Tuesday, September 24, 2002
I see from this story that US troops have been sent to the Ivory Coast to rescue Americans and other foreigners, 200 in all. Some French troops have also gone. I wonder if there are any Germans among the foreigners. Funny, I didn't see anything about German troops being sent to their rescue. Oh, well, I'm sure the Green Party can make up an expedition of dowsers, crystal ball-gazers and radical vegetarians to save their countrymen. God knows not one American GI should exert any effort to save any Germans. And I'm sure their government would not want us to help, since we're just Nazis and are probably only doing it for the oil.
Jesse the Moral Arbiter
Darling of the left Jesse Jackson is actually calling for censorship of a hit movie on the grounds that he's offended by it. I thought all these lefties were against interfering with creative freedom?? Only when their ox is not being gored, I guess. At least they can't call for government censorship, as in those countries, like France, Germany and California, that have draconian hate-speech laws.
Speaking of goring, Andrew Sullivan takes Al Gore apart completely over his late speech about how much better he would be prosecuting the war on terror by not worrying about terrorists like Saddam Hussein who have whole countries and WMD and concentrating on Osama bin Laden, who's decomposing in a bombed-out cave in Afghanistan.
Darling of the left Jesse Jackson is actually calling for censorship of a hit movie on the grounds that he's offended by it. I thought all these lefties were against interfering with creative freedom?? Only when their ox is not being gored, I guess. At least they can't call for government censorship, as in those countries, like France, Germany and California, that have draconian hate-speech laws.
Speaking of goring, Andrew Sullivan takes Al Gore apart completely over his late speech about how much better he would be prosecuting the war on terror by not worrying about terrorists like Saddam Hussein who have whole countries and WMD and concentrating on Osama bin Laden, who's decomposing in a bombed-out cave in Afghanistan.
New Neighbors
Time for some real weblogging. New neighbors moved in to the next townhouse yesterday. The same people had been there since I moved in seven (can it be that long?) years ago. We never talked much with the departees. The new people I glimpsed here and there - a middle-aged guy, a boy maybe in his teens, moving furniture in from the big U-Haul. Then in the night I heard a muffled bark or two. Oh no, not a dog. Why would anyone have a dog in a little townhouse? If I do become acquainted with the new neighbors, I will look back on the day they first moved in and wonder why I didn't see them as I will have come to know them. People are walking question marks. Finding the answer can be the fun part. Or maybe they'll stay there ten years and I'll never speak to any of them. Maybe they'll ask me questions, like, "Hey, how come you don't have a dog?"
Time for some real weblogging. New neighbors moved in to the next townhouse yesterday. The same people had been there since I moved in seven (can it be that long?) years ago. We never talked much with the departees. The new people I glimpsed here and there - a middle-aged guy, a boy maybe in his teens, moving furniture in from the big U-Haul. Then in the night I heard a muffled bark or two. Oh no, not a dog. Why would anyone have a dog in a little townhouse? If I do become acquainted with the new neighbors, I will look back on the day they first moved in and wonder why I didn't see them as I will have come to know them. People are walking question marks. Finding the answer can be the fun part. Or maybe they'll stay there ten years and I'll never speak to any of them. Maybe they'll ask me questions, like, "Hey, how come you don't have a dog?"
Monday, September 23, 2002
Sour Krauts
My admiration for the W administration keeps growing. The "new" German government backtracked on their anti-Bush stance by firing two ministers after they got safely reelected. If I know W, and I hope I do, that's not going to make a bit of difference. Rummy and Condi working together may even be able to give Colin Powell a backbone, unless he's been sandbagging all these months. I still haven't figured him out. All US troops should be out of Germany within a year, by the end of 2003. I'm old enough to remember, as a small boy in Germany, the devastation left by the war and how the only, and I mean the ONLY bright spot was the thousands of American kids like me, well-fed, well-scrubbed and looking forward, occupying forces, sure, but holding out a hand to the German people in their hour, heck, their decade of need and deprivation on a scale we today would find hard to believe. And now, nearly sixty years later they won't even help rid the world of a tyrant as odious as the one they produced, before he can do the same kind of damage. That's it. No more German nothing for me. Too bad. I used to like sauerkraut.
My admiration for the W administration keeps growing. The "new" German government backtracked on their anti-Bush stance by firing two ministers after they got safely reelected. If I know W, and I hope I do, that's not going to make a bit of difference. Rummy and Condi working together may even be able to give Colin Powell a backbone, unless he's been sandbagging all these months. I still haven't figured him out. All US troops should be out of Germany within a year, by the end of 2003. I'm old enough to remember, as a small boy in Germany, the devastation left by the war and how the only, and I mean the ONLY bright spot was the thousands of American kids like me, well-fed, well-scrubbed and looking forward, occupying forces, sure, but holding out a hand to the German people in their hour, heck, their decade of need and deprivation on a scale we today would find hard to believe. And now, nearly sixty years later they won't even help rid the world of a tyrant as odious as the one they produced, before he can do the same kind of damage. That's it. No more German nothing for me. Too bad. I used to like sauerkraut.
