AtomicBaboon!?!

The Fear of Fear Itself

But mostly, the spectacle left us wondering what the Democrats — especially their feckless Senate leaders — plan to do with their majority in Congress if they are too scared of Republican campaign ads to use it to protect the Constitution and restrain an out-of-control president.

Ummmm... so you really think that because a group of politicians has a D with their name instead of an R it means they are actually going to do something different? Seriously? You believe that? You mean the fact that they are just as much a part of the problem as the R's has escaped you? Well... guess what kiddies! Tickets for the Clue-train are free!

Iranian police captured 14 secret squirrel spies along the Iranian border. They were supposedly equipped with spy equipment from foreign intelligence agencies. According to Sky News, a foreign official told them "The story is nuts."

First its man eating badgers, now its nut-lovin' rodent-spies.

There are some good lines and quotes in this BBC article:British blamed for Basra badgers

"We can categorically state that we have not released man-eating badgers into the area."

"British forces have denied rumours that they released a plague of ferocious badgers into the Iraqi city of Basra."

"One housewife, Suad Hassan, 30, claimed she had been attacked by one of the badgers as she slept. 'My husband hurried to shoot it but it was as swift as a deer,' she said. 'It is the size of a dog but his head is like a monkey,'"

Make any sense?

"You can drag a dead horse to water, but no matter how much you beat him you can't make him drink."
-Me

<EDIT: Fixed the link to the essay> This essay by Albert Einstein entitled "The World As I See It" is a bit... what's the word... well... it seems like something I would write if I could write that well. Honestly, except for the fact that he was an amazing genius and I'm not, I identify with practically everything he says. Even his take on heroism and patriotism to an extent. I wish that men in our society could feel like they've accomplished something or proven themselves men without having to put themselves through what they do. Maybe that is just how I see it. I often think that in order to prove my honor and that I am a man I need to join the military to become a hero. To prove to my family and my countrymen that I am worth something and should be taken seriously I need to have my mettle tested in combat. Granted, what our people in the service do is valuable and honorable, but should I feel that way about my worth?

He also writes about his solitude and his lack of need for direct contact with other people. Although recently my feelings in that area have begun to change a bit I know exactly what he means. I relish the time I have alone to think about my existence and that of humankind and of the universe. To attempt to wrap my mind around the very fact that anything exists at all is quite a trip. By attempting to look beyond what my temporal mind can understand and contemplate the infinite I can make myself vaguely aware of just how small and insignificant we all are; before I scare the bejesus out of myself and have to go do something to take my mind off it.

The last paragraph of the essay touches on that mystery and the origin of "religiosity." As I have gotten older I find myself thinking of religion and spirituality more in the sense of admitting to the mystery and being in awe of it than something I am told or read in a book. Granted, I stand on the shoulders of giants when it comes to what I know of the world and of that great mystery. However, I cannot with clear conscience simply accept what I am told on that subject. To accept what mortal men have said simply because they were here first and wrote about it first would be absurd. If we are all truly equal in the eyes of our creator then the ideas presented by those before me are no more valuable than my own.

I really enjoy his paragraph on democracy and the value of the "sentient individual." He wrote "In my opinion, an autocratic system of coercion soon degenerates; force attracts men of low morality..." I can't argue with that.

In my opinion this essay very succinctly and elegantly sums up the way I feel about the world. However, it makes me worry that I may be egotistical to say so considering who wrote it... makes me feel good at the same time though.

I'm a half glass empty kind of guy. I'm a realist.
-Matt

Yep... half glass empty.

I am "working" down at my favorite place right now and I just overheard part of a phone conversation that included the following phrase: " Business is church and church is business. They're the same thing..."

Maybe that's what's wrong with it... sort of misses the point I think. Who wants their personal and spiritual interactions with people to be treated like business transactions? I sure don't...

