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Jan. 7th, 2002
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Jan. 7th, 2002 11:54 amI had a bubble bath yesterday afternoon and my hair still smells of Bathos. Guess that means I might want to wash again before encountering ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
snout. We could experiment, though. There's no lavender in this one.
Why had I never heard of the OTA? I guess I was fairly young. Anyway, it looks like the legislature may be realizing that they should know something about science, so that would be very good. I find it pretty disturbing that so many people dislike all science. (Specializing is fine; I've never taken a physics course, and I don't actually think they should have let me out of high school without one, but lots of adults know so little science and think it's not applicable...)
Whoa. Check out Captain Tootsie. I have nothing more to say.
Some really bad stuff going on in our lovely gigantic corporations, according to this article from the Multinational Monitor. My favorite line: "Sara Lee had a big hot dog contract with the Department of Defense."
I actually don't think it's such a bad idea for some restaurants to ban minors in favor of smokers. The problem is to make sure that people know what's up (which is why it sounds like everyone's pissed off) and that it's still possible for kids to get into some places (which doesn't sound like it's really a problem, but the precedent isn't so great). It's an inventive solution, at least, which is probably why I have warmed to it. The government could probably solve the problem by selling smoking licenses like they do liquor licenses; then it'd cost money to run a smoking establishment. Added bonus to me: there'd probably be more smoke-free bars.
It's interesting that the feral children listed were largely indifferent to sex. I remember hearing that sexual response was conditioned very early, so if they didn't have any humans to learn that from, it makes sense to me that they wouldn't be interested. One thing about the case summaries, though, is that I don't really feel they're reliable. I don't buy that Victor was "incapable of distinguishing hot from cold", though it seems likely that he wasn't a wimp about such things. And what does it mean that someone can't distinguish right from wrong? Oh, well, more research, poor me.
I haven't even started exploring Terrorism, Nonlinearity & Complex Adaptive Systems, but I have to share. Wow.
snout. We could experiment, though. There's no lavender in this one.Why had I never heard of the OTA? I guess I was fairly young. Anyway, it looks like the legislature may be realizing that they should know something about science, so that would be very good. I find it pretty disturbing that so many people dislike all science. (Specializing is fine; I've never taken a physics course, and I don't actually think they should have let me out of high school without one, but lots of adults know so little science and think it's not applicable...)
Whoa. Check out Captain Tootsie. I have nothing more to say.
Some really bad stuff going on in our lovely gigantic corporations, according to this article from the Multinational Monitor. My favorite line: "Sara Lee had a big hot dog contract with the Department of Defense."
I actually don't think it's such a bad idea for some restaurants to ban minors in favor of smokers. The problem is to make sure that people know what's up (which is why it sounds like everyone's pissed off) and that it's still possible for kids to get into some places (which doesn't sound like it's really a problem, but the precedent isn't so great). It's an inventive solution, at least, which is probably why I have warmed to it. The government could probably solve the problem by selling smoking licenses like they do liquor licenses; then it'd cost money to run a smoking establishment. Added bonus to me: there'd probably be more smoke-free bars.
It's interesting that the feral children listed were largely indifferent to sex. I remember hearing that sexual response was conditioned very early, so if they didn't have any humans to learn that from, it makes sense to me that they wouldn't be interested. One thing about the case summaries, though, is that I don't really feel they're reliable. I don't buy that Victor was "incapable of distinguishing hot from cold", though it seems likely that he wasn't a wimp about such things. And what does it mean that someone can't distinguish right from wrong? Oh, well, more research, poor me.
I haven't even started exploring Terrorism, Nonlinearity & Complex Adaptive Systems, but I have to share. Wow.
chatty day
Jan. 7th, 2002 02:58 pmI can bike! Yay! My right knee still feels a bit weird and swollen, but it wasn't actually painful to ride in to Fremont on my lunch break. I used very low gears, because I'm trying to test the motion without the pressure as much as I can. The bike is staying at work tonight so I don't overdo trying to climb hills on the way home. I suppose we'll see how it feels tonight and tomorrow.
One of the best books I read last year got left off the previously published list. Oops. Only Forward by Michael Marshall Smith definitely deserves mention. I might've described it here before. The metaphor that's coming to mind today is, well, you know those bowls of pudding, or sauces, or soups, where half the bowl is one substance and half is another, and they're swirled together with a utensil? Well, OF is like half William Gibson and half Clive Barker, decoratively swirled by a knife made of Douglas Adams. Very cool book.
The book I'm excited about today is The Beak of the Finch by Jonathan Weiner. Great stuff about very exact studies of the Galapagos finches, mostly on an island called Daphne Major, which has an extremely simple ecosystem, allowing them to do insane things like know exactly how much of what food is available and recognize every finch of the local population on sight. I got all caught up in the stories of intense selective episodes over lunch.
Follow-up to previous post: Teresa Nielsen Hayden has pointed out the full version of the Geek Hierarchy. She also has some rather old erotic fan art linked today. Fun stuff.
Also, science can now grow artificial tadpole eyeballs. And a good thing, too.
One of the best books I read last year got left off the previously published list. Oops. Only Forward by Michael Marshall Smith definitely deserves mention. I might've described it here before. The metaphor that's coming to mind today is, well, you know those bowls of pudding, or sauces, or soups, where half the bowl is one substance and half is another, and they're swirled together with a utensil? Well, OF is like half William Gibson and half Clive Barker, decoratively swirled by a knife made of Douglas Adams. Very cool book.
The book I'm excited about today is The Beak of the Finch by Jonathan Weiner. Great stuff about very exact studies of the Galapagos finches, mostly on an island called Daphne Major, which has an extremely simple ecosystem, allowing them to do insane things like know exactly how much of what food is available and recognize every finch of the local population on sight. I got all caught up in the stories of intense selective episodes over lunch.
Follow-up to previous post: Teresa Nielsen Hayden has pointed out the full version of the Geek Hierarchy. She also has some rather old erotic fan art linked today. Fun stuff.
Also, science can now grow artificial tadpole eyeballs. And a good thing, too.