Ideas in Progress

The Wrath of Goldberg

2008-03-20T09:17:00.000-07:00

On March 19th Jonah Goldberg observes that Borders bookstores seem much more reluctant than Barnes and Noble to either carry his new book or to give it good shelf space. The next day Yahoo News has the ominous headline: As shares sink, Borders bookstore considers selling business. Is there a connection? I don't know, but I'll be very careful about angering Mr. Goldberg in the future.

Online Movie Recommendation 23

2008-03-19T10:04:00.000-07:00

This week's move recommendations are a tribute to the late Arthur C. Clarke.

Sir. Clarke's 90th birthday message:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qLdeEjdbWE

Mysterious World:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XzrkkTBbob0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOdMs9tO9_4&
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOG8QdmMBuY

Hellerblogging

2008-03-18T07:26:00.000-07:00

SCOTUS Blog will be "liveblogging" the Heller Arguments today from the CSPAN rebroadcast shortly after the actual arguments conclude.

tags: Heller, DC, Supreme+Court, gun+ban, second+amendment

Sen. Obama and Rev. Wright Say the Same Thing Differently

2008-03-15T06:54:00.000-07:00

Sen. Obama speaks to enraptured voters of hope and change for a better future and offers the promise of a post-racial America. Rev. Wright speaks to enraptured churchgoers or hate and past wrongs and an America where white people always work to keep the blacks down. Sen. Obama claims that Rev. Wright is his pastor and spiritual advisor, and it is obvious that Rev. Wright has been a large influence in Sen. Obama's life. This has lead to a great deal of confusion by some people who look at the huge difference between the tone and meaning of their speeches and wonder how to reconcile that Obama, the student, seems to say the polar opposite of what Wright, his teacher, does... and yet Sen. Obama has not denounced or even distanced himself from Rev. Wright.

If you view them from a different perspective, looking at the audience instead of the orator, then perhaps Sen. Obama and Rev. Wright are saying the same thing after all. They are both saying what the crowd needs to hear. Sen. Obama is saying what will get him votes in the Democratic Primary. Rev. Wright is saying what will put butts in the pews and dollars in the collection plate.

If you assume that the most important thing about what someone says is its meaning then the disparity between what Obama and Wright say is mysterious. But if you think that the most important thing about what someone says is how it motivates the listener to do what the speaker wants them to, then the similarity in their ability as orators is obvious. If you assume that the most important things to learn from a spiritual advisor is theology and ideology, then it would seem that Sen. Obama has learned nothing from Rev. Wright. But if you think that the most important things to learn from a 'spiritual advisor' are how to read a crowd, then craft and deliver a message that will bend them to your will... then it appears Sen. Obama has learned a great deal from Rev. Wright.

The confusion amoung Obama's followers about why he has continuted to associate with Rev. Wright is understandable. Most of them probably believe, like normal people generally do, that what a man says is more important than how he says it and that the value in a pastor's sermon is measured in the truth that it illuminates instead of the dollars it puts in the collection plate. When normal people "get on their soapbox" they say what they believe. They naturally expect that others do as well, and that you can tell what a politician's or reverand's beliefs are by listening to what they say. But I think that Wrechard is right to say that Sen. Obama and Rev. Wright are not normal people. They both make their living by manipulating people with oratory and promises. Such people do not say what they believe, they say what they need to to get what they want. I think the differences between Sen. Obama's and Rev. Wright's speeches is not indicitive of large ideological differences between the two men... it is because of the differences in the audience they are seeking to motivate.

tags: obama wright

Good Advice, But Too Late

2008-03-12T10:14:00.000-07:00

With Gov. Spitzer's crimes and infidelity in the news, a private eye offers some timely advice on how not to get caught doing such things. I can think of an even better way to avoid being caught with a call-girl, though. My father always told me that the best way to avoid being killed in a bar fight was to not be in the bar. I think something similar might have applied here.

The private eye's last comment that some of the NY State Troopers had to have known what was going on and that as a result the scandal will grow even bigger is interesting. I don't know if I believe that, however. The average New Yorker may already assume that their State Troopers are in the habit of looking the other way when powerful people (or one of their own) does something wrong. I doubt many politicians will make a stink over the troopers being quick to cover up for one of the state's power elite, just in case they need such "discretion" themselves one day. Reporters don't have the attention span to stick with the story. At most, I fear, the crimes of the State Troopers in abetting Gov. Spitzer's activities will produce a few indignant posts in the blogosphere. I'd like to be proven wrong about that, though.

Tags: spitzer, prostitute, advice, NY+State+Troopers

Vitamin D and Health

2008-03-10T07:42:00.000-07:00

When I was a young tyke my mother would send me outside to play with my friends so I could "get my exercise and Vitamin D." I guess mom knew best.

Half Truths about Real ID from DHS

2008-03-05T10:27:00.000-08:00

There is a showdown coming up between several states and the federal government about state ID standards. The Dept. of Homeland Security warns that if the states do not adopt Real ID standards, that their driver's licenses will no longer be considered valid ID for people passing through airport security. I suspect that this statement is being promulgated by federal bureaucrats who are hoping that worried citizens will pressure their state governments into adopting Real ID standards for their states' licenses. While true, this statement is a half-truth. The full truth is that airline passengers need not worry about being denied the ability to fly on a commercial airline regardless of what state they are from or what their state's driver's license standards are. Airline passengers do not need to show ANY identification to fly, as most anyone who has had their wallet lost or stolen on a trip can attest. In fact, a member of the Department of Homeland Security's privacy advisory committee flew on a commercial flight out of San Francisco International Airport a couple of years ago without any ID as a public demonstration of this policy and discovered that he actually got through security screening faster than if he had brought some identification.

For the record, I am not against improving the security of state driver's licenses, but I am against federal bureaucrats distributing half-truths to frighten citizens and manipulate state politics.

Tags: real+id

In America Even Peasants Own a Car

2008-03-03T19:21:00.001-08:00

A Danish reporter who was in Crawford, Texas wandered into the yard of an elderly woman. The woman armed herself with a revolver and then demanded the trespassing man leave her yard, which he promptly did. The incident got reported in both American (hattip: Kim DuToit) and International media. Despite sensationalist language in some of the reports of the incident, it is unlikely that the woman was close to shooting the trespasser or threatened him with the gun, since he admitted later that he wasn't even aware that the woman he spoke with had a gun on her until fellow reporters pointed it out to him in pictures they took of the incident through a telephoto lens.

CNN's webpage describing the incident was filled with comments by both foreigners and Americans about how this incident is just another example of how stupid, backwards, and aggressive Americans (and Texas, specifically) are. I am not worried that reporting of this incident will hurt America's image in the rest of the world, however. I am sure that for every foreign busybody or elitist who posts on the internet or is quoted in the press about how terrible the incident is, that there are several times as many common people who get an entirely different impression of America than what the newsmen intended to portray. Think of how many of the elderly people or women in Denmark who read that story will quietly wish that they could have the same ability to protect themselves from strange men that the Texas ladies have.

Tough Guy Award 7

2008-02-26T07:42:00.000-08:00

Darwin works both ways, and man didn’t get to the top of the food chain by accident. The “Tough Guy Award” is the opposite of the Darwin Award.This week's tough guy award goes to Chris Everhart . Mr. Everhart and his sons were camping when a black bear came into their campsite. To protect one of his sons he killed the bear with one blow to the head from a thrown log. Forest Service agents arrived a few minutes later and ticketed him for failing to secure his campsite.

Artificial Organs and Easy Airport Screening

2008-02-25T18:21:00.000-08:00

National Defense Magazine has an interesting article on work being done to help grow artificial organs at Draper Laboratory. The researchers there are using micro-electromechanical technology (which is a step larger than nanotechnology, but is still really small) to create plastic scaffolding for growing artificial organs that has artificial vascular pathways built right into the scaffolding material. The center director says that growing complete artificial organs is still "15 to 20 years away," but in the meantime the work has the potential to improve existing organ assist devices and help create a liver-assist device. This research is sponsored by the Center for Integration of Medicine and Innovative Technology and overseen by the Army’s Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center.

There are also some interesting short articles in the magazine's Security Beat section. One is on a flat-folding gas mask prototype that looks like it would be ideal for throwing in your personal emergency kit if you live near a chemical plant or terrorism target. Another news article is on some old, classic sci-fi writers getting on their soapboxes at a Homeland Security technical conference about the delays and indignities of airline security screening and the potential for finding useful ideas in sci-fi stories. Lastly, there was also a story about work done on an airport security sensor tunnel that could eliminate the delays and indignities of airline security screening and which, strangely, looks like something right out of the sci-fi movie Total Recall.

Update (3/3/8): Changed movie reference from The Running Man to the correct Schwarzenegger flick.

Free* Digital TV Converter

2008-02-18T19:15:00.000-08:00

A year from now the old-fashioned analog TV broadcasts will stop, and all American TV signals will be broadcast in digital. If you have an analog TV set, however, you can still use it to watch TV by using a signal converter box. The Federal Gov't is subsidising the transition to digital TV by giving out free* coupons to consumers good for $40 off of the purchase of the converter boxes from participating retailers. To take advantage of this you should:

1. Go to this webpage and apply for your coupons (limit 2): https://www.dtv2009.gov/ApplyCoupon.aspx

2. Go to this webpage and find a participating retailer in your area: https://www.dtv2009.gov/VendorSearch.aspx

3. Wait to receive your coupons from the Gov't.

4. Take the coupon(s) to a participating retailer and use it to get a $40 discount on your analog-to-digital TV converter box. Do not wait long after getting the coupons since they expire within 90 days of being mailed to you.

5. Hook the converter box to your analog TV before Feb. 18, 2009.

If you don't have access to the internet, you can apply on the telephone by calling 1-888-388-2009 or mailing an application to PO BOX 2000, Portland, OR 97208-2000. If you use either of these options then custom requires you to thank the person who printed this posting out for you by giving them a nickel and telling them not to spend it all in one place. Calling them "sonny" is optional.

According to the gov't, all consumers are eligible for the $40 subsidy. Presumably this includes illegal aliens as well as US citizens and legal residents.

* Of course it isn't really free, since our tax dollars are paying for these coupons. Honestly, though, I'd rather have members of the public spend that money on new gadgets for themselves than to have government bureaucrats spend the money on new ways to regulate my life.

tags: digital+tv

Online Movie Recommendation 22

2008-02-17T16:17:00.000-08:00

This week's online movie recommendation is a four part lecture by Australian scientist Bob Carter looking at evidence against the popular notion of Global Warming (hattip:W.M. Briggs):

Part 1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOLkze-9GcI
Part 2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN06JSi-SW8
Part 3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCXDISLXTaY
Part 4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpQQGFZHSno

tags: global+warming, skeptic, bob+carter

Better Living with our friend The Atom

2007-12-20T11:56:00.000-08:00

The Instapundit has seen an article on Toshiba's home nuclear reactor design and wants to know where he can order one. I'd suggest he start here. Given his internet celebrity status, I wonder if they'd loan him a demonstration model to review. I'd also suggest to anyone who gets one that you take advantage of the reactor's waste heat and bury it under your driveway. That way you'll never have to shovel snow off your driveway again.

The article says that the reactor could be used to power apartment buildings, city blocks, or isolated communities. One application seemed conspicuous by its absence.

Geek Gift Guide

2007-12-12T20:11:00.000-08:00

Christmas is coming up soon, so it’s time for the 3rd annual Ideas In Progress geek gift guide. Most geek gift guides are really gift guides for early adopters with rich friends. This is an attempt at a guide for buying gifts for makers, hackers, real geeks, and other Sons of Martha (amateur and professional alike). Last year we divided up the entries by age group and highlighted one gift in each category. This year we’ve added a new category of gifts under $20, for those who are on a budget, need a little stocking stuffer, or have pulled the name of a geek in a secret Santa drawing.

If anyone has good recommendations for geek gifts that I did not include, please add them in the comments. I'll try to maintain this as a useful resource for geek gift givers.

Gifts under $20
Elementary School Geek Gifts
Middle School Geek Gifts
High School Geek Gifts
College and Older Geek Gifts

GEEK GIFTS ≤ $20.
TOP CHOICE:BALL OF WHACKS
The top choice in cheap geek gifts is a set of magnetic shapes that can provide endless hours of creative, sculpture-building entertainment during otherwise wasted time such as waiting on hold, updating your operating system, updating your computer’s operating system, or staff meetings. Do not use while operating heavy machinery.

OTHER IDEAS:

Construction Toys. Besides the Ball of Whacks, there are other construction toys that a geek can keep at their desk or in their room to fiddle with periodically. Acrobots and similar items are good desk toys for adults but should not be given to children because if they swallow one magnet then they may pass it safely but if they swallow two or more magnets they will need to be taken to the doctor! Magnetic sculptures are also fun, cheap desk toys but like all magnetic-based gifts they must be kept away from magnetic stripes, tapes, and disks. There are lots of neat Lego kits for under $20, that would be fun for children or adult geeks alike; there are even a few under $10. If Legos are a little too clichéd or modern then you could get them a Lincoln Logs kit, Erector set, or Tinkertoys.

Cool Science Demonstrators. Another set of ‘toys’ that both young and old geeks enjoy are those that either demonstrate or rely upon the clever use of some basic natural law. Cheap classic examples of these are the radiometer, praxinoscope, and the drinking bird. Modern cheapies include the airzooka and supercool handwarmers. After you give it to them, ask them to explain how it works.

Tools. It is hard to buy tools for geeks unless you share the same interests as them or they give you a wish-list. There are some inexpensive tools that are an exception to this because even if a geek already has one (and they probably do) then they can put spares in a desk drawer, glove compartment, or tool box so that they always have one close at hand. Knives, screwdriver sets, multi-tools, first aid or emergency kits, pick-up tools, paint pens, small flashlights, and flashlight accessories are good examples of these Bic Stics of tools. If shopping for a computer or digital camera geek you might also consider a USB card reader and/or memory card.

Books. There are a lot of books listed in this gift guide for both young and adult geeks, and many of them are less than $20. Good ones are:

The Mad Scientist’s Club and The Dangerous Book for Boys/The Daring Book for Girls for elementary school geeks,
any of the Heinlein juveniles and the Boy Scout/Girl Scout manual for middle school geeks,
Hackers and Painters and Advice to a Young Scientist for high school geeks,
Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman and My Life and Work for college students, and
Parkinson's Law and Everybody Wins! for older geeks.

T-Shirts. If your favorite geek wears T-shirts around (and many do), then Internet Duct Tape has a very good list of geeky T-shirts ideal for Christmas giving.

Portable booklight or lap desk. If they don’t already have one, that is.

Video. Most geeks like science fiction and/or fantasy, but (much like tools) finding videos to get them can be tricky. If they go around quoting Yoda or dress up like a Star Trek security officer for Halloween, then they probably already have all the Star Wars, Star Trek, and other staples of the genre. If you are determined to try and get them a video anyway, then here are some for under $20 that a geek would probably like, but might not already have: Primer, Destination Moon, Tycoon, The Prestige, The Andromeda Strain and Zulu. For younger geeks consider Tron, Wargames, Groundhog Day, Labyrinth, The Princess Bride, and The Last Starfighter.

Office Products. If your favorite office geek goes around quoting lines from Office Space, then get them a red Swingline stapler. Otherwise, get them a staple-less stapler. The combination highlighter and Post-It flag dispenser is a handy pen for scholarly geeks.

Gift Certificates. Giving gift certificates is an elegant solution to the geek gift problem. It lets you pick out a gift quickly and easily, while the recipient gets something that will be very useful. If there’s one thing geeks appreciate, it is an elegant solution to a problem.

LATE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS
TOP CHOICE: A BRAIN BOX KIT.The top choice for this first age group is a Brain Box electronics kit. It is like Legos for electronics. The principle is similar to those old "101 electrical experiments" kits but with one key improvement. The components are molded into handy, color-coded, plastic building blocks. These building blocks have metal snaps on the end that both hold the circuits together and provide the electrical connection necessary. This battery-powered circuit building kit is a great way to introduce young geeks to the fundamentals of electricity without needing solder or breadboards. Embedding the electrical components in big colorful building blocks make it unlikely that they will be lost or have their leads broken off. Both of which are a real possibility with young experimenters. The one disadvantage is that the manual does not explain the principles behind the circuits well enough for my taste. If the experiment kit is going to be used by a parent or other older geek to illustrate the basics of electrical circuits, then that is not a problem. Otherwise you should get a children's book on electrical fundamentals to go along with the kit. The kits are sometimes hard to get in the States but worth the trouble.

OTHER IDEAS:
Legos. These need no explanation and are really good for geeks of all ages. Even adult geeks use them as components in experiments and prototypes. Plus they're always fun to play with. Since geeks like to be creative, don't bother with a specific kit just buy them a whole Tub o' bricks so their imagination can run wild.

Books. Like a lot of other young geeks, my favorite book to look through during late elementary school was National Geographic's Universe. Now we know much more about astronomy, and the information in the book is out of date. The closest thing to this currently seems to be DK's Universe: The Definitive Visual Guide. The publisher DK also has a lot of well illustrated books that elementary school aged geeks should enjoy (and I wish were available when I was that age), such as Dinosaur, Pirate, and the DK Illustrated Family Encyclopedia. The new The Dangerous Book for Boys/The Daring Book for Girls pair of books make a great gift for the young boy or girl geek (respectively) and can also be enjoyed by older readers.

Basic Hand Tools. Build something with them or take something apart. Geeks are tool users. Whether it is a camera or oscilloscope geeks will be using tools their whole lives. Get young geeks started with some basic tools and teach them how to use them correctly and care for them (if you don't know, this is a good opportunity to learn). Build something with them. The Craftsman Kids Club is a good place to get project ideas. Then take apart some broken appliances with them. Teach them to put the removed parts aside in a neat fashion so they know how to reassemble it. Just make sure they understand to only take apart approved junk or you will find your favorite household items in pieces one day!

Gardening Kit. Something else geeks need is patience, and there's nothing that builds that like watching grass grow. Yes, I am serious.

MIDDLE SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS
TOP CHOICE: A GEEK LIBRARY STARTER KIT
The centerpiece of this should be Advice to a Young Scientist by P.B. Medawar, the old Dress for Success and Live for Success books by John T. Molloy, and Paul Graham's Hackers and Painters. Geeks often develop problems with social skills and grooming or dressing habits. The last three books approach these topics from a geek perspective and so their explanations of things will resonate with a geek reader. I have a link to some of Graham's short essays in the monographs section of the blogroll. Reading the essays What You'll Wish You'd Known and Why Nerds are Unpopular will give you a taste of his writing. The information in these books can save an adolescent geek a lot of heartache (but not all of it). You'll probably have to get the Molloy books used from some place like Amazon.com or Bookfinder, but they are worth the trouble to track down. While you are at it you might also try to get for yourself a copy of his book How to Work the Competition Into the Ground for even more geeky analysis of human nature. Regardless of what Molloy says about business fashion, discourage them from carrying a briefcase to school. Molloy's books are good because his method of looking at human interactions will appeal to and make sense to a young geek, not because business fashion advice is appropriate for school. Medawar's book was intended for aspiring scientists, but it is a good preview of what young geeks can expect from life in any technical field.

Don't get them biographies of famous geeks. Most of the famous geeks' contemporaries didn't understand them so a modern liberal arts graduate is not likely to either. Instead, get them autobiographies and other books written by famous geeks. Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman by Richard Feynman, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin, and My Life and Work by Henry Ford are good starters.

For periodicals, get them a subscription to Make Magazine, Craft Magazine, Popular Mechanics and/or Popular Science. Some older geeks may turn their noses up last two “popular” magazines, but they are fun reading for younger geeks.For fiction, get them any of the Mad Scientist Club books by Bertrand R. Brinley. At least one of Robert Heinlein's "juvenile novels" should be included; Tunnel in the Sky is a good choice. And, of course, you'll want to get them C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia books if they didn't already get them in elementary school.

For reference get them the Boy Scout Handbook or Cadette Girl Scout Handbook (even if they aren't a scout)and Asimov's Chronology of the World.

For audio/visual material, get them a Smartflix gift certificate so they can check out do-it-yourself DVDs on any topic that catches their interest.

Except for the fiction, some of these items may seem too advanced for geeks of this age. Kids like to get a glimpse of the adult world, and can understand a lot more complicated material than they are usually given credit for. Also, this material should stay in their personal libraries their entire lives and it is better for them to get it "too soon" and then go back and re-read the material later when they need it (saying to themselves suddenly "Ah, that's why they wrote that!") than to get it too late to do them any good.

OTHER IDEAS
Advanced Lego or Brainbox Kits. By now the young geek should be ready to tackle some of the more complicated Technic Lego kits and/or the advanced Brainbox kit. It is a little hard to wrap, but you could let your geek make their own Custom Lego Creation and pay for the pieces needed to make it. Really, this is a good gift even into geek adulthood.

Models. Train, Rocket, Car, Airplane, whatever they're into. Start with simple ones unless they have experience.

Hobby Tools. This could be anything from cooking utensils to camping gear to computer hardware depending on what hobbies the young geek is interested in. There is the temptation to skimp on kid's hobby tools because they are more likely to lose them, break them, or leave them in the back of the closet when their interests suddenly change. The problem is that if you get them items of too low quality their frustration at getting things to work can drive them away from an otherwise interesting endeavor, and does not promote the habits of caring for one's tools. It is generally better to get fewer basic tools of a reputable (though not necessarily luxurious) brand than a complete set of cheap crap. If they stick with the hobby, then they can expand beyond the basics. If they change hobbies, as is common with young geeks sampling many interests, then the fewer quality tools take less room in the back of the closet than a whole set of cheap ones.

Observational Equipment. Telescope, Microscope, Camera, etc. They should be mature enough not to break them now. These should be bought with the same attitude as hobby tools: A workhorse introductory model from a reputable source, not too cheap, but not extravagant and complex either.

A Class on Touch Typing. If they get fast enough typing by the "hunt and peck" method then they will never learn the even faster method of typing correctly. For a computer user the skill is an amazing timesaver.

Gift Certificates: Good places to get gift certificates for young geeks include comic book stores and gaming stores. The fashion for items in these categories change fast enough that it's best to give them the gift certificates and let them pick whatever their friends are reading/playing.

Games: Despite what I said earlier about getting gift certificates, Cheapass games make good stocking stuffers.

HIGH SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS
TOP CHOICE: HEWLETT PACKARD GRAPHING SCIENTIFIC CALCULATOR WITH RPN
In high-school science classes the young geek will have to give his calculator a considerable workout. Get him started on the right foot by buying him a calculator capable of using reverse polish notation (abbreviated RPN). Once mastered, this system speeds complex calculations and gives them an edge on math-intensive tests. If the young geek goes into a calculation-intensive career, then knowing how to use reverse polish notation will literally save them many man-weeks of effort over their lifetime! This is the reason that the RPN capable Hewlett Packard calculator is almost a badge of office for engineers. Learning to use a reverse polish notation calculator is easy, and will take only an hour or so of doing calculations that way before it seems natural. Old habits die hard, however, and a geek that learns to use a complex traditional graphing calculator in school may be hesitant to adopt the superior RPN system just because he "grew up" with the slower method. This will put the non-RPN using geek at a disadvantage in college when competing against their RPN-calculator-using peers. When they finally switch to RPN they will curse themselves for having wasted so much time doing it the hard way in their youth. Most high-school students won't know enough about calculators to request an RPN capable calculator, so you'll have to give it to them. Hewlett Packard is one of the few companies to make RPN calculators, and until the Hydrix Qonos is built the only one currently doing so. Fortunately, HP calculators have a great reputation among geeks. Unfortunately Texas Instruments has such a powerful marketing group that some schools may actually require students to get a non-RPN-capable Texas Instruments graphing calculator instead. Consider getting them both if you have to. If the young geek takes a calculation-intensive college major or career, then the skill at RPN will be worth the investment. The least expensive RPN choice is the HP-33s, but it doesn't have graphing capability that some classes will claim to require. The least expensive RPN graphing calculator is the HP-48gii and is a perfectly good calculator for even advanced geeks. Many users actually even prefer the older, discontinued version of the HP-48 model line because they think it has better ergonomics, a proven track-record of ruggedness (a feature useful to a geek who does field work and expects his calculator to be a lifetime investment), and a well developed collection of after-market accessories. These users go through the trouble of tracking down used ones instead of buying the newer HP models. Of course most geeks have a soft spot for the 'latest and greatest' gadget which for RPN calculators is the HP-50G. In addition to an RPN calculator, you might also get them additional documentation to help them more quickly master it.

OTHER IDEAS:
Video Game Consoles: Yes, everybody's asking for a PS3, Wii, or Xbox360. If you have a real electronics or computer geek, then get them their own build-it-yourself game console kit. Unfortunately the build-it-yourself handheld game kit is sold out right now.

Electronics kit. Heathkit is gone, but there are still companies making hobby kits for electronics geeks.

Books and Magazines. Make Magazine, Craft Magazine, Smithsonian Magazine, and/or Discover Magazine. If they don't already have the non-fiction books mentioned in the MIDDLE SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS section above, then those are excellent choices. Science fiction (as opposed to space opera) is typically very popular with geeks, and some geeky science fiction authors are Heinlein, Asimov, Brinley, Pournelle, Niven, Gerrold, Stephenson, Forward, Taylor, Turtledove, Crichton, Clarke, and Clarke. Fantasy can still be fun and it's hard to go wrong with Tolkien's Lord of the Rings books. If they liked Chronicles of Narnia then get them some of C.S. Lewis's more obscure works like Out of the Silent Planet, Present Concerns, The Screwtape Letters, or Till We Have Faces. Even though it is not often thought of as science fiction, C.S. Forrester's series of books about the fictional British Naval officer (and model for James T. Kirk) Horatio Hornblower will probably appeal to geeks and science fiction fans as much as if they had been set in deep space instead of on the high seas. There is also a Horatio Hornblower A&E series available but I recommend seeing it after reading the books, and I also recommend reading the books in the order they were written instead of the order they occur. With non-fiction it is generally better to get them books by other geeks (though not necessarily ones that are in the same field of interest as the reader) than to get them popular books. Consider buying them a copy of some geeky classic works, especially in their field of interest. Modern textbooks distill and filter the great works of geek history to make them more easily digested. That's fine for educating the bulk of the population, but geeks often gain insights from the original source materials that are missing from the reprocessed, regurgitated version told to schoolchildren. Bookfinder is a good source for used versions of these, and you can sometimes get antique printings of geek classics in good condition for surprisingly low prices. Additional good nonfiction books to consider are the massive McGraw-Hill Concise Encyclopedia of Science & Technology, the even larger The Engineering Handbook, the old How to Lie With Statistics, and the more recent How to Lie With Maps. If you don't know what books to get, just click on a few of the links and buy them. All of the links here lead to books that I and/or other geeks I know consider both good and of broad appeal despite their sometimes specialized topics. Geeks generally have diverse taste and usually love reading a wide variety of books.

Legos. Mindstorms or a Custom Lego Creation.

Gift certificates. Gift certificates are gaining in popularity as gifts, but there are still some people who view it as a "last minute" or "half @$$#)" gift. Ignore those people and consider giving gift certificates for geek hobby related presents. They are not only appreciated when they are received, they are also appreciated later when the recipient uses them to get exactly the item that they want and that you would never have thought of. Unless the geek you are shopping for has specifically mentioned some item that they need but haven't gotten yet or you share the same hobby, then odds are you will not be able to pick out good hobby related gifts for a geek. The chances that you can find some item that your geek friend or relative would really find useful in his hobby but that he doesn't know about are microscopic. Reading Internet or catalog ads and talking to salesmen or co-workers that have an uncle who knows something aren't going to help you. Instead of getting them that gadget that they either already have or that they passed up because they know the manufacture has a reputation for overpriced, unreliable junk just get them a gift certificate from their favorite hardware store, computer store, hobby shop, gun store, comic book and game shop, cooking store, camera shop, bookstore, camping store, Warehouse 23, or from Smartflix . They will appreciate it a lot (geeks are practical that way).

One potential problem with gift cards, as Tyler from Marginal Revolutions has observed, is that they can cost more than the value of the card! A geeky solution to this is to give stamps instead of gift cards or cash. They are usually prettier than gift cards and unlike cash they can show that you put some thought into the gift. Plus, everybody needs stamps. There are some really neat geeky stamps that you could give. For an economics geek, give them a book of forever stamps and ask the recipient what the rate of return on them will be. Another geek stamp gift you can give is to combine a photograph of the recipient, a little elbow grease with Photoshop, and the U.S. Post Office’s custom stamp program to create a fake (though perfectly legal) plate of Great American series stamps in commemoration of your favorite young geek’s future accomplishments. The custom stamp idea still winds up with a higher cost than monetary value, but sometimes money isn’t everything.

Games. Cheapass games, Settlers of Catan, Puerto Rico, and the aforementioned gift certificates.

COLLEGE AGE AND OLDER GEEKS
TOP CHOICE: TECHNICAL CLUB OR PROFESSIONAL SOCIETY MEMBERSHIP
Geeks are sometimes stereotyped as loners. Any technically demanding activity, however, requires a social support structure for exchanging ideas and expertise. These technical clubs and societies are also important for making friends with common interests, finding mentors to provide advice and moral support, and making connections for doing business and smoothing career advancement. Membership in at least one technical society or club in a geek's field of interest is a huge asset if they take advantage of it for more than just the free newsletter. Encourage college aged geeks to join their professional society or hobby club by offering to pay for their membership fee. Fortunately most professional societies offer discounts for student membership. There are hobby clubs for just about every possible avocation. Here is a partial list of professional societies in engineering and science. If you really want to splurge, pay their way to a convention, swap-meet, or conference on their favorite pass-time.

OTHER IDEAS:
Most all of the ideas suggested in the HIGH SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS section above, especially including books and gift certificates, are also good for college age and older geeks. Additionally, by this time most geeks should be worldly enough to appreciate the classic work on organizational behavior, Parkinson's Law by C. Northcote Parkinson.

Toys. Adult geeks can get nostalgic and often have less qualms about seeming immature about their quirks. As a result toys are often a good gift for adult geeks. Thinkgeek has a good selection, but they are missing some essentials like the Magic 8ball. Silly Putty, Etch-a-Sketch, Easy Bake Ovens, or toy guns. And don't forget the Legos and Brainboxes.

Classic Items. Despite being stereotyped as liking only the latest "high tech" developments, most geeks actually have a soft spot for classic devices (especially those they can use in their field or everyday life). Good "classic" gifts for geeks include slide rules, pocket knives, pens (I prefer pencils myself), watches, pistols and rifles (for shooters), 22lr pistols (even non-shooters should at least have a .22), home electronics, clothes, lighters, cameras, games, and games. The key element is not age itself or kitsch, but instead the appreciation for a design that is so streamlined or ingenious combined with such quality workmanship that a product is nearly perfect and needs no changes. As a result items that are new but still well-enough designed and made that they are likely to become "future classics" are often just as appreciated. Some of the new pocket flashlights are good examples of this.

Disaster preparedness kits. Guys in general, but guy geeks especially have some attraction to planning for disasters. Perhaps it is something primal that goes back to when life was a constant struggle against nature and other tribes. Buy them a pocket multitool, small survival tin, emergency pouch, "bugout bag" or roadside survival kit. Even if they don't secretly enjoy imagining themselves rebuilding civilization, they will appreciate the gift the next time the weather turns bad. Get them some classic survival fiction to read while waiting for the end of the world as we know it. Whatever survival kit you give (or keep) I suggest adding Stainwipes for 'emergencies' of the more mundane type. Also, you can get one of those vacuum sealers and seal up a pair of clean socks, underwear, and handtowel. They will seem like an amazing luxury when the recipient is soaking wet and away from home.

And for really hard-core geeks, get them their very own lab coat and safety glasses.

If you liked this list, you may also like my geek vacation ideas.

christmas gifts , geek+gift , hacker+gifts , gift+guide

Online Movie Recommendation 21

2007-12-11T05:02:00.001-08:00

This week's move recommendation is a tribute to the late Dr. Robert Bussard.

Google has said that they want to do for renewable energy what they did for search engines. Winds of Change suggests that means its time to short Google stock, because they are throwing money and brainpower at technologies which have already seen a lot of work and therefore are unlikely to have any undiscovered "low hanging fruit" that would allow a quick breakthrough. I agree in general, but there is a renewable energy technology that has the potential for a revolutionary breakthrough with the sort of resources Google could bring to bear. And they ought to know about it because Dr. Bussard explained it to them:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1996321846673788606

It's a shame that they are throwing more money at wind power instead of inertial electrostatic confinement fusion.

Warning: This talk is more technical than my usual recommendations, but you don't need to understand the nuclear engineering to grasp the potential of what Dr. Bussard is talking about.

Online Movie Recommendation 20

2007-09-26T11:04:00.000-07:00

This is video of an amazing piece of furniture by the design firm DB Fletcher. My congratulations to the designer(s).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKEOYfYQO08

If Moms Ruled the World There Would be No Rules in War

2007-09-24T10:45:00.000-07:00

At the Emmy Awards earlier this month Sally Field made the claim that if mothers ruled the world there would be no war. (hattip: Michelle Malkin)

This outrageous claim by an actress at an awards show has generated a surprising (at least to me) amount of commentary in the non-moonbat blogosphere. Dr. Helen ends her column on the topic with the question:

"What do you think, would the world really be better off if moms ran it?"

If the world was run by democracies of mothers, then it would be different in a way that the majority of mothers would describe as "more protective" and "more stable" and "fairer" and "better regulated", but which others (especially young men) would describe "suffocating" and "stifling" and "stagnant" and especially "oppressive." I would be in the camp that called it "oppressive."

I think that wars in particular would be much worse and much bloodier if moms ran the world. To support this assertion I offer this quote from C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity in which he defends the Christian doctrine of husbands being the head of the family:

"The relations of the family to the outer world -what might be called its foreign policy- must depend, in the last resort, upon the man, because he always ought to be, and usually is, much more just to the outsiders. A woman is primarily fighting for her own children and husband against the rest of the world. Naturally, almost, in a sense, rightly, their claims override, for her, all other claims. She is the special trustee of their interests. The function of the husband is to see that this natural preference of hers is not given its head. He has the last word in order to protect other people from the intense family patriotism of the wife. If anyone doubts this, let me ask a simple question. If your dog has bitten the child next door, or if your child has hurt the dog next door, which would you sooner have to deal with, the master of the house or the mistress? Or, if you are a married woman, let me ask you this question. Much as you admire your husband, would you not say that his chief failing is his tendency not to stick up for his rights and yours against the neighbours as vigorously as you would like? A bit of an Appeaser?

If mothers ran the nations of the world then I believe wars would be waged without quarter or mercy, as the mothers would be fighting for the survival and prosperity of their children... to hell with the children of the enemy. Please do not take this to be an insult against mothers or motherhood. Thank God for mothers. I only mean that a world with too much feminine influence is as much a dystopia as one with too little. Anything, in too high a dose, can become a poison. Even a mother's love. If you doubt this, then ask yourself C.S. Lewis's question. If your dog has bitten the child next door, or if your child has hurt the dog next door, which would you sooner have to deal with, the master of the house or the mistress?

CS+Lewis Sally+Field mothers motherhood war

Conservatives Failing to Follow Fashion

2007-09-17T06:25:00.001-07:00

There has been a new psychology study (hattip: Slate) that demonstrates Liberals are able to change their behavior more quickly than Conservatives when they are instructed to. Liberal news media are claiming that this study demonstrates Liberals are better judges of facts than Conservatives are because they change their habits more easily.

When, after decades of being a workers paradise, Communism suddenly became a miserable and murderous (and unfashionable!) failure Liberals were very quick to abandon it in favor of the newer and more hip philosophy of Environmentalism and the science of Gaia Worship. Those slow-moving Conservatives haven't even gotten around to embracing Communism yet. Even after Liberals have abandon Environmentalism for the next ideological sure thing, those stogy Conservatives will, no doubt, still be clinging to 18th Century ideas of Liberty and Property Rights and Constitutional Republics.

It's like they just don't learn at all. Though, who 'they' is in the previous sentence might be up for debate.

A New Oxymoron

2007-09-17T05:40:00.001-07:00

Organic Sea Salt

Online Movie Recommendation 19

2007-09-12T05:41:00.000-07:00

This week's* online movie recommendation is from the collection of interesting videos at TED. It is a talk by engineer Amy Smith about her work to invent technologies that will improve the lives of impoverished foreigners:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/2

I have long thought that the $100 laptop idea was foolish. Not because it wouldn't be nice to give poor kids a free laptop, but rather because applying that same amount of money and brainpower to "lower hanging fruit" could do so much more to improve the lives of the world's poor than can be done by handing them a laptop. I understand how the researchers working on the $100 laptop can get caught up in the romance of their idea, but they seem to have forgotten the basic definition of engineering: An engineer is someone who can do with one dollar what any bungler could do with two dollars. Mr. Negroponte's $100 laptop will do a lot of good for the children of the world. I think Ms. Smith is doing for $10 a lot more to help poor children than Mr. Negroponte will do with his $100 laptop. I also expect that alot of the poor children given a free laptop will sell them on the black market for much less than they are worth in order to buy things that their family needs even more, and that no amount of making it look distinctive will stop that. Ms. Smith's project, on the other hand, seems well targeted to do lots of good for the amount of money spent. Imagine what good Ms. Smith could do if she had Mr. Negroponte's budget... but philanthropists want to look cool too, and charcoal presses are not nearly as hip as computers.

*I know I've been lax on online movie recommedations for a couple of years, but I am going to reinstate it as a weekly/roundtuit feature.

$100+laptop , TED

Maybe the Stork Brings Them

2007-08-30T08:43:00.000-07:00

Instapundit and other bloggers have been giving the New York Times a hard time over the fact that their editors claimed in an article that "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" are constitutional rights. The phrase comes, of course, from the Declaration of Independence and not the U.S. Constitution. Everyone else seems to assume that the Times editors mislabeled the phrase as constitutional rights because they are either ignorant of what the U.S. Constitution actually says or because they are ignorant of what the phrase "constitutional right" means. I'm not so sure that they chose the incorrect label of "constitutional right" out of ignorance. I wonder if perhaps the New York Times editors did it so that they would not be forced to write the phrase "God given rights" (or the more technically correct "Creator endowed rights"). After all, if it is not written in the constitution then where else can a New York Times editor claim that our rights come from? Jefferson given rights? Declarational rights?

Maybe they think it is better for them to write a small deliberate mis-statement than to open the door to something they think is worse. I'm just grateful they didn't write something like "UN mandated rights" or "Fundamental rights, duties and guarantees of the working class."

NY Times

New Rules for Golf

2007-08-22T05:26:00.000-07:00

Improvements in technology provide both opportunities and challenges to traditional sports and games. How those sports incorporate new technology into their rules has a huge impact on their future. Tennis embraced advanced materials and, for good or ill, it is no longer the same game as when it was played on natural surfaces with wooden raquets. Major league baseball rejected metal bats, but embraced the electric light. Now there is a new technological advance in golf that has the potential to change the very nature of the game. I am writing, of course, about the pink golf ball.

In order to take best advantage of the pink golf ball I propose the following two rule changes be made by the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews and the United States Golf Association:

The player who makes the shortest drive off the first teeing ground must substitute a pink ball for his normal ball and resume play.

A player with a pink ball must continue playing with the pink ball until another player hits a shorter drive off a subsequent teeing ground. At that time, the player with the pink ball may substitute his normal ball for the pink ball. The player who hit the shortest drive must substitute a pink ball for his normal colored ball and resume play.

I think these changes would improve the play and spirit of the game considerably.

golf technology

Machinegun Shaped Like a Purse

2007-08-01T07:22:00.000-07:00

The Instapundit asked if a machinegun shaped like a purse wouldn't be more useful than a purse shaped like a machinegun.

I don't know if it is really more useful, but the machinegun shaped like a purse sure looks a lot more fun.

Wondering about the Story Behind the Ipod Lightning Story

2007-07-19T06:50:00.000-07:00

I'm sure that by now most of our readers have seen the news story about the 'dangers' of wearing your ipod during a thunderstorm. What I find most interesting about this newsreport is not the story itself but rather speculating on the story behind the story of how this newsreport happened. The report also describes Micheal Utley, a former stockbroker and lightning victim who has created a website that, among other things, tracks lightning strike injuries involving personal electronics. The complete address for his website is included prominately in the newsreport. I don't think such free advertising happens by accident very often.

When I see a newsreport such as this one, I like to speculate on the chain of events that lead to its publication. Was the report done because someone thought it was really newsworthy, or to push some journalist's pet agenda, or because of a favor owed or given to some public figure, or just because it was easier for the reporter to dress up a press release from some PR firm or marketing dept. as a story than to spend all day researching and writing something original? Paul Graham (whose essays are linked to on the sidebar) has a really good essay on the extent to which the "news" that is reported is really driven by PR and marketing efforts. I have no inside information about this particular story, but I suspect that Mr. Utley was the initial driving force behind the story as a way to publicize his website.

Perhaps the out-of-work stockbroker got the idea as a result of his own experience with lightning, which was described in the article... He made the website collecting lightning stories, then waited for the next iPod user to get hit by a lightning strike. As soon as he heard news of a suitable new lightning strike he no doubt sent out his own press release, which was picked up by the news wires and reported as an interesting news story by papers and websites and radio stations all around the country. Mr. Utley's website got a lot of free publicity as a result of the story, and I'm sure he got plenty of web traffic as a result.

While I am reasonably confident in my guess that Mr. Utley is the driving force behind the appearance of the stories on the 'dangers' of iPod lightning strikes, there are other aspects that I wonder about. Did the initial reporter who picked up Mr. Utley's press release do it as a favor or did he do it because the info just caught his fancy on a slow news day? Is Mr. Utley driving traffic to his website just to sell ads on it, or sell the domain name itself, or is he perhaps hoping that if he makes enough noise about iPods being a lightning risk he can get Apple to pay him to shut down the website? Mr. Utley's website does not appear to take advertisers or endorse products, but it does accept donations and offer lightning related consulting services. I wonder if Mr. Utley will make enough money on this endeavor to justify the effort he put into it. Or am I being too cynical, and is it possible that this is a purely philanthropic endeavor? I also wonder if Mr. Utley was sober when he came up with the idea.

ipod, lightning, journalism, pr, marketing

Make the Robot Mow the Lawn

2007-04-17T13:35:00.000-07:00

Some of the writers at National Review have complained about people paying illegal aliens to mow their lawn instead of just making their kids do it (or possibly even doing it themselves). Reason Magazine makes the (in my opinion correct) case that people should be free to spend money to have work done that they do not want to do for themselves. Reason then (incorrectly in my opinion) tries to use this to support the immigration of a large number of poor people who will act as cheap labor to mow the lawns and perform domestic services for rest of us. Just because we do not want to mow our own lawns (or make our children do it) does not mean that we have to import a permanent underclass of servants to do it for us. Why don't we just make the robots mow our lawn for us?

This applies to a lot more than just lawn mowers. I would much rather import a law-abiding Scottish mechanical engineer, a Serbian electrical engineer, and/or an Indian computer scientist that would develop a robotic tomato picker whose manufacturing, sales, and maintenance will create thousands of good paying jobs for American workers than to either pay tens of thousands of imported low-skill foreigners who must live impoverished on the margins of our society or else go without my favorite vegetables because the high-wage domestic tomato pickers are not productive enough to keep their cost low.

It seems strange to me that in this day and age people do not understand where real improvements in a society's standard of living comes from. The writers at Reason magazine or National Review might protest that they are only ignorant liberal arts graduates, not tech-savvy engineers or scientists, so they should not be faulted for short-changing the state of the robotic lawn-mower industry. I don't think it's about understanding automation technology, so much as it is about having the wrong attitude about how things improve. If you had gone back to to the middle of the last century and polled the average comic-book reader about how they thought lawns would be mowed in the twenty-first century, I'll bet you'd get a very high percentage of kids saying "robots will do it" even though those kids would have known less about computers and robotics than even a Reason magazine editor of today. The difference is attitude. "Let's figure out how this can be done automatically" vs. "who can we push this unpleasant task off on or force to pay for it."

For most of our nation's life people have understood that if we all want to have more and better stuff in the future, then we have to figure out some way for each of us to have a higher productivity than we did in the past. And since the industrial revolution the use of automation has been a key element in making that improved productivity happen. The strange thing is that Reason article looks like it will make the point, but then completely misses it, when it says:

"We could mow our own lawns. We could also make our own candlesticks and churn our own butter."

They are correct. We don't churn our own butter anymore. But that isn't because we pushed the butter churning work off on some underclass or poor foreigners; we have machines that churn our butter now. If we humans insist on doing all the menial, repetitive, and unpleasant work of the world ourselves then we will be too busy with petty chores to make the advances in technology and art and humanities and science that will make the future a much better place than the past. Let's not squabble over which people get stuck with the crappy and low-paying jobs. Let the machines take care of the work that they do best, to free up all of us human workers for the nobler and more ambitious tasks before us.

immigration, productivity, robots

A Modern Day Athens?

2007-03-22T12:53:00.000-07:00

Reading a recent study of the European Union, http://engram-backtalk.blogspot.com/2007/03/making-case-for-european-utopian-ideal.html (hat tip: Daniel W. Drezner), brought to the forefront something that has been in my mind for a while. The countries of the EU have hidden under the defense umbrella of the United States since the beginning of the Cold War. Because of the US, no Soviet armored columns drove through the Fulda Gap. Because of the US, the Western Europeans remained free.

As the United States spent its treasure building its armed forces, the Western Europeans (who eventually united into the EU) spent their treasure on other things, mostly government programs chasing socialist dreams. So many years have past since these countries have had to defend themselves, most of them have forgotten how to do so. EU officials now speak of their enormous “soft power” of economic standing, and cultural and moral superiority. I am not sure why they think a warrant from the International Criminal Court, economic boycott or United Nations Resolution would stop a resurgent Russia (or anybody else) from simply rolling their tanks across EU borders and simply conquering the place, but apparently they do. I can’t see the future, such boycotts and warrants and resolutions may indeed prevent open warfare in Europe again, but I would hate to bet my life and the existence of my country on it. This exactly what the Europeans are doing now.

But I sometimes wonder, was this America’s plan in the first place? Is America a modern day Athens leading a modern day Delian League?

