Archive for 2007

I am a small “c” conservative. I believe in less rather than more government. In the past, I have tended to support the Canadian Conservative party rather than the Liberals.

Lately, though, I’ve been feeling less and less inclined to think of the Conservatives as worthy of support. And in the last forty eight hours, I’ve really started to think they need a swift kick in the pants, just like the Liberals.

What has happened in the last couple of days? Well, for one thing, I watched Sicko by Michael Moore. I started thinking maybe our universal health care, despite its flaws, needs more protection than the Conservatives seem inclined to give it. I’ve never wanted American-style health care, but I could sort of see the point of some Conservative politicians that some level of for-fee medical services for “extraordinary” services makes sense. But I think any such adjustments to the health care policy probably need more care to insure our existing system remains solid and truly universal.

But what really bugs me, and I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit this side by side with the medicare comment, is the strong support the Conservatives seem to be giving to American style copyright reform. Here in Canada, “fair use” has been pretty well a given: if I pay for a CD or DVD in Canada, I am entitled to copy it for my own use on whatever personal playback device I choose. I can use whatever technical methods I need in order to exercise this right: the copyright holder can not take this away from me using digital rights management or copy protection. Of course, I’m still subject to prosecution if I subsequently resell my copies or even mass-distribute them: but for my own use, my rights are well protected.

Until now. The Liberals were the first to propose “copyright reform” in the American style, taking away our right to fair use…but they never got the legislation passed. The Conservatives are apparently intent on stripping even more of our rights away from us than the liberals, implementing a “DMCA North” that will make the American legislation look generous.

My recommendation to Jim Prentice, the Conservative introducing the new bill: start polishing up your resume. The folks who pay your salary, that would be us, the voters…we won’t take kindly to having our rights sold to music copyright groups like the CRIA. Interestingly, even the musicians are lining up against this bill. And the American music industry is starting to wake up to the fact that suing your customers is a stupid business practice, and perhaps trying to sell product the way people want to buy it would be a bit smarter.

We had another power failure this morning. It started at about 5:30 am and continued until about 8:00 am, just as I was (manually) closing the garage door to go to work.

Unfortunately, my web server (which delivers this wonderful blog) failed to restart correctly when the power came back up. It seems prone to forgetting how to connect to the network after a power failure…anyway, when I got home from work I was beat and plunked myself in front of the TV. The result- I didn’t even know the server was down until just now.

My apologies- but that’s what comes from having a self-administered server

There is no culturally significant reason for killing whales, I don’t care what the Japanese government says…and apparently my opinion is shared by Wired blogger Tony Long.

I am already against the native cultural “tradition” of killing whales, but so long as it is a couple a year hunted using traditional methods, I guess I have to live with it. But a dozen diesel powered whaling ships with radar, GPS, and rocket powered explosive harpoons kinda stretch any conceivable notion of “tradition”.

If I had the funds, I’d be giving some serious thought to getting my own submarine and doing my own kind of “traditional hunting”. And maybe there would be a few less Japanese whaling ships to find gainful employ for next year.

I’m obviously totally out of it…I’ve missed the train, the ship has sailed and I’m not on it, and whatever other cliches you might wish to add that describe someone who is oblivious to popular trends.

I just read about a new movie coming out that I had had never heard of before. That isn’t surprising: there are a great number of movies that come and go that I never hear about either before or after they hit the theaters. But this is a *fantasy* movie, for Pete’s sake. And what is even more shocking: it is a fantasy movie based on a very popular trilogy of fantasy books…that I’ve *also* never heard of.

I’m taking about The Golden Compass, which is based on the novels by Philip Pullman. It is a story that sounds promising: an alternate world, where people have souls that visibly manifest as companion animals. The main conflict apparently involves a young girl who must face the machinations of an oppressive theocracy. Apparently the story is a somewhat thinly disguised commentary on the evils wrought by religions that gain political power. Computer graphics are heavily used to portray the companion animals and main characters in the story (which include an anthropomorphic polar bear-like creature).

It sounds exactly like my kind of story. It also apparently opens in theaters on December 7th…that is this upcoming Friday.

Intelligent design is a theory of faith. Evolution is a theory of science.

Science is based on something called scientific method. A scientific theory requires something (or more realistically, several things) that can be proven or shown to be false. A scientific theory is never absolute “fact”: it is always subject to discovery of further data that could prove or disprove certain aspects of its truth. Science is strictly about the “how”, “what”, “where”, and “when”. Science demands perpetual intelligent inquiry, the continuous challenging of the status quo. Science does not guide a person’s moral choices, it does not make someone a kinder, better person. It does, however, require a certain amount of intelligence.

Faith is belief. It requires an act of will, and it abhors fact. Identifying contradictory information is anathema to faith. If something contradicts the matter of faith, it can be conveniently dismissed as heretic, or a lie. Faith can save a life or a soul, can guide one’s life decisions and moral choices. Fundamentally, faith is all about answering the “why” question. But Faith isn’t much good when trying to build a bridge or attempting to safely launch a man into space.

One does not “Believe” in science- science simply is. Faith is not challenged by science, unless one’s faith is doggedly attempting to explain natural occurrences. An intelligent religion could embrace science without giving up their fundamental belief: the “why” part of life.

