“This is it.” she whispered to herself as she attached the overhead harness to the receptacle on the seat between her legs. Dinah, a young student, was finally going to experience what she had been studying for so long, a negative energy space-time bubble. She sat up straight, fidgeting with the dog eared pages of her notebook, while anxiously awaiting her ship’s departure from the new America Deep Orbit Space Station. After escaping the Earth’s immediate gravitational pull the ship’s new engine, which Dinah helped design, would begin converting stored matter into pulses of negative energy. These pulses would be distributed along the exterior of the ship, warping space-time, and creating a bubble which would exist outside the affects of normal space. But before any of this could take place, they would have to depart from ADOSS. “What’s taking so long?!” She said out loud, a little louder than she meant to actually. Dinah was beginning to wonder if there was a problem with the new engine.
~ If Dinah should get up and inquire about the delay, turn to the last page of this paper…
~ If I should get on with it already, then please continue reading…

By this point in my paper, you are probably wondering just what this paper is going to be about. Due to our linear perception of time, most people would agree that I caused your confusion by first making you read the above nonsense. I would also like to think that most people would agree this essential past leading to the future system is how the universe works. But what if that isn’t always the case? What if the history of the universe wasn’t history at all, but a nearly infinite number of possible histories? And what if this strange multi-history wasn’t yet written? Could we the observer, participate in determining the final outcome, and even more strangely, could we actively change the past from our positions in the present? I think that through the course of this semester we have laid the ground work for tackling just such a question. And I hope that through the course of this paper, I can help the reader better grasp this interesting possibility.

To start, I think we need a little refresher. Now quick, go back and re-read every assignment we’ve had and get with Brent to see if he’ll let you listen to his recordings of each class; or, you could just read through my review of gravity, acceleration, space and time below. Sound a little grandiose? I promise to keep this fairly simple… for nothing more than my own sake. Now, presented with such a task, where does one start?

In the beginning, there was time (assuming you that you believe there was time before the big bang) and probably some unfamiliar form of space (Veneziano 2004). Working with this model of empty space and the passage of time, I hope to perform a series of experiments which will help the reader better understand how time can change in certain conditions. If you will, picture a person who synchronizes their wristwatch with an atomic clock every New Year’s Day, and assume that this wrist watch is a perfect time keeping device (meaning the watch is as efficient as an atomic clock, and encounters absolutely no malfunctions or hazardous events for the duration of its life). If this person conducts themselves in a manner typical to the normal American lifestyle, (i.e. walks, bikes, drives, flies, etc) then when they return to the atomic clock one year later, the clock and the watch would no longer be synchronized. Presuming such an unlikely wrist watch actually existed and that the stationary atomic clock functioned properly, how could this have happened?

The easiest way to answer this question is by using a photon “light clock” (Greene 1999: 38). A light clock consists of two fixed, parallel mirrors, with a single photon of light bouncing back and forth between them. If stationary, the photon will bounce straight up and down at the same constant speed; however, if the clock were riding shotgun in a speeding car, then the photon would have to cover the distance traveled by the car, as well as the distance between the mirrors, before hitting each mirror. (See Figure 1 below for an easier visual explanation.) With this example, it is easy to understand the connection between acceleration and time. But just how closely are they related?

Figure 1. At rest, the photon wants to move straight up and down. From the perspective of the outside observer however, the photon of the moving clock would travel along a diagonal path.

Pretend we have an object, which you place it in a room alone, and completely at rest. Can an object completely at rest still be moving? While this may sound like a contradiction, there is mounting evidence suggesting that such an object would still be moving through time (Greene 1999: 50). While reading this, even though you, your computer, and the objects around you are stationary (relative to the room you are in), you are all experiencing the “movement” of time. And for you and your belongings, time is moving at the same rate, that is to say you and those objects are aging at the same rate. The rate at which you and the other stationary objects are aging is at the speed of light. It is easier to imagine this if you think of time as an extra related dimension to the normal three dimensions of which most of us always think. Figure 2 below illustrates the moon’s orbit around the Earth over a period of time. This light speed aging is what accounts for our observations of time slowing at accelerated rates of speed. In order for an object to move through any spatial dimension, it must divert energy away from traveling through the time dimension. The exchange of energies between speed and time is so equivalent that if all of an object’s energy for traveling through time were diverted to traveling through space (essentially traveling at the speed of light or 670 million miles per hour), that object would no longer feel the affects of time.

Figure 2. While both the moon’s orbit around Earth and the Earth’s orbit around our sun take place in three dimensional spaces, this reminds us that these orbits take place over a given period of time. The last “flat” image shows a specific instant in time.