The Delian League was formed in 477 BC by Greek city-states to protect themselves against the Persian Empire after the Persians were finally driven from Greece (about a year after the battle of Thermopylae seen in the recent movie ‘300’). At the beginning, Athens was the leader of the League and each city contributed ships, men and treasure to strengthen the League’s military power. As time passed, Athens came to contribute more ships and men, encouraging the other cities to simply contribute treasure. More years passed and soon only Athens and her closest allies maintained any real armed forces, the other city-states were defenseless, relying on the League for protection.

With the only military around, Athens started to use the League for its own purposes, taking its treasure to build-up their city and increase its wealth. When the other cities protested, Athens ignored them. Some tried to leave the League, which didn’t make Athens very happy. Her forces would swoop down on these cities and ravage them, forcing the survivors back into the League and intimidating the other cities from leaving.

Why didn’t the other cities simply unite, and smash the now tyrannical Athens? Because they couldn’t as they no longer had any military power. For years they had avoided protecting themselves, happy to provide treasure to the Athenians, who built up their own military and watched it grow in strength and experience. When the Athenians eventually became tyrants, the other cities of the League had nothing to oppose them with.

Fast forward to today. Was America’s purpose in creating NATO to emasculate the Europeans? We volunteered to provide the shield under which Europe could grow, without forcing them to spend their funds on a military. We received our reward: vibrant markets to sell our goods and services, thereby strengthening our country. Meanwhile, the European militaries shrank and shrank. Now, they are hollow shells of their former selves. Does anyone think they could even begin to challenge America today?

I can’t think of any reasons why America would become a tyrant (and note: when I say a tyrant, I mean to other countries, not to her own people. The free citizens of Athens were just as free at the beginning of the Delian League as they were at its end). Of course, I am sure that the leaders of those city-states that joined the Delian League back in 477 B.C. thought that Athens would never become tyrannical as well.

Which brings me back to my original question: was the formation of NATO a way to cement America’s dominance of the world? Maybe not intentionally, but it sure looks like it worked out that way to me.

Is Bush a Pushover Boss?

2007-03-02T17:17:00.000-08:00

I checked out this article at Wired News (hat tip:Galactic Interactions) about the Real ID act. Over at Galactic Interactions, Dr. Knop seems to think that the Federal government mandating standards for state driver's licenses (which the states have until the year 2010 to comply with) is a sure sign "that the US is rapidly degenerating into an authoritarian police state." It looks to me like this is not an intrusion by the Federal Gov't on Individual Liberty. It looks to me like it is an intrusion by the Federal Gov't on State's Rights. The trampling of state's rights is hardly a conservative or right-wing position, but I must admit that if I recall my history correctly it was one of the founding principles of the Republican Party.

This move by the federal executive branch is sort of the "straw that breaks the camels back" and has motivated me to describe one of my biggest complaints about President Bush's management of the federal government. I've been meaning to post on it for a long time, and now is as good a time as any.

It seems to me that President Bush believes it is his job as a leader to be a champion for his organization and see to it that his team has everything they need to succeed. I'm sure they taught him crap like that in Harvard. So it seems to me like 9-11 happened and he went to "his team" in the federal executive branch and asked them what they needed to fight WW4^H^H^H the War on Terror. And the federal bureaucrats and regulators and agencies wasted no time in putting together a wish list of every power and tax and meddling authority and gadget and new office space that they have wanted for a long time. And I think he "whittled that down" to get rid of the obvious fat (like forcing the ATF to make do with a $33,000 dollar conference table in their new HQ instead of the $65,000 one they wanted) and then "went to bat for his team." I'm sure the bureaucrats had some really convincing arguments and examples and heartwrenching stories and that President Bush really believes that he needs to get these wish list items for "his team" in the Federal Executive Branch so they can do their jobs.

My problem with that is President Bush is not managing the Texas Rangers baseball team anymore. He's now an elected official. I don't want my elected officials to think of the bureaucrats they oversee as "their team." I want them to think of the rest of the citizens as their team and the bureaucrats and regulators and agents that they oversee as their enemy. I don't want a politician to champion government organizations to me and the other citizens; I want him to be a champion of the citizen's rights and liberties to (or more accurately over) the government organizations. I don't want him to try and keep the government organizations and government employees happy and well-fed; I want him to keep them lean and under control.

I think President Bush means well and thinks that he's doing what a good manager should do. But in fighting to fulfill the wish-list of a power-hungry bureaucracy he is being a "champion" of the wrong team. I don't dispute that some of the things that he has done to help fight the War on Terror are needed. The FBI should be able to do the same kind of open source research as any citizen journalist. The intel and military did need more money and transformation. I just wish that he would be more skeptical of the wish list items government agencies ask for from him. I wish that he would have cleared out a lot of deadwood and statists, and yes appointees and hires by previous administrations. I think that he would have had a lot less problems with in-fighting and leaks and deliberate sabotage and inter-agency squabbles if he had done like MOST presidents do and followed Andrew Jackson's advice about periodically cleaning house and flushing the toilet on bureaucrats and government agencies.

At least he should have done less "standing by his team" and giving them a chance to learn from their mistakes after 9-11, and done more house-cleaning and head-rolling. Has anyone, anywhere lost their job over allowing the 9-11 attacks to occur undetected or any other mistakes they have made? I think most citizens wanted some accounting of blame to be done and some firings and punishments meted out. I think that if the president had seen himself as a public champion instead of team captain of the Federal gov't, that we would have seen some firings and shake-ups in the intelligence and counter-intelligence services. I certainly don't think that a skeptical and frugal public servant should have given the Medal of Freedom to CIA director Tenet after 9-11 happened on his watch. What message does that send? I suspect that Bush thinks it sends the message that "he'll back the people who work for him if they try their best." I am afraid it really sends the message of "no matter how bad you screw up your job is secure." I know that if there was blame-storming done after 9-11 that some people would have been scapegoated unfairly. Being a fair and understanding boss, I guess that President Bush didn't want that to happen; he probably wanted to give people a chance to learn from their mistakes. You know what... Thosands of people died. Frankly, I don't care if a few dozen well-paid government employees get chewed out and fired unfairly as long as it instills a little fear among the remaining government employees that they could, maybe, just possibly be held accountable to the citizens of the country for their job performance.

I don't think this affliction of President Bush's is limited to the War on Terror. I think one of the reasons he has not behaved like a small-government, fiscal conservative is that he gets emotionally invested in the people in government and he becomes pre-disposed to believe what they tell him about the important work they are doing for the country and what they need to keep doing it… instead of being instinctively skeptical of how they are spending the public's money and what power they want to wield over the citizenry who elected him. This intrusion of the federal executive into the affairs of the state's executive branches is just another example of him letting the federal government get their wish list instead being a watchdog to keep them from overstepping the limits on their proper authority. Look, maybe it's a great idea and maybe the states really do need to update and standardize their ID cards… I admit that I don't know about that. But isn't that what our state legislatures and state executive branches are for? That and stuff like… I don't know… running the education system?

Unfortunately if there is anyone even more eager to be representatives of the Federal Government to the people instead of the people's oversight of the Federal Government, it would be the Democrats, so I don't look to the Democratic congress to rein in on President Bush's weak tendencies on this issue. Lest anyone think that I am just another victim of Bush Derangement Syndrome, I want to point out that I am not piling on President Bush for any political gain. I don't think he is stupid, or poorly educated. I don't think he is a war criminal or a fascist or a would-be-theocrat. I think that the mistakes he is making are very common in our culture for managers of all levels both in and out of government. And I think that as bad as he has suffered from this managerial deficiency, either Al Gore or John Kerry would have been worse. I just wish that he would, as they say in Texas, "ride herd" over the federal employees, agents, and organizations under his authority instead of being their friend. I'm glad I finally sat down and got that off my chest.

real+id, bush, states+rights

Gift Guide for Real Geeks of all Ages

2006-12-17T20:56:00.000-08:00

There's only one week left before Christmas, if you need help searching for last minute gifts for that special geek (or if you are through with Christmas this year and are looking ahead), then I have some recommendations for you. Most geek gift guides are really gift guides for early adopters with rich friends. Or for rich friends of early adopters. This is an attempt at a guide for buying gifts for makers, hackers, real geeks, and other Sons of Martha (amateur and professional alike). I have categorized the entries by age group and highlighted one gift in each category. If anyone has good recommendations for geek gifts that I did not include, please add them in the comments. I'll try to maintain this as a useful resource for geek gift givers.

LATE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS
TOP CHOICE: A BRAIN BOX KIT.
The top choice for this first age group is a Brain Box electronics kit. It is like Legos for electronics. The principle is similar to those old "101 electrical experiments" kits but with one key improvement. The components are molded into handy, color-coded, plastic building blocks. These building blocks have metal snaps on the end that both hold the circuits together and provide the electrical connection necessary. This battery-powered circuit building kit is a great way to introduce young geeks to the fundamentals of electricity without needing solder or breadboards. Embedding the electrical components in big colorful building blocks make it unlikely that they will be lost or have their leads broken off. Both of which are a real possibility with young experimenters. The one disadvantage is that the manual does not explain the principles behind the circuits well enough for my taste. If the experiment kit is going to be used by a parent or other older geek to illustrate the basics of electrical circuits, then that is not a problem. Otherwise you should get a children's book on electrical fundamentals to go along with the kit. The kits are sometimes hard to get in the States but worth the trouble.

OTHER IDEAS:
Legos. These need no explanation and are really good for geeks of all ages. Even adult geeks use them as components in experiments and prototypes. Plus they're always fun to play with. Since geeks like to be creative, don't bother with a specific kit just buy them a whole Tub o' bricks so their imagination can run wild.

Basic Hand Tools. Build something with them or take something apart. Geeks are tool users. Whether it is a camera or an oscilloscope geeks will be using tools their whole lives. Get young geeks started with some basic tools and teach them how to use them correctly and care for them (if you don't know, this is a good opportunity to learn). Build something with them. The Craftsman Kids Club is a good place to get project ideas. Then take apart some broken appliances with them. Teach them to put the removed parts aside in a neat fashion so they know how to reassemble it. Just make sure they understand to only take apart approved junk or you will find your favorite household items in pieces one day!

Gardening Kit. Something else geeks need is patience, and there's nothing that builds that like watching grass grow. Yes, I am serious.

Books. Like a lot of other young geeks, my favorite book to look through during late elementary school was National Geographic's Universe. Now we know much more about astronomy, and the information in the book is out of date. The closest thing to this currently seems to be DK's Universe: The Definitive Visual Guide. The publisher DK also has a lot of well illustrated books that elementary school aged geeks should enjoy (and I wish were available when I was that age), such as Dinosaur, Pirate, and the DK Illustrated Family Encyclopedia.

MIDDLE SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS
TOP CHOICE: A GEEK LIBRARY STARTER KIT
The centerpiece of this should be Advice to a Young Scientist by P.B. Medawar, the old Dress for Success and Live for Success books by John T. Molloy, and Paul Graham's Hackers and Painters. Geeks often develop problems with social skills and grooming or dressing habits. The last three books approach these topics from a geek perspective and so their explanations of things will resonate with a geek reader. I have a link to some of Graham's short essays in the monographs section of the blogroll. Reading the essays What You'll Wish You'd Known and Why Nerds are Unpopular will give you a taste of his writing. The information in these books can save an adolescent geek a lot of heartache (but not all of it). You'll probably have to get the Molloy books used from some place like Amazon.com or Bookfinder, but they are worth the trouble to track down. While you are at it you might also try to get a copy of his book How to Work the Competition Into the Ground for even more geeky analysis of human nature. Regardless of what Molloy says about business fashion, discourage them from carrying a briefcase to school. Molloy's books are good because his method of looking at human interactions will appeal to and make sense to a young geek, not because business fashion advice is appropriate for school. Medawar's book was intended for aspiring scientists, but it is a good preview of what young geeks can expect from life in any technical field.

Don't get them biographies of famous geeks. Most of the famous geeks' contemporaries didn't understand them so a modern liberal arts graduate is not likely to either. Instead, get them autobiographies and other books written by famous geeks. Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman by Richard Feynman, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin, and My Life and Work by Henry Ford are good starters.

For periodicals, get them a subscription to Make Magazine and/or Popular Science. Popular Science is like the People Magazine of geeks, but is fun reading for youngsters.

For fiction, get them any of the Mad Scientist Club books by Bertrand R. Brinley. At least one of Robert Heinlein's "juvenile novels" should be included; Tunnel in the Sky is a good choice. And, of course, you'll want to get them C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia books if they didn't already get them in elementary school.

For reference get them the Boy Scout Handbook or Cadette Girl Scout Handbook (even if they aren't a scout)and Asimov's Chronology of the World.

For audio/visual material, get them a Smartflix gift certificate so they can check out do-it-yourself DVDs on any topic that catches their interest.

Except for the fiction, some of these items may seem too advanced for geeks of this age. Kids like to get a glimpse of the adult world, and can understand a lot more complicated material than they are usually given credit for. Also, this material should stay in their personal libraries their entire lives and it is better for them to get it "too soon" and then go back and re-read the material later when they need it (saying to themselves suddenly "Ah, that's why they wrote that!") than to get it too late to do them any good.

OTHER IDEAS
A Custom Lego Kit. It is a little hard to wrap, but you could let your geek make their own Custom Lego Creation and pay for the pieces needed to make it. Really, this is a good gift even into geek adulthood.

Models. Train, Rocket, Car, Airplane, whatever they're into. Start with simple ones unless they have experience.

Hobby Tools. This could be anything from cooking utensils to camping gear to computer hardware depending on what hobbies the young geek is interested in. There is the temptation to skimp on kid's hobby tools because they are more likely to loose them, break them, or leave them in the back of the closet when their interests suddenly change. The problem is that if you get them items of too low quality their frustration at getting things to work can drive them away from an otherwise interesting endeavor, and does not promote the habits of caring for one's tools. It is generally better to get fewer basic tools of a reputable (though not necessarily luxurious) brand than a complete set of cheap crap. If they stick with the hobby, then they can expand beyond the basics. If they change hobbies, as is common with young geeks sampling many interests, then the fewer quality tools take less room in the back of the closet than a whole set of cheap ones.

Observational Equipment. Telescope, Microscope, Camera, etc. They should be mature enough not to break them now. These should be bought with the same attitude as hobby tools: A workhorse introductory model from a reputable source, not too cheap, but not extravagant and complex either.

A Class on Touch Typing. If they get fast enough typing by the "hunt and peck" method then they will never learn the even faster method of typing correctly. For a computer user the skill is an amazing timesaver.

Gift Certificates: Good places to get gift certificates for young geeks include comic book stores and gaming stores. The fashion for items in these categories change fast enough that it's best to give them the gift certificates and let them pick whatever their friends are reading/playing.

Games: Despite what I said earlier about getting gift certificates, Cheapass games make good stocking stuffers.

HIGH SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS
TOP CHOICE: HEWLETT PACKARD GRAPHING SCIENTIFIC CALCULATOR WITH RPN
In high-school science classes the young geek will have to give his calculator a considerable workout. Get him started on the right foot by buying him a calculator capable of using reverse polish notation (abbreviated RPN). Once mastered, this system speeds complex calculations and gives them an edge on math-intensive tests. If the young geek goes into a calculation-intensive career, then knowing how to use reverse polish notation will literally save them many man-weeks of effort over their lifetime! This is the reason that the RPN capable Hewlett Packard calculator is almost a badge of office for engineers. Learning to use a reverse polish notation calculator is easy, and will take only an hour or so of doing calculations that way before it seems natural. Old habits die hard, however, and a geek that learns to use a complex traditional graphing calculator in school may be hesitant to adopt the superior RPN system just because he "grew up" with the slower method. This will put the non-RPN using geek at a disadvantage in college when competing against their RPN-calculator-using peers. When they finally switch to RPN they will curse themselves for having wasted so much time doing it the hard way in their youth. Most high-school students won't know enough about calculators to request an RPN capable calculator, so you'll have to give it to them. Hewlett Packard is one of the few companies to make RPN calculators, and until the Hydrix Qonos is built the only one currently doing so. Fortunately HP calculators have a great reputation amoung geeks. Unfortunately Texas Instruments has such a powerful marketing group that some schools may actually require students to get a non-RPN-capable Texas Instruments graphing calculator instead. Consider getting them both if you have to. If the young geek takes a calculation-intensive college major or career, then the skill at RPN will be worth the investment. The least expensive RPN choice is the HP-33s, but it doesn't have graphing capability that some classes will claim to require. The least expensive RPN graphing calculator is the HP-48gii and is a perfectly good calculator for even advanced geeks. Many users actually even prefer the older, discontinued version of the HP-48 model line because they think it has better ergonomics, a proven track-record of ruggedness (a feature useful to a geek who does field work and expects his calculator to be a lifetime investment), and a well developed collection of after-market accessories. These users go through the trouble of tracking down used ones instead of buying the newer HP models. Of course most geeks have a soft spot for the 'latest and greatest' gadget which for RPN calculators is the HP-50G. In addition to an RPN calculator, you might also get them additional documentation to help them more quickly master it.

OTHER IDEAS:
Video Game Consoles: Yes, everybody's asking for a PS3, Wii, or Xbox360. If you have a real electronics or computer geek, then get them their own build-it-yourself game console kit or their own build-it-yourself handheld game kit.

Electronics kit. Heathkit is gone, but there are still companies making hobby kits for electronics geeks.

Books and Magazines. Make Magazine, Smithsonian Magazine, and/or Discover Magazine. If they don't already have the non-fiction books mentioned in the MIDDLE SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS section above, then those are excellent choices. Science fiction (as opposed to space opera) is typically very popular with geeks, and some geeky science fiction authors are Heinlein, Asimov, Brinley, Pournelle, Niven, Gerrold, Stephenson, Forward, Taylor, Turtledove, Crichton, Clarke, and Clarke. Fantasy can still be fun, however; and it's hard to go wrong with Tolkien's Lord of the Rings books. If they liked Chronicles of Narnia then get them some of C.S. Lewis's more obscure works like Out of the Silent Planet, Present Concerns, The Screwtape Letters, or Till We Have Faces. Even though it is not often thought of as science fiction, C.S. Forrester's series of books about the fictional British Naval officer (and model for James T. Kirk) Horatio Hornblower will probably appeal to geeks and science fiction fans as much as if they had been set in deep space instead of on the high seas. There is also a Horatio Hornblower A&E series available but I recommend seeing it after reading the books, and I also recommend reading the books in the order they were written instead of the order they occur. With non-fiction it is generally better to get them books by other geeks (though not necessarily ones that are in the same field of interest as the reader) than to get them popular books. Consider buying them a copy of some geeky classic works, especially in their field of interest. Modern textbooks distill and filter the great works of geek history to make them more easily digested. That's fine for educating the bulk of the population, but geeks often gain insights from the original source materials that are missing from the reprocessed, regurgitated version told to schoolchildren. Bookfinder is a good source for used versions of these, and you can sometimes get antique printings of geek classics in good condition for surprisingly low prices. Additional good nonfiction books to consider are the massive McGraw-Hill Concise Encyclopedia of Science & Technology, the even larger The Engineering Handbook, the old How to Lie With Statistics, and the more recent How to Lie With Maps. If you don't know what books to get, just click on a few of the links and buy them. All of the links here lead to books that I and/or other geeks I know consider both good and of broad appeal despite their sometimes specialized topics. Geeks generally have diverse taste and usually love reading a wide variety of books.

Legos. Mindstorms or a Custom Lego Creation.

Gift certificates. I know people sometimes don't like to give gift certificates because they are afraid it will be viewed as a "last minute" or "half @$$#)" gift. Consider them anyway for hobby related presents. They are not only appreciated when they are received, they are also appreciated later when the recipient uses them to get exactly the item that they want and that you would never have thought of. Unless the geek you are shopping for has specifically mentioned some item that they need but haven't gotten yet or you share the same hobby, then odds are you will not be able to pick out good hobby related gifts for a geek. The chances that you can find some item that your geek friend or relative would really find useful in his hobby but that he doesn't know about are microscopic. Reading Internet or catalog ads and talking to salesmen or co-workers that have an uncle who knows something aren't going to help you. Instead of getting them that gadget that they either already have or that they passed up because they know the manufacture has a reputation for overpriced, unreliable junk just get them a gift certificate from their favorite hardware store, computer store, hobby shop, gun store, comic book and game shop, cooking store, camera shop, bookstore, camping store, Warehouse 23, or from Smartflix . They will appreciate it a lot (geeks are practical that way).

Games. Cheapass games, Settlers of Catan, and the aforementioned gift certificates.

COLLEGE AGE AND OLDER GEEKS
TOP CHOICE: TECHNICAL CLUB OR PROFESSIONAL SOCIETY MEMBERSHIP
Geeks are sometimes stereotyped as loners. Any technically demanding activity, howerver, requires a social support structure for exchanging ideas and expertice. These technical clubs and societies are also important for making friends with common interests, finding mentors to provide advice and moral support, and making connections for doing business and smoothing career advancement. Membership in at least one technical society or club in a geek's field of interest is a huge asset if they take advantage of it for more than just the free newsletter. Encourage college aged geeks to join their professional society or hobby club by offering to pay for their membership fee. Fortunately most professional societies offer discounts for student membership. There are hobby clubs for just about every possible avocation. Here is a partial list of professional societies in engineering and science. If you really want to splurge, pay their way to a convention, swap-meet, or conference on their favorite pass-time.

OTHER IDEAS:
Most all of the ideas suggested in the HIGH SCHOOL AGE GEEK GIFTS section above, especially including books and gift certificates, are also good for college age and older geeks. Additionally, by this time most geeks should be worldly enough to appreciate the classic work on organizational behavior, Parkinson's Law by C. Northcote Parkinson.

Toys. Adult geeks can get nostalgic and often have less qualms about seeming immature about their quirks. As a result toys are often a good gift for adult geeks. Thinkgeek has a good selection, but they are missing some essentials like the Magic 8ball. Silly Putty, Etch-a-Sketch, Easy Bake Ovens, or toy guns. And don't forget the Legos and Brainboxes.

Classic Items. Despite being stereotyped as liking only the latest "high tech" developments, most geeks actually have a soft spot for classic devices (especially those they can use in their field or everyday life). Good "classic" gifts for geeks include slide rules, pocket knives, pens (I prefer pencils myself), watches, pistols and rifles (for shooters), 22lr pistols (even non-shooters should at least have a .22), home electronics, clothes, lighters, cameras, games, and games. The key element is not age itself or kitsch, but instead the appreciation for a design that is so streamlined or ingenious combined with such quality workmanship that a product is nearly perfect and needs no changes. As a result items that are new but still well-enough designed and made that they are likely to become "future classics" are often just as appreciated. Some of the new pocket flashlights are good examples of this.

Disaster preparedness kits. Guys in general, but geeks especially have some attraction to planning for disasters. Perhaps it is something primal that goes back to when life was a constant struggle against nature and other tribes. Buy them a pocket multitool, small survival tin, emergency pouch, "bugout bag" or roadside survival kit. Even if they don't secretly enjoy imagining themselves civilization, they will appreciate the gift the next time the weather turns bad. Get them some classic survival fiction to read while waiting for the end of the world as we know it. Whatever survival kit you give (or keep) I suggest adding Stainwipes for 'emergencies' of the more mundane type. Also, you can get one of those vacuum sealers and seal up a pair of clean socks, underwear, and handtowel. They will seem like an amazing luxury when the recipient is soaking wet and away from home.

