[Fis] The Sports, Music and Information Worlds

Wed Mar 2 02:26:43 CET 2022

Dear Wolfgang,

Since the second day of Ukraine has been invading, a group of famous Russian scientists wrote an open letter against war. Many academicians of the Russian Academy of Science, including the 2010 Nobel Prize winner in physics Konstantin Novoselov and others signed it. The number of signatures on the 24th was 816, on the 26th was 3686, and today is 6150. The letter was well written and clearly expressed the position of Russian scientists with conscience against the war and their concerns about Russia's future. At present, it has been translated into 10 languages, including Russian, Ukrainian, English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Polish, Suomi, and Chinese.

Please visit the Russian version: https://trv-science.ru/2022/02/we-are-against-war/

The English version: https://trv-science.ru/en/2022/02/we-are-against-war-en/

The German version: https://trv-science.ru/de/2022/02/we-are-against-war-de/

Best wishes,

Xueshan

I post the full English version here:

=================================================

Open letter of Russian scientists and science journalists against the war with Ukraine

24.02.2022

 <https://trv-science.ru/2022/02/we-are-against-war/> Originally published by Troitsky Variant – Nauka

We, the undersigned Russian scientists and science journalists, declare our strong opposition to the Russian hostilities launched against the Ukrainian people. These hostilities are incurring huge human losses and undermines the foundations of the established system of international security. The responsibility for unleashing a new war in Europe lies entirely with Russia.

There is no rational justification for this war. Obviously, Ukraine poses no threat to the security of Russia. The attempts to use the situation in Donbass as a pretext for launching a military operation are totally contrived. The war against Ukraine is unjust and frankly nonsense.

Ukraine has been and remains a country close to us. Many of us have relatives, friends, and colleagues living in Ukraine. Our fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers fought together against Nazism, and unleashing a war for the sake of the geopolitical ambitions of the leadership of the Russian Federation, driven by dubious historiosophical fantasies, is a cynical betrayal of their memory.

We respect the Ukrainian statehood, which rests on the ideals of a democratic institution, We are sympathetic to the orientation of Ukraine toward the European Union. We are convinced that all of the problems in the relationships between our countries could have been resolved peacefully.

Having unleashed the war, Russia has doomed itself to international isolation. It has devolved into a pariah country. This means that we, Russian scientists and journalists, will no longer be able to do our job in a normal way because conducting scientific research is unthinkable without cooperation and trust with colleagues from other countries. The isolation of Russia from the world means cultural and technological degradation of our country with a complete lack of positive prospects. The war with Ukraine is a step to nowhere.

It is bitter to realize that our country, which has made a decisive contribution to the victory over Nazism, has now instigated a new war on the European continent. We demand an immediate halt to all military operations directed against Ukraine. We demand respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Ukrainian state. We demand peace for our countries.

==========================================================================================================

From: fis-bounces at listas.unizar.es <fis-bounces at listas.unizar.es> On Behalf Of Wolfgang Hofkirchner
Sent: Tuesday, March 1, 2022 11:02 PM
To: Marcin SCHROEDER <mjs at gl.aiu.ac.jp>
Cc: Burgin, Mark <mburgin at math.ucla.edu>; fis <fis at listas.unizar.es>; annette.grathoff <annette.grathoff at is4si.org>; Gordana Dodig Crnkovic <gordana.dodig-crnkovic at chalmers.se>; Joseph Brenner <joe.brenner at bluewin.ch>
Subject: Re: [Fis] The Sports, Music and Information Worlds

dear marcin, dear friends,

i can’t hesitate to clarify some issues below in detail. i’m stll convinced that security in europe (as in the world) cannot be reached without/against russia. when i was young, german politics worked according to that maxim and the result was that with gorbachev the first cold war could be settled.

Am 01.03.2022 um 14:42 schrieb Marcin SCHROEDER <mjs at gl.aiu.ac.jp <mailto:mjs at gl.aiu.ac.jp> >:

Dear All,

I think Xueshan's support for the position of Russian scientists was the right reaction. 

no, see below.

I am not sure whether everyone read it, so I am including it below.

If Russian scientists are protesting Russian hostilities, then the hesitation to condemn the aggression on Ukraine can hardly be justified by the concern about cutting possibilities of a dialog. 

don’t you then exclude all other russian scientists that might have different opinions? 

