I found this on Dissecting Leftism. Key Ideas are highlighted.
Original Source: http://www.nature.com/mp/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/mp200955a.html
It is obvious that life experiences have some influences on us. Chinese kids grow up speaking Chinese, for instance. But genetics are also powerful and the latest research indicates that they do to a remarkable extent overwhelm environmental influences. Environmental handicaps tend to fade in importance as we get older. Abstract of the latest paper on the heritability of IQ below:
The heritability of general cognitive ability increases linearly from childhood to young adulthoodBy C M A Haworth et al.
Although common sense suggests that environmental influences increasingly account for individual differences in behavior as experiences accumulate during the course of life, this hypothesis has not previously been tested, in part because of the large sample sizes needed for an adequately powered analysis. Here we show for general cognitive ability that, to the contrary, genetic influence increases with age. The heritability of general cognitive ability increases significantly and linearly from 41% in childhood (9 years) to 55% in adolescence (12 years) and to 66% in young adulthood (17 years) in a sample of 11 000 pairs of twins from four countries, a larger sample than all previous studies combined. In addition to its far-reaching implications for neuroscience and molecular genetics, this finding suggests new ways of thinking about the interface between nature and nurture during the school years. Why, despite life's 'slings and arrows of outrageous fortune', do genetically driven differences increasingly account for differences in general cognitive ability? We suggest that the answer lies with genotype–environment correlation: as children grow up, they increasingly select, modify and even create their own experiences in part based on their genetic propensities.
Sunday, December 06, 2009
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
General Knowledge Quiz
Answers soon............
What is the capital of the Czech Republic?
Who was the loser General at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815?
Which Canadian PM cancelled the Avro arrow?
In which city was the First Modern Olympic Games held?
Who wrote the opera Carmen?
Which actor won an Oscar for Silence of the Lambs?
Which singer was married to Kevin Federline?
Who did Muhammad Ali defeat in the Rumble in the Jungle?
Who sculpted the ‘Thinker’?
Who wrote Don Giovanni?
With what do we associate Joseph Lister?
Who was the French King at the Time of the Revolution in 1789?
Which American General was notorious for his March on the South?
Who headed American forces in Vietnam?
Who was Prime Minister of Britain during the Falkland Wars?
With which Canadian Prime Minister do we associate the FLQ Crisis?
Which biologist discovered the Alpha Helix Structure?
With which field of Science do we associate Hutton, Lyell and Cuvier?
What is the most common Nobel Gas on Earth?
What is the outermost layer of the sun known as?
Who wrote Jailhouse Rock?
Which musical is based on a novel by Victor Hugo?
Who wrote the Three Musketeers?
What was the last Chinese dynasty?
Who was India’s First Prime Minister?
Which Country won Soccer’s First world Cup?
Which two Universities row against each other in an annual race?
Who is America’s longest serving President?
What state was Ronald Reagan a governor?
Who painted the Sistine Chapel?
Who invented the Reflecting Telescope?
Who is the Father of the Printing Press?
With which Baseball team do we associate Ted Williams?
What sport was played by Jim Brown?
Who was assassinated on the Ides of March?
Who are the Three Patriarchs mentioned in Genesis?
What is the Haj?
What in Buddhism is Dharma?
Which religion speaks about the Wheel of Life?
Which scientist is associated with the first Nuclear Chain reaction?
What are the only two elements that are liquid at room temperature?
With which Superhero do we associate Bob Kane?
Which Group wrote ‘Yellow Submarine’?
Who wrote the song “Pretty Woman’?
Who wrote, directed and acted in the movie Rocky?
Which national anthem was written by Francis Scott Key?
What is the largest Pyramid?
Who was the famous son of Philip of Macedonia?
Which Canadian politician won a Nobel Peace Prize for his work around resolving the Suez Canal crisis?
Who defeated Barry Goldwater in the 1964 US Presidential election?
What is the capital of the Czech Republic?
Who was the loser General at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815?
Which Canadian PM cancelled the Avro arrow?
In which city was the First Modern Olympic Games held?
Who wrote the opera Carmen?
Which actor won an Oscar for Silence of the Lambs?
Which singer was married to Kevin Federline?
Who did Muhammad Ali defeat in the Rumble in the Jungle?
Who sculpted the ‘Thinker’?
Who wrote Don Giovanni?
With what do we associate Joseph Lister?
Who was the French King at the Time of the Revolution in 1789?
Which American General was notorious for his March on the South?
Who headed American forces in Vietnam?
Who was Prime Minister of Britain during the Falkland Wars?
With which Canadian Prime Minister do we associate the FLQ Crisis?
Which biologist discovered the Alpha Helix Structure?
With which field of Science do we associate Hutton, Lyell and Cuvier?
What is the most common Nobel Gas on Earth?
What is the outermost layer of the sun known as?
Who wrote Jailhouse Rock?
Which musical is based on a novel by Victor Hugo?
Who wrote the Three Musketeers?
What was the last Chinese dynasty?
Who was India’s First Prime Minister?
Which Country won Soccer’s First world Cup?
Which two Universities row against each other in an annual race?
Who is America’s longest serving President?
What state was Ronald Reagan a governor?
Who painted the Sistine Chapel?
Who invented the Reflecting Telescope?
Who is the Father of the Printing Press?
With which Baseball team do we associate Ted Williams?
What sport was played by Jim Brown?
Who was assassinated on the Ides of March?
Who are the Three Patriarchs mentioned in Genesis?
What is the Haj?
What in Buddhism is Dharma?
Which religion speaks about the Wheel of Life?
Which scientist is associated with the first Nuclear Chain reaction?
What are the only two elements that are liquid at room temperature?
With which Superhero do we associate Bob Kane?
Which Group wrote ‘Yellow Submarine’?
Who wrote the song “Pretty Woman’?
Who wrote, directed and acted in the movie Rocky?
Which national anthem was written by Francis Scott Key?
What is the largest Pyramid?
Who was the famous son of Philip of Macedonia?
Which Canadian politician won a Nobel Peace Prize for his work around resolving the Suez Canal crisis?
Who defeated Barry Goldwater in the 1964 US Presidential election?
Tuesday, December 01, 2009
CRU Climategate Scandal
This from the NY Times.........
Author: John Tierney
If you have not delved into the thousands of e-mail messages and files hacked from the computers of British climate scientists, let me give you the closest thing to an executive summary. It is taken from a file slugged HARRY_READ_ME, which is the log of a computer expert’s long struggle to make sense of a database of historical temperatures. Here is Harry’s summary of the situation:
Aarrggghhh!
That cry, in various spellings, is a motif throughout the log as Harry tries to fight off despair. “OH [EXPLETIVE] THIS!” he writes after struggling to reconcile readings from weather stations around the world. “It’s Sunday evening, I’ve worked all weekend, and just when I thought it was done I’m hitting yet another problem that’s based on the hopeless state of our databases. There is no uniform data integrity. ...”
Harry, whoever he may be, comes off as the most sympathetic figure in the pilfered computer annals of East Anglia University, the British keeper of global temperature records. While Harry’s log shows him worrying about the integrity of the database, the climate scientists are e-mailing one another with strategies for blocking outsiders’ legal requests to see their data.
While Harry is puzzling over temperatures — “I have that familiar Twilight Zone sensation” — the scientists are confidently making proclamations to journalists, jetting to conferences and plotting revenge against those who question the dangers of global warming. When a journal publishes a skeptic’s paper, the scientists e-mail one another to ignore it. They focus instead on retaliation against the journal and the editor, a project that is breezily added to the agenda of their next meeting: “Another thing to discuss in Nice!”
As the scientists denigrate their critics in the e-mail messages, they seem oblivious to one of the greatest dangers in the climate-change debate: smug groupthink. These researchers, some of the most prominent climate experts in Britain and America, seem so focused on winning the public-relations war that they exaggerate their certitude — and ultimately undermine their own cause.
Consider, for instance, the phrase that has been turned into a music video by gleeful climate skeptics: “hide the decline,” used in an e-mail message by Phil Jones, the head of the university’s Climatic Research Unit. He was discussing the preparation of a graph for the cover of a 1999 report from the World Meteorological Organization showing that temperatures in the past several decades were the highest of the past millennium.
Most of the graph was based on analyses of tree rings and other “proxy” records like ice cores and lake sediments. These indirect measurements indicated that temperatures declined in the middle of the millennium and then rose in the first half of the 20th century, which jibes with other records. But the tree-ring analyses don’t reveal a sharp warming in the late 20th century — in fact, they show a decline in temperatures, contradicting what has been directly measured with thermometers.
Because they considered that recent decline to be spurious, Dr. Jones and his colleagues removed it from part of the graph and used direct thermometer readings instead. In a statement last week, Dr. Jones said there was nothing nefarious in what they had done, because the problems with the tree-ring data had been openly identified earlier and were known to experts.
But the graph adorned the cover of a report intended for policy makers and journalists. The nonexperts wouldn’t have realized that the scariest part of that graph — the recent temperatures soaring far above anything in the previous millennium — was based on a completely different measurement from the earlier portion. It looked like one smooth, continuous line leading straight upward to certain doom.
The story behind that graph certainly didn’t show that global warming was a hoax or a fraud, as some skeptics proclaimed, but it did illustrate another of their arguments: that the evidence for global warming is not as unequivocal as many scientists claim. (Go to nytimes.com/tierneylab for details.)
In fact, one skeptic raised this very issue about tree-ring data in a comment posted in 2004 on RealClimate, the blog operated by climate scientists. The comment, which questioned the propriety of “grafting the thermometer record onto a proxy temperature record,” immediately drew a sharp retort on the blog from Michael Mann, an expert at Penn State University:
“No researchers in this field have ever, to our knowledge, ‘grafted the thermometer record onto’ any reconstruction. It is somewhat disappointing to find this specious claim (which we usually find originating from industry-funded climate disinformation Web sites) appearing in this forum.”
Dr. Mann now tells me that he was unaware, when he wrote the response, that such grafting had in fact been done in the earlier cover chart, and I take him at his word. But I don’t see why the question was dismissed so readily, with the implication that only a tool of the fossil-fuel industry would raise it.
Contempt for critics is evident over and over again in the hacked e-mail messages, as if the scientists were a priesthood protecting the temple from barbarians. Yes, some of the skeptics have political agendas, but so do some of the scientists. Sure, the skeptics can be cranks and pests, but they have identified genuine problems in the historical reconstructions of climate, as in the debate they inspired about the “hockey stick” graph of temperatures over the past millennium.
It is not unreasonable to give outsiders a look at the historical readings and the adjustments made by experts like Harry. How exactly were the readings converted into what the English scientists describe as “quality controlled and homogenised” data?
Trying to prevent skeptics from seeing the raw data was always a questionable strategy, scientifically. Now it looks like dubious public relations, too.
In response to the furor over the climate e-mail messages, there will be more attention than ever paid to those British temperature records, and any inconsistencies or gaps will seem more suspicious simply because the researchers were so determined not to reveal them. Skeptical bloggers are already dissecting Harry’s work. As they relentlessly pore over other data, the British scientists will feel Harry’s pain:
Aarrggghhh! There truly is no end in sight.
Author: John Tierney
If you have not delved into the thousands of e-mail messages and files hacked from the computers of British climate scientists, let me give you the closest thing to an executive summary. It is taken from a file slugged HARRY_READ_ME, which is the log of a computer expert’s long struggle to make sense of a database of historical temperatures. Here is Harry’s summary of the situation:
Aarrggghhh!
That cry, in various spellings, is a motif throughout the log as Harry tries to fight off despair. “OH [EXPLETIVE] THIS!” he writes after struggling to reconcile readings from weather stations around the world. “It’s Sunday evening, I’ve worked all weekend, and just when I thought it was done I’m hitting yet another problem that’s based on the hopeless state of our databases. There is no uniform data integrity. ...”
Harry, whoever he may be, comes off as the most sympathetic figure in the pilfered computer annals of East Anglia University, the British keeper of global temperature records. While Harry’s log shows him worrying about the integrity of the database, the climate scientists are e-mailing one another with strategies for blocking outsiders’ legal requests to see their data.
While Harry is puzzling over temperatures — “I have that familiar Twilight Zone sensation” — the scientists are confidently making proclamations to journalists, jetting to conferences and plotting revenge against those who question the dangers of global warming. When a journal publishes a skeptic’s paper, the scientists e-mail one another to ignore it. They focus instead on retaliation against the journal and the editor, a project that is breezily added to the agenda of their next meeting: “Another thing to discuss in Nice!”
As the scientists denigrate their critics in the e-mail messages, they seem oblivious to one of the greatest dangers in the climate-change debate: smug groupthink. These researchers, some of the most prominent climate experts in Britain and America, seem so focused on winning the public-relations war that they exaggerate their certitude — and ultimately undermine their own cause.
Consider, for instance, the phrase that has been turned into a music video by gleeful climate skeptics: “hide the decline,” used in an e-mail message by Phil Jones, the head of the university’s Climatic Research Unit. He was discussing the preparation of a graph for the cover of a 1999 report from the World Meteorological Organization showing that temperatures in the past several decades were the highest of the past millennium.
Most of the graph was based on analyses of tree rings and other “proxy” records like ice cores and lake sediments. These indirect measurements indicated that temperatures declined in the middle of the millennium and then rose in the first half of the 20th century, which jibes with other records. But the tree-ring analyses don’t reveal a sharp warming in the late 20th century — in fact, they show a decline in temperatures, contradicting what has been directly measured with thermometers.
Because they considered that recent decline to be spurious, Dr. Jones and his colleagues removed it from part of the graph and used direct thermometer readings instead. In a statement last week, Dr. Jones said there was nothing nefarious in what they had done, because the problems with the tree-ring data had been openly identified earlier and were known to experts.
But the graph adorned the cover of a report intended for policy makers and journalists. The nonexperts wouldn’t have realized that the scariest part of that graph — the recent temperatures soaring far above anything in the previous millennium — was based on a completely different measurement from the earlier portion. It looked like one smooth, continuous line leading straight upward to certain doom.
