Context: https://www.ndtourism.com/theodore-roosevelt-man-legend

When Theodore Roosevelt first came to the North Dakota Badlands in 1883 to hunt bison, he discovered more than wildlife—he found “perfect freedom” and a rugged lifestyle that would shape his future. What began as a hunting trip turned into a lifelong bond with the Badlands, where he invested in the Maltese Cross Ranch. After losing his wife and mother in 1884, Roosevelt returned to the Dakota Territory to heal and built his beloved Elkhorn Ranch.

For years, he ranched, served as a deputy sheriff, and lived adventures that became frontier legends—like chasing boat thieves across 300 miles of icy terrain. Though his ranching days ended, Roosevelt’s time in North Dakota fueled his passion for conservation and the American West.

At the time he became the 26th President, Roosevelt credited the Badlands as “where the romance of my life began.” His experiences here inspired landmark conservation efforts, including the creation of national forests and wildlife sanctuaries. By the time of his death, Roosevelt had become a legend that lives on in North Dakota.

Although Theodore Roosevelt National Park was designated in 1947, its protection is rooted in Roosevelt’s 1880s ranching years and his lifelong conservation philosophy.

Today, Theodore Roosevelt National Park stands as a tribute to the man whose love for these rugged lands helped shape America’s environmental legacy.

Context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humorism#Four_humors

Humorism, the humoral theory, or humoralism, was a system of medicine detailing a supposed makeup and workings of the human body, adopted by Ancient Greek and Roman physicians and philosophers.^([1])

Humorism began to fall out of favor in the 17th century and it was definitively disproved with the discovery of microbes.

Even though humorism theory had several models that used two, three, and five components, the most famous model consists of the four humors described by Hippocrates and developed further by Galen. The four humors of Hippocratic medicine are black bile (Greek: μέλαινα χολή, melaina chole), yellow bile (Greek: ξανθὴ χολή, xanthe chole), phlegm (Greek: φλέγμα, phlegma), and blood (Greek: αἷμα, haima). Each corresponds to one of the traditional four temperaments. Based on Hippocratic medicine, it was believed that for a body to be healthy, the four humors should be balanced in amount and strength.^([20]) The proper blending and balance of the four humors was known as eukrasia.^([21])

Humorism theory was expanded by Galen, who incorporated his understanding of the humors into his interpretation of the human body. He believed the interactions of the humors within the body were the key to investigating the physical nature and function of the organ systems. Galen combined his interpretation of the humors with his collection of ideas concerning nature from past philosophers in order to find conclusions about how the body works. For example, Galen maintained the idea of the presence of the Platonic tripartite soul, which consisted of "thumos (spiritedness), epithumos (directed spiritedness, i.e. desire), and sophia (wisdom)".^([22]) Through this, Galen found a connection between these three parts of the soul and the three major organs that were recognized at the time: the heart, the liver, and the brain, respectively.^([22]) This idea of connecting vital parts of the soul to vital parts of the body was derived from Aristotle's sense of explaining physical observations, and Galen utilized it to build his view of the human body. The organs (named organa) had specific functions (called chreiai) that contributed to the maintenance of the human body, and the expression of these functions is shown in characteristic activities (called energeiai) of a person.^([23]) While the correspondence of parts of the body to the soul was an influential concept, Galen decided that the interaction of the four humors with natural bodily mechanisms were responsible for human development and this connection inspired his understanding of the nature of the components of the body.

Galen recalls the correspondence between humors and seasons in his On the Doctrines of Hippocrates and Plato, and says that, "As for ages and the seasons, the child (παῖς) corresponds to spring, the young man (νεανίσκος) to summer, the mature man (παρακµάζων) to autumn, and the old man (γέρων) to winter".^([24]) He also related a correspondence between humors and seasons based on the properties of both. Blood, as a humor, was considered hot and wet. This gave it a correspondence to spring. Yellow bile was considered hot and dry, which related it to summer. Black bile was considered cold and dry, and thus related to autumn. Phlegm, cold and wet, was related to winter.^([25])

Galen also believed that the characteristics of the soul follow the mixtures of the body, but he did not apply this idea to the Hippocratic humors. He believed that phlegm did not influence character. In his On Hippocrates' The Nature of Man, Galen stated: "Sharpness and intelligence (ὀξὺ καὶ συνετόν) are caused by yellow bile in the soul, perseverance and consistency (ἑδραῖον καὶ βέβαιον) by the melancholic humor, and simplicity and naivety (ἁπλοῦν καὶ ἠλιθιώτερον) by blood. But the nature of phlegm has no effect on the character of the soul (τοῦ δὲ φλέγµατος ἡ φύσις εἰς µὲν ἠθοποιῗαν ἄχρηστος)."^([26]) He further said that blood is a mixture of the four elements: water, air, fire, and earth.

These terms only partly correspond to modern medical terminology, in which there is no distinction between black and yellow bile, and phlegm has a very different meaning. It was believed that the humors were the basic substances from which all liquids in the body were made. Robin Fåhræus (1921), a Swedish physician who devised the erythrocyte sedimentation rate, suggested that the four humors were based upon the observation of blood clotting in a transparent container. When blood is drawn in a glass container and left undisturbed for about an hour, four different layers can be seen: a dark clot forms at the bottom (the "black bile"); above the clot is a layer of red blood cells (the "blood"); above this is a whitish layer of white blood cells (the "phlegm"); the top layer is clear yellow serum (the "yellow bile").^([27])

Many Greek texts were written during the golden age of the theory of the four humors in Greek medicine after Galen. One of those texts was an anonymous treatise called On the Constitution of the Universe and of Man, published in the mid-19th century by J. L. Ideler. In this text, the author establishes the relationship between elements of the universe (air, water, earth, fire) and elements of the man (blood, yellow bile, black bile, phlegm).^([28]) He said that:

• The people who have red blood are friendly, and often joke and laugh. They are rose-tinted, slightly red, and have pretty skin.
• The people who have yellow bile are bitter, short tempered, and daring. They appear greenish and have yellow skin.
• The people who are composed of black bile are lazy, fearful, and sickly. They have black hair and black eyes.
• Those who have phlegm are low spirited, forgetful, and have white hair.

Seventeenth century English playwright Ben Jonson wrote humor plays, where character types were based on their humoral complexion.

