Flat Earth

From the UK's Daily Mash and retweeted by Professor Brian Cox:

COUNCILLOR SUSPENDED FOR BRANDING EARTH 'ROUND'
21-07-10

A CARDIFF councillor has been suspended after claiming the Earth is round and orbits the sun.

More than 200 Flat Earthologists complained after Cllr John Dixon posted a Twitter message referring to the Earth as a 'globe'.

A council spokesman said: "Staff have a responsibility to respect the beliefs of others, no matter how scrotum-tighteningly idiotic they may appear to anyone with the cognitive ability to actually get to the end of this sentence. Well done."

He added: "We have a very clear policy on tolerance and inclusivity, which we've had translated into dozens of languages as well as having it carved into enormous stone monoliths for the local druids. That cost an absolute fortune, by the way."

Employee numbers have dwindled at the authority since January, when it agreed to allow registered Vikings to kidnap female employees out of respect for Norse mythology.

Meanwhile followers of the Persian deity Mithras have won a tribunal giving them the right to slaughter a bull in the canteen every Monday lunchtime.

Wayne Hayes, a Level 19 Flat Earthologist from East Grinstead, said: "Dixon's remarks are just typical of the prejudice we face on a daily basis just because we refuse to bow down to the dogma of scientific proof.

"He should be fed to the Great Salamander of Xenu or at the very least taken to the edge of the world and pushed off.

"We'll see who's stupid then."

He-he. Just a taste of what it feels like to be a skeptic and atheist in a world that bends over backwards to make sure that the religious are not offended.

"A man who is convinced of the truth of his religion is indeed never tolerant. At the least, he is to feel pity for the adherent of another religion but usually it does not stop there. The faithful adherent of a religion will try first of all to convince those that believe in another religion and usually he goes on to hatred if he is not successful. However, hatred then leads to persecution when the might of the majority is behind it." -- Albert Einstein

Movie Review - Equilibrium

I had several friends recommend Equilibrium to me over the last few years. Let's see ... Christian Bale, Sean Bean (LOTR), Emily Watson (Breaking the Waves), sci-fi, cool gun fights. I'm not sure why it took me so long to rent it. It came out quite a bit ago, 2002.

Equilibrium is a stylish movie, obviously borrowing from the Matrix in look and 1984 in concept. One of its cooler elements is the fictional Gun Kata martial arts fighting style that the director invented, borrowing from classic Kung Fu movie gun fighting.

The setup: near future. War has been abolished by making emotion and feeling illegal. Citing the extremes of emotion as being the cause of all war, people are required to take shots several times a day of a drug called Prozium to make them docile. People are not allowed to own or view art, listen to music, read literature. It's peace in name only. Classic war has been replaced with the state as judge, jury and executioner.

Christian Bale plays Grammaton Cleric First Class John Preston. Basically, they are instruments of the state that go out and destroy art and kill people for viewing it. He's the best at what he does and has a high standing in the government. Seemingly by accident, he forgets to take his meds and starts to feel natural human emotions. The main thrust of the plot follows Preston coming to terms with his humanity, with what society is, and his guilt.

Now, I like Christian Bale as an actor, but it seems like a lot of his roles are one note, and this is certainly no exception. Here, it reminds me of Keanu Reeves in the Matrix movies. Partly, that's due to the story ... you are not supposed to have emotion. But even once he has stopped taking the drug, he doesn't sell me completely that he feels. The rest of the cast is pretty good. I especially liked Angus MacFadyen (Braveheart) as the main bad guy, Dupont.

I've read reviews of this movie before and they're pretty universally negative. The movie bombed in the box office. Equilibrium came out during the height of the Matrix trilogy and I think it may have been unfairly compared to it. But it deserves to be judged on its own merits.

Equilibrium hits upon quite a few weighty subjects including oblique references to the MPAA film rating system and Prozac. The influence of art and propaganda are explored. Overall, I liked Equilibrium. It's certainly not classic, but like most sci-fi, it brings something intellectually to the table that makes it worth while. There's a yin and yang to life, light and dark. You might think you are solving a problem by eliminating the extremes, but you are instead destroying what makes us human. It's that raw emotion that creates true beauty, innovation, and love.  Grade:  B-

"One of the things which danger does to you after a time is -, well, to kill emotion. I don't think I shall ever feel anything again except fear. None of us can hate anymore - or love." -- Graham Greene

HE is AMAZING!

I saw this posted by one of my Facebook friends this past week:

I have to share how God comes through...unexpected ac repair, $210...unexpected refund check from mortgage company, $197. Thank you Lord for always providing.

Comment: HE is AMAZING!

Posts like these are by no means rare or unusual. I see something similar by a friend or family member just about every single day. They bother me quite a bit. I think I understand faith. I may not agree with it, but I think I understand it. But I have a hard time abiding hypocrisy and lack of consistency.