Paper vs. Plastic
I can’t believe people, when asked whether they want paper or plastic grocery bags, sometimes want paper. It’s nuts. The plastic bags are wonderful. You can hold twenty pounds of groceries in a soaking rainstorm with your little finger. They have a thousand uses around the house and can even serve as quick-lighting firestarters when the weather turns cool. Paper bags, however, turn soggy at the touch of rain or a leaky can or bottle, are difficult to hold with one arm, much less with one finger, and tear easily.
Oh, I know, the knee-jerk enviros say that plastic is awful and paper is more “natural” and efficient. Huh? That’s so dumb it’s hard to imagine anyone clinging to such a belief after any reflection at all. Which only shows that a lot of people don’t even start to reflect. They just emote. Brown, paper, from tree – good. But not too many, because there are only so many trees and they’ll all be gone soon. Right. Plastic – arggh – unnatural non-earth tones, from icky petroleum products raped from Mother Earth by right-wing conservative Texans. That’s about as far as their thinking goes. In truth, of course, the plastic bags are far more efficient than the paper ones. They weigh almost nothing, probably ten to a hundred times less than the paper ones. This means a tremendous savings in transport costs. Their strength means much less food is wasted from broken bottles and jars and dented cans and broccoli florets strewn across rain-soaked parking lots. And they even take up much less space in landfills and keep dyes and their other chemicals safely locked up instead of letting them leach into the soil, if you’re concerned about such nonsense. Not to mention that they’re cheaper, lowering food costs even more.
The worst way to bring home groceries is in your own canvas bag. Oh, I know, all the big chains are promoting them now, asking you to spend six or more dollars per bag. Now these things are heavy. You have to have ten dollars worth of groceries in them to equal the weight of the bag. I can’t imagine how heavy they get in the rain. But that’s not the worst part. They’re small. They don’t expand to hold very many groceries. You’d wind up spending thirty dollars just to have enough bags. The string bags we used to use when I was a boy in England make more sense. And, from an “ecological” point of view, these “reusable” bags are disasters. They cost far more resources to make than paper or plastic bags. And you can’t just blithely reuse them. The neo-Puritans’ horror of germs is even more severe than their hatred of plastic. Every time a bit of chicken guts gets onto the canvas bag, or meat juice or ketchup, you’re going to have to wash it. And let’s face it, that’s going to be every trip to the store. So if you go shopping more than once a week – and who doesn’t? – you’re going to be doing extra washloads to accommodate your idiot canvas shopping bags. Just think of the soap and water expended that wouldn’t be necessary if you weren’t scared stiff to be seen by the president of the local Sierra Club coming out of Publix with groceries in plastic bags. And do you really want to carry all those ultra-expensive “organic” vegetables home in a bag with detergent residue in it? How sanpaku!!
All in all, from every point of view, the old guy on his deathbed in “The Graduate” was right. It’s “Plastics, my boy, plastics...”
I can’t believe people, when asked whether they want paper or plastic grocery bags, sometimes want paper. It’s nuts. The plastic bags are wonderful. You can hold twenty pounds of groceries in a soaking rainstorm with your little finger. They have a thousand uses around the house and can even serve as quick-lighting firestarters when the weather turns cool. Paper bags, however, turn soggy at the touch of rain or a leaky can or bottle, are difficult to hold with one arm, much less with one finger, and tear easily.
Oh, I know, the knee-jerk enviros say that plastic is awful and paper is more “natural” and efficient. Huh? That’s so dumb it’s hard to imagine anyone clinging to such a belief after any reflection at all. Which only shows that a lot of people don’t even start to reflect. They just emote. Brown, paper, from tree – good. But not too many, because there are only so many trees and they’ll all be gone soon. Right. Plastic – arggh – unnatural non-earth tones, from icky petroleum products raped from Mother Earth by right-wing conservative Texans. That’s about as far as their thinking goes. In truth, of course, the plastic bags are far more efficient than the paper ones. They weigh almost nothing, probably ten to a hundred times less than the paper ones. This means a tremendous savings in transport costs. Their strength means much less food is wasted from broken bottles and jars and dented cans and broccoli florets strewn across rain-soaked parking lots. And they even take up much less space in landfills and keep dyes and their other chemicals safely locked up instead of letting them leach into the soil, if you’re concerned about such nonsense. Not to mention that they’re cheaper, lowering food costs even more.
The worst way to bring home groceries is in your own canvas bag. Oh, I know, all the big chains are promoting them now, asking you to spend six or more dollars per bag. Now these things are heavy. You have to have ten dollars worth of groceries in them to equal the weight of the bag. I can’t imagine how heavy they get in the rain. But that’s not the worst part. They’re small. They don’t expand to hold very many groceries. You’d wind up spending thirty dollars just to have enough bags. The string bags we used to use when I was a boy in England make more sense. And, from an “ecological” point of view, these “reusable” bags are disasters. They cost far more resources to make than paper or plastic bags. And you can’t just blithely reuse them. The neo-Puritans’ horror of germs is even more severe than their hatred of plastic. Every time a bit of chicken guts gets onto the canvas bag, or meat juice or ketchup, you’re going to have to wash it. And let’s face it, that’s going to be every trip to the store. So if you go shopping more than once a week – and who doesn’t? – you’re going to be doing extra washloads to accommodate your idiot canvas shopping bags. Just think of the soap and water expended that wouldn’t be necessary if you weren’t scared stiff to be seen by the president of the local Sierra Club coming out of Publix with groceries in plastic bags. And do you really want to carry all those ultra-expensive “organic” vegetables home in a bag with detergent residue in it? How sanpaku!!
