Summer's here

It's been a while since my last post.

Sometimes we're just lazy. Deal with it.

So there's a ton of scandals in the news. I'm unsurprisingly not surprised. Yeah it's unsettling, but hey, you know we're just going to vote them all back in next time. The only gov't or former gov't employee who might see any jail time is that young whistleblower, unfortunately.

What was I going to say? Nothing really. Just hello I guess. I'm not dead.

Anyway, read this guy's blog. Wonderful writer, and he makes me feel smart. And as a contrarian, I particularly appreciate his thoughtful refutation of libertarianism, here.

And this blog makes me feel smarter too.

After you're brain is tired, try watching this guy play games (he's remarkably entertaining). Watching other people play games is nearly as fun as playing yourself, and sometimes just as frustrating.

Warp Drive Update

Since reporting on any and all notable (if incremental and highly theoretical) advances in Warp drive is one of the explicit goals of this blog, I am duty bound to chronicle the following:

From PopSci.com: Warp Factor: A NASA scientist claims to be on the verge of faster-than-light travel: is he for real?

Not pictured above: NASA Scientist Sonny White

If, like me, you are pretty well-aware of the warp field theory and negative energy then don't bother reading most of the first two pages--it's all background on that (way to bury the lede PopSci). But PopSci reporter Konstantin Kakaes, took a tour with and interviewed NASA's warp-drive (among other things) scientist, Sonny White.

Here is where the good stuff starts:

Negative energy . . . is gravitationally repulsive. Instead of drawing space-time together, negative energy would push it apart. Roughly speaking, for his model to work, Alcubierre needed negative energy to expand the space-time behind a craft.

Though no one has ever measured negative energy, quantum mechanics predicts that it exists, and scientists should be able to create it in a lab. One way to generate it would be through the Casimir effect: Two parallel conducting plates, placed very closely together, should create small amounts of negative energy. Where Alcubierre’s model broke down is that it required a vast amount of negative energy, orders of magnitude more than most scientists estimate could be produced.

White says he’s found a way around that limitation. In a computer simulation, White varied the strength and geometry of a warp field. He determined that, in theory, he could produce a warp bubble using millions of times less negative energy than Alcubierre predicted and perhaps little enough that a space craft could carry the means of producing it. “The findings,” he says, “change it from impractical to plausible.”

"Plausible"

It'll be a good day when we discard the "you don't need to be a rocket scientist" idiom and replace it with "you don't need to be a warp scientist." I digress too much. Anyway, that snippet too, is old news. White's had this idea rolling around in his head for some time. But it looks like he finally got a little project going:

White’s warp experiment is tucked into the back corner of the room [What? Back corner?!? Get your priorities straight! -ed). A helium-neon laser is bolted onto a small table pricked with a lattice of holes, along with a beam splitter and a black-and-white commercial CCD camera. This is a White-Juday warp field interferometer, which White named for himself and Richard Juday, a retired JSC employee who is helping White analyze the data from the CCD. Half of the laser light passes through a ring—White’s test device. The other half does not. If the ring has no effect, White would expect one type of signal at the CCD. If it warps space, he says “the interference pattern will be starkly different.”

Before I quote any more, and blatantly abuse fair use, I should get my cynicism out of the way. Maybe it's just my cynical nature, but I'm not sure this White guy (heh) is on the level. I understand NASA is all government funded and deals with some pretty sensitive stuff, as well as mingling with the Pentagon/Air Force; but, it's also about science. Which is about sharing and showing your work. So upon reading the following, it felt like I was watching a bad sci-fi movie:

"People come in and want to talk about some things"

Yet when I ask how it would create the negative energy necessary to warp space-time he becomes evasive. “That gets into . . . I can tell you what I can tell you. I can’t tell you what I can’t tell you,” he says. He explains that he has signed nondisclosure agreements that prevent him from revealing the particulars. I ask with whom he has the agreements. He says, “People come in and want to talk about some things. I just can’t go into any more detail than that.”

Well, alright then. So, when can we expect to vacation in Alpha Centauri? If you're as optimistic as White sounds, probably in a few decades. I don't know if he's just generating buzz for whatever reason, or if he's that confident, but there it is. He says he's even found a way (at least theoretically--he's not clear on it) to generate a stable warp field. Here's hoping.