Acceleration through space is not the only force capable of altering time. The presence of large celestial bodies like our Sun can have drastic affects on both space and time through the exploitation of gravitational forces (Greene 1999: 69). Gravity’s strength is determined solely by the mass of an object, and the distance separating it from other objects. Newton’s theory of gravity states that if any change in these two factors were to occur, the affects would be felt immediately by all objects within the gravitational field of the first massive object. Say for example’s sake, the sun was to explode. According to Newton, even though it takes about eight minutes for the light from our sun to traverse the 93 million miles of space to get to Earth, the Earth itself would immediately notice a departure from its original orbit. Unfortunately for Newton, this is not true, because nothing can outrun the universal speed limit of 670 million miles per hour. The idea that the Earth would instantaneously feel this change was once at conflict with Einstein’s special theory of relativity. Because of this, Einstein would seek out a new theory of gravity fitting with his theory of special relativity.

Later dubbed the general theory of relativity, Einstein’s new ideas about space and time would revolutionize modern physics… again. The basic idea behind general relativity is that acceleration and gravity are both linked to one another. Either force can be used to mimic the other, or to seemingly cancel the other out. An easy way to understand this concept would be to think about free fall rides at amusement parks. Imagine you were traveling to Arizona’s newest and grandest amusement park, where you were looking forward to an exciting trip on Galileo’s Tower. You eagerly wait as powerful motors lift the cart and its passenger’s high into the sky above Tucson. On the way up, you are being pushed back into your seat by gravity and the extra forces exerted on you by the cart’s acceleration. The long awaited moment comes, and the cart plummets back down to the ground below. While falling, you and the other passengers will be in a state of freefall, where, at least temporarily, you will experience a sensation of weightlessness. This is because as you free fall, you are moving at the same rate as your surroundings (in this case the cart, the seats, and other passengers). In this state, you do have weight and are still being acted upon by the force of gravity; however, you don’t notice it as much because of the acceleration. By finding a concrete connection between acceleration and gravity, Einstein was later able to use his knowledge of accelerated movement to better understand gravity. In time, this understanding would lead Einstein to make another link combining accelerated motion and gravity. That link would be the curvature of space and time.

Through out this paper I have shown that gravitational forces can mimic acceleration, and acceleration can change how time affects an object. Therefore, it should go without question that gravitational forces can also affect time in a similar manner as acceleration. This affect is known as space-time curvature and can be seen in Figure 3 below. The closer to the source of a gravitational disruption you travel, the greater the difference in time will become. This affect is known as time dilation. If we are moving through time at light speed, and in order to move through space some of that energy must be diverted from our movement through time, then a gravitational field requires much more of that energy be diverted to move through the same amount of space. While not exactly how it works, you can imagine this affect through visualizing a rubber band. When not stretched, an ant could crawl along the circumference of the rubber band in a relatively short time. If you were to stretch the rubber band, in the manner that a black hole stretches space, then it would take significantly more time for the ant to travel around the exterior of the rubber band. Sometimes the gravitational forces can become so great, that even light can not move fast enough to escape gravity’s pull. This is best exemplified by the event horizon of a black hole, which is illustrated in Figure 3 by the dark ring around the top of the funnel.

Figure 3. On the left, a cross section of a star’s space-time curvature. On the right, a black hole massively disrupts the fabric of space-time around itself.

I hope by now, that I have sufficiently established the links between gravity, acceleration, space and time; however, I have not completely explained what any of this has to do with the present (as well as the future) being able to change the past. Finally, the history lesson is coming to an end, and we can begin to explore the main focus of this paper. But before we can continue, I have one more topic which I feel we need to review, those pesky super position states.

As explained in class, a particle in a superposition state is actually in all possible states simultaneously, as long as it remains unmeasured. The idea is not that we are simply unaware of its true state, but that the act of measuring the particle, forces said particle to choose a state. As strange as this idea sounds, it was accidentally proven by an Irish physicist named John Bell in 1964 (Kosso 1998: 139). The proof behind this idea lies in an expansion of the EPR experiment, which we discussed in class. In short, if you were to create two particles from the division of a single molecule, then both of these particles would spin in the opposite direction. And if you were to measure the first particle’s spin by one of three axes, then the second particle must have the opposite rotation on the same axis. Quantum mechanics tells us this much; however, it does not concretely prove what would occur if you were to measure the first particle along one axis and the second particle along a different axis. Knowing the spin along one of the three axes does not tell you what the spin along a different axis will be.

