The Ivory Tower

Changes

2007-01-26T08:37:00.000Z

I've stopped blogging because lately I've felt like I have to perform my best for an audience every time I write and a lot of times I don't want to talk to an audience, I just want to talk to myself. Either I want to hammer an idea for eventual public display, or just take notes, or I know that a certain subject doesn't matter to anyone but me and I don't want to justify my writing on it. The point is I never started a blog for an audience, and it's become a hinderance to my writing. I found a new blogging service, called Vox, which displays posts based upon who has access to see them. Which mean I don't have to search through the back pages of my dashboard for any stray note I typed down two months ago. It's as easily accessable as the rest of my blog, because when I'm logged in I can see all my posts displayed normally. I've been using it for a month and, although I'll miss experimenting with the greater power of Blogger, Vox suits me better. Even if it feels too pre-packaged to begin with.

My new site is http://ivorytowerdue.vox.com and I'll start moving my posts manually from here over there whenever I feel like it.

Beautiful Things #6

2006-11-11T22:37:00.000Z

The Second Proclamation of the Prince Chulalongkorn From The King and I [1956]

There shall be no bowing like toad, no crouching, no crawling. This does not mean, however, that you do not show respect for king! You will stand with sholders back and chin high, like this. You will face king with proud expression, showing pride in self as well as in king. This is proper way for men to show esteem for one another, by looking upon each other’s faces, with kindness of spirit, eyes meeting eyes in equal gaze, bodies upright, standing as men were meant to stand.

Taxes

2006-09-13T01:53:00.000Z

I saw this this on THE FORUM 4 Ayn Rand Fans, posted by Paul's Here. It really hits home.

I need a job where I can earn enough money to pay my bills, so that I can spend the rest of my time studying. I have such a job, in fact I make enough at this job that I can even think about investing ~$150-$200/month. However, I recently discovered that the government is taking damn near 25% of my paycheck in taxes! That's over $200 per month! The government is actually stealing a week out of four from me! I'm so pissed I actually cursed loudly on the job in front of customers when I found out. So now I have to waste even more time that could be dedicated to my studies in order to find a way to suplement my income. Rat bastards.

Tax his land,
Tax his bed,
Tax the table
At which he's fed.

Tax his tractor,
tax his mule,
Teach him taxes
are the rule

Tax his cow,
Tax his goat,
Tax his pants,
Tax his coat.

Tax his ties,
Tax his shirt,
Tax his work,
Tax his dirt.

Tax his tobacco,
Tax his drink,
Tax him if he
Tries to think.

Tax his cigars,
Tax his beers,
If he cries, then
Tax his tears.

Tax his car,
Tax his gas,
Find other ways
To tax his ass

Tax all he has
then let him know
that you won't be done
till he has no dough.

When he screams and hollers,
Then tax him some more,
Tax him till
he's good and sore.

Then tax his coffin,
Tax his grave,
Tax the sod in
Which he's laid.

Put these words
upon his tomb,
"Taxes drove me
to my doom..."

When he's gone,
Do not relax,
Its time to apply
The inheritance tax.

-----------------------------------------
Accounts Receivable Tax
Building Permit Tax
CDL license Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Dog License Tax
Federal Income Tax
Federal Unemployment tax (FUTA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax,
Fuel permit tax
Gasoline Tax (42 cents per gallon)
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Interest expense
Inventory tax
IRS Interest Charges
IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
Liquor Tax
Luxury Taxes
Marriage License Tax
Medicare Tax
Property Tax
Real Estate Tax
Service charge taxes
Social Security Tax
Road usage taxes
Sales Tax
Recreational Vehicle Tax
School Tax
State Income Tax
State Unemployment Tax(SUTA)
Telephone federal excise tax
Telephone federal universal service fee tax
Telephone federal, state and local surcharge taxes
Telephone minimum usage surcharge tax
Telephone recurring and non-recurring charges tax
Telephone state and local tax
Telephone usage charge tax
Utility Taxes
Vehicle License Registration Tax
Vehicle Sales Tax
Watercraft registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers Compensation Tax
-----------------------------------------

Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago and our nation was the most prosperous in the world, had absolutely no national debt, had the largest middle class in the world....
and Mom stayed home to raise the kids.

Enforced Wage Increases

2006-08-18T15:59:00.000Z

In regards to the recently proposed and happily defeated minimum wage increase. A government enforced increase in wages is not going to benefit anyone. Employers have a certain budget for employing labour and when the price of that labour increases, no matter how incrementally, they have to off-set the cost in some way in order to maintain their profit. Either they'll have to charge more for their product or cut costs in producing it or both. The most likely method of which is simply to reduce labour, as it's the source of the problem.

In other words, if an employer has to pay more per employee, he'll make due with less employees. Just like when anyone finds a necessary increase in their budget and they have to do without something to cover the costs. The same holds true if you were to argue that a company should take that money out of their profits, because a company doesn't just sit on a pile of money. They use their profit to invest back into the company in research and development, invest it in general, or pay dividends to their shareholders. There isn't an unlimited supply of money and rearranging where it goes does not create more of it.

So when you applaud the wage increase consider your own job, are you a necessary asset to your company or are you expendable to pay for someone else pay raise? And if you think it's OK, your position is secure you could use the money, consider who's paycheck you're receiving by governmental mandate.

It's disgusting that the government puts us in this position, of sacrificed and sacrificee, by rearranging wealth.

Update [8.18.2006 @ 5:53 pm]: I've submitted various forms of this post [edited depending upon the space I'm allowed] as letters to the editor to Purdue's Exponent, The Journal and Courier, and The Indianapolis Star.

Update [8.22.2006 @ 1:37 am]: I've got a confirmation call from all three newspapers, and my letter was published today in The Exponent. We'll see about the others, but I'm tinkled pink about it! Of course I'm keeping print copies; I may just frame them! ^_^
After reading over it in the paper, I really wish I could have expanded a few points and made my argument more explicit, but I think it was good for this format that I remain brief. I'm not sure, since I know what I meant to argue by each statement, but did my brevity do disservice to my clarity? I'd really appreciate an outside opinion on this, since it's my first LTTE.

Update [8.23.2006 @ 5:36 pm]: The Indianapolis Star has published my letter today. I'm going to run down to town today and pick up a paper. Still waiting on The Journal and Courier to see if I'm 3 for 3!

Update [8.25.2006 @ 5:33 pm]: An here's a link to the LTTE page in The Journal and Courier where mine is printed [scroll down to "Sacrifice comes with increased wages"].

Update [8.25.2006 @ 5:33 pm]: An ARI press release.

Scott Fitzhugh

2006-08-18T15:32:00.000Z

Watch, I command it. ---> Linky

Scott isn't always right, but he uses his head well. And this video alone is enough to put him on my top ten "list of people who are human".

A taste: "I've never really understood people who say gas costs too much."

Visiting "God" Again

2006-08-16T09:31:00.000Z

A little over a year ago I posted my ponderings over the validity of a metaphysically existent god, ie. in this plane/universe/realm/dimension. I wanted to know the answer to the question, "does god exist?" I concluded that to exist one must literally be in existence, that is, the modern notion of god as an infinite-unknowable-ethereal-being is ludicrous. But I was stumped by the claim that god is in existence, is knowable, and does have a definite identity all of which we simply don't yet have conclusive evidence.

What confused me about such an argument is that I knew arguing for either the proof or disproof of god on no evidence are both impossible and silly to attempt, but I didn't yet grasp the implications of that impossibility. I didn't understand where to go from there and I was stopped at the false dichotomy without a proper understanding of the correct third option. I guessed it had something to do with how one goes about gaining knowledge [epistemology], but no clear idea of what that meant.

Now, a year later, I've learned a lot with the help of excellent conversation with my friends Nick, Coire, and Peter. Now that it seems so clear I kind of wonder, rereading John Stark's comments, why it wasn't so obvious then. So, I'm going to explain my new understanding, though I don't think I'm saying anything new to those of you who understand the issue already and to those of you who don't, I don't think I can say anything which will make you understand if you haven't yet thought about it. This is purely for my own benefit.

We as humans very literally can't know anything on no evidence; or to put it positively, we know by evidence. We make observations and find the logical implications of those observations by reason. In the absence of observation there are no logical implications to discover, no conclusions to be made, literally nothing to say.

Put it another way: The conversation that helped me to finally glean this insight was one about truth in which Coire asked, if a man is proven guilty and sentenced but is later released on the grounds of new evidence which proves his innocence, is the original verdict true? Assuming the jury made no errors in judgment given the evidence they were provided, it was the introduction of new evidence and not the realization of faulty reasoning which proved the man's innocence.

The answer is yes, it was true within the context of the given evidence. And what about within the context of that same evidence plus that which was discovered later? It is silly to say. It is like asking if there are snow storms in North Dakota to which the proper answer is yes, then asking if there are snow storms in North Dakota in July, and claiming a "no" answer refutes the truth of the previous answer. They are both correct, both true, but only within the context of the evidence given for the conclusion.

Truth is not reality. Reality is as it is with or without our knowledge of it. Truth is what we correctly derive from our observations reality, but our observations are neither infinite nor boundless.

And so, when asked whether or not I think god exists, my answer is no longer a no [I don't think it was ever a yes]. My answer is: there is nothing I can say about god.

Starbucks

2006-08-03T01:17:00.000Z

How do you get along with co-workers? That's what I wish they'd ask me again.

In the last week I had an interview to be a barista at Starbucks. I was passed over for the position and someone else was hired. I remained persistent in talking with the managers, so much so that I was worried I'd become a pest, because I really wanted to know what I had done wrong or what I could do better. I discovered that I gave the impression that I would have difficulty getting along with customers and fellow workers, that I wouldn't be able to form the bonds that are so unique to Starbucks. That's what I had been anticipating.

While reviewing my interview in my mind this had been a knot of uncertainty, I didn't know if I had conveyed myself accurately. I understand that when I was asked that same question, "how do you get along with co-workers", I responded that I didn't very well. And that's true, I didn't get along with my co-workers very well, but it's not the whole truth. That was my error, where I had an oppourtunity to shine I remained blunt.

I should have explained why it is that I've spent the past two months hunting a job at Starbucks, why I've been so persistent. I should have said that I know Starbucks is all about the atmosphere. I know that you can get coffee almost anywhere, but Starbucks is the only place where you can relax among friends and sip a little coffee on the side. That's what I love about Starbucks so much, they've taken my favourite free-time activity and offered it to me any time I want for the price of a tall coffee frappuccino with an extra shot of espresso and light whip [$3.50].

I should have said that Starbucks is one of my favourite places to go and it would be only too wonderful if, for now, I could work there. I should have explained that I have a job now, a decent job at which I could conceivable do well and rise among the ranks. But I don't get along well with my coworkers because it's a fast food place and they're all harried with their own jobs. There's very little room to get along well with each other. I should have said that I try to crack a joke, be friendly, and cheer someone up when they're upset about upset customers, but that it's all secondary to my job where I'm supposed to be as fast as I can. Don't get me wrong, fast food isn't evil, they just sell speed instead of comfort and so "getting along" is rather a non-issue and often gets in the way.

I should have said that it bores me having to repeat lines at customers because when I try to be frank and friendly I get reminded that I'm going too slow. I should have said I enjoy speaking happily with customers and coworkers, that It'd be fun to play with the menu for customers the way Starbucks employees do rather than reluctantly saying, "no, we don't carry that". In short, I should have said that I don't get along well with my coworkers and that's precisely why I want to work at Starbucks so single-mindedly. Because I'm a cheerful and open person and even though I have to pay the bills I want to have some fun doing it. I want to work in a place where I have the oppourtunity, nay am encouraged, to get along with coworkers and customers.

What you have just read seriously illustrates my problem. I write better than I speak, and speak better in retrospect than at present. More to the point, I speak very well (as in the physical action of speech) with diction, clarity, and assertiveness. But what to say, that's what I can never get right the first time. I can't seem to speak my mind without giving it at least ten minutes of thought first as to what exactly I mean to say and in what words to best say it. My powers in that area are restricted to small witty commentary among friends, on which I've actually been highly complimented.

So now, I'm encouraged to try again in six months. We'll see if I can learn to communicate properly by then. I hope this has helped.

Lady Liberty On a Religious Bender

2006-07-10T00:48:00.000Z

On Tuesday July 4th in Memphis, Tennessee the World Overcomers Outreach Ministries Church erected a statue in the image of Liberty with a bizarre Christian metamorphoses.

Instead of the book she cradles the two tablets of the ten commandments in her left arm. In her right she raises aloft a cross rather than the torch of liberty. Reportedly, 'Jehovah' is written across her crown and there is a single tear rolling down her cheek. Lady Liberties wretched twin is named The Statue of Liberation Through Christ.

From The New York Times:

The statue, inspired by a Memphis church that has three giant crosses, strikes him [pastor Apostle Alton R. Williams] as "a creative means of just really letting people know that God is the foundation of our nation," he said.

Mr. Williams has written several books and pamphlets analyzing a variety of matters, among them patriotism and the original intent of the founding fathers.

In "The Meaning of the Statue of Liberation Through Christ: Reconnecting Patriotism With Christianity," he explains that the teardrop on his Lady is God's response to what he calls the nation's ills, including legalized abortion, a lack of prayer in schools and the country's "promotion of expressions of New Age, Wicca, secularism and humanism." In another book, he said Hurricane Katrina was retribution for New Orleans's embrace of sin.