And for really hard-core geeks, get them their very own lab coat and safety glasses.

If you liked this list, you may also like my geek vacation ideas.

This post evolved from last year's Christmas geek gift guide.

Update: An additional geek gift idea from Somewhat Frank (who also has a good review of other geek gift lists) is a lapdesk and nightlight. Engtech has a series of six posts full of book, movies, games and T-shirts that provide more ideas for adult geeks.

christmas gifts , geek+gift , hacker+gifts , gift+guide

New York Times About to Collapse

2006-11-16T08:55:00.000-08:00

The New York Times newspaper is now on its deathbed. I plan on buying several copies of the last issue as collector's items. How do I know the New York Times will soon go the way of the dodo bird? They have announced it themselves, although with their typical inability to understand how the world really operates they did not quite realize what they were saying. The New York Times announced its demise by spending about half a billion dollars on its new headquarters building. The Times Company will occupy floors 2 through 28 of the building. It has an open plan to ease communication, wide entrances to "facilitate pedestrian circulation," both roof and ground floor gardens, and all manner of green and energy efficient features. It will be the ultimate newspaper headquarters. Of course, any student of human institutions recognizes this for what it really is: a tombstone.

I think the great philosopher C. Northcote Parkinson described this phenomenon best in his classic short work on organizational behavior (and a must read for any literate modern man) Parkinson's Law:

It is now known that a perfection of planned layout is achieved only by institutions on the point of collapse. This apparently paradoxical conclusion is based upon a wealth of archaeological and historical research... A study and comparison of these has tended to prove that perfection of planning is a symptom of decay. During a period of exciting discovery or progress there is no time to plan the perfect headquarters. The time for that comes later, when all the important work has been done. Perfection, we know, is finality, and finality is death.

A vibrant, healthy news organization might have spent that half a billion dollars developing better newsgathering capability, trying to get more subscribers, or developing new markets and products. The fact that The Times Company spent it on having fancier administrative overhead tells us everything we need to know about its lack of future.

I can only hope that the ATF will not be far behind. I wonder what genius in the Bush administration put the nail in that hated-by-conservatives organization by offering to usher them into the grave with a perfect, new, taxpayer-payer funded mausoleum where they can push papers to each other in luxury instead of venturing into the harsh unairconditioned and uncarpeted world to pester the freedom loving citizenry.

Predictions on the 2008 Election

2006-11-09T10:04:00.000-08:00

Sadly, my co-blogger's predictions for the 2006 elections turned out to be optimistic. I am standing by my previous prediction for the 2008 election, however: tacky animated shirts will make their debut in political advertising.

Last year about this time I wrote a post "The Future of Tacky Clothing" in which I discussed what the development of wearable, washable touch sensitive and video display fabrics would mean for tacky holiday clothing options. In addition I speculated that they might also be used for wearable electronics, new fashions, and advertising. I also wrote "I wouldn’t be surprised if the technology for clothing with build-in wearable video displays arrives in time to produce some really interesting political T-shirts for the aught-eight presidential elections."

Since that post, Phillips has announced their development of the Lumalive light emitting textile product. Here is a great video demonstration. It looks like the animated political ad shirts are on schedule to be available for their first use by the 2008 campaigns. If only predicting the political world could be as easy.

2006 Election

2006-11-08T07:03:00.000-08:00

So where is that delete button again?

Seriously, my predictions on the 2006 Midterms were based on the feel from the Republican front lines. I think Republicans did turn out in relatively strong numbers, the problem is some clearly voted for the Democrats.

I think you are looking at the disgust of the Republican base against their Washington leadership. Yes, Republicans want the War on Terror (which includes the War in Iraq) won, but they don’t want the porkbarrel spending and growth in government that the Republicans brought. If you are going to have that kind of waste from your party, why vote for them?

Democrats have woken up this morning and said all the right things about “a new direction” and “cooperating with the Republican majority to move the country forward.” It may happen; Democrats may finally contribute to a victory in Iraq rather than rooting for our defeat, they may finally stop comparing our military to Saddam’s secret police and those who ran Stalin’s gulags. With the leadership they are bringing in however (mostly hard-core liberals left over from the last time they held the House) I doubt it.

Who knows, I may be pleasantly surprised. And if you believe that, I have this nice bridge in Brooklyn to sell you, hardly ever been used…..

Predictions on the 2006 Election

2006-11-06T21:10:00.000-08:00

The Senate: Democrats +3 (Republicans retain)
The House: Democrats +10 (Republicans retain)

I'll explain my reasons later (just wanted to be on record).

What Lesson Will the Republicans Learn if they Lose?

2006-10-28T16:41:00.000-07:00

There is a lot of talk on the internet and in the mainstream media (MSM) about conservatives sitting out this election to teach the Republicans a lesson about ignoring their core values of smaller government and/or insufficiently vigorous national security policies. The theory seems to be that this will “teach them a lesson” and lead to more conservative Republican behavior and more conservative Republican candidates in 2008. I think this analysis is incorrect.

It makes some sense that conservatives and libertarians would consider voting for a short term power loss if they thought it would lead to a long term improvement. Central to both political philosophies is the recognition that the “obvious” quick and easy action to solve a problem is not always the best, and that the long-term secondary effects of a political decision can be much larger than the short term direct effects. It is difficult to predict the long-term secondary effects of political actions (which is no doubt one reason that conservatives and libertarians are less eager to use the government to meddle with society) and I fear that people who think that sitting out the 2006 elections will teach the Republicans a lesson are only partly right. I think that Republican politicians will learn a lesson if they are defeated in this mid-term congressional election, but I also think it will not be the lesson that conservatives and libertarians would want them to learn.

I urge conservative and libertarian voters who are tempted to punish the Republicans for ignoring their concerns by not voting to think clearly about what the media and politicians will conclude from a Democratic political victory.

First of all, does anyone who has paid attention to the Left-wing bias of the mainstream media think that the “conventional wisdom” explanation of the Democrat victory will be that a lot of voters are unhappy with our national policies not being conservative enough? Of course the MSM will not report that. No matter how slim the Democrat victory it will be described by TV, newspaper, and most magazine reporters as a Liberal Mandate for the Democrats. Small government conservatives and libertarians might have given the election to the Democrats because of the Republicans increased spending and creation of new entitlement programs, but the MSM will tell everyone that the Democrats won because voters were angry over the Republican’s “tax cuts for the rich.” Jacksonians might have given the election to the Democrats because the Republican administration is being insufficiently vigorous in punishing our enemies and rewarding our friends, but the MSM will tell everyone that the Democrats won because voters prefer carefully worded multilateral diplomatic protests delivered at the UN to unilateral “cowboy” military actions taken against our enemies. They will report that voters are eager for us to leave the few allies who have stuck with us and people who believed our promises of liberty holding the bag while we abandon our hard-won forward bases in the Middle East war zone. There is no way that the mainstream media will describe a Democrat victory as anything but a victory for left-wing, socialist, internationalist, hopolophobic, multicultural policies and a Liberal Mandate to dismantle what few conservative and libertarian policies that the Republicans have actually supported.

Second of all, does anyone who has paid attention to Republican politicians believe that the party will ignore the constant “Liberal Mandate” drumbeat of the MSM and the “liberal shift” cocktail party conventional wisdom they will be bombarded with after the election and embrace more conservative and/or libertarian policies? The right-wing internet and talk-radio will certainly explain the importance of the Republican party returning to its small-government base and policies. If the Republican politicians made a habit of ignoring the MSM, the Washington press corps, and DC cocktail party talk in favor of right-wing thinkers then they would not be in such a poor electoral position right now. I do not think that will suddenly change on Nov. 8th. I fear that Republican politicians will generally believe the “Liberal Mandate” explanation that they will be bombarded with following a Democrat victory and that they will shift their positions even further to the left in an attempt to compensate for their perceived failure to be moderate enough.

I welcome anyone who is planning on sitting out this election to “teach” the Republicans that they should not take the conservatives and libertarian wing of the party for granted to explain to me how either:

1. The mainstream media will portray a Democrat victory as a sign that politicians should become more conservative if they want to win elections, or
2. Republican politicians will suddenly start ignoring the chorus of conventional wisdom handed to them by left-leaning journalists in favor of right-wing blogs and call-in shows.

I think that Republican politicians do need to be taught a lesson by small government conservatives, libertarians, and Jacksonians. I also think the time to do that is in the primaries. Not voting for the lesser of evils will hand a mid-term election victory to Democrats. That victory will be sold by the MSM as an example of the declining popularity of right-wing politics and politicians of both parties will follow along hook, line, and sinker.

Consider what Robert Heinlein wrote on the subject:

"If you are part of a society that votes, then do so. There may be no candidates and no measures you want to vote for ... but there are certain to be ones you want to vote against. By this rule you will rarely go wrong."

Then go out and vote against the Pinkos. Save your teachings for the next primaries when the right lessons will be learned.

An Attack on One is an Attack on All

2006-08-22T13:35:00.000-07:00

Iran has attacked an Romanian oil platform. Romania is a member of Nato. Does a state of war now exist between Iran and the United States? Perhaps by traditional definitions. But then by traditional definitions a state of war should have begun when they invaded the sovereign soil of the United States by taking over our embassy. By traditional definitions "terrorists" who fight battles without clearly identifiable insignia to differentiate themselves from civilians are spies who should be hung to discourage the endangerment of non-combatants. I wonder what "world opinion" would say if Bush decided to start respecting that little bit of the laws of war so sacred to the Gitmo protesters. Apparently sovereignty and "international law" and diplomatic tradition are things that are either sacred or ignored depending on how useful it is politically to the person making the decision. Was it ever any other way?

Then again maybe it is like a jackup-rig or something else that is not considered a Romanian ship at sea, in which case... nervermind.

In Which J. Random American Discovers How to Win World War IV

2006-08-16T15:43:00.000-07:00

Ann Althouse has a post (hat-tip Instapundit) about American Muslim kids who are memorizing the entire Koran so that they can get a free pass into heaven for themselves and 10 more that they can give away to friends and family.

This has given me a creative idea about how to win the war on terror (or World War IV as informed people are now calling it.)

Step 1. Make certain that the belief that memorizing the Koran will guarantee entrance to heaven for that person and ten others of their choosing is widespread throughout the Muslim world. Our enemies will probably be useful idiots in helping us with this.

Step 2. Have DARPA develop an accelerated learning program for memorizing the Koran in DVD format. Take out a whole bunch of ads on Al Jazeera for this program promising “Learn the Koran in 6 months or your money back.”

Step 3. Secretly fund the production of an Arabic sex-romp comedy movie in the style of Porky’s or American Pie. It should be about a group of young Muslim men who turn their backs on terrorism and instead of getting only one free pass to heaven by being suicide bombers they each memorize the entire Koran using the accelerated learning DVD. Then the young men pool some of their “free passes into heaven” and offer them as prizes to the local girls who give the best performance in various sex acts and positions. Make sure to cast really hot actresses to play some of the local girls who are engaged in the competition and have the competition “get out of hand” as all the local girls try to one-up each other to impress the young men with the free passes*.

Step 4. Make sure that bootleg copies of both the movie and accelerated learning program show up in every marketplace and vendor stall in the Muslim world. Within a year radical Islam will no longer be a problem, and instead we’ll be watching news reporters warn us about the rising tide of teenage pregnancy and STDs in the Middle East. After all, once at least 10% of the Muslim world has earned their 11 free passes to heaven by memorizing the Koran then the religion would lose all its fire and brimstone. If you knew you were going to heaven no matter what you did, then would you spend your Firday listening to some crazy old guy rant in the mosque or go down to Hooters for the wet-T shirt contest? Maybe you could promise the winner a free trip to heaven if she makes you really, really happy.

Step 5. Put another “World War” notch on our collective national riflestock.

* As a really insidious subplot one of the girls could be a shy Jewish girl who turns out to be a totally hot sex machine. Have one of the Muslim heroes fall in love with her and try to keep her from “auditioning” with the other judges. At the end of the movie when he tells his father that he’s going to marry the Jewish girl, his dad is furious. But the kid reminds his father that it doesn’t matter if she is the daughter of pigs and dogs, she can get into heaven anyway with one of the free passes. Then the hero reminds his dad that if he makes trouble over the marriage he might find HIS free pass into paradise revoked.

BWA-HA-HA-HA (Evil laugh)

Liquid Explosives

2006-08-10T07:57:00.000-07:00

There were reports suggesting that the latest Heathrow-centered airline bomber plot involves liquid explosives. If anyone doubts that liquid explosives are real, here is an example of one. I believe that the Pentagon looked into making this a standard kit item for infantrymen in the 1960's. It could be poured directly into soil and detonated to make instant "improvised foxholes" or rigged with a trip mechanism create a landmine. I think stability or storage problems hampered its widespread use, however.

Tags: liquid explosive, Heathrow

I Condemn the Murder of Innocents

2006-08-01T09:28:00.000-07:00

There is news in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer (hattip: Instapundit) that Naveed Haq, who recently murdered one Jewish woman and attempted to murder more during a shooting spree at the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, may have been a Christian. As a Christian, I want to announce publicly my condemnation of Naveed Haq's crime. Even if he was a Christian instead of a Muslim, as was first reported, that does not change the fact that his murderous attack was a terrible crime. I hope that the state of Washington is vigorous and effective in its pursuit of justice for the defenseless victims at the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle. Instead of capturing and trying the murderer, however, I think it would have been better if one or more of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle patrons had been armed and able to stop this crime sooner. In addition to saving lives, perhaps they could also have saved Washington taxpayers the cost of a trial.

I do not think that Naveed Haq's act was typical Christian behavior. As followers of Christ I think we should follow his example. I cannot imagine how someone would look at a "What Would Jesus Do?" bumper sticker and decide that the answer is "Walk into a Jewish community center and murder people." We should try to help people of other faiths understand Christ's love for them, but we should not attack them if they don't. We should love our neighbors even when we disagree with them about how best to worship God. Christians should work together with Jews to make our communities better. I hope that other Christians will join me in condemning the terrible attack against the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle and in praying for the family of the murder victim Pam Waechter, as well as for the speedy recovery of the other victims: Cheryl Stumbo, Dayna Klein, Carol Goldman, Layla Bush and Christina Rexroad. I hope that Jews will not think that Naveed Haq's horrible and inexcusable actions are representative of Christians or Christianity. If there are any Christian ministers who are preaching the murder of our Jewish neighbors, I hope that they either stop and repent, or else that they are driven out of positions of power within their churches. Lastly, if something like this ever happens again I hope that the murderous nutjob is stopped by police or armed citizens before he has a chance to hurt anybody else.

3 Iraqis Caught Sneaking Across Mexican Border into the United States

2006-05-06T12:12:00.000-07:00

Iraqis are just sneaking into this country to do the jobs Americans won't do.

Actually they claim they are here for asylum, which is believable. But if they can come with good intentions then why can't others come with bad intentions.

Online Movie Recommendation 18

2005-12-14T14:43:00.000-08:00

One day late, and in honor of the on-going Iraq vote:

http://thepoliticalteen.net/2005/12/13/gotohell/

Online Movie Recommendation 17

2005-12-05T22:40:00.000-08:00

This week's online movie recommendation is the first part of the World War 2 documentary "Why We Fight." Entitled "Prelude to War" it is found here:

http://www.archive.org/details/PreludeToWar

It is interesting to watch this in light of our current Global War on Terror. Notice especially the detail it goes into about things like the "Black Dragons" in Japan, the refusal to take newspaper reports on foriegn events at face value, the use of the enemy's quotes against him, the explaination of how tyranny abroad affects our own national security, the explaination of the enemy's use of propaganda and his adopting the mantle of victimhood, and the failure of the free world (ourselves included) to address this threat when it was manageable. There is still a free world and a slave world, but where is the "Why We Fight" for our time? It would be easy enough to make one. Memri has done a lot of the background work on showing the true face of Islamofascism already. But we have no "Why We Fight" for our time. The Bush administration, without any Great Communicator, cedes the entire fight for popular opinion and appears careful not to challenge the shared elitist delusion we call "common knowledge" which bombards us from the lamestream media. Instead the Republicans seem content to let the bulk of "common knowledge" sit where it is (even as it protrays the Islamofascists as reasonable people and carefully hides any hint of radical muslim barbarity or reminders of the crimes they have committed against us and others) and just edge the public argument a little bit in their direction here and there. Do they fear that any politician who steps too far outside this set of shared assumptions will be branded as "crazy" and destroyed by the newsmedia regardless of the quality of their proof and soundness of their arguments? Is the Bush administration afraid they are too stupid to successfully defend the truth, or do they think we are too stupid to recognize reality when we finally see it on screen? Or worst are they stupid enough to believe what they read in the NY Times? Given their immigration and spending policies, I suspect some combination the latter two. It is a darn shame that a command economy advocate like FDR apparently had more confidence in the wisdom and good sense of the general American population than our supposedly market oriented Republicans.

I don't expect to see an official "Why We Fight," but it would be a great project for some independent film-maker who wanted to really do some good and make a name for himself by providing a well produced collection of evidence to support the things which much of the population outside of the blue liberal enclaves feels in their gut to be true. Well, guys?

Geek Gift Ideas

2005-12-01T18:16:00.000-08:00

Instapundit was recently complaining about the poor quality of Wired’s geek gift guide, so I thought that I’d put up some geek gift suggestions of my own. Wired’s guide seems focused more on early adopters with rich friends*, whereas mine is more oriented toward finding gifts for hackers and other real geeks.

1. A subscription to Make magazine.

2. For geeks too young to read Make (or even those who aren’t) try Legos. Since geeks like to be creative, don’t bother with a specific kit just buy them a whole Tub o’ bricks so their imagination can run wild. It is a little hard to wrap, but you could also let your geek make their own Custom Creation and pay for the pieces needed to make it.

3. Books by Geeks. Geeks usually like to read and have a diverse taste in books. Generally it is better to get them books by other geeks (though not necessarily ones in the same field of study as the reader) than to get them popular books. If you are a friend or relative worried about a young geek who isn’t popular or dresses poorly I strongly recommend tracking down the Dress for Success and Live for Success books by John T. Molloy because he approaches these topics from a geek perspective and so his explanations of things will resonate with a geek reader. I can recommend Paul Graham’s Hackers and Painters for the same reason (I have a link to some of his short essays in the monographs section of the blogroll). All three would make a great collection for a young geek. It is often better to get books by famous geeks than to get biographies of them, if you can. What common biographer could explain to a geek how Richard Feynman studied physics or how Henry Ford revolutionized manufacturing better than they themselves? None, most of these super-geek’s contemporaries didn’t understand them so a modern liberal arts graduate is not likely to either. Don’t overlook buying them a copy of some geeky classic works, especially in their field of interest. Modern textbooks distill and filter the great works of geek history to make them more easily digested. That’s fine for educating the bulk of the population, but geeks often gain insights from the original source materials that are missing from the reprocessed, regurgitated version told to schoolchildren. Bookfinder is a good source for used versions of these, and you can sometimes get antique printings of geek classics in good condition for surprisingly low prices. Science fiction (as opposed to fantasy or space opera) is typically very popular with geeks, and some geeky science fiction authors are Heinlein, Asimov, Brinley, Pournelle, Niven, Gerrold, Stephenson, Forward, Taylor, Turtledove, Crichton, Clarke, and Clarke. Lastly, with the Narnia movie coming out soon C.S. Lewis books are going to be popular. Since geeks like something different, pass on the Chronicles of Narnia (which they probably read in grade school anyway**) and get them some of his more obscure works like Out of the Silent Planet, Present Concerns, The Screwtape Letters, or Till We Have Faces.

4. Classic Items. Despite being stereotyped as liking only the latest “high tech” developments, most geeks actually have a soft spot for classic devices (especially those they can use in their field or everyday life). Good “classic” gifts for geeks include slide rules, pocket knives, pens (I prefer pencils myself), watches, guns (for shooters), 22lr pistols (even non-shooters should at least have a .22), home electronics, clothes, cameras and games. The key element is not age itself or kitsch, but instead the appreciation for a design that is so streamlined or ingenious combined with such quality workmanship that a product is nearly perfect and needs no changes. As a result items that are new but still well-enough designed and made that they are likely to become “future classics” are often just as appreciated. Some of the new pocket flashlights are good examples of this.

5. Toys. Thinkgeek has a good selection, but they are missing some essentials like the Magic 8ball. Silly Putty, Etch-a-Sketch, or toy guns.

6. Gift certificates. I know people sometimes don’t like to give gift certificates because they are afraid it will be viewed as a “last minute” or “half @$$#)” gift. Consider them anyway for hobby related presents. They are not only appreciated when they are received, they are also appreciated later when the recipient uses them to get exactly the item that they want and that you would never have thought of. Unless the geek you are shopping for has specifically mentioned some item that they need but haven’t gotten yet or you share the same hobby, then odds are you will not be able to pick out good hobby related gifts for a geek. The chances that you can find some item that your geek friend or relative would really find useful in his hobby but that he doesn’t know about are microscopic. Reading Internet or catalog ads and talking to salesmen or co-workers that have an uncle who knows something aren’t going to help you. Instead of getting them that gadget that they either already have or that they passed up because they know the manufacture has a reputation for overpriced, unreliable junk just get them a gift certificate from their favorite hardware store, computer store, hobby shop, gun store, comic book and game shop, cooking store, camera shop or bookstore. They will appreciate it a lot (geeks are practical that way).

7. And for really hard-core geeks, get them their very own lab coat and safety glasses.

If you liked this list, you may also like my geek vacation ideas.

*or perhaps more accurately, rich friends of early adopters.

** assuming that they aren't young enough to still be in grade school; in which case go ahead and get them the Narnia books.

Update: Does anyone have a suggestion for a replacement of the old Heathkit projects? Also, Technical Video Rental says that they will redesign their website by around Dec. 15th to allow them to sell gift certificates; that (or tuition for an in-person class of some kind) would be another great hobby gift.

Update 2 (12/2/5): Welcome Instapundit readers. I encourage you to look around the rest of the blog, and if you like what you see consider making Ideas in Progress a regular stop on your walk throught the blogosphere.

christmas gifts

Marine Corps Role Playing Game Revisited

2005-11-30T21:13:00.000-08:00

A couple of months ago I wrote a post linking to an interesting tactical decision game in that month’s issue of the Marine Corps Gazette. Some of the solutions to this game (along with a reprint of the scenario) have been published here. The key decision of the game revolved around whether a Marine corporal leading a four man recon team should disregard his orders to “avoid confrontation with the enemy except for self-protection” in order to save a couple of local girls from being gang raped by a larger foreign military force.

Three responses were printed. One solution was for the Marines to snipe the rapists in order to force them to cover so the girls will have a chance to escape, and then to withdraw from the area. Another solution was to report the incident to higher-ranking officers and allow the platoon staff to make the decision as to whether the Marines can deviate from the established plan. The third solution also reports the incident to headquarters and asks for direction, but this solution is a bit more explicit in suggesting that the team be allowed to rescue the girls. The author of the third solution does not give any rank, and may be a civilian. I find it interesting that the author of the second solution is a 2nd lieutenant, while the author of the first solution (and the game) is a major. Keep in mind that both officers are supposed to be solving the game as if they were just a corporal.