I once heard one of the Pythons defend Life of Brian by saying it was blasphemous but not profane. Meaning - they were not attacking faith but rather dogma. I'm not sure which I might be treading on here. I'm not trying to do either. I'm just trying to understand. Help me out.

Why would one presume that God would care if you could pay for a/c repair? And if you did assume that he intervenes in things so mundane and pedestrian, then why not in everything else? Why couldn't you assume that it was God that caused that little girl down the street to get hit by a car?

You can't have it both ways. If God is active in every little thing on the one hand, you can't say that he's non-participatory in the cases of war and famine and disaster, etc. on the other hand.

I can see the response right now - "God works in mysterious ways". How convenient.

"Blasphemy is an epithet bestowed by superstition upon common sense." -- Robert Green Ingersoll, American Statesman and Orator

Movie Review: In the Loop

In the Loop is fucking brilliant. Sorry for my vernacular, but if that offends you, then this movie probably will too. It's foul-mouthed. It's insulting. And it's spot on.

Malcolm Tucker: Linton! Linton!
Linton Barwick: Mr Tucker, isn't it? Nice to see you again.
Malcolm Tucker: Are you fucking me about?
Linton Barwick: Is there a problem, Mr Tucker?
Malcolm Tucker: I've just come from a briefing with a nine-year-old child.
Linton Barwick: You're talking about AJ. AJ is one of our top guys. He's a Stanton College Prep, Harvard. One of the brightest and best.
Malcolm Tucker: Well, his briefing notes were written in alphabetti spaghetti. When I left, I nearly tripped up over his fucking umbilical cord.
Linton Barwick: I'm sorry it troubles you that our people achieve excellence at such an early age. But could we just move on to what's important here? Now, I understand that your Prime Minister has asked you to supply us with some, say, fresh British intelligence, is that true?
Malcolm Tucker: Yeah, apparently, your fucking master race of highly-gifted toddlers can't quite get the job done...
Linton Barwickk: All right.
Malcolm Tucker: ...between breast feeds and playing with their Power Rangers. So, an actual grown-up has been asked to fucking bail you out.

It's a modern day Dr. Strangelove with its satirical take on the machinations of politicians and the military in a so-called time of war. In this case, it's the Iraq war and the countries in question are the U.S. and Great Britain.  Now, don't get me wrong.  I'm not trying to put it on the same level as Dr. Strangelove, which is one of the best movies ever made.  But in terms of humor and the ability to hit its satirical target, it's in the ballpark.

In the Loop basically calls it like it was: The push for the Iraq War was made by a bunch of twats who were over their skis and who fudged intel to get what they wanted. This is a British film but America and the UK are skewered equally. Don't be turned off by the fact that it is political. It's more about human nature than the intricacies of diplomacy. Mostly, it's just plain fun to watch. I may have to re-watch it just to write down some new insults that I want to try out. The British seem able to cut someone off at the knees verbally with a lot more style than us Yanks.

The cast is mostly UK TV regulars. I recognized one of the main characters from Torchwood. There's a cameo by Steve Coogan. The most obvious American actors are James Gandolfini as a general and David Rasche (of Sledge Hammer! TV fame).  The Gandolofini character seems to be a bit of proxy for a Colin Powell-type ... someone who knows the intel is not there, but plays the good soldier so as not to rock an administration.

I highly recommend In the Loop. It came out in 2009 and I was able to rent it through Netflix. Grade: A

W.M.A.

dbackdad: Weird, but not scary, feeling being only white person on train back from downtown LA. More whites need to step outside their "safe" cocoons.
2:23 PM Jun 25th via Twitter for BlackBerry®

W.M.A. by Pearl Jam

he won the lottery when he was born
took his mothers white breast to his tongue
trained like dogs, color and smell
walks by me to get to him
police man
police man
he won the lottery by being born
big hand slapped a white male american
do no wrong, so clean cut...
dirty his hands, it comes right off
police man
police man
police stopped my brother again ...
jesus greets me...looks just like me...

"He pointed at me and said, 'that one won't stand up.' The two policemen came near me and only one spoke to me. He asked me if the driver had asked me to stand up? I said, 'yes.' He asked me why I didn't stand up, ... I told him I didn't think I should have to stand up. So I asked him: 'Why do you push us around?' And he told me, 'I don't know, but the law is the law and you are under arrest.'" -- Rosa Parks

Book Review: Better Off: Flipping the Switch on Technology by Eric Brende

I'm going to do my best to dispel the rumor that I never blog. Sure, it took getting out of Arizona and away from work a few days to do it.

I just finished the book Better Off: Flipping the Switch on Technology by Eric Brende. Brende, graduate of Yale, Washburn University and MIT, took the drastic step of putting his money (and his life) where his mouth was. For 18 months, Brende and his wife lived among a pseudo-Amish community and eschewed the so-called modern conveniences (electricity, automobile, TV, telephone) so as to better understand our motivations as a society. They grew their own food, or bartered their labor with others to get the things they needed.