At best, quantum mechanics can tell you the probability of spin along any axis, and what that probability tells us is rather surprising. The numbers shows us that the spin orientation for these two particles along the three axes can be different up to one third of the time (Kosso 1998: 149). Just because we have measured the direction of spin along the vertical axis, does not mean that the particle has an exact spin orientation along the right or left axes. John Bell proved that the value of spin for these particles can not be a determinate value before that value is properly measured. And only when this superposition state is taken into account, can we make accurate predictions about these particles and the universe around us.

Now I believe we are in a position to better explore the ideas behind how the human observer could affect the history of the universe. Imagine that the entire history of the universe is in a superposition state. To make sense of this, we need to start at the present and work our way backwards. Currently the universe is in a state of constant expansion, but if you were to reverse time, the universe would, of course, be constantly shrinking. The farther back in time you went, the more crowded the ever shrinking universe would become. Fitting all of these incredibly dense objects (planets, stars, galaxies, etc) into an increasingly smaller space would prove to be quite difficult, and this would cause an exponential increase in the curvature of space and time. As I’ve said before, a star or a black hole can drastically alter the passage of time, but what kind of affect would every star, every black hole, and every other celestial body have on space-time when condensed down to an object significantly smaller than a grain of sand? An object this small, with that much density, is what is known as a singularity. A singularity is a place where gravity becomes so strong that space and time are curved beyond any conditions which we would recognize, and in this state, general relativity would no longer be applicable (Gefter 2006: 28).

So, what set of laws would be relevant to a universe in such a state? On this tiny of a scale, the only real laws which would be of any use to us would be on a quantum level. Again I use an example from class, the double-slit photo experiment. If you recall, this idea uses a filter with two slits cut into it facing a sheet of light responsive paper. When light travels through both slits, the light appears as a short series of light and dark bands on the paper. Even when a series of unmeasured lone photons are fired at the slits, the same pattern of dark and light bands appears on the paper. This is because the traveling photon exists in a state very similar to the superposition state. The photon isn’t taking a single path to the paper, but it is in fact taking every possible path. But here’s the really strange thing, when the same experiment is performed with a photon detector to measure the path of the lone photons, the light and dark bands never appear on the paper. Instead, just a single point on the paper responds to the presence of the photons.

This superposition state is not limited to light, but can be applied to every particle on a quantum level. The very building blocks of the universe, the particles which make up the atoms of our bodies and everything we know, can exist in a state in which they have yet to be determined. And just like that photon of light in the double-slit experiment, the universe isn’t limited to a single path, but can take every possible path through time to its current location in the present. If that is truly the case, then just like when we measure the path of a single photon in the double-slit experiment, we could be affecting the history of the universe as we measure it.

This idea of measurements taken in the present determining the past, may seem to be throwing cause and effect to the wind, but that is nothing more than a matter of perspective. If we were able to stand outside the universe, any one of us would easily be able to see the measurement of a photon affecting its path in the double-slit experiment violates causality. However, none of us are able to exist outside the universe. From within the universe, within its laws and passage of time, no observer can see causality being violated in this manner. Now you may think that we are not taking the past from an infinitely possible state, but merely recording a state of which we were not previously aware. The rebuttal to this notion can be found in Bell’s Proof using the Stern-Gerlach device. In Bell’s Proof, the orientation of the measuring device determines which spin orientations are left in a superposition (Kosso 1998: 147). Figure 4 illustrates this idea by presenting a set of histories in superposition. Depending on the equipment used and its orientation to that which is being measured, the measurements will have very different outcomes.

Figure 4. Like a particle in superposition, the universe could have had a nearly infinite number of histories and geometries. When you make measurement, you are selecting from this landscape a set of histories that share the featured which you measured.

Much like string theory, the multi-history universe proposes an idea that seems like an easy way out to those physicists who still think we can absolutely know everything that was going on in the moments before and after the big bang. In most conditions, science requires that our observations be output from the data collected, and we certainly don’t expect our observation to become the input which creates a situation. This sort of thinking robs us of the chance to verify that a theory matches up with our observations. This is certainly a problem, but not a flaw in the idea of a multi-history universe. Quantum theory has always denied us the ability to know everything about the universe we inhabit, for quantum mechanics does not allow us to predict the exact momentum and position of a particle at any time. Even though the idea may be a little hard to swallow, Stephen Hawking of the University of Cambridge and Thomas Hertog of the European Organization for Nuclear Research think there is absolutely no doubt about this model’s accuracy. “It’s simple: if you can’t know the initial state of the universe, you can’t work forwards from the beginning…” (Gefter 2006: 32). According to Amanda Gefter, Hawking would argue that Heisenberg’s uncertainty principal tells us the universe is indeterministic. In this indeterminate state, both the past and the future would be open to change. Because of this indeterminate openness, Hawking argues that the parallel pocket universes implied by string theory should be done away with and replaced by a string theory landscape inhabited by the set of all possible histories. Hawking believes that all of the pocket universes determined by string theory exist simultaneously in one universe, but in a state of quantum superposition. If this were true, whenever you made a measurement, you would be selecting from these superpositioned histories. Essentially, you the observer, would get to choose your past.

