Yearly Archives: 2011

Financial Engagement, a Public Thing

Uncategorized

Several weeks ago, my friend and colleague, Shanai Matteson asked if I’d get involved in a project she was working on along with several other people. If you have been reading my blog, or for that matter, Pharyngula, for a while you’ll know of Shanai even if you don’t know you know: She was for many years the public outreach coordinator person (not sure of her exact title) for the Bell Museum of Natural History, so it is she who organized the Great Smackdown at The Bell (with PZ Myers, Chirs Mooney, Matt Nisbet and me), as well as several Cafe Scientifiques that I’ve done, as well as a very interesting Evolutionary Dinner With Beer a year ago or so. Since then, Shanai has left the Bell and with her husband, Colin Kloecker, have started a company, Works Progress, that does some very interesting things, including Financial Engagement, a Public Thing.

Continue reading Financial Engagement, a Public Thing →

Lost in (economic) history ….

Uncategorized,

…These days, when I drive out Route 55, also known as the Olsen Highway, most of the buildings I see were built since I stayed in that run down little motel, which by the way was long ago torn down and replaced with new development. Nothing about that drive is familiar now, except for the Rainbow which had just been built when I stayed there, and an old beat up strip mall from the mid 20th century. There was once wilderness, a few farms, the usual lakes. Then, Boom! Building everywhere.

And the funny thing is that today, many of those buildings are for sale, vacant, for lease. There are even buildings built in the last ten years that are at risk of deterioration through misuse. And that isn’t a particularly depressed part of town.

It seems that civilization, and its economy, are like the proverbial river that you can’t step into twice: It is always there, but never is it the same. This has been true since the Industrial Revolution: Cheap hydroelectric power harnessed by modern turbines under emerging brick mills filled with rural transplants, mostly women and children, losing the occasions finger or hand to the machinery but driving a brave new economy with the production of cloth or flour. But the water allowed only a certain amount of growth, so it was supplemented with coal-powered steam engines running the mill’s machines. Then the coal became the main form of energy. Homes lit by burning tallow and whale oil became brighter with the introduction of gas lines and lamps, and the streets glowed at night in London and New York and Minneapolis, and eventually liquid petroleum found its use to drive more industrial engines, and eventually cars, and eventually furnaces in our homes, and eventually along side coal power stations that produced the electricity that made our homes even brighter….

That is part of an essay I wrote for Financial Engagement, a Public Thing. It is published (in print) as part of a newspaper project. There is a PDF version of the while shebang, which you can get to here.

Wave Google Wave Good Bye

Uncategorized

From Google Wave:

More than a year ago, we announced that Google Wave would no longer be developed as a separate product. At the time, we committed to maintaining the site at least through to the end of 2010. Today, we are sharing the specific dates for ending this maintenance period and shutting down Wave. As of January 31, 2012, all waves will be read-only, and the Wave service will be turned off on April 30, 2012. You will be able to continue exporting individual waves using the existing PDF export feature until the Google Wave service is turned off. We encourage you to export any important data before April 30, 2012.

If you need to keep waving, try these OpenSource projects:

Apache Wave
Walkaround

Apologize for telling the truth? NBC and Jimmy Fallon drop the ball.

Uncategorized, , ,

Michele Bachmann intentionally lies. She lies to gain power, she lies for personal gain, she lies all the time. So, when the band on Jimmy Fallon’s talk show played ‘Lyin’ Ass Bitch’ … which, is, apparently, a song, they were making a fairly accurate statement.

One might question its appropriateness as a song or the use of the word “bitch” but aside from that, the shoe fit. There was no reason for NBC or Jimmy Fallon to apologize. Michele Bachmann is the one that needs to apologize.

Here’s the event in question: Continue reading Apologize for telling the truth? NBC and Jimmy Fallon drop the ball. →

The Best Eclipse Ever (of the moon and of the sun)

Uncategorized, , , , , ,

I remember my first solar eclipse. I was a kid, and it was the one Carlie Simon sang about, in March 1970.

(The eclipse reference is just past three minutes. Some other time we can argue over whether or not Carlie, singing in this video on Martha’s Vineyard, was referring to the March 1970 eclipse or the July 1972 eclipse, but I’m sure it was the former, because that’s the one everybody got all excited about.)

I was such a geek that I actually missed the eclipse because I was busy collecting data. There was a phone number you could call and a lady’s voice would give you the time and temperature. Perfect. I called the number again and again and wrote down the time and temperature and made a graph. And I got results!
Continue reading The Best Eclipse Ever (of the moon and of the sun) →

We will be doing an experiment; I thought you should know.

Uncategorized

As you know, freethoughtblogs.com has switched to a new server, and we are now in that post server-switch phase of adjusting everything that got broke during the move.

One of the problems we are having behind the scenes is this: Normally, if you open a blog post (or start one up) in edit mode, you see the current text and HTML code and stuff, you can change that, you can save that, and then the post on line is different according to those changes. What is actually happening is that there is almost no relationship, sometimes, between what you do and what comes out on the site. If you make a change, publish the change and verifiy it is there, then re-open the post and make a second change, there is a pretty good chance that the first change will be gone. Or, if you just let the post sit there and auto-saving happens, then the post may revert to an old form. And so on.

So, we are doing an experiment in which The X Blog (singularly and in particular) will have it’s HyperCache turned off. We are not sure but we are thinking that could be the cause. Or, more exactly, I was whinging about it possibly being the cause, in the back channel, and the IT Tzar, Mat, took that as me volunteering to have mine turned off to see what would happen.

Thus, HyperCache will be disabled on The X Blog during the night tonight (Wednesday).

After that, I’ll mess around with editing stuff and see if those problems go away. For your part, you can report anything interesting or strange that you observe, and make comments on performance.

The strange things you observe and issues of performance may or may not be related to this blog. As long as it is interesting.

Thank you very much.

What will you be cooking for Thanksgiving?

Uncategorized

If you are looking for some recipes, here are a few suggestions.

Theory and background

Cooking Thanksgiving Turkey

The True Meaning of Thanksgiving: Gravy

Stuffings

Thanksgiving Side Dishes

Thanksgiving Deserts

Additional Information:

So, what can you add to this list?