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May 31, 2005
Battling monks
For those skeptics out there among you who don’t believe all that “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” type kung fu clan dustup stuff ever really happens, check the news.
Satsuma Clan: “Step aside, you are blocking our road!”
Wu Tang Clan: “Ha! You step aside. This is our road!”
SC: “Do not make me laugh. Hahahaha. Your kung fu is weak.”
WTC: “You should talk about weak. What animal style is that you practice? Teddy bear?”
SC: “You would not be saying that if our master were here!”
WTC: “Your master… what is his name? Egg Foo Yung? Hu Flung Poo?”
SC: “Our master has invincible kung fu leg. And you smell like Japanese!”
WTC: “Ha! Your clan has all the power of a “kung fu fighting” ring tone!”
SC: “Eeeeaaaaaiiiii!!!!”
WTC: “Hiiiiiiyyyyyyaaaaaa!!!"
Like that.
Aside from the humor of having a Buddist monk named "Boonlert" involved in this fracas (which inevitably calls to mind Boomhauer from King of the Hill), the funniest line in the article is at the end when it talks about the five monks being fined by the courts and defrocked by senior monks:
But Boonlert was unrepentant.
Posted by John at 06:58 AM | Comments (0)
May 27, 2005
Opening the gates of heaven
Did you know that the song "Taps" has lyrics? The words to Taps are:
Gone the Sun
From the Earth
From the Hill
From the Sky
All Is Well
Safely Rest
God Is Nigh
Taps means something completely different at the end of the day than it does when played during daylight hours. Soldiers are used to hearing it played at dusk, but no soldier wants to hear it played during daylight. For when the bugle plays Taps in the daylight, it means that a fellow soldier has fallen. Some say that Taps is the clarion call to open the gates of heaven and admit the fallen warrior.
Memorial Day is a national holiday dedicated to remembering the sacrifices that our men and women of the armed forces have made over the last 229 years. America is a young nation by the standards of most developed countries, but one that has made many sacrifices to become free and to remain free. We should also take time to remember the families who have lost loved ones.
Have a great Memorial Day weekend.
Posted by John at 11:35 PM | Comments (0)
Mindset search - commercial vs. informational
Yahoo Research Lab has quietly released a new demo called Mindset.
The Mindset Search Demo applies a new twist on search that uses machine learning technology to give you a choice: View Yahoo! Search results sorted according to whether they are more commercial or more informational (i.e., from academic, non-commercial, or research-oriented sources).
Posted by John at 03:14 PM | Comments (0)
May 24, 2005
Stem cell debate
Reading a couple of acticles today on the proposed legislation to relax the restrictions on stem cell research. So far, it looks like it will pass in the House and get rejected in the Senate, so Bush won't have to veto it, as he has promised he would.
But in one of the articles I ran across a factoid of which I was unaware.
A study published in January in the Journal Nature said almost all of the cells that qualify for government research money have been contaminated by mouse proteins that would probably make humans reject therapies.So, given that we've screwed up the limited number of stem cell lines available for research use, we should authorize these same scientists to access more?
Sounds to me like these legislators and scientists are thinking about this like a video game scenario, where when you die you say, "darn, now I have to start over from the beginning." Except, of course, that when the genetic research gets out of control the deaths won't be temporary or virtual. Not that I'm paranoid or anything. We're just lucky it was only mouse proteins this time. Or, at least, lucky so far...
Posted by John at 07:13 AM | Comments (1)
May 22, 2005
Reality Smack
The article on page C1 of today's San Francisco Chronicle is writer Keith Thompson's discourse on his political journey from 1966-style Kennedy liberalism to today, when he has finally abandoned the liberal left. The post-modernist worldview finally collapsed for him this year, and he's delivered some insightful commentary on the reasons why. He cuts to the chase right up front with this observation.
"Leading voices in America's "peace" movement are actually cheering against self-determination for a long-suffering Third World country because they hate George W. Bush more than they love freedom."Thompson also hits the mark when talks about the JFK and MLK liberalism of the 1960's, when the goal was to bring down the barriers to equal rights and equal treatment under the law. That is no longer the agenda of the liberal left.
