Snow, for a Time

For this week's post about things I enjoy, I'll display some snapshots I took during last weekend's snowfall in Boston. Snow can be especially beautiful around the time it falls, but it does get ugly and nasty quickly, and this foot of snow definitely had by Monday.

Fortunately, the mercury hit a blistering thirty-six degrees yesterday and the streets finally cleared enough that I could wear normal shoes again. (Don't get me started on the funk snow boots can track in if you don't take them off...) You might as well add, "not having to put boots on/take them off every time I leave/enter my house when Christmas shopping," to the list of things I like, too!

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Needless to say, with Christmas just around the corner, I walked around to the front of that last building at bottom right to get a better shot of the wreath. At right is the cropped image.

In any event, I hope you enjoy these photos. I unfortunately do not have time to comment on them at any more length as I will have a plane to catch in a few hours.

This will be my last post until January 4 or possibly January 5. As usual this time of year, I take a week completely off from blogging and enjoy the holidays.

Here's wishing you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year!

See you in 2010!

-- CAV

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Quick Roundup 494

A Small, but Telling Lack of Selfishness

Glenn Reynolds notes, "A small but telling, example of government waste."

At the link, Ilya Somin discusses an Indiana Jones-esque government repository of gifts from foreign governments to U.S. officials, who are not allowed to keep them by law. He quotes a story from the Washington Post that indicates that foreign governments almost certainly know that the nominal recipients are barred from keeping the gifts.

Somin then sensibly recommends auctioning the items off -- but in an update, he caves in when some of his commenters plead that doing so would "offend foreign governments."

Still, it's possible that the gifts should only be auctioned off some years after they are given, by which time foreign officials are less likely to keep track of them. Alternatively, the gifts can be donated to charities that can then use the proceeds to help the poor; it would be difficult for foreign opinion to take offense at that. [bold added]

So we're supposed to treat with kid gloves a foreign government that ignored our laws (and possibly even attempted to bribe an official) and, when we act on knowledge that all parties have (that these expensive items are gathering dust), we are supposed to pretend that having these gifts do as much good as possible for the American people (the real sovereigns in this country, anyway) is somehow an ignoble enterprise.

I would feel safe betting that Somin, as a libertarian, sees no need to consider making a moral case for capitalism, and yet here he is making what he regards as an unassailable moral argument. Is this a cynical exercise in pragmatism or is he a committed altruist? In either case, he plainly sees defending freedom on moral grounds as less "practical," else he would advocate capitalism on moral grounds. Seeing that he posits altruism -- a type of morality -- as incontestable, indicates to me that he knows on some level that the purpose of our government, the protection of individual rights, is in some way incompatible with altruism.

This blindness to or evasion of the importance of grasping the proper moral principles underlying capitalism causes him not only to fold like a cheap lawn chair when his (good) gut reaction to this example of government waste came into question, but it causes him to miss a lesson our leaders have badly needed for some time.

Our leaders should auction off these gifts and, if questioned about it, proudly explain that these gifts properly belong to the American people, that they accepted these symbolic gifts as servants of their people, and that they auctioned them off as the best way to serve their people -- by becoming better able to protect their individual rights through the funds.

American leaders, at least before Barack Obama, did not bow to foreign dignitaries, and we had no trouble explaining (nor foreign governments accepting) that this was because we hold all men as equal. Why not also make the case that we regard all men as morally entitled to the pursuit of their own self-interest -- and our government obligated to protect them from coercion as they do so? Why not say something like, "I thank you for this generous gift on behalf of the American people whom I am sworn to protect," and auction it off for that purpose at some later date? If pressed on the sale later, thank the donor again for generously making more funds available for the protection of the American people.

I am sure that since his gift was really intended as an act of goodwill towards the sovereigns of this country, that the donor will take no offense.

Obsolescence

Via Geekpress, I learned of this list of "21 Things that Became Obsolete this Decade."

I mourn the obsolescence of Item 6 (maps) and am holding out against GPS, even in Boston. Also I haven't taken to buying my music off the Internet yet, so Item 15 (CDs) bothers me slightly.

Our Blind Left-Wing Establishment

Commit vandalism as a one-time supporter of an unnamed Democrat and you're an "activist."

Oppose physician slavery as a Senator and not only are you in league with "[t]he birthers, the fanatics, the people running around in right-wing militia and Aryan support groups," but you're marching "in lockstep." (Never mind that the Democrats there had to march in lockstep to the tune of sixty votes.)

In the meantime, Hugo Chavez has announced that he will implement the supermarket version of Barack Obama's public "option" with nary a peep about how similar this is to what is being considered in the Senate.

The blind cannot hold power forever: Either those who can see take power from them or we all collapse into barbarity. We're living Atlas Shrugged here in the United States, but they're getting ready to pick up We the Living and Anthem in Venezuela.

A Deep Fried List

This Southerner enjoys Item 12 (deep fried pickles) once in a blue moon, but he has his limits, and most of the items on this very amusing list fall beyond them.

Just a few off-the-cuff comments: (1) That pop-tart looks like a beignet. (2) Deep fried bacon? Why tamper with perfection? This strikes me as the culinary equivalent of gilding the lily. (3) Someone seems to have missed the lettuce and buns of the "deep fried" hamburger -- not that also frying those would sweeten the deal for me. (4) How do you deep fry coke?

Obama: Putting off Physician Slavery?

According to Hot Air, Barack Obama has suddenly decided to wait until February to attempt to take over the medical sector. That's the good news, such as it is, if it is. The bad news is that now he's going to focus on job creation, which the government is also inherently incapable of.

Heh!

Yes, I think that John F. Kerry does "totally look like" the Snow Miser!

-- CAV

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Sowell: The "Science" Mantra

I am glad to see a widely-read columnist like Thomas Sowell making the points he does about the the global warming debate without reading too much into what the ClimateGate revelations might specifically mean to the scientific arguments over whether the climate is warming and, if so, whether human activity might be the cause. This is precisely the right angle in discussing the "hysteria" (i.e., the push for global coercion), which is distinct from the actual scientific question being used to confuse or preempt debate by the general public.

"Global warming" hysteria is only the latest in this long line of notions, whose main argument is that there is no argument, because it is "science." ...

Factual data are crucial in real science. Einstein himself urged that his own theory of relativity not be accepted until it could be empirically verified. This verification came when scientists around the world observed an eclipse of the sun and discovered that light behaved as Einstein's theory said it would behave, however implausible that might have seemed beforehand.

Today, politicized "science" has too big a stake in the global warming hysteria to let the facts speak for themselves and let the chips fall where they may. ...

People who talk about the corrupting influence of money seem to automatically assume that it is only private money that is corrupting. But, when governments have billions of dollars invested in the global warming crusade, massive programs underway and whole political careers at risk if that crusade gets undermined, do not expect the disinterested search for truth.

Among the intelligentsia, there have always been many who are ready to jump on virtually any bandwagon that will take them to the promised land, where the wise and noble few-- like themselves-- can take the rest of us poor dummies in hand and tell us how we had better change the way we live our lives.