I hate dreaming because when you want to sleep, you want to sleep. Dreaming is work. Next thing you know, I have to build a go cart with my ex-landlord. - Mitch Hedberg

From Wikipeida: John W. Backus

John Warner Backus (December 3, 1924 – March 17, 2007) was an American computer scientist. He led the team that invented the first high-level programming language (FORTRAN) and was the inventor of Backus-Naur form (BNF), the almost universally used notation to define formal language syntax. He also did research in function-level programming and helped to popularize it.

He received the 1977 ACM Turing Award "for profound, influential, and lasting contributions to the design of practical high-level programming systems, notably through his work on FORTRAN, and for seminal publication of formal procedures for the specification of programming languages."

I like this quote of his found in the New York Times Obituary about him:

"You need the willingness to fail all the time," he said. "You have to generate many ideas and then you have to work very hard only to discover that they don’t work. And you keep doing that over and over until you find one that does work."

He laid the foundation for what makes it possible for me to do what I do today.

Via Slashdot: John W. Backus Dies at 82; Developed FORTRAN

Here's a pretty funny song: Threes Rev. 1.1

Three things trust above all else;
Your knowledge of your craft,
That someone makes a profit,
And that you will get the shaft.

"How would you feel if you lived on an island populated, apart from yourself, exclusively by retarded, malicious chimpanzees? Well, that's how I feel. Don't laugh, because you're one of those retarded, malicious chimpanzees."
-Arthur Jones

"Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world was here first."
-Mark Twain

Some interesting lyrics from Muse:

Throw it all away
lets lose ourselves
because there's no one left for us to blame
it's a shame we're all dying
and do you think you deserve your freedom?
how could you send us so far away from home
when you know damn well that this is wrong
I will still lay down my life for you
and do you think you deserve your freedom?
no I don't think you do
there's no justice in the world
there's no justice in the world... and there never was

I don't know the story behind those lyrics or the song. I think I understand where the speaker is coming from though... I can't say I know, but I understand.

I just found this comment in some code I wrote 3 years ago:

Beginning in <SomeVersionOfMyCode> this class will slowly be replaced by <SomeJavaClassIWrote> and its elite superiority and awesome goodness with peanuts, caramel, and chocolate.

I disguised the version number and name of the class just in case. Funny comment though. Elite superiority is pretty over the top... a little egotistical. It would have been better if that Java class I wrote had peanuts, caramel, and chocolate methods.

"Congratulations Fry! You've snagged a perfect girlfriend! Amy's rich, she's probably got other characteristics..."
-Bender

This is hiliarious. This is something someone said in IRC (Internet Relay Chat). There is a site called bash.org where people copy conversations and things people say in IRC that are funny, clever, and sometimes extremely offensive, twisted, or disgusting. Sometimes you run across a gem like this one:

<comwalk> Remember, here in the U.S.A, we have reached a new age.
<comwalk> NOBODY is responsible for their own actions.
<comwalk> Remember that.
<comwalk> Holy sh*t! I killed somebody! Bob made me do it!
<comwalk> Bob: Joe made me do it!
<comwalk> Joe: I blame the media!
<comwalk> Media: Videogames.
<comwalk> Videogames: Personal responsibility?
<comwalk> Personal Responsibility: <AFK>

By the way, AFK means "Away From Keyboard."

"The man who writes about himself and his own time is the only man who writes about all people and all time."
- George Bernard Shaw

This morning I read this and it immediately made me ponder why blogs, to me, are so interesting to read. My favorite blogs are often just people writing about themselves and what they do or think. Duane writing about farm life at Geek Acres, Zach writing about photography or whatever else comes to his mind, Granny writing about her life and observations, Jack ranting erratically, the list goes on and on. Some might consider blogs egotistical and silly, but I find them comforting and entertaining. You get to see the world through other peoples eyes in a very personal way. You can see what they see, how they see it, and how they are thinking about it. I enjoy that and I think I gain more perspective and insight about the real world and the day to day grind from that than I get by watching the News or Discovery Channel.

I don't know if that is what Shaw was getting at, but that's how I read it.