"A certain misplaced loyalty kept me from grasping that a view of individuals as morally capable of and responsible for making the principle decisions that shape their lives is decisively at odds with the contemporary left's entrance-level view of people as passive and helpless victims of powerful external forces, hence political wards who require the continuous shepherding of caretaker elites."I find this article to be slightly incredible, primarily due to the fact that it is from the San Francisco Chronicle, the bellweather publication of what is arguably the most liberal and left-leaning major city in the country. Dare we hope that glimmers of light are breaking through?? There's more interesting discussion on his website at www.thompsonatlarge.com.
Posted by John at 12:25 PM | Comments (0)
May 21, 2005
Thoughts on Newsweek
By most accounts, Michael Isikoff is what is colloquially known as an “ace reporter”. He had the Monica Lewinsky story first, including the fact that she was instructed to lie about it under oath. Newsweek decided not to run the story. Matt Drudge’s career was launched as a result.
Isikoff also had the goods on Kathleen Willey and her sexual encounter with the president in the Oval Office, complete with evidence. Newsweek decided not to run the story.
Isikoff was the first to get Paula Jones' accusations in her own words. Isikoff's employer at the time - The Washington Post - owners of Newsweek — decided not to run it.
So… what happened with the Guantanamo story about US interrogators flushing copies of the Quran down the toilet? Where was the prudence, the caution, the careful consideration of the impact the story might have? (One of the reasons the Lewinsky story was not released was concern that people might be hurt. Monica said if the story came out, “I’ll [expletive] kill myself.”)
The thing that gets me about this is not the mistake. Everybody makes mistakes and competitive print news media desperate for circulation in this increasingly digital world might be forgiven if their rush to print were, from time to time, premature.
The thing that gets me about this is not (!!!) even the hundreds wounded and 16 lives that were reportedly lost in rioting in Afghanistan when this story hit the press. My sympathy for people that either individually or collectively act like savages is quite limited.
It’s the agenda, stupid. Newsweek apparently missed the story earlier this month where Saudi Arabia arrested 40 Christians for "trying to spread their poisonous religious beliefs." But trot out some fabrication that makes American soldiers look like Nazi storm troopers, sadistic warmongers seeking to dominate Iraqis (to steal their oil, of course), and Newsweek pounces on it.
Evan Thomas, Newsweek’s Assistant Managing Editor, cited "similar reports from released detainees" which had already run on al-Jazeera as justification for running the story. So, if I’m connecting the dots correctly here, al-Jazeera said it, so it must be true?
Meanwhile, al-Jazeera is refusing to run pictures of Saddam in his underwear because “it’s demeaning to Iraqis”. Running footage of foreign journalists getting their heads cut off is still fine, though. The Newsweek folks ought to think about the benchmarks they’re using to set their standards.
Posted by John at 11:48 AM | Comments (1)
May 19, 2005
Personalize Your Google Home Page
Google Labs brings us a new goody! Personalize your Google home page with news, weather, word of the day, stock quotes, even your most recent emails (from GMail). As usual from Google, the UI is superb, very quick and easy to set up, drag-n-drop to configure the layout to your taste.
Nothing earth-shattering here, and I'm not sure I'm going to use it (since one of the main reasons I started using Google was the clean and simple and fast-loading home page). But now that Google has entered the portal wars, and given that they already have the ability to handle your personal, local content (Google Desktop), this home page modification capability could grow to be interesting. They have some catchup to do though, just to get on par with the other portal/search engines, especially MyYahoo.
Of course, if you want your Google really clean...
Posted by John at 11:36 PM | Comments (1)
May 17, 2005
Only a Sith thinks in absolutes
The first NY Times review of Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith is posted, and it's a rave.
This is by far the best film in the more recent trilogy, and also the best of the four episodes Mr. Lucas has directed. That's right (and my inner 11-year-old shudders as I type this): it's better than "Star Wars."
Posted by John at 05:35 PM | Comments (0)
May 14, 2005
Purple America
Tired of the red vs. blue states distinction? Given how close a lot of the counties and states were, there have been some interesting depictions of the gradations in between. Most dramatic, perhaps because it plays off the red/blue distinction, is this map of Purple America.
Posted by John at 12:01 AM | Comments (0)
May 13, 2005
More games = more brains
In an interesting book review by Malcolm Gladwell of the NY Times, he examines the claims in “Everything Bad Is Good for You” (Riverhead; $23.95), by Steven Johnson, namely that we're getting smarter, and video games and reality TV are the reason why.
I was not aware of the findings by James Flynn from 1984 which Gladwell cites, but they are interesting. Essentially, the number of IQ test questions which must be answered correctly to achieve a particular score has been consistently ratcheted up by about 3 IQ points per decade. Therefore a person with an IQ of 100 in 1975 would have an IQ of 91 as measured on today's tests. There are several possible explanations for this "Flynn Effect", including changes in cranial vault size, more rapid maturation of children, nutrition or environmental factors.
Steven Johnson's conclusion in the book is that popular culture is the reason for the rise in IQ scores. It would be relatively easy to draw out aspects of modern society that would account for such a rise, such as the flood of information to which we are subjected on a daily basis, the ubiquitous presence of computers, or a more rich media environment stimulating us through all five senses. Johnson takes a different path.
He says it is the complexity of modern entertainment that has caused more rapid development of reasoning and logic facilities in today's young people. TV shows are not the "General Hospital" or "Gunsmoke" episodes of years past, but multi-threaded, serial episodes that depict complex interactions, relationships and logic puzzles. Similarly, video games today offer the player the chance to engage in a fully formed virtual world, without a set of hard and fast rules for game play, but a chance to experiment, learn, and solve.
Intuitively, it seems there is an element of truth to Johnson's thesis. I do not know, however, how you would isolate this effect and measure it. The problem is that the Flynn effect is not smooth over the IQ curve; it is more pronounced at the lower end of the spectrum. And more of the world is developed today, with fewer cultures that have little or no exposure to technology, against which the developed world can be benchmarked. I like the thesis, though. More games, more brains.
Posted by John at 12:18 AM | Comments (0)
May 10, 2005
De-Animator
A heavy dose of H.P Lovecraft in this online shooter, where you are faced with legions of advancing undead. In De-Animator, you have a revolver, and it takes a few seconds to reload. You also have a shotgun (hit the Shift key), but that takes even longer. So far I've managed to bag 234 of the zombies before they, well..., ripped out my spine. What I really need here is an Uzi.
[props to MeFi for the link]
Definite Keelhauling Games Hall of Fame candidate. Let me know what you think.
Posted by John at 07:15 AM | Comments (2)
May 06, 2005
Friday movie fun
In the year 2014, the New York Times has gone offline, and the predominant new media delivery vehicle is EPIC, the Evolving Personalized Information Construct, a product of Googlezon. Welcome to the Museum of Media History, circa 2014 [8:00min Flash movie]. A vision of the future of news and information from the School of Psychology at GA Tech.
Overall, quite a rosy picture of the future compared to the privacy risks highlighted in the ACLU's picture of what happens in the future when you call Pizza Hut [2:15min Flash movie].
Posted by John at 07:34 AM | Comments (0)
May 05, 2005
See Matthew Run
Congratulations, Matt!
In a superb effort at the track meet today, brought to you exclusively by our field reporter Julie Parker who was there to observe the proceedings, Matthew Parker swept the field in the 1200 meter race winning by a comfortable 1/4 lap and setting a new Del Mar Middle School record of 4:15 (13 seconds better than the previous record!) in the process!People thought we were kidding when we said "running after the kids" kept us in shape.
Matt's going on to the regional championships to see if they have any stiffer competition for him. They run the 1500m at regionals, not the 1200m, but endurance has always been one of Matt's strong suits. If you extrapolate from last year's race results, assuming Matt kept the same pace over 1500m, he would be the 11th fastest youth in the tri-state Pacific Region of USA Track & Field (USATF).
Run, Matt, run.
Posted by John at 11:52 AM | Comments (0)
"Governor Moonbeam" blogs
It was interesting to run across Jerry Brown's weblog today. He writes it himself, and leaves comments open. In his position as Mayor of Oakland, that's a pretty gutsy thing to do.
In a quick read through the front page of his site, I was struck by how ... right-wing ... his views have become. Back in the day, Jerry was such a liberal Democrat (I just mis-typed it as demon-crat, thank you Dr. Freud) that Chicago columnist Mike Royko stuck Brown with the moniker "Governor Moonbeam" (for his proposal that the State of California purchase its own satellite that would be launched into orbit to provide emergency communications for the state) in one of his columns, and helped derail Brown's candidacy.
These days, though, while he's still clearly a strong advocate of all things eco-friendly, if I were matching the people in column A with the quotes in column B, I would never have drawn a line between Jerry Brown and this God-fearing commentary:
Scientists--at best--craft partial understandings or clever manipulations. That is why good science and all tradition advise humility when attempting to alter God’s creation. St. Paul counseled 'fear and trembling,' ...”