Only two data points is not enough to really draw general conclusions, but if I had to take a lesson about the most likely Marine response to a real situation similar to this tactical decision game I would guess that the corporal leading the recon team would probably report the incident to his commanding officer, who would then give the team permission to risk their lives to save the local girls from being raped.

Online Movie Recommendation 16

2005-11-29T04:49:00.000-08:00

Two weeks ago, I mentioned hobbyists who created films using the PXL-2000 camera. This week's recommendation is a film done with the PXL-2000:

http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2451080

On the Age of Men

2005-11-29T04:16:00.000-08:00

My co-blogger, Mr. Bloggs, recently put up a post with a good, succinct response to Rep. Murtha’s cowardly desire to abandon the Liberal Iraqis to our mutual enemies. The post links to an excerpt from the character Aragorn’s rallying speech to the troops of Gondor in The Return of The King. For those of you who cannot play the clip, the heart of his speech is:

“Hold your ground! Hold your ground!
Sons of Gondor, of Rohan, my brothers,
I see in your eyes the same fear that would take the heart of me.
A day may come when the courage of men fails,
when we forsake our friends
and break all bonds of fellowship,
but it is not this day.
An hour of wolves and shattered shields,
when the age of men comes crashing down,
but it is not this day!
This day we fight!!
By all that you hold dear on this good Earth,
I bid you stand, Men of the West!!!”

This is certainly an appropriate response to Rep. Murtha’s despicable desire to abandon our friends in Iraq. There is one minor nit I have to pick with this speech in the context of The West’s current predicament, however. Aragorn was fighting for an “age of men”, but I don’t think that is an appropriate term for what we now fight for.

When Islamofacists cut off the heads of their enemies or kill children to terrorize a neighborhood into obeying them Western pundits call them “inhuman” and “monsters” and wonder “how can people do such a thing?”. The Islamofacists are centainly inhumane and evil, but they are also certainly not inhuman monsters. They are very human, and it is dangerous of us to deny that human beings can and do behave in this despicable way. Anyone who thinks that treating women like property, killing and enslaving people who are different than you, terrorizing your neighbors into obedience, and taking pleasure in the pain and humiliation of your enemies is not a natural human condition must not know much about history or anthropology. The enemies of The West are not inhuman oddities; they are people behaving like people have since before history began. We are the exceptions, not them. The multiculturalists like to believe that a Universtiy campus is the end result of human nature, and that all cultures would naturally produce decent and civilized citizens whose main difference from The West is the quaint native dances and the exotic local food that they sampled on their latest alumni travel junket. The unpleasant truth is that an oppressed man’s first instinct is not to dream of living in a free society where he is equal to his oppressor. An oppressed man’s first instinct is to dream of still living in a tyranny, but one where he is on top and his current oppressors get to feel his boot on their throats.

The West does not fight now for an “age of men,” our enemies do. Alone the Islamofacists cannot prevail, but modern Western civilization has more enemies than just ruthless Mohammadans. It is my fear that together those enemies will tear down the institutions that made The West such an exception to the natural condition of mankind and then fall on each other as each faction wants to be the one on top with all others under their bootheel. I fear that we may see a return to the Age of Men. It will be a shame, too. I will dearly miss the Age of Laws.

Online Movie Recommendation 15

2005-11-22T20:51:00.000-08:00

Last week I mentioned hobbyists who created films using stop-motion-animation of LEGOs. This week's recommendation (not appropriate for some young viewers) is an example of that art:

http://www.nosniborus.brickfilms.com/movies/frankenstein_web.rm

It was made by Nosniborus Productions. More "brickfilms" can be found at Brickfilms.com.

Never To Forsake Our Friends

2005-11-22T06:48:00.000-08:00

An excellent answer to Rep. Murtha and one with which I wholeheartedly agree.

http://www.rightsideredux.com/2005/11/exclusive-video-i-bid-you-stand-men-of.html

The Future of Tacky Clothing

2005-11-19T13:47:00.000-08:00

The holidays are just around the corner. Inevitably you’ll start to see people showing up for work or Christmas parties in tacky electronically enhanced holiday clothing such as shirts with Christmas trees on them where little LEDs on it really illuminate the decorative lights, sweaters with an embroidered reindeer with a blinking red LED for a nose, ties that play Christmas carols, or hats that count the minutes until New Year’s Day. I haven’t seen any clothes yet with novelty menorah images on them where LEDs light up the appropriate number of fabric candles, but I’m sure someone is making them.

Just wait a few years until someone perfects machine washable fabrics with eink type display technology on them and you’ll really see some tacky holiday clothing that makes present LED enhanced ones look bland. People will be able to have whole animated Christmas specials playing on their chests or hats. I expect that after showing up on expensive novelty clothing this electronic display fabric will spread. Next high-end vendors will give away hats, tie tacks, or shirts with animated product logos at conventions and to big customers. Then when the technology becomes cheap enough you will start to see animated images and scrolling text on T-shirts, hooded jackets, hats, and other popular apparel. In my mind’s eye I can already see the old people walking around the mall with “My Cute Grandchildren” slideshows playing on their sweaters. If you were upset to see 14 year old girls prancing around with shorts that had the word “juicy” written across their butt, just wait until you see what the fashion designers can do with sexually suggestive full color animations. I wouldn’t be surprised if the technology for clothing with build-in wearable video displays arrives in time to produce some really interesting political T-shirts for the aught-eight presidential elections. Combine them with this with touch sensitive clothing and the options seem almost limitless.

Tough Guy Award 6

2005-11-17T19:59:00.000-08:00

Darwin works both ways, and man didn’t get to the top of the food chain by accident. The “Tough Guy Award” is the opposite of the Darwin Award.

This week's tough guy award goes to Wayne Goldsberry of Arkansas. Mr. Goldsberry was working on the computer at his daughter's home when a five-point whitetailed deer crashed through a window and ran into the master bedroom. After telling his wife to call the police, Mr. Goldsberry went into the bedroom and wrestled the deer for 40 minutes before he was able to kill the animal by breaking it's neck with his bare hands. Mr. Goldsberry had the deer butchered.

Machinima: A New Type of Videogame

2005-11-16T11:27:00.000-08:00

The last four online movie recommendations have all been machinima. Basically they are short movies made by recording video games as the players act out scenes in the game, and then editing them and adding voice actors. Two of the movies I linked to were made using the Halo first-person-shooter video games, and two were made using The Sims 2. Right now machinima is made with video games that were never designed to be used as movie making devices; creative hobbyists and artists have just taken games intended for a different purpose and used them to make movies.

I think there is a market for a “video game” that essentially is a machinima movie making kit. Most video games are just that, games. But historically there have been “games” sold for video game consoles that were really just a tool to let the game user create something. The old Atari 2600 had a game cartridge that allowed the user to write computer programs in the BASIC language*. Nintendo had a game cartridge called Mariopaint that let the user create drawings, music, and even animation. The first video featuring the popular web cartoon character Homestar Runner was created using Mariopaint. A machinima movie making kit would be a “game” in the tradition of these previous video game creative environments rather than a traditional game that you can win by scoring points or eliminating opponents. Think of it as a virtual version of the LEGO MovieMaker Set or a Fisher-Price “My First Movie Camera” PXL-2000.

I think a successful machinima movie making game for today’s video game consoles would combine features of first-person-shooters like Halo 2 (which give users very good real-time control of the virtual actors) with features of simulation games like The Sims 2 (which gives users very good control over what the game environment looks like). Users would be able to design virtual movie sets, props, and characters by creating and furnishing buildings, landscaping the outdoors, customizing vehicles, and designing & costuming virtual actors in the “The Sims 2” style of play with a set builder toolbox. Once the set, props, and characters are created a director’s toolbox would allow the user to plan various scenes and special effects similar to the way Rainbow Six allows players to plan military raids. Putting the game in “actor mode” would allow the users to act out the scenes by furiously manipulating their video game controls in an attempt to get the virtual actors to hit their marks and respond to each other, similar to the way that users control characters in first-person-shooters while trying to get them to shoot weapons and dodge enemies. Alternatively, some or all of the virtual actors could be put on automatic so that they move and emote to the director’s plan without any human intervention. A post-production toolbox would allow the user to edit the video he created and add voices (or other sounds). Lastly, a smart video game company would also have a website for users to upload their finished movies, review other people’s movies, compare notes on techniques, and trade custom created characters, sets, and props.

The key to such a game, I think, would be flexibility. Some users would just want to boot up a blank “Our Town” set, put it in “actor mode” and start improvising scenes with each other. Other users might want to create very elaborate scenes, environments, or effects in the director’s toolbox or set builder toolbox and not even try their hand at virtual acting at all. A well done machinima movie making game would accommodate them all.

* Which seems like any easy “game” for someone to remake for today’s gaming consoles, and it would let a whole new demographic of people develop a better understanding of how computers really function. I wonder how popular that would be. I also wonder if it would be worth some private organization producing such a game just for the educational benefits it would provide. If anyone really decides to make one of these, please don’t make it for PASCAL!

machinima, videogame

Update: Here is a link to the 2005 Machnima Awards, if you want to see some of the best examples of the hobby. Hattip: Through The Looking Glass. Also, there was a very primitive version of this in the early 1990's called Stunt Island but it focused just on making and filming stunts, not whole movies. There is also some of this functionality in the new game The Movies, which is a simulation of managing a movie studio. There, making movies is part of the larger game not an end in itself and the user has correspondingly much less powerful tools and less flexibility than in the "game" I propose here. They did think to make good use of their website as a user community, though.

Online Movie Recommendation 14

2005-11-15T19:01:00.000-08:00

This week's recommendation is another machinima video made with The Sims 2. It is the first episode of the award winning series The Strangerhood by Rooster Teeth Productions:

ttp://sh.roosterteeth.com/archive/download.php?id=361

COT #13 is up

2005-11-14T15:47:00.000-08:00

http://www.blog.speculist.com/archives/000531.html

Despite what you may have heard, I didn't write "The Future of Media, Not Now But Soon."

An Old Friend Returns

2005-11-14T11:15:00.000-08:00

Steven Den Beste appears to have returned to the world of blogging. Check out his new entries at his redstate.org diary.

http://steven-den-beste.redstate.org/user/Steven%20Den%20Beste/diary

Online Movie Recommendation 13

2005-11-07T22:06:00.000-08:00

This week's movie recommendation is the first episode of the three episode machinima series "The Awakening":

http://www.machinima.com/Streaming.php?id=1051

It made using The Sims 2 video game, and is about a Sims 2 character who begins to figure out how artificial the video game world he lives in is.

The rest of the episodes can be found at the series creator's website "Atlas Enterprises" under the "movies" link.

Paris Riots and City Planning

2005-11-05T10:27:00.000-08:00

Muslim riots continue in Paris for the 9th day. How could this happen in Paris of all places? Weren't Paris's wide boulevards and radiating spoke streets specifically designed to make it easy to stop riots? Judging from the lack of grapeshot I can only assume that Paris has forgotten its history, and the old contingency plans gather dust in the offices of people who think that traffic circles exist only to make driving more interesting.

paris riots

Online Movie Recommendation 12

2005-11-01T08:34:00.000-08:00

This week's recommendation is the first episode of an amateur talk show called "This Spartan Life." The episode is broken down into 6 files:

http://www.thisspartanlife.com/1001_mod1.html

http://www.thisspartanlife.com/1001_mod2.html

http://www.thisspartanlife.com/1001_mod3.html

http://www.thisspartanlife.com/1001_mod4.html

http://www.thisspartanlife.com/1001_mod5.html

http://www.thisspartanlife.com/1001_mod6.html

I think the Bob Stein interview in the third segment is the best. Like last week's recommendation, this video is made using one of the Halo videogames.

Light Posting Ahead

2005-10-31T08:38:00.000-08:00

I'm a little busy right now, so posting may be lighter than usual.

Now would be a good time to have a look through the links on the left, or browse the archives. If you haven't seen it yet, then it's new to you. :)

COTs, BATTs, and FFRs

2005-10-27T07:13:00.000-07:00

The 12th Carnival of Tomorrow is out.

Futurists may also want to check out The Speculist's posts "Better All The Time #23" and "FastForward Radio #6".

How to Get No Useful Information

2005-10-26T00:52:00.000-07:00

So, the American Society for Civil Engineers reports that America needs to spend a lot more money on Civil Engineering projects...

I notice my barber always thinks I need a haircut, too.

That doesn't mean I sometimes don't sometimes need a haircut, but it does mean that asking my barber doesn't get me any useful information about the real status of my hair. I suspect the ASCE report card may be a similar situation.

The next thing you know the teacher's unions will say we need to spend more money on schools and police associations will say we need to spend more money on law enforcement.

Freedom, Religous Faith, and The Singularity

2005-10-26T00:16:00.000-07:00

In one of his essays C.S. Lewis talked about how religion affects people’s perceptions of political issues. (BTW, I don’t have the reference because I loaned my C.S. Lewis collection out. If anyone can send me the citation I’d appreciate it. If wish sometimes that I had thought to buy two copies of all my books, or at least the ones by great authors like C.S. Lewis and Alan Moore, so that I could have one to loan and one jealously guard.) For atheists, like commies or watermelons, the length of a human life is short relative to the potentially centuries long existence of The State. It makes sense then that human life (as long as it is someone else) should be considered to be of small value compared to the value of a long-lived and continent-spanning State. So atheists have little problem sacrificing lots of people to build their dream government. Presumably you could say the same thing about pagans (real greens) and “Mother Earth.” They don’t mind if a few million brown people die sooner as long as Gaia isn’t desecrated by evil chemicals like DDT. Christians, on the other hand, view the human soul as potentially eternal and people as being not just smart animals but special creations of God made in His image. Compared to even one human soul, Earthly governments are short lived and inconsequential things. He thought that it made sense for Christians to value individual people in general (and their religious freedom especially*) over the value of a mere government program or agency, and that therefore Christians would prefer governments that would not intrude on the liberty of the individual citizen. Atheists would gravitate toward powerful and ‘impressive’ governments where their personal ideology might live for centuries even if they can’t. I apologize if I have butchered Lewis’s arguments, but as I mentioned I have to write this from memory alone.

With the radical advances in medicine and biology going on right now and the tremendous amount of resources (both their own and whatever they can steal from anyone else) that the self-absorbed “me generation” will no doubt pour into life extension research to postpone their inevitable demise we may be on the verge of seeing a huge increase in the average lifespan. There are serious efforts underway to understand and “cure” the causes of aging, and if we can ever get to the point where we extend the human lifespan at least one more year every year then we will have achieved practical near-immortality (though accidents would still kill people). Once the human lifespan becomes measured in centuries, then the life expectancy of governments and empires** will not only seem short relative to our immortal soul but also relative to our physical bodies. No longer would one have to believe in an afterlife to think that governments lived and died in the blink of an eye compared with human beings. Any atheist could look at the marvel of future medicine and realize that he could easily live longer than the 5 centuries allotted to the Roman Republic. It would not be an unreasonable assumption therefore that he might also outlive our own Republic (which is already over 2 centuries old) and perhaps even whatever comes after. Does this mean that radical life extension would lead to less statist philosophies in the developed world and renewed emphasis on each individual's liberties? Maybe. I hope so.

Or perhaps the pendulum of political philosophy will swing the other way. It is not unreasonable to assume that these life extending medical technologies will be developed in the United States where the private medical businesses could make a lot of money selling them to the aforementioned terrified aging baby-boomers. It is also reasonable to expect that initial life extension technology will be expensive. Market forces could make it cheaper (though that would require market forces to be operating effectively, which would assume that they are elective procedures like plastic or vision correction surgery) but for old people who are afraid of death that may seem too long of a wait. There would be a great temptation to use socialism to make the life extending treatments available to all politically powerful groups (like retirees) regardless of the cost to anyone else. Trotsky supposedly said of communism that:

"In a country where the sole employer is the State, opposition means death by slow starvation. The old principle: Who does not work does not eat, has been replaced by a new one: Who does not obey shall not eat."

In a state with both socialized medicine and potentially unlimited life-extension medical technology that principle could change to “Who obeys shall live forever.” The politically powerful in all nations would want this technology for themselves; intellectually property rights be damned, we’re talking virtual immortality here. No doubt they would use the promise of near eternal life here on Earth as a tremendous incentive to ensure loyalty in their subjects. Once disease and old age are conquered, accidents and crime would become the main fears and even a historically democratic society could be strongly tempted to give up liberties if they think that a more regulated society would also be safer. And who would risk losing their Earthly medical immortality by angering the government that runs the hospitals? In the past people might have the courage to rebel against their government since their life was probably going to be difficult and short anyway, but if you could live a few thousand years as long as you did not anger the government then there would be a very, very strong temptation to respond to injustices by just keeping quiet and hoping that they will go away in a century or two. Who could bring themselves to rebel against tyranny or injustice if it meant throwing away millennia of Earthly pleasures and luxury? Devout Christians, Muslims, and Jews… that’s who. What do they care that the government can deny them perhaps thousands of years of physical life if they believe both that their soul will live eternally anyway in a much better place than even the most decadent Las Vegas junket and that doing the right thing (id est that which pleases God) is infinitely more important than doing what merely pleases a government agency or politician.

Perhaps the trend for future societies will also be for freedom to be most likely in countries with largely devout*** populations. As a result of the threat to both tyrants and meddlesome bureaucrats of people who take their religion seriously there would, of course, be a considerable campaign by “reasonable people” to try to dilute, moderate, or emasculate any religious groups that considered principles of right and wrong to be more important than safety, security, and “getting along”… not unlike we are already trying to do to “domesticate” the radical Islam meme and leftists have been doing to modernist or progressive Christian denominations for decades.

* C.S. Lewis wasn’t much for the idea of using gov’t to compel people to not sin, since taking away people’s ability to choose also takes away the virtue of voluntarily turning your back on sin.
** Of course some governments are already too short lived to compare with even current Earthly human lifespans. Surely there were some long-lived people who were born before the Soviet Empire and lived to see its downfall. What is France on their 5th or 6th republic now?
*** Which is not to say that all devout populations would be free, since not all believers share the philosophy that when good acts are compulsory they cease to be moral. One only has to look at much of the Islamic world to see a ready counter-example. Some religious groups might also prefer to retreat from worldly concerns so much that Earthly injustices are viewed as being at least as inconsequential as Earthly mortality.

Update: Yes, I realize I misspelled "religious" in the title, but if I change the spelling now then it will break the permalink.
Update 2: Welcome Carnival goers. I encourage everyone to look around the blog at other posts. Some that you might find especially interesting are "The Future of Candy", "Educational Films...", and "The Japanese/French Son of Concorde...".

Online Movie Recommendations 11

2005-10-25T10:04:00.000-07:00

Anyone who has played the videogame Halo should recognize the environment from this week's online movie recommendation.

It is the 1st episode of the series Red vs. Blue by the creative geniuses at RoosterTeeth Productions:

http://www.machinima.com/Streaming.php?id=275

If you liked it you can download the next episodes here and here or use the search function to find other episodes using the string "red vs blue: episode " and then the appropriate number.

U.S. gets customized stamps too

2005-10-24T09:12:00.000-07:00

I mentioned earlier that Canadians could make custom stamps for themselves. Now the U.S. Postal Service offers custom stamps too. As postage for my Christmas cards this year I think I'll create my own "great bloggers series" of stamps to commemorate myself.

If I really want to seem famous though I'll need some custom PEZ dispensers made with my own likeness on them.

Oct. 25th is St. Crispin's Day.

2005-10-23T22:47:00.000-07:00

Don't forget to celebrate. You don't have to be a papist to consider the day special. On Oct. 25th 1415 the English defeated the French in the Battle of Agincourt.

King Henry V of England's speech on the eve of battle was portrayed* by Shakespeare thus:

This day is called the feast of Crispian:
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say "To-morrow is Saint Crispian":
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars.
And say "These wounds I had on Crispin's day."
Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day: then shall our names.
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

*Of course if I were a newspaper with a quote that good, I'd probably claim it was real. But since I don't have such high editorial standards, I'm willing to admit it is The Bard's embellishment.

Beware of Benedict Arnold Color Laser Printers

2005-10-20T10:55:00.000-07:00

http://www.eff.org/Privacy/printers/

hattip: Marginal Revolutions

Tough Guy Award 5

2005-10-20T10:32:00.000-07:00

Darwin works both ways, and man didn’t get to the top of the food chain by accident. The “Tough Guy Award” is the opposite of the Darwin Award.

This week's Tough Guy is Arthur Cole from Massachusetts. This 76 year old grandfather was out walking with his 4 year old grandson when they were attacked from behind by a coyote. Mr. Cole managed to get the coyote in a choke hold when it lunged for his throat, giving his grandson time to run to safety. Mr. Cole wrestled the animal to the ground and pinned it there until help arrived, suffering eight bite wounds from the beast in the process. Local authorities killed the animal and sent the remains to be tested for rabies.

More on Electric Aircraft

2005-10-19T09:52:00.000-07:00

Back in August, I asked if anyone knew of any electric aircraft developments as I suspected the concept was just a "green fantasy dreamed up by bureaucrats" rather than realistic alternative to conventional aircraft propulsion. It turns out that most "electric aircraft" discussion centers around fuel cell powered aircraft, and they suffer from the same problems as fuel cell powered automobile proposals. Fuel is one of the big issues, since no one has yet perfected an acceptable way to handle and store hydrogen fuel for everyday use or a good fuel cell that can run on easily transported and stored hydrocarbon fuels. Well, the first successful civil aviation use of electric aircraft may not use fuel cells at all. Perhaps it will use batteries.

I stumbled across another electric self-launched sailplane design called the Silent 2, and this one looks ready for the market. For a normal powered airplane, you couldn't store enough energy in batteries to make it a practical power source, but it would seem to be just fine for self-launching a sailplane. I think the key factor in the success of this will be getting the purchase and operation costs (particularly battery costs) lower than the costs of a similar engine powered self-launching sailplane.

If the nano-composite thin film solar panels I discussed earlier this week can be made cheap, efficient, durable, and light enough then coating the upper surfaces of battery powered electric sailplanes would be a great application for them. A self-launching sailplane that could "refuel" itself by recharging its batteries from solar power would be useful enough for cross country flights that buyers might be willing to pay extra for it.

A normal civil aviation airplane couldn't get enough energy from the sunlight hitting its wings to make a difference, but a sailplane might. The Army hopes to get the solar panel technology cheap enough to build into shelters at power outputs of 30 Watts/lb. The battery capacity of the Silent 2 electric self-launching sailplane is around 4 kiloWatt-hours so only 34 lbs. of these solar panels, which could generate 1 kiloWatt, should be enough to completely recharge the sailplane's batteries in 4 hours. I don't see any data on what the efficiency or areal density of the solar panels are so I don't know for sure if there is enough surface area on the glider for that much solar panel. The Silent 2 has a wing area of 8.8 square meters (about 95 square feet in real units). At a typical solar power density of 1.3 kiloWatts/m^2 that would give over 11 kiloWatts of solar power falling on those wings. If these nano-composite thin film solar panels can get over 10% efficiency, then covering the Silent 2's wings with them could produce at least 1 kiloWatt of power when they are in typical sunlight. Presumably if the Army is looking at coating shelters with them, they must be durable enough that applying them to sailplane wings wouldn't create a maintenance problem. In the end it all comes down to cost, but I wouldn't be suprised to see solar powered electric self-launching sailplanes become common within a decade.

