Another blog migration

If you can stand the errors that haven't been ironed out yet, I encourage you to read and comment upon the new WordPress version of this blog. You can even register as a subscriber, which should help you avoid problems with the new uber-spam filters.

Working all the kinks out will take a while. At Jessica's suggestion, I am only going to let myself reformat and debug as a reward for doing academic work. At least until I can find a way to deal with the photo issue outlined at the top of the new WP blog, I will keep publishing here.

Naturally, the new site is also available for RSS syndication.

Posted by Milan at 11:13 PM   

Caffeinated jitters

Happy Birthday Ashley Thorvaldson

Today was dominated by core seminar reading, catching up on The Economist, and playing around with WordPress. This term is odd in the sense that there are so few times during the week when members of the program are brought together for academic purposes. We have both the core seminar and the methods seminar on Tuesdays, with no seminars or labs taking place at other times. I do see some program members through the Strategic Studies Group, but that is on Tuesdays as well. I should find someone who is interested in once-weekly coffee and breakfast meetings to discuss academic matters.

Tuesday's core seminar is on the topics "Compare and contrast the American, Soviet, and European conceptions of détente during the 1970s" and "What were the most important factors that led to the end of the Cold War?" I've done some reading already, and will devote a good fraction of tomorrow to immersion in the social sciences library. Because of how early in the research process my thesis presentation will be, it will probably me markedly less useful than it might have been later on. I suppose its value may lie in it being a spur forcing me to think about some of the important questions earlier than I might otherwise have done.

This blog is a-movin'

After another long outage yesterday, I burn with the desire to move beyond Blogger. My experience there have been a progressively more emancipated one, as I got my own domain and learned how to use it. The biggest limitation of all, of course, is that all the content management is still being done on the Blogger side. There are advantages to that - I can't really break Blogger - and disadvantages - I can't tweak or fix it either. Of course, moving again means the whole rigamarole of broken links and hopeless search engine results for another few months. It was a mistake to give Blogger control of the root directory of my webspace. It will make the process of relocating trickier than it would otherwise have been.

A draft version of the new sibilant intake of breath as managed through WordPress 2.0.2 is online. I obviously need to tweak the template, as well as deal with some internal changes. Once finished, it will probably replace the Blogger based blog as my primary avenue for posting. I expect that with some learning and tweaking, it will be much snazzier.

For the moment, I will carry on updating both. A facelift and database shift for elements of the cryptoblog may also be in the offing, in the longer term.

PS. Those who haven't seen it yet should watch the video of Stephen Colbert addressing the White House Correspondents' Association dinner should make a point of doing so. It's an astonishing demonstration of someone using satire to speak truth (or truthiness) to power. It's especially remarkable that the President and others were actually present for it. (Small Quicktime version)

Posted by Milan at 6:38 PM   

Pondering content-management options

Increasingly, I feel the desire to be able to do more sophisticated things with this blog. For instance, I would appreciate being able to organize posts by category, as well as being able to send and receive trackbacks. I would also like to be able to host my own content management system, so I won't be out in the cold whenever Blogger (frequently) goes down. Having the ability to establish user profiles with differing access levels also has some appeal, given the wide variety of people who read this blog, and the varied purposes for which they do. At this stage, I should probably have a blogroll, as well.

The most comprehensive (and expensive) option is to switch to MovableType, which would cost about $200 - the amount I pay for four years of hosting at sindark.com. TypePad - also from six apart - is about $50 a year. WordPress is an appealing free option, seemingly used by many of the better blogs I read. I like that it is licensed under the GPL.

The most important consideration is ease of continuity. I need to shift more than 1200 posts (not all of them obviously part of a sibilant intake of breath), along with hundreds of images. Also, any viable transfer will need to include the automatic alteration of internal links to reflect the new structure. Clearly, it's not a project to be taken on during the middle of a term.

Has anyone made the transition from Blogger to WordPress or TypePad? If so, how difficult did you find it? Were you able to broadly transfer things automatically, or did it take a lot of manual tweaking? Also, what made you decide to switch and for what reasons are you either glad or regretful about doing so.

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In the interests of fair and comprehensive reporting, I should disclose that special forces teams are already operating inside WordPress - reconnoitering and marking targets to be followed up upon later. The important thing to to have a really sound post-migration plan in place, reducing the possibility of some kind of data insurgency from posts or other components that prove resistant to being integrated into the new order.

Posted by Milan at 1:33 PM   

Wadstock bartending

Bald, gaunt, in a black suit, black shirt, white tie and iPod: such was the dress of the suave Merton barman who was in command of our efforts at Wadstock tonight. The event was a music festival put on in the Wadham College back quad, with about twelve consecutive hours of bands accompanied by barbecues and drinks. I worked from 7:00 to 11:00pm and earned thirty quid: enough for three more strategic studies dinners this term. We were selling an array of sickly-sweet cocktails to undergraduates. Aside from brief glimpses of Nora and Bilyana, I didn't see anyone I recognized - aside from the SU executive members with whom I was working.

Tomorrow, I am going to do reading for the core seminar, as well as work on the thesis plan presentation I need to give on Tuesday. While I obviously don't have enough done for it to be comprehensive, I expect that my classmates and instructors will be sympathetic. It may even be very helpful, for plotting an initial course.

It should be noted that the customer service of The Economist in the UK is excellent. I called them the other day to explain that my April 22nd to 28th issue had not arrived. The call went directly to an operator: no ringing, no menus. I was astonished. After taking my name and address, they dispatched a new issue immediately. I got it the next day by express mail. After slogging away with customer service departments like Apple's (which is by no means the worst), it's incredibly welcome.

Posted by Milan at 11:35 PM   

Race Against Time

Early this afternoon, I finished reading the compilation of the Massey Lectures delivered by Stephen Lewis in 2005, on HIV/AIDS in Africa. It's overwhelming stuff - to be confronted with a problem on such a scale, where perfectly viable means of mitigation, treatment, and control exist, but where the overpowering lack of will on the part of those who possess such means keep appropriate and necessary actions from being taken.

There is nothing inevitable about the continuation of the AIDS pandemic. Through combined strategies of nutrition, education, and treatment we could squeeze it down to a tiny fraction of its present size. A 24-week course of nevirapine can cut the transmission rate from mother to child to under 2%. The viral loads of those already infected can be reduced through a combination of anti-retroviral therapies and improved overall health and nutrition, to the point where they are dramatically less infectious. The widespread use of condoms, the management of intravenous drug use, and the proper maintenance of hygiene in medical facilities could slash the vectors by which the infection spreads. Public education could make the avenues through which the disease travels known, as well as empower people to make choices that would protect them and their families.

Of course, there are lots of other factors that require examination: working out how to deal with millions of orphans, many of them now the heads of their families and responsible for younger siblings and, of course, the need to deal with conflict: the eternal spreader of disorder and disease. The danger exists of being overwhelmed by the toughest problems, or using them as an excuse for not taking the easiest and cheapest steps, as part of a progression towards improvement.

When the problem is presented as a cliff face, it seems impossible to climb. Much more accurately, the problem is like a difficult piece of terrain, but one in which we can maneuver if we marshall the skills, the equipment, and the will. As Lewis demonstrates eloquently, the potential benefits of doing so are as enormous as the moral obligation that should compel us to achieve them. Even without a cure or vaccine, it seems obvious that the toll of HIV/AIDS can be reduced enormously; all it would take is political will, backed with money, and the keeping of promises long-made but rarely honoured.

Lewis' short book is an eloquent and worthwhile expansion upon the above ideas, complete with a huge number of stories and examples from his own experiences in Africa and the corridors of the multi-national institutions. HIV/AIDS is certainly an area in which he speaks with authority. His final chapter, entitled "A Gallery of Alternatives in Good Faith," includes some excellent suggestions. I quite like the pique of suggesting that, if Japan gets the seat it seeks in the Security Council, it should be forced to live up to the promise it made - of doubling aid to Africa - in order to secure support for its campaign. Quite simply, Lewis suggests, they should forfeit the seat if they fail to live up to their promise. Other ideas, including giving the concerns of women an enormously more prominent place in the UN architecture through the creation of a powerful and permanent body with that mandate, are long overdue for implementation.

In short, I highly recommend the book. I am lending my copy to Emily now, but others in Oxford can borrow it subsequently. I also have Jeffrey Sachs' The End of Poverty to lend.

Posted by Milan at 5:00 PM   

No comment

Strange day. Strange night. No comment.

Ebm, lbh orjvyqre zr.

Posted by Milan at 12:25 AM   

Science, the environment, and development

Today's seminar for the Global Economic Governance Program was really excellent, discussing the future of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. On the panel were Jon Cuncliffe, Paul Collier, and Ngaire Woods. Overall, I would say that they agreed more than they disagreed. They primarily identified and discussed two areas of interest: the global financial consequences of the emergence of China and India and the role the Bank and the Fund should play in assisting development within countries that are either stagnating, or finding themselves at the start of an awkward path to reasonable prosperity.

While there, I realized that development might be the missing factor for my thesis. Conversing with Peter Dauvergne by email, he has identified the incredible variety of work already being done in the field of science and environmental politics. I need more of a focus if I am to say something new. To focus on the scientific and environmental questions that exist within the two areas listed above might be a good way to move forward. It captures concerns like China's growing need for energy and resources, as well as issues like the problems of desertification and lack of decent access to water in sub-Saharan Africa.

Potentially, this is a way of bringing a lot of reading I've been doing that is somewhat peripheral to both the program and my thesis back into line. I don't think it would be wise to extent the topic to consider health, which is also a fascinating intersection between science and development, but to use development to create a balanced triad between science and environmental politics might lend direction and balance, without going off topic.

Dr. Dauvergne also suggested that I read the last few years worth of issues of Environmental Politics: the journal from the MIT Press which he edits, as well as a thesis entitled Advocates, Experts or Collaborative Epistemic Communities by Lindsay Johnson, an MA student of his.

Comments would be especially appreciated on this, since I need to present my preliminary research plan on Tuesday at 11:00am.

Posted by Milan at 6:14 PM   

Of news and time management

When corresponding with friends back in Canada, I am frequently reminded about how out-of-touch with national news I have become while in the UK. For me, the Harper government is a distant and largely hypothetical possibility, still in the stasis of post-electoral uncertainty. I remembering wandering around surprised on the night of the election, finding it difficult to comprehend how a party that had been in power for all the time I had been aware of politics could suddenly be outed. It is still that general sense that dominates my intuitive perspective on the present Canadian political situation. That and the fervent hope that we don't descend into the insanity of social crusading and fiscal and strategic recklessness that have taken hold so ominously and harmfully in the United States.

