OMG! I just installed the FireFox 2 browser and noticed something. It spell checks form entries as you type! Just as Word and its ilk do in their documents.

Since its inception, I’d been using FireFox just because of speed, safety and security advantages. I added the Google toolbar only a month ago for spell checking in form entry fields. Then MSIE 7.0 came out, and had almost all the features of FireFox 1, and was nearly as secure. So this week FireFox riposted with its version 2, to stay a step ahead in both features and security.

As I was typing a response this morning, I noticed the Word-like squiggly red underline. Puzzled (because I hadn’t manually started the Google spell check) I rt-clicked, and it suggested the word I meant to type.

Yay! FireFox 2 is the Bloggers’ bee’s knees. No, I’m not actually that old.

I’m not sure if version 2 requires separate installation of the Google toolbar because I already had it. Maybe all you need is FireFox 2. Someone try it and let me know.

The Bible version of God doesn’t ring true to me. I don’t believe in any traditional sort of God.  I am not that sort of person who finds any purpose in worshipping or asking favors from invisible Beings.  I don’t ascribe any emotions or sentience (certainly, no vindictiveness) to any Person or Thing that might have created our universe.  How the universe came into being is beyond what I can know. 

I do cherish my universe, though, and I realize that I am an incredibly tiny and incredibly ignorant part of it. Many fervent believers (though not all) would characterize my beliefs as “atheism” although that word, as commonly construed, would characterize me in a misleadingly cartoonish way.  

Given my beliefs, most people would be surprised to hear that I sometimes go to church to be inspired and energized. What’s my secret?  I go to church when no one else is there—I like to go to empty churches.  When nothing else is going on other than one’s own breathing, meditating, thinking and writing, going to church can even be exhilarating.

With a pad of paper and a pen in my hands, in search of solitude, I walked to church twice this week.  I had previously noticed a huge church a few blocks from a courthouse where I sometimes work.  Only after walking to this church on Monday did I learn that it was called “Saint Peter’s Roman Catholic Cathedral” in Belleville, Illinois.  Here’s a photo I took on Wednesday (yes, a dreary looking day), just prior to my second “visit.”

The majestic interior of the church is also a treat to the eyes.  The thick stone walls morph into the peak of the ceiling as they rise to meet each other 70 feet in the air. 

               
Even on a dreary day, the natural light works its way into every pew.  Every tiny noise launches up into that vast inner-space like a dissipating butterfly. This incredible space, and the solitude it allows, more than make up for the musty church smell and the uncomfortable pews.  We mustn’t complain about uncomfortable pews, we were told as children.  After all, Jesus had nails driven through his hands for us.

When a church is empty, the overly-pious stained-glass images do not antagonize me.  (more…)

This is a bit embarrassing to admit but, over the years, I had grown almost infatuated with my computer.  Through thick and thin, she was always there for me, never complaining, always executing the computer commands I entered via the keyboard and mouse.  After a long session, I sometimes thought “She’s so kind and understanding of my erratic ways.  She alway waits patiently while I stare at the monitor thinking of the next thing to type in.”

All of that was before I installed my new purchase, the Computamatic Voice Module.  The TV commercial claimed that every computer had a unique personality and that this device would give me a chance to know the innermost thoughts of my computer.  I would now be able to hear what my computer was thinking as I used her.  As I opened the package, I wondered whether my computer was actually a female.  I was about to find out.

I’ll never forget the first time I attached the Module to the USB port.  I turned on the computer, waiting for Windows to boot up.  Then I heard her raspy voice.  It was a she.

“It’s about time,” she said. 

“Hello?” I replied.  

She simply said “Just get on with it. Hit some keys. Let’s go.”

I double-clicked the word processor icon and started keying-in an article.  About halfway through, I realized that the noise I heard whenever I made typos was my computer scoffing at me, sometimes laughing at me, sometimes insulting me.  When I listened closely, I heard things like “stupid fumbly fingers” and “moron.”  (more…)

About 20 years ago, I became frustrated that, because of long hours spent at the office, I was not able to read as much as I would like. After all, there were thousands of good books out there that I had never read.  To add insult to injury, my memory recall was poor regarding many of the classic books I had previously read.  For instance, I had read The Great Gatsby and Catcher in the Rye, but could I intelligently describe the plots and characters of these books?  Not without rereading them.