Transparent Aluminum

2005-10-18T09:57:00.000-07:00

http://aimpoints.hq.af.mil/display.cfm?id=7223

Hattip: Mr. Goldberg

Update: Welcome Carnival of Tomorrow goers. I encourage everyone to look around the blog at other posts. Some that you might find especially interesting are "The Future of Candy", "Educational Films...", and "The Japanese/French Son of Concorde...".

Online Movie Recommendations 10

2005-10-17T23:13:00.000-07:00

Advertisements are a part of everyday life, so it is no surprise that they have been turned into entertainment and art. Movie trailers are a form of advertisement with a usually predictable structure and creative amateurs have been making some very entertaining fake movie trailers that still have the “feel” of real ones. This week’s movie recommendations are 3 trailers for movies that don’t really exist.

Grayson: After watching this trailer, I wished the film was real.
http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2645516

Fast Times at Hero High: funny
http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2483385

Shining: Famous horror movie re-imagined
http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2681181

Solar Clothing

2005-10-16T21:27:00.000-07:00

Scott eVest already makes a jacket with solar panels built into it for recharging your phone, PDA, MP3 player, or other electronic devices. If the nanocomposite thin film solar panels being evaluated by the U.S. Army Soldier Systems Center work out, maybe solar power collecting clothes could be made sufficiently non-geeky looking that they become common. Being able to trickle charge your electronics that way would be great, and might compete with miniature fuel cells as a way to provide long effective battery life for mobile electronics.

COT #11 is up...

2005-10-13T20:48:00.000-07:00

... at The Speculist, here:

http://www.blog.speculist.com/archives/000479.html

This edition focuses on brains and energy. Mmmmm... Brains...

Educational Films, Still the Future of Learning

2005-10-13T16:40:00.000-07:00

The last three online movie recommendations I have made were all educational in some way. When my friend Tom (who encouraged me to start this blog) invented movies, he had high hopes that they would revolutionize education. He said:

“I believe that the motion picture is destined to revolutionize our educational system, and that in a few years it will supplant largely, if not entirely, the use of text-books in our schools. Books are clumsy methods of instruction at best, and often even the words of explanation in them have to be explained.

“I should say that on the average we get only about two per cent efficiency out of school books as they are written to-day. The education of the future, as I see it, will be conducted through the medium of the motion picture, a visualized education, where it should be possible to obtain one-hundred-per-cent-efficiency.

“The motion picture has tremendous possibilities for the training and development of the memory. There is no medium for memory-building as productive as the human eye.”

He explained the logic behind his bold claims of movies replacing books as the primary means of education:

“Most of our textbooks fail on two big counts. They are not sufficiently human, and their application is not sufficiently practical. Their tendency seems to be to look upon the whole process of education as a job of dull and uninteresting work-with the apparent argument that the duller and more uninteresting it is made the more credit there is for doing it.

“When we have tried to change that viewpoint we have used too much sugar coating, and have applied too many fanciful “isms,” and have gone to the opposite extreme. Education isn’t play- and it can’t be made to look like play. It is hard, hard work. But it can be made interesting work.”

Well, movies did not replace books in schools*. Certainly I remember some class films** when I was in school, but they were much less common than doing work out of textbooks. I think one reason that movies have a difficult time replacing books is that the expense of film and projectors made watching movies a group activity for the whole class. Being a group activity, all the students must learn at the same pace. A book, on the other hand, can be taken home and the student can re-read material he doesn’t understand. Also, a book could more easily be taken home and used as reference material for homework assignments. The self-paced nature of reading and handiness of books as reference materials will likely ensure that books remain a big part of education for the foreseeable future.

Instead of replacing books, perhaps Tom should have considered using them to replace teachers. You obviously couldn’t get rid of teachers entirely, but like automation does for mfg. workers, the use of films could greatly increase the productivity of teachers. The best professors and teachers on a topic could be filmed giving their lectures, and those lectures could be used to replace a large amount of the in-person lectures a teacher has to give. That would free up more time for the teacher to spend with students one-on-one, or allow you to reduce the number of teachers needed. Perhaps the movies could be done by the same companies that sell textbooks, and the reputation and quality of the lecture films would be an additional selling point for the publisher. A movie of the best instructor’s lecture will probably be inferior to personal lectures by a very good teacher, since the teacher who is there in-person can adjust his lecture to the students and respond to their attitude and comprehension. But think back to your own school experience… How many of your teachers were really good, inspiring teachers that connected with the students? Probably only a few out of your entire school experience. For each of those very good teachers there was probably one or more who just stood in front of the class reading blandly from the textbook or years-old course notes. The fact is that most teachers are mediocre instructors. If you don’t think that a movie lecture done by top notch instructors with quality film-making crew and a large enough budget for location shots and effects could be as educational as a personal lecture from a typical school teacher, then maybe you haven’t seen really good educational shows***, like Sir David Attenborrough’s Life on Earth or the original Connections series. I know I learned more and was more inspired by such shows on a per hour basis than over 90% of my grade school teachers could accomplish, and I went to pretty good schools. Monday I linked to streaming audio of Western Civ. lectures by the late George L. Mosse; wouldn’t it be great to have videos of lectures by history’s best instructors that could be available to future generations of students. I would be shocked if using such high quality educational films supplemented by personal attention to answer questions and reinforce problem areas didn’t provide a better education at less money than current school practices. Honestly, this isn’t that much different from having a world famous professor give lectures to an auditorium of hundreds of students and then having TA’s handle grading and labs while the professor sets his miniscule office hours to make himself almost unavailable to the average student. That arrangement seems to be sufficiently adequate for some our nation’s most expensive colleges, who by the way are generally considered far superior to public education.

Another possible reason why Tom’s prediction of widespread use of movies in education didn’t come true may have to do with the fact that our school system isn’t primarily in the education business. It is more concerned with being a state babysitting service, a self-esteem workshop, an NEA member makework program, and perhaps a AAA sports farm team administrator. If teacher productivity were drastically increased by use of top notch educational films matched to the textbooks then we would need less teachers, and the teacher’s union wouldn’t stand for efficient instruction of our children if it comes at their expense. No doubt they would attack widespread use of educational films as being inferior to personal instruction. Which I admitted it is… IF the teacher doing the instructing is really good and can connect with the students. But I don’t think, for example, that the vast majority of schoolteachers could present the evolution of modern science and engineering as well as something like James Burke’s The Day the Universe Changed. You would think that the lazy teachers would embrace educational films to replace their own work, and in fact I have a friend who says their public school did that frequently by herding multiple classes together and having one teacher keep order during the film while the others went off to the faculty lounge. It doesn’t seem widespread, however, which leads me to suspect that it is either due to habit and prejudice (that good teaching must be labor intensive) or due to not wanting to look like they are collecting a teacher’ salary to do movie usher work.

I had one professor who did a great job of using movies to improve his productivity. He would assign and grade problem sets, but he would never go over the answers in class. He would film himself solving all of the homework problems for each problem set on the blackboard in an empty room, and explaining each step in the problem solving process. When you got your graded homework back, if you had a question on why you missed a particular problem, you went to the library and watched the film of the professor solving it. That way he could spend the entire class time conducting lectures and the student’s didn’t have to sit bored as he went over all the problems they got right while they waited for him to explain the one problem they didn’t understand. Presumably he assigned the same problems every year, so he didn’t need to remake the movies unless the textbook changed. Students only needed to watch the film of him solving the problems that they had questions on, so it saved everyone’s time. The professor was available during office hours to give additional explainations if you still didn’t understand his movie, but I never needed it. I also found that watching all of his problem set movies back-to-back was a great way to review before a test. I don’t think Tom had this specific application in mind when he was promoting the usefulness of movies in education, but it is still a good example of how creative use of movies can greatly increase a teacher’s productivity. Unfortunately most teachers aren’t that imaginative with labor saving technology.

I accused our education system of not being primarily in the business of educating kids, but there are organizations where the risk or cost of poorly educated people is sufficiently high that teaching people well and efficiently does get a high priority. The military and private businesses often fall into those categories, and they have both embraced using movies to provide quality, standardized instruction for over half a century. Rapidly improving communication technology is revolutionizing distance learning and perhaps that will also provide an avenue for greater use of movies in education, especially for valuable but uncommon skill sets and degrees where the density of students is too low to support a large number of conventional schools or training classes spread all over the country.

Tom seemed to be thinking mostly**** about formal schooling when he discussed using movies in education. Movies, and other forms of video, have really succeeded in the competitive business environment of informal education of both children and adults where the convenience of getting the information and usefulness of the medium in conveying technical information relatively painlessly are strong advantages for video. Learning can be fun and/or useful enough that people outside of schools want to do it. Even people who hate the drudgery or structure of schoolwork often enjoy watching an interesting documentary or a do-it-yourself home improvement show. There are over a dozen TV channels dedicated to educational programs, and customers who want even more technical video programs can order them from several online businesses that specialize in educational movies. Nonfiction books are still big business, but in the competitive private sector it seems that Tom’s thinking hit closer to the mark.

The development of modern computers and electronic networks might make using movies in education easier and more common. One of the difficulties in using films in formal education is simply the logistics. Assuming that you used 8mm film, it takes a 7 inch diameter reel holding 400 feet of film to store a half-hour lecture. If a class of students were shown 15 hours of educational films a week for 35 weeks, then that would take over a thousand reels of film. An elementary school making regular use of educational films to supplement textbooks and personal instruction might easily require over 10,000 reels storing over 750 miles of film. They would need to be stored properly. Someone would be required to pull the lectures for the next day’s classes, shelve the previous lectures, and fix or replace damaged films. Each class would need projectors and there would have to be spares, preventive maintenance, and replacement of broken projectors. School employees would have to be trained in storing films, working the projectors, and some amount of repair skills. If lecture films matching school textbooks were widespread, none of this is a serious obstacle to a school that wanted to use them. After all, most schools already have libraries, librarians, various forms of specialized equipment, and maintenance staff. But for a school that doesn’t really want to use films (or just change the standard way of doing business) these logistical efforts and cost do represent a good excuse to do nothing. For homeschoolers, small businesses, or curious individuals, the trouble and expense of regular use of educational or training films might represent a real obstacle. The development of modern video formats and equipment such as DVD’s and streaming video has eliminated a lot of the hassle of dealing with a large volume of video information. Now films can be stored, transported, and displayed using compact formats and reliable, easily operated consumer electronics. Discovery Communications has already set up a business providing streaming educational videos online to both schools and homeschooling families. Now that the logistics excuse has been practically eliminated, we may see more widespread use of educational movies.

One of the advantages I stated above for books was their handiness as a reference, but with modern technology movies can be pretty handy too. Now using laptop computers or portable DVD players, you are no longer required to watch the movie inside a theater or specially equipped room. You can take the video outside to the subject you are observing or over to the equipment you are operating. This has great potential for making technical work or field work easier, since you can watch the video right where you need the information. Schoolkids can take the movies home with them to review or do homework with. Widespread use of laptop computers in schools could enable this portability for educational video in formal education, and MIT is already working on making low-cost laptops so that every schoolkid can have one. When they succeed, it will be another hurdle to widespread use of educational video that has been overcome and Tom’s dream for his invention will take another big leap forward.

The sort of educational movie Tom thought about primarily was minutes or perhaps even hours in length. It wouldn’t make sense to go to the theater and spend 5 or 10 minutes finding the right reel and setting up the projector only to watch an educational film that was just 18 seconds long. Yet, that is exactly how long the latest online educational video I recommended was. Now that modern video formats have removed the “set up” time for watching educational video and the portability of modern consumer electronics allows you to take it to wherever is most convenient, the length of useful educational movies has become much shorter. Perhaps one avenue of development in educational use of movies will be the creation of millions of very short (commercial length instead of TV show or theatrical film length) snippits of educational video. Think of them more as moving illustrations rather than movies. This sort of thing is already being used heavily in PowerPoint presentations; I think it is a short jump to larger video-illustrated documents.

If someone made a video illustration based auto repair handbook that included thousands and thousands of very short movies, each one describing and demonstrating one step in one process for working on your make and model of car, I think it would be much more useful than trying to interpret the written descriptions and static illustrations in Haynes or Chilton’s handbooks. You wouldn’t sit down and watch all the short movies; you would only find the few movies that covered the procedure that was giving you problems and watch them on a laptop or portable DVD player right there at your car. With so many cars having DVD players, perhaps video supplements to factory automotive manuals to illustrate basics of jacking, towing, jumping batteries, checking fluids, using the heated auto-adjusting seats, etc. will become common practice. I’d be shocked if the U.S. military isn’t developing these right now for their equipment maintenance training and reference needs.

Keep an eye on Wikipedia in the near future to see what a huge resource for education this might become. Right now if you look up a type of knot on this online electronic encyclopedia, you get still illustrations and written descriptions of how to tie it. Compare that with how easy it is to understand the Ian knot video I linked too. Wikipedia is already considering adding videos to help illustrate their encyclopedia entries. One of the biggest obstacles to using them now is the large amount of computer memory and network bandwidth they would require, but Moore’s Law will solve those problems soon enough. They ask rhetorically about short movies:

“How better to explain field hockey or the gait of a kangaroo?”

Perhaps some day soon when a college freshman wants to know how to fold a shirt or a grade school kid wants to know how to tie a shoelace their parents will tell them the same thing I was told when I asked my parents how to spell a difficult word: “Look it up; if I just tell you then you will never learn it for yourself.”

Make magazine had a short article on a hacker who had put the entire Wikipedia encyclopedia and several other written reference materials on a PDA so that he could have access to detailed information on a wide variety of subjects with him at all time. A video-enabled Wikipedia (or other comprehensive reference work) that included video of everything from how to fold an origami crane to what a bunt is in baseball would be many, many times larger than just current word and image based documents. Unfortunately, one of the limitations on the low cost laptops MIT is trying to make so that every schoolkid can have their own laptop computer is that they can’t afford to put much memory in them. This lack of memory means that while the laptops may allow the kids to take a few short videos home to review, they wouldn’t be able to store the huge amounts of data needed to use them as complete video-enabled reference materials like the hypothetical car or military equipment repair manuals I discussed above. Again, though, that is an engineering problem that Moore’s Law (and the dedicated work of millions of scientists, engineers, and technicians around the globe) will probably solve soon enough.

So where is Tom’s dream headed? What will the use of video (I hesitate to call it “movies”) in education be like? Well, superficially it might look like those books that Tom was trying to replace. Books are a convenient size and form factor, and researchers are already hard at work on electronically enhanced books. Instead of hundreds of pages, perhaps it will just have one (or a few) electronic displays. Maybe they would be very high quality video screens, maybe they would be lower quality thin displays that could be folded out to a larger size. Maybe it would have both. This super ebook reader could display video-enhanced textbooks. Maybe all the student’s textbooks would be stored on the reader, or maybe they would be stored on separate memory sticks that had to be physically switched out of the reader to view the material for different subjects. In addition to the normal illustrations and tables of our current “dead tree” textbooks, this one would also have short video illustration and animations to help explain the written text. Each chapter would also have several hours of video lectures done by the book author or perhaps some celebrity lecturer with location, historical, or special effects footage as needed. It might resemble an episode of Cosmos or Sesame Street more than a traditional school lecture. Teachers might video their own lectures or make their own notes and add them to the “margins” of the textbook to supplement the standard material from the publisher. The inclusion of both video lectures and written text might mean that the device needs two display screens so that the student can follow the text along with the lecture, or perhaps the one large display is smart enough to hold the lecture in a separate window, like picture-in-picture TVs. Audio speakers might be included, but headphones would usually be plugged into it for audio so you didn’t disturb other library patrons or classmates. The teachers might make the students listen to the lecture out loud on the classroom audio/video equipment though, because too many kids were caught hacking their books to allow them to listen to wireless podcasts instead of the lecture when they wore headphones in class. The student would highlight or make notes in the margins that would be stored with the book electronically. Perhaps the student works the review problems at the end of the chapter right there in the textbook, with the margins or space between problems automatically expanding to give as much room as is needed. At least some of the review problems would have the answers “in the back of the book,” though they might not be unlocked until after the student attempts the problem himself or on command from the teacher. No doubt cracking the access code to the answers would be a common pastime for mischievous students. The review problem answers would include a short video lecture or demonstration explaining how they were arrived at, much like my old professor had done with his brilliant homework solution videos. Some of those review problems might not resemble word problems as much as video games. Educational video games from the old Mavis Bacon typing game to modern military simulations have proven to be effective training devices, and perhaps the textbook would include one or more large video games, simulations, or other interactive content to compliment the text, video illustrations, and video lectures. High school English textbooks might contain entire productions of plays by various university, local, or even professional theater groups. Electronic textbooks for film studies classes would likely cost more, because of the need to pay royalties on the dozens of full length feature films included with the text. Surely this futuristic textbook replacement would have a nice bookcover to protect it, and store spare memory sticks if they are needed, that was liberally decorated with colorful flower stickers, initials drawn inside of hearts, or animated sketches of explosions and hot-rodded aircars to the student’s taste.

In short, Tom will be wrong. Movies won’t replace textbooks, but perhaps textbooks will become hyperlinked movies (among other things). Such a future textbook has already been described in the hands of a fictional schoolgirl, and maybe within the next decade or so schoolkids and adults alike will be able to have their own version of Penny Gadget’s gadget computerbook as a tremendous labor saving device for both formal and informal education. What, you thought I was talking about someone else?

Not everyone agrees (hattip: Dr. Pournelle) with Tom and I on the benefits of heavier use of video in education. I’d certainly welcome input from people who have experience with the drawbacks and advantages of using movies for training and education.

*Although if you consider advertising to be a form of consumer education, then perhaps video images do represent the majority of the total amount of education that occurs in the First World.

**Is it just me, or does young Carol have an Adam’s apple?

***Get the full length version of Life on Earth, not the edited one commonly sold in the U.S. Don’t waste your time on the later Connections sequels.

****Though he did like to brag about how early silent movies helped improve the movie going public’s reading speed and comprehension.

Update (10/14) added video game speculation

Custom Postage Stamps

2005-10-13T13:34:00.000-07:00

If having your own monogrammed M&M's in your favorite color isn't special enough for you, now the Canadian Post office will create a custom postage stamp for you for only $25* per 20! It's the perfect thing for impressing friends and family. Now you just have to decide if you want to use the "young you" or the "old you" picture.

*Presumably that's also in Canadian dollars. Using the handy Exchange Rate link on my blogroll to convert that, I see that $25 Canadian Dollars converts in U.S. dollars to "sofa cushion change."

Airpower Decisive Against Hold-out Communist Hamlet

2005-10-12T00:25:00.000-07:00

I heard the little commies practiced infantcide against their baby girls, too.

Good riddance.

Update: Here's the footage. Eh. I've seen the Wile E. Coyote take worse and walk away from it. These Euro caroon characters are wussies.

XM-25

2005-10-11T22:12:00.000-07:00

Strategy Page says that the XM-25 testing has been going very well. I think this smart grenade launcher will be very useful to American infantry on just about any battlefield. Its "window" setting, which determines the range to a selected target and programs the 25mm grenade to detonate just past the target, will greatly reduce the effect of cover for enemy troops and even allow the shooter to kill enemies hiding behind the corner of a building. An enemy soldier who just has cover in front of them would still be vulnerable to a smart grenade programmed to pass above him and explode; that suddenly makes our enemy’s job a lot more stressful. Because it will allow a soldier to shoot a target that is hidden, this weapon could increase the possibility of fratricide. I would expect that use of Blue Force Tracker technology and shooter discipline could keep that from becoming too much of a problem.

For a better idea of what this smart 25mm grenade launcher will be able to do, watch this video of the Bofors 40mm 3p round from Janes. Now imagine that technology optimized for use in infantry combat instead of anti-aircraft and shrunk down to around 18lbs. so that an infantry squad can carry one as a support weapon.

If this is successful, I expect that the next step will be to use the smart 25mm round developed for it in other weapon systems like vehicle mounted automatic grenade launchers. Pay attention to the scene in the 3p video where a burst of 40mm rounds are fired using the “time function” above a field full of simulated infantry and each one is programmed to detonate at a different location so that the field is saturated with lethal shrapnel from above. Imagine how useful that could be on an M-2 Bradley.

Now when does the civilian version come out? If ATK could put a proximity sensor into the 25mm rounds they would be perfect for birds, clay pigeons, or revenuers (though a little expensive).

Online Movie Recommendation 9

2005-10-10T22:01:00.000-07:00

How many times have you suffered through the slow and laborious process of tying your shoes, wondering if there were a faster way?

Well now there is, it's called the Ian Knot and here's how to tie it:

http://members.ozemail.com.au/~ingeborg/IanKnot.mpg

Globalization of Beauty

2005-10-10T22:00:00.000-07:00

Sterling steps out of his ill-informed, ego-stroking Cassandra fantasy long enough to make a really enjoyable post about the benifits of globalization.

Online Streaming Audio Recommendations

2005-10-09T22:34:00.000-07:00

At the bottom of this page are links to a wide variety of old radio programs. Lileks seems to prefer the Adventures of Sam Spade. I like some of the older comedies.

If you want more intellectually stimulating fare, turn off that “All Things Considered” and listen to George L. Mosse’s lectures on the history of Western civilization. They come recommended by no less a luminary than Dr. Pournelle.

These are streaming audio, so if you want to fill up your mp3 player with them you’ll need to use your favorite streaming audio ripping software.

Tough Guy Award 4

2005-10-06T10:15:00.000-07:00

Darwin works both ways, and man didn’t get to the top of the food chain by accident. The “Tough Guy Award” is the opposite of the Darwin Award.

So far all our Tough Guy Award recipients have been Americans, but there are Tough Guys all over the world. This week we look to Africa to find our latest Tough Guy Award winner, Daniel M’Mburugu of Kenya. Mr. M’Mburugu is a 73 year old grandfather who was ambushed by a leopard while tending his potato and bean crops. The leopard sank its teeth into Mr. M’Mburugu’s wrist and mauled him with its claws, but Mr. Mburugu fought back and killed the beast by reaching into its mouth and ripping its tongue out!

Harriet Miers is no Puritan

2005-10-05T19:54:00.000-07:00

There has been much comment in the blogosphere about Bush's new Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers. Some of it has revolved around her being an "evangelical Christian," speculation about how devout she really is, and how her religious beliefs will affect the court.

I do not know Ms. Miers personally, but I don't think she is a strict, Puritanical "Bible thumper" regardless of what speculation I hear in the press. After all, in 1995 she took the job of being chairman of the Texas Lottery Commission. Most of the sweet old church ladies I know would refuse a job like that which involved both encouraging people to pursue a quick and easy path to material wealth and also deceiving the innumerate, who are mostly poor and can least afford to be tricked out of money.

I am not saying Ms. Miers is un-Christian (after all, some churches have different views on the morality of gambling) merely that she obviously isn't a Puritanical prude.

Word of the Day

2005-10-04T23:15:00.000-07:00

This article claims it provides a list of foriegn words for which there is no English equivalent. It gets at least one wrong, however. It says that there is no English word for using company time and resources for one's own purposes (which is called "fucha" in Portuguese). The English equivalent is "perruque". It is borrowed from a similar French word, and can also mean a peruke or periwig.