I don't think there is much I can plausibly do to keep in touch beyond skimming the Globe and Mail website and Google News Canada every day or so. Between reading for the core seminar and thesis reading, I already have a great deal to do. I am frequently frustrated by the impossibility of doing as well as can be managed in all possible areas. It makes you constantly guilty when you aren't doing something classed as productive (course reading, scholarship applications) or semi-productive (cycling, reading The Economist). Also, it is the conversations you have with friends about current events that are the ultimate spur to be knowledgeable about them. Without debate tournaments or pub and living room arguments about Canadian politics, my lack of knowledge is rarely revealed. While Emily seems to be powerfully in touch with Canadian news - perhaps her time at Goldman Sachs taught her how to do so when busy and abroad - nobody else is likely to bring up current Canadian events as a topic of conversation.

The solution is to work towards squeezing out all activities that are not at least semi-productive, eliminating the gaps that make you feel as though you're not doing as much as you should be. Once you are doing more-or-less all you can be, you can be forgiven for some oversights. Everything I do should be part of some plan or project.

That said, I am going to get back to reading about AIDS.

Posted by Milan at 1:59 PM   

Zip, ziltch, nada - on the work front

Last night, I was up absurdly late. I remember hearing the clock tolling six as I covered my eyes with cloth in a late attempt to fall asleep. Understandably, my productivity today took a bit of a hit as the result of such sleeplessness.

After attempts at reading, and the completion of yet another scholarship application, I walked to the Port Meadow with Nora this evening - in time to see the sun set behind the western tree line.

Today was a good day, all told. I got to read the first few pages of Kelly's novel about the Picts. I also got to have a conversation in French, do some cycling, correspond with a distant colleague about the thesis, and read.

Tomorrow afternoon, I am attending a seminar entitled: "Is there a future for the IMF and World Bank?" at Merton College.

---

I saw a Canon A700 at the pub tonight. There is definitely a lot more glass included in the lens, possibly making the 800 ISO setting viable. The LCD screen is also much larger. Does anyone have personal experience with one?

The Colbert Report: Better Know a District: Georgia's 11th District is brilliant

Posted by Milan at 11:31 PM   

The Constant Gardener

I saw The Constant Gardener with the European Film Society tonight. I found the film to be very powerful, and thoroughly dispiriting. While the specific evils portrayed are obviously fictional, there is a grim plausibility that accompanies them. Humanity has a long way to go.

The pharmaceutical plot was actually the weakest part of the film. Not to spoil it for anyone, but you can't license a drug in the rich world on the basis of unsupervised clinical trials in Africa. That said, the portrayal of machine-gun wielding horsemen terrorizing villagers in the Sudan is probably quite accurate. Likewise, some of the depictions of the horrific toll of AIDS.

Appropriately enough, immediately before the film started, I began reading the copy of Race Against Time that my mother sent me, along with some extra illumination for my bike. Written by Stephen Lewis, it is a printed version of the Massey Lectures that were delivered across Canada, and it opens with the line: "I have spent the last four years watching people die."

I will probably finish it tomorrow, then lend it to Emily. I feel as though I should say more, but I am thoroughly overwhelmed.

Posted by Milan at 10:31 PM   

Oxford exploration

This morning, I was woken by the 9:00am booming of our local clock tower. Since it was already the time when I was meant to meet Sheena and Emily to start the Oxford tour for Martin Ziguele, the former Prime Minister of the Central African Republic, I had to roll straight out of bed and into a suit: arriving outside St. Antony's at six past nine.

The tour itself was very generic: Christ Church meadows, the Radcliffe Square, and up Parks Road. One notable sight was an actually Greylag gosling, beside the Isis. It was your stereotypical yellow puffball, and the parents visibly and audibly disapproved of my attempts to photograph it. Emily and I made efforts to describe things in French, where feasible, and impart some of the anecdotal Oxford history that gets absorbed by all students here.

In the afternoon, I took another bike ride out into the village-strewn countryside surrounding Oxford. This time, I headed southward, across Magdalen Bridge and way down the Cowley Road. I went past the BMW plant at the end of the Cowley Road, then up the hill near Garsington (N51 43.191, W001 09.678). From Church Walk to there and back is 22km.

He hill didn't offer as nice a view as the hills around Bath did, but it was nonetheless the most pronounced elevation I've climbed near Oxford. In response to Tristan's post requesting top speeds, I made an attempt to see how fast I could go before my gears became more or less useless, on a slight downslope in the countryside south of Oxford. I managed 48.2km/h, which isn't bad for a bicycle.

PS. I need to remember to email Peter Dauvergne about my thesis idea. Since I need to go a presentation on it in our methods seminar next Tuesday, I need to have a decent idea of the important methodological questions involved.

Posted by Milan at 6:49 PM   

Letters

After long delay, I dispatched my response to Alison's letter today. Indirectly, doing so was a reminder of the sheer number of important, interesting people who are out there to keep in touch with. There are even many fellow Oxford students who I see much less than I would like. Thankfully, there have also been reminders of late that even those with whom I lack contact for extended periods do not become entirely alienated from me as a result. At different times, Kate, Viktoria P, and Sarah W have all been reminders of this. To know that is comforting to someone off-continent from family and the bulk of friends.

I also finished re-reading Dune today. I read it for the first time during the first Bowron Lakes expedition, many years ago, with Alison Benjamin and my friend Chevar. Back then, I remember finding it very long and difficult, though enjoyable. It's certainly a book with extensive verisimilitude. Herbert does an impressive job of constructing a whole universe for it to take place within: complete with politics, history, and religion. Like all the best science fiction, the themes of Dune speak to enduring human concerns and possibilities.

Posted by Milan at 4:41 PM   

Disjointed thoughts

I don't really know what to say about today, so I will talk about something more general instead. This term, it seems as though we are being presented with our first opportunity to take some initiative. That's to say, elements of the workload are less focused on the completion of specific tasks and more tuned towards the advancement of general research. If I move quickly and find the right people, this might be a chance to step up involvement with the Environmental Change Institute. After today, I feel as though I need to be more aggressive in my questioning, when it comes to my thesis topic. In particular, I need to consider the very limited nature of some of the case studies I am considering. To say something really important, I need to do more.

Having just come back from the strategic studies dinner and presentation, I find myself hopelessly muddled. Somehow, it all combined to confuse things that had seemed fairly clear before. I am sorry to be vague, but I can't even really comment on what's eliciting such opaque responses. Since I need to be up early, I will read some Kerouac and go to sleep, rather than really contemplating it now. It feels like an idea that needs time to cook.

Emily and I set off fairly early tomorrow morning.

Posted by Milan at 11:25 PM   

Preliminary QT results

This afternoon, in the exam schools, twenty-five names were posted on the board: results for our qualifying test. Since there are 28 people in the program, that means that three people have either asked not to have their names displayed or failed.

I was among the twenty-one who are known to have passed. Among the twenty-five listed, there are also four distinctions. I am told this is the highest number in at least five years. Last year, there were two. My energetic congratulations to Iason, Bryony, Matthew, and Robert Wood. The three unknowns could be any combination of passes, fails, and distinctions.

We will have numeric grades posted to us sometime in the next few days. Since the results are now officially in, I have re-posted the three questions that I chose to answer.

PS. On an unrelated note, Emily and I are meant to give a tour of Oxford to Martin Ziguele, Former Prime Minister of the Central African Republic, tomorrow morning. Tonight, he is presenting before the Strategic Studies Group, meaning I will be having dinner with him, Sheena, and Claire in New College.

Posted by Milan at 3:40 PM   

Technical difficulties

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to post anything for today. Firstly, that's because I was unusually busy. Secondly, my internet connection at Church Walk has failed: probably because I don't have user credentials at St. Antony's and they reviewed network access at the start of the term. Hopefully, I can sort that out today, along with learning how I did on the QT and picking up my bike from the first month maintenance that Beeline Cycles includes with bikes they sell.

Despite having no time to get into details (I need to finish a presentation on the importance of nuclear weapons to the Cold War staying cold), I can assert that yesterday was an excellent day.

Posted by Milan at 9:11 PM   

At the cusp of a new term

Trinity term officially begins today, which means half again as much reading and paper writing as has taken place so far, all in the course of the next eight weeks. The core seminar for this term is the development of the international system from 1950 to present, which basically means great power diplomatic and military history. I think we're all appreciative of the fact that it's territory we've basically all covered to one extent or another before. You could hardly get this far if you hadn't.

Looking back over the break, it has been quite a good one. I travelled to Chichester, Arundel, and Malta. I saw Sarah get married. I spent a week with my mother. I met a number of new and interesting people. I read some good books. I applied (unsuccessfully) for a number of scholarships, as well as submitting a paper to the MIT International Review. I wrote the qualifying test, in fairly respectable fashion. I moved to a new place. I cycled a few hundred kilometres, in aggregate. That's pretty good for six weeks.

New duties

Along with the Vice-Presidential position, I have been given responsibility for the Strategic Studies Group website. I can already tell that it is orders of magnitude more complex than any website I've ever operated before. Looks like I will spend some portion of the next year learning how to use MySQL databases and the various content-management applications that keep the thing going. If all goes wrong, I made a full backup before I touched anything - a very time consuming task when there are thousands of sub-directories.

The first step, of course, is to quickly learn the nuts and bolts of posting informational updates. Later, I can really get acquainted with the innards of the site and the way it operates. Despite the fact that it doesn't seem to use much more bandwidth than a sibilant intake of breath, they have an absurdly large amount allotted.

[6:03pm] Within hours of taking over the OUSSG site, I managed to crash it completely, by not understanding the way the content management system, the SQL databases, and the FTP server talk to one another. I managed to fix it by manually editing a configuration file, since the way I screwed it up completely disabled the web-based CMS. I am going to leave the whole thing alone for a while now...

Posted by Milan at 4:16 PM   

Summary of summery pursuits

From late afternoon to early morning, today was a social whirlwind. I bumped into Lucy and Leonora on my way to Edwina's sendoff. From there, I ducked out of The Turf for a bit to watch croquet in New College with Madgdy and Rob Moore. Then, I briefly went back to The Turf before heading to St. Cross College to watch more croquet and drink Pimms, in what I am told is an Oxonian tradition. It's probably the influence of Dune upon me, but with her pashmina and blue eyes, Edwina had more than a bit of the Fremen look to her. She leaves for Australia tomorrow.

Later, I attended a dinner party at my new flat. All good fun, we listened to my 'Demure' playlist on the iPod Shuffle while eating, drinking, and exchanging stories. I appreciate the extent to which living with Kai and Alex draws me into new social environments, and into the company of new people.

That said, the party is ongoing, and it is anti-social to be elsewhere. Tomorrow, I delve into Kerouac, as well as taking over responsibility for the Strategic Studies Group website.