Update: From commenter Noel, apparently PopSci made a mistake. "White has not signed any NDAs. The article has it backwards. In order for the Popular Science author to get briefed on the referenced technology, he would need to sign an NDA with the government . . ."

New Star Trek Into Darkness Trailer

A bit more is revealed in this one. It looks okay. I guess as an action movie it looks good. And I really like Cumberbatch's acting. But more generally, as a Trek movie it looks like Abrams is trying too hard to move away from classic Trek. And as a Trekkie, I'm beginning to expect some disappointment.

I guess I should just be glad the reboot films aren't nearly as bad as the Star Wars prequels.



In an alien-filled galaxy, you think Abrams could have been a little more imaginative than to use a human as a bad guy. Former starfleet at that. It's all very interesting, but so very safe and unoriginal. Am I going to have to wait another 4-5 years to see a Klingon?

Via Gabe @ Ace's.

Linkdump

If I had time, I would probably blog about these and make you dumber for having read it.

Latino population rising. Yes, really.

Oregon Law Prof goes full retard.

Where Higher Ed went wrong (great read, even though I wouldn't know--havent read it yet).

The Onion brings out the best of the Darwin award hopefuls.
 
Hollywood without guns.

Lyle Denniston Willfully Deceiving the Public

There is so much stupid in this article I don't know where to begin.

I suppose I'll start with what motivated this post. Lyle Denniston, famous for SCOTUSblog, wrote some weird editorial for Yahoo, in which he refers to himself in the third person, about the Second Amendment not being absolute, while implying Ted Cruz is an idiot for thinking otherwise. And almost immediately he takes a blogger better than he, and simultaneously Senator Cruz, out of context.

After summarizing Ted Cruz's questioning of Dianne Feinstein about the limits of Congress with regard to the Second Amendment, Denniston quotes Allahpundit of HotAir:

Harvard Law grad Ted Cruz is willfully deceiving the public into thinking the Second Amendment is more absolute than the Supreme Court says it is.

Yep, that's all he quotes from Allahpundit. One very brief sentence, which is uncharacteristic of this blogger, which is highly suggestive of something else going on we're not seeing. He then pivots from this to the meat of his argument. Classy.

Now let me quote the next few sentences from Allahpundit's post at HotAir:

Why, clearly, Harvard Law grad Ted Cruz is willfully deceiving the public into thinking the Second Amendment is more absolute than the Supreme Court says it is. He’s acting like Heller never happened! Like I say, that’s what you might think if you watched Cruz-versus-Feinstein and nothing more. If you watched the rest of the Judiciary Committee hearing, you know better. [emphasis mine]

Denniston even omitted the "Why, clearly" part. What a douche. I guess Denniston thinks he's pretty safe since Allahpundit can't really fight back for a few reasons: 1. Doing so on HotAir would seem petty and beneath the standards of that blog. 2. Allahpundit has to remain anonymous lest certain people find out who and where he is. I'll add he has legitimate reasons for remaining anonymous, as his pseudonym might suggest.

Well here at the Daily Mud, pettiness is something aspired to. As for Ted Cruz, what pray tell, was in the rest of the Judiciary Committee hearing? See for yourself:


Not only is Ted Cruz familiar with Heller, he was on the winning team.

And he correctly acknowledges such restrictions on the Second Amendment that Heller identified, such as the "current prohibition on fully-automatic machine guns." There you go. Ted Cruz just acknowledged that the Second Amendment is not absolute. Excuse me while I clean up this mess of straw Denniston so bravely fought.

And there's more.

Much more, but I'm just going to tackle one egregious deceit (or conceit, depending on how you look at it). Denniston claims that concerning the Second Amendment,

The almost universal understanding (until several modern scholars began questioning it) was that the right only applied to state militia organizations, like the modern National Guard.

Almost universal, meaning very, very few people understood it as a personal right to keep and bear arms. Until those modern scholars came along messing up the Constitution with their subversive ideas:

No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.¹

Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birthright of an American.²

Americans have the right and advantage of being armed - unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.³

A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves...and include all men capable of bearing arms.⁴

Darn those modern scholars!

 I'm sure Mr. Denniston is a good guy, just not when he's lying and taking things out of context.
___________________________________________

¹ Thomas Jefferson, 1776
² Tench Coxe, 1788
³ James Madison, 1787
⁴ Richard Henry Lee, 1788

Colion Noir debuts on NRA News

So here's NRA News' new spokesman, Mr. Colion Noir, a lawyer and firearms enthusiast, making the case against more senseless gun control.