I like Brende's book. If there is one small criticism, it would be that attachment of a spiritual significance to his experience. This is most likely a product of his own religious background and the obvious religious nature of the type of community he was living in. But, I believe, it definitely does not take a Christian mind-set to appreciate the benefits of simpler living.

What they found was that technology, instead of making things easier, "Besides often depriving their users of skills and physical exercise, they created new and artificial demands - for fuel, space, money, and time. These in turn crowded out other important human pursuits, like involvement in family and community, or even the process of thinking itself. The very act of accepting the machine was becoming automatic."

By removing most of these tools, those things that we work so hard to make time for (recreation, exercise, education, socialization) become part of an integrated lifestyle. And instead of having to work harder and longer, we have more time for true leisure and reflection. Our current society barely leaves us enough time to think. "By speeding through life with technology, you reduce what any given moment can hold.  By slowing down, you expand it."

Another byproduct of our reliance on technology is the isolation that it encourages. This isolation is, perhaps, one of the biggest contributors to our partisanship in politics and human interaction. "Modern technology .. far from being neutral in its effects, has more than one underlying purpose ... besides reducing the need for physical effort, ... it helps us avoid the need for cooperation or social flexibility ..." If, in the course of a normal day, we had to rely on the help of others and, in turn, helping others, we might be more likely to find common ground.

I read a quote once, and I'm paraphrasing, "You first shape a tool to fit your needs, but as you become more dependent on it, the tools shapes you." We change our behaviors to accommodate those things we first created to make life easier. As Brende says,

"... The changes I have made to live less technologically are easy compared with the contortions most people go through to maintain technology. Their beloved machinery does not so much save labor as separate it out in time and place and thereby make it harder to obtain-physical exercise in the gym, moneymaking in the office, education in the school, and "quality time" with the family in the national park. Rather than an integrated whole, life become a temporal and geographical obstacle course."

Believe me, I'm not a Luddite. Anything but. Michelle has a valid criticism of me that I have too much technology. Technology is not inherently bad. But just think about whether it is really making your life easier and allowing you to spend more time with those things that really matter - your family, friends, and the acquiring of knowledge. And when evaluating the costs of your technology, don't just consider the price you paid, but also the costs on our environment and our society. One of the biggest problems with our modern culture is that we only consider the price that is on the sticker. People will go to Wal-Mart to buy cheap crap because they think they are getting a good deal. But they have no concept of the slave-labor it took or the sub-standard and environmentally harmful elements that comprise it. We like our cheap food, yet don't understand that it's because it is made up of nothing but government subsidized corn products made by huge corporations. Those fresh vegetables you get at the local farmers' market may have the higher sticker price, but the effective price is much lower. And people need to start thinking that way. Do more things yourself. When buying important things, think more about craftsmanship and the skill it took to make them. Barter. Volunteer. Ask for help and give help freely. Turn off the TV. Read a book. Grow a garden. Turn off the computer ..........

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Note: I'd also suggest reading "Nothing grows forever. Why do we keep pretending the economy will?" by Clive Thompson in May '10 Mother Jones Magazine. It examines how a growth-based economy is not necessarily the best thing for the future of our society.

A(nother) Book Meme

Inspired by CK at Seeking a Little Truth, my take on this book meme:

Do you snack while reading?

Unfortunately, I snack when doing just about anything.

What is your favourite drink while reading?

Diet Mt. Dew

Do you tend to mark your books while you read, or does the idea of writing in books horrify you?

Not in a million years. The fact that I have a hard time even getting rid of a book would indicate that I would not dream of defacing one.

How do you keep your place? Bookmark? Dog-ears? Laying the book open flat?

Usually bookmarks, but a ticket will do also. My main book that I am reading always has my gym pass in it, as I take it every time I go to the gym to read while on the stationary bike.

Fiction, non-fiction or both?

Both, usually at the same time. Reading two non-fiction books or one non-fiction and one fiction are fine. But reading two fiction books at once screws me up on characters a little bit.

Do you tend to read to the end of a chapter or can you stop anywhere?

I prefer stopping at a break indicated by the author, which may be the end of the chapter or just some other break within a chapter.

Are you the type of person to throw a book across the room or on the floor if the author irritates you?

Nope. As they say, the opposite of love is not hate ... it is apathy. If I disagree with the author, I'm more likely to just stop reading the book.

What are you currently reading?

Best Seat in the House: A Basketball Memoir -- Spike Lee
Better Off: Flipping the Switch on Technology -- Eric Brende
I Am Legend -- Richard Matheson

What is the last book you bought?

Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal -- Eric Schlosser

Do you have a favourite time/place to read?

Saturday and Sunday mornings on the couch near where most of my bookcases are.

Do you prefer series books or stand-alones?

Probably stand-alones, but some of my favorite books have been part of series (Dune, LOTR)

Is there a specific book or author you find yourself recommending over and over?

The book I've recommended the most in the last couple of years would be The World Without Us by Alan Weisman.

