I haven't posted anything on the Scooter indictment in part because I wanted to get my thoughts together and in part I wanted to see how things shake out.
I disagree in general with the celebratory mood over at Kos. This is not "Fitzmas" or some crazy thing, this is a potential tragedy and no American ought to be partying over this. If true, it means that the highest level of government conspired to mislead the American public and hide the evidence deep enough so that investigators could not find it.
I also disagree with the folks at National Review who seem to have taken up the "trivial perjury" talking points. Again, if true, there is nothing trivial about this.
I also can't quite figure out the mood at RedStates who seem to think this week was just a bad one and now they can get back to running the country into the ground. I think there is a lot of fall out yet to come and the elected GOP folks are going to try to get some distance from the president.
Then there is Volokh where the mood is sober, the discussion enlightened and the partisanship minimal. Quite refreshing.
Finally, there is this totally outer space piece by David Brooks today:
But he did not find evidence to prove that there was a broad conspiracy to out a covert agent for political gain. He did not find evidence of wide-ranging criminal behavior. He did not even indict the media's ordained villain, Karl Rove. And as the former prosecutors Robert Ray and Richard Ben-Veniste said on "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer," he gave little indication he was going to do that in the future.
I sent the following email to Mr. Brooks:
David,
You're missing the point. The point of the perjury and making false statements charges is that Mr. Libby has hidden any possible evidence well enough that the Justice Department couldn't find it. It doesn't mean, at this point, that evidence doesn't exist. Assuming Mr. Libby is cleared of these charges, one can then safely assume there was no crime.
Sometimes I can't believe I paid money to read his craptastic logic.
Sunday, October 30, 2005
Saturday, October 29, 2005
Sulu
Geoff: Dad, I know something you don't
Dad: probably. What this time?
Geoff: George Taki is gay.
Dad: Sulu? I knew that. Everyone knows that.
Geoff: No, it just came out.
Dad: Impossible. If I've known for years, then everybody knows.
Geoff: No, it just came out.
Dad: He. He just came out. I can't imagine this is news.
Geoff: It is!
Dad: probably. What this time?
Geoff: George Taki is gay.
Dad: Sulu? I knew that. Everyone knows that.
Geoff: No, it just came out.
Dad: Impossible. If I've known for years, then everybody knows.
Geoff: No, it just came out.
Dad: He. He just came out. I can't imagine this is news.
Geoff: It is!
Sin and Insanity
A friend of mine has recently crossed the border from "eccentric with spats of violence and delusion" into actual full-blown insanity. Real brain dysfunction causing emotional and cognitive problems which cannot be treated with any form of counseling and may not be responsive to psychopharmacology. I feel badly for him and worse for the people he's hurt along the way, especially his children who have grown up never knowing if they were going to be with good dad or bad dad. While good dad was often generous, supportive and loving, bad dad would bit the heads off dolls, throw things across the room or, as I once witnessed, run naked from the shower to scream and berate the children for some random, perceived misdeed. While not a fan of the government making familial decisions, I am relieved that he does not have custody of his kids. However, he does have visitation which he uses randomly and unfortunately good dad is increasingly less a part of those visits. It has reached a crisis point and I suspect my friend is going to be institutionalized.
Which brings me to this thread. I've heard a lot about souls, free-will and choices. I know the story of Adam which is a good allegory of choice and consequence in some ways. I've also read a little on what the Catholic church ahs to say on the subject of insanity, sin and responsibility. At least as far as I can find, they dodge it. The church agrees that if one is born insane, they aren't responsible for their actions and they are not sins. Actually to my mind this brings up 2 questions, 1) do the insane have a soul if they are never responsible for their actions and 2) why does god create people insane from birth? Scientifically I understand this, but from the point of view of beings with a "soul" , specifically born to make choices and go to heaven or hell it seems ... not very well thought out.
What about those that are going insane? What about people who, like my friend, are seemingly sane at some time and insane at another?
One idea is that the insane are not responsible for their actions. However, the Catholic Encyclopedia points out that, while a humane policy, it's directly in conflict with church doctrine:
The theory does, indeed, seem to disagree with the doctrine of our textbooks of moral philosophy and theology, which maintains that freedom of the will can be diminished or destroyed only through defective or confused action of the intellect.
In other words, through choices. This makes sense theologically since the soul is all about choice and if physical changes to the body can change our choices, it puts the soul and one's responsibilities into a very shaky area.
Its an interesting problem.
Which brings me to this thread. I've heard a lot about souls, free-will and choices. I know the story of Adam which is a good allegory of choice and consequence in some ways. I've also read a little on what the Catholic church ahs to say on the subject of insanity, sin and responsibility. At least as far as I can find, they dodge it. The church agrees that if one is born insane, they aren't responsible for their actions and they are not sins. Actually to my mind this brings up 2 questions, 1) do the insane have a soul if they are never responsible for their actions and 2) why does god create people insane from birth? Scientifically I understand this, but from the point of view of beings with a "soul" , specifically born to make choices and go to heaven or hell it seems ... not very well thought out.
What about those that are going insane? What about people who, like my friend, are seemingly sane at some time and insane at another?
One idea is that the insane are not responsible for their actions. However, the Catholic Encyclopedia points out that, while a humane policy, it's directly in conflict with church doctrine:
The theory does, indeed, seem to disagree with the doctrine of our textbooks of moral philosophy and theology, which maintains that freedom of the will can be diminished or destroyed only through defective or confused action of the intellect.
In other words, through choices. This makes sense theologically since the soul is all about choice and if physical changes to the body can change our choices, it puts the soul and one's responsibilities into a very shaky area.
Its an interesting problem.
Kudos to Kurzweil
I read a great deal of Ray's book yesterday on the plane from Seattle to Boston, and came away, as usual, unwillingly impressed by Ray. I had been prepared to write the following one line review of his book:
“Ray Kurzweil has written a Harlequin Romance novel for the technoratti.”
This was based primarily on the conversations I used to have with him and generally how they went. At KAI it would usually be Vlad and I against Ray and Francis on these topics and I'd bet my last dollar each side believed that it came out the better. Unfortunately I can't write that line for my review, it would be neither completely honest or fair. There are, however, elements of the romance novel in it.
First, the highlights:
I mentioned the other day that, while looking at in the bookstore, I read an appendix where Ray tries to give a mathematical justification for the singularity. The basic issue I had with it is that he made an assumption which I thought was unjustified and, if cast ever-so-slightly differently ( and more honestly in a scientific sense), the effect goes away. I sat down afterward and wrote what I thought was the more objective equation, solved it for a family of solutions and saw how Ray's solution was a subset within that superset. Ray's not wrong, just ... judicious in his choice of parameters. Upon looking through the book at leisure, I found that Ray had gone over this criticism in full. Not only had he enclosed a version of what I thought was the right general solution, he spent some time explaining why he thought he chose a conservative solution and argued that his solution should be stronger than it was.
Kudos to Ray for doing this.
However, his justification for doing this is circular. It basically boils down to, we know a singularity is coming, if I chose this parameter and do some math I get and equation with a singularity, therefore a singularity is coming. Q.E.D.
The basic problem is how strongly "the rate of technological change" couples to "the amount of knowledge in the world". Squishy concepts to be writing equations for in the first place. Ray assumes the coupling is directly proportional at least and maybe proportional to the square or some higher exponent. I take the more conservative approach and say while I think it's proportional, there are alot of other things the "amount of world knowledge" is dependent upon and say it's some power law X^(n) where 0<n<1. In Ray's solution you eventually get a singularity, in mine you "merely" get exponential growth. Given that nothing in nature (yes even black holes) generates a true singularity, I think mine is a more prudent set of assumptions. Ray, always the optimist, disagrees.
Also, kudos to Ray for directly confronting a lot of critical arguments. He has a whole chapter on a dozen or so objections people raise (I only thought of 3 or 4 of them). Some of them like, computers don't have souls so god will not recognize them as sentient beings, seem... too esoteric or philosophical for me. While I applaud him for raising them, I was not convinced about how he dismisses them, mostly with one version or another of "trust me, it will all be great".
The rest of the book is good and if you're one of the folks that already believes this is going to happen, this will help you rationalize believing that. While I was unconvinced of the approach of a singularity in 2050, the consolation prize (exponential growth) is pretty good and I do happen to believe that. Ray does a superlative job of laying out the current direction of technology, innovation and growth. He does a less successful job with economics, i.e. scarcity is solved and we all live in a communist utopia in 2050, law, human nature and, surprising to me, the nature of the eventual AIs.
This last point bears some explanation as I learned everything I know about AI from working at Ray's company, but not from Ray. It's also important to note here that Ray himself did not work on research or code at KAI. While I think he he understands AI very well, I don't think he quite gets what is going on in there. Basically his assumption is that neural nets will mimic the human brain and that the AIs the come in 2050 will all be human-based benevolent gods who (more or less) love us and keep as pets. My view is different. I think the AIs will be as alien to us as the dolphins, chimps and whales are. Actually, more so, as the latter all have meaty brains, meaty urges, meaty lusts and above all, meaty motivations. I think the AIs will be nothing like us at all, with no sense of nostalgia, no sense of history or parentage etc. In short, from our perspective as humans, they will be functionally psychotic, with nothing to ground them in the meat world and no real allegiance to us. It's likely to be more like Skynet than the Eschaton. Humans are not likely to understand the monomania and motivations of real AI based superintelligence and, if it understands us at all, it's not likely to care.
However, while never in doubt, I am often wrong and hopefully that is the case here. Read the book, it's got a lot going for it despite my reservations.
And, like a said, exponential growth is a damn fine consolation prize.
If, in 2051, I'm reading this as a disembodied consciousness floating just outside Tau Ceti IV, I'll enthusiastically cop to having been a doubter.
“Ray Kurzweil has written a Harlequin Romance novel for the technoratti.”
This was based primarily on the conversations I used to have with him and generally how they went. At KAI it would usually be Vlad and I against Ray and Francis on these topics and I'd bet my last dollar each side believed that it came out the better. Unfortunately I can't write that line for my review, it would be neither completely honest or fair. There are, however, elements of the romance novel in it.
First, the highlights:
I mentioned the other day that, while looking at in the bookstore, I read an appendix where Ray tries to give a mathematical justification for the singularity. The basic issue I had with it is that he made an assumption which I thought was unjustified and, if cast ever-so-slightly differently ( and more honestly in a scientific sense), the effect goes away. I sat down afterward and wrote what I thought was the more objective equation, solved it for a family of solutions and saw how Ray's solution was a subset within that superset. Ray's not wrong, just ... judicious in his choice of parameters. Upon looking through the book at leisure, I found that Ray had gone over this criticism in full. Not only had he enclosed a version of what I thought was the right general solution, he spent some time explaining why he thought he chose a conservative solution and argued that his solution should be stronger than it was.
Kudos to Ray for doing this.
However, his justification for doing this is circular. It basically boils down to, we know a singularity is coming, if I chose this parameter and do some math I get and equation with a singularity, therefore a singularity is coming. Q.E.D.
The basic problem is how strongly "the rate of technological change" couples to "the amount of knowledge in the world". Squishy concepts to be writing equations for in the first place. Ray assumes the coupling is directly proportional at least and maybe proportional to the square or some higher exponent. I take the more conservative approach and say while I think it's proportional, there are alot of other things the "amount of world knowledge" is dependent upon and say it's some power law X^(n) where 0<n<1. In Ray's solution you eventually get a singularity, in mine you "merely" get exponential growth. Given that nothing in nature (yes even black holes) generates a true singularity, I think mine is a more prudent set of assumptions. Ray, always the optimist, disagrees.
Also, kudos to Ray for directly confronting a lot of critical arguments. He has a whole chapter on a dozen or so objections people raise (I only thought of 3 or 4 of them). Some of them like, computers don't have souls so god will not recognize them as sentient beings, seem... too esoteric or philosophical for me. While I applaud him for raising them, I was not convinced about how he dismisses them, mostly with one version or another of "trust me, it will all be great".
The rest of the book is good and if you're one of the folks that already believes this is going to happen, this will help you rationalize believing that. While I was unconvinced of the approach of a singularity in 2050, the consolation prize (exponential growth) is pretty good and I do happen to believe that. Ray does a superlative job of laying out the current direction of technology, innovation and growth. He does a less successful job with economics, i.e. scarcity is solved and we all live in a communist utopia in 2050, law, human nature and, surprising to me, the nature of the eventual AIs.
This last point bears some explanation as I learned everything I know about AI from working at Ray's company, but not from Ray. It's also important to note here that Ray himself did not work on research or code at KAI. While I think he he understands AI very well, I don't think he quite gets what is going on in there. Basically his assumption is that neural nets will mimic the human brain and that the AIs the come in 2050 will all be human-based benevolent gods who (more or less) love us and keep as pets. My view is different. I think the AIs will be as alien to us as the dolphins, chimps and whales are. Actually, more so, as the latter all have meaty brains, meaty urges, meaty lusts and above all, meaty motivations. I think the AIs will be nothing like us at all, with no sense of nostalgia, no sense of history or parentage etc. In short, from our perspective as humans, they will be functionally psychotic, with nothing to ground them in the meat world and no real allegiance to us. It's likely to be more like Skynet than the Eschaton. Humans are not likely to understand the monomania and motivations of real AI based superintelligence and, if it understands us at all, it's not likely to care.
However, while never in doubt, I am often wrong and hopefully that is the case here. Read the book, it's got a lot going for it despite my reservations.
And, like a said, exponential growth is a damn fine consolation prize.
If, in 2051, I'm reading this as a disembodied consciousness floating just outside Tau Ceti IV, I'll enthusiastically cop to having been a doubter.
The Cutest Picture Ever
Which I would file under "Things Man Was Not Meant To See".
Here.
Sign up for the Liftport Newsletter while you are over there.
Here.
Sign up for the Liftport Newsletter while you are over there.
Friday, October 28, 2005
BAG News
I went to BAG news to see what was going on with the marketing of the current crisis. I was explaining to Jim that, while not an expert, I have accidently become knowledgable about marketing. I was giving the Nixon example when the page loaded.
I laughed for a full minute.
Jim's patience knows no bounds.
I laughed for a full minute.
Jim's patience knows no bounds.
Thursday, October 27, 2005
Currently Reading: The Singualrity Is Near
By Ray Kurzweil
Yeah, I'm reading Ray's book. I took a gratuitous pot-shot at him the other day, calling his idea that the singularity will happen in his lifetime a fantasy. I worked for him for nearly four years and, while I can't say we were friends or even very close, you could not work for KAI (Kurzweil AI) for more than 4 hours without getting a heaping spoonful of Ray's ideas (and a lesser, but potent dose of his optimism). Kathy, Amy and Mike, also KAI alum(1) and occasionally blog readers (Hi Guys!) should feel especially free to chime in here if I'm being too soft or mush-headed. Especially you Mike(2) After the pot-shot I figured the least I could do was read his book and base some of my judgment on that.
I did skip to the appendix in the store though and read his mathematical proof of the singularity. The math was flawless and straight-forward. It was also based on an incorrect assumption, rendering the proof invalid. Not a stunning start.
(1) In the interests of honestly and full disclosure, I am not actually a member of Listen to Me. "Listen to Me" was the phrase one used to activate the interactive mode of the recognizer and serves today as the name of the alumni news letter. My occasional petition for membership is always quietly rejected in part because many of the members of "Listen to Me" were people I either had fired or fired myself. The news-letter operator, Steve Rothman, was my boss for awhile at KAI. I got him fired.
(2) technically I own Mike's soul. I bought it for $5 one afternoon and so I feel justified in occasionally using the imperative voice with him. Mike is another Atheist and a good friend.