The trouble with this idea is that, we the observers are involved in making the history of the universe, not just from the present forward, but from long before the existence of man and well into the future. If this is actually the case, we would have to reevaluate the way we look at the world. Like a reverse choose-your-own-adventure story book, we are in charge of choosing the past. So, does Dinah’s ship ever successfully create that bubble from the beginning of our story? Something tells me that answer lies down a completely different rabbit hole.

Citations, References, and Recommended Reading

Barrow, John D., and John K. Webb. Inconstant Constants. New York: Scientific American, Jun. 2005.
Davies, Paul. That Mysterious Flow. New York: Scientific American, Sep. 2002.
Gefter, Amanda. Exploring Stephen Hawking’s Flexiverse. Cambridge: New Scientist, Apr. 2006.
Gell-Mann, Murray. The Quark and the Jaguar. New York: Freeman, 1994.
Greene, Brian. The Elegant Universe : Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory. New York: W. W.
Norton & Company, 1999.
Gribbin, John. Q is for Quantum: Particle Physics from A to Z. London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1999.
Kosso, Peter. Appearance and Reality : An Introduction to the Philosophy of Physics. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998.
Veneziano, Gabriele. The Myth of the Beginning of Time. New York: Scientific American, Apr. 2004.

The more thought I try to put into this assignment, the more I realise I will only be scratching the surface of a very complex and rich true story. Most people believe that Giacomo Puccini’s Madame Butterfly was the inspiration in David Henry Hwang’s tale, M. Butterfly; however, this just does not seem to be the case. While Puccini’s opera was most likely a strong influence on Hwang’s interpretations of gender and class, in all honesty the idea most likely came from Joyce Wadler’s surprisingly true short story entitled Liaisons. (Ansen 4) In her riveting true-to-life story, Wadler reports that when twenty year old Bernard Boursicot first encountered the twenty six year old opera performer Shi Pei Pu that he was dressed as a man and no one presumed he was anything else. This is just one of the many deliberate differences throughout the many versions of this tale. Despite their very different situations, every account of this story has had the same themes in common: a rich cultural, political, and sexual criticism on the influences and pressures of Western society on the Far East. I plan to examine and contrast these dissimilarities in order to better demonstrate the themes which underline and distort the very relationships between Eastern and Western cultures, as well as the affairs between men and women themselves.

Giacomo Puccini was not the driving force behind his epic opera; he actually got the idea from an American stage director by the name of David Belasco. Belasco’s one act play with the same title was seen being performed on Broadway by an eager Puccini. After a long courtship (Paul 13) Puccini eventually convinced Belasco that the story was worthy of much more attention and detail. Through the help of an interpreter, the two transformed the tale into a magnified example of an imperialistic culture dominating a presumably weaker society and more fragile sex. The self-absorbed American naval officer buys the young “Butterfly” not only to prove his wealth, but his manliness. He has no intention of staying with the delicate beauty, and treats her much like an expensive commodity. Once his short attention span is turned elsewhere, he abandons the juvenile geisha girl to her own shame and eventual suicide. This too is another strong cultural and sexual stereotype, putting the woman in a position of blame for her own tragedy. Therein lays the main ironies of David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly, that the woman isn’t just totally devoid of fault but completely absent from the story arch.

Mirroring Belasco’s story, David Henry Hwang’s version tells of a reluctant French anti-hero who is not only self deluded, but deceived by almost everyone around him. Still a man drunk on his own imperialism and position, Hwang’s protagonist falls blindly for Western stereotyping of Asia. By utilizing epic dramatic devices, David Henry Hwang forces the audience to critically examine the symbolism present within the play in hopes that they are confronted with the centuries old myth of Asian submissiveness to a Western dominated society. (Shin 182) Through comparisons with Belasco’s Madame Butterfly and this story, David Henry Hwang’s representation of Asians interaction with Anglo expectations of racial roles becomes blatantly apparent. But to truly understand how much of the true story was changed by Hwang’s views of a suppressed Asian society, one must look deeper into the true story behind M. Butterfly.