Mr. Williams said his statue's essential point was that Christianity should be the guiding ethos of the nation [...]

Nota Bene: the links to The New York Times will probably go defunct. I'll keep a personal copy for reference if anyone has questions.

Contemporary Minimalism

2006-06-24T23:24:00.000Z

"One of Britain's most prestigious art galleries put a block of slate on display, topped by a small piece of wood, in the mistaken belief it was a work of art."

This bit of news from Reuters, courtesy Nicholas Provenzo at Rule of Reason, is just too precious. The Royal Academy apparently doesn't know art from a paving stone.

I'm Not Usually Squemish About Bugs...

2006-06-24T05:31:00.000Z

... But this thing is in my house! ::horrified girly scream::

"House Centipede
(Photo Courtesy of Lindy Miller, Vigo County CES Educator)"
Picture taken from The Plant and Pest Digital Library of Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana

Famous Phrases #1

2006-06-23T17:12:00.000Z

Nothing irritates me more than when you're trying to have a conversation and the other party uses these famous phrases to support their argument from a commonplace. Let me clarify, a 'commonplace' is my term for an idea/theory/prejudice/what-have-you that is common in society and nearly universally accepted [usually by training/default and without thinking about it]. Commonplaces range from the good [killing people is wrong] to the bad [faith heals]. I think Ayn Rand would call them bromides but I'm not sure of her exact use of the word, I've only seen it used as a derogatory. Anyway, people tend to use these ideas in arguments because they expect it to be a point of agreement. In itself, I think this is a pretty good strategy for communication because you can build from where you agree without having to review redundant material.

Now, what gets me is when you don't in fact agree with the commonplace that another is trying to use. More often than not the other guy hasn't even thought about it. He doesn't accept it because it makes sense, he accepts it because he's been told to or everyone else does or he's always thought that or any number of inexcusable reasons. And so, when you point out that you don't agree with some commonplace [for those familiar with arguing Objectivism, an example would be: "actually, I don't think taxes in general are a good idea"] they don't have a reasoned out response, they don't take a step back and first rationally establish the commonplace. Instead, they repeat an oft heard phrase which essentializes the idea beautifully with all the intellectual content of horse shit, on the premise that "some witty man said it and we all agree so it must be true, after all it rhymes". I cayn't stan' it!

So, in this series [and I hope it'll be a series] I'll introduce such a phrase, identify the commonplace it shelters, and explain why such an idea isn't cogent. Because I'm sick of being confronted with such "arguments" and being at a loss for words, I'll do this every time I'm thus confronted and hopefully I can use these ready-made retaliations in the future.

Our first subject is: "we can't really know".

At the surface this may seem simple lack of information, but in such a case one would say "don't know", as in the information is not presently available but may be pursued. No, 'can't' denotes an inherent lack of information, as in the nature of man is such that the information is impossible to retrieve.

There are two ways that a person can mean this and both have to do with how the purveyor of these catch-phrases thinks man understands his surroundings [epistemology]. The first is that he claims man's senses are invalid in some way and therefore one's perception of reality is flawed from True Reality. Just walk away, by his own admission this man can't deal with reality thus it's a waste to attempt to deal with him.

The second way in which he can use that phrase is in what is generally considered a scientific way. That is, he means that nothing is proved until you check every instance, that the only conclusive information we have is when something has been disproven. In order to really know something, he thinks that one must show that it is true in every instance throughout time and space, test every eventuality. He rightfully concludes that this is impossible because humans aren't omniscient, they aren't able to possess infinite knowledge.

His error lies in his understanding of what is true, he confuses truth with reality. He's right in thinking that one must look to reality to find what is true, but he's wrong in thinking that means that truth and reality are the same thing. Reality simple exists, it is as it is and nothing more. Truth is established from reality, but it must undergo a process of being established and it consists in the rational conclusions drawn from necessarily finite observations. Truth is not the same thing as reality though they relate intimately with one another there is a subtle difference. He errs in thinking that there is some sort of Real Truth, some omniscient understanding of reality that goes beyond observation, that is infinite observation. So when he says "we can't really know", he's admitting to a fallacious understanding of truth which leads him to believe that it's impossible to achieve and we have to get by on temporary guesses that don't mean anything because it's not Real Truth.

Blog Feed

2006-06-17T17:00:00.000Z

I'm currently reading up on blog syndication. I'm thinking I want to add a feed to The Ivory Tower. However, I'm new to this and I'm sort of teaching myself as I go. So ... DISCLAIMER: I can't program myself out of a box; The Ivory Tower may act wonky while I mess around with things. If anyone has any advice, or if you notice something wrong, please tell me. I'll update my progress.

Update [6.17.2006 @ 6:36 pm]: I went with Feedburner, which was recommended by Blogger. It was a lot easier than I had thought, but then these services are rather pre-packaged and user friendly, so that helped. When I got it all set up, I decided the side bar was getting way too crowded so I cut the quotes section, culled my links, and did a little rearranging. I think it still looks a bit busy but it's better, and at least it's organized. If you find it distracting, please tell me.

What's New

2006-06-16T21:48:00.000Z

Lately I've been spending a most of my time reading. Here's some of what I've read in no particular order:

Flatland by Edwin A. Abbott - A math nerd classic, it's a short novel relating the travels of a square through various spatial dimensions. It reads like a mini version of Gulliver's Travels. It gets tedious during the flights of fancy like when Square is describing, in terrible detail, the social ascension of shapes, but the narrative picks up after he's through detailing social conventions. I found it interesting because I'm trying to explicitly define concepts like 'shape', 'space', 'figure', and 'line'. It gives food for thought.

Have Space Suit-Will Travel by Robert A. Heinlein - I'm wary of Heinlein. He can be a great writer; moving, dramatic, insightful, and appealing to the individualist. But sometimes he's spectacularly disappointing. Take Stranger in a Strange Land for example, it started off nicely with the introduction of the main character to humanity then devolves into a surreal romp through religious fanaticism. Then there's Future History, which is full of brilliant characters [most of whom are trapped in impotence or suffering] and amazing stories [most of which either end abruptly without resolution or peter out pathetically]. So, I earlier concluded that Heinlein is a wonderful writer who also happens to be a pessimist and likes to torture his characters. I avoided him carefully. Have Space Suit-Will Travel has none of these faults. Heinlein hit a home run with this one. Just to illustrate the character of the novel, my favourite part was ... SPOILER WARNING ... in a scene where an alien race is on trial before an intergalactic committee, the speaker asks if anyone will speak on behalf of them, defend them, or be character witness; no one speaks. The main character says:

"That was my chance to be noble. We humans were their victims; we were in a position to speak up, point out that from their standpoint they hadn't done anything wrong, and ask mercy - if they would promise to behave in the future. Well, I didn't. I've heard the usual Sweetness and Light that kids get pushed at them - how they should always forgive, how there's some good in the worst of us, etc. But when I see a black widow, I step on it; I don't plead with it to be a good little spider and please stop poisoning people. A black widow can't help it - but that's the point."

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card - I read this book because I like science fiction and fantasy but I know very few who write in the genre and are, at the some time, competent or challenging writers. Most sci-fi/fantasy is the worst possibly fluff, literary cotton candy. A friend emphatically argued that Card is good, and he'd been recommended before, so I thought I'd give it a shot while I have time. This was my review [hurray for copy/paste, the great time-saver]:

"I flew through Ender's Game in only one day and you're right that Card's writing is much better than your average Joe Sci-fi. He handles plot/characters fairly deftly and I'm shocked [and professionally impressed] by how desperately painful the novel is. I had hoped, though, that this brilliant suffering was leading to some glorious climax. But the whole novel seems ... like there's no hope, no action, only manipulation and deceit; I found that disturbing. Ender never conquered the forces at work against him, he was used, abused, and cast aside to lick his wounds and go off on his own. I'm really hoping this is only the set-up for the next novel and that Ender, as brilliant as he is, becomes a true hero instead of a tool. That would be magnificent, but I can't help but think that the next novel will degrade into Ender's quest to atone for "crimes" of which he had no consciousness."

I haven't read the sequel yet, nor have I read anything else of Card's, but I suspect he's going to be a lot like Heinlein in the same hit-or-miss sort of way.

The Double Helix by James D. Watson - A first person narrative account of the discovery of the structure of DNA by Watson and Crick. It was interesting in a historical sense but I'm biased against Watson [I think he's a mooching twit], and his extensive explanations of how he was constantly trying to cheat out of the work he was given a fellowship to do didn't help my opinion of him. I couldn't finish it out of disgust, as much as Francis Crick interests me.

"Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" by Richard P. Feynman - This is somewhat autobiographical; it's a collection of stories told by Feynman. It reads like you are sitting down at a party with Feynman and he is regaling you with his adventures. I really would have liked to meet Feynman, he was humourous and honest and curious in a way that makes you stop. I think that if I had to sum him up in one word, I'd say "wonder". He was a great physicist. I don't think we would have agreed about a lot of scientific matters, but it would have been a wonderful conversation and we both would have tried to learn something from the other. My favourite quote is when he talks about his experience with mind-readers:

"All the time you're saying to yourself, 'I could do that, but I won't' - which is just another way of saying you can't."

Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams - Adams is the famous author of the Hitchhiker's Guide. Though it's amusing, I don't think the Guide is his best work. It's horribly fragmented from massive multiple conversions into different media and toward the end gets kind of over-drawn like a popular television series that's gone on one season too long. Adams wrote two novels around the character Dirk Gently: this and another, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul. These are almost unknown, but are much better than the Guide. They both have the same delightful characteristic wit of Adams but they are each properly structured into a complete novel. And besides, Dirk Gently is a babe, there are few men half as interesting as him. To say that Dirk is eccentric and witty is to say that stars are rather hot. At one point a ghost tries to manipulate his thoughts and desires:

"He said in a low savage whisper, 'If anyone can hear me, hear this. My mind is my center and everything that happens there is my responsibility. Other people may believe what pleases them to believe, but I will do nothing without I know the reason why and know it clearly. If you want something, then let me know, but do not you dare touch my mind.'"

If you're familiar with the work of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, especially Rime of the Ancient Mariner, you'll appreciate the novel all the more because it draws many parallels and bases a lot of the humour on such inside knowledge. I also kind of think Adams is making fun of Scientology, either that or L. Ron Hubbard borrowed liberally from Coleridge. It's mystery novel, as well as a little science-fictiony, so you need to pay attention to details and follow conversations closely.

Other books I've read, by am not reviewing right now: Choke by Chuck Palahniuk, Newton Philosophical Writings edited by Andrew Janiak, The Character of Physical Law by Feynman. Currently reading: Number: The Language of Science by Tobias Dantzig. Planned future reading: The Universe by Isaac Asimov, From Copernicus to Newton: The Birth of a New Physics by I. Bernard Cohen, Dialogues Concerning Two Sciences by Galileo, and The Crime of Galileo by Giorgio de Santillana. If anyone has any information or advice about my future reading I'd be delighted to hear it. Especially about The Crime of Galileo, it's a biography that claims not to candy-coat the incidents in favour of Galileo by gratuitously lambasting the Catholic church. I was intrigued by that, but wary about the truth of it. ::raised eyebrow::

You Know You're a Bibliophile When...

2006-06-16T20:18:00.000Z

... Having to move your books becomes a major factor in whether or not you're going to move to save $100 or more on rent.

Don't let this happen to you.

Anniversary ... Say What?

2006-06-09T12:00:00.000Z

Holy expletives, Batman, I've been doing this for a year! Well, happy birthday to me. ^_^

Something Beautiful #5

2006-06-08T02:21:00.000Z

If you've never heard of Art Nouveau or Art Deco, it's really time you had. They are of the more modern art movements and like most modern-ish art tend toward defying any sort of definition. And I'm not really interested in supplying a definition because, in my experience, there is always something someone will call Nouveau or Deco which will contradict whatever I could come up with [for example, Gaudi's fascination with formless blobs]. Instead, I'll explain what it is that I'm referring to when I say Nouveau or Deco and why it is I love that.

The wonderful thing that I think best characterizes both Nouveau and Deco is that it is functional art. They enliven menial everyday items with inspirational art, not by pasting art on top of things, but by making the style an integral/natural part of the structure of the things one creates. Nouveau does it in a flowing, curvy, often described as "whiplash" style (usually busy). Deco does it in a geometric, angular, bare-bones sort of way. But the same glorious idea that I adore applies to both: beauty and elegance are necessary in the structure of living, and not to be added as an after-thought. Here are some cherished examples:

A door by an artist I haven't been able to identify.

Cover art by Nick Gaetano of The Romantic Manifesto by Ayn Rand.

Update [6.14.2006]: Special hello to visitors from Rule of Reason!

New Blog: American Renaissance

2006-05-28T20:51:00.000Z

American Renaissance run by Steven Brockerman is a delightful blog which showcases inspirational men and women at their finest. In his own words:
American Renaissance highlights and celebrates those individuals who, through their virtuous choices, tireless efforts and stunning achievements, embody the American ideal of self-made success.
Reading Borckerman's blog is a great way to remind yourself that it can be done!