Blood

It was thought that the nutritional value of the blood was the source of energy for the body and the soul. Blood was believed to consist of small proportional amounts of the other three humors. This meant that taking a blood sample would allow for determination of the balance of the four humors in the body.^([29]) It was associated with a sanguine nature (enthusiastic, active, and social).^([30])^([31])^(: 103–05)  Blood is considered to be hot and wet, sharing these characteristics with the season of spring.^([32])

Yellow bile

Yellow bile was associated with a choleric nature (ambitious, decisive, aggressive, and short-tempered).^([33]) It was thought to be fluid found within the gallbladder, or in excretions such as vomit and feces.^([29]) The associated qualities for yellow bile are hot and dry with the natural association of summer and fire. It was believed that an excess of this humor in an individual would result in emotional irregularities such as increased anger or irrational behaviour.^([34])

Black bile

Black bile was associated with a melancholy nature, the word melancholy itself deriving from the Greek for 'black bile', μέλαινα χολή (melaina kholé). Depression was attributed to excess or unnatural black bile secreted by the spleen.^([35]) Cancer was also attributed to an excess of black bile concentrated in a specific area.^([36]) The seasonal association of black bile was to autumn as the cold and dry characteristics of the season reflect the nature of man.^([32]) Black bile was generally seen as the most detrimental of the humors and within Galenic-Hippocratic humoral theory it was opposed to blood, the most natural and beneficial of the humors.^([1])

Phlegm

Phlegm was associated with all phlegmatic nature, thought to be associated with reserved behavior.^([37]) The phlegm of humorism is far from phlegm as it is defined today. Phlegm was used as a general term to describe white or colorless secretions such as pus, mucus, saliva, or sweat.^([29]) Phlegm was also associated with the brain, possibly due to the color and consistency of brain tissue.^([29]) The French physiologist and Nobel laureate Charles Richet, when describing humorism's "phlegm or pituitary secretion" in 1910, asked rhetorically, "this strange liquid, which is the cause of tumours, of chlorosis, of rheumatism, and cacochymia – where is it? Who will ever see it? Who has ever seen it? What can we say of this fanciful classification of humors into four groups, of which two are absolutely imaginary?"^([38]) The seasonal association of phlegm is winter due to the natural properties of being cold and wet.^([39])

Context:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kumis

Kumis (/ˈkuːmɪs/ KOO-mis, rarely /ˈkʌmɪs/ KUM-is), alternatively spelled coumis or kumyz,^([a]) also known as airag (/ˈaɪræɡ/ EYE-rag),^([b]) is a traditional fermented dairy product made from mare milk. The drink is important to the peoples of the Central and East Asian steppes, of Turkic and Mongolic origin: Volga Tatars,^([1]) Kazakhs, Bashkirs, Kalmyks, Kyrgyz, Siberian Tatars,^([2]) Mongols, and Yakuts.^([3]) Kumis was also historically consumed by the Magyars^([)^(citation needed)^(]) as well as the Khitans, Jurchens, and Han of northern China.^([4])

Kumis is a dairy product similar to kefir, but is produced from a liquid starter culture, in contrast to the solid kefir "grains". Because mare's milk contains more sugars than cow's or goat's milk, when fermented, kumis has a higher, though still mild, alcohol content compared to kefir.

Kumis is made by fermenting raw milk (that is, unpasteurized) over the course of hours or days, often while stirring or churning. (The physical agitation has similarities to making butter.) During the fermentation, lactobacilli bacteria acidify the milk, and yeasts turn it into a carbonated and mildly alcoholic drink.

Traditionally, this fermentation took place in horse-hide containers, which might be left on the top of a yurt and turned over on occasion, or strapped to a saddle and joggled around over the course of a day's riding. Today, a wooden vat or plastic barrel may be used in place of the leather container.^([13]) In modern, controlled production, the initial fermentation takes two to five hours, at a temperature of around 27 °C (81 °F); this may be followed by a cooler aging period.^([14])

Kumis itself has a very low level of alcohol, between 0.7 and 2.5%.^([15]) Kumis can, however, be strengthened through freeze distillation, a technique Central Asian nomads are reported to have employed.^([16]) It can also be made into the distilled beverage known as arkhi.^([17])

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/cool-side-tropical-warfare-180969515/

By late September 1944, the men of U.S. Marine fighter squadron VMF-122 were stuck on Peleliu and bored. Their F4U Corsairs were only 10 minutes’ flight time from Japanese-held islands, but the enemy, cut off from their supply lines, posed no aerial threat. As squadron commander J. Hunter Reinburg recounted in his autobiography Combat Aerial Escapades: A Pilot’s Logbook, he told a reporter, “This dive-bombing and strafing just isn’t as exciting as dogfighting, but the damn Japanese won’t come up and fight.”

Reinburg, determined to raise morale on a hum id tropical island with no fresh food and no refrigeration, had a plan. His maintenance crew cut the ends off an old belly-mounted drop tank, strung wire at both ends, and mounted an access panel to the side. Into this panel, secured by the wires, went a waterproof can that ordinarily stored .50-caliber bullets. And into that, the mess sergeant poured a mixture of canned milk and cocoa powder. Reinburg planned to ascend to high altitudes, where temperatures are well below freezing, and return with a gift for his men: Five gallons of homemade chocolate ice cream.

After lifting off on what he logged as an “oxygen system test,” Reinburg circled at 33,000 feet over Japanese-held Palau, watching anti-aircraft batteries—useless over 28,000 feet—waste irreplaceable ammunition trying to hit him. After 35 minutes of fireworks, he returned to Peleliu with a disappointing cargo. The mixture was cold but not frozen (the squadron scarfed it anyway), a failure the crew chalked up to its proximity to the hot engine.

For the next attempt (a “supercharger test flight”), they bolted ammo cans to the underside of a removable maintenance panel on each wing, well away from the engine—doubling their yield to 10 gallons, enough for 100 men. This time the mixture froze. The squadron again devoured it immediately. But the ice cream was too flaky for Reinburg’s taste, so his crew modified the ammo cans with small propellers: The wind turned the propellers, which drove a screw inside the can, churning the mixture. The result, finally, was a smooth, creamy chocolate ice cream.

Operation Freeze flights soon became routine, rotated between the squadron’s pilots and airplanes. They went off without a hitch, wrote Reinburg, until his boss, group operations officer Colonel Caleb Bailey, called to make clear that he didn’t buy the “test flight” ruse. “Listen, goddammit, you guys aren’t fooling me,” Bailey told a VMF-122 officer. “I’ve got spies. You tell [Reinburg] I’m coming over there tomorrow and get my ration.”

Reinburg’s Marines were not the only ice cream-makers of the war. B-17 crews in Europe brought ice cream mixtures along on operational bombing raids, according to a 1943 New York Times article, and at least one unit used its P-47s to create a real delicacy, vanilla ice cream mixed with canned fruit.

https://theblackwallsttimes.com/2022/11/18/tom-brady-may-be-the-goat-scammer/

Tom Brady,  who has a net worth of about $250 million, and ex-wife Gisele Bündchen, with an estimated $400 million to her name, donated less than 0.1% of their worth to charity.

The majority of donations were to yoga and meditation groups, including a $25,000 donation to the David Lynch Foundation in 2017. In total, the Luz Foundation (Tom and Gisele’s joint charity) gave out $640,402 between 2007 and 2019. That amount equals to 0.1% of their combined net worth. Among others, the former couple are also being sued by FTX investors who lost billions in the recent crypto collapse.

Since its founding, their charity had only given out some small grants to various causes, according to public records. One 2018 grant was for $300 to an environmental group in Costa Rica, where the pair owned a beachfront palace. They also gave $900 to the World Wildlife Fund and $1,000 to the Challenged Athletes Foundation.