We are not talking about sanctions,  as we (IS4SI) do not have any power to sanction anyone. However, we have the moral obligation to protest actions which are directed against civilians, against a country which does not have any means to threaten the aggressor.

the russian war is officially not directed against civilians, it is directed towards regime change (which is, of course, a breach of international law). for russia, the people of russia and ukraine are brothers. 

the country is militarily trained by nato troops, they have each year joint exercises. 

why didn’t we protest against the government’s civil war against the people in donbas, that caused up to 10,000 casualties so far? why is russian language forbidden in public life? 

For me, the additional reason to protest is the use of misinformation to justify actions: supposed genocide in and nazism of Ukraina.

bandera seems to be a hero in politics. he collaborated with the nazis, massacring jews and polish people. to my knowledge, no other european country has accepted „right-wing“ militia (as regular or irregular troops)!

If we do not protest we fail our moral obligation and neglect our professional duty to prevent the abuse of information as a political and military instrument.

we need to do this also with regard to the propagation of enemy-images and demonisation of any deemed adversary. 

In my opinion, we should not hesitate and act promptly to express our support for the Ukrainian people.

Regards,

Marcin 

Xueshan's support for the position of Russian scientists:

Dear Joseph and friends,

I firmly support the position of Russian scientists.

“We, the undersigned Russian scientists and science journalists, declare our strong opposition to the Russian hostilities launched against the Ukrainian people. 

again, it’s not targeted against the ukrainian people. 

These hostilities are incurring huge human losses and undermines the foundations of the established system of international security. 

that’s true – the currently realised system of internatonal security does not fulfill its own principle that security must not be achieved at the cost of the security of other states. if russia states it feels betrayed, nato needs to take that seriously even when it asserts that it does not want to pose a threat to russia. the same holds vice versa. all that must be negotiated again. 

The responsibility for unleashing a new war in Europe lies entirely with Russia.”

by ignoring what russia has been stating since years, russia has been cornered. that it (erronously) concluded to resort to waging a war, could have been prevented by nato entering into negotiations well before. 

“There is no rational justification for this war. Obviously, Ukraine poses no threat to the security of Russia. The attempts to use the situation in Donbass as a pretext for launching a military operation are totally contrived. The war against Ukraine is unjust and frankly nonsense.”

see my arguments above.

however, we should not get in disputes about that such that we would endanger our common work!

w.

…………

God bless the Ukrainian people!

Xueshan

Marcin J. Schroeder, Ph.D.

Specially Appointed Professor                                                                                

Global Learning Center                                                        

IEHE (Institute for Excellence in Higher Education)    (高度教養教育・学生支援機構)                            

Tohoku University                                                  (東北大学)                                                               

41 Kawauchi, Aoba-ku, Sendai 980-8576 JAPAN        (〒980-8576　仙台市青葉区川内41)                      

 <mailto:schroeder.marcin.e4 at tohoku.ac.jp> schroeder.marcin.e4 at tohoku.ac.jp                                   

Professor Emeritus

Akita International University, Akita Japan

 <mailto:mjs at aiu.ac.jp> mjs at gl.aiu.ac.jp          

Editor-in-Chief                                                                 

Philosophies  (MDPI Basel Switzerland)                                                     

 <https://www.mdpi.com/journal/philosophies> https://www.mdpi.com/journal/philosophies             

On Tue, Mar 1, 2022 at 9:37 PM Wolfgang Hofkirchner <wolfgang.hofkirchner at is4si.org <mailto:wolfgang.hofkirchner at is4si.org> > wrote:

sorry, i forgot to reference an eye-opening article (the author is an american who was involved in the cuba crisis): https://usrussiaaccord.org/acura-viewpoint-jack-f-matlock-jr-todays-crisis-over-ukraine/ 

best,

w.

Am 01.03.2022 um 13:28 schrieb Wolfgang Hofkirchner <wolfgang.hofkirchner at is4si.org <mailto:wolfgang.hofkirchner at is4si.org> >:

dear friends,

we are scientists, we are colleagues, we are international, we are even part of the spearhead of a future common humanity, we are working for the common good. and many of us are paid by their governments, by funds of eu etc. as to myself, i had tried the last years two times in vain for being funded by a joint bid of an austrian and a russian fund on a project on shaping human cyber futures. i had a team of the moscow academy of sciences and others, but was stalled because of anti-russian reviewers. thus, it is my view, we should not let policy interfere in academic exchange to an extent that hinders international collaboration. we should be very cautious to blame each other for that. we are not responsible for what our governments are doing, we can even oppose their policy, but this is up to each of us. 

as an international community, we need to have in mind how that conflict can be solved. and if there is a conflict, then all conflicting partners need to engage in conflict resolution. it is contraproductive (and inhumane) to oust one side. all are needed for establishing relations that prevent military measures – in our case, the establishment of a common security architecture, that is, including russia, nato states of eu as well as united states. the war will not be halted by sanctions. sanctions do prepare only the next round of escalation, not to speak of providing weaponry to one side. the war can be halted only by negotiations that thematise the underlying grounds of conflict.

don’t forget that the second cold war is not only with russia. for the united states it is, predominantly, with china. shall we put at stake our collaboration with our chinese colleagues?

w.

