... it's got to be fair and balanced, right? Mucho gusto! (here)
Conservapedia is a much-needed alternative to Wikipedia, which is increasingly anti-Christian and anti-American. On Wikipedia, many of the dates are provided in the anti-Christian "C.E." instead of "A.D.", which Conservapedia uses. Christianity receives no credit for the great advances and discoveries it inspired, such as those of the Renaissance. Read a list of many Examples of Bias in Wikipedia
Bias?? In Wiki? Like what?
For example, even though most Americans (and probably most of the world) reject the theory of evolution, Wikipedia editors commenting on the topic are nearly 100% pro-evolution.
Wikipedia often uses foreign spelling of words, even though most English speaking users are American.
Wikipedia claims about 1.5 million articles, but what it does not say is that a large number of those articles have zero educational value.
Wikipedia has many entries on mathematical concepts, but lacks any entry on the basic concept of an elementary proof. Elementary proofs require a rigor lacking in many mathematical claims promoted on Wikipedia.
So it's un-American, un-educational and contains math.
Egad!
(via)
Friday, February 23, 2007
Thursday, February 22, 2007
"You Could Shoot Things From Orbit WIth This Thing!"
In defeat, I am making good on my promise to buy my son a gun. Given the nature of the transaction, he can kind of get any gun he wants. Today, he showed me his choice.
Misread
I thought it said "It's me and Jay Pinkerton on Bloggingheads.TV! "
cool!
but it's really "It's me and Jim Pinkerton on Bloggingheads.TV! "
FTL. I think my version would have been more interesting.
cool!
but it's really "It's me and Jim Pinkerton on Bloggingheads.TV! "
FTL. I think my version would have been more interesting.
The Circle of Life is Complete
Red Hat Linux has finally completed the slow transformation into Windows 98.
Here
After thirteen years as a loyal Red Hat and Fedora user, I reached my limit today, when an attempt to upgrade one (1) package pitched me into a four-hour marathon of dependency chasing, at the end of which an attempt to get around a trivial file conflict rendered my system unusable.
The proximate causes of this failure were (1) incompetent repository maintenance, making any nontrivial upgrade certain to founder on a failed dependency, and (2) the fact that rpm is not statically linked -- so it's possible to inadvertently remove a shared library it depends on and be unrecoverably screwed. But the underlying problems run much deeper.
Over the last five years, I've watched Red Hat/Fedora throw away what was at one time a near-unassailable lead in technical prowess, market share and community prestige. The blunders have been legion on both technical and political levels. They have included, but were not limited to:
Chronic governance problems.
Persistent failure to maintain key repositories in a sane, consistent state from which upgrades might actually be possible.
A murky, poorly-documented, over-complex submission process.
Allowing RPM development to drift and stagnate -- then adding another layer of complexity, bugs, and wretched performance with yum.
Effectively abandoning the struggle for desktop market share.
Failure to address the problem of proprietary multimedia formats with any attitude other than blank denial.
There are all the problems that linux adherents criticize about Windows (and they are, for the most part, true when they say them). All complex projects eventually grind to stagnation unless interjected with competition and market forces (space shuttle anyone?) Linux has been in this phase for awhile. I expect the ad hominem attacks on Eric to begin forthwith.
Here
After thirteen years as a loyal Red Hat and Fedora user, I reached my limit today, when an attempt to upgrade one (1) package pitched me into a four-hour marathon of dependency chasing, at the end of which an attempt to get around a trivial file conflict rendered my system unusable.
The proximate causes of this failure were (1) incompetent repository maintenance, making any nontrivial upgrade certain to founder on a failed dependency, and (2) the fact that rpm is not statically linked -- so it's possible to inadvertently remove a shared library it depends on and be unrecoverably screwed. But the underlying problems run much deeper.
Over the last five years, I've watched Red Hat/Fedora throw away what was at one time a near-unassailable lead in technical prowess, market share and community prestige. The blunders have been legion on both technical and political levels. They have included, but were not limited to:
Chronic governance problems.
Persistent failure to maintain key repositories in a sane, consistent state from which upgrades might actually be possible.
A murky, poorly-documented, over-complex submission process.
