I'm Back

Hey there. No excuses for not posting. I have been writing a bit but , well, I am just lazy at the moment. I might pick a few of the pieces I have done over the past 6 or so months and put them up soon.

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Good News!

Here is the biggest news I have heard in the past few months. Rupert Murdoch has come out and now agrees that there is a link between human activities and global climate change. This is amazing! This marks the turning point of our history. It is really that big. This should be front page news on every media.

I wrote the previous post in ignorance of this factoid and this is exactly what I was on about. The practical upshot is that with the power of News corp things will start to change. The more informed have known and have been concerned about climate change for quite some time but this will push it down the throat of the other 70% of the population. It will become political suicide to avoid this issue over the coming years.

On the conspiracy theory front does this mean that big money has moved its capital out of businesses that will suffer as we move into a low carbon emission era?

Big business ideas for a low carbon world:

Direct conversion of cellulous into alcohol.
Creation/collection of biodegradable waste for feed stock for the above.
Combined food and cellulous farming
Battery/electrical energy storage technology
Low cost/low efficiency/easily deployed solar electric system integration for domestic application
Hybrid/all electric vehicles
Efficient artificial lighting and HVAC
Low capital fast neutron fission reactors
Public transport infrastructure systems

Politics

I read posts all over the web from people complaining about elected governments not serving the majority interest. Bad luck. You obviously have insufficient funds and influence. If you want to change the world get obscenely rich and do something about it other wise just sit back (or bend over) and enjoy the ride. Let go of this romantic notion that political activism will change anything. It hasn’t in the past and will not in the future.

Don’t fool yourself that some magical post will change anything. It won’t. A true, logical and sound argument read by millions means squat. Yes politicians will enact laws that the “people” cry out for but only on the proviso that it doesn’t interfere with persons who hold power. You know the sort of thing – anti abortion laws, save a bit of habitat there, no gay marriages; basically stuff that doesn’t matter except for a few individuals with insufficient power. And that is the nub of the argument; those with power are not the fools we elect and pay a few hundred grand a year to act on our behalf.

Scott Adams (of Dilbert fame) expressed it best when he stated that the general public had about as much chance of electing true and worthy leaders as a dog pissing the Mona Lisa into a snow bank. I believe even that is an optimistic estimate. It is impossible to elect the people who run the world – they elect themselves.

For our leaders the government/s is/are just an easy way to deal with the trivial administrative functions that they see no profit in.

There might have been some mythical point where the good and noble represented society but I have yet to find when that time was. At each point in history I sample, with sufficient scrutiny, I find the feudal system was alive and well. In the past it was tribal chiefs, kings and barons now it is the über rich, perhaps less than a few thousand individuals, who run the world.

This is the order of humanity.

Second thoughts about freedom

I have written about this subject before but thought my original thoughts lacked a vital bit so here is an update of my thoughts on the subject of freedom.

For this take I will only consider freewill (I have heard a lot of banter about this recently). It would seem to be the most fundamental aspect of the freedom question.

You can consciously decide to do this or that but below the surface each choice is pre-programmed by your learned prejudice (both conscious and subconscious), the environment the decision comes in and your genetic predisposition. In this sense freewill is only a perception and not reality. Perhaps there is some connotation of lack coercion in the term freewill but given the ensemble of inputs that lead to any, even the most trivial of choices, there is always some conflict.

We execute our pre-programmed code in response to stimulus. To me this is not freewill it is automation. Quantum uncertainty does not provide an out. A molecule in a liquid may follow some truly random path but it is just responding. Like wise we respond. It is not freewill. Our actions are locked in.

If we take action due to duress of some kind or for or own gain it is just response to stimuli. I guess it comes down to semantics if we label anything we do for ourselves as freewill and anything we do due to some negative pressure as against freewill then it resolves nicely.

If I see bucket full of $100 bills on the side of the street I have to make a decision. I can;

a. choose to pick it up and spend it,

b. pick it up and report it to the police or

c. just keep on walking.

By the definition above my freewill choice is a., the other options are tainted by my perceptions of consequence.

So I guess this means there is no freewill, just different varying degrees of oppression.

Crossing

Here is the second story that I mentioned in the introduction to Memory Stick. The time is still a millennia or so hence and involves the same lead character.

I awoke to the same appalling sameness of my life. My youngest was stealing food, dried meat, from a basket I kept near my bed. I was hungry, my head hurt and the mouth ulcer still refused to clear. “Get the hell out you little bastard”. It hurt when I yelled but it was the only way to get him to pay attention.

I rose kicking my foot on some unseen obstacle. This dark space beneath the earth, built a thousand years ago, was secure, concealed and warm but a pain to live in. Once more I cursed. The little one was now whimpering in some unseen corner. “Come here darling” I tried to find the little brat concealed by the darkness of my home. I do love him but I just don’t need the extra stress in my life. Eventually he came to me and we felt our way to the curving ramp that lead to the surface. The entrance was nicely hidden and afforded a sizable area to work in out of the sun. It overlooked a broad valley in the foot hills of a towering mountain range.

It was mid morning and, thankfully, it had rained during the night. We busied ourselves collecting the various vessels that we had set the night before to collect condensation. At least the rain was a change. The boy ran of to find fuel for a fire while I set to work grinding some seed into a paste. I reflected on this task that had been done for millennia; with only a short break hundreds and hundreds of years ago, imagine living in the golden times.

