Author: geoff

Dissonance

There’s science: a method of learning about the physical universe by applying the principles of the scientific method, which includes making empirical observations, proposing hypotheses to explain those observations, and testing those hypotheses in valid and reliable ways; also refers to the organized body of knowledge that results from scientific study.

And then there’s Kansas, as reported in the Guardian today: But the largest applause of the evening was reserved for a silver-haired gentleman in a navy blue blazer. “I have a question: if man comes from monkeys, why are there still monkeys? Why do you waste time teaching something in science class that is not scientific?” he thundered.

(Woodrow Wilson had it right, a mere 83 years ago: “…of course, like every other man of intelligence and education, I do believe in organic evolution. It surprises me that at this late date such questions should still be raised.)

Word of the day: resile

I was reading a story in the Guardian about the British government’s reaction to the latest IRA announcement*, and I read: “No 10 has never resiled from its view that the IRA was involved in the bank robbery”

resiled?! What’s this? Is the Grauniad** up to its old tricks? Apparently not: to resile is, inter alia, “to abjure: formally reject or disavow a formerly held belief, usually under pressure”. Dates back to 1520-1530, from the French resilir and before that the Latin resilire, to spring back. Same root as resilient. And I’d never seen it before. Neat.

* The IRA is throwing a hissy fit because it was caught robbing banks, so it’s withdrawing its commitment to decommission its weapons. Makes perfect sense….?

** I think it was Private Eye that dubbed the Guardian “the Grauniad” on account of its frequent typos.

Trackback blogspam

This morning, starting just after midnight Eastern, somebody started spraying trackback pings at my blog – about 150 so far, still going. A few weeks ago, while tweaking the template for the front page, I’d added a list of the last five trackbacks. I just got rid of that, so now (as far as I can see) there’s no trace of the spammer’s sites or addresses anywhere on geoffarnold.com. Hopefully this will persuade the bots to ignore me as an unprofitable target…..
[UPDATE: 2/3/05] Another burst of 50-60 pings this morning (on top of the 250 in this current plague) provoked me into doing what I should have done all along: install Jay Allen’s MT-Blacklist. It was amazingly easy. No excuses…..

Back to basics

After my recent rant about the lamentable state of the US cellphone market, I calmed down. What am I really looking for? I’ve already got a decentadequate digital camera; I’ve got a Bluetooth mouse, so I don’t need to use my phone as a remote control for my PowerBook (plus I won’t always be using my PowerBook – more in a week or two). I need a basic cellphone that has decent battery life, good signal reception, good audio, and an easy UI. I use the WAP! portal! to! My! Yahoo! a lot, so decent GPRS (EDGE) is a plus. Oh, and I’d like a usable hands-free solution, rather than that earbud-on-a-string that always seems to get tangled in my seatbelt.
So today, after my Nokia 3650 spontaneously powered off for the umpteenth time, I picked up a Motorola V551, along with a Motorola Bluetooth headset. Let’s see how it goes. I’ve noted one annoyance already: Motorola and Apple don’t agree about Bluetooth, so to use iSync I’ll have to get a cable. And when I select silent or vibrate mode I’d like a really clear indication of this in the external display. But on balance, I like it. It feels right; menus are mostly clear; the multimedia stuff is ignorable; the screen is dazzling; predictive text entry is a little easier than I’m used to; IM and email is a snap. The battery claims are impressive; we’ll see what reality is like.
Oh, yes, I did have one more criterion: that the price be low enough that if the perfect phone comes along tomorrow I won’t feel like a schmuck.

Busy, busy, busy

Five days without a blog entry… unthinkable! But I’ve actually been very busy, catching up with my reading for the Philosophy of Mind course I’m taking this semester at Tufts.
Now you have to understand that the last time I was in school was back in 1977, when I was at the University of Newcastle-on-Tyne in England. 28 years on and 3,500 miles away, things are a little different! This class meets twice a week, on Mondays and Wednesdays. Before each session, we go through a selection of readings on the topic for the day and submit our comments (which are assessed as part of the grading). We post the comments by 9pm the day before the class to an on-line Blackboard discussion board, where we can (and do!) all read and comment on each others’ submissions. And finally a streaming video of each class is posted to the Blackboard about a week after the class.
One thing that I’ve been worried about is how occasional business travel might disrupt class work. It looks as if the web-based tools will definitely help. I can see it now: reading the next selections at FL350 BOS-SFO, comments and dialogue via Blackboard from the Holiday Inn in Palo Alto…. Not ideal, but feasible. We’ll see.

