According to the article, many new technologies are reliant upon rare earth elements, of which China controls 97% of the world's supply. I'm not sure what the implications are.
As Deng Xiao Ping presciently commented, at a time when electric cars and wind power seemed like ecotopian wet dreams: "Arabia has oil, China has rare earth".
-Max
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Monday, December 14, 2009
Science is
Science, in its purest sense, is as much an individual activity as religion. Science means reasoning by means of repeatable, testable hypotheses: science is what you can put in a letter and mail to another scientist and have him verify. Asking a paleontologist if dinosaurs were warm-blooded is not science; studying the papers and the fossils and then forming (and checking) your own opinion is science.
-Max
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
-Max
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Thursday, December 10, 2009
WMDs
I'm not allowed to discuss politics until 2010, but you should read this:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/12/09/is_climategate_the_new_downing_street_memo_99468.html
I will note parenthetically that I was completedly fooled on Iraq, but had I listened to Greg Cochran's views here (http://www.jerrypournelle.com/archives2/archives2mail/mail227.html) I would have been a lot closer to correct, which is a large part of the reason I'm skeptical of Iran as a threat and trying to be appropriately skeptical of Afghanistan.
The really great thing about Cochran is he's quantitative, cogent, and fact-based. You can disagree with his priorities but you should always hear out people like this.
-Max
P.S. I didn't see this article at the time, but even though the surge in Iraq worked, should we have done it? Cochran discussed an alternative at the time. http://amconmag.com/article/2007/sep/24/00006/
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/12/09/is_climategate_the_new_downing_street_memo_99468.html
I will note parenthetically that I was completedly fooled on Iraq, but had I listened to Greg Cochran's views here (http://www.jerrypournelle.com/archives2/archives2mail/mail227.html) I would have been a lot closer to correct, which is a large part of the reason I'm skeptical of Iran as a threat and trying to be appropriately skeptical of Afghanistan.
The really great thing about Cochran is he's quantitative, cogent, and fact-based. You can disagree with his priorities but you should always hear out people like this.
-Max
P.S. I didn't see this article at the time, but even though the surge in Iraq worked, should we have done it? Cochran discussed an alternative at the time. http://amconmag.com/article/2007/sep/24/00006/
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Why Object Oriented Languages Need Tail Calls
According to this argument, object oriented languages that don't require tail call optimization from their compiler(s) don't preserve object-oriented abstractions. I'm not 100% sure I buy the argument, since even if you do tail-call optimizations there are ways to implement the example in such a way that it runs out of stack space anyway--but perhaps his argument is that there's no correct way to implement the example (in the OO paradigm) without tail call optimizations. If that's the argument then I need to think about it some more.
-Max
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
-Max
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Public speaking
Tips on public speaking from Scott Berkun, who presented at work here recently:
1. Don't be afraid of the crowd. If necessary, arrive early, acclimate to the room, exercise beforehand. Amygdala.
2. Don't make it look like it's your first time ("nervous surgeon syndrome"). Practice slides, pitches, video manipulation, etc., beforehand until it feels good.
3. Keep a rhythm. ("Turtle on crack") Let people know how long each segment is supposed to take, be consistent. Attention span: 5-10 minutes. "I've got six pieces, five minutes each." May also be useful to give people an outline to follow in case they drift off for a minute.
4. Keep an interesting angle on things. Make it interesting to yourself at minimum. Also study the audience, talk to the audience beforehand about past experiences.
5. Avoid obfuscation of rhetoric: watch your tendency to use big, obscure words to win arguments (because people won't ask what things mean in an argument). Be clear, bring people along. Don't use language to defend yourself from questions. Do not be afraid of questions! (Side note, trying to make arguments strong: there's a difference between the point you want to make, and the arguments you use to support the points. Points must be clear, arguments can be clarified reactively.)
6. Slides serve what you are saying. Huge bulleted lists are often an indication that you have not practiced this, and are planning to use slides as notes. (Back to the audience, feel obligated to cover every point on the slides, etc.) Makes too many demands on visual bandwidth (information density--speaker doesn't know what the point is). Goal of a slide should be to support your points. If you need density, write a report, make a web site, whatever--but don't do a presentation. The acceptable level of density depends upon the presentation goal and the audience--if you're presenting code programming tips it may be okay to have more density than if you're giving tips on dating. When in doubt, rip it out.
-Max
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Metacognition
I had to dig this up recently:
Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Leads To Inflated Self-Assessments
It turns out that the very thing which prevents you from being good at certain intellectual or social tasks also prevents you from recognizing that you're not any good at it. Fairly poignant stuff if you look at it from a certain perspective, since there may be things you think you do well (sense of humor?) which you're worse at than almost anybody without even realizing it. On the other hand, it may also explain why we we're so hard on ourselves on at stuff we're good at.
-Max
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Leads To Inflated Self-Assessments
It turns out that the very thing which prevents you from being good at certain intellectual or social tasks also prevents you from recognizing that you're not any good at it. Fairly poignant stuff if you look at it from a certain perspective, since there may be things you think you do well (sense of humor?) which you're worse at than almost anybody without even realizing it. On the other hand, it may also explain why we we're so hard on ourselves on at stuff we're good at.
-Max
--
If you're so evil, eat this kitten!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, November 16, 2009
Two-year-old reciting Gettysburg address
Subject: Two-year-old reciting Gettysburg address
Dr. P_____,
If you have two and a half minutes, you will get a kick out of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvlsco7ux4g&feature=related
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Dr. P_____,
If you have two and a half minutes, you will get a kick out of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvlsco7ux4g&feature=related
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Friday, November 13, 2009
Archaeology
[From Chaos Manor. May be of indirect interest to amateur Book of Mormon archaelogical enthusiasts. -Max]
'A wind arose from the south, strong and deadly, bringing with it vast columns of whirling sand, which entirely covered up the troops and caused them wholly to disappear.'
The supposedly unreliable Herodotus is vindicated yet again:
<http://news.discovery.com/archaeology/
cambyses-army-remains-sahara.html>
-- Roland Dobbins
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Religion from a functional perspective
"Stealth religions": interesting essay on objectivism, atheism, and other non-standard "religions" from a well-defined functional perspective.
http://scienceblogs.com/evolution/2009/10/atheism_as_a_stealth_religion.php
The main purpose of a religion or a stealth religion, however, is not to describe the real world but to motivate a given suite of behaviors. One way to do this is by creating a stylized world without tradeoffs, in which the prescribed behaviors are portrayed as good, good, good for everyone and the prohibited behaviors are portrayed as bad, bad, bad for everyone. Behaviors with mixed effects are absent from the stylized world because they do not clearly tell the believer what to do.
This might be a good working definition for the work of a "false prophet" (see Matthew 24:11).
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
http://scienceblogs.com/evolution/2009/10/atheism_as_a_stealth_religion.php
The main purpose of a religion or a stealth religion, however, is not to describe the real world but to motivate a given suite of behaviors. One way to do this is by creating a stylized world without tradeoffs, in which the prescribed behaviors are portrayed as good, good, good for everyone and the prohibited behaviors are portrayed as bad, bad, bad for everyone. Behaviors with mixed effects are absent from the stylized world because they do not clearly tell the believer what to do.
This might be a good working definition for the work of a "false prophet" (see Matthew 24:11).
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Friday, November 6, 2009
Cleanshaven Lincoln: true story
Hey you three,
Did you know Lincoln was cleanshaven most of his life? He grew out his beard only in 1860, on the advice of an eleven-year-old girl who said she could get her two brothers to vote for him if he would grow out some "whiskers."
Full story at http://home.att.net/~rjnorton/Lincoln50.html.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Thursday, November 5, 2009
High Taxes: a California vs. Texas case study
California ranks 4th in terms of total revenues (including federal subsidies) and Texas ranks 44th. What does California get for all this money? Comparison of public spending in Texas vs. California here:
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Sherman
William T. Sherman is a personal hero of mine, a kindred spirit and a modern-day Moroni. Here are some of my favorite quotes.
-Max
=====================================
If they want eternal war, well and good; we accept the issue, and will dispossess them and put our friends in their place. I know thousands and millions of good people who at simple notice would come to North Alabama and accept the elegant houses and plantations there. If the people of Huntsville think different, let them persist in war three years longer, and then they will not be consulted. Three years ago by a little reflection and patience they could have had a hundred years of peace and prosperity, but they preferred war; very well. Last year they could have saved their slaves, but now it is too late.
All the powers of earth cannot restore to them their slaves, any more than their dead grandfathers. Next year their lands will be taken, for in war we can take them, and rightfully, too, and in another year they may beg in vain for their lives. A people who will persevere in war beyond a certain limit ought to know the consequences.
-Letter to Major Sawyer, Jan 31, 1864
Hold the fort! I am coming!
-Signal to Gen. Corse, Oct 5 1864
You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know I had no hand in making this war, and I know I will make more sacrifices to-day than any of you to secure peace. But you cannot have peace and a division of our country. If the United States submits to a division now, it will not stop, but will go on until we reap the fate of Mexico, which is eternal war. The United States does and must assert its authority, wherever it once had power; for, if it relaxes one bit to pressure, it is gone, and I believe that such is the national feeling.
-Letter to City Council of Atlanta, Sept 12, 1864
Boys, I've been where you are now and I know just how you feel. It's entirely natural that there should beat in the breast of every one of you a hope and desire that some day you can use the skill you have acquired here.
Suppress it! You don't know the horrible aspects of war. I've been through two wars and I know. I've seen cities and homes in ashes. I've seen thousands of men lying on the ground, their dead faces looking up at the skies. I tell you, war is hell!
-Speech to cadets at Michigan Military Academy, 1879
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Conference notes from Sunday
[Priesthood notes not included since I don't have them with me.]
Sunday morning.
Sister Ann M. Dibb: (Collapsed bridge story) Get a grip, hold to the rod.
Elder Nelson: communication w/ heaven, conversion, discernment. Revelation facilitated by proper reverence for Deity. May be incremental, those who heed are given more line upon line.
