My personal glimpse into the first half of the 21st Century for some yet to be known future
Tuesday, September 13, 2005
Miserable response to disasters
Unchecked free market leads to instability if centralized forces work to abuse the system for personal gain, as in case of Enron’s manipulation of western U.S. electricity supplies at the turn of the 21st Century. Uncheck free market leads to too many people being hurt in recessions, and not enough people benefiting from booms. This is why America does not have an unchecked free market anymore. We have a Mixed Economy, which is free market based, but utilizes beneficial methods from all forms of economies. We use what works well for the individual, balanced with what is best for the population on the whole. Too much pull by one side or the other in the past has led our nation down roads we should not want to journey again.
Neocons live in a fantasy realm of 100% happy people, perfect conditions always persist, where up-trends never end, and everyone gets at least enough money for participating in the system at any level. They pick and choose events and quotes from American past to justify radical economic experiments. These experiments are ultimately victimizing our modern day populous for the gain of only a few fat cats.
Those fat cats are openly applying cronyism from the White House right now. They put ideological friends in charge of government agencies instead of looking for the best qualified person. This is the other reason for the failure of our government right now. Leadership positions are full of unqualified cronies, putting our country at risk and making dangerous situations much worse.
The current government is arrogant and haughty, bolstered by willful blinders preventing them from seeing their errors and making adjustments to account for imperfections in the system. This has led to a blind faith in an ideology, rather than acceptance of reality. Anything from reality that contradicts their notions is called a fluke, or even blamed on some other factor which they should’ve accounted for but pretend they can’t.
Our inability to take preventive and aftermath action at the federal level in the recent national disaster is a direct result of these flaws in our country’s leadership. This blind belief in disproved ideologies and the cronyism supporting it have led America to repeat the mistakes of our past on a monumentally grander scale. The time to correct these mistakes is soon at hand. I’m not going to say specifically who to vote for in the next elections. I will directly say who not to vote for. Do not vote for neocons or anyone that supports the neocon movement. If you are Republican, take back your party from these lunatics. If you are Democrat, vote for Democrats that have a proven record of taking on these lunatics. If you are an independent like me, vote in a way that stops the neocons from staying in power. Sometimes, this means not voting for the best person, but the best person given the circumstances.
Thank god
Even though the number lost is not as high, the President's lack action early on crossed over the line of what is acceptable for a President to do and not to do. He failed to protect Americans from harm. Yes, the storm is uncontrollable, but how we act if fully in our control. It is dishonorable behavior to not act to protect America. The homeland was under attack, and the very man and agency that the President set up to protect American acted like it wasn't their job to do anything and the President accepted this and tried to defend it. Basically, he failed to carry out his duties as President when it was most important for him to step up. He failed to act when it counted, even though they was creditable warnings up to one year ago about this kind of disaster. Katrina itself posed a threat for days before it hit. Days in which the President needed to ack to make sure everything was in place. Days that he instead spend running around the country trying to collect campaign money. What was he collecting campaign money for anyway? He's not going to be re-elected. In fact, this lack of action to protect American is cause for impeachment.
Ok, enough of that for now.
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
Garbage
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Average day and week
In other news, I have a trip to Hong Kong planned. Stay tuned!
Also, in even other news, please note the link to Backblog Awards in my left bar menu. Please check it out. The first winner of the Backblog Awards should be announced this week, for Aug 2005's best post.
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Seattle I
Sometime in August 2005, with Alice Leung visiting Seattle, WA and Vancouver, BC, including Seattle MoMA, Granville Island Public Market and other locations. (Original post/backup link)
Friday, August 19, 2005
Credit Card charge requirements $5 $10
CORRECTION: This post originally stated a falsehood which I thought was fact at the time. California law does not regulate credit card charges, nor can it. This is solely in the realm of the Federal Government. The truth is that the Card Card companies themselves have restrictions on when a fee can be charged. No fee is allowed for amounts greater than $1. If you come across a store that is charging a fee for any amount greater than $1, report that place of business to your credit card companies.
Original Post:
California has a law that makes it illegal for any place that accepts credit or charge cards to either have a minimum charge or to charge a fee for credit card use. Some stores or restaurants owners a dumb enough to actually post this policy (which is also separately illegal, in of itself). But more savvy owners will simply notify you of their fee when you try to use your credit/charge card for an amount below their supposed minimum. Either way, it's still illegal for them to do so.
If these places are encountered, simply refuse to pay the fee or refuse to accept their minimum. Remind then that they are breaking the law. Remind them that you are not in their place of business as a slave, but there as the customer. You don't need their produce, but they need your money. They don't need the trouble you can stir up by contacting the Better Business Bureau or class action lawsuits can come up from this sort of thing.
Ask them if all that is really worth the 25, 50 or 75 cent fee. Don't be afraid to make a big scene out of it.
Some of these store owners are under the strange impression that they deserve your money simply because you come into their store. They just need to be reminded that they have to earn the right to get your money.
