I like writing. I'm always coming up with plot lines and dialogue in my head. It's just that every time it comes to write something down, it gets a little difficult to actually get everything down the way I was thinking about it, without things going off in weird directions.
The story I just posted could be considered one such thing. This post is another.
What I really wanted to say was, I'd post more stuff like the story below, except I have a problem with "releasing stuff into the wild" if I don't think it's done yet. I'm unfortunately also a perfectionist, and I tend do abandon things before I consider them done.
Part of the point of this blog was to create a place to store all of the thoughts that I was storing on my PDA, but that other people might find at least remotely interesting.
Another point was to explore trying to say things a succinctly as possible. That would effectively require me to take old posts, trim the fluff or things that don't make sense or are blatantly wrong, in an effort to find perfection. I believe this is called "editing," which is something that doesn't happen easily online it seems.
So, I hope to write more, and more importantly, revisit and edit earlier thoughts at some point. Once I find the time. (Everyone say, "good luck with that last part.")
Sunday, November 2, 2008
A Story
Once upon a time, in the Kingdom of Fa, there lived a kind but stubborn king. Through the length of this kingdom ran the river Ga. It flowed from the mountains, passed through the plains, and then passed between two great hills before making its way to the sea. Upon the tallest of these hills was perched an enormous boulder.
During the summer months, the river provided food and water for the people, however, during the winter it would freeze solid or run dry. Winters were very hard, and many people would die of thirst.
One day, one of the king's advisers came to him with a plan. "We will roll that giant boulder down the hill into the valley, creating a dam on the river Ga. This will create a lake, whose water will sustain us through the winter!"
So the king and all of his advisers climbed the hill and tried to push the boulder down the hill. They pushed and they strained. But they could not move the boulder.
The wise adviser suggested, "Perhaps if we dig under the boulder, it will begin to roll down the hill." But the king said, "No! It might crush you, and I can not put any of you in danger."
So they called all of the men of the kingdom to help. They pushed and they strained. They huffed and they grunted. But they could not make the boulder move either.
The adviser suggested again, "Perhaps if we dig under the boulder just a little bit, just to get it started." But the king said, "No! It might crush you, and I can not put any of you in danger."
So they called all of the women and children to help. They pushed and they strained. They huffed and they grunted. They groaned and they moaned. But even with every person in the kingdom to help, they could not make the boulder move.
Finally the adviser said, "Allow me to dig under the boulder. I am willing to take the risk, and my personal safety is a small price to pay for the benefit of the entire kingdom." But the king said, "No! It might crush you, and I can not put any of you in danger."
So the people of the Kingdom of Fa did not get their dam, and there were many more hard years for the small kingdom.
The moral of the story? There is no Ga Dam Fa King way.
During the summer months, the river provided food and water for the people, however, during the winter it would freeze solid or run dry. Winters were very hard, and many people would die of thirst.
One day, one of the king's advisers came to him with a plan. "We will roll that giant boulder down the hill into the valley, creating a dam on the river Ga. This will create a lake, whose water will sustain us through the winter!"
So the king and all of his advisers climbed the hill and tried to push the boulder down the hill. They pushed and they strained. But they could not move the boulder.
The wise adviser suggested, "Perhaps if we dig under the boulder, it will begin to roll down the hill." But the king said, "No! It might crush you, and I can not put any of you in danger."
So they called all of the men of the kingdom to help. They pushed and they strained. They huffed and they grunted. But they could not make the boulder move either.
The adviser suggested again, "Perhaps if we dig under the boulder just a little bit, just to get it started." But the king said, "No! It might crush you, and I can not put any of you in danger."
So they called all of the women and children to help. They pushed and they strained. They huffed and they grunted. They groaned and they moaned. But even with every person in the kingdom to help, they could not make the boulder move.
Finally the adviser said, "Allow me to dig under the boulder. I am willing to take the risk, and my personal safety is a small price to pay for the benefit of the entire kingdom." But the king said, "No! It might crush you, and I can not put any of you in danger."
So the people of the Kingdom of Fa did not get their dam, and there were many more hard years for the small kingdom.
The moral of the story? There is no Ga Dam Fa King way.
Friday, October 24, 2008
Goooooooooogle
Well, that last post was exceptionally serious. Here's some original research to counterbalance.
It should be well known that a Google search for "boobs" will return a significant number of results. But what about people who are really excited about boobs, someone who would exclaim, "boooooooobs!" What is the distribution of that?
Question answered:
Because the hits for "boobs" (34800000) is substantially larger than for, say, "booooooooooooobs" (707), it was necessary to use a logarithmic scale.
I also included zero o's (bbs) and one o (bobs) for reference. Interestingly, it appears that people are about five times more interested in BBSes than they are boobs, but there are almost six times as many boobs on the Internet as there are Bobs.
