Worlds beyond belief

Quantum mechanics tells us that there are limitations to what we can know about reality. A particle appears to be in two places at the same time. Where is it "really"? Particles can be "entangled," so that one particle "knows" instantaneously what happens to another particle, no matter how far apart they are. How does it do that? When we try to look at these particles, to find out exactly what's going on with them, our doing so instantly removes the odd quantum effects. The quantum effects "collapse," so that the particle examined appears to be acting perfectly "normally."

In other words, we know weird things are going on, and we can see the statistical result of those weird things when we observe numerous particles. But when we try to observe what's actually happening to any one particle -- well, we simply can't.

Are the limitations of quantum mechanics epistemological or ontological? In other words, does quantum mechanics describe limits on our ability to observe reality, or does it describe the very weird nature of reality itself?

This week's New Yorker contains a lengthy article discussing the work of a British physicist who has spent his life thinking about these matters. He concludes that the limitations are ontological. Most physicists don't even like to think about the question -- it's too "philosophical." They'd prefer just to accept the theory as an accurate description of the data, and see what they can accomplish with it. Focus on building a better transistor.

But the British physicist -- David Deutsch -- who is the subject of the New Yorker article, believes that quantum mechanics can best be understood by accepting a "Many Worlds" theory of reality. This theory, well-known in physicist circles, hypothesizes that an incredibly large number of parallel universes exist, side by side, and that incredibly large numbers of new universes are being created every second, every time one of two possible outcomes of an event occurs. To simplify this idea, consider my flipping a coin. In our universe, we see it as coming up either heads or tails. In "Many Worlds," flipping the coin creates a split of universes -- it comes up heads in one and tails in the other.

Deutsch believes that quantum mechanics seems bizarre to us because most of what happens is happening in parallel universes. In the laboratory, for example, we shoot photons at a pair of openings or slits. We know the initial trajectory of the particles when we fire them off, and we see a wave diffraction distribution created by the particles when they hit a detector on the other side of the slits, a result not predicted by classical mechanics. But if we try to follow each particle, to see which slit it passes through, we immediately lose the wave distribution, and the pattern on the detector is the same as though we were firing BBs at the slits.

This result makes no sense under classical mechanics. Photons should act either as particles or waves -- they shouldn't change their nature based on whether they are being observed from origin to destination. Deutsch would contend that between the firing off of the particles, and the impact on the detector, the particles follow a trajectory that leads through parallel universes. He suggests that once one accepts the Many Worlds hypothesis, much of what seems weird about quantum mechanics then becomes more logical and undertandable.

[T]he quantum theory of parallel universes is not the problem -- it's the solution. ... It is the explanation -- the only one that is tenable -- of a remarkable and conterintuitive reality.

Deutsch's speculations would be merely a somewhat curious mind problem if quantum mechanics were not so important in today's world. Virtually all of our high tech equipment since the invention of the transistor depends on quantum mechanics. We have become dependent on the acceptance and use by scientists and engineers of data that make no sense under classical mechanics.

Do they make no sense because we haven't yet developed the technology to obtain additional data needed to understand reality? Or is that the way reality is -- what we see is all we'll ever get? Deutsch would argue the latter.

It would be fun to locate that parallel universe where I became an architect rather than a lawyer -- my alter ego probably has developed a more relaxed and less contentious personality.

"Third grade lied, I never use cursive"

The title above is a fan page on Facebook with, at present, over 764,000 fans (or "likes" as they're now called). If we ignore the painful comma splice, it accurately states the attitude of millions of Americans.

A feature article in today's New York Times points out that, although most schools still teach third graders to write in cursive, third grade is the final contact that most students will ever have with the skill. Some people nowadays can't even sign their own name in cursive.

An education professor lamented:

“These kids are losing time where they create beauty every day,” Professor Christen said. “But it’s hard for me to make a practical argument for it. I’m not one who’s mourning it because of that; I’m mourning the beauty, the aesthetics.”