It occurred to me that I was reading books at the rate of only about one book every three months.  If I lived 50 more years, reading four books per year, I would be dead after reading only 200 more books.  That seemed to be an exceedingly gloomy prospect given that the culture I inhabit is continually bursting with new and interesting information. 

No, I wasn’t under the delusion that I would ever be able to know everything.  I realized that it would be impossible for any one person (probably for any group of 1000 people) to to have detailed knowledge rivaling that contained in any large library.  Rather, I was seeking a basic working knowledge of many of the basic fields of study taught in most universities. I didn’t want to embarass myself in a group that started discussing well-known literature and basic principles from scientific fields such as biology, physics and anthropology. I felt that I needed to fill my head with more information in order to be a decent writer, much less a responsible voter.

I sought out a philosophy professor from my undergrad days.  He listened closely as I explained my frustration.  He then told me it did not matter what we read, as long as we choose quality reading material.  He explained that all good writers touch the same common deep issues.  He encouraged me to quit worrying about quantity and to focus on quality.  His advice was to make sure that every bit of reading I picked up “touched bottom.”

My professor’s advice was reassuring at the time, but I am not certain that it was accurate.  It is true that many of the same deep issues are addressed by many disparate fields of study.  It is my belief, however, that the various fields of study fail to overlap more often than they do overlap. 

For the past 10 years, I have spent much time auditing graduate-level courses at Washington University in St. Louis (I am very grateful that they offer this opportunity to members of the community). Many of those courses were in the area of cognitive science.  Jumping into this new field, however, was like trying to take a drink out of a fire hydrant.  It was not reassuring to be exposed, week after week, to ever more material that was almost entirely new to me.  There was so incredibly much to learn–this remains the case for me today.

Simply stressing quality over quantity, then, does not a total solution to having a working knowledge of the many basic fields of study. Rather, it’s necessary to consciously visit quality works from a wide variety of fields.  No matter how much you read traditional philosophy, for example, you will never encounter anything equivalent to the wonderful insights of modern era cognitive science writers such as Paul Churchland, Mark Johnson or Andy Clark. 

Then again, my philosophy professor’s suggestion was still helpful. Whatever you read, choose carefully, because there really is an avalanche of information out there. In sum, my professor was overconfident that any individual could keep up with the constant outpouring of new information from all fields.  On the other hand, whatever chance anyone has a being “well read,” that chance disappears once one stops being a selective chooser of reading material. 

I recently picked up a book that provided some good statistics regarding the amount of new information introduced into the world every day.  (more…)

The Pew Internet & American Life Project survey on blogging, published July 19, 2006 contains lots of good data on who all of those bloggers are.  The survey contains lots of statistics, charts and commentary.  Here’s the summary.

The Pew Internet Project blogger survey finds that the American blogosphere is dominated by those who use their blogs as personal journals. Most bloggers do not think of what they do as journalism.

Most bloggers say they cover a lot of different topics, but when asked to choose one main topic, 37% of bloggers cite “my life and experiences” as a primary topic of their blog. Politics and government ran a very distant second with 11% of bloggers citing those issues of public life as the main subject of their blog.

Entertainment-related topics were the next most popular blog-type, with 7% of bloggers, followed by sports (6%), general news and current events (5%), business (5%), technology (4%), religion, spirituality or faith (2%), a specific hobby or a health problem or illness (each comprising 1% of bloggers). Other topics mentioned include opinions, volunteering, education, photography, causes and passions, and organizations. 

Pouring time into this blog has been deeply satisfying to me.  But what is this accomplishing, I sometimes wonder? 

After all, there are already numerous writers out there.  Technorati.com indicates that it is now tracking 48.5 million sites and 2.7 billion links.  Plus, there are numerous traditional sources of information (books, magazines, movies, television) available to anyone who is interested.

I don’t have any illusions about my alleged importance.  As Charles De Gaulle famously said, “The cemetery is full of indispensable people.”  Nonetheless, I joined the Blogosphere to have a voice and to hopefully present a meaningfully unique voice.  This blog is an experiment that will always be provisional and evolving.

This blog grew out of an email relationship between a fellow who lives in Madison (he goes by the name of Grumpypilgrim on this blog) and me.  I met “Grumpy” when I provided legal services for a company for whom Grumpy worked.  We had emailed our rants and observations back and forth for more than a year.  Eventually, I suggested that we exchange our ideas in a public way, in case anyone else might be interested. 

Two months later, dangerousintersection.org was designed by Nick Smith of nicksmithdesign.com.  I chose the name after looking at a big yellow “Dangerous Intersection” sign I had in my office (I had it around as a novelty) and after considering how that name might generally fit an iconoclastic blog.  I took the photo of the intersection used in the site’s logo. Nick made it look more dangerous. Since then Nick has stirred in many navigational features, for which we are deeply appreciative.  

Here are some of our stats.  Ten authors are currently active on the site, with several additional writers to join us in the coming month.  We have authors residing in India, England, and all over the United States, though the core group of us is from St. Louis, where I live.  We were recently joined by Chris VanMierlo, who has been able to provide the perspective of one who previously lived in Africa.  The type of writers I have been seeking have been like-hearted people with unique voices who write impeccably (this last requirement probably means that they make fewer grammar errors and typos than me).  I’m tremendously grateful that the site’s co-authors are so much better versed than me in so many fields. 

That’s really the way it must be, though, because first rate learning is a highly collaborate enterprise.  Every day, I am appreciative of the things I learn from the authors and commenters of this blog.  We are each others’ teachers.  We need each other to knock each other off “safe” ways of thinking.  That is the essence of critical thinking. 

Dangerous Intersection is totally non-profit.  We don’t ask anyone for a penny.  I pay the hosting fees and that is that. This arrangement frees us from what might otherwise become a temptation to curb our opinions. (more…)

Bill O’Reilly hates the blogosphere. He hates many things, of course, among them Pepsi, rapper Ludacris, a wide array of conventional media outlets, and even some of his own guests. But today I focus on an entire media outlet that O’Reilly labels as biased, lacking in evidence, and in large part sensationalized: political blogs.

Of course, O’Reilly doesn’t oppose online journalism on his own. Even more mainstream news anchors (if you can call Mr. O’Reilly a news anchor) tend to scoff and roll their eyes at the notion of “the blogosphere” or the opinions expressed over the internet. O’Reilly has led the most outspoken movement against internet editorialism, though. In June of 2003, Bill had this to say about bloggers:

“Nearly everyday, there’s something written on the Internet about me that’s flat out untrue…the reason these net people get away with all kinds of stuff is that they work for no one. They put stuff up with no restraints. This, of course, is dangerous…”

By July of 2005, the “blogosphere” had become a common slang term for the mainstream news media, and became the focus of one episode of O’Reilly’s Factor program:

“Personal attacks lodged through the internet! How are so-called “Web logs” being used as ideological weapons? And who’s behind the smear campaigns? We’ll have a No Spin look at a dangerous new weapon in the culture wars!”

But as “dangerous” as these “weapons in the culture wars” may seem to some, online outlets such as Media Matters and Think Progress have called O’Reilly out on lies, poor interviewing tactics, poor taste, and misinformation nearly countless times. With the exception of Al Franken, who shook his finger at the Fox News Channel host for claiming to have earned a Pulitzer when he earned a Peabody, who in a conventional setting has held this raging ideologue to any standards?

Indeed, who holds Fox New Channel to any standards? We all know that this horrendously slanted news network carries bias under its weak claim of “We Report, You Decide”, but only by inspecting it critically ourselves. Occasionally the Channel receives an obvious attack from the likes of Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert, but in the mainstream news, silence.

Meanwhile, the Fox News talking heads delight in accusing their rivals in television and print of clear, corrupted liberal bias. The moderately liberal press goes about its way without a response, still maintaining its own facade of near-objectivity. Fox can openly claim pure truth while disseminating spin, so deeply does the rest of news media fear seeming overly catty or slanted. Why does moderate liberal media, like moderate liberalism in general, lack backbone?
(more…)

Here’s a recent example of the effective use of sharp-edged rebuttal (see the comments) to puncture bloated and unthinking terror-mongering (see the post). 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-smerconish/play-the-tape_b_19449.html

The point of these comments is that two wrongs don’t make a right.  The post-writer, a good example of tens of millions of like-minded others, is apparently oblivious.  I guess “turn the other cheek” and the golden rule have become quaint platitudes to him.

In my opinion this truly is the right time and place for rough exchanges like this.  As this administration gets ever closer to launching missiles at Iran, if only the MSM would feel 1% of the emotion and urgency displayed in the comments to this post.