If you come across an unfamiliar word, do you stop and look it up right away?

Definitely. I have a dictionary.com app on my Blackberry that I use all the time.

How do you organize your books (by genre, title, author's last name, etc.)?

Yes (all of the above). I try to split them up by genre and within each genre, they are ordered by author and title.

Background noise or silence?

Generally silence but can read with something mellow.

Framing ignorant vs. educated as a debate

Great New Rules segment by Bill Maher a few days ago.  The good stuff is at about the 2:20 point on in the clip.


Watch New Rules 6/4/10 in Entertainment  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

"That's the problem with our obsession with always seeing two sides of every issue equally -- especially when one side has a lot of money. It means we have to pretend there are always two truths, and the side that doesn't know anything has something to say. On this side of the debate: Every scientist in the world. On the other: Mr. Potato Head.

There is no debate here -- just scientists vs. non-scientists, and since the topic is science, the non-scientists don't get a vote. We shouldn't decide everything by polling the masses. Just because most people believe something doesn't make it true. This is the fallacy called argumentum ad numeram: the idea that something is true because great numbers believe it ...

... Media, could you please stop pitting the ignorant vs. the educated and framing it as a "debate." The other day, I saw a professor from the Union of Concerned Scientists face off against a distinguished expert on Tea Partying, whose brilliant analysis, recently published in the New England Journal of Grasping at Straws, was that we shouldn't teach climate science in schools because kids find it scary. As they should. I hope they're peeing in their pants.

The last decade, year, and month are all the hottest on record. Then there's the killing of the oceans, floods, Category 5 hurricanes, heat waves, giant wild fires, and the vanishing water supply. You know, the little things. And yet deniers say, it's just a theory. As is gravity. For progress to happen, certain things have to become not an issue anymore, so we can go on to the next issue. Evolution was an issue until overwhelming consensus among scientists made it not an issue ..."

"I much prefer the sharpest criticism of a single intelligent man to the thoughtless approval of the masses." -- German astronmer Johannes Kepler

Protest Art

3 posters by Californian poet and artist Xico Gonzalez that I was given this last weekend at the Alto Arizona SB 1070 protest march:

Book Review -- The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks

I just finished reading The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks this weekend. Cyberkitten read and reviewed the book several years ago. It's a great review and I agree with everything in it. This is truly an epic book and does a good job with characterization and bringing disparate cultures and species together in a believable story. Rather than try to improve on CK's review (which would be futile), I just want to list a couple of my favorite passages:

"The Truth went a stage further, holding that this was difference that could be made to make a difference. What was necessary was for people truly to believe in their hearts, in their souls, in their minds, that they really were in a vast simulation. They had to reflect upon this, to keep it at the forefront of their thoughts at all times and they had to gather together on occasion, with all due ceremony and solemnity, to express this belief. And they must evangelise, they must convert everybody they possibly could to this view, because - and this was the whole point - once a sufficient proportion of people within the simulation came to acknowledge that it was a simulation, the value of the simulation to those who had set it up would disappear and the whole thing would collapse.

If they were all part of some vast experiment, then the fact that those on whom the experiment was being conducted had guessed the truth would mean that its value would be lost. If they were some plaything, then again, that they had guessed this meant they ought to be acknowledged, even - perhaps - rewarded. If they were being tested in some way, then this was the test being passed, this was a positive result, again possibly deserving a reward. If they had been undergoing punishment for some transgression in the greater world, then this ought to constitute cause for rehabilitation.

It was not possible to know what proportion of the simulated population would be required to bring things to a halt (it might be fifty percent, it might be rather smaller or greater), but as long as the numbers of the enlightened kept increasing, the universe would be constantly coming closer to the epiphany, and the revelation could come at any point.

The Truth claimed with some degree of justification to be the ultimate religion, the final faith, the last of all churches...

...It could also claim a degree of universality that the others could not. All other major religions were either specific to their originating species, could be traced back to a single species - often a single subset of that species - or were consciously developed amalgams, syntheses, of a group of sufficiently similar religions of disparate origin..."

The "Truth" is the prevalent religion in the galaxy. Of course, any description of this religion that may seem similar to Christianity is purely coincidental (right). What I like about this book specifically and the sci-fi/fantasy genre, in general, is that you may seem like you are talking about one thing, but you are really talking about something else altogether. The cloak of science fiction gives one license to explore controversial subjects stealth-like. We've certainly seen that in things like His Dark Materials (The Church, free will) by Phillip Pullman and in Battlestar Galactica (fundamentalism, war on terror, torture, etc.).

The above passage and the following one also show that Banks is well-versed in philosophy. In this case, Bostrum's simulation thesis.

" ... Any theory which causes solipsism to seem just a likely an explanation for the phenomena it seeks to describe ought to be held in the utmost suspicion."

The Algebraist is also just a darn entertaining book that doesn't assume that you take any more out of it than that. But if you want the added meaning, you don't have to dig very far. You will not find much better fiction that explores the importance of rationality so well.

