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An appaearance!
Dec. 21st, 2006 01:08 pmBasically, things will be sporadic from here, as the Land of Dial-Up is not necessarily my preferred connection speed, nor do I have all my tools at my disposal. So you get what I've got, when I decide I have the time to give it.
Robots will be getting rights, according to a UK paper. Not necessarily that we'll be seeing Asimovian robots in our future any time soon, but there's already suggestions that we'll be granting rights to robots in the future. No word on whether they have to be Turing-capable.
More from the land of plug-in hybrid vehicles - there's some in here that's repeat knowledge, about using timed or intelligent chargers to charge hybrid vehicles at off-peak hours, as well as the capacity unused during those times. Now the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory suggests that if plug-in hybrids become ubiquitous, they could be used to balance loads on power grids by returning energy to the grid from the batteries. Might be a way for our car-obsessed culture to actually do some good. Additionally, if most people used only the electric motor for the majority of their tasks, costs go way down. Maybe then we can get in gear and go toward the world of renewable resources as well.
A New York times Journalist has been asking a very important question to members of the administration - Can you Tell a Sunni from a Shi'ite? The results have been mixed, but a trend is that the farther up the chain you go in the administration, the more likely it is they don't have a clue. And these are the people who are supposed to be directing the campaign to win the hearts and minds of the people we bombed and invaded. So not only do most of the people there not speak the language (and, as we've noted before, they're turning away qualified translators because of their sexual preferences), most of the people directing things don't really have an accurate big picture, much less the minutiae that are going to have to be dealt with. And beyond that, they're still looking to expand themselves - more ships from America and Britain are moving into the Persian Gulf. It's supposed to be to ensure that if the UN sanctions Iran, there's no retaliatory oil cut-off, but they also acknowledge that if a "projection of power" is needed, the increased naval presence could do the trick easily. So with two messes still needing significant clean-up, why are we even thinking about creating a third?
In all places, even Wal-Mart, the almighty dollar ruleth. Or maybe this following bit is an example of something all done by machine. Or maybe Wal-Mart isn't as uber-wingnutty as we think. Either way, the Voudoun Gnostic Workbook: Expanded Edition is available for pre-order from Wal-Mart.
In these times suggests a novel (to many Americans) idea - rather than cutting taxes to everyone, and especially the wealthy, in thinking that Reagen-esque trickle-down will make us all happier, why not soak the top 1 percent with significant income taxes so that everyone actually gets a real Social Security? This, the writer argues, will make us happier, as well as allowing us to plan for our futures, whether we like it or not. The writer also laments that we're too afraid to hit the rich with the taxes they deserve because we're not sure whether any of that increased tax money will come back to us in one form or another. Still, it's probably worth doing just so that we can bring the entire standard of living up to an acceptable point for everyone, and then we can work on ensuring that everyone has sufficient monies after retirement to live out their lives. That'd be nice, knowing that even though I'm getting sacked with debts, after I pay them off, there will still be enough in the government kitty to retire on.
Some people cannot take a joke. And apparently, the closer the joke is to skewering religious beliefs, the more people there are that can't take it. So Tracy Twyman speculates that with the pushes by Catholics to ban the Da Vinci Code and call it blasphemy and libel, combined with Muslim efforts to pass similar blasphemy legislation that would make the people who satirized Mohamed in cartoons eligible for extradition to Muslim countries, where blasphemy is likely punishable by death, that Christians and Muslims may team up to produce a new Inquisition. There's a case of unlikely bedfellows, isn't it?
There are occasions where the first response really is "You've got to be joking, right?", though. In this case, however, I doubt that's the response they were aiming for - Feministing showcases two posters that claim to explain the roots of societal problems - naturally, by equating everything wrong with society to sexual liberation, and showing off chastity as the root of the solution, with strong family life and all sorts of other good things naturally following. They're not joking, but Pharyngula takes them at their word (the beginnings of most good satire) and produces a graph that shows all the "expressions of Satanic influences" in our lives. I wonder if the people who made the flower graphics will seize upon it and decide to show it off themselves. Maybe they'll add more things to it, too.
P! shows a slightly conservative (in the true sense, not the wingnut sense) bent in reminding us that Just because it's an old idea doesn't mean it's a bad idea. The fetish with fashionable ideas often leads to the abandonment of things that have the weight of history behind them, embracing "War Is Peace" instead of "War Bad, Peace Good" and so on.
For those who would rather ask their own questions, though, I have a few to get started on. First, hone your skills in question asking by playing a round or two of Questions. After perfecting your asking, Slate has a list of The Explainer questions from this year that weren't answered. There's plenty of gems there to get you started. Although one of them will get answered, so you may have to wait until that one's answered to tackle the others. If you like other questions, though, there's a blog that's all about The Question of the Day.
And, saving it for last, because, really, I can't resist the headline, Virgin Dragon Prepares to Give Birth. Ah, the miracles of parthenogenesis. I wonder if that means all of the clutch are going to be daughters? But yes, those who know me and my three-quarters to full-on fascination with dragons know why this comes last. Anyway, now I disappear until some other time, when I will reappear.