The true inspiration behind Hwang’s epic drama probably came from discovering Joyce Wadler’s report on the story of Bernard Boursicot. (Corliss 7) In her book Liaisons, Wadler recounts the life of a French diplomatic functionary who discovered on the eve of his trial for espionage, that the Chinese opera star he had loved for 18 years was really a man. (Ansen 4) When the two young men met, it was under no false pretenses. Through Wadler’s interviews with the Frenchman Bernard Boursicot, we discover that they were the best of male companions at first. As the friendship blossomed, the Chinese opera performer Pei Pu, revealed his darkest “secret”, that he was in fact a woman. (Ansen 4) Raised since birth as a boy, Pei Pu told a fictional story about how he was forced to live such a lie so that his parents could stay together; otherwise his father would be forced to take a second wife. (Wadler 297) While this custom was a complete fabrication by Pei Pu (Thurman 97) the naive Bernard Boursicot, who was still a virgin at the time (DiGaetani 150) bought into the story. Wadler’s version paints the young Frenchman as a typical hormone driven fool for love. As time passed, and their relationship became deeper, Pei Pu was able to control Bernard through a veil of false religion and customs. Much to the astonishment of the doctors who were sent to examine Pei Pu, they learned the small Chinese man had the unique ability to make his testicles ascend upwards into his body, helping to create the illusion of female genitalia. (Bureaucracy in Transition 12) David Henry Hwang used the many role reversals present in the true life tale, to create an anti-view of the original West versus East stereotype.

Surprisingly David Henry Hwang did not have to add many embellishments to his play, for the strangest twist were all apart of the real story. One of the greatest ironies of Hwang’s story is how he relates the themes present in the real life events to the story of Madame Butterfly. The Westerns’ infidelity is another common stereotype that both the real and fictional leading men lend credit to. In the course of his travels Bernard Boursicot, the real life Frenchman, had many more lovers than Pei Pu. Through his travels with the French Foreign Legion, much like the male leads of Puccini’s opera and Belasco’s play, Bernard had taken several female companions in Saudi Arabia, New Orleans, The Amazon, Mongolia, Jerusalem, Belize and even Paris. (Ansen 6) As it turns out women were not the only source of desire for Bernard, a fact which aids Hwang’s symbolism through out this story. In fact, Bernard Boursicot had affairs with both men and women, the most lasting of which was with another man named Thierry, beginning when Bernard was 29. (Hwang 97) At one point when Bernard managed to get Pei Pu and their “son” out of Beijing, the four shared a small apartment in Paris, and neither Frenchman ever doubted Pei Pu’s femininality for a second. David Henry Hwang is quoted with saying “Female sexuality has always been conceptualized on the basis of masculine parameters”, but can the opposition between masculine and feminine forces embody the drive behind the very revolution which the young couple helped to feed? Is there really a difference between men and women, or is the Western man so caught up in the idealistic Eastern woman that he is willing to over look the obvious lies all around him?

This topic is by no means settled, and as the West versus East debates comes to a head in the modern world I expect David Henry Hwang, as well as other Asian artist, to reinvent themselves in the battle to destroy stereotypes and establish Eastern identity. The story of the Eastern “Butterfly” is not only limited to Asian artist, as Giacomo Puccini and David Belasco helped to shape the best known modern example of those fatal stereotypes; people of many cultures explore the rich differences between the two cultures. References are explored through out modern pop culture: showing up in television shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, fellow writers such as Maxine Hong Kingston, songs by musician Gwen Stefani, contemporary art and music by Yoko Kanno, as well as many other sources. The battle for identity among Asian Americans and the fight to end senseless stereotyping will rage on for some time to come; however, thanks in large to people like David Henry Hwang, who purposefully stand out to draw attention to the problems of sexism and racism apparent in the world, a compromise could be lurking on the horizon. Modern America, as well as the world, can learn a lot and be greatly enriched by his words, his themes, and by his struggle of trying to come to grips with his own identity.

Citations and References

Ansen, David.  “Much Stranger Than Fiction”.  Newsweek #84.  Newsweek, Inc.  18^th Oct. 1993.

“Bureaucracy in Transition”.  Declassified Documents Microfiche Series, 1981.  27^th Mar. 1992.  No agency or person(s) is indicated in the document.

Corliss, Richard.  “Betrayal in Beijing”.  Time Magazine.  Time Publications, Inc.  04^th Oct. 1993.

DiGaetani, John Louis.  “M. Butterfly: An Interview with David Henry Hwang”.  The Drama Review #33.3: pages 141-53.  Holland Publishing Company.  1989.

Hwang, David Henry.  M. Butterfly.  New York: A Plume Book, 1998.

—.  “Afterword”.  M. Butterfly.  94-100.