PS. This web comic I discovered today Diesel Sweeties will probably amuse those who make no attempt to suppress their nerdy tendencies. There are robots, and characters rendered as though on the SNES.

PPS. For about a week now, about five people a day have been finding the blog by clicking this picture of Tallinn at night when it comes up on Google Image Search. It isn't a terribly good photo. I wish some of my better work was being showcased.

Posted by Milan at 1:08 AM   

Discretionary reading

Early this afternoon, I read The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. While it was not at all what I expected, it was quite a fascinating book. Narrator-based novels have the potential to be the most interesting kind of character stories, and Mark Haddon delivers on that possibility with this unusual yet compelling book.

I enjoyed the mathematical, scientific, and factual asides. I don't know how accurate a representation the book makes of Asperger's Syndrome, but it struck me as credible and interesting during the course of reading it. The narrator is certainly an extremely sympathetic character.

I am glad I bought the book, because I will be able to lend it to other people. If Anna hasn't read it yet, I will lend it to her when we meet next week. I need to learn her last name, so people won't think I am referring to Anna Heimbichner from the program when I mention her.

Tonight, I am going to The Turf with a number of Edwina's friends, to see her off before her departure. Later, Alex has arranged a dinner party with Byrony, Emily and her boyfriend, and some friends of his from Aberystwyth.

Posted by Milan at 3:33 PM   

Big wheel keeps on turning

As if to demonstrate the slow but deadly rotation of bureaucratic gears, the University of British Columbia housing department sent me notice today that I am being fined for having a dirty oven: in the winter of 2003. I think that's from the period when I was living with my abusive and criminal varsity hockey playing roommates.

The fine is $25, to be split between four long-dispersed (and two much despised) roommates, so the natural thing is just to pay it and be done with the matter. Even so, it strikes me as exceptionally odd that they would literally wait years to serve me with notice of such a thing. They want to be paid by May 5th.

Posted by Milan at 11:04 PM   

Well endowed with fiction

With the completion of the exam, I find that my way of thinking about things quite unrelated to it has changed rather a lot. A kind of generalized urgency that had been prevalent before has softened a bit, leaving me more willing to take things as they come. I used my book token from one of the brain scan experiments to buy two books this afternoon: Jack Kerouac's On the Road and Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. I hope to get a good start on both over the weekend, as well as finishing my re-reading of Dune and The Skeptical Environmentalist. Reading fiction is one of the best things about times not yet endangered by papers and exams; of course, I've not been known to cease completely even during such times.

Our respite from schoolwork is not destined to be long-lived. Lectures resume on Monday and on Tuesday, we have our first core seminar discussion for the history from 1950 to present segment. I am told it's on nuclear deterrence: an especially appropriate topic given the ongoing kerfuffle about Iran.

PS. Those who have not yet seen it should check out my brother Mica's White Rabbit video. You can leave comments about it on his blog.

Posted by Milan at 8:45 PM   

NASCA and the BPG

As Fernando pointed out to me, the final report of the Bi-National Planning Group (PDF), with whom we met while on the NORAD trip, has specifically endorsed some recommendations from the report (PDF) that I wrote on behalf of our group.

[The fifth] BPG recommendation supports key recommendations identified by the North American Security Cooperation Assessment (NASCA): “The United States and Canada should increase the transparency of the process by which they engage in bi-lateral defence negotiations, policy development, and operations; This process should include a focus on public understanding and involvement; Projects undertaken by academic institutions, and other civilian research organizations should be supported, particularly as means of generating transparency in, and awareness about, the defence planning process.

The NASCA report was prepared by members of the University of British Columbia (UBC) International Relations Students Association (IRSA) in 2005, and their observations were compiled by Milan Ilnyckyj-obtained from http://www.irsa.ca. (51)

It's your classic self-interested academic appeal for more research to be done - especially by people like the person doing the suggesting - but it's still good to be mentioned. I shall have to read the entirety of their report once we finish cleaning up the flat from the party last night.

Posted by Milan at 11:44 AM   

Housewarming party

The housewarming party was a great success. The timing was good, the attendance was good, and the environment was good. At least half the program showed up, and probably a rather higher fraction. Food and drink were consumed; the completion of the QT was celebrated; and people interacted with one another in a way well outside the academic. In particular, it was interesting to meet the significant others of a number of fellow members of the program: Iason, Emily, and Tarun - for instance.

I am sure the gathering could have been a fine sociological opportunity, but I was far too entangled to reach any judgment. I just hope that people enjoyed themselves.

PS. There's something about playing a Melissa Ferrick song in the UK and having it recognized that is profoundly cool. In the end, it is the unexpected that propels us forward in the social universe.

Posted by Milan at 1:50 AM   

alea iacta est

The thing is done. I think it very unlikely I failed but, like everyone, I also think it unlikely that I did brilliantly. The questions I answered:

1. To what extent can the outbreak of war in Europe in 1939 be explained by the lack of an effective military deterrent against Hitler.
2. Which is the more useful concept in explaining international relations: anarchy or identity?
3. How much greater are a person's duties to eliminate injustice among her fellow citizens than to eliminate injustices among states or within other states?

I got a single-page letter back from the British Council right afterwards. With the Chevening out as a possibility, all the big scholarships for next year are gone.

Posted by Milan at 6:46 PM   

Preparations complete

Living in a place with a proper kitchen has already taught me just how much better grilled cheese sandwiches with fried and marinated tofu are than the sort assembled on your desk, beside the computer. Like cleaning my room or sorting things, preparing relatively elaborate food (by my standards) is one way to escape the anxious clock-watching that my pre-exam hours tend to centre around.

During the last few hours, I have found myself at a bit of a loss, in terms of deciding what to study. Normally, I would be studying specific facts I thought likely to appear on multiple-choice or short-answer questions, but this test will include neither. You cannot cram broad themes and historical periods.

I really dislike the nights before exams: they are one of those grim times in life - like during exams themselves - when you are excessively aware of your position in time. In almost all circumstances where that is the case, it is because something at least potentially bad is about to happen. The feeling of being inescapably fixed in a constrained time-stream can effectively strip away the sense of being prepared or capable. Likewise, the feeling of being exceptionally awake contrasts unnervingly with my standard perpetual quasi-tiredness.

I should go for a walk.

[8:10pm] After a long and aggressive bike ride in the drizzle, I feel dramatically better. I headed north up Woodstock Road, eventually turning west onto a road that took me to Cassington. From there, I followed steeples along a much smaller road until I was in Yarnton. By then, I was pretty thoroughly lost - and yet, I sensed Oxfordness to the South and managed to get home before it was even really dark. The bit between Cassington and Yarnton - which you can see on this Google map - was definitely the nicest. It was the kind of countryside that makes one think about stealth camping, of the kind Meghan Mathieson pioneered with me.

Posted by Milan at 6:32 PM   

Feed your head

With the QT tomorrow, I should go bury myself in the library. Those who are liberated, by comparison, should have a look at my brother Mica's newest video: White Rabbit.

Posted by Milan at 8:42 AM   

Soon to be examined

The second-to-last pre-QT day has passed. It's a good sign that I find myself going over things again, somewhat uncertain of how I should spend the rest of the time. That I am doing so seems to be an indication that I am fairly well covered, already. Thankfully, none of the examiners is a historian. As such, we are likely to get less badly criticized for failing to mention this or that theory or historian. As with the theory section, it is argumentation that is crucial.

Since a big part of the test is rhetoric, the wisest course seems to be to choose the questions to which you can give the most elegant answer - rather than the ones you know most about. That is why I am studying everything in reasonable detail - with a focus on times, countries, and questions that interest me - rather than preparing specific topics in hopes that they will appear.

Seeing Claire again this morning was really good. The return of friends to Oxford is the best thing about classes resuming.

A quick appeal to fellow students

Regarding the gathering of MPhil students on Thursday, after the QT: neither me, Alex, or Kai have a real stereo. If someone could lend us something with enough power to provide music for the party, we would be grateful. We have lots of music, but are distinctly lacking in watts.

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• iPod the Fourth arrived today; may it outlast its predecessors. I appreciate that it is actually possible to update two iPods at once, using my iBook. Even with the 20GB version available again, I suspect I will use the 1GB Shuffle frequently. The big advantages of the Shuffle are its size and simplicity: an excellent second iPod.
• Today also brought the results of the interviewing section of the qualitative methods exam: which I passed, with nice things said about my work.
• The clock tower near out flat tolls 156 times a day. I quite like the sound and experience of it; it makes me feel more in control of where I am, in relation to all temporal events.

Posted by Milan at 6:24 PM   

Malta photos, from film!

Along with some much appreciated Easter chocolates, the scans and negatives from the Malta trip arrived from my mother today. My thanks to her for all of them. Based on a very rapid survey, I picked out my seventeen favourites and added them to the Photo.net album. I will give them all a closer look after the QT.

A photographer's self-portrait is included. All told, this one is my favourite; it was worth soaking my feet for. The square block you can see in the distance on the left is the castle on Comino that served as the Chateau d'If for the new Count of Monte Cristo film.

Technical details

The black and white shots were all taken on Kodak T-Max 400 film. The colour is Kodak HD400. It doesn't surprise me at all that I generally prefer the black and white photos to the colour ones. All were taken using a Canon Elan 7N body, and a Canon 28-105mm f/3.5-4.5 USM II lens. Collectively, the gear these shots were taken on is worth about six times as much as my A510. Are they six times better? I would say not. If you care to compare, all the photos in this presentation were taken using my Canon Powershot A510 consumer-level digital camera.

Not having to worry about fungus to edit out of images is awfully nice, though I forgot how visible the vignetting can be when I use my circular polarizer at 28mm. Scans from Lens and Shutter also require markedly less sharpening than shots from my A510. I may well come back and give some of these more thoughtful editing, after the QT. Some of the B&W shots could definitely use some playing around with contrast.

As always, full sized image files are available upon request. Comments are always appreciated.

Posted by Milan at 12:29 PM   

One orbital notch

One year ago, today, I held my graduation barbecue in North Vancouver. Much like my departure party, it was a fun combination of good friends, nice weather, and satisfying food and drink. Most of the people who attended are now in Vancouver, though Nick Sayeg is in Australia, Tristan is in Toronto, and Gabe is in Helsinki. Karen Furstrand was there.

Two years ago, today, Meghan and I were working on Milton essays and geocaching all over the campus of the University of British Columbia. Then, as now, exams were a few days away. Then, as now, I was especially worried about whether my knowledge of 20th century history would prove adequate.

Three years ago, today, I was incensed by the low quality of teaching in my comparative politics class, as taught by a pair of married professors at UBC. I noted with approval that the quality of teaching at a graduate program in the UK would be better, and that I would appreciate the chance to live for a couple of years outside of Canada.

The public face of my life has been remarkably consistent, though the hints and shadows of crisis and discord are in that listing, as well.

Posted by Milan at 7:49 PM   

Science fiction and positivist social science

While thumbing through a copy of Frank Herbert's Dune that I bought for a Pound at a used book shop, I realized the extent to which the highest ideals of strongly positivist social science can be found in science fiction. Because of the complexity of his notion of politics - and the interconnections between politics and other phenomenon, like religion - Herbert's perspective extends somewhat beyond social science as often envisioned. Much closer to the ideal is some of the work of Isaac Asimov, which I will come to in a moment.

Dune itself can be read if an interesting (if fictional) study of politics. The Bene Gesserit notion of politics as fundamentally bound up in the structural relationships between different entities would not be hugely out of place in an American international relations faculty. The connections drawn up in Dune between transport, resources, and power are also relevant to contemporary politics. Of course, at times Dune is quite a self-aware allegory for the situation in the Middle East. I was entertained to find a discussion of coercion and consent as dual means for maintaining power in the novel. With a bit of terminology changed, it could be in a textbook on Machiavelli and Gramsci.

A better example of positivism embraced in science fiction is the concept of psychohistory: as described in Isaac Asimov's Foundation novels. Basically, psychohistory is envisioned as a science that can accurately predict the development of human society in the long term, and for large numbers of people. While it can't make specific predictions about precise moments in time, it can predict massive systemic reorganizations over the course of anywhere between decades and millennia. It's a strong endorsement of the idea that history is guided by comprehensible forces.

One interesting twist is that even with the benefit of psychohistory, the arch-positivists in the Foundation novels must still be actively involved in shaping the development of the system they examine. Also, for the predictive power to be maintained, people must not be aware of the fact that psychohistory is being applied. To say much more would spoil a number of key surprises in an iconic science fiction series, but the connections between science fiction and social science - within the historical context that spawned both - might reveal some important things about the kind of project some people understand themselves as being engaged in, as regards the world around them.

An alternative explanation is that, after spending so much time trying to force as much IR as possible into my head, I can't see things any other way. When an eight year old boy is given a hammer, he suddenly discovers that everything needs pounding.

Posted by Milan at 2:02 PM   

Of upcoming jobs and tests

Happy birthday Jennifer Ellan

Anyone who has been walking in the central part of Oxford lately will understand why my fallback idea of a summer job in the tourist industry is probably a sound one. The digital camera wielding masses increase in numbers and density with every passing weekend. Quite probably, the spectacle presented by my classmates and I walking around in the whole outrageous sub fusc outfit will provide them with the kind of experience they came here in search of. Working as a tour guide is a position that appeals to me. It would involve being outside, as well as really getting to know Oxford. Once the QT is over, I will investigate what is involved in getting such a job, and when one would have to begin. Naturally, my preference would be for something more academic, if it were available.

QT preparation carries on respectably. Based on my conversations with a great many people, it has become plain that your argumentative style is of absolutely critical importance on an Oxford examination. Questions at UBC were generally just a vessel, into which you were expected to pour factual information, within an argumentative context that was not always terribly important. Check marks would appear beside things like references to particular treaties, authors, or battles. Here, such references are still required, but will only get you anywhere within an argument that is quite tightly directed, as well as in keeping with certain rhetorical guidelines.

The first strategy suggested by that kind of test is to 'can' responses - in the way that people prepare cases to use at debate tournaments before they leave. Most people with whom I have spoken are doing something along these lines. They are choosing theoretical positions or historical topics and preparing specifically for them, in anticipation of the fact that some combination of questions they have prepared will be on the test.

This strategy does not appeal to me very much. Perhaps I flatter myself in thinking that I can come up with a more interesting answer on the spot, but I don't think my hopes with regards to the value of spontaneity are entirely misplaced. They do tend to ask questions about standard issues (such as appeasement or the causes of the first world war), but they tend to include a bit of a twist in the question that requires your response to be written along a somewhat unfamiliar grain. Perhaps those who have extensively prepared on specific topics will be less capable of paying appropriate attention to the adaptation that questioning style requires. Given how much my supervisor and others have stressed the importance of both answering and interrogating the particular question, that would be problematic.

In the three days of revision I have left, I will finish reading the papers that I have traded with classmates. I will also give my boiled down notes another going-over or two, try to memorize a few specific ideas from particular theorists and historians, and possibly re-read things I have written here about readings that particularly caught my interest. It is those things - the ones that I felt some passion for at the time I learned about them - that I have by far the best hope of remembering and of writing something convincing about.

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• Alex, Kai, and I are throwing a housewarming party on Thursday night, after the QT. It is unofficially Flying Spaghetti Monster themed. Those who have not yet been touched by his noodly appendage can read the Wikipedia article or the open letter that began the movement.
• A valuable discovery made today: a quadruple Starbucks espresso on ice only costs 10% more here than in Vancouver. Surprisingly, it only has about 360mg of caffeine in it, compared to more than 400 for a Venti-sized drip coffee. (Based on figures provided by Starbucks spokesperson Lara Wyss.) For my part, I enjoy eating the ice at the end.
• With a wrench and all the torque I could muster, I tightened every possible bolt on my bike. Hopefully, this will put a stop to the spontaneous mid-ride disassembly that was making my trips more anxious than they might otherwise have been.
• The latest additions to my (ever longer) discretionary reading list are Jack Kerouac's On the Road and Alexandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago. I saw them side by side in Blackwell's and could hardly resist buying one or the other. Perhaps a job there would be a good idea.

Posted by Milan at 8:44 PM   

On the price of oil

Tristan asked me a few days ago whether the status of oil as a non-renewable resource means that it must rise in price over the long term. It's an interesting question. Here is a fairly classical economic answer. The point here is not to consider the possibility of short-term price shocks, which are quite a different sort of phenomenon, and one not related directly to the scarcity or abundance of oil in the ground. Rather, the point is to consider whether the fact that oil reserves develop at a rate that is negligible compared to the rate at which they are exploited means that oil as a commodity is destined to become ever-dearer.

I would contend that there are three prices of oil which we can consider, and two of them are highly relevant. The first cost is simply the nominal cost of any particular grade of oil at a point in time. That is to say, the cost in whatever unit of currency you care to use. These are not directly comparable, over time, because they do not factor in inflation. The second, more relevant, price is the nominal price adjusted for the rate of inflation. While there are difficulties in properly assessing the rate of inflation, a price that takes it into account as can best be managed does a better job of reflecting what the price of oil is, relative to other commodities. Economists call this the 'real' price of oil. The third price, which I will get into further below, is the relative price of oil as a factor of production, from the perspective of any firm and firms in aggregate.

Examining the price trend, firstly, there are considerations of supply and demand. These are fundamentally related to the rate of oil extraction, not to the total available reserves. That said, those watching the levels of reserves might anticipate future scarcity (doing things like choosing less oil intensive technology or making bets on higher oil prices in commodity markets). Sticking to flows for the moment, there does seem to be a considerable extent to which oil production can be increased in the medium term. Especially given today's high oil prices, fields that were previously not commercially viable have become so. Likewise, fields that were depleted to the point where the cost of extracting an extra barrel of oil was at or below the value of that oil have become viable again. This kind of incentive will emerge whenever the real price of oil rises. The potential to bring new oilfields onstream in the medium turn should act to mitigate - though not eliminate - price rises in oil.

The next big issue is substitution. We use oil for a great many purposes: from powering vehicles to making plastics and fertilizers to generating electrical power. In some of these applications, it can be more easily replaced with alternatives than it can in others. While you would be hard-pressed to make many plastics without oil, electricity can certainly be generated in other ways. At present, the global system for distributing natural gas is far less extensive than the one for distributing oil. As greater scarcity and higher oil prices are experienced and anticipated, states will shift their energy production strategies towards those based on other technology. The degree to which such shifts can take place is called the elasticity of demand: the easier is it to substitute, the smaller price rises will be, both in the short and long term. In almost all cases, elasticity of demand becomes greater with time, as firms and individuals have more scope to modify their consumption and production choices.

Relative factor prices provide one market mechanism by which production choices are made. That is to say, if the price of an input - say labour - rises, firms will modify their production strategy in the short, medium, and long term to reduce the usage of that factor to an efficient level. How big the changes they make have to do with their anticipation of future movements in factor prices. Through the existence or anticipation of higher oil prices, firms will be driven to make production decisions that reduce their usage of oil, while increasing their usage of other commodities.

In the long term, major technological change also promises to help us shift away from oil. Biotechnology and genetic engineering promise ways to produce fuels and polymers from plants. Electrical generation based on renewable sources can offset that from hydrocarbons. Organizational change can also play a role. Power sources and power usage can be brought physically closer together, reducing the cost of transport. Likewise, the amount of travel undertaken by individuals and firms can be reduced through planning that minimizes it.

A final inductive point is that, while people have predicted for hundreds of years that all manner of minerals are in danger of running out, this has not taken place for any. Indeed, the real prices of commodities like gold, silver, and copper have been falling in the long term. For a lengthy statistical treatment of this, see Bjorn Lomborg's The Skeptical Environmentalist.

The short answer, then, is that we have reasons to believe that the real price of oil does not need to increase as the commodity itself becomes scarcer, provided the above assumptions about the capacity for factor substitution and technological change are accurate. Even if not, the same considerations indicate that price rises will at least be moderated in the medium and long-term. It should also be remembered that the overall phenomenon of economic growth increases the buying power of individuals and firms. That is to say, they can each afford more goods and services than they could before. As such, the total proportion of an individual or firms spending power devoted to oil need not grow at the same rate as the price of oil.

Posted by Milan at 12:02 PM   

Migrations

Five days until the qualifying test

I am excited about the upcoming term, not least because Oxford is going to be populated again. Spending so much of the break out of contact with Claire, Emily, Bryony, Margaret, and others has been less than excellent. It has also been less of a spur to study than one might expect or hope. For me, the social element of academic work is crucial. The shared experience of being in the program is a major motivation that erodes a bit in the relative isolation of revision periods. That said, I am managing to buckle down fairly well for the last few days before the exam.

As I acquired a keycard to use the laundry room at St. Antony's, I decided that I will pay little heed to what Alex told me about 'migrating' between colleges as an M.Phil student: namely, that it cannot be done. By stealth, I will become a fixture of the St. Antony's laundry, dining, and social facilities. Library access, I am told, is out of the question. I am undaunted; after all, there will always be the SSL.

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• I want to read the new book of Seamus Heaney poetry, but I must resist until after the QT. I was proud of my UK sophistication when I instantly recognized the significance of the title.
• Much as I like talking with all of you, I am on a self-imposed Adium ban until the QT is over. Adium is a free Mac program that talks to MSN, ICQ, Google Talk, AIM, and other instant messenger programs. If you see me on one of these services, shout at me until I go study instead. For those with a burning need to speak with me, I suggest email or a comment on the blog. I may also be on Skype from time to time.

Posted by Milan at 9:45 PM   

A theory of Kenneth Waltz

While speaking with Roham this afternoon, we stumbled across what may be the perfect Oxford way to respond to a question about Kenneth Waltz. Obviously, the first step is to interrogate the question. What do we mean by 'Waltz?' I think we can analyze him usefully on the basis of three levels of analysis: the cellular, the individual, and the systemic. Clearly, parsimonious theory demands that systemic explanations be concentrated upon: in this case, the extent to which Waltzian theory is constrained and disposed on the basis of the system in which it exists: American academia. A fundamentally anarchical system, where economic power and the recourse to forceful argument is the ultimate arbiter, American academia effectively constitutes large parts of both the identity and interests of Waltz.

Indeed, while a systemic theory of Waltz may not capture all of the detailed minutiae of his history, or the internal processes by which his external policy is defined, it does provide good answers to the big questions of his fundamental behaviours vis a vis other academic actors. Consider the phenomena of bandwagoning and balancing, in response to Waltzian hegemony. Additionally, consider the emergence of counter-hegemonies in different parts of the system. All can be explained on the basis of the distribution of research capabilities, and the rational characteristics of academic actors.

While many would contend that in order to really understand Waltz, we need to go back to analysis at the individual and cellular level - with a particular focus on the cellular elite that comprises his central nervous system - the fact is that theory, once broadened to that extent, risks being overwhelmed with detail and particularity. If we can develop testable hypotheses about the behaviour of Waltz on the basis of systemic analysis alone - evaluated, of course, through rigorous statistical analysis - we will have developed a theory of Kenneth Waltz is both useful and parsimonious.

Posted by Milan at 4:38 PM   

Diseases and factory farming

Despite how mad cow disease (bovine spongiform encephalopathy) and avian influenza have been in the news for years, I've never seen any coverage that explicitly makes the connection between industrial factory farming and the emergence of these diseases. While things like close human-animal contact in the developing world seem to be important when considering outbreaks of influenza, it is entirely a product of an industrial farming system that turns cows into cannibals that BSE has emerged as a threat to human health at all. BSE is a prion illness that spreads between cows when they are fed portions of the brains and spinal cords of their dead brethren. The fact that it keeps cropping up means that this is continuing to happen.

I don't doubt that if people were aware of the realities of where the bulk of humanly consumed meat comes from, there would be a lot more people wary about eating it - on environmental, health, and hygienic grounds. On the disease front, people should at least acknowledge the dangers inherent to keeping thousands of closely packed animals together, all of them on hormones and other drugs to make them grow faster. Additionally, the constant use of antibiotics to try to suppress disease among populations of factory farmed animals contributes to the emergence of bacterial strains resistant to antibiotics. Food animals have also been genetically weakened over time as they have been both 'standardized' so as to produce single definitive variants and bred for qualities like the quantity of a certain kind of meat they produce, rather than being able to resist diseases or even function on their own.

A lot of people seem to take the attitude that "given that I want to eat meat, and I am dimly aware that learning about where it comes from may put me off it, I will resist learning about where it comes from." While psychologically understandable, such approaches do not live up to the standard of good sense, or due diligence with regards to how we behave as individuals and societies.

Posted by Milan at 9:49 AM   

Pastoral wandering

I spent most of today exploring the area around Church Walk. The best discovery, by far, is that we are only two turns and six minutes away from the Port Meadow. Sitting beside the flooded portion of the meadow, immersed the direct afternoon sun, there was the uncanny sense of being profoundly disconnected from my whole environment. I could even see the blood vessels in my retinas: silhouetted in green against the grass and sky.

Out there in the late afternoon, with sun, breeze, and a brie baguette, it was a supremely attractive place. As the sun set, and its light grew redder, all the trees and church spires in the distance were cast with shadows and gorgeous hues. Living right beside a church spire conjures a really effective sense of place.

Seeing all this made me look forward to the summer, when I will have only financial and vague thesis commitments with which to concern myself. Our local environment seems to be the kind of place in which you need to spend a lot of time wandering alone, before you might bring some trusted individual along with you. As most of my trusted individuals are very far from here at present, it's an arrangement that suits me well.

QT strategy

Thinking about the QT, the question now seems to be whether it is worthwhile to push for a distinction. On the basis of the revision I have already done and my practice exam, Dr. Hurrell predicts that I will score in the high sixties. The amount of effort required to push that into the low seventies is probably very high: considering only a couple of people among the 28 in the program are likely to achieve that. The benefits are mostly prestige vis a vis the faculty and fellow students. The best plan, I think, is simply to prepare to a good extent - focusing on the shortfalls that Dr. Hurrell identified - and hope for inspiration to strike on the day of the exam.

Posted by Milan at 7:58 PM   

Iran, international law, and the bomb

While reading about US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice explaining why Iranian nuclear enrichment should be referred to the UN Security Council, I immediately began wondering why such enrichment is a breach of international law. The United States has signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), creating certain legal obligations, as has Iran. India, Pakistan, and Israel are non-signatory nuclear powers. For Iran to actually develop nuclear weapons would be a violation of the NPT, but the process of enrichment - even at an industrial scale that could produce enough uranium-235 for bomb making - does not seem to be, in and of itself. Indeed, the NPT explicitly affirms the right of members to develop civilian nuclear technologies, including uranium enrichment.

The much publicized announcement of Iranian enrichment of uranium was about material enriched to the level of about 3.5% uranium-235: the variety necessary for fission bombs. Such bombs require a much higher concentration of uranium-235, in the vicinity of 90%. Without guessing about the ultimate purpose of the program, the present enrichment activity seems to be in keeping with the requirements of nuclear power, rather than nuclear weapons.

When it comes to the United States and their obligations under the NPT, the present scorecard definitely doesn't look so hot. The nuclear deal with India that President Bush approved and is now seeking Congressional approval for is one such violation, since it includes the provision of nuclear fuel to a state without appropriate controls in place. Likewise, the push to develop new kinds of nuclear weapons is a definite violation of the spirit - if not the precise letter - of the treaty, which stresses the obligation of states to seek disarmament and the reduction of nuclear arsenals.

Maybe it is in the strategic interests of America to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons, but they shouldn't try to cloak that as being an enforcement of international law when it is not. More broadly, the United States should realize that using the United Nations at the times where it seems plausible that it might serve their interests, while ignoring it otherwise, seriously diminishes the credibility of their supposed commitment to multilateralism and international law.

All that said, it is certainly possible that Iran is conducting nuclear research with an aim to developing nuclear weapons. If so, evidence of that breach needs to be presented in an open and verifiable way.

Posted by Milan at 11:33 AM   

Travel plans

As the days get brighter, I have been plotting out travel plans for the period between now and the end of the M.Phil. My primary objective is to see the more interesting, less well known parts of Europe. Much as I enjoy Tuscany or the Italian coastline, it seems more intelligent overall to have a look at places like Estonia, Turkey, and Croatia, while they are reasonably close at hand. Indeed, Instanbul is my top European target at the moment; I am waiting for some combination of free time, money, and a traveling companion to come together. Within the UK, Dublin is the place I would most like to see - ideally with someone like Tristan.

The appeal of Istanbul has much to do with how exotic is seems. Especially after seeing the photos that Emily and Bryony brought back from Morocco, I am hoping to travel somewhere with an Arabic character. It should also afford a good number of photographic opportunities, which is becoming a critical consideration for travel destinations for me.

As much of Europe as their remains to see, I think it's essential that I see some other regions sooner rather than later. At the top of that list is Africa. Three sub-regions have particular appeal: French speaking West Africa (like Ghana and Benin), South Africa, and Kenya and Tanzania. I remain seriously interested in the possibility of climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro in the summer of 2007, as a follow-up to the M.Phil. To finish an academic program, then climb 5.8km straight up one of the world's most interesting mountains would make an excellent pairing. I've also heard a lot about how people have had their climbs sponsored and, in so doing, raised a lot of money for charity. While the time right before the QT isn't right for contemplating such expeditions, it's a good thing to keep in the back of one's mind.

Asia is another major region that I need to visit. I would very much like to go to Japan but, like Africa, it's a place I would much rather go along with someone who has local experience and, ideally, appropriate language skills. I can do well enough in Europe with English and French. I think that would be less true farther afield, especially if I want to experience things beyond the simply touristic.

Visiting Nick Sayeg in Australia would be a lot of fun, especially if it was a part of a trip that also involved Sidney and a good amount of New Zealand. Alex's photos from there are enough to ensure it a place on the relatively long list of potential destinations.

Of course, that leaves South America. For me, South America is more interesting as a quasi-athletic possibility than as a straightforwardly touristic one. My father went cycling in Peru, and Astrid did her incredible looking Andean hiking. It would also be really cool to see Tierra del Fuego, and even Antarctica, if it could somehow be managed.

One third of my Eight Year Plan, the overall strategic framework that should see me through until I am thirty, is defined as "travel everywhere important, or that I really want to see." Through a combination of planning, intelligent selection of jobs and schools, and opportunism, I definitely mean to do so.

Posted by Milan at 7:14 PM   

Progress on many fronts

Successful supervision

Both the meeting with Dr. Hurrell this evening and the exchange dinner went well. Apparently, my practice QT would have scored around 64, which he considers to be a good pass. He made some suggestions for things I can work on during the next week and predicts that I will score between 67 and 69 on the real test. Tomorrow, I get back to revising and writing my own practice essays. Above all, he stressed the importance of constantly sign-posting: indicating in the introduction not only what points you will make, but hinting at their content and stressing their relation to your main thesis. Doing so contradicts the aesthetic style of unfolding argument that I prefer, but it's hardly up to me to set the style for the qualifying test.

I also need to make one of my classic pre-exam lists of specific points made by authors that are likely to be useful for essays. When you can attribute something relatively obscure that is related to the question under discussion, it creates the impression that you have a really extensive grasp of the reading material. While that might be true when you are writing a paper, it can only really be simulated on a test that covers such a broad collection of materials.

I am to meet with Dr. Hurrell again before the end of the break, to discuss emerging thesis plans.

Exchange dinner

The exchange dinner was fun, particularly insofar as it involved talking with Lucy, Leonora, and their friend Anna in the MCR afterwards. The exchange dinner itself seemed more sparsely attended than the one in Cambridge was. I suppose twenty or so people take up much less of our hall than they would at Christ College. It's also rather less of a to-do to have dinner in your own college than it is to cross much of the country. I appreciated the fact that the vegetarian options were quite good.