I'd especially like to point out his two piece series on Kenneth Iverson, The Man of Steel. Thanks to Bruno at The Simplest Thing for the tip.

'Price-Gouging'

2006-05-25T17:19:00.000Z

This cartoon by Cox and Forkum very elegantly sums just about all I have to say to the bastard, where ever/who ever he is, who is screaming, "PRICE-GOUGING! I demand reparation, O Legislators, for I am being gouged!"

Seriously, I just read this update from the House Committee on Energy and Commerce about the anti-price gouging legislation that recently passed 389-34 in the House:

"Among the bill's highlights:

Directs the FTC to define "price gouging," "wholesale sale" and "retail sale" through rule-making within six months of enactment.
Provides for strong civil enforcement by the FTC and by states' attorneys general, and criminal enforcement by the U.S. attorney general and the Department of Justice.
Provides for civil penalties for price gouging.
For "wholesale sale" violations, the penalties are three times the ill-gotten gains of the seller, plus an amount not to exceed $3 million per day of a continuing violation.
For "retail sale" violations, the penalties are three times the ill-gotten gains of the seller.
Requires any civil penalty imposed to be deposited into any either account or fund used for paying compensation to consumers for violation of state consumer protection laws or into a state's treasury general fund.

Provides for criminal penalties.
"Wholesale" violations will be punishable by a fine of up to $150 million, imprisonment for up to two years, or both.
"Retail sale" violations will be punishable by a fine of no more than $2 million imprisonment for up to two years, or both." [Bold added]

People are calling it toothless especially in light of the more recent FTC report on price gouging which says very basically:

"In its investigation, the FTC found no instances of illegal market manipulation that led to higher prices during the relevant time periods but found 15 examples of pricing at the refining, wholesale, or retail level that fit the relevant legislation’s definition of evidence of “price gouging.” Other factors such as regional or local market trends, however, appeared to explain these firms’ prices in nearly all cases. Further, the report reiterated the FTC’s position that federal gasoline price gouging legislation, in addition to being difficult to enforce, could cause more problems for consumers than it solves, and that competitive market forces should be allowed to determine the price of gasoline drivers pay at the pump."

But still ... I have to laugh or I'll cry. People are just so god-damned eager in their demands for the government to tell us what to do and how to do it.

The Price of Money

2006-05-17T21:58:00.000Z

My best friend is an economist and we frequently have discussions about political economy. I don't write about the things I discover from those precious conversations nearly enough. As a result I forget some of the more specific things and have a lot of unnecessary repetition. So, this is just the latest thing and I'll try to be more consistent about documenting my thoughts. He has a much more thorough write-up, as he's the economist, on his blog.

The current consensus of what a currency is worth apparently is: the price of money is the interest rate. Never mind which interest rate, lets just say all interests rates. This is because one charges a price, some amount of money, which is interest for one's money.

I disagree.

First of all, you are not trading money for money; that would be ridiculous. What you are trading is the temporary use of your money for money. You trade a service for a price. So interest rates are not indeed the price of money, but the price of the use of money. Which is why one charges more interest for more potentially 'damaged'/lost money, that's called risk.

Secondly, if we were to determine the price of money we couldn't get an accurate price by assessing only one thing for which it is traded [i.e. the use of money]. When determining the relative price of money we need to consider all of the ways in which it is paid for. For example, when one buys money with a delicious coffee beverage [Starbucks], how much delicious coffee beverage must one pay for the money? Many different kinds of goods and services, including the use of money, are exchanged for money but only looking at one such instance can't tell you what the currency is relatively worth; only the collective productive effort that you can buy with it can.

So the price of money is not its interest rate, but its overall purchasing power.

Keeping the Faith at Arms Length

2006-05-11T22:15:00.000Z

Here's a good article from the New York Times via the new TOS blog. Alan Wolfe reviews three books about the founding fathers and their relationships with religion, two of which report that the FF were minimally religious. The other claims religion was integral to them.

First couple paragraphs:

Like most of his colleagues on the religious right, Tim LaHaye, a co-author of the best-selling "Left Behind" series, insists that "those who founded this nation" were "citizens who had a personal and abiding faith in the God of the Bible." If LaHaye means only to say that religion has played an important role in American history, he is surely correct. But if he is taken literally (as a believer in the inerrancy of the Bible should be), he is decidedly wrong. It is one of the oddities of our history that this very religious country was created by men who, for one brief but significant moment, had serious reservations about religion in general and Christianity in particular.

According to David L. Holmes's "Faiths of the Founding Fathers," none of the first five presidents were conventional Christians. All were influenced to one degree or another by Deism, the once-popular view that God set the world in motion and then abstained from human affairs. John Adams, a Unitarian, did not accept such Christian basics as "the Trinity, the divinity of Christ, total depravity and predestination." Thomas Jefferson cut and pasted his own Bible. Before he became president, James Madison wrote the "Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments," a classic text in the history of religious liberty. Our fifth president, James Monroe, gave his name to a doctrine, but it had nothing to do with faith; in fact, Monroe may have been the least religious of all our early presidents.

UPDATE: Weird New Trend?

2006-05-11T18:56:00.000Z

I've been scanning the news in my inbox for a reference to Christian responses over The Da Vinci Code to see if this renewed tendency toward violence is for real, or just a coincidence. I found this article from the New York Times: Christian Foes of 'Da Vinci Code' Mull Tactics.

It covers the different strategies that various churches are talking about using against the movie. They are largely non-denominational; the types of strategies run across the various flavours of Christianity. The range of ideas go from the evangelical-educational type like throwing "Da Vinci Code parties" for friends and politely explaining how it's blasphemous [see Constable Visit-The-Ungodly-With-Explanatory-Pamphlets of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch for a practical example], all the way up to suggestive references of how the Muslim community would handle affrontery.

I think this really illustrates the difference between the way a sane person of Western culture would behave and the behaviour of the fanatically religious. The kind of 'uprising' the Western person recommends involves boycotting, writing, and talking as opposed to burning, destroying, and killing. Dr. Brook made a very astute statement to that effect at the Unveiling the Danish Cartoons at USC panel discussions. [Sorry I don't have a quote, the discussion is available free for now online at The Ayn Rand Institute website on the Registered User Page; registration is free].

BTW: I just want to point out one humourously ironic statement by a religious man who proposes that Christians see the movie for sake of debate, "It's very important for some Christians at least to be able to engage in an intelligent discussion." Too true, I don't know how Christians survive without it.

Weird New Trend?

2006-05-10T12:52:00.000Z

While catching up on some blog reading this morning I came across two separate incidents of renewed fondness for fundamentalism among Christians. The first was tucked in the comments section of Jason Roth's Save the Humans [from 3.18.06], and expresses a wish that the recent violent Islamic outrage against depictions of Muhammad serve as an example against similar depictions of Jesus:

Let's hope the National Endowment for the Arts will learn from the reaction to that danish cartoon which parodizes Islam and think twice before funding anymore art which defames Christ Jesus!

The next was a news article posted by Nicholas Provenzo on The Rule of Reason. In the Reuters article Cardinal Arinze is quoted as urging Catholics to pursue some un-named legal recourse against those who insult Christianity. Most eerily, he cites respect for others beliefs as a fundamental right and hints at other religions that wouldn't tolerate such disrespect. The pertinent statements of Arinze are [emphasis added]:

"Sometimes it is our duty to do something practical. So it is not I who will tell all Christians what to do but some know legal means which can be taken in order to get the other person to respect the rights of others,"

"This is one of the fundamental human rights: that we should be respected, our religious beliefs respected, and our founder Jesus Christ respected,"

"Those who blaspheme Christ and get away with it are exploiting the Christian readiness to forgive and to love even those who insult us. There are some other religions which if you insult their founder they will not be just talking. They will make it painfully clear to you,"

As Mr. Provenzo points out, Arinze obviously has no idea what rights and respect are, though he throws the terms around quite a bit. Interesting to note, Arinze calls respect a "fundamental human right"; that is, fundamental to being human. But if this were true he'd have to respect the beliefs of the artist. No, what he's doing is demanding respect for Christian beliefs, by force if necessary, and legitimizing it by selectively applying the popular egalitarian idea that everyone deserves respect. Wrong on both counts. See what happens when you get sloppy with terms; when you confuse respect for the fact that a person was born with respect for their achievements since then [see my post on manners]. You allow room for all sorts of bad ideas to sneak by casually. That he is a follower of Jesus and advocating a policy which is specifically not turning the other cheek [calling one of Jesus' primary laws a "readiness"] is beside the point; but still worth mentioning because it's hilarious.

What's really creepy about these statements is that they're honouring religious violence. I mean, I thought Judeo-Christians abandoned that centuries ago and matured into passive aggressive moral domination. Does this signify a call to revert back to the good old days of the Medieval Age, or is it just a coincidence? I very much hope the latter, even though the former would show the perversion of religion more concretely.

Mr. Provenzo says:

Arinze's statement is disturbing; it indicates that even the more Westernized religious creeds are drawing inspiration from militant Islam in seeking to coerce belief. I count that as among one of the worst philosophic signs I've seen in years.

I agree.

TOS Events

2006-05-10T12:20:00.000Z

I've recently discovered that, in addition to publishing a most excellent journal, The Objective Standard posts audio files, free of charge, from their past lectures. Since I'm quite limited in transportation and funds, I couldn't be more thrilled! I hope it's a great source of advertisement for them.

TOS hasn't yet posted an audio file for their most recent event, the debate between Dr. Brook and Mr. Finkle on eminent domain, but I'm particularly looking forward it. Nicholas Provenzo wrote an overview of the debate on The Rule of Reason.

New Posting Policy

2006-05-06T22:32:00.000Z

This is a policy I've always followed somewhat intuitively but I decided to make it explicit in order to avoid minor incidents of self-doubt when it comes to posting. I'll only post on topics that interest me; there are two different ways that a topic interests me which decides how I will handle posting. The first is: I want to write about the topic or some aspect of it. The second: that I don't have anything to add to the conversation but am still interested in it, want to keep a record of it, and possibly relay information. Like I said, this isn't a radical change, I've pretty much been doing this all along. The only difference is that since I've now explicitly decided this, I won't refrain from posting a topic without writing an original analysis/opinion or feel guilty when I do.

Latin Essay #4 and [Hopefully] Final

2006-05-03T23:17:00.000Z

If anybody has any editing remarks or suggestions feel free to comment.

In his poetry Virgil writes using predominantly concepts that are immediately obvious physically as opposed to abstract concepts. He does this in two ways; the first of which is the way that he describes an idea by using concrete terms, representing a physical scenario for an abstract idea. He also very often replaces an abstract with a personification, as did most Romans. The second way in which Virgil writes in concretes is fundamental to the Latin vocabulary. The literal meanings of these words confuse the modern English reader, until one imagines the physical description of the word. Only then can an abstract meaning be discovered.

Virgil will take an abstract idea, a concept that generally involves a complex interaction, and instead of outright naming it he describes it circuitously. He lays out a scene in which the emotion, ideal, principle, etcetera is implied but never explicitly stated. By laying out this concrete he makes the idea immediately, perceptually, obvious without leaving it to the reader to explicitly understand the abstract concepts involved. As in the beginning of his Ecloga I, lines seven through ten, Tityrus says, “illius aram saepe tener nostris ab ovilibus imbuet agnus. ille meas errare boves, ut cernis, et ipsum ludere quae vellem calamo permisit agresti”. He doesn't name sacrifice claiming it is unfortunate. Instead, he conjures the pitiful image of a tener agnus nostris ab ovilibus, and note that the poor little lamb isn't “sacrificed” as such; he very physically wets/dampens the altar. Virgil doesn't say that this sad scene is nonetheless necessary, he makes no moral arguments. He simply points out that it is illius aram, for that god's altar; and as every good Roman was aware, fealty to the gods is of the utmost importance. Similarly, he doesn't state that by offering such fealty Tityrus is now well-off. He doesn't use a complex term like “well-off”, which demands a prerequisite understanding of what constitutes being well and whole definition of morality. He evokes an example saying that Tityrus's chattel are able to roam and that he is free to play what he wishes. This visual scene of wellness is then attributed to illius, which reinforces the idea of a necessity to the sacrifice but does so through images instead of philosophical arguments.

Another good example of Virgil's veracity for using sensory description instead of abstract terminology is when he discusses the habits of bees in the Georgicon four, lines 198 to 199. He describes the bees mating habits, “nec corpora segens in Venerem soluvunt”. Whereas we might say bees don't “make love” with all its underlying meaning and nuances, Virgil hits straight for a most sensual description of the act of making love. Also notice that he doesn't say “love” because love is a highly involved emotion it isn't obvious enough. He refers, instead, to Venus, a shining epitome of love, which everyone can readily recognize and understand.

This demonstrates an interesting characteristic in Roman literature for using gods as the ultimate physical example of what they represent and care for. So that Mars, for example, isn't just some superhuman who delights in massacre and is in charge of ensuring its continuance. He is destruction as his very essence, and destruction is Mars. In this odd way Romans encapsulate an unwieldy idea, or group of ideas, into a single physical entity so that they can hold the whole of it in their minds at once, without necessarily using abstract terminology. The most pronounced instance of this that I recall is in the first Georgicon line 297. Virgil writes, “at rubicunda Ceres medio succiditur aestu”. First of all when he means to say that the period of summer has ended and the winter season begun he says that summer has literally been cut down, destroyed, almost at the hands of winter. As though the two seasons were in actuality fighting for dominance and winter happened to win out. Next he uses the image of the literal harvest being too long in the sun in place of the concept of the end of summer.

