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You are viewing the most recent 25 entries.
24th April 2012
7:57am: America, fear, and torture
I listened to a description of the witch trials. Everyone knows they were burned at the stake or drowned. What I didn't know what that before their own sentencing the "witches" were tortured until they gave the names of their "accomplices" who were then also rounded up and tortured for their accomplices. I also didn't realize that some of the basis was biblical, e.g. Exodus 22:18, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." In more modern times, one thinks we'd be more enlightened, but then I was reminded of how easily America turned into a torture state. One quote from the Larry Siems article1 was striking: At least twice, after the torturers themselves concluded there was no point to further abuse, Washington ordered that the prisoners be tortured some more. If I were to wager a guess, I'd say the Washington didn't know what else to do. Left with a problem for which they didn't have a solution, motivated by fear and a need to do something, they found their scapegoats - including many innocents who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time - and tortured them like witches. 1http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2012/04/george_w_bush_and_torture_america_s_highest_officials_are_responsible_for_the_enhanced_interrogation_of_prisoners_.single.html
21st March 2012
9:16pm: King Cheney will brook no insults, ctd
Following up from this and this, it's nice to see a formal challenge to the increasing power of law enforcement: The U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments Wednesday in a case involving the arrest of a Colorado man who was thrown in jail after telling Vice President Cheney in 2006 that the Bush administration's policies in Iraq were "disgusting." Obama's stance on this is disappointing. The agents, backed by the Obama administration, are contending that in cases involving protection of the president and vice president in particular, law enforcement officers must make split-second decisions — and that their protective actions would be chilled if they could be sued for making the wrong call. They want immunity from lawsuits.
16th January 2012
7:55pm: The logic of non-religious faith
What does it mean to have faith if one is not religious? One could see it as a temporary or more permanent delusion to allow one to operate in challenging environments. Perhaps it's a distraction from unpleasant possibilities to allow one to concentrate on achieving more favorable outcomes. Thus, faith becomes a mechanism of eliminating trains of thought that serve little purpose: if the outcomes conceived by those trains of thought come to pass, then the effects are so dire that consideration of the consequences serves no purpose. More succinctly, "failure is not an option." Consider the early human running from a lion. Having faith in his (or her) ability to escape focuses the human's attention on the trains of thought that may allow him to escape. It is a waste to ponder issues related to capture because the consequences of failure to escape will leave no need for future thought. Faith is one mechanism to focus on productive considerations in an environment with potentially disastrous consequences. Could the same effects be achieved without faith? Likely certain types of mental compartmentalization would serve a similar purpose.
2nd January 2012
11:26am: The Joy of Quiet
Continuing a theme from yesterday, a colleague posted The Joy of Quiet, describing how some are almost desperate to escape the constant stimulation of ubiquitous connectivity. South Korea and China even have Internet rescue camps designed to combat Internet addiction in youth. Although perhaps some just need a break, perhaps there's also a biological basis for that desire: A series of tests in recent years has shown, Mr. Carr points out, that after spending time in quiet rural settings, subjects “exhibit greater attentiveness, stronger memory and generally improved cognition. Their brains become both calmer and sharper.” More than that, empathy, as well as deep thought, depends (as neuroscientists like Antonio Damasio have found) on neural processes that are “inherently slow.” The very ones our high-speed lives have little time for.