Pretty good. I like the part about the President suddenly caring about gun violence, as if Chicago never had such a problem.

John Stossel & Ann Coulter debate

From the clip, it's appears to be more of a townhall pile on Coulter. But still, you can see even the usually (if harsh) effectiveness of Coulter's logic dwindle. She makes a few good points about the socialist state and bigger issues, but ultimately, she has no defense.


If you're a conservative who argues for limited government, providing very good reasons for your inconsistencies would seem prudent. Via HotAir.

LAPD Pistol Target

Eh. Just because.

Inspired by Kevin.

Democrats suck, but voters are the real idiots

Yeah I'm just going to go the undignified route because I don't give two shits about politicians and the voting public in general. Let's just drop the pretense: the vast majority of Americans have a rational interest to be politically ignorant, and in our case, they are super-rational.

It's like they've all been urinating in the pool--what's a little pee in this giant pool, nobody will know--and now, thanks to all of them we're neck deep in piss.

Why am I so cynical today? You could probably guess in one try: Internet commenters. Specifically those commenters over at this Buzzfeed piece on the hypocrisy of Democrats.

A good percentage of those commenters get up on their high horse and say shit like, "Oh I voted for Bush, then I voted for Obama. Now I despise both of them. They are all corporatist war mongers!"

But you know what, it's ok because they're going to vote for the next candidate Pepsi or candidate Coke.


Go fuck yourself.

And no, I'm not saying we should get rid of democracy, I'm just saying it sucks. There are possible improvements, but that's for another post.

Look at this truck

From the wrongful shooting that took place in Los Angeles the other day. Police apparently mistook the truck for the murder-spree suspect's.

This was an innocent lady's truck, and yes, she and a passenger were shot (luckily both survived) by seemingly neglignent police officers.

This wrongful shooting took place in what appears to be a neighborhood. And if you look closely at the truck, there are at least 20 bullet holes by my count, that have penetrated it. At least a few of those are at the very top of the cab.

Who the hell trained these guys how to shoot? Elmer Fudd? Elmer Fudd at least had the excuse of a legitimate and cunning target.

There are bullet holes all over that truck. If the police were aiming at all, they even aimed at the passenger! As if stopping the truck depended not only on incapacitating the driver. These women were not armed. Apparently identification of the type of truck is all that is needed to satisfy due process.

Maybe I'm assuming too much, maybe the driver of the truck tried to flee. But either way, the shooting pattern on that truck indicates some very poor control of fire. They're lucky no one else in the neighborhood took a stray bullet. If there were a good reason for gun control, this would be it.

I've circled the bullet-holes that were near misses on top of the cab, and several more apparently aimed at the passenger

I hope the driver and passenger sue.

Police perjury

I have been thinking this for years.

If, in a court of law, the issue at hand comes down to just a he-said, she-said and one of those persons happens to be a cop, that testimony shouldn't be considered any more or less true (unless the other person's account is an obvious lie AND the officer's account is factually unquestionable).

Why would we give dirtbag criminal suspects an equal footing with law enforcement? Because that could be you standing there, and the only thing preventing you from years of absolute misery is that cop's word. I don't trust anyone that much, let alone a guy I never met.

I mean why, in a court of law, would we give one person's testimony more weight than another's?  Especially if the defendant is presumed innocent! It's foolish to think police officers are somehow inherently more honest. Tell me how they are more honest than the rest of us? Show your work!

I was reminded of this via a commenter at Classical Values, by this NYT op/ed.  Almost shocking, but definietely sad:

But are police officers necessarily more trustworthy than alleged criminals? I think not. Not just because the police have a special inclination toward confabulation, but because, disturbingly, they have an incentive to lie. In this era of mass incarceration, the police shouldn’t be trusted any more than any other witness, perhaps less so.

The right to your own name

I always thought it was self-evident that people had a basic human right to their own name. I still do, which makes me think Iceland isn't so cool after all (haha what a stupid pun):

A 15-year-old Icelandic girl has been granted the right to legally use the name given to her by her mother, despite the opposition of authorities and Iceland's strict law on names.

Reykjavik District Court ruled Thursday that the name "Blaer" can be used. It means "light breeze."