All in all, from every point of view, the old guy on his deathbed in “The Graduate” was right. It’s “Plastics, my boy, plastics...”
Paying the cost to be the boss
Ever thought you'd like to be a boss? Janis Ian has a great article about being a boss in the music industry. Makes you think twice, but she also makes it seem like, if she could do it, so could you. I enjoyed it, I think you will, too.
Ever thought you'd like to be a boss? Janis Ian has a great article about being a boss in the music industry. Makes you think twice, but she also makes it seem like, if she could do it, so could you. I enjoyed it, I think you will, too.
See Nessie! See Nessie swim!
Want to keep a lookout for the Loch Ness Monster (known to us of Scottish ancestry as Nessie)? The Scotsman has a webcam that will let you pass time scanning the grey loch for whatever secret its deep cold water may hold. Recommended as an activity while sipping single malt. Are you listening, Dr. Rines?
Want to keep a lookout for the Loch Ness Monster (known to us of Scottish ancestry as Nessie)? The Scotsman has a webcam that will let you pass time scanning the grey loch for whatever secret its deep cold water may hold. Recommended as an activity while sipping single malt. Are you listening, Dr. Rines?
Google news and an evanescent poster
Google has a news service now, here. I've checked it out and I'm quite impressed. It could be quicker than Drudge or Lucianne. And it tells you how long ago the article it links to was posted on the Web. I mean, where else could you get instant New Zealand v. Bangladesh cricket results? Search engines are changing our world.
Wolfram was offering a free poster for anyone who wrote a review of "A New Kind of Science". I was going to use my posts from earlier this summer to cadge a copy. It features the entire book micro-reduced onto a wall poster. Cool. But too late, again!! I'll keep looking, in case it shows up again.
The German election seems like a good result, oddly enough. The Lefties' majority is way down and the coming victory over Iraq will make them look like idiots, especially when we find all the German products going into So damn Insane's WMD apparatus. Anyone for Zyklon B, left over from a certain regrettable era?
Google has a news service now, here. I've checked it out and I'm quite impressed. It could be quicker than Drudge or Lucianne. And it tells you how long ago the article it links to was posted on the Web. I mean, where else could you get instant New Zealand v. Bangladesh cricket results? Search engines are changing our world.
Wolfram was offering a free poster for anyone who wrote a review of "A New Kind of Science". I was going to use my posts from earlier this summer to cadge a copy. It features the entire book micro-reduced onto a wall poster. Cool. But too late, again!! I'll keep looking, in case it shows up again.
The German election seems like a good result, oddly enough. The Lefties' majority is way down and the coming victory over Iraq will make them look like idiots, especially when we find all the German products going into So damn Insane's WMD apparatus. Anyone for Zyklon B, left over from a certain regrettable era?
Sunday, September 22, 2002
Don't smoke that stuff - you'll turn into an A-rab.
A lot of blogsters have been talking lately (Stephen den Beste, are you listening? And i flat refuse to capitalize the "d" in "den") about how different Arab Islamic cultures are from ours and how they must be defeated utterly in order to change. I have a different idea. Perhaps the real difference in our cultures stems from the choice of intoxicants. Mohammed forbade Muslims from using alcohol because he knew of the effects of alcohol on a civilization. But perhaps it is just those effects that makes modern Western society aggressive and forward-looking. Certainly alcohol is much more compatible with Western capitalist and Christian culture than is hashish or qat, the intoxicants allowed under Islam, by most interpretations.
Which reminds me, at the Cairo airport is a big sign "drug smuggling is punishable by death by hanging". Gets your attention. But then in the bazaars one sees old men sucking on hookahs and narjilahs, producing a smell that isn't tobacco. Like much of Arab culture, the reality differs from the public face. Rather than launching into a long discourse on the differential effects of alcohol and cannabis-like substances, I'll just suggest we try one experiment. Take an Arab state and introduce beer and whiskey big time, not just for the rich guys but for everyone. We can ban cannabinoids and qat if we want, but I don't think it will make much difference. In Western culture, even when cannabinoids were not illegal, alcohol dominated. I'd be willing to bet that within ten years that society would be optimistic, forward-looking, efficient and competitive. Perhaps the drug war in America is based on that insight. You smoke that ganja stuff, you turn into an A-rab, sitting around the hovel all day, listening to atonal music and casting longing glances at the camels. Drink beer and whiskey, you party, feel great for a few hours, wake up in the morning with a sore head and might as well go to work since you're going to be miserable until about five o'clock anyway.
If the combination of cheap booze, Baywatch and free love doesn't save the Arabs from their wretchedness, they're not worth worrying about. Just nuke 'em.
A lot of blogsters have been talking lately (Stephen den Beste, are you listening? And i flat refuse to capitalize the "d" in "den") about how different Arab Islamic cultures are from ours and how they must be defeated utterly in order to change. I have a different idea. Perhaps the real difference in our cultures stems from the choice of intoxicants. Mohammed forbade Muslims from using alcohol because he knew of the effects of alcohol on a civilization. But perhaps it is just those effects that makes modern Western society aggressive and forward-looking. Certainly alcohol is much more compatible with Western capitalist and Christian culture than is hashish or qat, the intoxicants allowed under Islam, by most interpretations.
Which reminds me, at the Cairo airport is a big sign "drug smuggling is punishable by death by hanging". Gets your attention. But then in the bazaars one sees old men sucking on hookahs and narjilahs, producing a smell that isn't tobacco. Like much of Arab culture, the reality differs from the public face. Rather than launching into a long discourse on the differential effects of alcohol and cannabis-like substances, I'll just suggest we try one experiment. Take an Arab state and introduce beer and whiskey big time, not just for the rich guys but for everyone. We can ban cannabinoids and qat if we want, but I don't think it will make much difference. In Western culture, even when cannabinoids were not illegal, alcohol dominated. I'd be willing to bet that within ten years that society would be optimistic, forward-looking, efficient and competitive. Perhaps the drug war in America is based on that insight. You smoke that ganja stuff, you turn into an A-rab, sitting around the hovel all day, listening to atonal music and casting longing glances at the camels. Drink beer and whiskey, you party, feel great for a few hours, wake up in the morning with a sore head and might as well go to work since you're going to be miserable until about five o'clock anyway.
If the combination of cheap booze, Baywatch and free love doesn't save the Arabs from their wretchedness, they're not worth worrying about. Just nuke 'em.
Tuesday, September 17, 2002
[9/17/2002 6:18:03 AM | Robert Speirs]
I haven't seen anything in any news about the pepper spray incident at the Eagles-Redskins football game last night. It was SO War on Terror! The pictures of people covering their mouths and noses, trying to get away from some "noxious substance" on the Eagles - away team - sideline sent shivers around the world of football. What if terror had struck home at the most sacred of American male ceremonies, Monday Night Football!? Or, perhaps worse, what if some sorehead Redskins fan, seeing the pounding his team was taking at the hands of Donovan McNabb and company, decided to overturn the chessboard and have the game called, by copycatting Osama? For a few minutes, no one knew quite what was going on, which is the worst thing that can happen these days. As it turned out, it was the cops. A fight had broken out in the stands behind the Eagles' bench and the cops had liberally doused the participants with pepper spray, some of which had drifted onto the field and around the stands. Like the cops don't have some better way to restrain drunken fools in the middle of a huge crowd other than dousing the whole crowd with noxious chemicals. Why do I sense the genesis of the problem in the politically correct presence of physically incompetent female cops here?
As to the Florida terrorist scare, set off by the boisterous idiocy of some wannabe Osamas in a diner in Georgia, I have to make one comparison. What would happen if I went into a restaurant in Saudi Arabia and started talking loudly about how those Arabs would regret September 11 when Mecca and Medina were vaporized? They wouldn't just close off a highway and explode my luggage. They'd bring out the sharpened scimitar immediately. If I insisted I was just joking, of course, they would apologize and let me go. Right.
I haven't seen anything in any news about the pepper spray incident at the Eagles-Redskins football game last night. It was SO War on Terror! The pictures of people covering their mouths and noses, trying to get away from some "noxious substance" on the Eagles - away team - sideline sent shivers around the world of football. What if terror had struck home at the most sacred of American male ceremonies, Monday Night Football!? Or, perhaps worse, what if some sorehead Redskins fan, seeing the pounding his team was taking at the hands of Donovan McNabb and company, decided to overturn the chessboard and have the game called, by copycatting Osama? For a few minutes, no one knew quite what was going on, which is the worst thing that can happen these days. As it turned out, it was the cops. A fight had broken out in the stands behind the Eagles' bench and the cops had liberally doused the participants with pepper spray, some of which had drifted onto the field and around the stands. Like the cops don't have some better way to restrain drunken fools in the middle of a huge crowd other than dousing the whole crowd with noxious chemicals. Why do I sense the genesis of the problem in the politically correct presence of physically incompetent female cops here?
As to the Florida terrorist scare, set off by the boisterous idiocy of some wannabe Osamas in a diner in Georgia, I have to make one comparison. What would happen if I went into a restaurant in Saudi Arabia and started talking loudly about how those Arabs would regret September 11 when Mecca and Medina were vaporized? They wouldn't just close off a highway and explode my luggage. They'd bring out the sharpened scimitar immediately. If I insisted I was just joking, of course, they would apologize and let me go. Right.
Monday, September 16, 2002
The latest puzzle from Richard Maltby, called Triplets, is quite diverting. It features overlapping combinations of three solutions from three mixed-together definition clues. Not only is the location of each triplet unspecified, but so is the sequence of solutions within each triplet. These triple entries take up a large part of the puzzle, but leave just enough normal clues to pin down the location and sequence of the triple entries. I enjoyed this one more than most of my recent tries. Is that because I solved it fairly quickly? Is it a big surprise that you enjoy things more, from cooking to flying airplanes to romance, when they go well? The glow on this one, though, is such that I want to nominate it for Best Puzzle Ever. We?ll see how long that lasts.
Another football weekend brings a new term of art. Have you noticed how much bigger football linemen are getting these days? I don?t mean tall - they?ve all been tall for some time - but fat, downright, hanging-over-the-belt fat? Many are pushing 400 lbs now. I noticed one of the players referring to ?the Buddhas on the inside? and was thinking, ?How poetic! That?s better than anything Dennis Miller ever came up with?. Then I realized he was talking not about some inner peace that helps you concentrate on endzone nirvana, but the linemen. They do look like Buddhas! Line play is becoming more and more like sumo wrestling. It had to happen. The next development will be Japanese teams, cloned perhaps from the biggest sumo wrestlers. After all, football players have pushed speed and strength and aggressiveness to a maximum. There?s only one frontier left - heft!
Another football weekend brings a new term of art. Have you noticed how much bigger football linemen are getting these days? I don?t mean tall - they?ve all been tall for some time - but fat, downright, hanging-over-the-belt fat? Many are pushing 400 lbs now. I noticed one of the players referring to ?the Buddhas on the inside? and was thinking, ?How poetic! That?s better than anything Dennis Miller ever came up with?. Then I realized he was talking not about some inner peace that helps you concentrate on endzone nirvana, but the linemen. They do look like Buddhas! Line play is becoming more and more like sumo wrestling. It had to happen. The next development will be Japanese teams, cloned perhaps from the biggest sumo wrestlers. After all, football players have pushed speed and strength and aggressiveness to a maximum. There?s only one frontier left - heft!
Saturday, September 14, 2002
New job. New JetStream Oven. New football season. Does life get any better? My observations of the blogosphere's delight at what looks to be George W.'s triumph at the UN, putting his critics in a bind make me wonder if I'm dreaming. Can he really have turned the tables so completely? One can only hope. The Iraq debate has shown the blog world at its most active and interesting. I no longer bother watching TV news or reading newspapers. Why should I, with Instapundit, Drudge, the News Forum and a dozen other sites ready and willing to serve me up news and spin that changes with the hour.
As to Wolfram, I've finished the main text and am struggling through the copious notes. I may skip a lot and go back to the main text. I may be reading this book for the rest of my life. Happy September!
As to Wolfram, I've finished the main text and am struggling through the copious notes. I may skip a lot and go back to the main text. I may be reading this book for the rest of my life. Happy September!
Monday, June 24, 2002
D. Ultimate Models for the Universe.
Yes, I'm not kidding, that's what Wolfram titled this section. He explained that he is looking for and is pretty certain he has found a "complete and precise representation" of physical reality. Or, at the least he's pointing the way there. He points out once again that because the universe might be more complex than we thought doesn't necessarily mean that the automaton that compiled it is all that complex. Heck, it could get ten or a hundred or a million times more complex and still it could be based on a very simple rule.
In some of his simplest, clearest language, Wolfram asks how we could ever find the rule for the universe, even if it is simple and how we would know it once we had found it. He provides simple clear answers. But his thoughts brought to my mind a Biblical quotation:
Seek and ye shall find; knock and it shall be opened unto ye.
There are no short cuts. You may have to do a lot of searching and there's no guarantee you'll find what you're looking for. Hey, that sounds like the universe I recognize, the one I live in every day.
In the notes to this section, which are almost as long as the section, Wolfram provides a potted history of models of the universe. It's excellent. Then at the end of the note he addresses the concept of whether the universe has a meaning. Since his model is based on an abstract mathematical logical system, not unlike the system from which the digits of pi are derived, W concludes that the universe has no more meaning than can be found in the sequence of digits after the decimal point in pi. A bit deflating, but I think he's got more deflating in store. Beat me!! At least I'm still the most important guy in MY universe!
Yes, I'm not kidding, that's what Wolfram titled this section. He explained that he is looking for and is pretty certain he has found a "complete and precise representation" of physical reality. Or, at the least he's pointing the way there. He points out once again that because the universe might be more complex than we thought doesn't necessarily mean that the automaton that compiled it is all that complex. Heck, it could get ten or a hundred or a million times more complex and still it could be based on a very simple rule.
In some of his simplest, clearest language, Wolfram asks how we could ever find the rule for the universe, even if it is simple and how we would know it once we had found it. He provides simple clear answers. But his thoughts brought to my mind a Biblical quotation:
Seek and ye shall find; knock and it shall be opened unto ye.
There are no short cuts. You may have to do a lot of searching and there's no guarantee you'll find what you're looking for. Hey, that sounds like the universe I recognize, the one I live in every day.
In the notes to this section, which are almost as long as the section, Wolfram provides a potted history of models of the universe. It's excellent. Then at the end of the note he addresses the concept of whether the universe has a meaning. Since his model is based on an abstract mathematical logical system, not unlike the system from which the digits of pi are derived, W concludes that the universe has no more meaning than can be found in the sequence of digits after the decimal point in pi. A bit deflating, but I think he's got more deflating in store. Beat me!! At least I'm still the most important guy in MY universe!
Sunday, June 23, 2002
More links
To get away from Wolfram for a minute, I've seen several stories linking Timothy McVeigh, Terry Nichols and the Mideast terror web. The latest relates that the bomb - apparently set up by AlQaeda - that exploded outside the US consulate in Karachi was a diesel oil/fertilizer bomb like the one that half-destroyed the Federal Building in OK City. I know that's hardly proof, but combined with the fact that the missing OK City suspect's picture looks an awful lot like Jose Padilla/Muhajir and the fact that Terry Nichol's ex-wife's maiden name is Padilla and the discovery of messages between AlQaeda operatives just before April 19, 1995 talking about the destruction of American landmarks and specifically mentioning the Murrah Building - among others, to be sure - why you've got more than enough for a website, paperback and set of Congressional hearings.
By the way, the lack of American fatalities in the Karachi blast says good things about the lessons learned since Beirut and Oklahoma City. Unfortunately, Pakistani bystanders were not so lucky. If a 500-lb bomb can't even destroy a consulate, we've come a long way.
To get away from Wolfram for a minute, I've seen several stories linking Timothy McVeigh, Terry Nichols and the Mideast terror web. The latest relates that the bomb - apparently set up by AlQaeda - that exploded outside the US consulate in Karachi was a diesel oil/fertilizer bomb like the one that half-destroyed the Federal Building in OK City. I know that's hardly proof, but combined with the fact that the missing OK City suspect's picture looks an awful lot like Jose Padilla/Muhajir and the fact that Terry Nichol's ex-wife's maiden name is Padilla and the discovery of messages between AlQaeda operatives just before April 19, 1995 talking about the destruction of American landmarks and specifically mentioning the Murrah Building - among others, to be sure - why you've got more than enough for a website, paperback and set of Congressional hearings.
By the way, the lack of American fatalities in the Karachi blast says good things about the lessons learned since Beirut and Oklahoma City. Unfortunately, Pakistani bystanders were not so lucky. If a 500-lb bomb can't even destroy a consulate, we've come a long way.
Chapter 9 of Wolfram - This is the BIG one, folks!
One hundred and twelve pages that will change my view of the universe. At least that's what I was hoping. It does build from section to section, though, with a chutzpah that amazes. My only problem is that I'm not sure whether he's delivering the goods or not. I started college as a physics major, but ended up as a hippie political scientist and then went to law school. So I can spot an argument, but I can't compare Wolfram's conclusions about quantum mechanics or gravitational waves to the standard theory because I don't know it. Maybe that's an advantage in a way, though.
Section A - Reversibility
It seemed a little odd for W to address "reversibility" as the first point of a chapter telling how fundamental physics is explained by his theory. But he does a good job of it, pointing out how cellular automata can produce reversible results, that is, patterns in which it is possible to run the rule backwards as well as forwards. And in doing so, the patterns lose none of the randomness he says is necessary to explain how they can produce everything we see around us.
B- Irreversibility and the Second Law
Once again, I wish I knew more about the Second Law of Thermodynamics. I'm sure it's more complicated than: "Everything's falling apart and there's nothing anyone can do about it." But Wolfram's message here seems to be "it ain't necessarily so". His automata patterns show that the king's horses and men can occasionally produce something that looks like Humpty Dumpty out of all that eggshell and protoplasm. I guess that means I have to say "the yolk's not necessarily always on them". King's anything - especially "men" - are non-PC these days, but W apparently doesn't care. He's been holed up with his automata since before there was any such thing as PC. Some patterns show a different kind of order emerging from randomized chaos from that order which existed before the chaos was generated. With many "mights" and "perhaps", W also points out the structures that occur, some of them separated by what look like "membranes". Curiouser and curiouser. The treatise on reversibility in the first section of the chapter makes more sense now.
C - Conserved Quantities and Continuum Phenomena
Hmm. Some cellular automata exhibit conservation of the number of squares of any one color. Wolfram compares this to the law of conservation of matter and energy - and momentum. Every so often I flash on how bold and confident Wolfram is about his comparisons. I almost want to see him fall flat on his face. But somehow he makes it all seem reasonable, almost inevitable.
A new word (for me): Ergodicity. Google found me a note about it, in, of all things, a game theory context:
In particular, his models show ergodicity. Basically, this means that if you have a large number of such systems, and at any one time p percent of them are in a given state, then every single one
of them will spend about p percent of its time in that state. (Technically, there's a distribution over the states such that the state-space average of any well-behaved function equals its
time-average starting from almost any state, if you take the latter over a long enough interval.) Ergodicity is a very strong property, and one of the stronger predictions his models make; it goes
away if the agents are not perverse, or can remember unlimited stretches of the past, in which case each population will lock in to a single convention forever. It is also liable to be hard to test
empirically, because it can take a considerable time to converge on the ergodic distribution, and in the meanwhile the game people are playing is apt to have changed.
Now that that's clear, I think I'll actually post this. More on the way about Wolfram's Chapter 9. A lot more.