The next method I've identified in which Virgil makes a perceptual experience out of his poetry is by the Latin language itself. He uses verbs which by their very meaning denote a concrete, tactile, portrayal of a concept. Take the verb tendere for instance, it literally means to stretch out, to extend or reach. Yet in book five of the Aeneid line twenty-seven he uses it to convey an abstract idea, saying, “frustra cerno te tendere contra”. In this situation Virgil conveys a spiritual straining, a force of effort, by saying that the helmsman is stretching or reaching out against some obstacle, namely the sea.

Latin also evokes a perceptual understanding of certain actions by modifying a direct verb with what would be a preposition in English to denote a more abstract form of that same basic action. For example, perfacere in Virgil's text, “en, perfecta tibi bello discordia tristi” from the seventh book, line 545, of the Aeneid. The simple root of this verb is facere [to do or make] but by modifying it with per- [through] we get to do through, or to do/make in succession. In English this would means something like to accomplish. Now, it takes a special effort in English to fully understand “to accomplish”. You must recognize that it is referring to goals and that goals may not be done in one action, one can't physically do it. It takes a coordinated series of actions to accomplish. This is exactly what the Latin is laying out in very concrete terminology for the reader, it is literally saying that a goal has been done through.

Finally, Latin can use verbs to stand for more highly abstract phrases simply by convention. This is seen by the common use of adeo in Virgil. I found three examples simply by scanning a few selections in the Georgics [1.287, 3.242, and 4.197]. Adeo literally means I come, a simple concrete action easily done and immediately understood by readers. But when used at the beginning of a verbal demonstration it signifies the introduction of an argument. The speaker has physically come to a point. Even though Latin has a specific term for “thus”, Virgil [and indeed, many other Latin authors] use the more concrete “adeo” instead.

Virgil is purposefully putting his work on the most perceptual level possible, making every situation and idea a sensory experience for the reader. He does so by employing concretes to replace abstract ideas. First, by using physical scenarios to describe a highly complex concept. And, next, by replacing actual concepts with godly personification. Though such metaphorical inversions are common in poetry, Virgil exclusively creates a concrete from an abstract, not the other way around. Virgil also writes concretely by using perceptual verb constructions in his Latin. Now, to say whether Virgil creates this sensory experience out of personal inclination or from a rampant worldview among classical Romans would require a more holistic account of the Latin language.

Latin Essay #3

2006-05-02T00:07:00.000Z

Ok, so scratch that. I can't write an essay about Latin as a whole with only Virgil to look at. Since it's an essay my subject has been broadly chosen for me - Virgil's poetry. Now, I can narrow that to the language Virgil uses, and make my theme the perceptual nature of his language.

On what do I wish to write?
The use of Latin vocabulary by Virgil.

Also, I am going to get rid of the whole "perceptual understanding of the world". It assumes too much about the writer's motives and smacks of psychoanalysis. Although it was an intriguing thought, trying to write about it is making me slightly nauseous. I still want to point out the prevalence of perceptual wording in Virgil but I am not going to go off on an unfounded rant about what it means for his cognitive habits.

What is it that I wish to say with this subject?
Virgil writes using predominantly concrete concepts.

Since I'm no longer talking about Latin as a whole nor trying to deduce Virgil's [or a Roman's] world view from the selections, I'm going to go with both methods that I identified of employing concretes.

Latin Essay #2

2006-05-01T19:31:00.000Z

I've identified two ways in which Virgil displays his largely perceptual understanding of the world in his writing. The first is that he uses concretes ideas in place of abstracts. He does this by employing a concrete where an abstract is meant; as in "tenui meditaris avena" (you meditate with a slender stalk) to mean you dote upon or adore. Also, he does this by replacing an abstract idea with a physical scenario which implies the idea. For example, he writes "illius aram saepe tener nostris ab ovilibus imbuet agnus" (a tender lamb from our fold often stains the altar of that god) when he is referring to an unfortunate but necessary sacrifice. Next, there are his actual words. As I've demonstrated with perfacere, in order to indicate abstract actions such as to accomplish the Latin language takes simple concrete verbs and modifies them.

As compelling as the first argument is I am going to exclude it from my essay and focus only on the modification of verbs. This is because my only source for this essay is the poetry of Virgil. And since the first type I identified is a method of arranging words commonly used in poetry I don't think it is appropriate to use as evidence. Though, in poetry one can use abstracts to represent concretes also and Virgil exclusively represents abstracts with concretes, it would take an exhaustive account to demonstrate that claim and I don't wish to write a book on the subject.

I'm thinking of reserving this for the end. I generally pick one common argument against my case and refute it at the end of my essay. So, I can use this to address the argument that my piece only looks at poetry. I specifically choose my examples because they are common words throughout all of Latin rather than only constructions of Virgil.

Latin Essay and The Art of Nonfiction

2006-04-30T19:51:00.000Z

Since it's the end of the semester I invariably have a few essays to write as finals for my classes. For my fourth level Latin course I'm supposed to write an essay about the Latin language (thank god, not in Latin). The professor didn't give us any restrictions as to the subject matter, so long as it deals in some way with Roman Latin, as we've spent the semester translating Virgil.

I'm also currently reading The Art of Nonfiction by Ayn Rand, and so thought that I could use this oppourtunity with a wide open essay to practice the principles of writing that she teaches. Even though she seems to be speaking specifically about articles, I think the same principle applies to essays, so long as a put it in a more formal format. The first step is to define your subject and theme which are, respectively, about what are you writing and in what way will you present it.

This makes sense considering my experience with writing. I've always preferred the theme aspect to the subject. It's what makes the essay interesting. There's absolutely nothing more dull than forcing yourself to write an impartial factual account, without being able to convey what the events mean. Of course the subject is important too, it comes first and is literally the stuff of the piece. Just as an onion is only an onion, but a saute makes an onion savory; subject and theme are: what is it and what are you going to do with it.

So, I start my essay with a basic exercise: write out the subject and theme of your piece. Miss Rand identifies a most excellent point in prescribing beginner's to go through this exercise, no matter how rudimentary. You don't really know something until you can convey it (whether written or oral, or better yet, taught).

On what do I wish to write?
The use of Latin vocabulary by Romans.

What is it that I wish to say with this subject?
That Romans had a perceptual understanding of the world as seen in the concrete nature of their concepts.

What I am not going to discuss in this article is epistemology and Rand's theory of concept formation. That is much too broad for my subject. Instead, I will take it as given and only mention the ideas as they are necessary to the connection between my subject and theme.

The reason I chose this subject is that vocabulary is the aspect of the Latin language that I am most comfortable with. Syntax, meter/poetry, grammar, and clause constructions are all very new to me and I don't feel at all confident in my ability to write about them. I chose the theme because it is an aspect of the language that immediately struck me while translating because I've recently become interested in concept formation and it's roles in both cognition and social dynamics.

Ok, now I need to find concretes to demonstrate my claim ...

Funny Cartoons

2006-04-29T22:52:00.000Z

A friend recently introduced me to Amy Winfrey's work. She's an animator from California who works on a few side projects which posts on the web. Her animation is professional and her stories witty, satirically funny. They're delightful to watch, short and sweet.

Making Fiends - This is the best, in my opinion. It has the most complete plot structure and is the longest running. The basis of the plot revolves around the conflict between Vendetta and Charlotte, of which Charlotte is happily oblivious. It goes like this, Vendetta is a nasty girl who subjugates her teacher and class mates with apparent alchemical powers. She hates Charlotte because Charlotte is sweet, innocent (annoyingly so), and totally unaware that she should be afraid of Vendetta. Charlotte thinks Vendetta is her best friend and is always delighted when Vendetta gives her 'presents'. A quote:

Vendetta: Enough! Don't torment me anymore! For your birthday I'm going to do something special for you. I have decided to throw a party at you. [maniacal laughter]
Charlotte [reading invitation]: 'Come to Charlotte's birthday party or you will be shot. When: this Friday. Where: Vendetta's backyard. Why: because Charlotte is stupid.' Hee hee, yippee!

Muffin Films - This is a series of very short skits about muffins with personality. There are self-righteous muffins, alien muffins, scared muffins, obsequious muffins, vengeful muffins, dancing muffins; muffins of every variety!

Big Bunny - One giant carnivorous bunny plus three stupid children who went out looking for a dog one day makes for many suggestive stories.

The Root of "Perfect"

2006-04-28T19:19:00.000Z

Ok, so I know I've been posting on an unprecedented scale and this is not something I could ever maintain. But I just had to write down this sudden personal revelation because I've been pondering the meaning of perfect and what is perfection for a while and this is a very big clue for understanding. Disclaimer: I'm an amateur Latin student, not an etymologist. This is not an 'official' or historically accurate etymology, it is a connection I found between perfect and a Latin equivalent. Take it as a folk etymology, and I'll research it's validity later [I have a Latin test I'm supposed to be studying for!].

Let's start with the base [wink wink, nudge nudge]. Facio/facere is the Latin verb for "to make or "to do". You add per- [through] to get perfacio/perfacere, which means "to make/do through", or more commonly in English "to accomplish". The perfect passive participle of this verb is perfectus/perfecta/perfectum which means "having been accomplished" [in the various genders]. For example: "en, perfecta tibi bello discordia tristi;" [in no particular word order, if you know Latin] means "Behold, sad discord/dissension/strife having been accomplished/perfected in war for you".

So "perfect" in English comes from something having been accomplished [or perfected]. What that something is, I'm not entirely sure yet but I have an idea.

Update [4.28.06 11:12 pm]: I've discovered the Latin etymology book I bought sucks. It doesn't explain any of the meanings, it just lists English words that come from a certain very common Latin root. So I went to Online Etymology Dictionary and it has to say [brackets are added by me for clarity and bold for emphasis]:

... from L. [Latin] perfectus "completed," pp. [participle] of perficere "accomplish, finish, complete," from per- "completely" + facere "to perform" (see factitious). Often used in Eng. as an intensive (perfect stranger, etc.). The verb meaning "to bring to full development" is recorded from 1398 ...

So, I was correct in essence, but I still need to think about how this applies to the concept of perfection. Here's something interesting:

... Perfectionist is 1657, originally theological, "one who believes moral perfection may be attained in earthly existence;" sense of "one only satisfied with the highest standards" is from 1934.

The concept of a perfectionist originally developed in the mid 17th century. I'm thinking "may be attained in earthly existence" refers back to the idea that perfection is something accomplished (facio --> I do) as opposed to perfection being Platonic in the sense that it is an ideal that can never be realized.

Something Beautiful #4

2006-04-28T11:54:00.000Z

I was just looking through my pictures of Chicago and I can't help but love America again. I can't stay mad. But I shake my finger at people who would erode the fundamental rights that make America so precious.

A look west upriver on Wabash Ave.

On Wabash Ave. just before a bridge over the Chicago River

Chicago financial district, a block or so east of Sears Tower

Sears Tower, up close and personal

Looking northeast from the Sears Tower

Looking out at Chicago from Navy Pier

Oil Fiasco ... Again

2006-04-28T06:28:00.000Z

I've been coming across articles about gas prices and the government's response a great deal recently. But I don't have the strength of stomach to sift through all of them, identify the fallacies, address them, and provide links. There's just too much garbage and it's too repetitive for such meticulosity to be of worth. I'm just going to write my own ideas on the matter.

So, what's the problem here? For some reason [I'm going to leave the reason to the economist] the price of gas has increased which is costing Americans more money. This upsets the American because he needs gas to fuel his car to get to work to earn money to buy things like bread and milk etc. He feels his rights are being violated and demands that the government resolve this atrocity. The government responds by demanding that the oil companies refund some of their profits, lower their prices, and/or repeals the companies tax breaks/subsidies.

Forgive me if this sounds old hat, but I'm going to address my arguments specifically toward those who are calling for oil company blood. Mostly because I'm angry and frustrated and need to articulate myself.

Firstly, there is no such thing as a right to oil. Even if oil is the only means to your job; there is no such thing as a right to a job. Even if a job is the only means to your survival; there is no such thing as a right to survival. By virtue of the fact that man must act in order to live you have the right to act, and to the consequences of those actions, so long as those actions don't interfere with other's right to act and retain the products of their actions (ie murder, theft, fraud). Every freedom and right that you have is derived from this most fundamental right. Free speech, free association, freedom of religion, and of press, etc. are all just examples of your broader right to do as you wish without infringes the rights of others. The right to property, and the sole direction of it, is simply the corollary right to the products of your actions. This is what is meant by life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is your life to maintain and do with as you please.

This means you can seek a life/job/oil, but no one is obligated to provide you with such. At first this may sound cruel [I know many who've claimed so], but examine the alternative. Who will provide you with this life/job/oil? Your means for living must come from somewhere; if not from yourself then from whom, at whose expense? Who are you going to make your slave? I posit that the cruelty, the brutish ignorance, is not that these things aren't provided for you, but that anyone would claim it must be.