The story behind that graph certainly didn’t show that global warming was a hoax or a fraud, as some skeptics proclaimed, but it did illustrate another of their arguments: that the evidence for global warming is not as unequivocal as many scientists claim. (Go to nytimes.com/tierneylab for details.)
In fact, one skeptic raised this very issue about tree-ring data in a comment posted in 2004 on RealClimate, the blog operated by climate scientists. The comment, which questioned the propriety of “grafting the thermometer record onto a proxy temperature record,” immediately drew a sharp retort on the blog from Michael Mann, an expert at Penn State University:
“No researchers in this field have ever, to our knowledge, ‘grafted the thermometer record onto’ any reconstruction. It is somewhat disappointing to find this specious claim (which we usually find originating from industry-funded climate disinformation Web sites) appearing in this forum.”
Dr. Mann now tells me that he was unaware, when he wrote the response, that such grafting had in fact been done in the earlier cover chart, and I take him at his word. But I don’t see why the question was dismissed so readily, with the implication that only a tool of the fossil-fuel industry would raise it.
Contempt for critics is evident over and over again in the hacked e-mail messages, as if the scientists were a priesthood protecting the temple from barbarians. Yes, some of the skeptics have political agendas, but so do some of the scientists. Sure, the skeptics can be cranks and pests, but they have identified genuine problems in the historical reconstructions of climate, as in the debate they inspired about the “hockey stick” graph of temperatures over the past millennium.
It is not unreasonable to give outsiders a look at the historical readings and the adjustments made by experts like Harry. How exactly were the readings converted into what the English scientists describe as “quality controlled and homogenised” data?
Trying to prevent skeptics from seeing the raw data was always a questionable strategy, scientifically. Now it looks like dubious public relations, too.
In response to the furor over the climate e-mail messages, there will be more attention than ever paid to those British temperature records, and any inconsistencies or gaps will seem more suspicious simply because the researchers were so determined not to reveal them. Skeptical bloggers are already dissecting Harry’s work. As they relentlessly pore over other data, the British scientists will feel Harry’s pain:
Aarrggghhh! There truly is no end in sight.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Letter to a 'Progressive'
I wrote this reply to a so-called progressive.....
Obama was a poor choice from the word go. He lacked the experience for the top job (as did George W. Bush and Sarah Palin – who I certainly do not support). His whole election was contrived by an ‘uncritical media’ (your words not mine) that vaunted him into a position that he is clearly undeserving of. As a long time observer of the US political scene I knew this was the case. While I did not support McCain’s policies on illegal immigration, nor his closeness with the Pro-Life Movement – his experience and know how in building real bridges (not Obama’s perceived bridges) across the political aisle (McCain-Feingold) would have made him a better choice than Obama. His realistic (not wishful and naïve) understanding of global relations and his conceptualization of Islamofascism further add to his credibility here. Unfortunately the downturn in the economy (which both parties share blame), the Sarah Palin fiasco and the free pass given to his Holiness by the Beltway boneheads robbed the US of the better man for the job.
So instead we have a leadership that burdened the American population with a stratospheric debt in following a false economic doctrine that has had virtually no impact in stimulating the economy; vacillated in Afghanistan about a troop surge as Americans soldiers have died, stoked the finger of racism (Skip Gates Affair); introduced a cabal of power Czars answerable only to the President (and therefore violated the spirit of democracy); stood idle while the mullahs throttled the democracy movement in Iran; pandered to Islam with a serious of half-truths that anyone with even a cursory understanding of history could identify (the Cairo speech)l; gave terrorists the same rights as American citizens; attempted to stifle free speech by his attacks on Fox News and other organs critical of him and further polarized the American public by his heavy handidness in introducing Health Care Reform (an ideal that I personally support). His decision to bankroll the Hamas thugs and throw Israel under the bus over the Jerusalem issue is a further indication of an a leader who lacks moral claity..And all of this after less than one year in power.
You are incorrect when you say that Obama’s popularity numbers have dropped because of his betrayal of the ‘progressive’ agenda (I hate it when Leftists talk about themselves as progressives…..What is progressive about Socialism? A movement that flies in the face of human freedom….. or of Communism, Marxism and National Socialism….all of which have bought millions of deaths and much suffering to humanity…yes National Socialism is a leftist philosophy I have addressed this point several times)
I have studied the popularity slump and all the data seems to indicate that he is losing ground amongst white voters, moderates and even those conservatives who backed him initially (I guess they have finally woken up to the Obama Delusion..remember that if weren’t for these voting blocks mentioned above Obama would just be a footnote in American electoral history…like George McGovern in 1972). The ‘progressive’ support is still strong for the Messiah (who else will they back? Perennial loser Dennis Kucinich, Ralph ‘Yesterday’s Man’ Nader, John ‘I cheated on my wife while she had cancer’ Edwards or the now virtually extinct Green Party represented by moonbeamer Cynthia Mc’Stupid’).
Weiner and Grayson are still nobodies. Weiner is ultimately anaethema to the left of the party as he is a Jewish supporter of Israel. The Left of the Democrat Party is fundamentally anti-Israel and in many cases anti-semitic (the former can serve as a smokescreen for the latter). You are however correct in noting that the Republican party is in a mess at this point in time. I have mentioned this several times on my blog. I personally believe that the party has to gravitate more to the center on social issues, maintain a strong opposition to Islamofascism, champion free market ideals but at the same time recognize the necessity of workable environmental policies.
In this respect my thinking is similar to that of David Frum or LGF Blogger Charles Johnson (who has done a great job as of late in bashing the ID movement and the extremists on the Right while at the same time championing Western Ideals). I myself am not a conservative but a Classical Liberal so I have no problem supporting Dems who adhere to the ideals of Daniel Patrick Monihyan (one of my favourite American politicians), Scoop Jackson and Leo Strauss. However I am not convinced that such Democrats still exist.
Gavin
Obama was a poor choice from the word go. He lacked the experience for the top job (as did George W. Bush and Sarah Palin – who I certainly do not support). His whole election was contrived by an ‘uncritical media’ (your words not mine) that vaunted him into a position that he is clearly undeserving of. As a long time observer of the US political scene I knew this was the case. While I did not support McCain’s policies on illegal immigration, nor his closeness with the Pro-Life Movement – his experience and know how in building real bridges (not Obama’s perceived bridges) across the political aisle (McCain-Feingold) would have made him a better choice than Obama. His realistic (not wishful and naïve) understanding of global relations and his conceptualization of Islamofascism further add to his credibility here. Unfortunately the downturn in the economy (which both parties share blame), the Sarah Palin fiasco and the free pass given to his Holiness by the Beltway boneheads robbed the US of the better man for the job.
So instead we have a leadership that burdened the American population with a stratospheric debt in following a false economic doctrine that has had virtually no impact in stimulating the economy; vacillated in Afghanistan about a troop surge as Americans soldiers have died, stoked the finger of racism (Skip Gates Affair); introduced a cabal of power Czars answerable only to the President (and therefore violated the spirit of democracy); stood idle while the mullahs throttled the democracy movement in Iran; pandered to Islam with a serious of half-truths that anyone with even a cursory understanding of history could identify (the Cairo speech)l; gave terrorists the same rights as American citizens; attempted to stifle free speech by his attacks on Fox News and other organs critical of him and further polarized the American public by his heavy handidness in introducing Health Care Reform (an ideal that I personally support). His decision to bankroll the Hamas thugs and throw Israel under the bus over the Jerusalem issue is a further indication of an a leader who lacks moral claity..And all of this after less than one year in power.
You are incorrect when you say that Obama’s popularity numbers have dropped because of his betrayal of the ‘progressive’ agenda (I hate it when Leftists talk about themselves as progressives…..What is progressive about Socialism? A movement that flies in the face of human freedom….. or of Communism, Marxism and National Socialism….all of which have bought millions of deaths and much suffering to humanity…yes National Socialism is a leftist philosophy I have addressed this point several times)
I have studied the popularity slump and all the data seems to indicate that he is losing ground amongst white voters, moderates and even those conservatives who backed him initially (I guess they have finally woken up to the Obama Delusion..remember that if weren’t for these voting blocks mentioned above Obama would just be a footnote in American electoral history…like George McGovern in 1972). The ‘progressive’ support is still strong for the Messiah (who else will they back? Perennial loser Dennis Kucinich, Ralph ‘Yesterday’s Man’ Nader, John ‘I cheated on my wife while she had cancer’ Edwards or the now virtually extinct Green Party represented by moonbeamer Cynthia Mc’Stupid’).
Weiner and Grayson are still nobodies. Weiner is ultimately anaethema to the left of the party as he is a Jewish supporter of Israel. The Left of the Democrat Party is fundamentally anti-Israel and in many cases anti-semitic (the former can serve as a smokescreen for the latter). You are however correct in noting that the Republican party is in a mess at this point in time. I have mentioned this several times on my blog. I personally believe that the party has to gravitate more to the center on social issues, maintain a strong opposition to Islamofascism, champion free market ideals but at the same time recognize the necessity of workable environmental policies.
In this respect my thinking is similar to that of David Frum or LGF Blogger Charles Johnson (who has done a great job as of late in bashing the ID movement and the extremists on the Right while at the same time championing Western Ideals). I myself am not a conservative but a Classical Liberal so I have no problem supporting Dems who adhere to the ideals of Daniel Patrick Monihyan (one of my favourite American politicians), Scoop Jackson and Leo Strauss. However I am not convinced that such Democrats still exist.
Gavin
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Ian Barbour - When Science Meets Religion
This is arguably one of the best books on Science and Religion for some time. Barbour is a deserving winner of the Templeton Award and I found his four facet model dealing with the relationship between these two avenues of human thought to be very useful
In summary Barbour sees the two mechanisms through the eyes of four different models
Conflict: Where they butt heads eg. - Scientific Materialism vs Biblical Literalism
Independence: Where they ignore one another - Separate Domains and Different Languages and Functions
Dialogue: Interaction in the area of Limit-Questions. Parallels and Common Methodologies
Integration: Incorporating the two dynamics together within the framework of Natural Theology, Theology of Nature or Barbour's favourite Systematic Synthesis.
I myself tend to agree with the Dialogue approach although a part of me yearns for a realistic Integration.
Barbour analyzes these models in the areas of Astronomy and Creation, Quantum Physics, Evolution and Continuing Creation, Neuroscience and Human Nature and finally God and Nature.
In summary Barbour sees the two mechanisms through the eyes of four different models
Conflict: Where they butt heads eg. - Scientific Materialism vs Biblical Literalism
Independence: Where they ignore one another - Separate Domains and Different Languages and Functions
Dialogue: Interaction in the area of Limit-Questions. Parallels and Common Methodologies
Integration: Incorporating the two dynamics together within the framework of Natural Theology, Theology of Nature or Barbour's favourite Systematic Synthesis.
I myself tend to agree with the Dialogue approach although a part of me yearns for a realistic Integration.
Barbour analyzes these models in the areas of Astronomy and Creation, Quantum Physics, Evolution and Continuing Creation, Neuroscience and Human Nature and finally God and Nature.
Outliers
I just finished the Malcolm Gladwell book Outliers and I still can't see what the fuss is. Yes the Lanagan Oppenheimer comparison was intriguing as was the schtick on Hockey players born in the first half of the year but his analysis of airline accidents and order of hierarchy was a bit tedious as was his endless rambling on about the Jamaican whiteness model. Nevertheless Gladwell's writing style is easy to follow and he knows his pop culture. But for a serious sociological study (if there is indeed such a thing) Outliers falls a bit short of the target.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
On the Terror Trials
by Thomas Sowell
In the string of amazing decisions made during the first year of the Obama administration, nothing seems more like sheer insanity than the decision to try foreign terrorists, who have committed acts of war against the United States, in federal court, as if they were American citizens accused of crimes.
Terrorists are not even entitled to the protection of the Geneva Convention, much less the Constitution of the United States. Terrorists have never observed, nor even claimed to have observed, the Geneva Convention, nor are they among those covered by it.
But over and above the utter inconsistency of what is being done is the utter recklessness it represents. The last time an attack on the World Trade Center was treated as a matter of domestic criminal justice was after a bomb was exploded there in 1993. Under the rules of American criminal law, the prosecution had to turn over all sorts of information to the defense-- information that told the Al Qaeda international terrorist network what we knew about them and how we knew it.
This was nothing more and nothing less than giving away military secrets to an enemy in wartime-- something for which people have been executed, as they should have been. Secrecy in warfare is a matter of life and death. Lives were risked and lost during World War II to prevent Nazi Germany from discovering that Britain had broken its supposedly unbreakable Enigma code and could read their military plans that were being radioed in that code.
"Loose lips sink ships" was the World War II motto in the United States. But loose lips are mandated under the rules of criminal prosecutions.
Tragically, this administration seems hell-bent to avoid seeing acts of terrorism against the United States as acts of war. The very phrase "war on terrorism" is avoided, as if that will stop the terrorists' war on us.
The mindset of the left behind such thinking was spelled out in an editorial in the San Francisco Chronicle, which said that "Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the professed mastermind of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, will be tried the right way-- the American way, in a federal courtroom where the world will see both his guilt and the nation's adherence to the rule of law."
This is not the rule of law but the application of laws to situations for which they were not designed.
For the rest go to:
Townhall
In the string of amazing decisions made during the first year of the Obama administration, nothing seems more like sheer insanity than the decision to try foreign terrorists, who have committed acts of war against the United States, in federal court, as if they were American citizens accused of crimes.
Terrorists are not even entitled to the protection of the Geneva Convention, much less the Constitution of the United States. Terrorists have never observed, nor even claimed to have observed, the Geneva Convention, nor are they among those covered by it.