1st January 2012
7:06am: students don't learn to think, and maybe lectures don't help
The idea that we're raising a generation of students that requires constant stimulation, negating the ability to take the time for deep reflection, is not a new one. Coming across a recent article about it, I was reminded of certain experiences last semester when I might pose a question to the class, and see obvious discomfort with being forced to generate one's own thoughts. Of course, there were many other potential factors such as teaching ability (or my lack thereof), and more abstract issues such as educational systems' lack of emphasis on higher-level thinking. Somewhat relatedly, I've been pondering is whether the lecture is an outdated teaching format ( American RadioWorks, RSA, Ken Robinson) or maybe not (at least for middle school). I tried to vary my class format with short video and class activities, but the majority of classes consisted of lectures of uneven quality. I'd consider teaching that class again, but I think I'd have to come up with a more interesting format. ETA: Interesting discussion on recorded lectures: http://www.masmithers.com/2011/03/11/is-lecture-capture-the-worst-educational-technology/
11th December 2011
6:01am: Getting back to my web development roots
Getting to play with some new toys. And, as with so many good things in the computer world, they're free! OpenLayers is analogous to the technology used by Google to create interactive maps. It's actually pretty straightforward as OpenLayers takes care of the magic heavy lifting in the background, so any complexity tends to be related to how elaborate an effect is being created. That is, the more stuff being put on the screen, the more code to write, but the infrastructure itself seems petty simple. ExtJS, on the other hand, is complex. It's a very powerful framework that allows one to create very interactive webpages. If you go to one of those sites where you forget whether you're on the desktop or in your browser, that could be ExtJS at work. Take a sample look. Unfortunately, ExtJS is based on Javascript, which is one of the most vicious love-hate languages out there, currently #12 on the all-time list of "I often get angry when writing code in this language". It's easy to break and hard to track down bugs, thus creating a permanent market for Firebug. Anyway, I'm trying to get OpenLayers and ExtJS to play well together. It's been an adventure, but I think I'm almost there. Good to be back to fighting with the 1s and 0s.
2nd December 2011
9:29pm: Photoshop arms race
So one one hand, we have the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, creating technology to modify digital images in extremely realistic fashion. Currently, most digital image modification, known to many by "Photoshopping", an allusion to Adobe's Photoshop tool, is rather obvious to the trained eye, as modification does not take into account issues such as lighting. However, this new technology demonstrate[s]...that synthetic images produced by our method are confusable with real scenes, even for people who believe they are good at telling the difference. You can see for yourself. On the other hand, Dartmouth is pioneering technology to detect image modification. Evidently Photoshopping is an epidemic when it comes to celebrity photos, as the authors of the tool demonstrate here and here. They propose that digitally enhanced photos should come with a disclaimer ("digitally enhanced images may promote insecurity within youth under the age of 18 25 35 55" ?) UIUC's technology presumably would be useful for animation and movie making. However, one could easily image less scrupulous motivations for advances in this field. Dartmouth's work could become an essential tool for those involved in digital forensics. No word yet on the results of any head-to-head matchups.
1st December 2011
9:16am: Your Brain At Work
Just viewed (while prepping for class) Your Brain At Work, a Google Tech talk from about two years ago. Made some points that either sounded familiar or just resonated. 1) The impact of emotion on cognitive ability: If one suppresses emotion, the result is several negative effects, including lower recall (memory) ability. If one regulates emotion, perhaps through explicit cognitive effort, the is no negative impact. However, one must invoke regulation before the brain's natural defenses kick in, typically within a few seconds. 2) The brain's reaction to "threats" is much stronger than the brain's reaction to "rewards" Not surprising. However, to the brain, a threat consisting of, for example, critique in a social setting, is the same as a physical attack. Obviously, YMMV, but this would be consistent with fear of public speaking, instances of groupthink, and submitting one's work for public review. 3) The brain has a limit on the amount of deep thinking that can be done before fatiguing, typically on the order of three hours. Unfortunately, not all deep thinking is created equal. In fact, pondering how to respond to an email can detract from the available well of deep thought as much as trying to solve a complex problem. This leads to conclusions such as that trying to schedule meetings and checking email first thing in the morning leads to less productive working days. I'm sure there were other interesting points mentioned, but, again, this was in the background while I was inputting grades and brushing up on my RSA algorithm theory and understanding. I'm sure he may have said something about impact of multitasking on brain function. :)
25th November 2011
10:55am: dusting it off
I know I've said this before, but thinking I need to upgrade my web presence. Pondering Wordpress and Typepad. Blasphemous thing to say around here, I suppose. Looking forward to next semester when I can devote the time that I'm teaching to some more strategic pursuits. Research-wise, I'm looking to get involved with Smart Grid technology. Playing-with-the-kids-wise, I should finally have all the pieces to get some Scratch and Finch robot camps up off the ground.
