Continuing to post on shallow topics in the midst of others’ heavy political discourse, what TV shows are people watching these days? Any can’t-miss shows on the TiVo? Lost, perhaps? Battlestar Galactica? (ahem) Doctor Who? *Cyndi and Jim immediately see through Valerie’s thin ruse of listing the show she’s obsessed with third* Looking forward to the return of Mad Men? Excited about Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse or still pining for Firefly? Comment about it!
If there’s interest, I or others could initiate an open thread after a new episode of whatever-it-is airs for water cooler discussion and the like.
For our part, other than the aforementioned Who and its slutty stepsister Torchwood, we are currently working our way through the BBC show Life on Mars which starred John Simm. We have been TiVoing Galactica but haven’t actually gotten around to starting the new season yet. And we are still laughing our asses of at Scrubs and at Neil Patrick Harris in How I Met Your Mother.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Monday, April 28, 2008
Global Warming. Why are we asking the wrong questions?
I was reading this blog post from David Brin recently, and started thinking about this issue again (his discussion of climate change is in the second half of the post). Especially look at the 9th and following comments after the post ("The wheels are coming off the global warming bandwagon..."). Brin slaps the guy down pretty hard, and I understand his frustration. It is amazing to me that there are intelligent people who are still arguing about whether we are affecting the climate.
I am not an expert in climate science (no one person really can be) but virtually every credible source agrees now that we are affecting the temperature of the planet. My favorite book on the subject is Tim Flannery's The Weather Makers. He lays out the arguments pretty fairly, including the problems climate models have with clouds and the effect of contrails. Most of the energy companies are even seeing the light and making plans for a low-carbon energy future (there was a YouTube recording of a BP meeting where the chief scientist of BP was talking in reasonable terms about climate change, but I can't find it now).
All the debate about whether global warming is happening is a distraction from the important policy questions we should be asking:
1) What are the best case and worse case scenarios for the effect this change is going to have on our civilization? How much CO2 is too much?
2) How much will it reasonably cost for a certain reduction in CO2 and other greenhouse gases?
3) How much can we do with current technology to curb the problem? Do we need to invest more in engineering or research?
These are just a few of the many questions we should be asking instead of having debates about whether the problem is real.
What do you guys think?
I am not an expert in climate science (no one person really can be) but virtually every credible source agrees now that we are affecting the temperature of the planet. My favorite book on the subject is Tim Flannery's The Weather Makers. He lays out the arguments pretty fairly, including the problems climate models have with clouds and the effect of contrails. Most of the energy companies are even seeing the light and making plans for a low-carbon energy future (there was a YouTube recording of a BP meeting where the chief scientist of BP was talking in reasonable terms about climate change, but I can't find it now).
All the debate about whether global warming is happening is a distraction from the important policy questions we should be asking:
1) What are the best case and worse case scenarios for the effect this change is going to have on our civilization? How much CO2 is too much?
2) How much will it reasonably cost for a certain reduction in CO2 and other greenhouse gases?
3) How much can we do with current technology to curb the problem? Do we need to invest more in engineering or research?
These are just a few of the many questions we should be asking instead of having debates about whether the problem is real.
What do you guys think?
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Logos and flashbacks
So I'm doing my lunchtime web crawl and come across this (may not be safe for work):
http://timesonline.typepad.com/comment/2008/04/the-original-lo.html which reminds me of this (same warning applies)
http://www.oddee.com/item_86090.aspx
which reminds me of the big brouhaha over Davidson's Sesquicentennial logo change involving a red bar with a white diamond under the V. We paid consultants with a five figure sum for that one, back in '88. That was when Harry Broome wrote a letter suggesting DC could have held a contest for the student body to choose a new logo. Well, while it may have been dumb to shell out that sort of money, at least we didn't get anything worth posting on the aforementioned sites.
http://timesonline.typepad.com/comment/2008/04/the-original-lo.html which reminds me of this (same warning applies)
http://www.oddee.com/item_86090.aspx
which reminds me of the big brouhaha over Davidson's Sesquicentennial logo change involving a red bar with a white diamond under the V. We paid consultants with a five figure sum for that one, back in '88. That was when Harry Broome wrote a letter suggesting DC could have held a contest for the student body to choose a new logo. Well, while it may have been dumb to shell out that sort of money, at least we didn't get anything worth posting on the aforementioned sites.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Maybe I used too many monkeys...
Jim thought this post from my livejournal account was worth cross-posting here. Sort of a summary of live music/comedy that we've seen recently.
We got Kids in the Hall tickets! We weren't really planning to go. We wanted to get tickets go see Flight of the Conchords, who are in Chicago on May 14th, but they sold out in presale, I think; we failed utterly. Jim went online looking for tickets from a broker and failed to find anything for less than about $180 per ticket. Then he says, "Hey, here's Kids in the Hall tickets for face value!" So we bought them. The month of May will be bringing teh funny: We are going to see Jonathan Coulton on May 3rd, which I think will make our 4th time seeing him, and now the Kids in the Hall on May 29th.
Other shows we've been to in the last year or so:
We got Kids in the Hall tickets! We weren't really planning to go. We wanted to get tickets go see Flight of the Conchords, who are in Chicago on May 14th, but they sold out in presale, I think; we failed utterly. Jim went online looking for tickets from a broker and failed to find anything for less than about $180 per ticket. Then he says, "Hey, here's Kids in the Hall tickets for face value!" So we bought them. The month of May will be bringing teh funny: We are going to see Jonathan Coulton on May 3rd, which I think will make our 4th time seeing him, and now the Kids in the Hall on May 29th.
