0 comments Tuesday 28 December 2010

In free societies and tyrannies alike, the hair on, and around, a man’s head always sends an ideological signal.



In many societies, beards and moustaches are even more ideologically charged than the question of what, if anything, sprouts from the top of male heads. Both in Muslim countries, and in the Muslim diaspora, sporting a bushy beard—often with the upper lip shaven—has become a symbol of piety. Many of the sternest Islamic regimes give men absolutely no choice in the matter. In June Somalia’s Islamic militants ordered men in Mogadishu to grow their beards and trim their moustaches. When the Taliban held power in Afghanistan, trimming one’s whiskers was outlawed; luxuriant beards flourished everywhere. Secular regimes that govern mainly Muslim populations often ban or strongly discourage beards. But when Saparmurat Niyazov, the late despot of Turkmenistan, ordered young men to shave their goatees, it was not so much an anti-religious measure as a general crackdown on personal freedom of all kinds. It was in a similar spirit that Enver Hoxha, Albania’s communist tyrant, outlawed beards (and almost every other show of individualism) in the 1970s.

One of the first changes decreed by the Islamists of Hamas after their victory over the secularists of Fatah in the 2006 Palestinian elections was that policemen were allowed to grow beards. But the theology of male hair can be controversial. Orthodox Christian priests generally sport beards in humble imitation of Jesus Christ; the most conservative say a priest’s hair and beard should not be cut because his whole body has been sanctified by the rite of ordination. Christian theologians still argue over what Saint Paul meant when he told the people of Corinth that for men to have long hair was shameful, while for women, flowing tresses were something glorious (although they should keep them covered, perhaps to avoid tempting wayward angels). Samson, one of the heroes of the Hebrew scriptures, seems to exemplify a different understanding of the power of hair: his awesome strength abandoned him as soon as his locks were trimmed.

For Muslims, imitating the faith’s founder is also given as a reason for growing beards. But there are many arguments over whether the practice is mandatory or just recommended. And the more beards are promoted in Islamic societies, the more unpopular they become in places that are wary of Islam—such as India, where a court opined last year that a Christian college was entitled to ban beards. To the dismay of Indian Muslims, the judge declared: “We do not want Talibans here.”

In Iran men can choose whether to shave or not, but Afro-sporting youths avoid beards because they would carry a hint of conformity with authority. And as Anthony Synnott, a British-born sociologist, points out, the only constant in the history of hairstyles is that each generation of men likes to defy its fathers (and father figures). In the 1960s both skinheads and hirsute hippies were challenging the uniformity of a generation that had received its formative haircuts while in uniform. Once every possible length had been tried, the only way to impress the world was through colour: rainbow-hued Mohawks, stripes and wings.

But in free societies, anything—however outrageous it seems at first—becomes respectable after a while. (Think how the body-piercing favoured by punk-rockers lost its power to shock after young bankers started sporting discreet earrings with their pinstriped suits.) One of the rising stars in Japanese politics is 58-year-old Yoshimi Watanabe, whose “Your Party” has just won 11 seats in the upper house of the legislature. Among his trademarks is a faux-hawk or “antenna” hairstyle, reportedly modelled on David Beckham’s appearance in 2002; voters apparently like it.

But Japan is no paradise for men in search of trichological freedom. The municipality of Isesaki has just told its male employees to shave their chins on grounds that “some citizens find bearded men unpleasant, so beards are banned.” The announcement coincided with the start of the summer season, in which men are encouraged to cool down by doffing their jackets and ties and save on air-conditioning. A bearded, open-necked town clerk, it seems, just wouldn’t look proper.

http://www.economist.com/node/16743613

0 comments Sunday 5 December 2010



Karen Beard, Adjunct Assistant Professor
Department of Biology, Utah State University

My areas of interest and teaching include conservation biology, invasion ecology, and linking species to ecosystems. Almost all of my research projects apply ecological theory to conservation or restoration ecology. Since coming to USU, most of my research has focused on invasive, non-native species. More specifically, my research has focused on (1) understanding non-native species from introduction to impact, and (2) developing techniques to manage and control non-natives. I also have a peripheral interest in disturbance ecology; more specifically, I have studied how disturbance influences native species and ecosystem processes, and how disturbance relates to non-native invasions.

Website: http://www.biology.usu.edu/htm/our-people/faculty/memberID=3068

0 comments



Friedrich Engels was a German social scientist, author, political theorist, philosopher, and father of communist theory, alongside Karl Marx. Together they produced 'The Communist Manifesto' in 1848. Engels also edited the second and third volumes of 'Das Kapital' after Marx's death.

0 comments Sunday 7 November 2010



Fredrik Bynander
Associate Professor
Fredrik Bynander's main sub-discipline is International relations, but his publications span Leadership succesion, Crisis management studies, Foreign policy analysis, and Development aid. He has published in journals such as Public Administration, Political Psychology, Government & Opposition, and Cooperation & Conflict. Currently, Bynander divides his time between the Department of Government, University of Uppsala, and a position as Special Adviser to the Prime Minister's Office.
http://www.statsvet.uu.se/PersonalInfo.aspx?UserId=71

0 comments Saturday 23 October 2010


Currently an instructor in the English Department at the University of Wyoming, Stricker earned his BA from UW in 2005, and his MFA in Poetry in 2007. In addition to teaching and a wide variety of other less desirable vocations, Luke has been publicly reading for about five years, and writing since he was a child.
http://uwacadweb.uwyo.edu/english/displayfaculty.asp?facultyid=4366

0 comments Sunday 5 September 2010



Young Beard of the Month
Josef Werne, Associate Professor
Large Lakes Observatory
University of Minnesota
http://www.d.umn.edu/llo/people/werne.html

0 comments Tuesday 3 August 2010



Young Beard of the Month
Marc Libault
Research Scientist
Division of Plant Sciences
University of Missouri
http://plantsci.missouri.edu/faculty/libault.htm

0 comments Friday 9 July 2010



Young Beard of the Month
Dr. Christopher Kuklewicz, research fellow
Experimental Quantum Optics
University of St Andrews
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~qinfo/eqo/people.html

0 comments

Academic beards has seen anecdotal evidence that successful independent production company Lucasfilm is planning a new blockbuster movie dedicated to the academic beard. Our informant suggests the movie will be about scientists with beards who study astrophysics. Academic Beards awaits additional proof with alacrity.

0 comments Friday 4 June 2010



Roland Speicher,Professor of Mathematics
Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Queen's University
http://www.mast.queensu.ca/~speicher/

0 comments Thursday 20 May 2010

0 comments Sunday 16 May 2010



Justin Bieber earns his beard with a nod to Michel Foucault.

0 comments



The Beard Theorem is a political theorem that relates to the Communist Party and its members. The Beard Theorem is a theory that suggests that the size of one's Beard, whether it be a puff, French Fork or Mutton Chop, has a direct correlation to the radicality of a person's Socialist views. If one was to have a large, beard, that person has a higher chance of being a communist revolutionary than one other person who has only as moustache, or worse: no facial hair at all. This theorem is proved by many of the communist Russian revolutionaries of the 1900's, those like Karl Marx, who has a massive, beard and, in accordance to the theorem, is a great communist. V.I. Lenin, the leader of the Russian Revolution, had a beard, yet it was not as profound, thus he is not as truly communist as Marx or Engels, as he has a relatively small beard, but it is still present and is truth of his communisity. Josef Stalin, the leader of the Communist Vanguard Party in Russia from the mid 1920's to 1952, has no beard, yet has a moustache. Stalin, in accordance to the theorem thus has very little Communist Blood in him, as he is a Stalinist, and a social fascist. Exceptions to the rule is most East Asian Communist leaders.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "The beard theorum". Link may die if entry is finally removed or merged.

0 comments Thursday 6 May 2010



Zoltan Lelkes, Docens, Dept. Chemical Engineering, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Budapest, Hungary 1521


http://www.ch.bme.hu/Portal/MunkatarsakReszletes.aspx?StaffId=6d8233b1-75f8-4b43-86bf-4b689cd3e910

0 comments Monday 12 April 2010



Martin Sahlen,Postdoc Cosmology, Particle Astrophysics and String Theory Group, Stockholm University
http://cops.physto.se/people/source/martin_sahlen.html

0 comments Thursday 18 March 2010



Professor Peter Aczel
Departments of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Manchester

Peter Aczel argues for a plurality of conceptual frameworks, coherence. Does he mean multiple foundations?


0 comments Monday 1 March 2010



Young beard of the Month, Mr. Cosgrove is a Research Fellow at the Foundation and Center for Critical Thinking Mr Cosgrove has a unique background. He is one of very few students who have been systematically taught critical thinking from the age of 10. It was at this age that he was taken from the main stream of instruction and put into an independent study program designed and supervised by Drs. Paul and Elder.

0 comments Thursday 25 February 2010


A feline subject reacts to a photograph of a man with a full dark semicircular beard.

Abstract

Cats were exposed to photographs of bearded men. The beards were of various sizes, shapes, and styles. The cats' responses were recorded and analyzed.

Interpretation

Cats do not like men with long beards, especially long dark beards.
Cats are indifferent to men with shorter beards.
Cats are confused and/or disturbed by men with beards that are incomplete (e.g., Bork) and to a lesser degree by men whose beards have missing parts (e.g., Crafts).

These interpretations are not categorical. They are subject to several obvious qualifications. The most notable are listed below.

Qualification A. This study excluded photographs of men with beards confined largely to the underside of the jaw (see above discussion of Robert Bork). While data are available from studies conducted by other investigators, those studies made use of a different methodology than the one we used in our study. We are therefore hesitant to interpret our findings in light of the "Bork" findings, or vice versa.

Qualification B. This study was conducted with photographs of bearded men. In a future study we intend to investigate feline responses to animate bearded men. A large number of factors might produce significantly different results in the two studies. In particular, there has been speculation that bearded men produce pheromones which could have a significant effect on cats.[3]

by Catherine Maloney, Fairfield University, Fairfield, Connecticut, Sarah J. Lichtblau, University of Illinois, Champaign, Illinois Nadya Karpook, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida Carolyn Chou, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Anthony Arena-DeRosa, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts

0 comments Wednesday 24 February 2010



Jack M. Beard (has no beard), Lecturer in Law, UCLA Law
B.S.F.S. Georgetown University, 1980
J.D. University of Michigan, 1983
LL.M. Georgetown University, 1989

0 comments Saturday 20 February 2010

Katepalli Sreenivasan a Professor of Engineering and distinguished university professor, University of Maryland, is one of the few Indian-American scientists who have been educated entirely in India. After obtaining a Ph.D. (with gold medal) in Aeronautics from the Indian Institute of Science in 1975, he did post-doctoral work at the Universities of Sydney and Newcastle in Australia and at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Katepalli R. Sreenivasan, sixty-one years of age, taught at Yale for twenty-two years from 1979, as the Harold W. Cheel Professor of Mechanical Engineering from 1988, later holding joint appointments in the Departments of Physics, Applied Physics and Mathematics.

0 comments Thursday 18 February 2010

It is unbecoming for young men to utter maxims - Aristotle.

0 comments Wednesday 17 February 2010

Londa Schiebinger
The John L. Hinds Professor of History of Science
History Department, Building 200
Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305-2024

The author of The Philosopher's Beard: Women and Gender in Science

0 comments



Prof. Dr. Ernst W. Mayr
Lehrstuhl für Effiziente Algorithmen, Institut für Informatik, Technische Universität München

0 comments Tuesday 16 February 2010




James J Angel, Associate Professor, McDonough School of Business, Georgetown University (est.1789)

0 comments Monday 15 February 2010





Dr. Alessio Bozzo
, Research Associate, School of GeoSciences, University of Edinburgh

0 comments




Thomas Knight Jr. Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL), MIT

0 comments Sunday 14 February 2010


Doctor Dillamond is a character in author Gregory Maguire's 1995 novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. The character also appears in the Broadway musical and West End theatre musical Wicked which is based on Maguire's novel. Doctor Dillamond is a goat who has the ability to speak and interact with humans. He is a professor at Shiz University. Because he is the only Animal professor at Shiz, he is subjected to discrimination from his students and colleagues. However, Elphaba (the future Wicked Witch of the West) takes a liking to him.

0 comments Thursday 11 February 2010



David Fraser, Professor, NSERC Industrial Research Chair in Animal Welfare, C.M., B.A. (Tor.), Ph.D. (Glas.), University of British Columbia

0 comments



Sigmund Freud (German pronunciation: [ˈziːkmʊnt fʁɔʏt]), born Sigismund Schlomo Freud (May 6, 1856 – September 23, 1939), was a Jewish-Austrian neurologist who founded the psychoanalytic school of psychology.

0 comments Sunday 7 February 2010


Actor Brian Blessed has two honorary degrees from British Universities. One awarded in 2003 from the University of Bradford, the second awarded in 2004 by the Sheffield Hallam University. This photo is from the University of Bradford where he received Doctor of Letters.