I was driving on 183 a couple of days ago, and this gaggle of Harley bikers rumbled past me, leather jackets and babes on the back. I was doing maybe 70 in a 65 zone, and so the bikers must have had their hogs up to 75 or 80. It occurred to me, with the vibrations of their engines pulsating through the door of my Toyota and the Bon Jovi or whatever anthem rock I'd cranked up temporarily drowned out, that I never see these guys get pulled over for speeding. When has anyone ever seen a bunch of Harley dudes parked to the side of the highway, doing that give-me-my-ticket-so-I-can-leave shame thing? What's the deal? My theory is that they're too damn harley, to make the noun an adjective for present purposes; it's not in the fabric of things to have these guys getting written up by un-cool Johny Law. They're only popped if things escalate, like a knife fight in Vegas. Or if something goes down in Sturgis.
But I love these guys anyway. I just wish they wouldn't drown out my anthem rock when I'm pulling gears in my 6 cylinder Tacoma. We all need those harly moments.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Thursday, December 18, 2008
The Neanderthal Project
The NYT recently reported that DNA sequencing of the Wooly Mammoth genome is now possible, using two fossilized hair samples, recovered from mammoths that died 20,000 and 60,000 years ago. NYT reports that scientists are now discussing how to modify DNA in the mammoth's closest living relative, the African elephant, so that it resembles the wooly mammoth. The elephant genome, according to Stephan C. Schuster and Webb Miller at Penn State, will need to be modified at about 400,000 places to make it resemble its hairer cousin. As the thinking goes, once modified at these locations, the elephant genome will be, effectively, a woolly mammoth genome, which can then be brought to term in a female elephant. The elephant would have a wooly mammoth. This clever technique makes moot the prior thinking that a mammoth genome would need to be synthesized in the laboratory. No need to do this (and we can't anyway), because we've got the elephant's cell, and with the mapping of the mammoths DNA, we can translate the one to the other.
So far so good, but there's (or was) a hitch: 400,000 changes are a lot of changes, and the process will likely be arduous to the point of not feasible. Enter the "454 machines", which automate a revolutionary new sequencing technique, that, in effect, let biologists do the genomic modifications in batches. According to George Church, genome technologist at Harvard Medical School, about 50,000 "corrective DNA sequences" can be injected into the cell at one time. In this case, with only a few iterations the machines could inject the entire set of necessary modifications, making the science-fiction like scenario a reality.
The cost estimate for the wooly mammoth project is about $10,000,000, which, while not chump change, is a figure that gaurantees that someone with deep pockets and an interest in our archaelogical past will see things through.
As if this isn't zany enough, there are efforts underway to regenerate the Neanderthals, a hominid race closely related to homo sapiens (us) that lived approximately 200,000 to 45,000 years ago, inhabiting Europe, and possibly coexisting with our direct Cro Magnon descendents. No one knows, conclusively, why the athletic, possibly dim-witted, Neanderthals died out those thousands of years ago. We don't know whether they could talk, or to what extent they created a culture similar to early humans (there is evidence that they drew paintings, suggesting an ability to communicate abstractly). What is certain is that, if the sequencing techniques work on the wooly mammoths, there will be no scientific reason that they can't likewise be applied to generating Neanderthals, if (or when) the extinct species' full genome is recovered.
Work on The Neanderthal Project is well-underway. Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, for instance, has been diligently reconstructing the DNA of Neanderthals using bone fragments discovered in Eastern Europe. With the help of the new "454" sequencing machines, he -- along with a similar project at Lawrence Berkely National Laboratory -- expects to get a complete Neanderthal genetic blueprint. In this case, just as with the use of elephants to birth mammoths, a Neanderthal could be delivered from a human female, or (perhaps less ethically questionable), a Chimpanzee.
As evolutionary biologist Hendrik Poinar notes, “The reality is it will happen,” ... “Twenty to 30 years is the span people are talking about.”
