WILD SURMISE

APRIL 1987 #l3

AN ALMOST ANONYMOUS INFORMAL NOTE

MISSING AT HOME

Almost two years ago when we first invaded the mail boxes of a lot of you with this letter, we were concerned about what appeared to be an inordinate number of deaths of Vietnam veterans who had returned alive from the war. The only evidence we had was anecdotal and the fact that the number of Vietnam veterans found by the 1980 census was far fewer than the military reported being discharged alive, allowing for any reasonable mortality rate. What we lacked was a serious study of the consequences of that combat in terms of the survival rate of the veterans. We feared a high death rate, feared that more veterans had died because of the war after returning home than had died in combat. But there were no hard facts available.

That has now changed. The February 13, 1987 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association carried an article, "Postservice Mortality Amonq Vietnam Veterans.~' The article was done by the Center for Disease Control, Atlanta, Ceorgia. fleprints, Center for Disease Control, 1600 Clifton Road (C-25) Atlanta, GA 30333 (Coleen A. Boyle PhD.) The study was ordered by the Us Congress. The results indicate that, yes, service in Vietnam did result in an increase in mortality due to motor vehicle accidents, suicide, homicide and accidental poisonings. However, the resulting deaths were not as many as the deaths that actually occurred in combat.

We would like to thank all who have taken an interest in this troubling matter, particularly those who were instrumental in having the study done and those who actually did the study itself. we are sending a BALBOA AWARD to the Center for Disease Control in recognition of their work. The award is wade by WILD SURMISE when we think someone has investigated seriously a matter we thought needed investigation. In a case like this, of course, it is not only the researchers themselves who deserve credit, but the congress and those who encouraged congress to order the study.

This is not the first such award. The first award was made to the Veterans Administration for undertaking to do a similar study. We understand that their study has been completed and is soon to be released. When that information becomes available, we will let you know. (Giving the BALBOA AWARD is not always simple. You have to find somebody to send it to. For instance, there is a group at the University of Maryland that has done some fascinating work on the time course of the change of a light interference study from interference pattern to photon counting. We want to give them an award, but they don't answer our mail. understandable, of course.)

The study done by the Center for Disease Control CCDC) went like this: They took a random sample of Vietnam era Army personnel records. of these, they selected those whose records could be found, who had had a single term of enlistment between January 1965 and December 1971 with at least 16 weeks of active service time with a pay grade no higher than Es. In order to be included in the study, the soldier also had to have earned a military occupational specialty other than "trainee" or "duty solder.IT Alas, I do not know what that selection implies. I assume that by the time a man is placed. in combat, he must have earned a specialty rating of some sort. IL not, it would seem that there is a weakness in the study by excluding a substantial number of men who may have been subjected to disproportionate stress.

Of a total random sample of 48,513, only 18,581 qualified for the study. Potentially, that could result in a serious distortion of the results; the study does not discuss what such a distortion 'night be. Of the qualified number, 9558 served in Vietnam and 9023 served elsewhere in the world: the Us, Germany or Korea. of these, it was possible to verify whether they were alive or not for 93.6% of the Vietnam veterans and 91.9% of the others. Those numbers are, of course, excellent. Of the soldiers who went to Vietnam, 234 died on active duty. Of the others, 34 died on active duty. It was the survival rate of the veterans that was studied.

What they found was this: During the first five years after discharge, 110 veterans with Vietnam experience died, compared with 73 of the other cohort. From then until the end of the data collection period, 136 of the Vietnam veterans died, compared with 127 of the others. Those are the facts. They are scientifically valid, and they indicate a statistically significant difference. They have been reported in newspapers and magazines, and several of the WILD SURMISE readers have been thouqhtful enough to send us clippings of the original article and of references to it elsewhere.

Let us look at their numbers a little longer. 9023 soldiers did not go to Vietnam and 34 of them died. We will assume this to be the expected death rate of healthy men of that age doing dangerous work under pressure. At that rate, of the 9558 who went to Vietnam, 36 would have died. Instead, 234 died; so 198 died as a consequence of being in Vietnam. Obviously, not everyone who went to Vietnam was shot at. This number 198 gives you an idea of how much and how dangerous the combat these particular Then faced really was. 8989 non Vietnam veterans were discharged; 200 of them died during the course of the study. 9324 Vietnam veterans were discharged; had they died at the same rate, 207 would have died. Instead, 246 died, 39 more than expected. You may compare the number 39 with the number 198 to see how dangerous coming home was compared with going to war.

Matters may be somewhat worse. The study points out that deaths due to diseases of the circulatory system were LOWER for those who had returned from Vietnam than for those who had served elsewhere. Frankly, we are astonished. We had believed, we still believe, that there is a powerful link between heart disease and the emotional state of the person. we bad expected a higher rate of lethal heart disease in people who had been subjected to maximum stress. However, we do not see it in their numbers.

One of five things must be true. 1) The difference means nothing; it is only a statistical fluke, like winning at solitaire without cheating. 2) For some reason, those who had a better, fitter cardiovascular system elected or were selected to go to Vietnam. This is what the CflC study asserts, and what I think must be true. 3) War is really good for people, kinds of tones up the system and shakes the kinks out. No, I don't think so. 4) In order to survive combat, you have to have a pretty terrific cardiovascular system. All those who were vulnerable to cardiovascular disease either on a physical or psychological basis died in Vietnam. I don't think that, either. 5) Somebody is covering something up. That way madness lies.

So, like the CDC, I think that men in better physical condition went to Vietnam. Unlike the CDC, however, I am willing to add up the consequences of that assumption. They say 23 of 8989 non Vietnam veterans died of cardiovascular disease. At the same rate, of 9324 Vietnam veterans, 24 would have died. Instead, 12 died. Since these were fit men, who were going to have a lower death rate anyway, we need to ADD 12 to the deaths of the Vietnam veterans to have an idea of what the effect of Vietnam itself was. Thus we have 51 deaths among veterans returning from Vietnam over and beyond the number of deaths that would have occurred among those men, had they not had Vietnam in their past-

The statistical purity of this approach is, of course, nonexistent. Had the death rate from cardiovascular disease been higher among those returning from Vietnam, I should hardly have argued, "Ah, but these men were already doomed by their own cardio-vascular systems,^" and excluded them from the war-related mortality. On the other hand, pre-selection of the more fit men going to Vietnam is the CDC's own interpretation. The CDC, in fact, points out that the cardio-vascular death rate among the Vietnam veterans was about the same as that for the population as a whole, whereas they expected the rate, on the bases of better conditioning, to be much lower. The cardlo-vascular death rate among veterans who had not gone to Vietnam was higher than what was expected at their age. One possible cause could be that the Vietnam veterans really were fitter or better trained and that both Vietnam and non-Vietnam veterans had an elevated cardiovascular death a rate a due a to the particular psychological repercussions of that particular war. A mystery remains, and I only make the assumption I do in order to make some estimate as to the cost of that war in lives for the particular group of veterans under study.

Final cost: 198 deaths in combat. 51 deaths due to combat after returning home. For every four who die in combat, one dies of the after effects after getting home. Incidentally, none of the deaths reported in the study were 'service connected," recognized as due to war injuries. List the ways to get killed in combat: bullets, bombs, flames and everything else combined. Coming home is more dangerous than at least one of these.

Of course, death rate is a very crude indicator of the health consequences of something. A question just as important is the question of how those who are still alive are doing. The presence of a higher death rate among Vietnam veterans would seem to indicate that the survivors should be studied more closely, with interviews, medical examination, psychological evaluation and laboratory testing designed to measure some sort of social "wellness" as well as physical fitness. In fact, the CDC undertook to do such a study at the same time as the mortality study, and they have promised to bring those facts forth in the near future.

Also in the near future, the Veterans Administration study, promised since last fall, should become available. That will be an independent job, and it will be a valuable check on the order of magnitude of the problem.

Another source of information is at hand as well. The original problem emerged as a result of the 1980 census. In three more years it will be time for another census. Assuming that the same questions are asked about military service, that census should once more give an estimate of the number of Vietnam veterans. Comparing military counts with census numbers is, of course, full of hazard. The professionals who did the CDC study did not even MENTION the census, rather than tackle the job of trying to reconcile it with the other data. On the other hand, comparing census data to census data seems straight forward, and surely it will be done, although probably not for a few more years.

Beyond 1990, things become more puzzling. The CDC study concludes the study by saying that the group should be monitored further to see what effect chronic diseases will have on them.

There are three categories of chronic disease that come to mind at once. The first would be complications of alcohol, tobacco and drug use. Drug use, the study has already stated, continues to be a health problem in the group. Alcohol and tobacco will probably be better understood through the

interviews in depth already done.

The second category of possible chronic disease will be extremely difficult to work out. That category is the effects of Agent Orange. Agent Orange was used as a defoliant during the war. The idea was that if the enemy was hiding in the jungle, it was reasonable to destroy the jungle. So ton after ton of Agent Orange was used. There is a scene in Heart of Darkness that describes a British man of war, brisling with canon, hove to off the coast of Africa. There had been a little native uprising and the war ship was retaliating incredibly by shelling the continent. That ship was only undertaking the relatively modest task of knocking off all the trees in Africa. Asia is a lot bigger. Another problem was, of course, that just being able to see the enemy did not mean one could identify him.

A third problem with the use of Agent Orange was the exposure of people to the dioxins it contains. One form of dioxin is exceedingly deadly, producing in tiny doses hepatic, intestinal, neurological and immunological disease in guinea pigs and, doubtless, similar changes in people. Consider: 1) Dioxins may be deadly in tiny amounts. 2) The effects on guinea pigs are varied and unpredictable. 3) The effects are also poorly understood. 4) People are different from guinea pigs. 5) There are lots of different kinds of dioxins. 6) Dioxins accumulate in tissue and may hang around for years. 7) There are many sources of dioxin in an industrial environment, from defoliants to by products of industry and waste disposal. 8) People in industrialized countries (and Vietnam) have high levels of tissue dioxins, and these levels are highly variable. 9) These levels may be dangerous already, irrespective of Agent Orange. (Which isn't orange at all; it's a white powder.) 10) What studies there are suggest as much as a 15 to 20 year latent period in the production of malignant tumors by dioxins. 11) There may be poor correlation between blood levels of dioxins and tissue levels. Considering such things as these, reaching a clear understanding of Agent Orange and its effects may never be possible. Of course, the attempt to understand it must be made, including as the CDC suggests, long term follow up of the Vietnam veterans.

The third category, also virtually imponderable, is the acquired immune deficiency syndrome. According to the CflC study, Vietnam veterans were at an increased risk of accidental poisoning, including drug overdose. The remainder of their study will tell whether, as seems plausible, they have an increased rate of abuse of intravenous drugs. If so, they are probably at an increased risk of acquiring the virus that produces the immune deficiency syndrome. It now appears that the virus is highly lethal.

The virus, called LAV or HTLV III, is carried by body fluids, mostly in lymphocytes in the blood stream. Infection occurs through blood, such as contaminated needles or transfusions or from pregnant mother to unborn child, and through sexual intercourse, particularly homosexual intercourse at least up to the present. After a long latent period, a certain proportion of those infected loose a substantial part of their bodies immune defenses, leaving them vulnerable to infections and malignant tumors they would otherwise fend off. Once the full blown syndrome develops, death is probable within a year or two.

To this small nugget of facts, is attached an enormous amount of speculation, fear, denial, uncertain statistics and lack of statistics. One important number would be: how many people, say in the U.S., are infected. One source recently has said about one million. A few months ago, the same source suggested more than that for the state of Florida alone. Another important number would be: how many get over the infection. So far, there has been no reported case of a person once infected becoming free of infection. Another number, how many have died? So far about 30,000. How many are likely to die within, say, ten years of getting the infection? Unknown, but it seems likely that it is the overwhelming majority, say in excess of nine out of ten. How fast is the disease spreading? currently, they think it is doubling about every year in the homosexual population and doubling every six months in the heterosexual population. Are there some people who cannot be infected? Unlikely, since there are populations in which the carrier rate is 80%.

Depending on which statistics you choose to accept, the situation ranges from a major modern tragedy to an unparalleled calamity. For instance, one source has said that in 1983, the carrier rate in Zaire was 3%. In 1987, the carrier rate is 60% of the adult population.

One problem with thinking about the disease is that the alarm sounds like many alarms discredited in the past. One recalls shrill predictions that in a comparable number of years: we would be overrun by aliens, the ice cap would melt, the ice age would return, the ozone layer would be burned off, we would have nuclear war, we would run out of oil, the majority of plant an animal forms would become extinct, the American family would vanish, morality would evaporate, crime would mount until society disintegrated, we would become a nation of junkies, the communists would take over the world, the planet would become polluted beyond fitness for life, the population would outstrip our ability to produce food, and so forth. To these things, common wisdom has generally been, 'Well, what you are looking at is a trend that may change. And even if the trend doesn't change, maybe the end result wouldn't be so bad as you think." Not that none of these things could happen; but they haven't happened yet.

There is even a suspicion that the epidemic is all a fabrication: that the virus has been around all along and that people are pretending that it is something new somehow to get at homosexuals and the sexually promiscuous.

There is also a suspicion that the virus has been around all along, but has only made periodic outbreaks. That the same virus was responsible for the fall of Rome, of Carthage, of Babylon and Surner. That the virus has laid low every mighty culture when it reached a certain size and the wealth to permit its population to carry on like Rome in her decay. That the virus was carried for eons in some African tribe, passed by some medicine man from victim to unwitting hapless victim along with the secret of its spread until recently some medicine man decided it was time to unleash the ancient horror on the world.

It is true that there are certain things in our culture that elicit a sense or revulsion somewhat out of proportion to the obvious damage they do. consider: sodomy, sexual promiscuity, physical mutilation (including ear piercing, tattoos, circumcision and other cosmetic surgery on healthy people) and playing with blood. These are shocking issues. The also happen to be ways to transmit AIDS. Perhaps it is only people who were shocked by such things who have survived previous epidemics. As M's older brother says it: "It's just a question of which life form came first. Did the fundamentalists invent AIDS, or did the virus invent the fundamentalists?"

Believe what you want, but if you want to survive, what you must do is quite simple. If you do not carry the virus, then do not catch the virus. Refrain from intravenous drug use outside a proper medically controlled environment. Do not get a blood transfusion unless the blood has been tested for the disease. Do not even travel in areas where there is a high carrier rate OR where they do not so test blood. Have no premarital intercourse or extramarital intercourse. He sure your spouse keeps the same rules. In short: don't cheat.

The surgeon general has said, more or less, "Unless you have had a monogamous relationship for at least five years, restrict yourself to sate sexual practice; that is, use a condom." Sorry, condoms are not safe. They are only about 90% effective in delaying pregnancy; I see no reason to expect them to be more effective in delaying AIDS infection.

If you DO carry the virus, then the rules are a bit different. Your survival may depend more on the efforts of others at finding a cure than on what you can do yourself. what you need is good professional advice about taking care of yourself. I presume such advice will include having sex with only one partner from now on, that that partner should already be a carrier to, and ALSO to use a condom to protect the two of you from each other's version of the virus.

If you do not know whether you carry the virus, that is, if there is any chance you might, then you need to find out. Public statements have not said that, at least in part because there do not exist the facilities to council all the carriers that a screening program would discover. With enough demand, those facilities will be created.

Tough rules. So tough, indeed, that the official position is that they are not recommended because they cannot be implemented. The sex drive, they say, is very strong.

That is true, but it is also true that people are very strong. In Britain, the population was constant for many centuries, possibly even many millenia, before the industrial revolution by the simple stratagem of couples not getting married until they could afford children. People are capable of discipline.

Which brings us back to veterans. Indeed, such veterans as are intravenous drug abusers are at increased risk of being infected with the virus, just as all such drug abusers are. Although the final numbers are not in, it may prove that only a tiny minority of veterans are drug users. The AIDS virus does not promise to remain an affliction of a tiny minority. Survival in the next decade may be strongly dependant on sexual prudence.

Ideally, sexual prudence is based on moral conviction. You don~t do certain things because they are wrong. Even if they were safe they would be wrong. Alas/ if you accept the statistics, this logic does not seem to have worked in Zaire.

Alternatively, prudence may be based on the belief that one is in the presence of a ruthless, deadly, sophisticated, even demonic enemy. Survival depends on the utmost caution, extreme, unblinking, beyond the ordinary bounds. Yet one must go about the ordinary business of life. Approximately, it is a combat mentality. It may be that those who have survived combat will adapt to it better.

Long term survival rates of combat veterans may thus prove very hard to interpret.

To return from speculation, it now seems clear that our initial fear is justified. Veterans returning from Vietnam have died at a higher rate because of their service there. That our initial guess at the numbers was not accurate is no surprise; what was needed was a proper study. That study has now been done. It will now be possible to make more rational decisions about how to treat people who have been exposed to extreme conditions. There is now also one more rational argument in the hands of those who argue that the cost of any war is too great.

Editor's Note: WILD SURMISE is an occasional newsletter on speculative matter. Last issue, Booty said he didn't think he was going to have any ideas this month, so we have three articles. Well, that's speculation for you. Next issue, which we hope to have out in June, he says he's going to talk about how not to let having an X ray examination ruin your day. Also, we have promises from Dl's wise older brother, M's smarter younger brother, the flurmese Harp and hints from such luminaries as Patrick Hill and Kevin Lanydon.

M, who is not to be confused with "baby M," and the beautiful Wild Surmise laboratory assistant just got back from a moonlight canoe trip down Prairie Creek and the Styx they took with Dl's mother and two brothers. The rivers run through miles of deep Florida cypress swamp. M has also taken up board sailing at night; says you don't get sunburned that way.

When I came to work the other day, I could hear Booty in the kitchen with the beautiful Wild Surmise laboratory assistant. Booty was mewing irritably about something. Visions returned to me of the day they tried to invent sorghum wine. She summed that one up saying, "flid you hear about the sorghum wine festival? Nobody went but the horses."

When I inquired, Booty said they were trying to revivify a cockroach by packing it in the microwave in dry ice. There followed one of those scenes in which he tried to explain that the microwave was supposed to exaggerate any effect of the cosmic micro-wave background radiation, while the dry ice was to keep the dead cockroach from over-heating and to supply a carbon dioxide source for its reversed metabolism and I tried to explain why he shouldn't put roaches in Moneybags's microwave. The scene had shifted to the dining room when M came in smearing cream cheese on something on a cracker. "Roaches in the microwave?" he said quietly. "That's disgusting." Then he ate the cracker.

"This is a very dangerous place," observed the laboratory assistant.

copyright April, 1987, WILD SURMISE

COMPUTER COMPATIBLE NUMERALS

R.0. Whitaker 317 241 7396

4719 Squire Drive

Indpls, IN 46241

How many numbering systems can you name just off the bat?

There's the Roman Numeral system. The Arabic Decimal system. Tally marks. The duo-decimal system used in counting eggs and doughnuts. The sexagesimal system carried over from the Babylonians and used in clocks and the measurements of angles --a base 60 system. Probably you can name several others. Like four score and twenty. About forty years ago we got a new one --the binary system. It is a base 2 system. Only two digits in it, 1 and zero. We did not exactly choose it. It was forced upon us by computers. Which use the binary system.

Peruse Table I for a moment. TABLE I. Numerals 0 - 5.

The year 1987 in binary becomes -- 11111000011 -- which is rather unwieldy. Indicates one reason why our numbering system is based on the number of fingers we have rather than the number of hands.

Computer slang for each digit of a binary number is "bit." Short for "binary integer" I think. Things are improved if we divide the number into sets of four bits each -- 1987, 111 1100 0011.

Each of these quads is a base 16 or "hexadecimal" number. A little study shows that the number is 7 12 3. So. In hexadecimal we all live in the year of our Lord 7 12 3.

Each quad may be formed into a "Computer Compatible Numeral (CCN) ((or "Completely Crazy Numeral"))

The current year of Our lord becomes

1987---111111000011 or 111 1100 0011 or Seven-Twelve-Three

Each element of each numeral corresponds to a bit inside the computer which is high. The zero is an odd ball. We have to have it to indicate a numeral is present. It is an odd ball in several respects. Suppose I have some horses in a pen. I have no trouble as long as I have four, six or thirty-two horses in the pen. But suppose I have zero horses in the pen. How do I know it isn't cows I have in the pen? It took the Arabic Decimal system about ten centuries to replace the Roman Numeral system. From about 500 AD to about 1500. The academic media really fought it. As late as 1400, a French professor bitterly attacked it. The Roman system had no zero. So, the zero was the target. The professor said -- Cette cifre! This something that means nothing. How asinine can you get!

Similar numerals have been proposed by others. However, there is no doubt that mine is by far the best.

Digital clocks and other such devices generally use the seven-bar numeral. The four bits representing a numeral inside the computer feed to an electronic converter, which then drives the bars of the display numeral. fly replacing the seven-bar numerals with four element CCN'S, the number of bars to be driven is reduced and the need for the code converter is eliminated.

A very simple reader for the numerals is possible. No character recognition. Just sense presence of each of the four elements with a four element array that scans down the page; One photocell detects an index that tells the system whether a numeral is being scanned in the base or middle. One cell detects 2's. One detects 8's. One reads both l's and 4'5, depending on whether the index reader is indicating middle or base of numeral.

Backward Universe.

In January, we were talking about how the universe must be running backward. General relativity asserts that any universe must be expanding or collapsing. General relativity also asserts that if enough matter is pressed into a small enough space, that matter can never escape because the escape velocity will be in excess of the speed of light. Therefore a universe with any significant amount of matter cannot be expanding because it would start out as a black hole. Therefore our universe is collapsing. Since it looks to us like our universe is expanding, our perception of time must be reversed.

In support of this notion, we proposed that anything, even a photon, must have a limit below which it cannot be compressed without becoming a black hole. We calculated a size for the smallest possible photon. As a photon gets smaller, it gets more energetic, as specified by Planck's constant. Its energy can by related to an effective mass, as specified by E=mc². The mass can be related to the radius of a black hole by using the universal gravitation constant. Given the smallest possible photon (which is also the smallest possible measurement and the smallest possible black hole), which we called a DOUBT, there is a question of how the photon fits into the DOUBT. In other words, is it the radius of the black hole or the circumference of the black hole. The difference in the calculations is, or course, 2 times pi, the ratio between the radius and circumference of a circle.

There are at least two published values of Planck's constant. The more common one is 6.625 x 10 to the -34 power. The other, 1.0546 x 10 to the -34 power, we found in a Physics text Principles of Physics by Hurley and carrod, published in Boston 1978 by Houghton Mifflin Company. These two numbers differ, of course, by a factor of 2 times pi. It seems reasonable to use the smaller number and then not correct for the fact that wavelength may refer to the circumference of the DOUBT while the black hole size is measured by its radius.

Not to worry if there is a an error of about that size. In the standard model of the Big Bang universe, there is an error also. If you go back in time to the moment when all radiation was so compressed as to form what we call ~DOUBTs," quantum theory calls for random fluctuations of about that size. If you take such fluctuations and expand them to the present size of the universe, they should produce inhomogeneities in the universe of a size that can be calculated. If you then measure the observable fluctuations in the universe, it turns out that the universe is much more smooth than it ought to be. The error, I think, is either a factor of ten to the 120th power, or ten to the ten to the 120th. Either way, it is the kind of error that makes a man want to stand up and salute.

The size of the error is so great that people are seriously proposing a class of theories called 'inflationary" or Grand Unified Theories. I call them crand Unified Field Fantasies. They have one thing in common. They all call for the universe to expand at greater than the speed of light during its initial moments. This is called trading one absurdity for another.

While we are talking about calculations, let us look briefly at the difference between past and future. What happens to things as the universe expands? We will consider four classes of things:

energy, matter, momentum and information.

One form of energy is electromagnetic radiation. There are other forms. Energy may consist of heat, measured as calories, as BTU's as "what you would get from burning a ton of coaltY and as 'what you would be from setting off a ton of TNT.,' It may consist of electrical power; it may be what you get for running electricity at a certain voltage and certain amperage for a certain period of time. It may be work, that is a force times a distance, what it takes to lift a weight so many feet. It may be kinetic energy, that is equal to the mass of an object times its speed multiplied by its speed again all multiplied by one half. All of these forms may be conveniently interconverted. They can be (and probably should be) all measured in the same units. We will consider them as identical.

So consider a moving photon. The photon moves at the speed of light (since it is light), and according to the theory of special relativity, it should not age. Thus the expansion of the universe should have no effect on the photon. The photon expands right along with the universe. If the universe doubles in size, the photon also doubles. At the same time, its energy falls, of course. Now the universe is enlarging in three dimensions while the photon only enlarges in one. It would seem that the photon cannot be enlarging as fast as the universe.

No so. The photon specifies a unit of length. But until that photon has hit something, it has not specified what direction it was going in. To specify its own direction for an infinite time, the photon would have to have an infinite amount of information. It doesn't, so its direction remains ambiguous. Its course is indeterminate in an expanding universe. Thus for any photon, the ratio of its own wavelength to the radius of the universe is a constant. However, once the photon DOES react with something, new information appears in the universe.

Mass can be converted into energy. Thus mass can be (and probably should be) measured in the same units as energy. Look what happens to mass as the universe expands. Consider all mass as consisting of a finite number of subatomic particles, neutrons and protons with their attendant electrons. These particles have a long life expectancy compared to that of the universe. That is, at present the half-life of a proton is greater than half the life of the universe until the present. To a first approximation, matter is not turning into non-matter. Each particle has a location that may be specified with an accuracy that is limited by that particle's mass. Thus the location has some specific size. There are only a certain number of locations of any given size in a universe of given size. As the universe goes up in size, the number of locations goes up in number.

Now if you have a telephone exchange in a little down, you may be able to give everyone in town a four digit number and have them all get a different number. For a city, you add more digits. For a nation or the whole world, more and more. Thus it takes more information to specify the location of a particle in a bigger universe. As with energy, matter is constantly associated with new information appearing in the universe.

With momentum, things are a bit more confusing. For one thing, the units are now different. Momentum is equal to mass times velocity. Assume that the velocity is fixed. The location of the mass still becomes more and more ambiguous as time goes by. The momentum carries the mass along as if it were going down an infinitely branching pathway. Even if the speed is fixed, the possible branches continue to diverge until the location of the mass has little to do with its initial location and very much to do with the particular path it has chosen.

They tell you that information is power. As usual, "they" are trying to confuse you. Information can be converted into energy. Information and energy can be (and probably should be) measured in the same units. Information is work. Information, if you will, is money. Power is the ability to do work over time. Information is not power. It is the ability to learn that is power.

In the military, where power is a big issue, an officer will not give an order that he not be disturbed. If he cannot be disturbed, he cannot learn. If he cannot learn, he has no power. He will always leave someone with permission to awaken him, no matter how sleepy.

You may be of the opinion that information is rather dull stuff. That it somehow isn't very sexy. On the contrary, J say that sex has everything to do with information. when a couple is courting, the two are discovering whether they will fall in love. If love is the perception in another of what one considers to be the best in oneself, then courtship is strictly an exchange of information. Each person says, "This is what I am." Each person inwardly asks of the other, "Is this other person good. And is this person myself, or the good in myself writ again?"

Seduction, also, is an exchange of information. In that case, of course, it is selected information that is offered, information calculated to have a certain impact,- conflicting information may be ruthlessly suppressed by either · party. That is why curiosity is such an effective technique in seduction, both acting curious and trying to encourage curiosity in the other. To be sure, physical contact has a lot to do with both courtship and seduction. But the nature of a caress is such that it is as inquiring as it is comforting. To touch is to learn and teach as well. Do it with care. The power involved is awe striking.

And when one speaks of sexual intercourse, then again, it is information transfer that is fundamental. The rnale transfers information to the female in a form she can use to produce another human who will have some of his characteristics, some of hers and nothing else. In principle, physical contact, even physical proximity is not needed for sex. It is possible to imagine life forms that pass the information (each sperm contains as much information as the Encyclopedia Britannica, millions are offered, lest some contain errors) that is the central event in sex by voice or gesture. Such creatures might achieve a pregnancy by a phone conversation or in a crowded room while others suspected nothing.

Well, we have said again and again that new information appears in the universe as that universe enlarges. On the other hand, as the universe collapses, being a black hole, information is not destroyed. After all, nothing gets out of a black hole. We have thus painted ourselves into a paradox.

However, the information that the future has that the past lacks is not really destroyed if time is reversed. In reverse time, the universe is getting smaller, more tightly packed, and is uniquely determined. The extra information of the future is simply used to determine that packing. Once that information has been used, it is used up. Otherwise, it would be an infinite power source.

It is the indeterminacy of the future that has produced the many puzzling features of modern quantum theory. when a photon comes to rest, at last indicating what its direction has been, physicists ask it, "Well, where have you been all this time?" The photon doesn't have much to say. Like the floor sweeper who answered the telephone, it told all it knew when it said, "Hello."

I will propose that quantum effects, indeterminacy, will only be found in circumstances that are not reversible. That the puzzling things about quantum mechanics are inescapably liked to the expansion of the universe

The experiment requires talking about "nuclear magnetic resonance." NMR is based on the observation that sorne nuclei (and we will only consider protons, hydrogen nuclei) behave as if they were spinning magnets. Imagine an iron top. We will magnetize the top so that the north magnetic pole is up and the south magnetic pole is down. We can still spin the top just as before. Now we will put the magnetized top on an iron table top that is an electromagnet. We set it spinning and then wait until it starts to wobble, to "precess." If we now activate the magnetic table top and try to pull the north end of the magnet down, the magnet will precess faster. Its top end will continue to swing in a little circle, but the rate at which it goes around that little circle will increase. This, of course, is a different rate from the rate at which the top is spinning.

If you measure the time it takes from when the table magnet is turned on until the top is sitting upside down, that time is called the "Ti relaxation time." Don't worry about where they got such an odd name. Next, let as take a whole host of iron tops and set them all spinning together on the same iron table top. Let us say that on one moment, they are all leaning twenty degrees out of vertical and are all leaning toward the north. They then swing through northeast, east, southeast, and so around. All in unison. If we come back after a while, we find that they are leaning over farther, say to thirty degrees, but that they are no longer pointing in any particular direction. As many are pointed north as south, as many east as west. The time it takes for the randomization to occur is called the "T2 relaxation time." Don't ask me why they call it T2, when Tl cannot possibly happen before T2.

You can describe protons, say in a glass of water, as they sit in a magnetic field the same way. For a given strength of the magnetic field, and given environment of the protons (Is there protein dissolved in the water? Is the water frozen?) you can measure a Ti and a T2. Magnetic Resonance is a field in which they measure proton density, Ti and rr2 in living tissues by using a controlled magnetic field, a radio wave to tilt the protons over, and a receiver to pick up the radio waves that the protons emit as they precess under the influence of the magnetic field. Mapping out such information produces a picture of what is going on inside of the body.

Such is the classical theory. However, the strict description of magnetic resonance is based on quantum theory. By the quantum model, when you put a magnetic field across a sample, all the protons line up one of two ways, either with the field or against the field. No in-between states are permitted. An almost equal number line up against the external field as with it. But slightly more line up with the field. When you stimulate the system with a radio wave, instead of tilting all the protons part way away from the field, you flip a few of them all the way over. They then flip back, each one emitting a photon as it does so. In the end, the two models make much the same prediction; both predict the same Ti and T2. The classical theory, however, makes pretty good sense. The quantum theory seems so improbable as to be almost perverse.

It looks to me, however, as if most of the system should be reversible. The system should function the same in forward time as in reverse time, just as a swinging pendulum will look about the same in forward and reverse time. If the system is reversible, then it has no input from the fact that the universe is expanding. One exception, the ¶2 time involves an increase in randomness. If you watch a pendulum for a long time, it will slow down; in this case, it is being significantly affected by the universe at large. We will ignore ¶2.

Now suppose we set a bunch of protons in a magnetic field. Tickle them with a radio wave so that by classical mechanics they are tilted over thirty degrees and all tilted north, swinging toward the northeast. Now, we simply turn off the magnetic field. Turning off the field will also produce a radio wave, but if that wave is not at a wavelength close to that that the protons are able to send out, the protons will not sense it. Let us contrive so that the field is gone at the moment all the protons are lined up leaning toward the east. Now we impose the magnetic field along a new axis. The new axis is chosen to be tilted toward the east, just like the protons are.

I submit that at this point, quantum and classical mechanics make different predictions. By quantum mechanics, there should be a burst of signal as protons, hitherto all aligned either with the old field or against it, shuffle around to be oriented to the new field. fly classical mechanics, the protons are already aligned with the new field; no signal will be emitted. Since, ignoring T2 effects, we are dealing with a reversible process, I hold that the results will be compatible with classical mechanics and that quantum mechanics do not apply.

There, if that's not sticking you neck out, I don't know what is.

There is another reason you might want to know about magnetic resonance, by the way. You see, Einstein based his work on the speed of light on the work of a man by the name of Fizeau. Pizeau beamed a light through a tube through which water was flowing. Be measuring the speed of light while the water was still and while the water was moving, he decided that the speed of light was not simply added to the speed of the water nor subtracted from the speed of the water, but had a complicated relationship, formalized in Einstein's special theory of relativity. There is a problem with the experiment, and that is that water does not flow in a simple way. Those who are working with magnetic resonance, and who are trying to use it to measure the flow of blood, have decided that there are three types of flow. Turbulent flow is complex swirling flow. Laminar flow is smooth, but as the fluid moves down a tube, fluid close to the tube wall moves slowly while fluid close to the center moves faster. Plug like flow is flow in which all the fluid moves together in a wad, like the spitball in your bean shooter. Plug like flow occurs only when flow is pulsatile. All the flow in Fizeau~s experiment was either laminar or turbulent, yet Fizeau did his calculations based on an assumption of plug like flow.

It is time the study was done again, this time either using pulsatile flow or proving that laminar and turbulent flow are not causing errors.

One last notion. Dl's mother just phoned and said that a super nova has been seen in the Creater blagellanic Cloud in the southern hemisphere. There is a chance that it will have at its heart a black hole. If there is a black hole there, it may be possible to detect matter falling into it. As matter falls in, the radiation from it should show a very characteristic ted shift as it drops into the black hole~s gravity well. This should be progressive for any glob of matter, the wavelength getting longer moment by moment. When that is seen, it will effectively disprove the notion that the universe is running backwards in time. Of course, if just the reverse occurs, I may be forgiven for gloating just a little bit.

BOOKS

There are a couple new books out. The Anthropic Cosmological Principle by John n. Barrow and Frank Tipler, published in 1986 by the Oxford University Press in New York with a foreword by John A. Wheeler tackles notions of the universe at a very sophisticated level. These writers are professionals. If you have been following Booty's ponderings with interest, you will be delighted by this substantial work.

Another book, privately printed, has a different appeal. Activity Ideas for the Budget Minded, by Debra Cassistre was written for those who work with the aging, particularly activity directors in retirement homes. It would also be of interest to anyone who had a friend or relative in such a home or was considering doing volunteer work. Practical, humorous and compassionate, it opens a world many of us think little about. IF THE THING YOU LIKE ABOUT WILD SURMISE IS THE PRICE, THIS Is YOUR BOOK. 0, the book may cost you a few dollars (six dollars for 38 pages paper bound, I think), but the activities are designed to be cheap. Write Debra Cassistre, 8220-F 12 Way North, St. Petersburg, Fla 33702.

We've tried out Kevin Langdon's HALLUCINATIONS program on the Wild Surmise word processor. Ours is not a color screen, but the patterns were varied and entertaining. Check availability with Polymath Systems P.O. Box 795, Berkeley, CA 94701.

Ed

Minus Five Minutes a Day

Here, with appreciation, is something to make up for the hours you have spent reading Wild Surmise. A physical fitness program that doesn't take any time at all.

There are two theories of fitness, the isometric and the aerobic. The ismetric is based on the observation that you can put a load an an individual muscle of about 60% of its maximum strength, maintain that load six seconds, repeat daily, and the muscle will grow in size and strength at its maximum rate until it has tripled in strength. The aerobic is based on the idea that the heart is a muscle, and if you run your pulse rate up daily to some high rate and keep it there for twenty minutes your heart will get stronger. Studies have shown that those who exercise live longer than those who don't. Alas, an hour of exercise only gives you about another hour of life, so you had better enjoy it.

Our notion is this: muscles take care of themselves. If a muscle really wants exercise, it is at liberty to cramp. Hard, frustrating work will run your pulse rate up just fine. The place where you get into trouble is in the joints.

You see, muscles and the heart have blood vessels. They can get all the nutrition they want. But what about cartilage? Think of the last fried chicken you ate. The cartilage is the tough gelatinous cap on the end of the bone. The cartilage has no blood vessels. The bone, which carries no greater load, is rich in blood vessels. It is constantly undergoing repair. But the cartilage must rely for its nutrition on diffusion.

If the cartilage does not get adequate nutrition, the little chondrocytes it contains die. The non cellular part of the cartilage is not maintained and loses bulk. As it loses bulk, the joint becomes unstable; after all, the tendons are not getting shorter. In response to the instability, the adjoining bone grows out to form spurs restoring a measure of stability but at the price of lost flexibility. Also, the bones tend to grind against each other, and that hurts.

When the joint is used, the joint capsule sends signals to the spinal chord indicating the instability. The spinal chord then informs the brain that a maximum effort has been made. The pain also instructs the brain not to try the same thing again. The result is that the muscles get no use and undergo atrophy. flespite everything people have said all your life, it isn't the muscles that limit your strength.

Muscles do not fail relaxed. A dead body becomes still as soon as the muscles run out of high energy phosphorus. That may take hours if the stores are high. If stores are low, the body may stiffen instantly. Try it. Pretend like you are M and go out and run strenuously for an hour or so. Include lots of punishing wind sprints and preferably do it when you are totally out of condition. Further, be sure to do it on uneven ground so that eventually you fall and hurt yourself. (Not to badly, just enough to be painful.) Splat! You are lying there hurting and gasping for breath, wondering why you didn't take my advice about how to stay fit. Now you try to get up. Stiff, right? Stiff and frail. That, friend, is rigor mortis.

Compare an athlete, say a college wrestler at practice. He exerts himself to his utmost. He tries to overcome his opponent. At last a moment of rest is called for, and he collapses limp as a dish rag. His muscles are doing just fine. They are relaxed because they are under orders from his central nervous system to relax. Try to lift a weight that is too much for you. Strain, struggle, and at last you let it drop. You feel all wobbly and weak, but in fact, you muscles have relaxed under orders. Probably it is because somewhere a joint was getting unstable.

Of course, part of the stability of a joint depends on support by muscles. A typical muscle is placed so that it exerts more force snugging down and stabilizing a joint that it does flexing or extending the joint. When the joint begins to fail, the brain receives the signal "not strong enough." The mind interprets that as, "Muscles too weak." Take care of your joints, and the muscles will take care of themselves.

In addition to joints, there are discs. The design feature that identifies our phylum is the notocord, a little streak that is visible in the embryo and that we have in common with other vertebrates and a few other creatures. In the adult human, the notocord remnant lies along the clivus of the skull, and then extends down the spinal column including the vertebral bodies and the intervertebral discs. The vertebral bodies are ordinary bone and usually don't get into trouble unless so weakened by age and disuse that they collapse. The discs consist of a ring of tough fibrous tissue surrounding an amorphous gel called the "nucleus pulposus." The nucleus pulposus is not centrally located in the disc, but lies rather toward the back, so that if it gets herniated, squeezed out through a tear in the fibrous ring, it has a somewhat greater chance of going posteriorly toward the spinal cord and nerve roots back there. That is probably not the design you would have chosen for yourself had you been given a choice.

In the adult, the disc, like cartilage, must live off what it can get by diffusion. Up until age twenty, the disc has a blood supply. You may have noticed what wonderfully supple and resilient backs youngsters have. Or, if you are a youngster, you may have noticed what a funny way of walking grown-ups have. It ain't by choice. They'd just as lief be lithe an strong, too. The difference is the difference between a disc living by blood supply an a disc living by diffusion.

So, the plan is to devise a way to improve the rate of diffusion into cartilage and discs without wasting any time about it. There is, in fact, a ray of hope. If you measure yourself first thing in the morning, you will find you are slightly taller than you were if you measured yourself before going to bed the night before.

That may seem like a rather modest cause for celebration, but think what is going on. The bones aren't changing length. When you measure yourself, you stand as straight as you can, so it isn't posture. So it has to be the discs and cartilage. They get compressed in the course of the day and get squeezed down. Overnight, when the load is off them, they puff back up again. In the process, waste material is squeezed out and fresh nutrients are brought it. (Probably carbon dioxide and oxygen diffuse across with adequate efficiency.

So in order to nourish your joints and discs, you want to encourage the process. To encourage you joints to reexpand, just make sure you get your sleep by lying flat. Don't sleep sitting up; that won't let the discs feed. If you can stretch out for an hour in the middle of the day, so much the better, but we promised not to spend any time doing this.

The other half of the task is to make sure the discs and the joints get properly squeezed on a regular basis, say every day. How long? Dlost fitness programs regard ten seconds as a minimum exertion for just about anything. So we will take that as our standard.

Now when to do it? During part of the day you regularly waste. Which is that? When you are taking your shower, of course. Everybody wallows about in the shower. It's pleasant. It's good clean fun. If you are busy, you tell yourself you need to in order to be presentable. If you are not busy, you do it because you have the time.

The reason it's so nice is the mammalian diving reflex. It turns out that the brain is a lot more demanding of nutrition and oxygen than the cartilage. Starved for thirty seconds, the brain shuts down. Starved for two minutes it begins to suffer permanent damage. Yet children have been pulled out from under ice after as long as twenty minutes and recovered completely. My impulse would be to say, meat in the ice chest takes longer to spoil- But the pro's nod and say, · ¹mammalian diving reflex."

From time to time, I have asked the pro's why they don't dump ice water on any person who has had a cardiac arrest. That would give them ten times as long to restore the circulation before brain damage occurred. I have collected, as a result, a large number of versions of the facial expression called the "strange look."

A troubling term, mammalian diving reflex. If you believe in evolution, you must believe that all mammals were once aquatic life forms. But we have always been told that we emerged onto dry land before we learned to regulate our metabolism. If we were on dry land first, what need had we of diving reflexes? And if did not get the reflex by evolution, how did we get it? Was the genetic ability developed among whales and manatee and then transferred to us by some virus?

Perhaps when mammals first appeared, there was a lot more water around. Thereby hangs another speculation. We have proposed elsewhere that at the center of every star there is a time-reversed black hole. That that black hole is shoving matter and energy out of itself at a rate that is linked to the rate of expansion of the universe. (Or if you will, the universe is collapsing and packing things into dense collections at the heart of each star.) One such reverse black hole may lie at the center of the earth, a fairly lazy one, as the earth is smaller than a star.

If that is true, the size of the planet must be increasing slowly, which gives us a test of the theory. When the planet first cooled, it must have consisted of a very dense core surrounded by an even lighter mantel surrounded by an even lighter crust of rock surrounded by water surrounded by the gaseous atmosphere. As the earth expanded, cracks appeared in the crust. The crack floors were, or course, denser than the upper crust and remained at a lower level. As the cracks widened, the water tended to pool in them, becoming shallower over the top crust, although still very deep.

Now the fossil record shows progress somewhat like this: There is Precambrian rock that is devoid of live except toward the end of that era when simple forms appear. There is Cambrian rock that suddenly shows a vast number of phyla, a vast diversity of life. All Cambrian rock has a lot of life. That's how you recognize it. A long time later, in the Silurian rocks, land forms first appear, and it is not until the Devonian that forms turn up that really look like they are fit for dry ground.

You smell the rat, of course. All Cambrian rock contains fossils, but there were no dry land forms. Therefore, all Cambrian rock was sea floor rock. The only life forms in the Precambrian era were simple because they were deep sea forms. The Cambrian era saw the first shallow seas. There life, at least the life we see in the fossil record, first became divers. Only as those cracks, which were to become the sea floor, spread until they could accept the bulk of the water could the water over what was to be continents become shallow and land eventually emerge.

If all of this sounds as if it was plagiarized from Cenesis, don't blame me. I didn't write the flible.

As the seas widened and the waters fell, first marshes emerged and at last in the Devonian era substantial areas of dry ground. So perhaps it is not a surprise that mammals have a diving reflex. By the time the first mammals appeared, there was dry ground, but perhaps not very much that could be depended on to stay dry all the time.

So mammals are divers. To this very day, in our most advanced civilizations, grown people stand in the shower zombified, staring with reptilian indifference into the unseen middle distance, in a state of suspended animation.

It is time to compress that cartilage. Warning: this is dangerous. You could slip and fall. Don't do any of this.

First, getting a good grip on the soap dish, stretch you heels. The muscle insertions on the heel are very strong and need to be compressed just like cartilage. Put your left foot flat on the floor and step forward with your right foot, keeping the left heel down and left knee straight. It may pull a bit, but if the heel isn't stretched, the sole under the heel may begin to hurt. They call that a spur or plantar fascutis, depending on how much they are charging you. This helps prevent it. Ten seconds, then go to the other foot.

Next the knee. The knee gets plenty of work in the straight position but not much when it is bent, unless you are heaving yourself out of a chair. Unused, it is the cartilage over the medial tibial plateau that gives out first. stand on your right foot, bend your left knee up toward your rump until you can reach the ankle with your left hand. steady yourself with your right hand on your trusty soap dish. Pull up on the ankle. Not too hard. If you've got powerful calf muscles, they can act as a fulcrum and you could damage the joint. Hips straight. Ten seconds, then the other side.

The hip, it gets a lot of pressure straight but not much bent. Step forward with your left foot, keeping the knee straight. Lean down along your left leg until something tells you to stop. Then stop. Ten seconds. Other side.

Time to work over the nucleus pulposus. That means squeeze the back of all your disks. Put you hands on your head (so when you slip and fall you might not brain yourself) and lean back. Arch the small of your back and all the way up the spine including the neck. Hold ten. Then twist left ten seconds. Then right ten seconds. By the way, I thought we might put in illustrations, you know, nubile young maidens in the shower demonstrating these things, but Ed says it isn't that kind of magazine.

Now possibly the most foolish exercise ever devised. Try to touch your toes. near in mind that actually touching your toes is of no consequence at all. A strong healthy person can seriously wrench his back in the attempt, and it looks like a manuever deliberately designed to tear the posterior part of that fibrous ring. Keep your knees straight. Bend forward and reach down. Be sure to bend with your upper back and neck as well as with your lower back. Hold ten seconds and relax.

This next one is an old jujitsu drill. If you haven't done it before, start out real easy the first few weeks. Put the heel of your left hand on the top of the left side of your pelvis in back; push forward and to the right at a 45 degree angle for ten seconds. Sounds harmless. It isn't. Do the other side. Then put the heel of your hand of the top of the left side of your pelvis and push for ten seconds, then the other side.

Now twist your whole body around to the left, head shoulders and all, ten seconds. Now the right.

Now just bend to the left ten seconds and to the right ten seconds.

Bend forward at the hips. From this position, bend to the left ten, then to the right ten. Then rotate your body to the left, right shoulder toward. the floor, left toward the ceiling. Then the other way. You will probably get an ear full of water in the process.

One joint that gives out regularly it the first knuckle of the big toe. The cartilage gives way and the big toe points over toward the other toes. It's called a bunion. Curl all your toes up ten. Curl them all down ten. Spread them out ten. Squnch them together ten. Stand tiptoe ten. Don't fall.

Your shoulders depend more heavily than other joints on muscular support, so they need some attention. Press the heels of your hands together in front of ~ou ten seconds. Then give yourself an Indian grip. That means you start out with the palm of your riqht hand on the underside of your left forearm and the palm of your left hand against the underside of your right forearm. Hold tight and pull for all you're worth ten seconds. Then do the same thing behind your head: heels of hands together and push, Indian grip and pull.

There are two bones in the thumb called phalanges. From the near knuckle of the thumb to the wrist is a bone called a metacarpal. At the base of the metacarpal for the thumb are two wrist (carpal) bones called the "greater and lesser multangular.^T' For some reason, the joints around the multangular bones lose their cartilage with great regularity. In order to stress them, hook your thumbs together over your head and push. By doing this over your head, you are less likely to over do it.

Another place where the joints of the hands routinely get into trouble is the distal interphalangeal joints. That's the far knuckle on each finger. To work them, put the finger tips of your right hand against the right side of your head and push ten seconds. Then do the same thing on the left.

The neck is also a frequent place to suffer cartilage loss. You've heard of the legendary pain in the neck. Well, that's why it happens. Furthermore, once spurs begin to form in the neck, they are likely to press on nerves. If the spurs form around the disc spaces in the neck, they may push back against the spinal cord. If spurs form around the little joints in the back of the neck, they may pinch nerves that go to the shoulders and arms. If you get too enthusiastic about exercising your neck, you may cause a hitherto harmless spur to gouge a nerve you never knew you had. So go gently. Tilt your neck to the right, then to the left. Then, gingerly, turn your head to the right. Put the heel of your right hand against your chin to hold it in place. Then put your left hand on top of your head and pull down. Ten seconds, then the other side. Do not wring your own neck.

One joint that almost never gets spur around it is the joint of the jaw. The jaw joint (tempero-mandibular articulation) does get into trouble, but it most often does so with young women, who have such otherwise enviable joints. What happens is this: when you open your mouth, the condyle of the mandible, the little ball on the top of the jaw bone actually slides forward out its fossa, its socket. As it does so, there is a little disc that slides between the condyle and the anterior eminence of the tempero-mandibular fossa. It's a kind of extra cushion between the two bones along with the usual cartilage. Well this disc is tethered in front and behind by little ligaments. If the ligaments are too slack, the disc gets in front of the condyle. When the mouth opens, the disc stays in front of the forward moving condyle until the ligament runs out of slack. Then the disc pops back into place with a little click. The click becomes annoying and even painful. I know of no exercise to snug up the ligament, but you can work the disc over thus: open your mouth, put the heels of your hands on your chin, push upward against the chin, keeping your mouth open.

By this time, you have probably run out of hot water. If not, you can go ahead and shave in the shower. It's better than the best shaving cream. Also you don't have to see your face while you do

it. You don't need a mirror. If you can't feel a whisker, it isn't there. That done, maybe you can do a little light reading. Moneybags says the paper this newsletter is printed on ought to be able to stand up to taking an occasional shower.

The problem with this routine is that, since it doesn^tt take any time or effort, it does not confer any spiritual benefit. Also, you may get in trouble with other members of the household who now have to take cold showers, and I'm sure there will be environmentalists who will be up in arms about the waste of hot water. They shouldn't be. We assumed this was time you were going to spend in the shower anyway.

Your exercises done, you are now ready to go on and spend the rest of your day abusing your body, sitting for long hours studying, or running around like M uprooting trees. If you had occasion to take a shower again, say after a tennis game, going through the routine again wouldn't do any harm at all.

MILD SURPRISE

I drove along the Danube above Vienna, pausing briefly to ask directions in Tuin and then on to the village. I stopped at an inn to ask directions one last time. The innkeeper stood behind his bar listening to my request for the seventh time with the pleasant composure of a man who is not about to give out the first scrap of information about his friends even if it takes all day. A Puch motorbike muttered past on the dusty street, paused and then returned. The innkeeper turned toward the door. "Here's the count now," he remarked in perfect German, as if suddenly he understood everything I had been saying.

Footsteps sounded on the wood steps, and the door was flung wide. "You must be M," the count announced. "I heard you had come through Tuin on an enormous motorcycle, and I thought you might be here." He was broad of beam as he was broad of smile and gesture. "Come." We went off to his home, he on his merry Puch and I on my black Triumph, decrepit with years and hard miles.

During the days all too brief I stayed there, we explored Vienna and castles in the country round, hunted roebuck in the forest, swam in the Danube, where the pebbles rattle forever in the swift current, met friends and relatives, and he told stories. This is one of his stories as best I remember.

World War I. The cavalry was on campaign in northern Italy. The commandant called him in. "Akos," said the commandant, "How long has it been since you were home in Hungary?

"Two years, my commandant₁ but it is a sacrifice I gladly bear for the glory of the Austro Hungarian Empire."

"Of course," said the commandant. "Akos, do you have a farm at home?"

"Yes, my commandant. It is one of the glories of the Austro Hungarian Empire. The estate dates back to the fifth century, when the founder of my line saved the life of the king's son by flinging a bull into Lake ..."

"Of course," said the commandant.

"Akos. We are starving here."

"Yes, my commandant, but it is a sacrifice I gladly bear for the glory of..."

"Akos. Are there any pigs on that farm?"

"Well, yes. There are many fine pigs..."

"Good, here is my plan. I am sending you home of leave. Take your horse. Go straight home. Say hello to your family. Spend a few days. Then come back. And when you come back, I want you to bring back a pig. And when you get here," his eyes drifted up and stared into the distance and his voice became thick with emotion, "We will eat the pig."

He left for Hungary within the hour. Before he reached the border of Austria the Austro Hungarian Empire collapsed. The war was over. He continued home.

After the war came depressions. The depression saw the rise of National Socialism in Germany. World War II came and went. The Russians occupied Hungary and Austria. Akos took his family to Canada. Then the Russians withdrew from Austria. The family land was in Hungary, but there was a hunting lodge in Austria, as fine a home as a family could want. With high hopes and great care, they returned and found it was safe. They moved into the lodge.

And so it was that one day my friend was walking down a street in Vienna. Now in Vienna, you can get anything you could possibly need. You simply sit at a table in a sidewalk cafe and have it brought to you. Do you need to make a phone call? They will bring a phone to your table. no you need to send a telegram? They will bring pencil and paper. Do you want a cigar from the tobacco shop down the street? They will have a boy run fetch it for you.

In fact, once you have sat at a table, there are very few reasons, and most of those of a grossly biological nature, why you should ever get up from the table at all. For one thing, they will not shoo you away, for they know beyond doubt that sooner or later you will get hungry again.

It was past such a cafe that Akos was walking when something made his hair stand on end. Incredulous, he stopped at the end of the block, turned and walked past again. Still doubtful, he retraced his steps the second and third times, walking a shorter distance after each turn until he was standing in front of what had first drawn his attention. It was a white haired man, sitting alone at a table staring down at the table top. The count leaned until his chin was almost on the table; then he pushed forward until he could look up into the grey eyes.

"It's not possible ..." he said. "Could it be ... after so many years ... sir ... were you ever ... cavalry campaign ... south Tyrolian Alps ... Austro Hungarian ..starving?"

"Where's the pig?" demanded the commandant.

M