Allowing RPM development to drift and stagnate -- then adding another layer of complexity, bugs, and wretched performance with yum.
Effectively abandoning the struggle for desktop market share.
Failure to address the problem of proprietary multimedia formats with any attitude other than blank denial.
There are all the problems that linux adherents criticize about Windows (and they are, for the most part, true when they say them). All complex projects eventually grind to stagnation unless interjected with competition and market forces (space shuttle anyone?) Linux has been in this phase for awhile. I expect the ad hominem attacks on Eric to begin forthwith.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
The Vanguard League Poster
My SG had our avatars done up in Alex Ross comic book style. We're pretty thrilled with the whole thing.
This is mostly done in Bryce and Poser, btw, with a great deal of Photoshop post rendering skill. The artist, Doug Shuler, is fantastic and a player on our server.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
They Must Not Take The Precious!
Fox News seems to be going through a greiving process around the loss of Congress to the Dems and the Presidents toxic popularity. That makes sense. The only question I have is, does this represent "Bargining" or are they still back in "Denial"?
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
24 And Torture
Geoff and I are having a debate about the dipiction of torture on one of his favorite shows "24". I say the show is de-sensitizing people to the use of torture by showing it as always effective in a tight situation (basically the way the president sells it). I point out that when the US tortures or detains folks on a terrorism charge, they hold them for years, long after any potential information would be useless.
Andrew Sullivan as an interesting view here.
Andrew Sullivan as an interesting view here.
Friday, February 09, 2007
Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest 2006 Winners
Detective Bart Lasiter was in his office studying the light from his one small window falling on his super burrito when the door swung open to reveal a woman whose body said you've had your last burrito for a while, whose face said angels did exist, and whose eyes said she could make you dig your own grave and lick the shovel clean.
...
It was a day, like any other day, in that Linus got up, faced the sunrise, used his inhaler, applied that special cream between his toes, wrote a quick note and put it in a bottle, and wished he'd been stranded on the island with something other than 40 cases each of inhalers, decorative bottles, and special toe cream.
...
It was a dreary Monday in September when Constable Lightspeed came across the rotting corpse that resembled one of those zombies from Michael Jackson's "Thriller," except that it was lying down and not performing the electric slide.
...
It had been a dark and stormy night, but as dawn began to light up the eastern sky, to the west the heavens suddenly cleared, unveiling a pale harvest moon that reposed gently atop the distant mesa like a pumpkin on a toilet with the lid down.
...
The rest are here.
...
It was a day, like any other day, in that Linus got up, faced the sunrise, used his inhaler, applied that special cream between his toes, wrote a quick note and put it in a bottle, and wished he'd been stranded on the island with something other than 40 cases each of inhalers, decorative bottles, and special toe cream.
...
It was a dreary Monday in September when Constable Lightspeed came across the rotting corpse that resembled one of those zombies from Michael Jackson's "Thriller," except that it was lying down and not performing the electric slide.
...
It had been a dark and stormy night, but as dawn began to light up the eastern sky, to the west the heavens suddenly cleared, unveiling a pale harvest moon that reposed gently atop the distant mesa like a pumpkin on a toilet with the lid down.
...
The rest are here.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
Speaking of Which
This struck me as an excellent piece of snark. I might like having the Dems in power for a while if this is their attitude:
Congressman Gary Ackerman (D-NY) has an idea for Secretary of State Condaleeza Rice: Have the State Department hire all those gay linguists booted from military service. In fact, hire a whole platoon of lesbians!Yesterday, during hearings on the State Department's 2008 budget request, Ackerman noted that Secretary Rice repeatedly emphasized the importance of recruiting qualified language experts to work in the agency. Remembering that the armed forces have fired more than 300 language experts (including at least 55 fluent in Arabic), Ackerman wondered, "Can we marry up those two — or maybe that's the wrong word — can we have some kind of union of those two issues?"
"Well, it seems that the military has gone around and fired a whole bunch of people who speak foreign languages — Farsi and Arabic, etc.," Ackerman said. "For some reason, the military seems more afraid of gay people than they are against terrorists, but they're very brave with the terrorists. ... If the terrorists ever got a hold of this information, they'd get a platoon of lesbians to chase us out of Baghdad."