As I worked a lone man on the other side of the valley caught my attention. A moving black spot some distance away. Apart from the boy he was the first I had seen in two long years. How could he have survived the plane beyond? That crossing had cost my partner and my darling daughter two winters before. And we were well equipped. This man was on foot, he did not even posses a cart. Was he from east of the mountains? No, that was imposable!

My husband had insisted on this foolish exodus. He believed the old men who said the world was repairing. He believed the traveller who came to our village; his claims that fertile land was to be had to the east. He believed that it was time; that we should found a new village. To start civilisations promise. I should have protested more, refused to go. Yes, the land is fertile, but, one lone woman and her child do not make a new civilisation. The others who promised to follow never came.

These were my thoughts as I watched the lone figure in concealed fascination. My boy, now beside me, pointed at the lone figure. “Be still”. I didn’t think we had been seen. “Quickly, fetch the glass”. He returned with my scope; it had been made by my partners father, a leaving gift. I spied the figure as he trod his way across the grass filled valley. He was in good shape. Clean, upright and strong but was not dressed in the way of my clan’s folk. Clearly he was making toward the southern end of our valley where some low trees grew. We had not been seen; I felt relief.

Triumph of the conscious

F0r most of my life I believed that being aware was good a noble ideal. Now I realises the error of my ways; being ignorant is a more than viable alternative. I spend my life concerned about things that I have no influence over. I worry about the state of the global environment and the rapid simplification of the global ecosystem. I am scared shitless by the rise of religious fundamentalism. I fear the one sided economic push. I loath the mounting restrictions on personal freedom.

I guess my problem is that my personal horizon is too big. I must only concern myself with the here and now, with my immediate gratification. I should disregard the future. When I see injustice (that doesn’t affect me) I will close my eyes. When I see climate or environmental assessments in the journals I read I will turn the page. When politicians start politicking I will only receive the message that appeals to my immediate needs and predaceous and ignore the long term impact of their short term policy. I will ignore the corporate hegemony of our lives or at least accept it as a gift from wiser people. In short I must endeavour to become one of the unconcerned, uniformed majority.

I will make my main concerns which prime time drama to watch. My sadness shall be reserved for dead celebrities or my favourite prime time drama being axed. I will only be outraged by what Rupert Murdoch tells me to be outraged about. I shall only listen to commercial adult-contemporary radio station (or may be even the commercial shock jocks). In all ways I will become a model citizen.

My only problem will be getting some genetic therapy to switch on my faith gene; how can I follow this doctrine without faith that, no matter what I do and what I ignore, I will be rewarded in some afterlife?

End of fantasy: we’re screwed.

Spectacular spectacular

Last night I went to an interesting show. It was a stage tribute to a TV music programme that aired from the mid seventies to eighties in my country. The TV show featured mainly local acts but also promoted international stars. The host of the show was credited with bringing a pile acts to a large audience. Over the years it aired every one in the music industry (that counted in my country). It was one of the top rating programs of the era (and well before MTV).

Some how the promoters of the live show got a heap of local acts, who featured on the TV show, to appear in a live tribute. These were the people who provided the sound track for my teenage years. I guess there would have been 50 or so songs performed over the evening by may be 150 musicians. Some songs were performed by the original line up, for other others the solo artist or lead singer from the original band would play with the ‘house band’ which was made up with other famous musos from the period.

Now if I had of seen any of these performers live in there peak I would have been happy. Seeing them, trotted out, doing their “hit” and then being replaced by an equally famous acts of from the past left me a little flat. True it tended to be the B graders that performed the show but there were a few who were very popular in their day and some of the songs were the anthems of my youth.

Some how it was nearly sad. These idols of a bygone age displayed on a revolving stage strutting their claim to fame. Don’t get me wrong. I have seen Mark Knopfler and Deep Purple recently and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. But, well, largely, they just didn’t capture It (whatever It is). Some of the acts were still great and I did enjoy them but they were only on for a song or two.

Maybe it is just me. I have a lot of albums and very few of my favourites are compilations. Well at least the tickets were free…….

Truthieness

The Al gore film, An Inconvenient Truth, opens in my country this week. The news feeds are full of it. The man has made the usual TV and radio appearances and the news organisations ask the usual questions. The sadly predictable thing is that the politicians from the two major parties are neatly following the party line – you know the right say bullshit and the left grant cautious acceptance. It is time to break this argument out of politics – this is about survival.

So we have then usual responses to the most important issue facing humanity. The science is done and dusted, consensus has been reached, there are no more arguments to be had. The only hold outs are a handful of non-climatologists funded by the carbon levy. The outstanding question is how bad it will be and even there the consensus is very strong. On our current trajectory the range is ‘end of civilisation as we know it’ through to ‘extinction’ of humans. By taking action now, and I mean now, there is a chance that our species and hopefully our civilisation can survive.

I have been convinced, but that wasn’t hard. It is easy for me to understand scientific and technological arguments and I have been reading those arguments and counter arguments for twenty years. I accept the evidence for human induced global warming. Even though I have a vested interest in the hydrocarbon economy I have an even bigger stake in ensuring the world is a good place to live. My DNA demands a future where it can continue to exist long after I am gone.

So the real question is how to convince the world leaders, the Bill Gates, Rupert Murdochs’ and the like, that with out change their achievements will be meaningless and that a world of low carbon emissions does not mean the end of making bucket full’s of cash. These are smart people with their own self interest at heart. These are the ones that need to be convinced, the ones with the power to change the world. Lobbying politicians is a waste of time and resources. The green groups need to get the mega capitalists on the team. This is where the game will be won or lost.

In Europe the CEOs of BP, Shell, BASF and others are in the game. That is why Europe is so much further down the path. This example needs to be emulated in the rest of the world.

