Random
catdynamics | May 31, 2007It is a blue friday, somewhere, and we precognitively ask the Mighty iPod One as topical question of stellar importance, remembering that we have the reduced traveling set...
So, oh mighty iPod One: what is the deal with pulsars in globular clusters? Are they high mass single progenitors with anomalous cooling, or are they low mass electron capture supernovae descendants, formed in intermediate mass binaries?
Whoosh goes the randomizer.
Whoosh.
The Covering: Get Over You - Undertones
The Crossing: Always Look On The Bright Side of Life - Monty Python
The Crown: The Selecter - The Selecter…
catdynamics | May 31, 2007Lubos makes a provocative comment to my contemplation of Griffin's comments on climate change
I can't resist following it up, despite its inappropriateness.
Consider war.
People are killed in war, but we as a culture distinguish the manner and motive.
Let us ignore the issue of "who started it" and just consider the process.
People fighting the war kill their opponent, it is a matter of kill or be killed and is broadly considered justified.
People die incidentally to the process of fighting. The "collateral casualties". This is an inevitable consequence of the process as it is conducted in…
catdynamics | May 28, 2007if you have a fine strong piece of metal, one you can barely bend, you can still break it with a bit of patient persistence
repeated bending will lead to metal fatigue, cracks will nucleate and migrate, then grow, until suddenly there is catastrophic failure.
Not from any stress that on its own would break the piece, but rather from persistent cumulative light stress that concentrates flaws into weak points until a finely engineered working tool falls to pieces.
On a completely unrelated issue, here is a zoomable chart of US Army division deployment during world war II.
Out of almost 100…
catdynamics | May 27, 2007Y Ranter looks at current disposition and predicates
I think he is right, the US doesn't have the forces or the political positioning.
For the paranoid, there is clearly a ramp-up to prepare for some political forcing of the issue in September, predicated on whatever happens in August...
The US now has no naval or army reserves, near as I can tell, but they could make a mess of things in september if they forced carrier rotation again and overlapped army unit rotation in a double surge.
Then the US is done, it can only react.
Situation would be further complicated by 2008 DoD appropriations…
catdynamics | May 25, 2007Steve was right...
Unclassified memo to forces in Iraq on the News Blog.
Hubris Sonic is covering for Steve G. who is critically ill.
Logistic interruptions for US forces in Iraq? Theater wide? WTF?!
UPDATE: Pat Lang speculates on causes - is it ambushes of convoys or failure to surge enough support units with the added combat troops?
As tempting as the latter explanation is, it doesn't quite make sense - the total number of added combat troops was not that large compared to all units in theater, and this seems to be affecting the bases, not field units who are presumably eating a lot of…
catdynamics | May 25, 2007Hot Friday, and I just deleted this post by accident...
Oh, mighty iPod One, the committee has reached a conclusion and filed a report.
What is in store for Beyond Einstein?
The Covering: Twenty Four Hours - Joy Division
The Crossing: Búkalú - Stuðmenn
The Crown: Vorið Góða Græ:nt og Hlýtt
The Root: Late Night, Maudlin Street - Morrissey
The Past: A La Volette - Sien Diels
The Future: Get Your Hands off My Woman - Darkness
The Questioner: Fljúga Hvíu Fiðrildin
The House: It Says Here (Alternate Version) - Billy Bragg
The Inside: Mansion on the Hill - Crooked Fingers
The Outcome:…
catdynamics | May 17, 2007Friday flies forth
And we ask the Mighty iPod One: oh, mighty iPod One, can we really achieve extremely high contrast optical astronomical imaging through negative refraction index superlenses?
Whoosh goes the randomizer.
Whoosh.
The Covering: Móðir - Ego
The Crossing: Lullaby
The Crown: The Prince - Madness
The Root: Baggy Trousers - Madness
The Past: Sleep Little One, Sleep
The Future: Like That - Undertones
The Questioner: Do Anything You Wanna Do - Eddy and the Hot Rods
The House: She Can Only Say No - Undertones
The Inside: The Right Profile - Clash
The Outcome: Let's Talk About Girls…
catdynamics | May 16, 2007score
Criminal Minds on CBS had its season finale.
Overdramatic
But, in the penultimate scene the "Greg" lead character confronts his boss, a senior FBI officer and profiles her to make his case for keeping her job.
Top of the pile in the FBI boss's office is SEED Magazine.
The March '07 "TRUTH" issue.
Now if they could just get the magazine into airport newsagents...
catdynamics | May 16, 2007some principles must hold for persistence of civic society
and sometimes we link because it is important to do so
catdynamics | May 15, 2007Unconfirmed report on CommonDreams that the White House wanted to put three carriers in the Persian Gulf in early April by having the Nimitz get there early.
Supposedly Admiral Fallon refused to do this, which is curious and problematic in itself.
On the one hand putting three carriers in the gulf is tantamount to a declaration of war, on the other hand CENTCOM commander does not make policy. The story implies Fallon was asked to request the carrier to provide cover and refused to do so, which is slightly plausible.
Quite weird, and quite worrying in view of Cheney's recent bluster and…
catdynamics | May 14, 2007Fascinating post on Scott's shtetl-optimized on logical inference, religion and the parsimony of evolutionary optimised reasoning
Read the whole thing.
There is always a worry that scientific rationalism is a darwinian dead-end, in that it is suboptimal for reproductive fitness, and Scott touches on that. Mathematics, beyond basic arithmetic, may be a peacock feather in the long run. Or not, the fitness landscape changes and memes, not just genes, compete.
We don't just reproduce, we convert...
More important is the cognitive dissonance: Scott thinks prevention of suffering is a good basis…
catdynamics | May 13, 2007So I'm catching up on stuff.
And I come across a short in Science (314, 1231 24 Nov 2006) on the resignation of the head of the US census bureay and his deputy.
Ok, interesting. It comes after a new Commerce Secretary is appointed. BFD.
Well, the Census Bureau does the census - coming up in 2010 - which detemines congressional seat allocation, could that be it? In particular, is the fight over the "undercount" correction at issue?
(There is a robust argument that the Census should do a "completeness correction" to correct for underreporting on census forms, and it is known that poor people…
catdynamics | May 11, 2007It is windy friday and we ask the Mighty iPod One, in the spirit of the soon to be news: a ring of dark matter? Really?
Whoosh goes the randomizer.
Whoosh.
The Covering: Strax í Dag - Stuðmenn
The Crossing: Wonderland - XTC
The Crown: Splunkunýtt Lag - Stuðmenn
The Root: Death or Glory - Clash
The Past: Do You Really Want To Hurt Me? - Violent Femmes
The Future: Sigurður er Sjómaður
The Questioner: Út íVeður og Vind - Stuðmenn
The House: Four Ruffles and Flourishes
The Inside: Móðir - Ego
The Outcome: Afgan - Stríð og Friður
Hm, I forgot I only had the reduced set of obscure music on this…
catdynamics | May 11, 2007For Mother's Day: "Betty Friedan Honored With Second-Class Postage Stamp"
Onion Special Issue
(h/t FSP)
One of these funny but makes you cry issues.
catdynamics | May 10, 200725 years ago I flew to the UK, after having been completely out of touch with all media for a week, and found the country was at war.
This was particularly awkward because traveling in our group was a young Argentinian woman, with a broken leg, who didn't know either.
Her family were prominent opponents of the Argentinian government, and had she been deported, as was the immigration peoples' first instinct, she would assuredly have "disappeared".
Fortunately sanity prevailed.
In the meantime, the Y-Ranter revisits history and dissects the myth of the warpart I and part II
and now part III…
catdynamics | May 10, 2007Brad deLong explains the issue with Wolfowitz and the World Bank, succinctly
catdynamics | May 9, 2007Most universities have both office specific keys and more general "master keys", I have observed a curious trend among those keys.
The "F" keys - those that open only the inner sanctum of faculty offices, closed seminar rooms and coffee supply cupboards - as opposed to the more general building keys, or keys for student offices - are "pointier", and this means they are far superior for opening bottles.
Using keys to open bottles, specifcially beer bottles, is an old survival skill from student days; particularly useful now that it is almost impossible to travel with tools, like bottle…
catdynamics | May 4, 2007Sunny, sunny friday at home!
So, we cheerfully skip to The Mighty iPod One and ask blithely:
oh, Mighty iPod, will we be seeing some interestingly habitable planets in the zone soon?
Whoosh goes the randomizer.
Whoosh.
The Covering: When Love Comes to Town - U2
The Crossing: If I didn't Lover You - Squeeze
The Crown: Forse la soglia attinse - Pavarotti
The Root: Billie's Blues - Billie Holiday
The Past: Still Ill - The Smiths
The Future: Let's Do Rock Steady - Bodysnatchers
The Questioner: Þá líður okkur vel - Hemmi Gunn
The House: I Sing of a Maiden - King's College Choir
The Inside: The…
catdynamics | May 2, 2007I was watching Olbermann's Countdown tuesday night, and a minor point has been irritating me all day.
He was discussing the infamous "Mission Accomplished" stunt four years ago, and his guest, who I think was a radio show person, made some sarcastic comment about the receiving line for Bush being colour co-ordinated for show - she was quite scathing about it (Bush walking through a line of ~ dozen brightly clad crew, paired in bright primary colour shirts - blue, yellow, red etc - to be welcomed aboard by the ship's officers).
This instantly hit my "you gotta be kidding" button.
It seemed…