Si Se Puede (Yes, We Can)

Today's protest of Arizona's anti-immigrant law, SB 1070, drew anywhere between 20,000 and 75,000 people, depending on who you listen to. The 5 mile march between Indian School Park and the Capitol was peaceful, multicultural and did not result in a single arrest, though you certainly wouldn't assume that considering the police presence:

I was heartened by all the groups in attendance.  You'd assume that it would only be Latinos, but there were a lot of Native Americans and African Americans, both as marchers and speakers.  They (and we) rightly see this as a basic issue of human rights. 

This might be an over-used (and over-revised) quote, but it still fits:

"THEY CAME FIRST for the Communists,

and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.

THEN THEY CAME for the Jews,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.

THEN THEY CAME for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.

THEN THEY CAME for me
and by that time no one was left to speak up."

The spirit, creativity, and humor of all in attendance was evident:
 

I'm glad we went.  I think it was important to show our son the positive influence of a peaceful protest.  As they say, the family that protests together, stays together.  Maybe they don't say that ... but they should.

Free enterprise as morality?

John Stossel on FOX News this week:

"[I]t's time now to repeal" the Public Accommodation section (of Civil Rights Act), "because private businesses ought to get to discriminate. And I won't won't ever go to a place that's racist and I will tell everybody else not to and I'll speak against them. But it should be their right to be racist."

"What they have to discover, what all the efforts of capitalism's enemies are frantically aimed at hiding, is the fact that capitalism is not merely the 'practical,' but the only moral system in history." -- Ayn Rand, "Capitalism : The Unknown Ideal"

Bill Moyers on Fresh Air:

"... I think the most important thing that we can do is to continue to treat Americans as citizens, not just consumers. If you look out and see an audience of consumers, you want to sell them something. If you look out and see an audience of citizens, you want to share something with them, and there is a difference.

Libertarians need to stop praying at the altar of Ayn Rand. Do you honestly believe that businesses would stop discriminating because the market told them to or because it was right? Even William F. Buckley didn't agree with this, "I once believed we could evolve our way up from Jim Crow," Mr. Buckley said in 2004. "I was wrong: federal intervention was necessary."

William F. Buckley Jr., in an essay written in the 1960s, directly confronted the libertarian/Objectivist philosophy of Ayn Rand. "The conservative's distrust of the state, so richly earned by it,"Buckley wrote, "raises inevitably the question, how far can one go?" He went on to warn against those "whose passionate distrust for the state has developed into a theology of sorts, or at least into a demonology; to which they adhere as devotedly as any religious fanatic ever attempted to adhere to the will of the Lord."

How did I get here?

A recent post at Atheist Revolution got me to thinking about how people fall into their religion ... or their lack thereof. I think a lot of religious people assume that atheists and agnostics have a falling out or "crisis of faith". At least from my personal experience and from having read a lot of your experiences, this is not the case. From Atheist Revolution:

"... To be fair to both my mother and to myself, I suspect that I would be an atheist today regardless of whether she had imposed church upon me. The way my mind works and my love of science from an early age probably would have led me away from superstition regardless of my church experience."

That's not that different from where my atheism came from, though that writer seems to have a little more animosity towards the parents. Here, I'm going to try and analyze the different reasons on why someone would be an atheist and how they apply to me:

Were our parents atheists and we are just following in their steps? In my case, not exactly. I was baptised Methodist. My parents took us to church when we were young (6 or 7 and younger). But I think this was done more to appease a grandfather (my dad's dad) who was very religious. Our attendance only seemed to happen when we lived in the same town as my grandfather.

My parents never talked about God, though we always had a bible in the house. But, conversely, we were never pushed away from religion either. I even remember saying prayers before going to bed every night. We probably did this until I was about 10. It didn't seem weird to me at the time, but it also didn't really seem spiritual. Just another daily ritual like brushing your teeth and giving your parents a kiss before going to bed.

I think that is a big part of my realization at a fairly young age that I didn't believe in God. Religious rituals like going to church, praying, etc. seemed like just that ... rituals. There was no spark. There was no feeling of a divine connection. I was doing the things because society made you feel like that was "normal".

Were our parents screwed-up Christians and that pushed us away from religion? That wasn't the case either. They certainly weren't devout but they also weren't sitting around railing on the church. Simply, my folks just never talked about religion or politics. I know it's wacky, but they thought their job was to provide a home, food, education, boundaries and to encourage their children. Parents are doing a disservice to their kids if they feel they have a mandate to do anything else. When you see kids holding "God Hates Fags" signs or you see a movie like Jesus Camp, how is that kind of parenting not child abuse?

Did I have a "crisis of faith"? That is a popular assumption - that all people are born religious and something pushes them away from it. I think this is a lot rarer than than most people would believe. Just because someone may have been born into a religious family and may have went to church does not mean that they ever believed in God.