Feeling fated…

This semester I’m going back to school. I’ve signed up to take Dan Dennett’s Philosophy of Mind course at Tufts, and the first classes are this week. I knew that it was going to be a challenge to fit classes and work into my schedule; I hadn’t counted on the weather.
The first class was scheduled for Monday, but with the blizzard last weekend everything (including Tufts) was closed. So the next session was this afternoon, Wednesday, 4:00-5:15. Coincidentally, we’re having another winter storm today. We’ve only had about 7 inches so far, but after the blizzard that felt like nothing. (Note the overconfident attitude.) So after finishing up a work (phone) meeting, I set out to drive the 12 miles from Brookline to Medford.
It was a nightmare. Even a major artery like Route 9 was deep in slush. Every time I touched the brakes I felt the ABS chattering to try and get a grip on something, anything. I’d only gone a couple of miles, and it looked like I would be lucky to average 10 MPH.
And then I cautiously stopped at a red light at the bottom of a hill, and looked in my mirror, transfixed, as a car slid down the hill towards me, obviously out of control. Somehow the driver managed to scrub off some speed by steering into the snowbank at the side of the road, and stopped inches behind me.
I pulled off onto a side street, called Tufts to explain that I wouldn’t be at class, and then drove home very carefully. It’s important to keep your priorities straight.

A brilliant "what if" from Juan Cole

Imagine if Bush was blessed with a modicum of foresight, and had told the truth about a war against Iraq back in 2002. In The Speech Bush Should have Given, Juan Cole describes what such a speech might have said – about the costs in dollars and lives, about the geopolitical issues, about the reasons. Money (ouch!) quote: “A war against Iraq will be expensive. It will cost you, the taxpayer, about $300 billion over five years. I know Wolfowitz is telling you Iraq’s oil revenues will pay for it all, but that’s ridiculous. Iraq only pumps about $10 billion a year worth of oil, and it’s going to need that just to run the new government we’re putting in. No, we’re going to have to pay for it, ourselves. I’m going to ask you for $25 billion, then $80 billion, then another $80 billion. And so on. I’m going to be back to you for money more often than that unemployed relative that you don’t like. The cost of the war is going to drive up my already massive budget deficits from about $370 billion to more like $450 billion a year. Just so you understand, I’m going to cut taxes on rich people at the same time that I fight this war. Then I’m going to borrow the money to fight it, and to pay for much of what the government does. And you and your children will be paying off that debt for decades.”

Dial 999 (or 911), then hop in the shower

I know that multiply-resistant pathogens are a significant risk in hospitals, but even so, this BBC story seems to go a bit far: “Patients should bring their own medical wipes and scrub up before coming to hospital to cut MRSA, say advisors. They should ask relatives to launder their clothes and make sure their visitors have washed themselves properly before entering the ward. The Patients Association’s 10-point code also advises patients to collect their own rubbish.”

I can see it now: “Dearie me – it looks like you’re having a heart attack. Why don’t you pop upstairs and have a quick shower, while I wash my hands, call an ambulance, and pack a few bin liners.”

Colour-blind, gender-blind

James Wolcott describes: “watching Senator Joe Lieberman […] drone his support for the nomination of Condi Rice as Secretary of Clueless, arguing that we should celebrate the breakthrough confirmation of an African-American woman for such a powerful post, even though her being African-American and a woman were irrelevant to her qualifications. Then why bring it up? I suppose it’s progress of a sort when a duplicitous incompetent can be promoted regardless of race or gender […] but it ought to make for a muted celebration.” Indeed.

(Via Jon, who manages to be amused by it – no small achievement.)