After the recent Arctic sea ice minimum . . .

. . . we have a new reconstructed state space diagram.

This year's minimum is 4.64 million sq km, which is a nice improvement from last year, and keeps the chart well within the lower area of Lyapunov stability proposed here about four years ago. With each passing year, my confidence that we have really entered an area of stability grows.

It is still unclear when the system will break out of its current area of stability, and what it's most likely behaviour will be (the two main contenders being a return toward the earlier area of stability at upper right, or a continuation towards the ice-free conditions forecast by so many. .

Massacre

A few days ago, air raid sirens went off all over China. I asked one of the locals if we should report to a shelter; he told me not to worry about it. The sirens were not for any foolishness emanating from North Korea, or even the United States, but were commemorating the invasion of China by Japan in 1931.

In Nanjing, the invasion culminated in a massacre that killed an  estimated 300,000 people in late 1937 (but this number is still a matter of some controversy)..This event is commemorated in a large memorial in Nanjing. In fact, it is a very large memorial. Too large to find a good vantage point to photograph the whole thing, except maybe by air.

Also, I have to say it is an ugly monument. Perhaps this was the intent, as it commemorates an ugly event. One of the first areas you pass consists of statues showing varioius outrages committed by Japanese troops.

One thing I found disturbing was the display of the contents of one of the mass graves, over which the monument was built. The remains of approximately 10,000 people were found in this one mass grave, and the display consists of a large number of bones from it. The disturbing part was the number of pictures people took of the scattered bones, although to be fair, at least none of them appeared to be selfies.

Those rich monks at Baoen temple

The Bao'en temple in Nanjing once boasted a pagoda 80 m tall that was entirely clad in decorative porcelain. Built during the fifteenth century, it was described by the first European explorers who viewed it as one of the seven wonders of the world. Unfortunately, it was destroyed in a series of unfortunate events during the 19th century, beginning with a lightning strike, and culminating in the chaos of the Taiping Rebellion.

The pagoda is being rebuilt, and it is presently made of glass, rather than porcelain. But the tower's base is porcelain.

The tower must have been quite a spectacle when built. Apart from the glittering white porcelain, the Chinese had many techniques for colouring porcelain, which were still unknown in the west, and had used these to cover the tower with Buddhist imagery.

Original tower arch (on display at provincial museum)

The tower today

Climbing it is a bit like climbing up a staircase in a greenhouse, especially near the top. But most of the lower layers are open and give clear views of the surrounding terrain.

Looking past the city wall into the old city.

Within the rebuilt temple is a display of the artifacts of the old temple, as well as some newer displays. I will gloss over most of these and focus on one thing--precious metals. These monks were rich. They have a lot of gold and silver items on display, although most of these are small..

Gold crown with cloud motif.

Gilded silver boxes (for incense)?

Gilded silver incense burner

A gold coffin, which may have contained holy relics of Sakyamuni, founder of Buddhism

Probably the most significant piece was discovered in the ruins of the old temple a little less than ten years ago. It was a tall (1.1 m) pagoda-shaped shrine, called an Asoka Pagoda. It contained the coffin depicted above, and, according to an accompanying stele, part of the skull of Sakyamuni, in a separate metal case

The King Asoka pagoda that bore the relics

Gilded silver king Asoka pagoda

A gilded stamp

Various bits of jewellry

A gilded silver spoon

Glass bowl with a silver rim

Silver and glass bottles, with gilding

Meditation

Updated Sept. 22. I've had some labels translated, and it seems that at least some of the jewellery above came from rich people's tombs, so they aren't all artifacts from the temple.

Nanjing part 1

China has had many capitals. During the relatively short-lived republic times, the capital was Nanjing (known then in the West as Nanking).

Another fine example of psychetecture.

Thinking about Nanjing, one's mind is inevitably drawn to the massacre that happened there when the Japanese captured the city in late 1937. So here are some scenes from a reconstructed street view of the time, which can be seen in the basement of the provincial museum.

The crowds of people milling about are other museum customers. Some of the shops were open, but they sold only modern-day snacks.

It occurred to me that it would have been more realistic to have a few people in period costume. Or maybe have some Japanese soldiers show up and start bayoneting people.

Other things in the museum are harder to explain. It's the old problem when you encounter a different culture--maybe you have walked in on a joke you don't understand.

A pyramid illustrating the evolution of money. I feel really good about the modern stuff ;)