Going Global

The Alpine Fund will be launched a 'my space' account this week. I am not necessarily pro-my space and the hyper-democratization of information in general but reality bytes these days, eh?

Hopefully we'll be able to use it to keep in touch with virtual people. Also, Ulan can learn about fiddlin' with his virtual self by checking out the AF myspace and then maybe making his own. Networking, Networking or just notworking? He will have to decide.

We sent out a big ol' email to all the widji folk asking them to forward a volunteering add to their outdoor programs. We have already had responses but so far only from people looking to come for a summer. That is all well and good but our institutional life revolves and kids and kids revolve around school.

Speaking of whom, the kids from CPC - Osh Bazaar are great. They are loud and energetic in a not shy way but still basically attentive. Not bad for a gaggle 15 of 12-13 year olds in a small room. Thus far we have no chalk, white or paper board. Hopefully we will remedy that soon. They speak almost exclusively Kyrgyz which is also a bonus for me because I need practice.

This last weekend we took some kids from CPC - Dordoi Bazaar (where our students Ulan, Adilet and Kuruchbek live) skiing for a day. We trundled on up there saturday. I spent the day snow ball fighting truant skiers and being wet.

I don't know about everywhere else in the world, but Central Asia is having another in a series of "abnormally hot" years. Maybe we should call them "years formerly known and abnormally hot." Bush is going to unleash an energy proposal. I can't wait to see how much he offers to pay energy companies that already are making record profits to seek new avenues of energy production. Nothing short of illiberal regulation will suffice I am affraid. The reason being that their are too many negative externalities in energy consumption for incentives to individual actors to work. The incentive for better environmental behavior lies with the whole, not the individual. That is why it requires models not based on self-interest. Judging by his most recent attempts to fix health care by further atomitizing the consumer and providing "tax incentives" for insurance this is not likely. As if the fault in America's health care system lay with workers scamming insurance companies into underpriced plans or unemployed persons requiring tax incentives for health insurance. Being un-insured or underinsured is terrifying. There is your demand incentive. Where is the supply incentive to provide coverage to those with pre-existing conditions or high risk groups?

But, it is much better than anything most of the world has, so we can be happy about that. In kyrgyzstan there is no coverage. But then oral surgery costs about $20 bucks. The question is then, do you want oral surgery at $20?

I just taught the first paying english class at the Fund. We are charging $1.30 for a one and a half hour class. Basically this will cover the costs of other classes and hopefully provide some access to the middle class. It is definitely a steal as normal class is 1.30 for an hour and that is not with a native speaker. Their mother sat through the class. Which was alright for me this time but that is about it. She kept interrupting to say that they already knew this or that and to prompt the students on the correct response.

I have been reading Dostoevsky lately. He is an interesting author to read because he is very much concerned with questions of the relationship between man and God, the purpose of suffering, and the tension in humans between good and desire. He also writes about all this stuff from an illiberal perspective. A lot of his criticism have yet to be properly answered from the liberal side. Take for example the problem that without God, "everything is permitted." That is to say that without some absolutist standards for judging moral behavior, how can one not slip into absolute relativism? This criticism has been well dealt with by individual philosophers that have formed coherent codes of ethics and morality without a deity at the center, however the problem is that none of these worldviews has the cohesive power of a religion. The coherence of one atheist simply becomes one man's noble efforts in the relativists' soup. Until the secular West has reconsiled its secular nature with some coherent system of judging right from wrong and demanding virtuous behavior, it will always be (rightfully) the object of absolutist criticism. What has US - and indeed Western - foreign policy been driven by if not simple material benefit? It has also been motivated by existential threats like the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany. In those situations foreign policy can be seen as virutous because the struggle for existence is viewed as a self-justifying end. But once existence is secure, the motivations are essentially greedy. That greedyness and consumerism has been the basis for all the major challenges to liberal hegemony be it from Fascism, Communism or Islamism.

I don't think there are any easy answers there. Most sorts of moral values justify the social context they came from; to project them onto others would be pompous. Such an value would have to be self-justifying. Perhaps environmentalism presents us with the greatest opportunity to unite behind a problem that may indeed be existential but need not be aggressive. The sorts of solutions that facing this challenge would require are likely to be inherently illiberal and allow us an opportunity for introspection and self-criticism without "proving terrorists right" or "being an apologist."

Speaking of terrorism, someone just through a snowball at my window and broke it. Scared the bajeezus out of me.