Yeah, I'm reading Ray's book. I took a gratuitous pot-shot at him the other day, calling his idea that the singularity will happen in his lifetime a fantasy. I worked for him for nearly four years and, while I can't say we were friends or even very close, you could not work for KAI (Kurzweil AI) for more than 4 hours without getting a heaping spoonful of Ray's ideas (and a lesser, but potent dose of his optimism). Kathy, Amy and Mike, also KAI alum(1) and occasionally blog readers (Hi Guys!) should feel especially free to chime in here if I'm being too soft or mush-headed. Especially you Mike(2) After the pot-shot I figured the least I could do was read his book and base some of my judgment on that.
I did skip to the appendix in the store though and read his mathematical proof of the singularity. The math was flawless and straight-forward. It was also based on an incorrect assumption, rendering the proof invalid. Not a stunning start.
(1) In the interests of honestly and full disclosure, I am not actually a member of Listen to Me. "Listen to Me" was the phrase one used to activate the interactive mode of the recognizer and serves today as the name of the alumni news letter. My occasional petition for membership is always quietly rejected in part because many of the members of "Listen to Me" were people I either had fired or fired myself. The news-letter operator, Steve Rothman, was my boss for awhile at KAI. I got him fired.
(2) technically I own Mike's soul. I bought it for $5 one afternoon and so I feel justified in occasionally using the imperative voice with him. Mike is another Atheist and a good friend.
2 Bits of Minor News
Bit 1: My new Motorola MPx220 smart phone arrived today. It's pimped out in every way I could think of, Bluetooth, Sim card, Quad band, MS Magneto OS, Internet and corporate email, etc. Very nice, although a little higher on the phone tech scale than I'm used to. My New number is 207 415 XXXX* Why a phone bought in Seattle has a Maine phone number, I'll never understand.
Call me when you get a chance, or email me at work Mark.Horvath@microsoft.com. I should get it either way!
Bit 10: I'm heading back to Boston tomorrow where I'l be in town for the better part of 3 weeks. 5 days of that I'm spending in the Lahey Clinic, 4 days in Dallas and 2 in New York, but other than that (21-5-4-2 = 10) I'll be home in an empty place with Jim, the cats, 2 chairs and a plastic table.
And my smart phone! :)
*Geoff rightly points out that, although the readership is small, google remembers things forever. Call the old number for the new
Call me when you get a chance, or email me at work Mark.Horvath@microsoft.com. I should get it either way!
Bit 10: I'm heading back to Boston tomorrow where I'l be in town for the better part of 3 weeks. 5 days of that I'm spending in the Lahey Clinic, 4 days in Dallas and 2 in New York, but other than that (21-5-4-2 = 10) I'll be home in an empty place with Jim, the cats, 2 chairs and a plastic table.
And my smart phone! :)
*Geoff rightly points out that, although the readership is small, google remembers things forever. Call the old number for the new
An Amusing, Agreeable Point on ID
From William Saletan
This soft-headed agnosticism matches the soft-headed arguments for including it in the curriculum. They're the same arguments leftists have made for ebonics. According to ID proponents, the committee in charge of Ohio's science curriculum is too "homogenous" and lacks "diversity." It marginalizes alternative "points of view" to which students should be "exposed." A conservative state senator says some people "think differently, and all those ideas should be explored." A conservative member of the state education board says Ohioans deserve a science curriculum "they can all be comfortable with."
Well said.
This soft-headed agnosticism matches the soft-headed arguments for including it in the curriculum. They're the same arguments leftists have made for ebonics. According to ID proponents, the committee in charge of Ohio's science curriculum is too "homogenous" and lacks "diversity." It marginalizes alternative "points of view" to which students should be "exposed." A conservative state senator says some people "think differently, and all those ideas should be explored." A conservative member of the state education board says Ohioans deserve a science curriculum "they can all be comfortable with."
Well said.
Devil Woman
You can almost smell the brimstone from this USA Today photo.
These kinds of things sell papers of course, but I dread to think what they'll do to her when she's VP.
Roars
I'm almost finished with Mary Roach's excellent book Spook. It's exactly the kind of book that the psuedo-scientific religious find extremely unconfortable because it comes up with rational pedestrian explainations for things which many report to be evidence of the supernatural. It's done in a non-condecending, humorous tone and Mary, like me and many others, want to believe in some of this stuff but can't find any reason to.
Part of Spook focuses on ghosts and hauntings and, at least so far, is one of the best parts of the book. Disclaimer: When I was young, until about the age of 11 or 12, I saw ghosts from time to time. I vividly remember them when I was 5 or 6 and would still hear things/feel things at night into my teen years. Mary goes through this pretty throughly and does a great job talking about how humans precieve infrasound and how we react. Infrasound is the term for an acoustic (longitudinal) wave with a frequency between 10 and 20 hertz, just below the threshold for hearing. You still precieve sounds this low, you just don't hear them. What do you do? Well, you panic a little.
It turns out that a lot of animals communicate by infrasound, especially ones with large territories to defend. The beauty of low frequency waves is that they travel for fucking ever, so if your an elephant or a rhino or a whale, infrasound is a good investment for you.
Or, if you're a tiger.
It turns out tigers communiate a lot through infrasound and humans (or at least soem humans who have not yet ruined their ears by playing the Yes Album at 120db for 18 hours a day) respond rather strongly to this.
It also turns out that your PC speakers can do a pretty good approximation of sounds in this range.
So, I went to a site Mary suggested here, read through and scrolled down to the first speaker. I hit the button, fully prepared to hear a tiger roar. And I did. What I was not prepared for, so much so that I burst out laughing afterwards at my foolishness, was the little spike of pure fear that came with it. I litterally got goosebumps. I played it a few more times and realized that part of what I felt was the little dark feeling of something in the room I had when I was a kid. Add to that the dark, too much imagination and some religion classes and I am fully satisfied I understand the creepiness feeling.
Now I want to do two things: 1) I want to watch Ghost Hunters again on Sci-Fi. I watched a few times hoping they would find something, but they never seemed to come up with anything convincing. I want to see if they are in environments which are likely to be good ultrasound resonators. and 2)
I want to play these sounds for the cats...
Part of Spook focuses on ghosts and hauntings and, at least so far, is one of the best parts of the book. Disclaimer: When I was young, until about the age of 11 or 12, I saw ghosts from time to time. I vividly remember them when I was 5 or 6 and would still hear things/feel things at night into my teen years. Mary goes through this pretty throughly and does a great job talking about how humans precieve infrasound and how we react. Infrasound is the term for an acoustic (longitudinal) wave with a frequency between 10 and 20 hertz, just below the threshold for hearing. You still precieve sounds this low, you just don't hear them. What do you do? Well, you panic a little.
It turns out that a lot of animals communicate by infrasound, especially ones with large territories to defend. The beauty of low frequency waves is that they travel for fucking ever, so if your an elephant or a rhino or a whale, infrasound is a good investment for you.
Or, if you're a tiger.
It turns out tigers communiate a lot through infrasound and humans (or at least soem humans who have not yet ruined their ears by playing the Yes Album at 120db for 18 hours a day) respond rather strongly to this.
It also turns out that your PC speakers can do a pretty good approximation of sounds in this range.
So, I went to a site Mary suggested here, read through and scrolled down to the first speaker. I hit the button, fully prepared to hear a tiger roar. And I did. What I was not prepared for, so much so that I burst out laughing afterwards at my foolishness, was the little spike of pure fear that came with it. I litterally got goosebumps. I played it a few more times and realized that part of what I felt was the little dark feeling of something in the room I had when I was a kid. Add to that the dark, too much imagination and some religion classes and I am fully satisfied I understand the creepiness feeling.
Now I want to do two things: 1) I want to watch Ghost Hunters again on Sci-Fi. I watched a few times hoping they would find something, but they never seemed to come up with anything convincing. I want to see if they are in environments which are likely to be good ultrasound resonators. and 2)
I want to play these sounds for the cats...
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
The Talking Points Memo
If you have not read Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo on the Italians, the faked Nigerian Yellowcake documents and the Office of Special Operations, your missing the best stuff in news reporting.
If you're not keeping up, there will be a point in the near future where you say to yourself "Why did that happen". If you read this, you'll have a better idea why Cheney gets indicted.
If you're not keeping up, there will be a point in the near future where you say to yourself "Why did that happen". If you read this, you'll have a better idea why Cheney gets indicted.
Andrew Sullivan's Excellent Point and the 5 Most Dangerous Words in the English Language
Simple and effective, as most clever things are. I don't know why I didn't htink to ask this, but I didn't.
THE SOCIAL RIGHT AND GAYS: My debate with David Blankenhorn on the matter of marriage rights is now posted. In many ways, I think the most telling part of the conversation was at the very end. Blankenhorn was asked a simple question by a member of the audience: since you oppose marriage rights for gay couples, what do you support for them? What's amazing is that after decades of thinking about marriage and several years mulling the issue of marriage for gays, David still had no answer. Frum has no answer. Gallagher has no answer. Kurtz has no answer. I have to say I find this quite extraordinary. It is as extraordinary as the social right's complete indifference to the revolution in gay culture and society these past two decades. I just read Rick Santorum's book about conservatism and the "common good." It's better than I expected and has many pages devoted to excluding gay couples from civil marriage. But again: I could find no practical, constructive suggestion from Santorum on what he believes should be our civil policy toward gay couples. Should they be deterred from settling down? Should they be encouraged to make faithful commitments? Should their households, when they include offspring, be legally protected? Silence. Nada. Zip. The "common good" does not include gay people or their kids. For much of the social right, homosexuals simply do not exist. Our reality is so threatening to them that they cannot even begin to construct a viable social policy toward us. And that's why they're losing this debate. In many ways, they haven't even joined it.
The Right can't simply come out and say, "stop existing", it's too late for that and anyone with a modicum of decency would be turned off. No, they can't answer because, like similar folk on the Left, the truth is unspeakable. Like their tutors on the Left, it's better to make some seemingly positive social policies (and damn the consequences) and quickly change the subject.
The 5 most dangerous words in the English Language are still:
Maybe it will go away.
THE SOCIAL RIGHT AND GAYS: My debate with David Blankenhorn on the matter of marriage rights is now posted. In many ways, I think the most telling part of the conversation was at the very end. Blankenhorn was asked a simple question by a member of the audience: since you oppose marriage rights for gay couples, what do you support for them? What's amazing is that after decades of thinking about marriage and several years mulling the issue of marriage for gays, David still had no answer. Frum has no answer. Gallagher has no answer. Kurtz has no answer. I have to say I find this quite extraordinary. It is as extraordinary as the social right's complete indifference to the revolution in gay culture and society these past two decades. I just read Rick Santorum's book about conservatism and the "common good." It's better than I expected and has many pages devoted to excluding gay couples from civil marriage. But again: I could find no practical, constructive suggestion from Santorum on what he believes should be our civil policy toward gay couples. Should they be deterred from settling down? Should they be encouraged to make faithful commitments? Should their households, when they include offspring, be legally protected? Silence. Nada. Zip. The "common good" does not include gay people or their kids. For much of the social right, homosexuals simply do not exist. Our reality is so threatening to them that they cannot even begin to construct a viable social policy toward us. And that's why they're losing this debate. In many ways, they haven't even joined it.
The Right can't simply come out and say, "stop existing", it's too late for that and anyone with a modicum of decency would be turned off. No, they can't answer because, like similar folk on the Left, the truth is unspeakable. Like their tutors on the Left, it's better to make some seemingly positive social policies (and damn the consequences) and quickly change the subject.
The 5 most dangerous words in the English Language are still:
Maybe it will go away.
Donald Trump, Forever
I've been working on the book a little this week after getting some stuff settled in Seattle and finishing some travel. The outline is hovering around 40 pages or so, and I'm starting to fill in details specific to one or two areas. Right now I'm working on life extension and the Corporate Senate sections, the former much harder than the latter.
In looking at trends in human history, there are a couple that might serve as models; 1) Cheap, easy and culture shifting, 2) expensive, rare and elite and 3) for lack of a better work, genetic or evolutionary.
1) Cheap, easy, culture shifting: The model here is electricity or the phone (or these days the internet). Everyone (or almost everyone with rare exceptions) has access, it quickly dives under the cultural radar (heard any Tesla jokes lately?) and isn't news except when it's missing. Many technologies eventually go this route. However, I don't think life extension will be one of them, at least not soon. Ray Kurzweil's fantasies aside, the singularity is not as close as people think, nano technology has been Real Soon Now for decades and, well, even stuff from the '50s like cheap fusion is still (and has always been) 20 years away. I think LE is not going to be a simple nutritional supplement, but a complete re-write of your DNA, or at least extending certain parts of it into every cell in your body. This is hard, uncertain work and biology isn't physics (it's vastly more complicated). Immortality won't be coming in a pill for a long time I think, so for the next 150 years or so, I'm ruling this one out.
2) Expensive, rare and elite. Everyone has a car (in the US) but how many people have McClearens? Not fucking me that's for sure. Delorian tried but failed. I think if LE is as complicated as I suspect, the first few iterations on existing humans may only be partly successful and I expect it to be very expensive. Also, the economics of it would seem to me (a non-economist) to keep it rare, i.e. providers could charge huge amounts of money for it because absolutely everyone would want it. It's unlikely to be covered by a healthcare plan especially when these days more and more plans are getting away from expensive treatments and looking for workers who won't get sick at all.
There is an argument to be made that folks could finance their LE and pay it out of their multi-hundred/thousand year lifespan. However, for those arguments to make real sense, you a) need the first few folks to live a sizeable fraction of that to prove it actually works (medical breakthroughs have an unfortunate history of not working quite as well as planned, e.g. seen any Jarvik artificial hearts around? Not a mean criticism, it's just a hard, hard problem in a complex system) and b) you need actuarial tables for those lifespans. LE doesn't mean you can't get hit by a car, slip in the shower etc. To point b), I talked to a number of insurance actuarials about this (my job brings me in contact with all sorts of interesting folks) and this is a known problem some few folks have worked on. Assuming immorality, your mean time to a fatal accident is somewhere between 800-1500 years. This also assumes that LE confers immunity to all disease, an assumption I can't see justifying. I don't see folks financing more than a small fraction of this, say 100 years or so. Hence, not may people will be able to afford it. Trumps, Hiltons, Gates etc. maybe, but not you or I. Well, not I.
Result: Donald Trump might be with us for a long time, but fortunately we'll die and not have to watch.
3)Genetic, evolutionary. I see some home for this. If we can build genes, or better yet eggs and sperm, we could build the LE genes right in from birth. This avoids a lot of problems in 2) and gets us to 1) (or at least set up for 1)) in a relatively short time. It's comparatively simple, cheaper than doing it after the system has booted (but likely not cheap) and might be workable. I call this the Gattica option and, while personally fond of it, it means pretty directly playing god with peoples lives (or future lives). I can't see this being popular for a few hundred years until a population of Gatticans gets large enough to vote in significant numbers. Again, this won't be available to everyone, so 2,000 years from now, we all might be Gates, or Fords, or Trumps.
This is evolution in action in the brave, new world.
I'm certainly open to other arguments, corrections, or debates on why I have my head up my ass, but this is the direction I'm going to head on this.
In looking at trends in human history, there are a couple that might serve as models; 1) Cheap, easy and culture shifting, 2) expensive, rare and elite and 3) for lack of a better work, genetic or evolutionary.
1) Cheap, easy, culture shifting: The model here is electricity or the phone (or these days the internet). Everyone (or almost everyone with rare exceptions) has access, it quickly dives under the cultural radar (heard any Tesla jokes lately?) and isn't news except when it's missing. Many technologies eventually go this route. However, I don't think life extension will be one of them, at least not soon. Ray Kurzweil's fantasies aside, the singularity is not as close as people think, nano technology has been Real Soon Now for decades and, well, even stuff from the '50s like cheap fusion is still (and has always been) 20 years away. I think LE is not going to be a simple nutritional supplement, but a complete re-write of your DNA, or at least extending certain parts of it into every cell in your body. This is hard, uncertain work and biology isn't physics (it's vastly more complicated). Immortality won't be coming in a pill for a long time I think, so for the next 150 years or so, I'm ruling this one out.