But over and above the utter inconsistency of what is being done is the utter recklessness it represents. The last time an attack on the World Trade Center was treated as a matter of domestic criminal justice was after a bomb was exploded there in 1993. Under the rules of American criminal law, the prosecution had to turn over all sorts of information to the defense-- information that told the Al Qaeda international terrorist network what we knew about them and how we knew it.
This was nothing more and nothing less than giving away military secrets to an enemy in wartime-- something for which people have been executed, as they should have been. Secrecy in warfare is a matter of life and death. Lives were risked and lost during World War II to prevent Nazi Germany from discovering that Britain had broken its supposedly unbreakable Enigma code and could read their military plans that were being radioed in that code.
"Loose lips sink ships" was the World War II motto in the United States. But loose lips are mandated under the rules of criminal prosecutions.
Tragically, this administration seems hell-bent to avoid seeing acts of terrorism against the United States as acts of war. The very phrase "war on terrorism" is avoided, as if that will stop the terrorists' war on us.
The mindset of the left behind such thinking was spelled out in an editorial in the San Francisco Chronicle, which said that "Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the professed mastermind of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, will be tried the right way-- the American way, in a federal courtroom where the world will see both his guilt and the nation's adherence to the rule of law."
This is not the rule of law but the application of laws to situations for which they were not designed.
For the rest go to:
Townhall
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Quantum Loop Gravity
What is Quantum Loop Gravity?
The Quick and Dirty:
A Theory of spacetime
Leading proponents include: Lee Smolin, Carlo Rovelli, John Baez, Roger Penrose and Abhay Ashtekar
Alternative to string theory - views space space as made up of discrete (quantised) loops that mesh together
Loops are spin networks of gravitational fields that have been energized.
In short: It is a quantum theory of Gravity.
It is strongly focused on Geometry
It is background independent
What are the strengths of Quantum Loop Gravity?
It doesn't require the higher dimensions of string theory
Very faithful to General Relativity especially Einstein's field equations
It deals very well with Black Holes
Replaces Big Bang Singularity with a Big Bounce
Can explain a positive cosmological constant
The Quick and Dirty:
A Theory of spacetime
Leading proponents include: Lee Smolin, Carlo Rovelli, John Baez, Roger Penrose and Abhay Ashtekar
Alternative to string theory - views space space as made up of discrete (quantised) loops that mesh together
Loops are spin networks of gravitational fields that have been energized.
In short: It is a quantum theory of Gravity.
It is strongly focused on Geometry
It is background independent
What are the strengths of Quantum Loop Gravity?
It doesn't require the higher dimensions of string theory
Very faithful to General Relativity especially Einstein's field equations
It deals very well with Black Holes
Replaces Big Bang Singularity with a Big Bounce
Can explain a positive cosmological constant
Sunday, November 08, 2009
Attention all Physics Teachers - Read Eric Mazur
The Work of Eric Mazur on Concept Teaching in Physics is excellent. I recently puchased his book Peer Instruction and would urge others to do the same. For more on Mazur's work go to:
http://mazur-www.harvard.edu/education/educationmenu.php
http://mazur-www.harvard.edu/education/educationmenu.php
In the News LXIII
Massacre at Fort Hood
Despite the Jihadist sympathies of the perpetrator the naysayers are still trying to find other excuses for his actions. What is equally disturbing are the warnings that were apparent before the massacre.
Chavez land grab may influence Catholic Church.
Perhaps he is taking a page from the Radical Jacobins of French Revolution fame. Another worrisome development in the Chavez saga though is a looming military clash with Colombia. The man is a menace - Where is the UN when you need it? I guess they don't have time to worry about real problems when the Joooos are on the agenda elsewhere.
Obama wins one in the House.
I tend to agree with the spirit of his Health care proposals but like many American citizens I am weary of the heavy hand of government that he envisions.
Republican wins in New Jersey and Virginia
If I was a Republican I wouldn't read too much into this (other than the fact that the GOP is clearly not dead - an outrageous analysis after the 2008 election that didn't deserve the news print it got in the firsrt place). Both Democrat governors who were ousted were incompetent and on the same day the Dems picked up two seats in the House including the much coveted NY-23. Nevertheless the results may force a slight rethink in Obama's approach.
US unemployment continues to grow
This despite the 'success of the stimulus package meme' championed by Neo-Keynesian poster boy Paul Krugman. Also the situation is not much better across the pond.
Israel rejects endorsement by UN of Gaza Report.
As it should the report is a travesty of jusice.
More on the 'peaceful' intentions of Hezbollah after rocket seize at sea.
Its an oldie but a gem. Sarkozy reminding Obama about the Real world of politics.
Obama: “We must never stop until we see the day when nuclear arms have been banished from the face of the earth.”
Sarkozy: “We live in the real world, not the virtual world. And the real world expects us to take decisions.”
The rest of Sarkozy’s remarks were, well, remarkable:
“President Obama dreams of a world without weapons … but right in front of us two countries are doing the exact opposite.
“Iran since 2005 has flouted five security council resolutions. North Korea has been defying council resolutions since 1993.
“I support the extended hand of the Americans, but what good has proposals for dialogue brought the international community? More uranium enrichment and declarations by the leaders of Iran to wipe a UN member state off the map,” he continued, referring to Israel.
The sharp-tongued French leader even implied that Mr Obama’s resolution 1887 had used up valuable diplomatic energy.
“If we have courage to impose sanctions together it will lend viability to our commitment to reduce our own weapons and to making a world without nuke weapons,” he said.
Mr Sarkozy has previously called the US president’s disarmament crusade “naive.”
Despite the Jihadist sympathies of the perpetrator the naysayers are still trying to find other excuses for his actions. What is equally disturbing are the warnings that were apparent before the massacre.
Chavez land grab may influence Catholic Church.
Perhaps he is taking a page from the Radical Jacobins of French Revolution fame. Another worrisome development in the Chavez saga though is a looming military clash with Colombia. The man is a menace - Where is the UN when you need it? I guess they don't have time to worry about real problems when the Joooos are on the agenda elsewhere.
Obama wins one in the House.
I tend to agree with the spirit of his Health care proposals but like many American citizens I am weary of the heavy hand of government that he envisions.
Republican wins in New Jersey and Virginia
If I was a Republican I wouldn't read too much into this (other than the fact that the GOP is clearly not dead - an outrageous analysis after the 2008 election that didn't deserve the news print it got in the firsrt place). Both Democrat governors who were ousted were incompetent and on the same day the Dems picked up two seats in the House including the much coveted NY-23. Nevertheless the results may force a slight rethink in Obama's approach.
US unemployment continues to grow
This despite the 'success of the stimulus package meme' championed by Neo-Keynesian poster boy Paul Krugman. Also the situation is not much better across the pond.
Israel rejects endorsement by UN of Gaza Report.
As it should the report is a travesty of jusice.
More on the 'peaceful' intentions of Hezbollah after rocket seize at sea.
Its an oldie but a gem. Sarkozy reminding Obama about the Real world of politics.
Obama: “We must never stop until we see the day when nuclear arms have been banished from the face of the earth.”
Sarkozy: “We live in the real world, not the virtual world. And the real world expects us to take decisions.”
The rest of Sarkozy’s remarks were, well, remarkable:
“President Obama dreams of a world without weapons … but right in front of us two countries are doing the exact opposite.
“Iran since 2005 has flouted five security council resolutions. North Korea has been defying council resolutions since 1993.
“I support the extended hand of the Americans, but what good has proposals for dialogue brought the international community? More uranium enrichment and declarations by the leaders of Iran to wipe a UN member state off the map,” he continued, referring to Israel.
The sharp-tongued French leader even implied that Mr Obama’s resolution 1887 had used up valuable diplomatic energy.
“If we have courage to impose sanctions together it will lend viability to our commitment to reduce our own weapons and to making a world without nuke weapons,” he said.
Mr Sarkozy has previously called the US president’s disarmament crusade “naive.”
Liverpool -The Slide Continues
Its tough to be die hard Liverpool fan these days ( a pedigree I have had since 1976). The Reds are on the verge of elimination from the Champion Leagues having failed to inspire whatsoever. Fortunes in the League are not much better (despite the 2-0 win against Man U two weeks ago - it seems like a blip now). The Reds have lost to the likes of Sunderland and Fulham and sit now with five losses (last season Pool only lost two matches over the 38 game run). However this is not the end - what is most disturbing is that the teams two super stars - Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard are facing lost term injury layoffs. Couple this with a manager who seems to be short on ideas and an ownership equally short on finances and one can appreciate my pessimism. I am predicting a seventh place finish for the Reds this season (behind the Big Three as well as Man City, Aston Villa and Spurs). Yes its not pleasant and I have an eerie sensation that this is looking like 98/99 all over again if not the horrific 93/94 season. I hope that I am wrong but sadly this seems unlikely.
Sunday, November 01, 2009
Books I am reading
I never read one book at a time after all I have genetic disposition towards multitasking. At present I am reading four books (when I have the chance).
These are Michio Kaku's Physics of the Impossible , Matin Gardiner's Churchill and the Jews and Robert Wright's The Evolution of God.
Gardiner is excellent as usual, Kaku is highly entertaining but I am finding
Wright's work to be a bit of a slog. Will keep you posted...
These are Michio Kaku's Physics of the Impossible , Matin Gardiner's Churchill and the Jews and Robert Wright's The Evolution of God.
Gardiner is excellent as usual, Kaku is highly entertaining but I am finding
Wright's work to be a bit of a slog. Will keep you posted...
Friday, October 30, 2009
How many Multiverses are there?
by Amanda Gefter - New Scientist
HOW many universes are there? Cosmologists Andrei Linde and Vitaly Vanchurin at Stanford University in California calculate that the number dwarfs the 10 Exp 500 universes postulated in string theory, and raise the provocative notion that the answer may depend on the human brain.
The idea that there is more than one universe, each with its own laws of physics, arises out of several different theories, including string theory and cosmic inflation. This concept of a "multiverse" could explain a puzzling mystery - why dark energy, the furtive force that is accelerating the expansion of space, appears improbably fine-tuned for life. With a large number of universes, there is bound to be one that has a dark energy value like ours.
Calculating the probability of observing this value - and other features of the cosmos - depends on how many universes of various kinds populate the multiverse. String theory describes 10 Exp 500 universes, but that just counts different vacuum states, which are like the blank canvases upon which universes are painted. The features of each canvas determine what the overall painting will look like - such as the laws of physics in that universe - but not the details.
Thanks to the randomness of quantum mechanics, two identical vacuum states can end up as very different universes. Small quantum fluctuations in the very early universe are stretched to astronomical scales by inflation, the period of faster-than-light expansion just after the big bang. These fluctuations lay down a gravitational blueprint that eventually determines the placement of stars and galaxies across the sky. Small differences in the form of these fluctuations can produce a universe in which the Milky Way is slightly bigger, or closer to its neighbours.
So just how many of these different universes can inflation's quantum fluctuations produce? According to Linde and Vanchurin, the total is about 10 Exp 10 Exp 10,000,000 - that's a 10 raised to a number ending with 10 million zeros (arxiv.org/abs/0910.1589). Suddenly string theory's multiverse of 10 Exp 500 universes is looking rather claustrophobic.
might be, however, that this number is irrelevant, and that in a world ruled by quantum physics what matters is how many universes a single observer can distinguish. "Before quantum mechanics," says Linde, "we thought that 'reality' was a well-defined word." In classical physics, observers are irrelevant - we simply want to know how many universes exist.
For the Rest go to: New Scientist.
The Restricted View - Same Article
Quantum theory splits the world into two parts: the system under study and the rest of the world, which contains the observer. The system hovers in a ghostly state of near-existence made up of a host of possibilities until the observer makes a measurement - and so reduces this to a single reality.
Cosmology suffers from the paradox that no observer can be outside the universe - so the universe is doomed to spend eternity as nothing more than a vague possibility. The lesson of quantum cosmology is that we can't talk about the universe as a whole, but only what a given observer inside it might measure. Applying that lesson to the multiverse, Andrei Linde and Vitaly Vanchurin suggest that what matters is not the total number of possible universes, but the number of universes a single observer could distinguish.
If that observer is a human, the brain limits the amount of information they can register. But any observer - even an inanimate one such as a galaxy - is limited in the information it can store. These limitations in what observers can measure whittle down the number of universes that come into play in cosmological predictions. That means an observer might make a difference in explaining the value of things like dark energy.
HOW many universes are there? Cosmologists Andrei Linde and Vitaly Vanchurin at Stanford University in California calculate that the number dwarfs the 10 Exp 500 universes postulated in string theory, and raise the provocative notion that the answer may depend on the human brain.
The idea that there is more than one universe, each with its own laws of physics, arises out of several different theories, including string theory and cosmic inflation. This concept of a "multiverse" could explain a puzzling mystery - why dark energy, the furtive force that is accelerating the expansion of space, appears improbably fine-tuned for life. With a large number of universes, there is bound to be one that has a dark energy value like ours.
Calculating the probability of observing this value - and other features of the cosmos - depends on how many universes of various kinds populate the multiverse. String theory describes 10 Exp 500 universes, but that just counts different vacuum states, which are like the blank canvases upon which universes are painted. The features of each canvas determine what the overall painting will look like - such as the laws of physics in that universe - but not the details.
Thanks to the randomness of quantum mechanics, two identical vacuum states can end up as very different universes. Small quantum fluctuations in the very early universe are stretched to astronomical scales by inflation, the period of faster-than-light expansion just after the big bang. These fluctuations lay down a gravitational blueprint that eventually determines the placement of stars and galaxies across the sky. Small differences in the form of these fluctuations can produce a universe in which the Milky Way is slightly bigger, or closer to its neighbours.
So just how many of these different universes can inflation's quantum fluctuations produce? According to Linde and Vanchurin, the total is about 10 Exp 10 Exp 10,000,000 - that's a 10 raised to a number ending with 10 million zeros (arxiv.org/abs/0910.1589). Suddenly string theory's multiverse of 10 Exp 500 universes is looking rather claustrophobic.
might be, however, that this number is irrelevant, and that in a world ruled by quantum physics what matters is how many universes a single observer can distinguish. "Before quantum mechanics," says Linde, "we thought that 'reality' was a well-defined word." In classical physics, observers are irrelevant - we simply want to know how many universes exist.
For the Rest go to: New Scientist.
The Restricted View - Same Article
Quantum theory splits the world into two parts: the system under study and the rest of the world, which contains the observer. The system hovers in a ghostly state of near-existence made up of a host of possibilities until the observer makes a measurement - and so reduces this to a single reality.
Cosmology suffers from the paradox that no observer can be outside the universe - so the universe is doomed to spend eternity as nothing more than a vague possibility. The lesson of quantum cosmology is that we can't talk about the universe as a whole, but only what a given observer inside it might measure. Applying that lesson to the multiverse, Andrei Linde and Vitaly Vanchurin suggest that what matters is not the total number of possible universes, but the number of universes a single observer could distinguish.
If that observer is a human, the brain limits the amount of information they can register. But any observer - even an inanimate one such as a galaxy - is limited in the information it can store. These limitations in what observers can measure whittle down the number of universes that come into play in cosmological predictions. That means an observer might make a difference in explaining the value of things like dark energy.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Seven Questions that Keep Physicists up at night
It's not your average confession show: a panel of leading physicists spilling the beans about what keeps them tossing and turning in the wee hours.
That was the scene a few days ago in front of a packed auditorium at the Perimeter Institute, in Waterloo, Canada, when a panel of physicists was asked to respond to a single question: "What keeps you awake at night?"
The discussion was part of "Quantum to Cosmos", a 10-day physics extravaganza, which ends on Sunday.
While most panelists professed to sleep very soundly, here are seven key conundrums that emerged during the session, which can be viewed here.
Why this universe?
In their pursuit of nature's fundamental laws, physicists have essentially been working under a long standing paradigm: demonstrating why the universe must be as we see it. But if other laws can be thought of, why can't the universes they describe exist in some other place? "Maybe we'll find there's no other alternative to the universe we know," says Sean Carroll of Caltech. "But I suspect that's not right." Carroll finds it easy to imagine that nature allows for different kinds of universes with different laws. "So in our universe, the question becomes why these laws and not some other laws?"
What is everything made of?
It's now clear that ordinary matter – atoms, stars and galaxies – accounts for a paltry 4 per cent of the universe's total energy budget. It's the other 96 per cent that keeps University of Michigan physicist Katherine Freese engaged. Freese is excited that one part of the problem, the nature of dark matter, may be nearing resolution. She points to new data from experiments like NASA's Fermi satellite that are consistent with the notion that dark matter particles in our own galaxy are annihilating with one another at a measurable rate, which in turn could reveal their properties. But the discovery of dark energy, which appears to be speeding up the expansion of the universe, has created a vast new set of puzzles for which there are no immediate answers in sight. This includes the nature of the dark energy itself and the question of why it has a value that is so extraordinarily small, allowing for the formation of galaxies, stars and the emergence of life.
How does complexity happen?
From the unpredictable behaviour of financial markets to the rise of life from inert matter, Leo Kadananoff, physicist and applied mathematician at the University of Chicago, finds the most engaging questions deal with the rise of complex systems. Kadanoff worries that particle physicists and cosmologists are missing an important trick if they only focus on the very small and the very large. "We still don't know how ordinary window glass works and keeps it shape," says Kadanoff. "The investigation of familiar things is just as important in the search for understanding." Life itself, he says, will only be truly understood by decoding how simple constituents with simple interactions can lead to complex phenomena.
Will string theory ever be proved correct?
Cambridge physicist David Tong is passionate about the mathematical beauty of string theory – the idea that the fundamental particles we observe are not point-like dots, but rather tiny strings. But he admits it once brought him to a philosophical crisis when he realised he might live his entire life not knowing whether it actually constitutes a description of all reality. Even experiments such as the Large Hadron Collider and the Planck satellite, while well positioned to reveal new physics, are unlikely to say anything definitive about strings. Tong finds solace in knowing that the methods of string theory can be brought to bear on less fundamental problems, such as the behaviour of quarks and exotic metals. "It is a useful theory," he says, "so I'm trying to concentrate on that."
For the rest go to New Scientist
That was the scene a few days ago in front of a packed auditorium at the Perimeter Institute, in Waterloo, Canada, when a panel of physicists was asked to respond to a single question: "What keeps you awake at night?"
The discussion was part of "Quantum to Cosmos", a 10-day physics extravaganza, which ends on Sunday.
While most panelists professed to sleep very soundly, here are seven key conundrums that emerged during the session, which can be viewed here.
Why this universe?
In their pursuit of nature's fundamental laws, physicists have essentially been working under a long standing paradigm: demonstrating why the universe must be as we see it. But if other laws can be thought of, why can't the universes they describe exist in some other place? "Maybe we'll find there's no other alternative to the universe we know," says Sean Carroll of Caltech. "But I suspect that's not right." Carroll finds it easy to imagine that nature allows for different kinds of universes with different laws. "So in our universe, the question becomes why these laws and not some other laws?"
What is everything made of?
It's now clear that ordinary matter – atoms, stars and galaxies – accounts for a paltry 4 per cent of the universe's total energy budget. It's the other 96 per cent that keeps University of Michigan physicist Katherine Freese engaged. Freese is excited that one part of the problem, the nature of dark matter, may be nearing resolution. She points to new data from experiments like NASA's Fermi satellite that are consistent with the notion that dark matter particles in our own galaxy are annihilating with one another at a measurable rate, which in turn could reveal their properties. But the discovery of dark energy, which appears to be speeding up the expansion of the universe, has created a vast new set of puzzles for which there are no immediate answers in sight. This includes the nature of the dark energy itself and the question of why it has a value that is so extraordinarily small, allowing for the formation of galaxies, stars and the emergence of life.
How does complexity happen?
From the unpredictable behaviour of financial markets to the rise of life from inert matter, Leo Kadananoff, physicist and applied mathematician at the University of Chicago, finds the most engaging questions deal with the rise of complex systems. Kadanoff worries that particle physicists and cosmologists are missing an important trick if they only focus on the very small and the very large. "We still don't know how ordinary window glass works and keeps it shape," says Kadanoff. "The investigation of familiar things is just as important in the search for understanding." Life itself, he says, will only be truly understood by decoding how simple constituents with simple interactions can lead to complex phenomena.
Will string theory ever be proved correct?
Cambridge physicist David Tong is passionate about the mathematical beauty of string theory – the idea that the fundamental particles we observe are not point-like dots, but rather tiny strings. But he admits it once brought him to a philosophical crisis when he realised he might live his entire life not knowing whether it actually constitutes a description of all reality. Even experiments such as the Large Hadron Collider and the Planck satellite, while well positioned to reveal new physics, are unlikely to say anything definitive about strings. Tong finds solace in knowing that the methods of string theory can be brought to bear on less fundamental problems, such as the behaviour of quarks and exotic metals. "It is a useful theory," he says, "so I'm trying to concentrate on that."
For the rest go to New Scientist
How your brain creates the Fourth Dimension
From New Scientist...
THE MAN dangles on a cable hanging from an eight-storey-high tower. Suspended in a harness with his back to the ground, he sees only the face of the man above, who controls the winch that is lifting him to the top of the tower like a bundle of cargo. And then it happens. The cable suddenly unclips and he plummets towards the concrete below
Panic sets in, but he's been given an assignment and so, fighting his fear of death, he stares at the instrument strapped to his wrist, before falling into the sweet embrace of a safety net. A team of scientists will spend weeks studying the results.
The experiment was extreme, certainly, but the neuroscientist behind the study, David Eagleman at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, is no Dr Strangelove. When we look back at scary situations, they often seem to have occurred in slow motion. Eagleman wanted to know whether the brain's clock actually accelerates - making external events appear abnormally slow in comparison with the brain's workings - or whether the slo-mo is just an artefact of our memory.
It's just one of many mysteries concerning how we experience time that we are only now beginning to crack. "Time," says Eagleman, "is much weirder than we think it is."
By understanding the mechanisms of our brain's clock, Eagleman and others hope to learn ways of temporarily resetting its tick. This might improve our mental speed and reaction times. What's more, since time is crucial to our perception of causality, a faulty internal clock might also explain the delusions suffered by people with schizophrenia.
For the rest go to: New Scientist
THE MAN dangles on a cable hanging from an eight-storey-high tower. Suspended in a harness with his back to the ground, he sees only the face of the man above, who controls the winch that is lifting him to the top of the tower like a bundle of cargo. And then it happens. The cable suddenly unclips and he plummets towards the concrete below
Panic sets in, but he's been given an assignment and so, fighting his fear of death, he stares at the instrument strapped to his wrist, before falling into the sweet embrace of a safety net. A team of scientists will spend weeks studying the results.
The experiment was extreme, certainly, but the neuroscientist behind the study, David Eagleman at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, is no Dr Strangelove. When we look back at scary situations, they often seem to have occurred in slow motion. Eagleman wanted to know whether the brain's clock actually accelerates - making external events appear abnormally slow in comparison with the brain's workings - or whether the slo-mo is just an artefact of our memory.
It's just one of many mysteries concerning how we experience time that we are only now beginning to crack. "Time," says Eagleman, "is much weirder than we think it is."
By understanding the mechanisms of our brain's clock, Eagleman and others hope to learn ways of temporarily resetting its tick. This might improve our mental speed and reaction times. What's more, since time is crucial to our perception of causality, a faulty internal clock might also explain the delusions suffered by people with schizophrenia.
For the rest go to: New Scientist
Liverpool 2 Manchester United 0
After Four defeats in all competitions this victory was most welcome. The Reds are 6th in the League and only 6 points behind leaders Chelsea.
Other great results:
Bolton 3 Everton 2
Man City 2 Fulham 2 (Sky Blues drop points)
West Ham 2 Arsenal 2 (Ditto for Gunners)
Other great results:
Bolton 3 Everton 2
Man City 2 Fulham 2 (Sky Blues drop points)
West Ham 2 Arsenal 2 (Ditto for Gunners)
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Another Stupid Nazi Comparison
Yes that are innately stupid but even more ridiculous when they are sprouted by that so-called cunning linguist Noam Chomsky
Gushing Over Obama
Much ink has been wasted praising the 'mighty one'...but I had to laugh at this one...talk about a man crush
http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/710925
http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/710925
An Excellent Physics Resource Site
I encourage all High School and AP Physics teachers to check out this amazing Resource Site.
http://dgende.homestead.com/
http://dgende.homestead.com/
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Teacher's Diary Week 6
Well ....I have finally finished the Optics Unit with the Grade 10's and we will be embarking on the Climate Change Strand next week. The latter is a new unit that incorporates, but does not include all of the topics discussed under the old climatology unit of the previous curriculum. While the expectations are straight forward I believe that the skill section of this unit will allow the students to better interpret data and apply reason and critical thought to the analysis of such information. I will attempt to encourage as much debate as possible as the nebulous nature of the specifics of the topic begs for such an approach.
In the Grade 11 Physics course the kids are all gung-ho about their Wondercoasters (a roller coaster contest run by Canada's Wonderland). On the more formal side we are working through Newton's Laws, clearing up the obvious misconceptions as we go along. The students seem to be coming to terms with the importance of Free Body Diagrams and attacked the lab work with much enthusiasm. So far so good....but lets see what the quizzes deliver.
In the Grade 11 Physics course the kids are all gung-ho about their Wondercoasters (a roller coaster contest run by Canada's Wonderland). On the more formal side we are working through Newton's Laws, clearing up the obvious misconceptions as we go along. The students seem to be coming to terms with the importance of Free Body Diagrams and attacked the lab work with much enthusiasm. So far so good....but lets see what the quizzes deliver.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Chavez's thuggery continues
Pro-Chavez lawmakers deny the government plans to use the militias to break up street protests, saying the armed groups would be deployed only if Chavez declared martial law amid widespread political upheaval or natural disasters.
The predominantly pro-Chavez National Assembly approved the legislation Tuesday, giving a legal framework for a project begun by Chavez more than three years ago, when volunteers began receiving military training to prepare for what the leftist leader warned could be a U.S. invasion.
His critics expressed skepticism.
"The militias are for intimidating and terrorizing" those who take to the streets to protest against Chavez, said Stalin Gonzalez, an opposition politician who helped organize anti-Chavez demonstrations in recent years as a university student.
Source: Taiwan News
The predominantly pro-Chavez National Assembly approved the legislation Tuesday, giving a legal framework for a project begun by Chavez more than three years ago, when volunteers began receiving military training to prepare for what the leftist leader warned could be a U.S. invasion.
His critics expressed skepticism.
"The militias are for intimidating and terrorizing" those who take to the streets to protest against Chavez, said Stalin Gonzalez, an opposition politician who helped organize anti-Chavez demonstrations in recent years as a university student.
Source: Taiwan News
Quote of the Week
Republican Rep. Gresham Barrett on Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize
"I'm not sure what the international community loved best," said Republican Rep. Gresham Barrett, a candidate for governor in South Carolina, "his waffling on Afghanistan, pulling defense missiles out of Eastern Europe, turning his back on freedom fighters in Honduras, coddling Castro, siding with the Palestinians against Israel, or almost getting tough on Iran."
Source: Chicago Tribune
"I'm not sure what the international community loved best," said Republican Rep. Gresham Barrett, a candidate for governor in South Carolina, "his waffling on Afghanistan, pulling defense missiles out of Eastern Europe, turning his back on freedom fighters in Honduras, coddling Castro, siding with the Palestinians against Israel, or almost getting tough on Iran."
Source: Chicago Tribune
Teacher's Diary - Weeks 3,4 and 5
To say that I am buried in work is an understatement. However its part of my role as a teacher and I wouldn't have it any other way. The new school is looking promising and the kids are great. We have all sorts of clubs and there are many students who are clearly not afraid to go above and beyond the curriculum. As someone dedicated to education this resonates very well with me.
