Nxxx,2006-02-28,F,001,Bs-C-4C,E1.0
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C M Y K ID NAME: Nxxx,2006-02-28,F,001,Bs-4C,E1 YELO MAG CYAN BLK 3 7 15 25 50 75 85 93 97 F1 N TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2006 By KATY BUTLER From infancy until he reached the threshold of manhood, the beatings Daniel W. Smith received at his older brother’s hands were qualitatively different from routine sibling rivalry. Rarely did he and his brother just shove each other in the back of the family car over who was crowding whom, or wrestle over a toy fire- truck. Instead, Mr. Smith said in an interview, his brother, Sean, would grip him in a headlock or stranglehold and punch him repeatedly. “Fighting back just made it worse, so I’d just take it and wait for it to be over,” said Mr. Smith, who was 18 months younger than his brother. “What was I going to do? Where was I going to go? I was 10 years old.” To speak only of helplessness and intimidation, how- ever, is to oversimplify a complex bond. “We played kickball with neighborhood kids, and we’d go off explor- ing in the woods together as if he were any other friend,” said Mr. Smith, who is now 34 and a writing instructor at San Francisco State University. (Sean died of a heart at- tack three years ago.) “But there was always tension,” he said, “because at any moment things could go sour.” Siblings have been trading blows since God first played favorites with Cain and Abel. Nearly murderous sibling fights — over possessions, privacy, pecking or- ders and parental love — are woven through biblical stories, folktales, fiction and family legends. In Genesis, Joseph’s jealous older brothers strip him of his coat of many colors and throw him into a pit in the wilderness. Brutal brother-on-brother violence dom- inates an opening section of John Steinbeck’s “East of Eden,” and in Annie Proulx’s short story “Brokeback Mountain,” the cowboy Ennis del Mar describes an older brother who “slugged me silly ever’ day.” This casual, intimate violence can be as mild as a shoving match and as savage as an attack with a base- ball bat. It is so common that it is almost invisible. Par- ents often ignore it as long as nobody gets killed; re- searchers rarely study it; and many psychotherapists consider its softer forms a normal part of growing up. But there is growing evidence that in a minority of cases, sibling warfare becomes a form of repeated, in- escapable and emotionally damaging abuse, as was the case for Mr. Smith. In a study published last year in the journal Child Maltreatment, a group of sociologists found that 35 per- cent of children had been “hit or attacked” by a sibling in the previous year. The study was based on phone in- terviews with a representative national sample of 2,030 children or those who take care of them. Although some of the attacks may have been fleet- ing and harmless, more than a third were troubling on their face. According to a preliminary analysis of unpublished data from the study, 14 percent of the children were re- peatedly attacked by a sibling; 4.55 percent were hit hard enough to sustain injuries like bruises, cuts, chipped teeth and an occasional broken bone; and 2 percent were hit by brothers or sisters wielding rocks, toys, broom Continued on Page 6 Beyond Rivalry, a Hidden World of Sibling Violence It is so common it often goes unnoticed. Parents dismiss it as sibling rivalry. Scientists rarely study it. But physical abuse by a sibling can leave long-lasting emotional scars. Leave Your Brother Alone! A study of 2,030 children found: 35% had been hit or attacked by a sibling. Of those attacked: 13% Were injured. 6% Were attacked with a weapon. 40% Were attacked repeatedly. Source: David Finkelhor, Univ. of New Hampshire The New York Times Ruth Marten By KIRK JOHNSON DENVER, Feb. 27 — Video game technol- ogy and Einstein’s work on relativity may at first seem as unlikely a couple as Oscar and Felix. One bobs in the froth of commercial cul- ture, dodging the scornful radar of educa- tors and parents who wish students were off doing something else like, say, studying Ein- stein. The other is as highbrow as science gets in its lofty waltz of theoretical physics, where time and space warp in otherworldly ways that have given brain aches to genera- tions of physics students. But to Andrew J. S. Hamilton, a professor of astrophysics at the University of Colora- do, they are perfect together. What gamer programs do with increasing speed, sophistication and computational muscle, Dr. Hamilton said, is visualize things that have never been seen in the real world. And what Einstein described, espe- cially in his theory of general relativity, are forces of time and space literally outside the real world we know, or can know. “What if you could take people through a wormhole the way Einstein’s equations said it would be?” he said in interview in his of- fice on the Boulder campus. “And what if you could bring art and science together in a way that compromised neither?” That is where black holes come in. Dr. Hamilton’s marriage of video game soft- ware and relativity, which he has fashioned into a “Black Hole Flight Simulator,” is at the heart of a new show at the Denver Mu- seum of Nature and Science that takes view- ers on a 23-minute thrill ride to what the pro- gram notes call “the other side of infinity.” The show is built on the crunching of num- bers that even a black hole might envy: some segments produced by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois required 90 hours of supercomputer calculation for each sec- ond on screen. The central goal, Dr. Hamilton said, is both simple