2) Expensive, rare and elite. Everyone has a car (in the US) but how many people have McClearens? Not fucking me that's for sure. Delorian tried but failed. I think if LE is as complicated as I suspect, the first few iterations on existing humans may only be partly successful and I expect it to be very expensive. Also, the economics of it would seem to me (a non-economist) to keep it rare, i.e. providers could charge huge amounts of money for it because absolutely everyone would want it. It's unlikely to be covered by a healthcare plan especially when these days more and more plans are getting away from expensive treatments and looking for workers who won't get sick at all.
There is an argument to be made that folks could finance their LE and pay it out of their multi-hundred/thousand year lifespan. However, for those arguments to make real sense, you a) need the first few folks to live a sizeable fraction of that to prove it actually works (medical breakthroughs have an unfortunate history of not working quite as well as planned, e.g. seen any Jarvik artificial hearts around? Not a mean criticism, it's just a hard, hard problem in a complex system) and b) you need actuarial tables for those lifespans. LE doesn't mean you can't get hit by a car, slip in the shower etc. To point b), I talked to a number of insurance actuarials about this (my job brings me in contact with all sorts of interesting folks) and this is a known problem some few folks have worked on. Assuming immorality, your mean time to a fatal accident is somewhere between 800-1500 years. This also assumes that LE confers immunity to all disease, an assumption I can't see justifying. I don't see folks financing more than a small fraction of this, say 100 years or so. Hence, not may people will be able to afford it. Trumps, Hiltons, Gates etc. maybe, but not you or I. Well, not I.
Result: Donald Trump might be with us for a long time, but fortunately we'll die and not have to watch.
3)Genetic, evolutionary. I see some home for this. If we can build genes, or better yet eggs and sperm, we could build the LE genes right in from birth. This avoids a lot of problems in 2) and gets us to 1) (or at least set up for 1)) in a relatively short time. It's comparatively simple, cheaper than doing it after the system has booted (but likely not cheap) and might be workable. I call this the Gattica option and, while personally fond of it, it means pretty directly playing god with peoples lives (or future lives). I can't see this being popular for a few hundred years until a population of Gatticans gets large enough to vote in significant numbers. Again, this won't be available to everyone, so 2,000 years from now, we all might be Gates, or Fords, or Trumps.
This is evolution in action in the brave, new world.
I'm certainly open to other arguments, corrections, or debates on why I have my head up my ass, but this is the direction I'm going to head on this.
Texas Leads the Way!
I see the Texans have already made a good start at getting government out of the bedroom and off our backs (via Volokh)
Opponents of a proposed amendment to the Texas Constitution banning same-sex marriage said Monday the initiative's poor wording could effectively nullify all marriages.
Proposition 2 on the Nov. 8 ballot states that marriage exists only as a union of one man and one woman.
It then adds that the state or political subdivision of the state "may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage."
"That in the hands of an activist judge could lead to the ruin of my marriage and every other marriage in this state because the status that is most identical to marriage is obviously marriage itself," said Trampes Crow, a graduate student at the University of Texas and a former army captain who served in Afghanistan and Iraq.
I'd say it's still in Captain Crow's hands to save or ruin his own marriage, but folks like to have a State to blame...
Opponents of a proposed amendment to the Texas Constitution banning same-sex marriage said Monday the initiative's poor wording could effectively nullify all marriages.
Proposition 2 on the Nov. 8 ballot states that marriage exists only as a union of one man and one woman.
It then adds that the state or political subdivision of the state "may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage."
"That in the hands of an activist judge could lead to the ruin of my marriage and every other marriage in this state because the status that is most identical to marriage is obviously marriage itself," said Trampes Crow, a graduate student at the University of Texas and a former army captain who served in Afghanistan and Iraq.
I'd say it's still in Captain Crow's hands to save or ruin his own marriage, but folks like to have a State to blame...
Tax the Permanently Single
This seems to be a point of surprise to some, but I think this is really just the enfranchisement of a new group in an existing process (Gregg Easterbrook, via Cathy Young, via Volokh)
If significant numbers of gays and lesbians begin to wed, the 100 million single people may become more dismayed that still more people wearing rings get special deals while they do not. Equally important, for every gay or lesbian pair who weds, winning benefits, a couple of single people must be taxed more to fund these benefits. Benefits can't just be demanded; someone must provide them. Marriage benefits for gays and lesbians will not come from the pockets of those in traditional one-man-one-woman unions. The benefits will come from the pockets of the single.
You chortle now, but as same-gender unions gain acceptance, prejudice against the single may become the final frontier. Marriage definitely isn't for everyone; some people were made by God to be single, and why should society punish them for that? Millions of people wish to marry but cannot find suitable partners; why should society punish them for that? The single makes substantial contributions to society, including often assisting in the all-important raising of children. Many single people form long-term or even life-long bonds to each other based not on eros but Platonic friendship; why shouldn't such people be able to pool their credit, inherit each other's property without taxation, and so on? ... At any rate, complaints from the single seem the next logical progression of this debate, and complaints from the single are going to be hard to rebut.
There are a couple of small problems with this argument but mostly just in magnitude, e.g. a number of gay people are already married to opposite sexed spouses, they just aren't happy, so in detail-balance this is a much smaller increase than it might look; the number of gays is statistically small (about 4% of the general population in the US) and the number of those who would marry is even smaller, so I'm not sure the magnitude of the problem would be detectable in the noise of the current data; 80% of gays are reproductively successful at some point in their lives so, to within a good approximation of non-gays, they are producing single folks to take up the burden, etc.
But, it's still a good point, one I'm surprised no one is really making on the other side. My solution, as always, is to get government out of the marriage business. Stop subsidies/penalties for doing it and make it a purely religious institution.
Also, take the time to ready Cathy Young's article. It's excellent, and makes the points Maggie Gallagher tried but really failed to make.
If significant numbers of gays and lesbians begin to wed, the 100 million single people may become more dismayed that still more people wearing rings get special deals while they do not. Equally important, for every gay or lesbian pair who weds, winning benefits, a couple of single people must be taxed more to fund these benefits. Benefits can't just be demanded; someone must provide them. Marriage benefits for gays and lesbians will not come from the pockets of those in traditional one-man-one-woman unions. The benefits will come from the pockets of the single.
You chortle now, but as same-gender unions gain acceptance, prejudice against the single may become the final frontier. Marriage definitely isn't for everyone; some people were made by God to be single, and why should society punish them for that? Millions of people wish to marry but cannot find suitable partners; why should society punish them for that? The single makes substantial contributions to society, including often assisting in the all-important raising of children. Many single people form long-term or even life-long bonds to each other based not on eros but Platonic friendship; why shouldn't such people be able to pool their credit, inherit each other's property without taxation, and so on? ... At any rate, complaints from the single seem the next logical progression of this debate, and complaints from the single are going to be hard to rebut.
There are a couple of small problems with this argument but mostly just in magnitude, e.g. a number of gay people are already married to opposite sexed spouses, they just aren't happy, so in detail-balance this is a much smaller increase than it might look; the number of gays is statistically small (about 4% of the general population in the US) and the number of those who would marry is even smaller, so I'm not sure the magnitude of the problem would be detectable in the noise of the current data; 80% of gays are reproductively successful at some point in their lives so, to within a good approximation of non-gays, they are producing single folks to take up the burden, etc.
But, it's still a good point, one I'm surprised no one is really making on the other side. My solution, as always, is to get government out of the marriage business. Stop subsidies/penalties for doing it and make it a purely religious institution.
Also, take the time to ready Cathy Young's article. It's excellent, and makes the points Maggie Gallagher tried but really failed to make.
Monday, October 24, 2005
Nipple Clamps
I love wonkette.
• Maybe it was her sexy nipple clamps that made Kay Bailey Hutchison forget all about blowjobs.
• Maybe it was her sexy nipple clamps that made Kay Bailey Hutchison forget all about blowjobs.
Talking Points:Perjury
Consistency may be the hobgoblin of small minds, but it's also damn useful. Back during the Monica thing I was consistent in two things: 1) Congress had no business investigating the president's blow-job and 2) Clinton needed to tell the truth. While I had a lot of sympathy for the man while he was having his consensual dirty laundry aired, I didn't condone lying to cover it up.
Like everyone else, I heard the new GOP talking points yesterday by Sen. Hutchison,
"that it is an indictment on a crime and not some perjury technicality where they couldn't indict on the crime and so they go to something just to show that their two years of investigation was not a waste of time and taxpayer dollars."
The fact that the GOP flips 180 on this only when it's their ox being gored, makes me want to vote for them even less than I already do. Note: This also represents small minded consistency on my part as I stopped voting for dems on the same principle.
And, in case the GOP has forgotten their eagerness, well some helpful folks can help remind them of how they looked at this a few years ago. If anyone is stupid enough to take up the new talking points, I hope their opponents crucify them with ads in 2006.
Sen. Hutchison: "The reason that I voted to remove him from office is because I think the overridding issue here is that truth will remain the standard for perjury and obstruction of justice in our criminal justice system and it must not be gray. It must not be muddy." [AP, 2/12/99]
Sen. Frist: "There is no serious question that perjury and obstruction of justice are high crimes and misdemeanors...Indeed, our own Senate precedent establishes that perjury is a high crime and misdemeanor...The crimes of perjury and obstruction of justice are public crimes threatening the administration of justice." [Congressional Record, 2/12/99]
Sen. DeWine: "Obstruction of justice and perjury strike at the very heart of our system of justice...Perjury is also a very serious crime...The judiciary is designed to be a mechanism for finding the truth-so that justice can be done. Perjury perverts the judiciary, turning it into a mechanism that accepts lies-so that injustice may prevail." [Congressional Record, 2/12/99]
Like everyone else, I heard the new GOP talking points yesterday by Sen. Hutchison,
"that it is an indictment on a crime and not some perjury technicality where they couldn't indict on the crime and so they go to something just to show that their two years of investigation was not a waste of time and taxpayer dollars."
The fact that the GOP flips 180 on this only when it's their ox being gored, makes me want to vote for them even less than I already do. Note: This also represents small minded consistency on my part as I stopped voting for dems on the same principle.
And, in case the GOP has forgotten their eagerness, well some helpful folks can help remind them of how they looked at this a few years ago. If anyone is stupid enough to take up the new talking points, I hope their opponents crucify them with ads in 2006.
Sen. Hutchison: "The reason that I voted to remove him from office is because I think the overridding issue here is that truth will remain the standard for perjury and obstruction of justice in our criminal justice system and it must not be gray. It must not be muddy." [AP, 2/12/99]
Sen. Frist: "There is no serious question that perjury and obstruction of justice are high crimes and misdemeanors...Indeed, our own Senate precedent establishes that perjury is a high crime and misdemeanor...The crimes of perjury and obstruction of justice are public crimes threatening the administration of justice." [Congressional Record, 2/12/99]
Sen. DeWine: "Obstruction of justice and perjury strike at the very heart of our system of justice...Perjury is also a very serious crime...The judiciary is designed to be a mechanism for finding the truth-so that justice can be done. Perjury perverts the judiciary, turning it into a mechanism that accepts lies-so that injustice may prevail." [Congressional Record, 2/12/99]
Apt comment on Harriet
Found in my mail this morning, care of the Strawberry Woman:
I give Miers no chance. She is Thomas without the pubic hair.
To which I can only add, in the faint praise category,
or the reasoning skills.
I give Miers no chance. She is Thomas without the pubic hair.
To which I can only add, in the faint praise category,
or the reasoning skills.
Sunday, October 23, 2005
Truth in Advertising
Administration apologist and Harriet Miers Junior Fan Club President Bill O'Reilly on the Today show this week:
The Center of the Galaxy
Another great image from the APOD. This is the best picture of the center of the galaxy I've ever seen.
She Doesn't Take a Good Photo
Recent WH pictures featuring Harriet in her second re-launch as a product.
Wow. They can't take a good picture of the woman.
The thing here is not so much Harriet herself (intrade is currently got her at about 32% chance of winning), but the seeming incompetence of the WH team in getting her going. This is the first product they've tried to move without Rove (this has been Andy Card's game from start to finish for various reasons) and, frankly, it shows. Candidate photos are basic blocking and tackling though. I don't quite know they are managing to screw that up, it's known science.
If Rove does get an indictment, I wonder if Bush will issue a blanket pardon to keep the WH afloat?
Wow. They can't take a good picture of the woman.
The thing here is not so much Harriet herself (intrade is currently got her at about 32% chance of winning), but the seeming incompetence of the WH team in getting her going. This is the first product they've tried to move without Rove (this has been Andy Card's game from start to finish for various reasons) and, frankly, it shows. Candidate photos are basic blocking and tackling though. I don't quite know they are managing to screw that up, it's known science.
If Rove does get an indictment, I wonder if Bush will issue a blanket pardon to keep the WH afloat?
Saturday, October 22, 2005
Interacting Galaxies
APOD has an excellent picture today of an interacting galaxy.I used to have some code around I got from one of my fellow grad students at UMass, Kevin Olson, who modeled this kind of thing for his thesis. I haven't touched it for awhile, but I remember last time thinking, "Wow! This runs shitloads* faster on this pentium than it did on the VAX-750"
Tropical Storm Alpha
Yup, it's official! Tropical Storm Alpha is now chugging along off the coast of the DR.
Alpha is forecast to move northwestward for thenext 12-24 hours around the anticyclone to the northeast...thenrecurve to the northe and eventually northeast ahead of Wilma andthe large deep-layer baroclinic trough forming over the easternUnited States. The official track forecast has Alpha beingabsorbed by the trough in 96 hours if not sooner.
Alpha is forecast to slowly intensify in the next 12 hours prior to
making landfall along the South Coast of Hispaniola. After
weakening over the mountains some brief re-intensification is
possible prior to the cyclone being absorbed into the larger system
to the northwest.
Alpha is forecast to move northwestward for thenext 12-24 hours around the anticyclone to the northeast...thenrecurve to the northe and eventually northeast ahead of Wilma andthe large deep-layer baroclinic trough forming over the easternUnited States. The official track forecast has Alpha beingabsorbed by the trough in 96 hours if not sooner.
Alpha is forecast to slowly intensify in the next 12 hours prior to
making landfall along the South Coast of Hispaniola. After
weakening over the mountains some brief re-intensification is
possible prior to the cyclone being absorbed into the larger system
to the northwest.
Friday, October 21, 2005
The Tab Key FAQ
Here
Q. I put some quarters in and pushed the Tab button, but nothing happened. Where’s my soda?
A. Do not stick loose change into the slots in your keyboard.
Q. I put some quarters in and pushed the Tab button, but nothing happened. Where’s my soda?
A. Do not stick loose change into the slots in your keyboard.
Volokh SSM Debate
Well, Maggie Gallagher's week of SSM debate is over. It ends with this:
No time to introduce you to the joys of theories of the cognitive nature of social institutions, the relevance of the New Institutionalist Economics understanding of isomorphic institutional change, the developing legal pressures in Canada to repress opposition to its new normative understanding of marriage, or even why I think the most likely outcome of same-sex marriage is not polygamy but the end of marriage as a legal status.
Which is to say, "I saved all my really good arguments this week for the end and oops, I've run out of time!"
I read her arguments, the threads they generated etc. First let me says it was fairly gutsy on her part to do this at all. Sure, Volokh is generally read by conservatives, but they are conservative lawyers and as such are pretty good at the process of debate. I give her a lot of credit for volunteering for this. If I were more cynical than I actually am, I might think this was a plot to trot out weak arguments and have them strengthened by debate. I'm not really that cynical though and, of course, that's not what happened.