Or how about this observation on the decline of modern values?
Morals represent tradition and custom. In this brave new century, tradition and custom are replaced by fashion and hype. The past is for reactionaries, we are told. Science, technology and the ever-expanding GDP will solve our problems. Yet, no society can hang together without a proper balance between stability, respect for the old ways and openness to the new. In our time—2005—we are way out of balance.
Jerry's full of surprises, and his bio makes an interesting read. Check out the wikipedia entry.
Posted by John at 06:53 AM | Comments (0)
May 02, 2005
Wrong address
I wrote yesterday about David Parker. I wrote last week about the Oxyrhynchus manuscripts. Today, I come across an article that mentions both!
The article cites a British paleographic professor named David Parker who suggests that based on writings from the recently discovered scrolls, we have the "number of the beast" all wrong. It's not 666; it's 616.
Posted by John at 07:34 AM | Comments (0)
SOW: Week of 05-01-05
Song: Train Out of Hollywood
Artist: Judith Owen
Album: Lost and Found
You will like this if you like: Nora Jones, George Benson, Keith Jarrett, Diana Krall, Cassandra Wilson
While I’m waiting for the CD to arrive, I thought I’d highlight a song from Welsh singer Judith Owen’s latest CD, Lost and Found. Note: You can download a higher resolution version of this MP3 (192K Variable) from her website - or watch a music video of it - for a limited time.
Normally, I'm not a big fan of contemporary jazz with its emphasis on slick production values. It has a tendency to minimize the best elements of avant garde jazz - the improvisation and challenging experimentation. When the very best artists do it, however, I'll make an exception. It is hard to resist the stylish sophisitication of some of these pop/jazz and R&B/jazz fusion numbers.
If you haven’t encountered Judith Owen before, you’re in for a treat. I don’t have any of her earlier works but I was reminded of her distinctive vocal styling this morning when I heard her doing an interview on local San Francisco radio station KFOG. She performed a version of Deep Purple’s Smoke on the Water that was really unusual and just blew me away. It is one of the tracks on the new album, which features covers of classic and new material, as well as original songs. Judith also covers Walking on the Moon by The Police, which – judging by the snippet which the player on her website makes available - should be excellent.
Actually, you probably have encountered her before, although you may not know it. One of her songs was featured in the film As Good As It Gets starring Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt. Television shows on the WB, CBS, NBC and HBO utilized several tracks from Limited Edition. She was even invited to appear in animated form on The Simpsons. But that may have been due to her connections – she’s married to Harry Shearer, who in addition to being Derek Smalls from This Is Spinal Tap, does the voices for Mr. Burns, Otto, Ned Flanders, Principal Skinner and the Rev. Lovejoy.
Speaking of connections, on Lost and Found, she’s got Cassandra Wilson joining her at the microphone in counterpoint on the song Enough, Tom Scott and his mighty sax on Sky High, and on this week’s featured Song of the Week, bluesman Keb' Mo' playing his distinctive guitar on the swampy Train Out Of Hollywood.
Posted by John at 07:11 AM | Comments (0)
May 01, 2005
Way to Go, David Parker!
I did a double-take when I saw my brother's name in the news, but I don't think this Massachusetts Parker is related to us.
Nevertheless, I admire him for standing on an important principle. He asked to be notified in advance if pro-homosexual material was to be distributed or discussed with his child. The school agreed.
Moreover, the state has a parental notification law that requires parents be contacted when adult themes are raised. But the school distributed a "diversity" book bag that included, among other things, "Who's in a Family?" by Robert Skutch, a book that
catalogues multicultural contemporary family units, including those with single parents, lesbian and gay parents, mixed-race couples, grandparents and divorced parents. Kevin and his brother like their kimono-clad grandmother to help them with their jigsaw puzzles, while Ricky lives with two families.
David objected, and refused to leave school grounds until administrators would assure him it would not happen again. The school officials called the cops, and David spent the night in jail for "trespassing".
While books like this one might not be accurately described as pro-gay, they are certainly condoning of gay behavior and gay lifestyles. The problem is that they seek to destroy the special nature of the nuclear family. If, as the book asserts, it's perfectly normal for a kid to have two fathers and no mother, then the nuclear family has no greater value than any other arbitrary familial arragement. Similarly, if a same sex couple can be "married", then marriage loses its special status as the holy union of a man and a woman. It is insidious, as no one wants to be condemnatory or judgmental, but at the same time we cannot stand by and watch the foundational institutions of our society torn down in the name of tolerance.