Marine World
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Tipping in American
So, why tip over the counter food preparers? You’re not supposed to. This is even an IRS relevant matter. If a tip is expected, the person receiving the tips must pay tax on 8% of the sales that person handles, whether they receive the tip or not. Comparatively few people tip over the counter, so this means those cashiers and food prepares are required to pay tax on money which they have not hope of receiving. The responsible restaurant owner should not allow tipping jar placed on their counter, and should even have a no tipping policy. This saves the staff from paying extra taxes, and saves the restaurant from the headache of having the paperwork and labor to track tipping for the IRS.
I tip generously. This is because I live in Silicon Valley, were the expected tip is 15 to 20%. Where service is reduced (you take your own bill up to the cashier, or you seat yourself), the tip may be reduced in kind. In those cases, 10% is acceptable. Where there is no service, there is no tip.
A's Game
Wednesday, August 03, 2005
Original MS Write program
Advice: To open Write files embedded as an icon within another Write document, you will need to associate .wri files with MS Word (default setting is Wordpad). Then, open the other Write document with Write. When you double click on the embedded icons, Word will open the embedded document. If you don't associate .wri with Word, Windows will try to use Wordpad even though you have Write open. If you try to associate .wri files with Write, the embedded iconed Write files will not open at all.
Strange review of Wedding Crashers movie
Anyways, I didn’t go into Wedding Crashers with high expectations. I was pleasantly surprised by the movie’s humor. It’s not in the league of Meet the Parents or Old School, but it is pretty damn funny. When the movie had to move the plot along, it did so without getting overly wishy-washy or at the expense of the overall humor. In other words, although it has the elements of a romantic comedy, it didn’t become a romantic comedy. It’s nice not to be tricked into watching a chick flick. However, I’m on the fence as to whether this one makes it into my DVD collection or not.
Tuesday, August 02, 2005
Emotional Cheating
There is not such thang as Emotional Cheating. It's a term that is created to vilify normal human interaction. Emotional attachment between any two people (male/female, male/male, female/female) is a natural part of being human.
Emotional Cheating is a term that hides the true nature of what it's trying to describe. The cause of the issue is a rift between two people in a relationship. However, the term is used by one person to push off blame for the rift onto some third party interaction that is absorbing their partner's attention. It pushes blame from the cause to the effect. It allows the slighted partner a false excuse for their feelings of betrayal. The real cause is that the two partners are allowing themselves to drift apart. For the emotionally immature, the emotional bond which one person is developing outside that relationship is response to that drift. For the emotionally mature person, any emotional bonds developed outside the relationship are irrelevant to what is going on within the relationship. The forming rift must be addressed directly, either to mend or break completely.
Old rules that led into the evolution of the marriage tradition were based on primitive survival needs of those times. Over time, the marriage rules have become more restrictive, and less in touch with human nature. The Old Testament glorifies behavior that is seen as obscene in our time. By contrast, marriage rules today would be considered absurd to the bible's writers. The rules change, but our species hasn't. So, what's going on?
Since the beginning of the 20th Century, we now have the power to understand ourselves in ways that weren't even imagined in previous times. Yet, as a society, we seem to be gravitating more towards emotional immaturity than ever before. We should be trying to move towards emotional maturity. As a society, we have to learn that we are emotional creatures. Emotion is part of who we are. We are going to experience emotion whether we want to or not. Trying to create new ways to vilify our nature is pushing us in the wrong direction.
Two people should be able to have an emotional connection that doesn't interfere with that relationships of which those people are a part. Guys and girls can be close friends without being involved. Where the issues of emotional cheating comes in, is when that close friendship becomes an excuse. Either person in the relationship can use it as an excuse, but it's still only an excuse for the unrelated cause.
Thursday, July 28, 2005
Back for the Post-modern
This is ignorant on two levels. First, we already have a word that describes the time in which we live. That word is modern! There is no way to be in post-modern times unless you time travel. Even then, that doesn’t make sense because if you travel to the future, you are still going to be in the modern times of that period. Secondly, use of the term post-modern shows a complete lack of knowledge about the Industrial Age and our transition into the Information Age.
Since the 1980’s, people understood we were at or nearing the end of the Industrial Age. But without an obvious understanding of the catalyst that was already in place to usher in a new age, few knew what to call this new period. Some people rightfully used the term Post-Industrial for a while. That makes sense. We are living in times after the Industrial Age. Other people didn’t understand this dynamic, and quickly adopted strange words like post-modern.
Of course, these terms do not define all aspects of society. In art, the term is postmodern. It is a response to modernism, which itself was a fad during a particular period of time. Why art would be labelled in any way "modern" is funny, since the art of any period of time will be modern to that time. Beyond art, the term modernism describes a period of time long past, during the 19th and early 20th Centuries. How can it be "modern" if it was over a century ago? This is all very silly.
I think it was people who are caught up in a limited world view that coined terms like post-modern and modernism, without taking into account more aspects of the times in which they live. Basically, they got so used to using the word modern to describe certain series of events, they didn’t know what word to use once those series of events came to a close.