Other shows we've been to in the last year or so:
Josh Joplin (with Garrison Starr opening) -- I really liked Garrison Starr live (I think I described her as Amy Ray meets Kelly Clarkson, which totally worked, believe it or not), so I bought a couple of her albums, only to find that she was better live than recorded. Josh Joplin was dressed as a beatnik (with a kerchief! seriously!) and was sort of a spaz live, but very good nonetheless.
Michael Penn (with The Last Town Chorus opening) -- Michael Penn is one of those singers who sounds effortlessly perfect live. He was clearly very uncomfortable with the between-song banter thing, which I thought was funny given how many years he's been at this. He instead solicited banter, recipes, old wives' tales, and political discourse from the audience.
The Decemberists (with Laura Veirs opening) -- we went to the "The Short of It" night from their "The Long and the Short of It" Tour, where they were planning to do all their really long epic songs the first night and then their shorter songs the second. It was a great show, but they cancelled all of the rest of the tour right after we saw them.
Jonathan Coulton with Paul and Storm (several times) -- Because we love them utterly. Jim got to go up on stage at the last show to do the "Message Redacted" voice for "Chiron Beta Prime," which he was very pleased with. Ranked up there with his participation in Penn & Teller's bullet catch when we saw them in Vegas.
Julia Sweeney, "Letting Go of God" -- I really can't say enough about how good this show was -- hilarious and thought-provoking and touching. Good especially if you are an atheist but I think even an open-minded religious person would appreciate it. Julia actually has a lot of affection for the church in spite of her beliefs. She's coming out with a DVD of this show at some point, which I can't wait for.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
We're Number Three!!!
Yes, I am claiming the Davidson men's basketball team is #3 in the nation. First off, ignore the regular season -- games before March don't count. Now look at the tournament results. How many points away from Kansas was every other team? Points add, so if A loses to B who loses to C, C absorbs A-B and B-C. Now let's look at the results:
Kansas = 0
Memphis = -1/2 [yeah, they lost by 7, but in overtime, so -1/2]
Davidson = -2
Mississippi State = -1/2 - 3 = -3.5
The rest of the South bracket - 18.5 or lower since Memphis usually romped
The entire East bracket = -18 or lower, since UNC got blown out by Kansas
The entire West bracket = -1/2 -15 = -15.5 or lower, after UCLA's 15 point loss.
So obviously Davidson was the third best team in the tournament and those supposed losses to Duke, UNC, and UCLA in the regular season Never Really Happened.
I am also available for political campaign analyses and budget estimations.
Kansas = 0
Memphis = -1/2 [yeah, they lost by 7, but in overtime, so -1/2]
Davidson = -2
Mississippi State = -1/2 - 3 = -3.5
The rest of the South bracket - 18.5 or lower since Memphis usually romped
The entire East bracket = -18 or lower, since UNC got blown out by Kansas
The entire West bracket = -1/2 -15 = -15.5 or lower, after UCLA's 15 point loss.
So obviously Davidson was the third best team in the tournament and those supposed losses to Duke, UNC, and UCLA in the regular season Never Really Happened.
I am also available for political campaign analyses and budget estimations.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Two Recommended Books
Rainbow's End, by Vernor Vinge
Vinge is best known as a proponent of the idea that humanity is approaching a Singularity where our scientific progress creates a self-evolving machine intelligence which enables a feedback loop of technological expansion.
His other novels are set the in far future, while this one is set perhaps twenty years from now. Vinge is super at extrapolating current technological trends in plausible ways, while also giving us engaging characters and action. The world he describes lets everyone construct their own virtual reality and superimpose it on the real one. It is also a world in which medical science has made amazing discoveries, but some diseases remain uncured creating a roulette of medical cures depending on your condition.
The main character is a poet who is cured of Alzheimer's among other physical ailments and finds himself with a restored body in this new world. He becomes caught up in an international plot that would kill most of humanity.
I highly recommend this book.
Quantico, by Greg Bear
This is the latest novel by my favorite hard science fiction author. Quantico is set in the very near future, and as the name suggests it revolves around the FBI. I would call this a horror story about what is possible for terrorist groups with the acceleration of genetics in the past ten years. A young FBI agent, his partner, and his father investigating the possible use of anthrax end up discovering a far more frightening possibility for modern criminals.
As with Bear's other books, his characters are smart and well-defined. If you are familiar with his other work this is a good book, but if you have not read Greg Bear, I would start with Eon, The Forge of God, or Darwin's Radio.
Vinge is best known as a proponent of the idea that humanity is approaching a Singularity where our scientific progress creates a self-evolving machine intelligence which enables a feedback loop of technological expansion.
His other novels are set the in far future, while this one is set perhaps twenty years from now. Vinge is super at extrapolating current technological trends in plausible ways, while also giving us engaging characters and action. The world he describes lets everyone construct their own virtual reality and superimpose it on the real one. It is also a world in which medical science has made amazing discoveries, but some diseases remain uncured creating a roulette of medical cures depending on your condition.
The main character is a poet who is cured of Alzheimer's among other physical ailments and finds himself with a restored body in this new world. He becomes caught up in an international plot that would kill most of humanity.
I highly recommend this book.
Quantico, by Greg Bear
This is the latest novel by my favorite hard science fiction author. Quantico is set in the very near future, and as the name suggests it revolves around the FBI. I would call this a horror story about what is possible for terrorist groups with the acceleration of genetics in the past ten years. A young FBI agent, his partner, and his father investigating the possible use of anthrax end up discovering a far more frightening possibility for modern criminals.
As with Bear's other books, his characters are smart and well-defined. If you are familiar with his other work this is a good book, but if you have not read Greg Bear, I would start with Eon, The Forge of God, or Darwin's Radio.
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