The 2000’s

I just thought of a great generic term for the first decade of this millenium, the 2K’s. I would pronounce it “the too-kays”. I think it rolls off the tongue easier than “the Oughts” or “the Naughts”. When we get to the the 2010’s someone else can label that decade.

Single Government ID Moves Closer to Reality

This WP article,Single Government ID Moves Closer to Reality (washingtonpost.com), discusses the new NIST ID card and raises some of the objections some workers might have. One objection I don’t see addressed is the federal employee that doesn’t want to carry the card when not at work. Are they going to have a bank of safety deposit boxes at the door for the employees to leave the cards in?

What’s the problem? Tracking the cards off-premise. Not only is it a potential privacy issues, but those with the right scanners can track government employees from afar and indiscriminately. There needs to be an off switch on the card, or maybe the users can put the card in a lead-lined holder off-premise and block any RF.

I’m sure that the ‘powers that be’ will think of all this. It’s kind of silly to think of a squad of soldiers sneaking about in the dark and the enemy watching the IDs broadcasting their location, surprise.

Theory vs. Not Theory

This aticle in the Washington Post highlights an “Intelligent Design” conflict in PA. Evolution Shares a Desk With ‘Intelligent Design’ (washingtonpost.com)

First, I would suggest that people learn what a “theory” is, at least in science. A searcher for knowledge makes observations and, based on those observations, puts together an Hypothesis that links and explains various observations. The Hypothesis is shared with other seekers and observers and they generate a general consensus that; Yes indeed, this hypothesis holds water, or; No, this hypothesis doesn’t float.

If the general consensus of the Hypothesis is “Yes”, then it is upgraded to a Theory. As a Theory, it will be taught in higher centers of learning; it informs the next generation of seekers of what those that have gone before have found. It does not mean that the Theory is absolute and can not be questioned, but you will need extraordinary evidence to show that the theory is wrong. Tweaks are always possible, addons that further clarify the Theory; expansions that extend the theory to new realms, although they may require new theories themselves. Theories are not Immutable.

Laws are Immutable. And there are very few laws in science. Things like :

On object in motion stays in motion unless acted upon by an outside force.

Acceleration equals force divided by mass.

For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

After much experimental observation and agreement a theory may become a law. Though some theories are thought of as law since they’ve been around for so long.

Even Einstein’s Relativity work is still theory, though it may become law soon.

Either way, the “Intelligent Design Theory” is not a Theory, it is a hypothesis. Once it has been accepted by the general scientific community it can become a theory. And then it will be taught in colleges and universities and some of the kinks in the theory will be worked out.

At that point, it will be fit to be taught in elementary and high schools. Trying to teach subjects in K-12 that aren’t being taught at higher levels of education is like feeding a child mud. It might fill him up but it won’t nourish him.

If the community feels strongly enough that a subject shouldn’t be taught in a curriculum, remove it, don’t replace it with material that is not accepted in higher levels of education. If a community wants to teach the 1+1 = 3, because it works for them and higher levels of education teach the 1+1 = 2, then it is better not to teach that 1+1 = anything than to teach something that will ruin the child’s chances to live in the rest of the world.

In the News

I heard about the Sumatran earthquake/tsunami in the morning and decided to tune in CNN to see what was happening. It was a bit surreal. There was a natural disaster that started about 6PM yesterday, our time; thousands of people are dead, tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands are directly affected by it. An entire region of the globe is affected and CNN is giving the Midwest airport travel snafu more coverage. We feel so sorry for the little girl who can’t get to Disney World. (Well, that will teach them to use a cheap airline that can’t even stress test its computer systems.)

I also noticed that the American media didn’t seem to be on top of the issue. The only online news resource I found that was updating the news through the day was Reuters. The others didn’t mention it or just noted that something had happened. While Reuters had the death toll over 10,000, CNN was still reporting 4,000. Of course, it is a holiday weekend so no one may be working. We’ll see what they say tomorrow. It looked pretty horrific, what images I have seen.

Weatherbug

As an accident of having to install AOL IM on my PC at work, I ended up with the WeatherBug installed as well. I find it to be a nice little addition to my tool bar, showing the local temperature and alerting me if the forecast changes. So when I uninstalled the AIM, I decided to leave the WeatherBug.

Unfortunately, when the WeatherBug opens a window at bootup, it seems to corrupt my PC and prevents the other applications from running. So I decided it had to go. As I started to remove the software, WB kept shouting “Ohhhhh! Noooooo! Mr. Billlll!” and it asked me if I really wanted to go through with this. Soft-hearted chump that I am, I relented and agreed to keep the WeatherBug, as long as it didn’t open a window at boot-up. It can just maintain a presence on the toolbar and we’ll all be happy. Or will we? I shall see next week if I have to reboot the PC several times a day. (That was the nice thing about upgrading to the XP OS. I have only had to reboot maybe once a week. ) But, if the WeatherBug doesn’t crash your PC, it is a nice little toy to have.

The Thoughts and Luminations of Jack Heneghan