Like

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I think, like, I want to, like, ban the word, like, “like,” from the English, like, language.

Alexandar Diego Soli

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And so I learned this strange theology of Alexandar Diego Soli: It was known that the first Lord Cantor, the great Georg Cantor, with an ingenious proof array had demonstrated that the infinity of integers — what he called aleph null — is embedded within the higher infinity of real numbers. And he had proved that that infinity is embedded within the infinites of the higher alephs, a whole hierarchy of infinities, an infinity of infinities. The Simoom cantors believed that as it is with numbers, so it is with the hierarchies of the gods. Truly, as Alexandar had taught his son, Leopold, if a god existed, who or what had created him (or her)? If there is a higher god, call him god^2^, there must be a god^3^ and a god^4^, and so on. There is an aleph million and an aleph centillion, but there is no final, no highest infinity, and therefore there is no God. No, there could be no true God, and so there could be no true creation. The logic was as harsh and merciless as Alexandar of Simoom himself: If there is no true creation then there is no true reality. If nothing is real, then man is not real; man in some fundamental sense does not exist. Reality is all a dream, and worse, it is less than a dream because even a dream must have a dreamer to dream it. To assert otherwise is nonsense. And so to assert the existence of the self is therefore a sin, the worst of sins; therefore it is better to cut out one’s tongue than to speak the word “I.”

— Mallory, in Neverness, by David Zindell

Still here?

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Been kind of quiet around here lately. No major reasons for that, really, but a few minor ones.

I’ve been wanting to revamp my photoblog for a while now, but it had been one of those “back burner” projects. I finally decided it was time to get started, and — rather than do my coding from scratch, as I normally do — I went out looking for a decent pre-made template to use. Unfortunately, I don’t think that that’s going to work. I started work on setting everything up, but all I’ve succeeded in doing so far is making my photoblog all sorts of screwy. The template I found, while a decent look, is designed for smaller photos than I’ve been posting (so I’d have to resize everything I’ve uploaded so far), uses very different posting conventions (so I’ll have to fix my previously uploaded photos), and — the two most damning issues — will not work for portrait photographs (landscape only), and is a heavily table-based layout (rather than CSS-based). Ick. So, I need to start over with that project.

Another project I’ve got going on is fixing up all my past entries in this weblog to work better with the related entries hack I put in last week. In order for it to calculate which entries are related to a given post, the most important fields are the ‘Excerpt’ and the ‘Keywords’. Well, as I’ve wasn’t using some of MT’s features when I started this weblog, only about half of my posts have excerpts, and I just started using the keywords field. So, I’m working my way backwards through over two years of posts, adding in the missing information. It’ll be good when it’s done, but it’s a long, slow process.

Lastly, when I’ve been taking some time to scan through my newsreader, there just hasn’t been anything much that’s really catching my eye enough to post about. All the political stuff starts to sound the same after a while, the technical weblogs I read have been focusing more on issues that I don’t deal with very much, and the mac world is more or less on hold until WWDC at the end of this month.

So, things are a little slow for the moment. I’m sure they’ll pick back up in a bit — I go through times like this every so often. Just a bit ‘OB’d’ (overblogged), I think. ;)

In the meantime, I’ve started yet another project (because I need another one…), and will be resurrecting my long-dead quotebook by posting a quote a day to the ‘quotes’ category of this weblog. Until any more substantial content shows up, enjoy those!

Foolishness

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Who is more foolish — the child afraid of the dark, or the man afraid of the light?

— Maurice Freehill

That'll stop them!

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(Shamelessly snagging this post from Bob Harris at This Modern World, as nothing more needs to be said.)

Our Attorney General wants to make terrorist attacks against military bases or nuclear plants a capital offense.

Obviously. Nothing deters a suicide bomber quite like the death penalty.

The full article is even scarier, though. Ashcroft is calling for a widening of the Patriot Act.

The Purity Test

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Dyanna and I got talking online tonight, and over the course of the conversation, the topic of the infamous Purity Tests came up.

I don’t really know where the Purity Tests got started, but I first found them not long after I first got online, sometime in 1991. The test itself (which now exists in various versions, though my personal favorites are the ‘original’ versions that I found all those years ago) is a series of yes or no questions designed to determine how morally, ethically, and sexually pure you are. As you go through the test, you mark off each thing you’ve done. At the end of the test, you count up your answers, and figure out your percentage — the more you’ve done, the lower your final score, and the less “pure” you are.

It’s all in good fun, of course, and they make a great party game. The only solid rule is that at the end of the test, anyone who took it must admit their final score. It’s entirely up to each person if they want to admit the answers to any particular question — and in many cases, they won’t — but the final score must be admitted!

The person with the lowest (least pure) score then gets hit on by everyone for the rest of the night, while the person with the highest (most pure) score gets giggled at by everyone for the rest of the night. ;)

So…now that all that’s out of the way…anyone care for a test? All of the following links are to downloadable text files. My scores either are posted, or will be after I re-take the tests — leave yours in the comments!

  • The Purity Test: 100 Questions (Quick and dirty, get it out of the way, see what you think. My score: 6%)
  • The Purity Test: 500 Questions (My favorite of the set — long enough to be thorough without getting overly ridiculous or tedious. My score: ??)
  • The Purity Test: 1000 Questions (Starting to get a little overly long, but still bearable. My score: ??)
  • The Purity Test: 2000 Questions (Farily ridiculously long — they’re stretching to find this many questions, and it shows. Included mostly for completeness/curiosity’s sake. My score: ??)

Have fun!

Episcopal Church elects first gay bishop

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Excellent news this morning — the New Hampshire Episcopal Church has elected the nations first openly gay bishop!

The selection of the Rev. V. Gene Robinson, 56, who was chosen over three other candidates in voting by New Hampshire clergy and lay Episcopalians, is still subject to confirmation next month by the church’s national General Convention.

The confirmation is likely to be a heated battle with international implications. Robinson drew opposition from many in the Anglican community worldwide.

After the election, Robinson told his supporters to be gentle with those who disagreed with their decision.

“We will show the world how to be a Christian community,” he said. “I plan to be a good bishop, not a gay bishop.”

This is wonderful to hear, and makes me quite glad to have been brought up as part of the Episcopal Church. Many congratulations to Bishop-elect Robinson!

(via D)

Apple woos indie labels for iTMS

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After the iTunes Music Store opened, there were two recurring comments from much of the Mac world: why was it US only, and what about independent labels? It’s commonly accepted that the intricacies of international copyright law are most likely what’s restricting the iTMS to the US for now, but aside from a few rumors, the question of whether the store would open up to more than just the major labels was still unanswered.

Yesterday, however, Apple hosted a special invitation only event for independent and smaller music labels, giving them information on how they could join with the iTMS. A representative from CDBaby was at the event, and has posted an extremely interesting rundown of Apple’s offer to indy labels, mixed in with a lot of information about the iTMS system.

Interesting reading, even just for the peeks into how Apple is handling all the behind-the-scenes details of the iTMS. From what I can see, I think this is just going to keep getting better and better.

That explains it

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I’m the commander. See, I don’t need to explain why I say things. That’s the interesting thing about being the president. Maybe somebody needs to explain to me why they say something, but I don’t feel like I owe anybody an explanation.

— Pres. George W. Bush, to Bob Woodward, in Bush at War

(via Tresy)