Across Difficult Country

I read in the news that : America's second biggest bank, JP Morgan Chase, has made a rare apology for its subsidiaries' involvement in the slave trade 200 years ago, admitting that it accepted slaves as loan collateral and ended up owning several hundred. In the spirit of atonement exemplified by JP Morgan Chase, I would like to apologize to the descendants of anyone who may have suffered a raping or a pillaging at the hands of one of my Viking ancestors. I feel terrible about it. Or I did, before apologizing. Now I feel terrific. I will not, however, apologize to the proprietors or any of the employees of the Super 8 Motel on East Cherry Street in Vermillion, SD, who maliciously claim I caused a variety of incidents during the brief time I stayed there. My policy is that anyone who voluntarily accepts my money in exchange for drinks deserves whatever ensues. Luckily, I discovered the delightful Comfort Inn. I enjoyed my stay there immensely, and if I ever come back I...

My planned excavation of Paha Wakan hill has run into the objections of the local authorities. It seems one can’t dig up Indian sacred sites without getting numerous permits first, now matter how momentous the discovery one is on the verge of (did they make Galileo fill out all the proper forms before he dropped his balls off the roof?). In this new Dark Age the petty whims of the bureaucrat ruling class take precedence over Science. The weather forecast of snow and a high of 0 degrees Fahrenheit for Friday does not help matters much either. Why does anyone live here? Surprisingly, there is an institution of higher learning in this town, the University of South Dakota . I recommend sending your kids to it if you wish to punish them. I foolishly thought some of the scholars at USD would be interested in assisting my archeological endeavors, but they were in fact hostile, and abetted the obstruction of my planned dig. Undoubtedly they could not bear the thought of a clever amateur di...

When were the Americas first settled? Some archeologists claim to have discovered tools and other evidence of human activity at a site in South Carolina which radiocarbon date to 50,000 years ago. Many scientists dispute this date as far too early, among them anthropological geneticist Spencer Wells . Analyses of genetic markers not only indicate a date closer to 20,000 years ago, but preclude the possibility of a date as early as 50,000 years ago. The genetic evidence is so convincing Wells believes that "It is likely...the 50,000 year old "tools" found there were produced by natural flaking, not human manufacture, and that the charred plant remains resulted from a natural fire" (letters, Discover magazine, Feb. 2005). But what if the authenticity of the tools withstands scrutiny, how could they be reconciled with the genetic evidence? According to Wells "...there is an intriguing, although unlikely, possibility. Given the recent discovery in Flores of a d...