Koller, John M. A Sourcebook in Asian Philosophy.  New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc. 1991.

Konaka, Chiaki J.  Serial Experiments Lain. Japan: Production 2^nd, June 1997.

Leong, Russell, ed.  Moving the Image: Independent Asian Pacific American Media Arts.  Los Angeles: UCLA Asian American Studies Centre, 1991.

Paul, Barbara.  A Cadenza for Caruso.  New York.  St. Martin’s Press, 1984.

Shin, Andrew.  “Projected Bodies in David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly and Golden Gate”.  Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States (MELUS) #27 (1): pages 177-197.  Watt Publishing Company.  1993.

Thurman, Robert A. F. “The Mentor Worship”. Essential Tibetan Buddhism. California: HarperCollins. 1995.

Wadler, Joyce.  Liaison.  Bantam Books, Inc.  Sept. 1993.

One of the greatest human fears is living, being, and dying alone; however, there is something that can overcome this fear. That is one of the many powers of love. But what is love? Can you see it? Is there a taste to love? Does one touch love, or is love relegated to some other sense? Does true love exist, or is it just a cheap thrill that lasts for one night? Does love have substance, or is it merely a word fabricated by the pressures of society as a way to justify the means of propagation and selling candy?

It is true that love is a formidable and thoroughly proven commercial engine. People will do almost anything for the promise of love. This is the thought behind many large enterprises: greeting cards, stuffed animals, boxed candy, dress makers, florists, etc. Is love merely a conglomerate’s concoction or is it something more?

I think that depends on how we define love, and how those we love define love. You can’t chose who you “fall in love” with, it just happens. How you chose to express that love is something you can choose. While society sets certain assumptions and pressures on how people express their love, there is no right or wrong answer in that expression. If you realize one day, that a person means more to you than you previously realized, then that is when you know that you are in love. Love exists in different forms in different people’s minds.

The word love, and its related words, has been created in countless cultures and languages. People have been trying to define this idea for centuries, but has anyone really shown that love actually exists? Love is a state of mind, but it can also be fleeting and transitory. Loves comes and goes between people. The truth of love is nearly impossible to find. It isn’t tangible, it isn’t logical, it is utterly emotional.

The concept of “true love” is a shelter for those people who believe that without love there would be no point to life. These people would argue that life isn’t about existence, learning, or propagation of a species. To them, life is about love. It is obvious that love means many different things to different people, and that to each it has a different value. Because of these different values, some people throw the word around meaninglessly. They know it is what someone wants to hear, and exploit that to get what they want. They say that they love, but with no meaning or substance to back it up.

That isn’t love. These people use the idea, pervert the theories, and weaken the basis of love. They use the term in place of what they are really feeling, lust. Are those people missing out on something, or do they have the best of both worlds? Does the physical intimacy fill the void that our society says is left in a loveless relationship? It is difficult to tell, but it is certainly a less expensive approach to mating. Could it be that love is really just a beautiful metaphor created to justify these types of actions? Unfortunately in our society, shallowness and this misuse of love are applauded by the troglodytic masses. So it becomes difficult to distinguish simple lust from the goal of reproduction.

So is reproduction the ultimate goal of love? Many people would argue that the concept of love did not exist before societies developed in a way to create an abundance of leisure time. Those who buy into this idea say that our conveniences are the very trappings of love’s tangled web. But is that the case? Did our instinctual need to reproduce require love? Probably not. A quick glance around the animal kingdom will definitively illustrate that lust long outdates love as the means for propagation. So where did love’s origin’s begin?

The concept of love exists within almost every language and culture on the planet. Love, it would seem, is a human concept which goes beyond simple leisure. But as you study love in different cultures, you find that many of them break love down into various categories: romantic love, familial love, sexual love, etc. Even the dictionary has different classifications for the word love. Does this deep connection with human language prove that love is a basic human emotion or something more? Does one definition carry more weight than others, or is love truly unique to each individual?

It would seem that maybe there could be a place for those one-night-stand in love’s many definitions. But that creates a new problem. How do people express their love, when they each have different definitions of love? Can love truly exist between two people who accept love at different values? People don’t have to agree on the value and place of an object for it to exist, but two objects cannot exist in one place simultaneously. I think the same is true for love. Without at least a similar definition of love, two people cannot have a truly loving relationship.

This does not mean that one person’s definition is more valid than another’s definition. It just means the topic is even more complicated. Some people can search all of their lives for love never to find it. Yet, there are those who can live the lie, thinking that they have found it when they have not. Love is not what it is because people desire it to be so, and love is not what it is because of our day-to-day human interactions. Love is what it is because of the different ways we imagine love to exist. Our emotions guide us, they are a constant force driven by our instincts.