The catalyst for the new modern age was the establishment and popularization of the Internet, bringing a new understanding of ownership of information, and the resulting technological, cultural and economical shifts. Once people started understanding the driving force behind this new age, we knew what to call it. We are now in the Information Age.
There are other terms, such as waves of the Industrial Revolution. However, the problem with this term is that we are already on the 'fourth' such waves. This metric is really just tracking ups and downs in manufacturing rather than identifying a significant period of time. A revolution is a point in time, not a long period. Long periods of time tend to be identified by trends. By definition, a revolution is not a trend, but rather specific events of upheaval, overturning an old system. Industrial Revolution lead to the Industrial Age. However, these subsequent supposed revolutions aren't really the start or stops of any particular ages, and they aren't responsible for any specific upheaval.
These little revolutions have been happening as a backdrop to the bigger trend, being the rise of importance of information. Aspects of the Information Age allow for improvements to manufacturing, but manufacturing itself has taken a backseat to the real revolution that happened with the advent of the Internet and new levels of data collection and usage.
Tuesday, July 12, 2005
Shorter Commute
Thursday, July 07, 2005
Have we come so far
As a whole, the global threat of terrorist has increase U.S./U.K. power. Before, we projected our power, but with a bit of timidity. Now, our power is projected with bold confidence, whether justified or not.
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
Online gaming
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Mind Control works for fun and profit
See, mind control works! When someone gets used to being told what to believe, they tend not to question anything regarding what they are being told from their masters.
Tuesday, June 21, 2005
Vegas 2005
Thursday, June 16, 2005
Las Vegas Vacation 2005
June 16-18, 2005, with Alice Leung, Jennifer Lydecker and Miriam Melo visited Las Vegas, NV. (Original post/backup link)
Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Conservatives are speaking up over the Neocons for once
Monday, June 13, 2005
Saturday party
This one big guy tried to crash the party by sneaking into the VIP area. The first time I noticed him, I simply got in his space and sent out unwelcoming vibes. He cleared off, but came back a bit later. As he leaned against the railing that overlooked the dance floor, I came up beside him and asked if he was with the party. He was all, “The owner over there told me to come up,” while gesturing his hand to a random area near the bar. I was like, “Really. Which guy is the owner?” He pointed to the same general area, “That guy over there.” Dumbass didn’t know the owner was a woman. I never told him his mistake. After realizing he wasn’t fooling me, he figured out it was a private party. So he turns to me, using his height and mass to tower over me. He looked me straight in the eyes. I stared right back at him with intensity that threw him off so much he was forced to make verbal threats. “You know I could beat you up and there’s nothing the bouncers could do about it.” I responded with an ever so slight, arrogant “Whatever” facial gesture. “Just leave. It’s no hard feelings.” He was all, “There never is.” I patted him on the arm, gesturing him to go. I backed off a bit, giving him a chance to leave on his own. I could see he was thinking about it before slowly turning and heading out. I could tell he was unfamiliar with the club, such as the number of bouncers at the club, the number of cops within 150 yards of the club (quite a lot actually), and he seemed blind to the fact that there was immediately three guys and my g/f just waiting to pounce on him if he even flinched at me. Not to mention the other 5 or so guys in our party that woulda been up there in a instant.
So, did I mention that Miriam got totally drunk? LOL Over all, we had a lot of fun. Always feels good to have a private area to drink and relax in between dancing and roaming around. On, and the bartender was awesome, keeping mixers and ice available the whole night, so thanks Heather! :) I'm definately considering reserving the VIP again.
Saturday, June 11, 2005
Something about evolution just occurred to me...
This is certainly a human-centric view of evolution. However, it must be admitted that things happened to our ancestors which didn't happen to the ancestors of any other of the great apes.
- We have much better buoyancy, allowing us to swim.
- We walk upright.
- We have more complex brains.
- We have less prominent body hair.
- We have a protruding nose.
- We have much less muscle mass, etc.
In a New Age sense, I might ask, what if we are the intended form? What if all the other species on this planet are just off-shoots of our ancestral line? I'm not sure about taking this line of reasoning seriously, but I'm putting it out there for others to think about with me.
We may not be able to apply this reasoning to all of Earth's history, but maybe it can be applied to the primate line. Even further, this doesn't justify viewing one species as inferior to us. Nor does it justify viewing different races of our own species as inferior. In this line of reasoning, I would hold that all humans represent the intended form. In fact, given our lack of genetic diversity, maybe we are missing a few races which we sorely need to keep our species genetically healthy into our long future. I would also say, this line of reasoning demands that all species on this planet are our cousins, brothers and sisters, whether Great Ape, monkey, lizard, fish, fungus, plant, or sponge.
Anyways, to finish a thought about the 12 tribes of Israel
Leah bore Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar and Zebulun.
Bilhah bore Dan and Naphtali.
Zilpah bore Gad and Asher.