I am closing on completing the Optics section with my Grade 10s. They write their unit ending test this coming week and have a kaleidoscope design project to hand in a few days later. It is important to keep challenging the 10s and encouraging an appreciation of the sciences as their follow through influences the future of our department and ultimately the school. Thankfully we have the support of the parents and the administration on this matter and have no shortage of students wishing to sign up for the myriad of science competitions that are now common place at the senior high school level.
On the physics front (with my Grade 11s) I have just started the Mechanics section having completed the Kinematics Unit. I spent some time on Projectile motion (PM)attacking the subject with computer simulations, discovery/thinking lab work and problems. PM can be a difficult topic for the students to master as they are still trying to come to terms with the idea of resolving a vector into components using the tools of trigonometry. The scaffolding necessary is a bit more intense than other topics and requires constant feedback and multiple assessments.
In short all is well (at least is seems so...I may yet get mugged around the corner). There are still some issues with respect to helping some of the struggling students with the material that I will work on in the next week or so. I also have a student teacher who will be assigned to me come months end. Since I am a great fan of mentoring I am looking forward to helping another teacher develop their pedagogic potential.
I am closing on completing the Optics section with my Grade 10s. They write their unit ending test this coming week and have a kaleidoscope design project to hand in a few days later. It is important to keep challenging the 10s and encouraging an appreciation of the sciences as their follow through influences the future of our department and ultimately the school. Thankfully we have the support of the parents and the administration on this matter and have no shortage of students wishing to sign up for the myriad of science competitions that are now common place at the senior high school level.
On the physics front (with my Grade 11s) I have just started the Mechanics section having completed the Kinematics Unit. I spent some time on Projectile motion (PM)attacking the subject with computer simulations, discovery/thinking lab work and problems. PM can be a difficult topic for the students to master as they are still trying to come to terms with the idea of resolving a vector into components using the tools of trigonometry. The scaffolding necessary is a bit more intense than other topics and requires constant feedback and multiple assessments.
In short all is well (at least is seems so...I may yet get mugged around the corner). There are still some issues with respect to helping some of the struggling students with the material that I will work on in the next week or so. I also have a student teacher who will be assigned to me come months end. Since I am a great fan of mentoring I am looking forward to helping another teacher develop their pedagogic potential.
Saturday, October 03, 2009
Fifteen Annoyances on the Left
1. Maureen Dowd
2. Thomas Friedman
3. Alexander Cockburn
4. Noam Chomsky
5. Naomi Klein
6. Glenn Greenwald
7. Gore Vidal
8. Michael Lerner
9. Medea Benjamin
10. Avi Lewis
11. Rick Salutin
12. Ted Rall
13. Norman Finkelstein
14. Howard Zinn
15. John Pilger
2. Thomas Friedman
3. Alexander Cockburn
4. Noam Chomsky
5. Naomi Klein
6. Glenn Greenwald
7. Gore Vidal
8. Michael Lerner
9. Medea Benjamin
10. Avi Lewis
11. Rick Salutin
12. Ted Rall
13. Norman Finkelstein
14. Howard Zinn
15. John Pilger
Fifteen Annoyances on the Right
1. Pat Buchanan
2. Robert Novak (deceased)
3. Joseph Sobran
4. John Sununu
5. Justin Raimondo
6. Paul Craig Roberts
7. Taki
8. Ron Paul
9. Lew Rockwell
10. Paul Gottfried
11. Ann Coulter
12. Bay Buchanan
13. Karl Rove
14. Alex Jones
15. Scott McConnell
2. Robert Novak (deceased)
3. Joseph Sobran
4. John Sununu
5. Justin Raimondo
6. Paul Craig Roberts
7. Taki
8. Ron Paul
9. Lew Rockwell
10. Paul Gottfried
11. Ann Coulter
12. Bay Buchanan
13. Karl Rove
14. Alex Jones
15. Scott McConnell
My Top Ten Political Pundits
1. Victor Davis Hanson
2. George Jonas
3. Charles Johnson
4. Sultan Knish
5. Jonah Goldberg
6. Steven Plaut
7. Thomas Sowell
8. John Ray
9. Tammy Bruce
10. Dennis Prager
2. George Jonas
3. Charles Johnson
4. Sultan Knish
5. Jonah Goldberg
6. Steven Plaut
7. Thomas Sowell
8. John Ray
9. Tammy Bruce
10. Dennis Prager
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Teachers Diary - Week 2
The world continues to be on the up and up for me with respect to teaching. My Physics Grade 11 students delved more firmly into Kinematics with a non-traditional ticker tape run where they determined their own acceleration. They then worked on a computer simulation program designed to reinforce the difference between position, velocity and acceleration (kids for the most part love computer simulation labs) and I have made a concerted effort to encourage the teachers in the department to make better use of such resources. The Gizmo site, Halliday and Resnick and PHET are all worth looking at. The week ended with a quiz and their teacher attempting the classic coin and feather free fall experiment.
The Grade 10 Students seemed to master a basic understanding of the law of reflections however they now need to extend their understanding by applying these principles to concave and convex mirrors. Next week will be the true test. I am also moving toward organizing a building project for them - the design of a kaleidoscope or a physics magic show (smoke and mirrors) are both being considered.
The Grade 10 Students seemed to master a basic understanding of the law of reflections however they now need to extend their understanding by applying these principles to concave and convex mirrors. Next week will be the true test. I am also moving toward organizing a building project for them - the design of a kaleidoscope or a physics magic show (smoke and mirrors) are both being considered.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Teachers Diary - Week 1
It was my first week at the new school and although this is my seventh year as a teacher, week one's are always a bit off putting. Perhaps its the awkwardness of facing a class of fresh faces (and not knowing what to expect)coupled with the unfamiliarity of a school culture that differs remarkably from what I have experienced in the last two years. Nevertheless I believe that I made a strong start and achieved my week`s goals. It hasn't been easy as I have had to complement my teaching with the added responsibility of being Curriculum Leader (Head of the Department). This is demanding but challenging and it is this challenge that I relish (whether I will feel like this at the end of the school year is still up in the aether of uncertainty but for the present time all is well on the admin front...for now).
I have three classes this semester - A grade 10 Academic Science Class and two Grade 11 Physics Sections.
In Science I `threw`the students very early into the Curriculum. We are working on the newly formulated Optics Section and my lesson plans this week dealt with the human eye and its comparison to the camera, the electromagnetic spectrum and methodologies for the production of light. I am more aware than ever of the need to diversify my lessons and Fridays co-operative assignment on making posters to describe various types of light production (with the followup of a crossword) seemed to work well. The demo of producing light through the electric discharge of a gas source (with a Tesla coi)l was well appreciated by the students as was the use of Slinky's to illustrate the wave nature of light. My challenge with the Grade 10s is to incorporate more computer simulations in my pedagogy, a phenomenon that has been made more difficult by the lack of Internet access in the class. However I have initiated an action,as Curriculum Leader, with the board`s computer help desk to rectify the situation ASAP.
In Physics I have been stressing critical thinking. I opened up with a Fermi problem where I asked the students to estimate the number of marbles that could be packed into the room. This caused some initial confusion as many were not used to making assumptions (viz. diameter of the marble, voidage space, dimensions of the room etc) but after the dust it settled the solutions began to flow. Most attempts were valid but several students erred in making the correct conversion from cubic meters to cubic centimeters. Fermi problems are incredible devices for stressing the importance not only of reasonable assumptions but of order of magnitude approximation. This is a foreign concept for many students schooled in the hard philosophy of the exact answer.
Once the logistics of unit conversion and significant numbers were addressed (its amazing how many students have no idea why significant digits are so important), we spent time, via the mechanism of the faithful Socratic in discussing the importance of the three critical entities: mass, length and time. I then did a review of some key concepts from Grade 10 Kinematics (position, distance, velocity types - instantaneous, average, uniform, displacement and acceleration). Early diagnostics indicate that the students have strong mathematical skills and we really enjoyed breaking down the dynamics of the Usain Bolt Olympic run and the Donovan Bailey-Michael Johnson fastest man scenario.
My conclusion is that this will be a fun year. I can push these students to excel and we can really entertain the curriculum at its fullest.
I have three classes this semester - A grade 10 Academic Science Class and two Grade 11 Physics Sections.
In Science I `threw`the students very early into the Curriculum. We are working on the newly formulated Optics Section and my lesson plans this week dealt with the human eye and its comparison to the camera, the electromagnetic spectrum and methodologies for the production of light. I am more aware than ever of the need to diversify my lessons and Fridays co-operative assignment on making posters to describe various types of light production (with the followup of a crossword) seemed to work well. The demo of producing light through the electric discharge of a gas source (with a Tesla coi)l was well appreciated by the students as was the use of Slinky's to illustrate the wave nature of light. My challenge with the Grade 10s is to incorporate more computer simulations in my pedagogy, a phenomenon that has been made more difficult by the lack of Internet access in the class. However I have initiated an action,as Curriculum Leader, with the board`s computer help desk to rectify the situation ASAP.
In Physics I have been stressing critical thinking. I opened up with a Fermi problem where I asked the students to estimate the number of marbles that could be packed into the room. This caused some initial confusion as many were not used to making assumptions (viz. diameter of the marble, voidage space, dimensions of the room etc) but after the dust it settled the solutions began to flow. Most attempts were valid but several students erred in making the correct conversion from cubic meters to cubic centimeters. Fermi problems are incredible devices for stressing the importance not only of reasonable assumptions but of order of magnitude approximation. This is a foreign concept for many students schooled in the hard philosophy of the exact answer.
Once the logistics of unit conversion and significant numbers were addressed (its amazing how many students have no idea why significant digits are so important), we spent time, via the mechanism of the faithful Socratic in discussing the importance of the three critical entities: mass, length and time. I then did a review of some key concepts from Grade 10 Kinematics (position, distance, velocity types - instantaneous, average, uniform, displacement and acceleration). Early diagnostics indicate that the students have strong mathematical skills and we really enjoyed breaking down the dynamics of the Usain Bolt Olympic run and the Donovan Bailey-Michael Johnson fastest man scenario.
My conclusion is that this will be a fun year. I can push these students to excel and we can really entertain the curriculum at its fullest.
Friday, September 04, 2009
In the News LXII
Healthcare takes a toll on Obama approval rating
Looks like the gloss is coming off the 'enlightened one' - about bloody time.
Anti-Chavez marchers take to the street
Relations continue to deteriorate between Colombia and Venezuela...Colombians are correct not to trust the growing influence of Chavez in Latin America (especially in light of his suppression of media criticism and opposition voices in Venezuela).
Iran places a terrorist in its new cabinet
No surprise here...Ahmadinejad is solidifying his lock in government....He knows for one that an US Administration will not call him on this one...Obama didn't even back up the protests from two months ago.
Canada's Hate Crime Law unconstitutional
On the surface it looks like a victory for Freedom of Speech but we will have to wait and see.
Web of complexity around Afghani election grows
Karzai is untrustworthy but the alternatives seem worse.
Netanyahu faces challenge from his own cabinet regarding concessions
Its the same story all over again...I personally support the right of Jews to live anywhere in the Jerusalem vicinity but I am not in favour of added settlements in the West Bank. I do detest the involvement of a busy body such as Desmond Tutu who by their comments, as outlined in the Australian article cited, appear to only have a rudimentary understanding of the issues at hand.
Looks like the gloss is coming off the 'enlightened one' - about bloody time.
Anti-Chavez marchers take to the street
Relations continue to deteriorate between Colombia and Venezuela...Colombians are correct not to trust the growing influence of Chavez in Latin America (especially in light of his suppression of media criticism and opposition voices in Venezuela).
Iran places a terrorist in its new cabinet
No surprise here...Ahmadinejad is solidifying his lock in government....He knows for one that an US Administration will not call him on this one...Obama didn't even back up the protests from two months ago.
Canada's Hate Crime Law unconstitutional
On the surface it looks like a victory for Freedom of Speech but we will have to wait and see.
Web of complexity around Afghani election grows
Karzai is untrustworthy but the alternatives seem worse.
Netanyahu faces challenge from his own cabinet regarding concessions
Its the same story all over again...I personally support the right of Jews to live anywhere in the Jerusalem vicinity but I am not in favour of added settlements in the West Bank. I do detest the involvement of a busy body such as Desmond Tutu who by their comments, as outlined in the Australian article cited, appear to only have a rudimentary understanding of the issues at hand.
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Twenty Annoyances
1. The whole Jon and Kate break up
2. Whitewashed Ted Kennedy Eulogies and Obituaries
3. Manchester United winning another EPL title
4. The Michael Jackson 'Homicides' debacle
5. Michael Ignatieff and yet another 'call' for an election
6. Lindsey Lohan
7. Obama's relentless criticism of Israel
8. Jon Stewart's ego
9. Letterman trying to sound intelligent
10. Hugo Chavez and the growing dictatorship in Venezuela
11. Another rant by the New Atheists
12. Conservatives turning a blind eye to the many faults of Robert Novack
13. David Miller's tenure as mayor of Toronto
14. Jimmy Carter - International bungler and meddler
15. Contracts for Professional Sportsmen
16. The Steroid Saga in Baseball
17. Ap0logists on the Left/Paleo Right for Islamist radicalism.
18. Keynesian economic proponents
19. There should be 'no debate about Global Warming crowd'
20. Politicians who oppose school vouchers and then send their own kids to private schools (Barack Obama)
2. Whitewashed Ted Kennedy Eulogies and Obituaries
3. Manchester United winning another EPL title
4. The Michael Jackson 'Homicides' debacle
5. Michael Ignatieff and yet another 'call' for an election
6. Lindsey Lohan
7. Obama's relentless criticism of Israel
8. Jon Stewart's ego
9. Letterman trying to sound intelligent
10. Hugo Chavez and the growing dictatorship in Venezuela
11. Another rant by the New Atheists
12. Conservatives turning a blind eye to the many faults of Robert Novack
13. David Miller's tenure as mayor of Toronto
14. Jimmy Carter - International bungler and meddler
15. Contracts for Professional Sportsmen
16. The Steroid Saga in Baseball
17. Ap0logists on the Left/Paleo Right for Islamist radicalism.
18. Keynesian economic proponents
19. There should be 'no debate about Global Warming crowd'
20. Politicians who oppose school vouchers and then send their own kids to private schools (Barack Obama)
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Philosophical Confirmation
1. I tend to agree with the sceptics movement in their rigorous defence of science but I am somewhat ….can I say it…sceptical…..about their use of logical positivist arguments in tackling the question of God’s existence. In this sense my position is similar to the well known mathematics promoter and critical thinker Martin Gardiner.
