Thursday, January 22, 2009

Recently watched: Stargate

Back in 1994 when the movie Stargate was first released, I remember watching it in the theater and liking it much more than most of the reviews at the time suggested.

I watched it again on DVD a couple years ago, and that time I didn't like it as much. The pacing seemed off, the plot a little silly, and I think I couldn't get past a couple inconsistencies with the Stargate SG-1 TV series that I had watched quite a bit of in the preceding years.

I watched it again a couple of days ago, and this time I enjoyed it immensely. The pacing was good, the ideas and universe created were interesting and detailed, and I saw more ideas that were well integrated into the TV series than I saw inconsistencies.

I think maybe it's one of those movies you have to be in the right mood to watch. There are so many cool ideas in it, from a "hidden history" on Earth to traveling to another world. I think I've always appreciated movies like that, but somehow the presentation in this one falls flat for some people. The immense success of the TV series probably demonstrates that well.

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Banning Books

So, apparently there are still people who think that banning books is perfectly reasonable.

To summarize:

"Robert Edwards, who launched a formal complaint about the Canadian novel, says the foul language, anti-Christian overtones, violence and sexual degradation probably violate the Toronto board’s policies of respect and tolerance."

Fine then, how about we remove the Bible from all school libraries, for it's violence, sexual degradation, incest, murder, genocide, and what I would expect is a clear violation of the Toronto board's policies of respect and tolerance?

You know what? Reading stuff that makes you uncomfortable is good for you. Reading about nasty stuff does not imply its endorsement, it offers and opportunity to discuss how it could happen and how never to let it happen.

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Zzzzzzzzzz

Yes, I haven't been writing recently. Between finalling a game, Christmas and generally not being very worked up about anything, I haven't written for much too long. Even my plan of fictional writing hasn't panned out because I was doing more of that in a directly work-related fashion, which obviously isn't really able to be shared here.

I came across this site: http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/ (via Pharyngula). That pretty much sums up the majority of thoughts I've had on the topic of prayer/miracles.

In case you don't want to read all that though: Miracles are things that God does that violate the laws of physics. God never performs miracles that clearly violate the laws of physics, or even fall outside of statistical expectations. That is to say, without a lot of fudging around the definition of "miracle," it's pretty safe to say that there have been none in modern times and prayer is utterly ineffective in causing them to happen.

In other news, I just recently had two wisdom teeth out. "Fun" is not a word I would use to describe it, but having had kidney stones, I would like to mention that any pain is nothing compared to that.

Work is going well. Our game is approved and on the way to store shelves (and Steam)! I'm moving from Rendering to Gameplay on the next project, which is both a little disconcerting, since I have a proven track record in rendering, but haven't done much specific gameplay programming for quite a while. I've always railed against being pigeonholed, but having done rendering for several years I may have done it to myself. This will be a good change. My main goal is always to Make A Difference, and that's where I'm needed more at the moment.

In other other news, the snow is finally melting in Vancouver. This is the most snow I've seen out here in 10 years, and it's sticking around much longer than I've ever seen too. After a pretty cold summer, I was hoping for a mild winter. Oh well, maybe next year. And maybe the fog will go away - it's been foggy day and night for the past three days at least, and for a good portion of the last week. Other than that, it's been cloudy. I think we had a few hours of sun a couple weeks ago... My astronomical observation plans have not gone well over the last few months. Every time I think about buying a semi-decent telescope, I wonder if it's even worth it, living in Light Pollution Hell and all. Of course, some day it will clear up and I'll regret not being prepared.