Update: I had written a kind of rambling entry about why I thought she hadn't made her point. However, in reading through the comments, I found someone had articualted it better.
No time to introduce you to the joys of theories of the cognitive nature of social institutions, the relevance of the New Institutionalist Economics understanding of isomorphic institutional change, the developing legal pressures in Canada to repress opposition to its new normative understanding of marriage, or even why I think the most likely outcome of same-sex marriage is not polygamy but the end of marriage as a legal status.
Which is to say, "I saved all my really good arguments this week for the end and oops, I've run out of time!"
I read her arguments, the threads they generated etc. First let me says it was fairly gutsy on her part to do this at all. Sure, Volokh is generally read by conservatives, but they are conservative lawyers and as such are pretty good at the process of debate. I give her a lot of credit for volunteering for this. If I were more cynical than I actually am, I might think this was a plot to trot out weak arguments and have them strengthened by debate. I'm not really that cynical though and, of course, that's not what happened.
Update: I had written a kind of rambling entry about why I thought she hadn't made her point. However, in reading through the comments, I found someone had articualted it better.
Revealed Preference
A good note on Andrew Sullivan today on revealed preferences in the abortion debate:
"The arguments for and against aborting babies who will be born with disabilities are not much different than the arguments for abortion in general. If you believe that the fetus is a person from the start, then the consistent position is not to abort babies with disabilities. After all, they are people, and just as you would not euthanise them after they were born, or as adults, you would not kill them before they are born. On the other hand, if you believe that the fetus is not yet a person, then deliberately allowing a disabled child to be born is akin to abuse.
Just as you would not maim a child after it is born in order to cause mental or physical handicaps, you would also not allow such a child to form in the first place when you could avoid it.
In other Revealed Preference news, I would suggest I have accidentally revealed that I'm not the big left-leading liberal I thought. When the choice came to take a job in Washington state vs. staying in Massachusetts (arguably the bluest state currently still in the union), I chose to move. The money is the same in both cases, the housing situation is about equal etc., so the conclusion I come to is that the value of living there, despite laws which were favorable and a good political climate were minor compared with the novelty of exploring a new area of the country.
"The arguments for and against aborting babies who will be born with disabilities are not much different than the arguments for abortion in general. If you believe that the fetus is a person from the start, then the consistent position is not to abort babies with disabilities. After all, they are people, and just as you would not euthanise them after they were born, or as adults, you would not kill them before they are born. On the other hand, if you believe that the fetus is not yet a person, then deliberately allowing a disabled child to be born is akin to abuse.
Just as you would not maim a child after it is born in order to cause mental or physical handicaps, you would also not allow such a child to form in the first place when you could avoid it.
In other Revealed Preference news, I would suggest I have accidentally revealed that I'm not the big left-leading liberal I thought. When the choice came to take a job in Washington state vs. staying in Massachusetts (arguably the bluest state currently still in the union), I chose to move. The money is the same in both cases, the housing situation is about equal etc., so the conclusion I come to is that the value of living there, despite laws which were favorable and a good political climate were minor compared with the novelty of exploring a new area of the country.
Thursday, October 20, 2005
Also in Media Training News...
BAGNews has some interesting comments on the optics of the Saddam Trial.
Largely political neutral commentary, BTW. If your a weary Right Winger, you probably don't need your nose rubbed it.
Largely political neutral commentary, BTW. If your a weary Right Winger, you probably don't need your nose rubbed it.
Media Training 351
This is a brilliant piece of marketing on the part of Team DeLay. No really, I'm not being sarcastic, it's fucking brilliant. High profile politician goes down for a mug shot? Well son, flip it around and make it look like a campaign poster. Let the NYT run that!
Kudos to the bastard, there are no flies on him.
Kudos to the bastard, there are no flies on him.
Marriage Debate
Over at Volokh, guest blogger, Maggie Gallagher, is having a debate about same sex marriage. It's an interesting exchange in a variety of ways, some of which I comment on over there and some which I will comment on here later.
Occasionally, amid the huffing, puffing and strawman agruements on each side, a little nugget of the visceral, emotional truth bobs breifly to the surface. Here's one I thought an interesting observation:
I really do think, btw, that this is what bothers most ordinary people: an instinct that their government, against their will, is telling them (and will re-educate their children) that everything they know about marriage (like the first ingredient is a husband and a wife, duh) is wrong and must now change. Upon penalty of being officially labelled bigots by their government. And everyone knows its open season on bigots in our society.
Read the thread and comments. It's really very interesting.
My hat is off to Eugene for hosting this on his site.
Update: This is also an excellent bit, although Andrew Sullivan made a similar point a while back in one of his columns.
As to the second, Maggie captures something important that has been obscured by reproductive technology--primarily birth control. Prior to reliable means of birth control, it was inevitable that male-female unions would produce babies; in this way, they were fundamentally different from same-sex relationships, and even had such relationships been recognized, they would have not have presented the same problem of how to contain and nurture the inherent generativeness (?) of the male-female union. Defining marriage broadly enough to capture most fertile couples was an attempt to solve the myriad problems this generative (and uncontrollable, apart from celibacy) characteristic of male-female relationships. Perhaps Kate is also correct that the popular concept of marriage has been transformed (arguably by the development of reliable birth control technologies). If she is, and the popular concept of marriage has finally diverged (or will diverge) so markedly from the traditional religious concept, perhaps it's time for either a privatization of marriage or a reassertion of the distinction between civil and religious marriage?
I'm fundementally a fan of the idea the a) the government shouldn't be in the marriage business at all and b) we should end all government subsidy/penalty of marriage.
Occasionally, amid the huffing, puffing and strawman agruements on each side, a little nugget of the visceral, emotional truth bobs breifly to the surface. Here's one I thought an interesting observation:
I really do think, btw, that this is what bothers most ordinary people: an instinct that their government, against their will, is telling them (and will re-educate their children) that everything they know about marriage (like the first ingredient is a husband and a wife, duh) is wrong and must now change. Upon penalty of being officially labelled bigots by their government. And everyone knows its open season on bigots in our society.
Read the thread and comments. It's really very interesting.
My hat is off to Eugene for hosting this on his site.
Update: This is also an excellent bit, although Andrew Sullivan made a similar point a while back in one of his columns.
As to the second, Maggie captures something important that has been obscured by reproductive technology--primarily birth control. Prior to reliable means of birth control, it was inevitable that male-female unions would produce babies; in this way, they were fundamentally different from same-sex relationships, and even had such relationships been recognized, they would have not have presented the same problem of how to contain and nurture the inherent generativeness (?) of the male-female union. Defining marriage broadly enough to capture most fertile couples was an attempt to solve the myriad problems this generative (and uncontrollable, apart from celibacy) characteristic of male-female relationships. Perhaps Kate is also correct that the popular concept of marriage has been transformed (arguably by the development of reliable birth control technologies). If she is, and the popular concept of marriage has finally diverged (or will diverge) so markedly from the traditional religious concept, perhaps it's time for either a privatization of marriage or a reassertion of the distinction between civil and religious marriage?
I'm fundementally a fan of the idea the a) the government shouldn't be in the marriage business at all and b) we should end all government subsidy/penalty of marriage.
Harriet's Defeat
Based on the bi-partisen reaction here, I'd going to take a risk and predicit defeat or withdrawl for Harriet.
The Supreme Court nomination of Harriet E. Miers suffered another setback on Wednesday when the Republican and Democratic leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee asked her to resubmit parts of her judicial questionnaire, saying various members had found her responses "inadequate," "insufficient" and "insulting."
...
Veteran senators and aides said they could not recall another occasion when the committee had sent back a nominee's answers to a questionnaire because they were incomplete. Former Senator Daniel R. Coats of Indiana, the administration's appointed guide for Ms. Miers on Capitol Hill, defended her answers in the Senate questionnaire as a work in progress.
It seems to support the idea that she's just plain not qualified.
The Supreme Court nomination of Harriet E. Miers suffered another setback on Wednesday when the Republican and Democratic leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee asked her to resubmit parts of her judicial questionnaire, saying various members had found her responses "inadequate," "insufficient" and "insulting."
...
Veteran senators and aides said they could not recall another occasion when the committee had sent back a nominee's answers to a questionnaire because they were incomplete. Former Senator Daniel R. Coats of Indiana, the administration's appointed guide for Ms. Miers on Capitol Hill, defended her answers in the Senate questionnaire as a work in progress.
It seems to support the idea that she's just plain not qualified.
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Something Wiki Doesn't know
xclock.
I'm a little surprised that an open source, unix-based system has holes like this. Although it was helpful with ifconfig.
And it's still unbeatable as a math reference. It even has an excellent thread on quadratic residues, one of the key underpinnings of multistep PKI.
I'm a little surprised that an open source, unix-based system has holes like this. Although it was helpful with ifconfig.
And it's still unbeatable as a math reference. It even has an excellent thread on quadratic residues, one of the key underpinnings of multistep PKI.
Dali Lama: Junk Scientist
From the ever enchanting Wonkette:
"Happy Design": The Junk Science Everybody Can Live With!
Take an old-fashioned red state preacher in the cut of every character John Lithgow has ever portrayed on film. Make him spew fire-and-brimstone imprecations and certainties about a creationist myth tricked out as "intelligent design." You'll have every member of the scientific community who's not a laughable fraud sighing in frustration. Ah, but now turn that same preacher into the Dalai Lama, and make the cosmic message something about shiny happy people holding hands. And what do you get? Something like this:
[The Dalai Lama] has been an enthusiastic collaborator in research on whether the intense meditation practiced by Buddhist monks can train the brain to generate compassion and positive thoughts. Next month in Washington, the Dalai Lama is scheduled to speak about the research at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
But 544 brain researchers have signed a petition urging the society to cancel the lecture, because, according to the petition, "it will highlight a subject with largely unsubstantiated claims and compromised scientific rigor and objectivity."
But wait, that's not nearly the end of it:
Defenders of the Dalai Lama's appearance say that the motivation of many protesters is political, because many are Chinese or of Chinese descent. The Dalai Lama fled Tibet in 1959 after the Chinese crushed a Tibetan bid for independence.
But many scientists who signed the petition say they did so because they believe that the field of neuroscience risks losing credibility if it ventures too recklessly into spiritual matters.
Got that? Brain researchers (who I'm sure spend their weekends abusing Falun Gong members) claim that a whoppingly dubious idea deserves no place on any legitimate scientific lecture circuit. And they're met with charges of chauvinism (and worse) because they're... Chinese, or "of Chinese descent."
Now. How many out there who've bumped His Holiness into bestsellerdom on multiple occasions can't see the logic in that? --MICHAEL WEISS
Scientists Bridle at Lecture Plan for Dalai Lama [NYT]
READ MORE: dalai lama , intelligent design , new york times , science , washington, d.c.
"Happy Design": The Junk Science Everybody Can Live With!
Take an old-fashioned red state preacher in the cut of every character John Lithgow has ever portrayed on film. Make him spew fire-and-brimstone imprecations and certainties about a creationist myth tricked out as "intelligent design." You'll have every member of the scientific community who's not a laughable fraud sighing in frustration. Ah, but now turn that same preacher into the Dalai Lama, and make the cosmic message something about shiny happy people holding hands. And what do you get? Something like this:
[The Dalai Lama] has been an enthusiastic collaborator in research on whether the intense meditation practiced by Buddhist monks can train the brain to generate compassion and positive thoughts. Next month in Washington, the Dalai Lama is scheduled to speak about the research at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
But 544 brain researchers have signed a petition urging the society to cancel the lecture, because, according to the petition, "it will highlight a subject with largely unsubstantiated claims and compromised scientific rigor and objectivity."
But wait, that's not nearly the end of it:
Defenders of the Dalai Lama's appearance say that the motivation of many protesters is political, because many are Chinese or of Chinese descent. The Dalai Lama fled Tibet in 1959 after the Chinese crushed a Tibetan bid for independence.
But many scientists who signed the petition say they did so because they believe that the field of neuroscience risks losing credibility if it ventures too recklessly into spiritual matters.
Got that? Brain researchers (who I'm sure spend their weekends abusing Falun Gong members) claim that a whoppingly dubious idea deserves no place on any legitimate scientific lecture circuit. And they're met with charges of chauvinism (and worse) because they're... Chinese, or "of Chinese descent."
Now. How many out there who've bumped His Holiness into bestsellerdom on multiple occasions can't see the logic in that? --MICHAEL WEISS
Scientists Bridle at Lecture Plan for Dalai Lama [NYT]
READ MORE: dalai lama , intelligent design , new york times , science , washington, d.c.
Bidding
MSFT has an in house auction system to riase money for charity (in this case Katrina Victims). The basic idea is the same as ebay-someone donates something to the cuase, other's bid up the price with the procedes going to the charity.
I am in a bidding war for this:
Experiences Auction #1233: 1 Month of Historical European Sword Play Classes
Oct 14 2005 1:26PM - Oct 20 2005 12:00AM
Item Description:
For thousands of years, the sword has enjoyed a position has one of the most romantically portrayed weapons ever to grace the human mind. With recent history the Silver Screen has provided us with even more vivid images of "Swashbuckling" and "Daring-Do" by telling and retelling the stories of the Three Musketeers, Zorro, Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean, Excalibur, the Highlander series, and many more. Have you always wished you could do some of the things that you have seen in these movies, or read in books? But never found a place that really taught what you were looking for? Perhaps you could only find Asian Martial Arts, or schools that offered Modern Olympic Fencing? Well look no further!
This Auction is for 1-free month of membership with Old World Martial Arts, a school that provides instruction in Historical Sword Play styles of Europe. We concentrate on styles influenced by the writings of period masters such as Nicoletto Giganti (1606), Ridolfo Capo Ferro (1610), Achilles Marozzo (1536), and the "anonymous" I.33 MS (13th Century). All new students of the sword will start with an introduction to the basics of European Sword Play, such as body mechanics, the concepts of time, measure, and safety, as well as the different types of swords and styles available. All initial instruction will focus more on the use of the Rapier (1600;s), prior to expansion into the other sword styles such as the knightly medieval sword, the wicked "2 handed" long sword, etc. Please see the website listed below for more thorough details regarding OWMA, and what we offer.
I started at $40, but am now up to $65. I'll quit at $100.
...
or so.
More info here
I am in a bidding war for this:
Experiences Auction #1233: 1 Month of Historical European Sword Play Classes
Oct 14 2005 1:26PM - Oct 20 2005 12:00AM
Item Description:
For thousands of years, the sword has enjoyed a position has one of the most romantically portrayed weapons ever to grace the human mind. With recent history the Silver Screen has provided us with even more vivid images of "Swashbuckling" and "Daring-Do" by telling and retelling the stories of the Three Musketeers, Zorro, Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean, Excalibur, the Highlander series, and many more. Have you always wished you could do some of the things that you have seen in these movies, or read in books? But never found a place that really taught what you were looking for? Perhaps you could only find Asian Martial Arts, or schools that offered Modern Olympic Fencing? Well look no further!
This Auction is for 1-free month of membership with Old World Martial Arts, a school that provides instruction in Historical Sword Play styles of Europe. We concentrate on styles influenced by the writings of period masters such as Nicoletto Giganti (1606), Ridolfo Capo Ferro (1610), Achilles Marozzo (1536), and the "anonymous" I.33 MS (13th Century). All new students of the sword will start with an introduction to the basics of European Sword Play, such as body mechanics, the concepts of time, measure, and safety, as well as the different types of swords and styles available. All initial instruction will focus more on the use of the Rapier (1600;s), prior to expansion into the other sword styles such as the knightly medieval sword, the wicked "2 handed" long sword, etc. Please see the website listed below for more thorough details regarding OWMA, and what we offer.