Ah, c'mon. Let's not get carried away.

I also learned to write cursive in third grade. At first, I was pleased, because I could now read the written comments on my report card (and formulate my defenses), before I turned the card over to my parents. But in my school, we continued to have sporadic penmanship classes through sixth grade. I soon learned to hate them.

I hated them, first of all, because they made us write with what were called "library pens," nibs on a stick that had to be repeatedly dipped in ink. This process was only one step beyond the use of quill pens. It is impossible for a fifth grade boy to write cursive, using a scratchy pen that he dips in liquid ink, without smearing the ink all over his fingers, the side of his palm, and -- consequently -- the page on which he is writing. And if you think I had problems, talk to the left-handers in our class.

But beyond the mechanics, cursive -- as we were taught it -- was not a thing of "beauty." The capital letters were archaic, with the "S" looking a bit like a treble cleft, and the "Q" looking like the number "2." The small letters, written in a continuous, fluid line, looked like a series of waves upon a body of water. This was the "Palmer" method of penmanship.

And even worse than the style we were taught were the exercises we were forced to endure, exercises deemed necessary to perfect the style: long sequences of overlapping circles, and repetitive up and down strokes.

The process of becoming an adult included the process of simplfying this imposed style of writing, until -- by the end of high school -- you finally were back to writing printed letters, some of which were tied together in various ways of your own choosing. In college, when I saw an occasional fellow student still writing in the unmodified Palmer method, I concluded to myself that here was a fellow without much initiative or ability to break away from dictated absurdities.

Except for writing checks and scratching out an occasional note to yourself, handwriting in any form with an actual pen or pencil is increasingly unusual. Keyboarding allows you to write almost as fast as you can think, and more and more people have a laptop or an iPad within reach at all times. Traditional Palmer cursive will still interest some folks as an art form, I suppose, a style of calligraphy (although teaching yourself the far more attractive italic style of penmanship would seem to me far more satisfaying). But to require all students to learn cursive when available classtime is already in such short supply seems a poor allocation of resources.

Third grade teachers didn't "lie" when they assured students that cursive would always prove useful. They simply accepted without reflection the simple truths they had been taught in schools of education, and failed to foresee the future.

Royalty

I must have too much time on my hands. I've just finished reading another news story about the Royal Wedding, this one viewing with concern the allegation that President Obama has been royally snubbed. As usual, the on-line comments to the article were more irritating than the story itself. All the comments were irritating, in fact, regardless of the position the writers took -- I must be irritable this week -- but to me the most aggravating were those denouncing the British monarchy itself and demanding its abolition.

Let me be clear. I'm a monarchist. At least, I'm a monarchist on behalf of the United Kingdom, as well as, incidentally, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and a few bits and pieces of the former Empire.

Every nation needs something to tie its people together, something bigger than their collective sum, something to bind them collectively to their own history. We have our Constitution. We have our houses of Congress -- however much we deplore the performance of the members of those houses. We have our Supreme Court, with its over 200 years of precedential decisions. We have our White House, with its oft-studied history of occupants: good, bad, mediocre, and simply bizarre.

Britain has the monarchy. The kings and queens of England stretch back 945 years to the Norman Conquest, and -- in reality -- hundreds of years earlier, back to a time when "kings" were merely leaders of Germanic tribes. The line of monarchs has been broken only once, for a score of years under Oliver Cromwell. The experience wasn't pleasant, and hasn't been repeated.

I occasionally talk to Brits who wonder what it would be like to change to a republic. More democratic, they suspect. Less expensive. More like "normal" countries.

Fine. If they want to abolish the monarchy, they will in fact be more like other countries. A small, wet island with nice (if rather eccentric) citizens, a bad economy, some pretty (if unattended) cathedrals, and national football (soccer) teams that never seem to get very far in the World Cup play-offs. They will be another Austria or Sweden.