I would have liked to see Sowell standing up for private funding of science, as well as a sentence or two to the effect that government control of the economy is immoral. (The latter is precisely how the leftist intelligentsia intend to take us dummies into the promised land: by force.) Nevertheless, Sowell has succeeded in bringing up several crucial points: that high-pressure salesmanship by a scientist is a red flag, that government money does not somehow ritualistically purify those on whom it falls, and that scientists should not be treated as if they are our philosopher-kings.

-- CAV

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Spiritual Bankruptcy

It is hardly a surprise that a committed altruist would extol shoplifting.

Delivering his festive lesson, Father [Tim] Jones told the congregation: 'My advice, as a Christian priest, is to shoplift. I do not offer such advice because I think that stealing is a good thing, or because I think it is harmless, for it is neither.

'I would ask that they do not steal from small family businesses, but from large national businesses, knowing that the costs are ultimately passed on to the rest of us in the form of higher prices.

'I would ask them not to take any more than they need, for any longer than they need.'

Color me unsurprised, but hardly jaded. It is an outrage that someone to whom others look for moral guidance could condone theft under any circumstance. Father Jones is as morally bankrupt as they come.

What is perhaps less apparent, but no less remarkable is the declaration of spiritual bankruptcy also evident in his sermon. Consider the notion that theft from a big corporation is somehow better than theft from a mom-and-pop store. Is a shareholder or a customer of such a corporation any less violated simply because the impact of such a theft might seem to be proportionally less, or because it is impossible to say precisely who suffers from such crime? Of course not.

Indeed, big corporations, due to their size, are often among our greatest benefactors as measured by their ability to bring large numbers of paying customers excellent value. Should their owners, invisible or not, have a pack of shoplifters as their reward? According to Father Jones, they should.

It is common today for people to regard theft from big, "faceless" corporations as somehow not really stealing. Many such people do not think in abstractions well enough to see that they are, in fact, violating fellow human beings when they do, or the abstraction of a corporation makes it easier for them to evade the fact that they are stealing. Father Jones quite obviously doesn't see the owners or customers of large corporations as human beings. He furthermore doesn't see the "haves" as having rights.

The inexorable logic of Father Jones's altruism thus blinds him to achievers as human beings. If you are able, particularly is you are "big" (i.e., successful), you are fair game to legions of people down on their luck. Perhaps, if you're driven out of business as a result, he'll spare you some sympathy and tell you whose pocket you can pick.

It says something about a man -- something not good -- when what it takes to get his notice is your misery.

I cannot recall exactly where I read it, but I have encountered the idea more than once that great historical atrocities against one group or the other were often preceded by depersonalization, by people in a society coming to regard such a group as less-than-human, and thus not worthy of moral consideration or political protection.

Altruism has long goaded people into persecuting businessmen, usually through government regulations and the like. Not that persecuting businessmen through a government intermediary is any less immoral, but this telling people individually to do so is a new low. Whatever debt the idea of individualism might have to Christianity, the ethics of that religion is plainly at odds with it.

We are, it seems, permitted by its light to be wretched, stunted versions of what we potentially could become.

-- CAV

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Quick Roundup 493

Worse than Ellsworth Toohey, Actually

A secular conservative commentator calls a recent column by George Monbiot "environmentalism's real-life equivalent of Toohey's confession," because Monbiot essentially admits to wanting to crush mankind.

That much is true, but I think that pushing such an agenda by appealing to reason and self-interest as Monbiot does makes him worse in an important sense: At least it was hard to mistake Toohey for a champion of reason.

There are legitimate scientific questions pertaining to whether anthropogenic global warming is occurring. However, anyone who falls into Monbiot's trap of squabbling over scientific minutiae when upholding objective political principles is in order is helping him get away with his ruse.

This is not to dismiss science as unimportant, but to reaffirm its proper place in the philosophic hierarchy.

Sales of TOS Prompt Wider Distribution

Good news for anyone who needs it: The Objective Standard is now slated to appear in more newsstands thanks to strong sales.

I needed some good news after this weekend, and this hit the spot.

Monument Builder Gets a Pass

Oscar Niemeyer, a man whose professed aesthetic could pass as the inspiration for Nippopolis in SouthPark's "Major Boobage" episode, recently turned 102. His comment?

Turning 102 is crap, and there is nothing to commemorate.

And yet the very same article goes on to praise his, "love of life," even citing his habit of smoking cigars as evidence for such love.

Actually, I could see that, although I find it debatable in this particular case. However, I have to admit that if I did not already know what a symbol of towering genius this guy is to leftists, I would be flabbergasted that the media could report any indulgence in tobacco products sympathetically.

On the other hand, perhaps this admission so stunned the reporter that any thoughts of soliciting the usually obligatory health-advice-from-a-centenarian questions were stopped dead in their tracks.

There's no lefty like an old lefty.

The "Invention" of the Jewish People Revisited

I missed this, although he actually beat me to the story by a day, but in November SB also discussed the premise of the book, The Invention of the Jewish People, although from a slightly different angle than I:

Without even knowing (never mind evaluating) Professor Sand's specific claims, which the Times describes as a mixture of "respected scholarship with dubious theories," I dismiss his theory out of hand because of the blatant irrationality of its thesis. There should be no claims to property because of one's racial makeup.

That, plus what I said about the Israeli's leaving themselves open to Sand's charges by accepting his premise.

Quote of the Day

"And yes. We do have glass display heads in stock. Doesn't everyone?" -- LB

-- CAV

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NCIS

My favorite televison show by far is NCIS, which I was delighted to see covered recently by The Wall Street Journal. The below quote nicely captures why I like the show, along with why I think its success confounds so many in the media establishment including, perhaps, reporter Amy Chozick:

"NCIS" is proof that even if the economics of the business are in upheaval, large swathes of the audience still want traditional storytelling, righteous heroes, and reality that's not offensively gritty.

CBS executives say the success of "NCIS," which stands for Naval Criminal Investigative Service, rests in the show's levity. In between solving crimes related to the military, "NCIS" star Mark Harmon's Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs and his cohorts exchange witty guy banter and crack jokes, even as they stand over a dismembered corpse.

Yes. I'll take a show with a solid plot and actual moral conflict any day. But as for "reality that's not offensively gritty," I beg to differ, because reality isn't fundamentally gritty.

Commenting on the nature of art, Ayn Rand once said something quite profound that pertains to the offensive grittiness of most modern art. She was speaking of sculpture, but her comments apply equally well to television drama (and I include "'reality' TV" in the genre as naturalist drama):

[C]onsider two statues of man: one as a Greek god, the other as a deformed medieval monstrosity. Both are metaphysical estimates of man; both are projections of the artist's view of man's nature; both are concretized representations of the philosophy of their respective cultures. ("The Psycho-Epistemology of Art," in The Romantic Manifesto, 19.)

The "offensive grittiness" in many television shows isn't reality per se, but the artists' general impression of its essential malevolence. This negative assessment of reality in offensively gritty art both offends me and, because it contradicts mountains of evidence from my own learning and experience to the contrary, it also strikes me as foolishness. The "grittiness" of so many modern artists and entertainers is a pose calculated to distract one from the fundamental sort of ignorance that comes from failing to engage in (actual) reality and, which, in turn, leads to despair. Who needs a gritty-acting Chicken Little as an artist? I don't.

I agree with and prefer the benevolent assessment of reality offered by NCIS, with its engaging and sympathetic protagonists, its captivating stories, and its brand of light humor . Special Agent Jethro Gibbs is motivated by a strong sense of justice, and he leads a highly capable team in its pursuit. I enjoy and highly recommend the show.