Rachel bore Joseph and Benjamin.
Additionally, Joseph had two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, who's descendants are treated as their own tribes.
Now do the math
Leah bore 6 sons. Bilah bore 2 sons. Zilpah bore 2 sons. Rachel bore 2 sons. Joseph (son of Rachel) bore two sons, and he himself doesn't count. 6+2+2+2-2-1=13, not 12. Yet, even throughout the bible, Israel is often said to be the made up of 12 tribes.
Even more contradictions come from different texts in the bible from different periods.
At Deuteronomy 33, leaders of all the tribes of Israel are said to be present at a gathering to receive their tribe's blessing. The odd thing is that the tribe of Simeon isn't listed. Were they snubbed? Unlikely. Such a snubbing would be listed with reasons for condemnation. In fact, even more strange, Joseph is listed right along with his two sons as though a separate tribe from them.
There's also missing reference to a tribe in 1 Kings 11 in the prophecy regarding the brake up of the nation of Israel.
Song of Deborah
However, the biggest glaring contradiction comes from the Song of Deborah in Judges 5. "This may be the oldest textual fragment preserved in the Bible, dating to about the twelfth or eleventh century B.C....," says Gary Greenberg in his book 101 Myths of the Bible (of which most, but not all, of this blog entry is derived). The Song of Deborah records Deborah's efforts to rally the tribes of Israel against the Canaanites. It lists the tribes that heeded the call and the tribes that didn't. The names of the Israelite tribes listed in the Song of Deborah are substantially different from the traditional 12 (or 13) tribes of Israel. Gilead, Machir, Meroz are included, but Simeon, Levi, Judah, Manasseh, and Gad are not mentioned. Take a quick glance above to see who are the mothers of these missing tribes. That is an interesting nuance.
Mr. Greenberg states,"Because this is one of the oldest textual passages in the Bible, the inclusion and omission of names provides solid clues about the emergence of Israel and any connections to the sons of Jacob." Additionally, "The absence of these five tribes from Deborah's list strongly suggests that they had not yet come into existence as political entities until later and that their namesakes had no earlier existence as sons of Jacob."
Excuses, excuses
Growing up in a Christian Fundamentalist home, one thing always excused away was the inconsistencies in the number and names of the tribes of Israel. Is it 12 or 13? I count 13, but we always would say it's 12. Then, when it came time to read the Song of Deborah, the contradiction of names and number was waved off with something like "the extra tribes mentioned were actually other peoples in the area that decided to help Israel." Of course, there's no support for that statement anywhere in the bible. It was pulled out of the air by someone hundreds of years ago and has been passed along as a quick way to prevent people from questioning the contradiction; which could lead to questioning the idea of taking the Bible literally. (Oh, the horror of it all!) Also, the ridiculous excuse doesn't explain why so many of the traditional Israelite tribes are missing from the list.
Traditions
The stories surrounding each of the tribes of Israel were written long after the events listed. These stories were written as metaphors for each tribe's place in Israel. As tribes disappeared, their stories where lost, or changed to suit the newer tribes. Each tribe needed its own story in order to have a place in the Israelite nation. This political story telling was a tradition that has its origins in Egypt. The Israelite priests and leadership carried on the traditional after they were expelled from Egypt as a way to legitimately establish new political/religious structures in the new land. It is likely many of these first priests and leaders had similar positions in Egypt before their expulsion. In fact, the name of Moses himself is a clue as to the real origin of many of the stories in the Bible. More on that some other time. Hint: Hyksos.
Friday, June 10, 2005
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Bible Myth #63
...just got busy...finish this line of thought later.
Thursday, June 02, 2005
Trees and Hair
Stereotype alert: Do all of the local Seattle residents have bad hair? Even people with styled hair go out of their way to make it messy. What gives?
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Seattle
We slept in hella late on Sunday. Lost half a day. Oh well. We started off by hopping on the monorail which took us to the Space Needle. It wasn't as tall as I thought it would be. We had a lovely and fun brunch in the revolving rest'rant at the top. I had my g/f place a penny on the rim to see if it would still be there when we rotated back around. Being the brat she is, she put the penny tail side up to give bad luck to anyone who tried to take it. When it came around again, I flipped it head side up to reverse her curse intent, but she said it didn't count. lol
That evening, we had dinner at Ototo, which is kinda a hip sushi rest'rant. It had good food in good portions, though I'd recommend avoiding the sake based cocktails.
Monday morning, we headed down to the Pike Street Festival. All kinds of local arts and craft were available. We watched the fish throwing antics of the famous fish market down there. The only question I had was, "Who would by so much fish at once?" cuz they sold the fish whole, and the fish they sold whole were BIG. Well, luck for us, someone did buy one of the fish, giving us a wonderous, yet brief, display of their throwing and catching abilities. We later checked out the Science Fiction Museum and part of the rock-and-roll museum near the Space Needle.