16th April 2010
12:56am: National Day of Prayer controversy
If there's one thing I'm going to avoid, it's reading the comments that will be posted in response to any article discussing the recent ruling of the National Day of Prayer statute. Both sides of this issue need to get over themselves. For those who support NDOP, this is not "yet another attack on Christianity." Unfortunately, Christians (I'll pick on them because they howl the loudest, but this applies to most monotheistic religions) forget that, even as much as many are taught that Christianity is the one true religion, the reality is that we live in a multi-cultural world. Thus, in order to coexist, we have to respect others' beliefs, particularly when those beliefs are strong, and emotions are high. Because of this, the law of the land is that the government will respect no religion above another. So, if we're being honest, the goal of the NDOP organization "[to mobilize] the Christian community to intercede for America and its leadership in the seven centers of power: Government, Military, Media, Business, Education, Church and Family" [1] is specific to Christianity and excludes atheists and many faiths. For those who oppose NDOP, this is not a nefarious plot designed to turn America into a theocracy (James Dobson's involvement notwithstanding). There is a reality that the majority of the US population claims Christianity as their religion, and it's reasonable that our culture will reflect that. So, in getting people together to express their best desires for our country, prayer is a natural common language for majority of the population. Unfortunately, being a minority is always a challenge, as your own beliefs and culture will not match up with the mainstream's. However, this does not have to be a negation of those beliefs and cultures. So, once we are honest with ourselves about both sides of the issue, perhaps we can have intelligent discussion. I personally expect that the court's decision will be upheld, and James Dobson and crew will go on a rampage. However, I would hope that cooler heads would prevail, and a celebration that embodies the ideals of NDOP would stand in its place, without the prevalent Christian theme that would seem unwelcoming to those not of that faith. [1] http://nationaldayofprayer.org/about
11th April 2010
2:05pm: Has the word "terrorist" become meaningless?
After reading Roland Martin's article that supposes that Confederate soldiers were terrorists, I think we're to the point were we can add "terrorist" to the list of terms that have lost true meaning (viz. "socialist", "fascist"), except for the purpose of invoking emotional response to things we want to demonize. Mr. Martin makes an excellent point about how our perspective will determine our semantics. Simply put, we are always the good guys, and our opponents are always the bad guys. However, his strategy of drawing parallels between Muslim extremist terrorists and Confederate soldiers seems unconvincing. I'd imagine his logic would apply to any armed conflict, such that both sides could call the other 'terrorists'. The recent debate about whether or not Joseph Andrew Stack, who flew a plane into a Texas IRS building [1], is a 'terrorist' highlights the term being used for emotional reaction. Whether or not a right-wing American citizen fits the definition of 'terrorist' does not affect the enormity of his crime, except that if we can call him a 'terrorist', one gets the benefit of outrage over the issue outside of regular crime. Similarity, whether or not we call Confederate soldiers fighting in defense of slavery 'terrorists' does not change slavery as the most vile practice, except as cheap emotional exploitation. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/us/19crash.html
12th December 2009
11:19pm: more chess
This was a hard-fought game until my opponent dropped his rook. I had built up a king-side attack, but after his blunder changed tactics to simplify to an endgame. I blundered in the endgame, but managed to pull it out. http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game-replayer.php?id=21178
Slower, very closed game. Think I could have pulled it out, but I allowed him to even up the pawn structure. Blundered again in the endgame, but still ended up as a draw http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game-replayer.php?id=21179ETA: Looking at it again, I missed a couple moves that I think win for me. Feels a little empty to dominate the game and end up with a draw. Ah well.
22nd October 2009
9:23pm: Response to Ben Stein - working post
Received this in an email forward. Typically ignore such things, but then it was sent to me again, so I took it as a sign to respond. The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary.
My confession:
I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees, Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against.. That's what they are, Christmas trees.