Being "normal" is vastly overrated.

If I were designing Britain from scratch, I probably wouldn't give it a queen as its head of state. But we take nations as we find them, with all their own historical experiences. The British monarchy recalls a glorious past, a lengthy past, a fascinating past -- Shakespearean in majesty and scope. The Crown with its historical associations brightens what would otherwise be a somewhat dim nation. I doubt that it costs the British taxpayer much more than the amounts other countries' taxpayers pay for trappings of sovereignty. In fact, the aristocracy and royal family derive much of their income from their own inherited landed estates -- estates that no one proposes confiscating.

I don't share the American press's fascination with every last detail of William and Kate's upcoming nuptials, but I'm quietly pleased that they're being celebrated. The occasional bit of British pageantry reminds us that our American brand of republicanism isn't the only form of government that ensures its citizens freedom and the right to be heard -- the same benefits also accrue to the subjects of this ancient constitutional monarchy. And Britain shows us that honoring an "elite" -- whether aristocratic, plutocratic or meritocratic -- is not incompatible with democracy.

So best wishes to the prince and his princess. And God Save the Queen.

Tales of the Rabbit

Does any child really believe in the Easter Bunny? In the comic strip "For Better or Worse," young Michael has been having existential doubts, but today I see that he's happily dyeing eggs, together with his younger sister.

I can't remember ever taking the story seriously, deep, deep down in my infantile heart. My folks and I sort of pretended that I believed, and that they believed that I believed.

Santa Claus was something different. That story had some emotional resonance with me. It seemed to state some real truths about life as I knew it. Santa lived away from civilization in the remote Arctic. The newspapers offered Arctic weather reports on Christmas Eve, advising readers as to any navigational difficulties Santa might encounter. The post office accepted letters directed to him. Santa was able to visit an amazing number of homes in one evening, it's true, but then that was the nature of Santa -- just like God, who could listen to several billion prayers at the same time and not get confused. Santa wasn't part of Christianity, but he coordinated his activities with the Christmas story.

Santa was cool, and I didn't really stop believing in him until I was ten, long after I could describe to you the details of all nine (at the time) planets, give you an accurate figure for the speed of light in a vacuum, and explain to you the location (in my capacity as a stamp collector) of Afghanistan. I began having suspicions, admittedly, but it wasn't until a fighter pilot in a "Blackhawk" comic book spoke the fateful words, "I feel like I did the day I learned there was no Santa Claus," that I firmly put aside childish things. That ended it. The Blackhawks knew what was what, even if my parents didn't.

But the Easter Bunny? A rabbit that went door to door delivering candy to kids while they slept? A bunny that either took eggs from chickens or (OMG!) laid them himself? Come on! This story didn't fit into anything I knew about real life, and it had nothing to do with what we learned at church about Easter. I loved Winnie-the-Pooh, but I certainly never thought that a stuffed bear really lived in a forest in England, with pots of honey on his wall. The Easter Bunny was another Pooh Bear -- loveable, but clearly on the child's fiction side of the line between fact and fiction.

Or am I just projecting my present-day cynicism back to my early childhood? A little, maybe, but I'm sure the Lapin de Pâques never really played a major role in my childhood iconography.

But if he did/does in yours? That's totally cool! May the Easter Bunny bring you once more his colorful and tasty bounty.

And Happy Easter!

Mulling over mullahs

After two weeks of travel among the warm and friendly people of Iran -- a people whose national heroes are not generals, but lyric poets -- you are left with the question: Why is their government so paranoid and, especially, why is it so hostile to America and to the West in general?