<signatur-footer-HE-Aufruf-EN-500px.jpg> 

Am 01.03.2022 um 12:08 schrieb annette.grathoff at is4si.org <mailto:annette.grathoff at is4si.org> :

Dear Joseph,

I understand both of your arguments, but making a decision in this case is really difficult. The first argument, that any pressure that makes the Russian regime less viable internationally and, temporarily, isolated should be exerted, is especially valid if the actual political leader can soon be stopped, freeing all Russian people who are against the "policy" of attack. The second argument, that breaking all ties to Russia and Russian general public tends to be a hardship for and isolate our friends in Russia even further is valid especially on a long term, in case the actual conflict takes long. Can we take the risk of stopping the information flow between a country which is (has been forced into) isolating itself and its (with regards to information nurturing) environment? Will the self-organization of opposing forces be viable then on a long term scale? We have to avoid any support for a new iron curtain!

I do not know which argument is more relevant and which scenario more probable. Thank you for starting the discussion here!

Kind regards,

Annette

---

Dr. Annette Grathoff

Evolution of Information Processing Systems

Vienna

 <mailto:grathoff at icbm.de> grathoff at icbm.de

06802341968

General Secretary of the

International Society for the Study of Information (IS4SI)

 <mailto:Annette.grathoff at is4si.org> Annette.grathoff at is4si.org

Mark Burgin wrote on 01.03.2022 08:27 (GMT +01:00):

Although I don't have scientific relations with Russian scientists or 
mathematicians, I support your proposal.

Mark

On 2/28/2022 8:57 PM, Marcin SCHROEDER wrote:
> Dear Joseph, Dear Friends,
> I support your proposal with my heart and my reason.
> This protest is not against any individual researcher, no matter what 
> their nationality is. It is against unprovoked actions of the Russian 
> government and military threatening peace in the entire world, against 
> actions bringing harm, death and suffering to innocent people of Ukraine.
> Regards,
> Marcin
> 
> Marcin J. Schroeder, Ph.D.
> Specially Appointed Professor
> Global Learning Center
> IEHE (Institute for Excellence in Higher Education) 
> (高度教養教育・学生支援機構)
> Tohoku University (東北大学)
> 41 Kawauchi, Aoba-ku, Sendai 980-8576 JAPAN 
> (〒980-8576　仙台市青葉区川内41)
> schroeder.marcin.e4 at tohoku.ac.jp <mailto:schroeder.marcin.e4 at tohoku.ac.jp> 
> 
> Professor Emeritus
> Akita International University, Akita Japan
> mjs at gl.aiu.ac.jp <mailto:mjs at gl.aiu.ac.jp>  <mailto:mjs at aiu.ac.jp>
> Editor-in-Chief
> /Philosophies / (MDPI Basel Switzerland)
> https://www.mdpi.com/journal/philosophies
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Tue, Mar 1, 2022 at 4:52 AM joe.brenner at bluewin.ch <mailto:joe.brenner at bluewin.ch>  
> <joe.brenner at bluewin.ch <mailto:joe.brenner at bluewin.ch> > wrote:
> 
>     Dear Mark, Dear Marcin, Dear Friends and Colleagues,
> 
>     Today Switzerland gave up its otherwise precious neutrality, and
>     two major sports organizations, FIFA and the International Olympic
>     Committee, excluded Russian members and athletes. The Russian
>     Director and Conductor of the prestigious Verbier Music Festival
>     in Switzerland was fired.
> 
>     Many of us have positions in and relations to Russian scientific
>     bodies and publications as authors, editors, reviewers and
>     publishers. The question is whether individually or collectively,
>     these relations should be terminated. The argument can be made
>     that this would tend to be a hardship for and isolate our friends
>     in Russia even further. For me, the counterargument is that any
>     pressure that makes the Russian regime less viable internationally
>     and, temporarily, isolated should be exerted.
> 
>     We are fortunate in having Mark Burgin and Marcin Schroeder at the
>     head of our initiatives. Before making any moves, given their
>     direct knowledge of that part of the world, I ask them for their
>     guidance.
> 
>     Thank you and best wishes to all,
> 
>     Joseph
> 

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