I started at $40, but am now up to $65. I'll quit at $100.
...
or so.
More info here
Derivitives Trading, Refco and Why Wall Street Hasn't Learned It's Lesson
Interesting article on the risk in derivatives trading and the (currently) hidden dangers around unmanaged complexity.
Refco's Collapse Underscores Risks Inherent in the Derivatives MarketOctober 19, 2005 – WSJ – Jesse Eisinger
A month hasn't gone by recently without some regulator or obscure commission sounding an alarm about privately negotiated derivative deals.
If you wade through their speeches and reports, you find out there's a small problem with these fast-growing markets: Traders don't have a clear idea about who ultimately is on the other side of derivative trades that aren't executed on regulated exchanges.
The debacle at Refco, the commodities and securities firm that filed for bankruptcy-law protection this week, gives us all a reason to care about this stuff. So far the spectacularly rapid flameout has been mere spectator sport for most investors. There has been little market fallout. There is good news: Refco doesn't appear to have been a significant broker in the main area of regulatory concern, credit derivatives, where investors buy protection against bond defaults. And the longer the markets go without panicking, the lower the risk.
The bad news is that painless lessons tend not to stick.
Derivatives are designed to make markets more efficient and spread risk, and mostly work well. In their most vanilla form, a derivative allows you to, say, offset the risk of owning ABC stock, worth $55 a share, by buying the right to sell ABC shares for $45. That's called a put option, and those aren't a problem. But derivatives get endlessly more complicated -- defaults can be mind-bending, involving a cascading series of risk buyers -- and regulators are concerned, rightly, about that market's growth.
The main problem is inadequate record-keeping. Joe Buyer sometimes doesn't know who the ultimate seller is, so he's taking it on faith the seller will make good on the deal. That's why brokers like Refco are so important. They are go-betweens that can put up money to make the deal go smoothly. If the market loses faith in the broker, watch out. This problem is multiplied by the risk appetite of short-term investors who borrow to increase returns, primarily hedge funds.
It turns out Refco, a major broker in futures and more-complicated derivatives, woefully underinvested in its "back office," the folks who are supposed to keep track of all this buying and selling. That's not comforting for a firm that is an agglomeration of more than a dozen smaller firms, acquired rapidly. It clearly isn't alone.
That there hasn't been contagion is gratifying, but the firm's troubles are barely a week old. The regulated futures brokerage has a takeover agreement with private-equity fund J.C. Flowers. The area that could pose more problems is the firm's unregulated prime brokerage business. That unit makes its money arranging private "over the counter" trades, including derivatives, without the transparency of an exchange, like the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Refco has frozen its customer accounts in this unit indefinitely.
Refco's Collapse Underscores Risks Inherent in the Derivatives MarketOctober 19, 2005 – WSJ – Jesse Eisinger
A month hasn't gone by recently without some regulator or obscure commission sounding an alarm about privately negotiated derivative deals.
If you wade through their speeches and reports, you find out there's a small problem with these fast-growing markets: Traders don't have a clear idea about who ultimately is on the other side of derivative trades that aren't executed on regulated exchanges.
The debacle at Refco, the commodities and securities firm that filed for bankruptcy-law protection this week, gives us all a reason to care about this stuff. So far the spectacularly rapid flameout has been mere spectator sport for most investors. There has been little market fallout. There is good news: Refco doesn't appear to have been a significant broker in the main area of regulatory concern, credit derivatives, where investors buy protection against bond defaults. And the longer the markets go without panicking, the lower the risk.
The bad news is that painless lessons tend not to stick.
Derivatives are designed to make markets more efficient and spread risk, and mostly work well. In their most vanilla form, a derivative allows you to, say, offset the risk of owning ABC stock, worth $55 a share, by buying the right to sell ABC shares for $45. That's called a put option, and those aren't a problem. But derivatives get endlessly more complicated -- defaults can be mind-bending, involving a cascading series of risk buyers -- and regulators are concerned, rightly, about that market's growth.
The main problem is inadequate record-keeping. Joe Buyer sometimes doesn't know who the ultimate seller is, so he's taking it on faith the seller will make good on the deal. That's why brokers like Refco are so important. They are go-betweens that can put up money to make the deal go smoothly. If the market loses faith in the broker, watch out. This problem is multiplied by the risk appetite of short-term investors who borrow to increase returns, primarily hedge funds.
It turns out Refco, a major broker in futures and more-complicated derivatives, woefully underinvested in its "back office," the folks who are supposed to keep track of all this buying and selling. That's not comforting for a firm that is an agglomeration of more than a dozen smaller firms, acquired rapidly. It clearly isn't alone.
That there hasn't been contagion is gratifying, but the firm's troubles are barely a week old. The regulated futures brokerage has a takeover agreement with private-equity fund J.C. Flowers. The area that could pose more problems is the firm's unregulated prime brokerage business. That unit makes its money arranging private "over the counter" trades, including derivatives, without the transparency of an exchange, like the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Refco has frozen its customer accounts in this unit indefinitely.
Cheney Resigning??
Seems very unlikely to me.
Sparked by today's Washington Post story that suggests Vice President Cheney's office is involved in the Plame-CIA spy link investigation, government officials and advisers passed around rumors that the vice president might step aside and that President Bush would elevate Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
"It's certainly an interesting but I still think highly doubtful scenario," said a Bush insider. "And if that should happen," added the official, "there will undoubtedly be those who believe the whole thing was orchestrated – another brilliant Machiavellian move by the VP."
Said another Bush associate of the rumor, "Yes. This is not good." The rumor spread so fast that some Republicans by late morning were already drawing up reasons why Rice couldn't get the job or run for president in 2008.
"Isn't she pro-choice?" asked a key Senate Republican aide. Many White House insiders, however, said the Post story and reports that the investigation was coming to a close had officials instead more focused on who would be dragged into the affair and if top aides would be indicted and forced to resign.
The Kremlinology continues in the wake of resolution.
Sparked by today's Washington Post story that suggests Vice President Cheney's office is involved in the Plame-CIA spy link investigation, government officials and advisers passed around rumors that the vice president might step aside and that President Bush would elevate Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
"It's certainly an interesting but I still think highly doubtful scenario," said a Bush insider. "And if that should happen," added the official, "there will undoubtedly be those who believe the whole thing was orchestrated – another brilliant Machiavellian move by the VP."
Said another Bush associate of the rumor, "Yes. This is not good." The rumor spread so fast that some Republicans by late morning were already drawing up reasons why Rice couldn't get the job or run for president in 2008.
"Isn't she pro-choice?" asked a key Senate Republican aide. Many White House insiders, however, said the Post story and reports that the investigation was coming to a close had officials instead more focused on who would be dragged into the affair and if top aides would be indicted and forced to resign.
The Kremlinology continues in the wake of resolution.
Wilma, Cat 5
Wow, the hurricane season just keeps getting weirder and weirder.
Gathering strength at a fierce pace, Hurricane Wilma grew into a Category 5 monster storm early Wednesday with 175 mph winds. Forecasters warned the storm was "extremely dangerous" and said a key reading of its pressure was the lowest ever recorded in the Atlantic basin.
Also, I stand corrected on the record-breakingness of Wilma. It's a record tier.
Wilma made history before hitting land. It is the 12th hurricane of the season, the same number reached in 1969, the highest since record-keeping began in 1851. It is also the 21st named storm, tying the record set in 1933.
The six-month hurricane season ends Nov. 30. Wilma is the last on the 21-name list for storms this year. If any other storms form, letters from the Greek alphabet would be used for the first time, starting with Alpha.
So far this year, the Atlantic has had as many hurricanes as in two normal seasons. There are 10 tropical storms and six hurricanes in the average season.
''I hope people aren't too worried. It's not time to panic. It's time to prepare,'' said Sandra Mallory, 68, of Port Charlotte.
------
Hurricane Alpha... That has to show up in Looking Backwards.
I need to find the Standard Deviation of hurricane occurances and see if I can figure out when we are offically off the guassian.
Gathering strength at a fierce pace, Hurricane Wilma grew into a Category 5 monster storm early Wednesday with 175 mph winds. Forecasters warned the storm was "extremely dangerous" and said a key reading of its pressure was the lowest ever recorded in the Atlantic basin.
Also, I stand corrected on the record-breakingness of Wilma. It's a record tier.
Wilma made history before hitting land. It is the 12th hurricane of the season, the same number reached in 1969, the highest since record-keeping began in 1851. It is also the 21st named storm, tying the record set in 1933.
The six-month hurricane season ends Nov. 30. Wilma is the last on the 21-name list for storms this year. If any other storms form, letters from the Greek alphabet would be used for the first time, starting with Alpha.
So far this year, the Atlantic has had as many hurricanes as in two normal seasons. There are 10 tropical storms and six hurricanes in the average season.
''I hope people aren't too worried. It's not time to panic. It's time to prepare,'' said Sandra Mallory, 68, of Port Charlotte.
------
Hurricane Alpha... That has to show up in Looking Backwards.
I need to find the Standard Deviation of hurricane occurances and see if I can figure out when we are offically off the guassian.
Spook
While I didn't go to yesterday's talk by Mary Roach, I was in a bookstore last night looking for something to read, picked it up to browse and got hooked.
It's pretty good and didn't live up to any of the unfounded expectations I had that it would be new age hippy, trippy stuff. It's well written, amusing and squarely within the relem of science reporting.
I would even recommend it.
It's pretty good and didn't live up to any of the unfounded expectations I had that it would be new age hippy, trippy stuff. It's well written, amusing and squarely within the relem of science reporting.
I would even recommend it.
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
The Joys of Being on Campus
They are good and bad. Last year I got to meet Alastair Reynolds, famous sci-fi author and fellow astronomer.
Today... well... not as upscale:
Visiting Speakers: Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife
Begin:
10/18/2005 10:30 AM
End:
10/18/2005 12:00 PM
Description:
What happens when we die? Does the light just go out and that's that—the million-year nap? Or will some part of my personality, my me-ness persist? What will that feel like? What will I do all day? Is there a place to plug in my laptop? In an attempt to find out, Mary Roach brings her tireless curiosity to bear on an array of contemporary and historical soulsearchers: scientists, schemers, engineers, mediums, all trying to prove (or disprove) that life goes on after we die.
She begins the journey in rural India with a reincarnation researcher and ends up in a University of Virginia operating room where cardiologists have installed equipment near the ceiling to study out-of-body near-death experiences. Along the way, she enrolls in an English medium school, gets electromagnetically haunted at a university in Ontario, and visits a Duke University professor with a plan to weigh the consciousness of a leech.
Her historical wanderings unearth soul-seeking philosophers who rummaged through cadavers and calves' heads, a North Carolina lawsuit that established legal precedence for ghosts, and the last surviving sample of "ectoplasm" in a Cambridge University archive. BIO: Mary Roach is the author of Stiff. Her writing has appeared in Salon, Wired, Outside, GQ, Discover, Vogue, and the New York Times Magazine. She lives in Oakland, California.
Location:
Redmond
Recurrence:
Workspace:
Building/Room:
113/1021 Research Lecture Room
Today... well... not as upscale:
Visiting Speakers: Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife
Begin:
10/18/2005 10:30 AM
End:
10/18/2005 12:00 PM
Description:
What happens when we die? Does the light just go out and that's that—the million-year nap? Or will some part of my personality, my me-ness persist? What will that feel like? What will I do all day? Is there a place to plug in my laptop? In an attempt to find out, Mary Roach brings her tireless curiosity to bear on an array of contemporary and historical soulsearchers: scientists, schemers, engineers, mediums, all trying to prove (or disprove) that life goes on after we die.
She begins the journey in rural India with a reincarnation researcher and ends up in a University of Virginia operating room where cardiologists have installed equipment near the ceiling to study out-of-body near-death experiences. Along the way, she enrolls in an English medium school, gets electromagnetically haunted at a university in Ontario, and visits a Duke University professor with a plan to weigh the consciousness of a leech.
Her historical wanderings unearth soul-seeking philosophers who rummaged through cadavers and calves' heads, a North Carolina lawsuit that established legal precedence for ghosts, and the last surviving sample of "ectoplasm" in a Cambridge University archive. BIO: Mary Roach is the author of Stiff. Her writing has appeared in Salon, Wired, Outside, GQ, Discover, Vogue, and the New York Times Magazine. She lives in Oakland, California.
Location:
Redmond
Recurrence:
Workspace:
Building/Room:
113/1021 Research Lecture Room
Redmond Move
So far, so good. I moved in yesterday to corporate housing and everything seems to be going well. The aparment is really a hop, skip and jump to shopping, restaurants etc. The view out my living room window encompasses both the Monorail and the Space Needle, so I can watch the train scooting back and forth a couple times an hour.
Let me just say, for the record, it does not glide as softly as a cloud, it makes a racket that could wake the dead. Trendy, styling retro-20th-centruty-futurist dead, mind you, but departed nonetheless.
Let me just say, for the record, it does not glide as softly as a cloud, it makes a racket that could wake the dead. Trendy, styling retro-20th-centruty-futurist dead, mind you, but departed nonetheless.
Hurricane Wilma
Sweet Jesus!
Although not yet a record year.
The record number of hurricanes in one season is 12 in 1969, while 21tropical storms were recorded in 1933. Although November marks the official end of the hurricane season some storms can occur as late as early December, so it seems likely that these records could be toppled this year. With only 21 names nominated for each storm season it also means that the National Hurricane Centre (NHC) in Miami will need to resort to using letters of the Greek alphabet should the record be broken.
Although not yet a record year.
The record number of hurricanes in one season is 12 in 1969, while 21tropical storms were recorded in 1933. Although November marks the official end of the hurricane season some storms can occur as late as early December, so it seems likely that these records could be toppled this year. With only 21 names nominated for each storm season it also means that the National Hurricane Centre (NHC) in Miami will need to resort to using letters of the Greek alphabet should the record be broken.
Monday, October 17, 2005
A Shot Across the Bow
Bob Herbert splashes a little "reality-based community" on the DNC:
A word of caution: Democrats should think twice before getting all giddy about the problems caving in on the Republicans and the prospects of regaining control of Congress in next year's elections.
For one thing, the Democrats' own house is hardly in order. While recent polls have shown growing disenchantment with President Bush and the G.O.P., there's no evidence that voters have suddenly become thrilled with the Democrats.
A survey taken by the Pew Research Center showed an abysmal 32 percent approval rating for Democratic leaders in Congress.
Another thing to keep in mind is that Congressional redistricting (anti-democratic in every sense of the word) has made it more difficult to oust incumbents. It would take a landslide of shocking proportions for the Democrats to win control of both houses of Congress next fall.
...
It's not enough to tell voters how terrible the Republicans are. (Leave that to the left-leaning columnists.) What Democrats have to do is get over their timidity, look deep into their own souls, discover what they truly believe and then tell it like it is.
Give us something to latch onto. Where do we go from here?
What the Democrats have to do is get off their schadenfreude cloud and start the hard work of crafting a message of hope that they can deliver convincingly to the electorate - not just in the Congressional elections next year, but in local elections all over the country and the presidential election of 2008.
That is not happening at the moment. While Americans are turning increasingly against the war in Iraq, for example, the support for the war among major Democratic leaders seems nearly as staunch and as mindless as among Republicans. On that and other issues, Democrats are still agonizing over whether to say what they truly believe or try to present themselves as a somewhat lighter version of the G.O.P.
Actually, I don't really give a damn what the Dems care about, I want them to win elections because I want a return to split party government. Government does best when it governs least and that only seems to occur they've grid-locked the place up solidly. Then we have a shot at surpluses and reducing the deficit.
If it's one thing the last 50 years have taught us, it that one party government leads to excess, corruption and loads of expensive, pointless trials.