The Future of Candy

2005-10-04T22:15:00.000-07:00

Lean manufacturing trends are moving many everyday products from commoditization to customization; candy is no exception. Used to you could get M&M candies in any color you wanted, as long as it was brown. Then more colors were added, but mixed together in a standard bag. Special color mixes were sold for certain holidays like the black and orange mixed bags for Halloween. Now, though, M&M has ‘discovered’ customization and you can buy specially mixed bags of M&M candies with any color or colors you want from their palette of 21 colors. It’s just the thing to spice up your corporate or university event. You can even order M&M’s with a custom message written on them in place of the standard “m”. I expect that soon they will sell bags of any custom color (instead of just the currently existing 21) or colors you want in a variety of sizes and flavors.

Now how long will it be before someone combines a 3d laser scanner with rapid prototyping technology to allow people to buy a custom Pez dispenser with a head that looks just like them on it? I expect that within a decade you’ll be able to buy one from a kiosk in the mall.

Update: Places that will sell you custom wrapped candy are common and, of course, custom decorated cakes are nothing new. The point of the M&M evolution is the change from a product that used to be a commodity into one with both a wide variety of "standard options" and that for a little more money can be highly customized (as has been happening with other products like cars) for a wealthier society that both wants and can afford to have more more individualized products. No doubt the next step in sweet treats is for everyone to get their own customized flavors. That would extend the lean and just-in-time mfg. even further, where the product is made right where and when it is sold. What would such a store look like? Like a cocktail bar for children. This is not to say that mass production was a wrong turn. In the 1950's there probably wasn't the technology nor the widespread wealth to make custom M&M candies profitable. I'd rather have standard brown M&M's than suck on a rock because I couldn't afford the high priced custom candy. Standardized products still have a place but increasingly customized ones will return, not because we've forgotten how to lower cost with mass production but because we can afford not to use it when we feel like having something special.

Serenity Now!

2005-10-04T22:08:00.000-07:00

I can highly recommend the movie Serenity, even for people who haven't seen the TV show it is based on. Don't just take my word for it, Orson Scott Card thinks so too. I never would have guessed that River Tam was made of chocolate. Oh, uh... spoiler warning.

Still, it isn't my favorite movie this year. So far that honor goes to The Great Raid. If you haven't seen that movie yet, maybe you can still catch it in a dollar-theater.

Online Movie Recommendation 8

2005-10-03T22:17:00.000-07:00

So you think you know how to fold a shirt? Think again:

http://www.devilducky.com/media/15594/

Balloon Houses

2005-10-03T22:05:00.000-07:00

TCS has an interesting article on the history of the two-by-four.

Cat Diesel Power

2005-10-02T23:44:00.000-07:00

Back on Sept. 13th I linked to a news article about a German group that invented a way to turn dead cats into diesel fuel. The article reports being able to get 2.5 liters (0.016 bbl) of diesel per cat at a cost of only $0.30 per liter ($1.14/gal). Since we use about 1 billion barrels of diesel* a year, that means we’d need 62.5 billion cats a year to meet our present rate of diesel consumption. There are only about 70 million cats in the United States.

This illustrates a problem with a lot of these gimmicky alternative fuel proposals like making fuel out of French fry grease or turkey guts. In small quantities (enough for some test programs and publicity stunts) you can get these ingredients for free. But to produce the huge amounts of fuel our economy consumes, you’d need to greatly increase the production of these currently cheap feedstock. Once you need more of these cheap feedstock than are currently available you must begin producing them deliberately, and that means they stop becoming cheap. For example, let’s look more at what it would take to supply all of the United States’s diesel needs with cats. Assuming that house cats live to be 15 years old, then the average person would need to keep over 3,000 cats as pets in order to keep up with diesel demand using dead pets. Since that seems unlikely, we must consider raising cats as livestock. If each cat weighs 10lbs, then 62.5 billion cats means we must raise 625 billion pounds of cat a year. Compare that with other livestock such as cattle. We have about 100 million head of cattle in the United States. At 2,000 pounds each, that means we have about 200 billion pounds of cattle at any given time. So the amount of cat that would need to be raised is high, but not unthinkable. Unfortunately, mass doesn’t tell the whole story. If anyone thinks managing hundreds of cats would be the same as one cow, they must not have much experience with animal husbandry. And for those of us with allergies, the idea of living in a nation with billions of cats sounds a lot worse than drilling a few new holes in northern Alaska. So far, we have still only considered replacing current diesel consumption. Replacing gasoline consumption with cat diesel would be even harder.

I think we can safely say that if dead cat diesel alternative fuel caught on, supplying cats would be a major economic consideration. Wholesale prices of diesel are currently about $1.85/gal, which seems higher than the cat diesel price given of $1.14/gal. The cat diesel price probably assumes free cats, so that means that cat costs can run as high as $0.47/cat before oil based diesel is competitive. This assumes the $1.14/gal given in the article is an accurate cost that includes such things as taxes, and amortization of the refining equipment and other capital expenses. As I will explain later, I suspect it is reasonably accurate except perhaps for the taxes.

This brings up another danger, however, in analyzing gimmicky alternate fuel proposals. Normal refining is a mature field, and the costs are well known. The costs given in press releases on alternate fuels have to be considered more skeptically. Aside from the already mentioned problem of underestimating feedstock costs, the alternate fuel proposal may either ignore the cost of capital equipment entirely and give only marginal costs, or it may make overly optimistic estimates of the cost of building an alternative fuel refinery (which may be an immature technology depending on the method) by basing it on conventional refinery costs (which is a mature technology). For an example of how maturity can affect costs, imagine how many people would be able to truthfully answer a job listing for a chemical engineer with 10 years of cat refining experience, as opposed to the number that have the same amount of petroleum refining experience.

Taxes are yet another cost that must be considered. Alternative fuel supporters may suggest that their favorite fuel could be made more competitive if it were given special tax breaks. Well, special tax status may make a fuel more profitable, but it doesn’t make it more economical. Consider the case of tax breaks to encourage people to buy hybrid or electric vehicles instead of traditional internal combustion engine powered ones. The hybrids and electric vehicles can conserve petroleum and reduce vehicle tailpipe emissions by getting better fuel economy. The hybrids and electric vehicles, however, consume more of other types of resources, like copper for the electric propulsion system and heavy metals for the batteries. The mining of these raw materials and the maintenance of the hybrid or electric vehicle will create additional types of pollution that normal cars don’t have. So now, before we can decide if we want to encourage people to buy hybrid or electric cars (and how much to encourage them), we need to figure out some way to compare the relative scarcity of the raw materials each requires, the amount of the raw materials (including human effort) each vehicle requires, and the relative damage to the environment of each of the types of pollution involved. It is very easy for a central planning committee to make decisions that let them feel good about themselves, but it is very, very hard to weigh all of the factors needed to make the correct decision. And, of course, since technology, consumption, people’s habits, and available information change all the time the value and importance of all these factors must be constantly reconsidered. Fortunately, we don’t need to invent some new way to weigh the relative importance and scarcity of all the things that goes into building and maintaining vehicles. Engineers have already come up with a figure of merit to describe the sacrifices society must make to produce some product; it is called cost and is usually measured in dollars. Typically products even have this helpful figure of merit printed on the outside of their packaging to assist consumers in deciding which things they want to buy.

The point of this long winded explanation is that the cost of an item is actually a very good estimate of the quantity and scarcity of the raw materials (including human effort) that goes into making something and the operating cost of a piece of equipment is a very good estimate of the quantity and scarcity of the raw materials needed to keep the equipment running. In a properly functioning market economy, price automatically functions** to provide the essential piece of information needed for efficiently distributing resources that planned economies find so impossible to calculate. Think about how many man-hours (and now computer cycles) are spent by sellers all over the country just considering how best to price their product, and by buyers considering what items to buy, and the negotiating that goes on between the two. That represents a tremendous amount of brainpower directed at the problem of what resources are more important than others. Central planning committees would kill (many literally) to have that kind of resources at their disposal but to us it is so distributed that the efforts seem invisible and the results of the calculations capricious. If we subsidize people to buy more expensive cars or more expensive fuels then it may make us feel warm and fuzzy inside, but in reality it will almost certainly also mean that we are inducing them to consume more (and/or more valuable) resources and to create more waste.

Of course, as the Greens love to point out, the price that items have in our economy often overlooks costs that are borne by society at large instead of the individuals doing the buying and selling. This is true, and if we use taxes correctly then we can correct prices to even better reflect these societal costs. For example, if we discover that carbon dioxide emissions are causing global warming problems we could pass on the cost of maintaining a carbon sequestration program to fuel users by having an appropriate amount of tax tied to the carbon content of fuels. Or, if we decide that using natural petroleum causes us national security problems because of the instability of the supplier countries then we could add a tax to it that would pay for the additional military spending we determine is needed to protect those supply lines. We don’t use our tax system very well to correct inaccuracies in price information right now, but perhaps in a more enlightened future (the kind where we all have aircars and silver jumpsuits) it will be common practice. Notice that I am only suggesting here that taxes be used to improve the accuracy of information contained in prices so that the market can better predict what solutions will be the most efficient use of resources, I am not suggesting that the information in market forces be abandon or deliberately distorted by subsidizing specific solutions directly. Fortunately, even with our present tax environment I think cost is still a very good indicator of the amount of resources a product consumes***. The problem is that some people, the kind that love to plan everyone else’s lives for them, discover that no matter how accurate the price information their favorite special solution isn’t the one that the market identifies as being the best. Then, like unethical engineers who rig trade studies to always prove themselves right, they want to use taxes to force their favorite solution to be adopted rather than have to admit that their personal prejudices might really be less informed than the billions of expert man-hours that are distilled into market price information. If you find yourself looking over some gimmicky alternative fuel or alternative vehicle solution that advocates subsidies and or tax policies be used to over-ride market forces in a way that directly drives people to their solution then I think you can save yourself the time and safely assume that the rest of the proposal is merely the ill-conceived work of an arrogant and unscientific busybody.

Now to get back to the main topic of cat diesel. Taxes are about 21% of wholesale diesel prices so if the $1.14/gal price of cat diesel doesn’t include taxes then it would have to compete with $1.46/gal diesel prices. That means cats would have to cost less than $0.21 each for the cat diesel to be more economical than traditional petroleum based diesel. But the more pressing question is:

What would make someone invent a cat diesel refining process in the first place?

Do they hate cats? Or, considering that an economically competitive cat diesel fuel would cause the cat population to explode to 1000 time its present size as they became valuable livestock, perhaps the process was invented by someone who loves cats. The answer is neither. Like so much of what passes for news, the article on making diesel from dead cats was not an accurate description of facts. Instead, it was a carefully orchestrated marketing stunt aimed at achieving a specific goal for a client organization. In fact, the invention described doesn’t just use dead cats as feedstock but runs on a wide variety of organic materials from plastics to hospital wastes (and yes, French fries and turkey guts). A press release on a company that is marketing a small synthetic fuel refinery operating on a new catalytic decomposition process might actually be big news but unfortunately few reporters would know enough about technical subjects to realize it. A press release about turning cats into diesel, on the other hand, is weird enough to guarantee that some news media will report it and the predictable outcry of cat lovers will ensure that the story continues to get press coverage for days. Then, the company involved can release a follow-on press release that tells the rest of the story which will both be reported on enough to reach a wide audience and have enough details to arouse the curiosity of potential buyers. I have to admit, it worked well enough for me to research the product.

The “cat refinery” is the KDV-500 by Alphakat Zukunftsenergie GmbH and it looks like a very promising development. Because it can take a wide variety of dry organic matter**** it doesn’t have the feedstock limitations described earlier. One of the obvious applications for it is to dispose of waste. The KDV-500 has the potential to both drastically reduce the amount of garbage that must be land-filled while also producing valuable fuel (a very TRIZesque solution). I can easily see garbage disposal companies buying these turnkey refineries to both increase the useful life of their landfills by diverting much of the waste into fuel production and also to have a source of cheap diesel fuel for their fleets of garbage trucks and other vehicles. Depending on what material is being used as the feedstock for this invention, its waste disposal ability may be just as big of a revenue stream as fuel production. Also, I would expect that it would be easier to get political and regulatory approval to build a KDV-500 (or similar competing products) than a traditional refinery since the waste recycling and alternative fuel aspects of the design should get it support from Green organizations (though since I wouldn’t count on them being logical, some carefully targeted charitable donations may also be needed to make sure).

Now what does this mean in quantitative terms? The design specs of the KDV-500 claim that 1 ton of input generates on average 6.29 barrels of diesel fuel. It would only take 158 million tons of input to meet the United States’s present 1 billion barrel annual diesel consumption. If the Engineer Poet can be believed there are around 700-800 million tons of dry organic waste generated in the United States annually that could be used as input for KDV-500s. If we made total use of that potential input, using the KDV-500 technology we could make 4.4 to 5 billion barrels of diesel annually (which is about 3.4 to 4 billion barrels of diesel more than we currently consume). That extra fuel could be used to replace the almost 3.3 billion barrels of gasoline that the United States consumes annually (assuming that increased tailpipe emissions for the diesels weren’t a problem). Judging from their website, the cost estimates given earlier are fairly complete except for taxes. Even if the manufacturer is being a little optimistic in their sales brochure, the costs are still probably competitive with current diesel prices of $1.46/gal before taxes. While there is some uncertainty as to whether current prices will stay this high, the possibility of getting additional revenue from the KDV-500’s waste disposal abilities and the likelihood of getting Green groups to politically back its construction are attractive features that may offset the risk involved with buying one. I wrote last week that

“Capitalist economists assured the “peak oil” Chick-Littles that the invisible hand would naturally encourage alternative fuels once oil prices became high. Well, oil prices are now high and here come the alternative fuels.”

The KDV-500 “cat refinery” by Alphakat Zukunftsenergie GmbH is another example of this effect. I expect to hear more about it (and its competitors) in the future, especially since they seem to have a very good marketing group working with them.

Welcome carnival-goers. If you liked this post, take a look around the rest of the blog.

*distillate fuel oil in the transportation sector.
** I am very excited about the potential advancements in economics as it is increasingly seen to be an information theory problem instead of the resource management problem. The shift may one day be viewed like the past academic shifts from alchemy to chemistry and astrology to astronomy.
*** Which we can do a sanity check on with this example. If the moonbats are to be believed, the entire purpose of our war and continuing operations in Iraq is to secure our oil supplies (except when it is to help the Jews). So far they estimate the cost of this at almost $200 billion dollars. Since the Iraq war started in March 2003 we have consumed about 20 billion barrels of petroleum products of which about 2.5 billion barrels is diesel. If we divide the cost of our Iraq intervention by volume (perhaps not the best method, but easy and good enough for gov't work) that would raise the cost of a gallon of diesel by $0.23 or a before tax increase of about 16%. I have ignored the "human cost" of the war, but considering both the historically low casualty rates of our troops and the high mortality rate of pre-war Iraq there may not be a net negative human cost at all (despite what Lancet said). Since both cat diesel and traditional diesel would contribute to carbon emissions, I will ignore that cost in this example. These assumptions give an adjusted pre tax breakeven cat price of about $0.36/cat for a comparison of cat diesel and traditional diesel. This calculation would be the worst case of assuming all the costs of the Iraq war and occupation are spent to secure our petroleum supplies. If we assume that the moonbats are not right and there are other valid reasons for the war then the war related costs of petroleum would be even smaller than the 16% calculated here. The national security costs of using natural petroleum from unstable countries to produce our diesel is probably not zero, however, so the actual cost is likely somewhere between a lower bound of 0% and an upper bound of 16% of it's current pre tax price of about $1.46/gal. As I said price is not a perfect figure of merit, but it does seem to be close enough to be very useful and (most importantly for our decision to use it in making resource conservation judgements) better than any other figure of merit I know of.
**** Well, actually it can handle wet waste too by using heat to turn the wet waste into dry waste.

Update: added the 3rd footnote and corrected annual gasoline consumption estimate
Update 2(10/3): added 4th footnote and CWT link. (thanks Alan)
Update 3(10/10): In the comments, Engineer Poet points out some oddities about Alphakat's claims, including an unrealistic product yield, that makes him wonder if they are on the level. Even if they aren't, there are more organizations working on similar products and high oil prices will encourage investors to look seriously at synthetic fuels.
Update 4(10/13): added carnival welcome

Marine Corps Role Playing Game

2005-09-30T05:48:00.000-07:00

The Marine Corps Gazette publishes a tactical decision game as a regular feature. They describe some tactical military situation and the reader is encouraged to write in with a solution. The best solutions are printed in the next issue. Usually the game focuses on testing the reader's knowldge of small unit tactics. September's game, however, is as much of a test in ethics as it is martial skill. What would you do?

If you don't like that, they have an interesting article on Mongolian warfare. Neither Russian winters nor asian land wars were a problem for the "children of the blue-gray wolf."

Tough Guy Awards 3

2005-09-30T05:04:00.000-07:00

Darwin works both ways, and man didn’t get to the top of the food chain by accident. The “Tough Guy Award” is the opposite of the Darwin Award.

This week's Tough Guy is Cpl. Samuel Toloza of El Salvador. While serving in Iraq last year as part of El Salvador's distinguished contribution to the multi-national forces protecting the Iraqi's emerging democracy Cpl. Toloza's unit was attacked by insurgents. After 13 of his 17-man unit were killed or wounded and out of ammunition Cpl. Toloza continued to carry the fight to the enemy by whipping out his pocket knife, rushing the enemy gunmen, and stabbing them until reinforcements arrived. He later explained his actions by saying, "We never considered surrender. I was trained to fight until the end." Cpl. Toloza, I'm glad you're on our side.

Online Movie Recommendation 7

2005-09-27T21:35:00.000-07:00

This week's recommendation is a helpful three part do-it-yourself video on how to get rid of those unsightly and dangerous area denial munitions, brought to you by the nice folks at the U.S. Humanitarian Demining R&D Program.

Part 1
http://www.humanitarian-demining.org/demining/awareness/DssDeminingTraining/Original/VIDEO/17%20DEMINING%20PROCEDURES%20VIDEO%20(ENGLISH-SPANISH).MPG

Part 2
http://www.humanitarian-demining.org/demining/awareness/DssDeminingTraining/Original/VIDEO/17%20PRIMING%20THE%20DEMOLITION%20VIDEO%20(ENGLISH-SPANISH).MPG

Part 3
http://www.humanitarian-demining.org/demining/awareness/DssDeminingTraining/Original/VIDEO/18%20CONSTRUCTING%20A%20RING%20MAIN%20VIDEO%20(ENGLISH-SPANISH).MPG

"Corrective action should only be undertaken by the person who placed the charge."
Translation: "Be careful, because if you screw up the first time then you'll be the person who has to risk his neck to fix it. " And that's a good policy for a lot of other types of work, too.

Kids, remember that being a sapper may look like fun but it is for adults only.

Carnival of Tomorrow #10

2005-09-27T01:14:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the Carnival of Tomorrow 10.0, I’m J. Random American and I’ll be your guest host this week. In an attempt to make your Carnival experience go smoothly, I have divided the entries into categories and highlighted the blog post hyperlinks in bold text. Now let’s dip into the future…

SPACE EXPLORATION

“For I dipped into the future, far as human eye could see,
Saw the vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be;
Saw the heavens fill with commerce. Argosies of magic sails,
Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales”
-Alfred Lord Tennyson

Last week NASA rolled out its new moonshot plan. Space enthusiasts and sci-fi aficionados began complaining immediately that they could have done better. One of the axioms of technical work is that the less someone knows about a job the easier they think it is. So where can we go for good, informed analysis on the near future of space exploration? Rand Simberg (who knows quite a bit about the space launch business himself) of Transterrestrial Musings has the answer in his post “Apollo 2.0”.

Mark Whittington of Curmudgeon’s Corner (author of the book _Children_of_Apollo_) and Jonathon Goff (yet another space launch industry insider) of Selenian Boondocks also have been debating the merits of NASA’s latest plan in a series of posts on their respective blogs starting here.

The “Apollo 2.0” description is being thrown around a lot. Personally, I think the new plan should be called “Gemini to the Moon 2.0”, but I seem to be alone in that opinion. I had incorrectly predicted here at Ideas in Progress that NASA Administrator Mike Griffin would use the new lunar plan rollout event to promote a "Lagrange point marshalling yard" for storing supplies between the Earth and the Moon that would be partially serviced by contracts with private space launchers. I'm still expecting him to push that idea, even though it didn't show up in the latest press conference.

Semi-Random Ramblings chooses to get his analysis of aerospace engineering from a lawyer. At least it’s not kitty porn. :)

The Encyclopedia Astronautica Blog takes a light-hearted view of the new lunar program with a parody entitled Apollo 18 is GO!

If you can’t get enough of NASA Administrator Mike Griffin, Aerospace America has an in depth interview with him this month on the politics and business of space launch.

Lastly, if all this chemical propulsion stuff is too near term then the Liftport Staff Blog reports (complete with pictures and video) in the post Photos & More from 1,000-ft Robot Test that their space elevator climbing robot tests are going well. There hasn’t been any news this month on large clusters of micro-engines, skyhook tethers, or beamed propulsion to report but DARPA still seems to be funding micro-engine work and any materials developments that would allow space elevator construction would likely enable a skyhook first.

THE SINGULARITY

“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there” -L. P. Hartly

Another big futurist news item is the publication of Ray Kurzweil’s new book The Singularity is Near. Fighting Aging! already has a review of it in the post Reading "The Singularity is Near" along with analysis that suggests some very interesting developments in the business of biotechnology are near at hand.

Evelyn Rodriguez of Future Salon blogs Kurzweil’s keynote speech at the Accelerating Change 2005 conference in the post Kurweil Keynote: When Humans Transcend Biology.

The usual home of the Carnival of Tomorrow, The Speculist, has more on the conference in the post Between the Lines by Phil Bowermaster. I hope they post more information from the Accelerating Change conference in the future.

There are singularity doubters, however. Al Fin at AlFin2100 points out in the post Right Ascension that the if the singularity is the moment when the future can no longer be understood by previous experience then it may be like a mathematician’s girlfriend, something that we can get arbitrarily close to but never quite reach.

Amet Patel of Amet’s Thoughts points out in his post The Singularity is Near? that describing the singularity as the “knee” in the curve of exponential technological growth where progress seems to “go vertical” doesn’t work either because exponential curves don’t actually have “knees”, they are illusions whose location keeps moving as you change the scale of the graph.

In the post “Michael Flynn does not think the singularity is near” Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolutions gives an excerpt from an email he got with an elegantly simple bit of evidence about our current lack of proximity to The Singularity.

MACHINES

"If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." -Henry Ford

Of course the biggest technology news story of last week is that one of the fundamental six simple machines has finally been improved upon by the Illinois Tool Works. Geek Press has more here.

With hurricanes and flood control in the news, Future Feeder has a timely post entitled Smart Concrete for Levees.

CONVENIENCE

“Keep on the lookout for novel ideas that others have used successfully. Your idea has to be original only in its adaptation to the problem you're working on.” - Thomas Edison

Technological development isn’t just about far out topics like visiting other planets, uploading minds electronically and threaded fasteners. Virginia Postrel covers upholstery advancements on her Dynamist Blog in the post Reinventing Upholstery Fabric. It may not seem like an interesting topic at first but give it a chance; it is exactly these sorts of “mundane” developments that add up to a better standard of living for all of us. If you have trouble accessing the NY Times link in her post, try using this service to bypass web registration.