There is a curious dip around eight o's, and an inexplicable notch at 18. Otherwise things gradually taper off to zero at 93 o's, only to have a temporary resurgence at
96 and 97.
I'm not exactly sure what that says about people. I'm not sure exactly what it says about me either, but at least it was worth a bit of a laugh.
Now the next great experiment: what does this do to my page hits?
For future reference, and to screw up any future attempts to perform this research, I hereby provide the raw data (sorry, you'll have to copy it elsewhere if you really want to read it, Blogger's formatting is less than ideal):
It should be well known that a Google search for "boobs" will return a significant number of results. But what about people who are really excited about boobs, someone who would exclaim, "boooooooobs!" What is the distribution of that?
Question answered:
Because the hits for "boobs" (34800000) is substantially larger than for, say, "booooooooooooobs" (707), it was necessary to use a logarithmic scale.
I also included zero o's (bbs) and one o (bobs) for reference. Interestingly, it appears that people are about five times more interested in BBSes than they are boobs, but there are almost six times as many boobs on the Internet as there are Bobs.
There is a curious dip around eight o's, and an inexplicable notch at 18. Otherwise things gradually taper off to zero at 93 o's, only to have a temporary resurgence at
96 and 97.
I'm not exactly sure what that says about people. I'm not sure exactly what it says about me either, but at least it was worth a bit of a laugh.
Now the next great experiment: what does this do to my page hits?
For future reference, and to screw up any future attempts to perform this research, I hereby provide the raw data (sorry, you'll have to copy it elsewhere if you really want to read it, Blogger's formatting is less than ideal):
Google Search bbs bobs boobs booobs boooobs booooobs boooooobs booooooobs boooooooobs booooooooobs boooooooooobs booooooooooobs boooooooooooobs booooooooooooobs boooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobs 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Thursday, October 23, 2008
Us vs Them
If you've been following the American presidential election in the last few days, you may have noticed that the Republican side has taken on a very "Us vs Them" tone.
This is probably a fairly good summary:
I've been seeing this trend down south for quite a long time now. Political opinion is not just polarized, it's not really even opinion any more. It's even moved past the "cheer for your own team" mentality, and focused on hatred of the "other guy's team."
This way of thinking is poisonous, and it has spread into every facet of politics.
The War on Terror exists because we can't talk to terrorists. They're the "other" guys. If you don't negotiate, though, how do you intend to win, other than genocide?
The War on Drugs exists because drugs are seen as inherently evil, even though the War doesn't prevent drug use - it just makes it hazardous through lack of quality control and medical intervention, and puts money into the pockets of gangsters. It creates an Us vs Them mindset, where people involved with drugs become disposable people. If we could solve the organized crime problem, wouldn't it be worth legalizing drugs?
Imagine, for a moment, the world at peace. What does that world look like? Does everyone believe exactly as you do? Like the same things you do? Have the same color skin you do? What happens when we answer "yes" to any one of those? I think what happens is endless conflict, intolerance and hatred, and that is where the Us vs Them mentality takes us.
To me, peace does not mean absence of conflict. It means wars are fought with words, not bombs. It means every person is free to openly question beliefs. It means we can still be friends when we disagree. It means my moral code will not intrude into the privacy of your home, and yours will not intrude into mine. It means we respect each other. It means we honestly search for the truth in matters, and understand that disagreement arises from imperfect information, muddled thinking, or from selfishness.
Perhaps it means realizing that We are somebody else's Them, and They might be right.
This is probably a fairly good summary:
I've been seeing this trend down south for quite a long time now. Political opinion is not just polarized, it's not really even opinion any more. It's even moved past the "cheer for your own team" mentality, and focused on hatred of the "other guy's team."
This way of thinking is poisonous, and it has spread into every facet of politics.
The War on Terror exists because we can't talk to terrorists. They're the "other" guys. If you don't negotiate, though, how do you intend to win, other than genocide?
The War on Drugs exists because drugs are seen as inherently evil, even though the War doesn't prevent drug use - it just makes it hazardous through lack of quality control and medical intervention, and puts money into the pockets of gangsters. It creates an Us vs Them mindset, where people involved with drugs become disposable people. If we could solve the organized crime problem, wouldn't it be worth legalizing drugs?
Imagine, for a moment, the world at peace. What does that world look like? Does everyone believe exactly as you do? Like the same things you do? Have the same color skin you do? What happens when we answer "yes" to any one of those? I think what happens is endless conflict, intolerance and hatred, and that is where the Us vs Them mentality takes us.
To me, peace does not mean absence of conflict. It means wars are fought with words, not bombs. It means every person is free to openly question beliefs. It means we can still be friends when we disagree. It means my moral code will not intrude into the privacy of your home, and yours will not intrude into mine. It means we respect each other. It means we honestly search for the truth in matters, and understand that disagreement arises from imperfect information, muddled thinking, or from selfishness.
