Literary Warrant [28]

• President George W. Bush, The White House, Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), CEQ Fact Sheet: Conserving Our Oceans Through Stewardship, Volunteerism, and Education (March 24, 2008)
  
  "The President And Mrs. Bush Are Committed To Continuing To Protect Our Natural Resources Through Wise Stewardship And Sensible Management. In 2004, the President released his Ocean Action Plan to promote an ethic of responsible use and preservation of our oceans and coastal resources. Of the 88 actions in the President's 2004 Ocean Action Plan, this Administration has met or is on schedule to meet all commitments, and more than a quarter of the existing actions have activities that 'moved beyond' the initial commitments."


• Centers for Disease Control (CDC), CDC Influenza Pandemic Operation Plan (January 11, 2008)
  
  "This CDC Influenza Pandemic OPLAN is an INTERNAL document that provides guidance for CDC operations as directed by the Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This plan is made available to outside agencies for the sole purpose of providing an understanding of the internal processes within CDC. This document in no way prescribes guidance for any entity other than CDC agencies. This plan shall not be construed to alter any law, executive order, rule, regulation, treaty, or international agreement. Noncompliance with this plan shall not be interpreted to create a substantive or procedural basis to challenge agency action or inaction."

Read the rest of this post . . . .

• Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), FEMA 2008 Federal Disaster Declarations
  
  Includes tables indicating Declared Disasters by Year or State, Major Disaster Declarations, Emergency Declarations, Fire Management Assistance Declarations, Declaration Policies and Guidance, and a Declaration Process Fact Sheet for Media.


• Government Accountability Project (GAP), Climate Change Report Buried by DOT; Author Blocked From Reporters (March 14, 2008)
  

  "This past Wednesday, March 12, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) and the U.S. Climate Change Science Program quietly released a major assessment report on the likely impacts of global climate disruption on a wide range of transportation infrastructure in the Gulf Coast region. This report release was buried by the DOT, and officials have been blocking journalists from speaking with the report’s lead author.

  "Specifically the report, Impacts of Climate Change and Variability on Transportation Systems and Infrastructure: Gulf Coast Study, analyzes how Gulf Coast roads and highways, transit services, oil and gas pipelines, freight handling ports, transcontinental railroad networks, waterway systems, and airports are likely to be harmed by heat waves, extreme precipitation events, sea level rise, increased hurricane intensity, and storm surge damage associated with climate change. The report outlines why changes must be incorporated in transportation planning now in order to avoid serious future problems."

• Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change (IIGCC), Electric Utilities: Global Climate Disclosure Frameworks (2008)
  
  "Climate change is increasingly recognised as a key strategic issue for the electricity generation sector. Of all sectors the Electric Utilities1 is the most carbon intensive, responsible for approximately one quarter of all carbon emissions. The opportunities and compulsion for carbon reduction and adaptation strategies for this sector are therefore considerable and warrant particular attention from investors."—Introduction.


• Investor Network on Climate Risk (INCR), a project of Ceres, Investor Network on Climate Risk Action Plan—Capitalizing the New Energy Future: Minimizing Climate Risks, Seizing Opportunities (February 2008)
  
  "Nearly 50 leading U.S. and European institutional investors managing over $1.75 trillion in assets today released a climate change action plan at the United Nations that will boost investments in energy efficiency and clean energy technologies and require tougher scrutiny of carbon-intensive investments that may pose long-term financial risks. Additionally, European investors managing $6.5 trillion in assets supported the action plan 'in principle.'"—Press release (February 14, 2008)


• Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), Dropping the Ball: EPA’s Investigation and Regulation of Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products (PPCPs) and Endocrine Disrupting Compounds (EDCs) (March 19, 2008)
  
  "Scientists have known about the widespread presence of chemicals from pesticides, pharmaceuticals and personal care products in our drinking water for decades, despite recent media coverage of the issue. In 1996, Congress ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to address the issue, but the agency has missed deadlines and avoided addressing the growing contamination, according to an analysis released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER)."—Press release.


• James Randerson, Science Correspondent, Scientists warn of soot effect on climate, The Guardian (March 24, 2008)
  
  "Soot produced by burning coal, diesel, wood and dung causes significantly more damage to the environment than previously thought, according to research published today. So-called 'black carbon' could cause up to 60% of the current warming effect of carbon dioxide, according to the US researchers, making it an important target for efforts to slow global warming."


• UN Pulse, Addressing Climate Change: The United Nations and the World at Work (February 11, 2008)
  
  "The United Nations General Assembly President has convened this morning a two-day thematic debate entitled Addressing Climate Change: The United Nations and the World at Work. The debate is being guided by the report of the Secretary-General (A/62/644), which provides an overview of the UN's work on climate change."


• UN Pulse, Mobilizing Finance for the Climate Challenge (February 13, 2008)
  
  "More than 100 ministers from across the globe are scheduled to attend the Global Ministerial Environment Forum (GMEF)—the world's forum for environment ministers—alongside senior figures from industry and economics; science; local government; civil society, trades unions and intergovernmental bodies."—Press release (February 11, 2008)


• UN Pulse, Shared Natural Resources: Aquifers (March 19, 2008)
  
  "The fifth report on shared natural resources of Special Rapporteur Chusei Yamada, on Transboundary Aquifers, has been issued (A/CN.4/591). The report is submitted for the consideration of the International Law Commission and presents draft articles on transboundary aquifers for consideration. Learn more about the ILC's consideration from the online chapter on shared natural resources of the Analytical Guide."


• United States Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB), Anatomy of a Disaster: Explosion at BP Texas City Refinery (2008)
  
  "Three years after the explosion that killed 15 workers and injured 180 others at the BP Texas City refinery, the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) today released a new, comprehensive safety video that describes the causes of the accident and key safety lessons."—Press release (March 21, 2008)


• United States Congress, Congressional Budget Office (CBO), Policy Options for Reducing CO2 Emissions (Pub. No. 2930) (February 2008)
  
  "The most efficient approaches to reducing emissions of CO2 involve giving businesses and households an economic incentive for such reductions. Such an incentive could be provided in various ways, including a tax on emissions, a cap on the total annual level of emissions combined with a system of tradable emission allowances, or a modified cap-and-trade program that includes features to constrain the cost of emission reductions that would be undertaken in an effort to meet the cap. This Congressional Budget Office (CBO) study—prepared at the request of the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources—compares those policy options on the basis of three key criteria: their potential to reduce emissions efficiently, to be implemented with relatively low administrative costs, and to create incentives for emission reductions that are consistent with incentives in other countries. In keeping with CBO’s mandate to provide objective, impartial analysis, the report contains no recommendations."—Preface.