Robots will be getting rights, according to a UK paper. Not necessarily that we'll be seeing Asimovian robots in our future any time soon, but there's already suggestions that we'll be granting rights to robots in the future. No word on whether they have to be Turing-capable.
More from the land of plug-in hybrid vehicles - there's some in here that's repeat knowledge, about using timed or intelligent chargers to charge hybrid vehicles at off-peak hours, as well as the capacity unused during those times. Now the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory suggests that if plug-in hybrids become ubiquitous, they could be used to balance loads on power grids by returning energy to the grid from the batteries. Might be a way for our car-obsessed culture to actually do some good. Additionally, if most people used only the electric motor for the majority of their tasks, costs go way down. Maybe then we can get in gear and go toward the world of renewable resources as well.
A New York times Journalist has been asking a very important question to members of the administration - Can you Tell a Sunni from a Shi'ite? The results have been mixed, but a trend is that the farther up the chain you go in the administration, the more likely it is they don't have a clue. And these are the people who are supposed to be directing the campaign to win the hearts and minds of the people we bombed and invaded. So not only do most of the people there not speak the language (and, as we've noted before, they're turning away qualified translators because of their sexual preferences), most of the people directing things don't really have an accurate big picture, much less the minutiae that are going to have to be dealt with. And beyond that, they're still looking to expand themselves - more ships from America and Britain are moving into the Persian Gulf. It's supposed to be to ensure that if the UN sanctions Iran, there's no retaliatory oil cut-off, but they also acknowledge that if a "projection of power" is needed, the increased naval presence could do the trick easily. So with two messes still needing significant clean-up, why are we even thinking about creating a third?
In all places, even Wal-Mart, the almighty dollar ruleth. Or maybe this following bit is an example of something all done by machine. Or maybe Wal-Mart isn't as uber-wingnutty as we think. Either way, the Voudoun Gnostic Workbook: Expanded Edition is available for pre-order from Wal-Mart.
In these times suggests a novel (to many Americans) idea - rather than cutting taxes to everyone, and especially the wealthy, in thinking that Reagen-esque trickle-down will make us all happier, why not soak the top 1 percent with significant income taxes so that everyone actually gets a real Social Security? This, the writer argues, will make us happier, as well as allowing us to plan for our futures, whether we like it or not. The writer also laments that we're too afraid to hit the rich with the taxes they deserve because we're not sure whether any of that increased tax money will come back to us in one form or another. Still, it's probably worth doing just so that we can bring the entire standard of living up to an acceptable point for everyone, and then we can work on ensuring that everyone has sufficient monies after retirement to live out their lives. That'd be nice, knowing that even though I'm getting sacked with debts, after I pay them off, there will still be enough in the government kitty to retire on.
Some people cannot take a joke. And apparently, the closer the joke is to skewering religious beliefs, the more people there are that can't take it. So Tracy Twyman speculates that with the pushes by Catholics to ban the Da Vinci Code and call it blasphemy and libel, combined with Muslim efforts to pass similar blasphemy legislation that would make the people who satirized Mohamed in cartoons eligible for extradition to Muslim countries, where blasphemy is likely punishable by death, that Christians and Muslims may team up to produce a new Inquisition. There's a case of unlikely bedfellows, isn't it?
There are occasions where the first response really is "You've got to be joking, right?", though. In this case, however, I doubt that's the response they were aiming for - Feministing showcases two posters that claim to explain the roots of societal problems - naturally, by equating everything wrong with society to sexual liberation, and showing off chastity as the root of the solution, with strong family life and all sorts of other good things naturally following. They're not joking, but Pharyngula takes them at their word (the beginnings of most good satire) and produces a graph that shows all the "expressions of Satanic influences" in our lives. I wonder if the people who made the flower graphics will seize upon it and decide to show it off themselves. Maybe they'll add more things to it, too.
P! shows a slightly conservative (in the true sense, not the wingnut sense) bent in reminding us that Just because it's an old idea doesn't mean it's a bad idea. The fetish with fashionable ideas often leads to the abandonment of things that have the weight of history behind them, embracing "War Is Peace" instead of "War Bad, Peace Good" and so on.
For those who would rather ask their own questions, though, I have a few to get started on. First, hone your skills in question asking by playing a round or two of Questions. After perfecting your asking, Slate has a list of The Explainer questions from this year that weren't answered. There's plenty of gems there to get you started. Although one of them will get answered, so you may have to wait until that one's answered to tackle the others. If you like other questions, though, there's a blog that's all about The Question of the Day.
And, saving it for last, because, really, I can't resist the headline, Virgin Dragon Prepares to Give Birth. Ah, the miracles of parthenogenesis. I wonder if that means all of the clutch are going to be daughters? But yes, those who know me and my three-quarters to full-on fascination with dragons know why this comes last. Anyway, now I disappear until some other time, when I will reappear.
