Flat Cat Controversy in China Ends

( Please note there is a new post on this topic: Flat Cat Continues to Live on Paper, and Face has been lost )

Science on its Nov 2007 issue published a photo named “flat cat?” and a column article RARE-TIGER PHOTO FLAP MAKES FUR FLY IN CHINA. They were about the claimed discovery of South China Tiger, which had been believed extinct in the wilds. The photo as well as the article stirred up the already chaotic situation in China.

The story started from earlier this year. On October 12th, the Forestry Bureau of Shaanxi Province claimed that a South China tiger (Panthera tigris amoyensis) was spotted–and photographed–in the wilds of Shaanxi Province. The photos were provided by a local hunter Zhou Zhenglong. After being examined and approved by a group experts appointed by the Shaanxi Forestry Bureau, the photos–71 in total including 40 digital and 31 film ones–were soon turned to the National Forest Bureau of China for application of a grant to establish a reservation for the South China Tiger. Two of them were published on newspapers and internet.

Zhou Zhenglong was happy, for he got an award of 20,000 RMB (2,666$) as promised by the government. Officials from the local government, the City of Zhenping, were even happier. They had been trying to boost Zhenping’s economy for a long time. The newly discovered tiger would become a great resource for the city’s tourist industry. No wonder that only one day after the tiger photos were approved, the mayor of Zhenping City convened a meeting of local government officials and and presented a development plan based on the tiger. As a part of the plan, a new agency was established in a surprisingly speedy way–within 2 days–named “the office of Zhenping City for Protecting South China Tiger.”

Shaanxi Forestry Bureau (SFB) showed strong support since the first day. Its motivation was obvious: as an officials told a journalist, SFB considered the tiger evidence that it had done a great job of environment protection. “Shaanxi is proud for the tiger, China is proud for the tiger, and the world is proud for the tiger,” said an official. He did not mention, however, that if the preservation were approved and established, SFB would financially benefit much from it–the profits derived from tourist industry would split between this agency and Zhenping City.

While various levels of the government officials were celebrating for the tiger photos, netizens in China and elsewhere declared it only a “paper tiger” after scrutinizing the two available images. They claimed since the tiger in the two different photos had remained the same position and same gesture, it most likely would be a paper tiger.

Other voices joined in, along with the “paper tiger” challenge from internet, to generate skepticism. Fu Dezhi, a Scientist from China Academy of Science, wrote on his blog, “I can guarantee with my head that the tiger photos are fake.” Another scientist Xie Yan told journalists that he had examined the footprints, claimed tiger dejecta and tiger hair. Xie found they were not from South China tiger. Hu Huijian, a professional photographer, commented that the photos were definitely fake judging from the artificial color of the tiger’s eyes on the two photos. Some other photographers did an experiment of shooting a paper tiger. The photos from the experiment turned out to be surprisingly similar to the two published photos.

Zhou Zhenglong, therefore, was put on spot. The poor “hunter,” who actually was found currently an ordinary peasant, had never been surrounded by journalists. He was constantly asked to provide original evidence for the tiger photos. Zhou kept silence, except for countering the “head guarantee.” He said with regard to the authenticity of the photos he would like to put his head on the scale, too.

Greater challenge was made to the credibility of SFB. But SFB surely had a better way to respond to the journalists’ questions and netizens’ inquiries than poor Zhou Zhenglong. Guan Ke, a propaganda official of Shaanxi Forestry bureau, published more evidence through his blog and some journalists to defend the government. He announced that Shaanxi Forestry Bureau had sent him and other investigators to Zhenping City to carry out a judicious collection of evidence. Consequently, he reported, the photos were once again proved to be authentic, and no doubt should be sustained. Experts from Shaanxi were shut up, reported by journalists, after being told by their supervisors respectively.

When journalists realized they could get no more useful information could from SFB, they turned to the National Forestry Bureau of China(NFB) . NFB officials, facing all sorts of inquiries from journalists, dismissed them by the following rhetoric: NFB does not have any duty to examine the photos, so it won’t comment on them; NFB does have duties on investigating the existence of South China Tiger, so it will to it; the investigation–which will take a long time–has not got anything, and therefore nothing NFB can say.

Netizens thought the response from NFB avoided the important points and dwelled on the trivial. One of them, disappointed by the answer, went straight to court to sue NFB for its “administrative inaction.” So far no follow-up news came out.

As all these interactions going on, one dramatic discovery by a netizen changed the landscape of paper tiger debate. On Nov. 15, a netizen reported that the tiger looked surprisingly similar to the one from a mass-produced decoration painting, which was hung on the wall of his living room. He then took a picture of the painting and published on the internet.

Some other netizens did a little bit more comparison using the basic photoshop software. After a bit analysis, it was clear that they were the same one.

The immediate response from SFB was to deny. Seeing no effect, it then accused the netizen who reported the discovery, arguing the painting was made from the published tiger photos.

Before the accusation by the Shaanxi government got circulated, discovery of another copy of the same painting was reported. Within 2 days 20 such reports were made. Some netizens went further to look for the producer. Their actions were quick. Within 24 hours the producer was found. The painting was printed by a company from Zhejiang, named Yiwu Weisite Print and Wrap Co. The original painting was found and demonstrated to th journalists by the manager Luo. The result was published on internet immediately.