Intelligent design can be taught in a church. It does not belong in a school, unless it is a school of religion. If someone choses to set aside facts and reason for a life dedicated to faith, they can educate themselves in whatever misinformation they choose: but public schools should stick to facts, not faith. Unless, apparently, you live in Texas, where a science curriculum director was suspended (and felt compelled to resign) recently for expressing the opinion that Intelligent Design is not a science.

I feel nothing but sorrow (and a bit of anger) that the U.S. has sunk to such a low state. Not only do 40% of Americans still believe that Weapons of Mass Destruction were found in Iraq (about the same percentage that believe in Angels, I believe…), but apparently a nearly equal number have no clue regarding the difference between faith and science.

And if you are reading this and muttering “heretic!” and “blasphemer!” under your breath, there is another faith-based “theory” you should check out: the theory of intelligent falling.

I remember my bike when I was a kid. Adding sound to it was a special art: the right kind of card or piece of cardboard, an appropriate clothes-line clip or other attachment device…it was tres chic.

But apparently my concept of bicycle sound is outmoded. Some very demented people are bolting huge speakers, massive amps, and even DVD video screens onto their bikes. Then I guess they roll around, struggling to peddle their 300 pound boom boxes with wheels around the neighborhood, where, if they are lucky, they can perhaps get 15 minutes or so of decent sound before their batteries run down.

I don’t get it…but then, the whole “boom box bigger than the guy carrying it” thing never made much sense to me either. I’m more a “oblivious to the world guy with headphones on” person: I only have a very weakly expressed piss-everyone-off-by-drowning-out-all-sound-with-my-crappy-music gene, I guess.

My favorite line from the article?

“Some guy hired me to build them for his kids,” he said. “Now a lot of people want them.”

Kids do crazy things…but the parent buying this for his kids, he has obviously had his head stuck between those 150 decibel-producing speakers far, far too long.

I came across this comic on xkcd today…and it seemed so true to what happens during my upgrades that I felt compelled to share it

I just changed out of my pajamas and put on my normal day wear. As I looked at myself in the mirror, I realized that there really wasn’t a significant difference between these two modes of dress.

I was a reasonably well-dressed man less than a decade ago. No, never really stylish, but I was at least a step or so above “slob”. I had three modes of dress:

• Work: I had three or four good suits: tailored, from a reputable suit store. A decent collection of tailored cotton shirts. Some nice ties: when I went to the office, I was typically wearing over $1,000 worth of clothing, and I bought at least one new suit each year
• Home/casual: Cargo pants, cotton tourist slacks, a pair or two of jeans and golf shirts; I even had a couple of pairs of Tilley pants
• Rough/yard: a few pairs of sweat pants and T-shirts for working in the yard, washing the car, what have you

I the last seven years I’ve significantly simplified my life. I have my “work/social” clothing, which is basically the “home/casual” category above, and everything else is in the “rough/yard” category. I’ve gone from budgeting $2,000 a year for new clothes at my peak of sartorial excellence to probably spending $150 a year. My suit trousers are so far from fitting that I really have no idea why I keep them any longer. So if I’m relaxing at home, going to the store, going to the park, or generally doing anything other than going to dinner or visiting with the family, I wear sweat pants and a T-shirt. If you drop in unexpectedly or come to stay in my house for a few days, that’s the way you’ll see me: sweat pants and a T-shirt.

But what I do is one thing- trying to figure out why is another matter entirely…

Read the rest of this entry »

I generally have a lot of respect for police officers. Lately, there have been a lot of questions raised regarding the use of tasers by police. To me, a taser is an alternative to deadly force: if the cop feels they have to use a gun, or if they feel that the next step will be hand to hand combat, then the taser gives them an alternative.

Tasers are about as likely to cause lasting harm as a night stick or a punch, and are far more effective with much less risk to both the police officer and bystanders. However, I am beginning to think that some police officers are using them under rather questionable circumstances. If there are four or five cops and one guy with no history of violence and without a weapon, why is a taser considered “appropriate”? Or how about the circumstance in this video…

Here we have a police officer pulling over a guy for speeding in a construction zone. The driver has no priors, his wife and baby are in the vehicle with him, he is not drunk or stoned, and he is carrying no weapons. He is being belligerent and uncooperative: specifically, he is asking where the 40 MPH sign is (the video clearly shows him driving past it). And his big crime: he refuses to sign the speeding ticket.

Now…I personally don’t think I would do what this guy is doing- you don’t get out of your car and ask a cop to show you the speed limit sign. You might ask him (politely) where the speed zone is, but you leave the maneuvering for the court room. But it is a small step from asking a reasonably polite question to the level this guy was at- he wasn’t swearing, he wasn’t spitting, swinging, or throwing things, he didn’t even noticeably raise his voice. But he was tasered, thrown to the ground, handcuffed, and arrested. And the second officer on the scene (supervisor?) said “Good job!” to the arresting officer.

This doesn’t look like the right way to use a taser to me…

I stumbled across this video which gives a stop-action view of someone using the least impressive of computer tools to perform some rather impressive illustrating magic…

Being able to do something amazing with a very basic tool may seem like a rather limited skill. But I have to wonder- what could this artist do with a “real” drawing program?