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Showing posts from July, 2009

People who infuriate me into Generalizing

from this thread http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.php?p=827896&postcount=19 Some insight: http://video.nytimes.com/video/2009/06/25/business/1194841179365/generation-r.html [QUOTE=Crakkerjakk;827896] Bull. SEALs go through a rigorous selection process that guarantees that before training they are already better than 95+% of the population. Then, yes, they get greater training than others. But a large portion of the initial selection process is weeding out a substantial portion of the population. They are "better" than most other people even before their training, by definition .[/QUOTE] Who said universities aren't picky? ever tried applying for harvard? So people who actually fight over slots in places like a university arent' as 95%+ of the population? and Accountants? c'mon its like comparing soldiers to support technical personel, not even the same grade. The closest thing to State funded human development outside of war was the space project. Comparis

The latest from Condell : Pharyngula

The latest from Condell : Pharyngula Posted using ShareThis I'm all for his message and think more people should be aware of it.

Soccer is better than basket ball!?

The title (which has the link) reflects what a soccer player would take from this article. I wonder if the full court press is still being used today? The Trillion Credit Squadron Tournament, should have Changed the rules to accommodate the Naval Traditions they had instead of having a bunch of assuming that the rules the made accomodated their naval traditions. The AI in question, which i'm happy to observe, has its roots in game theory and system analysis. Of course its better than humans in the way, few humans can tackle the problem without the human mind making a bunch of assumptions. Assumptions :P the bane of reason?

Heart Burn

I went to the emergency last night for heart burn. Basically it feels like there is something quite stuck in my throat and I have chest pains. It was sudden but I've been piecing things together and I guess its been a long thing coming. Stress, Dieting, Forgetting to eat has pushed my system this far. I really should have an examination of the damage done. The thought that acid is gurgling at places not designed to hold them is scaring me. Could not go to work today, the convenience of one's family owning the business. Something like this constitutes an emergency. I was so scared because It felt like my heart was struggling and It was so painful i thought my some part of my body would give. Oh well, now I should eat, and eat often. Time to carry a bunch of snacks with me.

Joined some Orgs

Joined the Philippine Humanists Athiests groups. About time since I keep talking about my faith on my blog, I might as well participate and learn whats going on.

Bye bye Blue collars

I was talking to my wife about the economic situation again on the trip home from her mothers. Interestingly enough, the Idea I had was in line in a recent new york times article . The idea is nothing new, I've been talking about it considering my hypothesis of migrating labor and population, and shifting the majority hopefully from working class towards skilled professional class. Right now I've been looking at its effect in a quite simple manner that I hope i can communicate well. Given that we're learning about the recession: that there was a surplus of spending power that that had nothing substantial to back it, spending has come to pretty much a serious halt, for the rest of the world and especially for the united states. Considering that this caused a Loss of Jobs, one would begin to wonder on the macro principle of economics: That as long as there is a population there are jobs specializing to support every aspect of it. So, just because the whole world lost a ton of

Something that Cheered me up!

Source from pharyngula

A Loophole in Existance

The book isn't very clear though is it? What kind of average? Mean? Median? Mode? This is why we have clarifications, FAQs and such. At any rate, I think you are missing my point. I'm saying that IQ 10 doesn't mean anything differently in 1453 than it does in 2009. Therefore the 1453 equivalent of a template that in 2009 would have a modestly high IQ (like 11-12) such a template for a military officer or national politician perhaps, shouldn't have genius level intelligence. Of course I intentionally chose to fail my Control Rating Roll to stop myself short of Trolling this remark. It basically is SO Frustratingly ...SSSSSSTUPID! Basically, the guy is telling us to compare IQs Irregardless of population standards! So I get all the greek philosophers who developed/discovered empirical thought and scale them with todays standards. Consider that it was when we had probably a world population of 20M comparing it to a population of what is now 6 Billion! ARRRGGGG Sigh...

Foot in my Mouth, or some anatomical impossibility

Got to talk to my best man . I really screwed up, really really screwed up. :( Public apologies to my friend who saw my really nasty side. Sigh, I've burned enough bridges to know that If i want to be "normal" and amicable then I have to vent this sh*t out properly and let time run through. I'm not even defending my own points I made, I can be very tempestuous and totally irrational that I KNOW that I am wrong. thats why i don't use real names. I know I'm wrong but it takes some time for me to come around and its just shocking that I really put my foot up my ass. I feel soo bad, as my best friend put it, its like my mom caught me shaking the sheriff bad. I just feel sooo bad :(( Well, on the bright side, it over, I learned something and have a bad enough memory to BURN the lesson into my subconcious. I'm not going to stop ranting of course, I'm just going to be less sloppy about it. I'm perfectly happy that the knowledge of this blog is not going t

Writing and Hoping

The summary came out well. I've been sometime in between fear and growing confidence to write the Mahadlika story but I've gotten an chapter one summary down. Its down and I'm ironing out the motives, the structure and the words "between the lines" elements that comes with fairly complex interactions of the few characters. I'm more excited to work and start writing but I want to make sure that once I zone out, I have a plan of action and some redoubts to retreat too if I hit a stumbling block. Bottom line, I'm amateur with spelling and grammar problems and my real strength is Phil History and Story Telling from Gming. Character Drama is something I've been trying to observe in the stories I'm reading and realized how subtle and the economic use of words comes in creating the best impact (not the most) for a given situation. Looking at my original outline from 2 years ago, a lot has changed in how I've learned the plot can be best told with auth

Liking what I choose

I've chosen Ubuntu , I admit it was hard and the time investment was considerable. In hindsight though, I think I invested as much as I did when I tried to get the hang of windows anyway. The penny arcade discussion about choice in their recent comic got me to thinking about my own commercial choices. Right now I'm working with a Windows Vista, but if or when my time arrives I plan to move towards Ubuntu in all my business transaction. Consider that I don't pay Microsoft or anyone else, any more than the customizing and business specific needs I am willing to pay for when it comes to a Linux computer. When I think about it a little more, considering that there are SO many varieties of Linux, Linux has their own OS-Tan roster . these days other than my other little distracting projects, i'm considering when I can get the time to translate all my Adobe and 3ds Max skills into ther Open Source Version. Considering how much 3d capabilities of Blender is enough for a basic

A Bad Jaw and the Return of the Fatty thingys

The left side of my face inflamed :( It seems that those fatty bumps have slid to my jaw's joint (because I sleep on my left side). I cannot fully open my mouth and I really need to find out what the hell is happening to my jaw. When i open my mouth, my left side bulges so much that my glasses move. ARGGG!!! A medical anomaly, right there along with my wife's unusual belly b problems. I'm afraid if I open my mouth fully I will dislodge my jaw. I scheduled an appointment with my TMJ doctor and hope things improve by tomorrow. Damn Facebook! I dont have time to waste in facebook. Arggg... I got out of Friendster and found a ton of better things to do. Social networking is such a disadvantage because its "reactive" and eats up so much attention. I have to react with an escalating amount of people that reduces the quality of each interaction to that of token bits. What is interestingly unusual is the distant relationships you create when all you have is a bunch of re

A definite whack on my Faith!

My GM disallowed me from taking Secularist humanism for discipline of faith for a character as it doesnt count as a religion? But discipline of faith The problem with this is how do you define Faith? there is no GURPS definition of it, and the dictionary definition has too many cultural afflicted terminology to it. Here is the game rules of the disadvantage: Disciplines of Faith You live by a strict set of rules in order to achieve a greater understanding of your faith. This might be a personal decision or a requirement of your religion. Such rules are optional in many faiths, though – indeed, some religions might forbid them as excesses! What set of rules do Secularists follow? The wikipedia tenents is a helpful guide . Does it affect my personal decisions? Yes, I can't just do something and justify it as "God told me to do it!" or twist it around to suit my circumstance. Are they a form of rules in order to achieve a greater understanding of my belief structure or fait

Writing Mojo

Black Jack Geary. I'm reading the Lost Fleet by John G. Henry. I like it a lot, and Ir has given me a better mood, from after the Vatta's War stint. Reading it makes me make up my mind in what kind of space battles I can write about given my Point of view concerning technology trends. Information Age . the Unique educational opportunity opened up by the Information Age is quite interesting and has certain trends that has a profound change in the future of skills and efficiency. particularly in the field of attention, education, information management, skills, and experiences. I'm not pertaining to virtual or augmented reality, the implication of brain taping, or some other fantastic technology change, instead of the Mental Discipline required in order to survive and grow in the the Data saturated future created by the information Age. The Discipline to be able to analyze memes, cultural patters and traditions, and to critcise information's accuracy, source and point of

I stopped reading the book

Engaging the Enemy . I've reached a point I'm angry at what I'm reading. "Engaging the Enemy" is the third book of Vatta's War. I'm half way through simply on the merit of Elizabeth Moons previous books: Serrano Legacy and the Speed of Dark. What Was Wrong: Right to Bear Arms 101. The NPCs and the badguys are unbelievably juvenile and clueless. I'm at the part where she is at a station and her arguments for self defense has been an over simplification on the philosphy of armed defense. Characters who are cops, administrators of autonomous entities, and the setting in general doesnt have a concept of armed vigilance as what was the established philosophy of the "right to bear arms". Sci Fi and Tech . I know the author hasn't heard of "tight beam" which is basically a powerful and directed laser transmition used by the more tech savy sci-fi writers for the "secure" transmision, because part of it exists today and the pr

Writing and Reading.

Kath . thanks for the support, maybe I could just write an outline and see where it leads me. Vatta's War. I'm reading the 3rd book- engaging the enemy. I have a small complaint with the book: it seems that the enemy and all the non-major cast are too conspiratorial. If I were to break down the events and outline, the bad guys seem to be diffuse, disorganized and has almost unlimited resources. I find the adversaries in Vorkosigan Saga and Honerverse more believable because of their limits and predictability. In Vatta's war the police are all stupid and lacking of common sense. The main characters deal a lot with the law enforcement doesnt seem to have some basic common sense. I know its not a detective story or I understand difference of modern taste when it comes to crime related story and the their proliferation in todays media but the Police in the story lacks the ability to not take everything at first glance. For law enforcement and supposedly one of the more people

The urge to write

Suppressing the Urge to lose my time writing is quite strong. Especially since having read so many books of late. Going through so many book too quickly can reveal several story organizational patterns and basics of how to organize. Of course the skills I learned in Story Telling as a GM comes in useful in looking a this in other angles. I've finished the Serrano Trilogy and found it interesting and fun. Although I've been spoiled by David Weber naval battle orchestration. I keep coming back to what I've learned in Management, Organization and Entrepreneurship when I think about military endeavors. In such a small span of time Webber, Bujold, and Moon. I'll try to start at lost fleet soon. Right now, I feel like writing my own story since i have ideas how to characterise characters for my Mahadlika Setting. I've been reading up alot of heroines and given the current voices of writers mixing in my head, I fell like I've read up on enough variety to know how I wan

Doubt

Got this from PZ. I wish I got a chance to learn this or to be with people like this earlier in my life. I would have been less confused and all around better. All I can do is probably give another generation a chance I didn't have.