On Thursday, it was reported Brady’s own charity, TB12, Inc., was in the red as recently as 2020, with a negative balance of $7 million in net assets after several years of profit. During that year, Brady was under fire when it was revealed TB12, Inc. received nearly $1 million in loans from the federal Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protection Program.

The Daily Beast reports data from the SBA shows TB12, Inc.’s loan of $960,000, which the company claimed would support 80 jobs, was forgiven. The loan was approved on April 15, 2020, about four weeks after Brady signed a two-year, $50-million contract with the Buccaneers, and three months after TB12, Inc. acquired the nutrition and wellness company VitalFit for an undisclosed sum.

Brady is alleged to have diverted donations from the TB12 Foundation for sports therapy sessions instead. Like Brett Favre, who was involved in $5 million fraud scheme which hurt those most vulnerable, Brady too, has robbed those in need of an opportunity to better their outcomes.

The TB12 foundation claims in part, to empower “those at-risk to overcome economic or health-related obstacles to reach their performance goals.” Well, that’s pretty difficult to do when its founder is taking money and resources from whomever is “at-risk.”

The Daily Beast reported that as recently as 2020,  the TB12 Foundation managed to fund Brady’s for-profit company, TB12 LLC, with over $1.6 million, making the Foundation the LLC’s biggest contractor.

Laurie Styron, executive director of independent nonprofit monitor CharityWatch, said, “When a charity has related for-profit legal entity, it can turn into an accountability black hole,” Styron added. “If the charity is granting or reimbursing funds to the for-profit entity, and the for-profit is then paying money to other companies or individuals, there is a danger that charitable dollars are indirectly subsidizing the expenses of the for-profit. Money is fungible.”

“A lot of philanthropy is some combination of providing public good while garnering public goodwill for a charity’s funders,” Styron said. “But in this case, the person who appears to be benefiting from the public goodwill isn’t providing significant funding to the organization.”

She continued, “I can say that I haven’t come across this type of arrangement too often in my 19 years of nonprofit financial analysis in a watchdog role.”

Context:

The Sumerian King List is an ancient cuneiform text that shares striking structural and thematic parallels with the early genealogical accounts and the Great Flood narrative found in the Book of Genesis. Both traditions outline a primordial era of remarkably long-lived figures before a catastrophic global flood reset human history, after which lifespans drastically shortened.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumerian_King_List

The Sumerian King List (abbreviated SKL) or Chronicle of the One Monarchy is an ancient literary composition written in Sumerian that was likely created and redacted to legitimize the claims to power of various city-states and kingdoms in southern Mesopotamia during the late third and early second millennium BC.^([2])^([3])^([4]) It does so by repetitively listing Sumerian cities, the kings that ruled there, and the lengths of their reigns. Especially in the early part of the list, these reigns often span thousands of years. In the oldest known version, dated to the Ur III period (c. 2112 – c. 2004 BC) but probably based on Akkadian source material, the SKL reflected a more linear transition of power from Kish, the first city to receive kingship, to Akkad. In later versions from the Old Babylonian period, the list consisted of a large number of cities between which kingship was transferred, reflecting a more cyclical view of how kingship came to a city, only to be inevitably replaced by the next. In its best-known and best-preserved version, as recorded on the Weld-Blundell Prism, the SKL begins with a number of fictional antediluvian kings, who ruled before a flood swept over the land, after which kingship went to Kish. It ends with a dynasty from Isin (early second millennium BC), which is well-known from other contemporary sources.

The SKL is preserved in several versions, the first fragment of which was published in 1906 by Hermann Volrath Hilprecht, and the second in 1911 by Jean-Vincent Scheil.^([5]) Most of these date to the Old Babylonian period, but the oldest version of the SKL dates back to the Ur III period. The clay tablets on which the SKL was recorded were generally found on sites in southern Mesopotamia. These versions differ in their exact content; some sections are missing, others are arranged in a different order, names of kings may be absent or the lengths of their reigns may vary. These differences are both the result of copying errors, and of deliberate editorial decisions to change the text to fit current needs.

In the past, the Sumerian King List was considered as an invaluable source for the reconstruction of the political history of Early Dynastic Mesopotamia. More recent research has indicated that the use of the SKL is fraught with difficulties, and that it should only be used with caution, if at all, in the study of ancient Mesopotamia during the third and early second millennium BC.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Genesis

The Book of Genesis (from Greek Γένεσις, Génesis, 'Origin'; Biblical Hebrew: בְּרֵאשִׁית,romanized: Bərēʾšīṯ,lit. 'In [the] Beginning'; Latin: Liber Genesis) is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament.^([1]) The Hebrew name bereshit ('in the beginning') is taken directly from the first word. The primary narrative of Genesis includes a legendary account of the creation of the world, the early history of the human race, and the origins of the Jewish people.^([2]) In Judaism, the theological importance of Genesis centers on the covenants linking God to his chosen people and the people to the Promised Land.

Genesis is part of the Torah, the first five books of the Bible (or Pentateuch). Tradition credits Moses as the Torah's author. However, there is scholarly consensus that the Book of Genesis was composed several centuries later, after the Babylonian captivity, possibly in the fifth century BCE.^([3]) Like other ancient Israelite texts, the Book of Genesis originally circulated anonymously.^([4]) Based on the scientific interpretation of archaeological, genetic, and linguistic evidence, mainstream biblical scholars consider Genesis to be primarily mythological rather than historical.

It is divisible into two parts: the primeval history (chapters 1–11) and the ancestral history (chapters 12–50).^([5]) The primeval history sets out the author's concepts of the nature of the deity and of humanity's relationship with its maker: God creates a world which is good and fit for humans, and God creates a garden for Adam and Eve, but when humanity corrupts the world with sin, he decides to destroy his creation, sparing only the righteous Noah and his family to re-establish the relationship between man and God.^([6])

The ancestral history (chapters 12–50) tells of the prehistory of Israel, God's chosen people.^([7]) At God's command, Noah's descendant Abraham journeys from his birthplace (described as Ur of the Chaldeans and whose identification with Sumerian Ur is tentative in modern scholarship) into God-given land of Canaan, where he dwells as a sojourner, as does his son Isaac and his grandson Jacob. Jacob's name is changed to "Israel", and through the agency of his son Joseph, the children of Israel descend into Egypt, 70 people in all with their households, and God promises them a future of greatness. Genesis ends with Israel in Egypt, ready for the coming of Moses and the Exodus (departure). The narrative is punctuated by a series of covenants with God, successively narrowing in scope from all peoples (the covenant with Noah) to a special relationship with one people alone (Abraham and his descendants through Isaac and Jacob).^([8])

This source does clearly have a Christian Bias however based on reading the article and doing my own research they do know what they are talking about, however they are viewing this from a very christian perspective and that must be taken into context.

https://answersingenesis.org/bible-history/the-antediluvian-patriarchs-and-the-sumerian-king-list/?srsltid=AfmBOoq5ex6s_8_Be6V4afPJptClPAQvqjcs3DetmcKslgP_F_lcK33p

The Sumerian King List records the lengths of reigns of the kings of Sumer. The initial section deals with kings before the Flood and is significantly different from the rest. When the kingdom durations of the antediluvian section are expressed in an early sexagesimal numerical system, all durations except two are expressed as multiples of 60^(2). A simple tally of the ciphers used yields six 10x60^(2) signs, six 60^(2) signs and six 60 signs.