A word of caution: Democrats should think twice before getting all giddy about the problems caving in on the Republicans and the prospects of regaining control of Congress in next year's elections.
For one thing, the Democrats' own house is hardly in order. While recent polls have shown growing disenchantment with President Bush and the G.O.P., there's no evidence that voters have suddenly become thrilled with the Democrats.
A survey taken by the Pew Research Center showed an abysmal 32 percent approval rating for Democratic leaders in Congress.
Another thing to keep in mind is that Congressional redistricting (anti-democratic in every sense of the word) has made it more difficult to oust incumbents. It would take a landslide of shocking proportions for the Democrats to win control of both houses of Congress next fall.
...
It's not enough to tell voters how terrible the Republicans are. (Leave that to the left-leaning columnists.) What Democrats have to do is get over their timidity, look deep into their own souls, discover what they truly believe and then tell it like it is.
Give us something to latch onto. Where do we go from here?
What the Democrats have to do is get off their schadenfreude cloud and start the hard work of crafting a message of hope that they can deliver convincingly to the electorate - not just in the Congressional elections next year, but in local elections all over the country and the presidential election of 2008.
That is not happening at the moment. While Americans are turning increasingly against the war in Iraq, for example, the support for the war among major Democratic leaders seems nearly as staunch and as mindless as among Republicans. On that and other issues, Democrats are still agonizing over whether to say what they truly believe or try to present themselves as a somewhat lighter version of the G.O.P.
Actually, I don't really give a damn what the Dems care about, I want them to win elections because I want a return to split party government. Government does best when it governs least and that only seems to occur they've grid-locked the place up solidly. Then we have a shot at surpluses and reducing the deficit.
If it's one thing the last 50 years have taught us, it that one party government leads to excess, corruption and loads of expensive, pointless trials.
Sunday, October 16, 2005
Was it an honor-system kind of thing? With the Devil?
McSweeney asks the Obvious Questions to Charlie Daniels about one of my favorite songs.
Now for the Catholics in the audience I realize the Devil is a real person who does this sort of thing and no disrespect (1) is intended to your belief system.
Hat tip to Volokh
(1) and by "no disrespect" I mean, well, very little disrespect(2) since you are basically afraid of another made-up-being you use as a target onto which you project your guilt and psychosis.
(2) By "very little disrespect" I mean, well, basically I mock your core values and question your fitness to raise children.
Now for the Catholics in the audience I realize the Devil is a real person who does this sort of thing and no disrespect (1) is intended to your belief system.
Hat tip to Volokh
(1) and by "no disrespect" I mean, well, very little disrespect(2) since you are basically afraid of another made-up-being you use as a target onto which you project your guilt and psychosis.
(2) By "very little disrespect" I mean, well, basically I mock your core values and question your fitness to raise children.
The Electric Kilogram Acid Test
This is an interesting development:
It's a two-story-tall contraption that looks one part Star Trek, one part Wallace and Gromit. Briefly put, it measures the power needed to generate an electromagnetic force that balances the gravitational pull on a kilogram of mass.
The general answer is that humans have always needed to quantify and standardize, to make their world more certain. Without a standard kilogram - roughly 2.2 pounds - how would scientists know their measurements of mass were accurate? Without a standard meter, how would a manufacturer make a ruler and know that it is precise?
The cool upshot of this would be a device, which would only get smaller as time goes on, people could use to create exactly one kilogram of force. Similar to the atomic clock broadcasts that are used to calibrate watches, the electric kilogram could be used to calibrate scales to arbitrary accuracy.
Meth labs around the world are rejoicing! :)
It's a two-story-tall contraption that looks one part Star Trek, one part Wallace and Gromit. Briefly put, it measures the power needed to generate an electromagnetic force that balances the gravitational pull on a kilogram of mass.
The general answer is that humans have always needed to quantify and standardize, to make their world more certain. Without a standard kilogram - roughly 2.2 pounds - how would scientists know their measurements of mass were accurate? Without a standard meter, how would a manufacturer make a ruler and know that it is precise?
The cool upshot of this would be a device, which would only get smaller as time goes on, people could use to create exactly one kilogram of force. Similar to the atomic clock broadcasts that are used to calibrate watches, the electric kilogram could be used to calibrate scales to arbitrary accuracy.
Meth labs around the world are rejoicing! :)
Saturday, October 15, 2005
Plus Shipping and Handling
I boxed up and mailed my server to my new apartment today. The cable and wiring alone weighed 10 lbs., so this was a Project a little larger than I was expecting. I took the big pieces, i.e. the server and monitors, along with a large box containing the external stroage and the aforementioned box of copper to the UPS store this afternoon. I had no real expectation for the cost, but the figure of merit floating in my head as $150 or so.
UPS guy: I have to pack the server if you want insurance.
Me: Okay.
(I had mailed a server to Geoff some years back, packed it myself, didn't insure it and, you guessed it, it arrived busted. I do not want go through that again with my heavily modded home system)
UPS: How much do you want to insure it for?
Me (calculating replacement value to self. Server cost $1500, memory + mods $500 or so... ): About $2000
UPS [looks at chart]: hmmm... for that much, they will only ship 2-day air.
Me: Okay.
UPS: What about the Monitors?
Me (replacement cost: $800 each): $1000
UPS: ok..
Me (to self:shit, out loud): Each.
UPS: [takes second look at monitors]: Okay. Now this box of drives, how do you want to ship that?
Me: I want it all together. Wires too.
UPS: Okay. Do you want to bother insuraning the drives?
Me (6 300Gig drives X $400 each =):yes, $2500
UPS: You don't have gold wires or anything do you?
Me (thinking): Noooooo...... ... No.
UPS: Okay. verify this, this and this address.
Me: Okay (verifies). What's the total?
UPS (adding ... adding ... adding): Hold on, that can't be right. (throws away tape, starts over.)
Me (to self): uh-oh..
UPS: ... ... (looks at tape).. oooooooookay. That's $825.46
Me (agape, jaw swinging freely in the breeze)
UPS: Sir?
Me (mental calculation of replacement cost of system: Server+monitors+drives + content = $9000+ ... shit! How did that happen? ... This is less than 10% of the value of the system. ... shit.): Go for it.
UPS: Yes sir! Cash or card?
Me(handing over MSFT AMEX): card.
UPS (rings up): Here you go sir! It should be there Wednesday.
Me: For 800 bucks you ought to have a host of seraphim personally fly it to my office.
UPS (without missing a beat): Yes sir, but we can't get them to work Sundays. Union Rules.
Me (Oh, is THAT my place? I'd better go stand there): hahahahhahahahahahahahhaha touche!
And that's how UPS got $825.46 to move my modded server to Redmond and where I learned a Valuable Lesson in the wit and snarkiness of UPS countervolken.
UPS guy: I have to pack the server if you want insurance.
Me: Okay.
(I had mailed a server to Geoff some years back, packed it myself, didn't insure it and, you guessed it, it arrived busted. I do not want go through that again with my heavily modded home system)
UPS: How much do you want to insure it for?
Me (calculating replacement value to self. Server cost $1500, memory + mods $500 or so... ): About $2000
UPS [looks at chart]: hmmm... for that much, they will only ship 2-day air.
Me: Okay.
UPS: What about the Monitors?
Me (replacement cost: $800 each): $1000
UPS: ok..
Me (to self:shit, out loud): Each.
UPS: [takes second look at monitors]: Okay. Now this box of drives, how do you want to ship that?
Me: I want it all together. Wires too.
UPS: Okay. Do you want to bother insuraning the drives?
Me (6 300Gig drives X $400 each =):yes, $2500
UPS: You don't have gold wires or anything do you?
Me (thinking): Noooooo...... ... No.
UPS: Okay. verify this, this and this address.
Me: Okay (verifies). What's the total?
UPS (adding ... adding ... adding): Hold on, that can't be right. (throws away tape, starts over.)
Me (to self): uh-oh..
UPS: ... ... (looks at tape).. oooooooookay. That's $825.46
Me (agape, jaw swinging freely in the breeze)
UPS: Sir?
Me (mental calculation of replacement cost of system: Server+monitors+drives + content = $9000+ ... shit! How did that happen? ... This is less than 10% of the value of the system. ... shit.): Go for it.
UPS: Yes sir! Cash or card?
Me(handing over MSFT AMEX): card.
UPS (rings up): Here you go sir! It should be there Wednesday.
Me: For 800 bucks you ought to have a host of seraphim personally fly it to my office.
UPS (without missing a beat): Yes sir, but we can't get them to work Sundays. Union Rules.
Me (Oh, is THAT my place? I'd better go stand there): hahahahhahahahahahahahhaha touche!
And that's how UPS got $825.46 to move my modded server to Redmond and where I learned a Valuable Lesson in the wit and snarkiness of UPS countervolken.
All Four Horsemen, and Their Little Dog Too
I was reading this Bill Mahr monologue (very mildly amusing) , got to the end and was just stunned at his guest list:
I want to thank my terrific panel: Salman Rushdie, Ben Affleck, Andrew Sullivan, Kayla Williams and Ann Coulter
AS, Salman Rushdie and Ann Coulter??!!???
I have to find a tape of this show.
I want to thank my terrific panel: Salman Rushdie, Ben Affleck, Andrew Sullivan, Kayla Williams and Ann Coulter
AS, Salman Rushdie and Ann Coulter??!!???
I have to find a tape of this show.
Birth Snark
I'm catching up on stuff after a few busy days at work and while I pack up. So when I took a look at Slate this morning, the first article I read was Dana Stevens' on the Scientology Birth Plan.
Yes, of course the plan is total crap, but she does a great job summing it up into one line:
Apparently pretending to all concerned that pushing a human being out your coochie is not only painless, but downright relaxing, will "save both the sanity of the mother and the child and safeguard the home to which they will go."
I was in the room when my son was born. I have no idea at all why any rational woman would ever want a second child. If I were her, I'd fill the damnable portal with cement, cover it with the Seal of Solomon and chop my husband's dick off for good measure. "silence" isn't in it.
Read the rest of the article, it's pretty funny.
Yes, of course the plan is total crap, but she does a great job summing it up into one line:
Apparently pretending to all concerned that pushing a human being out your coochie is not only painless, but downright relaxing, will "save both the sanity of the mother and the child and safeguard the home to which they will go."
I was in the room when my son was born. I have no idea at all why any rational woman would ever want a second child. If I were her, I'd fill the damnable portal with cement, cover it with the Seal of Solomon and chop my husband's dick off for good measure. "silence" isn't in it.
Read the rest of the article, it's pretty funny.
Friday, October 14, 2005
Farting Elves - 12 Days Of Christmas
There are exactly 3 people on this planet for whom this is funny and at least two of them read this blog.
It's the First Day of School for Aspiring Vatican Exorcists
Oh yes, they are serious.
"There is no doubt that the devil is intervening more in the life of man these days," Father Paolo Scarafoni told the students, most of them priests who want to learn how to tackle the demon if they should ever encounter him.
"Not all of you will become exorcists but it is indispensable that every priest knows how to discern between demonic possession and psychological problems," he said.
The four-month course, called "Exorcism and the Prayer of Liberation," is being offered for the second year by Pontifical Regina Apostolorum University on Rome's outskirts.
The about 120 students from around the world will hear lectures on topics such as the pastoral, spiritual, theological, liturgical, medical, legal and criminological aspects of Satanism and demonic possession.
The parallels here between the Catholic and Scientology Churches' approaches to neurology and psychology are just too obvious to list.
Further down in the article though, there is something practical and useful:
"When confronted with a physical aspect of Satan, your only real hope of victory lies in rolling a natural 20", says Father Scarafoni
"There is no doubt that the devil is intervening more in the life of man these days," Father Paolo Scarafoni told the students, most of them priests who want to learn how to tackle the demon if they should ever encounter him.
"Not all of you will become exorcists but it is indispensable that every priest knows how to discern between demonic possession and psychological problems," he said.
The four-month course, called "Exorcism and the Prayer of Liberation," is being offered for the second year by Pontifical Regina Apostolorum University on Rome's outskirts.
The about 120 students from around the world will hear lectures on topics such as the pastoral, spiritual, theological, liturgical, medical, legal and criminological aspects of Satanism and demonic possession.
The parallels here between the Catholic and Scientology Churches' approaches to neurology and psychology are just too obvious to list.
Further down in the article though, there is something practical and useful:
"When confronted with a physical aspect of Satan, your only real hope of victory lies in rolling a natural 20", says Father Scarafoni
Firewall
While this looks like something I might have invented, I can only imagine the dubious looks and shocked outrage if I had proposed this to any of my friends or relatives.
"You want to put a fire where?"
via boing boing
"You want to put a fire where?"
via boing boing
Photoshop Phriday
It's PP over at Something Awful and today's theme is "Game Crossovers"
I laughed out loud at the Halo take-off (scroll down).
I laughed out loud at the Halo take-off (scroll down).
The American Programmer and the Science Advantage
Back in the early '90s I was a software engineer for a company that made FEA products for the manufacturing, automotive and airline industries. I was fresh out of grad school with no formal software engineering training, but I'd been programming since I was 13 and managed to land a job. I was no great shakes as a programmer (I'm no great shakes at any kind of real engineering, mechanical, chemical or software.) and realized after a few years that I wasn't going to be happy with it. So I moved into a different aspect of development, quality assurance (it turned out I had slightly more talent for this and enjoyed it immensely) where I worked until I moved into management.
Ed Yourdon wrote a book back then called The Decline and Fall of the American Programmer, basically saying that America had about 10 years before companies started shipping their software development needs overseas. At the time, it seemed unlikely, but obviously he was right.
Freedman today suggests that the governement may finally have decided that cutting all the science out of the ciriculum may not have have been smart (and may not have producded the army of god-fearing theocrats the policy was intended to generate -Ed).
Fortunately, two senators, Lamar Alexander and Jeff Bingaman, asked the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine to form a bipartisan study group to produce just such a list, which was released on Wednesday in a report called "Rising Above the Gathering Storm."
...
The report's key recommendations? Nothing fancy. Charles Vest, the former president of M.I.T., summed them up: "We need to get back to basic blocking and tackling" - educating more Americans in the skills needed for 21st-century jobs.
Among the top priorities, the report says, should be these:
(1) Annually recruiting 10,000 science and math teachers by awarding four-year merit-based scholarships, to be paid back through five years of K-12 public school teaching. (We have too many unqualified science and math teachers.)
I think this is a good idea. Most (but not all) of the math or science teachers I had were terrible at the subject. They didn't study it in school and were forced to teach it as punishment for whatever political failure was in vouge at the school . I became a scientist in spite of most of them, not becuase of them (with 2 exceptions)
(2) Strengthening the math and science skills of 250,000 other teachers through extracurricular programs.
The risk is that the US will become the France of the 21st Century. A has-been global power more obsessed with preserving language and former cultural victories and progressing to the 22nd.
Ed Yourdon wrote a book back then called The Decline and Fall of the American Programmer, basically saying that America had about 10 years before companies started shipping their software development needs overseas. At the time, it seemed unlikely, but obviously he was right.
Freedman today suggests that the governement may finally have decided that cutting all the science out of the ciriculum may not have have been smart (and may not have producded the army of god-fearing theocrats the policy was intended to generate -Ed).
Fortunately, two senators, Lamar Alexander and Jeff Bingaman, asked the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine to form a bipartisan study group to produce just such a list, which was released on Wednesday in a report called "Rising Above the Gathering Storm."
...
The report's key recommendations? Nothing fancy. Charles Vest, the former president of M.I.T., summed them up: "We need to get back to basic blocking and tackling" - educating more Americans in the skills needed for 21st-century jobs.
Among the top priorities, the report says, should be these:
(1) Annually recruiting 10,000 science and math teachers by awarding four-year merit-based scholarships, to be paid back through five years of K-12 public school teaching. (We have too many unqualified science and math teachers.)
I think this is a good idea. Most (but not all) of the math or science teachers I had were terrible at the subject. They didn't study it in school and were forced to teach it as punishment for whatever political failure was in vouge at the school . I became a scientist in spite of most of them, not becuase of them (with 2 exceptions)
(2) Strengthening the math and science skills of 250,000 other teachers through extracurricular programs.
This is a waste of time. Just fire them.
(3) Creating opportunities and incentives for many more middle school and high school students to take advanced math and science courses, by offering, among other things, $100 mini-scholarships for success in exams, and creating more specialty math-and-science schools.
Incentives are good, although I'm not certain this is the right one. Still, it's a start.
(4) Increasing federal investment in long-term basic research by 10 percent a year over the next seven years.
Again, incentives are good.
(5) Annually providing research grants of $500,000 each, payable over five years, to 200 of America's most outstanding young researchers.
I'm not sure how you will figure out who these people are given the disparate topics.
(6) Creating a new Advanced Research Projects Agency in the Energy Department to support "creative out-of-the-box transformational energy research that industry by itself cannot or will not support and in which risk may be high, but success would provide dramatic benefits for the nation."
A new DARPA would be a great thing.
(7) Granting automatic one-year visa extensions to foreign students in the U.S. who receive doctorates in science, engineering or math so they can seek employment here, and creating 5,000 National Science Foundation-administered graduate fellowships to increase the number of U.S. citizens earning doctoral degrees in fields of "national need." (See the rest at www.nationalacademies.org.)
The risk is that the US will become the France of the 21st Century. A has-been global power more obsessed with preserving language and former cultural victories and progressing to the 22nd.
New, Seattle Address
My new physical address as of Monday:
2201 4th Ave #500
Seattle, WA 98121
(206) 728-6210
I am literally down the block from the Space Needle.
2201 4th Ave #500
Seattle, WA 98121
(206) 728-6210
I am literally down the block from the Space Needle.
Thursday, October 13, 2005
Sigh
Some still wonder why I don't trust the President or believe what he says.
At the WH Press breifing today:
Scott McClellan got asked whether the teleconference the president had with troops in Tikrit was scripted. Here's what he said ...
QUESTION: How were they selected, and are their comments to the president pre-screened, any questions or anything...
MCCLELLAN: No.
QUESTION: Not at all?
MCCLELLAN: This is a back-and-forth.
But...
I was listening to NPR this evening and on "All Things Considered" they played a sizeable chunk of the rehearsal where Alison Barber gives very specific instructions to the troops about what to do in case Bush goes off script. She then goes through a list of questions Bush is going to ask and rehearses the answers with the troops, coaching them along the way. You can listen to the entire rehearsal or read transcripts here.How did she know what Bush was going to ask if Bush and his cronies (Mclellan included) weren't involved? It seems as though Mclellan and the administration are caught up in another lie and I think this staged event is tantamount to Goebbels-level propaganda. Maybe I'm wrong, but an event this scripted and passed off as candid seems like nothing but a ruse for the American people.
When Clinton lied I was equally upset. Can this type of behvaior really be the norm for Presidents? If so, it's a damning indictment of the country as a whole.
At the WH Press breifing today:
Scott McClellan got asked whether the teleconference the president had with troops in Tikrit was scripted. Here's what he said ...
QUESTION: How were they selected, and are their comments to the president pre-screened, any questions or anything...
MCCLELLAN: No.
QUESTION: Not at all?
MCCLELLAN: This is a back-and-forth.
But...
I was listening to NPR this evening and on "All Things Considered" they played a sizeable chunk of the rehearsal where Alison Barber gives very specific instructions to the troops about what to do in case Bush goes off script. She then goes through a list of questions Bush is going to ask and rehearses the answers with the troops, coaching them along the way. You can listen to the entire rehearsal or read transcripts here.How did she know what Bush was going to ask if Bush and his cronies (Mclellan included) weren't involved? It seems as though Mclellan and the administration are caught up in another lie and I think this staged event is tantamount to Goebbels-level propaganda. Maybe I'm wrong, but an event this scripted and passed off as candid seems like nothing but a ruse for the American people.
When Clinton lied I was equally upset. Can this type of behvaior really be the norm for Presidents? If so, it's a damning indictment of the country as a whole.
Something Mildly Clever
I woke up in the middle of the night last night and couldn't manage to fall back asleep, so I started thinking about how I would prove the Four Color Theorem. (This is one of many little tricks I use to disctract myself from whatever is really bothering me and keeping me awake. It almost never works, but if I am going to be up I might as well think about something like this or Fermat's Last Theorem or non-orientable surface integrals or something like that).
(Yeah, I'm weird like this.)
I started by trying to divide up an arbitrary map using Poincare Maps. I quickly decided I didn't remember enough about Poincare Maps to have any chance with this. :(
Unfortunately, it didn't put me to sleep either.
So then I thought about Euler networks and tried to figure out if I could figure out the Euler characteristic of simple maps and expand outwards. I pondered this for about an hour, decided I couldn't get to fewer than 5 colors and finally fell asleep.
In looking up the wiki on poisson distributions below, I remembered my problem last night and try to see if there was any merit to what I was trying.
Is seems there was. :)
(although I was not as concise as the wiki version)
It's a little reassuring to know that the brain worms haven't gotten everything yet.
(Yeah, I'm weird like this.)
I started by trying to divide up an arbitrary map using Poincare Maps. I quickly decided I didn't remember enough about Poincare Maps to have any chance with this. :(
Unfortunately, it didn't put me to sleep either.
So then I thought about Euler networks and tried to figure out if I could figure out the Euler characteristic of simple maps and expand outwards. I pondered this for about an hour, decided I couldn't get to fewer than 5 colors and finally fell asleep.
In looking up the wiki on poisson distributions below, I remembered my problem last night and try to see if there was any merit to what I was trying.
Is seems there was. :)
(although I was not as concise as the wiki version)
It's a little reassuring to know that the brain worms haven't gotten everything yet.
The Statistics of Small Numbers
Dr. Nick makes an insightful observation
I’ve noticed for this blog anyway, if a post is going to get commented upon, it will be commented upon the first day it appears, and generally not thereafter. I wonder if this is true for blogs in general? I think it might be.
...
Yes. One might even expect a … wait for it… power law to apply, somehow?
I think it's more like a Poisson Distribution or, in cases where the numbers aren't so small, a Cauchy or even full-bore Guassian.
Wonkette makes a similar observation in a different context
The Huffington Post yelped, almost Drudge-style, "NBC/WSJ Poll: 2% Of African-Americans Give President Bush A Positive Rating," with the helpful modifier, "UNBELIEVABLE..." And, indeed, it is. For a good reason: It's not exactly true. While two percent grabs headlines and make Tim Russert all wriggly ("Only 2 percent -- 2 percent!" as he spurted last night), the more significant number is buried in report. Dug up by Dan Froomkin, it's this: Out of 807 surveyed for the poll, only 89 were black. As Froomkin puts it, "there is a considerable margin or error." Our statistics are rusty, but it seems like it could be high as +/- 10 percent. Sure, there's a possibility that Bush has a -8% approval ratings from blacks. Or maybe Kanye West should investigate whether NBC/WSJ care about what black people really think.
I’ve noticed for this blog anyway, if a post is going to get commented upon, it will be commented upon the first day it appears, and generally not thereafter. I wonder if this is true for blogs in general? I think it might be.
...
Yes. One might even expect a … wait for it… power law to apply, somehow?
I think it's more like a Poisson Distribution or, in cases where the numbers aren't so small, a Cauchy or even full-bore Guassian.
Wonkette makes a similar observation in a different context
The Huffington Post yelped, almost Drudge-style, "NBC/WSJ Poll: 2% Of African-Americans Give President Bush A Positive Rating," with the helpful modifier, "UNBELIEVABLE..." And, indeed, it is. For a good reason: It's not exactly true. While two percent grabs headlines and make Tim Russert all wriggly ("Only 2 percent -- 2 percent!" as he spurted last night), the more significant number is buried in report. Dug up by Dan Froomkin, it's this: Out of 807 surveyed for the poll, only 89 were black. As Froomkin puts it, "there is a considerable margin or error." Our statistics are rusty, but it seems like it could be high as +/- 10 percent. Sure, there's a possibility that Bush has a -8% approval ratings from blacks. Or maybe Kanye West should investigate whether NBC/WSJ care about what black people really think.
Civilization IV release Notes
Finally! Civ IV is ready for the streets! Release notes from Sid Meier.
I. Added Civilizations:
The Polish: Long have these hardy people existed in the unfavorable location between Germany and Russia, and have been overlooked as a major player in European history. Although much was destroyed in WWII, these proud people have outlasted the worst conditions and persevered with nothing more than potatoes and polka music. They are even America's third biggest ally right now in the fight against terror in Iraq. That tells you something!Special Unit: Polka band. Replaces the archer. This unit has a special attack that can lower the culture of any city it enters.Leaders: King Paskiewicz (seductive, warlike), John Paul II (religious, seafaring).
...
II. New Technologies
News Entertainment: Decreases war weariness via propaganda and confusion. Once you unlock this technology you may produce the special unit Bill O'Reilly. The unit may be used in an unhappy city by clouding the truth with unabashed lying and magic tricks.Prerequisites: Fascism, Television
Latin Pop Music: The discovery of this technology gives you the ability to generate a new form of happiness in the guise of festive Latin pop. It allows you to build the Latin pop radio station, making two citizens happy in your city. The downside is that you lose two production from the illegal immigrant influx.Prerequisites: The Tango, Radar
...
There is also a new Citizen type: the Blogger, which increases pollution.
I. Added Civilizations:
The Polish: Long have these hardy people existed in the unfavorable location between Germany and Russia, and have been overlooked as a major player in European history. Although much was destroyed in WWII, these proud people have outlasted the worst conditions and persevered with nothing more than potatoes and polka music. They are even America's third biggest ally right now in the fight against terror in Iraq. That tells you something!Special Unit: Polka band. Replaces the archer. This unit has a special attack that can lower the culture of any city it enters.Leaders: King Paskiewicz (seductive, warlike), John Paul II (religious, seafaring).
...
II. New Technologies
News Entertainment: Decreases war weariness via propaganda and confusion. Once you unlock this technology you may produce the special unit Bill O'Reilly. The unit may be used in an unhappy city by clouding the truth with unabashed lying and magic tricks.Prerequisites: Fascism, Television
Latin Pop Music: The discovery of this technology gives you the ability to generate a new form of happiness in the guise of festive Latin pop. It allows you to build the Latin pop radio station, making two citizens happy in your city. The downside is that you lose two production from the illegal immigrant influx.Prerequisites: The Tango, Radar
...
There is also a new Citizen type: the Blogger, which increases pollution.
Blog Errors
I'm having trouble with the blog this morning, it's chopping out text from postings. Appologies if I make even less sense than usual.
Antitrust
Trying to post this a 5th time:
Good Article in the SeattlePI on the effect of anti trust legislation.
Then there's the question of who antitrust law is supposed to benefit -- competitors or consumers. Proponents of the former argue that maintaining multiple competitors, especially in the face of a large, dominant player, is essential to protecting the latter. Others argue that near-monopoly companies (such as Microsoft and PC operating systems) are not necessarily detrimental to consumers, and if there's no proof consumers are being harmed, there's no basis for legal intervention.
The continuing antitrust fights involving Microsoft have raised a third point of contention: Whether bankruptcy law can move fast enough to deal with realities of the technology marketplace. The judgments and settlements in the government's antitrust cases seemed to be resolving yesterday's disputes tomorrow; by the case's conclusion the original point was moot.
If anything, the Microsoft-RealNetworks settlement announced earlier this week demonstrates how unresolved those first two debates are. Those who question the need for antitrust law won't find much to dissuade them from the belief that such suits are merely grabs for money, publicity or protection. Those who insist antitrust law doesn't go far enough will see just another example of Microsoft settling because it has the cash to make troublesome suits go away.
One of the best books on the law and econometrics of antitrust legislation is Richard Posner's. Definitely worth reading.
Good Article in the SeattlePI on the effect of anti trust legislation.
Then there's the question of who antitrust law is supposed to benefit -- competitors or consumers. Proponents of the former argue that maintaining multiple competitors, especially in the face of a large, dominant player, is essential to protecting the latter. Others argue that near-monopoly companies (such as Microsoft and PC operating systems) are not necessarily detrimental to consumers, and if there's no proof consumers are being harmed, there's no basis for legal intervention.
The continuing antitrust fights involving Microsoft have raised a third point of contention: Whether bankruptcy law can move fast enough to deal with realities of the technology marketplace. The judgments and settlements in the government's antitrust cases seemed to be resolving yesterday's disputes tomorrow; by the case's conclusion the original point was moot.
If anything, the Microsoft-RealNetworks settlement announced earlier this week demonstrates how unresolved those first two debates are. Those who question the need for antitrust law won't find much to dissuade them from the belief that such suits are merely grabs for money, publicity or protection. Those who insist antitrust law doesn't go far enough will see just another example of Microsoft settling because it has the cash to make troublesome suits go away.
One of the best books on the law and econometrics of antitrust legislation is Richard Posner's. Definitely worth reading.
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
Joys of Atheism
done excellently.
Theists often write and speak of the wonders and happiness their religion provides, citing miracles, doing good works for others, and security in the belief that they’ll ascend into a place called Heaven when their lives end. I have no doubts they’re sincere, and if this is what truly makes them happy, then it’s a good choice for them.
...
A common misconception that many theists labor under is the belief that the only kind people are those who follow a particular god or religion. To this, any atheist or freethinker with common sense will no doubt reply ‘rubbish.’ British philosopher Bertrand Russell, a well-known secularist himself, made the following statement in his essay ‘The Faith of a Rationalist:’ “Men tend to have the beliefs that suit their passions. Cruel men believe in a cruel god and use their belief to excuse cruelty. Only kindly men believe in a kindly god, and they would be kindly in any case.” In other words, one doesn’t have to believe in a god to be a kind person. Many atrocities in past history have clearly demonstrated that religion and kindness were worlds apart.
...
Anyone who has voluntarily left Catholicism and other conservative faiths will no doubt cite lack of freedom to make individual choices as one of their chief reasons for seeking a different path. I was no exception. In my personal experience, there was no pleasure in being told that I would have to remain celibate until marriage, even if for some reason I chose never to marry. I didn’t see the point of having the church decide the circumstances under which I could have sex, whether it be as a single or married person. I thought it both absurd and intrusive that a church had the arrogance to tell me I should never use certain kinds of birth control to prevent pregnancy. Or that I couldn’t indulge in certain sexual acts that avoided pregnancy altogether.
Since I valued my freedom more than observing the arbitrary and cruel rules of Catholicism, secularism was by far the better choice.
Theists often write and speak of the wonders and happiness their religion provides, citing miracles, doing good works for others, and security in the belief that they’ll ascend into a place called Heaven when their lives end. I have no doubts they’re sincere, and if this is what truly makes them happy, then it’s a good choice for them.
...
A common misconception that many theists labor under is the belief that the only kind people are those who follow a particular god or religion. To this, any atheist or freethinker with common sense will no doubt reply ‘rubbish.’ British philosopher Bertrand Russell, a well-known secularist himself, made the following statement in his essay ‘The Faith of a Rationalist:’ “Men tend to have the beliefs that suit their passions. Cruel men believe in a cruel god and use their belief to excuse cruelty. Only kindly men believe in a kindly god, and they would be kindly in any case.” In other words, one doesn’t have to believe in a god to be a kind person. Many atrocities in past history have clearly demonstrated that religion and kindness were worlds apart.
...
