What scientific concept would improve everyone’s cognitive toolkit?

This question from The Edge and the dozens of thoughtful answers make for some good reading. Basically, each author picks a single idea they feel is necessary for everyone to "get" in order to understand the world we live in; to have a successful technological civilization. I found this via Pharyngula, who suggested that the Mediocrity Principle may be The One. That is, the basic understanding that we are not the special reason for the existence of the universe. His argument is that basic math skills would help. We're talking about skills that even average college students seem to lack, but are nominally taught to most people who graduate secondary schools. Adjacent to PZ, Sue Blackmore argues for the primacy of understanding that CINAC (Correlation Is Not A Cause). Apparently this lesson is hard to drum into even college students who are nominally studying science. Most of the answers are direct explanations of ideas necessary to scientific understanding. But a few are more of the "what would be nice to discover" variety. But go see for yourself. There are many insightful replies to this question by 160 authors.

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The Irresistible Lord Ralph

It is the first Sunday of 2011. I woke feeling a bit uneasy; somewhat queasy. As though someone were calling to me, deep inside. As a good igtheist, I ignore calls from the invisible beyond, even on Sunday. But as the day progressed, I divined that it was Lord Ralph calling to me. Loud. After another hour, it became distressing. I tried to placate him with a wintergreen pink tablet made with compounds of Bismuth (the element between toxic lead and radioactive Polonium). But he continued calling louder. I huddled under my blankets and moaned. This helps for a short periods, repeated over a couple of hours. Finally his call became not just clear, but imminent. Lord Ralph was demanding immediate supplication. I threw a wrap around my shivering shoulders and bolted for the room of his shrine. As I knelt before his porcelain altar, I gazed up through at shimmering ceiling to see if his ethereal chariot was nigh. It was. Forcefully I hailed the Holy Buick. The stars then did shimmer around me. The chariot was passing. I hailed it again, slightly weaker. It receded, even though I did loyally call after it a few more times in breathlessly quick succession. Lord Ralph must have been pleased. He set peace upon my wracked body, and allowed me go return to my covers and lie in serenity for a while. Then my wife came to offer us a bile-colored, caffeinated, fizzy, syrup solution over ice, called Mountain something-or-other. This, sipped with great respect, did placate this irresistible lord.

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Maddening Blather on Hold with AT&T

We lost our Roku internet connection this evening. Also the laptop connection, and the main computer. Basically, my internet was down. So I went through all the usual things to find the problem. Computer was talking to the router that was in turn talking to the modem. So far so good. I managed to tell the router to tell the modem to change my IP address. Everything was working. But I could not reach any web sites, email, or ftp servers. I finally figured out that the DNS must be down. Domain Name Service is the internet utility that converts name addresses (like DangerousIntersection.org) to numerical route addresses (like 206.225.8.91) so your packets (requests, pages, images, etc) can find their way through the web. So I called AT&T and answered a series of questions, like "Can you get online?" (No) and "Did you try rebooting and turning the modem off and back on?" (Yes). Finally, I landed in the service hold queue. What to my wondering ear did appear in the cannot-get-online and did-reboot queue? An annoying loop of messages telling me all the wonderful support I can get online! This, plus the repeated suggestion that I try rebooting.

ga-ah!GAA-AH!ga-ah!

I sat on hold for 35 minutes before I decided to vent on this forum. Well, at least to write about it. I have to wait till either they fix the problem, or I get through and can ask for a numerical address for the address server to bypass the broken automatic one. After 73 minutes (1:13) of this, I reached an actual person. I started with asking if she knew how long the DNS would be down, largely to jump past all the AnyKey suggestions. No, but similar problems typically are resolved in 4 hours. Then I asked if she had a bypass DNS address that I could use until theirs was working. No she didn’t have this information. I suggested that she pass upstream my frustration with the “just go online” message piped in to people who were calling because they cannot get online. She had no mechanism for this. Oh, well. I stayed polite. Tech support folks are in a miserable position when they have no way to fix anything, and the problem is real.

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A Refreshing Retelling of a Classic Tale

As a story is passed along, it evolves. With the advent of writing, the rate of change slowed, but still continues. I was reminded of this by a delightful retelling in modern form of a story traditionally told in staid structure. Here is a chuckle-worthy modern take on the arrival of Jesus. As always, this vernal event is traditionally pasted over the older pagan winter solstice Yule festival. This retelling in modern paradigm also embraces the evolution of the Bedouin shepherds to Zoroastrian wise men to Kings, and somehow skipping l33tspeak but keeping the Renaissance garb. This tale is usually full of anachronisms and inconsistencies. But it still makes a good yarn.

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