Saturday, September 28, 2002
Alright, just this and nothing more
I got a Google hit for "Madelyne Toogood Playboy". Go ahead, Mr. Hefner, let's see what you can do with that one.
Nothing happening this weekend
I'll be incommunicado, but there's enough blogs and other sources listed here to keep you busy for days. See ya late Sunday night at the earliest.
Friday, September 27, 2002
Blinded by science
I'm getting some feedback that suggests that some of us have a fundamental misunderstanding about science. IMO I'm picking up a heavy load here, but let's see what happens.
Plato famously made a point with his "cave". In this, people were chained facing a wall, unable to turn around. Things were going on behind them, but all they could see were the shadows of them on the wall before them. Whatever Plato's intent was, mine is to get across the idea that our perception of nature is similar - what we can know of the world is distorted because we have distorted information, filtered through our senses and our instruments.
Another example would be the blind men and the elephant. One found its trunk, another its leg, another its side, etc, and each drew an incomplete conclusion about what an elephant was. Here the idea is that our perceptions can be all too narrowly focused on aspects of a phenomenon which are inadequate or even misleading wrt describing its whole.
Are scientists thus "blind"? Yes, like all the rest of us, in certain respects.
Well, there's no denying that science has had smashing success. So let's suppose we ignore those problems and gather data anyway - now what? We have to decide what data to collect. That requires a hypothesis, which introduces yet another source of distortion. What doesn't get hypothesized doesn't get investigated. So if scientists are politically limited, internally or otherwise, they can remain blind to discoveries that are obvious to less constrained investigators.
OK, now you've collected data. It alone isn't so useful. It is given value by being organized into models designed to behave like the phenomena being studied. Then these models can be used to interpolate values where no direct data exists (in 1995 the population of Chicago was X), or to extrapolate beyond the range were data was available (in 2100 the population of Chicago will be Y). I'm showing my bias toward the "hard sciences" here, but corresponding processes exist where the data is less quantitative.
Engineers like myself can testify to the great usefulness of these models in innumerable situations. But these models impose yet another form of blindness or distortion. They might apply to only very limited circumstances. They take into account only the phenomena that appear in the equations. Other yet to be discovered phenomena might be emerge, or be significant under other circumstances. We may improve our mensuration, thus exposing flaws in the model that were not evident or significant previously. And mathematical models necessarily have the same limitations of mathematics itself (you can't divide by zero, for instance).
If you were successful to this point, terrific, but it ain't science yet. Now you must suffer peer reviewers. Peer reviewers are human beings, complete with biases, blind spots, reputations, and political agendas. Woe to you if your discovery is unwelcome. It can take years before the fogeys give way for a new theory, and entire books have been written about this.
You made it this far? Now we get to the interpretation, where entirely different kinds of errors arise. This is especially true in the hands of amateurs like journalists.
One of these errors arises in application. Models ordinarily are limited in applicability to a range of circumstances. For instance, you can use the "ideal gas law" for gases, but not for liquids (you'd think that's intuitive enough, but I've corrected alleged engineers who thought otherwise). Even that law isn't good for all gases under all circumstances. And beware of extrapolations.
Another type of application error which is depressingly common is overgeneralizing. I don't know how many times people have told me seriously that Einstein's General Theory of Relativity shows that "everything's relative", morality and all. Or they start with microevolutionary changes in, say, the distribution of colors of some moths as proof that all life on earth came from some primordial protein molecules coming together by chance - maybe they did, but you'll need more and better evidence than that.
One of the worst interpretation errors is to confuse the model for the phenomenon. Nature doesn't obey our scientific "laws" - it does what it does . We write our "laws" to accomodate what we observe, subject to the limitations of our observations, our mensuration, and our capabilities for mathematical reasoning. Any conflict between what nature does and what scientists predict is always the scientist's fault. And we can't ever be sure but that tomorrow something new might come along and force us to revisit it all.
Despite it all, science produces results which we engineers use to make life better for all of us.
But science does not give us Truth. To that it will remain forever blind.
Plato famously made a point with his "cave". In this, people were chained facing a wall, unable to turn around. Things were going on behind them, but all they could see were the shadows of them on the wall before them. Whatever Plato's intent was, mine is to get across the idea that our perception of nature is similar - what we can know of the world is distorted because we have distorted information, filtered through our senses and our instruments.
Another example would be the blind men and the elephant. One found its trunk, another its leg, another its side, etc, and each drew an incomplete conclusion about what an elephant was. Here the idea is that our perceptions can be all too narrowly focused on aspects of a phenomenon which are inadequate or even misleading wrt describing its whole.
Are scientists thus "blind"? Yes, like all the rest of us, in certain respects.