Lets tie this principle back to the oil companies. It is their oil, not yours. They buy it, store it, refine it, package it, ship it, and however they so choose - sell it. No one has any authority to demand that they do any of this in any way; least of all the government whose prerogative it is to protect rights, not violate them. The oil companies are under no obligation to sell you oil at a price that you like, and you are under no obligation to buy from them. They are not your slave, you are not theirs; as humans you must interact mutually.

The oil company willingly produces gas and sells it in order to make a profit. Just as you willingly do what you do in order to make a profit. Imagine the consequences of what you're demanding of the oil company in regards to your own business. If you're a construction worker, what happens when consumer thinks your manager is charging too much for houses? A lawyer; what happens when everyone has a 'right to representation', who's going to set your pay? Oh, you're a teacher. Well, I think you know what happens when every child has a 'right to education' and the government sets your pay. But the oil companies are different you say, they're rich. Would you dare claim it isn't wrong to usurp the property of an oil company because they have more of it and can 'afford' to lose some? Stealing from a millionaire or a teacher is stealing all the same.

If it isn't profitable for you to buy gas and drive to work, then don't do it. Do something that is profitable. For example, I purposefully live near where I work and go to school. I walk, ride bike, bus, and when I absolutely need better transportation I buy a cheap efficient scooter/motorcycle. It's mine and your choice to drive a car or not, and accept the expenses of that or not.

Hark! In the distant I hear the faint whine of, "but they're gouging..." Yes, and exactly what is gouging? I've yet to hear any complainant offer a definition for this. The closest I can figure is that it means that consumers feel they're being taken advantage of. But, how is that? The oil companies aren't lying to you about their product or prices, they're not forcing you to buy it. I damn well know you can choose not to have a car, or not have responsibilities that necessitate a car. So, please, tell me where is this gauging. I'm begging to be enlightened.

No, what "gouging" is, is a term people throw around to justify legally endorsed and executed theft. It's better if it's not defined, then it can mean whatever you imply it to mean. If no one looks too carefully, you can magically get the government to steal for you just by chanting "gouging".

And, what's that you say? Oil companies receive subsidies from taxpayers and so they 'owe' you? Ah, taxes! I'm glad you brought it up! You are entirely right to feel cheated when it comes to taxes, you are being stolen from. Imagine it, the government forcibly takes [dare you not to pay your taxes if you take issue with my terms] money from everyone every year, removes a percentage for administrative costs and the expense of performing this great scandal, then distributes to the rest on services you could very well have gotten yourself. That is at it's best; at it's most honest it steals from the rich and/or industrious to give to the poor and/or lazy; charity at gunpoint.

The oil companies shouldn't receive subsidies. More to the point they shouldn't be taxed and regulated to death so that begging stolen money is the only way to stay in business. And, you shouldn't have to beg stolen money in the form of exemptions every year either. There's no reason why both you and the oil company shouldn't keep and do with your money as you like; except enforced charity. But taxes are another vile story that will be told at a later date.

Yay!

2006-04-28T06:18:00.000Z

Apr 28, 2006 5:44:11 AM [UTC]: 1000 visitors

**Small celebratory dance in honour of me** ^_^

Another Good One...

2006-04-28T05:23:00.000Z

I love this song because of the amazing sound, which Nick dubbed "rocky-retroy-dancy". I'm going with Punk Nouveau. Think White Stripes, Franz Ferdinand, The Killers, The Strokes, Fall Out Boy, and The Bravery, of course. But more importantly (because I'm a lyric nazi) I love the tongue in cheek demand for love when he's aware he hasn't earned it. The fact that he calls unconditional love "something for nothing" is so pleasantly unexpected.

Unconditional by The Bravey

I've spent my whole life surrounded
and I've spent my whole life alone
I wonder why I never wonder why
The easiest things are so hard
I just want, I just want love
I just want, I just want love
I just want, I just want love
I just want something
Something for nothing
Something, something for nothing

I'm a beggar and I'm a chooser
I'm accused, I'm an accuser
But nothing's unconditional

I hold the whole world accused
I've only got myself to blame
I wonder why, I never wonder why
The easiest things are so hard

I just want, I just want love
I just want, I just want love
I just want, I just want love
I just want something
Something for nothing
Something, something for nothing

I just want, I just want love
I just want, I just want love
I just want, I just want love
I just want, I just want love
I just want something
Something for nothing
Something, something for nothing

I'm a beggar and I'm a chooser
I'm accused, I'm an accuser
But nothing's unconditional

Manners

2006-04-25T05:27:00.000Z

Recently I've been contemplating basic human relations and communicating. And so while reading Contact by Sagan, a line where Ellie and Ken are walking along the Vietnam memorial caught my attention. It goes, "It's hard to kill a creature once it lets you see its consciousness." This statement really helps me to elucidate an idea that's been broiling just below explication in my mind. In 'seeing' the consciousness of another individual one is directly confronted with the reality of this entities humanity.

We experience in a very immediate way our own emotions, thoughts, fears, wonders, desires, heartaches, and joys. And, even though it is obvious that other humans experience this too as humans, it isn't immediately obvious in the sense that we necessarily experience it (you might experience it in speaking with a great friend, but not with the face in the crowd).

This is the basic principle behind manners. One is conscientiously recognizing that another human is in fact human. That, regardless of your feelings toward them, they are a self-contained entity, directing their thoughts and actions as you do. This principle may manifest itself in various forms, official standards [the difference between American and European styles of utensil holding come to mind], but the principle still holds. One is to behave as a human and treat others as such.

To put this concretely, the young man behind the cash register at Wendy's isn't a robot who is automatically programmed to take your money and produce for you food. It's his job, for whatever reason he's chosen to trade his services for money. He may not be good at it or even really know what he's doing, but he is the one who is doing it. Or the lady walking in front of you on the sidewalk. She's not a moving roadblock, an impediment in your way; you shouldn't treat her as such. She's going somewhere and is thinking about it, maybe anxiously, maybe expectantly. The polite thing to do would be to ask her to move aside, look her in the eye and see that she's a person.

Manners are respecting that someone is human, no more, no less. Respect encompasses more than that. I'm not yet certain how to define respect, but merely being human does not qualify one for it; being rightly human does. This brings up the issue of morality and what is right, but I don't want to get into that here. I just want to differentiate between manners and respect, in which manners are granted by virtue of being and respect/admiration/love is earned.

The Funniest Thing on the Web Today

2006-04-25T00:32:00.000Z

Duking it Out with Iran by Jason Roth

There are still Republicans who seem to think there are underground student groups in Iran with the ability to overturn their government. Who exactly are these superheroes and how can I meet one? Is there some kind of Hall of Justice, or are they more like X-Men, like underground guardians, biding their time until when they're truly needed? I'm waiting for Wolverine versus Ahmadinejad. And I don't even read comic books.

Please, please, tell me that isn't the reason Bush is holding back with his football. Seriously, I have no idea what motivates our government to so tip-toe around war. Like if we just do it a little at a time then it won't be so bad.

In and of itself war is a nasty thing, you kill people, but you do it because otherwise they'd kill you. Maybe Americans can't say they're at war because they can't say what is worth war.

Something Beautiful #3

2006-04-19T05:45:00.000Z

Profound kudos go to Bruno T. Raymundo at The Simplest Thing for identifying this:

Invictus by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

My 7th grade English teacher had this posted on a wall near my desk and I read it every day, but she didn't include a title or author. So, thank you Bruno, for reintroducing me to something I thought was lost.

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT

2006-04-07T22:28:00.000Z

If you live in the West Lafayette area and also oppose the recently passed smoking ban I encourage you to voice your opinion. Kris Knigga has set up an e-mailer for those who want to declare their opposition to the common council. This is his letter (he has a form that automatically fills in the blanks):

From: (your name here)
To: The West Lafayette City Government
Subject: About the smoking ban...

Dear (recipient name),

As a member of the West Lafayette Community, I would like you to know that I do not support the recently passed smoking ban.

I believe that dining in a restaurant or visiting a bar is not a fundamental right, but a luxury. People in our community can choose where they will dine or with whom they want to do business. If a non-smoker decides they don't wish to patronize an establishment that allows smoking, they are free to do so. This makes the smoking ban solely a matter of convenience, not of necessity.

In the same way, no employee is forced to work at an establishment that allows smoking. As Americans, we have the freedom to choose for whom we will work and can choose to work in a smoke-free environment if we do not appreciate second-hand smoke. In fact, Tippecanoe County's largest employer, Purdue University, chooses to be smoke free, along with many other businesses. So again, this is a matter of convenience, not of necessity.

Freedom of Association is an inherent right that Americans hold, guaranteed to us by the Bill of Rights. To deny business owners and smokers the choice of participating in a legal activity goes against the very spirit of our nation. We must uphold the principle that it is never acceptable to deny rights to one group of people simply for the convenience of another group.

Furthermore, I believe that the economic harm caused by this ban will outweigh any good that might come of it. I believe that this ban will result in restaurant and bar business being shifted to Lafayette, causing a loss of business in our city. West Lafayette already has smoke-free establishments for those who choose to visit them. By forcing all restaurants and bars to be smoke-free you take away an advantage that smoke-free establishments hold with non-smokers.

For all of these reasons and more, I ask you to do what you can to repeal the smoking ban before it can take effect.

Thank you for your consideration,

(your name here)
(your street address here)
West Lafayette, IN

The first three paragraphs I agree with entirely. While I still agree with the next two paragraphs, I think they miss the key issue here (which is of rights), though they're probably the arguments that will be the most convincing. For example, Kris argues freedom of association. Though he's correct, I'd say the more pertinent argument is the right to property, because of which one is able to have freedom of association. (Freedom to associate comes from the right to own property and dispense with it as one chooses). By dictating how an individual may or may not run their business the government of West Lafayette is violating the citizens' right to do with their property as they see fit.

I understand, though, Kris is directing his letter to the most pressing of the fallacious arguments used by those in favour of the ban.

I can't get it out of my head ...

2006-04-07T01:33:00.000Z

... But it's so good. Jason Mraz is a self-styled lite-rocker. But his lyrics tend to be so wordy (impressively so, and refreshingly witty) that it's rap-ish and he's the only one I know who does it well. I'm normally a classic and punk rock person, but Mraz is very entertaining and benevolent. And as I indicated, his lyrics get stuck in your head easily.

Geek in the Pink by Jason Mraz

(do do do...)

Well let the geek in the pink take a stab at it.
If you like the way I'm thinkin' baby wink at it.
I may be skinny at times but I'm phat fulla rhymes,
pass me the mic and I'm a grab at it.
Isn't it delicious crazy way that I'm kissin' this,
baby listen to this, don't wanna miss it while it's hittin'.
Sometimes you gotta fit in to get in,
but don't ever quit cause soon I'm gonna let you in, but see...

[Chorus]
I don't care what you might think about me
You'll get by without me if you want...
Well, I could be the one to take you home;
baby we could rock the night alone.
If we never get down it wouldn't be a let down.
But sugar don't forget what you already know,
that I could be the one to turn you out.
We could be the talk across the town.
Don't judge it by the color, confuse it for another.
You might regret what you let slip away.
Like the geek in the pink.

The geek in the pink (do do do...)
I'm the geek in the pink, yeah (do do do...)

Well my relationship fodder don't mean to bother nobody
But Cupid's automatic musta fired multiple shots at her
Because she fall in love too often that's what the matter
At least I'm talkin' about it keep my pattern of flattery and
She was starin' through the doorframe, and
Eyeing me down like already a bad boyfriend
Well she can get her toys outta the drawer then
Cause I ain't comin' home, I don't need that attention, see...

[Chorus]

Hey baby look at me go
From zero to hero
You better take it from a geek like me
I can save you from unoriginal dumb-dumbs
Who wouldn't care if you com...
...plete them or not

So what, I've got a short attention span, a coke in my hand.
Because I'd rather have the afternoon relaxin', understand.
My hip hop and flip-flops, well it don't stop with the light rock.
My shot to mock you kinda puts me in the tight spot.
The hype is nothing more than hoo-ha,
So I'm developing a language and I'm callin' it my own.
So take a peek into the speaker and you'll see what I mean
That on the other side the grass is greener.

[Chorus]
(do do do...)
I'm the geek in the pink yeah
i'm the gink in the pink
oh ya'll, geek is the color for fall

Also eminently worthy of praise is The Killers. "I've got soul, but I'm not a soldier"

Rock on.

The Much Maligned Toons

2006-04-04T21:40:00.000Z

Since I've finally discovered how to use the posting-pictures-function I can very succinctly make my stance on the issue.
There are no degrees of tolerance in free speech. Either my words are mine by right or not at all.

Something Beautiful #2

2006-04-04T04:18:00.000Z

The Violinist by Norman Rockwell [1923]

This man has the most gorgeous hands. The obvious strength of his hand holding the violin contrasts wonderfully with the delicate instrument and his manicured appearance.

The Violinist [detail]

There's somewhat of a story behind my fascination with this particular violinist's hands, but it's not appropriate for polite company. ;-)

West Lafayette Smoking Ordinance #2

2006-04-03T23:12:00.000Z

Tonight is the second reading for the smoking ban. I'm going for something a little more philosophical in my approach this time because the last meeting dissolved into a mess. No one there had any concept of what rights, justice, and liberty are. They were arguing as though this were an issue of equally valid claims that needed to be finely compromised to get the maximum amount of satisfaction for everyone (including those that don't deserve it at the expense of those that do). This is what I had prepared to say:

We are not granted rights out of generosity. As the founding fathers knew, rights result directly from man's nature, and the character of man is such that he must act in order to secure his life. This concept of 'right' is exemplified by an American's stated unalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. You may note that actual gratification is not guaranteed; the act of pursuing values and by implication, the consequences of those actions are.