When checking in for our flight home, I discovered I had purchased first class return tickets. Nice surprise for myself. We literally had the worse seats on the flight to Seattle (next to the engines in the last row). We literally had the best seats on the return flight, complete with cushioned leather seating, breadsticks and a tasty dip, and whole cans of soda.
My thought upon returning home is that I could imagine living in Seattle.
Wednesday, May 25, 2005
I'm a happy camper
Saturday, May 21, 2005
Acting Style Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
There are several forms of acting. Each is used to tell a story for which it is best suited. "Realistic acting" (Method Acting, and also variations of Stanislavski Acting), have dominated Hollywood since the 1950's. In particular, Method Acting best tells strong emotional character driven stories. Unfortunately, such styles are used for almost every movie these days. These acting styles do not fit many types of stories. But, us Americans are so accustomed to them, we are adverse to any other acting styles.
There's a quote from George Lucas about the acting style of the Prequel Trilogy: "It's not deliberately camp. I made the film[s] in a 1930s style. It's based on a Saturday matinee serial from the 1930s, so the acting style is very 30s, very theatrical, very old-fashioned. Method acting came in the 1950s and is very predominant today. I prefer to use the old style. People take it different ways, depending on their sophistication."[001]Taken in context of filmmaking, without regard for American prejudice, the acting in the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy is very good. The formal acting style (derived from theatrical or stage acting) is used very effectively. It allows the story to be told through a balance between dialog, plot, and character development, rather than being over-driven by character development (as is the case for many Hollywood movies of any genre).
I too used to have a prejudice in favor of "realistic acting". However, the Prequel Trilogy has opened my mind to other forms, not just of acting, but filmmaking in general. I now understand Non-hollywood films and can enjoy them as much as I enjoy Hollywood films. I don't believe I'm alone. I think the Prequel Trilogy is, in part, responsible for the growth of the independent film industry since the 1990's. Thank you George Lucas.
Yesterday
I did check out the Chocolate Festival in Oakdale today. Kinda lame. Hersey's Chocolate sponsers this thang cuz I guess they used to have a factory there or sumfin. Anyways, the festival doesn't have a whole lot to do with Chocolate, dispite its name.
::que Star Wars theme::
I got in line early for the digital showing of Revenge of the Sith at
Century 22. Big, bold and almost brilliant. I had a lot of fun at the
theater before and during the movie. I really enjoyed it. I felt the
handling of the Emperor and yoda was a little cartoonish, but the movie was
good over all. There was a lot of plot in this movie...kinda feels Lucas
should have made the prequel trilogy on the story of episode 3 alone.
___
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Tuesday, May 17, 2005
What a mess
Personally, I believe the four sources themselves have many other sources from which they were derived. The sense I get is that each tribe in the Israel nation had its own set of stories to give itself legitimacy, serving as metaphors for their place in the region. In fact, I believe they were intentional written as metaphors, and never were meant to be taken literally. When all of Israel was finally conquered by an outside power, there appeared to be an effort to assembly a unified history of the Hebrew peoples, maybe to find hope or meaning in their new role as a conquered people. Since most of their other tribes of Israel had already vanished by this time, this assemblage (which became the Torah) mostly reflects stories of the last surviving tribes and priestly establishments.
Given this view, it is possible that Israel was never one nation. It appears that it was an alliance of different nations that changed through time. Fact is the bible has several different lists of the tribes of Israel. These lists vary substantially. It wasn’t until King David established his empire that all these various nations become one country. At that time, the fluid alliance formalized under one central power. If I remember correctly, the list of tribes doesn’t change after this period.
The further implication is that the peoples that made up the Israel alliance where originally polytheistic, with each tribe choosing which gods to represent them. The struggle between Baalist and Yahwehist survives in the bible because Yahwehist (the winners) got to write the final versions of that part of Israel’s history. They used the struggle and defeat of the Baalist to justify their position. However, Yahweh himself is a composite of 3 other gods, prolly combined to unify the religion, link up the various tribal stories and expand the priestly orders. Some early images of Yahweh (before he was declared an invisible god) show him as a lion with legs as serpent bodies. Hmm, there is an underlining serpent story to the earliest parts of the Torah. God used serpents to punish his people. Then Moses made a statue of a serpent for people to seek salvation from the serpents. It’s possible that story was created in order to explain away evidence of early serpent worship by Israelite ancestors. What other gods disappeared from Israelite history at the hands of the victorious Yahwehist?
So, both gods and peoples vanish from Israelite history. The victors wrote stories justifying their conquests. Later generations took these stories as fact, combining them into the Torah. They also informally attributed the Torah to Moses. The informal credit to Moses as the writer later became fact by tradition, and the Torah become undeniable truth. And there stands the foundation of three great religions.
Reference: 101 Myths of the Bible
Friday, May 13, 2005
Fighting the Future, One Square Root at a time
Stage One:
1. Determine the largest squared whole number less than Y.
2. Use the square root of the largest squared whole number to be the first part of the answer. Place this number to the left of the decimal place within the answer.
3. Find the difference of Y and the squared whole number.
Stage Two:
1. Multiple the difference by 100, designated as A.
2. Multiple the answer so far by 2 (without the decimal point), designated as B.
3. Multiple B by 10.
4. Give C one of the following values: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9
5. Find D where (B+C)*C equals the greatest value less than A.
6. C becomes the next digit right of the decimal in the answer.
7. Find the difference between of A and D.
8. Repeat Stage Two until the answer reaches the desired number of digits after the decimal.
Example:
PDF File: Example to find the square root of 3
(Sorry, I had to make it a PDF file because html isn't good at showing math equations and I didn't want to scan in my chicken scratch writing. Free Acrobat Reader is a must, but if you don't already have it, go here to get it: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html)
Now, is anyone ever going to use this? Hey, if anyone has seen this method in print, please let me know.
Tuesday, May 10, 2005
Preface to Square Root
I've never found this long method in print anywhere. I’ve found other simpler methods to finding a square root, but they usually involve closing in on the square root by continuously rerunning the same method. You are never left with a perfect answer because you can never be sure if the successive decimal places are correct. I’m also not sure which method is used by calculators (on which we all depend for square roots these days, which is the beginning of Asimov’s vision for our world coming true, but that’s a future blog entry).
I have no clue why this long method works. But, in a very small effort to fight the future, I’m going to show the method here, soon.
UPDATE: Here's the link to the long method of finding square roots: http://fcsuper.blogspot.com/2005/05/fighting-future-one-square-root-at.html#comments
Saturday, May 07, 2005
We're returning to where we were.
At first I thought I was a bit weird. Then I noticed other people use the word them in this way. It's not overly common, but it's out there. Like, "if a stranger comes up next to you in a car, don't get in the car with them no matter what." An english major might tell you that statement is mixing up the subject, but it really is an attempt to apply them in the singular form.
The nice thing about the word 'em is that it is much quicker and easier to say than the artificial sounding P.C. term him/her. I also use themself as the nongender version of him/herself.
Since my realization about this word 'em, I use it intentional instead of him/her except in formal documents. Another thing I've noticed is that I do not use any replacement of he/she. Maybe it's be sounds ignorant to say "They is walking this way." :)
Ok, so is there any takers on helping me start the revolution to get rid of the word him/her? :)
Ok, so thinking about this got me thinking about the complexity of the English language. When I was younger, I used to think that French was strange, with it's unpronounced letters and odd contractions. Of course, English gets many of its habits from French, but it took me a long time to put two and two together. Then one day, I realized that English has just as strange unpronounced letters and even more weird contractions. I'm mean, trying telling a nonenglish speaker that thorough is pronounced "thir-o". Or worse, the same letters that are silence in thorough make the F sound in rough. What the hell? LOL
Along this thought, a phrase popped into my head that I thought would be particularly hard for nonenglish speakers, both in spelling and pronunciation. "We're returning to where we were." We're, where and were. They look pretty much the same, and sound pretty similar, but still distinct. Imagine a french speaker trying to say that three times fast. I think we're, where and were is worse than they're, their and there because at least these have the same pronunciation.
Tuesday, May 03, 2005
Crenelatory Critique
I’ve noticed that fantasy movies tend to have crenellations with way too many merlons and embrasures. In fact, I’ve seen merlons placed at the tip of a king’s donjon! Now how are a king's men supposed handle that? This display of diminutive crenels has got to stop! If this continues, I just know we’ll soon see exposed penetralias, and draughty keeps in the open streets! And then where will we be?
crenellation, merlon, embrasure, donjon, penetralia, draughty, & keep
Friday, April 29, 2005
I was this close to a bear cub
Monday, April 25, 2005
Comments about recent movies
Sahara was a film following in the footsteps of the Indiana Jones type of movie. It falls well short of the Indiana Jones standard with too many ah-ha moments carrying the plot. An ah-ha moment is a point in the story where the story can’t proceed without some accidental amazing discovery or insight. Even still, the movie is fun to watch with fairly cleaver action. It’s not going to make it into my DVD collection though.
The Interpreter is a good political thriller film. I especially appreciated Nicole Kidman’s acting. You could see what she was thinking and feel what she was feeling, even without dialogue; all without over acting. I feel that the film’s story isn’t as grandiose as films like Clear and Present Danger. This story and plot were more dialogue driven. This makes Nicole’s and Sean Penn’s great acting essential for turning an ok story into a good movie. There is a change this DVD will make it into my collection.
