Thursday, August 30, 2007

What's wrong with this country? Pt.2

See below for part 1, or read out of order, no biggie.
Both of these news snippets were stolen from like minded Mark at Cosmic Variance.

Legislation is in the works in Louisiana to put a ban on wearing baggy clothes. Apparently it accompanies bad, delinquent behavior, and if we tighten the clothes of our youth then they will behave better. What bothers me is how this kind of thing occurs with every generation, and this one could be seen as racially motivated, but really it's more of a generation gap. It doesn't matter what people wear or how they wear it, what matters is how they behave.

What's wrong with this country? Pt.1

The way this blog is listed you will probably read part 2 first, but that's okay because the order isn't relevant. This first bit is reminiscent of the Florida debacle a few weeks ago, but is higher profile and sort of strange. The news is that senator Larry Craig plead guilty to lewd misconduct by supposedly making sexual advances on an undercover police officer. He is being pressed to resign as senator while he argues that he should not have plead guilty at all. The worst part is that the police report states that the lewd misconduct was tapping feet with the officer in the adjacent stall and *gasp* waving at him under the stall barrier. This reeks more of extortion than anything, how is that lewd and gay misconduct? It doesn't even fit the definition of sexual harassment and could easily be regarded as a misunderstanding. Maybe all he wanted was toilet paper. I'm not saying that's the case, but it you can't really get much out of that kind of behavior. The cherry on this whole ridiculous case is that the Senate is asking him to resign for it, rather than focusing on his hypocrisy. If the incident really was a sexual advance (and popular opinion says it was, even though consensual) then it is badly out of character for a senator who is against gay rights. I don't have any problem with a senator being horny (well I do if he acts out inappropriately because of it), the real issue is a senator whose opinion can't be trusted.

Also, who the hell is against gay rights these days? Come on, get with the times...

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

China bans unregulated reincarnation

I don't want this blog to become exclusively anti-China, but I can't help it if the Chinese government keeps doing stupid things for me to blog about. The latest news: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20227400/site/newsweek/
A new law in China will take effect next month that bans reincarnation without government permission. At first this seems incredibly silly, until you read on about China's motives. The Dalai Lama is getting old, and when he dies he will be reincarnated, supposedly in Tibet. However, Tibet is under China's control, and so with this new law, they can then choose who the new Dalai Lama will be. In retaliation the current Dalai Lama has decided that he will not be reincarnated in Tibet while it is under Chinese rule. Of course, this whole thing is rather ridiculous, in fact, why does China have control over Tibet anyway? I mean, why would they want to control a bunch of Buddhist monks at the base of a giant, impassable mountain? In any event, the Chinese government is ridiculous and they should stop picking on Buddhist monks.

Thursday, August 23, 2007

myPhone, Seattle

It happened. It actually happened. Well in advance of my birthday I have been gifted an iPhone from Mike and Wendi. While I typically don't like (or at least don't feel good about) accepting generous gifts, I wanted and iPhone so bad that I had no qualms accepting this one.

This gift was given to Erin and I for our birthdays while we visited them last weekend in Seattle, WA. It was a really fun trip, and very interesting. I was really impressed with the architecture of the new houses going up out there. It had the feel of a housing development that I had been used to in Arizona, but vertical (on the mountains for the views) and not every house was the same. Different models next to each other (though very close together) and the styles were very cool. Sort of a rugged country architecture, with a modern feel. A lot better than the adobe clay walls in the southwest, and even better than the victorian or colonial style houses of the northeast. Another interesting thing was the way the communities were arranged. Everybody wants a view of the mountains out there, so on a small mountain where houses are going up, they'll start with low income apartments on the bottom, then townhouses, small houses, large houses, and then mansions on the top of the mountain. It was oddly reminiscent of labor union days and segregation by income.

There were lots of other cool things on the trip that I can't mention here, except to say that it was all very fun, and I got an iPhone.

Sunday, August 12, 2007

Chinese Immigrants (and others...)

So I should note that the previous post has a few things I call 'jokes' in it. These 'jokes' are hidden among serious non 'joke' content, and are thus hard to find. I'll give you a hint: I don't think all Chinese people look alike. But that comment about the Chinese food is both a joke, and serious. Moving on...

A few days ago my mom sent me a forwarded email from some racist nationalist friend of hers. It was one of those emails disguised as a joke, but in this case the truth behind the joke was no good at all. It went something like this:

"How businesses should answer their phone:
'Press 1 for english,
Press 2 to wait until you learn english'
Remember, two people died for us, jesus and the american soldier. If you think that's pretty sweet, forward this to everyone you know so that they can share in your anti-immigration-for-jesus-campaign" I paraphrase that last bit, which was accompanied by a bunch of pictures of bald eagles and american flags.