The merchants of West Lafayette have a right to their business and the operations of such by virtue of the fact that they own it. Desiring a smoke-free environment on someone else's property does not mean you have the right to it. And inviting the general public onto one's property does not imply the public has any right to the property or it's functions, it is not a 'public place' no matter that you call it such. So let us clarify this legislation, it is not the needs or desires of business that you are compromising, but their rights, for the desires of others. In judging this bill you are not balancing equally valid interests, you are balancing the rights of some citizens with the wishes of others.

Another point, the rightness or wrongness of enacting this legislation has nothing to do with the decisions of other governmental bodies. The purpose of legislation and enforcement is to protect individual rights, previously defined as derived from the nature of man. The decisions of neither Madison, nor Bloomington, nor Montana, nor 85% of the population can change the nature of man and his rights. The opinion of no person or group can change the fact that this legislation makes children out of citizens.

Update [4.3.2006 - after the council meeting]: The proposed ordinance passed 5-1. I'm going to stay out of politics from now on. I haven't got the stamina for beating my head against a wall.

Something Beautiful #1

2006-03-31T18:01:00.000Z

This is something that I love for very personal reasons. I'm posting it so that I can have it on hand and, secondarily, to share it because it's beautiful.

Woman by Nikki Giovanni

she wanted to be a blade
of grass amid the fields
but he wouldn't agree
to be the dandelion

she wanted to be a robin singing
through the leaves
but he refused to be
her tree

she spun herself into a web
and looking for a place to rest
turned to him
but he stood straight
declining to be her corner

she tried to be a book
but he wouldn't read

she turned herself into a bulb
but he wouldn't let her grow

she decided to become
a woman
and though he still refused
to be a man
she decided it was all
right

Structure of Semi-Permeable Membranes

2006-03-16T20:56:00.000Z

While corresponding with a friend today about the phenomenon of cell suicide (apoptosis) I remembered that I had recently written about a personal revelation in cell membranes. And that since then I had completely forgotten about it. After rereading it and doing some touch editing and clarification I decided it was definitely blog-worthy, I don't know why I didn't post it before. So this was originally written on November 7th 2005:

I just got out of my physics research seminar, which is basically a one hour pass course where we listen to various professors explain about their research and tour their labs. Today Professor Ritchie, a new professor, lectured about his work in biophysics. Since he is so new, he doesn't have a web domain set up with Purdue yet, I asked him about it and he said he's "working on it", it'll probably be a while. Anyway, if you're interested in his research here is his contact page at Purdue.

So what he said in class was pretty amazing. He was talking about his research in cell membranes, specifically the lipid bilayer. A single lipid/phosphate head molecule (I'll just call it a lipid) moves around the general surface. They move like plastic ducks on water; staying within the general 2-D plane of the membrane, but the individual lipids and proteins float around each other randomly.

The problem with that is that if this were entirely accurate, a single lipid should move randomly at a certain speed. After tagging a single lipid with a photoluminescer and watching it's progress, they find it moves at about a fifth of the speed expected. Also, in such a model, the cell wouldn't be able to efficiently localize information. He gave the example of nerve cells that have definite outgoing and ingoing regions, if the lipids and proteins move freely/randomly about one another, then the cell could not have the specified regions of receptor proteins (they would be mixed randomly).

So, what he did was to use an incredibly high frame/s camera. (digression: this thing is wicked awesome! He showed us a demo of the camera he used in which the camera recorded a balloon filled with water being punctured by an exacto. As the exacto bit through the balloon, the balloon quickly snapped away and crumpled as would be expected, but the water almost perfectly held it's form, due to the high elasticity of water. Even the air bubble kept it's shape, and the camera was able to record this! Link) So, using this new camera he set the same experiment with photoluminescer tagged lipid and watched what happened (I presume he was careful not to change variables from the original experiment). The lipid moved randomly in a certain perimeter, then shifted a bit to move randomly in another perimeter, then shifted again to a neighboring perimeter. What they found was that the speed of the lipid within a perimeter was that which they had expected for the duck/pond model of a membrane, in which the lipid could float freely anywhere, and the speed that it took the lipid to move from one sector to the next was what they had recorded to cause the whole problem in the first place (1/5 expected speed). Apparently there is some sort of pattern of boundaries on the membrane which causes freely moving bodies to get stuck, but eventually make through, it holds them up.

They used a nifty little method of anchoring one of the more tightly bound proteins to a gold colloid and literally dragged the protein around the membrane in order to sound out the boundaries. If they hadn't of used a protein that binds tightly with gold, then the gold would have had a higher chance of breaking off when meeting resistance, which was the whole point, to measure resistance.

After mapping the boundaries they found that they align with the actin microfilaments of the cytoskeleton!

All through my biological studies in high school I had been confused as to what the cytoskeleton actually does, what function it performs.

This is what professor Ritchie says, the cytoskeletal filaments are right below the membrane and proteins are anchored to the structure. These proteins stick up inside (sometimes through) the membrane and cause what he calls "fences". A lipid is free to move within any of these little areas, but it takes some time for it to get through/around the fence. I didn't ask if all proteins are anchored to the actin, but knowing generally how a cell works, I'd say that the proteins which are advantageous to be localized are anchored and the ones that need to move aren't. Which explains how a nerve cell can partition one branch for ingoing and another for outgoing proteins.

West Lafayette Smoking Ordinance

2006-03-07T20:54:00.000Z

Our city council has been tossing around this legislation for a while now, since about November (old articles from the campus newspaper can be found here). It was barely voted down in late January, due mostly to 'ambiguities' in the wording and heavy complaint from local business. So, recently they've introduced a revised version (Linky). This is the pertinent article. The council met on Monday (Mar. 6) to discuss passing this legislation again and I attended the meeting to speak against the ordinance myself. I only got two/three minutes, so I tried to attack mostly their fundamental justifications for it (in the actual ordinance, everything after "WHEREAS"). This is what I'd prepared to say:

The reason the proposed smoking ban is being considered as a beneficial ordinance to the citizens of West Lafayette is: A.) smoking and second-hand smoke are health risks and B.) it is the responsibility of this city council to ensure an environment free of smoke-risk.

The second of those statements is false rendering the first irrelevant to legislation. If Mr. X desires a smoke-free environment because of the inherent risks, then it is in Mr. X's every right to abstain from entering into such environments. No one is forcing Mr. X to suffer a smoke-filled room; if he enters a bar or restaurant or club or 'place of employment' where smoking is allowed by the owner of the building, then he does so by choice. Yet, according to this legislation, Mr. X would have this council force another citizen to provide that environment. It is not the needs or desires of business that this legislation is compromising, but their rights, for the desires of others. And, contrary to popular opinion, it is not your obligation to protect my health and welfare, it is my own. If you pass this legislation in the name of public good, then please count me out of the public, because setting the precedent for violating property rights is not in any one's best interest.

Greg Ehresman owns Triple XXX, Mary Cook owns Harry's, and Derrick Raymer owns Where Else?. If they wish to allow their patrons to smoke on their property, it is not for anyone else to say otherwise. It is not the prerogative of any governmental body to dictate what citizens may freely choose to do on private property, whether they're smoker or non-smoker, business-owner or customer.

I've often heard the argument that if left to themselves businesses wouldn't offer non-smoking services. To that let me point out that businesses very seldom fail to capitalize on such consumer demands. And that, if it is found businesses can't make a profit from catering to non-smokers, it is a failure of the demand for such a service rather than of the business.

Update [Same Day]: Take a wild guess at who was quoted in the Exponent today! ^_^ Though, I'm a sophomore transfer student, not a freshman.

Electric and Magnetic Fields

2006-02-26T03:01:00.000Z

While taking physics classes I learn quite a few derivations and formulas, but curiously little in the big-picture-conceptual sense . Lately I've been trying to answer this basic question: what are electric/magnetic fields, what in the actual world does this concept represent? This is my current understanding.

Matter interacts with other matter in various ways. One way in which it does so is by charge, charge being an attribute of matter analogous to mass. There are two types of charge which produce opposite effects. They are therefore said to be 'opposite' charges and assigned the arbitrary value of positive and negative. Matter that interacts by virtue of its charge is said to do so electrically, and when charged matter is moving it also interacts magnetically.

In these interactions the charged matter applies equal and opposite force on one another. An electric field is a map of predictions of how this force will be applied to any other charge given a certain degree of charge of a particle; a magnetic field is this set of predictions for moving particles.

Particles only interact magnetically when all the concerned particles have a magnetic field, ie. are charged and moving. One particle will not act magnetically while the another acts electrically, or not at all, or in any other manner. To illustrate this point, consider a static charged particle and a passing charged particle. The static particle has an electric field, the passing particle has both an electric field and a magnetic field. The particles will interact equal and oppositely depending upon charge (attraction or repulsion), causing the static particle to move (thus a magnetic field) and the passing particle to shift in it's motion. They will then begin to act magnetically.

An important thing to note is that since the magnetic interaction of particles is dependant on their velocities, and velocity is relative to the reference frame of observation, magnetic fields are relative. This means that how one observes the interaction is dependent upon the context in which one views it; it does not look the same from every point of view.

Separation of Education and State

2006-02-15T14:48:00.000Z

Yesterday the Ohio Board of Education voted 11-4 to dispense with a 'mandate' for Ohio schools to teach a 'critical analysis' of evolution in school, along with an accompanying model lesson plan published/disseminated by the Discovery Institute. The move was considered a victory for evolution because it was made on the basis that the 'critical analysis' wording favoured intelligent design in second guessing evolution. What these cheering squads have again failed to notice is that it is now considered acceptable for the legislature to pass approved lesson plans and even specifically mandate what is and is not to be taught in schools.

It's wonderful that this legislation was finally struck down, but not because the opposing view should be sanctioned by the government instead. It should have been struck down because the government has no right to sanction any educational standards.

Electric Field

2006-02-13T01:20:00.000Z

I have been trying to figure out what exactly is meant by the term electric field. This is what I think so far:

A net/matrix of predictions over distance of the force exerted on a hypothetical particle, P2, by a particle, P1.

This is how my textbook (Matter and Interactions v.2 e.1.5 by Chabay) defines an electric field: Force2 (vector) = charge2 * electric field1 (vector)

Any thoughts; what is an electric field?

Google: 'Chat + E-mail = Crazy Delicious'

2006-02-11T08:20:00.000Z

Congratulations Google, on another awesome achievment.

"When we launched Google Talk, some people told us what a great idea it'd be to add chat to Gmail. True that. So a couple of us Google Talk engineers approached the Gmail team. They were excited about the idea, and we got to work immediately -- spending a lot of not-so-lazy Sundays huddled in a conference room ... "

Ayn Rand's Birthday

2006-02-02T12:39:00.000Z

Today most especially, I'd like to recognize what Miss Rand has done for me; even if I can't wish her happiness on her birthday.

Her philosophy made the precious, yet fragmented and undefined, thoughts of my adolescence intelligible. If not for her I don't know if I would have ever figured out how to do it myself. At best, I would have spent many more years in frustration.

Hats off to the woman who is my intellectual guide.

Judge Rules Against Intelligent Design

2005-12-27T16:31:00.000Z

In a surprisingly vociferous statement Pennsylvania Judge John Jones ruled against teaching intelligent design in public classrooms. What's unfortunate about this victory is that Judge Jones passed his decision on the case without considering that the United States Government has no business interfering at all in either education or research, in favour or against.

The purpose of our government is not to tell us what is and is not science. Such a policy is horribly dangerous to our liberty because the government holds the ultimate legal authority to use force. To make the philosophical issue here very concrete; a person who has the legal right to hold a gun to your head should not also have the legal right to tell you what is/is not proper to believe/learn/research. Consider the ramifications when such an action on the part of government officials is tolerated.

Articles/Resources:
Judge Rules Against Pa. Biology Curriculum (Excite News) Update [2.10.2006]: Link Defunct
Judge Rejects Teaching Intelligent Design (New York Times)
Kitzmiller, et. al. v. Dover Area School District, et. al. (Filed by Judge Jones on 12/20/05)

Windfall Taxes

2005-11-16T01:41:00.000Z

Last Wednesday the Senate called a group of representative executives of the oil industry to a meeting in Washington D.C. in which they were asked to justify the fact that they had made very large profits.

Even though it's been in the news a lot, I thought I'd just repeat that for the benefit of those of you who already heard about this but thought you had accidentally fallen into a Twilight Zone special in which Stalin and the pope team up to take over the world. Consider this a public service announcement; I assure you that you are still living in what is left of America, and this did actually happen.

In an interview on MSNBC Senator Ken Salazar (D-CO) accused oil executives of having "the highest profits that we've seen in history for the oil companies", contriving to make that a derogatory remark by also calling the profits "inexplicable". Scarborough echoed this sentiment by also labeling the oil prices, and subsequent profits, as inexplicable. (In related news Salazar and Scarborough are currently winning the People's Republic of America Award for invoking the vague concept of 'The People' the most times in an interview. See if you can find a more atrocious example and you'll win the vague concept of 'A Prize'!).

