A Peace Offering

In light of recent current events, I thought it might be worth rerunning some of my posts about peace. These include Turkish Delight, A Giant Keg for Mankind, What Stands Between Us is Only Words, and Non-Violence and the Jedi.

http://www.samuraiscientist.blogspot.com/search/label/peace

Talkin' politics

Hi [Samurai],

Being that you are one of the most politically liberal people I'm in contact with, and I believe you to be intellectually honest, I'm curious how you would respond to this: Warmongers or Peacemakers: Who will scorch the earth?

Granted it's from a conservative source, but it seems to raise some very convincing points.

Also: WIKI - Prisoner's_dilemma Prisoner's dilemma & Obama

The arguments raised by the above cause the current approaches to relations with other countries, both by the US and Israel, to trouble me greatly.

(If you aren't yet interested in a political discussion, ignore this...)

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Hey [Friend in Israel], thanks for the e-mail, I appreciate your genuine interest. I do try to be intellectually honest.

So far, I've listened only to the first video (about Hitler, WWII). I think these arguments do hold some water. In particular, I agree with the speaker's central thesis - that diplomacy frequently fails to bring peace. However, I think the speaker is not sufficiently critical of war, which often fails as well (often at tremendous cost).

... The main problem with the video is that it only considers only two options: diplomacy (by politicians), or war. Neither option is very effective in my opinion. This is characteristic of Western thought these days - very polarized, not very creative.

There is a third option - one that has been largely forgotten even by the left. That option is non-violent resistance. It is the way of Ghandi and Martin Luther King, both of whom led tremendously successful social movements post-WW2. Non-violence does not mean non-action. It means active protest without resorting to violence. In theory, this helps you win the enemy's hearts and minds by getting them to think and respect you. If you are interested in learning how it works, I suggest you read two books:

1. The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr., by Clayborne Carson
--this is a collection of MLK's writings and speeches, chronicling his civil rights days through his opposition to Vietnam

2. Ghandi: an Autobiography; the Story of My Experiments With Truth
--penned by Ghandi himself, it goes into depth about his early upbringing and his philosophies of non-violence and experimentation

A common denominator to these two fellows is that they were raised very religious, although in two different faiths, and both men drew from their faiths to arrive at the principle of non-violence. I can relate to this; when I memorized Pirkei Avot over ten years ago, the many sayings about peace, wisdom, and relationships planted the seeds of this philosophy in my mind, well before I read any of the above.

I think there are other ways to wage peace besides non-violent resistance, but you really have to get creative. This creativity is what's missing from our leaders these days. I do not trust them one lick - they are old fools, and one is worse than the next. I would not follow them into battle, or rely on them to make peace through diplomatic means.

Hope this gives you something to think about! Let me know if you have any specific responses to what I've said. Take care and always fun to talk politics with you.
Samurai

PS Have you ever seen Watchmen? Or read the graphic novel? It gets into a lot of these questions. You might like where it ends up.

How To Create 10,000,000 Jobs

President Obama, here's a little back-of-the-envelope calculation for you:

~1~ Monthly wage for a security guard = $2,000.

~2~ Cost/month of our wars in Iraq+Afghanistan =
$20,000,000,000. (Yes, that many zeroes.)

~3~ Number of security guards this could employ instead =
$20,000,000,000/$2,000 = 10,000,000.

Economy crisis, solved.

Towers of Miscommunication

ד וַיֹּאמְרוּ הָבָה נִבְנֶה-לָּנוּ עִיר, וּמִגְדָּל וְרֹאשׁוֹ בַשָּׁמַיִם, וְנַעֲשֶׂה-לָּנוּ, שֵׁם: פֶּן-נָפוּץ, עַל-פְּנֵי כָל-הָאָרֶץ.	4 And they said: 'Come, let us build us a city, and a tower, with its top in heaven, and let us make us a name; lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.'
ו וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה, הֵן עַם אֶחָד וְשָׂפָה אַחַת לְכֻלָּם, וְזֶה, הַחִלָּם לַעֲשׂוֹת; וְעַתָּה לֹא-יִבָּצֵר מֵהֶם, כֹּל אֲשֶׁר יָזְמוּ לַעֲשׂוֹת.	6 ... And the LORD said: 'Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is what they begin to do; and now nothing will be withholden from them, which they purpose to do.
ז הָבָה, נֵרְדָה, וְנָבְלָה שָׁם, שְׂפָתָם--אֲשֶׁר לֹא יִשְׁמְעוּ, אִישׁ שְׂפַת רֵעֵהוּ.	7 Come, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.'
ח וַיָּפֶץ יְהוָה אֹתָם מִשָּׁם, עַל-פְּנֵי כָל-הָאָרֶץ; וַיַּחְדְּלוּ, לִבְנֹת הָעִיר.	8 So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth; and they left off to build the city.