And what then? When a creature so like us -- but so different -- walked again among us, what then? Dartmouth College ethicist Ronald M. Green's comment is as creepy as it is probing:
“This was a species we competed with,” ... “We would not want to recreate a situation of two competing advanced hominid species.”
We may just find out.
So far so good, but there's (or was) a hitch: 400,000 changes are a lot of changes, and the process will likely be arduous to the point of not feasible. Enter the "454 machines", which automate a revolutionary new sequencing technique, that, in effect, let biologists do the genomic modifications in batches. According to George Church, genome technologist at Harvard Medical School, about 50,000 "corrective DNA sequences" can be injected into the cell at one time. In this case, with only a few iterations the machines could inject the entire set of necessary modifications, making the science-fiction like scenario a reality.
The cost estimate for the wooly mammoth project is about $10,000,000, which, while not chump change, is a figure that gaurantees that someone with deep pockets and an interest in our archaelogical past will see things through.
As if this isn't zany enough, there are efforts underway to regenerate the Neanderthals, a hominid race closely related to homo sapiens (us) that lived approximately 200,000 to 45,000 years ago, inhabiting Europe, and possibly coexisting with our direct Cro Magnon descendents. No one knows, conclusively, why the athletic, possibly dim-witted, Neanderthals died out those thousands of years ago. We don't know whether they could talk, or to what extent they created a culture similar to early humans (there is evidence that they drew paintings, suggesting an ability to communicate abstractly). What is certain is that, if the sequencing techniques work on the wooly mammoths, there will be no scientific reason that they can't likewise be applied to generating Neanderthals, if (or when) the extinct species' full genome is recovered.
Work on The Neanderthal Project is well-underway. Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, for instance, has been diligently reconstructing the DNA of Neanderthals using bone fragments discovered in Eastern Europe. With the help of the new "454" sequencing machines, he -- along with a similar project at Lawrence Berkely National Laboratory -- expects to get a complete Neanderthal genetic blueprint. In this case, just as with the use of elephants to birth mammoths, a Neanderthal could be delivered from a human female, or (perhaps less ethically questionable), a Chimpanzee.
As evolutionary biologist Hendrik Poinar notes, “The reality is it will happen,” ... “Twenty to 30 years is the span people are talking about.”
And what then? When a creature so like us -- but so different -- walked again among us, what then? Dartmouth College ethicist Ronald M. Green's comment is as creepy as it is probing:
“This was a species we competed with,” ... “We would not want to recreate a situation of two competing advanced hominid species.”
We may just find out.
A Cool Trillion
The front page of the Austin American Statesman sports this, in bold block letters:
A 1,000,000,000,000 plan?
I'll admit that I had a hard time parsing the digits at first. Turns out it's a cool trillion. A trillion dollar plan? Did I miss something? I know the unemployment rate is, what, 6.7%, but the breadline is hardly stretching around the city block. Maybe I suffer from a failure to predict the something economically-wicked that this way comes. Fine. But, a trillion dollars? (I love how it's a nice even number too, like the calculating master minds in the back gave up on more precision: "Hell, just make it a trillion. That oughta do it.") We're gonna break the freakin' printing press...
The only bright spot reading this trillion dollar plan scenario came, for me, when Speaker Pelosi went on record wanting something like 200 billion in tax cuts. We've got bipartisan consensus now (FWIW) that reducing tax burdens help stimulate the economy. Conservatives have been shouting this on a mountain for a very long time.
A 1,000,000,000,000 plan?
I'll admit that I had a hard time parsing the digits at first. Turns out it's a cool trillion. A trillion dollar plan? Did I miss something? I know the unemployment rate is, what, 6.7%, but the breadline is hardly stretching around the city block. Maybe I suffer from a failure to predict the something economically-wicked that this way comes. Fine. But, a trillion dollars? (I love how it's a nice even number too, like the calculating master minds in the back gave up on more precision: "Hell, just make it a trillion. That oughta do it.") We're gonna break the freakin' printing press...