The lives of the biblical patriarchs, however, have a precision of one year. If Adam and Noah are not included (as in the King List), and the lives of the patriarchs are similarly rounded to two digits, the sum of the lives has six 10^(3) signs, six 10^(2) signs and six 10 signs. In addition, if the number representing the sum of the ages was wrongly assumed as having been written in the sexagesimal system, the two totals become numerically equivalent.

It is suggested that the Sumerian scribe that composed the original antediluvian list had available a document (possibly a clay tablet) containing numerical information on the ages of eight of the patriarchs similar to that of the Genesis record and that he mistakenly interpreted it as being written in the sexagesimal system.

That the two documents are numerically related is strong evidence for the historicity of the book of Genesis. The fact that the Sumerian account shows up as a numerically rounded, incomplete version of the Genesis description, lacking the latter’s moral and spiritual depth, is a strong argument for the accuracy, superiority, and primacy of the biblical record. In addition, the parallels between the Sumerian and biblical antediluvian data open up the possibility of establishing chronological correlations between the rest of the Kings List and the book of Genesis.

The early chapters of the book of Genesis contain numerical information about the ages of the biblical patriarchs and their chronological relationships during the antediluvian world. They also contain a description of the moral and spiritual condition as well as the history of that period. Although there are other, non-biblical, references to the antediluvian era, there is no other document in all of the extant records of the ancient world that provides the detailed and coherent information found in the book of Genesis. The Genesis account gives us a glimpse into that obscure portion of the history of mankind, and provides information for a chronology of that period. It has, nevertheless, been criticized by non-Christians as well as liberal theologians as being mythological, or at best symbolic and incomplete.

The Sumerian King List, on the other hand, contains an initial section that makes reference to the Flood and to Sumerian kings of extremely long reigns before the Flood.1 The antediluvian portion of the King List is very different from the biblical account. It only contains eight kings, while Genesis has ten patriarchs. The Sumerian list assigns an average reign duration of 30,150 years, with a total duration for the period of 241,200 years, compared to an average age of the biblical patriarchs of 858 years and a sum of 8575 years for their full lives. It also lacks the detailed information of Genesis and its moral and spiritual emphases.

Nevertheless, Walton2 has pointed out that the antediluvian portion of the King List does not include the Sumerian first man nor the Flood hero. If Adam and Noah are dropped from the biblical list, the number of people in the two lists is then the same—eight. Walton has also noticed that the total of the durations of the kingdoms and the total of the ages of the patriarchs are numerically related and are equivalent if the number base of the Sumerian list is changed from sexagesimal to decimal.

This is an important result and would imply that the two records relate to the same events in the early history of mankind. If so, then finding numerically related elements of the biblical account in the Sumerian King List would open up important avenues of research into the relationship of biblical and Mesopotamian chronologies. This paper carefully and thoroughly examines the numerical relationships between the two documents. In Section 2, the Sumerian King List is surveyed in the light of its chronological context. In Section 3, a study is made of the Sumero/Babylonian numerical systems to ascertain the development of the different methods used to represent numbers and the peculiarities and limitations of the different systems that could have possibly been used to represent the original antediluvian Kings List. In Section 4, the two lists are expressed in one of the early numerical systems and compared. Attention is paid to the internal characteristics of the two sets of numerical values and their formal similarity. Section 5 summarizes the results, presents a hypothesis for the similarities of both records, and comments on the importance of these findings.

Context: https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/law/swiss-banks-admit-holding-accounts-holocaust-victims

Switzerland was a neutral nation during World War II, so it was common practice for European Jews to open accounts with Swiss banks. In 1994, Elan Steinberg, the executive director of the World Jewish Congress (WJC), charged that Swiss banks still held between ten and twenty thousand dormant accounts containing the assets of Jewish victims of the Nazi Holocaust. Twenty thousand far exceeded the number of accounts the banks had admitted to in the past.

On May 2, 1996, a memorandum of understanding announced by the World Jewish Restitution Organization, the WJC, and the Swiss Bankers Association (SBA) led to the formation of the Independent Committee of Eminent Persons (ICEP). Paul Volcker, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve System, was asked to form the commission to audit wartime accounts. The ICEP was instrumental in leading the banks finally to admit that thousands of accounts lay dormant in their vaults. On June 25, 1997, a claims resolution process was announced jointly by the SBA, the Swiss Federal Banking Commission, and the ICEP.

Thomas Borer, a Swiss diplomat and chairman of Switzerland’s own investigating commission, established in December, 1996, announced that the Swiss government would release all information it had on unclaimed bank accounts belonging to Holocaust victims. The revelation brought Switzerland great embarrassment, and the United States issued swift condemnation. The U.S. Senate introduced a bill requiring the U.S. government to divest its $300 million in investments in Swiss companies and to cease doing business with Switzerland until reparations were made. A commission headed by Stuart Eizenstat, the U.S. undersecretary of commerce for international trade, castigated Switzerland for not taking action in the case and also blamed the U.S. government for not insisting the Swiss take action.

The Eizenstat commission’s May, 1997, report noted that the Swiss received $400 million in gold (worth ten times as much by 1997 standards) from Germany during the war, gold that was deposited with Union Banque Suisse (Union Bank of Switzerland, or UBS) or sent to other countries to pay for war materials. The report denounced the Swiss for their complicity with Germany, denounced their attitudes toward victims of Nazi oppression during the war, and claimed that Switzerland’s dealings in German gold prolonged the conflict. The Swiss argued, in turn, that they should be judged on their present actions in trying to compensate the victims and not for what they did or did not do before and during World War II.

Further information on the banking scandal had come to light on January 8, 1997, when Christophe Meili, working as a security guard at UBS, came across during his rounds two carts filled with “very old documents and books” that were scheduled for shredding, including two thick books, with “1945-1965” marked on their covers. Meili testified at a later hearing (May 6) before the U.S. Senate that he returned to the room because he remembered press reports concerning bank documents and records from World War II. He believed the items set for the shredder belonged in the national archives and that it would have been illegal had they been destroyed. As he found out the following day when he returned to the shredding room, most already had been destroyed. He also testified that he did not want harm to come to either the Jews or the Swiss, who certainly would be blamed for the illegal shredding. Meili brought what he could of the remaining documents to the Israeli Cultural Association, who handed them over to the police.

Meili was treated as a pariah in Switzerland. He was fired from his job and unable to find new employment. He was threatened by an anonymous caller who said he would kidnap his children and that he could collect the ransom money “from the Jews.” Meili complained that the Swiss police would not investigate the case and asked for political asylum in the United States. The WJC offered him employment. Meile also has received awards from Jewish organizations as well as aid to help with his legal fees.

The ICEP, in its final report of December 6, 1999, found no proof that the banks were acting together to destroy account records nor was there proof of a concerted effort to use the funds from these dormant accounts for illicit purposes. The commission did conclude, however, that some individual banks were unethical in handling the dormant accounts.

