Month: October 2010 Page 1 of 4

If you ever hear stuff about the Constitution emanating from the fringe that makes you think “WTF?”, here’s a peek into where (some of it) is coming from.

All Patriots ‘Know’ that Moses Wrote the Constitution – Garrett Epps – National – The Atlantic

But what’s striking is how much these people hunger to understand America and its Constitution. “I have a master’s degree,” one man said to me, “and nine-tenths of this information I never got in any formal education. That’s not good when you live in a country that you don’t understand.” There’s a palpable yearning for tools to understand and change the terrible mess we’re in.

Given that curiosity, it’s quite striking that the seminar, which begins at 8:30 a.m., takes until 1:30 to get to the actual Constitution.

That’s because we have to learn the basic truth about the Constitution: God wrote it. It comes directly from the government instituted by Moses when he led the Children of Israel out of Egypt. That system was re-instituted in England around 450 A.D. by the Anglo-Saxon rulers Hengist and Horsa. The Founding Fathers, led by Thomas Jefferson, copied the Constitution directly from the “ancient constitution” of the Anglo-Saxons.

The new barbarism: Keeping science out of politics – How the World Works – Salon.com

By autographedcat

On October 28, 2010

In Blog

I pretty much agree with this. We need more science driving policy, not less. More rationality, less superstition. More reason, less dogma.

The new barbarism: Keeping science out of politics – How the World Works – Salon.com

Keep science out of the political process? Science? I thought it was supposed to be the other way around; that the goal was the keep politics out of science. I can understand, albeit disagree with, categorizations of anthropogenic global warming as bad science, but I’m afraid I just can’t come to grips with the notion that we should keep “science” from influencing politics at all. What is the point of civilization in the first place if we don’t use our hard-won understanding of how the universe works to influence our decisions on how to organize ourselves?

Watching one Republican candidate for office after another declare outright that they do not believe humans are causing climate change is befuddling enough. But to flat-out reject science as a guide to policy is beyond medieval. It’s a retreat to pure superstition, a surrender to barbarism. We might as well be reading omens in the entrails of sacrificial animals. Our wealth as a country, our incredible technological wonders — the Industrial Revolution! — were built upon scientific discovery.

Bids start at $35,000 for this street-legal Tron lightcycle | DVICE

By autographedcat

On October 27, 2010

In Blog

Bids start at $35,000 for this street-legal Tron lightcycle | DVICE

No need to wait for the release of Tron Legacy in December — now you can turn science fiction into science fact with a street-legal Tron Legacy lightcycle. Built from the exact specs of the movie props, there will only be five of these in existence, all lit up with LEDs and neon that will certainly be the envy of all the other motorcyclists.

Powered by the buyer’s choice of a 1000cc gasoline engine or high-powered electric motor, the bikes will have custom-built 22-inch hubless wheels, and the builder even promises to include an authentic Tron helmet. You’ll have to put together that lit-up fire suit yourself, a small price to pay for this dazzling authenticity.

Each of the five one-of-a-kind collector’s items will have a different accent color in either red, blue, yellow, green, or orange, and the famed custom motorcycle builders at Parker Brothers Choppers say they can put this monster together for you within a couple of months. Order now — bidding starts at $35,000 — and by the time the movie hits theaters, you’ll already have been riding your new lightcycle for a couple of months.

Quote of the Decade

By autographedcat

On October 27, 2010

In Blog

“I have been part of this debate for years, but things do get settled and this issue is now settled for me. I do not debate any longer with members of the “Flat Earth Society” either. I do not debate with people who think we should treat epilepsy by casting demons out of the epileptic person; I do not waste time engaging those medical opinions that suggest that bleeding the patient might release the infection. I do not converse with people who think that Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans as punishment for the sin of being the birthplace of Ellen DeGeneres or that the terrorists hit the United Sates on 9/11 because we tolerated homosexual people, abortions, feminism or the American Civil Liberties Union. I am tired of being embarrassed by so much of my church’s participation in causes that are quite unworthy of the Christ I serve or the God whose mystery and wonder I appreciate more each day.

Indeed I feel the Christian Church should not only apologize, but do public penance for the way we have treated people of color, women, adherents of other religions and those we designated heretics, as well as gay and lesbian people. Life moves on.

As the poet James Russell Lowell once put it more than a century ago: “New occasions teach new duties, Time makes ancient good uncouth.” I am ready now to claim the victory. I will from now on assume it and live into it.

I am unwilling to argue about it or to discuss it as if there are two equally valid, competing positions any longer. The day for that mentality has simply gone forever. This is my manifesto and my creed. I proclaim it today. I invite others to join me in this public declaration. I believe that such a public outpouring will help cleanse both the church and this nation of its own distorting past. It will restore integrity and honor to both church and state. It will signal that a new day has dawned and we are ready not just to embrace it, but also to rejoice in it and to celebrate it,”

—Bishop John Shelby Spong

(much thanks to Andrew Sullivan for the pointer)

The 10 weirdest physics facts

By autographedcat

On October 26, 2010

In Blog

Science is utterly fascinating. The more we learn about the universe, the more we realize how much we don’t know about it.

The 10 weirdest physics facts, from relativity to quantum physics – Telegraph:

Physics is weird. There is no denying that. Particles that don’t exist except as probabilities; time that changes according to how fast you’re moving; cats that are both alive and dead until you open a box.

We’ve put together a collection of 10 of the strangest facts we can find, with the kind help of cosmologist and writer Marcus Chown, author of We Need To Talk About Kelvin, and an assortment of Twitter users.

The humanities-graduate writer of this piece would like to stress that this is his work, so any glaring factual errors he has included are his own as well. If you spot any, feel free to point them out in the comment box below.

OVFF Reports

By autographedcat

On October 25, 2010

In Blog

kitanzi and I are sitting at our gate at the Columbus airport, waiting for our slightly delayed flight to board. We had a fantastic weekend, and I will likely post a more complete report later.

Meanwhile, I’ve been scanning back to try and catch con reports that were made during the convention (laptops and smartphones have made this a much harder process than it was when I started doing it eight years ago!) and will continue to collect them going forward, as I see them. If you know of a report I don’t have on hand, please drop me a note in comments.

Here’s the complete list of reports that I have found.

If you’re inclined towards Twitter, there are a number of entries from the last few days with the hashtag #ovff.

[NB. Due to the nature of friends-locking posts, some entries on this list may not be visible to all persons. Please contact any person whose entry you cannot see directly if you want to find out what they had to say. I apologise in advance for any inconvenience.]

Thought for Today

By autographedcat

On October 18, 2010

In Blog

For the sake of a single poem, you must see many cities, many people and Things, you must understand animals, must feel how birds fly, and know the gesture which small flowers make when they open in the morning.

You must be able to think back to streets in unknown neighborhoods, to unexpected encounters, and to partings you had long seen coming; to days of childhood whose mystery is still unexplained, to parents whom you had to hurt when they brought in a joy and you didn’t pick it up (it was a joy meant for somebody else); to childhood illnesses that began so strangely with so many profound and difficult transformations, to days in quiet restrained rooms and to mornings by the sea, to the sea itself, to seas, but it is still not enough to be able to think of all that.

You must have memories of many nights of love, each one different from all the others, memories of women screaming in labor, and of light, pale, sleeping girls who have just given birth and are closing again. But you must also have been beside the dying, must have sat beside the dead in the room with the open windows and the scattered noises.

And it is not yet enough to have memories. You must be able to forget them when they are many, and you must have the immense patience to wait until they return. For the memories themselves are not important. Only when they have changed into our very blood, into glance and gesture, and are nameless, no longer to be distinguished from ourselves only then can it happen that in some very rare hour the first word of a poem arises in their midst and goes forth from them.

from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Rainer Maria Rilke.

h/t to Andrew Sullivan for the pointer.

The Vulture Transcript: Neil Gaiman on Comics, Twilight, Twitter Etiquette, Killing Batman, and Shar

By autographedcat

On October 15, 2010

In Blog

Great, long interview with Neil Gaiman, about comics, movies, privacy, young adult fiction, and other such esoterica.

The Vulture Transcript: Neil Gaiman on Comics, Twilight, Twitter Etiquette, Killing Batman, and Sharing Porn With His Son — Vulture

So it seems that a lot of your concerns in terms of privacy are very much motivated by trying to get young people to take these things seriously.

A lot of this is trying to give them information. There is that point where, you know, there are some of those strange conversations that I’ve had over the years that still echo. Sitting there with my son who was 14 or 15, having spotted an inappropriate Google search from him. Probably back in the days almost before Google, where he now works. “Hi, Mike!” And sort of saying to him, “You know, the truth is if you head over into the basement, there are boxes and boxes over in that corner of soft-core men’s magazines that I used to have film reviews and things in the eighties which you are welcome to go and peruse at your leisure.”

Just read them for the articles?
[Laughs.] My attitude on it was you are not going to find any images in there that you will wish you had never seen. If you go looking on the web, you may well find yourself with things that you really wish were not in your head. And things that have been seen can never be unseen, or not entirely.

FreckledNest.com: Old to New: Typewriters

By autographedcat

On October 14, 2010

In Blog

This is awesome. I want one.

FreckledNest.com: Old to New: Typewriters

Last week I stumbled upon the USB Typewriter etsy shop and my jaw dropped! Jack Zylkin has invented a Typewriter Convertor process that turns any manual typewriter into a keyboard for your computer! He sells ready to purchase typewriters or you can buy a kit and do it yourself! I think these would be awesome for hotel/B&B lobby computers or electronic guestbooks at a shop… something memorable to catch your eye! Or if you’re a modern Angela Landsbury, use it for writing a book the semi-old school way!

Resource Furniture

By autographedcat

On October 12, 2010

In Blog

This is some amazing stuff. I haven’t quite dared look at the prices yet, but if it works nearly as well as the demo, holy moley.