The decision overturns an earlier rejection by Icelandic authorities who declared it was not a proper feminine name. Until now, Blaer Bjarkardottir had been identified simply as "Girl" in communications with officials.

"I'm very happy," she said after the ruling. "I'm glad this is over. Now I expect I'll have to get new identity papers. Finally I'll have the name Blaer in my passport."

Like a handful of other countries, including Germany and Denmark, Iceland has official rules about what a baby can be named. Names are supposed to fit Icelandic grammar and pronunciation rules — choices like Carolina and Christa are not allowed because the letter "c'' is not part of Iceland's alphabet.

But seriously, if people can't name their own son or daughter, or even themselves as they see fit, it makes you wonder how these cultures regard free expression. And these are supposedly Western cultures! Are there more examples of Iceland's chilling effects (hurr, pun or not it fits!)?

Well good thing Blaer won. Now excuse me while I change my name to Ꮺ$#^☺æɣ☢.

This made my day

Hahahaha:

Police officers in Seattle, Washington held their first gun buyback program in 20 years this weekend, underneath interstate 5,  and soon found that private gun collectors were working the large crowd as little makeshift gun shows began dotting the parking lot and sidewalks. Some even had “cash for guns” signs prominently displayed.

Robot & Frank

I don't typically do movie reviews, primarily because it feels like writing a lit review for college. So let's just call this a movie suggestion instead.

Frank and Robot casing a joint

Robot & Frank is a wonderful movie with a moderate amount of cleverness, good storytelling, and the whole robot-as-friend gimmick works remarkably well.  In fact, the robot reminded me of GERTY, the robot from Moon. I would go so far as to say Frank's relationship with the robot parrallels in many ways with Sam Bell's and GERTY's relationship.

It is sort of a refreshing movie; it's a sci-fi without being all sci-fi-y. A fun and sad little dramedy without being too sad, nor too funny. Just enough to leave you wanting more. Maybe that's why it's only 85 minutes or so.

I must say it has been one of the better movies I've seen in a while. Thoroughly enjoyable if you care more about characters and story than explosions and boobs. I mean I like explosions and boobs, but without good story it's basically porn.

So yeah, Robot & Frank. I guess I should give you a reason to see it, rather than just my word. Well, here's a taste: Frank is an old guy living alone with Alzheimer's who used to be a professional cat-burglar. Worried about Frank's health, his son gets him a robot to help take care of him. At first, Frank despises the robot and resents his son for getting him a babysitter. But after spending some time with the robot, Frank learns that it has certain advantages in not-so-legal activities.

I would go further but I don't want to spoil how Frank "persuades" his robot to be a partner in crime. That part is done very well. If you have time, go see it.


Edit: I found the trailer. I watched the movie and wrote this review suggestion before watching the trailer. I feel like the trailer gives too much away, so kinda-sorta semi-spoiler alert:

Top 7 reasons to NOT watch a presidential inauguration

Yes you read that right. I'm not saying this because I dislike Obama's politics, or because I heard his inauguration speech was overly political.

I'm saying it because inaugurations are increasingly pompous, gaudy, ritualistic, overdone celebrations of political victory, two and a half months after the original victory speeches. The president is a public servant, not royalty.

So, here are the top 7 reasons why you shouldn't watch, let alone attend a presidential inauguration:

1.  No matter what the newly elected/relected president says, the inauguration speech will be of no consequence to your life. Really.


2.  They are full of mindless platitudes and cliches, or if not, cheap political attacks rhetorically dressed as visionary leadership.


3.  The State of the Union address is only a short time after the inauguration, is slightly more informative, is more relevant to current issues, and is usually much more entertaining.


4.  Does the president really need any more celebratory attention? He (or she) is the most covered person in media throughout the world; watching the inauguration only encourages such royalty-like status.


5.  Despite the sensationalism, it is not that culturally significant. Want to be a part of history? Well try doing something that doesn't happen every 4 years.


6.  If you must, you can read the transcript and/or watch news coverage of the inauguration later, at your convenience, which won't take up half the day.


7.  Unless you just woke up from a deep coma, watching the inauguration will not make you a better citizen, nor will it make you more politically knowledgable. Inauguration speeches tell you virtually nothing about the president's policies, but on the off chance it does, it will be horrendously one-sided (see #2).