Perhaps it means realizing that We are somebody else's Them, and They might be right.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
It is done
So, the election's done. The Conservatives won another minority. Overall, I figure that's pretty much about the best I could hope for, I suppose.
Despite my minimal efforts to the contrary, our local Conservative incumbent, James Moore, was re-elected. I was right about that. My estimate of 35% of the vote (down from 41%) was a little off the mark, with him taking 54.6% of the vote. That would be 25525 votes vs. 19961 last time, so despite low turnout he actually got more votes. Wow! I totally failed to call that!
Interestingly, the NDP candidate was well ahead of the Liberal candidate as well, which is reversed from last time. I guess the Liberals decided to vote for the Conservatives this time around.
In other news, the NDP appear to have taken the Western Arctic riding. Since I appear to have actually pissed off the only person I know who calls there home (which I feel quite badly about, by the way), I hope there is some consolation in her having made some difference by travelling home to vote, with a vote spread of only 523 votes.
So, all in all, that was probably the least useful $400,000,000 I've seen spent recently. Let's hope we don't have to do it again soon.
Despite my minimal efforts to the contrary, our local Conservative incumbent, James Moore, was re-elected. I was right about that. My estimate of 35% of the vote (down from 41%) was a little off the mark, with him taking 54.6% of the vote. That would be 25525 votes vs. 19961 last time, so despite low turnout he actually got more votes. Wow! I totally failed to call that!
Interestingly, the NDP candidate was well ahead of the Liberal candidate as well, which is reversed from last time. I guess the Liberals decided to vote for the Conservatives this time around.
In other news, the NDP appear to have taken the Western Arctic riding. Since I appear to have actually pissed off the only person I know who calls there home (which I feel quite badly about, by the way), I hope there is some consolation in her having made some difference by travelling home to vote, with a vote spread of only 523 votes.
So, all in all, that was probably the least useful $400,000,000 I've seen spent recently. Let's hope we don't have to do it again soon.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
My problem with religion
My problem with religion is that it is not actually responsible for almost all of the good things that people attribute to it, and is responsible for some very bad things that people do not attribute to it.
Two days to the election
Here's a link to the candidates. It will probably be invalid soon, but then so will this post.
I'm inclined to vote Conservative, but that's primarily to piss off a good friend of mine who recently told me that I should keep my disagreements that are only tangentially disagreeable to my own blog. (That's not strictly true, but I'm really fishing for a reason to vote for anybody this time around. But it is fun when she's all annoyed.) It's not really a disagreement though. As far as I'm concerned, that argument is already won. Go read The God Delusion and save all of us some pain. I've even added some handy atheism links to the sidebar in case going to the library is too much work.
I almost like my local Liberal candidate. He's seems like a smart guy, is in the computer business, and has various science degrees. He's also not going to win - his flyer was filled to the brim with meaningful, intelligent information, and even I said, "just give me the bullet points!"
Our Green candidate is a computer guy too, but as far as I can tell, he was just dropped into the riding to have somebody on the ballot. Even the lawn signs in my riding are just generic "Green Party" signs, they don't even have his name on them.
Our NDP candidate is pretty cute... that counts for something, right? I'm assuming our young, handsome Conservative incumbent wouldn't disagree.
Current inclination: Liberal by a hair, followed closely by Conservative, with Green coming up a very close third. Am I forgetting anybody? (Hint: yes.)
Current guess at the outcome: Conservative, with 35% of the vote (down from 41% last time).
I'm inclined to vote Conservative, but that's primarily to piss off a good friend of mine who recently told me that I should keep my disagreements that are only tangentially disagreeable to my own blog. (That's not strictly true, but I'm really fishing for a reason to vote for anybody this time around. But it is fun when she's all annoyed.) It's not really a disagreement though. As far as I'm concerned, that argument is already won. Go read The God Delusion and save all of us some pain. I've even added some handy atheism links to the sidebar in case going to the library is too much work.
I almost like my local Liberal candidate. He's seems like a smart guy, is in the computer business, and has various science degrees. He's also not going to win - his flyer was filled to the brim with meaningful, intelligent information, and even I said, "just give me the bullet points!"
Our Green candidate is a computer guy too, but as far as I can tell, he was just dropped into the riding to have somebody on the ballot. Even the lawn signs in my riding are just generic "Green Party" signs, they don't even have his name on them.
Our NDP candidate is pretty cute... that counts for something, right? I'm assuming our young, handsome Conservative incumbent wouldn't disagree.
Current inclination: Liberal by a hair, followed closely by Conservative, with Green coming up a very close third. Am I forgetting anybody? (Hint: yes.)
Current guess at the outcome: Conservative, with 35% of the vote (down from 41% last time).
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