Mankind commits no sin here. Rather, it is God who feels threatened by a unified mankind, for whom the sky is literally the limit. To curb humanity's potential, God purposely puts a stumbling block in its way: language.

Today we face global challenges: ecological and economic disasters, pollution, poverty, hunger, and disease. United, it is within our power to solve these problems. And yet we spend our time quibbling over matters of 'language', allowing cultural, racial, and religious differences to divide us, even to the point of war.

The same irony applies to our country, America. As Thomas Friedman puts it, we have a one-party democracy - because the second party refuses to cooperate! We are the richest, most powerful country in history, yet we can't even get health care reform through Congress. China, on the other hand, has a government which, although corrupt, is unified. And her people are unified. While we're wasting money on wars nobody cares about, they're quietly cornering the green energy market.

The first step to ending our 2,500 year curse is to realize that we are all brothers, all in the same boat, and that we are stronger together than we could possibly be apart. After that, the sky's the limit.

... a giant keg for mankind?

Not long ago, I blogged about Obama's commitment to world peace. A lofty goal, but not one that most of us can impact directly. But before long, Obama himself became embroiled in a little war of words about a certain white police officer arresting a certain black professor in his kitchen - a conflict decidedly more down-to-Earth.

Obama's solution? "Let me buy you a beer." And in less than a week, they were all together, Obama, Crowley, Gates, and even Joe Biden, hanging out on the white house lawn with brewskies.

Some may dismiss this as a publicity stunt, but I think Obama is making a point about how to resolve our differences. It's human nature to be sucked into interpersonal drama, especially when someone offends our brain's delicate sense of 'identity'. But go out for beers, and something else kicks in: suddenly, you're buddies. Something deep within our psyches identifies friends emotionally, through shared social interactions, and such interactions are a shortcut to peace.

In other words, a beer's a hell of a lot cheaper than a lawsuit - and a lot more fun.

Blow it out your hole, Roberts!

Kudos to Charles Siebert for writing a wonderful article about whales for the New York Times rag. Siebert has previously covered other highly social and self-aware animals, such as elephants and chimpanzees, and he was interviewed yesterday on Fresh Air. There's a wonderful moment when Siebert starts talking about how, through research, we are beginning to appreciate the aliens right here on Earth, whose cultures are no less intricate than our own.

Boo-hiss to John Roberts and the United States Supreme Court for supporting Navy war games which terrify and kill endangered whales. Apparently Roberts thinks it's uber-important that we give our subs a lot of target practice... unfortunately, all they're blasting out of the water is a bunch of friendly whales.

Turkish Delight

My friend E recently invited me over for dinner with her parents, who were in town from Istanbul. I grabbed a bottle of Mendocino Pinot Noir Grape Juice ($12.95 at the neighborhood wine store), plucked a huge lemon from the tree in front of my house, and headed over on an empty stomach. E is a great cook, and let me tell you, the food was delicious. The first course was a lentil soup, amazing taste, I'd never had anything like it. While we were sipping, E let slip to her family that I was Jewish. E's father -- a short, mustached fellow with serious brown eyes -- got very excited about this.

E's dad informed me that there were many Jews in Istanbul. Apparently, the late, great Ottoman Empire had taken in the Jews when they were chased out of Spain by the inquisitors. "Yes, there are many, how do you say, hahams in Turkey," E chimed in. E's father, himself a civil engineer, had recently read a biography of Einstein ("He was religious!") and was greatly impressed. He taught me that inshallah is the Arabic equivalent of im yirtzeh HaShem, gave me a blessing that I should have good luck in my career, and offered to host me and show me around if I ever visited Istanbul. He was very friendly in his somber way and I didn't detect a trace of anti-Semitism in the man. (With his three daughters and his sister at the table, I think he was just happy to have another guy around.)