A plan to give billions of Swiss francs to victims of the Holocaust as a humanitarian measure was presented before the Swiss parliament, but Borer stated that the continued public accusations against Switzerland hindered passage of the measure because many Swiss believed the country was being treated unfairly. Switzerland cherished its strict neutrality during World War II, and allegations that it abetted Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler remained a critical concern for the country. The Swiss eventually agreed to some reparations from the government.

On February 26, the SBA announced the establishment of a $67 million humanitarian fund by the banks, and on March 5, Switzerland’s president, Arnold Koller, announced the government’s Swiss Foundation for Solidarity (SFS) to help victims of poverty, disasters, and human tragedy, such as genocide. He proposed that Swiss banks contribute $4.7 billion from their gold reserves, and the interest, several hundred million dollars per year, be used for aid, including for those persons (and their families) who survived the Holocaust. Koller’s announcement marked an official acknowledgment that the banks held deposits of gold owned by Jewish account holders. The conservative opposition in the Swiss parliament opposed the plan, claiming that it acknowledged Swiss guilt. The government proposed raising the money by the sale of gold over a ten-year period so that the sale would not affect the price of the precious metal or harm the Swiss economy by undermining its currency. Furthermore, tax money would not be used.

Moshe Fogel of the Israeli Press Office said Jerusalem welcomed the funds. Avraham Burg, the head of the Jewish Agency for Israel, said it marked a victory for the moral stand the agency had taken in championing the reparations.

The Union Bank of Switzerland, Swiss Bank Corp., and Credit Suisse admitted to having thousands of dormant accounts from the time before and during World War II, accounts that totaled $200 million. The Central Bank of Switzerland, which received most of the Nazi gold, did not participate in the banks’ humanitarian fund. The humanitarian fund and SFS, the Swiss government foundation, helped repair some of the damage Switzerland incurred for denying its role in keeping the dormant accounts secret.

At the end of 1998, more than 100,000 Holocaust survivors in Eastern Europe received from five hundred to twelve hundred dollars each. Payments were then made to survivors in Western Europe in February, 1999. An agreement was reached in March to reimburse $1.25 billion to American and Israeli victims for their economic losses. The banks, however, refused to admit liability.

German companies also charged with exploiting Holocaust victims looked at the Swiss model to settle their own lawsuits. In July, 1998, Volkswagen, which had used slave labor during the war, agreed to a reparations plan. In 1999, the German government agreed to set up a fund similar to that of Switzerland to compensate victims exploited by German companies in the Nazi era.

Context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/York_(explorer)#On_the_expedition

York (1770–1775 – after 1815)^([1]) was an enslaved man^([2]) who was the only African-American member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804–1806. A lifelong slave and personal servant of William Clark, York participated in the entire exploration and made significant contributions to its success.^([3])^(: 302) ^([4])^(: 152)  In doing so he became the first African American to cross the continent and to see the Pacific Ocean.^([4]) He has since become an American icon and several monuments depicting him have been erected in honor of his legacy.^([5])^([6])^([7])

York was born into slavery in the Colony of Virginia, the son of Old York and Rose, both of whom were enslaved by John Clark III, William Clark's father.^([8]) William inherited York from his father in 1799. He was Clark's "body servant".^([9]) York was a large man; his weight has been estimated as 200 pounds (91 kg).^([10]) He was about the same age as Clark, perhaps a few years older or younger, and naturally strong.^([11])^([)^(page needed)^(])^([12]) His skin was dark: he was "black as a bear", said one who knew him,^([13]) and his hair was short and curly.^([14]) Like most enslaved persons of the time, York was illiterate, and information about him is scant.

York expected to be given his freedom after the expedition was successfully completed, in view of what he called his "immense services",^([12]) but Clark refused repeatedly and became angry when York would not go back willingly to his pre-expedition role as Clark's body servant. He also expressed irritation at York's insistence on remaining in Louisville, where his wife and possibly children were. He whipped York and eventually sold him.^([4])^([10])

Documentation concerning York is lacking for the years immediately following the expedition. About 20 years later, Clark told Washington Irving that he had freed York and set him up in business, giving him six horses and a large wagon to start a drayage business moving goods between Nashville and Richmond.^([4])

York "participated fully in the journey and contributed in significant ways to its success."^([3])^(: 302)  Surviving records of the well-documented trip do not reveal any overt racial bias against him.^([17])^(: 5)  For all intents and purposes, York's role in Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery was equal to that of the expedition's white men.^([10]) He could swim, which many of the troupe could not.^([17])^(: 11, 40)  He was also allowed to use a rifle, something the enslaved were not ordinarily permitted. When a decision had to be made, York's vote counted equally with those of the white men. The expedition apparently maintained none of the usual restrictions on the movement of enslaved people, and while opportunities to escape may have appeared, York remained with the Corps of Discovery.

A modern writer^([)^(who?)^(]) has called York indispensable to the expedition. The journals are peppered with references to York's hunting prowess: he shot buffalo, deer, and geese alike. His use of a rifle is highly unusual and shows the trust expedition members had in him. His skill in hunting with a rifle may have antedated the expedition.^([17])^(: 13)  He also kept his eye out for new species, for which the expedition was searching. He played a major role in the heavy work of paddling upstream, portaging, and building shelters.^([18]) He aided in navigating trails and waterways.^([10])

On November 18, 1805, York accompanied Clark to a tree at what is now Cape Disappointment State Park in the U.S. state of Washington, where Clark added his name to Lewis's and carved in the tree "By Land from the U. States in 1804 & 1805".^([11]) York became the first African-American man to reach the Pacific Ocean when he walked nineteen miles (31 km) from camp with Clark.^([4]) In late November, all the members of the party, including York and Sacagawea, were consulted by the leaders as to where to camp for the winter.^([4]) According to Martin Plamondon II, to call this a vote, as it is often called, is to create a myth; there is no implication that the vote of the majority was followed. He calls it "polling" rather than voting.^([22]) In a reply, Dayton Duncan notes that Clark wrote down the views on the question of every member of the expedition, including York and Sacagawea. This was itself very unusual. The men believed that they, not the leaders, had made the decision. According to Duncan, it was a vote.^([23]) Glen Kirkpatrick disagrees.^([24])

Context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon

Napoleon's family was of Italian origin. His paternal ancestors, the Buonapartes, descended from a minor Tuscan noble family who emigrated to Corsica in the 16th century. His maternal ancestors, the Ramolinos, descended from a noble family from Lombardy.^([12]) Napoleon's parents, Carlo Maria Buonaparte and Maria Letizia Ramolino, lived in the Maison Bonaparte in Ajaccio, where Napoleon was born on 15 August 1769. He had an elder brother, Joseph, and six younger siblings: Lucien, Elisa, Louis, Pauline, Caroline, and Jérôme.^([13]) Five more siblings were stillborn or did not survive infancy.^([14]) Napoleon was baptized as a Catholic under the name Napoleone di Buonaparte. In his youth, his name was also spelled as Nabulione, Nabulio, Napolionne, and Napulione.^([15])

Napoleon was born one year after the Republic of Genoa ceded Corsica to France through the Treaty of Versailles.^([16])^([d]) His father supported Pasquale Paoli during the Corsican war of independence against France. After the Corsican defeat at the Battle of Ponte Novu in 1769 and Paoli's exile to Britain, Carlo became friends with the French governor Charles Louis de Marbeuf, who became his patron and a godfather to Napoleon.^([20])^([21]) With Marbeuf's support, Carlo was named Corsican representative to the court of Louis XVI, and Napoleon obtained a royal bursary to a military academy in mainland France.^([22])^([23])

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Versailles_(1768)

The Treaty of Versailles was a treaty concluded on 15 May 1768 at Versailles between the Republic of Genoa and France, in which Genoa sold Corsica to France.