After the gathering in the MCR really died down, it was nice to have a cup of tea with Anna at the G and D's on Little Clarendon Street: one of my favourite bits of Oxford, especially as it appears at night.

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• The iPod Shuffle is a brilliant little device. Worn in a shirt pocket, you barely feel it. Somehow, music sounds better from a device that you don't even notice that you're carrying.

Posted by Milan at 1:05 AM   

Day largely bereft of revision

Happy Birthday Louise Little

There's nothing like sitting at your own kitchen table with food, music, and something good to read. It's an experience that was decidedly lacking in Wadham, and one that I am quite glad to have once more. Now, I just need to find a way to reconcile the making of coffee with the mineral content of Oxford water.

I need to get a set of wrenches for my bike. A few days ago, while I was riding on the Iffley Road, the pedal fell off, complete with the shaft that connects it to the bearing around which it rotates. Today, my handlebars suddenly became loose and slid well out of their intended position, making riding in a straight line impossible. They may not have put quite enough torque into the assembly.

Clearly, Church Walk is going to be the happening place to be this summer. Roham lives across the street, and was over here for a while last night. Emily will be living up the road, and was also over here for a while last night. She even brought us flowers, which was very kind.

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• I borrowed one of Kai's Apocalyptica CDs this evening. Drew Sexsmith first introduced me to them, and I really love the way they do strings with punk-rock style percussion backing. It's extremely dramatic and musically effective. That's probably why "Drive" is my favourite song of theirs, not to be confused with the Melissa Ferrick version.
• A word to all the commenters: I appreciate the contributions that you make to the blog a great deal. It makes is much more vibrant to have some feedback. That said, please include some kind of name when you leave one. It doesn't have to be your real name, just something that other people can refer to. Conversations between a pack of people, all called 'Anonymous' get confusing fast.
• Tristan linked a site about underground exploration that brought back happy memories of exploring the steam tunnels at the University of British Columbia with the Afternoon Tea Society.
• My brother Mica is going to be a residence advisor in Totem Park next year. Apparently, that means free tuition at UBC, as well as free residence. Good for him.

Posted by Milan at 9:21 PM   

On narration

Reasons for which I am not too guilty about writing a blog that is often just a "daily diary filled with trite commentary:"

1. Letting my family keep track of what I am up to
2. The same, for those friends who care to know
3. Documenting the Oxford student experience for those thinking of coming here, or those simply interested
4. Keeping track of various things that may be important to know in the future

For those it bothers, it shouldn't be too difficult to skim or ignore.

Posted by Milan at 9:03 PM   

Second termly report

In my pigeon-hole today, I received my supervisor's report on me for Hilary Term:

He has produced a series of well researched and interesting papers, and he engages very well with the issues in the theory seminar. It is perhaps important to think a little more about ways of sharpening the focus of the argument of his papers, especially given the constraints of the Qualifying Test. But overall he seems to be getting a lot out of the MPhil. He is continuing in his energetic search for funding opportunities.

My Michaelmas assessment was posted here in January. They both seem reasonably good to me. I am meeting with Dr. Hurrell to discuss my practice qualifying test tomorrow evening. Afterwards, I have the second portion of the Wadham exchange dinner with Christ College, Cambridge, where they will be dining here.

Posted by Milan at 6:31 PM   

Last post of the day

For three hours, I sat in the Wadham Library and wrote until my arm practically fell off. The result: forty-three handwritten double-spaced pages in response to three questions. I didn't make reference to many specific authors, but I definitely think I got the concepts down. I was particularly gratified to get a question on the relevance of neo-Marxism in a globalizing world. Regardless of whether it's a perfect Oxford exam, I am supremely confident that I haven't embarrassed myself with it. I meet with Andrew Hurrell on Wednesday to discuss it. The real QT is on the 20th.

After having a few hours to get used to it, I can say with a good degree of certainty that my new room is a distinct step up. My basic thoughts when I arrived in Library Court: "Not bad... but I thought this was Oxford." I understand it better now, and rooms with windows that show the outside world are good. Especially when it's right behind your iBook screen: reminding you that the world does not turn upon the subtleties (and blatancies) and the blogosphere.

PS. Remember the iPod that Apple said was working fine when I first sent it to them? Well, they are sending me a new one now that they have re-tested it and realized that it was every bit as broken as I said it was. They could probably have saved some money on shipping if they just listened to me the first time...

Considering the three-year AppleCare plan cost me about $80 Canadian and the iPod has already been replaced twice, it seems like a pretty good deal, doesn't it?

Bring on iPod the fourth!

Posted by Milan at 11:59 PM   

Published from 2 Church Walk, Oxford

One of the reasons for which the journey tale is an archetypal genre of fiction is because it is intuitively obvious that traveling can lead to new understandings and possibly enlightenment. The two kilometre trek from Wadham College to Church Walk has already done so; I can tell that I am going to have to change my life.

Firstly, I can see that in any room that has a decent supply of shelving, the supply of books I have here is absolutely pitiful. If you walked into the room of a thirteen year old with as many books as I have, you would become concerned about his life prospects and strongly suspect that he spends too much time playing video games.

Secondly, I am going to need to learn to rise with the dawn, at the same time as I am unlearning any immodest behaviours I have picked up. This is because my room lacks both bedsheets and curtains, though I do have a lovely view into the back yard and the houses around us.

All told, this place is really nice, and it was very kind of Kai to help me move. Between the adjacent kitchen and the large amounts of natural lighting, this place strikes me as much nicer than Library Court, all told. I am excited about living here, and inviting people for tea and such. First, I need to go write that damnable practice examination.

Posted by Milan at 3:10 PM   

Farewell to Library Court

Everything from my strategic loose change reserve - an incoherent mix of Canadian, British, Maltese, American, Estonian, and Finnish coins - to my tea kettle is now packed. Hopefully, my brain is equally packed with practice QT appropriate knowledge, rather than my account number at a bank I stopped using a decade ago and have never been able to forgot. (This was before they would give me a bank card, so I had to write it out every time.)

My fellow denizens should know that I've enjoyed living in their company, and that the shift to Church Walk has much more to do with long term accommodation needs than any dissatisfaction with living in Wadham. Doubtless, I will come around and lurk dangerously once in a while, with collar up and hat brim low.

Posted by Milan at 10:06 AM   

Exam dress rehearsal tomorrow

Today concluded both packing and first wave studying, with enough time left over to walk with Louise for a bit in the Wadham gardens and appreciate a couple of the brief but intense hailstorms that have been a feature of this variable day. In Shakespearean fashion, the weather is demonstrating the existence of changes afoot.

I have now re-read all my notes, all my papers, the comments on my papers, as well as many of the papers which I've exchanged with my classmates. I feel familiar, overall, with the type of questions being asked about the first world war, the middle east, and China and Japan. Any question on the United States would be a gift to me, since I did so much US history and foreign policy at UBC. On the theory side, I think I have a strong grasp on everything except international society - partly because it is somewhat vague as a discipline, when compared with the neos, constructivism, and such. I'd like to answer a question on Gramsci's Marxism, because I think his ideas are really interesting.

The biggest question weighing upon my mind at present does not have to do with the content of either of the core seminars being examined. Rather, it has to do with the stylistic requirements of a formal Oxford examination. For instance, I am uncertain about how important it is to discuss the ideas of theorists with reference to their names, or whether we can answer the question in relatively non-annotated ways. In some cases, it's easy: "As constructivist theorists like Wendt identify, the iterated interplay between states serves to constitute their identities over time," for instance. When it comes to topics that I've read a huge amount about in many different sources (for instance, humanitarian intervention), it becomes almost impossible for me to remember who exactly said what. Thankfully, the questions on the qualifying tests are quite open ended. Here are some examples from past exams, courtesy of Alex Stummvoll:

• 'The First World War was the logical outcome of imperialism.' Do you agree? (QT 2003/Easter)
• Was the peace settlement of 1919 doomed from the start or was it undermined by the Great Depression? (QT 2003/Easter)
• Was there a better case for appeasing Japan rather than Germany in the 1930s? (QT 2002/Easter)
• Does ‘self-interest’ mean the same thing to neorealists and constructivists? (QT 2003/Trinity)
  Is it correct to say that while democracy produces peace, democratization produces war? (QT 2000/Easter)
• ‘The expansion of international law into areas that involve fundamental conflicts of interest has usually resulted in the weakening of law rather than any real constraint on the practice of states.’ Discuss. (M.Phil 2000)

That diminishes the importance of knowing each and every fact, but increases the importance of getting the style and structure right. We need to answer three such questions over the course of the three hour exam, including at least one from history and one from theory.

---

• I really wish Blogger had categories incorporated in the way that WordPress does. Then I would feel less guilty about how eclectic these postings can be. If I could mark things obviously as 'boring day to day life,' 'reflections on Oxford,' 'world politics,' 'environmental politics,' 'photography,' 'literature,' and such, people would have an easier time reading only what they care to. That said, I've been making an effort to separate discussions of different fields into distinct posts or sections, with comprehensible titles. Topic posts (usually without photos) are more focused than there were in previous times and daily posts (usually with photos) capture the bulk of the day-to-day stuff that some readers find intolerably boring.
• Are there any other formatting suggestions people have? One possibility is to actually separate the substantive discussions in my area of core academic competence - world politics and environmental politics - and put them into another blog.
• In my inbox, there are a collection of the kind of emails I am always excited to receive: lengthy, substantive ones from friends that I want to respond well to. I shall do so after the move and practice QT are done. You are not being ignored.

Posted by Milan at 8:56 PM   

Brief comment on Iran

The idea that the United States is planning to attack Iran seems to be gaining currency in the media. Let us hope that this is an intentional strategy of intimidation meant to bolster efforts to deal with the Iranian nuclear program diplomatically. Compared to Iraq - which had been crippled by sanctions and frequent military interventions in the years leading up to the second Gulf War - Iran certainly retains the offensive capability to inflict considerable direct and indirect damage to American and other western interests.

Consider the single possibility of rendering the Strait of Hormuz impassable. Given the sheer volume of oil that passes through there, a disruption could cause severe economic problems worldwide. Between air power and missiles, Iran also has the capacity to strike targets throughout the region. Any military action in Iran would lead to casualties that make the 2000 or so in Iraq so far look like nothing: and that's just if the strikes are based around conventional forces. There is apparently talk of using tactical nuclear weapons to strike embedded facilities, such as the uranium centrifuge cascade that is supposedly under construction. Even without nuclear weapons, Iran could inflict massive casualties in retaliation for such an attack: an attack that would also be a gross violation of international law and any reasonable code of morality.

