Oct 2006
- Oct 6
- lowest common denominator
OK, sure, this will definitely come out culturally elitist, but the phenomenon known as digg.com is yet another example of the principle of mediocrity in capitalist economies. (Or, for the more politically correct minded, perhaps we can call it the principle of democracy.) Like Walmart, the American public school system, Microsoft Windows, and our pathetic dependence on hydrocarbons for fuel, the “good enough” is the enemy of the “best” and, contrary to what Social Darwinists would have you believe, laissez faire capitalism leads to championing the mediocre.
· Read more… - Oct 7
- alpha centauri and final fantasy 7
These games came out almost 10 years ago, but I spent way too much time playing them both. Final Fantasy 7 defined my senior year in college, and Alpha Centauri was how I spent my year in existential limbo.
· Read more… - Oct 11
- swirling
Oh, what was it I had meant to say? There are a million thoughts careening through my addled brain at this benighted hour, and I sit here tongue-tied like an idiot.
· Read more… - Oct 13
- sheer madness
So I like to blame all this on damned cats. Now I’ve got nothing against cats, per se. I kind of like how they’re not literal ass-kissers like dogs are (and I am a dog person.) But the problem is that I’m deathly allergic to them, and on Thursday night I got a double dose.
· Read more… - Oct 13
- no day but today
There are three musicals that I used to know all the lyrics to: “Beauty and the Beast”, “Once On This Island”, and “Rent” Each one encompassed a particular period of my life, and “Rent” reminds me of my junior and senior year in college, especially because my roommate at the time was quite obsessed with it. Being in college, the Bohemian lifestyle, the conflict between making money and making art—these things all resonated.
· Read more… - Oct 14
- narnia, corruption, and perfectability
I think the book in The Chronicles of Narnia that left the strongest impression on me was The Magician’s Nephew[site by Keith Webb][on wikipedia]. The setting that I remember most strongly is the ruined and blasted world of Charn, destroyed by the White Witch Jadis by using magic that seems strongly allegorical to nuclear weaponry. I was struck by how the monarchy of Charn started off being benevolent and wise, then became corrupted and evil, eventually spawning the monstrosity that is the White Witch. I also remember the hue of redness encompassing Charn. (Was C.S. Lewis trying to evoke medieval visions of Hell?) What was interesting to me was the explanation for this reddish light—Charn’s sun is a red giant star. While this could’ve just been an idiosyncrasy of this particular world, it actually evoked in me the idea that the civilization of Charn had existed so long that their formerly sun-like star had exhausted its nuclear fuel and was beginning to cool and expand. For some reason (although this is apparently not the reason for its destruction), this also reminds me of the destruction of the planet of Krypton, but that is neither here nor there.
· Read more… - Oct 14
- expendability
The notion of sacrificing your life for others, embedded in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, closing paralleling the New Testament, brings to mind what I find to be a viable adaptionist claim: that some individuals need to die for the good of others in the same genetic pool, which is probably pretty harsh if you happen to be that individual so chosen by selection pressure.
· Read more… - Oct 15
- one sunset at a time
Nothing like a nice sunset to snap me out of a terrible mood.
· Read more… - Oct 15
- morrissey “will never marry”
I’m writing this to say
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In a gentle way
Thank you—but no
I will live my life as I
Will undoubtedly die—alone - Oct 17
- mac/intel != win/intel
J Angelo Racoma looks back at the argument that Apple switching to the x86 would be tantamount to the suicide of Apple Computer, Inc.
· Read more… - Oct 20
- surrender is not an option
Saying “I give up” solves nothing.
· Read more… - Oct 21
- radiohead “go to sleep (little man being erased)”
Something for the rag and bone man
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Over my dead body
Something big is gonna happen
Over my dead body
Someone’s son or someone’s daughter
Over my dead body
This is how I end up sucked in
Over my dead body
I’m gonna go to sleep
And let this wash all over me
We don’t really want a monster taking over
Tip toe around, tie him down
We don’t want the loonies takin’ over
Tip toe around, tie him down
May pretty horses come to you as you sleep
I’m gonna go to sleep
And let this wash all over me - Oct 21
- time marches on
So I give up. This is all there is, and there ain’t no mo’. God only knows what sort of fucked up crisis would actually get me to save myself, but I’m too fucking tired.
· Read more… - Oct 22
- thom yorke “analyse”
A self-fulfilling prophecy of endless possibility
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You roll in reams across the street
In algebra, in algebra - Oct 23
- ipod turns five
Charlie White writes about what he hates about the iPod which is, I guess, praising with faint damnation. First off, the proper colloquial term is “hatorade” or maybe “hatoration” if you want to get pendatic. Get it right.
· Read more… - Oct 23
- a hundred million bottles washed up on the shore
I just read this post about depression by alison on bluishorange, and I am so there.
· Read more… - Oct 23
- 15 years too early
I stumbled upon this post about NeXTSTEP (the OS that Steve Jobs created after leaving Apple way back when), which basically already had almost all the features of Mac OS X. Which makes sense. Mac OS (what is now known as Classic) was an evolutionary dead-end with regards to operating systems, about on par with Windows 3.11. And while Apple worked on the vaporware that was known as Copland and even while they flirted with BeOS (what could’ve been, huh?), NeXT was already there and was already a decently established development environment. Hell, it had already spawned an Open Source project (GNUstep) before Apple finally decided to get their shit together and bring Steve back.
· Read more… - Oct 26
- the cure “untitled”
hopelessly adrift in the eyes of the ghost again
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down on my knees and my hands in the air again
pushing my face in the memory of you again
but i never know if it’s real
never know how i wanted to feel - Oct 27
- My new topic on Consumating
Tell me, how many of you are Consumating from work, and how do you get anything else done?
· Read more… - Oct 27
- physics vis-a-vis racism and misogyny
Man, Lee Smolin, theoretical physicist to the nth degree, is my hero. The first I had heard of him was his book Three Roads to Quantum Gravity, a discussion of the possible unification of quantum mechanics and general relativity, which covers string theory and loop quantum gravity. I also noted his name in João Magueijo’s book Faster than the Speed of Light.
· Read more… - Oct 27
- Consumating’s Question of the Week
What brings out the devil in you?
· Read more… - Oct 27
- more than just aesthetics
x86 machines have been traditionally much cheaper than their Mac counterparts, but things have improved a lot lately. Still, a Macbook Pro supposedly costs as much as two similarly spec’ed Dells. Naturally, the author ignores certain things (which he at least acknowledges): built-in iSight, bundled software, faster RAM.
· Read more… - Oct 28
- waiting for leopard
I admit it. Apple has gotten me successfully hooked. I bought my Mac Mini when Tiger came out. I’m probably going to be buying another machine when Leopard comes out.
· Read more… - Oct 29
- feeling abandoned
I have spent the last 80 hours or so without speaking to another soul. (I am not counting buying stuff at the store, or communicating via computer.) I can’t help but wonder if anyone would miss me if I disappeared.
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