Well, there's no denying that science has had smashing success. So let's suppose we ignore those problems and gather data anyway - now what? We have to decide what data to collect. That requires a hypothesis, which introduces yet another source of distortion. What doesn't get hypothesized doesn't get investigated. So if scientists are politically limited, internally or otherwise, they can remain blind to discoveries that are obvious to less constrained investigators.
OK, now you've collected data. It alone isn't so useful. It is given value by being organized into models designed to behave like the phenomena being studied. Then these models can be used to interpolate values where no direct data exists (in 1995 the population of Chicago was X), or to extrapolate beyond the range were data was available (in 2100 the population of Chicago will be Y). I'm showing my bias toward the "hard sciences" here, but corresponding processes exist where the data is less quantitative.
Engineers like myself can testify to the great usefulness of these models in innumerable situations. But these models impose yet another form of blindness or distortion. They might apply to only very limited circumstances. They take into account only the phenomena that appear in the equations. Other yet to be discovered phenomena might be emerge, or be significant under other circumstances. We may improve our mensuration, thus exposing flaws in the model that were not evident or significant previously. And mathematical models necessarily have the same limitations of mathematics itself (you can't divide by zero, for instance).
If you were successful to this point, terrific, but it ain't science yet. Now you must suffer peer reviewers. Peer reviewers are human beings, complete with biases, blind spots, reputations, and political agendas. Woe to you if your discovery is unwelcome. It can take years before the fogeys give way for a new theory, and entire books have been written about this.
You made it this far? Now we get to the interpretation, where entirely different kinds of errors arise. This is especially true in the hands of amateurs like journalists.
One of these errors arises in application. Models ordinarily are limited in applicability to a range of circumstances. For instance, you can use the "ideal gas law" for gases, but not for liquids (you'd think that's intuitive enough, but I've corrected alleged engineers who thought otherwise). Even that law isn't good for all gases under all circumstances. And beware of extrapolations.
Another type of application error which is depressingly common is overgeneralizing. I don't know how many times people have told me seriously that Einstein's General Theory of Relativity shows that "everything's relative", morality and all. Or they start with microevolutionary changes in, say, the distribution of colors of some moths as proof that all life on earth came from some primordial protein molecules coming together by chance - maybe they did, but you'll need more and better evidence than that.
One of the worst interpretation errors is to confuse the model for the phenomenon. Nature doesn't obey our scientific "laws" - it does what it does . We write our "laws" to accomodate what we observe, subject to the limitations of our observations, our mensuration, and our capabilities for mathematical reasoning. Any conflict between what nature does and what scientists predict is always the scientist's fault. And we can't ever be sure but that tomorrow something new might come along and force us to revisit it all.
Despite it all, science produces results which we engineers use to make life better for all of us.
But science does not give us Truth. To that it will remain forever blind.
Monday, September 23, 2002
Packaged cogeneration
< needle>By the grace of God< /needle> Kathy Kinsley has led me to this item about a company that is building rooftop power plants on commercial buildings.
The article doesn't give a lot of detail, but it appears that they are doing something called cogeneration. With cogeneration, you generate electric power, but you also use some of the waste heat from the prime movers (usually gas turbines) for heating rather than rejecting it to a heat sink like a river, lake or atmospheric cooling tower. The result is improved thermal efficiency - more delivered power per unit of gas consumed.
There are other benefits also. There is more diversity of supply for electric power. Capital, operation and maintenance costs can be reduced with standardized designs and training. And as an engineer with a strong IT background, I like technologies that leverage both - such installations require sophisticated control systems.
There is a downside, however. One nice thing about remote powerplants is that any pollution is deposited far from the point of consumption. And the real cost of pollution is a strong function of where it is deposited. I'm not sure places like LA need any more heat or exhaust gases around - other locales such as Ontario may be far better.
The prime movers, which provide the heat and drive the generators, run on natural gas. Presumably any cost savings would result in part by buying natural gas in long-term contracts. I have to wonder if the existing gas distribution infrastructure can handle large-scale application of this. This could require major capital investment in places that are hostile to such development.
Also, although absorption chillers can use waste heat to provide cooling for air conditioning, it's difficult to balance the power and cooling demands. The difference presumably would be made up by buying more power from other utilities. The result will be a system that reduces the base load for power without doing much to reduce the maximum loads. And it's the costs at the maximum loads that cause the grief.
So I'm not sure we'll ever see really wide application of this in places like California, where the initial sites are. Ontario may be different. It will be interesting to watch.
The article doesn't give a lot of detail, but it appears that they are doing something called cogeneration. With cogeneration, you generate electric power, but you also use some of the waste heat from the prime movers (usually gas turbines) for heating rather than rejecting it to a heat sink like a river, lake or atmospheric cooling tower. The result is improved thermal efficiency - more delivered power per unit of gas consumed.
There are other benefits also. There is more diversity of supply for electric power. Capital, operation and maintenance costs can be reduced with standardized designs and training. And as an engineer with a strong IT background, I like technologies that leverage both - such installations require sophisticated control systems.