Another example of brilliant but mundane developments that will make the world a slightly better place is the solar handbag profiled in the accurately titled Slashdot entry Solar-Powered Handbag. I can’t wait for the solar powered saddle bag.

SCIENCE

“The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' (I found it!) but 'That's funny...'” – Isaac Asimov

Dominic Vella and Dr. Mahadevan have released an exciting new paper on why Cheerios stick to each other in the bowl.

Hypotheses Non Fingo points out in his post Stupid "International Astronomical Union" that one of the biggest problems with discovering new things is naming them. If Kurzveil is right about the coming wave of new discoveries, we’re going to need to address this problem soon.

Meanwhile, the Make Blog introduces O'Reilly's new science and technology podcast entitled Distributing the Future.

WARFARE

“Scientists have always been pawns of the military!” -Star Trek II

While the US Army and Marines have been making headlines revolutionizing small wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the USAF has been in the news for its high-tech, big-budget efforts to maintain a credible deterrence against the People’s Republic of China, the Navy has been quietly engaged in its own revolution in military affairs. The Winds of Change post by Joe Katzman US Navy Preparing for Littoral Warfare summarizes the Navy’s developments in support of its coastal and littoral waters doctrine.

Dr. Pournelle at Chaos Manor has information and links on the state-of-the-industry Navy cargo ship the HSV-2 Swift from his son Phillip at the bottom of yesterday’s entry.

Matt at BlackbeltJones points out an Edward Castranova quote in his post Terra Castronova which suggests we wage memetic warfare on Islamic radicals by making an online video game that would let Islamic youths play at living in a democracy. That’s not unlikely, considering that we are already working a video game to teach oppressed people how to stage their own velvet revolution.

Nate at Project Nothing! points out that the United States isn’t the only nation trying to revolutionize warfare in the post Seoul to Build Combat Robot.

NANOTECH

Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present. -Marcus Aurelius Antoninus

Chris Phoenix at Responsible Nanotechnology reviews an article on nanotechnology and in the process provides a good nano primer in the post Nanoparticles, Nanodevices, Nanofactories.

The Instapundit points to a promising medical use in his post on cancer seeking nanotechnology.

ENERGY

“In times of rapid change, experience is your worst enemy.” - J. Paul Getty

Capitalist economists assured the “peak oil” Chick-Littles that the invisible hand would naturally encourage alternative fuels once oil prices became high. Well, oil prices are now high and here come the alternative fuels. The Green Car Congress post Chattanooga Corp. Successfully Converts Shale to Oil with Lower Impact Process and the Montana's Energy Future Symposium scheduled for next month hint that the most economical next generation fuel might be synthetic hydrocarbons made from coal, instead of the hard-to-store hydrogen that Greens and gov’t central planners would have picked.

This may be bad news for the Future Pundit who hopes that Tony Blair might be coming around to his own position on the future of energy, productivity, technology, and carbon emissions in his post Tony Blair Wants Technological Advances To Reduce CO2 Emissions. Well, if it turns out that carbon emissions really are causing global warming then there’s always carbon sequestration.

The End.

The next Carnival of Tomorrow will be back at The Speculist. If you would like to contribute to it, email them at:

mrstg87 {@ symbol} yahoo {dot} com

or

bowermaster {@ symbol} gmail {dot} com.

Rita Evacuation Traffic Cams in Houston

2005-09-22T09:25:00.000-07:00

http://traffic.houstontranstar.org/cameras/camtext.aspx

I-10 Katy
I-45 North
US-290 Northwest
US-59 Eastex

Assuming 2 million vehicles and 20 ft. of road per vehicle that's about 7500 linear miles of traffic jam. Assuming that 75% of that is spread over about 36 lanes of outbound traffic that's 156 mile traffic jams, which corresponds roughly to the "100 mile traffic jams" the news is reporting. At 3 mph, that will take 50 hours to get out of the traffic. Most cars (but not hybrids) won't be able to idle for 50 hours. Rita will likely make landfall in less than 40 hours, so a lot of people are going to be riding out Rita (which will hopefully have weakened to only tropical storm strength by the time it gets that far inland) in traffic.

Light Posting Ahead

2005-09-21T13:03:00.000-07:00

I may be too busy over the next few days to post regularly.

I will make it up by guest hosting the Carnival of Tommorow #10 early next week.

In the meantime, I encourage everyone to look through my blogroll on the left side of the screen. In addition to other blogs (in the "periodicals" section), there are some really good essays, papers, and other monographs in the aptly named "monographs" section. If you haven't looked though them yet, now would be a good time. Paul Graham has a new essay that's good. _LEO_On_the_Cheap_ is very timely in light of NASA's rollout of their lunar plan. The global warming panic over recent hurricanes (though I have yet to figure out how global warming makes hurricanes home in on American cities instead of less photogenic foreign ones) makes _Fallen_Angles_ seem more relevant than ever. Anyone who likes wealth can unlock many powerful truths (that are now often considered too impolitic to teach the general public) about how it is made by reading _My_Life_and_Work_, _The_Principles_of_Scientific_Management_, _Who_Gains_By_Innovation_, and (of course) anything by Adam Smith. These mostly older monographs provide a hard nosed and plain English analysis uncontaminated by the truth-obscuring politically-correct mythologies* that are so often required by modern discussions. The rest of the monographs in my blogroll, especially "The Industrial Revolution:Past and Future" and _The_Road_to_Serfdom_in_Cartoons_ are just simply fun reading.

*Which is not to say that all modern political attitudes are mythologies who obscure older truths. My friend Henry's unfortunate (though he claims well intended) concerns over Orientalism, lack of assimilation, and bigotry amoung a particular immigrant community in early 20th Century America may be a good counterexample. Still a publication does not have to be Gospel in order to be enlightening, and examining even (or perhaps especially!) flawed original sources first-hand instead of trusting "Cliff Notes" summations from present authority figures usually provides shocking insights that make you wonder what other crucial information has been glossed over or gone unrecognized by the mediocre minds that write our school textbooks. For example, many decendents of the very same immigrant community that Henry worried (in Chapter 17 of _My_Life_and_Work_) was unwilling to assimilate into American society can now be found publishing the exact same complaints of tribalism, subversion, and bigotry about newer Muslim immigrants and demanding that the moderate Muslim community leaders should, in Henry's words, "remove their protection from the more flagrant violators of American hospitality." Even if this tells us nothing about the accuracy of either's complaints, it tells us a great deal about human nature and puts our present problems in a useful (and in a way comforting) historical perspective that is missing from almost all modern news reporting or history classes.

Public Affairs Problems When Only Defeat is Victory

2005-09-20T00:04:00.000-07:00

There is an interesting article in the current Air and Space Power Journal on public affairs and information operations that includes the quote:

“…saying that public communication cannot succeed without credibility puts us up against the hard facts that our enemies have had good media success without being particularly truthful, and that modern media are often more concerned with framing ideological conflict than with judging which version of the truth is right.”

The article also claims that highlighting good news from military operations is not being partisan; it is simply “part of a strategy for mission success.” The problem with that logic is that there is an unfortunately large movement in America whose political goal is for the United States to be defeated militarily. To them, any effort on the part of the military to do their job well, any activity that brings "mission success", will necessarily be viewed as a partisan attempt to undermine their political goal of an embarrassing defeat and humiliating retreat from our present global “War on Terror” military operations. They resent all the partisan soldiers, sailors, and airmen who are trying so hard to win Bush’s war. Non-partisan troops would put in no more work or creativity into winning than, for example, civilian bureaucrats, apathetic union workers, or better yet, apathetic unionized bureaucrats; they would just put in their eight hours a day (minus breaks), do the minimum work they could get away with, and collect their paycheck. That’s non-partisan troops. What would the Western civilization hating “loyal opposition” really like to see American soldiers, sailors, and airmen do? Stop fighting America’s enemies, and start murdering Americans. But only the bourgeois, I’m sure.

Online Movie Recommendations 6

2005-09-19T22:48:00.000-07:00

This week’s recommendation is the trailer for the full length documentary One Six Right: The Romance of Flying:

http://www.onesixright.com/video/aerials.html

Yes, it is only a trailer… but it is a great one. I can't wait for the DVD to come out.

After you’ve finished watching it you’ll probably want to either head to the airport if you're a pilot, or if you aren't go here to fix that and then watch this important pre-flight information.

Hat tip: Uncommon Sense

Griffin you magnificent b@$^@&#, I read your presentation slides!

2005-09-15T22:11:00.000-07:00

NASA is set to unveil its near term lunar exploration plan this Monday.

Those wanting a sneak preview should take a look at this PDF file. It is the slides from a presentation Mike Griffin made in 2001 as a guest lecturer at the University of Wisconsin about how NASA might return to the moon in the near future. Expect to hear the term "Lagrange point marshalling yard" as a potential market for private launchers to contribute to cislunar infrastructure development, but perhaps not as part of the initial lunar return flight.

If you still haven't had enough NASA handicapping this prepared statment of his from 2003 is worth a look as well.

Tough Guy Awards 2

2005-09-15T08:09:00.000-07:00

Darwin works both ways, and man didn’t get to the top of the food chain by accident. The “Tough Guy Award” is the opposite of the Darwin Award.

Since I didn’t post a Tough Guy Award last week, I’ll do a double award this week. It is said that coyotes are so tough that they will gnaw their own leg off to escape from a trap. Coyotes don’t have anything on Coloradans when it comes to toughness. This weeks double “Tough Guy Award” goes to Aron Ralston and William Jeracki, both from Colorado. Mr. Ralston was trapped alone when a shifting boulder pinned his arm and after five days without rescue he had to cut off his own arm to escape. Mr. Jeracki was trapped alone when another shifting boulder fell on his leg. With a snowstorm blowing in he had to cut off his leg to escape.

Besides demonstrating extreme toughness, both of these incidents are good lessons on the dangers of traveling in the wilderness alone. Yes, plenty of mountain men were solitary but they also tended to die in unpleasant ways. If you are going to be in the wilderness alone, tell someone where you are going and/or invest in one of the new personal locator beacons.

Fan Films Foreshadow Future

2005-09-14T01:49:00.000-07:00

My last 3 movie recommendations have focused on fan films. I had intended to write a post commenting on how technological developments have made it so much easier to make and distribute reasonable quality movies that groups of fans can now do for fun what was once the domain of multimillion dollar studios, and that soon local movie productions will be as common as local theater groups. Unfortunately the Instapundit beat me to many of the points I was going to make; but not all of them. I will, therefore, take my post on fan film trends in a different direction.

I think that fan films like the ones I have recommended demonstrate not only a trend in the democratization of filmmaking, but also a trend in avocations.

One desire people have that is often overlooked is the desire to experience things. In his book The Next 200 Years thinker Herman Kahn predicted that an increasingly wealthy population of the First World would make tourism a much larger industry. Smart people in the tourist trade have already figured out that tourism isn’t about selling travel, it is about selling experiences. People don’t just want to look at a pretty landscape as a passive observer. They want to go on their own safari, or sift the dirt for fossils of early man. They want to play at being Hemmingway or Leakey. This desire is not limited to brief vacations and I think fan films are part of the hobby trend resulting from that. As productivity increases from technological development and capital investment allows ever higher income for the average person, we will have more time and resources to spend on just having interesting experiences.

In Roman times, all the average person could do is listen to stories and daydream about what other times, places, or occupations might be like. By the time of the Late Unpleasantness, printing presses and widespread literacy at least allowed the average person to read* history, fiction, or travelogues in what free time they had. But now the common man has enough free time and disposable income that groups of ordinary men who are fascinated by these previous times can afford to equip, train, and spend their weekends “living the life” of their Roman or 19th Century predecessors. It is a tremendous extravagance that we take for granted. I think this trend is fortunate, since without the hobbyist desire to experience the past we would lose some of our ability to understand our own history as technological development separates us ever faster from a past driven by the cycles of nature and the speed of a horse.

It is more than just the spread of wealth and leisure time that rising productivity gives us that will likely drive the spread of experience-oriented hobbies. Technological innovation also reduces the difficulty and cost of what were once extravagant undertakings available only to a few. It took backing by a superpower to send Columbus across the Atlantic, but now a very large percentage** of American adults could probably arrange their own transcontinental sailing expedition if they wanted it badly enough. It is not just that we are richer than Queen Isabella, but that building, sailing, and navigating boats has become much easier. Very soon the same will be true for a trip to outer space. Making your own movies is one of those areas where technology has lowered the difficulty by introducing relatively cheap digital cameras and computer f/x & movie editing software. Do you wish that you could have been the actor cast to play a Federation starship captain, comic book hero, or Jedi? Well, now you can be. In the future you can be a space explorer or just play one on TV, all without quitting your day job.

If you want to know what people in the future will do for fun, just ask yourself:

What do people wish they could be?

So, you wanna be a rock and roll star? A crusading journalist? A crusader? A pistolero? A race car driver? You can be, in your spare time. Even things that are too dangerous or too impossible for hobbyists to really do can be simulated with increasing sophistication. You can dabble a little in many fields to get just a taste of a lot of experiences, or you can immerse yourself in one favorite. You probably (though not certainly) won’t be the first or the best at something that you only do as a hobby, but still there’s a lot to be said for talented amateurs. Just ask an astronomer.

Making and distributing high quality fan films are one part of a much larger trend of new experiences which technological innovation and improved productivity are just now opening the doors to for the common man. Now, can anyone name a hobby that is getting harder to experience instead of easier?

*The technology (and motive) for role playing games seems to have existed for a long time before they were popularized. I wonder why they weren’t developed sooner.

**Some blogger in the recent past had a post about this. If anyone remember who, I’d appreciate the link to it.

Update: Welcome carnival goers. If you like this post, I encourage you to look around at the rest of the blog. If you haven't already done so, take my Transporter poll; I need more data points.

Update 2: Yes, you could consider being a "brave revolutionary" to be a modern experience-oriented hobby.

Online Movie Recommendation 5

2005-09-13T21:10:00.000-07:00

I didn’t post a recommendation (or much else) last week. I’ll make up for it by doing a triple recommendation this week! All are science fiction fan films again. The first is Chapter 1 of IMPS:The Relentless:

http://impstherelentless.com/tek9.asp?pg=chapter1

It is by the same group that made Troops. I can’t wait for the rest of the series.

The second is Batman:Dead End:

http://www.collorastudios.com/projects/bde/bdemain.htm

There is an interview with the director on ifilm. Apparently Kevin Smith called it the “the best Batman film ever made.”

The last ends my fan film phase with Star Wars:Revelations:

http://panicstruckpro.com/revelations/revelations_movie.html

Its speakeasy is the best Star Wars bar scene since the Mos Eisley Cantina.

Two Birds with One Stone

2005-09-13T12:27:00.000-07:00

"A German inventor says he's found a way to make cheap diesel fuel out of dead cats."

Why do they have to be dead?

Lileks Tempts the Fates

2005-09-08T23:36:00.000-07:00

James Lileks reports today that he:

1. Managed to not only avoid a demotion in his paper's reorganization, but has landed a new and more frequent collumn.
2. Sent Gnat off to her first day of kindergarten and he anticipates all the future bus-stop mornings.
3. Got an Apple Nano-Ipod, which is so new even the Instapundit can't get one yet.

and

4. He made PERFECT hamburgers for dinner.

If I have learned anything from a lifetime of watching war movies it is this:

James Lileks is about to be killed by an enemy sniper.

It's really a shame, too; I liked his books.

Are we donating money to pay for disaster relief operations or to give as gifts to the hurricane Katrina victims?

2005-09-04T00:04:00.000-07:00

They are not the same thing, and it is a question that I think deserves some consideration.

Right now all over the country, people are donating money to help the victims of hurricane Katrina. Everyone donating needs to put a few moments thought into where their donation is going. Obviously, they should make sure that they are donating to a real charity and not to a confidence scam; there are non-comprehensive lists of legitimate charities involved in the disaster response at Instapundit, and FEMA’s website. But we need to go beyond just that and consider where we want the money to ultimately end up. The donations that are given this week cannot be sent backwards in time to buy relief supplies last week when they were most needed. It is non unlikely, therefore, that after this is all over there will have been more money donated to these legitimate charities than they have spent on both disaster relief and normal post-disaster recovery assistance. I want to warn everyone that these charities may not divide up all the money they have left and give it as payments to the victims of this high-profile disaster or provide Katrina’s victims with more elaborate forms of post-disaster aid than is normally given to the survivors of less publicized disasters like building fires or tornadoes. Instead the charities may keep the extra money for themselves to spend on either preparing for the next large disaster or helping victims of ongoing smaller disasters that might not receive any national news coverage at all! Shocking, I know, that charities might divert money this way to needy people we haven’t even seen on TV but it is a reality that donors should be prepared for when deciding who to trust with their donations.

Personally, I think that donations to disaster relief charities being made right now should go into their general budget and that if the charities have any surplus still left after providing their normal level of assistance to hurricane Katrina’s victims then that money should be used for helping victims of and preparing for other disasters around the country. I think that disaster victims should be helped with the same enthusiasm regardless of how dramatic or publicized the disaster was. Up until 2001 I thought that was a fairly typical attitude and that only a sick solipsist would feel that people who he saw suffering should be helped more than people he didn't, but apparently a lot of other people disagree with me.

I donated to the Red Cross immediately after the 9-11 insurgent attacks that year, like a lot of other people. I assumed that if they had any money left after providing help to the victims and feeding the other emergency crews, that they would use the extra to prepare for the next disaster or the next attack in what I assumed would be a long terrorist war. Imagine my surprise when prominent news media figures began attacking charities for doing exactly what I expected (and assumed everyone else expected) instead of dividing up the loot and cutting big checks to the families of 9-11 victims! At first, the idea that the 9-11 victims and their families should get gifts of so much more money than we give anonymous victims of an apartment building arson or other “mundane” disaster seemed so bizarre and illogical that I naturally assumed that something nefarious was going on and that the extortionists or scam artists pushing the story would soon be exposed. Instead more and more seemingly respectable news outlets, who assured me that they spoke on behalf of hordes of howling donors, demanded that every penny of the over $1 billion raised for disaster relief charities in the wake of the attacks to go to the 9-11 victims families “to guarantee security for everyone who’s suffered a loss in the attacks.” Congressmen beat their chests in outrage, the head of the Red Cross resigned, and a special fund was set up just for the 9-11 families that victims of less photogenic disasters would not have access to. No one, at least no one on TV, echoed my concern over turning disaster relief into a sympathy contest with six figure prizes for the unlucky winners.

So if you are one of those many donors who believe in the disaster relief lottery, then you should to heed my warning and be careful about who you donate to or you might be outraged to discover that part of your hurricane Katrina donation winds up helping Wisconsin tornado victims or some other non-Katrina sufferers. I’m sure that if you look hard enough there are charitable funds being set up exclusively for Katrina victims, perhaps even some for just New Orleanean victims. A little care now in researching the proper charity will keep you from feeling betrayed later.

If, on the other hand, you are like me and think that any hurricane Katrina donation surpluses should be used by the charities for other relief and preparation efforts then you should also be careful about who you donate to. Once I would have suggested that a cash donation to the Red Cross is a good place to donate for general disaster relief. Unfortunately that may not be true in this case. There are a lot of dishonest New Orleaneans, from the politicians who sent their cronies around to extort bribes from businesses on the excuse of them not having enough horse hitching posts down to the modern-day Fagins who have children bet gullible tourists that they can tell them where they got their shoes*, that suddenly don’t have anything to do (or at least they won’t after all the good looting is done) but sit around their new host communities listening to the huge amounts of money that are being raised for disaster relief charities and scheme about how they can get control of some of it. I certainly hope I am wrong, but I expect that before the streets are dry in Orleans Parish we will see self-appointed community leaders and well dressed lawyers making television appearances to decry how unfair it is that the money donated “to them” is being stolen by greedy charities for use in other disasters instead of being put in a special fund “to rebuild New Orleans” that they can more easily skim money out of or take kickbacks on the contracts from. Since so many of the high profile donations are for the Red Cross and the special “Liberty Disaster Fund” set aside just for 9-11 victims showed that the Red Cross can be bullied into giving preferential treatment, I fear that any surplus donations to the Red Cross will be an obvious target for victims who want more than their “fair share” of the generous gifts its donors make. Anyone wanting to make sure that their disaster relief donations are really only used for disaster relief in a needs-based (as opposed to a publicity-based) manner might want to consider spreading their donations around to some of the lower profile, but equally effective, disaster relief groups like Southern Baptist Convention -- Disaster Relief and Mennonite Disaster Service. Perhaps the best way to have control over how your donations are used is to donate your time by volunteering for one of your local disaster relief organizations.

I think it is a shame that people will use the opportunity of a disaster to get things at the expense of others, but it is a reality that we should not be blind to even in our scramble to help the truly needy. A little forethought now in the mad rush to give assistance can help insure that fairness trumps media pressure and the dark side of human nature when the huge amount of money in the hurricane Katrina disaster relief funds inevitably becomes a temptation.

* The answer, btw, is “You gots dem on yo feets,” and suddenly a group of thugs materialize to insure that you pay the boy for his correct answer.

Ideas in Progress

The Wrath of Goldberg

Online Movie Recommendation 23

Hellerblogging

Sen. Obama and Rev. Wright Say the Same Thing Differently

Good Advice, But Too Late

Vitamin D and Health

Half Truths about Real ID from DHS

In America Even Peasants Own a Car

Tough Guy Award 7

Artificial Organs and Easy Airport Screening

Free* Digital TV Converter

Online Movie Recommendation 22

Better Living with our friend The Atom

Geek Gift Guide

Online Movie Recommendation 21

Online Movie Recommendation 20

If Moms Ruled the World There Would be No Rules in War

Conservatives Failing to Follow Fashion

A New Oxymoron

Online Movie Recommendation 19

Maybe the Stork Brings Them

New Rules for Golf

Machinegun Shaped Like a Purse

Wondering about the Story Behind the Ipod Lightning Story

Make the Robot Mow the Lawn

A Modern Day Athens?

Is Bush a Pushover Boss?

Gift Guide for Real Geeks of all Ages

New York Times About to Collapse

Predictions on the 2008 Election

2006 Election

Predictions on the 2006 Election

What Lesson Will the Republicans Learn if they Lose?

An Attack on One is an Attack on All

In Which J. Random American Discovers How to Win World War IV

Liquid Explosives

I Condemn the Murder of Innocents

3 Iraqis Caught Sneaking Across Mexican Border into the United States

Online Movie Recommendation 18

Online Movie Recommendation 17

Geek Gift Ideas

Marine Corps Role Playing Game Revisited

Online Movie Recommendation 16

On the Age of Men

Online Movie Recommendation 15

Never To Forsake Our Friends

The Future of Tacky Clothing

Tough Guy Award 6

Machinima: A New Type of Videogame

Online Movie Recommendation 14

COT #13 is up

An Old Friend Returns

Online Movie Recommendation 13

Paris Riots and City Planning

Online Movie Recommendation 12

Light Posting Ahead

COTs, BATTs, and FFRs

How to Get No Useful Information

Freedom, Religous Faith, and The Singularity

Online Movie Recommendations 11

U.S. gets customized stamps too

Oct. 25th is St. Crispin's Day.

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