All I Want Is to Be Loved sucked. I got the movie to see Nev Campbell naked. She’s not naked in any erotic or sex scenes, but hey, she’s naked! lol Well, I understand the movie’s title. The title serves as a clue for the final show down at the movie’s end. But, the whole story is so improbable, it isn’t enjoyable. The movie was less than 1hr and 20min. It would’ve have been a much better story if it was cut down to about 35 minutes. The entire first 45 minutes of the film serve no purpose, though they are meant to develop the story’s characters. Here’s a hint to future film writers: Don’t develop a character without telling the overall story for longer than a couple minutes. Simply having a character do a bunch of stuff just so show personality traits for 45 minutes is extremely poor writing, no matter how cleaver or witty the dialogue or on-screen activity. Ok, in case you saw this movie and missed the point of the title: The old Duke is lying, but not about the money. Nev never said he was lying about the money. He promised to satisfy Nev’s character, but obviously wasn’t up to the task. If you haven’t seen the film, don’t bother finding out what I’m talking about, unless you real goal is to see Nev naked. :)
Friday, April 22, 2005
Lying Liars face
One of the poor liars in the White House is Condalizza Rice. You can see a complete facial shift between almost any other topic and when she's was talking about "facts" that were used to justify the Iraqi War.
Another liar in his interviews was Scott Peterson. He was pretty good at controlling his facial motions, but he wasn't good enough.
The most recent case I've seen is that lady that found the finger in her food. As I watched her interview, I couldn't see any ugly faces (beyond expected disgust when talking about chewing a finger). Then I re-watched the interview, and there it was, plan as day near the beginning of the interview. She compressed and dropped her lips for a split second right after finishing her response to a question. Caught! :)
How do you tell the difference between normal face twitches and a liar's face? Several ways. Most important is the type of movement, particularly with the lips. Often, one or both corners are pulled down, or the upper lip is pulled up in the middle. The pulling up of the upper lip isn't a great sign because several thangs cause this. However, the pulling down of the corners of the mouth is a sure sign because there really is not other reason for a mouth to be doing that. A second factor is the timing of the ugly face movement. A liar's face usually shows up right before answering a question or immediately following the answer.
Want practice identifying liars' faces? Seriously, watch pundants on Fox News and CNN.
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Between the lines
Friday, April 15, 2005
Support for the anti-gay marriage ban
Constitutional Amendment to establish marriage as only applying to a union between a man and a woman is a joke. Well, it’s not intended to be a joke. The topic of same-sex marriage is a point that agitates the Conservative and neocon base of the Republican Party. What makes the associated proposed Constitutional Amendment a joke is that it is very poorly worded. It cannot be passed in its current form because of sloppy language that can easily be abused to legalize heinous behavior. It is not intended to actually be passed, and thus the joke.
''Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and woman. Neither this Constitution or the constitution of any State, nor State or Federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.''
What is a man and a woman?
It says that marriage can only occur between a man and woman. There are several problems with that statement.
- I’ve said this before; hermaphrodites are both a man and a woman at the same time. Although rare, they create a valid issue. Are we going to tell hermaphrodites who they can and cannot marry simply because nature didn’t make up its mind? You can argue whether gays are born gay. You cannot argue whether a hermaphrodite was born a hermaphrodite.
- The amendment federalizes marriage. No other national law governs who can marry directly. In the absence of clear instruction, “man and woman” is inherently inclusive of incestuous marriage. The old legal rule is that if the Constitution doesn’t specifically make exclusion, it is interpreted as being allowed.
- No Federal law, not even the Constitution itself, can act retroactively. Massachusetts has already legalized same-sex marriage. Those same-sex couples already married under Massachusetts law cannot be unmarried by the federal government. Even if the Amendment passes, it could never apply to those couples. This would create a legal mess as States adjust to this one-time only hyper-minority group. In effect, it would provide status of privilege for these individuals which would not be conferred on any other citizen. By extension, such a position of privilege would require equal rights be applied to everyone. Basically, the existence of this group creates a catch-22 that invalidates (one way or another) any limitation placed on same-sex marriage by the Constitution or any federal law.
Domestic Mess
Now I’ll consider the rest of the wording of that proposed Amendment. The first part of the second sentence of the proposed Amendment basically says that States cannot contradict the Amendment. This is redundant, since no law is allowed to contradict any part of the Constitution. However, the next part of the sentence uses sloppy and obscure language to prevent States from giving rights to nonmarried couples. It is a fairly bizarre phrase. It limits rights of individuals within a relationship to just being friends in the legal sense, regardless of the true nature of the relationship. Just stupid. What about common-law? What about shared property? What about the couple’s children? There’s a million “What abouts…” here!
According to the second sentence, no rights of marriage can be given to nonmarried couples, but it makes no provisions for the nature of those relationships. People in nonmarried couples aren’t entitled to seek child support? Nonmarried couples that brake up aren’t allowed to split property as is done with divorce? That second sentence would create a domestic legal mess across the country.
Constitution cannot contradict itself
My third point here is that no law, not even the Constitution itself, is allowed to contract the Constitution. There’s a specific clause in the Constitution that actual says the Constitution cannot contradict itself. The inherent nature of the Constitution makes it unlawful to establish any law that creates a special class of citizen that cannot have the rights granted to other citizens, expect as a means of punishment for crime. This is part of the power behind the 14th Amendment, though not explicitly stated. Any other Amendment that limits the rights of one class of citizen would also have to specially repeal the 14th Amendment in order to be valid itself. The proposed Amendment does not repeal the 14th Amendment, so it is unconstitutional because of its de facto creation of a second class of citizen that does not have the same rights as others.