Congressman Gary Ackerman (D-NY) has an idea for Secretary of State Condaleeza Rice: Have the State Department hire all those gay linguists booted from military service. In fact, hire a whole platoon of lesbians!Yesterday, during hearings on the State Department's 2008 budget request, Ackerman noted that Secretary Rice repeatedly emphasized the importance of recruiting qualified language experts to work in the agency. Remembering that the armed forces have fired more than 300 language experts (including at least 55 fluent in Arabic), Ackerman wondered, "Can we marry up those two — or maybe that's the wrong word — can we have some kind of union of those two issues?"
"Well, it seems that the military has gone around and fired a whole bunch of people who speak foreign languages — Farsi and Arabic, etc.," Ackerman said. "For some reason, the military seems more afraid of gay people than they are against terrorists, but they're very brave with the terrorists. ... If the terrorists ever got a hold of this information, they'd get a platoon of lesbians to chase us out of Baghdad."
Closing a Loophole
I’ve had the gay marriage debate with a number of people who, while supportive of the theory, try to find ways out of actually supporting it, largely due to religious reasons. Personally, I think it’s fine to object to an idea based on religious reasons, just be honest about. Disingenuous libertarians have posed their position as “I’m for equal rights for everyone, but I don’t think the state should be in the marriage business at all. Therefore I wont support gay marriage because, you know, more government”. This is wrong on a number of levels both morally and logically. What they’re really saying is, “I don’t support this, so I will hedge by making my support contingent on something very unlikely, the end of heterosexual marriage. That way I don’t look like a bigot, but don’t have to expose my actual opinions”. It seems however that bluff is going to be called:
The Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance seeks to defend equal marriage in this state by challenging the Washington Supreme Court’s ruling on Andersen v. King County. This decision, given in July 2006, declared that a “legitimate state interest” allows the Legislature to limit marriage to those couples able to have and raise children together. Because of this “legitimate state interest,” it is permissible to bar same-sex couples from legal marriage.
The way we are challenging Andersen is unusual: using the initiative, we are working to put the Court’s ruling into law. We will do this through three initiatives. The first would make procreation a requirement for legal marriage. The second would prohibit divorce or legal separation when there are children. The third would make the act of having a child together the legal equivalent of a marriage ceremony.
I completely and 100% support this effort, to the extent I am writing a generous check.
Look son! All the money your army scholarship will save me is going to a good purpose! to Freedom!!!
It will be interesting to see how people make a rational argument against this that can't be turned around and be for gay marriage.
The Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance seeks to defend equal marriage in this state by challenging the Washington Supreme Court’s ruling on Andersen v. King County. This decision, given in July 2006, declared that a “legitimate state interest” allows the Legislature to limit marriage to those couples able to have and raise children together. Because of this “legitimate state interest,” it is permissible to bar same-sex couples from legal marriage.
The way we are challenging Andersen is unusual: using the initiative, we are working to put the Court’s ruling into law. We will do this through three initiatives. The first would make procreation a requirement for legal marriage. The second would prohibit divorce or legal separation when there are children. The third would make the act of having a child together the legal equivalent of a marriage ceremony.
I completely and 100% support this effort, to the extent I am writing a generous check.
Look son! All the money your army scholarship will save me is going to a good purpose! to Freedom!!!
It will be interesting to see how people make a rational argument against this that can't be turned around and be for gay marriage.
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Getting off the Gold Standard
The Almighty Dollar isn't back by gold anymore, in fact no currency is. There was a time when you could take a dollar bill to a bank and (in theory anyway) get $1 worth of gold for it. When it was decided to go off the gold standard, it was a Big Deal. The government created the fiction that it was still backing the dollar with gold, but in reality you dollar is backed merely by the credit of the US Government, with other currencies back the same way. This is all fine except when it goes wrong and you get hyperinflation spirals etc., but even there it's possible to dump value into other tangible assets for transport to other more stable countries. The upshot of the whole program as been a complex combination of lending, credit, inflation, recession and innovation that has propelled the world economy forward for most of a century.
