12/19/2008

The Universe Conspires

12·11·08
We never had a choice, you and I.

Fuck this place. (Not the comic, the world it describes.)

Hitler had a mother.
How would you justify taking pride in your boy?
Do you know how many people die every day of starvation? Do you even know where to look to find out? According to the wikipedia article, Starvation, more than 25,000 people died of starvation every day in 2003. According to WHO, malnutrition is by far the biggest contributor to child mortality, present in half of all cases. Maybe you could help me, because I have some other questions: how many people die per day from religious warfare? From preventable disease? (Preventable meaning, those diseases that have been defeated by those of us who happen to be born in societies with the wealth to defeat such diseases for the entire general public.) How many people die from political conflict? How righteous can we really claim to be? We bicker over bullshit like stem cell research, gay marriage, right, left, abortion, taxes, guns, Love, hate, education, sex, drugs, religion, morals, beliefs... and 25,000 people die a day from no food? Nine million, one hundred twenty-five thousand people per year. Something like 237 million people in my reasonably short, 26 year lifetime, assuming it were constant. Something along the lines of 77 out of every 100 Americans, assuming it were constant.

Since the
80+ female population is much larger than the 80+ male population
, I am going to start aiming for 80+ women, to increase my likelihood of success.

Don't let your cereal rust?

Robonography

"There's a strong possibility that I'm losing my mind."
"Maybe we even fall in love."


12·12·08
Kiss the ceiling.

Could our problem be trying to compare the time required to verify solutions versus the time required to solve problems?
Are there other complexity classes that are defined in terms entirely due to their verification or solution time alone? (And not things like FNP, that are basically NP already.)
Is there a clear meaning to the idea of having multiple time dimensions? Could there be a clear meaning to it?

I suspect that an 'ultimate theory', if ever discovered, will almost be difficult to imagine as being any other way. Unlike the current state of physics, in which there are many unknown parameters (the fundamental constants), a true ultimate theory would emerge from a single underlying principle (or set of principles), much the way special relativity emerges from two underlying ideas, or general from a third.


12·13·08
Ha ha ha, "Among other things, kids can tailor problems to stuff they're already interested in. Like gambling."

I just realized, that the Francis Bacon quote I am fond of, "[i]t is true that that may hold in these things, which is the general root of superstition; namely, that men observe when things hit, and not when they miss; and commit to memory the one, and forget and pass over the other", (which I usually apply to the ease with which we humans note coincidence in our lives), explains gambling very well (whether lottery, or craps, or blackjack, or whatever). Logically, these games are all obviously a losing battle (why else would casinos be so rich?), but all it takes is one small win, or even knowing someone else has won, to keep most people playing.

I want you to know.
Nontransitive dice

12·15·08
On the one hand, this is hilarious, on the other hand, how the hell does the cop not know better? Isn't this a man whom we have put faith in to "protect the public"? How can he do that when he is so uninformed and unaware of what is dangerous? (Granted, he can't do that anymore anyway.) This sort of superstition about things like drugs must end, we cannot afford it's costs.

It hurts me so much.

12·16·08
Lets be the radical center.

The only offer.
Am I still living vile?
Slowly tearing out her heart.
Steal me a dream.

This man, Jack Conte, and his girlfriend, Nataly, are both really cool. And so is their music. Andthis one too.

"You're doing it wrong!"


12·18·08
Must emphasize, not like extortion, more like seduction. "Hey baby, those are some sexy potatoes you got there, what say I buy them at above market value? Wanna buy some CD players that 'fell off the truck', big boy?"
Plus, even if we did pay them outright, it wouldn't be extortion, we would be choosing to do so. Though similar to our oil relationships, it would be different; our oil relationships are like a drug addict: we will pay whatever it costs for our next hit. Paying off nations to do what we want is more like telling them, listen, it's cheaper for us to buy you than to invade you, as long as you cooperate. Remember though, prices are dynamic.

Are there any truly one way functions? Maybe quantum cryptography could count?


I need to say that I.

