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Thursday, October 13, 1988 / University Daily Kansan
Opinion
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
KU doesn't lack speakers but could use organization
The KU Student Senate is looking for a way to establish a lecture series on campus that would rival Kansas State University.
Both are only half right.
There are two things that make the Landon Lecture Series famous, and leave some KU students jealous: the important titles and national prominence of the speakers, and theance and media attention given to each lecturer's appearance.
But some administrators said they believed that the various Kiik lecture was together were as good or better than the Land Institute's.
But big names aren't necessarily the best names. In the past eight years, K-State has had President Reagan, Vice President George Bush, Secretary of State George Shultz and former House Speaker T O'Neill.
Randy Shilts, author of "And the Band Played On," the story of AIDS and how the U.S. government made the epidemic worse by ignoring it in its early stages, spoke at KU last year. It would be hard to find a topic more important than AIDS, and it would be harder to find anyone with greater knowledge about the subject than Shilts.
But KU students must look at some of the speakers who have come or are scheduled to come to KU whose lectures have not attracted the same attention as the Landon speakers but are just as important.
This year, Holocaust survivor and Nobel Prize Winner Elie Weisel will speak at KU Monday. "Night," his book about the Nazi death camps, is taught in one of KU's courses in Western Civilization.
As these examples show, names and titles aren't the only reasons to turn out to see a speaker.
But there is one reason the KU lecture series have not attracted as much student and media attention as the speakers at KState. There are too many lecture series, and none among them stands up. Funds and publicity efforts are too divided to advertise the impact of a single speaker or to bring more expensive lecturers to campus.
Judge Robert Bork's rejection by the Supreme Court commanded national media attention last year. He will speak at
To compete at K-State's level of prominence and publicity will take not only good attendance, but a flagship lecture series and a coordination of the funds from more than 25 different lecture series on campus. According to Pam Holley, student body vice president, the main problem at KU is the lack of continuity among the series. The Student Senate lecture series committee must encourage the administration to realize the importance of coordinating the lecture series and their financing.
The ability to meet and hear famous and important people is one of the great privileges of attending a university. KU students must prove that they are eager to take advantage of such opportunities, and that they ensure that the desire of the students in this area is fulfilled.
Mark Tilford for the editorial board
GOP no friend of the family
The Republicans: the party that stands up for the family. Right?
Wrong. The family as a campaign slogan is one thing, but when faced with action that will actually aid families, don't count them.
Last week Senate Republicans saw to it that a family aid bill was shelved. The bill would have provided child-care assistance; guaranteed parental leave for workers with newborn, or endured seriously ill children; and toughened childnormally laws.
But the Republicans forget their own rhetoric and decided to foreign the welfare of U.S. families in order to deny the benefits that they deserve.
Sen. Christopher J. Dodd, D-Conn., a chief sponsor of the bill, said, "Never in the history of American politics has there been a constituency so popular but with so little political clout as the American family."
Apparently, a "pre-family" stance only is useful to portray wholesome images and to generate sound bites. The party that coisted Ronald Reagan through two elections by sellingisions of family values was the family some payment for its votes.
But last week the Republicans turned their backs.
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100DAYS
A chance to evaluate Reagan as his era draws to a close
History will start making judgments on the Reagan Era in 100 days.
There is a new president who is making judgments. Write a
response to how he is making judgments. Write
someone else's response.
Illustration by John Sopinski KANSAN
down what you think of the man and his accomplishments, or lack thereof, in a brief note (75 words or less), please and may or not drop it.
On the biting edge of molar style
Predictions that teeth will disappear are a bit hard to swallow
I read a recent New York Times article with a mixture of joy and skepticism. These two emotions were exceptionally strong because the content of the article directly affected my self-esteem.
Trend-setting never has been my strong point. I've managed to avoid dressing for success, preferring white seam instead. The closest I got was a pillowcase with an opening that got those as a gift. Instead of choosing a trendy cereal that's high in fiber, vitamin-enriched, non-preservative and proven effective against cellulose, I'm wearing it.