In Bizet’s opera “Carmen”, the seductive title character warns, “Love is like a rebellious bird that nobody can tame.” This description paints a very irrational picture of love, and rightfully so as love and logic are often at opposites. (Something Carmen later learns while being stabbed to death by one of her former lovers.) Love and logic play against each other, but love could not truly exist without the other. Because of this relationship, love can have both a light and a dark side.

When you give your love to a person, you are sharing a portion of yourself. You are showing you trust them, and thinking that they would never hurt you. If betrayed, this once euphoric feeling turns cold, empty, and bitter. This is the side of love which has the power to devastate someone emotionally. Often times, people have used this pain as an excuse for taking their own lives, or the life of someone else. This makes love fickle, and in turn makes the people who love weak. This is the dark power of love.

Love has a serious influence over people, one which is too often taken for granted. Love has horrid consequences if you do not respect it for what it is to others. Love is not always what you think it is, or what you think it should be. Love can take many different forms, and can even be deceptive. Love can be healing, or it can be devastating. Love is ecstasy and torment. Love gives you strength, but can make you weak. Love can be freeing, or enslave us under its power.

One thing about love is for certain, once you find it you never want to lose it. Love is everywhere and in many different forms all around us. Love permeates our thoughts, fills our dreams, and effects our actions. Even though love permeates the world around us, it is still so hard to assign a definitive value. Of course, love is different for everyone, and this is part of what makes defining love so difficult. No one can tell you what love is to you, that is something you have to find for yourself. I think love is something you define through your own desires, and express through your own experiences. Love is unique to each person, and sometimes those values are incompatible. In the end, love is what you make of it.

As our glorious government spends billions of dollars on secret operations and third-world aid, we sit back thinking that we still have our freedoms. I will begin with my favourite anti editor cartoon, which shows Charles Dickens sitting in a fancy book-lined office. His editor, who has one of those smug Hollywood smiles that drives writers to intricate fantasy of torture, is saying, “Mr. Dickens, either it was the best of times, or the worst of times, it cannot be both.” But for someone living in America during these last few years, complete with fire, flood, riot, earthquake, and O.J. on the freeway, the paradox of opposites being true simultaneously rings with a piercing clarity. Never have we had some many powerful outlets for our minds, while also having so many destructive tendencies and pleasures. Need an example to clarify that last thought for you? Ok, I’ll be nice. Take the Internet, its’ early purpose was to exchange ideas and information across the planet, there was no point for censorship. But now, because of the profiteering low-lifes in our society, everything is being censored. From e-mail to literary information on Isaac Newton, nothing is tolerated. The Internet is becoming a single web page, www.denied.com. We have all these freedoms, that we cannot exercise. A restricted freedom, shrouded in presidential scandals and foreign policies. Yes, yes, I know, we shouldn’t talk badly about our lovely little government, but why not when there is so much to talk about? Did you ever think that maybe the government even initiates it’s own conspiracy theories to mask the true nature of our beloved system? The “hidden” Area 51 draws so much attention from the rest of the world, who is paying attention to the other parts? Who is watching that cornfield in Libya? Did you ever take a look at it? I didn’t think so, but then, who would? The censorship of documents dubbed “classified” or “sensitive” has intrigued people for years. But how many people are interested in a reading a small pox report from F.E.M.A.? Didn’t think so. The conspiracy count rises. The lies mount and run so deep that the President of this “democracy” is unaware of most of them. Democracy, that’s a laugh. Democracy is defined as a form of government in which supreme power is exercised by the people. Do the people really have supreme power when we are forced to chose between two individuals, both of from the privileged class, to be the executive leader and ultimate reprehensive of our nation? The only people with the power to decide are the corporate conglomerates that are controlled by the upper three percent. These companies hold their finger to the pulse of every decision from the smallest business to the very industries that supply us with water and electricity. They do this by expanding their capitalistic empires into many smaller, unrelated service and manufacturing venues. Take for example, General Electric. GE is split into fourteen different divisions ranging from medical systems to televisions networks. This same company was responsible for the death of thousands of innocent people during the Gulf War. It was GE who manufactured the warplanes which dropped the bombs that destroyed hydroelectric damns, which left citizens of the Persian Gulf without electricity, water, or hope. Are these the people you want choosing your leaders and leading your lives? The same people who, moments after the North American Free Trade Agreement was signed, began a strategic lay off of thousands of American workers in order to move their factories to Mexico. Do we, the average majority, not have, or at least deserve the right to voice our own opinions? To speak our minds, even though our minds are constantly bombarded with lies? To demand, in one large voice, our right as a knowledgeable society. Or should we be dedicated followers of the industrial bulldozer that strips a path through our logical reasoning and plants the seeds of deceit deep in our subconscious? Sanctified disciples of the most corrupt and undercover political system in the world? Nothing will change until the people demand it. We lose more and more control everyday. So I urge you, as victims of your own country, to remove the iron curtain from your eyes. Because if you don’t throw a wrench in the cogs, there will be no stopping the corporate machine.

