Fred Astaire Week: Hatrack dance from “Royal Wedding”

August 26, 2012 • 1:00 pm

Fred made even a hatrack look good. This famous clip, called “Sunday Jumps,” is from the movie Royal Wedding, made in 1951 when Astaire was 52. There’s another famous dance scene in this movie—you might know it—which I’ll highlight later in the week. We haven’t even gotten to his famous partners yet: Cyd Charisse, Rita Hayworth, and of course Ginger Rogers.

Wikipedia says this about the scene:

“Sunday Jumps”: Astaire credits the idea for this famous solo to his long-time choreographic collaborator Hermes Pan. In it, Astaire parodies himself by dancing with a hatstand and appears to parody his rival and friend Gene Kelly by inserting a mock bodybuilding episode during which he kicks aside some Indian clubs in a reference to Kelly’s routine with The Nicholas Brothers in The Pirate. The fame of the dance rests on Astaire’s ability to animate the inanimate.

The solo takes place in a ship’s gym, where Astaire is waiting to rehearse with his partner Powell, who doesn’t turn up, echoing Adele Astaire’s attitude toward her brother’s obsessive rehearsal habits to which the lyrics (unused and unpublished) also made reference. Controversially, in 1997, it was digitally manipulated to show Astaire dancing with a vacuum cleaner in Dirt Devil commercials. In a missive, later published in Time Magazine and Variety, Astaire’s daughter Ava severely criticized the corporation’s president, writing: “Your paltry, unconscionable commercials are the antithesis of everything my lovely, gentle father represented.” This number has been referenced by Mel Gibson in What Women Want and by David Byrne in the live film of his band, Talking Heads, and was also parodied by Kermit the Frog in The Great Muppet Caper.

More Islamic lunacy: mentally handicapped girl imprisoned for (maybe) burning a page of the Qur’an, faces death

August 26, 2012 • 9:30 am

According to multiple sources, a 12-year old Christian girl was arrested outside of Islamabad for allegedly burning a page or pages of the Qur’an. Such a crime is considered blasphemy in Pakistan, and is punishable by life imprisonment—or even execution. As The Washington Post reports:

Amid the conflicting claims, this much is certain: As many as 600 Christians have fled their colony bordering the capital, fearing for their lives, officials said, after a mob last week called for the child to be burned to death as a blasphemer.

The girl, who authorities have described as mentally challenged, sits in jail in Rawalpindi, charged by police with blasphemy, while her family has been put in federal protective custody. The evidence against her is muddled at best, but police said they arrested her in part to assuage the mob and also because they knew she would be safer in jail.

. . .Some Christians who stayed in the area said shopkeepers are refusing to sell them food and have issued threats.

“They said they will burn our house down if we don’t leave,” said a 17-year-old who lived near the accused girl’s family. “They are also saying that since a woman burned the Koran, they will come after our women now.”

Laws against defacing the Qur’an aren’t just for show: people have been killed for this. As HuffPo reports:

This is one of the latest high-profile incidents to draw attention to Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy laws, which state that people who are convicted of insulting the Quran or Islam’s prophet can face the death penalty.

In 2010, a Christian mother of five was sentenced to death for blasphemy.

And last month, a man accused of desecrating the Quran was dragged from a police station in Pakistan and beaten to death before his body was set on fire.

Salman Taseer, a Pakistani governor, was assassinated by a bodyguard in 2011 because of his reported opposition to the laws.

It reminds me of Alexandr Solzhenitsyn’s description in The Gulag Archipelago of someone getting sent to the camps for wrapping a fish in a sheet of newspaper containing Stalin’s picture.

Besides the obvious over-the-top sensitivity of Muslims to this incident, there are two other problems:

1. According to AFP, the girl had Down Syndrome.  She could hardly be held responsible even if she did burn the holy book.

2. It’s not clear if any pages of the Qur’an were burned at all.  The Washington Post details the ambiguities:

The incident involving the girl happened Thursday afternoon, evidently while she was gathering trash — but beyond that, everything is in dispute. Some locals claim to have witnessed her and her mother burning the entire Koran.

But Tahir Muhammad, a 30-year-old shop owner and landlord, said the girl found just one page of the holy book while cleaning a house, mixed it with other papers and burned it.

A 10-year-old neighborhood girl said she saw the whole thing and took the ashes to the mosque — with no pages of the Koran extant. In interviews Sunday, two men at the mosque said that only ashes remained and that the imam mixed in some pages himself before turning over the “evidence” to police.

“Somebody must be confused when they said pages were mixed in — no such thing happened,” Imam Hafiz Muhammad Zubair said Monday. He said community leaders decided to turn the girl and her mother over to police for their safety.

“Both the women confessed to us that they had indeed burned the Koran,” he said.

I wonder how those confessions were obtained.

Among the local Islamic population, there’s no presumption of innocence in such cases, and some Muslims are baying for blood. Besides the threats that have caused 600 Christians to flee the village, there’s this:

“The one who burned the Koran should be burned,” said Shaukhat Ali, an assistant at the local mosque, expressing a sentiment shared by many Muslims in the community.

Such are the lunacies of Islam. Yes, there are moderate Muslims who decry this kind of violence (although they tend to remain silent when stuff like this—or Rushdie’s fatwa—take place), but who can say confidently that Islam is not among the world’s most dangerous faiths? Can you imagine someone being imprisoned or killed for burning the Book of Mormon or the Bible? If that were true, P. Z. Myers would have been dead long ago.

I’m always surprised at atheists who take out readily and gleefully after Catholics or fundamentalist Protestants, but remain largely silent on the greater excesses of Islam.  Those who are more vociferous are often branded “Islamophobes.”  But it’s not the people we hate: it’s the extremist ideology that leads many Muslims to kill apostates, imprison girls with Down Syndrome, threaten a teacher with flogging for naming a teddy bear “Muhamed,” and systematically disenfranchising half of their population: the ones with two X chromosomes.

Perhaps I’m wrong, but my impression is that atheists, with the exception of people like Dawkins and Hitchens, are loath to go after Islam nearly as strongly as they go after Western religions. Perhaps that’s out of fear of appearing racist, or perhaps it’s just out of fear for one’s skin.  But being “Muslim” is not a racial trait, any more than is being “Jewish.” These are religions, and their adherents include a broad mixture of ethnicities.  What we deplore are the beliefs, not the genes.

Lampreys deep-six their genomes during development

August 26, 2012 • 5:43 am

One of the most bizarre phenomena uncovered since we’ve been able to sequence genomes is that of “programmed genome rearrangement” (PGR), whereby an animal starts its life as a zygote with a full genome, and then some of its genes are lost from the somatic (body) cells as development proceeds.   This has been seen in organisms as diverse as flies, hagfish, zebra finches, and, especially, ciliate protozoans, which extensively remodel their genomes during development, getting rid of repetitive DNA elements (“satellite DNA”).

It’s not entirely clear why this happens, but what is clear is that in organisms like us that whose somatic cells are segregated from the germ cells (cells that produce our sperm and eggs) gene loss doesn’t occur in germ cells. It couldn’t, for if those genes did have functions in the germ tissue, they’d be irrevocably lost in the next generation. In fact, if you find a gene present in germ cells but not somatic cells, because it’s lost in the latter, that gene almost certainly does something in germ cells.

Gene loss has also been described previously in the hagfish, a jawless vertebrate that, together with lampreys, make up the monophyletic group cyclostomes. Here’s a hagfish:

But the most comprehensive study yet of programmed genome reduction was just published by Jeremiah Smith and three colleagues in Current Biology (reference below). Building on previous but less comprehensive work suggesting that from development of egg to adult, the sea lamprey (Petromyzon marinus) lost about 20% of its genes in body tissues (while retaining them all in the germ line), Smith et al. sequenced DNA from both germ tissues and body tissues of single individuals. Here’s are two sea lampreys on a brown trout: they’re parasitic on fish and usually kill them by sucking blood:

The authors sequenced DNA from body tissues (and blood) as well as germline tissue (sperm), and also looked at the RNA transcripts.  What they found was this:

  • 13% of DNA sequences found in the germline were missing in body tissues, roughly consonant with the 20%  reported in previous work on this species.
  • The genes eliminated from the DNA during development—and we’re not quite sure how this happens— included not just repeated satellite DNA, but real, single-copy genes that have functions.  Eight genes were identified that were active in germ cells but not somatic cells, and there are undoubtedly more.
  • The functions of these genes in germ cells give one clue why they might be eliminated in body cells. (The genes include APOBEC-1 Complementation Factor, RNA Binding Motif 46 [cancer/testis antigen 68], and two “zinc finger” proteins.) The authors note that these genes do act very early in development to segregate the germ cells from the body cells, and have other unknown functions in the germline—they could, for example, be involved in crossing-over between chromosomes or the production of sperm and eggs themselves.
  • Why, then are those genes eliminated from body cells? The authors suggest that genes like those identified above have crucial functions either in germ cells or in segregating germ cells from body cells early in development, but might be deleterious within body cells, perhaps because their bad effects—in particular, in causing cancers—outweigh any good effects. In other words, there’s a conflict within the bodies of lampreys and hagfish between germ and body cells. The way evolution appears to have resolved this conflict is to simply get rid of the “bad” body genes during development.  An alternative strategy would be to “silence” those genes in the body tissues—prevent their expression in non-germ cells—and I’m not sure why they’re removed rather than silenced. (It might be evolutionarily “easier” to snip out genes than silence them, but yet many species, including ourselves, have ways of silencing different genes in different tissues without removing those genes from the DNA. The reason different tissues are different is because they express different sets of genes.)

Many questions remain.  Are those genes eliminated from body cells in fact deleterious if they remain in body cells? If so, why do they remain active in the bodies of non-jawless vertebrates, like ourselves?  Second, if they’re harmful in the body, how are they harmful? Do they cause disease, or do they simply impose a useless metabolic and somatic burden?  Third, is this phenomenon of PGR an ancestral condition, since jawless vertebrates are the descendants of the earliest vertebrates, or has it evolved secondarily in those lineages? As the authors note:

Notably, both extant lineages of jawless vertebrates (agnathans: lampreys and hagfish) are known to undergo PGR, which would seem to indicate that the phenomenon is common to all extant agnathans [jawless fish] and potentially represents an ancestral condition. Thus, PGR may represent an ancient mechanism for moderating genetic conflict between germline and soma that evolved within an ancestral vertebrate lineage (alternately, repeated evolution of PGR in lamprey, hagfish, and numerous invertebrate and protist lineages may reflect recurrent selective advantages for PGR).

Finally, are different genes eliminated in different body tissues, or do all body cells get rid of the same set of genes? The authors’ analysis was too coarse to answer this question.

Regardless, the phenomenon of eliminating some genes from body tissues but not from germ tissues appears to have an evolutionary advantage, for it has happened (or been retained) in many lineages.  What that advantage is remains to be seen. This is an example of one of the evolutionary questions that could only be studied properly once we became able to sequence DNA.

__________

Smith, J.J., Baker, C., Eichler, E.E., and Amemiya, C.T. (2012). Genetic consequences of programmed genome rearrangement. Curr. Biol. 22, 1524–1529.

1969: Men on the Moon

August 26, 2012 • 4:11 am

This is what we all saw 43 years ago when Neil Armstrong, who died yesterday, first set foot on the Moon. After the famous climb down the ladder, Armstrong cavorts with crewmate Buzz Aldrin.

It still amazes me that that tiny lunar module was able to take off and rendezvous with the command module for the trip back to Earth.  I remember being really nervous that something would go wrong and the lunar module would be stranded on the Moon.

Since 1972, only four years after this, no human has set foot on another celestial body.