2. Classical Liberalism in my opinion balances both the excesses of the left and the right very well, taking the strong points from each philosophy and rejecting the nonsense (which abounds on both sides). In short it champions valuable tradition and human freedom while making a strong argument for necessary government.
3. I was attracted to Libertarianism several years ago but ultimately rejected its narrow outlook and recourse to selfishness…like Marxism its emphasis on utopianism is dangerous. Nevertheless the contribution by Libertarian thinkers such as Friedman, Nozick, Van Mises and Hayek (who would reject the label) are critical to effective economic thinking. Ron Paul and the Cato crowd best exemplify the Libertarian tradition today but I find that their tendency to dismiss the flow of history at the expense of the wealth index problematic and not conducive to a thorough understanding of the human condition.
4. Victor Davis Hanson and George Jonas are two thinkers who characterize the Classical Liberal tradition. Both are ardent defenders of Western Civilization and have a deep understanding of the ongoing struggle against totalitarianism – whether it be socialist, Marxist, national socialist, fascist or Islamist. Others who encapsulate the Classical Liberal tradition are Charles Johnson and David Frum.
5. Classic Liberals are not to be confused with neo-conservatives. While leading neo-conservative thinkers: Leo Strauss and Scoop Jackson are off shoots of the Classic Liberal tradition they tend to be more interventionist with respect to foreign policy than are pure Classic Liberals.
2. Classical Liberalism in my opinion balances both the excesses of the left and the right very well, taking the strong points from each philosophy and rejecting the nonsense (which abounds on both sides). In short it champions valuable tradition and human freedom while making a strong argument for necessary government.
3. I was attracted to Libertarianism several years ago but ultimately rejected its narrow outlook and recourse to selfishness…like Marxism its emphasis on utopianism is dangerous. Nevertheless the contribution by Libertarian thinkers such as Friedman, Nozick, Van Mises and Hayek (who would reject the label) are critical to effective economic thinking. Ron Paul and the Cato crowd best exemplify the Libertarian tradition today but I find that their tendency to dismiss the flow of history at the expense of the wealth index problematic and not conducive to a thorough understanding of the human condition.
4. Victor Davis Hanson and George Jonas are two thinkers who characterize the Classical Liberal tradition. Both are ardent defenders of Western Civilization and have a deep understanding of the ongoing struggle against totalitarianism – whether it be socialist, Marxist, national socialist, fascist or Islamist. Others who encapsulate the Classical Liberal tradition are Charles Johnson and David Frum.
5. Classic Liberals are not to be confused with neo-conservatives. While leading neo-conservative thinkers: Leo Strauss and Scoop Jackson are off shoots of the Classic Liberal tradition they tend to be more interventionist with respect to foreign policy than are pure Classic Liberals.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Two more Movie Reviews
Inglourious Basterds
Despite all the hype about this being a great movie...it simply wasn't. The storyline was poor. Scenes were needlessly extended and contained too much nonsense dialogue and the script ran roughshod over history (the History of World War Two is rich enough for Tarantino not to have taken the degree of liberty that he did with the facts). Jewish soldiers were purposely shown acting like savages in a manner completely contradictory to Jewish ethics and if it weren't for the excellent performance of Christoph Waltz as Colonel Hans Landa, Inglourious Basterds would be starved for a saving grace. In addition, Brad Pitt's semi-southern accent was both annoying and overplayed. I have no idea what the fuss is with this movie but it falls short on many an account.
Rating: 5/10
District 9
This was not a masterpiece but it was a genuinely decent work of art. As an ex-South African I could appreciate many of the nuances of District 9 and thoroughly enjoyed the references that coloured the script. Neill Blomkamp, the director, made commendable use of the documentary format to narrate the story and the acting by Sharlto Copley as the reluctant hero Wikus van Der Merwe is praiseworthy. Clearly District 9 was written as a critique of Apartheid, which it successfully carried through with earnest. Overall D-9 is a definite 'must see' especially within the ambiance of the big screen theatre.
Rating: 8/10
Despite all the hype about this being a great movie...it simply wasn't. The storyline was poor. Scenes were needlessly extended and contained too much nonsense dialogue and the script ran roughshod over history (the History of World War Two is rich enough for Tarantino not to have taken the degree of liberty that he did with the facts). Jewish soldiers were purposely shown acting like savages in a manner completely contradictory to Jewish ethics and if it weren't for the excellent performance of Christoph Waltz as Colonel Hans Landa, Inglourious Basterds would be starved for a saving grace. In addition, Brad Pitt's semi-southern accent was both annoying and overplayed. I have no idea what the fuss is with this movie but it falls short on many an account.
Rating: 5/10
District 9
This was not a masterpiece but it was a genuinely decent work of art. As an ex-South African I could appreciate many of the nuances of District 9 and thoroughly enjoyed the references that coloured the script. Neill Blomkamp, the director, made commendable use of the documentary format to narrate the story and the acting by Sharlto Copley as the reluctant hero Wikus van Der Merwe is praiseworthy. Clearly District 9 was written as a critique of Apartheid, which it successfully carried through with earnest. Overall D-9 is a definite 'must see' especially within the ambiance of the big screen theatre.
Rating: 8/10
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
In the News LXI
Obama bites off more than he can chew.
Senior Citizens, Blue Dogs and the fact that the US is still a center right country will make this an extremely tough fight. I myself support a blended system (public and private) but sympathize with those who are mindful of the heavy hand of government.
Hamas lashes out against Islamist Opponents
This is one of these situations where you wish both sides would lose.
South African economy shrinks by 3% in Quarter
as if having an uber leftist such as Jacob Zuma was not bad enough..
Gordon Brown - 'dour' - according to fellow Scot
The assessment is a bit harsh but Brown is no leading light in the charisma department. It will cost him, together with the failed economic policies of Labour, when he faces up to David Cameron in the next general election.
Netanyahu has actually suspended settlement building
There must be a lot happening behind the scenes (in the negotiation department) that is being kept from the public eye. I just hope that Netanyahu is listening more to Avigdor Lieberman than Ehud Barak.
Canada: Ignatieff is still not as popular as Harper
Polls are often wrong but the fact that Iggy continues to stall in a weak economy is not good news for the Grits.
Senior Citizens, Blue Dogs and the fact that the US is still a center right country will make this an extremely tough fight. I myself support a blended system (public and private) but sympathize with those who are mindful of the heavy hand of government.
Hamas lashes out against Islamist Opponents
This is one of these situations where you wish both sides would lose.
South African economy shrinks by 3% in Quarter
as if having an uber leftist such as Jacob Zuma was not bad enough..
Gordon Brown - 'dour' - according to fellow Scot
The assessment is a bit harsh but Brown is no leading light in the charisma department. It will cost him, together with the failed economic policies of Labour, when he faces up to David Cameron in the next general election.
Netanyahu has actually suspended settlement building
There must be a lot happening behind the scenes (in the negotiation department) that is being kept from the public eye. I just hope that Netanyahu is listening more to Avigdor Lieberman than Ehud Barak.
Canada: Ignatieff is still not as popular as Harper
Polls are often wrong but the fact that Iggy continues to stall in a weak economy is not good news for the Grits.
Usain Bolt sets field on fire. Absolutely incredible.
9.58 seconds is the new 100m Mens World Record. I never thought I would see the time drop below 9.6 seconds in my life Now Bolt is talking about lowering the time to 9.4 seconds. There must be a limit although I suspect now that this could be closer to 9.1 seconds.
To see the race go to
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=io8t2CHGNb4
To see the race go to
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=io8t2CHGNb4
Monday, August 17, 2009
Eric Margolis - Another Useful Idiot
There are many second rate minds who occupy print space in the media but one who definitely would be in the running for any contest in this regards is Eric Margolis.
Margolis is the Toronto Sun's resident pseudo-intellectual (although he does write for a host of Middle Eastern publications as well as the Huff Po). He claims to be an Eisenhower Republican but his rhetoric is akin to anything that can be found in the sewers of Counterpunch or ZNet in that he has two targets consistently in focus: neoconservatives and the state of Israel. Margolis, the human pretzel, will twist a story around to fit his skewed view of the world, he refuses to condemn Hamas for what they are - a terrorist organization, comes up with all sorts of wingnut conspiracy theories to vilify Israel and claims that the US could have reliably appeased North Korea. If its worth getting wrong - Margolis is your man. What surprises me is that he still continues to hold a position with the Sun (not a great paper by any stretch of the imagination but one that is normally at odds with the just of Margolis' arguments).Could it be a consequence of the fact that he is a majority owner of Jamieson's Laboratories? I wonder.....Oops I sound like Margolis now...
Margolis is the Toronto Sun's resident pseudo-intellectual (although he does write for a host of Middle Eastern publications as well as the Huff Po). He claims to be an Eisenhower Republican but his rhetoric is akin to anything that can be found in the sewers of Counterpunch or ZNet in that he has two targets consistently in focus: neoconservatives and the state of Israel. Margolis, the human pretzel, will twist a story around to fit his skewed view of the world, he refuses to condemn Hamas for what they are - a terrorist organization, comes up with all sorts of wingnut conspiracy theories to vilify Israel and claims that the US could have reliably appeased North Korea. If its worth getting wrong - Margolis is your man. What surprises me is that he still continues to hold a position with the Sun (not a great paper by any stretch of the imagination but one that is normally at odds with the just of Margolis' arguments).Could it be a consequence of the fact that he is a majority owner of Jamieson's Laboratories? I wonder.....Oops I sound like Margolis now...
Monday, August 10, 2009
North Korean Genocide
Bill Clinton was hailed a a hero for 'playing nicely with the North Koreans' to win the release of the two journalists....I wonder if he ever read this.
by Fiona Terry, Ph.D.
Staring across the frozen Tumen River into North Korea, I wonder how long it will be before we know the extent of the horror inflicted on the North Korean people by the Kim dynasty. Not a trace of smoke rises from the chimneys of the ghost town on the opposite bank despite the -25° C temperature. The only movement visible is a border guard patrolling the river bank; it is eerily silent. Etched in the snow are footprints leading down one riverbank and up the other, the mute testimony of a man's attempt to escape hunger and cold by crossing into China. Like thousands of his compatriots, he prefers to risk capture by North Korean and Chinese authorities than to watch his family starve, even though capture means imprisonment for himself and his family in North Korea's gulag. The recent launch of the 'strike hard' campaign by Chinese authorities has drastically reduced his chances of avoiding arrest and expulsion, and increased the penalties imposed on those who might be able to offer him shelter and food. Why, I wonder, do we express revulsion when reading of Stalin's gulag in the 1930s-60s; Mao's secret famine in the 1960s; or the killing fields of Pol Pot in the 1970s, yet show indifference at the plight of North Koreans today. We regret that our predecessors did not listen to the pleas of those who escaped the gulag, famine and killing fields; we chastise them for not believing that such horror could occur. But who is listening to the North Korean refugees in China now, in 2001, and who is willing to ensure their protection?
North Korea, the last bastion of Stalinism on the planet, is in the grip of an economic crisis that has provoked famine in many parts of the country. Since the end of Soviet aid a decade ago, North Korea has faced a severe energy shortage and lack of hard currency that has ground industry and mechanised farming to a halt. Yet the regime maintains the budget for its 1.1 million-strong defence force and continues to develop missile technology and to sell missiles abroad. While grandiose monuments to the grotesque personality cult of the two Kims are floodlit throughout the night, apartment blocks in the showcase capital, Pyongyang, are without electricity, and rural areas have abandoned tractors and reverted to ploughing by hand or with livestock. Mercedes Benz of the ruling elite ply the streets of the capital, while ordinary citizens dig for roots and edible plants in the grass strips lining the five-lane boulevards. Factory workers have no work and receive no salary, but must still attend the daily political education sessions before going to the hills to gather 'alternative' foods. The public distribution system on which three-quarters of the population depend for food, only provides rations on important dates, like the birthdays of Kim Il Sung or Kim Jong-il, leaving people to fend for themselves. Extrapolations from testimonies of refugees in China collected by local organisations suggest that up to three and a half million people might have died from starvation and related illnesses between 1995-1998 alone. Reports of deaths continue to permeate the border, although with less frequency now: the refugees say that the weakest have already died - the elderly, the young, and the sick - leaving less mouths to feed from the meagre food available. Imagine the shock we will feel if we one day discover that there are not 23 million North Koreans as the government claims, but 15 million as some former government officials hiding in China suggest.
For the rest go to Medecins sans Frontieres
by Fiona Terry, Ph.D.