In modern Islam there is a saying, “Everything manifested is part of God… so try not to be the toilet brush.” This rather crude adage helps to better understand the position of most modern Islamists in the world today. Despite the Islamic preachings of beauty and love, many people in Western culture are afraid of a community they know precious little nothing about. Recently Afghanistan has become infamously well known around the world, which has forced people to look even deeper into the region’s dark history; however, in the end, the aspect of terror sells more books and fills more lecture halls than the Islamic ideas of peace, love, and harmony.

Recent world events have had Westerners running to their atlases trying to locate the country which seemed to hold such little importance before September 11th, 2001. Over three years later, Afghanistan has become a key country in America’s Foreign Policy Agenda. America’s occupation brings little, late relief to a country which had been in constant turmoil for decades. Until recently, the Islamic rules on how to lead a Godly life had become rhetoric for a small group of power hungry individuals. This power vacuum created decades of strife and struggle for the citizens of Afghanistan. Only the privileged few drug lords could afford the modern luxuries we take for granted. (Which, according to retired Ambassador David Dunford include such simple items as scissors, alarm clocks, and pens.) Neighboring Iran had made the sufferings of the Afghani people a long standing part of their domestic agenda for years before the recent American occupation, and even now they harbour over a million and a half refugees from the conflict. Time and time again civil war has further destabilized the Afghani government, and until a short time ago Iran had been the only country really dedicating any relief efforts to the poverty stricken country. It would take a major economical event to bring the problems of Afghanistan to the public eye; yet, this isn’t the first time Afghanistan has taken center stage in the American limelight.

One long standing tradition of American culture is the constant need for an arch-enemy. Without the pretense of competition or a feeling of imminent danger, America seems to have no goals to strive toward. In the closing years of the 20th century, multiple branches of the American government were searching the globe for a new enemy after the collapse of the Soviet Empire. Even in early 2001, the New Yorker magazine had published a cartoon in which a newspaper headline read, “War to be declared tomorrow, enemy to be selected soon.” This isn’t the first time such a thing has happened, the Korean War and the Soviet’s invasion of Afghanistan are just two examples of America’s need to create an enemy.

During December of 1979, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was a major point in the Cold War. This attack was the largest single military action by the Soviets since the end of the Second World War. The crisis had major impacts on American foreign policy, triggering a shift towards a much more forceful military procedure. At the global level, this event was a major turning point in delegitimizing Soviet policy and Communism around the globe; yet, this conflict started in neither the Soviet Union, nor Afghanistan. America had an idea, which they officially dubbed the “Reagan Doctrine.” The doctrine’s intended purpose was to undermine pro-Soviet regimes worldwide, and it eventually turned into the largest single operation in the Central Intelligence Agency’s history. Under this doctrine, America was able to arm Mujahiddin guerrilla fighters in Afghanistan, which in turn triggered the invasion by a nervous Soviet Union. America then used this excuse to increase military budget spending by over 300 percent, which had been their intended goal all along.

Afghanistan’s poor political standing has made it a target for more powerful countries throughout the years, but according to Dr. David Gibbs, “at the time of the invasion and for an extended period afterwards, few doubted that the Soviets threatened Western security.” An exception to this view can be found in George F. Kennan’s writings. Kennan emphasized Afghanistan as “a border country to the Soviet Union,” and concerns about the instability of Afghanistan’s government were the main motivations. Kennan’s most passionate argument was that the invasion showed “defensive rather than offensive Soviet impulses.” This of course was in response to American weapons being given to the Afghani soldiers.

People reflect the limitations of their environment, the microcosm represents the extremes of the macrocosm and because of this, harshness is a way of life in the Middle East. As a result of the poor economic situation and barren landscape, Afghanistan has always been a self centered country. Even today, under American military rule, Afghanistan still clings to many of its long standing cultural traditions. Despite the recent changes, many people still live life as they did five years ago, when the Taliban first took governing power. In this way, change communicates slowly to a community, then society, and finally the culture as a whole. It permeates throughout the environment, and even though the landscape may be decimated, love and the instinct of survival continue to exist through out.