For parents trying to instill an ethical sense of right and wrong into their children, the anything goes attitude of modern multiculturalism poses a serious problem.
I'm reminded of this snippet of dialog from The Incredibles:
Helen Parr: Everyone's special, Dash.
Dashiell Parr (sullenly): Which is another way of saying no one is.
The most important part of that dialog is that you hear it repeated by the arch-villian, Syndrome, as he departs his secret lair: "I'll give them heroics. I'll give them the most spectacular heroics they've ever seen! And when I'm old and I've had my fun, I'll sell my inventions so everyone can be superheroes! Everyone can be super! And when everyone's super... no one will be."
A more detailed examination of the philosophy behind "The Incredibles" is this short and interesting New York Times piece.
And when any group of people that want to call themselves a family can raise kids and nobody sees any problem with that, the nuclear family will no longer be special.
And when any group of people can get together in a union and call it marriage, then the union of one husband and one wife is no longer special.
Leaving aside the rather compelling arguments for teaching a more skeptical and cautious perspective on homosexuality (like average life spans), I actually think David Parker has the best answer, which is the Christian answer. Not being judgmental, but being firm in conviction. Not condemning other people or their practices, but being assertive about what he wants for his child. Not speaking out against others, but insisting on a role and dialogue about material that is presented to his son.
I like the quote from Parker's wife, which ends the article:
"We're not giving unfettered access to the psyche of our son when he enters the school," said Tonia Parker.
Here in northern California, we're fighting this battle every year. Rather I should say Julie is fighting the battle every year. While I go out and slay software dragons, she defends the children from material such as this, forced on our school systems by organizations like The Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN, pronounced "Glisten"). Their strategy is simple and direct. Teach the children as youngsters to go out of their way to accommodate every sexual variation possible, and the multiculturalism agenda will finally be free to flourish.
Posted by John at 11:34 PM | Comments (0)
More Stormy Weather Forecasts
Quality stuff coming out of Morgan Stanley lately! Continuing the theme of pending economic disaster, and trying to figure out exactly how the house of cards of cards is going to come down, here's a research piece from Morgan Stanley's Chief Economist, Stephen Roach.
Roach makes the case in his article, titled "Original Sin", that the current asset-based over-leveraging of the American household is a direct result of a policy change made by Alan Greenspan and the Federal Reserve in the late 1990's.
After 1997's "irrational exuberence" speech and subsequent tightening of the Fed funds rate, such a storm of political criticism ensued that the Fed caved in to the pressure. Lowering interest rates, they cited the emergence of a "new economy" of higher productivity based largely on the tremendous technical strides made during the dotcom boom. Significantly higher productivity has not emerged, however, and the exuberence of the dotcom boom as reflected in the stock market died a painful death. Asset inflation continued, however, funded by ever-lower interest rates, and cycled through the stock market, the bond market and most recently real estate.
As a result, household sector indebtedness surged to nearly 90% of US GDP -- an all-time record and up over 20 percentage points from levels in the mid-1990s when the Asset Economy was born. Secure in the asset-driven spending posture that resulted, consumers saw no need to save the old-fashioned way out of earned labor income. That’s why the personal saving rate has collapsed and currently stands near zero.As noted here before, this cycle of deficits in the current account cannot continue to be funded by increased asset leverage. The first serious move upward in interest rates threatens the whole infrastructure, and that's exactly what Roach thinks is likely to happen.
The day is close at hand when US monetary policy must get real. At a minimum, that will require a normalization of real interest rates. Given the excesses that now exist, it may even require a federal funds rate that needs to move into the restrictive zone -- possibly as high as 5.5%. Yes, this would cause an outcry -- perhaps similar to that which occurred in the spring of 1997 on the occasion of the Original Sin. But in the end, there may be no other choice. Fedspeak has taken us into the greatest moral hazard dilemma of all -- how to wean an asset-dependent system from unsustainably low real interest rates without bringing the entire House of Cards down. The longer the Fed waits, the more perilous the exit strategy.
If you want a more detailed explanation of the phenomenon that is unfolding, as well as an overview of the various theories of how the correction of imbalances might play out in our economy, check out today's post in Nouriel Roubini's Global Economics Blog.
Posted by John at 10:56 PM | Comments (0)