Anyone who is as terrified as I am by recent revelations that the United States may be planning an attack on Iran, or who maintains a general interest in the Middle East region, might want to take a look at a new Oxford blog: Middle East Wonks. Among the contributors is my friend and fellow M.Phil student Roham Alvandi, who I was impressed to learn writes about Iran for the Economist Intelligence Unit.

Posted by Milan at 1:53 PM   

Study strategies

Most of my fellow students will understand what I mean when I describe the point in time, before a test, when your strategy switches from that of best practice to that of last ditch defence. This is the point where studying (or revising, as it is called here) becomes cramming.

As a strategy, it's not too bad. There will always be details that you cannot retain in the long term: because they aren't interesting to you, because they are very specific, or because they just refuse to stick. The revising phase cements the major themes, concepts, and ideas that can be easily remembered in both the short and the long term. The cramming phase sprinkles the desperate remnants on top, where one hopes they will not be jostled off before the exam.

Posted by Milan at 1:08 PM   

Evening enormously more valuable than revising

Happy Birthday Chris Yung

Many thanks to Leonora and Lucy for inviting me over for a very enjoyable dinner party. It included excellent vegetarian pasta, wine, and the kind of superb company one hopes to encounter at Oxford. The gathering was the sort of Kitsilano basement suite event that was becoming standard among my more sophisticated friends during my last year at UBC. The contrast with an evening in a smoky pub is considerable, and the differences much appreciated. The other contrast - with a day spent orbiting between reading venues and guiltily checking email - likewise put me in a mood to especially appreciate the party. Meeting some more of Lucy and Leonora's friends was one of the nicest things I've done in Oxford for a long time. Hopefully, it shall not prove a lone occurrence.

For some reason, cycling home through a cold and recently inundated Oxford - after such an event - felt like a quintessentially graduate school experience.

Tomorrow will be my last day living in Wadham. That means I need to pack all the things that I use almost constantly. I also need to finish revising for my practice QT. In truth, I am nowhere near ready for the history segment. There is a huge amount to know about international history from 1900 to 1950, and it isn't anywhere so fresh in my mind as the theory from last term was. That said, if I write two theory papers and one on history, I should do well enough to not embarass myself too badly in front of my supervisor. It will also allow him to give me useful direction for the real exam on the 20th.

Posted by Milan at 1:05 AM   

Questions of governance and respect

While I was revising IR theory, I found myself wondering how we establish whether an approach to development assistance is patronizing or not. For example, we can send a team of economic advisers to help create macroeconomic stability in a developing country. As Jeffrey Sachs' role in ending hyperinflation in Bolivia seems to show, this is a strategy that can yield results. Of course, this kind of 'we know better' approach might hamper the development of governance structures and new ideas in the long run.

That said, leaving countries to sort things out for themselves could still be considered patronizing. Not only do we know better, but we know even better than that: we know to allow countries to make their own mistakes in the interests of developing legitimacy and their own capacity. Maybe, by that point, the patronizing aspect has become neutralized or non-corrosive.

These questions are relevant to my research when we start thinking about environmental governance and development. No problems crop up where new technology is both more economically efficient and cleaner. The trouble comes when situations like China's growing need for energy and its huge reserves of coal are considered in combination.

There are situations where choices that would not be made in the rich world might make sense in the developing world, even at the cost of a somewhat damaged environment in those countries. Look how many forests were cleared in Europe during the period of industrialization. The trickiest issue is in places where the ecological harm is borne, in some measure, by everyone. How do we reconcile the teleological objective of a healthy planet with the deontological imperative to respect the freedom of states to make their own choices?

Posted by Milan at 3:41 PM   

Maddening little bits

Whoever designed the expensive electronic devices that ship with these tiny plastic doo-dads must have been aware, on some level, that there were people out there who would actually try to keep track of them. As such, it can only be understood as an act of cruelty that they were made so small and, in many cases, actually transparent.

Without exaggeration, I can affirm that I have spent at least one hour of my life looking for each of these, and many more in a state of paralytic anxiousness about them. That's particularly true of the tiny, soft, black things. If I lose one of those, my expensive headphones become worthless. Once, after being up all night, I spent almost an hour searching the main road beside the Nanaimo Skytrain Station, looking for one of these that had fallen off while I was crossing. I did find it, but nearly got killed by passing cars a half dozen times, while crossing the road looking straight downwards over and over again.

£1 coin included for scale.

Posted by Milan at 3:06 PM   

One weekend before the move and practice exam

Everything aside from studying moved forward well today: working on taxes, dealing with the bank and college, and packing. I now have essentially everything that I don't use many times a day packed into fruit boxes from Sainsbury's. I also went for a solid forty minute bike ride, up the Cowley Road and back to Wadham. It is becoming a truism that I am never so productive in non-school areas as when some big school deadline is looming.

The practice exam plan is to write the thing immediately after moving my stuff to Church Walk on the morning of the 10th. I can start unpacking afterwards, after I have hand delivered it to Nuffield. That way, I will have all of tomorrow and Sunday to revise. Naturally, I will be less than entirely prepared when I write the practice exam. I will have another ten days afterwards and - critically - those ten days won't include moving or the other miscellaneous projects that are cluttering my personal ecosystem.

To those who have received one of the letters I've written lately with a fountain pen: does it improve the legibility of my printing? If so, I may use it for the qualifying test, in place of the four-coloured ballpoint pens that are the workhorses of my note taking.

Tiny new toy incoming

I ordered a one gigabyte iPod Shuffle from the Apple Store today. I am sick of having nothing to listen to during my 20GB iPod's frequent trips to service depots. Also, it only cost a bit more than the service charges NatWest imposed on me in exchange for a bank draft to give to Wadham. The tiny size and twelve hour battery life are selling points. I tried about twenty shops in Oxford, looking for one, and discovered that they cannot be had here for love or money. It should arrive early next week.

When you're used to studying with music, it's surprisingly difficult to do so without it. Naturally, trying to use my computer as a music source leads to inescapable distraction. Spending so long without a working iPod has also proven to me how intolerable human babies are. I am personally astounded that parents can endure such shrieking on a continual basis. It can only really be explained with the endorphins and other opium-like chemicals our brains and glands see fit to flood us with, in order to ease the process of procreation.

Within twenty years, there will doubtless be a sub-dermal version of the iPod that charges using energy it draws from your body and downloads songs wirelessly off your iTunes library, which will probably be stored online by then. It will be a good day when that comes about. Hopefully, it won't be necessary to ship one's arm back to Apple every year or so, because the hard drive keeps failing.

PS. Lee Jones has a good post sharing my indignation about the Department of Politics and International Relations actually being commended by the ESRC for our quantitative methods training.

Posted by Milan at 8:14 PM   

Great power history

While revising, I have realized that ninety percent of all the history I have ever done has been the history of six countries between around 1900 and the present. Here they are, complete with a crude trend line for their overall influence/affluence:

• United States (Up)
• Britain (Down)
• Russia (Down, Up, Down)
• China (Down, Up)
• Japan (Up, Down, Up)
• Germany (Up, Down, Up, Down, Up)

Top performer: USA
Most improved: Japan
Most troublesome: Germany
Most dramatic: Russia / China, tie
Most graceful decline: Britain

The history of other countries has mostly been bound up in their importance, vis a vis this crew. For instance, the transition from British to American hegemony in the Middle East, the role of France in developing and maintaining the interwar order in Europe, India as the jewel of the British Empire, American containment strategies in Europe and Latin America, or the various imperial phases of all and sundry.

I am fairly sure you could get a distinction on my International System 1900-50 qualifying test without mentioning any other states.

Posted by Milan at 10:43 AM   

Taxes, exams, and changing seasons

From the way Oxford looks already, you can tell that it is going to be gorgeous in the summer. That is especially true for those of us who arrived in September and October; we've never been exposed to the verdant face of Oxford. I confess that it is something of a surprise to actually see leaves on a tree here.

The overall feeling created by long, bright days is quite at odds with the knowledge that there is a whole other term left. Eight more seminars, another batch of papers, and of course the research design essay. Having a room increasingly full of boxes combines with the sunshine to make me feel as though summer is very nearly here. Far better, for the moment, to focus on the short and medium term.

Running into Emily at the Codrington was enjoyable - a reminder of when we were there reading about the middle east and the interwar period the first time around. To study that time period and region in the same college and library where T.E. Lawrence wrote his two books and innumerable letters has a certain excellence of authenticity to it. Moving on: I am off to study international relations theory in the SSL.

This evening, I even managed to roll over my financial spreadsheets into the new fiscal year. Because it's all done using formulas I've made myself, it's no small task to shift so much information around. Updating and connecting four databases, listing information on seven accounts in two currencies and countries, along with two credit cards, is tricky. Doing all that under conditions where you document every transaction over the entire year, down to the penny, is really laborious. All the same, I prefer a system that I designed and hence understand to the incomprehensible datasets produced by programs like Quicken. Tax audits do not scare me. I even have all of the receipts more or less sorted.

The Skeptical Environmentalist

I am presently reading Bjorn Lomborg's The Skeptical Environmentalist: a book that has created a huge amount of controversy since it was released, because it questions the empirical basis for the idea that the global environment is undergoing severe degradation. There are two major kinds of arguments in the book, each of which is somewhat problematic to deal with:

1. The empirical argument that, for instance, forest cover is increasing in Canada, while the Worldwatch Institute says that it is decreasing, and that the rate of contraction in places like Brazil is far lower than it is generally listed as being. These kinds of arguments are difficult to access because they turn on the level of credibility we assign to experts. While we could theoretically go look at the numbers themselves, we don't know enough about the numbers to know which are important, which are credible, and why.
2. The social and political argument about the character of what Lomborg calls 'the litany' of environmental decline: here, he is talking about the tendency to exaggerate, to accept bad figures more easily than good ones, and to manipulate data in ways that serve political ends. As in the first case, much of what he says is probably correct. The difficulty is in assessing the overall importance of competing claims, as well as the overall legitimacy of different claimants.

I shall write more about it as I progress through the book. I will be especially interested to see what he has to say about fisheries. Organizations like the Sea Around Us Project at UBC seem to employ the kind of rigorous statistical methods Lomborg espouses, and the picture they paint of the state of world fisheries is hardly a rosy one.

Posted by Milan at 8:25 PM   

Praise and censure

In a bewildering move, the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) has actually praised the quantitative methods training offered by the Department of Politics and International Relations. This is the same training that 27 of the 28 people in my program formally protested the poor quality of, in a letter to the department. I think the predominant view of the statistics portion of the M.Phil, among those taking it, is that it's the primary evidence that just because something is taught at Oxford, that doesn't mean that it's taught well. It's the black mark within an otherwise excellent program. A great deal of dissatisfaction with the course was also expressed to me by several members of the faculty, as well as the program director.