Pres. Monson: Dr. Jack McConnell's father, every day at dinner, "And what did you do for someone today?" He who loses his life for my sake shall find it. Kindness. Ideal gift, "Find someone who is having a hard time, or is ill, or lonely, and do something for them." Received dozens of cards recording service rendered.
Sunday evening.
Elder Holland. Protection against personal calamity, vs. the mist of darkness. Hold to the rod. Mist of darkness descends on ALL, successful travellers resist all distractions. Divinity of the Book of Mormon. Joseph & Hyrum, Ether 12, "Thou shalt be made strong even unto the sitting down in the place which has been prepared for you in the mansions of my Father." Apostolic witness of the divinity of the book and the prophetic calling of Joseph Smith. Great-grandfather: "No wicked man could write such a book as this, and no good man would write it, unless he were commanded of God to do so." Like Christ himself, it is a stone of stumbling, a rock of offense, a barrier in the path of those who wish to disbelieve this work.
Elder Cook. Stewardships, we believe we are our brother's keeper. Story: Jewish visitors to temple square & welfare square. "Obedience to the unenforceable." Faithful stewardship exercises righteous dominion, looks to his own, cares for the poor and needy. Story: clear spring at grandfather's ranch, when not protected eventually became polluted. Was then returned to original purity and beauty. Rationalization: "The ship must sail. You can't explain to the ocean." "What happens in Vegas" vs. "What happens in Severe County, you can share with your friends." Provide family with physical security and spiritual nourishment. From abundance, impart portion unto the poor and needy. Story: as new bishop, "some will respond to every suggestion, even at great sacrifice." (Sarah on top of a ladder, at age 80, cleaning out neighbor's raingutters.) Be prudent, but also diligent.
Elder Brent H. Nielson. To rising generation: go ye therefore, and teach all nations, every young man prepare to serve an honorable mission. Story: Finnland (Vipori/Freiburg, praying to open the Soviet Union for the gospel, fulfilled unknowingly by son 32 years later). Jacob 5, "[labor because] this is the last time that I will prune my vineyard."
Elder [not sure]. Heart transplants, need constant attention lest rejection occur. Tendency of the natural man is to reject the changed heart and allow it to harden. Ammonites, "as many as were converted... never did fall away." How? Zeal towards God and men, perfectly upright and honest, held covenants sacred. Story: purposefully late home to skip church for a nap. Discovered he had become casual about prayers and scriptures because of schedule, heart had begun to change back to stone. Do not risk forfeiting the fruits of the ultimate operation.
Elder Michael T. Ringwood. Story, grandfather Ephraim K. Hanks heard that his brother had gone off with the Mormons, went off to retrieve him, ended up getting baptized. Lamoni's father, soft heart that that was willing to change, willing to give up both sins and kingdom. Self-reflection will times when we found it easier to believe the word of God, perhaps especially childhood. Sometimes we are like Naaman, "some great thing." Easiness and willingness to believe, soft hearts, will come from obedience to simple things.
Elder Joseph W. Sitati. Marvelous work. Last dispensation, keys of revelation, no respecter of persons. Dispensations: Enoch, Noah, Babel, Brother of Jared, Nephites, Abraham, lesser covenant under Moses, the Savior's ministry, mission to the Gentiles, last dispensation. Elder Sitati has lived to see the fulfillment of the prophecy of Xenos, all nations partaking of the gospel. Blessings he has seen at home in Africa--celestial culture is developing in homes. Able to break free from the shackles that restrict the use of agency. Singled out dowry as a specific example of one shackle.
Elder Christofferson. Story, James E. Faust in OCS. Does not battle justify relaxed standards? "In the end I simply said, 'I do not believe there is a double standard of morality.'" "This was one of the critical crossroads of my life." Moral agency must be accompanied by moral discipline, self-discipline based on moral standards. To choose the right when it is right, even when it is hard. Society: because there is no discipline, must be imposed by external control. Once gentlemanly behavior protected women from coarse behavior, now we rely on sexual harrassment laws. Recession, partly because of widespread dishonest and unethical conduct. There can never be enough rules so finely crafted as to anticipate and cover every situation, and even if there were enforcement would be impossibly expensive and burdensome. This approach leads to diminished freedom for everyone. We would not accept the yoke of Christ, so now we must tremble at the yoke of Caesar. Moral discipline. We stand with those who demonstrate virtue in their own lives and inculcate virtue in the rising generation. Teaching children: "'Then they will have gained a strength from what they are, not merely from what they know.'" Intelligent use of agency requires knowledge of the truth, knowledge of things as they really are. Satan does not promote objectivity, but is a vigorous multi- media advocate of sin. Story: candy bar. "My mother's love and discipline put an early and abrupt end to my life of crime." We do not have to yield simply because a temptation surfaces. "'Don't you want to?' The question intrigued me because it was so utterly beside the point. Mere wanting... [missed the rest of the quotation]" We cannot presume that the future will resemble the past--politically, economically, etc.--but moral discipline will be immense help to us, whatever challenges may come.
Pres. Monson. Time of permissiveness, we often find ourselves swimming against the current. Ye cannot cross this great deep, save I prepare you against the waves of the sea... and the floods which shall come. If we heed his words we will survive this time of permissiveness. He is ever mindful of us and will bless us as we do what is right. We are all in this together and every man, woman, and child has a part to play.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
A privilege that could not be denied her
[Cc'ing Brother L______ in case I have your address wrong]
Sister L______,
Here is the quote I was thinking of. I couldn't find a copy of Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith so I couldn't verify whether it's in that book, but I found it in another source.
"He [Joseph Smith] also said many would awake on the morning of the resurrection sadly disappointed; for they, by transgression, would have neither wives nor children, for they surely would be taken from them and given to those who should prove themselves worthy. Again he said, a woman would have her choice; this was a privilege that could not be denied her." (Lucy Walker Kimball, as quoted in They Knew The Prophet, p. 136.)
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a
man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and
desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although
he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F.
Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, September 21, 2009
RE: Church Question
P.S. If you find all that confusing, let me try again: it is not true that there is only one God. As you originally observed, Jesus and his Father and the Holy Ghost are all Gods, and they are three different people. When Jesus told the Jews he was the Son of God, they accused him of blasphemy, and he said, basically, "In your own scriptures it says you are all gods. How can you say I'm blaspheming then because I say I am the Son of God?"
John 10:31-36:
31 Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him.
32 Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?
33 The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.
34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?
35 If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken;
36 Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?
He's referring back to Psalm 82:6, "I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High." So anyway, the simplest and most basic true answer to your question is, "It is not true that there is only one God. That is an old sectarian notion and is false."
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
To us there is but one God...
[In answer to the question, "I was studding Egyptian Religion, when I got thinking, we are suppose to believe in one God. Yet dont we believe in the father and the son, and dont we believe that they are both gods, so wouldnt that make two gods that we believe in? Then there is the holy ghost, which doesnt that make three deities? Then where does the devil play into it all. We belive he is our brother, he is collecting an army of his own to fight agianst us, is he not a god in his own right? Would he not compare to anciant religions form of the god of the underworld?" I wrote the following]
When I read the scriptures, the impression I get is that when it talks about there being "one God," it's as a contrast to the many idolatrous gods of the Egyptians and the Babylonians, etc. They had a god of rain and a good of the river and a god of fertility and a god of the sun and on and on--and none of those gods were real or able to do the slightest thing, they were just blocks of wood or stone. It's offensive to see the children of God worshipping things that aren't even real, instead of a real being who actually has power to help them and advise them. Anyway, that's the feeling I get from e.g. Exodus 3:13-14. Moses asks, when they ask me which God sent me, what shall I tell them? And the Lord basically says, "The real one."
So when the Lord says, "There is no God else beside me; a just God and a Savior; there is none beside me" (Isa 45:21), I don't think he is any way intending to exclude his Father from consideration. He's just saying, "None of the gods YOU think are god actually are. Baal is not a God, nor Isis, nor Horus."
I suppose from a mythological viewpoint you could view any powerful being with a following as a god, and that would make Satan a god from that perspective. (In fact, Satan is referred to in scripture at least once as the "god of this world," i.e. he whom Babylon worships.) Ultimately, though, he is weak and no more a god than any other thing which has no power in the eternities, and is not a God at all.
That's my take on it anyway. What's yours?
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Health care solution
I sent the following note to both my Senators and my Congressman:
Subject: You can have my vote if...
I'm a conservative-leaning independent, but I think the Democrats could instantly get my support for the public plan (even at a $1 trillion price tag over ten years) on one condition: hospitals must be required to let me pay cash for medical services at the same rate they would charge the public plan. One problem as I understand it with the health care industry is, if you took the same money you want to spend on health insurance and simply self-insured (i.e. invested it in bonds or CDs), when you actually needed health care you'd find that the hospitals charge you more for a given service than they charge health insurance companies, because of economies of scale and business leverage. I see that as a problem because it means you're forced into the insurance industry, you can't buy health care out of pocket, so the health CARE industry automatically inherits all the problems of the health INSURANCE industry. By letting me pay cash at the same rate as at least one insurance company (the public plan), it brings market forces back into play and, assuming that the public plan negotiates rates that are not foolishly high, gives health INSURANCE companies their most important competitor--not the public plan but me as an individual--and I don't have to be afraid if the public plan does happen to put the other health care providers out of business, even if there _were_ "death panels," since I could just buy care myself if the public plan won't provide it. Basically I'm using the government as a proxy to negotiate my rates for me.
Anyway, if you enable individuals to compete you'll have my vote even if I end up paying for something I'd rather not (the public plan) to get it. Fixing the structural problems in the system is worth it.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, September 14, 2009
Christopher Columbus and the Book of Mormon
So, you know Columbus is mentioned in the Book of Mormon, right?
1 Ne. 13: 12-13
12 And I looked and beheld a man among the Gentiles, who was separated from the seed of my brethren by the many waters; and I beheld the Spirit of God, that it came down and wrought upon the man; and he went forth upon the many waters, even unto the seed of my brethren, who were in the promised land.
13 And it came to pass that I beheld the Spirit of God, that it wrought upon other Gentiles; and they went forth out of captivity, upon the many waters.
Okay, so does everyone. Did you also know that Columbus realized he was being inspired? And that he was visited by angels? In order that we may gain greater understanding of 1 Ne. 13:12-13, I quote from the Oct 1992 issue of Ensign:
The novelty of Columbus's idea was not that the earth was round—every major geographer and scholar since the ancient Greeks accepted a spherical earth, as did seamen and educated people of the time. Rather, it was that the earth was not as far around as everyone believed. The most respected geographical authority in Columbus's time was Ptolemy, who had calculated the circumference of the earth at 21,840 miles (the modern measurement is 25,902 miles). Columbus preferred the estimates of Arab mathematician al-Farghani, who came up with a measurement of about 20,000 miles.
More important for Columbus, however, was the ratio of land to water. Here he made his greatest miscalculations. Marinus of Tyre had suggested that land extended for 225 degrees around the earth, leaving only 135 degrees of water between Portugal and China. But even that was too far for Columbus. Had not Esdras written (in the Apocrypha) that six parts of the globe are habitable land and only one part water? Columbus therefore reduced the width of the ocean by 28 degrees to account for a larger Asia and then another 30 degrees to Japan, because Marco Polo had reported (without seeing it, of course) that the island of Cipango (Japan) lay 1,500 miles off the coast of Cathay (China). Columbus subtracted 9 more degrees when he decided to depart from the Canary Islands.
Thus, he calculated the distance from the Canaries to Japan at about 2,400 miles. He was wrong, of course; the actual airline distance is 10,600 miles. But remarkably, what did lie about 2,400 miles west of the Canaries was an entirely new continent, unknown to anyone in Europe or Asia.
...Columbus would not be put off. He continued to promote his project so tenaciously that it gave rise to sundry stories and myths to explain his dogmatic certainty. There are so many flaws in these stories that it is amazing anyone ever believed them, much less modern critical scholars. Yet some people are willing to believe almost anything to explain Columbus's unmovable conviction rather than accept his claim that he was led by God. "I could sense his hand upon me," wrote Columbus, "so that it became clear to me that it was feasible to navigate from here to the Indies, and he gave me the will to do it."
...On the third voyage, he was unable to control the open rebellion that had broken out in the new colony he had founded on his second voyage. In October 1500, Columbus was arrested and deported to Spain in chains.
The humiliation was overwhelming. In a letter to a friend, Columbus wrote, "The only thing that sustains me is my hope in him who created everyone; his support has always been near. On one occasion not long ago, when I was deeply distressed, he raised me with his right arm, saying: 'O man of little faith, arise, it is I, do not be afraid.' "
Later, during his fourth voyage, Columbus received another divine assurance during an extremely perilous moment when he was about to abandon all hope. "Exhausted, I fell asleep, groaning," he reported to the sovereigns. "I heard a very compassionate voice, saying: 'O fool and slow to believe and to serve thy God, the God of all! … Thou criest for help, doubting. Answer, who has afflicted thee so greatly and so often, God or the world? … Not one jot of His word fails; all that He promises, He performs with interest; is this the manner of men? I have said that which thy Creator has done for thee and does for all men. Now in part He shows thee the reward for the anguish and danger which thou hast endured in the service of others.' I heard all of this as if I were in a trance, but I had no answer to give to words so true, but could only weep for my errors. He, whoever he was, who spoke to me, ended saying: 'Fear not; have trust; all these tribulations are written upon marble and are not without cause.'" [emphasis added]
1 Ne. 13: 12-13
12 And I looked and beheld a man among the Gentiles, who was separated from the seed of my brethren by the many waters; and I beheld the Spirit of God, that it came down and wrought upon the man; and he went forth upon the many waters, even unto the seed of my brethren, who were in the promised land.
13 And it came to pass that I beheld the Spirit of God, that it wrought upon other Gentiles; and they went forth out of captivity, upon the many waters.
Okay, so does everyone. Did you also know that Columbus realized he was being inspired? And that he was visited by angels? In order that we may gain greater understanding of 1 Ne. 13:12-13, I quote from the Oct 1992 issue of Ensign:
The novelty of Columbus's idea was not that the earth was round—every major geographer and scholar since the ancient Greeks accepted a spherical earth, as did seamen and educated people of the time. Rather, it was that the earth was not as far around as everyone believed. The most respected geographical authority in Columbus's time was Ptolemy, who had calculated the circumference of the earth at 21,840 miles (the modern measurement is 25,902 miles). Columbus preferred the estimates of Arab mathematician al-Farghani, who came up with a measurement of about 20,000 miles.
More important for Columbus, however, was the ratio of land to water. Here he made his greatest miscalculations. Marinus of Tyre had suggested that land extended for 225 degrees around the earth, leaving only 135 degrees of water between Portugal and China. But even that was too far for Columbus. Had not Esdras written (in the Apocrypha) that six parts of the globe are habitable land and only one part water? Columbus therefore reduced the width of the ocean by 28 degrees to account for a larger Asia and then another 30 degrees to Japan, because Marco Polo had reported (without seeing it, of course) that the island of Cipango (Japan) lay 1,500 miles off the coast of Cathay (China). Columbus subtracted 9 more degrees when he decided to depart from the Canary Islands.
Thus, he calculated the distance from the Canaries to Japan at about 2,400 miles. He was wrong, of course; the actual airline distance is 10,600 miles. But remarkably, what did lie about 2,400 miles west of the Canaries was an entirely new continent, unknown to anyone in Europe or Asia.
...Columbus would not be put off. He continued to promote his project so tenaciously that it gave rise to sundry stories and myths to explain his dogmatic certainty. There are so many flaws in these stories that it is amazing anyone ever believed them, much less modern critical scholars. Yet some people are willing to believe almost anything to explain Columbus's unmovable conviction rather than accept his claim that he was led by God. "I could sense his hand upon me," wrote Columbus, "so that it became clear to me that it was feasible to navigate from here to the Indies, and he gave me the will to do it."
...On the third voyage, he was unable to control the open rebellion that had broken out in the new colony he had founded on his second voyage. In October 1500, Columbus was arrested and deported to Spain in chains.
The humiliation was overwhelming. In a letter to a friend, Columbus wrote, "The only thing that sustains me is my hope in him who created everyone; his support has always been near. On one occasion not long ago, when I was deeply distressed, he raised me with his right arm, saying: 'O man of little faith, arise, it is I, do not be afraid.' "
Later, during his fourth voyage, Columbus received another divine assurance during an extremely perilous moment when he was about to abandon all hope. "Exhausted, I fell asleep, groaning," he reported to the sovereigns. "I heard a very compassionate voice, saying: 'O fool and slow to believe and to serve thy God, the God of all! … Thou criest for help, doubting. Answer, who has afflicted thee so greatly and so often, God or the world? … Not one jot of His word fails; all that He promises, He performs with interest; is this the manner of men? I have said that which thy Creator has done for thee and does for all men. Now in part He shows thee the reward for the anguish and danger which thou hast endured in the service of others.' I heard all of this as if I were in a trance, but I had no answer to give to words so true, but could only weep for my errors. He, whoever he was, who spoke to me, ended saying: 'Fear not; have trust; all these tribulations are written upon marble and are not without cause.'" [emphasis added]
Columbus was wrong about some of the details of geography, and he didn't fully understand the purpose of his mission--but he knew that God had a work for him to do and he did it.
-Max
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Friday, September 11, 2009
Miss Manners (Is Hilarious)
Clever people make me happy. The line in bold reminds me of K.'s sense of humor.
-M.
Dear Miss Manners:
When is it appropriate for men to wear white tuxedos? My family is planning an anniversary gala, and would like to have some of the young men escort guests to their tables.
So far so good, but they want the men to wear white tuxedos because it is August. I told them that since the affair was being held after 5 p.m. and it is being set up as a formal (semi-black tie) event, that white was not right to wear. I also said that the men would look like they were ready to pass out ice cream. Am I wrong?
Not about the hope of double scoops of chocolate whirl this will engender, if Miss Manners may judge by her own reaction. That white dinner jackets look silly, she agrees.
But they are not incorrect as summer evening clothes, so your objections about the hours and the degree of formality are incorrect. They do qualify as black tie. (Miss Manners has no idea what semi-black tie might be, but it sounds disheveled.)
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, September 7, 2009
IQ and financial acumen
Surprise, surprise! IQ is a general cognitive phenomenon, it's not subject matter-specific. It turns out that having a high IQ means you're likely to make better financial choices.
See http://www.jerrypournelle.com/mail/2009/Q2/mail570.html#IQ which refers to:
People with higher IQs make wiser economic choices, study finds
http://www.physorg.com/print160077614.html
People with higher measures of cognitive ability are more likely to make good choices in several different types of economic decisions, according to a new study with researchers from the University of Minnesota's Twin Cities and Morris campuses.
The study, set to be published online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this week, was conducted with 1,000 trainee truck drivers at Schneider National, Inc., an American motor carrier employing 20,000. The researchers measured the trainees' cognitive skills and asked them to make choices in several economic experiments, and then followed them on the job.
People with better cognitive skills, in particular higher IQ, were more willing to take calculated risks and to save their money and made more consistent choices. They were also more likely to be cooperative in a strategic situation, and exhibited higher "social awareness" in that they more accurately forecasted others' behavior.
The researchers also tracked how trainees persevered on their new job. The company paid for the training of those who stayed a year, but those who left early owed thousands in training costs. The study found that those with the highest level of cognitive ability stayed at twice the rate of those with the lowest.
The finding that individual characteristics that improve economic success--patience, risk taking and effective social behavior--all cluster together and are linked through cognitive skill, which could have implications for policy making and education.
This matches my modest personal experience. Several weeks ago, I spent a few days asking various friends, "If you had a choice between $500 now or a 15% chance of $1,000,000 in six months, which would you pick?" I thought the choice was obvious, but in practice I was shocked at how many people picked the $500. While I can potentially imagine some scenarios in which the certainty of $500 has greater utility (you're living on the edge already and $500 is enough to keep you from losing your house and spiraling down into the disaster of homelessness) I can't possibly imagine that 60% of the people I know are in that situation, which means that most or all of them aren't making good financial decisions. You will never get another chance at an investment with a 60,000% annualized expected-value rate-of-return. All of the financial decisions you will ever make in your life are a worse bet than that. Take the 15%!!!
And of course there's the whole mystery of credit card debt. Don't get me wrong--I've found some situations where it's useful to have a credit card, and there are even situations where I can see that it would be advantageous to carry a balance for a brief period of time, if an unexpected expense requires liquidating assets and you need more time to avoid taking a loss. Still, I remember the first time I was ever exposed to credit cards. I was somewhere around four or five years old, and I remember being at a store and watching my mom pay for something with a credit card--the clerk had this awkward contraption with carbon paper, and he put the card in there and worked the device (ka-chunka-chunka!) and gave it back to my mother, then did some paperwork for a minute and then we were done--and I was amazed. You can actually buy stuff without money! I also remember my disillusionment when I found out, later that day, that you have to pay the money back. My disgruntled reaction: "Well then what's the point?!"
See http://www.jerrypournelle.com/mail/2009/Q2/mail570.html#IQ which refers to:
People with higher IQs make wiser economic choices, study finds
http://www.physorg.com/print160077614.html
People with higher measures of cognitive ability are more likely to make good choices in several different types of economic decisions, according to a new study with researchers from the University of Minnesota's Twin Cities and Morris campuses.
The study, set to be published online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this week, was conducted with 1,000 trainee truck drivers at Schneider National, Inc., an American motor carrier employing 20,000. The researchers measured the trainees' cognitive skills and asked them to make choices in several economic experiments, and then followed them on the job.
People with better cognitive skills, in particular higher IQ, were more willing to take calculated risks and to save their money and made more consistent choices. They were also more likely to be cooperative in a strategic situation, and exhibited higher "social awareness" in that they more accurately forecasted others' behavior.
The researchers also tracked how trainees persevered on their new job. The company paid for the training of those who stayed a year, but those who left early owed thousands in training costs. The study found that those with the highest level of cognitive ability stayed at twice the rate of those with the lowest.
The finding that individual characteristics that improve economic success--patience, risk taking and effective social behavior--all cluster together and are linked through cognitive skill, which could have implications for policy making and education.
This matches my modest personal experience. Several weeks ago, I spent a few days asking various friends, "If you had a choice between $500 now or a 15% chance of $1,000,000 in six months, which would you pick?" I thought the choice was obvious, but in practice I was shocked at how many people picked the $500. While I can potentially imagine some scenarios in which the certainty of $500 has greater utility (you're living on the edge already and $500 is enough to keep you from losing your house and spiraling down into the disaster of homelessness) I can't possibly imagine that 60% of the people I know are in that situation, which means that most or all of them aren't making good financial decisions. You will never get another chance at an investment with a 60,000% annualized expected-value rate-of-return. All of the financial decisions you will ever make in your life are a worse bet than that. Take the 15%!!!
And of course there's the whole mystery of credit card debt. Don't get me wrong--I've found some situations where it's useful to have a credit card, and there are even situations where I can see that it would be advantageous to carry a balance for a brief period of time, if an unexpected expense requires liquidating assets and you need more time to avoid taking a loss. Still, I remember the first time I was ever exposed to credit cards. I was somewhere around four or five years old, and I remember being at a store and watching my mom pay for something with a credit card--the clerk had this awkward contraption with carbon paper, and he put the card in there and worked the device (ka-chunka-chunka!) and gave it back to my mother, then did some paperwork for a minute and then we were done--and I was amazed. You can actually buy stuff without money! I also remember my disillusionment when I found out, later that day, that you have to pay the money back. My disgruntled reaction: "Well then what's the point?!"
And that's still basically my attitude toward credit card debt today. The crazy thing is that it should be the universal attitude, but somehow it isn't.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Twin studies
This guy reminds me of Judith Harris. I wonder if it's still true.
"In graduate school at UC [the University of California] Berkeley, I was reading a book edited by psychiatrist D. D. Jackson on the etiology of schizophrenia. The first chapter, by a geneticist, was on twin studies. Then Jackson refuted it all with just the kind of [guff] you hear now against twin studies. He said families are the cause of schizophrenia. I remember saying in a graduate seminar, "Most of this stuff [in Jackson's argument] is junk"—I crawled out of the seminar room a bloody pulp. The reaction [from seminar members] was my first absolutely clear-cut demonstration that psychologists believed correlation is causation, ... and many still do."
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Soft-hearted dupes
M.,
I spent some time today trying to remember enough names to dig up this info--someone made a disparaging comment about HUAC and McCarthy, but the fact is that the in some cases HUAC was right and the soft-hearted "useful idiots" were wrong, even if they managed to keep the cases controversial. (That is, you don't have to be innocent to convince a lot of people that you're being witchhunted.) The Rosenbergs are a case in point. They were executed for treason fifty years ago. This has been "controversial" for a long time because a lot of people thought they weren't guilty. In 2008, one of their co-conspirators confessed, without regret, that the Rosenbergs and their supporters had lied to everybody all along and that they and he had actually done the things they were accused of (passing secrets to the Soviets), although according to him "spying" isn't the way he likes to think of it.
Anyway, I remember hearing about this at the time, but it took me a while to track it down and so per policy this time I'm notifying you and archiving the info (and Cc'ing the blog).
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, August 31, 2009
Spy vs. Spy
Okay, you've got to admit this is pretty interesting.
Facts: On July 24, between the islands of Oland and Gotland, the vessel was attacked by a group of 10 to 12 people in black masks. They beat and bound the crew while searching for something on the vessel. According to some sources, the hijackers spent nearly 12 hours on the Arctic Sea before leaving empty-handed... It was allegedly hijacked again on August 3, at which point the hijackers demanded a $1.5 million ransom for the vessel's safe release. The Russian navy embarked on its first major operation since the end of the Cold War, rushing three battleships and one frigate to find the Arctic Sea.
Speculation: Given the scale of the potential international brouhaha, a country with a distinct interest in preventing this shipment chose to interdict it in an unofficial manner.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Message in a Bottle
Dear K.,
How are you? I mean that sincerely. The fact that my mind is blank ought perhaps to clue me in to the possibility that I ought to write later when I do have something to say, but I can't help wanting to interact with you in some way anyway. For so long you've been my best friend--who knows how long? maybe years, maybe centuries--but there's still so much about you that I only guess at, but wish to know. So, dear friend, how are you?
I love the climate and terrain here in Washington. One thing about desk jobs though--it's important for me to interact with the actual physical universe because of all the time I spend living in my head, and it takes a fairly deliberate effort to do so. Pain is a funny thing. Though it isn't pleasant in and of itself, there's something deeply satisfying about having worked hard enough to have sore muscles all over your body.
I really like my new apartment, by the way. It's my first time without roommates, and to my surprise I find that rather than being lonely I enjoy controlling the whole space, deciding how most efficiently to use each room, internalizing the details of what I own and precisely where it is, and what is okay to throw away or not buy in the first place. And when I clean something it stays clean--it's very motivating. I think so far at least I have fewer urges to go out and spend money--perhaps that was a coping mechanism for getting away from people (and clutter).
I also bought an iPod Nano. It's amazingly small and light. Music makes me happy. I continue to read (both sci-fi/fantasy and nonfiction, variously scientific, psychological, political, or business-oriented). How are your hobbies?
It's nice to talk with you. Be well, dear friend.
Love,
Maximilian
P.S. I now have a multicolored propeller beanie. Watching the red propeller spin in the wind makes me happy.
(Hmmm. "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Propeller Beanie." Because seriously, what is more amazing and enviable, a coat or a hat? What do you think?)
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
How are you? I mean that sincerely. The fact that my mind is blank ought perhaps to clue me in to the possibility that I ought to write later when I do have something to say, but I can't help wanting to interact with you in some way anyway. For so long you've been my best friend--who knows how long? maybe years, maybe centuries--but there's still so much about you that I only guess at, but wish to know. So, dear friend, how are you?
I love the climate and terrain here in Washington. One thing about desk jobs though--it's important for me to interact with the actual physical universe because of all the time I spend living in my head, and it takes a fairly deliberate effort to do so. Pain is a funny thing. Though it isn't pleasant in and of itself, there's something deeply satisfying about having worked hard enough to have sore muscles all over your body.
I really like my new apartment, by the way. It's my first time without roommates, and to my surprise I find that rather than being lonely I enjoy controlling the whole space, deciding how most efficiently to use each room, internalizing the details of what I own and precisely where it is, and what is okay to throw away or not buy in the first place. And when I clean something it stays clean--it's very motivating. I think so far at least I have fewer urges to go out and spend money--perhaps that was a coping mechanism for getting away from people (and clutter).
I also bought an iPod Nano. It's amazingly small and light. Music makes me happy. I continue to read (both sci-fi/fantasy and nonfiction, variously scientific, psychological, political, or business-oriented). How are your hobbies?
It's nice to talk with you. Be well, dear friend.
Love,
Maximilian
P.S. I now have a multicolored propeller beanie. Watching the red propeller spin in the wind makes me happy.
(Hmmm. "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Propeller Beanie." Because seriously, what is more amazing and enviable, a coat or a hat? What do you think?)
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, August 17, 2009
Medical malpractice
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/036480.html
In 2003, $11 billion for medical malpractice premiums, out of $215 billion for all liability insurance, or out of $1.5 trillion on health care costs.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Miscalculations and Interpersonal Relationships
You know, M., if I had known then what I do now, there are several things I probably wouldn't have done. One is this: there were occasions when I knowingly did things that would hurt my relationship with K., because I thought the benefit to her would be greater than the cost. For instance, still forwarding her interesting articles while we weren't on good terms. I thought she would value the information despite the source (incorrect assumption), and that our relationship wasn't important to her so any damage to it would also not be important (also incorrect). Things would have turned out better if I had assumed that we were both important to each other.
That would also have changed the way I addressed problems in our relationship. For instance, when she felt inundated with Max-ness (you know I can be pretty overbearing), she tended to react by being purposefully rude so that I'd back off. Eventually I would notice and stop talking to her, and I'd count that as further evidence that she didn't really care about our relationship. At which point she would now feel comfortable talking to me again, so we'd drift back into being friends. It was a vicious, perplexing cycle. If I had known we cared about each other I would have used my normal tactic of asking, "Hey, what's up with the way you're treating me lately?" and she probably would have told me that I needed to back off. Since I figured I already knew, though, I didn't ask, I just kept assuming that she occasionally found me useful but didn't like me very much as a human being, and that she was sometimes annoyingly rude--and the cycle never got fixed.
There are things I would do differently if I had the chance to do them over again, now that I know more.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
That would also have changed the way I addressed problems in our relationship. For instance, when she felt inundated with Max-ness (you know I can be pretty overbearing), she tended to react by being purposefully rude so that I'd back off. Eventually I would notice and stop talking to her, and I'd count that as further evidence that she didn't really care about our relationship. At which point she would now feel comfortable talking to me again, so we'd drift back into being friends. It was a vicious, perplexing cycle. If I had known we cared about each other I would have used my normal tactic of asking, "Hey, what's up with the way you're treating me lately?" and she probably would have told me that I needed to back off. Since I figured I already knew, though, I didn't ask, I just kept assuming that she occasionally found me useful but didn't like me very much as a human being, and that she was sometimes annoyingly rude--and the cycle never got fixed.
There are things I would do differently if I had the chance to do them over again, now that I know more.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Friday, August 14, 2009
Gulf War I (Recommended)
A summary of the first Gulf War. Very readable, pretty short.
Discusses motivations and larger context.
Discusses motivations and larger context.
http://www.jerrypournelle.com/mail/2009/Q3/mail583.html#Trainor
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a
man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and
desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although
he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F.
Smith (manual, p. 69)
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Tax revenues
[From http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/slideshow/ALeqM5ibGXhJv-N7Qg6nh-nQpPOgJRTgugD99ROBK80?index=0]
I wonder what caused the big spike in corporate tax revenue during the Bush years.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
I wonder what caused the big spike in corporate tax revenue during the Bush years.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, August 3, 2009
I love Gmail!
http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2007-11-20-n35.html
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a
man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and
desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although
he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F.
Smith (manual, p. 69)
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Language and Cognition: Investigating the Sapir-Wharf hypothesis
Pretty interesting reading below. I was impressed by how thoroughly they seem to be investigating the phenomenon, and how many chances they gave themselves to falsify their own hypothesis. Looks like good science.
-Max
Follow me to Pormpuraaw, a small Aboriginal community on the western edge of Cape York, in northern Australia. I came here because of the way the locals, the Kuuk Thaayorre, talk about space. Instead of words like "right," "left," "forward," and "back," which, as commonly used in English, define space relative to an observer, the Kuuk Thaayorre, like many other Aboriginal groups, use cardinal-direction terms — north, south, east, and west — to define space.1 This is done at all scales, which means you have to say things like "There's an ant on your southeast leg" or "Move the cup to the north northwest a little bit." One obvious consequence of speaking such a language is that you have to stay oriented at all times, or else you cannot speak properly. The normal greeting in Kuuk Thaayorre is "Where are you going?" and the answer should be something like " Southsoutheast, in the middle distance." If you don't know which way you're facing, you can't even get past "Hello."
... [W]e gave people sets of pictures that showed some kind of temporal progression (e.g., pictures of a man aging, or a crocodile growing, or a banana being eaten). Their job was to arrange the shuffled photos on the ground to show the correct temporal order. We tested each person in two separate sittings, each time facing in a different cardinal direction. If you ask English speakers to do this, they'll arrange the cards so that time proceeds from left to right. Hebrew speakers will tend to lay out the cards from right to left, showing that writing direction in a language plays a role. So what about folks like the Kuuk Thaayorre, who don't use words like "left" and "right"? What will they do?
The Kuuk Thaayorre did not arrange the cards more often from left to right than from right to left, nor more toward or away from the body. But their arrangements were not random: there was a pattern, just a different one from that of English speakers. Instead of arranging time from left to right, they arranged it from east to west. That is, when they were seated facing south, the cards went left to right. When they faced north, the cards went from right to left. When they faced east, the cards came toward the body and so on. This was true even though we never told any of our subjects which direction they faced. The Kuuk Thaayorre not only knew that already (usually much better than I did), but they also spontaneously used this spatial orientation to construct their representations of time.
... Our research into such basic cognitive abilities as estimating duration shows that speakers of different languages differ in ways predicted by the patterns of metaphors in their language. (For example, when asked to estimate duration, English speakers are more likely to be confused by distance information, estimating that a line of greater length remains on the test screen for a longer period of time, whereas Greek speakers are more likely to be confused by amount, estimating that a container that is fuller remains longer on the screen.)
... Russian speakers are quicker to distinguish two shades of blue that are called by the different names in Russian (i.e., one being siniy and the other being goluboy) than if the two fall into the same category. For English speakers, all these shades are still designated by the same word, "blue," and there are no comparable differences in reaction time.
Further, the Russian advantage disappears when subjects are asked to perform a verbal interference task (reciting a string of digits) while making color judgments but not when they're asked to perform an equally difficult spatial interference task (keeping a novel visual pattern in memory). The disappearance of the advantage when performing a verbal task shows that language is normally involved in even surprisingly basic perceptual judgments — and that it is language per se that creates this difference in perception between Russian and English speakers.
...Does treating chairs as masculine and beds as feminine in the grammar make Russian speakers think of chairs as being more like men and beds as more like women in some way? It turns out that it does. In one study, we asked German and Spanish speakers to describe objects having opposite gender assignment in those two languages. The descriptions they gave differed in a way predicted by grammatical gender. For example, when asked to describe a "key" — a word that is masculine in German and feminine in Spanish — the German speakers were more likely to use words like "hard," "heavy," "jagged," "metal," "serrated," and "useful," whereas Spanish speakers were more likely to say "golden," "intricate," "little," "lovely," "shiny," and "tiny." To describe a "bridge," which is feminine in German and masculine in Spanish, the German speakers said "beautiful," "elegant," "fragile," "peaceful," "pretty," and "slender," and the Spanish speakers said "big," "dangerous," "long," "strong," "sturdy," and "towering." This was true even though all testing was done in English, a language without grammatical gender. The same pattern of results also emerged in entirely nonlinguistic tasks (e.g., rating similarity between pictures).
... In fact, you don't even need to go into the lab to see these effects of language; you can see them with your own eyes in an art gallery. Look at some famous examples of personification in art — the ways in which abstract entities such as death, sin, victory, or time are given human form. How does an artist decide whether death, say, or time should be painted as a man or a woman? It turns out that in 85 percent of such personifications, whether a male or female figure is chosen is predicted by the grammatical gender of the word in the artist's native language. So, for example, German painters are more likely to paint death as a man, whereas Russian painters are more likely to paint death as a woman.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
... [W]e gave people sets of pictures that showed some kind of temporal progression (e.g., pictures of a man aging, or a crocodile growing, or a banana being eaten). Their job was to arrange the shuffled photos on the ground to show the correct temporal order. We tested each person in two separate sittings, each time facing in a different cardinal direction. If you ask English speakers to do this, they'll arrange the cards so that time proceeds from left to right. Hebrew speakers will tend to lay out the cards from right to left, showing that writing direction in a language plays a role. So what about folks like the Kuuk Thaayorre, who don't use words like "left" and "right"? What will they do?
The Kuuk Thaayorre did not arrange the cards more often from left to right than from right to left, nor more toward or away from the body. But their arrangements were not random: there was a pattern, just a different one from that of English speakers. Instead of arranging time from left to right, they arranged it from east to west. That is, when they were seated facing south, the cards went left to right. When they faced north, the cards went from right to left. When they faced east, the cards came toward the body and so on. This was true even though we never told any of our subjects which direction they faced. The Kuuk Thaayorre not only knew that already (usually much better than I did), but they also spontaneously used this spatial orientation to construct their representations of time.
... Our research into such basic cognitive abilities as estimating duration shows that speakers of different languages differ in ways predicted by the patterns of metaphors in their language. (For example, when asked to estimate duration, English speakers are more likely to be confused by distance information, estimating that a line of greater length remains on the test screen for a longer period of time, whereas Greek speakers are more likely to be confused by amount, estimating that a container that is fuller remains longer on the screen.)
... Russian speakers are quicker to distinguish two shades of blue that are called by the different names in Russian (i.e., one being siniy and the other being goluboy) than if the two fall into the same category. For English speakers, all these shades are still designated by the same word, "blue," and there are no comparable differences in reaction time.
Further, the Russian advantage disappears when subjects are asked to perform a verbal interference task (reciting a string of digits) while making color judgments but not when they're asked to perform an equally difficult spatial interference task (keeping a novel visual pattern in memory). The disappearance of the advantage when performing a verbal task shows that language is normally involved in even surprisingly basic perceptual judgments — and that it is language per se that creates this difference in perception between Russian and English speakers.
...Does treating chairs as masculine and beds as feminine in the grammar make Russian speakers think of chairs as being more like men and beds as more like women in some way? It turns out that it does. In one study, we asked German and Spanish speakers to describe objects having opposite gender assignment in those two languages. The descriptions they gave differed in a way predicted by grammatical gender. For example, when asked to describe a "key" — a word that is masculine in German and feminine in Spanish — the German speakers were more likely to use words like "hard," "heavy," "jagged," "metal," "serrated," and "useful," whereas Spanish speakers were more likely to say "golden," "intricate," "little," "lovely," "shiny," and "tiny." To describe a "bridge," which is feminine in German and masculine in Spanish, the German speakers said "beautiful," "elegant," "fragile," "peaceful," "pretty," and "slender," and the Spanish speakers said "big," "dangerous," "long," "strong," "sturdy," and "towering." This was true even though all testing was done in English, a language without grammatical gender. The same pattern of results also emerged in entirely nonlinguistic tasks (e.g., rating similarity between pictures).
... In fact, you don't even need to go into the lab to see these effects of language; you can see them with your own eyes in an art gallery. Look at some famous examples of personification in art — the ways in which abstract entities such as death, sin, victory, or time are given human form. How does an artist decide whether death, say, or time should be painted as a man or a woman? It turns out that in 85 percent of such personifications, whether a male or female figure is chosen is predicted by the grammatical gender of the word in the artist's native language. So, for example, German painters are more likely to paint death as a man, whereas Russian painters are more likely to paint death as a woman.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, July 27, 2009
Brigham Young quote
I recently had cause to dig this up.
"Another great cause of dissatisfaction [in the home] is that so many women are such noble women, and know so much more than their husbands. They say, 'This man is not capable of leading me.' That is a positive proof to me that that man does not know his ability and calling. I will acknowledge that many women are smarter than their husbands. But when people are married, instead of trying to get rid of each other, reflect that you have made your choice, and strive to honour and keep it. Do not manifest that you have acted unwisely, and say that you have made a bad choice, nor let anybody know that you think you have. You made your choice; stick to it, and strive to comfort and assist each other." -Brigham Young
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
"Another great cause of dissatisfaction [in the home] is that so many women are such noble women, and know so much more than their husbands. They say, 'This man is not capable of leading me.' That is a positive proof to me that that man does not know his ability and calling. I will acknowledge that many women are smarter than their husbands. But when people are married, instead of trying to get rid of each other, reflect that you have made your choice, and strive to honour and keep it. Do not manifest that you have acted unwisely, and say that you have made a bad choice, nor let anybody know that you think you have. You made your choice; stick to it, and strive to comfort and assist each other." -Brigham Young
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Friday, July 24, 2009
SecDef Gates on the future of the military
I have my problems with the President's handling of domestic issues, but I'm generally pretty happy with the foreign policy scene--and perhaps Obama's best move so far has been listening to Gates. It looks like some things are happening under Obama that Gates probably wanted to do under Bush but couldn't. This is a speech the SecDef gave recently at the Economic Club of Chicago:
But other nations have learned from the experience of Saddam Hussein's military in the first and second Gulf wars - that it is ill-advised, if not suicidal, to fight a conventional war head-to-head against the United States: fighter-to-fighter, ship-to-ship, tank-to-tank. They also learned from a bankrupted Soviet Union not to try to outspend us or match our overall capabilities. Instead, they are developing asymmetric means that take advantage of new technologies - and our vulnerabilities - to disrupt our lines of communication and our freedom of movement, to deny us access, and to narrow our military options and strategic choices.
At the same time, insurgents or militias are acquiring or seeking precision weapons, sophisticated communications, cyber capabilities, and even weapons of mass destruction. The Lebanese extremist group Hezbollah currently has more rockets and high-end munitions - many quite sophisticated and accurate - than all but a handful of countries. [snip]
We must also get control of what is called "requirements creep" - where more features and capabilities are added to a given piece of equipment, often to the point of absurdity. The most flamboyant example of this phenomenon is the new presidential helicopter - what President Obama referred to as defense procurement "run amok." Once the analysis and requirements were done, we ended up with a helicopter that cost nearly half a billion dollars each and enabled the president to, among other things, cook dinner while in flight under nuclear attack. [snip]
To this end, the president's budget request cut, curtailed, or ended a number of conventional modernization programs - satellites, ground vehicles, helicopters, fighters - that were either performing poorly or in excess to real-world needs. Conversely, future-oriented programs where the U.S. was relatively underinvested were accelerated or received more funding.
For example, we must sustain and continually improve our specialized strategic deterrent to ensure that our - and our allies' - security is always protected against nuclear-armed adversaries. In an initiative little noticed, the President's program includes money to begin a new generation of ballistic missile submarines and nearly $700 million in additional funds to secure and assure America's nuclear deterrent.
Cutting the F-22 budget got some media attention but it looks like that's just the tip of the iceberg. I am impressed with the way Gates thinks and I'm pleased that Obama is listening.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Personal matters
[I redacted this before sending it on to the blog]
My church callings are as employment specialist and assistant ward clerk. Both of those are going fine, pretty much, although I don't really feel completely competent in either role--but I guess I'm not as incompetent as I started out, either. I am no longer attending Institute, because I checked the Church web site and found out that I'm exempt :). "Institutes of religion provide weekday religious instruction for single and married postsecondary students. Young single adults of the appropriate age (generally 18-30) are also welcome to attend." That's good news for me because I have noticed a tendency for Institute to crowd out other things in my life sometimes, because it pushes church-related activities to >50% of the week (including Sunday, temple night and Family Night), especially in weeks where I need to travel or do errands or go out with a girl or something. I'm not saying that Institute isn't worthwhile, just that it was tough crowding everything in and it's a nice surprise to find out that I'm actually done, at least with that part of life. I expect to feel that same kind of pleasant surprise when I die.
I may have mentioned that I have been considering adopting a dog, lately. There are several reasons for this, including concern over the general poisonous selfishness which is inherent in life as a bachelor, the impossibility (or at least inadvisability) of adopting kids without a spouse--children have a right to have a mother and a father--coupled with the fact that animals have no such right w/rt their owners, basic mammalian psychological needs, etc. At the same time, any such plans have been shoved onto the back burner for the time being because I think I have enough to keep me busy for the short term, at least the next couple of years, in broadening and deepening certain relationships and preparing for the non-zero possibility that I could marry at some point in the next few years[1]. Specifically, there are a number[2] of girls I know, each of whom I love and admire enough to allow whatever kind or level of relationship between us which she should happen to want, from no contact up to marriage or anything in between[3]. The universe is infinite, and ultimately the set of women to whom this applies is actually infinite, but at the moment I know of only a handful and that handful is enough to keep me busy, at least until my capabilities expand. There's one of them I am considering visiting later this year. And of course K-------- is on that list.
I know this sounds kind of weird and polygamous[4], which is really why I fought my suspicions about myself for so long--if the list is longer than one name, "K--------," it's probably infinite in length. Oh. Well. [sigh] We do the best we can with what we've got, right? Where we're wrong we will eventually be corrected.
Love,
Max
[1] New data has come to light, and I now know a way to keep all of my promises, to everyone, even if I don't die a bachelor.
[2] More than one, less than six.
[3] Luke 14:8-11 seems relevant here.
[4] The basic truth I've discovered about myself is that I'm not actually monogamous by nature--it's in my nature to treat all relationships individually, separate from any other relationship.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Luke 14:8-11
[Fwd'ing to blog]
I'm going to be cryptic here, and share something that was on my mind yesterday because of stuff at the reunion:
8 When thou art bidden of any man to a wedding, sit not down in the highest room; lest a more honourable man than thou be bidden of him;
9 And he that bade thee and him come and say to thee, Give this man place; and thou begin with shame to take the lowest room.
10 But when thou art bidden, go and sit down in the lowest room; that when he that bade thee cometh, he may say unto thee, Friend, go up higher: then shalt thou have worship in the presence of them that sit at meat with thee.
11 For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.
8 When thou art bidden of any man to a wedding, sit not down in the highest room; lest a more honourable man than thou be bidden of him;
9 And he that bade thee and him come and say to thee, Give this man place; and thou begin with shame to take the lowest room.
10 But when thou art bidden, go and sit down in the lowest room; that when he that bade thee cometh, he may say unto thee, Friend, go up higher: then shalt thou have worship in the presence of them that sit at meat with thee.
11 For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Following the prophet
J.,
I liked this sentiment a lot and think you will too, because it reminds me of something you said when we were talking about amnesia. Emphasis added in bold by me.
(I also like President George Albert Smith's correction, but am not quoting it here. The essence of the correction is this quotation from Joseph Smith: "If I esteem mankind to be in error, shall I bear them down? No. I will lift them up, and in their own way too, if I cannot persuade them my way is better; and I will not seek to compel any man to believe as I do, only by the force of reasoning, for truth will cut its own way." Emphasis in original.)
-Max
Ward Teachers' Message for June, 1945
"SUSTAINING THE GENERAL AUTHORITIES OF THE CHURCH"
No Latter-day Saint is compelled to sustain the General Authorities of the Church. When given the opportunity to vote on the proposition in any of the several conferences held throughout the Church, he may indicate his willingness to sustain them by raising his right hand; he may manifest his opposition in like manner; or he may ignore the opportunity entirely. There is no element of coercion or force in this or any other Church procedure.
However, there is the principle of honor involved in the member's choice. When a person raises his hand to sustain Church leaders as "prophets, seers, and revelators," it is the same as a promise and a covenant to follow their leadership and to abide by their counsel as the living oracles of God. Consequently, any subsequent act or word of mouth which is at variance with the will of the Lord as taught by the leaders of the Church places the sincerity of such person in serious doubt. One could scarcely have claim upon complete integrity, if he raises his hand to sustain the Authorities of the Church and then proceeds in opposition to their counsel.
Any Latter-day Saint who denounces or opposes, whether actively or otherwise, any plan or doctrine advocated by the "prophets, seers, and revelators" of the Church is cultivating the spirit of apostasy. One cannot speak evil of the Lord's anointed and retain the Holy Spirit in his heart.
It should be remembered that Lucifer has a very cunning way of convincing unsuspecting souls that the General Authorities of the Church are as likely to be wrong as they are to be right. This sort of game is Satan's favorite pastime, and he has practiced it on believing souls since Adam. He wins a great victory when he can get members of the Church to speak against their leaders and to "do their own thinking." He specializes in suggesting that our leaders are in error while he plays the blinding rays of apostasy in the eyes of those whom he thus beguiles. What cunning! And to think that some of our members are deceived by this trickery.
The following words of the Prophet Joseph Smith should be memorized by every Latter-day Saint and repeated often enough to insure their never being forgotten:
When our leaders speak, the thinking has been done. When they propose a plan--it is God's plan. When they point the way, there is no other which is safe. When they give direction, it should mark the end of controversy. God works in no other way. To think otherwise, without immediate repentance, may cost one his faith, may destroy his testimony, and leave him a stranger to the kingdom of God.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
I liked this sentiment a lot and think you will too, because it reminds me of something you said when we were talking about amnesia. Emphasis added in bold by me.
(I also like President George Albert Smith's correction, but am not quoting it here. The essence of the correction is this quotation from Joseph Smith: "If I esteem mankind to be in error, shall I bear them down? No. I will lift them up, and in their own way too, if I cannot persuade them my way is better; and I will not seek to compel any man to believe as I do, only by the force of reasoning, for truth will cut its own way." Emphasis in original.)
-Max
Ward Teachers' Message for June, 1945
"SUSTAINING THE GENERAL AUTHORITIES OF THE CHURCH"
No Latter-day Saint is compelled to sustain the General Authorities of the Church. When given the opportunity to vote on the proposition in any of the several conferences held throughout the Church, he may indicate his willingness to sustain them by raising his right hand; he may manifest his opposition in like manner; or he may ignore the opportunity entirely. There is no element of coercion or force in this or any other Church procedure.
However, there is the principle of honor involved in the member's choice. When a person raises his hand to sustain Church leaders as "prophets, seers, and revelators," it is the same as a promise and a covenant to follow their leadership and to abide by their counsel as the living oracles of God. Consequently, any subsequent act or word of mouth which is at variance with the will of the Lord as taught by the leaders of the Church places the sincerity of such person in serious doubt. One could scarcely have claim upon complete integrity, if he raises his hand to sustain the Authorities of the Church and then proceeds in opposition to their counsel.
Any Latter-day Saint who denounces or opposes, whether actively or otherwise, any plan or doctrine advocated by the "prophets, seers, and revelators" of the Church is cultivating the spirit of apostasy. One cannot speak evil of the Lord's anointed and retain the Holy Spirit in his heart.
It should be remembered that Lucifer has a very cunning way of convincing unsuspecting souls that the General Authorities of the Church are as likely to be wrong as they are to be right. This sort of game is Satan's favorite pastime, and he has practiced it on believing souls since Adam. He wins a great victory when he can get members of the Church to speak against their leaders and to "do their own thinking." He specializes in suggesting that our leaders are in error while he plays the blinding rays of apostasy in the eyes of those whom he thus beguiles. What cunning! And to think that some of our members are deceived by this trickery.
The following words of the Prophet Joseph Smith should be memorized by every Latter-day Saint and repeated often enough to insure their never being forgotten:
I will give you one of the Keys of the mysteries of the Kingdom. It is an eternal principle, that has existed with God from all eternity: That man who rises up to condemn others, finding fault with the Church, saying that they are out of the way, while he himself is righteous, then know assuredly, that that man is in the high road to apostasy; and if he does not repent, will apostatize, as God lives. (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pp. 156-157.)
When our leaders speak, the thinking has been done. When they propose a plan--it is God's plan. When they point the way, there is no other which is safe. When they give direction, it should mark the end of controversy. God works in no other way. To think otherwise, without immediate repentance, may cost one his faith, may destroy his testimony, and leave him a stranger to the kingdom of God.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, June 29, 2009
Economics of nuclear power
I haven't time to read this right now but I think you'll be interested.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Climate change costs
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124588837560750781.html
"The reality is that cost estimates for climate legislation are as unreliable as the models predicting climate change."
An interesting point, and one I hadn't thought of. Of course it cuts both ways, especially for someone as economically ignorant as me, so my takeaway may be rather different than what the author intended. I guess I'm acquiring more epistemological humility as I get older[1].
-Max
[1] Losing arguments with K. probably doesn't hurt that process either. And yes, it is possible to lose an argument with someone you haven't seen in years, if you can remember what they used to tell you.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Revision? Dinosaur weights
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/06/22/dinosaur_weight_revisionism/
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a
man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and
desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although
he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F.
Smith (manual, p. 69)
Friday, June 19, 2009
Programming languages overview
May also be of interest, if you have time. I've found Peter Van Roy's thoughts on this subject to be cogent in the past.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
When is a picture worth a thousand words?
On diagrams and problem-solving:
http://social.cs.uiuc.edu/class/cs591kgk/LarkinSimon87.pdf
It's 36 pages long, so be warned. I haven't actually finished it yet,
but so far it's interesting.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a
man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and
desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although
he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F.
Smith (manual, p. 69)
Health Care Costs
Interesting story: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124536722522229323.html
As most of corporate America sits on the health-care sidelines -- issuing vague statements, trying not to offend a new U.S. president -- Mr. Burd has charged into the political debate. "I'm here because health-care simply isn't a partisan issue," he says. There is what works, and what doesn't. "I'm genuinely concerned someone might try to solve this by nationalizing health care, at the moment we at Safeway have proven that it is the market that reins in costs."
Prove it, he can. As recently as 2004, Safeway was suffocating under health-care costs growing at 10% a year. Mr. Burd, who had long been intellectually and politically drawn to the health-care issue, decided it was time to hit the restart button. He blew up the company's existing health-care structure and replaced it with one that embodied market principles -- choice, responsibility, competition and price.
Today, Safeway has accomplished what Washington claims is the goal: The company's per-capita health-care expenses have remained flat, compared to the near 40% increase experienced by the rest of corporate America over the past four years. This has not been done by cutting care or shifting costs to employees. Nearly 80% of the 30,000 nonunion Safeway workers who take part in the program rate it good, very good, or excellent. [snip]
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Legal vs. natural rights
Thomas Jefferson talked about "natural" and "inalienable rights" which came from Nature, and as a kid I never really understood what he meant: a right, I reasoned, is always granted by someone and must by acknowledged by them in order to take effect. If I give you the right to buy oil from me at $80 a barrel--a right which is worth nothing unless oil starts trading at higher than $80 a barrel--that right came from me and will be enforced by me. Talking about self-existing rights makes no sense. Suppose I claimed I had a "right" to medical treatment for my cancer (if I had cancer). From whom does such a right come? If someone refuses to treat me, because I can't pay them, to whom do I go for recourse? Such a right is no right at all, it's just nonsense.
There's another sense in which we sometimes use the term "right," though, and it basically comes down to this: if intelligent and right-thinking people[1] would universally find no fault with you in a certain course of action, then you have the right to take that course of action. For instance, you have the right to marry someone you're actually attracted to[2]. Some people might fault you for holding out, but no celestial beings will[3]. If we wanted to draw a distinction between these two usages of the word right, I propose that we call the first kind "legal rights," granted to you by some other entity, and "natural rights," because I think that's what Thomas Jefferson pretty much meant by his use of the term. To say that man has a right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," is not to say that anyone is required to GIVE them to you--inalienable rights cannot be given or taken, else they'd not be inalienable. Rather, it is to assert that one can claim that for one's self, or seek to claim them, with a clear conscience, no matter what or who may claim otherwise.
-Max
[1] I.e. all celestial beings.
[2] And yes, this is one of the reasons I think about rights sometimes. There's a part of my psyche that still feels bad about dying a bachelor, eventually, but I really do have the right not to marry someone I don't want to marry. Plus, it's impossible to marry anyone against your will anyway, at least in the temple.
[3] Or if they do, then by definition you DON'T have that right. It certainly wouldn't be the first time I've been wrong, or even the thousandth. But I'm pretty sure you actually do have that right, because it's testified of all over the scriptures and throughout the gospel.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
There's another sense in which we sometimes use the term "right," though, and it basically comes down to this: if intelligent and right-thinking people[1] would universally find no fault with you in a certain course of action, then you have the right to take that course of action. For instance, you have the right to marry someone you're actually attracted to[2]. Some people might fault you for holding out, but no celestial beings will[3]. If we wanted to draw a distinction between these two usages of the word right, I propose that we call the first kind "legal rights," granted to you by some other entity, and "natural rights," because I think that's what Thomas Jefferson pretty much meant by his use of the term. To say that man has a right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," is not to say that anyone is required to GIVE them to you--inalienable rights cannot be given or taken, else they'd not be inalienable. Rather, it is to assert that one can claim that for one's self, or seek to claim them, with a clear conscience, no matter what or who may claim otherwise.
-Max
[1] I.e. all celestial beings.
[2] And yes, this is one of the reasons I think about rights sometimes. There's a part of my psyche that still feels bad about dying a bachelor, eventually, but I really do have the right not to marry someone I don't want to marry. Plus, it's impossible to marry anyone against your will anyway, at least in the temple.
[3] Or if they do, then by definition you DON'T have that right. It certainly wouldn't be the first time I've been wrong, or even the thousandth. But I'm pretty sure you actually do have that right, because it's testified of all over the scriptures and throughout the gospel.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Thoughts on investment and inflation
[I didn't Cc the blog on this originally last week but now I've changed my mind because I think it's important.]
From a co-worker of mine, some interesting thoughts. Emphasis added.
Maturity mismatch is the main purpose of the modern banking business existence! Normal people are presumed to be unwilling to lend money to someone for more than one year, yet the industry needs this sort of loans. The banks therefore borrow short and loan long, lying to depositors about being able to return their deposits on time. The FDIC is there to instill confidence in the lies. [snip]
Back when we did not have the bond market what banks were doing was justifiable – in order to finance the industry somebody had to pry the savings away from populace, evaluate risks and borrow out the funds. Now there is simply no excuse for this anymore – people should invest their savings directly or via special vehicles (e.g. mutual funds) with explicit understanding of commitment terms and risk levels instead of the vague "magic FDIC will save me!". Maturity transformation is steroidal and we're well into "drug abuse" territory.
On a related note, people should not be using fiat currency as a store of value, because doing so is implicitly transforming the responsibility for investment management from the individual to the state. It's wrong for the same reason that maturity transformation is wrong – people surrender responsibility for managing their wealth without knowing they did so. (Hoarding hard currency is fine since you are explicitly committing to invest into gold or silver commodity).
Interesting way of thinking about it, no?
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Irony
Just as we're phasing out incandescent light bulbs for energy-efficiency, someone invents a cheap way to boost incandescent efficiency by more than 65%:
The process could make a light as bright as a 100-watt bulb consume less electricity than a 60-watt bulb while remaining far cheaper and radiating a more pleasant light than a fluorescent bulb. Despite the incredible intensity involved, the femtosecond laser can be powered by a simple wall outlet, meaning that when the process is refined, implementing it to augment regular light bulbs should be relatively simple...
It seems that Professor Chunlei Guo of Rochester hit upon the idea of brightening-up lightbulb filaments following earlier experiments in which he and his team used laser zapping to turn metals completely black. This worked so well that Guo and his cohorts wondered if they could reverse the process.
"We fired the laser beam right through the glass of the bulb and altered a small area on the filament," says the prof. "When we lit the bulb, we could actually see this one patch was clearly brighter than the rest of the filament, but there was no change in the bulb's energy usage."
It seems that Guo and his team of lightbulb-blasting boffins can also produce other strange effects, getting incandescent bulbs to emit partially polarised or differently-coloured light - without the energy-wasting filters that would normally be necessary.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
The process could make a light as bright as a 100-watt bulb consume less electricity than a 60-watt bulb while remaining far cheaper and radiating a more pleasant light than a fluorescent bulb. Despite the incredible intensity involved, the femtosecond laser can be powered by a simple wall outlet, meaning that when the process is refined, implementing it to augment regular light bulbs should be relatively simple...
It seems that Professor Chunlei Guo of Rochester hit upon the idea of brightening-up lightbulb filaments following earlier experiments in which he and his team used laser zapping to turn metals completely black. This worked so well that Guo and his cohorts wondered if they could reverse the process.
"We fired the laser beam right through the glass of the bulb and altered a small area on the filament," says the prof. "When we lit the bulb, we could actually see this one patch was clearly brighter than the rest of the filament, but there was no change in the bulb's energy usage."
It seems that Guo and his team of lightbulb-blasting boffins can also produce other strange effects, getting incandescent bulbs to emit partially polarised or differently-coloured light - without the energy-wasting filters that would normally be necessary.
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Birdcam
You may enjoy this: http://wimp.com/hawkssee
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Compassion
Well, isn't this interesting. Dante vs. Vlad.
But then things got surprising. When Rokia was presented with the statistics, the donations fell by nearly half. Worse still, when the authors asked one set of subjects to perform mathematical calculations and the other set of subjects to describe their feelings when they heard the word "baby," the subjects who'd done math gave only about half as much to Rokia as the ones who'd thought about babies. Apparently, just thinking analytically makes us stingier. The authors of the study concluded that "calculative thought lessens the appeal of an identifiable victim."
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Life Is
Annie,
I thought you might get a chuckle out of this, given our recent conversation.
-Max
I thought you might get a chuckle out of this, given our recent conversation.
-Max
Subject: Life Is
He says:
Life is a battlefield. Sometimes you get shot at, sometimes you get pieces shot off of you, but if you pull yourself together and keep moving forward, in spite of all the Adversary can send against you, and reach the finish line with your precious charges intact: this is victory.
She says:
Life is a garden, full of wondrous plants and animals to nurture. Some are flashy, others are small and ugly and easy to overlook but when given a little water and sunshine and human kindness they grow into something wonderful: this is victory.
They stare at each other in mutual incomprehension. This is love.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
He says:
Life is a battlefield. Sometimes you get shot at, sometimes you get pieces shot off of you, but if you pull yourself together and keep moving forward, in spite of all the Adversary can send against you, and reach the finish line with your precious charges intact: this is victory.
She says:
Life is a garden, full of wondrous plants and animals to nurture. Some are flashy, others are small and ugly and easy to overlook but when given a little water and sunshine and human kindness they grow into something wonderful: this is victory.
They stare at each other in mutual incomprehension. This is love.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Monogamy & Me
Dear J.,
Sometime during the past year I became persuaded, unwillingly, that a truth I had darkly suspected for some time about myself was actually true: I am not, and presumably men in general are not, actually monogamous by nature. If we appear to be monogamous it is a secondary emotion, a consequence of empathy for and desire to avoid causing pain to our partners--a logical and not an emotional choice--but our basic nature is to treat relationships on an individual basis: I can be completely and totally in love with Sarah[1] and it has nothing to do with anyone except Sarah, and I can at the same time be mildly attracted to Sue because of who she is, and at the same time I can admire, respect, and love Sally on her own merits. These feelings are not mutually exclusive except to the extent that, for instance, Sarah and Sally each feel threatened by my feelings for the other, in which case circumstances force me to choose between them. Part of love is wanting what makes the other person happy, and so obviously if Sarah is unhappy if I love Sally and vice versa, loving both is an inconsistent state of affairs and can't actually exist for long. In practice, here in the mortal realm the choice is simplified by the temporal ordering: typically you'll find that I've made a commitment to Sally prior to ever meeting Sarah (e.g. we're married) so the relationship with Sally takes precedence.
Of course, this propensity to treat relationships individually doesn't always relate to marriage. You'll see it crop up in other places, such as dealing with children (fact: you don't have the same relationship with all your children, and with some you get along better than others). You'll also note that Heavenly Father is renowned for his ability to have personalized, completely individual relationships with all of his children... and Heavenly Father is male. Significant? I don't know, maybe all celestial beings are like that.
As always, I may be completely wrong about this whole topic, but this is my best understanding from the data that I have available to me here and the thinking I've been able to do. If I'm wrong it will be pointed out to me eventually by someone or other or something.
-M.
[1] To pick a name out of a hat.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Sometime during the past year I became persuaded, unwillingly, that a truth I had darkly suspected for some time about myself was actually true: I am not, and presumably men in general are not, actually monogamous by nature. If we appear to be monogamous it is a secondary emotion, a consequence of empathy for and desire to avoid causing pain to our partners--a logical and not an emotional choice--but our basic nature is to treat relationships on an individual basis: I can be completely and totally in love with Sarah[1] and it has nothing to do with anyone except Sarah, and I can at the same time be mildly attracted to Sue because of who she is, and at the same time I can admire, respect, and love Sally on her own merits. These feelings are not mutually exclusive except to the extent that, for instance, Sarah and Sally each feel threatened by my feelings for the other, in which case circumstances force me to choose between them. Part of love is wanting what makes the other person happy, and so obviously if Sarah is unhappy if I love Sally and vice versa, loving both is an inconsistent state of affairs and can't actually exist for long. In practice, here in the mortal realm the choice is simplified by the temporal ordering: typically you'll find that I've made a commitment to Sally prior to ever meeting Sarah (e.g. we're married) so the relationship with Sally takes precedence.
Of course, this propensity to treat relationships individually doesn't always relate to marriage. You'll see it crop up in other places, such as dealing with children (fact: you don't have the same relationship with all your children, and with some you get along better than others). You'll also note that Heavenly Father is renowned for his ability to have personalized, completely individual relationships with all of his children... and Heavenly Father is male. Significant? I don't know, maybe all celestial beings are like that.
As always, I may be completely wrong about this whole topic, but this is my best understanding from the data that I have available to me here and the thinking I've been able to do. If I'm wrong it will be pointed out to me eventually by someone or other or something.
-M.
[1] To pick a name out of a hat.
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
Monday, May 25, 2009
Stories
I think you should read this:
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/lost-heroes-of-the-war-on-terror-gallant-deeds-and-untold-tales/
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/lost-heroes-of-the-war-on-terror-gallant-deeds-and-untold-tales/
-Max
--
Rock Is Dead. Long Live Scissors!
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a
man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and
desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although
he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F.
Smith (manual, p. 69)
Friday, May 15, 2009
Wise words from my older sister
Facebook status update:
Corinne Wilson is so happy that Tim took her to see Marriage of Figaro at McCaw Hall. A man that has sat patiently through 3 hours of opera music is a man that has proven his true love.
;)
-Max
--
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."
Corinne Wilson is so happy that Tim took her to see Marriage of Figaro at McCaw Hall. A man that has sat patiently through 3 hours of opera music is a man that has proven his true love.
;)
-Max
--
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."
Thursday, May 14, 2009
The mysteries of the female mind ("Musings..." continued)
On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 10:05 AM, ... wrote:
> I don't know if women feel very secure around me
>cause that thought never came to mind, that it would
>be important to them. I will see about mulling over
>how to implement the idea.
> I don't know if women feel very secure around me
>cause that thought never came to mind, that it would
>be important to them. I will see about mulling over
>how to implement the idea.
This is one reason men have to learn how to listen for the sake of listening. It makes a woman feel safe if she can, for instance, have a grouchy crabby day without feeling that it's going to make a man think less of her. It also makes her feel safe if she can talk about her feelings (e.g. "our house is too small") without him jumping up to try to change things that she knows can't be changed right now ("we can't afford it"). It makes her feel safe when she can just be herself.
-Max
--
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."
Musings on womankind
On Wed, May 13, 2009 at 11:02 AM, ... wrote:
> I agree. I'm still hopeful that you and I will find a woman
> worth marrying that reciprocates such feelings.
> I agree. I'm still hopeful that you and I will find a woman
> worth marrying that reciprocates such feelings.
Well, obviously yes. Simple logic says that in an infinite universe, anything which exists in quantities greater than 1 exists in infinite quantity. I know of more than one (though currently fewer than five) girls whom I would be willing to marry, if she wanted us to. Ergo, there are an infinite number, and sooner or later one of them will reciprocate the feeling and we probably will get married. That's all in the far future, though, and not really something that should concern us in the here-and-now. We've always known things are going to turn out well in the long run.
In other words, I'm currently optimistic about individual relationships, not just the far future. I'm gradually realizing that women are far more security-driven than men are. Regardless of whom you eventually marry, regardless of whom W----- eventually marries, current data suggests that inasmuch as you show unconditional love[1] for W-----, there's a part of her that appreciates it[2] and you have a good chance of being friends in the long-term. With her as an individual, not just some random fungible woman. To me that's a cheerful thought.
To put it yet another way, current evidence is that your friendship with W----- is based on something fundamentally solid: http://scriptures.lds.org/en/dc/88/40#40. Of course we won't know for sure until all the data are in and the world is over.
-Max
[1] Using the conventional terminology. I'd pick a different word for it myself, but I think you get the idea.
[2] Which isn't to say that she doesn't have other feelings as well. E.g. she may appreciate knowing that you will always be there for her, but simultaneously feel bad for not being attracted to you, etc. Women are emotionally complex.
--
"The presentation or 'gift' of the Holy Ghost simply confers upon a man the right to receive at any time, when he is worthy of it and desires it, the power and light of truth of the Holy Ghost, although he may often be left to his own spirit and judgment." --Joseph F. Smith (manual, p. 69)
"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."
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