This opinion on the cause of profits is in line with the recent bustle about imposing a windfall profit tax on the oil companies. A windfall profit is money which one wasn't expecting, with the connotation that it was due to luck, eg. inheritance. A windfall tax is one-time direct tax on unexpectedly large profits. You see, if the profit is unexpected, inexplicable, then it isn't wrong to steal it because the oil companies didn't earn it to begin with. *wink, wink*

I haven't been able to find a reporter, a political commentator, or even an oil executive who will say it. So, I'll say it; these companies are selling a product. That means that they expend effort and/or capital to create a value and then trade it. This particular value that they create is at an extremely high demand. That is how they justify their profit, because there are a lot of people who are willing to pay what they charge for oil. And the reason they are morally entitled to all the profits is because they get the crude oil (by buying or collecting it), they refine it into gasoline, They do research in how to make it better, and they ship it to easily accessible stations for purchase. If you think I sound like the little red hen, then fantastic! That hen had a fucking point.

Terry Pratchett

2005-11-07T22:33:00.000Z

To anyone who happens to wander by; I highly recommend Terry Pratchett and most especially his novel Going Postal.

"Ordinary men had dreamed it up and put it together, [...] across the frozen spines of mountains. They'd cursed and, worse, used logarithms. They'd waded through rivers and dabbled in trigonometry. They hadn't dreamed, in the way people usually use the word, but they'd imagined a different world, and bent metal around it. And out of all that sweat and swearing and mathematics had come this ... thing, dropping words across the world as softly as starlight." ~Terry Pratchett

This Just In: Competent Professor Found!

2005-11-03T16:33:00.000Z

I underestimated my classes this semester, and overestimated my willingness to do homework; so I ended up dropping out of my Calculus class which left me with only 11 credit hours. In order to keep my financial aid I need to maintain a least 12 hours; enter the 1 credit hour GS 175: Information Strategies.

While going over the syllabus my professor states that she wants to make this "more than just a one credit course". This is code for: I'm going to assign a lot more busy work than is necessary. Sharkey says that we are going to spend the entire course preparing for the final project, which is to create a 7-minute movie documentary about a chosen topic. What does making movie documentaries have to do with proper methods of gathering information? I don't know, she didn't care to explain.

Then came a miracle, the class was too large and had to be split; half the students (including myself) were assigned to a new professor. I have been to the edge of hell and returned to find a promised land!

My new professor, Alexius, says: "this is a one-credit course, let's treat it as such". What she is lecturing over, what we're working on, is actually about information strategies. It is even threatening to be useful! I just finished giving a presentation with my group on using Academic Search Elite, which is a article database hosted by Purdue University. I told the class about how you can use difference specifications to limit or expand your search results and Alexius added informative commentary on Boolean qualifiers; it was enlightening! While another group was presenting information on library catalogues they weren't sure what the Library of Congress is. Working in a library, I was able to explain what it is and how it's different that Dewey Decimal; and the other students were genuinely interested in knowing! It's like I've stumbled into this tiny little world inside the university and it's ... education!

We spent the rest of the period discussing what types of research would be personally useful to us; next week Alexius will assign a specific topic to each us of us based upon what will help us learn what we want to know. She then announced that it would only be necessary to meet once a week to do the work she's planned.

I'm floored. It's like I'm actually being educated, and I don't have to bend over backwards and take it up the ass to do so! It's sad that such a competent professor is so surprising.

'Correlation Does Not Prove Causation'

2005-10-07T02:01:00.000Z

A few people have told me that before, but now I get it.

My physics textbook says, "If our model is a good approximation to the real world, our prediction will be a good approximation to what will actually happen."

This is a false assumption because though your model fits the data you've collected, you have no reason to think that it actually does so, in that way. It's like assuming that your outcome could only possibly be caused by one thing, then your model must be that cause. Even if the data continues to seemingly corroborate your model, all you've proved is that the model hasn't changed, not that your model is the correct one. Your model could very well be Ptolemaic.

It's like you're given a set of data points, and instead of looking for the function of those data points, you connect them in what seems the most obvious pattern to you. Then you extrapolate that pattern without regard for the cause of your data points. And if ever your model should fail to predict the data points, then you simply alter the model to now fit both patterns, rather than looking for the cause of the difference. Replace the term 'you' with 'theoretical physicist' and you get the mess of quantum mechanics today.

A mathematical model may certainly be internally valid, in a deductive sense, and indeed may accurately reflect the data. But where does this model come from; how does it fit the data; why did you pick it as opposed to any other model that also fits the data? It is these relationships between the cause of an event and the event that needs to be identified, and then from there you can make a simplified model.

Poetry 3-Differentiae of Poetry

2005-10-03T09:57:00.000Z

So, now comes the hard part.

First, let me restate (in order to make very clear) that every individual thing has many characteristics. The task of identifying a differentiae consists of identifying the causal (defining) characteristic (or combination of characteristics, as the case may be), i.e. that (those) which make the individual a part of this concept and not that.

The class and the professor named a few characteristics which seem to follow poetry; emotion, structure (form), metaphors or any image (a metaphor being an image which means something other than it's literal definition), to name a few. While considering which one defines poetry I asked myself: which one is in all poetry, which one can poetry not do without. Of course, I came to the conclusion of emotion. But later it occurred to me that all art is created from emotion. It must be, because an emotion is experienced in response to a value and art is idealized values. So an artist would have an emotional response to his art because it is his values which are being idealized. So, not emotion, that is already implicit in that poetry is an art.

The professor gave some examples of experimental forms of 'poetry' in class which were confusing in that they had some of the characteristics of poetry, yet still did not seem like poetry. The first was a paragraph of prose that was very beautiful, elaborate, and eloquent in it's use of metaphor. The second, a sentence vividly describing an image. While they were emotional and descriptive, they were not poetry in a strict sense, though unnervingly alike to poetry. They were examples of art with characteristics of poetry, undefining characteristics. An example of an undefining characteristic is a human hand. Humans generally have two hands; hands (with 8 fingers and 2 opposable thumbs) are considered to be human. But losing a hand or not being born with any does not preclude one from being human. Conversely, by randomly attaching a human hand to a dog a la Frankenstein or through genetic modification does not create a human, only a weird dog. Similarly, poetry has characteristics which, though common, are not causal in defining poetry. Such things that have some of the undefining characteristics of poetry are called poetic. The examples of experimental 'poetry' were poetic, but not actually poetry in nature. The one thing that neither contained was a structure of poetry, they were both written in the form of prose rather than poetry.

The definition of poetry is art with a repetitive structure. A repeating structure is the one thing poetry can claim that no other language art can. Not, I should point out, simply repetition; anything redundant can accomplish that. No, poetry must be repetitious in it's form, in how it is produced rather than the content that is produced.

Poetry 2-Genus of Poetry

2005-09-30T01:53:00.000Z

I began with calling poetry an art, in that poetry is an idealized creation of man. The definition of art is: a selective recreation of reality. A recreation of reality because art is not reality itself, yet reality is it's only subject. Selective because the artist does not portray reality exactly, he chooses which aspects to portray depending upon his values and idealizes those values. Please, don't ask me to define value, I thought about it and I can't do that yet. I have a working definition which I use to judge a value, for now, but I don't understand it well enough to defend the definition. Art is judged good to the extent of the artist's ability to idealize the value(s), and it is appreciated by an individual to the extent that that individual agrees with the value(s).

Then it occurred to me that I can narrow the genus further, poetry is expressed only in one particular medium. You can't paint or sculpt a poem: if you tried, what you'd end up with is a painting or a sculpture based upon a poem, but not a poem itself. At first I wanted to call this medium 'literature', and it's definition was: language arts. In other words, art which is expressed in language (written or oral). But after consulting a great friend, I think this is the wrong concept for this definition. Literature can include history/science/technical textbooks which aren't art, though it's written. But, whatever the label, the definition is correct; so poetry is a language art.

Poetry 1-Definitions

2005-09-30T01:16:00.000Z

I am taking a class in Greek Literature this semester and we had a very interesting discussion in class recently about poetry. We were asked to define it. The professor wanted us to talk about it, and then think about it over the next fifty-years or so. But ... Lets do this now.

So, what is a definition, what are we being asked to do with poetry? A definition is simply identification, it means stating explicitly that this is this as opposed to that. So in defining something we first need to narrow down what we're talking about, and then we need to state how it is different than everything else. That is why I think Aristotle is correct in saying that a definition is both a genus and a differentiae. For example, when you ask 'what is man, how do you define it?' you first narrow down what you're talking about from everything that exists to a specific category of things that exist of which man is a part (similar/related to, but not wholly compromising). This is the genus, and in this case the genus is 'animal'. Man is an animal, but not the animal. I don't see why you couldn't use a more or less specific genus, why this is the certain level of genus that one must use, but it would take a more thorough study of concepts than is necessary now to answer that.

Anyway, now the important part is stating what it is that makes this animal, man, different than any other animal. This is called the differentiae, and I think it is the most important, most difficult part of a definition because you must identify the causal trait, or as I call it 'defining characteristic', that makes it this and not that. For every individual object there are many numerous ways to describe it, characteristics, but it is the job of the definer to identify which one causes it to be a part of this concept and not another. For the concept 'man' the defining characteristic is reason, ergo --> man is the reasoning animal, it is an animal which reasons as opposed to any other animal.

So far this is my understanding of definitions and I do not think it is yet complete.

Intelligence

2005-09-08T15:38:00.000Z

Has this ever happened to you:
You're arguing with someone who doesn't agree with you on some aspect of reality, maybe a priest. After you've presented your argument and are waiting for his reply, he begins by complimenting your intelligence, then proceeds to deny what you've just said.

This is an irritating pet peeve of mine. Beyond being baldly obsequious (ie. the person with whom you're arguing doesn't have the balls to flat-out state he thinks you're a moron), I've always found it oddly disconcerting; it stops me in my mental tracks. But it's simply a compliment, and such compliments from certain people I can take graciously. So I've been wondering what it is about this particular type of situation, this particular compliment, that bothers me.

Now to the 'ah-ha' moment...

What exactly is intelligence? Intelligence is the ability to abstract (if anyone disagrees with my definition, speak now and we'll talk about it). But anyone can abstract, it is a (if not the) defining trait of humans. What makes the difference between a petty mystic and great genius, is whether or not your abstraction corroborates reality. Take Plato for example, his theory of forms is a complex and interesting abstraction ... which has nothing to do with reality. I'd admit he's intelligent, but I still think he's a rat-bastard.

This person with whom I'm arguing obviously doesn't think my abstraction models reality (because he's disagreeing), yet he still calls me intelligent, as though it is supposed to mean something significant (ie. "I agree with your model of reality and congratulate you on abstracting it") when it so blatantly doesn't. He may as well congratulate me on not having brain damage; because, whether or not I'm correct, by Jove I have a functioning human brain. Think about that for a minute, how would you feel if something, very seriously, walked up to you and said, "Wow. You know, you really are good at not being brain damaged." What could you possibly say to such a person? "Thank you, I practice being human every day."

Progress

2005-08-01T07:58:00.000Z

The other day I drove by an old ruined hunk of building beside an abandoned railroad.

It made me melancholy to see such a scene of degradation and it reminded me of the old adage that everything is impermanent. That, though man builds skyscrapers, they don't last forever, and are eventually demolished. This means that man himself is conquerable, because he dies and even his most exalted works are passing. Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, right.

No.

A person who would take my sad scene as an example of the impotence of man is failing to see that the railroad and building were most likely abandoned in favor of a more efficient mode of transportation. Or the company who owned it was driven out of business by a superior competitor. Or any number of other scenarios, but in no instance is it a testament to universal failure.

Skyscraper's are torn down by men; not some un-named all-powerful malevolent force bent on the destruction of man. The reason they are torn down is to make way for bigger and/or better things. Nothing is permanent because everything is constantly being improved, and that is the defining trait of human history - progress. It is stagnation humans should fear, not change and improvement.

The Existence of God

2005-07-15T20:19:00.000Z

I am almost entirely convinced that god does not exist. Almost. I am an atheist and have been for a year, so this may seem a belated statement to some...

But god was not a part of my decision to break from Catholicism, and by extension - religion. I thought quite a bit about the matter once I became old enough to seriously consider it. After years of casual pondering, a short while before my confirmation, I came to the conclusion that 1.) I don't 'believe' in god (i.e. I have no faith in him, no trust), and 2.) the metaphysical existence of god was beyond my comprehension and concern. But I believed in morality, right and wrong; so despite my abandonment of the concept of 'god', I still wanted religion.

I went through my confirmation with every intention of treating religion like a philosophy with lots of fairy tales. It was my job to sort through Catholicism and pull out the morals from the fairy tales, to find the essence of what is good. Religion was my ethics. I turned to science for everything else; the scientific method was epistemology, which was used to discover the metaphysics of the universe. That was about as sophisticated as I got at age 16 and I was happy with it. I wasn't entirely satisfied with my catholic ethics, but was content to settle down and unravel the whole thing.

The more I read the more critical I became of certain religious doctrines. But it wasn't until I read Ayn Rand that I questioned the innate goodness of religion, and by that time the only thing holding up my faith in religious ethics was my own rationalizations. These I promptly discarded after an emotional and somewhat dramatic experience, which I won't go into.