Hopefully, the ESRC was looking at one of the other statistics courses being offered by the department, rather than the one given to people doing M.Phils in International Relations. Ours managed to please nobody: neither those already experienced with statistics nor neophytes, neither those who see a lot of value in quantitative methods nor those who prefer other methodologies.

To any fellow M.Phils reading the blog: would you not agree that the quantitative methods training we received was not deserving of praise of this kind?

Posted by Milan at 4:19 PM   

Longer days, upcoming exam

Academic nuts and bolts

In a spurt of productivity this afternoon (helped along by the Venti coffee I got during my walk with Louise), I finished editing the venerable fish paper for submission to MITIR. With the deadline just five days away, on the same day that my practice exam is due and when I am moving, it seemed most sensible to do a modest edit and send it off on a wing and a prayer. Without access to my original sources and ample amounts of time, nothing more ambitious could be attempted.

The first priority now is to sort out taxes and the final payment to Wadham College for this year. I also need to learn why NatWest missed two months worth of interest payments on my accounts, then fined me eighteen Pounds for not paying a bill which I never received, and which cannot be paid online. They are the worst bank I have ever had to deal with, including one in Canada where I closed my account in disgust.

The second priority is to pack. Does anyone know of somewhere in Oxford that has large and study cardboard boxes up for grabs? It seems that if I can have everything ready to go on the morning of the 10th, Kai will be able to help shift my stuff in his car. I can then spend the afternoon writing my practice exam for Dr. Hurrell, so that we can discuss it on the 12th. I will then have eight last days in which to revise, partly guided by his suggestions. Revision in general, with a particular eye to the practice test, is the third priority.

The revision plan, at this point, is basically to read over my notes a couple of times: both those from lectures and seminars and those on the readings. I will also go back over my own essays carefully - trying to hammer the knowledge of who wrote what about what into my brain - and the essays of a few friends.

Sometime at the start of the term, Kai, Alex, and I will need to throw some kind of welcome party at the Church Walk flat. The huge backyard would be ideal for an afternoon gathering, especially if we could find some seating.

Oxford spring

The walk around Christ Church Meadows with Louise this afternoon was a stunning demonstration of a greening Oxford. The cherry blossom trees in front of St. Mary's Church are stunning, and the increasingly verdant look of the meadows themselves lends hope to downtrodden graduate students. My favourite geese were out on display, as well clutches of people in boats on the Isis and secondary waterways.

I have been making an effort to cycle at least half an hour a day. The exercise is enjoyable, and a nice contrast to my relative idleness during periods of reading.

Posted by Milan at 9:36 PM   

Short Cambridge foray

I just returned from Cambridge, after a long coach ride in the same clothes I wore last night, on account of having forgotten the change of clothes I packed in Wadham. Largely due to time constraints, I saw hardly any of Cambridge. I saw the inside of Christ College, where we had dinner, and some of the surrounding streets. From the coach, I saw the river.

Like St. John's College, in Oxford, Christ College seems to extend back in fairly linear fashion from the porter's lodge. Meeting some of the students at our sister college, as well as a surprising number of Wadham graduates who I don't recall having spoken with before, made it a fairly good use of 24 hours. The knowledge that I only have 15 days left before my qualifying test led to me going to bed enormously earlier than most people seem to have done.

Obviously, I will need to return at some point. I am off to shower and get back to reading.

PS. Mica has two new videos online.

Posted by Milan at 2:28 PM   

Malta Trip Photos: Final Installment of Digital Camera Shots

Regrettably, there will probably be some duplication once the film gets developed and scanned. Even so, I thought these were worth putting up.

Harbours, boats, and clear seas

Interesting rock formations

Limestone farmhouse

Fisherman's chapel

Field of flowers

My mother certainly has a disapproving look here, probably because of how much the wide angle effect increases the apparent size of the bottle.

Posted by Milan at 7:44 PM   

Another one bites the dust

It's never encouraging to look into your pigeon hole and see a slim envelope from a scholarship committee: in this case, the selection committee for Oxford's Overseas Research Scholarship (ORS):

I regret to tell you that your application was unsuccessful. Unfortunately, due to the large number of applicants we are unable to provide individual feedback on the results.

Those who have applied and not found such a letter in your post, take heart. The ORS is quite a nice scholarship, which converts the fees you pay as an international student to those paid by someone from the UK: a dramatic reduction.

Posted by Milan at 12:28 PM   

Brief post from a busy life

I got a good amount of revision done today and had a last dinner with my mother, prior to her return to Vancouver tomorrow. At noon, she leaves for Heathrow. At three in the afternoon, I am going to Cambridge for an exchange dinner. If I had known how hectic a time period it was going to fall during, I would have thought twice about signing up. As it happens, I will try to do what reading I can on the coach.

Those in need of some entertainment, and who have not yet seen my annotated Malta photos, might give that a try.

I will be more interesting soon.

Posted by Milan at 8:47 PM   

Malta Trip Photos: Second Installment

I will keep posting photos here that are not quite arty enough to be part of the Photo.net album, but which have some documentary value that compensates. As a bonus, all photos on the blog are included at 1024x768 resolution, while those on Photo.net are a maximum of 800x600. People wanting the full 2048x1536 jpeg files my camera produces can request them by email or comment.

Valletta's status as a frequently invaded city is demonstrated by the elaborate fortifications that have been constructed around the harbour.

An important trans-shipment point between the countries circling the Mediterranean, Malta has extensive ship building and material transfer capabilities, both in Valletta Harbour and on the south side of the island near the main power plant.

The interior of St. John's Co-Cathedral is both elaborate and unusual. The church is rectangular, with alcoves along the edges and a semi-cylindrical roof. Also, can anyone - perhaps Tony - enlighten me as to the meaning of a 'co' cathedral?

The emergence of skeletonized dead from tombs is an exceptionally common motif on the panels that make up the cathedral floor, each of which seems to be a grave marker.

My mother under an archway in central Valletta.

Posted by Milan at 7:17 PM   

Trying to increase nose-grindstone proximity

Revision began in earnest today and, as I predicted before, it managed to induce that little tinge of raw panic that is the basis for all academic achievement. Many thanks to Claire for stripping questions from the most recent qualifying test from the lists of past questions I will be studying from. As I am meant to write a practice test consisting of last year's exam for Dr. Hurrell by the tenth of April, and it would hardly do to know the questions while I am revising.

If I want to submit the fish paper to the MIT International Review - with submissions for its inaugural issue due by the 10th of April - I will need to get started on editing and reformatting it. Doing so is quite difficult because I don't remember the sources well or have them with me. I wrote this more than a year ago, after all. The submission guidelines do say that: "After initial submission, writers whose articles are being considered for publication will be asked to resubmit articles according to more specific guidelines." As such, it's probably best to do a moderate edit and see if they're interested, before I commit a lot of time.

When contemplating the fact that April 10th is also the day during which I am to move, I may have stumbled across a universal law:

The law of deadline gravitation

The times and dates when projects are due will approach one another at a rate directly proportional to the number of hours the respective projects will require to complete, and inversely proportional to the distance already separating them.

This explains why big tasks cluster - like periods of examination - but why mundane tasks arise constantly and individually. While much theoretical work remains to be done on this concept, it seems plausible to me that the attractive force may only apply itself to certain classes of tasks: just as photons are exempted from the effects of magnetic fields.

Looks like I may not have as much time to try out my new bike as I thought. Of course, spending a week in Malta leaves me with no reason to complain about having to buckle down now.

More iPod trouble

Well, the iPod that Apple sent back because it was apparently fine will not be recognized by my computer at all and now simply boots to an unhappy Mac icon when you turn it on. I wonder if they actually looked at the thing before they decided that "issues reported concerning [my] iPod" "were found to be within Apple's specifications for acceptable performance, usability and/or functionality." I'll call them again tomorrow. Looks like it's going back to the Netherlands.

Posted by Milan at 7:04 PM   

Malta Trip Photos: First Installment

In some order determined by my patience and level of distraction by other ongoing concerns, I will be posting a collection of photos from the Malta trip here, as well as on my Photo.net page. Keep checking back for updates, if you're interested.

The architecture in Malta frequently reflects its 98% Catholic population.

This shot was snapped between two chained and angry dogs, during our first hike.

Surprisingly elaborate steps down to a Maltese beach.

You can identify a traditional Maltese fishing boat by the Eyes of Horus near the bow, as well as a distinctive colour scheme.

Much of Malta seems to be either in repair or under construction.

Posted by Milan at 2:23 AM   

From tiny island country to small island country

Well, I am back in England - where you can't figure out how to turn on dryers and water heaters (the secret is often pulling on a rope hanging from some dark corner of the ceiling), where they will charge you as much for a half hour train ride as lunch and a whole day's exploring in Gozo does, and where you will wrap your rain jacket around your shoulders while reading, despite being indoors, within the confines of a surprisingly sunny living room. That's not meant as a series of complaints, of course. Indeed, I read about sixty pages of Bill Bryson's Notes from a Small Island while trying to dry my socks on an icy radiator and can therefore say that the above is positively chipper by comparison.

In a few hours, I am heading to Drury Lane to see The Producers with my mother before trekking myself and a great mass of dirty clothes to Marble Arch for the bus back to Oxford. One piece of welcome news, delivered by text message as my mother and I waited in line at passport control at Gatwick Airport, is that Louise will be in Oxford next week. Her presence will either mean that I will have someone to scrutinize my efforts at revising, even as I play the same role for her, or that I will have good company to look forward to in those periods when I will take breaks.

Tomorrow, it will take the greatest restraint to avoid spending hours sorting and editing photos. That is to say, I will almost certainly spend much of tomorrow doing exactly that. I will then work myself into a proper panic by looking through the dozens of exam related Word document attachments that are lurking in my email inbox. My mother is stopping by Oxford on Monday and spending that night, before returning to Vancouver the day after. Hopefully, she will have the chance to meet a few more friends I've made in the U.K., as further demonstration of how clever and interesting Oxford graduate students can be.

Posted by Milan at 5:51 PM   

Matters of definition

Cryptoblog: A weblog somehow concealed or encrypted, so as to restrict those who have access. Unlike password based restrictions or 'friends lists,' cryptoblogs are intended to present an overt challenge to those wanting access, calling upon them to exercise cleverness in figuring out how.

Also, cryptoblogging: the act of writing a cryptoblog.

See also, weblog: A frequently updated web site consisting of personal observations, excerpts from other sources, etc., typically run by a single person, and usually with hyperlinks to other sites; an online journal or diary. (Source: OED)

Posted by Milan at 1:22 PM