Staring across the frozen Tumen River into North Korea, I wonder how long it will be before we know the extent of the horror inflicted on the North Korean people by the Kim dynasty. Not a trace of smoke rises from the chimneys of the ghost town on the opposite bank despite the -25° C temperature. The only movement visible is a border guard patrolling the river bank; it is eerily silent. Etched in the snow are footprints leading down one riverbank and up the other, the mute testimony of a man's attempt to escape hunger and cold by crossing into China. Like thousands of his compatriots, he prefers to risk capture by North Korean and Chinese authorities than to watch his family starve, even though capture means imprisonment for himself and his family in North Korea's gulag. The recent launch of the 'strike hard' campaign by Chinese authorities has drastically reduced his chances of avoiding arrest and expulsion, and increased the penalties imposed on those who might be able to offer him shelter and food. Why, I wonder, do we express revulsion when reading of Stalin's gulag in the 1930s-60s; Mao's secret famine in the 1960s; or the killing fields of Pol Pot in the 1970s, yet show indifference at the plight of North Koreans today. We regret that our predecessors did not listen to the pleas of those who escaped the gulag, famine and killing fields; we chastise them for not believing that such horror could occur. But who is listening to the North Korean refugees in China now, in 2001, and who is willing to ensure their protection?
North Korea, the last bastion of Stalinism on the planet, is in the grip of an economic crisis that has provoked famine in many parts of the country. Since the end of Soviet aid a decade ago, North Korea has faced a severe energy shortage and lack of hard currency that has ground industry and mechanised farming to a halt. Yet the regime maintains the budget for its 1.1 million-strong defence force and continues to develop missile technology and to sell missiles abroad. While grandiose monuments to the grotesque personality cult of the two Kims are floodlit throughout the night, apartment blocks in the showcase capital, Pyongyang, are without electricity, and rural areas have abandoned tractors and reverted to ploughing by hand or with livestock. Mercedes Benz of the ruling elite ply the streets of the capital, while ordinary citizens dig for roots and edible plants in the grass strips lining the five-lane boulevards. Factory workers have no work and receive no salary, but must still attend the daily political education sessions before going to the hills to gather 'alternative' foods. The public distribution system on which three-quarters of the population depend for food, only provides rations on important dates, like the birthdays of Kim Il Sung or Kim Jong-il, leaving people to fend for themselves. Extrapolations from testimonies of refugees in China collected by local organisations suggest that up to three and a half million people might have died from starvation and related illnesses between 1995-1998 alone. Reports of deaths continue to permeate the border, although with less frequency now: the refugees say that the weakest have already died - the elderly, the young, and the sick - leaving less mouths to feed from the meagre food available. Imagine the shock we will feel if we one day discover that there are not 23 million North Koreans as the government claims, but 15 million as some former government officials hiding in China suggest.
For the rest go to Medecins sans Frontieres
Sunday, August 09, 2009
In the News LX
Obama and co. may soften sanctions on Sudan
The Obama administration seems to be doing its best in blurring the distinction between good and evil. Meanwhile here is some news on a National Fast concerning Darfur.
Five reasons why Obama will hike middle class taxes despite the rhetoric to the contrary.
Key Idea: He is a Keynesian at heart and so are his advisers.
Human Rights Watch slams Hamas.........I guess they finally saw through all the pro-Terror rhetoric.
A Chavez Thug may actually meet some justice.... Although I wouldn't hold my breath.
Gordon Brown insists Britain is still a Christian Country
But not for long....The Anglican Church is in severe decline, atheism is at an all-time high and the only religion that is gaining strength in the UK is Islam.
Wishful thinking from Hilary Clinton regarding Zimbabwe-South Africa
South Africa has enabled Mugabe's Zimbabwe and will likely (if post-colonial African history is a guide) follow the same policies towards self destruction in the future. However you have to at least appreciate Clintion's Pollyanna like effort....it has some value in its irony.
Canadian PM is not budging on Omar Khadr
I agree with Harper. Although Khadr should be tried in a US Court (not held indefinitely).
Michael Ignatieff has to tell us who he is..
The man changes position so often that I am not sure he knows himself.
Sotomayor confirmed
She replaces the liberal David Souter in the Court (so from that perspective it is awash) but for all those who champion the discriminatory policies of affirmative action this is a big win.
Obama aides sees signs of recovery but say it will be slow
Yes and at the end of it all future generations of Americans will have a huge mountain of debt to deal with.
The Obama administration seems to be doing its best in blurring the distinction between good and evil. Meanwhile here is some news on a National Fast concerning Darfur.
Five reasons why Obama will hike middle class taxes despite the rhetoric to the contrary.
Key Idea: He is a Keynesian at heart and so are his advisers.
Human Rights Watch slams Hamas.........I guess they finally saw through all the pro-Terror rhetoric.
A Chavez Thug may actually meet some justice.... Although I wouldn't hold my breath.
Gordon Brown insists Britain is still a Christian Country
But not for long....The Anglican Church is in severe decline, atheism is at an all-time high and the only religion that is gaining strength in the UK is Islam.
Wishful thinking from Hilary Clinton regarding Zimbabwe-South Africa
South Africa has enabled Mugabe's Zimbabwe and will likely (if post-colonial African history is a guide) follow the same policies towards self destruction in the future. However you have to at least appreciate Clintion's Pollyanna like effort....it has some value in its irony.
Canadian PM is not budging on Omar Khadr
I agree with Harper. Although Khadr should be tried in a US Court (not held indefinitely).
Michael Ignatieff has to tell us who he is..
The man changes position so often that I am not sure he knows himself.
Sotomayor confirmed
She replaces the liberal David Souter in the Court (so from that perspective it is awash) but for all those who champion the discriminatory policies of affirmative action this is a big win.
Obama aides sees signs of recovery but say it will be slow
Yes and at the end of it all future generations of Americans will have a huge mountain of debt to deal with.
Thursday, August 06, 2009
Ratings of recently seen movies
Bruno- A far cry from Borat. This movie falls far short of the mark despite several funny scenes (the talk show, Hamas-Hummus jibe). Rating: 5/10
Hangover - A pleasant surprise. Hilarious and well directed. Although the movie took some licence with a slightly disjointed plot it delivered as expected in the humour department. Rating: 8/10
Transformers II - long, tedious and disappointing. Failed to reach the heights of the original and if it wasn't for the special effects I would classify this as a complete dud. Rating: 4/10.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - Except for the Hogwarts shtick..I couldn't care less about ole' Harry 'Pothead' anymore. The series has run its course and this, the latest installment was indicative of the fact. Rating: 5/10
Hangover - A pleasant surprise. Hilarious and well directed. Although the movie took some licence with a slightly disjointed plot it delivered as expected in the humour department. Rating: 8/10
Transformers II - long, tedious and disappointing. Failed to reach the heights of the original and if it wasn't for the special effects I would classify this as a complete dud. Rating: 4/10.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - Except for the Hogwarts shtick..I couldn't care less about ole' Harry 'Pothead' anymore. The series has run its course and this, the latest installment was indicative of the fact. Rating: 5/10
Tuesday, August 04, 2009
Scramjets...All the Rage
Picture Courtesy of N ASANew Scientist sees them flying around the world in four hours......
For more on this marvel of aeronautics (planes can reach speeds of 10 Mach) go to NASA mission
On the Iraq Pullout...Not so fast
RAMADI, Iraq - The top U.S. general in Iraq said Tuesday that he disagrees with a colonel's memo urging an early troop withdrawal even though the security situation is better than expected since American forces turned over security in urban centers to the Iraqis more than a month ago.
Gen. Ray Odierno, the first senior American official to comment on the memo, told The Associated Press the Americans need to stay the course in Iraq.
The Iraqi security forces face corruption and other problems but "overall it's gone very, very well," he said. But, he added, the Americans are still needed to protect security gains.
For the full story go to MSN
Gen. Ray Odierno, the first senior American official to comment on the memo, told The Associated Press the Americans need to stay the course in Iraq.
The Iraqi security forces face corruption and other problems but "overall it's gone very, very well," he said. But, he added, the Americans are still needed to protect security gains.
For the full story go to MSN
I have moved house
For the fourth time in seven years I have moved location. However I do not plan to move again for a very long time...this is it. Too much impermeance is bad for the soul.....
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
From the World of Science
Is Pluto a Planet again?
I always believed that it was unfairly demoted now it appears that the case for reinstatement is gaining momentum..Mark Sykes an astronomer at the Planetary Institute in Tuscon puts forth this argument
if an object is big enough for its own gravity to squeeze it into a rounded shape, then call it a planet. That would make a planet of Pluto again, as well as Ceres and a growing number of other bodies
For more go to Pluto
Comets not Asteroids to blame for Moons Scarred face
It all happened 3.85 billion years ago...The clincher would be the discovery of ice.
Source Comets
Food Dye may ease Spinal Injury Severity
Its all about halting the rush of molecular changes that occur after an injury. Apparently the food dye Brilliant Blue G can help. Science never fails to surprise.
Source Food Dye
Low Level Cloud Cover and Global Warming
This further complicates the Rube Goldberg mechanism of feedback cycles that already influence climate change.
Source Cloud Cover
I always believed that it was unfairly demoted now it appears that the case for reinstatement is gaining momentum..Mark Sykes an astronomer at the Planetary Institute in Tuscon puts forth this argument
if an object is big enough for its own gravity to squeeze it into a rounded shape, then call it a planet. That would make a planet of Pluto again, as well as Ceres and a growing number of other bodies
For more go to Pluto
Comets not Asteroids to blame for Moons Scarred face
It all happened 3.85 billion years ago...The clincher would be the discovery of ice.
Source Comets
Food Dye may ease Spinal Injury Severity
Its all about halting the rush of molecular changes that occur after an injury. Apparently the food dye Brilliant Blue G can help. Science never fails to surprise.
Source Food Dye
Low Level Cloud Cover and Global Warming
This further complicates the Rube Goldberg mechanism of feedback cycles that already influence climate change.
Source Cloud Cover
Dersh gets it right again
Hamas 'New' Culture Wars
by Alan Dershowitz
Hamas, the terrorist organization that specializes in targeting civilians, has now decided, according to a New York Times headline, to shift “from rockets to culture war” in an effort to garner public support for its cause. Part of its ongoing public relations campaign is to portray the Israelis as the “new Nazis” and the Palestinians as the “new Jews.” In order to bring about this transformation, it must engage in a form of Holocaust denial that erases the historical record of widespread Palestinian complicity with the “old Nazis” in perpetrating the real Holocaust. It has become an important part of the mantra of Hamas supporters that neither the Palestinians people nor its leadership played any role in the Holocaust. Listen to Mohammad Ahmadinejad talking to students at Columbia University:
If [the Holocaust] is a reality, we need to still question whether the Palestinian people should be paying for it or not. After all, it happened in Europe. The Palestinian people had no role to play in it. So why is it that the Palestinian people are paying the price of an event they had nothing to do with?...The Palestinian people didn’t commit any crime. They had no role to play in World War II. They were living with the Jewish communities and the Christian communities in peace at the time.
by Alan Dershowitz
Hamas, the terrorist organization that specializes in targeting civilians, has now decided, according to a New York Times headline, to shift “from rockets to culture war” in an effort to garner public support for its cause. Part of its ongoing public relations campaign is to portray the Israelis as the “new Nazis” and the Palestinians as the “new Jews.” In order to bring about this transformation, it must engage in a form of Holocaust denial that erases the historical record of widespread Palestinian complicity with the “old Nazis” in perpetrating the real Holocaust. It has become an important part of the mantra of Hamas supporters that neither the Palestinians people nor its leadership played any role in the Holocaust. Listen to Mohammad Ahmadinejad talking to students at Columbia University:
If [the Holocaust] is a reality, we need to still question whether the Palestinian people should be paying for it or not. After all, it happened in Europe. The Palestinian people had no role to play in it. So why is it that the Palestinian people are paying the price of an event they had nothing to do with?...The Palestinian people didn’t commit any crime. They had no role to play in World War II. They were living with the Jewish communities and the Christian communities in peace at the time.
The conclusion that is supposed to follow from this “fact” is that the establishment of Israel in the wake of the Nazi genocide of the Jewish people was unfair to the Palestinians. Central to this claim is that neither the Palestinian people nor their leadership bore any responsibility for the Holocaust, and if any reparations are owed the Jewish people, it is from Germany and not from the Palestinians. The propounders of this historical argument suggest that the West created the Jewish state out of guilt over the Holocaust. It might have been understandable if a portion of Germany (or Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, France, Austria, or other collaborator nations) had been allocated for a Jewish homeland—but why Palestine? Palestine, according to this claim, was as much a “victim” as were the Jews.
The truth is that the Palestinian leadership, supported by the Palestinian masses, played a significant role in Hitler’s Holocaust.
The official leader of the Palestinians, Haj Amin al-Husseini, spent the war years in Berlin with Hitler, serving as a consultant on the Jewish question. He was taken on a tour of Auschwitz and expressed support for the mass murder of European Jews. He also sought to “solve the problems of the Jewish element in Palestine and other Arab countries” by employing “the same method” being used “in the Axis countries.” He would not be satisfied with the Jewish residents of Palestine—many of whom were descendants of Sephardic Jews who had lived there for hundreds, even thousands, of years—remaining as a minority in a Muslim state. Like Hitler, he wanted to be rid of “every last Jew.” As Husseini wrote in his memoirs, “Our fundamental condition for cooperating with Germany was a free hand to eradicate every last Jew from Palestine and the Arab world. I asked Hitler for an explicit undertaking to allow us to solve the Jewish problem in a manner befitting our national and racial aspirations and according to the scientific methods innovated by Germany in the handling of its Jews. The answer I got was: ‘The Jews are yours.’
For the rest go to the Source
Friday, July 24, 2009
In the News LIX
Joe Biden denounces Russian Invasion of Georgia
Georgia is an ally of the West it is important that we not let them down
(as the West did with the Czechs prior to WWII).
George Bush and Tony Blair in Africa
Success in Africa - You won't read much about this story line in the MSM but it is definitely newsworthy. Juxtapose this against the failure of the Clintonistas in the region.
Honour Killings on the rise in Canada
This phenomenon is growing in my home country under the cover of the twisted phrase of 'Reasonable Accomodation'. For more go to Jawa Report
Obama Approval rating at new low
Only 43% approve of his handling of healthcare for example. Has the Glean come off the Messiah? Meanwhile the Obama (not knowing all the facts) has unwisely chosen to stir the racial pot on the Henry Louis Gates issue. Larry Elder had this to say about the issue.