The only bright spot reading this trillion dollar plan scenario came, for me, when Speaker Pelosi went on record wanting something like 200 billion in tax cuts. We've got bipartisan consensus now (FWIW) that reducing tax burdens help stimulate the economy. Conservatives have been shouting this on a mountain for a very long time.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Edgar Allen Poe
I'll do this from memory but saw it originally years ago in some book about Edgar Allen Poe. Legend has it that it came originally from the morbid maestro himself, inscribed on the wall of a pub somewhere in Massachusetts:
Fill with mingled cream and amber, I will drain that glass again. What hilarious thoughts do clambor, through the chambers of my brain. Quaintest thoughts, queerest fancies, come to life, then fade away. What care I how time advances? I am drinking Ale today.
Fill with mingled cream and amber, I will drain that glass again. What hilarious thoughts do clambor, through the chambers of my brain. Quaintest thoughts, queerest fancies, come to life, then fade away. What care I how time advances? I am drinking Ale today.
Save the Planet
Gore thinks he's saving the planet. I love this. The hubris. Most of us can't save our sandwich from getting stale on the corners. But Gore's got us frothed up about saving the planet. Well, hell, let's do it Al (say this in a slow Southern drawl). Let's save it mo fo. What to do first? How about, with every last penny, mobilize our forces to scare the beejeesus out of China, until they stop building those 1950s coal plants. That'd do a heckuva lot. Failing that, I'll put in those energy saving bulbs (I do use these, actually, but only because it makes good financial sense). How many flourescent bulbs does it take to cancel out a coal plant? Have to start somewhere, I guess.
Harry Reid
Like Mission Accomplished, Harry Reid delivers. At least President Bush later expressed regret about the "bring em' on" bravado and the Mission Accomplished banner (Bush might instead have fallen back on parsing words: "No, I meant the particular mission to take Baghdad in the first weeks of battle..."). Harry Reid, the [insert your favorite moniker], managed to proclaim to all the world just before the surge that the war is lost. Which war, Harry? Vietnam?
Gettin' it Straight
The Credit Crisis. Auto bailouts. Stock market in turmoil. What does it mean, and who has the answers? Let's start with some clarification of terms. Define your terms, as philosophers teach us. So I'll try to do just that, and I'll pick as my subject matter a set of terms that we constantly use, that have different meanings though it's common to view subsets of them as in essence the same (or at least having substantial overlap), and that are particularly germaine given our current circumstances. The terms are:
Geek
Nerd
Dork
Tool
Jerk
Asshole
Prick
Douche Bag
Dumb ass
Pinwheel
Let's get started. In what follows I'll define the term, then offer some exemplar from popular culture to tack down the definition. I'm confident that the conflations will melt away, to the edification of all.
First, a geek. Contrary to popular opinion, a geek is not a nerd. Don't conflate them, folks. A geek is someone that drills into a particular subject with a zest that borders on the maniacal. But (and this is important), he does his drilling at the expense of, say, hygiene, or social skills. The classic geek is the computer geek. Moooove. But geeks find homes in other technical disciplines as well. Nicholas Cage's character in The Rock, Stanley Goodspeed, was a geek.
The nerd. Ah yes, the nerd. Nerds are boring, unathletic types that tend to fall into nerdy routines (like getting up at the same time, having coffee, listening to some soothing music, leaving the house at the same time, etc.). Nerds are terrible with the opposite sex, tend to be abstemious (being too "smart" for vice), and are by definition socially unattractive to non-nerds and in particular to members of the opposite sex that are non-nerds. In other words, they're smart, with nothing else. Nerds. Classic nerd is Marty McFly, from Back to the Future. Also, Ross from Friends (though a borderline case, since Ross had a greater than zero chance that a woman would find him attractive).
Dorks. Dorks are nerds with less native intelligence. A dork looks and sounds like a nerd but talks about his car, or his recipe for Jalapeno macaroni salad. Dorks tend to watch a lot of sports on T.V., and may wear sports insignia, especially on dates, or to nice restaurants.
