something that Varese, Frank Zappa and Bob Moog pushed the limits of. Even Beethoven was amazed at the "new technology" of adding two more octaves to the piano within his lifetime. Rather than see it as a threat, it should be welcomed because these are new tools to work with, which creates innovation, new music, ideas and collaboration. I look forward to more music and technology articles from you. It was a great read. Walt ... Read More
Can Hurricanes Be Predicted Decades in Advance?
May 3, 2010 • By • 1 Comment
In 2007, a reporter for the Post & Courier of Charleston, S.C., was tired of doing straight stories on hurricane forecasts. So he hired a medium to predict the forthcoming storm season. "The sense we got from emergency-management people here," the reporter wrote, "is that the forecasts had been so wrong that they were hearing from the public, 'Why should we pay any attention to this stuff?'" At the end of the hurricane season, it turned out the medium had been more accurate than the scientists who took it upon themselves to make storm predictions. But research seems likely to soon make ... Read More
The Grandson’s Inheritance: Grandpa’s Walker
April 30, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment
Does your grandpa have a bum hip? That's bad news for you, sonny boy. A study in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism discovered a link between hip fractures in grandfathers and reduced bone size in their grandsons. "This is the first time this risk factor for low bone mass has been demonstrated across two generations," research team leader Mattias Lorentzon said. The study examined about 3,700 grandparents and their grandsons, finding that 270 grandsons had reduced bone density in their skeleton — and all of these also had a grandparent with a broken hip. Further ... Read More
The Sociology of Avatar, The X Files and The Simpsons
April 29, 2010 • By • 2 Comments
After watching the premiere episode of House, I confidently predicted the Fox medical drama would be dead on arrival. I was certain the viewing public would not respond to a program based around such a cold, arrogant character. And the questions it posed — Is there a God? Does anyone ever tell the whole truth, even to himself? In the end, don't we always choose self-interest over altruism? — were not ones the American Idol crowd was especially interested in contemplating. I gave it six weeks, eight tops. House is now in its sixth season and remains among the 10 most-watched programs in ... Read More
A Right to Home-School?
April 27, 2010 • By • 6 Comments
At the start of this year, in Tennessee, a funny thing happened to Uwe and Hannelore Romeike, members of a German family that sought asylum in the U.S., based on what they said was persecution by the government in a stable, modern, democratic European country. A U.S. court granted it. A federal immigration judge in Tennessee found that the Romeikes were at risk of persecution by German authorities because they wanted to home-school their kids. Now Uwe and Hannelore can raise their five Christian kids in Morristown, Tenn., not far from Knoxville, instead of facing fines or fearing a knock on ... Read More