They are not "losing" faith but rather gaining a confidence that they can express the fact that they never believed in the first place. In the current climate in the U.S., that is not a trivial occurrence. Society, as you may have noticed, does not embrace atheists.

I cannot personally speak for the opposite - for those people who may have been born without religion or went through atheist phases and then "found" religion. I would suspect that the situation is similar in that they always had faith but it took awhile for them to come around to that realization. But, I'm sure there are those that truly did not believe in God but later changed.

What about those that were born Christian and readily admit that they believed in God but had a change of heart? This would seem to be fairly common and not to just run-of-the-mill types that never go to church. It can even happen to the most devout (bible scholar Bart Ehrman, for example).

Those cases seem to born of education or, at the very least, a removal from limiting environments where they would not know of alternatives. Ex-Mormons would certainly fit into this category, though not all Ex-Mormons give up a faith in God in general.

People may leave the church, but not leave God. Even Christians would have to admit that organized religion can be pretty fucked up -- priests buggering young boys and churches who seem more concerned with raising money that with raising souls. If these particular instances also cause people to leave God altogether, that has more to do with people not understanding how a caring God could allow those situations to happen. And you would have no argument from me on that one. How, indeed?

So, I do not believe in God. I never did. I did not give up God because something bad happened or because someone told me to. God did not make sense to me even before I could intellectually grasp why. When my education caught up with my intuition, it merely confirmed what I already knew.

God was yet another societal construct that was put in place to help me stay in line, like a teacher, or a policeman. Something to ease my fears of death. No more than that. I'm not afraid of death. I am afraid of believing something just because it is convenient and comforting. But, that's just me. This was my path. This is how I got "here".

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" -- Epicurus

Book Review: why does E=mc2 by Brian Cox & Jeff Forshaw

Possessing a fairly technical background -- engineering degree, college calculus and calculus-based physics -- I'm not completely lost when I read science books. Still, I'm 20 years removed from college and have not found a lot of cause to use any of that. And brain cells are readily killed by lack of use and beer.

So, when I heard of why does E=mc2? on the Daily Show and I read its cover promising, "the most accessible, entertaining and enlightening explanation of the best-known physics equation in the world ...", I was encouraged. The following excerpt from the book does a good job of confirming my optimism:

"the provocation lies in the way the science challenges us to think
about the world around us. Scientist or not, each of us has intuition and we all infer things about the world from our everyday experiences. If we subject our observations to the cold and precise light of the scientific method, however, we often discover that nature confounds our intuition. As this book unfolds, we will discover that when things whiz about at high speeds, common-sense notions regarding space and time are dashed and replaced by something entirely new, unexpected, and elegant. The lesson is a salutary and humbling one, and it leaves many scientists with a sense of awe: The universe is much richer than our everyday experiences would have us believe. Perhaps most wonderful of all is the fact that the new physics, for all its richness, is filled with a breathtaking mathematical elegance.

... science at its heart is not a complicated discipline. ... it is an attempt at removing our innate prejudices in order to observe the world as objectively as possible. It may be more or less successful in that goal but few can doubt its success in teaching us how the universe “works.” The really difficult thing is to learn not to trust what we might like to think of as common sense. By teaching us to accept nature for what it is, and not for what our prejudice may suggest that it should be, the scientific method has delivered the modern technological world. In short, it works."

That's part of the strength of this book - It gives a general perspective on the role and scope of science while explaining a specific concept. I guess that helps to make it less of a dry and scholarly tome.

The basic thing to take from the theory of relativity is that mass and energy are interchangeable. Also, space and time are not not mutually exclusive entities but rather interwoven ones. Our observations of each are dependent on our location and our speed. That may seem abstract, but it has been experimentally proven. If the variations of time predicted by Einstein were not taken into account, the GPS system in your car would not work. "Time ticks at a different rate on the orbiting satellites than it does on the ground."

That's the big kicker. People could not get through a single day without using technology that has been developed using science, and theory, and experimentation. Though, many would pretend they are not and would deny science and would seek to deny others from using it.

Science does not revel in perpetuating myth, but rather in destroying it: "Science is at its heart a modest pursuit, and this modesty is the key to its success. Einstein’s theories are respected because they are correct as far as we can tell, but they are no sacred tomes. They will stand, to put it bluntly, until something better comes along. Likewise the great scientific minds are not revered as prophets but as diligent contributors to our understanding of nature. There are certainly those whose names are familiar to millions, but there are none whose reputations can protect their theories from the harsh critique of experiment. Nature is no respecter of reputations."

Besides the previously mentioned technology that relies on an understanding of E=mc2, there are experiments going on right now that will further our understanding of the nature of particles and will perhaps lead to an even better understanding of the nature of our universe. If you want to know that they are trying to do and what they are trying to find at the Large Hadron Collider, I would suggest you read this book and, perhaps, Particle Physics – A Very Short Introduction by Frank Close, as reviewed very well by Cyberkitten.