To understand the problem, I think you need to consider two aspects of the present government: first, it's the civil government of a nation, located on natural trade routes and with few natural geographical boundaries, that has historically been at times a dominant empire, but also at other times subject to frequent external threats and humiliations; and second, it's a formal establishment of a religious sect, one that's highly self-confident and emotionally devoted to its tenets, but one that nevertheless represents only ten percent of the world's Muslims, and is considered gravely heretical by the ninety percent majority

The 1979 Revolution that drove out the shah and created the Islamic Republic was driven by a broad coalition of interests within Iran. Nearly everyone wanted a more just society, not one in which only a small percentage of well-educated, upper class citizens prospered. A very large segment of the population -- probably a substantial majority -- also wanted a society and government organized in conformity with the tenets of the Qur'an. These devout citizens, like many others in the Middle East, had seen enough of secular, Western-oriented monarchies, dictatorships and oligarchies, such as those existing in Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Their desire for something different was prompted not so much by hostility to the West -- although many were repelled by the "decadence" of Western society -- but by a desire to return to the original social ideals of the Prophet.

Iran's new government was thus to be both republican in form and Islamic in content, with a Supreme Leader-- representing the ulama, or community of religious experts, and acting as proxy for the "twelfth Imam" (see below) -- who would pass on legislative and other acts of the government to ensure that they conformed to Islamic law.

Historical vulnerability to foreign dominance

Iranians -- the heirs to a succession of powerful Persian empires -- have suffered from a long series of painful reverses. The Arabs conquered Persia shortly after the founding of Islam, imposing both Islam and Arabic on the country, at a low point in Persian history when it was exhausted from a series of wars with the Byzantines. As the result of this conquest, Islam permanently supplanted Zoroastrianism as Persia's dominant religion, but did so only in the more congenial form of Shi'a. The Arabic language eventually hung on only insofar as it now provides the alphabet used to spell the Persian language, as well as supplying a number of Arabic words that have been incorporated into Persian (or "Farsi," as it's pronounced in Persian).

Persian society was nearly obliterated by the Mongol invasions of Ghengis Khan and Tamerlane in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. But the Persian culture proved strong enough to "Persianize" the invaders in each instance, until the powerful Safavid dynasty (ethnically Turkic, but fully Persian in culture) came into being in the sixteenth century. In the nineteenth century, the decadent Qajar dynasty led Persia into a prolonged decline, allowing it to be humiliatingly dominated by rival British and Russian influences, themselves engaged in the "Great Game" in Central Asia.

The Pahlavi shahs, father and son, threw off the Qajars, but imposed an entirely secular rule on the country, relying more and more on support from Britain and the United States as Iran's oil became increasingly critical during World War II and the subsequent cold war. In 1951, a freely elected prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh, brought a more democratic and egalitarian rule to the country. But, in doing so, he nationalized the assets of what is now BP Petroleum. Americans may have forgotten -- the Iranians never have -- that the CIA, in cooperation with the British Government, then engineered a coup d'etat, removing Mosaddegh from power. From that point on, the Shah was securely in America's pocket. And the Shah, supported by American weapons, ruled his own people with a cruel and iron hand.

Iranians therefore have many reasons to fear foreign interference and rule -- and, in recent decades especially, Western interference and rule. Let's not forget that the United States (and other Western nations) strongly supported Saddam Hussein's 1982-90 war against Iran, a war that left an estimated 188,000 Iranians dead. The war ended after the U.S. shot down -- deliberately or accidentally -- Iran Air Flight 655, killing all 290 passengers and crew.

But Iran's prickly relationships with the rest of the world also result from its Shi'ite faith.

Shi'a religion

I took courses in Islamic history in college, and the subject has always interested me. But I learned much about the religion that was new to me in the course of this trip. Shi'a is a branch of Islam resulting from a dispute over the proper successor to the prophet Muhammed. Shi'ites believe that Muhammed's cousin, Ali, was the last legitimate sucessor of the Prophet (legitimate successors are called "Imams" by Shi'ites) upon which both Sunnis and Shi'ites agree. Ali, chosen by Muhammed himself, was the fourth Imam, and after eight more Imams, recognized only by Shi'ites, the twelfth Imam disappeared in some manner from human sight ("Occultation"). This twelfth Imam still lives, and will reappear at the end of time as the Mahdi.