For more on the Obama stimulus package read: Rasmussen. 31% say the stimulus packages hurt the economy.
Rioting in South Africa
Georgia is an ally of the West it is important that we not let them down
(as the West did with the Czechs prior to WWII).
George Bush and Tony Blair in Africa
Success in Africa - You won't read much about this story line in the MSM but it is definitely newsworthy. Juxtapose this against the failure of the Clintonistas in the region.
Honour Killings on the rise in Canada
This phenomenon is growing in my home country under the cover of the twisted phrase of 'Reasonable Accomodation'. For more go to Jawa Report
Obama Approval rating at new low
Only 43% approve of his handling of healthcare for example. Has the Glean come off the Messiah? Meanwhile the Obama (not knowing all the facts) has unwisely chosen to stir the racial pot on the Henry Louis Gates issue. Larry Elder had this to say about the issue.
For more on the Obama stimulus package read: Rasmussen. 31% say the stimulus packages hurt the economy.
Rioting in South Africa
It is interesting to see how Zuma responds to this. I hope for the sake of the country that he does not take a leaf out of the playbook of Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe.
Crackdowns in Iran Continue
Something has to give. I still believe that Obama and co. missed the boat in driving this situation into a more favourale direction. The democracy moving was left hanging by the nation that is supposed to be the champion of liberal democracy.... What a shame.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Obama Track Record
by Dick McDonald
1. He promised to save 3 or 4 million jobs – we have lost 3.5 million jobs since January
2. He promised to hold unemployment to 8% - it is at 9.5% and skyrocketing
3. The Government’s tax receipts from corporations are down 55%
4. The Government’s tax receipts from individuals are down 27%
5. Obama passed a stimulus bill that has no chance of stimulating the economy.
6. Announced plan to tax job creators and kill old people to pay for a universal health plan no one wants
7. The deficit hit a record $1 trillion on July 14, 2009 on its way to a record $2 trillion by year end
8. The number of under-employed is at 20% and rising
9. Business is reeling from being told they will bear more of the tax burden and have reduced staff
10. Cap and Trade will add billions to the cost of all products sold in America – it will hurt the poor
11. New emission standards will add billions to transportation cost for everything
12. He has incurred more debt in 5 months than all the presidents before him (combined)
13. He has favored wealth re-distribution over job creation and economic growth
14. He bowed to a Saudi King and runs down America wherever he goes
15. He has taken sides favoring Islamic Palestinians over the Israelis1
16. He funds a Gestapo-like mob of ACORN brown shirts intimidating everyone
17. He voted against strict constructionists for SCOTUS
18. He is anti-gun and for post-birth abortions
19. He attended a black separatist church for twenty years and never heard the sermon
20. He has taken over General Motors and bankrupted little old ladies that invested in their bonds
21. He gave an equity interest in General Motors to an unsecured UAW debtor as a political payoff
22. He doesn’t hold his hand over his heart for the pledge of allegiance
23. His only solutions are to tax the rich directly or the poor indirectly
24 Gives Miranda Rights to the enemy on the battlefield
25. Wants to stop the CIA from killing enemy leaders during a war
26. Hires 30 Czars to run the country without vetting by Congress
27. He is an anti-capitalist that favors a socialist big government
28. He is against increasing domestic oil drilling in ANWR and offshore
29. He is against building nuclear plants
30. His ethanol addiction has caused corn shortages that precipitated starvation in the Third World
1. He promised to save 3 or 4 million jobs – we have lost 3.5 million jobs since January
2. He promised to hold unemployment to 8% - it is at 9.5% and skyrocketing
3. The Government’s tax receipts from corporations are down 55%
4. The Government’s tax receipts from individuals are down 27%
5. Obama passed a stimulus bill that has no chance of stimulating the economy.
6. Announced plan to tax job creators and kill old people to pay for a universal health plan no one wants
7. The deficit hit a record $1 trillion on July 14, 2009 on its way to a record $2 trillion by year end
8. The number of under-employed is at 20% and rising
9. Business is reeling from being told they will bear more of the tax burden and have reduced staff
10. Cap and Trade will add billions to the cost of all products sold in America – it will hurt the poor
11. New emission standards will add billions to transportation cost for everything
12. He has incurred more debt in 5 months than all the presidents before him (combined)
13. He has favored wealth re-distribution over job creation and economic growth
14. He bowed to a Saudi King and runs down America wherever he goes
15. He has taken sides favoring Islamic Palestinians over the Israelis1
16. He funds a Gestapo-like mob of ACORN brown shirts intimidating everyone
17. He voted against strict constructionists for SCOTUS
18. He is anti-gun and for post-birth abortions
19. He attended a black separatist church for twenty years and never heard the sermon
20. He has taken over General Motors and bankrupted little old ladies that invested in their bonds
21. He gave an equity interest in General Motors to an unsecured UAW debtor as a political payoff
22. He doesn’t hold his hand over his heart for the pledge of allegiance
23. His only solutions are to tax the rich directly or the poor indirectly
24 Gives Miranda Rights to the enemy on the battlefield
25. Wants to stop the CIA from killing enemy leaders during a war
26. Hires 30 Czars to run the country without vetting by Congress
27. He is an anti-capitalist that favors a socialist big government
28. He is against increasing domestic oil drilling in ANWR and offshore
29. He is against building nuclear plants
30. His ethanol addiction has caused corn shortages that precipitated starvation in the Third World
Wise words from Bibi
"Jerusalem is the "unified capital of Israel and the capital of the Jewish people, and sovereignty over it is indisputable. We cannot accept the notion that Jews will not have the right to buy apartments specifically in Jerusalem. I can only imagine what would happen if they were forbidden from purchasing apartments in New York or London; there would be an international outcry. This has always been Israel's policy and this is the policy of the current government."
Reading Time well spent
Gavin's Big Five
Five Areas that tend to consume about 90% of my reading time as of late.
1. Physics: Both Classic and Modern
2. Modern History - Philosophy of History
3. Jewish Philosophy
4. Political Commentary
5. Climate Change Science
Five Areas that tend to consume about 90% of my reading time as of late.
1. Physics: Both Classic and Modern
2. Modern History - Philosophy of History
3. Jewish Philosophy
4. Political Commentary
5. Climate Change Science
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Roger Federer - Tennis Genius
Roger Federer now has his fifteenth Grand Slam title which makes him the most succesful Grand Slam Tennis Player of All-Time.
He has gone ahead of the following illustrious ensemble and is my pick for the Greatest Player of all-Time. Kudos to the Swiss super talent.
(Player and Number of Slams won)
Sampras - 14
Emerson - 12 (took advantage of the Laver absentee years)
Laver - 11 (could have won twenty + if Professionals weren't barred for several years)
Borg -11
Tilden - 10
Rosewell - 8
Agassi -8
Connors -8
McEnroe -7 (My personal favourite)
Newcombe - 7
Wilander - 7
He has gone ahead of the following illustrious ensemble and is my pick for the Greatest Player of all-Time. Kudos to the Swiss super talent.
(Player and Number of Slams won)
Sampras - 14
Emerson - 12 (took advantage of the Laver absentee years)
Laver - 11 (could have won twenty + if Professionals weren't barred for several years)
Borg -11
Tilden - 10
Rosewell - 8
Agassi -8
Connors -8
McEnroe -7 (My personal favourite)
Newcombe - 7
Wilander - 7
Mussar Movement
I have been reading about the Mussar Movement lately and find it to be a very refreshing and forward thinking philosophy. The ideal encapsulates the vision of Judaism that appeals to me most. I have been disappointed before in my search for spiritual betterment so I still have some reservations but right now I am impressed with what I have read.
For more go to: http://www.mussarinstitute.org/
or
http://www.salantfoundation.org/
For more go to: http://www.mussarinstitute.org/
or
http://www.salantfoundation.org/
Wednesday, July 01, 2009
British and Irish Lions Tour of South Africa
The British and Irish Lions have been battling it out in my country of birth. The Springboks lead the Rugby Union Series 2-0 and could sweep their opponents with a win this coming weekend. However all games have been exciting - much as the famed 1980 series (which I remember from my childhood - South Africa triumphed 3-1) was. For more on the tour go to
http://www.lionsrugby.com/supportersclub/Benefits.php
http://www.lionsrugby.com/supportersclub/Benefits.php
Footer Roundup from last week.
Confederation Cup
The Confed Cup is the poor cousin of the World Cup and it lived up to expectations. The Italians underachieved, the Spaniards choked and the South Africans groaned their way to the semi-final. Kudos to Brazil for restoring the world order with a first rate display in the second half of the final (to win their third Confed Cup) but the tournament's real heroes were the Americans, who showed as they did in World Cup 2002, that they are not afraid to rub heads with football's elite.
European Under 21 Championship
England almost caused a rip in the space time continuum but in predictable fashion went down to the Germans in the final......this time in a torrent of bullets (4 to zero). Well done to Steve Pearce and co. for closing in on the finish line with nothing more than fumes.
I still don't know why they call it an Under 21 championship when there were several players in each squad who were older than 21.....go figure.
The Confed Cup is the poor cousin of the World Cup and it lived up to expectations. The Italians underachieved, the Spaniards choked and the South Africans groaned their way to the semi-final. Kudos to Brazil for restoring the world order with a first rate display in the second half of the final (to win their third Confed Cup) but the tournament's real heroes were the Americans, who showed as they did in World Cup 2002, that they are not afraid to rub heads with football's elite.
European Under 21 Championship
England almost caused a rip in the space time continuum but in predictable fashion went down to the Germans in the final......this time in a torrent of bullets (4 to zero). Well done to Steve Pearce and co. for closing in on the finish line with nothing more than fumes.
I still don't know why they call it an Under 21 championship when there were several players in each squad who were older than 21.....go figure.
In the News LVIII
Bernie Madoff sentenced to 150 years
I am interested in what he will have to say when he wins release in 2159. Seems as though the sentence fits the crime in this case. If he were convicted in Canada he would probably only receive five to ten years.
Coup D'Etat in Honduras
Manuel Zelaya was a threat to democracy and was on his way to establishing a dictatorship in the country (via an unconstitutional referendum) but his opponents should have sought redress and defeated him at the ballot box. A military coup d'etat is not the solution.
A Muslim Nation moves closer to Israel
Kudos to Azerbaijan for seeing the light. Who will follow next?
Pakistani troops hit out at Taliban at Swat
There was room for a pun in this one but I will let it go. Suffice it to say Pakistan is finally pulling its weight in their fight against Islamofascism.
United Nations continues its war against the Jews
This heading sounds severe - but I am tired of glossing over what is so obvious.
Mousavi - not really better than Ahmadinejad
Mir Hossein Mousavi a thug and is no champion of Freedom and Justice.
Iran needs a true democracy not another spokesperson for the Mullahs.
Is Obama getting tough with Cuba?
The better question is : How did he get this one by the Move.on.org crowd who so influence the Dems?
Affirmative Action defeated in Firefighter Case
The New York Times laments the Supreme Court verdict but those who believe in fairness and equality will champion it.
British PM Gordon Brown attempts to wreck tourism industry with added tax
Lets see the British economy is in the tank and our boy Gordon wants to burden it with further taxes.....Draw your own conclusion here.
Chavez continues his march toward dictatorship by threatening to remove a second TV Network from the air.
Still he remains the darling of the left. Proving once again when push comes to shove the left is totally hypocritical.
Hamas endorses Obama
Not exactly earth shattering but worth mentioning.
I am interested in what he will have to say when he wins release in 2159. Seems as though the sentence fits the crime in this case. If he were convicted in Canada he would probably only receive five to ten years.
Coup D'Etat in Honduras
Manuel Zelaya was a threat to democracy and was on his way to establishing a dictatorship in the country (via an unconstitutional referendum) but his opponents should have sought redress and defeated him at the ballot box. A military coup d'etat is not the solution.
A Muslim Nation moves closer to Israel
Kudos to Azerbaijan for seeing the light. Who will follow next?
Pakistani troops hit out at Taliban at Swat
There was room for a pun in this one but I will let it go. Suffice it to say Pakistan is finally pulling its weight in their fight against Islamofascism.
United Nations continues its war against the Jews
This heading sounds severe - but I am tired of glossing over what is so obvious.
Mousavi - not really better than Ahmadinejad
Mir Hossein Mousavi a thug and is no champion of Freedom and Justice.
Iran needs a true democracy not another spokesperson for the Mullahs.
Is Obama getting tough with Cuba?
The better question is : How did he get this one by the Move.on.org crowd who so influence the Dems?
Affirmative Action defeated in Firefighter Case
The New York Times laments the Supreme Court verdict but those who believe in fairness and equality will champion it.
British PM Gordon Brown attempts to wreck tourism industry with added tax
Lets see the British economy is in the tank and our boy Gordon wants to burden it with further taxes.....Draw your own conclusion here.
Chavez continues his march toward dictatorship by threatening to remove a second TV Network from the air.
Still he remains the darling of the left. Proving once again when push comes to shove the left is totally hypocritical.
Hamas endorses Obama
Not exactly earth shattering but worth mentioning.
Monday, June 29, 2009
I am keeping busy
I am hoping to start posting soon on a more frequent basis but I am swamped what with the end of school, the beginning of my new opportunity and the forthcoming house move. Nevertheless still true to myself I have managed to wangle in some readings on the Musser Movement, Economics Theory and Climate Change.
Yes I know the world is going down around me (Iran, Michael Jackson, Bernie Madoff and Honduras etc) but I expect to be back with more regular comm entries and opinions in a day or two.
Anyone seen my life jacket.......
Gavin
Yes I know the world is going down around me (Iran, Michael Jackson, Bernie Madoff and Honduras etc) but I expect to be back with more regular comm entries and opinions in a day or two.
Anyone seen my life jacket.......
Gavin
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