• United States Department of Commerce & National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Report to Congress on the Implementation of the Deep Sea Coral Research and Technology Program (March 2008)
  
  "The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Reauthorization Act of 2006 (MSRA) includes a requirement to establish the 'Deep Sea Coral Research and Technology Program.' Section 408 (b) of the reauthorized Act tasked NOAA with submitting, in consultation with the Fishery Management Councils, 'biennial reports to Congress and the public on steps taken by the Secretary to identify, monitor, and protect deep sea coral areas, including summaries of the results of mapping, research and data collection performed under the program.' This is the first biennial report in fulfillment of that requirement."—Executive Summary.


• United States Department of Energy (DOE), Climate VISION (Voluntary Innovative Sector Initiatives: Opportunities Now), Climate VISION Progress Report 2007 (February 2008)
  
  "The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today released the Climate VISION Progress Report 2007, which reports on the actions taken by energy-intensive industries to improve greenhouse gas emissions intensity of their operations from 2002 to 2006. The report indicates that the power and energy-intensive industrial sectors improved their combined emissions intensity by 9.4 percent over this four year period, and in 2006, actual greenhouse gas emissions for these sectors fell a combined 1.4 percent."—Press release (February 11, 2008)


• United States Department of Energy (DOE) & United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), National Data Center Energy Efficiency Information Program (March 19, 2008)
  
  "The voluntary National Data Center Energy Efficiency Information Program has been initiated. The Program coordinates a wide variety of activities from the DOE Industrial Technologies Program Save Energy Now initiative, the DOE Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP), and the EPA ENERGY STAR program. The program is engaging numerous industry stakeholders who are developing and deploying a variety of tools and informational resources to assist data center operators in their efforts to reduce energy consumption in their facilities. These groups include, for example: 7 x 24 Exchange, AFCOM, American Society of Heating, Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE), Critical Facilities Roundtable, Information Technology Industry Council (ITIC), Silicon Valley Leadership Group, The Green Grid Association, and The Uptime Institute."—Summary.


• United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Good Neighbor Environmental Board to the President and Congress of the United States (GNEB), (March 2008)
  
  "The border region provides a compelling example of vulnerable populations often not prepared for natural disasters. Unlike the situation in many such emergencies, residents with different cultures, backgrounds and languages must attempt to coordinate their responses across the border, often through informal channels."—Press release (March 19, 2008)


• United States Government, Federal Guidance to Assist States in Improving State-Level Pandemic Influenza Operating Plans (March 11, 2008)
  

  "Effective State, local and community functioning during and following an influenza pandemic requires focused planning and practicing in advance of the pandemic to ensure that States can maintain their critical functions. The Interim Pre-pandemic Planning Guidance: Community Strategy for Pandemic Influenza Mitigation in the United States – Early, Targeted, Layered Use of Nonpharmaceutical Interventions (February 2007) was developed to provide guidance for pandemic planning and response. For community mitigation strategies to be effective, State governments need to incorporate them into their operating plans and assist local communities, businesses, non-governmental organizations, and the public in doing the same. State governments must have robust operating plans that have been sufficiently tested and improved by staff who understand and perform proficiently their supporting activities. Community partners must also perform proficiently their roles and responsibilities and understand accurately what the State government will and won’t do and how it will communicate with both them and the public.

  "This document provides a strategic framework to help the 50 States, the District of Columbia (DC), and the five U.S. Territories improve and maintain their operating plans for responding to and sustaining functionality during an influenza pandemic."



• United States House of Representatives, Committee on Energy & Commerce, Subcommittee on Energy & Air Quality, Climate Change Legislation Design White Paper: Competitiveness Concerns/Engaging Developing Countries (January 2008)
  
  "The Committee on Energy and Commerce and its Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality are issuing a series of Climate Change Legislation Design White Papers as the next step toward enactment of a mandatory, economy-wide climate change program. This White Paper released today discusses potential domestic legislative provisions that could encourage developing countries to curb their emissions of greenhouse gases."


• Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy, Yale University & Center for International Earth Science Information Network, Columbia University, Environmental Performance Index 2008 (EPI)
  
  "The 2008 EPI, released at the World Economic Forum in Davos ranks 149 countries on 25 indicators tracked across six established policy categories: Environmental Health, Air Pollution, Water Resources, Biodiversity and Habitat, Productive Natural Resources, and Climate Change. The EPI identifies broadly-accepted targets for environmental performance and measures how close each country comes to these goals. As a quantitative gauge of pollution control and natural resource management results, the Index provides a powerful tool for improving policymaking and shifting environmental decisionmaking onto firmer analytic foundations."—Press release (January 23, 2008)

The quark, the jaguar, and the laws of Jurisdynamics

	[H]istory shows clearly that humanity is moved forward not by people who stop every little while to gauge the ultimate success or failure of their [own] ventures, but by those who think deeply about what is right and then put all their energy into doing it. —  Murray Gell-Mann, The Quark and the Jaguar: Adventures in the Simple and the Complex 338 (1994)
Murray Gell-Mann's lyrical book, The Quark and the Jaguar, spans the subjects of interest to Jurisdynamics as perhaps no other book does. Gell-Mann connects linguistics, art, medicine, quantum physics, superstring theory, evolution, artificial intelligence, and contemporary threats to biological and cultural diversity. The entire book represents a tour de force in complexity theory and how that discipline can inform a broad range of inquiries in many scientific fields. The title of The Quark and the Jaguar comes from one of Gell-Mann's favorite poems: "The world of the quark has everything to do with a jaguar circling in the night." Arthur Sze, The Leaves of a Dream Are the Leaves of an Onion, River, River. To wit: Quarks are elementary particles, building blocks of the atomic nucleus. . . . [T]he quark symbolizes the basic physical laws that govern the universe and all the matter in it. . . . The jaguar stands for the complexity of the world around us, especially as manifested in complex adaptive systems. Together, Arthur's images of the quark and the jaguar . . . convey perfectly the two aspects of nature that I call the simple and the complex: on the one hand, the underlying physical laws of matter and the universe and, on the other, the rich fabric of the world that we perceive directly and of which we are a part. Gell-Mann, along with George Zweig, predicted the existence of quarks. Gell-Mann alone holds the distinction of naming them quarks, after a passage from Finnegans Wake: "Three quarks for Muster Mark!" The former feat earned him the Nobel Prize in Physics. The latter connects him in a beautiful way with another discipline graced by Alfred Nobel's bequest: literature. At MoneyLaw, I have more to say about Gell-Mann and his views on academic culture. As this post's opening quote suggests, Gell-Mann cares passionately not only about pure knowledge, but also about its application to real-world problems. For purposes of Jurisdynamics, which operates in that realm where beauty holds sway in its eternal rivalry with truth, it suffices to close with this simple demonstration of the quark-based structure of neutrons and protons:
The action inside the nucleus of a deuterium atom containing a proton and a neutron, each with three quarks: An electron strikes a quark inside a proton, passing energy to the quark before the electron bounces back. The quark now has so much energy "stuffed" into it, it creates a cascade of new particles as it flies out of the proton. The result is two new, two-quark particles.