The majority Sunnis believe that Ali was succeeded by the Umayyad caliphate in Damascus, and by its successors. Ali was assassinated while at prayer, and his heirs were defeated in battle by the Umayyads. He is mourned annually by Shi'ites, by means of lamentations, histrionic stories of his life, and self-flagellation. Devotion to Ali (and his successors) is highly emotional. His portrait is seen everywhere in Iran. Shrines to successor Imams and other Shi'ite martyrs exist throughout Shi'ite-dominated areas of the Middle East

But this dispute over the succession is more than a simple schism. To a Sunni, the absolute one-ness and sovereignty of God are a base rock foundation of Islam. There are no priests in Sunni Islam; there are no intermediaries between the believer and God. Sunnis view Shi'ite devotion to Ali and the martyrs, and their veneration of shrines, as a form of idolotry, a heresy that hits at the very heart of Islam. An analogy would be the dispute between Protestants and Catholics over the priesthood and the veneration of saints.

Shi'ites thus believe that only through acknowledgement of Ali, of the subsequent Imams, and of the imminent coming of the Mahdi, can a Muslim be true to Islam and to the explicit wishes of Muhammed (who allegedly instructed that Ali should be his successor). Sunnis believe Shi'ites misunderstand the very foundation of Islam ("There is no god but Allah, and Muhammed is his prophet.") And Iranian Shi'ites have drifted even further from the true path, in Sunni eyes, by incorporating certain practices of Zoroastrianism into their practice of their faith. These differences and Sunni hostility again feed Iranians' distrust of cooperation with outsiders, and make it far less likely than it would otherwise be that Iran -- as a major regional power -- can effectively lead any coalition or alliance of Middle Eastern states

For example: While I was in Iran, Iranian television was obsessed by the situation in Bahrain. Bahrain is a Shi'ite Gulf State ruled by a Sunni king. Mass protests by the Shi'ite people -- similar to those going on at the same time in other countries in the region -- were met by assistance to the king (or "intervention") by Sunni Saudi Arabia. The Iranian media were livid, denouncing the Saudis as puppets of American imperialism.

Furthermore, when it comes to Iran's problems specifically with the West, there is the issue of Western morals and conduct. As our American guide pointed out, Islam is a religion that is concerned less with orthodoxy -- what you believe -- than orthopraxy -- how you behave. They think we behave badly, and who can blame them? Many Muslims have come to the U.S. with the dream of living here permanently, only to return to their homelands in disgust. We aren't going to change our society to meet Muslim standards, but we should be able to understand that the way we live our lives is problematical when it comes to dealing with a country like Iran. After all, was it so many generations ago that plenty of Americans were appalled by the way that French "libertines" lived their lives?

Muddled future

Iran is the most modern and technologically developed country in the Middle East. (With the possible exception, I suppose, of the small nation of Lebanon.) It is destined, sooner or later, to be a nuclear power. (One of its uranium enrichment plants was pointed out to us, south of Tehran, from the freeway.) Its Supreme Leader, and its President Ahmadinejad who has the Leader's full support, drive us nuts. But they are devoted to developing a nation based on Islamic principles and law, principles that include the egalitarian social teachings of Muhammed. They genuinely hope to restore Islam, in Iran at least, to primitive Islam -- just as many Protestants in our country hope to render their own faith -- and their country -- consistent with their understanding of primitive Christianity.

The Islamic Republic is thus an experiment, both in government and in religion. As such, I'm not sure that we should be instinctively hostile to it, although we can certainly deplore some of its more extreme punitive practices, practices based on strict application of sharia law. It will be interesting to see whether Iran can continue to combine a theocratic government with a modern and sophisticated society and economy, and to do so with the continued support of the majority of its people.

Those of us who wish Iran well obviously have areas of serious concern. First and foremost is Iran's repeated refusal to abide by U.N. resolutions and its insistence on proceeding with enrichment of uranium; despite protestations that it seeks only nuclear energy for peaceful uses, Iran's hostile defiance and activities make this claim unlikely. Second is the threat Iran poses to the peace process -- however moribund at present -- between Palestine and Israel. Third, despite its claim to be republican as well as Islamic, the Ahmadinejad administration appears to have fraudulently stolen the most recent election in 2009, indicating a lack of self-confidence in its popular support and a lack of dedication to its own purported principles. (Apparently, the Supreme Leader follows the tenet that any government has as its paramount duty the duty of ensuring its own survival.) Fourth, there appears to be a significant amount of corruption among the Revolutionary Guard and some of the mullahs (clergy); members of both groups have received the lion's share of those properties nationalized early in the Revolution, and have openly used them for their own personal benefit.

I've tried to identify some of the problems. But we know too little about what goes on inside Iran's ruling circles -- and a highly-structured, two week's visit as a tourist is ludicrously inadequate -- for me to offer any predictions of what happens next.

I can only predict that it will be interesting!

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didactic
of literature or other art, intended to convey instruction and information. The word is often used to refer to texts that are overburdened with instructive or factual matter to the exclusion of graceful and pleasing detail so that they are pompously dull and erudite. Some literature, however, is both entertaining and consciously didactic, as, for example, proverbs and gnomic poetry. The word is from the Greek didaktikos, "apt at teaching." [emphasis added]

Adventure in Iran

"Why would you ever want to go to Iran?" After being asked that question repeatedly, and having repeatedly suppressed my instinctive reply "If you have to ask, I can't explain," my sister and I finally arrived in Tehran near midnight -- 11½ hours ahead of Seattle time -- after endless hours of flight. We had wisely arranged to arrive a day early, giving our minds and bodies some chance to adjust before we met up with our university alumni group.

By chance, the day following our arrival was Iran's "National Picnic Day" (13th day of the Persian new year), when everyone spends the day outside. The beautifully landscaped park adjacent to our hotel was crawling with families, many of whom had set up umbrella tents at an early hour; others were cooking lunch over camp stoves. As we strolled around cautiously, waiting to fend off denunciations as agents of the Great Satan, it suddenly dawned on me: it wasn't going to happen. Everyone we saw was outgoing and friendly. Frisbees were tossed, ping pong was played, chess games were under way, hookahs were smoked. Kids zipped around on in line skates, looking like kids at home; many played pick-up games of soccer. Fathers carried their children about on their shoulders. Mothers joined their daughters in kicking soccer balls about.

That first holiday morning in Tehran set the theme for the two weeks to come. The theme was: "Leave your preconceptions about Iran back at the airport."

The next morning, our group of 35 assembled at the hotel. We met our American guide, a former U.S. ambassador, now affiliated with both Stanford and Harvard, who delivered five formal lectures during the days to come. We also met our local guide, Ali, an amazing source of good humor and knowledge. Ali not only was knowledgable about Persian history, religion, politics, culture, economics, and sociology -- but was a well-traveled man who also had a good background in American and European civilization. We spent the first couple of days in Tehran, visiting the National Archeology Musem, the former royal palace (including the throne room where the shah was coronated), and a museum of glass and ceramics. We also paid a visit to the crown jewels of the pre-Revolution era, which included whole stacks of emeralds, rubies, diamonds and pearls -- precious stones hauled back from India during the days of the Mogul Empire.

We then flew to Mashad in the east, Iran's second largest city, famous especially as the site of a mammoth shrine complex devoted to the Imam Reza, eighth imam in the Shi'ite version of Islam. The women were provided with chadors to cover their entire bodies, with the exception of hands and face. Kathy never looked better. We also visited the tomb of the eleventh century poet Ferdowski, author of the Shahnameh, Persia's national epic, who did much to preserve Persian as the language of Iran against the influence of its Arab conquerors.