I liked this book quite a bit. It's not a book filled with equations. But don't kid yourself. When they say "accessible", they are stretching it a bit. There is still a lot of talk about "Minkowski spacetime", the "Higgs field", quarks and gluons. But any reasonably clever person can read this book and get a better handle on relativity.

Note: For anyone that might want to download this book to their PC or book reader, I found a full PDF version at: why does E-mc2?

Political Song of the Day - Ohio by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming,
We're finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drumming,
Four dead in Ohio.

Gotta get down to it
Soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her
And found her dead on the ground
How can you run when you know?

Gotta get down to it
Soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her
And found her dead on the ground
How can you run when you know?

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming,
We're finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drumming,
Four dead in Ohio.

Today is the 40th anniversary of the Kent State shootings. From Wikipedia:

"The Kent State shootings ... occurred at Kent State University in the city of Kent, Ohio, and involved the shooting of unarmed college students by members of the Ohio National Guard on Monday, May 4, 1970. The guardsmen fired 67 rounds over a period of 13 seconds, killing four students and wounding nine others, one of whom suffered permanent paralysis.

Some of the students who were shot had been protesting against the American invasion of Cambodia, which President Richard Nixon announced in a television address on April 30. Other students who were shot had been walking nearby or observing the protest from a distance.

There was a significant national response to the shootings: hundreds of universities, colleges, and high schools closed throughout the United States due to a student strike of four million students, and the event further affected the public opinion – at an already socially contentious time – over the role of the United States in the Vietnam War ..."

Sometimes the cost of speaking out is paid with our lives. All the more reason to keep speaking out. Don't assume your government ... the military ... the police always have your best interests in mind.

"To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men." -- Abraham Lincoln

SB 1070 - anti-illegal immigration law

People are talking about this all over the place. Most have shown a remarkable lack of understanding of the law and its implications. I'm not interested in getting in flame wars in those places, so I'm just going to outline a few points here that you may not have thought about and then I'm not interested in talking about it any more:

- Police officers already have the power to arrest illegal immigrants and turn them over to the Border Patrol. This law will allow people to sue the police for both NOT enforcing the law and for racial profiling. It's an untenable law that even police think is BS. They will be damned if they do and damned if they don't.

- It requires police to make an effort to determine immigration status if there is "reasonable suspicion". That is left within the police's discretion. How does an illegal look? I'll tell you, in the eyes of the police, he looks brown. That gives the them the right of asking legal American citizens for their proof of citizenship. If someone was in the country illegally from say, Canada or Ireland, what would make them identifiable by the police? Absolutely nothing! So, what makes our police so special that they can see something we cannot? They can't. That's the point. If you are brown, you are going down.

- If you are for this law, then you must be for all citizens carrying proof of their citizenship at all times and being required to provide it at the police's discretion. Sound familiar?

- In a already down economy, Arizona is doing something that is going to isolate them from the country in the world in a manner similar to what it did during the MLK day fiasco. I have personally spoken with business owners here who are getting cancellations by the truckload for resorts, hotels and conventions. There is a very real chance that Major League Baseball will relocate next year's All-Star game from Arizona. If our leaders want to be backwoods, ignorant xenophobes, do it somewhere else, because it is affecting the ability of non-racist people to make a living. This law, though signed, will not go into effect for at least 90 days. With all of the costly court challenges sure to come, I would suspect it may never go into effect. So, what has been accomplished? Nothing is done to help illegal immigration. The state will lose hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue. The world will laugh at Arizona. Congratulations, Russell Pearce, Joe Arpaio, and Jan Brewer ... you are sure to go down unfavorably in the long list of Arizona political fuck-ups (Evan Mecham, Fife Symington).

What is "success"?

I was listening to NPR the other day and heard a story that helped give some perspective to our daily lives: Mayor of Central Park

Anyone who walked or ran on the famous Central Park Reservoir running track in New York would see him. They called him the Mayor of Central Park, and he claimed to be the first person to jog around the reservoir when there was just a little path. Since 1937, Alberto Arroyo was there every day, and when he retired he was often there the entire day, waving and saying hello to everyone. When he couldn't run, he walked. Then he used a cane, then a walker, and finally, after a stroke, a wheelchair. Arroyo died last month at 94.

... For some 75 years, Alberto Arroyo ran in Central Park. He claimed to be the first runner there, the first to run around the Central Park Reservoir, long before there was a running track. Later, with his weather-beaten face and white hair, he was still there, no matter the season, waving, talking and encouraging people.

Yesterday, the running track was dedicated to Arroyo ...

MARGOT ADLER: As some 150 people lined both sides of the reservoir track near the bench where Arroyo often sat, they left a wide space so that runners could pass by throughout the service. He would've insisted, they said. Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe said Arroyo was like the mail carrier neither rain, nor snow, nor gloom of night kept him from his rounds.

Wendy Mondreresena(ph), a mother of three, said she would return to the reservoir after each child was born and Alberto was always there.

Ms. WENDY MONDRERESENA: I was always so out of shape and I felt so crappy, and you know, he always really brought me up and made me feel good and said I could do it and I could get back in shape. He was such a positive thing in my life. I wonder if he knows that...

Ms. LORI BRAUN: Always gave you time, always. The smile, just a genuine person.

Ms. RUTH PAGON: I did the power walking. I didn't do the jogging like he did. But he got me hooked and I looked forward to coming here every single day just to see Alberto. He was just a wonderful soul ...

ADLER: Arroyo, who died last month at 94, was a very private person. At the memorial service, a longtime friend, Edmund Maring(ph), said he only learned late in his friendship that Arroyo had taken a vow of poverty at an early age and had given all his money away. He lived in a single-room occupancy hotel on the Upper West Side.

Mr. ADRIAN BENEPE (Parks Commissioner): With just a hot plate and a phone that only dialed 911. Alberto said that you have to be able to be happy with nothing. He had cereal in the morning. He said that he had fresh air in the afternoon. And then he'd have Chinese takeout for dinner. What's more New York than that?

ADLER: Edmund Maring said Arroyo told a filmmaker he didn't mind dying. You just go from one apartment to another. This was his place in the sun, he said, the Central Park Reservoir, even on a rainy day, his last apartment on earth. But most runners said they still keep thinking they'll see him when they round a bend.

Margot Adler, NPR News, New York.

It kinda makes you think about what we define as "success". This man had no money, was not some storied businessman or celebrity, yet profoundly impacted more lives than any of us could ever hope to.

We slave each day at our jobs for some elusive carrot. What is that carrot? For some, it is money. For some it is the security that money may bring so that they can do other things. For others, it is accolades. Are those bad goals in and of themselves? No, of course not. But the path you take to that goal is as important as the destination. I don't care if you are giving a bunch of your money to charity if you are screwing some homeowner with a shady mortgage to get there. I don't care if you are volunteering each weekend if you are knowingly peddling some financial derivative that you know is toxic during the week.

Don't be a hater. Don't just be generous to "your" people. Love need not see color or gender, so don't tell people who they can't marry. Religion and patriotism are not cloaks of protection that allow you to be a bigot. If you believe in God, then practice what the book preached:

"Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you ..."

"Do not judge, lest you too be judged"

"Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions ..."

"You cannot serve both God and money"

If you don't believe in God, those are still not too shabby of things to live by. You only have one life here, so don't waste it.

There is no inherent merit to collecting wealth. Being rich doesn't make you a better person.

So, go out there, do your thing, be successful. But me mindful of your journey. The way in which we impact this world is through our relationships with others and how we impact our surroundings. Don't be remembered as "that guy" that may have died with a lot of money but had no friends.

"To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children...to leave the world a better place...to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Movie Review - Clash of the Titans

We went and saw Clash of the Titans this last weekend.  I'm usually a bit of film snob but will make exceptions for the latest big-budget sci-fi/fantasy flicks.  Plus, Alex has been reading the Percy Jackson books and thus has a new found fascination with Greek mythology.  As in the 1981 version of the movie, the story is based on the myth of Perseus, son of Zeus.  It follows him battling Medusa, Hades, the Kraken, etc.

Those that don't like the new movie because they are nostalgic for the "original" need to gets some perspective. Have they watched the earlier one lately? It has a certain campy charm, but it is hardly the Godfather.  I mean ... honestly, is that Land of the Lost?

L.A. Law actor Harry Hamlin played Perseus in that version.  That gives you some idea how high-brow it was.

Some of the dialogue in the new movie is cringe-worthy. There's the obligatory Braveheart ("They can never take our freedom!") / Aragorn-at-the-gates-of-Mordor speech.  But that kind of corn is almost expected and doesn't necessarily detract from the movie.

But the cast is good: Liam Neeson as Zeus, Sam Worthington as Perseus and Ralph Feinnes as Hades. But it's a bit creepy how Feinnes brings just a bit too much Voldermort and Amon Goeth to the role (this movie is a reunion of sorts with Schindler actor Neeson). Gemma Arterton (Quantum of Solace and the upcoming Prince of Persia) is very attractive as Io.

The special effects are fine.  We saw it in 2D, as I want to make of point of only seeing those movies in 3D that were actually designed that way, not done afterwards, as Clash was.

Also, is it just me, or is the Kraken in the new movie just Rancor from Return of the Jedi?

The movie certainly embellishes the myth of Perseus, but isn't that the point?  The myth itself is fabricated and has been embellished for time eternal.  There is no over-arching theme or attempt to give Titans some modern context, at least none that I could gather.  But that's OK.  Sometimes, you just go to a movie to have fun.  And ... we had fun.  A pleasant diversion.  Grade:  B-

Isaac Asimov

"If I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern of their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteous atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is God, God, God, and whose every deed is foul, foul, foul." -- Isaac Asimov

"Reasonably Suspicious"