Corsica had been ruled by Genoa since 1284. In the 18th century, Corsicans started to seek their independence.^([1]) A German adventurer, Theodore von Neuhoff, briefly became King of Corsica in 1736, supported by the Dutch Republic and Great Britain. In 1755, a full-fledged Corsican Republic was founded under Pasquale Paoli, and in 1764 Genoa asked France to send troops to the island.^([1])

Context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neolithic_Revolution

The Neolithic Revolution, also known as the First Agricultural Revolution, was the wide-scale transition of many human cultures during the Neolithic period in Afro-Eurasia from a lifestyle of hunting and gathering to one of agriculture and settlement, making an increasingly large population possible.^([1]) These settled communities permitted humans to observe and experiment with plants, learning how they grew and developed.^([2]) This new knowledge led to the domestication of plants into crops.^([2])^([3])

Archaeological data indicate that the domestication of various types of plants and animals happened in separate locations worldwide, starting in the geological epoch of the Holocene 11,700 years ago, after the end of the last Ice Age.^([4]) It was humankind's first historically verifiable transition to agriculture. The Neolithic Revolution greatly narrowed the diversity of foods available, resulting in a decrease in the quality of human nutrition compared with that obtained previously from hunting and foraging.^([5])^([6])^([7]) However, because food production became more efficient, it released humans to invest their efforts in other activities and was thus "ultimately necessary to the rise of modern civilization by creating the foundation for the later process of industrialization and sustained economic growth".^([8])

Prehistoric hunter-gatherers had different subsistence requirements and lifestyles from agriculturalists. Hunter-gatherers were often highly mobile and migratory, living in temporary shelters and in small tribal groups, and having limited contact with outsiders. Their diet was well-balanced^([)^(citation needed)^(]) though heavily dependent on what the environment could provide each season. In contrast, because the surplus and plannable supply of food provided by agriculture made it possible to support larger population groups, agriculturalists lived in more permanent dwellings in more densely populated settlements than what could be supported by a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. The agricultural communities' seasonal need to plan and coordinate resource and manpower encouraged division of labour, which gradually led to specialization of labourers and complex societies. The subsequent development of trading networks to exchange surplus commodities and services brought agriculturalists into contact with outside groups, which promoted cultural exchanges that led to the rise of civilizations and technological evolutions.^([15])^([)^(full citation needed)^(])

However, higher population and food abundance did not necessarily correlate with improved health. Reliance on a very limited variety of staple crops can adversely affect health even while making it possible to feed more people. As an example from the Americas, maize is deficient in certain essential amino acids (lysine and tryptophan) and is a poor source of iron. The phytic acid it contains may inhibit nutrient absorption. Other factors that likely affected the health of early agriculturalists and their domesticated livestock would have been increased numbers of parasites and disease-bearing pests associated with human waste and contaminated food and water supplies. Fertilizers and irrigation may have increased crop yields but also would have promoted proliferation of insects and bacteria in the local environment while grain storage attracted additional insects and rodents.^([15])

The Neolithic Revolution involved much more than the adoption of a limited set of food-producing techniques. During the next millennia, it transformed the small and mobile groups of hunter-gatherers that had hitherto dominated human prehistory into sedentary (non-nomadic) societies based in built-up villages and towns. These societies radically modified their natural environment by means of specialized food-crop cultivation, with activities such as irrigation and deforestation which allowed the production of surplus food. Other developments that are found very widely during this era are the domestication of animals, pottery, polished stone tools, and rectangular houses. In many regions, the adoption of agriculture by prehistoric societies caused episodes of rapid population growth, a phenomenon known as the Neolithic demographic transition.

These developments, sometimes called the Neolithic package,^([9]) provided the basis for centralized administrations and political structures, hierarchical ideologies,^([10]) depersonalized systems of knowledge (e.g. writing), densely populated settlements, specialization and division of labour, more trade, the development of non-portable art and architecture, and greater property ownership.^([11]) The earliest known civilization developed in Sumer in southern Mesopotamia (c. 6,500 BP); its emergence also heralded the beginning of the Bronze Age.^([12])

The relationship of the aforementioned Neolithic characteristics to the onset of agriculture, their sequence of emergence, and their empirical relation to each other at various Neolithic sites remains the subject of academic debate. It is usually understood to vary from place to place, rather than being the outcome of universal laws of social evolution.^([13])^([14])

Context: https://hikoco.co.nz/blogs/tmi/korean-folklore?srsltid=AfmBOopiNZeOA0MbjUd6V75uLBL0t1vmoYE-sqGsSi4xF7pP8N1OUnY5

When telling a Korean folktale, the phrase “once upon a time” would always be followed by “back when tigers used to smoke.” The reason being is that in the past, tobacco was a thing for everyone in Korea. From kids to elders and from rich to poor. Yet in the Joseon dynasty, the aristocrats banned commoners smoking and made it a rich-people-only thing. Smoking pipes were designed with luxurious jewels and gold, soon becoming the symbol of wealth. From then onwards, people refer to “when everyone, even tigers, were allowed to smoke” as a very very long time ago.

Context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt

All through history, the availability of salt has been pivotal to civilization. What is now thought to have been the first city in Europe is Solnitsata, in Bulgaria, which was a salt mine, providing the area now known as the Balkans with salt since 5400 BC.^([12]) Salt was the best-known food preservative, especially for meat, for many thousands of years.^([13]) A very ancient salt-works operation has been discovered at the Poiana Slatinei archaeological site next to a salt spring in Lunca, Neamț County, Romania. Evidence indicates that Neolithic people of the Precucuteni Culture were boiling the salt-laden spring water through the process of briquetage to extract salt as far back as 6050 BC.^([14]) The salt extracted from this operation may have directly correlated with the rapid growth of this society's population soon after production began.^([15]) The harvest of salt from the surface of Xiechi Lake near Yuncheng in Shanxi, China, dates back to at least 6000 BC, making it one of the oldest verifiable saltworks.^([16])

There is more salt in animal tissues, such as meat, blood, and milk, than in plant tissues.^([17]) Nomads who subsist on their flocks and herds do not eat salt with their food, but agriculturalists, feeding mainly on cereals and vegetable matter, need to supplement their diet with salt.^([18]) With the spread of civilization, salt became one of the world's main trading commodities. It was of high value to the ancient Hebrews, the Greeks, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Hittites and other peoples of antiquity. In the Middle East, salt was used to seal an agreement ceremonially, and the ancient Hebrews made a "covenant of salt" with God and sprinkled salt on their offerings to show their trust in him.^([19])

An ancient practice in time of war was salting the earth: scattering salt around in a defeated city to symbolically prevent plant growth. The Bible tells the story of King Abimelech who was ordered by God to do this at Shechem.^([20]) Texts claim that the Roman general Scipio Aemilianus Africanus ploughed over and sowed the city of Carthage with salt after it was defeated in the Third Punic War (146 BC),^([21]) although this story is now considered to be entirely apocryphal.

Salt may have been used for barter in connection with the obsidian trade in Anatolia in the Neolithic Era.^([22]) Salt was included among funeral offerings found in ancient Egyptian tombs from the third millennium BC, as were salted birds, and salt fish.^([23]) From about 2800 BC, the Egyptians began exporting salt fish to the Phoenicians in return for Lebanon cedar, glass, and the dye Tyrian purple. The Phoenicians traded Egyptian salted fish and salt from North Africa throughout their Mediterranean trade empire.^([24]) Herodotus described salt trading routes across Libya back in the 5th century BC. In the early years of the Roman Empire, roads were built for the transportation of salt from the salt imported at Ostia to the capital.^([25])

In Africa, salt was used as currency south of the Sahara. Slabs of rock salt were used as coins in Abyssinia.^([18]) The Tuareg have traditionally maintained routes across the Sahara especially for the transportation of salt by Azalai salt caravans. The caravans still cross the desert from southern Niger to Bilma, although much of the trade now takes place by truck. Each camel takes two bales of fodder and two of trade goods northwards and returns laden with salt pillars and dates.^([26]) In Gabon, before the arrival of Europeans, the coast people carried on a remunerative trade with those of the interior by the medium of sea salt. This was gradually displaced by the salt that Europeans brought in sacks, so that the coast natives lost their previous profits; as of the late 1950s, sea salt was still the currency best appreciated in the interior.^([27])

Salzburg, Hallstatt, and Hallein lie within 17 km (11 mi) of each other on the river Salzach in central Austria in an area with extensive salt deposits. Salzach means "salt river", while Salzburg means "salt castle", both taking their names from the German word Salz, salt. Hallstatt was the site of the world's first salt mine.^([28]) The town gave its name to the Hallstatt culture that began mining for salt in the area in about 800 BC. Around 400 BC, the townsfolk, who had previously used pickaxes and shovels, began open pan salt making. During the first millennium BC, Celtic communities grew rich trading salt and salted meat to Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome in exchange for wine and other luxuries.^([13])

The word salary comes from the Latin word for salt. The reason for this is unknown; a persistent modern claim that the Roman Legions were sometimes paid in salt is baseless.^([29])^([30]) The word salad literally means "salted", and comes from the ancient Roman practice of salting leaf vegetables.^([31])

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold#History

The earliest recorded metal employed by humans appears to be gold. Small amounts of natural gold have been found in Spanish caves used during the late Paleolithic period, c. 40,000 BC.^([91])

The oldest gold artifacts in the world are from Bulgaria and are dating back to the 5th millennium BC, such as those found in the Varna Necropolis near Lake Varna and the Black Sea coast, thought to be the earliest "well-dated" finding of gold artifacts in history.^([92])^([82])^([93])

Gold artifacts probably made their appearance in Ancient Egypt at the beginning of the pre-dynastic period, at the end of the fifth millennium BC and the start of the fourth, and smelting was developed during the course of the 4th millennium; gold artifacts appear in the archeology of Lower Mesopotamia during the early 4th millennium.^([94]) As of 1990, gold artifacts found at the Wadi Qana cave cemetery of the 4th millennium BC in West Bank were the earliest from the Levant.^([95]) Gold artifacts such as the golden hats and the Nebra disk appeared in Central Europe from the 2nd millennium BC Bronze Age.

Exploitation of gold in the south-east corner of the Black Sea is said to date from the time of Midas, and this gold was important in the establishment of what is probably the world's earliest coinage in Lydia around 610 BC.^([96])

Context: https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/the-kennedy-family/rosemary-kennedy

Rosemary Kennedy, born Rose Marie Kennedy on September 13, 1918, was the third child and eldest daughter of Joseph and Rose Kennedy. She was slower to crawl, slower to walk and to speak than her brothers, and she experienced learning difficulties when she reached school age. Despite her apparent intellectual disabilities, Rosemary participated in most family activities. In the diary she kept as a teenager she described people she met, dances and concerts she attended, and a visit to the Roosevelt White House. When her father was appointed US Ambassador to Britain in 1938, Rosemary went to live in London and was presented at court along with her mother and sister Kathleen.

But when the family returned to the United States in 1940, “Rosemary was not making progress but seemed instead to be going backward,” as her sister Eunice later wrote. “At 22, she was becoming increasingly irritable and difficult.” The following year, after being persuaded that a lobotomy would help to calm his daughter and prevent her sometimes violent mood swings, Joseph Kennedy authorized the operation. The relatively new procedure, which at the time seemed to hold great promise, left Rosemary permanently incapacitated and unable to care for herself. On the recommendation of Archbishop Cushing, Rosemary was sent to St. Coletta’s School for Exceptional Children in Jefferson, Wisconsin, where she would live for the rest of her life.

Eunice Kennedy Shriver had a particularly close relationship with her older sister, and great empathy for Rosemary and others who faced similar challenges. In 1962, Mrs. Shriver started a summer day camp in her own back yard for children and adults with intellectual disabilities, a camp which evolved into Special Olympics, now a global competition that involves 1.4 million athletes from 150 countries.

Rosemary Kennedy died on January 7, 2005 at age 86. Eunice Shriver said in her eulogy that Rosemary had left a legacy that was long and deep. Along with inspiring Mrs. Shriver’s own work with Special Olympics, Rosemary had inspired her brother, President John F. Kennedy, to initiate sweeping legislation designed to improve the quality of life for Americans with disabilities. She had inspired her sister Jean Kennedy Smith to start Very Special Arts and her nephew, Anthony Shriver, to start Best Buddies. Hospitals, schools and other such facilities around the world have been named in honor of Rosemary Kennedy.

Context: https://www.lanl.gov/media/publications/national-security-science/0723-visit-to-japan

J. Robert Oppenheimer’s only visit to Japan was for a lecture tour that began on September 5, 1960. Sponsoring the tour was the Japan Committee for Intellectual Interchange (JCII), an organization founded during the formal U.S. occupation of Japan, which lasted from 1945 to 1952. JCII’s mission was to accelerate Japan’s transition to democracy by introducing Western political values, economic systems, and social norms to the country. 

The JCII had sponsored other high-level visits, including one by Eleanor Roosevelt in 1953, but Oppenheimer’s visit presented new challenges. As the “father of the atomic bomb,” Oppenheimer was inextricably linked to the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki—and the death and destruction that followed.  