It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, 'Merry Christmas' to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu . If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away. Very mature viewpoint. It boggles my mind that people want to get all up in arms about someone expressing a sentiment in a manner consistent with his/her means of expression. I typically say 'salud' when someone sneezes, and people understand my intent the same as if I said 'bless you' Why can't we all enjoy each others' goodwill without focusing on the syntactic representation? I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I guess it's all a matter of perspective. It's interesting to hear that Jews and Christians feel pushed around, when, particularly with today's vocal extreme right wing, I would have guessed it's the religious folks doing the pushing. I have no idea where the concept came from, that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat. Neither is America an explicitly Christian country, regardless of what the Pat Robertsons and James Dobsons of the world would have you believe. Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship celebrities and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him? I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where these celebrities came from and where the America we knew went to.
In light of the many jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke; it's not funny, it's intended to get you thinking.
Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her 'How could God let something like this happen?' (regarding Hurricane Katrina). Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She said, 'I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives. And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?' I'd also challenge Stein's lack of nuance in his equating Christianity, God, and morality. Not allowing Christianity a prominent place in government or schools (e.g. removing the Ten Commandments from a court house) is not anti-God or anti-morality, or even anti-Christianity. Perhaps it's anti- pro-Christianity for the sake of not favoring Christianity over other beliefs. In light of recent events... terrorists attack, school shootings, etc.. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found a few years ago) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK. Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school. The Bible says thou shalt not kill; thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK. Similarly, removing Bible reading from public schools does not imply a rejection of morals. Morality tends to be pretty universal between religions, and even in non-religious belief systems. The ability to teach children right from wrong is not exclusive to any one religion, or religion at all. Instead of lamenting the removal of one's religion of choice from schools, I think Stein and others should find a way to teach these universal truths without alienating those whose belief systems may not match theirs. I personally would advocate a general education about religion as opposed to removing it altogether, but would advocate banning religiously-biased practices over implicitly teaching any one religion as superior to another. Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave, because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr. Spock's son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he's talking about. And we said okay..
Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves. Well, I'm all for corporal punishment. :) Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with 'WE REAP WHAT WE SOW.'
We definitely agree on this last point.
30th March 2009
9:13pm: Back from Las Vegas (again)
One again a rewarding experience escorting my high school students to the NSBE National Convention. Slightly different experience than the Vegas excursion with the Tulane crew two weeks earlier. :) I did the math, and I was in Las Vegas ten of the last fourteen days. Yes, sick of travel for now. The NSBE experience has been a more and more a mixed one in recent times. The potential for NSBE is and remains truly awesome. But over the past several years, I find myself becoming more and more disenchanted with aspects of it. I haven't thought this one out as much as other posts, so bear with me... As a college freshman in 1995, I was introduced to NSBE and found it a wonderful support system and leadership training opportunity. I give much thanks to those that recognized some sort of potential and pushed me towards chapter leadership, ultimately leading to my serving several terms as the Pre-College Initiative Chair among other position. The example set for me was one of service and the business of being an engineer and, as an extension, the business of NSBE. My recent experience with NSBE causes me to question where the type of mentoring that I benefited from is. The tone nowadays at NSBE conferences to me feels more like an engineering freaknik (term borrowed from discussion overhead from a conference attendee analyzing the benefits of Nationals) than people interested in the mission of NSBE. One can look at the dwindling attendance at the General Sessions as one metric. More anecdotally, I look at a recent college freshman describing going to one workshop but four strip clubs. I look at a national NSBE officer loudly recounting a R-rated story on a bus full of middle and high school students. I look at how, two years ago, our previous Executive Director was a keynote and couldn't be heard over the side discussions. As much as I wish the best for NSBE, I wish this problem was limited to NSBE. However, I fear that the effects I feel are a result of a change in mentality of the population, and thus those in NSBE's pipeline. I also wonder if the traditionally high entertainment quotient of NSBE, along with its recent membership push, are part of the reason that those truly serious about NSBE may be getting diluted by those looking for a good time. In any case, I feel NSBE has to find a way to re-instill a commitment to the original tenants and intent of the founding of NSBE.