One hundred and twelve pages that will change my view of the universe. At least that's what I was hoping. It does build from section to section, though, with a chutzpah that amazes. My only problem is that I'm not sure whether he's delivering the goods or not. I started college as a physics major, but ended up as a hippie political scientist and then went to law school. So I can spot an argument, but I can't compare Wolfram's conclusions about quantum mechanics or gravitational waves to the standard theory because I don't know it. Maybe that's an advantage in a way, though.
Section A - Reversibility
It seemed a little odd for W to address "reversibility" as the first point of a chapter telling how fundamental physics is explained by his theory. But he does a good job of it, pointing out how cellular automata can produce reversible results, that is, patterns in which it is possible to run the rule backwards as well as forwards. And in doing so, the patterns lose none of the randomness he says is necessary to explain how they can produce everything we see around us.
B- Irreversibility and the Second Law
Once again, I wish I knew more about the Second Law of Thermodynamics. I'm sure it's more complicated than: "Everything's falling apart and there's nothing anyone can do about it." But Wolfram's message here seems to be "it ain't necessarily so". His automata patterns show that the king's horses and men can occasionally produce something that looks like Humpty Dumpty out of all that eggshell and protoplasm. I guess that means I have to say "the yolk's not necessarily always on them". King's anything - especially "men" - are non-PC these days, but W apparently doesn't care. He's been holed up with his automata since before there was any such thing as PC. Some patterns show a different kind of order emerging from randomized chaos from that order which existed before the chaos was generated. With many "mights" and "perhaps", W also points out the structures that occur, some of them separated by what look like "membranes". Curiouser and curiouser. The treatise on reversibility in the first section of the chapter makes more sense now.
C - Conserved Quantities and Continuum Phenomena
Hmm. Some cellular automata exhibit conservation of the number of squares of any one color. Wolfram compares this to the law of conservation of matter and energy - and momentum. Every so often I flash on how bold and confident Wolfram is about his comparisons. I almost want to see him fall flat on his face. But somehow he makes it all seem reasonable, almost inevitable.
A new word (for me): Ergodicity. Google found me a note about it, in, of all things, a game theory context:
In particular, his models show ergodicity. Basically, this means that if you have a large number of such systems, and at any one time p percent of them are in a given state, then every single one
of them will spend about p percent of its time in that state. (Technically, there's a distribution over the states such that the state-space average of any well-behaved function equals its
time-average starting from almost any state, if you take the latter over a long enough interval.) Ergodicity is a very strong property, and one of the stronger predictions his models make; it goes
away if the agents are not perverse, or can remember unlimited stretches of the past, in which case each population will lock in to a single convention forever. It is also liable to be hard to test
empirically, because it can take a considerable time to converge on the ergodic distribution, and in the meanwhile the game people are playing is apt to have changed.
Now that that's clear, I think I'll actually post this. More on the way about Wolfram's Chapter 9. A lot more.
Tuesday, June 18, 2002
Responding to terror
The horrific massacre by a Palestinian mass murderer in Jerusalem requires a response. His house and all his family's possessions that can be traced should be destroyed or confiscated. The university in Nablus he went to and where he was apparently recruited should be razed to the ground. My God! The Euro-weenies call the Israelis Nazis. Do they have any idea what the SS would have done if the French resistance had exploded a bomb on a bus in Germany and the bomber's family had crowed about it in public? There wouldn't have been anything left of the area of France the bomber was from. And the French are an actual nation. And the Nazis were real monsters.
The horrific massacre by a Palestinian mass murderer in Jerusalem requires a response. His house and all his family's possessions that can be traced should be destroyed or confiscated. The university in Nablus he went to and where he was apparently recruited should be razed to the ground. My God! The Euro-weenies call the Israelis Nazis. Do they have any idea what the SS would have done if the French resistance had exploded a bomb on a bus in Germany and the bomber's family had crowed about it in public? There wouldn't have been anything left of the area of France the bomber was from. And the French are an actual nation. And the Nazis were real monsters.
Soccer, Wolfram and even a puzzle
I've been absorbed in the twelfth chapter of Wolfram, which appears to be as complicated - and interesting - as the rest of the book so far, which is saying something. I've even been taking notes. I'll be posting summaries soon. I'm at school with professor Wolfram. It bothers me maybe a bit that he's ten + years younger than I am, but I'm not letting that stop me. My mornings have been obsessed with the latest soccer games from Korea and Japan, which, too bad, just was ousted by Turkey at about 4:30 Tallahassee time. Korea's fighting for its life against Turkey, down 1-0. I did, yes, get my copy of Maltby's latest puzzle from Harper's and am liking it. It's nearly as intricate this time as one of Wolfram's automata. Hey, wouldn't that be a discovery? Automata using cryptic clues! Ha! Sorry, too much coffee and enough Wolfram for now.
Another suicide bombing in Jerusalem. When are the Israelis going to get really mad and just resettle the Palestinians, to, oh, say, Madagascar? Judea and Samaria fully Jewish again would make it so much harder for Hamas and Hezbollah to operate there.
I've been absorbed in the twelfth chapter of Wolfram, which appears to be as complicated - and interesting - as the rest of the book so far, which is saying something. I've even been taking notes. I'll be posting summaries soon. I'm at school with professor Wolfram. It bothers me maybe a bit that he's ten + years younger than I am, but I'm not letting that stop me. My mornings have been obsessed with the latest soccer games from Korea and Japan, which, too bad, just was ousted by Turkey at about 4:30 Tallahassee time. Korea's fighting for its life against Turkey, down 1-0. I did, yes, get my copy of Maltby's latest puzzle from Harper's and am liking it. It's nearly as intricate this time as one of Wolfram's automata. Hey, wouldn't that be a discovery? Automata using cryptic clues! Ha! Sorry, too much coffee and enough Wolfram for now.
Another suicide bombing in Jerusalem. When are the Israelis going to get really mad and just resettle the Palestinians, to, oh, say, Madagascar? Judea and Samaria fully Jewish again would make it so much harder for Hamas and Hezbollah to operate there.
Tuesday, June 11, 2002
Too much cheese, too many surrenders!
Saw the end of the France-Denmark World Cup game today. The cheese-eating surrender monkeys surrendered once again, 2-0, and go home having not just failed to win but having failed even to score in three games. And they're the World Cup champions! Is it a coincidence that France has the euro and Denmark has resisted it? I think not! The French played abysmally. You could tell half-way through the second half that they would lose. The Danes were smiling, loose. The French looked lost, hypnotized. Now don't get me wrong. I love France. It's beautiful. If there just weren't so many darned Frenchmen in it! Fill it with Danes and send the French to keep the Palestinians company. They deserve each other.
Saw the end of the France-Denmark World Cup game today. The cheese-eating surrender monkeys surrendered once again, 2-0, and go home having not just failed to win but having failed even to score in three games. And they're the World Cup champions! Is it a coincidence that France has the euro and Denmark has resisted it? I think not! The French played abysmally. You could tell half-way through the second half that they would lose. The Danes were smiling, loose. The French looked lost, hypnotized. Now don't get me wrong. I love France. It's beautiful. If there just weren't so many darned Frenchmen in it! Fill it with Danes and send the French to keep the Palestinians company. They deserve each other.
Monday, June 10, 2002
Bugs
Found an astonishing article at the Atlantic online (theatlantic.com) about viruses and bacteria that may - probably do - cause - get ready - heart disease, cancers, schizophrenia, even - gasp! - homosexuality! Somewhat breathless but entertaining. I knew it wasn't the sausages and bacon I eat every morning that were the problem, or even Atkins' demons, starches. It's infection, I tell you! They're everywhere!! Get them off me!! ARRRRRRR .....
Found an astonishing article at the Atlantic online (theatlantic.com) about viruses and bacteria that may - probably do - cause - get ready - heart disease, cancers, schizophrenia, even - gasp! - homosexuality! Somewhat breathless but entertaining. I knew it wasn't the sausages and bacon I eat every morning that were the problem, or even Atkins' demons, starches. It's infection, I tell you! They're everywhere!! Get them off me!! ARRRRRRR .....
Sunday, June 09, 2002
[6/9/2002 10:56:48 AM | Robert Speirs]
Snowflakes, flowers, seashells and the stock market - Wolfram as God
In Chapter 8, Wolfram tells how snowflakes are made, how flowers grow, how sea creatures form their shells and how stock traders determine when to buy or sell. Or, he tells why we can't tell when traders will sell. This chapter has rather a lot on evolutionary mechanisms, a la Stephen Jay Gould. I kept wondering how Gould would respond to the patterns Wolfram generates from quite simple rules. As a layman, I also wondered how experts in the various fields Wolfram looks at would respond. Would it be, "Oh, of course, everyone knows that," meaning everyone in the field, or "That can't possibly be and I'll show you why"? Or, more likely, would it be, "Well, that's interesting. I'll have to check that out."?
For me, in my state of half-education on all these topics, my reaction to the revelations matches my wonderment at being shown that the progressions of buds on a plant stem are spaced according to the Fibonacci sequence. Ah, so there IS a correspondence between numbers and nature! And, now, "Ah, maybe someday we will be able to grow a creature like none that ever lived on Earth before!"
Snowflakes, flowers, seashells and the stock market - Wolfram as God
In Chapter 8, Wolfram tells how snowflakes are made, how flowers grow, how sea creatures form their shells and how stock traders determine when to buy or sell. Or, he tells why we can't tell when traders will sell. This chapter has rather a lot on evolutionary mechanisms, a la Stephen Jay Gould. I kept wondering how Gould would respond to the patterns Wolfram generates from quite simple rules. As a layman, I also wondered how experts in the various fields Wolfram looks at would respond. Would it be, "Oh, of course, everyone knows that," meaning everyone in the field, or "That can't possibly be and I'll show you why"? Or, more likely, would it be, "Well, that's interesting. I'll have to check that out."?
For me, in my state of half-education on all these topics, my reaction to the revelations matches my wonderment at being shown that the progressions of buds on a plant stem are spaced according to the Fibonacci sequence. Ah, so there IS a correspondence between numbers and nature! And, now, "Ah, maybe someday we will be able to grow a creature like none that ever lived on Earth before!"
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