and mind-bendingly paradox- ical: to visualize what cannot be seen. Because not even light can escape the gravitational pull of a black hole, the interi- or of a hole is perhaps the ultimate terra in- cognita. The absence of light coming out means an absence of all information. Most of what science knows about these objects is thus entirely inferential — from gravitation- al effects on other objects like nearby stars. The simulator, to be featured this year in a “Nova” program on PBS about black holes, seeks to lift the veil. Using Einstein’s equa- tions and a graphics language called Open GL, developed by Silicon Graphics, Dr. Ham- ilton told the computer to show how individ- ual vectors of light should behave at the no- man’s frontier of the black hole, called the event horizon, and inside the hole itself. That meant not only creating a visual rep- resentation of Einstein’s work, but also in a real sense creating from scratch a world that cannot be known. “When I started this, I had no idea what would emerge from the equations,” Mr. Hamilton said. Part of the Continued on Page 4 Images from the Denver Museum of Nature and Science BLACK HOLE ADVENTURE The planetarium at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science relies on video game technology to enable viewers to see the impossible — what a flight through a black hole might be like. In the se- quence, the viewer approaches the black hole at the center of our galaxy, enters it, crosses the event horizon beyond which nothing emerges, finds that there is an exit via a wormhole, and witnesses a kind of ultimate chaos. Theoretical Physics, in Video: A Thrill Ride to ‘the Other Side of Infinity’ SCIENTIST AT WORK / ANDREW HAMILTON THE APPROACH FIRST GLIMPSE ACROSS THE HORIZON NO EXIT THE HEART OF CHAOS Israel’s Patient-in-Chief The Doctor’s World: Ariel Sharon told his medical team to talk to the public. By Lawrence K. Altman, M.D. Page 5 Personal Health: Eyesight Steps to take now to protect your vision against macular degeneration. By Jane E. Brody Page 7 Before You Go to Mars Science Illustrated: How cosmic rays would imperil astronauts in deep space. By Frank O’Connell Page 4 A ‘Lost Kingdom,’ Frozen in Time In Indonesia, scientists find remains from an 1815 volcano catastrophe. By John Noble Wilford Page 4 Conceptual illustration by Frank O’Connell/The New York Times Æ Readers can discuss sibling violence in a Web forum and watch a video interview on evolution with Niles Eldredge of the American Museum of Natural History: nytimes.com/science. Æ The weekly Science Times Podcast fea- tures interviews with writers and scien- tists: nytimes.com/podcasts. Æ John Noble Wilford answers readers’ questions: [email protected]. More Science: Just Click
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Transcript of Nxxx,2006-02-28,F,001,Bs-C-4C,E1.0
C M Y KID NAME: Nxxx,2006-02-28,F,001,Bs-4C,E1 YELO MAG CYAN BLK 3 7 15 25 50 75 85 93 97
F1N
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2006
By KATY BUTLER
From infancy until he reached the threshold ofmanhood, the beatings Daniel W. Smith received at hisolder brother’s hands were qualitatively different fromroutine sibling rivalry. Rarely did he and his brotherjust shove each other in the back of the family car overwho was crowding whom, or wrestle over a toy fire-truck.
Instead, Mr. Smith said in an interview, his brother,Sean, would grip him in a headlock or stranglehold andpunch him repeatedly.
“Fighting back just made it worse, so I’d just take itand wait for it to be over,” said Mr. Smith, who was 18months younger than his brother. “What was I going to
do? Where was I going to go? I was 10 years old.” To speak only of helplessness and intimidation, how-
ever, is to oversimplify a complex bond. “We playedkickball with neighborhood kids, and we’d go off explor-ing in the woods together as if he were any other friend,”said Mr. Smith, who is now 34 and a writing instructor atSan Francisco State University. (Sean died of a heart at-tack three years ago.)
“But there was always tension,” he said, “becauseat any moment things could go sour.”
Siblings have been trading blows since God firstplayed favorites with Cain and Abel. Nearly murderoussibling fights — over possessions, privacy, pecking or-ders and parental love — are woven through biblicalstories, folktales, fiction and family legends.
In Genesis, Joseph’s jealous older brothers strip
him of his coat of many colors and throw him into a pit inthe wilderness. Brutal brother-on-brother violence dom-inates an opening section of John Steinbeck’s “East ofEden,” and in Annie Proulx’s short story “BrokebackMountain,” the cowboy Ennis del Mar describes an olderbrother who “slugged me silly ever’ day.”
This casual, intimate violence can be as mild as ashoving match and as savage as an attack with a base-ball bat. It is so common that it is almost invisible. Par-ents often ignore it as long as nobody gets killed; re-searchers rarely study it; and many psychotherapistsconsider its softer forms a normal part of growing up.
But there is growing evidence that in a minority ofcases, sibling warfare becomes a form of repeated, in-escapable and emotionally damaging abuse, as was thecase for Mr. Smith.
In a study published last year in the journal ChildMaltreatment, a group of sociologists found that 35 per-cent of children had been “hit or attacked” by a sibling inthe previous year. The study was based on phone in-terviews with a representative national sample of 2,030children or those who take care of them.
Although some of the attacks may have been fleet-ing and harmless, more than a third were troubling ontheir face.