There is a downside, however. One nice thing about remote powerplants is that any pollution is deposited far from the point of consumption. And the real cost of pollution is a strong function of where it is deposited. I'm not sure places like LA need any more heat or exhaust gases around - other locales such as Ontario may be far better.
The prime movers, which provide the heat and drive the generators, run on natural gas. Presumably any cost savings would result in part by buying natural gas in long-term contracts. I have to wonder if the existing gas distribution infrastructure can handle large-scale application of this. This could require major capital investment in places that are hostile to such development.
Also, although absorption chillers can use waste heat to provide cooling for air conditioning, it's difficult to balance the power and cooling demands. The difference presumably would be made up by buying more power from other utilities. The result will be a system that reduces the base load for power without doing much to reduce the maximum loads. And it's the costs at the maximum loads that cause the grief.
So I'm not sure we'll ever see really wide application of this in places like California, where the initial sites are. Ontario may be different. It will be interesting to watch.
Sunday, September 22, 2002
Heroine for the day
You've probably already seen this on Instapundit, but it's worth republishing. Anyway, a Jordanian woman kicked three creeps' butts in front of a bunch of witnesses. Heh heh.
Attention sisters
Researchers trying to find environmental causes of breast cancer--diet, exercise, exposure to chemicals or other factors--will start recruiting 50,000 sisters on Saturday for study.Much more here.
The government-funded teams will start in Florida, at a fund-raising event in Tampa called the "Race for the Cure."
They hope to sign up 50,000 women nationally, aged 35 to 74, whose sisters have been diagnosed with breast cancer.
Sisters of women with breast cancer have up to twice the breast cancer risk of other women. A few genetic mutations are associated with breast cancer risk, but they account for fewer than 10% of cases.
Stem cell misreporting
Gray Davis has signed a bill to allow embryonic stem cell research in California.
The misreporting is here: "Stem cells, which are found in human embryos, umbilical cords and placentas, can divide and become any kind of cell in the body. " Stem cells are also found in adults.
Why is this important? Because some people want to represent embryonic stem cell research as the only game in town. It does offer advantages for some purposes, but the use of adult stem cells is more advantageous for other purposes.
The misreporting is here: "Stem cells, which are found in human embryos, umbilical cords and placentas, can divide and become any kind of cell in the body. " Stem cells are also found in adults.
Why is this important? Because some people want to represent embryonic stem cell research as the only game in town. It does offer advantages for some purposes, but the use of adult stem cells is more advantageous for other purposes.
What has he been smoking?
Rod Blagojevich is a representative from IllinoisChicago, representing disgraced fellow Democrat Dan Rostenkowski's old district.
Now he's running for governor. We have yet to see if he's crooked enough - I think the last two Democrats who governed Illinois wound up in prison like Rosty.
Someone asked him if he had smoked pot, and this is what he said
Big deal if he did some pot. Good grief, anybody who went to a rock concert in the 70's or 80's did whether they liked it or not - closed venues were like walk-in bongs.
But does he have to insult our intelligence by saying he doesn't know if he inhaled or not?
Now he's running for governor. We have yet to see if he's crooked enough - I think the last two Democrats who governed Illinois wound up in prison like Rosty.
Someone asked him if he had smoked pot, and this is what he said
"I did it twice, and I'm a nonsmoker," Blagojevich said at a Statehouse news conference. "I don't like it; I run. So I don't know if I inhaled or not."Musta been some good stuff.
Big deal if he did some pot. Good grief, anybody who went to a rock concert in the 70's or 80's did whether they liked it or not - closed venues were like walk-in bongs.
But does he have to insult our intelligence by saying he doesn't know if he inhaled or not?
Saturday, September 21, 2002
You deserve better
...so check out The Misanthropyst.
He has some good ideas, but it'll be a cold day when they implement this one.
He has some good ideas, but it'll be a cold day when they implement this one.
Abuse?
I'm gonna have to learn to shut off the TV. I just saw the videotape of the event that led to the hunt for Madelyne Gorman Toogood for child abuse.
Maybe you've seen it - she's leaving a Kohl's department store and puts her 4 year old girl in the back of the vehicle, and from a camera some distance away we see some rapid movements which could be construed as a mother beating her child violently. I understand that the whole thing lasts about 55 seconds.
Nobody is in favor of child abuse. But we saw abuse of The Children™ under the previous administration, and there appears to be some here too.
How? Well, we don't know exactly what happened to the child. We do know that when the mother turned herself in (several days later) the child had no cuts or bruises. We know the child was taken away from her mother and the rest of her family, which IMO is at least as traumatic as anything that happened with bare hands in 55 seconds in the car.
I've seen worse, but I'm not a child abuse professional, so I'll withhold judgment of that. What gets under my skin is this:
Pavlik Morozov would be proud.
Maybe you've seen it - she's leaving a Kohl's department store and puts her 4 year old girl in the back of the vehicle, and from a camera some distance away we see some rapid movements which could be construed as a mother beating her child violently. I understand that the whole thing lasts about 55 seconds.
Nobody is in favor of child abuse. But we saw abuse of The Children™ under the previous administration, and there appears to be some here too.
How? Well, we don't know exactly what happened to the child. We do know that when the mother turned herself in (several days later) the child had no cuts or bruises. We know the child was taken away from her mother and the rest of her family, which IMO is at least as traumatic as anything that happened with bare hands in 55 seconds in the car.
I've seen worse, but I'm not a child abuse professional, so I'll withhold judgment of that. What gets under my skin is this:
Toogood's sister, 31-year-old Margaret Daley, who authorities say was with her at the store, was arrested and charged with a misdemeanor count of failure to report child abuse. Prosecutors later added a charge of assisting a criminal. Daley was released Friday after posting $2,150 bond.Got that? Now you have to turn in your relatives on suspicion of such events, or get busted yourself. I haven't heard of anything like that even in the drug wars.
Pavlik Morozov would be proud.
September 22 is Bilbo Baggins' birthday
It's also the day he set off to Rivendell ahead of the Black Riders, leaving the ring with Frodo.
Admit it, you wanted to know.
Admit it, you wanted to know.
96% of all international terrorists fail to eat a nutritious breakfast
For that and many more, look here.
Anti religious nuts part 2
This started as a reply to a comment made by Robert Spiers on this item. It exceeded the 2500 word YACCS limit, so here it goes.
Religion is based on faith, meaning it is based on mystical visions visible and knowable only to the one who has the visions.
You make it sound like one's religion is determined by what he smokes or what kind of mushrooms he eats.
If religious people have had such visions, so what?
Communism and Fascism are, like religions, based on fictions called "the people" or "die Volk".
You have yet to demonstrate that religions are based on fictions.
Objectivism is based on perception and reason
Look, I like Ayn Rand - anybody who writes books with titles like "The Virtue of Selfishness" can't be all bad, and "Atlas Shrugged" influenced me more than any other book I've read.
But you're leaving something out. Objectivism is based on faith in perception and reason.
It doesn't take much perception to see that you can't perceive everything. And it doesn't take much reasoning to show that reason is ultimately based on some assumptions that cannot be proven within reason's framework.
It is not faith that says free markets work. That statement is based on perception and reason.
And faith. You have to believe that human nature and economic circumstances are such that it works. Fortunately I know of no exceptions.
It is not faith that says religion and other collective delusions kill. That statement is based on history.
You haven't demonstrated that religion is a "collective delusion". This must be an article of faith.
Meanwhile, what was the faith of the Mongols? The Huns? The Cold War Russians? The Red Chinese? The Nazis? Pol Pot?
And who attacked first in the Crusades?
Religion is a problem only when it is harnessed by the state, such as in the Spanish Inquisition. Ferdinand and Isabella, the two who had just united Aragon and Castile to make modern Spain and bankrolled Columbus, wanted money. They resorted to the age-old expedient of screwing Jews out of their property. Ha! - some of the Jews converted to Catholicism. But F and I still wanted their property, so they sent for Grand Inquisitors from the Vatican to pronounce them heretics. Then the state could kill them under their heresy laws and take their property anyway.
It's the state power that's the problem. Keep churches separated from the state and then it's clear what is to blame. That's the whole problem with Islam - state leaders can't be trusted with that kind of power over people's lives.
And it is only faith that says that "God" or "the people" exist at all.
I'm with you on the God part - I haven't had one of those visions you're talking about, and furthermore nothing that I know of in the Bible promises me one. I can't speak for other religions.
This reminds me of a story I heard once. State cops came by a house to warn the resident that a flood was rising and he had to leave, but the resident said "no, the Lord will provide". Later some officials came by in a rowboat to rescue him, but he said "no, the Lord will provide". The waters kept rising, forcing the man to get on the roof of his house. A helicopter came by to rescue him and he said "no, the Lord will provide". Then he was washed away and drowned.
Outraged, he confronted St. Peter, who told him "We sent the cops, a rowboat and a helicopter - what more did you want?" If you're expecting your own personal burning bush, maybe you're just too much trouble.
Several of Kurt Vonnegut's books include improbable religions, such as the Church of Jesus Christ the Kidnapped (followers were always snapping their heads around looking for him) and the Church of God the Utterly Indifferent (I'm working from memory, so cut me some slack). Anyway, the latter group said that there was a God, but it was preposterous to think that He would care about what happened to something so trivial as a human being. Hmm.
The fictions of Heaven and angels, just to name a couple of examples, are so transparent that one can only accept them as a guide to action if one closes one's eyes, falls one's knees and inhales incense. Which is exactly why religions encourage such behavior.
But the arrogance of such a statement is here for all to see. Sheesh. I'm no expert, but I don't recall any of that stuff in Sunday school (although they might have given us some Kool-Aid). And that's the last time I was a regular churchgoer.
Until we can see a God or until our reason otherwise tells us he must exist, he does not. And that statement is NOT based on faith.
Yes it is. You are implicitly claiming that everything that exists can be perceived or deduced. We must be creating the universe as we go then, because germs have thus existed for only the last couple of centuries, and quarks for less time yet.
If I told you that germs didn't exist because I can't see them, you'd rightly think of me as deranged. Has it occurred to you that perhaps the reason why you can't perceive any deities that might exist lies not in them, but in your capacity to perceive and reason?
Religion is based on faith, meaning it is based on mystical visions visible and knowable only to the one who has the visions.
You make it sound like one's religion is determined by what he smokes or what kind of mushrooms he eats.
If religious people have had such visions, so what?
Communism and Fascism are, like religions, based on fictions called "the people" or "die Volk".
You have yet to demonstrate that religions are based on fictions.
Objectivism is based on perception and reason
Look, I like Ayn Rand - anybody who writes books with titles like "The Virtue of Selfishness" can't be all bad, and "Atlas Shrugged" influenced me more than any other book I've read.
But you're leaving something out. Objectivism is based on faith in perception and reason.
It doesn't take much perception to see that you can't perceive everything. And it doesn't take much reasoning to show that reason is ultimately based on some assumptions that cannot be proven within reason's framework.
It is not faith that says free markets work. That statement is based on perception and reason.
And faith. You have to believe that human nature and economic circumstances are such that it works. Fortunately I know of no exceptions.
It is not faith that says religion and other collective delusions kill. That statement is based on history.
You haven't demonstrated that religion is a "collective delusion". This must be an article of faith.
Meanwhile, what was the faith of the Mongols? The Huns? The Cold War Russians? The Red Chinese? The Nazis? Pol Pot?
And who attacked first in the Crusades?
Religion is a problem only when it is harnessed by the state, such as in the Spanish Inquisition. Ferdinand and Isabella, the two who had just united Aragon and Castile to make modern Spain and bankrolled Columbus, wanted money. They resorted to the age-old expedient of screwing Jews out of their property. Ha! - some of the Jews converted to Catholicism. But F and I still wanted their property, so they sent for Grand Inquisitors from the Vatican to pronounce them heretics. Then the state could kill them under their heresy laws and take their property anyway.
It's the state power that's the problem. Keep churches separated from the state and then it's clear what is to blame. That's the whole problem with Islam - state leaders can't be trusted with that kind of power over people's lives.
And it is only faith that says that "God" or "the people" exist at all.
I'm with you on the God part - I haven't had one of those visions you're talking about, and furthermore nothing that I know of in the Bible promises me one. I can't speak for other religions.
This reminds me of a story I heard once. State cops came by a house to warn the resident that a flood was rising and he had to leave, but the resident said "no, the Lord will provide". Later some officials came by in a rowboat to rescue him, but he said "no, the Lord will provide". The waters kept rising, forcing the man to get on the roof of his house. A helicopter came by to rescue him and he said "no, the Lord will provide". Then he was washed away and drowned.
Outraged, he confronted St. Peter, who told him "We sent the cops, a rowboat and a helicopter - what more did you want?" If you're expecting your own personal burning bush, maybe you're just too much trouble.
Several of Kurt Vonnegut's books include improbable religions, such as the Church of Jesus Christ the Kidnapped (followers were always snapping their heads around looking for him) and the Church of God the Utterly Indifferent (I'm working from memory, so cut me some slack). Anyway, the latter group said that there was a God, but it was preposterous to think that He would care about what happened to something so trivial as a human being. Hmm.
The fictions of Heaven and angels, just to name a couple of examples, are so transparent that one can only accept them as a guide to action if one closes one's eyes, falls one's knees and inhales incense. Which is exactly why religions encourage such behavior.
But the arrogance of such a statement is here for all to see. Sheesh. I'm no expert, but I don't recall any of that stuff in Sunday school (although they might have given us some Kool-Aid). And that's the last time I was a regular churchgoer.
Until we can see a God or until our reason otherwise tells us he must exist, he does not. And that statement is NOT based on faith.
Yes it is. You are implicitly claiming that everything that exists can be perceived or deduced. We must be creating the universe as we go then, because germs have thus existed for only the last couple of centuries, and quarks for less time yet.
If I told you that germs didn't exist because I can't see them, you'd rightly think of me as deranged. Has it occurred to you that perhaps the reason why you can't perceive any deities that might exist lies not in them, but in your capacity to perceive and reason?
Old jokes
This past week some of us were talking around the water cooler and sci-fi came up. Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" came up, especially Mike the computer.
Mike was pretty smart, but he had a hard time with jokes. This was a problem because Mike was a joker. Humans had to explain to him that some jokes were funny once, and others could be funny repeatedly. And to this day I haven't heard of any computers that were successful in generating non-formulaic funny material on demand. So work on your jokes folks - comedians may be the last people on the planet that aren't displaced by computers and robots.
Humor certainly doesn't age well. Shakespeare has some great lines, but you have to read a dozen footnotes or be familiar with ancient cultures to appreciate them. Likewise for Chaucer, Boccaccio and innumerable others. I really don't want to work that hard.
Even old joke books can be mystifying. The oldest one I've heard of is Joe Miller's Jests, published in 1739. Here's one killer from the collection:
There were idiotarians around before they were so named, and their recent "chickenhawk" slur isn't anything terribly original. It reminds me of a joke popular with Democrats around 1988 when Bush 41 and Dan Quayle were running against a nonentity named Dukakis (who desperately needed to get out of Massachusetts before the impact of his policies set in) and future Clintonoid Lloyd Bentsen. When Dem sympathizers weren't accusing Bush of strafing lifeboats in the Pacific Ocean, they were giving Dan Quayle lip about being in the National Guard during the Vietnam War. (This was before it became convenient for them to act outraged whenever anyone questioned Bill Clinton's dishonest behavior regarding military service). Anyway, the joke was "What do you get when you cross a hawk with a chicken?". "A Quayle".
(You remember Dan Quayle, don't you? He was accused of being stupid by people who later supported Al Gore, who couldn't cut it in divinity school during the Vietnam War. And he didn't have a brother with a history of substance abuse and drowned women, so he was 'no Jack Kennedy').
I don't hear so much from them nowadays, but for a long time there has been a charity called the United Negro College Fund. Anyway, back around the early 80s accidents affected black entertainers Michael Jackson and Peoria, Illinois native Richard Pryor. Jackson's hair caught on fire while filming a Pepsi commercial, and Pryor was badly burned while free-basing some cocaine. About then I heard a joke that the two of them were starting a charity - the "Ignited Negro College Fund".
That's all I can think of for right now. Well, I edited out two that concerned a mass murderer - I have some taste.
Mike was pretty smart, but he had a hard time with jokes. This was a problem because Mike was a joker. Humans had to explain to him that some jokes were funny once, and others could be funny repeatedly. And to this day I haven't heard of any computers that were successful in generating non-formulaic funny material on demand. So work on your jokes folks - comedians may be the last people on the planet that aren't displaced by computers and robots.
Humor certainly doesn't age well. Shakespeare has some great lines, but you have to read a dozen footnotes or be familiar with ancient cultures to appreciate them. Likewise for Chaucer, Boccaccio and innumerable others. I really don't want to work that hard.
Even old joke books can be mystifying. The oldest one I've heard of is Joe Miller's Jests, published in 1739. Here's one killer from the collection:
A Westminster Justice taking Coach in the City, and being set down at Young Man's Coffee-house, Charing-Cross, the Driver demanded Eighteen-Pence as his Fare; the Justice asked him, if he would swear that the Ground came to the Money; the Man said, he would take his Oath on't. The Justice replyed, Friend, I am a Magistrate, and pulling a Book out of his Pocket, administer'd the Oath, and then gave the Fellow Six-pence, saying, he must reserve the Shilling to himself for the Affidavit.Alright, are you composed yet?
There were idiotarians around before they were so named, and their recent "chickenhawk" slur isn't anything terribly original. It reminds me of a joke popular with Democrats around 1988 when Bush 41 and Dan Quayle were running against a nonentity named Dukakis (who desperately needed to get out of Massachusetts before the impact of his policies set in) and future Clintonoid Lloyd Bentsen. When Dem sympathizers weren't accusing Bush of strafing lifeboats in the Pacific Ocean, they were giving Dan Quayle lip about being in the National Guard during the Vietnam War. (This was before it became convenient for them to act outraged whenever anyone questioned Bill Clinton's dishonest behavior regarding military service). Anyway, the joke was "What do you get when you cross a hawk with a chicken?". "A Quayle".
(You remember Dan Quayle, don't you? He was accused of being stupid by people who later supported Al Gore, who couldn't cut it in divinity school during the Vietnam War. And he didn't have a brother with a history of substance abuse and drowned women, so he was 'no Jack Kennedy').
I don't hear so much from them nowadays, but for a long time there has been a charity called the United Negro College Fund. Anyway, back around the early 80s accidents affected black entertainers Michael Jackson and Peoria, Illinois native Richard Pryor. Jackson's hair caught on fire while filming a Pepsi commercial, and Pryor was badly burned while free-basing some cocaine. About then I heard a joke that the two of them were starting a charity - the "Ignited Negro College Fund".
That's all I can think of for right now. Well, I edited out two that concerned a mass murderer - I have some taste.
When the cheering stops
Bob Hayes died this past week. He's still the only athlete who had an Olympic gold medal and a Super Bowl ring. What a shame he couldn't keep his hands off booze and drugs. Link via Oceanguy.
Anyway, the Hayes thing made me think of several others who were heroes for a while, but ended up in obscurity or worse.
It would have been easy to miss the tragic death of Rod Milburn in 1997. He won a gold medal in the 110m hurdles in the 1972 Olympics.
We'll never really know how good Sammy Drummer could have been with the right guidance. He was a hoops legend in Muncie, IN, a basketball-crazy town in a basketball-crazy state. He went on to play for Austin Peay and Georgia Tech, but somehow he never made the pros. Before he was done he was sweeping the gym back in Muncie when he was killed at age 38 in a crack deal gone bad.
At least Sammy got to play in college - then there's Ben Wilson of Simeon High School in Chicago:
I can't stop it here, that's too depressing. One more.
Bob Love played pro basketball with the Bulls, and was their alltime high scorer until eclipsed by a guy named Jordan. Love had always had a stutter, and after an injury ended his basketball career he went downhill to the point of being a busboy. Then a manager took interest in him, got help for his speech problems, and at last notice he was back with the Bulls as Directory of Community Relations.
Anyway, the Hayes thing made me think of several others who were heroes for a while, but ended up in obscurity or worse.
It would have been easy to miss the tragic death of Rod Milburn in 1997. He won a gold medal in the 110m hurdles in the 1972 Olympics.
We'll never really know how good Sammy Drummer could have been with the right guidance. He was a hoops legend in Muncie, IN, a basketball-crazy town in a basketball-crazy state. He went on to play for Austin Peay and Georgia Tech, but somehow he never made the pros. Before he was done he was sweeping the gym back in Muncie when he was killed at age 38 in a crack deal gone bad.
At least Sammy got to play in college - then there's Ben Wilson of Simeon High School in Chicago:
As a junior he led Chicago's Simeon High School to the Illinois State Championship. In the summer of '84, he was selected as the top player at the ABCD Camp in Princeton, NJ., (back when it was known as "Nike/ABCD," before Sonny Vacarro took the camp over to adidas). Wilson finished the summer as the highest rated player, and entered his senior year regarded by most as the top high school senior in the country. Just a few days before the first game of his senior year, Ben Wilson was shot, less than a block from his high school campus. He died in a Chicago hospital less than a day later.Wilson had committed to the University of Illinois, and so far Nick Anderson and three other Illini players from Simeon have worn #25 in his honor.
I can't stop it here, that's too depressing. One more.
Bob Love played pro basketball with the Bulls, and was their alltime high scorer until eclipsed by a guy named Jordan. Love had always had a stutter, and after an injury ended his basketball career he went downhill to the point of being a busboy. Then a manager took interest in him, got help for his speech problems, and at last notice he was back with the Bulls as Directory of Community Relations.
Friday, September 20, 2002
Anti religious nuts
I used to give religious people a hard time, generally good-naturedly. One woman in particular described the results as "vain babblings". I can't say I was charmed at the time, but she was right.
Claudia Winkler has written an excellent Weekly Standard article here. It appears that Stephen Pinker and Simon Schama have the same problem I grew out of.
You'd think that by the time someone had achieved Pinker's stature you'd be able to draw meaningful distinctions. But he apparently thinks that because some nuts from a particularly poisonous variety of Islam carry out some outrageous atrocities, so all of religion must go.
Inevitably these people talk about reason, as if this were somehow incompatible with religion. It would help if they could do a better job of reasoning themselves. Then they'd realize that reason cannot justify itself, without the use of circular reasoning.
Therefore everything always starts from some core beliefs which must be accepted on faith. Which leaves the most militant evolution uber alles ranter standing on a platform no more solid than that of the religious people he ridicules.
Personally, I'm an agnostic. I find the atheists to be at least as clueless and asinine as they claim religious people are. As for the religious, good luck picking the right door.
But IMO most of those doors lead ultimately to the same place. I'm speaking in worldly terms - mostly it's about getting along with people. It's not asking so much to say "thou shalt not commit murder", or "thou shalt not steal", and as far as I'm aware these are fairly universal.
These ideas are awfully inconvenient for those of the religion that dares not speak its name, the secularists. They want to redistribute your property, abort your children, and euthanize your aged to make their idea of heaven on earth. And we've seen what these heavens look like repeatedly by now.
If the last Wahhabist died tomorrow I wouldn't shed a tear. But given a choice between putting up with them or those who would get rid of religion altogether, I'll take my chances with the Wahhabis.
Claudia Winkler has written an excellent Weekly Standard article here. It appears that Stephen Pinker and Simon Schama have the same problem I grew out of.
You'd think that by the time someone had achieved Pinker's stature you'd be able to draw meaningful distinctions. But he apparently thinks that because some nuts from a particularly poisonous variety of Islam carry out some outrageous atrocities, so all of religion must go.
Inevitably these people talk about reason, as if this were somehow incompatible with religion. It would help if they could do a better job of reasoning themselves. Then they'd realize that reason cannot justify itself, without the use of circular reasoning.
Therefore everything always starts from some core beliefs which must be accepted on faith. Which leaves the most militant evolution uber alles ranter standing on a platform no more solid than that of the religious people he ridicules.
Personally, I'm an agnostic. I find the atheists to be at least as clueless and asinine as they claim religious people are. As for the religious, good luck picking the right door.
But IMO most of those doors lead ultimately to the same place. I'm speaking in worldly terms - mostly it's about getting along with people. It's not asking so much to say "thou shalt not commit murder", or "thou shalt not steal", and as far as I'm aware these are fairly universal.
These ideas are awfully inconvenient for those of the religion that dares not speak its name, the secularists. They want to redistribute your property, abort your children, and euthanize your aged to make their idea of heaven on earth. And we've seen what these heavens look like repeatedly by now.
If the last Wahhabist died tomorrow I wouldn't shed a tear. But given a choice between putting up with them or those who would get rid of religion altogether, I'll take my chances with the Wahhabis.
Yak Pizza to Go
While researching the item below I stumbled upon this book. I haven't read it myself, but it sounds interesting. The author calls himself a "professional vagabond", and spends his time exploring and writing about areas like Vietnam, the Galapagos, Nepal, Madagascar and the Middle East. Here's what Amazon has to say.
African pizza
Some occupations turn out to be more multicultural than others. Working in nuclear power exposed me to people from about every corner of India, and nowadays in IT I run into people from about anywhere you can name. At the moment I have a Turk in the next cube, a Hindu across the aisle, a Jordanian a few cubes down, an Iranian a row over, and by the time you make it out of the building you've run into someone from about everybody else.
Many of them know by now that I'm fairly shameless about introducing myself if necessary, asking where they're from, and maybe even debriefing them about world news. Nobody has screamed yet, but it doesn't always go well.
Today someone had ordered a bunch of pizza for a meeting and the surplus was sitting in a common area. Several people were there, including a Tanzanian woman I know with her Chinese and Filipino-Chinese buddies. Instantly, I had to know - what do they put on pizzas in Africa?
Several people heard me ask this question, and some made noises like it was the dumbest thing they've ever heard. My quarry was amused though, and allowed as to how they didn't have much pizza over there - it was still "Italian food". Ouch - if that's not cultural deprivation, what is?
As for the ones who laughed out loud at the question, well, somebody finally Googled for 'tanzania pizza', and by Jove you find a decent list back. From here we learn that "Zanzibar pizza is the local specialty. These are small dough discs cooked quickly on brazier with onions, egg and chillis added. Totally unlike an Italian pizza, it makes a delicious and different treat. " (They also tell us that local ice cream is flavored with ginger, cloves, and lemon grass. No wonder obesity isn't much of a problem there...)
So that's not a pizza to you? Well, call Debonair's Pizza in Tanzania, and also in Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Uganda, Ivory Coast and in it's home in South Africa. (Limited delivery area.)
Go ahead - find that on Instapundit...
Many of them know by now that I'm fairly shameless about introducing myself if necessary, asking where they're from, and maybe even debriefing them about world news. Nobody has screamed yet, but it doesn't always go well.
Today someone had ordered a bunch of pizza for a meeting and the surplus was sitting in a common area. Several people were there, including a Tanzanian woman I know with her Chinese and Filipino-Chinese buddies. Instantly, I had to know - what do they put on pizzas in Africa?
Several people heard me ask this question, and some made noises like it was the dumbest thing they've ever heard. My quarry was amused though, and allowed as to how they didn't have much pizza over there - it was still "Italian food". Ouch - if that's not cultural deprivation, what is?
As for the ones who laughed out loud at the question, well, somebody finally Googled for 'tanzania pizza', and by Jove you find a decent list back. From here we learn that "Zanzibar pizza is the local specialty. These are small dough discs cooked quickly on brazier with onions, egg and chillis added. Totally unlike an Italian pizza, it makes a delicious and different treat. " (They also tell us that local ice cream is flavored with ginger, cloves, and lemon grass. No wonder obesity isn't much of a problem there...)
So that's not a pizza to you? Well, call Debonair's Pizza in Tanzania, and also in Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Uganda, Ivory Coast and in it's home in South Africa. (Limited delivery area.)
Go ahead - find that on Instapundit...
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