What a mess!
The proposed Amendment is horribly written. It creates one-time only hyper-minority that have special privileges. It is caught up in a catch-22 that is self defeating and invalidating. It contradicts the 14th Amendment, but does not repeal it, making it unconstitutional. Who wants this thing passed? If the civil rights battle can serve as an indicator, this proposed Amendment (if passed) would ultimately create such a legal mess, it could take half a century to sort out the details, whether enforced, repealed, or found unconstitutional in the courts. The logically conclusion is that it is not intended to pass. It is only used as a tool to rally the Conservative and neocon base of the Republican Party, to sucker more people to giving more support and more money to do more of nothing about the issue. It’s a joke on the true believers and party loyalists. The Amendment is a joke on America.
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
I'll be joining the 21st century on Thursday
Wednesday, April 06, 2005
Aspen
Monday, April 04, 2005
Happy Camper
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Unidentified Sign in the middle of nowhere
The first time I saw it, I had to wonder about what the hell it means. It shows a white and hilly road leading into a mountain through a forest. The strange thang is that it is not posted at the beginning of such a road. It's posted in the middle of nowhere, long after you are on such a road. The sign is too pretty and too faded to serve as any warning unless the message is, "Warning, you are already on a scenic road in which you may be in danger of enjoying." I took this photo the next time I saw this sign because it's hard to really describe how pointless it is unless I can show it. As far as I know, the sign is still standing where I last saw it. Anyone else ever see sumfin like this?
Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Big 2001 Vacation: Part 12: 11/18/01 and Epilogue
I woke up and went about the business of getting ready for the flight back to the mainland.
Aloha!
Epilogue
My trip to Hawaii served as a turning point for me. Before the trip, I had poor job satisfaction and reduced motivation. I think I was still grieving too. Living my life had become a chore. I didn't admit it to myself at the time. There are many reasons for these issues. I'm not going into them now. However, after the trip I was able to focus and self-motivate again. Over time, subsequent events and changes grew to be even more drastic, allowing me to free myself from the shackles of my past. My grieving ended. I finally opened my eyes to religious truths which, ironically enough, allowed me to have no need for religion in my life. I had a progressively better outlook on life. What does this have to do with the trip to Hawaii? As far as I can tell, nothing. Yet, there it stands at my crossroads, like a strange figure giving me a wink and a nod as he watches me walk past and continue towards the horizon along my path.
Final Entry
I'm going to end this series with a brief annotate from Hawaii that wasn't included in my written journal. I made it my mission to try authentic Polynesian Hawaiian food. I spent a lot of time tracking down a place. I quickly found that no Hawaiian restaurants exist in Waikiki. Finally, on day three, some locals pointed me in the right direction. I found this little-hole-in-the-wall called Ono's. I told the owner that I had been trying to find a Hawaiian restaurant for days. He seated me and then walked me through the menu. I remember having a large meal of many different Hawaiian dishes and sides. I don't remember the names of the food, but I remember my experience was enjoyable. One dish I remember is poi. It was a Polynesian staple for thousands of years. I didn't like it. It tasted like flavorless applesauce. For the main course, I had pork steamed in leaves. I really enjoyed that item. Overall, the meal had way too much salt. It tasted good, but I think all that salt it through my body outta wack for months. Next time I have a Hawaiian meal, I'm going to remember one word, moderation.
Brilliant idea for new IM software at Hey Freak
Also, http://minibikini.blogspot.com/
Monday, March 28, 2005
Big 2001 Vacation: Part 11: 11/17/01 Night
Well thangs with Nicole fell completely thru. So, I went out. Two girls from the hotel [I stayed at] and I went looking for a club “W”. That ended [up] not being open on Sat night, so (after walking clear out of Waikiki [to find it]) we got a cab back and ended up [at] the Maze in the hip hop room.
[We] danced the night away. {Sheeze, why did I feel so compelled to write such completely lame statements in my journal?} [Their] names were Morgan (a model) and Andrea. {I remember that Morgan was a cute, petite brunette. I was a little attracted to her, but at the time, I had no game. In fact, I had negative game. lol More than a few times in the past, I’ve been able to turn away interested females with the dumb cunning, all against my actual wants. Damn, I was such a dork. Of course, the fact that girls are so easily scared off is another problem. lol Anyways, if anything at all might have happened with Morgan, I soundly blow my chance at even making a friendship that would last beyond the night with her. We did have fun though, with an eventful night at the various clubs and wondering around the streets afterward. I lost Morgan and Andrea for a time, but when they found me again, Andrea had collected a few men to entertain her. :) Later on, I sensed I scared or annoyed (or sumfin) Morgan beyond repair, so I choose the right moment to graciously call it a night. Over all, it was a great night.}