No further did Shaanxi Forestry Bureau go. Nothing more would Chinese citizens believe. Flat Cat Controversy thus ends with a clear period. The only thing left for the world to see is what the government will say about it. No matter what the government is going to say, one thing the government for sure doesn’t like has happened: that the phrase “paper tiger” has forever changed its meaning, after Chairman Mao defined it 50 years ago.

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Two law professors, Adrian Vermeule of Harvard and Cass R. Sunstein of Chicago, have raised a new argument for capital punishment. Based on the economic analysis that the execution carried out is correlated with fewer murders the following year, they stated that “capital punishment may be morally required, not for retributive reasons, but rather to prevent the taking of innocent lives.”  http://lawreview.stanford.edu/content/vo…)

Their argument, however, is not entirely new. Conventionally, arguments against capital punishment include: first, the state doesn’t have a moral basis to kill a person; second, even if it does, capital punishment may lead to disastrous result for the State may execute innocent people by mistake; third, even if the mistaking execution won’t happen, it goes nowhere –capital punishment doesn’t prevent crimes from happening. Those argue for capital punishment, accordingly, have three counter-arguments: first, it is a moral responsibility of the state to punish criminals by executing murderers; second, mistaking execution may happen, but it won’t be disastrous, particularly when nowadays the principle of reasonable doubt has been strictly applied; third, capital punishment does deter new crimes. The argument that Professor Adrian Vermeule and Cass R. Sunstein have raised focuses on the first and the third one.

Their argument mingles two of the aforementioned arguments: first, as a matter of fact, capital punishment does prevent new crimes (the taking of innocent lives); second, the state does have a moral basis to enforce capital punishment.The mingling contributes to its creativity, but more of its vulnerability. On the one hand, their argument won’t convince those who believe any killing by the state is morally wrong. The statistics carries no persuasion to them. On the other hand, it will not make the non-deterrence proponents change their view–after all, since the statistics only build correlations, not causations, how can one possibly prove the causation between execution and crime deterrence? The moral argument would not add upon this debate of cruel logic(!) any weight.

Cass R. Sunstein & Adrian Vermeule:Is Capital Punishment Morally Required? The Relevance of Life-Life Tradeoffs
58 Stan. L. Rev. 703 (Jan. 2006)
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In the late 1890s, political and ideological changes produced dramatic episodes of reform and revolution that in 191 1 ended the imperial system in China. Part of this process was the growth of a nationally conscious public opinion, which stimulated demands for redistribution of political power and led to new forms of group organization and action. A reexamination of the evolution of “pure discussion” (qingyi) in the metropolitan bureaucracy during the last quarter of the nineteenth century provides new perspectives on these still imperfectly understood developments and leaves us with a better understanding of why expanding political awareness led to alienation from existing authority.

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by CHRISTOPHER M. ISETT

CONTRACT AND PROPERTY IN EARLY MODERN CHINA, Edited by Madeleine Zelin, Jonathan K. Ocko and Robert Gardella.

In his overarching study of China’s legal tradition (Law and Society in Traditional China [Paris: Mouton and Co.]), published in 1961, Ch’ü T’ungtsu’s few references to property are largely tangential to discussions of the family and inheritance. His accounting followed logically from the fact that the Chinese legal system did not yield a coherent and systematic body of property law before the twentieth century. *** ***……

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http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/guorui/files/2007/11/jews.pdf

Harold J. Berman, expert in Soviet law, legal history, and law and religion: 1918-2007

November 13, 2007

From Harvard Law School Webpage

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按: 美国著名法学家哈罗德.伯尔曼今晨在纽约去世, 享年89岁.伯尔曼一生教书育人, 桃李满天下.他早年执教哈佛, 后为埃默里大学礼聘，荣膺埃默里最高荣誉之讲席Robert W. Woodruff讲席教授。 伯尔曼巨著《法律与革命》在美国影响巨大，翻成中文后更成为一代中国法律学人之必读书目。

Berman (1918-2007) was Pioneer of Law and Religion

11/13/07

Harold J. Berman

Emory Law Professor Harold J. Berman, honored and respected for his scholarship and passion for the law, passed away in New York City today, Tues., Nov. 13, 2007. He was 89.

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雅虎: 技术巨人,道德侏儒 (Yahoo!: tech giant, moral pygmy)

By Marie Boran

07.11.2007 – At a congressional hearing in Washington yesterday Yahoo! was called on to defend the role it played in the 10-year prison sentence for Chinese journalist, Shi Tao. Back in February the company claimed that when it handed over details of Tao’s email account it wasn’t aware that the case would lead to a prison sentence for the journalist by the Chinese Government for engaging in ‘pro-democracy’ activity.

On Tuesday Yahoo! defended itself by saying that its Chinese employees had no choice but to hand over the information and that the company didn’t want to put them at risk if they didn’t comply with the government’s request. (more…)

Why Putin Wins

By Sergei Kovalev

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