LETTERS: Thursday, February 17, 2000

Penn's history of sweatshop dissent Penn's history of sweatshop dissentTo the Editor: Universities have the opportunity to strike an important blow against the return of the sweatshops by demanding that their clothing be produced under reasonable working conditions by workers receiving an adequate wage. I commend the Students Against Sweatshops for bringing this issue to the attention of the community and refusing to let it be buried in endless committee deliberations. The students that were in College Hall are continuing an important Penn tradition. At the beginning of the 20th century, Wharton Professor Scott Nearing worked indefatigably to end sweatshop labor. In a sorry chapter of Penn history, the University bowed to corporate pressure and fired him in 1915; apparently freedom of speech did not extend to defense of sweatshop workers. I hope that at the start of the 21st century, Penn's response will be more enlightened. We should all recognize the important service that Students Against Sweatshops has provided to the University and the greater community in raising this important issue. Dan Sidorick College '70 To the Editor: I would like to add some clarification to Ariel Horn's column "The tragedy of personal self-absorption" (The Daily Pennsylvanian, 2/16/00). Ms. Horn writes, "How, despite the laws of physics, can you ensure that you won't fall off the planet?" As an undergraduate member of the Physics Department here at Penn, I would like to say that the laws of physics would not definitively protect Ms. Horn from falling off the planet. Quantum mechanics shows us that all particles are actually waves, and so human beings (who are made up of particles) are also waves with a very, very small wavelength (something in the neighborhood of 1/Planck's constant). We can say that humans are on the surface of the earth simply because probability states that that is the most likely location of their wave at any time. This wave is located at a gravitational potential created by the mass of the earth. But there is an effect in wave dynamics called "tunneling" that tells us the probability of part of a wave being at a different potential (called the transmission probability) is non-zero. There is actually a probability of approximately 10 to the power of minus-99 that Ms. Horn will spontaneously be transmitted outside of the earth's atmosphere. Alex Fleming College '01 To the Editor: Sujuata Gosalia criticized The Daily Pennsylvanian for "sensational storytelling" in regards to the alleged rape at the Delta Tau Delta fraternity ("Be fair to DTD," DP, 2/16/00). First of all, I believe the word "alleged escaped Gosalia's attention.E Secondly, the DP's responsibility as the premier source of information for a campus of over 10,000 undergrads is to inform the populace. I can see that Gosalia is in the dark on this issue. But Gosalia is correct on one point: A rape allegation is "a serious one to make." In the state of Pennsylvania, the only higher felony is murder If convicted, a rapist will receive a standard minimum of 10 years in prison. So yes, Sujuata, it is serious.EThe fact that this allegation happened approximately four years ago should not be an issue. The current brothers should not be and are not implicated. Gosalia accuses the DP of loose storytelling, yet Gosalia states that DTD is composed of "respectable people." I'm not saying that the brothers aren't respectable; I am, however, saying that Gosalia made a definitive statement on the character of the DTD fraternity that, however, does not take away from the fact that a crime was allegedly committed. The DP was merely upholding its responsibility to inform the student body and I, for one, am grateful. Ashley Belin College '02