The trouble isn't in that last bit, which is completely irrelevant to the point of the email, it's in the 'joke' at the beginning. Allow me to address the issue of immigration, and from now on, regardless of your stance on jesus and supporting the troops, you can feel bad about yourself for how you treat non-americans.

Our ancestors were immigrants once, it is their blood and culture that make america what it is today. If you look back on the relatively recent Irish immigration, they were treated very poorly when they first got here, but have now assimilated into american culture and added to it in significant ways. Complaining that hispanic people are only coming here to get jobs is silly. That's why our ancestors came here, don't be such a jerk. Complaining that they should learn english is also silly. Another reason they come to american is for an education. They don't take english classes in high school. Americans should crawl down off their pedestal for minute. All other countries speak several different languages. We're the lazy ones. We should know spanish because that is the language of our neighbors. Especially given our wealthy status, education should be no problem (it is a problem, but not when it comes to learning other languages, that's taught in high schools all over the country). So to conclude this rant, immigration isn't bad, americans are bad because of the way they treat immigrants and each other. If a mexican is going to make my electronics I'd rather he do it as an american citizen, making a decent living and being able to support his family.

Friday, August 10, 2007

Anti-Chinese Sentiments

I have recently learned that the Chinese government (People's Republic of China) censors my blog. Of course censorship of the internet (and everything else) in China is a big problem and apparently blogs pose a threat to the Chinese government in particular. Apparently, any blog on blogspot (which, you'll notice, this blog is hosted by) is completely off limits in China. It seems silly for the Chinese government to censor my blog, a relatively harmless and meager collection of posts. So, I've decided to give them something worth censoring:

The Chinese government is bad.
Communism is an inherently flawed ideal, and not in the best interest of the individual.
All Chinese people look alike.
While China boasts a growing economy it lacks the safety standards that make its products suitable for civilized nations.
The Olympics should not be held in Beijing because of the poor air quality.
The Chinese are bad for the environment.
No matter how much Chinese food I eat, I'm always hungry 20 minutes later.
The Chinese government stole Jack Bauer.

Please feel free to add your own defamations of the Chinese government to the comments section.

Wednesday, August 8, 2007

The egg came before the chicken, now what the hell is a pre-chicken?

Okay, the egg came before the chicken, and here's why: What we define as a chicken came about through a gradual series of mutations from some other animal. There is a threshold that separates what we call a chicken from its ancestor. One genetic mutation between chicken, and not chicken. That mutation occurs at conception, and so the egg contains the mutated animal that is a chicken, laid by it's non-mutated parent, not a chicken. QED.

Now that we have an answer for that, we can finally move on to other questions about existence, like what should we call the strange monster that came before the egg (Pre-chicken)? And how is that related to what McDonald's used to make McNuggets out of before they switched to 100% real chicken?

Friday, August 3, 2007

The Ultimate 747 Gambit

I have recently finished reading The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. I thoroughly enjoyed the book, and while some of his arguments are loosely backed up in my opinion, he does a much better job than his adversaries in the debate. One particular argument of his against the existence of god also refutes a common theological argument for the existence of god. This is that life in all of its complexity is so improbable, that were it to come about by chance it would be similar to a hurricane sweeping through a junkyard and assembling a Boeing 747. Therefore god exists, QED. Of course this is silly because if life is too complex, and therefore to improbable to not have a designer, then by definition the designer must be more complex than what is designed. This, according to Dawkins, is the ultimate 747. The end of the argument rests on what created god, if life can't appear by chance, then neither can god by that argument, and so on.

Dawkins' more important point in this section is that nobody is arguing that life came about by chance. Theologians often assume that it is chance or god. Scientists, one in particular, have come up with a way life could have come about that is neither intelligently designed, nor by chance. This of course, is evolution by natural selection. Notice how I didn't say the theory of evolution. It is as well tested as any of the theories that have given us fantastic advances in technology, and is therefore scientific fact. Evolution by natural selection does not involve any highly improbable events, only a series of slightly improbable events, namely genetic mutations. And the fact is, many of these mutations occur all the time, only some of them lead to more favorable living conditions for the host. This isn't a sharp spike, but a gradual incline in complexity that requires neither great chance, nor god. This is like a hurricane gradually moving parts in a million junkyards, over millions of years. In the end this is a very good argument for the improbability of god, and the lack of a need for god at all.