The time to act is now. If you know any rich people pass on the word. Present the argument in terms of NPV, diminishing returns, succession and legacy. It is pointless sitting around with people who already agree wringing your hands, talking to politicians or getting on the local news media. This will achieve nothing without the agreement of capital.

Go direct to the leadership - talk to CEOs and other wealthy individuals.

Life stories

The other night I was visiting a friend. There were several of us sitting on his back patio having a chat over a few intoxicants. The evening was cool and still and we chatted about politics, religion and the environment. With out any waring a loud BANG rang out over the suburb. From the way the sound rattled around I guessed it was about 500m away from my friends house. “Do you think it was a gun shot” one of the others asked. I didn’t think so. It was too loud, too much percussion.

I very much suspect it was one of the local kids experimenting. I know I blew a few things up when I was a kid. We laughed as we and exchanged stories of blowing things up and other dangerous experiments we did as kids. These experiments were a memorable part of growing up as a geek.

I wonder if those involved in the explosion we heard will be sitting around in twenty or thirty years telling the tale of the night the let of the big one.

Memory stick part 3

Here is part three - you might want to read parts one and two first...

With one day to go we entered the chamber with the goal of coming up with an action plan. We made paper copies of the control panel and lists of translated word that might be useful. Vernon explained what he expected when the ON button was pressed and we rehearsed a hundred potential sequences. The day dragged on in this manner. We even started to speculate what this language sounded like.

I didn’t sleep well that evening. Restless hours tossing, turning, staring at the stars, swatting at insects….. I recall seeing first light and then, just after dawn, Vernon woke me. I was in no shape for this. He sensed my condition and prescribed some concoction of herbs.

I picked at breakfast but the herbal tea seemed to work. Although there were ten people sitting around our section of the camp no one spoke. And even though only Vernon and I knew what was going on our fellows seemed to be infected by this anticipation. The gravity of the day was palpable.

Vernons special compass, which he now carried constantly, chimed. The gears and cogs whirred. He consulted the dials. “I was afraid of this, time to move boy. Our six ours have been reduced to two.” The event had been rescheduled.

I made to pick up a pile of supplies for the day. “No need for those, just bring a water bag and fresh bucket”. I quickly grabbed the items that some unseen steward had left during the night and chased after him as he headed toward the cave entrance. ‘Once more into the wizards’ arena’ I thought as we descended in the moving room.

The lighting in the room had changed, gone was the familiar, almost cozy, warm aspect. The whole room was illuminated as brightly as if by sun light; the whole ceiling glowing bright white. I could also hear a low rumble.

“No time to waste, quickly lay out our parchments”

I fumbled and knocked over Vernons ‘instant table’. He did not comment but just started picking up the papers. His compass chimed, the cogs whirred “30 minutes boy, no time for niceties” The hum in the room changed note. The some of the buttons on the control panel illuminated. “Now boy, hit the ON button”. As my finger made contact the blank square in the panel filled with the strange text. I started translating. “Vernon, It, it is listing options…. Upload…. Delete…. Start new… Refresh”

Vernon approached and looked over my shoulder. “Hmm.. I suspect given there is nothing in the arena that we should upload”. He pressed the corresponding button A new list of options appeared. He elbowed me aside – but not in a rude or pushy way.

A list of names and dates. “Vernon this is sporting fixtures – I recognise the team names from the ruins”.

“Yes I see that.” He randomly selected one of the options. The arena in front of us filled with some crazy geometric pattern that resolved into what I am guessing was the ruins above, but in their glory days. A full model. I looked closer and could see people in the stands and on the playing surface. On the display the options were replaced by symbols – arrows, squares, a definite three axis that I remembered from geometry books, and others. It was my turn. I felt some connection with these markings. I pressed the axis button and a pair of clock wise and anti-clockwise symbols appeared. I pressed one. The whole model in the arena rotated. I then pressed others. I found I could zoom in to an area, spin it around on any plane, and make the people in the model move faster, slower or backward. I could even hear the words said by individuals when I made them come close.

Vernon grumbled “This is no good, it is just some record of the ancient past. I have read of such devices but could not fathom how they would look”. The time dial on his compass was reading 5 minutes. For the first time I saw Vernon looking forlorn.

I looked at the panel for some time. I had no option, this was now my show. I pressed the button with the symbol for option upon it. The model in the arena dissolved back into the crazy collection of lines and geometric shapes and then back into the grey grid mesh of its floor. Scanning the list of options that appeared one stood out – Refresh. I pressed it. Verons compass chimed zero seconds.

I can’t really describe the next few moments.

Everything changed. I was lying in some sort of sterile environment. A room. There were other people engaged in unfathomable tasks. One was working a panel, not dissimilar to the one I had been at moments before. A woman approached, she spoke in some foreign tongue. She then spoke to they man at the panel who nodded and proceeded to finger the display.

She spoke once more “Hello Zara, your sim broke down. Please relax it is perfectly normal to experience a lot of disorientation. Don’t try to speak just yet….” She looked down at some device. “It appears you found a glitch with one of the AI characters. That should of alarmed months ago”. I tried to speak but only some unrecognisable garbage came out.

My mind whirled. I was confused. I could remember things that were beyond my experience. I knew this facility. I think I knew the man at the console – his name was…Arthur, eys Arthur. It was a cute name he had adopted after his ….his out time?

I could remember my youth playing with the other boys I my fathers court, training with Vernon and….and my middle aged husband? I had lived two lives. No more, many more. I recalled living in space with aliens, a Neanderthal tribe, swimming the oceans as a whale and a dozen more. I finally recalled the real me; a 400 year old woman who lived on an earth where death was optional. Where you can only spend one tenth of your life living, the rest of the time you are condemned to a live a fantasy – of your own design.

I had booked in for another full life experience, my favourite. 100 years of sim, my husband was booked in for the same stretch. We had planned to save up a full ten years of life and loan another eight together to produce our first child. Now he lay somewhere in this facility with a couple of million other nominally dead minimally alive people while I wasted my up time.

I began to cry. The woman approached me. “it’s ok. We can restart, When you get back to the sim you wont even be aware that this has happened. It will be something to chuckle about when you come out to live. You don’t even need to prep – your already wired and plumbed’

She carefully re-arranged some tubes and leads. I felt a wave of cold over my body.

Vernons look of depression was replaced with elation. “My boy this is it. Look the arena is filled with book files. The ultimate artefact. The ultimate machine. It does contain all knowledge – well at least the useful things. We can analyse it, we can ponder its workings. This will finally allow our civilisation to break away from the curse, this crutch of magic to solve our problems”. I was only relieved that pressing the refresh button didn’t destroy the machine.

Vernon stayed at the cave site while I returned home to take up his post. Even though I was young Vernon greased the path, so to speak, appearing in the court and even to the masses.

Now, at the end of my life, I feel that it was a life well lived. I look back on all that I have achieved and the transformation of my society. Our life is free from wizards and kings. We live in enlightened times where all knowledge is shared and all can contribute. I am pleased. My natural death will conclude it well.

So that is the story where the technological singularity was reached and humanity uses a simple method to overcome environmental problems. The next one will be shorter – I promise.

Lazy kids

We are often told how lazy the youth of today are. They sit around in front of one screen or other while eating themselves to obesity. They don’t want to help with house work, don’t play much sport, get mum or dad to drive them everywhere and will not get involved with community activities. Now this may be a bad thing but there is an up side.

There is this guy in our neighbourhood who puts bird and bat breeding boxes up trees. He loves the native fauna and will do everything in his power to ensure their survival. Just recently my partner was asking him if he has much trouble with vandals; he locates the boxes in trees in isolated parts of the burb. His reply was no. Back, say ten years ago, he would have to mount them at least 8 meters above the ground. Even then the local vandals would still throw rocks at them. Now he recons that 5 meters is more than enough and that it is rare to find any sign of damage.

Apparently the local vandals are too lazy (or fat) to climb that high.

Steve Irwin

I have just heard Steve Irwin has died. I feel a little sad about this. He was a good bloke, may be a bit of a dork, but one of the few real genuine people. I have no real connection with him other than seeing him doing a show at his Australia Zoo earlier this year. I guess that was enough to catch some of his enthusiasm. I will also admit to have watched his TV shows and movie – having a young son gives one an excuse. Well, just maybe, I was a fan.

His exuberance and passion for animals and preservation made him unique. I know a couple who went to high school with him and apparently what you see on TV is him. It is not fake. His over the top enthusiasm is because that is the way he was.

It sounds like he died doing what he loved. I guess that is a good thing. I offer my sympathy to his family and friends.

I salute a life well lived. May his work continue.

Memory stick part 2

Okay this has become a is a multipart thing. youn might want to read part 1 further down first.

Vernon directed the work team to a cave entrance that hade been blocked off by a land side. Huge boulders were knotted together by vegetation. The heat and flying insects made a miserable existence for the guys. There wasn’t much space to manoeuvre and the men took their turn breaking up rocks and dragging away vines, roots and debris. By the end of the first day I was able to work my way into the entrance proper and started to explore a little way into the cave.

It was discussing. The smell was fantastic, small bats clung the low ceiling. The floor was crawling with all manor of creepies feasting of the thick layer of bat shit The oil lamp I had been provided with was next to useless. Several times I brushed into the bats causing a cascade of them to take flight. I guess I would have been no more than 10 meters into the cave where I discovered the remains of some unidentifiable animal as my foot sunk through its bug infested corps. This was enough for me and I beat my retread back to the crawl hole and mad a hasty exit.

Howls of laughter greeted my return. ’Laddie did you have young lass in there with yea?’ One of the men managed to get out between guffaws. Even Vernon was actually smiling, now that was a first. I dusted of and jumped fully clothed into the small creak fully clothed. I swear I could not get that smell out of my nose and could feel the bugs crawling across my skin for the rest of the night.

The next day the cave entrance was fairly accessible. A good portion of proof rum mixed with lamp oil was thrown in and ignited. It made a satisfying Woof followed by a cloud of black smoke and bats. The flames dwindled and a few of the more adventurous ventured into the cave. Loud cries of complaint issued from the crew: ‘Caw….did you drop one jimmy’ and the like. It was all a lot of fun but Vernon was starting to look serious.

‘Right you lot clear the cave’. His order was followed with no hesitation.

He called me to his side, lit his lamp and proceeded inside. The lamp was a marvellous contraption. It emitted the purest white light with no smoke or heat. Noticing my inquisitiveness he assured me that it was a scientific device, no magic involved. Still it was amazing and revealed the cave in all its gory. I noticed details that I had missed totally before – this was not a cave it was a structure. I could see beams and flat surfaces.

I could not fathom this place : ladder like foot holds were on all the walls and ceiling. Shallow glass protrusions glinted in under the glare of Vernon’s un-magic lamp. What I assumed to be guard rails where also apparent but made no sense on the walls. We pushed onward. May be 50 meters on we found the end wall of the cave/structure and what clearly was a door way, but unlike anything I had seen before. Vernon produced a wallet containing an assortment of intricate tools.

The door object was made of some moulded material. I reached out and touched it. This was surprising. The door appeared to be some sort of painted metal but had the same feel as finely finished wood. Vernon spoke ‘Until now you have assumed a passive role in this adventure. I have trained you these past four years in the ways of magic, mechanics and science. It is time you put those skills to some use.’

I didn’t have a clue what he was on about as he handed me his tools. ‘Fathom the mechanism of this door and open it’. Fair enough, he had directed me to lean the art of lock picking ‘as an exercise in logic’. I had excelled at this task, easily opening all the doors I could find, mind you most of this was done late at night in my fathers castle; you would be amazed at what junk people put under lock and key. Firstly I evaluated the target. It was like a flat panel fitted into the jam. There was no handle or key hole. I explored further, and, after dusting of the area surrounding the frame I found a small slightly recessed panel. There were what appeared to be words (in some strange language) inscribed in squares on the panel. Clearly they were the mechanism.

Simple things first; I pressed one and then the other. The door dissolved in front of my very eyes, clearly this was magic. Some strange magic that left no flavour. The revealed room was no more than a few meters square. It smelt strange, sweet but not pleasantly so. Vernon gestured me on. We entered and another of those strange panels was evident. This one was larger with two columns of numbered squares and unlike the other the symbols in the squires were illuminated.

We puzzled the markings for some time. Vernon reached out and pressed the one on the lower right side. The door re-appeared and my stomach started to rise to my throat Vernon steadied me with a hand on my shoulder. The illuminated numbers changed colour one at a time in a sequence down the panel. I believe we were moving down!

The chamber we reached was like some sort of mini stadium. A guar rail surrounded a round depressed pit. The floor of the pit was some sort of grid mesh. I spotted another of those strange panels mounted on the rail. We walked around. As we reached the panel it illuminated. There were many symbols in different colours.

I remember feeling very afraid. This are had the feel of some sort of cauldron of some powerful mage. I relaxed and heightened all my senses as per Verons teaching. I could feel no entity or presence in the paranormal aspect. This calmed me some what. I noticed Vernon busily setting up a small work table he had produced from beneath his robes. “Right lad we have seven days to cipher this mechanism”.

And so for the next six days we worked in this timeless room where neither light or temperature changed. I learnt the ways of the travelling room well in that period. Running errands back to the surface, bringing down supplies, emptying the waste bucket and the like.

The crew had established a fine camp and seemed very content with the area. On my frequent appearances they would ask of our progress as a way to glean some information as to what this mission was about. I always answered truthfully providing minute detail of the work of deciphering the strange script. Of course this did not help them in the slightest.

On the sixth day on one of my errands to the surface the captain of one of the minor ships ran up to me very excitedly. “We have found some ruins”. The crew had become bored and had taken to exploring the area.

“They are covered in glyphs and text, some of it is in very old standard, I have read it”

I knew immediately this would be useful. Despite Vernons astounding intellect, and my assistance, we were never going to decode the words on the control panel. I collected some tools, paper and measuring sticks then asked him to show me. Within an hour I stood within an obviously ancient structures. One wall contained text in several languages carved into grange granite. Could recognise the ancient standard and also the strange symbols we had been deciphering. Working carefully and quickly I made rubbings and highlighted details that were missed in this process. I immediately headed back to Vernon with this information.

He started to berate me for my tardiness but he saw the look in my eye and the rolls of paper I was carrying. Quickly I set them down on the ground and unrolled them. Vernon immediately understood what lay before him. He was elated and almost hugged me but caught himself mid act and feigned interest in his sleeve – this was the first time I had seen him at anything less than 100% in control of himself. I was proud.

“My boy, this is it. Look here – see the list of our numbers see the corresponding symbols – I know we already had that but look….” He went on for some time and yes it was obvious. We had stared at the strange marking for this long week and knew them all. Now we had meaning. The ancient text spelled out the rules of a team sport essentially the same as football. There were minor differences - each break in play, due to a goal score or time out would last exactly 15, 30 or 60 seconds. I don’t understand why. As we read the strange text it became intelligible. The syntax was the same as ours. Some words were much shorter than and they didn’t worry to much about gender, punctuation or joining words. But it was simple.

Now looking at the control panel was as if some one had relabelled everything. There was still a disturbing blank portion in the middle of the screen but the word “ON” was easy to understand. Vernon forbade be touching the console for a further 48 hours – this was a clear 12 hours in front of the event predicted by his contraption. “twelve hours will be more than enough to master this mechanism” were his final word on the subject.

We spent the next two days on the surface. This was a relief. The captain who had discovered the text was congratulated and Vernon awarded him two years wage for his discovery. In fact he was in such spirits that he awarded all crew a full years pay on our return home. There was much merriment and feasting than night. The next day Vernon and I inspected the ruins. It had clearly been a sporting arena. I don’t know who I failed to see this on my first visit. I guess the jungle growing in the play area might have disguised it. The text was in what I suspect was the entrance to the place. It was represented in twelve languages. Vernon said he recognised five of them but the others were a mystery. It is strange that on the whole world only standard is spoken (mind you some of the dialects are barely recognisable).

Veron spent most of the rest of the day examining the site while I was content to sit in the sun, watch the birds fly around and generally just be lazy for a day.

End of part 2

War on errorism

Just a thought. What about if the governments of the world banned all news reporting of any terrorist activity. A complete media black out of bombs exploding, planes falling and fools self detonating? They should still keep up the surveillance and intervention of persons of interest but publicly ignore that the problem exists.

My theory goes something along the lines that the terrorists are acting for groups, 99% of the time, that are trying to get control of some land they believe belongs to them. Religion is only used to recruit the dumb fucks that want to blow them selves up for a cause and not the reason for the terrorist activity. This view is backed up by the recent report and subsequent book by Professor Robert Pape (google him if you want a lot of statistics and analysis) who did has researched the past 460 odd suicide bombers and their motive.

The reason terrorism is used is to gain public exposure for their cause. This goal is to put pressure on the target government either to remove their troops from the disputed land or to stop supporting the government that is controlling the said land. So if you remove one of the cornerstones of the tactic then the problem should disappear.

I guess basically I hate to see terrorism succeeding. All the media hype and government scare mongering has thus far lead to new and novel ways to restrict our freedom. Basically they win.

End of thought

Memory stick

Last night I had a request to write a piece set in the far future, say, a thousand years from now. The problem I have is the starting assumptions. Does the world reach technological singularity or does everything wind down due to environmental degradation? Well what follows are two short stories about the same character.

Memory stick

The swell was immense. In the great troughs of the waves nothing could be seen but blue sky above, on the crests, the watery world we floated upon was revealed. An even score of worthy ships rode the seas. Full three masters surfed down the flanks of the great mountains of water, sleek cutters struggled to maintain forward momentum before breaching the crests. The watch, up high, kept count of our fellow travellers, sometimes a whole vessel could be seen on another peak, sometimes only the very tip of a mast, or nothing at all. Horizon to horizon the ocean pitched, the wind blew up some froth, but no breakers were observed. The relentless wind drove us onward. Six hundred and seventy souls on this undulating aquatic terrane. The voyage only ten days old.

Vernon, the Diagra’s chief mage, was my master. In the years ahead he would be my teacher, mentor, and ultimately, predecessor. His influence had procured and provisioned this adventure with no explanations given, only demands. He alone knew the true reason for this venture, only he could make un reasonable demands.

It was not rare for ships to leave the port heading to head west as we were. It was also not rare for little convoys to leave together. But, it was unheard of that someone as powerful as Vernon to be in the crew. Why, he could have transported all of us in one blink to anywhere in the universe. He had gained access to the highest levels of knowable knowledge. He was, in effect, a god. Yet he denied any desire to exploit this power (myself excluded).

A few years earlier, I think I was about 10 or 12, I had asked him why he didn’t want to be king. His reply changed my young life 'A good question boy', he crouched down to my eye level, took both my hands in his and fixed his eyes upon mine. I fell into the universe, or that is how it felt, tumbling out of control as whorls of gas and pin lights of starts swirled around. Through will I gained control and began to soar through the spectacle that unfolded. I understood the wholeness of what I saw. For many months or maybe years I roamed alighting on suns, conversing with strange beings and becoming at one with the other souls let loose in the cosmic soup. This reality ripped apart and there I was staring at Vernons face as he crouched in front of me.

'Very good boy. You are to be my servant. You can take that as a very great honour, you are to be the first and last that I apprentice'. I didn’t argue, In reality I couldn’t talk. So it was done and my life is what it has become. Of my family only my mother was concerned. My father, then the king of Aranta, already had five heirs older than myself so I was mere background noise of no import.

I later found out that that little holding hands trick he did would only work on a 10^th order freak and that, not my privileged ancestry, got me the job. It would take a full fifty years before I achieved the right of freedom once more.

Vernon was about 300 when I first met him, although he would never really specify his age. In looks you might judge him to be perhaps fifty, but a very healthy fifty. In nature there could be no guessing. I deduced this number from historical records of some of the places and names he dropped from time to time. That and the fact he often referred to his mother by full name, My great grandmother some 16 generations past. Now this might have been a rouse but it did fit with a lot of other things I gleaned from the family history.

His demeanour switched from sullen adolescent to that of the highest lord during the course of a sentence. The forgetful professor, was his most common mode. I don’t think it was actually forgetful but more of a lack of concern with the goings on of the temporal world.

His powers were immense and to my young eyes unlimited. He could wink at a person and ensure a long healthy life. At a thought an illusion of his liking would spread across a kingdom. Literally night to day stuff. He never manipulated matter that much, it was just as easy but he said that meddling with human existence was more than enough. And so it was his influence that had created the first stable society on the planet. He did answer to the higher authority and in due course so would I. We all serve.

The one weakness that Vernon had was his deep affection for mechanisms. He employed a team of craftsmen for almost the duration of his time on Aratna. Specifying this, pointing at that, developing what he termed the future. Apparently I was to be the last of our particular profession.

I did take on the team after he passed on, his interminable visits after that time ensured his work continued. It was painful drain of my time: training, coaching, attending, funerals, picking new apprentices, lobbying provisions, it distracted me from my main task. But that was my contract.

Ah, I see I have been distracted from my story, yes there we were, I a young boy just sprouting hair on my chin on the deck of a pitching vessel with my 300 year old master. I had been in his charge for only a few years at the time and new a lot about assembling gears and cogs but little of magic. I had digested a thousand books of lore, read a million letters and had mastered though distance but had no experience of the world outside my fathers’ court or Vernons workshop. Life onboard a fleet ship, crewed by some of the hardest cases in my fathers navy, was educational.

The weeks drew on and my education continued. Petty illusions and mind touch were my tasks, that and cleaning up after Vernon. He assured me that humility was my real lesson. And looking back he was right. I also sat in at the daily meetings, the captain updating the days progress, the state of rations amongst the fleet, our remaining duration and the like. Truly boring stuff that even I could deduce with my limited powers. I am guessing Vernon already had completed the voyage a hundred times over in his mind. But still we attended the ritual and Vernon played the interested interloper.

Why didn’t we just emerge at the destination? It would have been a lot quicker and a lot less stressful for all involved. He had a plan and he wasn’t telling me. I couldn’t even begin to deuced the reasons.

Finally, after six weeks at sea the watch called land. The crew gathered at the rails and sure enough, as our sturdy vessel peaked on the swell, the distant coast was revealed. Vernon conferred with the captain. Maps and diagrams were drawn and a new course was plotted. A vector almost parallel with the new coast line but gradually closing the gap. The crew just wanted to make land fall, to feel real ground below their feet and drink fresh water. Vernon gave strict instructions that all magical activity was to cease. The message of the new course was given to the various captains and the instructions to cease and desist was spread amongst all wizards on the other ships.

That night the clear sky and fair winds that had marked our voyage collapsed into the most violent storm I had ever experienced. The ocean was a seething mass of pitching waves and white water. Lightning cracked from the heavens. I remained huddled against the bulkhead in Vernons cabin while he was on deck overseeing the mellay.

By morning all was calm under the grey sky. One ship and fifty crew were unaccounted. Two of the other ships were severely damaged. In the calm our reduced armada re-grouped and repairs effected. We tried our best to patch up the injured but with out utilising the healing charms our efforts were next to useless. Vernon ignored the many pleas steadfastly refusing the use of magic.

By that evening a four more of the crew had been laid to rest. Temporary masts had been fitted to the two damages vessels, rigging and sail repairs were well underway. Our voyage continued.

Finally after skirting the coast for another two weeks we turned for shore. A huge natural harbour of untold beauty came into view as we rounded a head land. Dense green forest, tall trees, a fast flowing stream and untold game were ours to be had. It was as if we had been delivered to paradise. Quickly shore teams set up our temporary base. The crew were eager to experience dry land after so long at sea. Vernon had his private tent set up in an area on the slope just above the rest of our encampment.

He called me to his tent. Inside he had set up the usual array of his paraphernalia – Mechanisms hung from the ceiling, a collapsible office had been erected on one side and his bed, complete with a mosquito net sat on the other. He sat at the desk with a plane black box in front of him.

'Thus far you have been a spectator in this game, now you must take you place at the table'. He was always full of this sort of talk. He opened the box and withdrew a contraption. I recognise the mechanism as a difference engine but with the input dials adjusted by a form of compass I had never seen. And then ignoring his previous sentence he set to work adjusting the delicate device as if I did not exist.

After a time and some muttering he released a latch which had held the pointer. The pointer swung through the hemisphere of its movement. The gears and cogs below whirred obediently and fell silent as the compass point decided on its final direction.

'There'

'There what?' I replied

'Can’t you fathom the machine and the significants of the reading?'

'It is the direction and distance to something?'

'and time' he added.

So if the output was in standard measures the ‘something’ was about 2000 measures directly inland from or location but at a declination of 45 degrees. The when was ten days away.

'But what?'

'The centre will be there then'

'The Core of Existence?'

'What else could I mean and do not refer to it as The Core of Existence. Those are the words of the uneducated. I would expect more of you'

The myth went something along the lines that the source of all that was was momentarily available on our plane of existence. This point contained ultimate knowledge.

‘I plan to use the centre as a doorway to the next plane of existence. You must understand that it is not a magical device but an artefact. My life work has been to understand its essence and now is the culmination of that work.’

‘I see.’ Although in reality I still didn’t have a clue about what he meant.

'Ah my young apprentice I see you don’t’. I guess he didn’t need to use PSI to see through my ignorance.

He then went on for about an hour describing the intricacies of Boolean algebra and the representation of reality using differential equations, probability and massive matrix operations. I did understand the fundamentals – I was a good student but I failed to grasp what he was driving at.

I guess suspect he was gloating and desperately needed someone to boast to, someone who could appreciate the cleverness and perseverance. To bad his best option was a pubescent apprentice.

Finally he pulled it all together for me. ‘So as you can clearly see it is possible to simulate an entire universe with what ever parameters you desire given a mechanism with enough capacity to represent the state of the created universe. The boundary is tricky but by observing the partial state overflow it becomes possible to interrogate the system from within the simulation. Further…..’ I glazed over once more. Was he saying we were the simulation?

End of part 1

Right and wrong

This is my list of things that are good and bad in the world. It is my list and only applies to me.

Wrong

1. Inequity
2. Greed
3. Short sightedness
4. Disregard
5. Foolishness
6. To few controlling too much
7. nationalism
8. religion
9. The human life span
10. Over exploitation (in all forms)

Right

1. love
2. Family
3. The earth
4. Communication (full blast)
5. Science
6. Rhetoric (as distinct from spin)
7. Music
8. literature
9. Art
10. Diversity

I restricted my self to 10 each and the lists were made up in a hurry. I will think about these matters more deeply and see if I change my mind.

Prejudice

From the lofty hight of my comfortable existence I feel things are going pretty good in my little spot on the globe. I feel a general well being of my fellow country men (and women). This is an easy trick; I just forget my past and don’t look too closely at the edges.

When I do look closely is see my society as a diamond rather than the traditional pyramid. A few on top a lot in the middle and a few on the bottom. This seems a fine thing. As I step back I find my diamond society fits snugly into the pyramid of the larger world population. The billions working for bare existence just to support my lifestyle.

My leaders (and most western governments) tell me not to dwell on the working poor of the world – they live elsewhere. They are not my countrymen and therefore do not count. But I look at the made in China, Philippines, Indonesia etc labels on the products I use and know there is a problem. I know that the person who sewed my shoes or assembled my latest gadget didn’t get the best part of the deal.

Prejudice exists. It seems to be a constant of human nature. I am aware of it both with in myself and without. The leaders of my country encourage division and not unity. As leaders they are leading us astray.

It happens at so many levels. They tell us that the unions are lazy. That the working and unemployed poor deserver their lot in life and that they deserve no assistance from the government. We are taught to distrust the other. We are tough to disregard others when we are doing alright for ourself.

The war on terror and my countries part in it would seem to be the most divisive tool in this game. All this effort to stir up distrust has worked. Last year my country saw its first race based riots in 50 odd years. Deep divisions are forming at the fringes. .

So instead of celebrating diversity, encouraging alternative views and above all equity we are taught that compliance is good, different is bad and to disregard the ‘other’. Instead we wave the flag and all gather in a huddle of our uniformity to protect ourselves from the foreign hordes at our door step.

Don’t get me wrong, I have prejudices. I do feel it: I can’t help it. I feel threatened in certain situations that would not cause and concern if I was in the same position with people from my own ethnic background. I can’t help these traits that have been so strongly indoctrinated since I was a child but I can overcome them.

So my fellows enjoy the results of having masses of low paid people working for them with out the inconvenience of having to live in the same country. And perish the thought of considering them as equal human beings. It’s all rather nice isn’t it.

The big question

There is one fundamental assumption that is made by all science. It is the idea that the universe has some knowable underlying principal. Now it is a big assumption but all of our probing to date seems to confirm this assumption but it is still the biggest unanswered question. I guess that is what makes science great. There is always room for the next test.

The history of physics has depended on this assumption with spectacular results. But what if it is wrong? What if the universe is just a collection of disjointed rules? Perhaps there is no unified theory of everything.

Imagine if there is no real relationship between quantum mechanics and the big world. That there really is some imaginary line where quantum mechanics breaks down and relativity takes over. That gravity and the other forces really are separate deals. Perhaps the rules that allow consciousness to exist are separate from the physical laws and so on.

What would this mean for science if relentless the reductionalist principal hits the brick wall? I don’t think we have to worry too much about that. So far the evidence is fairly conclusive.

Frontier town

I had a thought. Fundamental science researchers are like the early explorers of old. Seeking out new land, beating new paths. Sometimes they would fail; either consumed by the environment or their over estimation of their capability. Sometimes, if they were lucky and the new land fertile small groups would follow, set up villages and then towns. They work on the frontiers while the vast population fills in all the gaps in the discovered territories.

Math

The number of scientists and engineers being produced by my country is dropping alarmingly. The educators are all running around in a fuss trying to figure out what is wrong. It seems obvious to me; our education system discriminates against people who have poor communication skills. The most obvious give away is the relative achievement of boys against girls.

The changes have been subtle, but enough, to discount reasoning and visualisation abilities while elevating language abilities. So a child that would have bumbled through primary education but excelled at math and science in secondary education are so thoroughly beaten by the time they get there they consider themselves worthless students. Add to this the dumming down of the math and science syllabus by ignoring a fundamental understanding of mathematics and the problem becomes self evident.

I believe the syllabus has reduced these subjects to emphasise process and describing rather than equations and diagrams. There is no emphasis on the proof, the ability to logically present a mathematical argument. The visualisation of the mathematics replaced by the ability to regurgitate.

You see I was one of those students who failed primary education thoroughly. I am not a communicator – at least I wasn’t until I discovered the word processor. But when I got to high school I discovered geometry. It was just so easy for me. We did science, once more the facts of science stuck and resonated with me. I could ‘see’ it. I continued to fail the humanity type subjects but there was a couple of subjects that I could be good at.

And that is the point by the time I did upper school I could choose to do math and science courses with standard English as the only non-option. My math and science note books were filled with equations and diagrams not words. I was doing stuff that I could excel at.

Perhaps some early testing of students could stream out those that have high reasoning ability and protect them from the near useless requirements of learning to spell or times tables or other like tasks. Give them word processors, calculators and special courses on business English; use short sentences with simple words. It would be more efficient and allow these kids to develop their talent and not be dragged down into a quagmire of having to communicate with expressive regurgitation.

I am sure there are enough kids who like to write and talk to fill the needs of society with out interfering with the progress of those that will be needed to invent the new world and keep it running.

Move on

Enough of the melancholy.

Shannon - Herry Gross

I know it is copyright infraction but I heard this song on the radio. Seemed nice...

SHANNON
WORDS AND MUSIC BY HENRY GROSS
@1976 BLENDINGWELL, ASCAP

Another day is at end
Mama says she's tired again
No one can even begin to tell her
I hardly know what to say
But maybe it's better that way
If Papa were here I'm sure he'd tell her

Shannon is gone
I hope she's drifting out to sea
She always loved to swim away
Maybe she'll find an island
With a shaded tree
Just like the one in our backyard

Mama tries hard to pretend
That things will get better again
Somehow she's keepin' it all inside her
But finally the tears fill our eyes
And I know that somewhere tonight
She knows how much we really miss her

Shannon is gone
I hope she's drifting out to sea
She always loved to swim away
Maybe she'll find an island
With a shaded tree
Just like the one in our back yard ...
Just like the one in our back yard ......