According to a preliminary analysis of unpublisheddata from the study, 14 percent of the children were re-peatedly attacked by a sibling; 4.55 percent were hit hardenough to sustain injuries like bruises, cuts, chippedteeth and an occasional broken bone; and 2 percent werehit by brothers or sisters wielding rocks, toys, broom
Continued on Page 6
Beyond Rivalry, a Hidden World of Sibling Violence
It is so common it often goes
unnoticed. Parents dismiss it as
sibling rivalry. Scientists rarely
study it. But physical abuse by a
sibling can leave long-lasting
emotional scars.
LeaveYour
BrotherAlone!
A study of 2,030
children found:
35%had been
hit or attacked
by a sibling.
Of those attacked:
13%Were
injured.
6%Were
attacked with a
weapon.
40%Were
attacked repeatedly.
Source: David Finkelhor, Univ. of New Hampshire
The New York TimesRuth Marten
By KIRK JOHNSON
DENVER, Feb. 27 — Video game technol-ogy and Einstein’s work on relativity mayat first seem as unlikely a couple as Oscarand Felix.
One bobs in the froth of commercial cul-ture, dodging the scornful radar of educa-tors and parents who wish students were offdoing something else like, say, studying Ein-stein. The other is as highbrow as sciencegets in its lofty waltz of theoretical physics,where time and space warp in otherworldlyways that have given brain aches to genera-
tions of physics students.But to Andrew J. S. Hamilton, a professor
of astrophysics at the University of Colora-do, they are perfect together.
What gamer programs do with increasingspeed, sophistication and computationalmuscle, Dr. Hamilton said, is visualizethings that have never been seen in the realworld. And what Einstein described, espe-cially in his theory of general relativity, areforces of time and space literally outside thereal world we know, or can know.
“What if you could take people through awormhole the way Einstein’s equations saidit would be?” he said in interview in his of-
fice on the Boulder campus. “And what ifyou could bring art and science together in away that compromised neither?”
That is where black holes come in. Dr.Hamilton’s marriage of video game soft-ware and relativity, which he has fashionedinto a “Black Hole Flight Simulator,” is atthe heart of a new show at the Denver Mu-seum of Nature and Science that takes view-ers on a 23-minute thrill ride to what the pro-gram notes call “the other side of infinity.”
The show is built on the crunching of num-bers that even a black hole might envy:some segments produced by the NationalCenter for Supercomputing Applications at
the University of Illinois required 90 hoursof supercomputer calculation for each sec-ond on screen.
The central goal, Dr. Hamilton said, isboth simple and mind-bendingly paradox-ical: to visualize what cannot be seen.
Because not even light can escape thegravitational pull of a black hole, the interi-or of a hole is perhaps the ultimate terra in-cognita. The absence of light coming outmeans an absence of all information. Mostof what science knows about these objects isthus entirely inferential — from gravitation-al effects on other objects like nearby stars.
The simulator, to be featured this year in a
“Nova” program on PBS about black holes,seeks to lift the veil. Using Einstein’s equa-tions and a graphics language called OpenGL, developed by Silicon Graphics, Dr. Ham-ilton told the computer to show how individ-ual vectors of light should behave at the no-man’s frontier of the black hole, called theevent horizon, and inside the hole itself.
That meant not only creating a visual rep-resentation of Einstein’s work, but also in areal sense creating from scratch a worldthat cannot be known. “When I started this, Ihad no idea what would emerge from theequations,” Mr. Hamilton said. Part of the
Continued on Page 4
Images from the Denver Museum of Nature and Science
BLACK HOLE ADVENTURE The planetarium at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science relies on video game technology to enable viewers to see the impossible — what a flight through a black hole might be like. In the se-quence, the viewer approaches the black hole at the center of our galaxy, enters it, crosses the event horizon beyond which nothing emerges, finds that there is an exit via a wormhole, and witnesses a kind of ultimate chaos.
Theoretical Physics, in Video: A Thrill Ride to ‘the Other Side of Infinity’
S C I E N T I S T AT W O R K / A N D R E W H A M I L T O N
THE APPROACH FIRST GLIMPSE ACROSS THE HORIZON NO EXIT THE HEART OF CHAOS
Israel’s Patient-in-ChiefThe Doctor’s World: Ariel Sharon toldhis medical team to talk to the public.
By Lawrence K. Altman, M.D. Page 5
Personal Health: EyesightSteps to take now to protect your visionagainst macular degeneration.
By Jane E. Brody Page 7
Before You Go to MarsScience Illustrated: How cosmic rayswould imperil astronauts in deep space.
By Frank O’Connell Page 4
A ‘Lost Kingdom,’ Frozen in TimeIn Indonesia, scientists find remainsfrom an 1815 volcano catastrophe.
By John Noble Wilford Page 4 Conceptual illustrationby Frank O’Connell/The New York Times
Æ Readers can discuss sibling violence in a
Web forum and watch a video interview
on evolution with Niles Eldredge of the
American Museum of Natural History:nytimes.com/science.
Æ The weekly Science Times Podcast fea-
tures interviews with writers and scien-
tists: nytimes.com/podcasts.
Æ John Noble Wilford answers readers’
questions: [email protected].
More Science: Just Click
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