-- CAV

PS: Possibly forgetting to fast forward my TiVo at one point during a recent episode of NCIS, I recently saw this old, but brilliant Fruit of the Loom ad.

Writing about it for Ad Week, Mark Dolliver quips that, "I'm not sure whether it's meant as a good-natured homage to the Cirque du Soleil school of performance or as a wicked parody of it."

I think it's both. The ad manages to harness the more spectacular aspects of that type of performance, while aiming a well-placed jab at its peculiar strain of avant-garde pretentiousness.

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Quick Roundup 492

Nancy Pelosi's Idea of a Gift

From a news story about the Democrats' vow to enslave physicians and patients by the time Barack Obama delivers his State of the Union address:

[Pelosi] downplayed differences over the public option for coverage, saying the emphasis had always been on giving consumers an insurance option, not that it be public or government run.

I have just one question: Exactly how the hell is forcing me to buy insurance if I don't want it, telling me what kind to buy if I do, or making me pay for someone else's mandated insurance if she thinks I can afford to "giving" me an "insurance option?"

The Post-Human Left

Being within ten feet of a hippie any time during the last fifty years was only a whiff of things to come:

But then Copenhagen is the triumphant bleat of an inhuman world, a world in which humanity has no more meaning than a mollusk. Had the activists of the left thrown a fraction of the effort they have devoted to Global Warming into the genocide being carried out by the Sudanese regime in Darfur, countless numbers of people might have been saved. Instead the hypocritical jet setters of the left will get on their jets and into their limos, reserve entire hotel floors, gorge themselves on the finest delicacies imported from around the world at the expense of working class taxpayers--all in order to spend trillions of dollars on schemes that will do nothing to fight an imaginary problem that even the dullest of them knows doesn't exist, but that will personally enrich them and their supporters.

We'll forgive author Daniel Greenfield the small error of saying that they see humans and molluscs as perhaps being equally valuable. He's on a roll.

Their most potent political weapon against Homo sapiens is the precautionary principle, forced down our throats by the government.

Sarah Palin Cools on Global Warming

The so-called capitalist who "took on big oil" as Alaska's governor, has been exposed by a global warming alarmist as also being a false opponent of said alarmism.

Sarah Palin is such a cold-eyed skeptic about the Copenhagen summit on climate change that it's no surprise she would call on President Obama not to attend. After all, Obama might join other leaders in acknowledging that warming is a "global challenge." He might entertain "opportunities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions." He might even explore ways to "participate in carbon-trading markets."

Oh, wait. Those quotes aren't from some smug Euro-socialist manifesto. They're from an administrative order Palin signed in September 2007, as governor of Alaska, establishing a "sub-Cabinet" of top state officials to develop a strategy for dealing with climate change.

Palin is not even a Reagan, nor is she an Obama of the Right. She's Obama in drag, flouncing pom-poms to empty cheers for capitalism.

It's not so much that they're at the trough, ...

... it's that there's a trough at all.

This American Thinker article, as interesting as it appears to be, narrowly misses making that point.

So long as what passes for incisive commentary on the welfare state is focused on such things as how well government officials get compensated, we who favor full government protection of individual rights will know that we have our work cut out for us.

-- CAV

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The Young "Astrologer"

My first scientific interest as a child was astronomy, after a flirtation with geology. Not surprisingly, a favorite Christmas gift of mine was a telescope. Both interests were kindled by children's books I'd received as holiday gifts. (The interest in rocks started with a copy of the very book pictured at right, which arrived one year in an Easter basket.) The astronomy book of the same Golden series soon followed. Not long after, my parents bought a set of World Book encyclopedias, which I would devour.

I recalled this today when I got a call from my youngest brother for advice on selecting a telescope for his older son for Christmas. That conversation brought back various formative memories, some pleasant like the ones above and others not so pleasant, but no less formative. All the experiences shaped my intellectual development.

No less important than the excitement of learning about the world was discovering the limitations of those in authority over me. Two products of my voracious reading were that I knew lots of things that many adults did not, and that I had a reputation as someone who did. Both led me early on to develop a highly skeptical view of anyone holding himself out as an authority, benevolent or not.

In sixth grade, our teacher posed us the question of how many moons Jupiter had. Some time between the poor girl's college education and my entering her care, several additional moons had been discovered. I gave the correct number -- at least according to the available knowledge at the time -- and was told that I was wrong. I stuck to my guns anyway, to the point that she looked it up. To her credit, she admitted I was right. From then on, I was acutely aware that a teacher can be mistaken about his material.

Around the same time, our parish priest, obviously trying to be friendly, unintentionally embarrassed me in front of my classmates by referring to me as someone who liked "astrology" -- which I thought even then to be silly. I now suspect that the man simply didn't know the difference between astronomy and astrology, but back then, I assumed that he did. I corrected him, but was perplexed by the fact that the correction seemed to make no difference one way or the other to him. Once again, an authority figure believed something I knew to be false. But it would take me a long time to realize that some adults did not care that they were wrong. That wouldn't come until high school.

During high school my other brother and I ran a paper route for spending money, and one of the more annoying duties was to collect unpaid monthly subscription fees door to door. Mostly, people had simply forgotten and would pay right away, but one time, a guy got several months behind. The possibility didn't occur to me at the time, but he was probably hammered when I showed up to collect. (It was my turn to do the rounds that month.)

The man gave me a hostile rant about all kinds of absurd deficiencies in our service. He rode a bicycle, but we lazily drove cars. He rolled the papers up, but we lazily folded them. Et cetera, et cetera. He refused to pay and eventually became so belligerent that I seized on the first opportunity to leave.

I ended his subscription without notice the next day, and thought that was the end of it until my supervisor mildly scolded me about a complaint from the man's address about a week's worth of "misses." I informed him of my decision and learned that it wasn't mine to make. The man was reinstated as a customer of the paper and I had to resume deliveries at his address, although at least my supervisor would collect from him from now on.

My father, probably because I did not adequately convey how rude and abusive this person was (or because the customer successfully made me look like a jerk), told me that I had been rude and that adults deserved respect. That was the first time I ever found myself disagreeing with my father about a matter of opinion. I kept it to myself, though, because I knew my father to be someone who was conscientious about learning whet he needed to know and forming his opinions. I differed with him, but still respected him -- but I still felt no respect for the deadbeat subscriber. I decided then that respect, or at least my respect, was something that had to be earned. (To be fair, I also suspect my father would agree with such a sentiment.)

And yet, I was hardly a rebellious kid. This was in large part due to the fact that my parents were a foil of honesty against which many other adults of my acquaintance came up short. But it was also due to the fact that I never allowed someone's say-so to override my knowledge, which I always noticed came from various sources, rather than from on high. I consider myself very privileged to have grown up in the kind of stable environment that allowed my mind to develop a normal relationship with reality, rather than atrophy from a constant barrage of such mental abuse as, "Do as I say!" or "What do you know, kid?" or "Who are you to judge?"

I am very grateful to both of them.

-- CAV

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Conflicted Climatologists

Glenn Reynolds points to a news story detailing the numerous conflicts of interest of one Rajendra Kumar Pachauri, an IPCC official. Reynolds rightly notes his abuse of government power as he quotes from the article:

In December 2007, [Pachauri] became a member of the Senior Advisory Board of Siderian ventures based in San Francisco. This is a venture capital business owned by the Dutch multinational business incubator and operator in sustainable technology, Tendris Holding, itself part-owned by electronics giant Philips. It acquired a minority interest in January 2009 in order to "explore new business opportunities in the area of sustainability." As a member of the Senior Advisory Board of Siderian, Dr Pachauri is expected to provide the Fund and its portfolio companies "with access, standing and industry exposure at the highest level."

I have no quarrel with Reynolds, but I do have a question.

If, as Wikipedia puts it at the start of its article on the subject, "A conflict of interest ... occurs when an individual or organization is involved in multiple interests, one of which could possibly corrupt the motivation for an act in the other," [formatting dropped] when will people stop taking for granted government funding and "supervision" of science, and start to ask whether and when one's involvement in both government and science can constitute a conflict of interest?

The answer to that question is possible only with a proper understanding of the nature (the only social institution that can legally wield retaliatory force) and proper role (to protect individual rights) of government.

The answer is not always, No. For example, a scientist working as a patent examiner is acting in a manner proper to both a scientist and a government official by bringing his expertise to bear on how to protect the rights of inventors. A scientist who performs research for the Department of Defense on how to make a smart bomb is being paid to perform a legitimate function of the government (national defense) that happens to coincide with his research interests. In each case, there are objective ways to detect, deter, and punish conflicts of interest.

But a scientist receiving government funding for climate research is -- in today's context of a government-controlled economy -- in a postition to "justify" vast new plundering and control by the government with his findings or even just a willingness to sew panic. He is paid by what is effectively a giant guild of thieves intent on finding a ready excuse to plunder even more.

As the nation speaks of "going Galt" regarding the Bush-Obama economic crisis, perhaps it should remember another figure from Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged regarding Copenhagen, ClimateGate or not:

"Why did you refuse to work for Dr. Stadler?" she asked.

The hint of his smile grew harder and more stressed; this was as near as he came to showing an emotion; the emotion was anger. But he answered in his even, unhurried drawl, "You know, Dr. Stadler once said that the first word of 'Free, scientific inquiry' was redundant. He seems to have forgotten it. Well, I'll just say that 'Governmental scientific inquiry' is a contradiction in terms." (p. 355)

The second speaker and the name Copenhagen ought to bring to mind is Quentin Daniels: He refused to work for a once-great scientist who sold out by accepting state control of science.

Advocates of big government, including the vast majority of today's scientists, see state funding removing many financial constraints from their work, but they fail to recognize that this is inherently a devil's bargain. Many will object that private benefactors or corporate employers would exercise too much control over their work in the form of being interested in certain types of results -- while ignoring the fact that this will be true of any sponsor of scientific research. (Otherwise, why not just hand money out to any passer-by?)

To them, I pose the following question: What is a cleaner motive for funding research? The hope that valid results will lead to profit from free trade or the hope that spin will lead to plundered loot and coercive power?

-- CAV

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Quick Roundup 491

Admin Note

As a reminder: I'm starting a new job today. Blogging may be irregular for a while and comment moderation may be slow -- but I will get to them! This place was quite the drawing room last week, with two very interesting threads on global warming and one on education/job hunting.

I'll do whatever I can to keep that going.

Extremes in Living Arrangements

I wouldn't want to live like they do, but I still found it fascinating to read about how one New York couple has managed to make their 175 square foot "microstudio" apartment work as its primary home:

"We don't cook," Zaarath said, adding that their fridge never has any food in it. "So when you don't cook, you don't need plates or pots or pans. So we use that space for our clothes."

Once in their running attire, the two change the cat litter box (stored under the sink) and start their small Rumba vacuum -- which operates automatically while they're out, picking up cat hair.

They then jog to their jobs in Midtown, picking up along the way their work clothes, which are "strategically stashed at various dry cleaners."

Just in case the cleaners are closed, both have emergency clothes at their offices.

And I thought we lived in cramped quarters in Bean Town!

At the opposite extreme is Jay Walker's library:

Stuffed with landmark tomes and eye-grabbing historical objects—on the walls, on tables, standing on the floor—the room occupies about 3,600 square feet on three mazelike levels. Is that a Sputnik? (Yes.) Hey, those books appear to be bound in rubies. (They are.) That edition of Chaucer ... is it a Kelmscott? (Natch.) Gee, that chandelier looks like the one in the James Bond flick Die Another Day. (Because it is.) [link dropped]

And, yes, there are pictures at the link!

And if that isn't enough for you, I also ran into a list of the world's eighteen strangest houses. Haven't looked at it yet, so this is as much a reminder to myself as anything else.

The Other Side of ClimateGate

If for no other reason than to see what the global warming alarmists will say to rebut ClimateGate, watch the following video.

Once you get past the condescending tone, it is interesting that even that video concedes there might be some wrongdoing. On the other hand, it makes an argument that prima facie seems reasonable on the count of "trick" simply meaning something like, "hack." Whether that's an honest argument remains to be seen.

Also, Keith Lockitch has an interesting post on the "conspiracy theory" meme I also noticed a while back: "The conspirators are united not by a secret plot, but by a shared philosophy that they promote openly and self-righteously: the philosophy of environmentalism."

Religious Right Shot Down in H-Town

In a dull-as-dishwater race between Tweedledee and Tweedledum that drew a whopping 16.5% voter turnout, Houston has become the largest American city to elect an openly gay mayor.

Parker, 53, has never made a secret or an issue of her sexual orientation. But it became the focus of the race after anti-gay activists and conservative religious groups endorsed Locke and sent out mailers condemning Parker's "homosexual behavior."

Locke, 61, tried to distance himself from the anti-gay attacks while courting conservative voters who could tip the election in his favor. Meanwhile, gay and lesbian political organizations nationwide rallied to support Parker by raising money for her campaign and making calls urging people to vote.

The story makes much of Houston's demographic makeup and the fact that most of its voters are Democrats, but that misses the point about Houston, which has long been (relatively speaking) a hotbed of capitalism and a pretty socially tolerant place.

I see two stories that this report missed: First, I would hazard to guess that more voters were repelled by Gene Locke's Bible-thumping supporters trying to make hay out of Anise Parker's sexual orientation than were intent on making a statement by voting for Parker. Second, Houston is long past the need to make such a statement.

But I repeat myself.

Recipe Update

In failing to follow my own instructions last night, I may have solved a problem with the Marrakech Lamb Stew I posted not too long ago. It tasted just about right last night, so I revised the recipe. (I can't completely rule out having missed a key spice the first couple of times I made it, but skipping the step also was convenient.)

Also, David Veksler posts an interesting Swiss Steak recipe I might try some time soon, assuming I can find venison. I guess that will be the goal of my next foray to Whole Foods...

-- CAV

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Being a Hired Gun

Editor's Note: Apologies for the late post. We suffered a DSL outage this morning due to a fire in a manhole somewhere in our neighborhood last night. I'm having to post this over email and will be unable to check my main email account or moderate comments until the telecom company repairs the fiber optics. Thank you for your patience.

Ever since college, I have either worked for the government or in academia. In fact, until I left Houston, I was an academic scientist. But several years ago, I determined that, although I find science interesting, I don't want to remain in academia. There were many things that went into this decision, but I will not belabor them here. The point is that I made the decision long ago, but for a variety of reasons, could not act on it until my move to Boston.

Since I do not discuss my job (at all) or my personal life (beyond a certain point) here, I will also not lay out my exact career objectives. Suffice it to say that the career change I want will most likely involve several steps. Also, there are several alternate paths I could take to meet those objectives. This is because my area of expertise and experience differ too much from what I ultimately would like to do for me to be able to expect to make the entire transition all at once. In any event, thanks to some patient networking and a technological advance I had not heard about, I am happy to say that I can finally take Step One.

The really strange thing is that I am also getting to try one of the paths that I thought was all but closed off to me. And the great thing is that the position is temporary. It might sound counterintuitive, but this works to my advantage in numerous ways. Among them: (1) There is always the potential that the job could become permanent or lead me to another permanent job with the same company based on personal familiarity and the high quality of my work. (2) And yet, because it's temporary, my employer cannot reasonably expect me not to keep looking for work in the other path I was concentrating on (and which I suspect I might prefer). (3) I will be able to list some new skills and industrial experience on my resume. (4) I am now aware of a new type of job for people like me, and know that some Boston-area firms need it done. (5) And, yes, I will be getting paid -- paid, in fact, better than I ever have for anything in my entire life. It isn't riches, but it isn't chickenfeed, either.

I am a bioscientist, which to anyone familiar with Boston, might make getting a biotech job in the area sound like a no-brainer despite the state of the economy. Well, yes and no. My area of expertise and laboratory experience occupy an unusual niche, which recent moves by a couple of major pharmaceutical firms had caused to all but evaporate from the local job market: Those jobs mostly went out of state shortly before I arrived here, making me something of a square peg for a round hole as far as industrial jobs went. As a result, I was almost certain that my next job would lie on one of the other paths I saw myself taking.

In fact, it had gotten to the point that whenever I would meet an industrial recruiter, I'd describe my expertise and end with the following quip, "If that made any sense to you, you know what I do, and if it didn't, you see what my problem is!" I have since met a recruiter who will be able to help me, but my landing this job happened first and is a great example of the maxim, "Fortune favors the prepared mind," in action.

Some time ago -- perhaps as much as a year ago -- a blogging friend (Resident Egoist) who was aware that I was job hunting emailed me to the effect that I really ought to take a look at Nick Corcodilos's Ask the Headhunter web site. I did, and I devoured the Headhunter's contrarian, yet very well thought-out advice. It did not all apply to me, but his words about networking really opened my eyes and caused me to approach my problem in a much more deliberate and patient way.

My focus became getting to know other people like me in occupations I might be interested and qualified in, rather than bottom-feeding from the slim pickings on the Internet job boards. (That said, one such board nevertheless may have already led me to my next position. It will probably take about as much time as my temporary job will last for that process to unfold, however. Moral: Know which weapons are better, but be ready to use any of them. And no, I haven't stopped looking.)

One of my local contacts -- I'll call him Jim -- I met at a networking event back in February or March. A fellow PhD, he and I commiserated a little bit about how our degrees often priced us out of the market and discussed my (then) upcoming move. We exchanged cards and broke off to circulate, and I didn't actually meet him again until very recently.

By the time I actually moved here, I had acquired a very nice group of contacts, and at the urging of my father-in-law, who was a great sounding board the whole time, I emailed my contacts and basically said, "Hey! I'm finally here and I'm looking for [fill in whatever whoever might be able to help me find]. Here's my resume. Let me know if you hear about anything." Nobody replied for weeks, but eventually Jim did, with a job his recruiter had brought to his attention. The recruiter didn't quite know how to fill his client's opening: What they needed was outside Jim's skill set, but, fortunately, mostly well within mine.

Jim referred me to his recruiter and I got an interview through him. The interview seemed to go pretty well. I even knew several people that my prospective boss had also worked with in the past. I was pretty excited as I left. But then that company went in-house. That was tough: All this time, and my job interview count was still lower than the number of tropical storms I'd had to run from while I was finishing up my work in Houston! And this interview came up snake eyes!

Luckily for me, the in-house guy didn't work out for them and so they asked about me, their top outside candidate. I start Monday and I may have to put in some long hours at first -- and I probably will have a few blogging hiccups until I settle in to a routine. But that's a relatively minor problem for my writing career that I'm more than happy to put up with for a while.

To end on a positive note, I wish to thank Resident Egoist and my father-in-law for helping me learn how to job hunt, which is something academia does not prepare one to do very well, and especially my wife for her love, patience, and support during what has been in some respects a very difficult and frustrating time for me.

And my contacts, especially Jim, even though most don't know about my blogging. I never forget a good turn.

-- CAV

Updates

12-12-09: Removed superfluous HTML tags.

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Quick Roundup 490

"If you value X, then you have to agree with everything I say about Y."

Someone left the following very astute comment to a recent post of mine:

[T]he environmentalists have seized upon global warming as a flagship issue is precisely because it is hard to understand. The better to befuddle their opponents. [minor format edit]

I completely agree that this is the case. Understanding a complex piece of science like global warming is very difficult: There can be major (and perfectly honest) disagreements between experts in the field, mistakes on lower levels than the theoretical, outright fraud, and even whole areas that do not admit of ready investigation at the current level of technology.

Add to that the usual difficulties of making any political argument and the fact that laymen familiar enough with one side of such a scientific argument will often become all but unreachable because there is no way to know every detail of every nook and cranny of a scientific literature (and thus not look foolish to them). What better way could there be to cause one's opponents to waste valuable time and effort than to give them an endless reading assignment consisting of (often poorly-written) academic papers?

This is all true, but until I learned that Senator Harry Reid had "doubled down" on a particularly asinine comment likening opposition to Obamacare to opposition to the end of slavery, I felt like I was missing part of the exact method of argument, which I haven't fully conceptualized yet:

"At pivotal points in American history, the tactics of distortion and delay have certainly been present," Reid said. "They've certainly been used to stop progress. That's what we're talking about here. That's what's happening here. It's very clear. That's the point I made -- no more, no less. Anyone who willingly distorts my comments is only proving my point."

One one level, Reid is not doing the same thing as the warmists. There is no package dealing of a scientific question with one of political philosophy. For example, this debate hasn't included massive reading of medical literature by both sides. Nevertheless, Reid is clearly -- like the warmists -- indulging in a species of the argument from intimidation. But he adds a twist similar to what we see from the global warming alarmists. Who wants slavery? Who doesn't value progress?

And who doesn't value the earth we live on? Reid and the alarmists are, as incredible as it might sound, using self-interest as a means of inducing unearned guilt, and they are doing it by attempting to make people doubt that they are being conscientious enough about what they value. In a culture where most people have poorly-defined values (and even senses of self) and are thus not used to thinking deeply about their own self-interest, such a tactic, I suspect, is highly effective.

To love is to value, which is to understand the full nature of that which one values. (And regarding "full nature," it is crucial to reject omniscience as the standard of knowledge.) In the case of global warming, the question everyone who tries to become a climatological expert will fail to get (along with omniscience) from the scientific literature is: "What is the earth for?" On a metaphysical level, it has no purpose, of course, but on the ethical level, it does: To help us live. And living, for rational animals, consists in much more than the "sustainable" subsistence-level existence (if that) promoted by global warming hysterics.

If we are dead (or physically alive, but miserable), we accomplish no good by adopting the warmists' recommendations. This is very interesting to note since we haven't even reached the level of politics in the philosophical hierarchy! On that level, the current proposed "solutions" to global warming are out the window on the grounds that they violate individual rights.

There is an important difference between agreeing on principles and agreeing on how to apply them. Both matters can involve honest mistakes or evasion. (And the latter, at the personal level can also involve matters of personal taste, but this is not important here.) For example, if we grant, arguendo, that Harry Reid favors progress, we would have to say at minimum that he misunderstands the nature of progress or is misapplying the concept in some way when he equates it with what is in fact physician slavery.

Book Reviews

Fun with Gravity recently reviewed Jennifer Burns's Goddess of the Market, and The Objective Standard is making Robert Mayhew's Winter 2009 issue review of same publicly available from its web site.

I am also pleased to announce that my review of Ian Plimer's Heaven and Earth also appears in the print edition of the same issue of TOS.

More Government Corruption of Science

On the one hand, the simple fact that a scientist works for private industry as opposed to the government or academia (which is functionally almost the same thing as working for the government now) does not impugn his motives. Barring independent wealth, we all have to work for somebody, don't we?

That said, the common (and inverted) leftist premise that the government is somehow the guardian of scientific impartiality is -- finally -- being called into question by ClimateGate.

Might there now be a SwineGate to go along with ClimateGate?

World Health Organization scientists are suspected of accepting secret bribes from vaccine manufacturers to influence the U.N. organization's H1N1 pandemic declaration, according to Danish and Swedish newspapers.

Yes, but only if intellectual activists make the point whenever possible that the bribery was made possible by government interference in medicine in the first place.

In a truly free medical sector, there would probably be something like WHO in its role of keeping an eye out for epidemics and the like, but that "something" would also be non-governmental, like a Consumers' Union. If it cried "wolf" enough, people would stop listening to it and be free to move to a more conscientious and reliable body of scientists for advice on such matters. Such an organization would have a financial incentive -- that WHO does not have -- to avoid bribery and it would lack the backing of government power that WHO does possess.

As things stand now, though, the pharmaceutical firms involved, though not innocent, are getting more than their share of the blame and innocent firms are unjustly suffering "guilt" by association.

Obama Warns of "Command and Control"

It's bad when President Obama warns against too much government control, and worse that neither he nor anyone else has proposed abolishing or at least severely curtailing the powers of the EPA.

Or would that fall under "frightening" the American people too much?

What Obama is really doing instead is using the impending EPA rules to make whatever the Democrats can cook up instead seem reasonable -- as if nothing can be done about the EPA.

A Smooth Road in South Africa?

There are no excuses for the American national soccer team to fail to make a respectable showing in the 2010 World Cup: They drew an easy set of first round opponents:

U.S. national soccer coach Bob Bradley usually has a permanent scowl etched across his face, his lower lip scrunched into his upper lip like he just sucked on a lemon or got a bad meat pie from a Cape Town street vendor.

But yesterday he couldn’t help himself. He broke into a broad smile.

He caught himself, pursed his lips, furrowed his brow ... and lost the battle again. Another smile escaped.

Hard to fault him, though, after the draw for soccer's 2010 World Cup handed the Yanks one heavyweight (England) and two junior flyweights (Slovenia and Algeria) in Group C of the first round.

As an added bonus for me, anyway, England, the team I default to whenever "the Yanks" get yanked, is almost certain to make it to the next round -- especially if our side blows it again.

Objectivist Roundup

It's at Titanic Deck Chairs this week.

-- CAV

Updates

Today: Corrected a typo and added link to roundup.

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Nelson Amendment Fails

A small bit of news has me pondering cultural activism at the one-on-one level...

The Senate debate on physician slavery continues, yesterday's events possibly setting one pressure group, anti-abortionists, against the bill.

The Senate narrowly rejected an amendment that would have restricted abortion coverage in the pending health-care bill, leaving in question whether Majority Leader Harry Reid (Nev.) has the 60 votes needed to move the bill toward final passage.

This is what passes for good news in the barely-civil free-for-all that is pressure group warfare over loot stolen from productive men by a government turned against them. Anti-abortionists, most notably Roman Catholic bishops, who would otherwise support the bill, have said that they will not support a bill that provides tax money for abortions.

In being on the right side of this debate for the wrong reason, the anti-abortionists accidentally allude to a valid point. The real motive of the stance is, of course, abhorrent: The establishment of a theocratic welfare state. Nevertheless, I would hardly be surprised if some people with a mixture of philosophical premises that included many elements of individualism might sympathize with the stand (regardless of their personal views on abortion) for a reason on the order of, "Why should they -- or anyone else -- be forced to pay money for something to which they are morally opposed?" After all, this stand has to be premised in part on religious freedom, which stems from freedom of conscience.

Only in that context could I possibly sympathize with such a stand, and only if, after I indicate that I oppose being forced to put my money where the mouths of the altruists are, he concedes that I have a good point. "Indeed. Nobody should be forced to pay for someone else's abortion or perform one against his will, but I take things further: I oppose the idea that I should be forced to cover any of your medical expenses, or you mine. Should I be forced to pay for socialized medicine any more than a Catholic should be forced to participate in an abortion?"

I suspect that I will more likely get a nod of agreement, or at least provoke thought, from someone who sees abortion as a matter best left to the individual, at least on the political level.

The bishops oppose government funding only for some things, but they do not oppose it in principle. This inconsistency, necessitated by the war on reality that is their moral code, opens them up to inconvenient questions any time it comes up in the guise of them superficially agreeing with me. All one has to do is ask two questions ("Why do they want X? Why do I want X?), compare the answers, and then look for a chance to call their inherent bluff. Often, the context they have just dropped will supply such a chance.

This possibly convenient obstruction to efforts to establish physician slavery can only buy time. Use it wisely.

-- CAV

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Monbiot: Tools and Fools

RealClear Politics posts a link to an article by George Monbiot in The Guardian in which the noted advocate of government controls premised on global warming moves from defense to offense in the aftermath of the breaking of the ClimateGate scandal. I had earlier noted here that I found that an earlier response of his to the leaked emails at least bore some resemblance to what that of a conscientious scientist would be like.

But the global warming debate is a confused mess of state-funded science and pressure group warfare, and Monbiot is firmly in the government coercion camp of the political debate. Today, we see how he reacts as the political activist he is. I must say that I find him much more disappointing on this level.

Monbiot's piece takes three observations as his point of departure. Here they are below, listed as bullet points directly from his piece. I follow each with my brief response in bold.

• The first is the tendency of those who claim to be the champions of climate science to minimise [the] importance [of the leaked emails]. True.
• The second observation is the tendency of those who don't give a fig about science to maximise their importance. Also true, and, moreover, even some who do care about the science might be jumping the gun.
  
• The third observation is the contrast between the global scandal these emails have provoked and the muted response to 20 years of revelations about the propaganda planted by fossil fuel companies. This is where things get interesting.

The meat of this piece is the third point, in which Monbiot slams the "denial industry." Given the saturation of our culture with anti-capitalist sentiment, the very term is a smear and leads in almost predictably to Monbiot's rhetorical approach, which I will return to shortly.

But first, a word about the science. I am not a climatologist, but I am a scientist. I have recently started looking at the scientific side of this debate and find that the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis (or at least parts of it) to be reasonable, but I am still learning about the evidence pro and con. Although I am disinclined to accept the hypothesis, I am still weighing it.

At this point, I have to declare my official position to be agnostic on the scientific questions of (1) whether there is warming, (2) if so, whether it is due to increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere; (3) if so, whether human activity has caused a substantial portion of said increase; and (4) what effects would accrue from such warming. Nevertheless, as an advocate of capitalism, I am completely opposed to the economic strangulation of the global economy that is being proposed as a "solution" to this alleged crisis and would be even if I regarded the most dire predictions to be likely.

With that in mind, I do have to take issue with one scientific point Monbiot makes.

Even if you were to exclude every line of evidence that could possibly be disputed -- the proxy records, the computer models, the complex science of clouds and ocean currents -- the evidence for man-made global warming would still be unequivocal. You can see it in the measured temperature record, which goes back to 1850; in the shrinkage of glaciers and the thinning of sea ice; in the responses of wild animals and plants and the rapidly changing crop zones.

No. I think you would see an increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide and an increase in global temperature for this time period. However, without proxies (for temperature, carbon dioxide, and any number of other things), you would have no way of discerning whether anything like what we're observing has also occurred before the Industrial Revolution or is within the normal range of variability of the global climate. Proxies are vital to evaluating this theory in the same way that we use historical evidence to evaluate political theories: We simply can't run experiments on the the entire planet, so information from the past is the next best thing.

Also, you would need climate models to integrate all the climate data with your theory to (a) discern whether your theory might indeed accurately describe what is going on now, (b) look into the past to see whether your theory still explains things without man's current output of carbon dioxide, and, thereby (c) determine whether there might be something your theory is still failing to account for. (And, yes, if everything holds up, you can reasonably attempt to forecast what might happen to earth's climate in the future.)

Ditto for "the complex science of clouds and ocean currents." For one thing, these (and many other factors that affect climate) would need to accounted for in anything as complex as a decent computer model of the climate. If correlation does not equal causation, it certainly doesn't equal "unequivocal" proof of the hypothesis that man is causing the earth to warm, and indeed "a novel and radical theory [might] be required."

Moving on...

Monbiot's third argument is something of a cross between, "May he who is without guilt cast the first stone," attempting to hide the elephant we have all just found in plain sight and right under our noses while we watch, and the argument from intimidation.

Predictably jumping straight for the throats of the wicked "energy companies," Monbiot screams payola and cites deliberate attempts by companies to plant "memes" with the help of "PR companies and hired experts." These "memes" are targeted at less educated and less intellectual demographics who are "more confident expressing opinions on others' motivations and tactics than they do expressing opinions on scientific issues." (Would you feel more confident arguing about the minute details of how a carburetor works with a mechanic or discussing his honesty? Some things simply are more accessible to more people.) The "memes" include such ideas as, "climate scientists are only in it for the money, or that environmentalists are trying to create a communist world government."

"Remember," Monbiot says, "these ideas were devised and broadcast by energy companies." Never mind that the measures being considered are worldwide economic controls that include massive redistribution of wealth. Never mind that the climate scientists' government patrons are busy spreading memes of global catastrophe of their own devising. Never mind that our government-controlled education system is so saturated with tenured radicals and global warming alarmists that the best chance at persuading someone that these measures are a bad idea might appear to be to reach out to those not subjected or susceptible to its constant ideological barrage. Never mind that pervasive government controls of the economy necessitate public relations campaigns targeted at voters by all kinds of corporations. And never mind whether these "memes" might actually be true: If you buy them, George Monbiot has just called you a fool or a tool.

I personally don't think that fighting mainly over the science is the best tactic for the embattled energy companies to take. Rather, they should start proudly standing up for themselves as producers on moral grounds and for everyone's freedom on the basis of the idea that a government's sole proper purpose is the protection of individual rights.

It has been the sheepish acceptance of altruism and state controls by the corporations that has caused them to cede the moral high ground to people like George Monbiot and Al Gore, and desperately fight them on the home turf of climate specialists, gambling that either they're wrong about the science or (worse) that they can wrongly convince most of the public that these scientists are wrong. The proper tactic, again, is this: Whatever the science says (yes, no, or maybe), admit it. And then argue from correct political principles that take into account man's nature and the proper role of government when engaging in the political debate about global warming legislation.

-- CAV

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Quick Roundup 489

Unilateral Economic Disarmament

Roger Simon questions the conventional wisdom (HT: Glenn Reynolds) on why Barack Obama rescheduled his trip to to the Copenhagen "climate" conference.

Lately we have heard he switched his itinerary to be there at the end of the two weeks in order to give his blessing and impetus to the decision itself. That's the conventional wisdom anyway, but I am growing suspicious. Things are falling apart with amazing rapidity for the man-made global warming movement, not just because UN’s own climate chief is getting cold feet.

I question Simon's optimism, starting with his assessment of the temperature of Yvo de Boer's feet:

The U.N.'s top climate official on Sunday conceded that hacked e-mails from climate scientists had damaged the image of global warming research but said evidence of a warming Earth is solid. [bold added]

The current political proposals premised on global warming are collectivism excused and promoted on altruistic grounds, just like unilateral nuclear disarmament was in the West back in the days of the Cold War. Barack Obama will show up even if Hell freezes over and pull out all the stops to enact some form of economic controls over the U.S. economy regardless of how grim ClimateGate might look to his political allies. If I'm right and he shows up, it will be his attempt at a salvage operation.

Does nobody recall that despite a near-majority of adults now opposing Obama's physician slavery proposal, Congress still seems bent on getting some version of that ready for the President's signature? Does anyone doubt that Obama will sign it if it reaches his desk? What part of "quite comfortable" with one term are people failing to understand about Obama?

Barack Obama sees the struggling remnants of capitalism in America in the same light as his ideological predecessors saw America's nuclear arsenal: as an evil that needs to be exterminated at all costs. "Climate change" legislation is a way for him to achieve the unilateral economic disarmament of America. He will not abandon it.

Key to both crusades is the failure of their opponents to champion America as a good nation. America's nuclear arsenal defended her against tyranny and protected the freedom of her citizens to pursue their own happiness. America's economic freedom is, likewise, an important means for her citizens to achieve their own happiness. These are good things, but Barack Obama does not see it this way, as hard as that might be to believe.

Winter is Here!

This time last year, I was experiencing an unusual snowfall and a heat outage in Houston -- which apparently has had measurable snow for two years in a row for the first time. This year, I had a lot more snow and indoor warmth when Old Man Winter arrived. I was too busy to snap pictures, but LB has a very nice picture up at 3 Ring Binder.

I'm not sure we got even that much where we are, but I plan to go out and get pictures whenever we get a bunch. I want to be able to remember how nice it looks at first after it gets ugly and nasty from staying on the ground for days at a time!

Head to the Houston Chronicle's web site for more snow pictures. (Around picture 21 or so looks a lot like my old neighborhood.) Snow, far from a constant winter plague down there, is a rare treat, so people have a blast when they do get it.

Objectivist Roundup

In case you went by there earlier to find a truncated version, stop by Rule of Reason again to see all of last week's Objectivist Roundup. (That wasn't why I didn't mention it earlier. I just forgot.)

Sometimes being late has its advantages!

Being Able to Name a Problem Helps

Interested in seeing whether I might like soca music, I went to YouTube recently and looked around, only to be somewhat intrigued by the rhythms, but completely repelled by some of the "vocals." Wondering what was going on, I Googled a few things like "annoying voice effect" and eventually learned a new word: That effect is generated by something called a vocoder and it's as bad or worse to my ear even than excessive melisma.

If the term "vocoder" has you scratching your head, go here, scoot to about 0:10, and be prepared to stop quickly. Average Bro has a pretty good brief history of the phenomenon, if you're interested in that sort of thing. But don't worry: Nobody here will get, "as sick of hearing me moan and complain about vocoders as I am of hearing songs that feature them."

That's because I'll avoid them as much as I can!

It's Over.

Usually, when I play fantasy football, I pad my odds of having a successful season by joining two leagues, but time constratints kept me down to one this year -- the league of grad school friends I've played in every year for over a decade now. We're all "auto drafters" over there, but I like to set some sort of draft order so I don't get stuck with four quarterbacks or something ridiculous like that. I forgot the meaning of "12:00 a.m." this year and ended up not setting a draft order in time.

That looked like a stroke of luck at first: Sure, I had no big-name wide receivers, but I did end up with Adrian Peterson, Brian Westbrook, Cedric Benson, and Antonio Gates. All have been injured or otherwise having sub-par years, and Peterson seems to be suffering, in a fantasy football sense, from having Brett Favre as his quarterback. (I got five points out of him yesterday.) With meager playoff hopes on the line, I got to play the guy with Brett Favre on his roster. It all came down to whether Minnesota would go with Favre's arm or Peterson's legs for their last touchdown.

Can't let that happen again!

-- CAV

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Saving My Bacon

I have to leave early and managed not to set my alarm for a correspondingly earlier time. Amusingly, this situation makes the title of this week's post on things I like take on a funny additional meaning.

Yes. This post is figuratively and literally about saving my bacon!

Ever since I was a toddler, I have loved bacon. My mother told me some time ago that I once became curious enough about the can of bacon drippings she kept in the refrigerator that I asked her for a taste. She obliged, and my immediate response was, "Good grease!"

And so it was with intense interest that I read a post at Jill McKeever's site, Simple Daily Recipes, that I happened by one day about the advantages of baking bacon. I had always fried it in a pan, with inconsistent results, and avoided the microwave because all those grease-soaked paper towels always make a huge mess -- not that frying it in a pan was all that much better.

And so it was that, after reading the article at Simple Daily Recipes, I decided I'd try the new technique to see if it was really as good as advertised. I was not disappointed.

I have no idea how I found it, but bacon has been a rarer treat than it ought to have been for a long time because I never eat it fast enough to use an entire package before it goes bad. To save money, I usually bought bacon only if we also had guests or if some recipe, like gumbo, called for it. And then some of it still would go to waste. I like bacon, but not necessarily day in and day out -- especially if I have to fool around frying it.

In a nutshell:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees.
2. Line a baking pan with aluminum foil.
3. Line the aluminum foil with thick-sliced bacon. (Well, okay. Let's not get carried away. Just the bottom, with some space between rashers.)
4. Place in oven and bake for about 15 minutes. (Depending on whether your oven cooks evenly, you may have to rotate the pan 180 degrees half-way through the cooking time. I don't. Also, the first time you do this, you may want to start watching earlier, in case your oven cooks faster than mine for any reason.)
5. Near the end of cooking time, flip on the oven light and watch like a hawk to avoid over-cooking, which can happen quickly by that point.
6. Remove from oven and allow to cool on paper towels.
7. Save the grease in the fridge.
   
8. Toss whatever you don't use into a plastic freezer bag and freeze it. Individual pieces are good to go after about 20 seconds in a microwave.
9. Air out your house.
   

McKeever also warns that the bacon will come out a little bit paler and a lot softer than you might be used to and advises that both problems are cured a little bit by the drying.

Yes, the only disadvantage of this method (which I'm not sure isn't also true for frying) is the need to get rid of the cooking odors. Otherwise, my cleanup consisted of: throwing the paper towels into the center of the foil on the pan, balling it up, and tossing it into the trash. Oh, and I cover the bacon with a paper towel when I nuke it.

Bacon on demand. Nice.

With that, I leave with this video of Trey Parker and Matt Stone "Bakin' Bacon with Macon" and prepare to rush through my morning routine, and the door.

And yes, I'll be having bacon!

-- CAV

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Quick Roundup 488

Apple's Mistake(s)

Paul Graham asks some interesting questions about the development process for iPhone applications, and offers answers that Apple or the software developers it is alienating could use.

Apparently Apple's attitude is that developers should be more careful when they submit a new version to the App Store. They would say that. But powerful as they are, they're not powerful enough to turn back the evolution of technology. Programmers don't use launch-fast-and-iterate out of laziness. They use it because it yields the best results. By obstructing that process, Apple is making them do bad work, and programmers hate that as much as Apple would.

How would Apple like it if when they discovered a serious bug in OS X, instead of releasing a software update immediately, they had to submit their code to an intermediary who sat on it for a month and then rejected it because it contained an icon they didn't like?

By breaking software development, Apple gets the opposite of what they intended: the version of an app currently available in the App Store tends to be an old and buggy one.

I don't work in software, but I always enjoy reading Paul Graham. He makes what he's thinking about accessible to anyone, and I think anyone can use what he learns as he writes his essays. Here, his immediate subject is software development, but he is really talking about are the importance of goodwill and of checking one's assumptions against reality -- as he urges Apple to with respect to the software development process.

Wallpaper Galore!

Via LifeHacker, I learned that National Geographic has made available for download a large number of stunning images suitable for computer wallpaper.

Don't Trust that Cloud

I already am too leery about entrusting important information to the cloud, but I was still surprised to read the following (HT: Linux Today).

[A]t the Google Docs Help Forum, some perplexed cloud computing users spent the month of November unsuccessfully trying to figure out why they've been zinged for inappropriate content. Among the items deemed inappropriate and unshareable include notes on Henry David Thoreau ('the published version of this item cannot be shared until a Google review finds that the content is appropriate'), homework assignments, high school yearbook plans, wishlists, documents containing botanical names for plants, a list of websites for an ecommerce class, and a list of companies that rent motorcycles in Canada.

If it absolutely has to be there, I make my own local backups.

Superstition Kills

A story out of Africa shows that no arbitrary notion is too ridiculous not to have adherents who take it seriously enough to commit murder:

The surge in the use of albino body parts as good luck charms is a result of "a kind of marketing exercise by witch doctors," the International Federation for the Red Cross and Crescent societies said.

The report says the market for albino parts exists mainly in Tanzania, where a complete set of body parts -- including all limbs, genitals, ears, tongue and nose -- can sell for $75,000. Wealthy buyers use the parts as talismans to bring them wealth and good fortune.

Thousands of albinos have gone into hiding as a result of this nonsense.

-- CAV

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