We retired to the living room, where we sat together on the couch and broke open the grape juice. "Nice color," E's dad complimented, holding his shot glass up to the light (the Pinot Noir grape gives a deep red color, not the dark purple of the concord grapes). We drank the sweet, cool juice with a twist of the lemon I had brought, a wild California lemon with a large rind. "The lemon tree in my garden tastes the same," E's father reminisced. Then E served up flan with caramel. It held together perfectly and had a clean, just-sweet-enough finish. It was one of the best desserts I have had in my entire life. I reminded her husband, a friendly PhD who makes microchips for a cell phone company, that he's a lucky man.

Only once did the Israel/Palestine issue come up (or as E's father malaproposed, the "Isra-el/Phili-stines"). He was opining about how our two cultures had so much in common. "You and I are cousins!" he exclaimed, squeezing my shoulder. "So why are our peoples at war?"

I had a flash. "Sometimes we fight most with members of our own family."

E's father nodded and smiled, his dark eyes flashing. "I understand what you said. I understand."

Obama, Respect, and Peace

Back when I was campaigning for Obama, I called a member of the family who is a prominent rabbi and Jewish political emissary. He expressed reservations about Obama, particularly on Israel. "What I want to know," he told me, "is what Obama is actually going to do if he's elected."

"What's he going to do?" I replied, "He's going to bring world peace, that's what he's going to do!"

I think the bigness of that vision caught the rabbi off guard. He laughed, and it was a good laugh, a delighted laugh. He was silent for a moment, and finally replied, "Well, I hope you are right."

Today in Cairo, Obama made a gesture towards that world peace I was talking about. You can watch it here:

I noticed that the audience gave its biggest applause whenever Obama referenced something from Arab culture. This reinforces a suspicion I've had for a long time that what the Arab world really wants is respect and recognition. There is something to be said for encountering other cultures by visiting, learning, and absorbing - so many of our biases arise from the neighborhoods in which we live. In terms of Israel/Palestine, you'd be surprised how far a good apology might go towards regaining trust.

The weakest part of the speech to me was the part about nuclear weapons. It is the height of hypocrisy for the leader of a country with >2,000 nuclear warheads to deny the rights of another country, even an imperfect country, to have even one. Obama, the States, and Israel ought to put their money where their mouth is - either toss your own nuclear weapons into the sea, all of them, or acknowledge that fact that every nation has an equal "right to bear arms." (The only reason Obama doesn't do that is the political reality that a nuclear Iran is simply not in the limited strategic interests of the United States.)

World peace may seem like a lofty goal, but it's also the most important thing humanity can achieve. The opportunity is here today, right now. Herzl once said, Im tirzu, ain zo agada - if you will it, it is no fantasy. It's time to take that vision, and make it bigger.

E.O. Wilson's War

הלל אומר, הוי כתלמידיו של אהרון--אוהב שלום ורודף שלום,

אוהב את הברייות ומקרבן לתורה

Hillel says: Be like the students of Aaron, loving peace and chasing peace,

loving other people and bringing them closer to Torah. (Avot 1:12)

Pulitzer Prize-winning biologist E.O. Wilson is passionate about biodiversity. The multitude of plant and animal species is not only beautiful, but also holds secrets to combating human disease. In the 1990s, Wilson became concerned that industrialization of the world's most biodiverse zones, such as Madagascar, was threatening thousands of species. But his efforts to raise awareness were frustrated by the political climate, in which any environmental cause was linked with liberal politics and rejected by the right. Wilson's response? He wrote a book, The Creation, which reached out to religious groups to cooperate with scientists in order to save endangered species. In a recent interview on NPR, he described his thought process (skip to 18:50):

I said to myself, it's something obvious, you know we're not going to really get a lot of movement until the people arebehind it. Then, who are the people? This is a religious country... the Evangelicals, I grew up among them, that's what I was, when I was a kid in the South, ~42 % of Americans are Evangelicals. Why not find a way to form an alliance? And the only way to do that was to extend the hand of friendship, sincerely, to show some respect, to show that scientists don't really disrespect them, at least in terms of what we could all accomplish together. And so I wrote the book The Creation, in which I did this, and asked for their help.

... I believe this is the right way to proceed: Let's put all this stuff we've been fighting about - evolution and traditional Judeo-Christian or Abrahamic religious beliefs - can we put that aside for a moment, and fuss about it later, and meet on common ground... to talk about something that is transcendent.

Note the Obama-esque pragmatism of this approach. It's very realistic (read, scientific). To succeed as a modern-day Noah, Wilson knew he'd have to come down from the ivory tower and start speaking the peoples' language. As a result, both sides have moved a small step closer to one another - and to saving Earth's precious biodiversity.

A Very Karaite Lag B'Omer

Think today is the 33rd day of the Omer? You must be a "Rabbanite," who counts the Omer from the second day of Passover. But if you're a Karaite, you take the Bible as literally as possible – so when it says you count from "the morrow of the Sabbath," you always start counting on a Sunday.*

Around the time of Christ, this difference caused a huge rift between Rabbanite and Karaite Jews. But these days, many Jews have not even heard of Shavuot. In such times, wouldn't it be wise to broaden our horizons a little and welcome the Karaites into the greater Jewish community... even if they celebrate Shavuot a little later in the week?

The thriving Karaite community in San Francisco recently celebrated a major milestone: a Karaite conversion ceremony, the first since 1465. Browsing online, I found this interview with the Karaite rabbi, Joe Pessah. To me, the most interesting stuff is what he says about interacting, and intermarrying, with Rabbanites. This could be the start of something big, the mending of a rift that has festered for far too long.

I am reminded of a mishna every Jew should know:

בית שמאי מתירין את הצרות לאחין, ובית הלל אוסרין. חלצו--בית שמאי פוסלין מן הכהונה, ובית הלל מכשירין; נתייבמו--בית שמאי מכשירין, ובית הלל פוסלין. אף על פי שאלו פוסלין ואלו מכשירין, אלו אוסרין ואלו מתירין--לא נמנעו בית שמאי מלישא נשים מבית הלל, ולא בית הלל מבית שמאי. וכל הטהרות והטומאות שהיו אלו מטהרין ואלו מטמאין, לא נמנעו עושין טהרות אלו על גב אלו

Beth Shammai permit the [rival wives] to the surviving brothers, and Beth Hillel prohibit them... Though these forbade what the others permitted, and these regarded as ineligible what the others declared eligible, Beth Shammai nevertheless did not refrain from marrying women from Beth Hillel, nor did Beth Hillel refrain from marrying women from Beth Shammai. [Similarly...] neither of them abstained from using the utensils of the others for the preparation of food that was ritually clean. (Y'vamot 1:4)

Amen.

*The intricacies of the debate are far too boring to go into here. All interested parties should start with Leviticus 23:9-21 and Joshua 5:11. The interested Rabbanite should proceed to the Babylonian Talmud (Menahot 65a-66aa); the interested Karaite to the Korner. The Modern Orthodox movement has prompted much more in-depth learning of Hebrew Bible, and this has re-opened a very interesting debate about literal (p'shat) vs. exegetical (d'rash) understanding of the Torah. Historically, a chasm has developed between Orthodox Jews and the Karaites and Samaritans. Perhaps this newfound appreciation of "p'shat" will lead back to a reunification of sorts.

Should Jedi torture?

There's probably no greater contemporary commentary on the futility of war than LucasArts' Star Wars: Clone Wars saga. What could possibly be more futile than a war between a droid army and a clone army? The whole thing is orchestrated by a Sith puppet-master with no interest in either side winning, but rather in wreaking chaos, weakening his enemies, and consolidating personal power. In envisioning the Clone Wars, Lucas has brought our generation a story more complex and relevant than the simple good-versus-evil semantic of the original trilogy.

In the trenches of the Clone Wars are the famous knights of the Jedi order. Their training has prepared them to keep a cool head, but they're only humanoid, and they've never been involved in a conflict this big or this scary. Try as they might, they can't help being sucked in by the murky business of war. In this scene, a younger Jedi makes a strong case to her mentor in favor of bullying a prisoner for information. The mentor stops her - "Terror is not a weapon the Jedi use," she says - but here, as later in the episode, the question of whose judgment is correct remains unresolved.

Pull the slider to 4:00 for some hot Jedi torture

The greatest example of how war corrupts, of course, is the star of the show - Anakin Skywalker, well on his way to becoming Darth Vader. Anakin's in over his head, and his emotions are beginning to strain even as his reputation grows (cartoon Anakin is actually a better actor than Hayden Christensen). It's impossible to imagine that this powerful Jedi's experiences in the Clone Wars played no role in his turning to the Dark Side. On the contrary - his exposure to violence, anger, frustration, and power were just what Palpatine had in mind.

It is... unfortunate... that Clone Wars has not been more popular with the American public. Perhaps it was the hackneyed dialogue of the prequels, or the complicated plot, or perhaps the message of the Clone Wars was simply not what the audience was expecting to hear (I'd have missed it myself had my brother, a Star Wars expert, not pointed it out to me after The Phantom Menace). But there are real wars out there, and universal challenges, and our generation is inheriting them. I am concerned that America is still thinking in terms of good versus evil, black and white, us versus them.  We would do much better to heed the harsh lessons of the Clone Wars: that all war is costly, and we often do not recognize the real menace until we taste his lightsaber. And of course, sometimes that menace is us.

Polluted clouds, silver lining (An Earth Day meditation)

Something amazing is happening.

We are all in it together. We are all in the same boat.

It doesn't matter whether you register Democrat or Republican. Whether you are capitalist or communist.

It is as the Buddha said. We are all connected.

For years they have tried to stifle the truth. And yet it has a way of shining through - in scientific journals, at international conferences.

Smoke from our factories in China is turning the snowcaps gray.

Marlins caught today are only a third of the size they were in the 50's.

The rise in ocean temperature and acidity is causing algae to flourish, and choking our coral reefs.

The ancient Hebrews knew this. They called for a Sabbatical every 7 years, to let the land rest.

"Go forth and multiply" - we have done this. "Conquer the Earth's creatures" - we have done

 this.

But we forgot to tend the Garden.

The Native Americans knew this. They respected fellow creatures as equals, and used every part of the buffalo.

But we have ignored these teachings, and we have suffered for it.

The Big Three automakers are filing Chapter 11. Huge lots full of gas guzzlers, never to be sold.

Japanese cars, based on the Kyoto protocol, are selling like hotcakes all around the globe.

We are addicted to oil. If those prices rise again, it will send us spiraling into a Depression.

The good news is, the world is finally beginning to take these problems seriously.

Thanks to Al Gore and the IPCC, who won the 2007 Nobel Prize.

Good riddance to George W. Bush, who did his utmost to silence the scientific community.

It's a shame America is a follower, not a leader in this effort. Par for the course lately.

But our environment does not belong to any country, creed, or government. It is bigger than that, more real, and more important.

It doesn't even belong to our species.

It is as the Buddha said. We are all connected.

In this age of racial/religious/political diversity, humankind's greatest challenge is to realize that we are all in the same boat.

And it's an ark.

Climate change is bringing that awareness. Where philosophy has failed, reality is turning heads.

That's the silver lining on our polluted clouds this Earth Day.

Fresh Fathers: Pre-ramble

During my first year in Israel after high school, I decided to memorize the mishna. Like a Tanna of old, I wandered the streets of Jerusalem, silently repeating the little tidbits of case law and pithy sayings. Did you know that the word mishna means “that which is repeated”? And when you repeat something long enough, a little bit of it trickles down into your soul.

The book that truly stuck with me was Pirkei Avot, or the Book of Fathers. Memorizing Avot was a transformative experience - it blew my mind. The book is abstract and philosophical in nature, quite different from the case law that characterizes most early Rabbinic writings. It opened my heart to many of the values I still cherish today.

I'd like to revisit Avot, here on Samurai Scientist and/or Twitter, over the coming weeks. Traditionally, the book is studied during the seven weeks between Passover and Shavuot, so this is a good time to start. Avot lends itself easily to blog format - the pithy sayings are short and open-ended, a springboard for discussion. I hope you'll chime in.

What stands between us is only words

I'm damn proud of you people.

Maybe I don't say it enough. Definitely I don't say it enough. But it's true.

We may have different opinions, you and I. We may see life from two different points of view. But that doesn't matter. What matters is, you're an amazing person.

It's easy to get bogged down in politics, religion, ideology, etc. There's something in our crocodile mind that identifies ourselves with "truth" and perceives everything else as a threat. And yet what separates us is only words, only ideas. We have much more in common than we ever could have apart.

The way to overcome these barriers is through human communication. Face-to-face if possible, over the telephone or the internet if necessary. Seeing each other, hearing each others' voice, has a way of easing our fears. Of reminding us that we are all just human beings, each of us with an intricate life, dealing with challenges as best we can.

When we talk to each other, when we see each other, when we touch each other, I do not need to understand you, and you do not need to understand me. We only need to be in each other's presence, to accept one another, to spend time together. Then our monkey minds, always racing with thoughts and fears, is quieted. For isn't rejection our greatest fear? And if we're sitting together, then we are not being rejected.

So when I think of my family and my friends, this is what I think: I'm proud of you. You are amazing people. I learn from each of you. We may not always agree, and that's natural. That's to be expected. But let's not let it stand in the way of appreciating each other, just as we are.

Roger Cohen on Iran's Jews

Roger Cohen, one of the New York Time's conservative op-ed columnists, had a nice piece about Iran's Jews in yesterday's paper. Iranian political and religious leaders make a lot of anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic comments, which make a lot of American and Israeli Jews fearful and angry. Yet it seems that the Jews who actually live in Iran basically blow off the rhetoric, and blame Israel for the recent Gaza invasion.

I'm not sure these Iranian Jews are sophisticated, as Cohen suggests, or naive. But either way, I think this is an interesting example of how our geographic neighborhood influences our seemingly objective interpretation of reality.

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Response to Physics vs. Medicine

Kenneth Chang of the wonderful blog TierneyLab has pointed out the double-standard in trimming physics out of the stimulus package while increasing funding for biomedical research. Now, I’m a molecular biologist, but my housemate is a laser-particle physicist, so here's my 2 cents:

It’s terrible to see science cuts in any field, but unfortunately these cuts reflect the priorities of average Americans. As has been pointed out elsewhere, the NIH budget increase reflects only 1% of what our government is putting towards the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The question has never been physics vs. medicine, and merely by posing it in this way you do a disservice to both. The question is education/research vs. military spending. Our US budget is ~25%-40% military, depending on who you ask. This is a waste of money that could be spent on research and education.

There are other nations, such as Singapore and Japan, whose citizens prioritize science. Ours does not. When this changes, you will find that there is plenty of money for both physics and medicine.

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Obama: "Start by listening"

Oh yeah, *this* is why we elected him.

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Non-violence and the jedi

The non-violent preachfest starts around 17:25

Channel surfing last night, I caught a bit in the Star Wars: Clone Wars cartoon ("Jedi Crash," posted above) that struck me as both absurd and relevant. Around minute 17;30, a chipmunk with an Irish accent starts channeling Martin Luther King. He engages in a debate about the morality of war with no less than a jedi knight. "It takes two to fight," he tells her. "Only when you lay your arms down and pursue a course of nonviolence can you make this claim to me that the Jedi are peacekeepers."

If you do nothing else for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, order The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr. and throw it in your bathroom. King was a fascinating person, a great thinker, speaker, and doer. He thought outside the box and managed to translate a philosophy of "love thy enemy" into concrete political action. His clear ethical perspective would be of tremendous benefit today.

King had no illusions about man's capacity for cruelty. He considered it a moral obligation to fight evil. Like the chipmunk in the cartoon above, King was skeptical about the use of violence to achieve peace. Live by the sword, die by the sword. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.

But what's a jedi without a lightsaber? How can we expect to win?

King would answer that non-violence does not mean non-action - it means vigorous activism. MLK believed mankind's best hope for survival was the power of love. His weapon of choice was non-cooperation. He organized sit-ins, marches, meetings, speeches, and boycotts, all with the objective of provoking the public's conscience. In Birmingham, he dispatched children in front of dogs and fire hoses to make his point.

Whatever you think about the wars that are going on right now - whether you believe they are justified or not - it is worth taking a moment and asking, What would Martin Luther King do? Are we, as non-military citizens, sufficiently involved in this struggle, or have we left it all to our soldiers and politicians? What can we do in our everyday lives to promote peace between nations? Are there tactics of non-violence available to us that might have overlooked?

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