Wait, whether they got good grades because they enjoyed learning, or because they worked hard to earn good grades, how is either one of those detrimental to a person's notoriety? Aren't both of those people somewhat non-typical in their ability to accomplish things? Isn't that what we want in government? People who either work hard, or find hard work easy? And how can academia be a racket if it doesn't have those sweet fruits like mercedes and million dollar apartments? I agree, it is a racket for those of us who enjoy learning, but the word 'racket', in this context, generally implies financial benefit, which most academics would probably agree doesn't really exist.


12·24·08
There is a comfort to the ambiguity.

This evidence, is everywhere.

When people ask, "why do you have faith in science, and reject the notion that it is reasonable to have faith in god?", an appropriate response ought to be, "I do not have faith in science, just like I do not have faith in gravity, or the big bang or evolutionary theory. I have empirical evidence that fits logical and mathematical theory (science), and I have empirical evidence that the very methods used to establish


12·27·08
Ah ha, maybe now we have found the heart of the matter. Scruton (is it?) says that "...we seek for the causes of things, but we also seek for their meaning. We have moral values, aesthetic tastes, yearnings and aspirations, which for the want for a better word we call spiritual. Such things are not irrational even if we find it difficult to provide a scientific foundation for them." I for one have had no trouble finding a scientific foundation for aesthetic tastes (my own or others), moral values, yearnings, or aspirations, but meaning I believe must be understood as a relative word. What does the moon mean? What is the meaning of a specific bacterium's life? What is the meaning of a specific molecules' role in the universe? The word 'meaning' only makes sense with respect to some lifeform, and even then only really to the higher life forms. It does not make sense to talk about the meaning of some causally disconnected galaxy with respect to humanity, because it literally makes no difference. I do not find it difficult to find scientific explanation for this, nor would I consider topics that find scientific explanation elusive to be evidence that non-scientific descriptions are adequate. I am now entirely convinced that science is the only method which can resolve any approximation to truth, and that when implemented correctly, it will always produce the most accurate representation of what we would all agree to understand is truth.

Science, in it's most abstract form, has no flaws. This follows from the fact that any flaw that appears provable is more than sufficient enough to revise science to accommodate for the oversight. Science might be described as an abstract process of observing and interpreting the world, with the trait of allowing revision of method upon new evidence. Basically, science is the memetic evolution of ideas, independent of the bias provided by tradition, rites, rituals, belief, desire, etc. IT MUST BE UNDERSTOOD that SCIENCE has NO QUALMS about abandoning it's current methods in exchange for improved results. Humans have such a problem, and that is the only thing that retards the ability for science to do that.

We need ask them, how would you explain the obvious fact that children are not identical to their parents? And what would you expect the extreme long term effect of this would be on a species?

Remember that, the crusades, the inquisition, and the current conflicts in Kashmir, Israel, and many other places in the world, are in the name of religion. Stalin did not commit crimes in the name of antitheism, or atheism, but in the name of another dogmatic belief system (communism). An atheistic stance can be derived from strong skepticism, an informed understanding of science, or equivocally Occam's razor, if one has accepted the notion that no belief is more valuable than any other, and receives even a small dose of science, or an intelligent inference from the world that surrounds them.

When people claim science is a religion, is an appropriate answer: but it has no true dogma?
I dreamt we were all beautiful and strong.

No matter how close two people are, an infinite distance still separates them.
Never underestimate the capacity for other people to let you down.

Isn't it beautiful?

We all end up old and in the way.
I can't go home. There's too much silence.

Heres a question, expanding on the issues I already have with the whole story of Abraham and Isaac: if you were to walk in on me, with my child tied up, and a knife held high above their chest, and I told you to trust me, that you should not intervene because I have a plan and it will all work out in the end. Would you be willing to just go along with me? Maybe since I'm not god, it's easier to not trust me. But it seems like I should be more trustworthy than a very old book that was written by people you'll never know.

Make sure it doesn't boil over.
"That means she's got issues, so she's not out of my league."

We should have worn helmets.


1·04·09
Even if the universe conspires against us.
I don't mind you hanging out, and talking in your sleep. I think you're just what I needed.

One way functions, entropy, causality, free will, incompleteness, randomness; the fact that quantum mechanics seems to both preserve causality, but destroy determination? These things all seem to relate






Lunacy and destruction, couldn't you tell that I was always happy to see you?

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