Even Wal-Mart's styles occasionally are too avant-garde for me.
But if the findings reported in the New York Times are correct, my backward days are over. In at least one respect, I'm ahead of my time. My estimate, by about 30,000 or 60,000 years.
Fellow University of Kansas students, I have trend-selling teeth.
According to the article, people with small teeth may represent the advance guard of human evolution, at the forefront of a 100,000-year trend.
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The evolution of my own teeth is less because of the advent of fire than to the advent of sweets
An appropriately named anthropology professor, C. Loring Bracer, analyzed millions of teeth from 152 patients aged 25 years. Teeth today, he discovered, are half the size of those employed by Nerubinthers in ancient Egypt.
Brace theorizes that as northern Europe entered the last Ice Age, primal humans were faced with the problem of eating meat that was too cold to kill, the prehistoric version of the TV dinner.
Neanderthal hunters discovered that fire could be used to thaw the meat. The hunters began to cook the meat when they realized that cooked food tasted better and was easier to eat. As food became easier to chew, the need for large teeth became less essential for survival.
The rest, as they say, is history.
Mark
Jost
Staff Columnist
An appropriately named anthropology professor, C. Loring Brace, analyzed millions of teeth collected throughout the world during the past 25 years. Teeth today, he discovered, are half the size of those employed by Neanderthals in northern Europe 75,000 to 100,000 years ago.'
and dentists. But hey, evolution is evolution.
that it's not 'devil's' evolution is evolution.
Now I'm waiting for fashion to catch up with evolution.
Enough of straight, healthy teeth In a few more years, give or take a millennium, the term "plankton mouth" may be considered complimentary.
But the article didn't stop with the prospect of shrinking moles. One of Brace's colleagues said that it牙病 no longer were necessary for them, someday they might disappear altogether.
Now wait just one evolutionary minute.
Despite my joy of finding myself a trendsetter in the tooth world, the prediction of the end of teeth as we know them is taking this evolution a lot faster than I was standing. I believe teeth are here to stay
I don't question the scientific credentials of Brace and his colleagues. Nor do I doubt his understanding of human evolution and prehistorial knowledge, understanding of modern humanity I question.
According to the 1888 World Almanac, we in the United States spent $2.6 billion on our teeth
and guns in 1866. That's more than we spent on the Spanish-American War, the American Revolution, the War of 1812 and the Mexican War. We lost the war because we expected to spend 899 billion on dental work.
We still celebrate the American Revolution after 200 years, and we spent a paltry $120 million on that war. Does anyone think that the United States did not die just because of a minor 100-year-word trend?
This is America, foks. We are not about to let go of this dental gold mine without a fight. We know the value of a buck. Where else but in America could body odor become a social disease and a multimillion dollar a year industry?
Where else in America could we develop dozens of cigarette brands, all of which taste alike? Where else in America can the right label double or triple the price of jeans?
Teeth are here to stay because they are important to the economic well-being of this country. What's good for the dentists of America is good for the rest of the nation. You might just want a dentist, lawyers, insurance salesman and presidential candidate. Talk all you want, but it'll never happen.
If necessary, the government will subsidize teeth. Subsidies worked for Chrysler a few years ago. Reversing a 100,000-year trend may take a multibillion dollar industry, it said it worth $1.
Perhaps in a few years, we'll be on frozen meat diets similar to the high-fiber diets we're on now. Anything to keep those incisors in business.
So, Dr. Brace, although my teeth and the evolutionary process may be following your theories the American Dream will not. Although I appreciate being a tooth-worthenessetter, your lakes lack hacks. When it comes to evolution, you can never expect evolution loses, if only by the skin of its teeth.
Mark Jost is a Lawrence graduate student in journalism.
BLOOM COUNTY
by Berke Breathed
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