We made our final flight of the tour to the desert town of Kerman, from which we toured the ruins of an entire city constructed of red clay. We then drove to Yazd, the center of the remaining Zoroastrian community in Iran. We visited a Zoroastrian village, and its "fire temple," and also hiked to the top of one of two adjacent "towers of silence," where the bodies of the dead, until quite recently, were commended to the attention of vultures. The birds stripped the bodies to bare bones within a few hours, we were told, and the cleaned bones were then dropped into a deep pit and covered by lime as final interment. This information appealed strongly to certain adolescent strains in my personality.

We then drove to the beautiful city of Shiraz (home of Shiraz grapes, and hence Syrah wine). On the way, we visited the ruins of Pasargad and the tomb of Cyrus the Great, who first united the Persians and Medes and founded the Achaemenian Empire. Cyrus was one of the more admirable conquerors in world history, encouraging each of his conquered peoples to preserve its own culture and religion. It was Cyrus who ended the captivity of the Israelites in Babylonia, and ordered the rebuilding of their temple at Jerusalem, thus earning himself high praise in the Old Testament book of Ezra.

From Shiraz, we took a day trip to the ruins of Persepolis, the ceremonial capital of the Achaemenids, constructed under Darius I. The town was one of the wonders of the world for two hundred years until set on fire -- apparently on drunken impulse -- by Alexander the Great. Alexander (as warlike invaders go, one of my heroes) was, like Cyrus, almost always a compassionate and generous conqueror. His behavior in this instance wasn't typical. In Shiraz, we also visited the quiet, shady tomb of the fourteenth century poet Hafez, a poet still much read and appreciated in Iran, a poet who has a present day impact on Iranians certainly beyond that of any literary figure on modern Americans.

The best was saved for last. From Shiraz we drove to Isfahan, the capital of Persia under the Safavid dynasty in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The city is beautiful, both architecturally and in its urban design. Like many of Iran's cities, it is rich in green, carefully maintained city parks. Located astride a river, its two halves are tied together by five historic and beautiful bridges. The enormous Maydan-e Shah (Royal Square) is enclosed on all four sides by uniformly designed buildings, interrupted by two very large, ornately tiled mosques. The town also has Iran's largest remaining settlement of Armenians; we walked through their part of town and visited an Armenian Christian church.

Finally, after a visit of 17 days, we drove back to Tehran and our flights home. I was left with strong impressions of the modernity and prosperity of the country. It is one of the few Asian countries where you can drink the tap water without hesitation. We drove about the country on well-designed four and six laned freeways. People were well dressed. Children were immaculate. Laughing seemed to come more easily to Iranians than it does even to Americans. The parks in Tehran and Isfahan, especially, were lush and green, well designed and maintained, and heavily used by local residents.

As one of our group noted, we saw virtually no homeless people or beggars. The only exception would be a few refugees from Afghanistan and migrants from Baluchistan. In general, Afghanis seem to play a part in the social ecology similar to recent immigrants from Mexico in our southwestern states.

Iran is a complex nation. Its people are warm and friendly, even as their Shi'ite faith teaches them the world is full of injustice. They are proud of their Persian heritage, but modern Iran is also home to Azeris, Baluchis, Afghans, Turks and Arabs. Its government is Islamic, one of the few theocratic states in the world, but it protects Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians as "people of the Book." Iran lies on historic crossroads in the Middle East, and is at a crossroads itself. It may soon be a nuclear power. It's a country we can't ignore, and one worth knowing well.

In this post, I've tried to give an overview of the sights we saw and a few of my overall impressions. I plan to follow up with another post, soon to come, based on what I learned during the trip, giving my thoughts about religious and political problems in today's Iran, and Iran's place in the international picture. (Well, that sounds a bit pompous -- it will just be a post, not a treatise!)

Click here for a number of photos I've posted on Facebook.