The JCII tried to get ahead of potential issues by routing Oppenheimer through Tokyo and Osaka, avoiding Hiroshima and Nagasaki. JCII also instructed Oppenheimer to discuss recent physics and policy developments, but the bombings inevitably found their way into the conversation.

At one point following a talk in Osaka, an American who lived in Hiroshima approached Oppenheimer and handed the physicist an invitation to visit the city. The American assured Oppenheimer that he would be welcomed and forgiven by the local population. Oppenheimer politely declined, citing the JCII’s recommendation, but a local newspaper reported that Oppenheimer also said, “Had it been my choice, I would have wished to have quietly visited the city.”

Oppenheimer’s struggle with the moral implications of developing atomic weapons was apparent throughout the JCII lectures. Oppenheimer recognized the irreversible nature of his work and warned of the responsibility that comes with each new discovery. “Indeed, even in pure science with no thoughts of weapons or immediate change in life, a great discovery is a source of terror,” he said to an audience in Osaka.

He mentioned a few days later at another lecture that his friend and fellow physicist Niels Bohr once joked, “When I have a great idea, I am always close to suicide.”

Oppenheimer’s lectures often offered a similarly pessimistic view of the world. One was titled “The Future of Civilization in the Scientific Age,” a name that he didn’t seem to agree with: “The title of my lecture is ‘The Future of Civilization’, this was not quite my own doing. I do not use this phrase easily, for I am one of those who share with my many colleagues at home and here in Japan profound doubts of the very existence of a future.”

Oppenheimer described an exciting age of technological development laced with words of caution. “We have seen many improvements, but we have also lived through profound moral retrogression,” he warned. “We must remember the two sides, science as it is for the pursuit of truth, to understand nature, to understand ourselves as a part of nature, and science as a source of technology and power to alter the world, to meet human needs, real or artificial.”

In another lecture, he said: “The legend of the Tree of Knowledge, of Adam, and the legend of Prometheus—they both attest to the danger of going beyond the familiar compass of human life.” 

Toward the end of his trip, Oppenheimer visited with the Society of Science and Man, a group of Japanese scholars and professors. In talking to this group, Oppenheimer strayed from statements of impending doom and instead focused on how to promote collaboration among scientists and politicians. Scientists, he posited, had a duty to serve as advisors to guide politicians and ensure technology wasn’t misused. 

“Since the federal government, for good and bad reasons, is supporting science, they must have contact with scientists,” Oppenheimer said. “In recent years [...] it has been possible to create for the president an advisory committee which does not hesitate to talk about major questions [...] it can talk to the president about what it wants.” The advisory committee Oppenheimer was likely referring to was the General Advisory Committee of the Atomic Energy Commission, which he chaired from 1947 to 1952. 

In a different venue, Oppenheimer commented on the human condition. “To cope with our sorrows, to limit and make noble our joys, to understand what is happening to us, to talk to one another, to relate one thing to another, to find the great themes which organize our experience and give it meaning,” he said, “it is what makes us human.”

Oppenheimer died less than seven years after this trip. He never did visit Hiroshima or Nagasaki. 

Context: https://www.britannica.com/event/Battle-of-Cannae

Battle of Cannae, (August 216 bce), battle fought near the ancient village of Cannae, in southern Apulia (modern Puglia), southeastern Italy, between the forces of Rome and Carthage during the Second Punic War. The Romans were crushed by the African, Gallic, and Celtiberian troops of Hannibal, with recorded Roman losses ranging from 55,000 (according to Roman historian Livy) to 70,000 (according to Greek historian Polybius). One of the most significant battles in history, it is regarded by military historians as a classic example of a victorious double envelopment.

Hannibal was the first to arrive at the battle site, with a force of about 40,000 infantry and 10,000 cavalry. His army took command of the Aufidus (now Ofanto) River, the main source of water in the area. That added to the strain on the Romans, who would struggle to satisfy the thirst of their greater number of soldiers in the early August heat. Hannibal positioned his lines facing north, compelling the Romans to face mostly to the south, where the hot libeccio wind blew dust and grit into their eyes, an irritant and disadvantage that, according to ancient authorities, cannot be ignored. In addition, Hannibal confined the eight Roman legions in a narrow valley, hemmed in by the river. In one stroke, Hannibal thus restricted the mobility of the Roman cavalry and forced the Roman infantry to adopt a formation that was deeper than it was wide, two factors that would prove critical in the outcome of the battle.

Breaking from the Fabian strategy of nonengagement, the Roman consuls Lucius Aemilius Paullus and Gaius Terentius Varro brought to Cannae roughly 80,000 men, about half of whom lacked significant battle experience. They sought to meet Hannibal, who had just taken a highly coveted grain depot at Canusium, in the hope of delivering a knockout blow and ending the destructive Carthaginian invasion of Italy. Terentius Varro had been popularly elected as a plebeian consular political appointee, and ancient sources describe his character as overconfident and rash, ascribing to him the hope that he could overwhelm Hannibal with sheer numbers. Aemilius Paullus, however, was both a veteran and patrician from an established military family, and he was justifiably cautious about facing Hannibal on his enemy’s terms.

The Romans faced southwest, with their right wing resting on the Aufidus and with the sea about three miles (five kilometres) to their rear. They placed their cavalry (about 6,000) on their wings and massed their infantry in an exceptionally deep and narrow formation in the centre in the hope of breaking the enemy centre by weight and push. To counter that, Hannibal relied on the elasticity of his formation. He stationed his Gallic and Spanish infantry in the centre, two groups of his African troops on their flanks, and the cavalry on the wings. But before engaging the enemy, his line adopted a crescent shape, the centre advancing with the African troops on their flanks en échelon. As Hannibal had anticipated, his cavalry won the struggle on the wings, and some then swept around behind the enemy.

Meanwhile, the Roman infantry gradually forced back Hannibal’s centre, and victory or defeat turned upon whether the latter held. It did: although it fell back, it did not break, and the Roman centre was gradually drawn forward into a trap. Hannibal’s crescent became a circle, with Hannibal’s African and Spanish troops on the wings pressing inward on the Romans and the Carthaginian cavalry attacking from the rear. Some of the equipment used by troops engaging the Roman flanks—especially shields and other armour—had been taken from dead Romans after the Carthaginian victory at Trasimene. That may have further confused the Romans, who were already fighting through a steady torrent of dust. Pressed tightly together and hence unable to properly use their arms, the Romans were surrounded and cut to pieces. It is possible that the falcata, a brutally effective curved short sword employed by Celtiberian troops, played some role in the dismemberment of the Roman ranks.

Terentius Varro fled the field of battle with the remnants of the Roman and allied cavalry. Aemilius Paullus was killed along with many other high-ranking commanders, including Gnaeus Servilius Geminus, Marcus Minucius Rufus, and other veteran patricians. Among the Roman dead were 28 of 40 tribunes, up to 80 Romans of Senatorial or high magistrate rank, and at least 200 knights (Romans of equestrian rank). It was estimated that 20 percent of Roman fighting men between the ages of 18 and 50 died at Cannae. Only 14,000 Roman soldiers escaped, and 10,000 more were captured; the rest were killed. The Carthaginians lost about 6,000 men.