I have hesitated to call myself atheist, except out of expedience, because I still did not have any opinion or concern over the existence of god. After an argument with a friend about the nature of atheism (which I generally considered to be a form of idiocy) I decided to revisit 'god' and figure out the second part of the mystery.

The problem with this is the definition of god. There are two fundamentally differing ideas of what god actually is. First was the pagans, to them gods were metaphysical facts; literally super-humans. They existed in the same way the stars exist; obvious, but still incomprehensible to the technologically deficient humans.

Then there was a revolution and many pagan gods became one True God (Plato style). Many historians consider this revolution in terms of the number of god (i.e. gods vs. God, plural vs. singular). I think this misses the very key change in the definition of what god is. Suddenly god became something not of this world, literally super-natural, above or beyond the natural universe. Nowadays, god isn't described as something that humans don't understand, it is something humans can't understand. Any modern priest will balk when you ask him to point to god, because you can't point to god. God literally doesn't exist as we know existence; he is of a 'higher' existence.

Well, it's obvious that the latter 'god' doesn't exist; it is built into his definition. There is no other plane, realm, or universe; higher or otherwise. The universe is everything that exists. Everything. If you define god as not a part of the universe; as something that you can't, by its very nature, identify then it doesn't exist.

And that's all very well and good, but what if you define god as something that is in the universe, that does exist, that you can point to and identify and say "yep, that right there is god alright" as the pagans did. Then he could exist and we simply haven't yet devised a way to find him.

Now 'could' does not mean 'does', it means 'could'. That's what makes the former so easy to deal with and the latter so hard. With the former god, by definition, does not exist, but the latter is too open-ended for my comfort.

The only thing that I see resolving the issue is the idea that what exists must be proven to exist. In other words, (and I hate to divert a philosophical discussion towards the imaginary, but it demonstrates the point) just because one can't actually prove that pink unicorns don't exist doesn't mean that they do. The old cliché, "just because you can't see it doesn't mean it isn't there" is wrong and misleading. We can't see air, but we can detect it; I haven't ever seen a million dollars at once, but I could; I have never seen nor detected god in any manner, but could I? That begs, how would I? I don't know. My gut reaction is to say that it's impossible and therefore god can't exist. But how it is impossible, I can't say.

Any ideas, I'm kind of stumped.

Librarians

2005-07-13T00:22:00.000Z

Librarians are masterminds at devising inane, tedious tasks. They may even surpass kindergarten teachers in the matter.

I work for librarians and today I spent an hour paper-clipping long blue strips of paper to square white pieces of paper in a certain specified manner. I also had to sort out a giant bag full of various paperclips, because it was absolutely necessary to use plastic triangular paperclips as opposed to any other kind of paperclip.

When asked by my supervisor, the librarian, to do this ridiculous thing, which she didn't have time for, I asked why such a thing must be done. To which she responded, "I don't know, my boss told me to do it."

...and you're a 40-something-year-old with masters degree who didn't bother to ask why such a thing is necessary.

I am shocked by the casual insanity of it all. This is only one of the many subtly strange, obviously meaningless tasks I've been asked to devout my time to. And whenever I point out some simple way of making the idiotic chore more efficient I am, without fail, lauded for my brilliant technical knowledge. It's like a cruel prank by renegade psychology majors.

North Koreans

2005-07-07T23:19:00.000Z

Propaganda film backfires

"A North Korean propaganda film about the repatriation of a spy — Lee In-Mo — who had languished for years in a South Korean prison may have a short shelf life, according to defectors now living in the South. [...]
'What we could not believe in the movie was that Lee and others were conducting hunger strikes in the prison,' said one defector about the movie.
'Refusing to eat was a form of resistance in the South? Boy, South Korea must be a paradise. That's what we said among ourselves'
Lee received a hero's welcome and, sure enough, Pyongyang made a film on Lee's 'heroic struggle for the motherland' in South Korean prisons and made sure all North Koreans saw it.

However, the movie caused many North Koreans to become curious about South Korean society.

Many North Korean defectors said their first reaction upon seeing the film was to ask how people could stay in prison for more than 10 years and remain alive? They say few people survive even three years in North Korean political prisons. Being fed three regular meals a day is utterly unimaginable.

Political prisoners die from disease and malnutrition, if not from torture, as documented by Kang Chul-Won in his best-selling book, 'Aquariums of Pyongyang,' which recently led him to be invited by President Bush to the White House.

The North Korean defectors said the movie had the opposite effect from what was intended. One wondered if Pyongyang is still showing the movie to the people.

'I bet they are not,' he said."

Well, that is a happy little irony. :-D

In Praise of Fireworks

2005-07-05T20:08:00.000Z

Last night I watched Tempe's fireworks display over Tempe Town Lake from the top of the Languages and Lit. building at ASU. Since Sky Harbor Airport is on the very eastern edge of Phoenix and small Tempe is nestled right beside it, ASU is directly under the busiest flight path in Arizona. So, as I was marveling at the pyrotechnic display I couldn't help but notice the continual traffic of planes flying low over ASU and the lake just as it always does.

It is such a wonderfully arrogant display of control that we can set off precision explosions for our pure pleasure without even interfering with flight paths. I mean, imagine the complicated arrangement of color and light in explosion that is a firework. That, in itself takes masterful skill in exerting one's will over fire. Then consider that we have the ability to coordinate such a show by means of a computer. That, literally with the press of a button, one man can orchestrate a symphony of lights, incorporating whichever elements he designs.

And on top of all that, the show need not interfere with daily business unless one chooses it too. If you want to take the day off and sit with the kids at a lake to watch the show, then wonderful! Have a great time. But if you have to be at a business meeting in North Carolina in the morning, then the show doesn't have to interfere with your schedule, because we can control the fireworks to such a degree that we can remove the danger of shooting them off.

That is simply brilliant! It is a testament to our ability to shape our environment. An ability, which I am learning, that is preceded by freedom. Is it any wonder that fireworks are such an important part of our celebration of freedom.

A Whole Can-O-Justice

2005-06-28T21:23:00.000Z

Freestar Media Press Release

::raucous laughter::

sigh...but seriously; if this gets approved by the 3 selectmen votes, I wonder if Justice Souter will contest it in court. And if he does, who will he get to represent him? Even a great lawyer knows to get an attorney if he himself needs one. I don't think the Institute for Justice would take Souter's case, but it would amazingly ironic if they chose to defend Clements rather than him.

Whatever happened to property rights...anyone?

2005-06-24T20:32:00.000Z

Justices Affirm Property Seizures

So, now the government may seize property not for "public use" but for "public purpose". That is an inch away from "public good" and I am worried that this sort of statism is going to be allowed. That the American people will not be outraged by this.

But if there is anything more scary in this event than the blatant defacement of property rights, it's that Justice Stevens thinks that "[t]he court should not 'second-guess' local governments". If the Supreme Court has decided that they don't have the power to "second-guess" legislators then we may as well toss our notion of checks and balances. When does a hesitance to check local legislators spread to state and federal legislators? And why is Stevens so quick to make himself ineffectual?

I also recently discovered the impotence of patent laws, so all-in-all, I'm pretty pissed about property rights. I'm considering becoming a hermit and hiding on a mountain, because what the hell am I going to do? How can I achieve any of the things I planned for my life if I have to protect myself not only from ordinary thieves but also the government? It's like this giant mouldering pit of blackness stretching out like a chasm and I don't know how to fix it.

Update [6.27.2005]: Related items
ARI Op-Ed
Cap. Mag. Article
Property Wrongs by Cox and Forkum

Scholarship

2005-06-22T18:12:00.000Z

I'm transferring to Purdue, and my bank account is getting the shit beat out of it. I'll need like 29,000 every year, and right now I'm behind 13,000. So, I'm entering every and any scholarship I can, sending letters to private corporations, and getting loan estimates from banks.

I just entered this scholarship contest for 10,000. That would help; that would help a lot! I was supposed to write a 500 (or less) word essay about what I think is the most important choice I have to make in my life to be happy and successful. I think I did well, I'm fond of my little essay, but keep your fingers crossed.

Owning and Living My Life

The defining choice I’ve made in my life, the choice which precedes happiness, is the choice to acknowledge that I own my life. Every human owns their life by the fact of volition, but some choose to abstain from asserting that right. I choose to claim the right to my life and the productive work therein.
Owning my life means that I have complete responsibility for it. It means that I choose to act and think as I do; and I claim the consequences of all my actions and thoughts. Since my actions and thoughts are my own, I must decide upon morals to govern those. And since I own my life, the choice of morals is my own. I don’t expect the morals of any other person to work in place of my own. Morality means that which is beneficial to my life, because I own and must act to keep it. This emphatically does not mean that I do whatever I please.
Let me give some examples. The law states that I’m not allowed to drink alcohol because I’m under 21. I do not drink alcohol because it will a.) make me temporarily stupid and b.) physically harm me. Owning my life means that I choose whether or not I want to drink alcohol by rationally considering the value and consequences of doing so. The same applies to criminal behaviour. I do not condone murder because I respect my life and don’t want to be murdered. I don’t steal because I value my own property and my right to it.
Owning my life also means that I have the duty of either sustaining it or not. I produce the means for my survival, either with my mental or physical labor. If I need a gallon of milk I buy it with money which I have earned. The money I have earned is derived from my ability to work and exchange my work in a mutual trade. Since I want an education, in order to achieve the goals of my life, I must acquire the money to pay for that education. I am writing to earn the money by answering with the ability of my words. I hope my ability is great enough to please those who are willing to give money in order that I may get an education. But the means is not achieved by begging; rather it is achieved by proving my self-worth.
I think this makes me wholly selfish; everything I do is for my own benefit. I make friends to gain conversation and human contact. I trust that those with which I make friends do so for similarly selfish reasons. Our interaction is mutual, not parasitic. Because I have chosen to own my life, I love out of happiness rather than pity.
Happiness comes from living your life well. I can’t imagine any better way to do so than by thoroughly owning it every day.

Update [7.15.2005]: I made it to the finals! There were 7,000 entries and 140 were chosen as finalists to be published in the companies' promotional book. 10 of those will be chosen to receive 1,000 scholarship each.

So I was mistaken; it's 1,000, not 10,000. But 1/14 chance for 1,000 might be better than 1/140 chance at 10,000. Of course, the judging isn't random; it's based on merit, so I think my chances are considerably better than 1/14. I'll know in November how my essay fared. I wish I could be there during the judging to see what the mysterious 'they' have to say about my essay.

Google, how could you!

2005-06-13T21:14:00.000Z

"Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful." http://www.google.com/corporate/

Google's noble goal and unparalleled ability to achieve that goal has been an inspiration since the day I learned of it. Now, they have taken their greatest virtue, destroyed it, and apologized for it. All for the sake of their philosophical enemies, who want to destroy independence and liberty by making knowledge universally inaccessible. It breaks my heart. It's like watching Hercules in his madness, except in Google's case it is self-induced. I feel betrayed.

Update [7.22.2005]: To remove expired news link. See comments for summary.

The Importance of Context When Evaluating Morality

2005-06-09T17:10:00.000Z

Recently I began to understand what it means to concretize abstractions (courtesy Ed From OC on The Forum). It means that you increase your understanding of a concept (or an "abstract", I'm not sure what the difference is) by creating a bank of experience or examples. For instance, one can describe "red" but you don't really understand what it represents until you've experienced many examples of red, and have explicitly identified these examples as red. The more examples you amass the clearer you're understanding of red is. For example, if a red ball is identified as red, you can't initially know if "red" refers to it's color, orientation, shape, material, textural/biological characteristic, the sound it makes, etc. But when you have many cases you can identify the pattern and label it "red". I think that is what integrating is, you take a large mass of data and identify patterns and relationships. (But that's another topic.)

And so, one fine day, with my new found definition of concretization I found my self saying "I'll just have to make a little compromise". It struck me immediately that I have never liked compromises as such and I hate the idea of doing it myself, yet I was not feeling particularly loathsome about this specific compromise. Which seemed a horrible contradiction. So I identified my warrant (or premise) for considering the action immoral. It was: all compromises are immoral. Well, in this situation, I had had to choose between two cds I liked because I didn't have enough money for both, which I don't think is immoral in the least. I was confused, at first, as to what was wrong with my warrant. When I realized that it was missing a qualifier and that my situation didn't apply to that qualifier. The qualifier being: ...when you sacrifice a value for a non-value. I was simply choosing between two values (which is often necessary) but didn't "sacrifice" a value. Not only did I explicitly identify two types of compromise and the morality for each, but it also became a good example of the importance of context. Or, a concretization of the concept "context". Because in order to distinguish between a moral and immoral compromise I had to identify two different context, or "in this situation", without that I could only have concluded that either I am base (because I seemingly had no objection to immorality) or that morality is arbitrary.

Portrait

2005-06-01T23:59:00.000Z

I need to post this picture so I can add it to my profile since the profile only accepts images that are hosted and have a URL. So I'm going to hide it way back here and hope nobody finds it. If you do happen to stumble upon this post, disregard it. It's a somewhat sloppy quick fix until I can find/afford better web hosting for pictures.

Shit, I thought I found a valid domain for my pictures: