Bless the stupid and ignorant, if not for them, we’d be the stupid ones…
CoS1
Author: armenhov
Ehm... Yeah...
Don’t speak: somebody may get offended.
It’s becoming exceedingly dangerous voicing your opinions in this country; punishment may range from losing your job to death threats and violence.
There is a big difference between helping people and pleasing them. How much are we willing to sacrifice trying to please those hypothetical over-sensitive people we don’t even know? The remaining shards of our basic freedoms? We already lost most of them to so-called “safety”. I couldn’t agree more with Benjamin Franklin who said: “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”
On lock-downs and safety
The best way to keep everybody safe is to put all people into solitary confinement cells. Forever. Because flu kills people too, and every life matters, right? And I’m not talking about all the other dangers in the outside world: car accidents, crime, etc. And, don’t worry, if you scare people enough, they will gladly and happily forget about all their freedoms and run into the cell. Now we know that.
Wisdom Is Moderation
… and the truth is often found in a balance.
What? That’s it, that’s all I wanted to say; don’t get me started on how things and ideas, even the good ones, are pushed to the verge of insanity all the time.
Fun
There are very few things in life which are less important than the day job, and one of them is fun. But hey, who said we should only do important stuff?
Building from Code
Nature makes hardware the way we make software: it invented a code and lets the hardware build itself using that code. This makes making updates easy and quick. It achieved incredible sophistication with live organisms: every new organism is an upgrade with code updated with other parent’s code and some random (as it seems) mutations.
Our first, clumsy attempt to build hardware in a similar way, was the invention of 3D printing. Assembly line robots do not really build hardware but rather help with specific functions, in other words, at least for now, they cannot build anything notable from design blueprints. 3D printers can, though, technically, 3D printers are robots too.
Happiness
Happiness is a natural human condition, we all feel it when we stop worrying.
So, as ridiculously cliché as it sounds, the phrase: “Don’t worry, be happy” has a bit of beautiful wisdom in it, though, of course, what I’m saying is not a prescription, but an observation. True: most of our worries are irrational and counterproductive, but some are useful, like those that force us to take actions preventing even worse worries down the line. Fixing a roof that is about to leak comes to mind… So, yeah, go ahead fix that roof of yours and you may feel a bit happier, albeit with less money in your pockets.
Disclaimer: I’m not fixing roofs, and I’m not associated with anybody (as far as I know) who may profit from your maintenance projects. Here, I said it, one less thing to worry about.
Social Security
This is a development of the original idea suggested by my friend Greg Shirakyan (who has since moved on to building Photographer Robots) on a fair and self-sufficient system of social security, and it gives investing in one’s children a whole new meaning. I have thought of many details of this system that would make it more acceptable for more egalitarian part of the society, but describing it here would take too much space; so, here’s the gist of it:
A certain percentage of person’s income goes to his/her parents’ retirement fund (I have some ideas on how to deal with divorced/widowed parents, more than two parents participating in child’s bringing up, etc.). If a person doesn’t have parents, her/his contributions go to the social security fund from which all retired people get their benefits, just like it is today, but in significantly reduced amounts. Childless people will have to rely on that minimal payment, which I consider fair as they invested less in their children and had the opportunity to save more into their retirement accounts, their own careers, etc. Same goes for the parents whose neglectful upbringing resulted in children who do not generate enough income to provide significant additional funds for their parents’ retirement. Children who care more about their parents (as a direct result of parents caring about their children) may make additional tax-exempt contributions. A part of the fund can go to an insurance fund for parents who lost their children to death or work-impairing disability.
Gifted Programs
I think US gets the gifted/advanced school programs wrong: instead of selecting students from ‘regular’ classes according to some, arbitrary, method, the right thing to do would be to start from the most advanced and challenging program for all (or, at least, for all who desires), then, gradually, move students who can’t keep up with the program to easier levels, with slower pace, leaving the option of going back up anytime (after all, it’s their choice, if they want to get bad grades). This will ensure all kids get the chance to shine, the average education level and expected standard will be higher (US regular school program is ridiculously retarded, that’s why we keep importing engineers and scientists from abroad), in addition, with this approach, the students will strive not to be considered “less smart” and will try to keep up with the “new normal” standard.
The “Mystery” of Moving Rocks in Death Valley? C’mon, It’s Simple!
If not for my usual laziness, I would have written about this years ago. But after reading the latest “scientific explanation” of the phenomena, I just couldn’t keep silence anymore. So, here’s my view on the forces that seem to be more likely culprits of the moving rocks phenomenon than the now commonly accepted “light breeze”.
Anyway, for those who doesn’t know what this is about: there is this place in California (mostly in California anyway), apparently, the hottest, driest and lowest place in the US, called “Death Valley” (but you already know that, right?), and, in certain flat field in that area, there are some rocks scattered on the field, some are pretty heavy, more than 300 kg (folks who are still confused by metric system: it’s more than 660 lb), which (the rocks) apparently move time to time, as it seems “by themselves”. Here’s a photo which shows the rocks and the tracks they left (image stolen from some random Internet site, apologies if I violate somebody’s copyright; just let me know and I’ll remove your image and make somebody else famous):
Anyway, the movement was actually caught on a time-lapse camera, as you can see on this site. And the latest and greatest scientific explanation can be found on that same site, which apparently claims that the rocks are moved by a light breeze, or a wind with a speed of 3 – 5 m/sec… Really? Like that’s the strongest force applied to the rocks or ice sheets or whatever there? I prey you put 300 kg rock on a level ground (dried mud), add some water, freeze it, slightly melt the ice, then lightly blow on the rock with your mouth. I’m not kidding, when you just exhale air while breathing normally, the air comes out with the speed of about 1 – 2 m/sec, blowing lightly will easily triple that. And, yes, I realize that the air should apply with the same force to the entire surface of the side of the rock, so you can ask one or two friends to join you. That should be enough: an average 300 kg rock is not that big (e.g. for granite, a 300 kg cube will have a 47.8 cm sides and most of the rocks have more aerodynamic shapes than a cube). Note, that the rocks leave deep tracks on the mud, they are not ON the ice sheets. Do you really believe that you can cause those rocks move THROUGH that mud with your breath?
No, seriously, I think there are much stronger forces in play during the day. I’m talking about gravity. To me it seems much more likely that the same gravity that holds those rocks in place, moves them just like it moves the tides in the ocean. Of course, for this to happen, you need the condition to be really slippery, like ice and/or mud, but the pulling force is gravity, the earth’s gravity for that matter (no, no, I’m not confused, just keep reading). In simple words: the rocks slide down the slope. And the slope constantly changes, even reverses during the day. Let me explain.
You probably know that tides are caused by the moon and the sun pulling on water. Mostly. But the water is not the only thing that can be pulled and displaced by external gravity. There is stuff in the earth, about 4,990 times heavier than all the water in all the oceans, namely: the mantle and the earth’s core, which constitute 99.8% of the earth’s mass. This stuff is either liquid or semi-liquid (better known as magma), or floats inside the magma like a yolk in an egg-white. What I’m saying is: all those 99.8% of the earth are pulled by the moon and the sun constantly stretching the earth, changing its shape, causing it to bulge in one place, depress in the other, and even making the core wobble inside the earth, changing the effective earth’s gravitation on the surface, affecting tides and moving stuff which doesn’t have enough friction to stay in place, just like rocks in Death Valley when the surface is really slippery.
And, by the way, I’m not making this up, this is called “Earth Tide”, and is well known in scientific community. The Earth Tide affects volcanic activities and some geologists found strong correlation between times when the earthquakes strike and the times of the day when the gravitational pull from the moon and the sun is at it’s maximum*.
Like I said before: effectively the rocks slide down the slope. That’s why they all move in the same direction. And the slope changes over time, causing the rocks to move all together in a new direction.
Armen' s Random Thoughts 