So there you have it. Inaugurations are a waste of time, and in my opinion are a disservice to our collective poltical knowledge and heritage. IF you really want to be politically knowlegeable, study the political philosophies of both parties, avoid the speeches aimed at the general population and watch the speeches aimed at the candidate's base: they will tell you much more about a candidate's position.

But most importantly, figure out your own political philosophy. Not just a vague idea of what sounds good to you, but a guiding philosopy that makes sense, that you fundamentally agree with. Once you know that, the rest will follow.

Classical Liberalism and Libertarianism (these two are closely related)

Progressivism

Conservatism

In defense of Video Games & Hollywood

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. Played by millions. Surprisingly, pixelated bullets have not caused an epidemic of murderous sociopaths pillaging their way accross rivers of blood.

The blaming of violence on video games (particulary violent, first person shooter games), and violent hollywood films is getting ridiculous.

This is coming from the left and the right, and although it tends to get political, it's actually less about politics and more about ignorance.

Who you ask is pointing the finger at games and film? Old people. Stupid old people who don't know what MMORPG means, are no longer entertained by violent films, and couldn't figure out how to turn on an Xbox to save their life.

If this sounds mind-numbingly familiar to you, it's because we've all had this discussion before. Remember the outrage and controversy over the game Grand Theft Auto? Yeah, it turned out that it was just a video game, not a mass-recruitment for MS13.

There has been an explosion of video games, especially violent video games just in the last decade. And thanks to improving technology, these games are looking more realistic every day.  You would think, even if the violent video games flooding American homes in the last decade had a shred of influence on physical violence, our crime rate would reflect that. After all, millions of kids and adults alike, play these games on a daily basis. But no, violent crime is going down.

There are even benefits from playing video games.



Movies. We all love movies. Except for some (old) people.

Apparently movies, just like video games, are turning our kids' brains to mush, except the part where it turns them into highly efficient killing machines. You would think with such rhetoric being repeated ad nauseam, Hollywood does a better job of training soldiers than our own military. I don't really want to test that theory, but if killing needs to be done, I'm still pretty sure professional soldiers would do a better job of it.

[You are getting sleepy, very sleepy. Now you must go buy lots of guns and indiscriminately shoot people]

I agree violence can be done poorly in movies. Gratuitous, excessive violence is really just poor film-making especially when it doesn't advance the plot. But it can be done well; even disgusting, bloody, horrific violence can be tasteful in the right context.  And it serves a valuable purpose.  There is not only the action to get one's attention, but emotion, suspense, and consequences that tell a part of a larger story; many times without the violence it would make the film a lot less interesting.

Imagine Saving Private Ryan, only nobody gets shot. D-Day happened of course, but it was summarized by narration. Or maybe people get shot, but there's no blood, and nobody gets blown to pieces. Now there's a lot less suspense, and while the consequences are technically the same, they are significantly less dramatic. In the end you get a crappier, less realistic movie.

But there is no real, hard proof that violence in media increases violence in society. I mean, television, film, games, especially violence in media really didn't take off until say, the 80s (that's when it was ubiquitious). And now there's the internet with more free media violence available than ever before.

Yet global violence is down, even warfare.

Unfortunately, stupid old people run the government, and they like to make rules for the rest of us, even if those rules have no scientific basis, or a snowflake's chance in hell of working. But hey, if it makes a few old people feel better, we all should be grateful to suffer for them. Or we can tell them to stop fucking with our freedom.

Sigh.

You think Piers Morgan would have learned something, anything about rifles, or guns in general since he started basking in the anti-2nd Amendment spotlight. Sadly, no.

 Hey Piers, aside from caliber and aesthetics, these two rifles are essentially the same. Neither of them are assault rifles, neither are machine guns, neither is more or less lethal (actually the bottom rifle has a larger caliber, so...). They shoot exactly the same way as each other, at exactly the same rate: 1 pull of the trigger = 1 shot fired and no more.



AR-15:

Remington Auto-loading:

"But, but you can modify those evil black rifles to shoot a zillion rounds per second with just a screw driver" you say? No, you can't.

Obviously, this is already illegal, but I must confess it can be done. Someone with enough determination and wanton disregard for the law can alter just about any semi-auto to become fully auto, if he had the right tools, skills, and knowledge. But a bad guy who does that is not about to be stopped by any gun law you can imagine.

Chart of the day

via Coyoteblog and Mark Perry

Roundup of 'Obama gun memes'

Of the image variety:

And a few others for good measure:

I could post these all day: