College football

The Hawks beat up on Florida, so that was great.

OU lost, which disappointed me. Is it mostly attributable to the distraction of Mike Stoops leaving?

We are moving inexorably to a college playoff. It is not necessary, but it will happen in the next couple years. D-1 college football becomes more and more like the minor leagues because that's what the public wants and, therefore, it's where the money's at. The days of student-athletes are pretty well gone in big-time D-1 football and basketball. D-3 is more where it's at for real student-athlete action. Will is still follow D-3? I'm sure. But I wish there were a better way...

Well, I'm back...

We're back from travels hither and yon.

I had a good time at Urbana. One highlight was communing and worshiping in the Assembly Hall with 20,000 other people as the year turned.

And while I was there I got to have lunch with 'interact' correpsondent Kathleen Kern, a childhood friend of mine. It was great to catch up with her. Thanks, Kathleen!

I'm out of town...

for a couple weeks. No posting until 1.2.2004 or later. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

'Return of the King' Reviews

(via Jaq)

Green Man Review

Gamer's Nook Review

I mainly agree with these guys and will come back and reference them later.

Return of the King review [No Spoilers]

Well, we saw 'Return of the King' last night. Of course, we enjoyed many parts of it immensely. You may remember from years past that my first review does not include criticism, just the stuff I enjoyed. So let's get on with it:

- Miranda Otto/Eowyn - loved most everything about her. Whenever she's on stage I call out 'Choose her!'

- Aragorn was more regal, and Christine said she felt Viggo's performance was better.

- Sir Ian McKellen continues his star turn

- a lot of the Pippin stuff, including Billy Boyd's singing

- really, all the Hobbits do a good job. Christine called this 'The Movie of the Brave Hobbits'.

- Minas Tirith

- Frodo's and Sam's relationship (with one minor objection)

- the lighting of the signal beacons

- Grond, the hammer of the Underworld

- the ride of the Rohirrim at The Battle of the Pelennor Fields

- Minas Morgul

- The Straight and Winding Stairs to Cirith Ungol

- Shelob

- the Phial of Galadriel

- Sam in the Tower of Cirith Ungol

- Galadriel is chill at the end

- the ending (which I can't talk much about right now)

Hopefully that makes you even more excited to go see the movie. It's always good to remind myself of all the good things. Otherwise the unreasonable expectations can overwhelm...

The future of flight

Really cool article in The Economist. Pretty wide-ranging, covering both commercial and military frontiers. Warning: no flying cars.

Abandon hope, all ye who enter here

(Which I've also seen translated 'Abandon all hope, you who enter here.', incidentally.)



One of the cool things about Macon, new interact commenter and reader, is that his brothers-in-law run Despair.com.

Repeat after me, Jaq...

New England Patriots: Team of Destiny.

I can't believe how many close ones the Patriots have won. It's like their championship season all over again.

The Patriots gave up a touchdown at home for the first time in five games.

That's crazy.

A better Arwen

interact correspondent Kathy alerted me to a better Arwen:



Had you seen Barbie as Arwen and Ken as Aragorn? I like Barbie as Arwen better than Liv Tyler. Ken as Aragorn, though...that's scary.

Great stars, Batman!

Wow, An Atlas of the Universe is really cool, with lots of additional links, information, and maps.

Which dictionary is the best?

My philologists out there will enjoy this article. Please read it and comment with a few thoughts. You know who you are! (via kottke)

(Speaking of philologists, Macon and I were talking about the word for 'lover of words' the other day. I can't believe I forgot 'philologist', especially since it is so connected with Tolkien. I honestly suggested 'logophile'. Oh well.)

Also via kottke, Funny imitation of Google search features.

My Presidential Candidate Selector Results

2004 American Presidential Candidate Selector

1. Your ideal theoretical candidate. (100%)
2. Kucinich, Rep. Dennis, OH - Democrat (68%)
3. Dean, Gov. Howard, VT - Democrat (61%)
4. Kerry, Senator John, MA - Democrat (56%)
5. Edwards, Senator John, NC - Democrat (53%)
6. Gephardt, Rep. Dick, MO - Democrat (50%)
7. Sharpton, Reverend Al - Democrat (47%)
8. LaRouche, Lyndon H. Jr. - Democrat (46%)
9. Clark, Retired General Wesley K., AR - Democrat (45%)
10. Bush, President George W. - Republican (39%)
11. Libertarian Candidate (34%)
12. Lieberman, Senator Joe, CT - Democrat (33%)
13. Moseley-Braun, Former Senator Carol, IL - Democrat (25%)
14. Phillips, Howard - Constitution (23%)

(via Scott, via Charles)

Obviously, this selector is just about stated policy and not about character. That indicates a problem with the selector itself. Where's the place of character? For example, I don't see myself voting for Lyndon LaRouche ever.

It'a all good...

over at defective yeti.

You Know Yer Indie. Let's Sub-Categorize.

You're a Post-Punk. You know 70s punk was cool, but
it was mostly just a stepping stone for the
greater intellectualism of what would come
after. The 80s were amazing. You quite possibly
have huge hair, and may wear lots of black.
Snare drums need reverb. Lots and lots of
reverb.


You Know Yer Indie. Let's Sub-Categorize.
brought to you by Quizilla

via 13labs

David and 'The Two Towers'

Remember when I had dinner with Dorothea and David? David is on the bonus footage for 'The Two Towers' and wrote the lament for Theodred that Eowyn sings on the Extended Version. Cool.

Nalgene

If you've been around me, you probably know I'm a big water drinker. I'm enjoying my new Nalgene bottle. My friend, Leigh, is studying chemical engineering and wondered what Nalgenes are made of. Also, you might be interested in the Nalgene story.

Getting up to speed

I'm so excited. Now I'm playing with power: I just installed DSL at home. I'm downloading applications and surfing like a madman.

Finally watched The Return of the King trailer and really enjoyed it.

Checked out the latest Finches' Wings and defective yeti to great effect. Found out on Collaboratory that many surviving firemen of the NYFD have left their wives and married their friends' widows. Ewww.

I have finished 'Longitude' by Dava Schobel, 'An Illustrated Brief History of Time' by Stephen Hawking, 'Gates of Fire' by Stephen Pressfield, and the massive, 926 page 'Taiko' by Eiji Yoshikawa. 'Gates of Fire', especially, was excellent. I highly recommend it.

As you can see, I've been pretty into historical fiction. What's your favorite? (I'm going to ask on Collaboratory, too.)

Next up, 'Six Easy Pieces' by Richard Feynman and 'A Game of Thrones' by George RR Martin on Jaq's recommendation.

I have also been enjoying Jimmy Fallon's 'Troll Doll Celebrities' quite a bit, like, I wake up with it in my head first thing in the morning

Good riddance, Keyshawn

Only one more major mouth to go on that team...

v. the Anthropic Principle

People in the know agree:

the delicate balance of cosmological and physical conditions necessary for intelligent life does cry out for some sort of interpretation which will render it intelligible.

I've run into the Anthropic Principle lately in my reading of Hawking and Greene.

Teleologists and Anthropic philosophers differ radically as to what that interpretation should be. Theistic philosophers view this sensitive nexus of conditions as evidence of wider teleology and therefore indicative of a cosmic Designer. Anthropic philosophers contend that due to the self-selection effect imposed by our own existence we can only observe a limited number of worlds; therefore, we should not be surprised at observing this one. Moreover, if a Word Ensemble exists in which all possible values of cosmological and physical quantities are somewhere instantiated, it follows necessarily that our world with its delicate balance of conditions will also obtain.

I think William Lane Craig summed it up pretty well (from Concluding Remarks).

Obviously, I believe that conditions Hawking says 'seem to have been very finely adjusted' are what Hugh Ross calls 'the fine-tuning of the universe' by an Intelligent Designer.

Another interview with Brian Greene

I meant to link Brian 'String Theory' Greene's latest interview in Scientific American (via kottke), but I think I forgot. So here it is.

Jason's back

Jason's back to logging with some really strong stuff. I had Mr Sheeley, too, and he was a major influence.

Carver Mead redux

John Hardy and I really liked the Carver Mead interview in The American Spectator, but the link was broken. John has completely reconstructed the interview so we can all find it and make reference to it.

Venn Diagram-o-rama!

Did you know that I love Venn Diagrams? (I also loved proofs in geometry. I'm one of those.) So, here are 10 ways to use Venn Diagrams and Create-A-Venn. (from kottke)

Who is the working class

Jaq's got some good stats:

:: Forget "flipping burgers". Fast-food jobs constitute less than 5% of low-end jobs.
:: Teenagers hold 7% of low-wage jobs.
:: A majority of adults who hold low-wage jobs also have families.
:: Nearly two-thirds of all low-wage workers are white.
:: While blacks and Latinos constitute a minority of low-wage workers, they are represented in the low-wage workforce by a greater percentage of their overall workforce than are whites (31.2% of blacks and 40.4% of Latinos, versus only 20% of whites.)
:: Women constitute 60% of the low-wage work-force.
:: Three-quarters of those women are white. (But again, blacks and Latinos are overrepresented here.)
:: 40% of low-wage workers have a high school diploma, 38% have some post-secondary education, and 5% have a college degree.

These stats helped change my view of the working class. I've been assuming more immigrants were in that class (though there are plenty).

My position is still: if you like your lifestyle, with cheap food and service and goods, you better be darn grateful for these people who work so cheap. We should support a better deal for them.

(Hey, that could be my campaign: A Better Deal.)

The new Walt Disney Concert Hall

I knew nothing about this until I saw it in the paper today. Apparently it's the bomb, architecturally (designed by Frank Gehry) and acoustically. Good for LA.

Kucinich for President?

passed by the Kucinich table today and picked up his 10 key issues. I like 9 of the 10 proposals pretty well (you know which one gives me pause). What do you think of them?

Of course, he's not electable, but that's another issue.

Just when you thought the Chargers might be the worst team in football...

the Vikings came along and found a way to change your mind.

Garrrrrr!!!!!

Some of my favorite movies made since 1980

(Inspired by Jaq.)
in no particular order:

I think the thing that really distinguishes these movies is that if I walked in the room and they were on I would pretty much be happy to sit down and watch them anytime. That's saying something.

Raiders of the Lost Ark
The Empire Strikes Back
Say Anything
Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
The Hunt for Red October
Raising Arizona
The Princess Bride
Toy Story 2
12 Monkeys
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Gattaca
A Room with a View
The Apostle
Strictly Ballroom
[Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Persuasion, and Clueless] (count as one for purposes of this list)

I think I'm in love with the idea of Annie Dillard

I listened to 'An American Childhood' on tape recently and adored it. I'll admit I couldn't get through 'A Pilgrim at Tinker Creek' (too filled with naturalistic data for a theorist like me). But I loved 'Holy the Firm'.

Now I'm inspired to write my own autobiography. And I've decided to do the first (only?) draft in installments on a separate weblog, My Childhood In Iowa. It doesn't matter if few people read it. This public announcement is intended not only to inform but also to keep me a little bit accountable. My basic goal is to write 'some lines' every day. You should feel free to prod me when necessary.

I'm further making a commitment to not play Civilization until I've done my lines each day. I was going to give up Civ altogether, but that seemed a little rash :-).

Rant on!

I don't generally do rants. Maybe I'm feeling crabby today...

Daniel Schorr informed me via ATC today (scroll down to the fifth item) that the vote in the Senate on the Iraq and Afghanistan budget was a voice vote that leaves no record of who voted which way. It was agreed to by the Majority and Minority Leaders in advance. There truly ought to be a law against such a thing. We have a right to know how our representatives vote and to hold them accountable for it!

I wasn't avowedly pro or con on the war, in Iraq. But I'm surprised by people who were pro, but now want out. This is not some simplistic deal where you depose a government and then pull out. If you're going to do something like this, you better have the will to follow through.