Tool. Interesting type, the tool. Tools are smart, mostly successful, with something more to offer than can be managed by geeks, nerds, or dorks. A tool will be at least one of: attractive, athletic, or sociable. Tools are tools essentially because they follow the rules. A tool made it into a good law school, dresses nice, may have an attractive mate, and refuses to buy beer for the neighbor kid (though he's known him for years). A tool may inform on classmates for cheating. He rarely speeds. Tools generally end up running things. (Don't worry, however, because they're still tools.)
Jerk. Low class, mean spirited, don't give a damn types. Chet from Weird Science. You can almost substitute "jackass" for jerk, though there is some small semantic difference.
Asshole. Jerks that have made something of themselves. Colonel Nathan R. Jessup from A Few Good Men. 'Nuff said.
Prick. Pricks are assholes with an innate and ineradicable sense of entitlement. They're high society about their assholiness. It's an important distinction. You can't call a prick an asshole without a palpable degree of imprecision: "No, he's a prick, Bob. Get it straight". Hardy Jenns, from the 1987 Some Kind of Wonderful, was a classic prick.
Douche Bag. The douche bag. This is generally a lower management type that makes everyone in the room (or office) go mum when he walks in. Like a Pez Dispenser he pops out company lines with a shitty smile, poring cold water all over your once hot but now extinguished conversation about the weekend's activities, or the new girl in office 101. The douche bag would be a standard issue nerd or dork, only there's an additional moral deficiency with the DB; the bag wants to climb up the management ladder, and at your expense. Go mum when you spot the Douche Bag. He's only gonna cause you pain. (The silver lining, however, is that DBs tend to get their comeuppance, having more desire for Machiavellian conniving than actual ability, and tending always to repel all things cool. Exemplar? Hard to find. Best that comes to mind is Carter Burke, the character played by Paul Reiser in Aliens. Douche bag. But anyway in spite of the dearth of DBs in popular culture, I know several from past jobs. I bet you do too.)
Dumb ass. Nerds and even dorks may have something to say within their sphere of expertise, but dumb asses, by definition, always come up short. Dumb asses speak, and every non-dumb ass starts an imaginary stop watch, waiting for the cessation of dumb ass sounds. The "Oh" guy from Office Space is a classic dumb ass.
Pinwheel. A pinwheel is someone who may or not be smart about something, but seems drawn, like a moth to a flame, to sound off about other subjects about which he has only enthusiasm without accompanying expertise. Pinwheels come out of the woodwork when discussions turn to politics. Classic pinwheel? There are lots. Clooney can be a pinwheel, as can "green" actors like DiCaprio. In fact, pretty much any Hollywood actor with strong views on political issues is sure to adorn him or herself with fluffy pinwheel attire. Ashton Kutcher sounds more than a little pinwheely at times. These pinwheels, the Hollywood variety (a common strain of pinwheel), all suffer from the false belief that their sheer attractiveness somehow promotes their opinions to bedrock truth. Maybe, but only for other pinwheels (this is key). Also, fourteen year olds.
So there you have it. In the midst of these dire times, a get to the point, hard hitting, good ole' fashioned linguistic analysis of the nouns whose referents we're seeing more and more of these days. Let's get it straight.
Geek
Nerd
Dork
Tool
Jerk
Asshole
Prick
Douche Bag
Dumb ass
Pinwheel
Let's get started. In what follows I'll define the term, then offer some exemplar from popular culture to tack down the definition. I'm confident that the conflations will melt away, to the edification of all.
First, a geek. Contrary to popular opinion, a geek is not a nerd. Don't conflate them, folks. A geek is someone that drills into a particular subject with a zest that borders on the maniacal. But (and this is important), he does his drilling at the expense of, say, hygiene, or social skills. The classic geek is the computer geek. Moooove. But geeks find homes in other technical disciplines as well. Nicholas Cage's character in The Rock, Stanley Goodspeed, was a geek.
The nerd. Ah yes, the nerd. Nerds are boring, unathletic types that tend to fall into nerdy routines (like getting up at the same time, having coffee, listening to some soothing music, leaving the house at the same time, etc.). Nerds are terrible with the opposite sex, tend to be abstemious (being too "smart" for vice), and are by definition socially unattractive to non-nerds and in particular to members of the opposite sex that are non-nerds. In other words, they're smart, with nothing else. Nerds. Classic nerd is Marty McFly, from Back to the Future. Also, Ross from Friends (though a borderline case, since Ross had a greater than zero chance that a woman would find him attractive).
Dorks. Dorks are nerds with less native intelligence. A dork looks and sounds like a nerd but talks about his car, or his recipe for Jalapeno macaroni salad. Dorks tend to watch a lot of sports on T.V., and may wear sports insignia, especially on dates, or to nice restaurants.
Tool. Interesting type, the tool. Tools are smart, mostly successful, with something more to offer than can be managed by geeks, nerds, or dorks. A tool will be at least one of: attractive, athletic, or sociable. Tools are tools essentially because they follow the rules. A tool made it into a good law school, dresses nice, may have an attractive mate, and refuses to buy beer for the neighbor kid (though he's known him for years). A tool may inform on classmates for cheating. He rarely speeds. Tools generally end up running things. (Don't worry, however, because they're still tools.)
Jerk. Low class, mean spirited, don't give a damn types. Chet from Weird Science. You can almost substitute "jackass" for jerk, though there is some small semantic difference.
Asshole. Jerks that have made something of themselves. Colonel Nathan R. Jessup from A Few Good Men. 'Nuff said.
Prick. Pricks are assholes with an innate and ineradicable sense of entitlement. They're high society about their assholiness. It's an important distinction. You can't call a prick an asshole without a palpable degree of imprecision: "No, he's a prick, Bob. Get it straight". Hardy Jenns, from the 1987 Some Kind of Wonderful, was a classic prick.
Douche Bag. The douche bag. This is generally a lower management type that makes everyone in the room (or office) go mum when he walks in. Like a Pez Dispenser he pops out company lines with a shitty smile, poring cold water all over your once hot but now extinguished conversation about the weekend's activities, or the new girl in office 101. The douche bag would be a standard issue nerd or dork, only there's an additional moral deficiency with the DB; the bag wants to climb up the management ladder, and at your expense. Go mum when you spot the Douche Bag. He's only gonna cause you pain. (The silver lining, however, is that DBs tend to get their comeuppance, having more desire for Machiavellian conniving than actual ability, and tending always to repel all things cool. Exemplar? Hard to find. Best that comes to mind is Carter Burke, the character played by Paul Reiser in Aliens. Douche bag. But anyway in spite of the dearth of DBs in popular culture, I know several from past jobs. I bet you do too.)
Dumb ass. Nerds and even dorks may have something to say within their sphere of expertise, but dumb asses, by definition, always come up short. Dumb asses speak, and every non-dumb ass starts an imaginary stop watch, waiting for the cessation of dumb ass sounds. The "Oh" guy from Office Space is a classic dumb ass.
Pinwheel. A pinwheel is someone who may or not be smart about something, but seems drawn, like a moth to a flame, to sound off about other subjects about which he has only enthusiasm without accompanying expertise. Pinwheels come out of the woodwork when discussions turn to politics. Classic pinwheel? There are lots. Clooney can be a pinwheel, as can "green" actors like DiCaprio. In fact, pretty much any Hollywood actor with strong views on political issues is sure to adorn him or herself with fluffy pinwheel attire. Ashton Kutcher sounds more than a little pinwheely at times. These pinwheels, the Hollywood variety (a common strain of pinwheel), all suffer from the false belief that their sheer attractiveness somehow promotes their opinions to bedrock truth. Maybe, but only for other pinwheels (this is key). Also, fourteen year olds.
So there you have it. In the midst of these dire times, a get to the point, hard hitting, good ole' fashioned linguistic analysis of the nouns whose referents we're seeing more and more of these days. Let's get it straight.
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