I've always wondered though, "how much gold is there really?" which is another way of asking, "how much higher is the ceiling now than if we stayed on the gold standard?"
I ran across this today:
Finally, global gold mine production is between 2,500 to 3,000 tons per year and about 155,000 tons of gold would have been mined as of 2006, with a total value of $3.2 trillion at June 2006 prices. Underground an estimated 50,000 ton is left and booked as “reserves” on the balance sheets of mining companies.
For reference, the proposed US Government Budget for 2008 is $2.9 trillion.
Neat! :)
[As an aside, I don't really know how the anarchocapitalists tackle this problem. Anarchocapitalism seems to be gold standard type of economy, although in theory it could be backed by any asset. I should find out, but without the concept of a central bank, I think it isn't possible to pull off this fiction. I still think the biggest mistake Bremmer made in Iraq was not getting the central bank back up in 30 days.]
I've always wondered though, "how much gold is there really?" which is another way of asking, "how much higher is the ceiling now than if we stayed on the gold standard?"
I ran across this today:
Finally, global gold mine production is between 2,500 to 3,000 tons per year and about 155,000 tons of gold would have been mined as of 2006, with a total value of $3.2 trillion at June 2006 prices. Underground an estimated 50,000 ton is left and booked as “reserves” on the balance sheets of mining companies.
For reference, the proposed US Government Budget for 2008 is $2.9 trillion.
Neat! :)
[As an aside, I don't really know how the anarchocapitalists tackle this problem. Anarchocapitalism seems to be gold standard type of economy, although in theory it could be backed by any asset. I should find out, but without the concept of a central bank, I think it isn't possible to pull off this fiction. I still think the biggest mistake Bremmer made in Iraq was not getting the central bank back up in 30 days.]
Credit Derivatives
I'm working on an interesting project at the moment, part of which involves designing an art-backed credit security. The basic idea is to take a bundle of a slow, illiquid asset, e.g. art, and turn it into a credit derivative that can be traded on an exchange. In the process I have learned some interesting things:
1) It’s quite possible to build a stable index for art
2) It turns out art naturally falls into a set of stable asset classes
3) It turns out that the value of sub-classes of assets, e.g. old masters, post-modernists etc. are surprisingly well correlated
4) Most interestingly: these asset classes have long term performance statistics which are different from either stocks or bonds in terms of market index correlation.
It’s #4 there that makes this a very interesting assignment. Some days, my job doesn’t completely suck.
1) It’s quite possible to build a stable index for art
2) It turns out art naturally falls into a set of stable asset classes
3) It turns out that the value of sub-classes of assets, e.g. old masters, post-modernists etc. are surprisingly well correlated
4) Most interestingly: these asset classes have long term performance statistics which are different from either stocks or bonds in terms of market index correlation.
It’s #4 there that makes this a very interesting assignment. Some days, my job doesn’t completely suck.
Monday, February 05, 2007
Dawn Breaks Over Marblehead
oooohhhhhhhh! I get it! The Onion Editorial Cartoon is also parody!
I was wondering why "this guy really likes crying Statues of Liberty"
Sometimes I am a wee bit slow.
I was wondering why "this guy really likes crying Statues of Liberty"
Sometimes I am a wee bit slow.
Andrew Sullivan Concedes Defeat
If no evidence can change your mind, no argument assail your logic, you've left the realm where reason can aid you and you're flying on blind faith.
Which was, actually the whole point.
Here
So when I am asked to justify this belief, as you reasonably do, I am at a loss. At this layer of faith, the first critical layer, the layer that includes all religious people and many who call themselves spiritual rather than religious, I can offer no justification as such. I have just never experienced the ordeal of consciousness without it. It is the air I have always breathed. I meet atheists and am as baffled at their lack of faith - at this level - as you are at my attachment to it. When people ask me how I came to choose this faith, I can only say it chose me. I have no ability to stop believing. Crises in my life - death of loved ones, diagnosis with a fatal illness, emotional loss - have never shaken this faith. In fact, they have all strengthened it. I know of no "proof" that could dissuade me of this, since no "proof" ever persuaded me of it.
Faith is a very human thing, and every single person has faith in something (or someone). It's not a rational thing, but an emotional one. I have, in general, no problem with people having faith in things. It's when you start trying to rope reason in to "justify" faith that I step off the bus. Reason is ultimately a tool of proof, of habeus corpus, or finding what's wrong and fixing it. No matter how elaborate the argument, convoluted the logic, or loud the proponant, the existance of god cannot be justifed by reason without evidence. And, as any preacher will tell you, if you only believe because of evidence, it isn't faith.
"Blessed Are Those Who Have Not Seen, Yet Believe" John 20:19-31*
*this is also what god said to me during my first NDE when I was a kid.
Which was, actually the whole point.
Here
So when I am asked to justify this belief, as you reasonably do, I am at a loss. At this layer of faith, the first critical layer, the layer that includes all religious people and many who call themselves spiritual rather than religious, I can offer no justification as such. I have just never experienced the ordeal of consciousness without it. It is the air I have always breathed. I meet atheists and am as baffled at their lack of faith - at this level - as you are at my attachment to it. When people ask me how I came to choose this faith, I can only say it chose me. I have no ability to stop believing. Crises in my life - death of loved ones, diagnosis with a fatal illness, emotional loss - have never shaken this faith. In fact, they have all strengthened it. I know of no "proof" that could dissuade me of this, since no "proof" ever persuaded me of it.
Faith is a very human thing, and every single person has faith in something (or someone). It's not a rational thing, but an emotional one. I have, in general, no problem with people having faith in things. It's when you start trying to rope reason in to "justify" faith that I step off the bus. Reason is ultimately a tool of proof, of habeus corpus, or finding what's wrong and fixing it. No matter how elaborate the argument, convoluted the logic, or loud the proponant, the existance of god cannot be justifed by reason without evidence. And, as any preacher will tell you, if you only believe because of evidence, it isn't faith.
"Blessed Are Those Who Have Not Seen, Yet Believe" John 20:19-31*
*this is also what god said to me during my first NDE when I was a kid.
Friday, February 02, 2007
An Ad from the '80s
What's going on in this picture? Cyndi Lauper video? Bangels re-union? Soft-core episode of Family Ties?
...
Yes, I'm using wawa-wa-windows ... 386!
It's long, and normal until about 7:10. Then crack addicited monkeys take the directors chair and it goes right through the window. The attractive young man from accounting gets more than the Lotus 1-2-3 he was expecting.
amazing!
And what's up with the freakin' space shuttle???
Cat on Fire
From Slate:
Hon. Loretta Sanchez has quit the House Hispanic Caucus, claiming its chairman called her a "whore." A shocking affront to Congressional dignity! ... Wait. ... Loretta Sanchez ... Loretta Sanchez ... wasn't she the distinguished lawmaker who sent out a Christmas card showing her ... er, cat on fire? I think she was! ... P.S.: Wonkette is on the case, sort of. But instead of the scandalous flaming "cat" card they chose one with a modest surfing theme!
lolerskates!
Also above that is a gem of bad "if you can't prove it isn't false, it must be true " logic.
Hon. Loretta Sanchez has quit the House Hispanic Caucus, claiming its chairman called her a "whore." A shocking affront to Congressional dignity! ... Wait. ... Loretta Sanchez ... Loretta Sanchez ... wasn't she the distinguished lawmaker who sent out a Christmas card showing her ... er, cat on fire? I think she was! ... P.S.: Wonkette is on the case, sort of. But instead of the scandalous flaming "cat" card they chose one with a modest surfing theme!
lolerskates!
Also above that is a gem of bad "if you can't prove it isn't false, it must be true " logic.
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Baby Chloroform
Julie Aigner-Clark responds to Timothy Noah's piece which basically points out that Baby Einstien is a bunch of crap and, well.. opens herself to even more of a trouncing.
She got to spend time on the stage with the president, being hailed as "hero" in the same class as a marine or a guy who threw himself under a subway train to save someone. If I were her, I'd have quit while I was ahead.
She got to spend time on the stage with the president, being hailed as "hero" in the same class as a marine or a guy who threw himself under a subway train to save someone. If I were her, I'd have quit while I was ahead.
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