Anyone who has voluntarily left Catholicism and other conservative faiths will no doubt cite lack of freedom to make individual choices as one of their chief reasons for seeking a different path. I was no exception. In my personal experience, there was no pleasure in being told that I would have to remain celibate until marriage, even if for some reason I chose never to marry. I didn’t see the point of having the church decide the circumstances under which I could have sex, whether it be as a single or married person. I thought it both absurd and intrusive that a church had the arrogance to tell me I should never use certain kinds of birth control to prevent pregnancy. Or that I couldn’t indulge in certain sexual acts that avoided pregnancy altogether.
Since I valued my freedom more than observing the arbitrary and cruel rules of Catholicism, secularism was by far the better choice.
Open Letters to George Bush
Dear George
Econometrics is the contemporary reincarnation of Medieval Scholasticism. The only difference is that where the Scholastics carried on long disputations over how many angels could fit on the head of a pin, econometricists carry on long disputations over equations of regression that explain the constant relationships between multiple magnitudes in the economic domain. In both cases, superstition is concealed beneath a gauze of pseudo science. As with any superstition, if enough people believe it, it is true.
But, let us disregard all the pooh-bahs of complex theoretical formulas. The complexity doesn’t exist that can’t be reduced to a simple wisp of a thread even you can understand.
There are intelligent people I know who beleive the bolded part about science as well.
Excellent Use of Media Training 101
Superlative. I'd give John an "A" if he were in my media class.
I got this email from a news/spam email list I signed up for a few years ago. John Blair is a DJ at NY City's Roxy nightclub. The Roxy is a little "tired" and out of fashion.
Hi there, Mark! The rumor is NOT TRUE!!!!
MADONNA IS NOT PERFORMING at the ROXY!We've been bombarded with questions from all of you who read a posting on yahoo stating that Madonna is performing at the Roxy on Oct 22. While we live for Madonna and our doors are always open to her, please help us spread the word: MADONNA IS NOT PERFORMING at the Roxy!
John: Madonna is not playing at the Roxy
Public: Madonna is at the Roxy! Let's go!
I got this email from a news/spam email list I signed up for a few years ago. John Blair is a DJ at NY City's Roxy nightclub. The Roxy is a little "tired" and out of fashion.
Hi there, Mark! The rumor is NOT TRUE!!!!
MADONNA IS NOT PERFORMING at the ROXY!We've been bombarded with questions from all of you who read a posting on yahoo stating that Madonna is performing at the Roxy on Oct 22. While we live for Madonna and our doors are always open to her, please help us spread the word: MADONNA IS NOT PERFORMING at the Roxy!
John: Madonna is not playing at the Roxy
Public: Madonna is at the Roxy! Let's go!
Good Quote
"Nothing conveys the feeling of infinity as much as stupidity does." (Motto of Geschichten aus dem Wienerwald)
also (and lesser)
Thaurloteion: why must linux discs not work well?
Toast171: Becuase you must be a level 12 Cleric to cast them my son.
also (and lesser)
Thaurloteion: why must linux discs not work well?
Toast171: Becuase you must be a level 12 Cleric to cast them my son.
Role Reversal
During the Clinton Administration, with taxes and deficits going down, welfare recipients working and a burgeoning government surplus, I used to kid my democratic freinds by saying, "Clinton is the best Republican President never elected". This republicanism, more than any other single thing, is what the GOP hated most about him becuase he stole a lot of their issues and got them done.
Now, 10 years later, we sadly have the exact opposite. Whereas Clinton took the best of the republican ideas and made them his, the current President has taken the worst of the democrat’s ideas and succeded in bringing them home.
For example, Nick Gillespie in Reason notes:
Over the past two weeks, I've written or co-written a couple of things about how George W. Bush outspent Lyndon Baines Johnson in his first four budgets. To recap: When it comes to inflation-adjusted increases in discretionary spending (comprising most defense and nonentitlement spending), Dubya beats LBJ like Sam Houston beat Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto.
The gap becomes even bigger when you stretch the comparisons out to the first five years of each prez's budgets. Here are numbers for all recent presidents who oversaw at least five budgets prepared by American Enterprise Institute analyst Veronique de Rugy. All are based on Office of Management and Budget and all are adjusted for inflation. The Bush figure for fiscal year 2005 is based on OMB midsession review numbers; the figure for fiscal year 2006 is based on the OMB midsession review of the budget Bush submitted earlier this year (if anything, the final figures will be higher than his provisional budget):
First Five Years, Percentage Changes in Real Discretionary Spending
LBJ: 25.2%
Nixon: -16.5%
Reagan: 11.9%
Clinton: -8.2%
Bush: 35.2%
Read 'em and weep.Posted by Nick Gillespie at October 12, 2005 11:15 AM
Well, at least we know Iraq isn't a nuclear threat anymore! That was money well spent.
Now, 10 years later, we sadly have the exact opposite. Whereas Clinton took the best of the republican ideas and made them his, the current President has taken the worst of the democrat’s ideas and succeded in bringing them home.
For example, Nick Gillespie in Reason notes:
Over the past two weeks, I've written or co-written a couple of things about how George W. Bush outspent Lyndon Baines Johnson in his first four budgets. To recap: When it comes to inflation-adjusted increases in discretionary spending (comprising most defense and nonentitlement spending), Dubya beats LBJ like Sam Houston beat Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto.
The gap becomes even bigger when you stretch the comparisons out to the first five years of each prez's budgets. Here are numbers for all recent presidents who oversaw at least five budgets prepared by American Enterprise Institute analyst Veronique de Rugy. All are based on Office of Management and Budget and all are adjusted for inflation. The Bush figure for fiscal year 2005 is based on OMB midsession review numbers; the figure for fiscal year 2006 is based on the OMB midsession review of the budget Bush submitted earlier this year (if anything, the final figures will be higher than his provisional budget):
First Five Years, Percentage Changes in Real Discretionary Spending
LBJ: 25.2%
Nixon: -16.5%
Reagan: 11.9%
Clinton: -8.2%
Bush: 35.2%
Read 'em and weep.Posted by Nick Gillespie at October 12, 2005 11:15 AM
Well, at least we know Iraq isn't a nuclear threat anymore! That was money well spent.
Miss-named?
I've never seen a serious public document refer to anyone by "Miss" in decades. Technically correct, I though this went out of style quite a while back, at least when refering to anyone over the age of 18.
Was Miss Miers’ corporate practice primarily transactional (contract writing and negotiations) or was it primarily litigation? How many of her cases involved constitutional issues? What were the issues? Did Miss Miers do most of the research and writing herself? Has she argued constitutional issues before a court? How many times? In what courts? In how many did she prevail? Are there any published opinions? If so, what are the case names and citations?
To which of the Founders was Miss Miers referring in her acceptance statement, and why?
What did Miss Miers mean when she promised to keep our judicial system strong and what would she do to accomplish that commitment?
Does Miss Miers believe that the Declaration of Independence is important to understanding the U.S. Constitution?
What do the style books say?
The American Heritage® Book of English Usage says:
Many of us think of Ms. or Ms as a very recent invention of the women’s movement, but in fact the term was first suggested as a convenience to writers of business letters by such publications as the Bulletin of the American Business Writing Association (1951) and The Simplified Letter, issued by the National Office Management Association (1952). Along with many others, champions of women’s rights saw the virtues of the term and soon advocated its use in more general contexts, as is evidenced by the founding of Ms. magazine in 1972.
1 The form Ms. or Ms is now widely used in both professional and social contexts. Thus the term stands as a highly successful language reform—probably because people value its usefulness. As a courtesy title, Ms. serves exactly the same function as Mr. does for men, and like Mr. it may be used with a last name alone or with a full name: Ms. Pemberton; Ms. Miriam E. Pemberton.
2 Using Ms. obviates the need for the guesswork involved in figuring out whether to address someone as Mrs. or Miss: you can’t go wrong with Ms. Whether the woman you are addressing is married or unmarried, has changed her name or not, Ms. is always correct. And the beauty of Ms. is that this information becomes irrelevant, as it should be—and as it has always been for men.
3 Of course, some women may indicate that they prefer to use the title Miss or Mrs., and in these cases it only makes sense to follow their wishes.
So it could be her wish to be called Miss.
What's Wiki say?
Miss can be used in direct address to a woman, for example, May I help you, miss? Some women consider this disrespectful and prefer ma'am. In the United Kingdom, Miss is often used to address female teachers without using their name, regardless of marital status.
Miss was formerly the default title for a businesswoman. It was (and to some extent remains) also a default title for celebrities, such as actresses. (The poet Dorothy Parker was often referred to as Miss Parker, even though Parker was the name of her first husband and she herself preferred Mrs. Parker.)
Another notable use of Miss is as the title of a beauty queen, such as Miss America, Miss World, or Miss Congeniality.
So the choices seem to be preferred (possible), a teacher (no), a businesswoman (seems a stretch) or a beauty queen (unknown, but maybe we'll find out during the confirmation hearings).
Interesting.
Was Miss Miers’ corporate practice primarily transactional (contract writing and negotiations) or was it primarily litigation? How many of her cases involved constitutional issues? What were the issues? Did Miss Miers do most of the research and writing herself? Has she argued constitutional issues before a court? How many times? In what courts? In how many did she prevail? Are there any published opinions? If so, what are the case names and citations?
To which of the Founders was Miss Miers referring in her acceptance statement, and why?
What did Miss Miers mean when she promised to keep our judicial system strong and what would she do to accomplish that commitment?
Does Miss Miers believe that the Declaration of Independence is important to understanding the U.S. Constitution?
What do the style books say?
The American Heritage® Book of English Usage says:
Many of us think of Ms. or Ms as a very recent invention of the women’s movement, but in fact the term was first suggested as a convenience to writers of business letters by such publications as the Bulletin of the American Business Writing Association (1951) and The Simplified Letter, issued by the National Office Management Association (1952). Along with many others, champions of women’s rights saw the virtues of the term and soon advocated its use in more general contexts, as is evidenced by the founding of Ms. magazine in 1972.
1 The form Ms. or Ms is now widely used in both professional and social contexts. Thus the term stands as a highly successful language reform—probably because people value its usefulness. As a courtesy title, Ms. serves exactly the same function as Mr. does for men, and like Mr. it may be used with a last name alone or with a full name: Ms. Pemberton; Ms. Miriam E. Pemberton.
2 Using Ms. obviates the need for the guesswork involved in figuring out whether to address someone as Mrs. or Miss: you can’t go wrong with Ms. Whether the woman you are addressing is married or unmarried, has changed her name or not, Ms. is always correct. And the beauty of Ms. is that this information becomes irrelevant, as it should be—and as it has always been for men.
3 Of course, some women may indicate that they prefer to use the title Miss or Mrs., and in these cases it only makes sense to follow their wishes.
So it could be her wish to be called Miss.
What's Wiki say?
Miss can be used in direct address to a woman, for example, May I help you, miss? Some women consider this disrespectful and prefer ma'am. In the United Kingdom, Miss is often used to address female teachers without using their name, regardless of marital status.
Miss was formerly the default title for a businesswoman. It was (and to some extent remains) also a default title for celebrities, such as actresses. (The poet Dorothy Parker was often referred to as Miss Parker, even though Parker was the name of her first husband and she herself preferred Mrs. Parker.)
Another notable use of Miss is as the title of a beauty queen, such as Miss America, Miss World, or Miss Congeniality.
So the choices seem to be preferred (possible), a teacher (no), a businesswoman (seems a stretch) or a beauty queen (unknown, but maybe we'll find out during the confirmation hearings).
Interesting.
A Good List, But not Long Enough
A listing at amazon on Atheism and Morality.
Interesting, if a bit old. if I were 20 or so I might get het-up about it.
One interesting insight here:
To my mind what the authors come close to proving (in the most painstaking fashion) is that the usual definitions of God are inadequate, thereby allowing one to derive contradictions from those definitions, contradictions that prove that God, defined in such and such a way, cannot exist. For example (and several of the contributors use variations on this theme), God cannot be all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-benevolent since there exists the palpable presence of evil in the world. Actually the editors break this down more finely and throw out three categories of "disproofs" which might be called, (1) the argument to disproof from definition; (2) the argument to disproof from evil; and (3) the argument to disproof from doctrine. In the latter, what is demonstrated is that a particular formulation of God is inconsistent with a particular religious doctrine, demonstrating that THAT God cannot exist.
The astute reader will note that all three categories rest on demonstrating a disconnect between definitions. What the various authors are trying to do is NOT to prove that God does not exist, rather that it is impossible to define God in such a way that contradictions do not arise. As the editors point out in their introduction, the real task here is to show that God is a logical impossibility, and therefore, like a square circle, cannot exist.
Basically, it comes down to the simple truism, any god which can be defined cannot exist without contadicting facts observable in the universe. Since (almost) all religions depend on defining a god and embuing it with moral authority, those religions are based on something which does not exist. It doesn't mean their moral logic is necessarily wrong, it just isn't proven by their assumptions about their gods.
Hence agnogisticism or atheism.
If you're a Christian already, it won't convince you of anything since you've already made peace with the contradictions. For the rest of us, it's an interesting academic argument.
Interesting, if a bit old. if I were 20 or so I might get het-up about it.
One interesting insight here:
To my mind what the authors come close to proving (in the most painstaking fashion) is that the usual definitions of God are inadequate, thereby allowing one to derive contradictions from those definitions, contradictions that prove that God, defined in such and such a way, cannot exist. For example (and several of the contributors use variations on this theme), God cannot be all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-benevolent since there exists the palpable presence of evil in the world. Actually the editors break this down more finely and throw out three categories of "disproofs" which might be called, (1) the argument to disproof from definition; (2) the argument to disproof from evil; and (3) the argument to disproof from doctrine. In the latter, what is demonstrated is that a particular formulation of God is inconsistent with a particular religious doctrine, demonstrating that THAT God cannot exist.
The astute reader will note that all three categories rest on demonstrating a disconnect between definitions. What the various authors are trying to do is NOT to prove that God does not exist, rather that it is impossible to define God in such a way that contradictions do not arise. As the editors point out in their introduction, the real task here is to show that God is a logical impossibility, and therefore, like a square circle, cannot exist.
Basically, it comes down to the simple truism, any god which can be defined cannot exist without contadicting facts observable in the universe. Since (almost) all religions depend on defining a god and embuing it with moral authority, those religions are based on something which does not exist. It doesn't mean their moral logic is necessarily wrong, it just isn't proven by their assumptions about their gods.
Hence agnogisticism or atheism.
If you're a Christian already, it won't convince you of anything since you've already made peace with the contradictions. For the rest of us, it's an interesting academic argument.
Chinese Astronauts
The Chinese are running their second space mission in as many years. Way to go guys!
The pair of Chinese astronauts in orbit about 350 km above the Earth said they were "feeling well" and everything is normal.
A senior official has just declared the success of China's second manned space mission.
"Normal" is the most used term during the half hour since the launch Wednesday morning in the dialogue between the control centers in Beijing and remote Gobi Desert Jiuquan and the spacemen in space.
They reported to the doctor on the ground that they are well and physical conditions are good.
They were even comfortably flipping and reading flight books, proving that they felt at ease and more comfortable than Yang Liwei, the first Chinese into space who said he felt strong tremor about 120 seconds after liftoff.
The pair of Chinese astronauts in orbit about 350 km above the Earth said they were "feeling well" and everything is normal.
A senior official has just declared the success of China's second manned space mission.
"Normal" is the most used term during the half hour since the launch Wednesday morning in the dialogue between the control centers in Beijing and remote Gobi Desert Jiuquan and the spacemen in space.
They reported to the doctor on the ground that they are well and physical conditions are good.
They were even comfortably flipping and reading flight books, proving that they felt at ease and more comfortable than Yang Liwei, the first Chinese into space who said he felt strong tremor about 120 seconds after liftoff.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)