Tuesday, September 10, 2002
"You First - No More Pearl Harbors"
Maybe you've seen this Larry Miller piece before, but I don't care - read it anyway.
Indifference in sexism in blogging.
Last Page doesn't care about this sexism in blogging issue - don't let those 9 links fool you.
And Media Minded butts in with this. Your move, Dawn.
UPDATE: Dawn made her move, with a picture more consistent with the name of her site. I like the old ones better.
And Media Minded butts in with this. Your move, Dawn.
UPDATE: Dawn made her move, with a picture more consistent with the name of her site. I like the old ones better.
Sexism in blogging II
Just for the record I'll address some things posted on Meryl Yourish's blog about my post immediately below.
You'll notice 4 things I asked if she could agree with. I didn't offer any evidence - I figured that they weren't particularly controversial, so I didn't lay everything out as if I were deriving a mathematical proof. But Ms. Yourish took issue with all 4.
I'll plead guilty to sloppiness on 1 and 2, where I should have said political blogs instead of blogs in general. With that qualification I'll stand behind 1 and 2.
An act of faith? Not really. References like this one show the results of investigations showing that men simply show more knowledge of politics than women. This I attribute to interests rather than innate abilities, and it fits most of the women I know.
As originally written 1) is questionable, but based on the reference above I'll stand by it as amended to refer to "political" blogs.
Ms. Yourish says that more women than men are online now as if this addresses 1). But that does not mean that women are reading more blogs than men are. My "sexist" guess is that if her assertion is true, those women are spending most of their time shopping, chatting or swapping email rather than reading or writing blogs. That too is consistent with the behavior of most of the women I know, who don't even suspect the existence of weblogs.
2) also needs the amendment limiting it to political blogs. Check the blogroll to the left - if Ms. Yourish will point out neglected predominantly political female bloggers to whom I'm not already linked and who are politically similar to the ones there now, I'll be happy to check them out. I'm already linked to most of the blogs she has mentioned, and in most cases I have been for months (including, more recently, Ms.Yourish herself). If I'm neglecting any group, it's men - there's just so many good ones I won't even claim to have heard of them all.
3) and 4)? Gimme a break. If statements as mild as "Each sex tends to write about things of interest to their own sex." and "Each sex tends to read about things of interest to their own sex." are found controversial, we have little if any common ground.
What was Ann Coulter doing in there? Ms. Yourish was going off on her a while back, so the devil in me couldn't be denied. I thought Ms. Yourish might admire Ms. Coulter's success in a field dominated by men.
How many of various bloggers' audiences are female? Beats me. If Ms. Yourish know of a way to sex readers via their IP addresses I know some marketers she can sell it to. My best tool for evaluating this distribution is my commenting facility, where I'd say it's at least 3 to 1 in favor of women by distinct names (assuming I know which are which). In total post count it's far more lopsidedly male. That's grossly inadequate as a measure of the sex distribution of traffic, but Ms. Yourish doesn't support even that, so I'd be interested in knowing how she knows the true composition of her audience if in fact she does.
Now, the Diane E. example, comparing her knowledge to that of Steven Den Beste on Middle Eastern issues. OK, suppose Ms. Yourish is right. Diane E. isn't as prolific as SDB. She doesn't cover as many topics. The non-Middle East topics she covers are less interesting to men than are those that SDB covers. And she hasn't been around as long to get the exposure he's had. So why would a reasonable person declare them as somehow equivalent with respect to worthiness for traffic in general?
Then there's this: "Are you trying to say that women don't care about politics? Technology? Sports? That only men are interested in reading warblogs?" No, of course not, and spare me the straw men. I wonder if Ms. Yourish really believes that all of those topics are of equal interest to both men and women - if so, the reference above might help. Again, my experience is consistent with its findings.
Lest my shortcomings as a writer should obscure it, the only emotion that ought to be showing in any of the above is disappointment.
You'll notice 4 things I asked if she could agree with. I didn't offer any evidence - I figured that they weren't particularly controversial, so I didn't lay everything out as if I were deriving a mathematical proof. But Ms. Yourish took issue with all 4.
I'll plead guilty to sloppiness on 1 and 2, where I should have said political blogs instead of blogs in general. With that qualification I'll stand behind 1 and 2.
An act of faith? Not really. References like this one show the results of investigations showing that men simply show more knowledge of politics than women. This I attribute to interests rather than innate abilities, and it fits most of the women I know.
As originally written 1) is questionable, but based on the reference above I'll stand by it as amended to refer to "political" blogs.
Ms. Yourish says that more women than men are online now as if this addresses 1). But that does not mean that women are reading more blogs than men are. My "sexist" guess is that if her assertion is true, those women are spending most of their time shopping, chatting or swapping email rather than reading or writing blogs. That too is consistent with the behavior of most of the women I know, who don't even suspect the existence of weblogs.
2) also needs the amendment limiting it to political blogs. Check the blogroll to the left - if Ms. Yourish will point out neglected predominantly political female bloggers to whom I'm not already linked and who are politically similar to the ones there now, I'll be happy to check them out. I'm already linked to most of the blogs she has mentioned, and in most cases I have been for months (including, more recently, Ms.Yourish herself). If I'm neglecting any group, it's men - there's just so many good ones I won't even claim to have heard of them all.
3) and 4)? Gimme a break. If statements as mild as "Each sex tends to write about things of interest to their own sex." and "Each sex tends to read about things of interest to their own sex." are found controversial, we have little if any common ground.
What was Ann Coulter doing in there? Ms. Yourish was going off on her a while back, so the devil in me couldn't be denied. I thought Ms. Yourish might admire Ms. Coulter's success in a field dominated by men.
How many of various bloggers' audiences are female? Beats me. If Ms. Yourish know of a way to sex readers via their IP addresses I know some marketers she can sell it to. My best tool for evaluating this distribution is my commenting facility, where I'd say it's at least 3 to 1 in favor of women by distinct names (assuming I know which are which). In total post count it's far more lopsidedly male. That's grossly inadequate as a measure of the sex distribution of traffic, but Ms. Yourish doesn't support even that, so I'd be interested in knowing how she knows the true composition of her audience if in fact she does.
Now, the Diane E. example, comparing her knowledge to that of Steven Den Beste on Middle Eastern issues. OK, suppose Ms. Yourish is right. Diane E. isn't as prolific as SDB. She doesn't cover as many topics. The non-Middle East topics she covers are less interesting to men than are those that SDB covers. And she hasn't been around as long to get the exposure he's had. So why would a reasonable person declare them as somehow equivalent with respect to worthiness for traffic in general?
Then there's this: "Are you trying to say that women don't care about politics? Technology? Sports? That only men are interested in reading warblogs?" No, of course not, and spare me the straw men. I wonder if Ms. Yourish really believes that all of those topics are of equal interest to both men and women - if so, the reference above might help. Again, my experience is consistent with its findings.
Lest my shortcomings as a writer should obscure it, the only emotion that ought to be showing in any of the above is disappointment.
Monday, September 09, 2002
Sexism in blogging?
Meryl Yourish seems to think that there is sexism in blogging. Well, let's quote her:
Before I start, let's see if we can agree on a few fundamental things. 1) More males than females read blogs 2) More males than females write blogs 3) Each sex tends to write about things of interest to their own sex. 4) Each sex tends to read about things of interest to their own sex. Anything controversial so far?
From the above it's easy to conclude that it's 100% natural that men would have most of the traffic, and might possibly be tempted to link to men more often because of their *content*. There's nothing sinister about that.
Women as a group, in my experience, tend to write more "diary-style" blogs. You need continuity to appreciate them. That makes them comparatively high-maintenance, like a soap opera - you either tune in everyday or have to be brought up-to-date each time.
Certainly all women aren't like that - among many others, Susanna Cornett and Jane Galt are two major exceptions. Not coincidentally, they are two of my most regular stops.
Meryl's isn't like that either. But I'm there less often because her politics are to the left of mine, and I usually don't go looking for trouble. Meryl has been permalinked here for a while, as has Dawn Olsen who has also written on the topic, and many others.
I could be wrong here, but Dawn seems irritated because she's not linked by Glenn Reynolds or some others. About that, well, Glenn really can't win on this one. I don't remember the particulars, but I know he's been criticized for linking to some women for reasons which supposedly were other than merit. He's interested in certain things, and he reads and links to those, that's all, and doesn't owe anybody any apologies for that.
And Dawn surely wouldn't have forgotten a bunch of crap Steven Den Beste caught for the unspeakable crime of noting a few good looking young women and posting pictures on his blog. Her hubby Eric pounced all over SDB, as did others. There's a huge double standard here, and God help us if he posted a picture of his ass on his blog, jean-clad or otherwise. There are some blogs which I assume are by men that might get by with something like that (maybe wKenshow), but they're exceptional.
With Dawn's blog being like it is with graphics and content, men who read it regularly are put in the position of men who say they read Playboy for the articles - it may be true, but it's a tough sell. Especially at work where Glenn Reynolds believes most of his hits come from.
Traffic is cool to the extent that there is a certain amount of validation, but really - having any traffic at all on something as vast as the web is exceptional. For a site that is sociable like Dawn's, more traffic would be likely to be what I have heard called "pissing in the soup" - you're more likely to pick up creeps like the one she writes of here. (Incidentally, is anyone making any assumptions about the sex of the creep?).
Meryl doesn't have any commenting facility that I can tell, so I'll ask her a few questions here: why is the sex of a blogger important? Are you saying a man can't write like a woman, or vice versa? You don't seem to like Ann Coulter - don't you like the idea that a woman can be as obnoxious as any man? Are you contending that there are no meaningful differences in the sexes that might be relevant to the choice of topics, the tone, the volume, and the overall success (whatever that is) of a blog?
UPDATE: Godless Capitalist of Gene Expression weighs in.
UPDATE 2: Meryl has responded to a number of posters. Somehow I'm portrayed as "really mad". I'll admit to asking fairly pointed questions and to having a certain lack of patience with -ism claims nowadays, but "really mad?"
Take a look at the blogrolls on Scripting News or Doc's place, or even Diane E. and Megan McArdle, and you'll find few women-written weblogs. Again, I'm not saying this is deliberate. But it is a striking fact. It's not just the men. Even women have a low female-to-male blogroll ratio.Why should anything be done about it at all? Why is this a problem?
So what's to be done about it? That, too, is a tough one. I believe that bloggers would be better off checking a few of the female pundits on a more regular basis
Before I start, let's see if we can agree on a few fundamental things. 1) More males than females read blogs 2) More males than females write blogs 3) Each sex tends to write about things of interest to their own sex. 4) Each sex tends to read about things of interest to their own sex. Anything controversial so far?
From the above it's easy to conclude that it's 100% natural that men would have most of the traffic, and might possibly be tempted to link to men more often because of their *content*. There's nothing sinister about that.
Women as a group, in my experience, tend to write more "diary-style" blogs. You need continuity to appreciate them. That makes them comparatively high-maintenance, like a soap opera - you either tune in everyday or have to be brought up-to-date each time.
Certainly all women aren't like that - among many others, Susanna Cornett and Jane Galt are two major exceptions. Not coincidentally, they are two of my most regular stops.
Meryl's isn't like that either. But I'm there less often because her politics are to the left of mine, and I usually don't go looking for trouble. Meryl has been permalinked here for a while, as has Dawn Olsen who has also written on the topic, and many others.
I could be wrong here, but Dawn seems irritated because she's not linked by Glenn Reynolds or some others. About that, well, Glenn really can't win on this one. I don't remember the particulars, but I know he's been criticized for linking to some women for reasons which supposedly were other than merit. He's interested in certain things, and he reads and links to those, that's all, and doesn't owe anybody any apologies for that.
And Dawn surely wouldn't have forgotten a bunch of crap Steven Den Beste caught for the unspeakable crime of noting a few good looking young women and posting pictures on his blog. Her hubby Eric pounced all over SDB, as did others. There's a huge double standard here, and God help us if he posted a picture of his ass on his blog, jean-clad or otherwise. There are some blogs which I assume are by men that might get by with something like that (maybe wKenshow), but they're exceptional.
With Dawn's blog being like it is with graphics and content, men who read it regularly are put in the position of men who say they read Playboy for the articles - it may be true, but it's a tough sell. Especially at work where Glenn Reynolds believes most of his hits come from.
Traffic is cool to the extent that there is a certain amount of validation, but really - having any traffic at all on something as vast as the web is exceptional. For a site that is sociable like Dawn's, more traffic would be likely to be what I have heard called "pissing in the soup" - you're more likely to pick up creeps like the one she writes of here. (Incidentally, is anyone making any assumptions about the sex of the creep?).
Meryl doesn't have any commenting facility that I can tell, so I'll ask her a few questions here: why is the sex of a blogger important? Are you saying a man can't write like a woman, or vice versa? You don't seem to like Ann Coulter - don't you like the idea that a woman can be as obnoxious as any man? Are you contending that there are no meaningful differences in the sexes that might be relevant to the choice of topics, the tone, the volume, and the overall success (whatever that is) of a blog?
UPDATE: Godless Capitalist of Gene Expression weighs in.
UPDATE 2: Meryl has responded to a number of posters. Somehow I'm portrayed as "really mad". I'll admit to asking fairly pointed questions and to having a certain lack of patience with -ism claims nowadays, but "really mad?"
Sunday, September 08, 2002
Thursday, September 05, 2002
NLP - for real?
I've had my killer SUV almost long enough to pay it off, and it shows in the way I get into it. In a fluid motion the door is open, I'm in the seat, my key is instantly in the ignition and off we go.
As long as I don't look at the ignition switch that is. It seems odd that looking at the target for my ignition key would make things worse, but it does. I rarely miss. Of all the physical skills to have, this is mine - whoopee.
Alright, I've been in and out of the thing probably a couple of thousand times now, so I have had practice. But how much practice does it take to acquire "muscle memory"? How much should it take? How can we make it faster?
Nowadays I find myself learning American style tango. Slowly. All that attitude, the picture lines, etc - I'm more of a plow horse than a show horse. Maybe my expectations are out of whack, but I seem to be learning it very slowly.
Could the answer lie in phobias?
Some years ago I read a number of books on neuro-linguistic programming. Practitioners study the way people react to external stimuli, and phobias are particularly interesting examples. They can be thought of as the result of effortless, very thorough yet instant visceral learning. Which suggests that learning about how phobias are created and overcome can teach us a lot about learning in general - why can't all learning be done so rapidly and thoroughly? The applications to training, sales, politics and other human interactions are boundless.
Phobias are just one thing that NLP practitioners study. They also study other clues that trigger behaviors, and seek ways to create these triggers and attach reactions to them. I'm not doing it justice by any measure, and its backers have high hopes for it, publishing books with titles like "Using Your Brain - For a Change".
I've never run into anyone who's heard of this, much less who had an opinion about whether it was for real or just so much overpromoted pseudoscience. Any opinions out there?
As long as I don't look at the ignition switch that is. It seems odd that looking at the target for my ignition key would make things worse, but it does. I rarely miss. Of all the physical skills to have, this is mine - whoopee.
Alright, I've been in and out of the thing probably a couple of thousand times now, so I have had practice. But how much practice does it take to acquire "muscle memory"? How much should it take? How can we make it faster?
Nowadays I find myself learning American style tango. Slowly. All that attitude, the picture lines, etc - I'm more of a plow horse than a show horse. Maybe my expectations are out of whack, but I seem to be learning it very slowly.
Could the answer lie in phobias?
Some years ago I read a number of books on neuro-linguistic programming. Practitioners study the way people react to external stimuli, and phobias are particularly interesting examples. They can be thought of as the result of effortless, very thorough yet instant visceral learning. Which suggests that learning about how phobias are created and overcome can teach us a lot about learning in general - why can't all learning be done so rapidly and thoroughly? The applications to training, sales, politics and other human interactions are boundless.
Phobias are just one thing that NLP practitioners study. They also study other clues that trigger behaviors, and seek ways to create these triggers and attach reactions to them. I'm not doing it justice by any measure, and its backers have high hopes for it, publishing books with titles like "Using Your Brain - For a Change".
I've never run into anyone who's heard of this, much less who had an opinion about whether it was for real or just so much overpromoted pseudoscience. Any opinions out there?
I'll teach her...
The price of leaving a comment on this site can be severe, as Beth knows now that I've ransacked her website. Well, it wouldn't have been so bad if she had permalinks that I could find.
Anyway, my terminally geeky favorite is the pi trainer (not to be confused with a Baseball Hall of Fame third baseman), from which I found the e-trainer. But now I also know more about "the swollen treasure of her femininity", the heretofore-unappreciated cuteness of wet rats, the aesthetics of long toes, and newt care.
Anyway, my terminally geeky favorite is the pi trainer (not to be confused with a Baseball Hall of Fame third baseman), from which I found the e-trainer. But now I also know more about "the swollen treasure of her femininity", the heretofore-unappreciated cuteness of wet rats, the aesthetics of long toes, and newt care.
Condoms urged for Male Prisoners
Are condoms a cure for cancer? It can't hurt to try them - they seem to be the answer to so many other problems. Now we should distribute them in prisons.
Yep, a bunch of guys who not only broke the law but managed to get caught and imprisoned for it will suddenly become responsible citizens when it comes to prison sex. Although the article does confide that
Prisons must not be too awfully restricted if we can't even keep the prisoners from having sex with each other consensually or otherwise. Here as always, abstinence beats condoms. Yet somehow if we took strong measures to prevent prisoner sex, I suspect that the folks who are pushing condoms for prisoners would take issue.
Yep, a bunch of guys who not only broke the law but managed to get caught and imprisoned for it will suddenly become responsible citizens when it comes to prison sex. Although the article does confide that
The survey found that many of the newly admitted inmates admitted to "high-risk behaviors," such as not using condoms and having anonymous sex with a variety of partners.Imagine that!
Prisons must not be too awfully restricted if we can't even keep the prisoners from having sex with each other consensually or otherwise. Here as always, abstinence beats condoms. Yet somehow if we took strong measures to prevent prisoner sex, I suspect that the folks who are pushing condoms for prisoners would take issue.
Pebble bed modular reactors
Alright, it's your turn to be an engineer. Suppose you created a toaster, then found out that in service the heating elements burned out. What would you do?
Back to the drawing board. Hmm, what if we put in some kind of heat sensing device and automatically turned on a powerful fan when the heat got too high?
Well, fans are expensive. We could just put in a simple thermostat and set it to short out the toaster if the heat got too high, and depend on the house wiring's fuses or breakers to protect us.
If you chose either of the above, it's back to engineering school with you - both of those ideas really stink out loud. In fact, as millions of people worldwide can tell you, it's possible to design a toaster that will be almost idiotproof day in and day out for years without burning out or otherwise failing electrically, and the whole device can be had for under $10. And if you want to design something that will burn out at a specified current level or higher, those can be had even cheaper - they're called "fuses".
We can design this way because we can calculate the heat generation rates, the rate of heat transfer out of the heating elements, and the temperature at which the heating elements will fail. In essence, the heat generated will equal the heat discharged at some temperature T, and if T is less than the temperature that will significantly impair the performance and life of the heating elements you have a workable product.
It seems pretty obvious that you'd want to design a heating device such that it couldn't destroy itself by overheating if that was at all possible. You might think that that was especially important in something like, say, a nuclear reactor.
It is. But unfortunately there was a big push to get nuclear reactors working in the early days, and the first designs they got to work didn't meet that criterion - they were capable of getting hotter than what they could physically withstand. Lots of training, auxiliaries, testing and emergency planning are used to make up for this design characteristic. And really, these reactors were designed for submarines - all the cooling water you could ask for was right there outside the hull.
But then there was a big push for land-based reactors back in the 1950's, so submarine reactors were scaled up in size to make US commercial nuclear power reactors. The inherent overheating capability problem remained.
Now there's no arguing with experience. The engineered safety features and other measures taken by US commercial nuclear power plants have been very successful and safe by any reasonable standard (don't compare them to Russian designs like the VVERs or the RBMKs - the latter made Chernobyl famous and have far worse design issues than the ones discussed here).
But they make for a more expensive and ultimately less reliable plant than what could be realized with fuel that can't destroy itself or its containment by overheating. And these plant designs exist.
This is a technical reference on the plants.
Of course there are organizations that bitch about nuclear power plants for a living, such as NIRS. This is what they have to say about the design. This post is already long, so I'll Fisk the NIRS link later.
Back to the drawing board. Hmm, what if we put in some kind of heat sensing device and automatically turned on a powerful fan when the heat got too high?
Well, fans are expensive. We could just put in a simple thermostat and set it to short out the toaster if the heat got too high, and depend on the house wiring's fuses or breakers to protect us.
If you chose either of the above, it's back to engineering school with you - both of those ideas really stink out loud. In fact, as millions of people worldwide can tell you, it's possible to design a toaster that will be almost idiotproof day in and day out for years without burning out or otherwise failing electrically, and the whole device can be had for under $10. And if you want to design something that will burn out at a specified current level or higher, those can be had even cheaper - they're called "fuses".
We can design this way because we can calculate the heat generation rates, the rate of heat transfer out of the heating elements, and the temperature at which the heating elements will fail. In essence, the heat generated will equal the heat discharged at some temperature T, and if T is less than the temperature that will significantly impair the performance and life of the heating elements you have a workable product.
It seems pretty obvious that you'd want to design a heating device such that it couldn't destroy itself by overheating if that was at all possible. You might think that that was especially important in something like, say, a nuclear reactor.
It is. But unfortunately there was a big push to get nuclear reactors working in the early days, and the first designs they got to work didn't meet that criterion - they were capable of getting hotter than what they could physically withstand. Lots of training, auxiliaries, testing and emergency planning are used to make up for this design characteristic. And really, these reactors were designed for submarines - all the cooling water you could ask for was right there outside the hull.
But then there was a big push for land-based reactors back in the 1950's, so submarine reactors were scaled up in size to make US commercial nuclear power reactors. The inherent overheating capability problem remained.
Now there's no arguing with experience. The engineered safety features and other measures taken by US commercial nuclear power plants have been very successful and safe by any reasonable standard (don't compare them to Russian designs like the VVERs or the RBMKs - the latter made Chernobyl famous and have far worse design issues than the ones discussed here).
But they make for a more expensive and ultimately less reliable plant than what could be realized with fuel that can't destroy itself or its containment by overheating. And these plant designs exist.
This is a technical reference on the plants.
Of course there are organizations that bitch about nuclear power plants for a living, such as NIRS. This is what they have to say about the design. This post is already long, so I'll Fisk the NIRS link later.
Wednesday, September 04, 2002
An answer to corruption?
Don Park writes of corruption in Korea and an innovative technological approach to combating it.
Via Scripting News.
Via Scripting News.
Tuesday, September 03, 2002
Born gay?
As I mentioned below, we managed to get some of the family together for Labor Day weekend.
If you're a relative, you'd better show up to these things or else we'll talk about you. This time it was mostly about a relative I haven't seen in years. I don't know how to contact him even if I had a mind to, and likewise he hasn't really stayed in touch with anybody to my knowledge. The last I heard was from his mother, and she's dead.
If I had been told that one of us was gay and I had to pick the one, he would have been it, and in fact he is. Apparently he's in Key West with the same partner he's had for a long time, running a tourism-based firm.
That he's gay is his business. It wasn't what his parents had in mind, but I don't know that anybody else in the family has ever given him any flak about it. But it led to a conversation in which one relative claimed that you're born gay.
Hmm. This seems to be almost totally behavioral to me. AFAIK there's no controlling what turns you on, but you can control what you do about it.
Thought experiment time. You're blindfolded and subjected to, uh, mechanical stimulation. Nature takes its course. Then the blindfold is taken off and you see that the agent was of a sex other than your preference. Do you suddenly switch teams or turn bi?
Or maybe it's something visual. Eros raises his ugly head, then you realize it's someone who's off limits like a relative or someone underaged (and I'll bet you 20 years you can't always tell). Can you keep playing by society's rules, or must we change the rules for you?
I find it interesting that many societies have such strictures regarding gays. Is it reasonable to ask people to abstain from exercising certain practices or to keep their hands off certain people? Can such rules be so integral to the success of a society that failure to enforce them will lead to that society's destruction?
If you're a relative, you'd better show up to these things or else we'll talk about you. This time it was mostly about a relative I haven't seen in years. I don't know how to contact him even if I had a mind to, and likewise he hasn't really stayed in touch with anybody to my knowledge. The last I heard was from his mother, and she's dead.
If I had been told that one of us was gay and I had to pick the one, he would have been it, and in fact he is. Apparently he's in Key West with the same partner he's had for a long time, running a tourism-based firm.
That he's gay is his business. It wasn't what his parents had in mind, but I don't know that anybody else in the family has ever given him any flak about it. But it led to a conversation in which one relative claimed that you're born gay.
Hmm. This seems to be almost totally behavioral to me. AFAIK there's no controlling what turns you on, but you can control what you do about it.
Thought experiment time. You're blindfolded and subjected to, uh, mechanical stimulation. Nature takes its course. Then the blindfold is taken off and you see that the agent was of a sex other than your preference. Do you suddenly switch teams or turn bi?
Or maybe it's something visual. Eros raises his ugly head, then you realize it's someone who's off limits like a relative or someone underaged (and I'll bet you 20 years you can't always tell). Can you keep playing by society's rules, or must we change the rules for you?
I find it interesting that many societies have such strictures regarding gays. Is it reasonable to ask people to abstain from exercising certain practices or to keep their hands off certain people? Can such rules be so integral to the success of a society that failure to enforce them will lead to that society's destruction?
Kid stuff
I managed to get together with some relatives this past weekend, including an assortment of rugrats and preteens before whom civilization cowers.
Well, the kids weren't bad, but they certainly were spirited and loud and ornery. And they're learning too fast, particularly the stuff they needn't. (If we could only convince kids that there's something illicit about math and science. Maybe we could inscribe multiplication tables on the bathroom walls or something).
For instance, the oldest was a girl of about 10. She's getting big to ride on my shoulders, but I carried her around for awhile. Then my neck got tired and I put her back down and she told me "that wasn't long enough!". I mumbled something to one of the adults about how a woman shouldn't ever tell a man that, har har. The kid made it clear that she caught the allusion and pronounced me a "perv" or something like that. Well, at least she thought it was off color.
I usually bring something for the kids in hopes that they'll learn something besides stuff like the above. There were some age-appropriate quizzes among the booty, and the little squirts wanted to play. They did better than I had hoped. Hopefully the parents can help them with some of the projects that I don't have time to do with them.
The smallest was 6 months old, and has had her picture posted here before. She just laid there cooing, kicking her feet and getting passed around to everybody. She's not too easily intimidated, even though I kept telling her in baby talk how I was going to bite off her nose and suck out her brains. Hey, if you want something mushier, read Lileks.
Oh yeah, I saw the relative I mentioned a few posts ago about college funding. We got everything straightened out and she's back at the same school for her junior year (We finally got her father out of the way - what a jerk! Everyone but him should have a daughter so bright and beautiful). Many thanks to those of you who offered advice, especially the two of you to whom I wrote directly - that was an outrageous imposition, but I wanted to try something.
Enough - I leave you with Warm Fuzzies.
Well, the kids weren't bad, but they certainly were spirited and loud and ornery. And they're learning too fast, particularly the stuff they needn't. (If we could only convince kids that there's something illicit about math and science. Maybe we could inscribe multiplication tables on the bathroom walls or something).
For instance, the oldest was a girl of about 10. She's getting big to ride on my shoulders, but I carried her around for awhile. Then my neck got tired and I put her back down and she told me "that wasn't long enough!". I mumbled something to one of the adults about how a woman shouldn't ever tell a man that, har har. The kid made it clear that she caught the allusion and pronounced me a "perv" or something like that. Well, at least she thought it was off color.
I usually bring something for the kids in hopes that they'll learn something besides stuff like the above. There were some age-appropriate quizzes among the booty, and the little squirts wanted to play. They did better than I had hoped. Hopefully the parents can help them with some of the projects that I don't have time to do with them.
The smallest was 6 months old, and has had her picture posted here before. She just laid there cooing, kicking her feet and getting passed around to everybody. She's not too easily intimidated, even though I kept telling her in baby talk how I was going to bite off her nose and suck out her brains. Hey, if you want something mushier, read Lileks.
Oh yeah, I saw the relative I mentioned a few posts ago about college funding. We got everything straightened out and she's back at the same school for her junior year (We finally got her father out of the way - what a jerk! Everyone but him should have a daughter so bright and beautiful). Many thanks to those of you who offered advice, especially the two of you to whom I wrote directly - that was an outrageous imposition, but I wanted to try something.
Enough - I leave you with Warm Fuzzies.
Another way to reform campaigns...
Roots of racism?
It appears that lady lions prefer males with darker manes.
Of course, nothing is innocent, you know - there must be a political dimension to this. Does this mean that lions are racist? And if it does, does it mean that females are responsible for causing racism?
Uh, no. But some of us seem to think that animals have a lot to teach us humans, and draw conclusions no less asinine than the above.
Of course, nothing is innocent, you know - there must be a political dimension to this. Does this mean that lions are racist? And if it does, does it mean that females are responsible for causing racism?
Uh, no. But some of us seem to think that animals have a lot to teach us humans, and draw conclusions no less asinine than the above.
Four strikeouts in one inning
Who else but the Cubs?
Incidentally, I wonder if major league baseball attendance has been impacted by the strike threat?
Incidentally, I wonder if major league baseball attendance has been impacted by the strike threat?
Monday, September 02, 2002
Stem cell question
From here we get
The team of researchers from Keio University School of Medicine in Japan extracted stem cells from a 14 day-old rat fetus. The type of stem cells they extracted are called neural progenitor cells, which are genetically programmed to later develop into various kinds of nervous system cells.I thought the point of getting stem cells from a fetus was that any such stem cell could form any other type of cell, ie, it wouldn't matter what kind of stem cell you got from a fetus. Otherwise you could use non-fetal stem cells instead, which were more specialized and highly developed at the cost of the flexibility.
Wireless networking available at Starbucks
Via Daniel Pink we have this story. It does require a membership with a particular wireless carrier, but the first 24 hours are free.
Borders, Barnes & Noble, are you listening?
Borders, Barnes & Noble, are you listening?
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