Starts With a Bang! has some nice pictures of the landing and subsequent frolics. Oh, and there’s this statement, just issued by Armstrong’s family:

“For those who may ask what they can do to honor Neil, we have a simple request. Honor his example of service, accomplishment and modesty, and the next time you walk outside on a clear night and see the moon smiling down at you, think of Neil Armstrong and give him a wink.”

h/t: Michael

RIP Neil Armstrong

August 25, 2012 • 12:58 pm

Neil Armstrong, the first human to set foot on the Moon, died today at age 82.  A legendary test pilot before he became an astronaut, his big feat (feet?) took place on  July 21, 1969, followed by the famous statement analyzed in detail by Wikipedia:

Although the official NASA flight plan called for a crew rest period before extra-vehicular activity, Armstrong requested that the EVA be moved to earlier in the evening, Houston time. Once Armstrong and Aldrin were ready to go outside, Eagle was depressurized, the hatch was opened and Armstrong made his way down the ladder first.

At the bottom of the ladder, Armstrong said “I’m going to step off the LEM now” (referring to the Apollo Lunar Module). He then turned and set his left boot on the surface at 2:56 UTC July 21, 1969, then spoke the famous words “That’s one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind.”

Armstrong had decided on this statement following a train of thought that he had had after launch and during the hours after landing.The broadcast did not have the “a” before “man”, rendering the phrase a contradiction (as man in such use is synonymous with mankind). NASA and Armstrong insisted for years that static had obscured the “a”, with Armstrong stating he would never make such a mistake, but after repeated listenings to recordings, Armstrong admitted he must have dropped the “a”.  Armstrong later said he “would hope that history would grant me leeway for dropping the syllable and understand that it was certainly intended, even if it was not said – although it might actually have been”.

It has since been claimed that acoustic analysis of the recording reveals the presence of the missing “a”; Peter Shann Ford, an Australia-based computer programmer, conducted a digital audio analysis and claims that Armstrong did, in fact, say “a man”, but the “a” was inaudible due to the limitations of communications technology of the time.Ford and James R. Hansen, Armstrong’s authorized biographer, presented these findings to Armstrong and NASA representatives, who conducted their own analysis.  The article by Ford, however, is published on Ford’s own web site rather than in a peer-reviewedscientific journal, and linguists David Beaver and Mark Liberman wrote of their skepticism of Ford’s claims on the blog Language Log. Although Armstrong found Ford’s analysis “persuasive”, he has expressed his preference that written quotations include the “a” in parentheses.

NASA has a wonderful minute-by-minute transcript of the first Moon walk, linked to audio and video of the event.  Do check it out (h/t to Matthew Cobb for this).

I went to a friend’s house to see the first step on the Moon, but was late because it wasn’t supposed to occur until later.  And just as I walked through the screen door (it was in Virginia, and it was hot), I saw Armstrong walk down the ladder and step on the surface. I was lucky I made it in time! Where you were when you saw that is something you never forget, just like where you were when you heard that John F. Kennedy was shot. Were you alive during that time, and if so, did you watch the Moon walk live?

This photo, showing Armstrong’s face as he walked on the moon, surfaced only three years ago:

And a sad commentary from xkcd:

Oh,to leaven this sad day a bit with some humor, Byron Tau posted on Twitter a headline that NBC News got wrong:

This latter Neil was often accused of being a space cadet, but never left the Earth.

Fred Astaire Week: Caturday surprise

August 25, 2012 • 12:39 pm

This isn’t what I consider one of Astaire’s greatest pieces, though it’s clever. I’m including it today because there’s a special surprise during the fourth minute when the band plays “Tiger Rag”: you’ll have to watch to see.  The clip does showcase Astaire’s piano-playing skills, and, when this movie was made (it’s from Let’s Dance, 1950), shows that he still had it at the age of 51.

h/t: Latha

BioLogos lays out the tenets of theistic evolution

August 25, 2012 • 10:27 am

I’m strongly tempted to label God-driven evolution this way: Theistic Evolution™, since it’s becoming as common as Sophisticated Theology™.  But I’ll call it TE for the nonce. And TE is dominating the conversation over at the accommodationist outfit BioLogos, for they’ve recently pushed it heavily as a way to bring evangelical Christians to Darwin.  But we know that that hasn’t worked, and it won’t work, for it demands that you see part of the Bible as metaphor and the rest as literally true, without knowing how to tell these parts apart.  Moreover, the things that TE requires adherents to take as metaphor—God’s creation of life and the existence of Adam and Eve—cannot be seen metaphorically by Christians because they debase God’s action in the world, making him a a puppet-master pulling the strings of natural selection, and also completely removing the rationale of salvation from original sin brought by the crucifixion of Jesus.

Theistic evolution is also, of course, the way that accommodationist organizations like the National Center for Science Education have chosen to go, claiming that there’s no real difference between TE and “real” naturalistic and scientific evolution, which proceeds in an unguided fashion.  But there is a difference, of course, just like there’s a difference between radioactive decay that happens without “cause” and radioactive decay that happens because God determines when to tweak an electron.  It’s like telling Irish people that evolution is consistent with leprechauns because the LITTLE PEOPLE could be guiding it invisibly.

Imagine telling chemists that their field is compatible with the Bible because God could be behind every chemical reaction! That’s not necessary, of course, because (unlike biology), chemistry doesn’t conflict with religious feelings or dogma. The only reason that TE even exists, unlike “theistic physics” and “theistic chemistry,” is that biology is uniquely placed to hit religion in the solar plexus.

At any rate, a new post on BioLogos by Ted Davis, “Science and the Bible: Theistic Evolution,” lays out what Davis sees as TE’s core tenets.  Davis explains the audience:

This column presents one type of TE, a type favored by many evangelical scientists and scholars. For example, the people I will discuss all accept (as far as I can tell) the Incarnation and Resurrection—that is, they are Trinitarian Christians who believe that Jesus was fully divine (and fully human) and that the disciples went to the right tomb, only to find it empty, before encountering the risen Christ in diverse places. They also believe in creation ex nihilo, the classical view (illustrated at the start of this column) that God brought the universe into existence out of nothing.

Classically, of course, creation ex nihilo didn’t just mean only the Big Bang, but the view God made the earth and its inhabitants as described in Genesis: animals, plants, water, stars, and humans were instantly poofed into existence (well, it might have taken a day for each one).  So evolution is at the outset in conflict with Scripture unless you see “creation” as meaning only the Big Bang. But on to the tenets (indented; my comments are flush left).

Core Tenets or Assumptions of Theistic Evolution

(1) The Bible is NOT a reliable source of scientific knowledge about the origin of the earth and the universe, including living things—because it was never intended to teach us about science.

This reflects not only modern scientific knowledge, but also (more importantly) modern biblical scholarship. Peter Enns and some other evangelical scholars have recently stressed this point, initiating a firestorm in the evangelical academic community that, so far, has confirmed my view that evangelicals in general are just not ready to deal with this, even though it is consistent with the classical notion of accommodation. My own comments about the magnitude of the problem, written before the firestorm started, can be found here.

This is a base canard: of course the Bible was meant to teach us about science, insofar as there was science in those days:  it was the attempt of a prescientific (and largely preliterate) people to explain why things were the way they were—how the universe, Earth and Earth’s inhabitants came into being, why there were plagues and diseases, and where the stars were.  It just turned out to be wrong.  Trying to make a virtue out of necessity (the habitual practice of theologians), we’re now told it wasn’t really written to give us facts about the Earth.  That’s not only wrong, but offensive to those who have studied how the Bible was interpreted over the millennia. It is intellectually dishonest to pretend that literalism was never intended or construed. It’s no wonder that evangelicals “aren’t ready to deal with this,” for they sense the dishonesty.

(2) The Bible IS a reliable source of knowledge about God and spiritual things.

Remember the quip that Galileo attributed to Cesare, Cardinal Baronio, “The intention of the Holy Ghost is to teach us how one goes to heaven, not how heaven goes.” (We discussed this earlier in the series). Evolution was not an issue in Galileo’s day, but this platitude is frequently quoted by advocates of TE—and often without proper attribution to Baronio. Commonality obviously lies in the attitude, not the topic. Many critics of TE are willing to adopt Galileo’s approach when it comes to the Solar System, but not when it comes to evolution: they are anxious to keep Galileo out of the garden of Eden.

Yeah and Cardinal Baronio was trying to make the best of a bad job since science was beginning to dispel one Biblical notion after another.  And how, exactly, do we know that the Bible is a reliable source of knowledge about God and spiritual things? Is it—really? Is the stuff in the Old Testament about the vindictive, mean-spirited, and arrogant God “reliable”?  Is the God who ordered nonvirgin brides stoned, and the death of many children for making fun of a prophet’s baldness a “reliable” characterization of Our Deity? What about all the horrible morality in the Bible—morality ignored when people cherry-pick the “good morality” like “don’t kill”?

No, the Bible cannot be a reliable guide to spiritual things because so many theologians—both evangelical and liberal—simply reject the characterization of God given in the Bible as well as many of the moral “lessons” in scripture.

(3) Scientific evidence is irrelevant to the Bible—it is simply not a science book.

See above. This needs to be stated separately, since some believers look to science for “proof” of the Bible, just as some unbelievers look to science for “disproof.” Proponents of TE stress that science and the Bible aren’t like apples and oranges; rather, they are more like apples and rocks: you can hold one in each hand without tension, but they have very little in common. We wouldn’t look for God in the phone book, or in an automobile repair manual. Don’t look for science in the Bible. In principle, scientific theories neither support nor threaten the Bible.

The Bible was meant to be a science book in the sense that it was meant, and interpreted by nearly everyone except the few people always cited by accommodationists (e.g. St. Augustine, who was a still a literalist in many ways), as a true account of the origin and diversity of life.  If you argue that the Bible wasn’t meant to be a science textbook simply because it doesn’t comport with what modern science has found, then you must also argue that the Bible is not a textbook about God and morality since most modern people have rejected the characterization of God and much of the morality in scripture.  How many of us think that nonvirgin brides should be stoned to death, along with blasphemers, disobedient children, and those who violate the Sabbath? If we don’t accept these as guides to moral behavior, in what sense is the Bible a “reliable guide to spiritual things”?

(4) The creation story in Genesis 1 is a confession of faith in the true creator, intended to refute pantheism and polytheism, not to tell us how God actually created the world.

This is meant to echo what we said about the Framework View. It is not necessarily true that all TEs accept the Framework View or something like it, but many do. Most would probably say that the Bible is not contradicted by any specific scientific theory of biological diversity—unless that theory oversteps its philosophical boundaries and functions as a kind of religion, what Conrad Hyers called “dinosaur religion.”

See above.  Read Genesis 1 and 2 and see if you don’t see them as literal (and conflicting) accounts of creation.  Where, oh where, do theologians get the idea that the Bible doesn’t really mean what it says in plain language, and actually means something much more arcane? If God, either the author or inspirer of the Bible, meant to tell us that in Genesis, why didn’t he just say it straight out?  He could have said (or inspired a writer to say) “There are no other Gods but me, and I’m sort of like you humans but a lot more powerful, kind, and smart.” That would be all he had to say in Genesis to convey the message Davis says is really there. Why the impossible-to-interpret metaphor?

(5) The Bible tells us THAT God created, not how God created

Again, this sounds like the Framework View—or, at least, it should. Belief in God the creator is consistent with science, and even supported by some aspects of science; but, it is not a substitute for scientific explanations.

Here Davis is simply telling evangelicals the correct way to interpret the Bible, and the interpretation is not the way the Bible sounds to them.  Davis is telling them tha God actually created life through evolution, although Genesis plainly says otherwise. The Bible says nothing about natural selection or the transformation of species.

Is it no surprise, then, that BioLogos has had no success in converting evangelicals to Darwin? To do so means getting them to reject many tenets of their faith, forcing them to figure out what the Bible really meant when there’s no obvious way to do that, and making them admit that the sacrifice of Jesus was metaphorical since there was no Adam and Eve to sin.

Nevertheless, Templeton keeps throwing money at BioLogos. Their initial $2 million dollar grant was renewed this year to the tune of $1,929,863, the project being “Celebrating the harmony between mainstream science and the Christian faith” (do read their grant proposal, though it may raise your blood pressure).  The new grant, if spent instead buying the food product Plumpy’nut™ for malnourished African children, could provide sixty-four thousand months of treatment for children, saving many lives and preventing the damage that comes with malnutrition.

What would you rather spend two million dollars on: saving the lives of children or engaging in a futile attempt to reconcile Jesus and Darwin?

 

The last Hitchens book (and a memoir by Carol Blue)

August 25, 2012 • 5:14 am

At least one more book by Hitchens will be published. Mortality, apparently the story of his battle with cancer, comes out September 4, is short (128 pages), and can already be ordered at Amazon.  Some jottings of Hitchens have just been published at Slate, along with a slideshow of some photographs. As the website notes:

Publisher’s note: These fragmentary jottings, published as the last chapter of Christopher Hitchens’ new book, Mortality, were left unfinished at the time of Hitchens’ death in December. Annotations by Slate editor David Plotz.

Here are a few of them, and they’re sad:

“Remember, you too are mortal”—hit me at the top of my form and just as things were beginning to plateau. My two assets my pen and my voice—and it had to be the esophagus. All along, while burning the candle at both ends, I’d been “straying into the arena of the unwell” and now “a vulgar little tumor” was evident. This alien can’t want anything; if it kills me it dies but it seems very single-minded and set in its purpose. No real irony here, though. Must take absolute care not to be self-pitying or self-centered.
******
Only OK if I say something objective and stoical: Ian remarking that a time might come when I’d have to let go: Carol asking about Rebecca’s wedding “Are you afraid you won’t see England again?”Also, ordinary expressions like “expiration date”…will I outlive my Amex? My driver’s license? People say—I’m in town on Friday: will you be around? WHAT A QUESTION!

*****

Now so many tributes that it also seems that rumors of my LIFE have also been greatly exaggerated. Lived to see most of what’s going to be written about me: this too is exhilarating but hits diminishing returns when I realize how soon it, too, will be “background.”

It’s been eight months since Hitchens died, but the sense of his loss is still palpable, and keen.  They say that nobody’s irreplaceable, but he’s as close as it comes.

Here are some photos from Slate‘s slideshow; there are eight of them.

A group shot in 1991, while Salman Rushdie was in hiding. Back row from left: Rushdie, Andrew Wylie, David Rieff, Hitchens, Ian McEwan. Front row from left: Blue, Erica Wylie, Elizabeth West, and Martin Amis.

This photo is unspeakably sad:

This photo, taken during Hitchens’ illness, is featured on the back cover of his new book, Mortality.

UPDATE: Reader “bonetired” called my attention to a column in today’s Telegraph by Carol Blue, Hitchens’s wife for 22 years: “Christopher Hitchens: an Impossible act to follow.” It’s the most detailed account yet of how he faced death, and confirms again the bravery with which he faced insuperable odds. It will also make you tear up.

Here’s one anecdote, involving Hitchens’s chemotherapy, that will appeal to us science fans:

Not long before, back in Washington, on a bright and balmy Indian-summer afternoon, he excitedly summoned his family and visiting friends on an outing to see the “Origins of Man” exhibition at the Museum of Natural History, where I watched him sprint out of a cab and up the granite steps to throw up in a trash can before leading his charges through the galleries and exuberantly impressing us with the attainments of science and reason.

And there’s this:

I miss his perfect voice. I heard it day and night, night and day. I miss the first happy trills when he woke; the low octaves of “his morning voice” as he read me snippets from the newspaper that outraged or amused him; the delighted and irritated (mostly irritated) registers as I interrupted him while he read; the jazz-tone riffs of him “talking down the line” to a radio station from the kitchen phone as he cooked lunch; his chirping, high-note greeting when our daughter came home from school; and his last soothing, pianissimo chatterings on retiring late at night.

These are from Blue’s afterword to Mortality. I always wondered how the two got along, for Hitchens never wrote much about his family, and I’m sure he was fiercely attractive to other women. But it’s clear from this memoir, and the pictures in the Slate column, that they loved each other very much.