11th March 2009
11:53pm: re "After Gay Marriage, Robot Marriage!"
Mr. Sullivan: Regarding your post "After Gay Marriage, Robot Marriage!" [1], I find it a harbinger to our future equality battles. Working in the artificial intelligence field, the debate of "what is intelligence?" is never-ending, and it directly leads to the question of what constitutes a first-class entity. That is, what happens when, 50 years from now, a robot asserts its autonomy and demands the unalienable rights that we biologically-based beings have had since we decided that such things existed? Do we determine that a robot deserves to marry, as any other self-aware being that is able to enter into a legal contract (ala Star Trek's Mr. Data); or do we see them as glorified walking, but dumb, computers prey to our whims (ala Star Wars' C3PO), analogous to how many justified slavery? Even beyond the inevitable debate surrounding our own creations, how will we evaluate the appropriate level of interaction with future intelligent beings with whom we will eventually come into contact? Obviously this relates to our eventual contact with extra-terrestrials, but what happens when we find a way to reliably communicate with animals here on earth? Will we acknowledge their intelligence and deal with dolphins, apes, or even the family pet expressing that its rights should be equal to our own? Or will we fall back on Biblical precedent that declares humans as superior to all other beings? Getting back to marriage, if we do acknowledge other beings as intelligent, then Gibbs' worst fears are realized, and we will go through the same faulty, narrow-minded logic that keeps gays from being first-class citizens. We are perhaps an intelligent race, but a bigoted one in which first-class beings can only exist in forms with which we are familiar. And we will find religious or other forms of "absolute truth" to justify our preexisting bias. [1] http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/03/after-gay-marri.html
23rd February 2009
5:35am:
Can't believe Feb is already gone. Anyway, this is a journal entry that turned itself into a blog-worthy entry. I need to get smarter. I was looking at a post by Nate Silver [1] and a follow on by Peter Norvig [2], both hat-tipped by Tim Finin [3]. The topic isn't realy the point; the point is that Nate Silver came up with a very interesting premise [4], and when a comment was made to his post at 7:52, he was able to pull out a reference to some old french election at 7:57. So obviously the man has a strong fundamental understanding of his domain. That's really what I'm lacking as I move forward with this PhD thing. I feel like a hack who is skimming by on just knowing enough to get something done, but not really fully trained with an indepth grounding of the tools of the trade. This was also made clear to me during an ebiquity lab meeting when a discussion about statistical techniques come up. In general, the concepts familiar to me, but I don't have the experience or a deep enough understanding to contribute at the level my labmates were speaking. I really see how being full time in that space (or any space in question) truly does make a difference. I feel like I'm a jack of all trades, but master of none. My conflict is that I know I like to experience a lot of different things, and I seem to be able to find connections between them, but it's like I'm a broker, not one with a true contribution. I also need to get "smarter" by using better tools. Norvig came up with a quick simulation and charts to demonstate his ideas by using Python and the Google API. My best bet probably would have been Java, and then hacking the results into Excel or Matlab. Seeing examples like this makes Stephen Covey's points about sharpening the axe and focusing on Quadrant II more salient. I feel rushed to try and get through this PhD thing, so I find it difficult to make the non-urgent but important investment into Quadrant II activities like finding the tools that will ultimately make my life easier; instead I'm focusing on semester-based deadlines. Again, investing in Quadrant II would be so much easier if I were full-time. So either I'll have to carve time from something else, or just accept that the investment I must make will cause short-term goals to take longer. Now the challenge is to not be satisfied with having achieved a goal of spending time thinking and writing. Need to actually follow my own advice. :) [1] http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/02/land-of-thousand-liebermans.html[2] http://norvig.com/chart538.html[3] http://ebiquity.umbc.edu/blogger/2009/02/22/republicans-vs-democrats-in-python/[4] had to actually look up that word.. am I losing my mind???
Current Mood: unsatisfied
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