Easter moonrise

The moon rises over Ahu Akivi on Easter Island.

Easter 2008 falls on March 23. According to western Christianity's rules for calculating the date of Easter, this movable feast will not arrive as early in the calendar for another 152 years (2160). Easter will not fall on the earliest possible date of March 22 until 2285. Some bristlecone pines alive today, God willing, will see that date. That is a better bet, environmental degradation and climate change notwithstanding, than the prospects facing any human alive today.

Under the western definition of the Paschal full moon, Easter always takes place under a moon that is no dimmer than the third quarter. This year's calendar places a nearly full moon on top of Easter. In the southern hemisphere, that full moon coincides with the autumnal rather than the vernal equinox. Whether it is observed from Ahu Akivi on Easter Island (a configuration of seven moai — monolithic ceremonial sculptures made of volcanic ash — aligned according to sunset at the equinox), or or from any other point south of the equator, the Easter moon is the astronomical equivalent of what we northerners call the harvest moon.

Happy Easter.

Holy Thursday / Semana Santa

William Blake, Holy Thursday, Songs of Innocence (1789) ’Twas on a Holy Thursday, their innocent faces clean, The children walking two and two, in red and blue and green, Grey-headed beadles walk'd before, with wands as white as snow, Till into the high dome of Paul’s they like Thames' waters flow. O what a multitude they seem'd, these flowers of London town! Seated in companies they sit with radiance all their own. The hum of multitudes was there, but multitudes of lambs, Thousands of little boys and girls raising their innocent hands. Now like a mighty wind they raise to Heaven the voice of song, Or like harmonious thunderings the seats of Heaven among. Beneath them sit the aged men, wise guardians of the poor; Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your door.

William Blake, Holy Thursday, Songs of Experience (1794) Is this a holy thing to see In a rich and fruitful land, Babes reduced to misery Fed with cold and usurous hand? Is that trembling cry a song? Can it be a song of joy? And so many children poor? It is a land of poverty! And their sun does never shine. And their fields are bleak & bare. And their ways are fill'd with thorns. It is eternal winter there. For where-e’er the sun does shine, And where-e’er the rain does fall: Babe can never hunger there, Nor poverty the mind appall.

John 13:1, 12-16 (RSV)

¹ Now before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. . . .

¹² When he had washed their feet, and taken his garments, and resumed his place, he said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you? ¹³ You call me Teacher and Lord; and you are right, for so I am. ¹⁴ If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. ¹⁵ For I have given you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. ¹⁶ Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him.

---

Duccio di Buoninsegna, The Washing of the Feet (ca. 1311)

Semana Santa

Literary Warrant [27]

• beSpacific, EPA Issues Strengthened National Standards for Ground-Level Ozone (March 12, 2008)
  
  "On March 12, 2008, EPA significantly strengthened its national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for ground-level ozone, the primary component of smog. These changes will improve both public health protection and the protection of sensitive trees and plants."—Fact Sheet: Final Revisions to the National Ambient Air Quality Standards for Ozone | Summary of Action.


• Thomas E. Drabek, John Evans Professor, Emeritus, Department of Sociology and Criminology, University of Denver, Social Problems Perspectives, Disaster Research and Emergency Management: Intellectual Contexts, Theoretical Extensions, and Policy Implications (2007)
  
  "This essay explores the intellectual contexts wherein disasters are defined as non-routine social problems. The argument is advanced that this theoretical orientation can both open new doors for researchers and assist emergency management professionals in critically reviewing existing policy and future proposals. The essay is comprised of five sections: 1) introduction (how I came to this topic); 2) social problems perspectives (key insights from past and recent analyses); 3) disaster research (sampling of theoretical issues and conclusions relevant to a social problems orientation); 4) emergency management (selected policy areas and implications) and 5) conclusions (payoffs for future theory and application)."—Abstract.

Read the rest of this post . . . .

• National Research Council, Committee on Climate Change and U.S. Transportation, Potential Impacts of Climate Change on U.S. Transportation (March 2008)
  
  "Transportation professionals should acknowledge the challenges posed by climate change and incorporate current scientific knowledge into the planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of transportation systems. Every mode of transportation and every region in the United States will be affected as climate change poses new and often unfamiliar challenges to infrastructure providers. Special Report 290: Potential Impacts of Climate Change on U.S. Transportation—the report of a study conducted by a committee of experts under the auspices of the Transportation Research Board and the Division on Earth and Life Studies of the National Research Council—makes the case that focusing on the problem now should help avoid costly future investments and disruptions to operations."—Transportation Report in Brief (TRB)


• National Wildlife Federation (NWF) et al., Imperiled Treasures: How Recent Supreme Court Decisions and Agency Actions Have Endangered Southwest Waters and Wildlife (January 2008)
  

  "For thirty years the federal Clean Water Act broadly protected waters in the nation and across the Southwest. It sought, with a great deal of success, to safeguard important waters from pollution and destruction. Historically, it applied to waters from the Rio Grande to playa lakes. However, now the protections of the Act are being whittled away. Two recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions, Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (2001) and Rapanos v. United States (2006), have placed protections of many of the nation’s waters, such as intermittent and ephemeral streams and so-called 'isolated' wetlands, in doubt. While these Supreme Court decisions have not overturned any of the current regulations that broadly protect waters, they have created significant legal confusion over the scope of the Act’s protections.
  

  In response to these decisions, federal agencies have issued guidance that has directly affected waters vital to the Southwest. In 2003, agency guidance effectively removed protections for so-called geographically 'isolated' waters like playa lakes. In response to Rapanos, guidance issued in 2007 makes it nearly impossible to protect many intermittent and ephemeral streams, along with wetlands that neighbor such streams."—Executive Summary.
  

• Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), OECD Environmental Outlook to 2030 (2008)
  
  "The 2008 OECD Environmental Outlook is a pathbreaking report that marries economic and environmental projections for the next few decades and simulates specific policies to address the key challenges. It identifies four priority areas where urgent action is needed: climate change, biodiversity loss, water scarcity and the impact on human health of pollution and toxic chemicals....
  

  "OECD recommends use of policy mixes, and to keep the costs of action low these should be heavily based on economic and market-based instruments. Examples are the use of green taxes, efficient water pricing, emissions trading, polluter-pay systems, waste charges, and eliminating environmentally harmful subsidies (e.g. for fossil fuels and agriculture). But more stringent regulations and standards (e.g. for transport and building construction), investment in research and development, sectoral and voluntary approaches, and eco-labelling and information are also needed."—Press release (March 5, 2008)
  

• Skaidra Smith-Heisters, Reason Foundation, Illegally Green: Environmental Costs of Hemp Prohibition
  

  "The Reason Foundation study reveals that polyester fiber manufacturing requires six times the energy needed to grow hemp. And cotton is one of the most 'water- and pesticide-intensive crops in the world.' Hemp's naturally higher resistance to weeds and pests means it requires dramatically fewer pesticides than cotton.
  

  "Not only has the government banned hemp production in the U.S., it is also directly subsidizing other crops that the study shows to be 'environmentally inferior.' Corn farmers received $51 billion in subsidies between 1995 and 2005; wheat farmers were given $21 billion; cotton farmers fleeced taxpayers for $15 billion; and tobacco farmers were handed $530 million in taxpayer-funded subsidies."—Press release (March 13, 2008)
  

• Russel S. Sobel, Christopher J. Coyne & Peter T. Leeson, The Political Economy of FEMA: Did Reorganization Matter? (January 25, 2008)
  
  "This paper investigates the political economy of FEMA’s post-9/11 merger with the Department of Homeland Security. Using panel data for the post-DHS merger but pre-Katrina period, we examine how FEMA’s much-debated reorganization has impacted the strong political influences on disaster declaration and relief spending identified by Garrett and Sobel (2003) before FEMA’s reorganization. We find that although politically-important states for the president continue to have a higher rate of disaster declaration, disaster expenditures are no longer higher in states with congressional representation on FEMA oversight committees. These results suggest reorganization has reduced political pressures within FEMA. Tullock’s theory of bureaucracy helps to explain this change."—Abstract.


• United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), A Decade of Children's Environmental Health: Highlights from EPA's Science to Achieve Results Program (December 2007)
  

  "In 1997, Federal Executive Order 13045, Protection of Children from Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks, mandated Federal agencies to place a high priority on identifying and assessing risks affecting children and to ensure their policies, standards, and programs address disproportionate risks to children. The Executive Order stimulated a wide array of research supported by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), particularly through the National Center of Environmental Research’s (NCER) extramural Science to Achieve Results (STAR) grant program.
  

  "In 1998, the STAR grant program, which supports human health, ecology, economics and engineering sciences through grants, centers, and fellowships, initiated a diverse portfolio focused specifically on children’s environmental health research. The goal of this research is to better understand children’s genetic, life stage, and behavioral susceptibilities. The research also aims to better characterize child-specific harmful chemical exposures and to demonstrate cost effective, protective interventions, particularly at the household and community level. Since 1998, the STAR grant program has issued more than 10 research solicitations and awarded over 60 grants focusing on children’s environmental health, including: Centers for Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research (21 Children’s Centers awards—11 currently active); Aggregate Exposure Assessment of Pesticide Exposure (3 grants); Biomarkers for Children’s Risks (8 grants); Children’s Vulnerability to Toxics (19 grants); Children’s Valuation (7 grants); and Early Indicators of Environmentally Related Disease (5 grants). To date, NCER has funded more than a hundred individual projects resulting in more than a thousand peer-reviewed articles in a wide array of scientific publications."—Executive Summary.

  N.B. 'at's my boy! (DCR)
  

• United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Vision, Mission and Strategy for Sustainable Ports
  
  "Between 1970 and 1995, US international waterborne freight nearly doubled, and is forecast to triple by 2020. Ten billion dollars will be spent over the next 5 years to expand the commercial use of public port terminals. An equal amount may be spent to expand port security. This port growth has tremendous implications for intermodal transportation, e.g. ships, trucks, and trains, as well as property utilized for port activity. The challenge is to help the ports and their trade partners minimize their environmental footprint, even as they grow, i.e. to be economically viable, environmentally sustainable, and socially responsible."—Sector Profile.


• United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Office of Inspector General (OIG), Annual Superfund Report to Congress for Fiscal Year 2007 (EPA-350-R-08-001) (January 2008)
  
  "Although EPA has taken actions to improve its 5-year review process for Superfund sites, additional steps are needed to support and communicate conclusions, improve review timeliness, and provide fuller assurance that cleanup actions protect human health and the environment. Addressing Superfund funding and program management issues remains important. We will continue to assist Congress and EPA in their efforts to protect against the potential adverse health and environmental impacts resulting from Superfund sites. Early identification, communication, and evaluation of issues needed to reform the Superfund program can better prepare the Agency to address Superfund issues."—Foreword.


• United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Natural Resource Management: Opportunities Exist to Enhance Federal Participation in Collaborative Efforts to Reduce Conflicts and Improve Natural Resource Conditions (Report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests, Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Senate, GAO-08-262) (January 2008)
  
  "Experts generally view collaborative resource management that involves public and private stakeholders in natural resource decisions as an effective approach for managing natural resources. Several benefits can result from using collaborative resource management, including reduced conflict and litigation and improved natural resource conditions, according to the experts. A number of collaborative practices, such as seeking inclusive representation, establishing leadership, and identifying a common goal among the participants have been central to successful collaborative management efforts. The success of these groups is often judged by whether they increase participation and cooperation or improve natural resource conditions. Many experts also note that there are limitations to the approach, such as the time and resources it takes to bring people together to work on a problem and reach a decision."—What GAO Found.


• United States House of Representatives, Committee on Energy and Commerce, Climate Change Legislation Design White Papers
  
  "The Committee on Energy and Commerce and its Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality are issuing a series of Climate Change Legislation Design White Papers as the next step toward enactment of a mandatory, economy-wide climate change program. While the hearings earlier in this Congress were designed to give the Committee an understanding of the status and projected path of climate change and potential ways to address it, these White Papers and the hearings on them will focus on the construction of mandatory, economy-wide climate change legislation. The White Papers will describe the basic design and key principles of a regulatory program and also identify issues about which further information and discussion is desirable."


• Bradley S. Van Gosen, United States Geological Survey (USGS), Reported Historic Asbestos Mines, Historic Asbestos Prospects, and Natural Asbestos Occurrences in the Southwestern United States (Arizona, Nevada, and Utah) (Open-File Report 2008-1095)
  
  "This map and its accompanying dataset provide information for 113 natural asbestos occurrences in the Southwestern United States (U.S.), using descriptions found in the geologic literature. Data on location, mineralogy, geology, and relevant literature for each asbestos site are provided. Using the map and digital data in this report, the user can examine the distribution of previously reported asbestos occurrences and their geological characteristics in the Southwestern U.S., which includes sites in Arizona, Nevada, and Utah. This report is part of an ongoing study by the U.S. Geological Survey to identify and map reported natural asbestos occurrences in the U.S., which thus far includes similar maps and datasets of natural asbestos occurrences within the Eastern U.S. (http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2005/1189/), the Central U.S. (http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2006/1211/), and the Rocky Mountain States (http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2007/1182/). These reports are intended to provide State and local government agencies and other stakeholders with geologic information on natural occurrences of asbestos in the U.S."


• Sharon Wiharta et al., Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), The Effectiveness of Foreign Military Assets in Natural Disaster Response (2008)
  
  "This study provides an overview of recent developments in the use of foreign military assets in response to major natural disasters, based on primary and secondary data. Four case studies of recent disaster relief operations that have involved major deployments of foreign military assets have been used to contextualize the general observations and give examples of good and bad practice. These case studies examine the responses to: floods and cyclones in Mozambique in 2000; the 2004 floods and tropical windstorms in Haiti; the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami (focusing on Aceh province, Indonesia); and the 2005 South Asian earthquake (focusing on Pakistan-administered Kashmir)."—Executive Summary.

Patrick Henry Hughes

As described at The Cardinal Lawyer, the story of Patrick Henry Hughes is breathtaking and inspirational, musical and true:

Part 1	Part 2

Complexity, IPR Rights and Innovation Ecologies: Distributive Considerations

Part 2 — Distributive Considerations

As touched on in the previous post, an important implication of the nexus between appellate patent law, commercialization-based S&T policies privileging closed IPR rights and the notion of an increasingly global innovation ecology is the manner in which newer conceptual theories and analytical frameworks such as systems theories may be used to explicate and, perhaps, stimulate true ‘breakthrough’ innovation. The term breakthrough innovation is used consciously as opposed to nominal or incremental innovation with little or no social value.

There are any number of potential theoretical applications of systems theories to the notion of an innovation ecology. The purpose of this entry is to put forward a small number of those that may have particular resonance in a health law and policy context.

Read the rest of this post . . . .While certainly theoretical in nature, the intersection of innovation policy and complexity frameworks is not an argument about either narrow IPR rights or facilitating innovation in the context of patents as ‘simply property’. As noted by Janice Stein, it is only when values are added to the debate over policies that underpin particularly fundamental social programs such as education and health care that the concept of efficiency becomes meaningful in a democratic state. This is because in the absence of values the relationship between efficiency and accountability of government is hollow. This is the nexus where the distributive nature of systems theories generally, and complex adaptive systems in particular, may have unique value.

The strength of economic arguments regarding the societal value of strong IPR rights will vary from one jurisdiction to the next, depending on contextual balancing of distributive social considerations with those privileging free market principles. Where the balance lies on the spectrum has obvious implications for public health, given its ties to human rights and the notion of a compassionate welfare state.

On the one hand, domestic patent legislation and appellate jurisprudence that diverges from that of other nations seeking to capitalize on their domestic S&T bases may harm the global patenting strategies and marketing efforts not only of multinationals engaged in local biomedical product development but also of domestic firms and inventors seeking to capitalize on publicly funded medical research globally. IPR rights carry significant weight in the medical sciences, as they determine what type of healthcare products, devices and testing procedures become available to the public, when and on what conditions they become available, how much they cost, and the reach of innovative domestic products, firms and clinical research into the global market. Movement away from strong IPR rights and regulatory oversight (including that masquerading as under-regulation) can be seen in this light to provide disincentives for strong innovation.

On the other however, is the more subtle but (potentially) more important consideration that ‘strong’ domestic standards for patentability and product regulation, such as a low standard for obviousness in patent law or a low threshold for drug approval, may paradoxically inhibit truly creative activity in a complex innovation ecology which depends on the inherent creativity of persons positioned at the ‘front lines’ of innovation- in other words those occupying the lower rungs of the organizational hierarchy yet nevertheless form the basis for emergent adaptive system behaviours.

Undue encroachment of the inventive activity of persons skilled in the art may in fact be more counterproductive than obvious at first glance. For example, as some complex adaptive systems become increasingly ordered they have the potential to move into “detail mode” where further improvements in operational efficiency become increasingly costly. This is rather like the uppermost portion of an asymptotic curve, where almost endless investments in time, energy, resources etc. are required for tiny increments in system output. This can happen either by the dominant IPR rights regime privileging less innovative forms of activity or via national S&T policies that have as their object the ‘fencing in’ or controlling of otherwise open and creative innovative activity as part of prevailing economic models of science-based domestic productivity.

The ironic result of this scenario is that innovation might be stifled by the very policies meant to stimulate it. As argued in the paper, it is becoming increasingly plausible that this state of affairs governs commercialization and innovation in certain segments of the medical sciences. Under this view, it is not merely the capital and risk-intensive nature of product development that opposes innovation, as is often claimed (though of course, this may be true to some extent), but rather a non-systems based legal-regulatory regime that allows for and indeed privileges nominal or incremental product development activities rather than true creative inventiveness.

The global reach of regulatory instruments such as TRIPS and decisions by prominent patent offices and appeal courts such as that in KSR illustrate that firms and inventors do not operate within a purely local sphere, but rather are embedded within a complex domestic network of scientific, legal, regulatory, economic and political actors enfolded within a still larger global innovation ecology. Systems theories such complex adaptive systems help to teach us that efficient adaptation to changing and inherently uncertain conditions depends on first the recognition; second the acceptance; and third learning from and adaptation to uncertainty. This involves wholesale change from most current models of innovation, particularly in ‘risk-averse’ contexts and jurisdictions.

A systems approach to innovation-based S&T policy may be particularly useful in a global economy. This is because it privileges the interrelationships among actors and institutions (technology clusters and the social institutions underpinning them) and their interdependence in maximizing system fitness e.g., enhancing productivity and prosperity through innovation in the medical sciences. Of importance from a health law and policy perspective, a systems approach to innovation in the medical sciences may be conducive to accomplishing these goals in a manner that respects many of the distributive and egalitarian considerations embedded within prevalent social institutions such as the democratic state, common law, Rule of Law and entrenched human rights.

A systems view of innovation may also have the potential (however amorphous) to render somewhat more opaque, from both a broader governance and a more applied policy perspective, the implied relationship between individual and collective interests. This arises from the express goal of complex adaptive systems to maximize system fitness rather than that of constituent modules or actors. Distributive fitness presents an opportunity to reshape the interface between science, politics and economics based on a more contemporary nuanced understanding of the complex systems-based interaction of the elements and feedback loops comprising the current commercialization regime in the life sciences.

As discussed in the context of adaptive environmental policies, a systems approach underscores the importance of balancing accommodation and cooperation with competition among system elements so as to maximize the flexibility and responsiveness of the system to changing conditions. Indeed in its leading patent jurisprudence the U.S. Supreme Court, from Hotchkiss through Graham and KSR, has maintained the position that grant of patents for non-inventive products and process inhibits rather than stimulates innovation and competition, presuming competition is relatively unencumbered. This body of jurisprudence suggests that the goals of society and those of individuals can be appropriately prioritized and balanced and that it is the role of law to do so.

A systems theory of innovation, or public health for that matter, does not detract from the critical importance of a vital market in innovative products (indeed just the opposite), provided that separation of scientific, political and economic interests in medical product development and regulation are properly bounded by, among other things, justice and the operation of law. Global and national public-private partnerships are an example of how systems thinking can offer an exponential jump in research and development resources, both at the sheer dollar level but also in terms of the scope of interconnected hubs and nodes of resources. Hub and spoke models of this nature are not new. What is new, however, is the explicit goal of maximizing the distributive fitness of the system in the context of commercialization regimes privileging strong IPR rights. By no means does a complexity-based approach to innovation argue against the per se legitimacy of IPR rights — only that they are balanced by equally strong distributive means and mechanisms.

One of the major leverage points of complex adaptive systems, and other systems-based approaches, is the acceptance of uncertainty as an inherent, unavoidable and positive force, rather than something to be restrained and constrained at all costs. This has some fairly straight forward implications for innovation, in the medical sciences or otherwise. This is because the sine qua non of innovation is invention, which is at heart a highly serendipitous process rather than one that can be quantified by narrowly circumscribed or measurable IPR rights-intensive S&T policies. This is particularly true where, as in the present instance, the conceptual models for obtaining, synthesizing and explicating new forms of knowledge are themselves new and evolving.

Dr. Ron A. Bouchard
Associate Professor
Faculties of Law and Medicine & Dentistry
Fellow, Health Law Institute
University of Alberta

Birdsong gives voice and motion to the mysteries of speech

A new study of vocalization in birds sheds possible light on the relationship between voice and movement in humans and other mammals:

Movement-Associated Areas in the Avian Brain

Gesa Feenders et al., Molecular Mapping of Movement-Associated Areas in the Avian Brain: A Motor Theory for Vocal Learning Origin, PLoS ONE [Public Library of Science] 3(3): e1768. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0001768 (March 12, 2008):

Vocal learning is a critical behavioral substrate for spoken human language. It is a rare trait found in three distantly related groups of birds — songbirds, hummingbirds, and parrots. These avian groups have remarkably similar systems of cerebral vocal nuclei for the control of learned vocalizations that are not found in their more closely related vocal non-learning relatives. These findings led to the hypothesis that brain pathways for vocal learning in different groups evolved independently from a common ancestor but under pre-existing constraints. Here, we suggest one constraint, a pre-existing system for movement control. Using behavioral molecular mapping, we discovered that in songbirds, parrots, and hummingbirds, all cerebral vocal learning nuclei are adjacent to discrete brain areas active during limb and body movements. Similar to the relationships between vocal nuclei activation and singing, activation in the adjacent areas correlated with the amount of movement performed and was independent of auditory and visual input. These same movement-associated brain areas were also present in female songbirds that do not learn vocalizations and have atrophied cerebral vocal nuclei, and in ring doves that are vocal non-learners and do not have cerebral vocal nuclei. A compilation of previous neural tracing experiments in songbirds suggests that the movement-associated areas are connected in a network that is in parallel with the adjacent vocal learning system. This study is the first global mapping that we are aware for movement-associated areas of the avian cerebrum and it indicates that brain systems that control vocal learning in distantly related birds are directly adjacent to brain systems involved in movement control. Based upon these findings, we propose a motor theory for the origin of vocal learning, this being that the brain areas specialized for vocal learning in vocal learners evolved as a specialization of a pre-existing motor pathway that controls movement.

The upshot of this study, as described in Science Daily, is that neural pathways affecting basic motor control hold the key to the neurology of birdsong — and quite possibly of speech in humans as well. If areas in charge of movement in three distantly related avian taxa share many functional similarities with the brain areas for singing, then brain pathways used for vocal learning in humans may have evolved out of the brain pathways used for motor control.

This study may also explain why humans talk by gesture and by voice, but chimps talk only with their hands. "In its most specialized way, spoken language is the ability to control the learned movements of our larynx," senior author Erich Jarvis told Science Daily. "It's possible that human language pathways have also evolved in ways similar to these birds. Perhaps the evolution of vocal learning brain areas for birds and humans exploited a universal motor system that predates the split from the common ancestor of birds and mammals."

According to National Institutes of Health Director Elias A. Zerhouni, "The discovery that vocal learning brain pathways are embedded in the parts of the brain that control body movement offers unexpected insights on the origins of spoken language and could open up new approaches to understanding vocalization disorders in humans."

While all birds vocalize, most avian sounds are genetically dictated. Only songbirds, parrots, and hummingbirds can learn new songs. That skill resembles human speech, and the resemblance quite possibly has a shared genetic basis. Human speech may trace its origins 300 million years back to a type of vocal learning enabled by the neural pathways of stem amniotes, the common ancestor of reptiles, birds, and mammals.

Musical and true

And apropos of birdsong, the human voice too can be musical and true:

She let her mind wander back over her stay at Grand Isle; and she tried to discover wherein this summer had been different from any and every other summer of her life. She could only realize that she herself — her present self — was in some way different from the other self. That she was seeing with different eyes and making the acquaintance of new conditions in herself that colored and changed her environment, she did not yet suspect. . . . Robert's voice was not pretentious. It was musical and true. The voice, the notes, the whole refrain haunted her memory. — Kate Chopin, The Awakening, chapter 14 (1899)

Editor's note: These images originally appeared on Raumwerk 3_0, the "experimental platform of visual artist Dimitrios Tsantidis."

Patrick S. O'Donnell is now blogging at Ratio Juris

I am pleased to announce that Patrick S. O'Donnell, one of the smartest readers and commentators in the legal blogosphere, is now blogging at Ratio Juris. Patrick's first contribution includes links to two of his remarkably thorough reading lists, one on bioethics and the other on environmental and ecological worldviews, and a description of his storehouse of bibliographies.

Please join me in welcoming Patrick to the Jurisdynamics Network.

Anatomy of a masterpiece

From the New York Times' review of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's new exhibit, Anatomy of a Masterpiece: How to Read Chinese Paintings:

From his terrace, the world is blue and green — mountains and trees — or almost green. Spring is on the way; the geese are back. One, then two, alight on the river, with more still invisible but close behind. Pavilion living! The only way. With the city somewhere down there, and nature everywhere up here, he watches mist rise. River meets sky.

The calm watcher is the fourth-century scholar-artist Wang Xizhi, father of classical calligraphy and model for living an active life in retreat. He is depicted by the painter Qian Xuan, another connoisseur of reclusion, in a 13th-century handscroll at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The scroll is in “Anatomy of a Masterpiece: How to Read Chinese Paintings,” a spare, studious show that offers, along with many stimulations, a retreat from worldly tumult — the religious fervor, the courtly pomp, the expressive self-promotion — that fills much of the museum.

Anatomy of a Masterpiece runs through August 10.

Complexity, IPR Rights and Innovation Ecologies

I say unto you: one must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. I say unto you: you still have chaos in yourselves.

— Zarathustra

Part 1 — IPR Rights Considerations

In a recent editorial in Science, Bill Wulf used the systems ecology model to frame a forward-looking model for innovation in the life sciences. He defined an “innovation ecology” as the various “interrelated institutions, laws, regulations and policies” necessary to underwrite successful commercialization of publicly funded research through an “infrastructure that entails education, research, tax policy, and intellectual property protection, among others”.

In this formulation, as we have seen increasingly over the last few decades, intellectual property and regulatory (IPR) rights form the linchpin between innovative medical research and the marketing and consumption of approved medical products.

Notwithstanding the value attached by some to ‘strong’ IPR rights, casting the innovation landscape as an open complex organic ecology rather than a closed historical linear model of basic-to-applied research is consistent with newer more open-ended analytical models such as complex adaptive systems, network dynamics and systems dynamics.

These 'systems' frameworks view and model systems as dynamic, adaptive and indeterminate networks where the behavior of the system as a whole is governed by the ever-changing and non-linear nature of the connections between actors and institutions rather than as a predictable sum of a set of linear deterministic nodes.

The implications of a systems view of areas of law, such as environmental law, that are strongly contingent on science have been insightfully described by JB Ruhl, including in this blog. Reading over JB’s posts and articles from the perspective of someone who has spent nearly 20 years at the experimental bench prior to entering legal scholarship got me thinking about the value of this approach to the generation of breakthroughs in the life sciences and the policies now being advanced globally for this purpose, particularly those aimed at enhancing domestic productivity and prosperity.

One implication of a systems view is that smaller domestic innovation ecologies are collapsing globally due among other things to the global reach of patent decisions such as that in KSR v. Teleflex, harmonization of regulatory processes and standards, such as those relating to drug and biologics approval, adoption of international intellectual property instruments such as the WTO's Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) and convergence of national science and technology (S&T) policies aimed at commercialization of publicly funded medical research. Indeed many nations such as my own (Canada) are implementing strong IPR rights regimes that explicitly encompass publicly funded research efforts in order to reproduce the phenomenal success of university technology transfer and commercialization in the United States.

So, what has complexity theory have to say about the tension between strong ‘closed’ IPR rights on the one hand and more ‘open’ systems of innovation that depend on the inherent creativity and inventiveness of persons skilled in the art (PHOSITA) in an increasingly global product development context? A lot, at least in theory. I will explore this in the second post.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children

The work of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children warrants very close look by Jurisdynamics. The NCMEC is an exemplary case of multijurisdictional coordination, cooperation between private and public actors, and astonishingly rapid adaptation in pursuit of the public good.

For the moment, given this forum's focus on natural disasters, it suffices to recognize the NCMEC's greatest contribution to the recovery of children separated from their families during disasters — the National Emergency Child Locator Center:

In October 2006, Congress and President George W. Bush created the National Emergency Child Locator Center (NECLC). NECLC will be operated by NCMEC when a national disaster is declared by the President, to assist in the location of children and the reunification of families resulting from the disaster or subsequent evacuations.

In the event of a natural disaster, the National Emergency Child Locator Center will

• Establish a toll-free hotline to receive reports of displaced children;
• Create a website to provide information about displaced children;
• Deploy staff to the location of a declared disaster area to gather information about displaced children;
• Provide information to the public about additional resources;
• Partner with federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies; and
• Refer reports of displaced adults to the Attorney General’s designated authority and the National Emergency Family Registry and Locator System.

Same-sex marriage and the meaning of conservatism

I'd like to offer a few thoughts in response to the video proceedings of Is Gay Marriage Conservative?, a February 15 conference previewed on Jurisdynamics.

Let's begin by watching videos presenting the opposing perspectives of Dale Carpenter and Teresa Stanton Collett:

Dale Carpenter	Teresa Stanton Collett
Dale Carpenter The Traditionalist Case [G]ay marriage is a conservative idea, though many self-described conservatives may be among the last to realize it. Marriage for gay couples, moreover, is conservative in the original and deepest sense of the word: it is traditionalist. Traditionalist conservatism, described most ably in the work of writers like Edmund Burke and Michael Oakeshott, emphasizes the need to respect longstanding practices and traditions; the need for continuity and stability in social institutions; the need to proceed incrementally where change is warranted; the need to be modest and cautious about the powers of reason; and the importance of basing any reform on experience rather than on abstract ideas about the good society. I will first sketch a traditionalist argument against gay marriage rooted in the work of Burke and Oakeshott. Next, I will note some advances in positive knowledge that weaken traditionalist concerns about homosexuals and their relationships. From this base, I will make an affirmative case for marriage for gay Americans. The affirmative case points to both individualistic and communitarian benefits. I will then reconsider the traditionalist objections to gay marriage outlined previously and place the argument for gay marriage within the framework of traditionalist conservative thought. . . . The traditionalist, I conclude, should resist a “final” answer to gay marriage found in either constitutional solutions that take the form of amendments banning gay marriage or judicial declarations imposing it.	Teresa Stanton Collett Marriage and Same-Sex Unions: Asking Too Little and Too Much The cultural debate over whether the state should recognize same-sex unions as marriage is only a tiny, albeit a very important, part of a much larger debate surrounding the nature and meaning of marriage for American society. Both the broader and more narrow debates occur in the media, state and national legislatures, the courts, the schools, various faith communities, and perhaps most importantly (and most passionately) in our homes. Much of the passion that surrounds these debates arises from our expectations of what the law of marriage will do for and to us, yet we rarely step back and closely analyze these expectations. This presentation attempts to analyze some of the expectations held by advocates involved in the debate about the meaning and scope of marriage laws. Beginning with the common expectations of those who support and oppose recognition of same-sex unions, I consider whether our expectations are realistic in light of what we know about human nature and contemporary American culture. I then progress to the differing expectations of both advocates and opponents, exploring the basis for our difference. Ultimately I conclude that those involved in this debate (including myself) expect both too much and too little of the legal institution of marriage. It is my hope that clarifying these expectations will allow us to find some areas of common concern that warrant our collective action, while reducing the rancor over the true areas of disagreement.

The debate over same-sex marriage is fascinating because it exposes a fundamental contradiction in the definition of conservatism. Does conservatism represent a commitment to a process for societal decisionmaking, one that honors tradition, venerates established institutions, and places the burden of persuasion on novel propositions? Or, alternatively, does conservatism represent a commitment to certain substantive values established at some point in history, in this instance the proposition that marriage as an institution permits only one structure — namely, one woman and one man?

The idea of jurisdynamics, as I have defined it, is bound to have some tension with both species of conservatism. Insofar as process-oriented conservatism (which strikes me as the heart of Dale Carpenter's case for same-sex marriage) permits more room for legal change, even on a modest and incremental basis, I find it more appealing at the margin than a substantive commitment to particular values. To be sure, neither the age nor the durability of a social custom or norm is dispositive in a jurisdynamic view of the law. But the process-oriented traditionalist seems more open to arguments favoring change, as long as novelty bears the burden of persuasion, whereas a substantive commitment to a particular bundle of values deemed "conservative" offers no obvious avenue for a collective social decision to change course.

And on those grounds, I give Dale Carpenter the upper hand relative to those who oppose same-sex marriage for putatively conservative reasons.

Die Schöpfung: Zwei Podcasts

By way of Theologisches Deutsch I've discovered this treasure trove of literary podcasts in German. I have combined Literatur-Podcast.de's podcast of Genesis, chapter 1, with the 1912 revision of Martin Luther's translation and an excerpt from Joseph Haydn, Die Schöpfung, as performed on December 8, 2002, by Benita Borbonus (soprano), Jörg Nitschkes (tenor), Almas Svilpa (baritone), and the Chor und Orchester der Universität Witten/Herdecke under the direction of Ingo Ernst Reihl.

Click here or on the picture at right to read the rest of this post . . . .

Die Schöpfung: Sechstagewerk

1. Am Anfang schuf Gott Himmel und Erde.



Genesis (Erstes Buch Moses) 1, Die Schöpfung: Sechstagewerk 
2. Und die Erde war wüst und leer, und es war finster auf der Tiefe; und der Geist Gottes schwebte auf dem Wasser.


3. Und Gott sprach: Es werde Licht! und es ward Licht.


4. Und Gott sah, daß das Licht gut war. Da schied Gott das Licht von der Finsternis


5. und nannte das Licht Tag und die Finsternis Nacht. Da ward aus Abend und Morgen der erste Tag.


6. Und Gott sprach: Es werde eine Feste zwischen den Wassern, und die sei ein Unterschied zwischen den Wassern.


7. Da machte Gott die Feste und schied das Wasser unter der Feste von dem Wasser über der Feste. Und es geschah also.


8. Und Gott nannte die Feste Himmel. Da ward aus Abend und Morgen der andere Tag.


9. Und Gott sprach: Es sammle sich das Wasser unter dem Himmel an besondere Örter, daß man das Trockene sehe. Und es geschah also.



Joseph Haydn, Die Schöpfung (Chor), No. 2-3 , Chor und Orchester der Universität Witten/Herdecke (Dec. 8, 2002)
10. Und Gott nannte das Trockene Erde, und die Sammlung der Wasser nannte er Meer. Und Gott sah, daß es gut war.


11. Und Gott sprach: Es lasse die Erde aufgehen Gras und Kraut, das sich besame, und fruchtbare Bäume, da ein jeglicher nach seiner Art Frucht trage und habe seinen eigenen Samen bei sich selbst auf Erden. Und es geschah also.


12. Und die Erde ließ aufgehen Gras und Kraut, das sich besamte, ein jegliches nach seiner Art, und Bäume, die da Frucht trugen und ihren eigenen Samen bei sich selbst hatten, ein jeglicher nach seiner Art. Und Gott sah, daß es gut war.


13. Da ward aus Abend und Morgen der dritte Tag.


14. Und Gott sprach: Es werden Lichter an der Feste des Himmels, die da scheiden Tag und Nacht und geben Zeichen, Zeiten, Tage und Jahre


15. und seien Lichter an der Feste des Himmels, daß sie scheinen auf Erden. Und es geschah also.


16. Und Gott machte zwei große Lichter: ein großes Licht, das den Tag regiere, und ein kleines Licht, das die Nacht regiere, dazu auch Sterne.


17. Und Gott setzte sie an die Feste des Himmels, daß sie schienen auf die Erde


18. und den Tag und die Nacht regierten und schieden Licht und Finsternis. Und Gott sah, daß es gut war.


19. Da ward aus Abend und Morgen der vierte Tag.



20. Und Gott sprach: Es errege sich das Wasser mit webenden und lebendigen Tieren, und Gevögel fliege auf Erden unter der Feste des Himmels.


21. Und Gott schuf große Walfische und allerlei Getier, daß da lebt und webt, davon das Wasser sich erregte, ein jegliches nach seiner Art, und allerlei gefiedertes Gevögel, ein jegliches nach seiner Art. Und Gott sah, daß es gut war.


22. Und Gott segnete sie und sprach: Seid fruchtbar und mehrt euch und erfüllt das Wasser im Meer; und das Gefieder mehre sich auf Erden.


23. Da ward aus Abend und Morgen der fünfte Tag.


24. Und Gott sprach: Die Erde bringe hervor lebendige Tiere, ein jegliches nach seiner Art: Vieh, Gewürm und Tiere auf Erden, ein jegliches nach seiner Art. Und es geschah also.


25. Und Gott machte die Tiere auf Erden, ein jegliches nach seiner Art, und das Vieh nach seiner Art, und allerlei Gewürm auf Erden nach seiner Art. Und Gott sah, daß es gut war.


26. Und Gott sprach: Laßt uns Menschen machen, ein Bild, das uns gleich sei, die da herrschen über die Fische im Meer und über die Vögel unter dem Himmel und über das Vieh und über die ganze Erde und über alles Gewürm, das auf Erden kriecht.


27. Und Gott schuf den Menschen ihm zum Bilde, zum Bilde Gottes schuf er ihn; und schuf sie einen Mann und ein Weib.


28. Und Gott segnete sie und sprach zu ihnen: Seid fruchtbar und mehrt euch und füllt die Erde und macht sie euch untertan und herrscht über die Fische im Meer und über die Vögel unter dem Himmel und über alles Getier, das auf Erden kriecht.


29. Und Gott sprach: Seht da, ich habe euch gegeben allerlei Kraut, das sich besamt, auf der ganzen Erde und allerlei fruchtbare Bäume, die sich besamen, zu eurer Speise,


30. und allem Getier auf Erden und allen Vögeln unter dem Himmel und allem Gewürm, das da lebt auf Erden, daß sie allerlei grünes Kraut essen. Und es geschah also.


31. Und Gott sah alles an, was er gemacht hatte; und siehe da, es war sehr gut. Da ward aus Abend und Morgen der sechste Tag.