The subject is an early disclaimer that I'm not politically inclined. I'm not a lawyer, all characters and events -- even those based on real persons -- are entirely fictional, of course your mileage may vary, and you should eat your greens.
Anyway, so a good discussion today was brought up at lunch out of the blue. Usually we'd discuss... errr pretty much nothing, but somehow today we ended up debating whether punishment should be applied to "insane criminals" just as well as their sane counterparts, specially in a murder case where a sane person would've been sentenced to death.
The discussion evolved to include ethics, right and wrong, free will, what it means to be human, the philosophy of imprisonment and the death penalty amongst other things. And the answer is not 42 (a joke if you're a galaxy hitchhiker). Actually we never came up with any answers, as is often with such highly enjoyable and rare debates. I was playing devil's advocate most of the time just to fuel the debate more and it worked. Good mental exercise.
- Waking life
An excellent movie (beware the spoilers on that link), one that can actually be watched many times over always finding new hidden ideas to think about. Warning: it's not for the faint of mind and will make you ponder themes you might have never thought of before.
- Women vote in Kuwait
While this should be good news. I can't help but think of how sad it is that the date this news item is published is in the year 2006.
- Bogs
By complete accident I learned this is not just a typo people make when trying to type blogs. It actually is something.
- Typos
Open notepad (or kpad if you're on linux or something) and type the word ratio. Seriously, try to do it. I can safely bet that at least 90% of the people will type it 'ration' first before correcting it (or not). It is one of the most popular typos out there. It's probably because we're used to typing 'ion' as in "relation", or "nation", come to think of it. 'io' is an uncommon ending for an English word. I find the typo that usually results amusing.
Congratulations, you just lost 5 minutes of non refundable time.
Friday, June 30, 2006
Thursday, June 22, 2006
We eih kaman
Life can get boring sometimes, living seems to be the one action you can't just stop doing when you're bored with it to take a break and do something else, dying for example.
At a very high level, there's really nothing much to do out here but living. And living takes its toll on you eventually, they say smoking is dangerous because it might kill you at the age of 50 or something, but living is about as dangerous as smoking. In Egypt, for example, it kills people at an average age between 68 and 73.
Anyway, I'm done with the nonsense, here is a few things that might make slightly more sense:
- Drama
For some reason we all use the word Drama when we actually mean tragedy. Drama turns out to be a greek word that means "Action", kinda ironic, and something to think about the next time you watch a Jackie Chan movie.
- Ratatouille (rat.a.too.ee)
The funniest trailer I have ever seen, a definite must see. It played while I was waiting for Cars (an excellent movie too) to start and I was still laughing 10 minutes into the movie. Even though it's still a year away I can't wait.
It's getting late so I'll just wrap it up here.
Over and out.
At a very high level, there's really nothing much to do out here but living. And living takes its toll on you eventually, they say smoking is dangerous because it might kill you at the age of 50 or something, but living is about as dangerous as smoking. In Egypt, for example, it kills people at an average age between 68 and 73.
Anyway, I'm done with the nonsense, here is a few things that might make slightly more sense:
- Drama
For some reason we all use the word Drama when we actually mean tragedy. Drama turns out to be a greek word that means "Action", kinda ironic, and something to think about the next time you watch a Jackie Chan movie.
- Ratatouille (rat.a.too.ee)
The funniest trailer I have ever seen, a definite must see. It played while I was waiting for Cars (an excellent movie too) to start and I was still laughing 10 minutes into the movie. Even though it's still a year away I can't wait.
It's getting late so I'll just wrap it up here.
Over and out.
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Mom, what is a planet?
You thought you'd learnt it in school. Everybody knows what a planet is. And if you didn't you can always pick up a dictionary and look it up, right?.
Well I thought so too, but then I saw this on the news and I kid you not.
"After over seven years of debating, the International Astronomical Union announced that it expects to announce the official definition of a planet in September. After many-a-deadlock, they handed the task of deciding exactly what a planet is to a new committee, which includes historians and educators. 'They wanted a different perspective from that of planetary scientists,' said Edward Bowell, an astronomer at Lowell Observatory who is also vice president of the IAU's Division III-Planetary Systems Sciences group. If all goes according to plan, the wording will be proposed in their 12-day General Assembly meeting in Prague." (Courtesy of /.)
Unfortunately, they're serious.
Some people have too much time on their hands obviously.
Well I thought so too, but then I saw this on the news and I kid you not.
"After over seven years of debating, the International Astronomical Union announced that it expects to announce the official definition of a planet in September. After many-a-deadlock, they handed the task of deciding exactly what a planet is to a new committee, which includes historians and educators. 'They wanted a different perspective from that of planetary scientists,' said Edward Bowell, an astronomer at Lowell Observatory who is also vice president of the IAU's Division III-Planetary Systems Sciences group. If all goes according to plan, the wording will be proposed in their 12-day General Assembly meeting in Prague." (Courtesy of /.)
Unfortunately, they're serious.
Some people have too much time on their hands obviously.
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Tourism And Marketing
Continuing with the multi-point posts I had these 2 separate subjects in mind. Only when I put them together in the title did I notice they are actually related. My post however is agnostic of that and you'll hardly notice any relation, it's more of something for you to think about.
-Tourism
At the start of the last century (the 1900s) Leavenworth, WA was a city that depended on commerce for its economy. The railroad tracks used to go through it and a railroad track going through a city back then meant a healthy commercial economy. But then the railroads were rerouted, the city's economy fell apart gradually and for some 30 years the city was on the brink of extinction.
In the late 1960s they decided to try and do something about it.
Ideas were thrown around and an idea to turn the city into a mock bavarian (Bavaria is a state in Germany) village was chosen to turn the city into a touristic destination and help revitalize economy.
And it worked. Even though the city had nothing particularly Bavarian about it, they started remodelling their hamlet to look Bavarian. People started festivals, signs in German were erected, and with all the remodelling work the city looks very refreshing.
Today the city whose area is 3.2 Km² and population around 2000 people gets more than a million tourists annually.
It would be a healthy exercise to think about the story of this city and compare it to how we're "investing" our priceless monuments and potentially touristic areas.
Actually, I take that back, this is not a healthy exercise at all.
-Marketing
I've noticed a few things about ads and marketing that I find oxymoronic. Let me illustrate.
Quite a few ads or statements on product packaging proudly boast "Better taste or less fat or more cleaning power than the leading (beverage, or chocolate, or detergent) brand(s)"
Well, if I, the advertiser, willingly admit that some other brand is the leading brand what am I basically declaring my brand to be... the following brand perhaps?
The other thing is just as popular, I would be watching TV or listening to the radio when the announcer declares '60 minutes of music brought to you "commercial free" by Mercedes Benz' or 'The Closer, series premiere brought to you "commercial free" by Audi'
What exactly is this statement if not a commercial?
Anyway, I'm done talking. I'll leave you with a few photos of my visit to Leavenworth that triggered parts of this post.
-Tourism
At the start of the last century (the 1900s) Leavenworth, WA was a city that depended on commerce for its economy. The railroad tracks used to go through it and a railroad track going through a city back then meant a healthy commercial economy. But then the railroads were rerouted, the city's economy fell apart gradually and for some 30 years the city was on the brink of extinction.
In the late 1960s they decided to try and do something about it.
Ideas were thrown around and an idea to turn the city into a mock bavarian (Bavaria is a state in Germany) village was chosen to turn the city into a touristic destination and help revitalize economy.
And it worked. Even though the city had nothing particularly Bavarian about it, they started remodelling their hamlet to look Bavarian. People started festivals, signs in German were erected, and with all the remodelling work the city looks very refreshing.
Today the city whose area is 3.2 Km² and population around 2000 people gets more than a million tourists annually.
It would be a healthy exercise to think about the story of this city and compare it to how we're "investing" our priceless monuments and potentially touristic areas.
Actually, I take that back, this is not a healthy exercise at all.
-Marketing
I've noticed a few things about ads and marketing that I find oxymoronic. Let me illustrate.
Quite a few ads or statements on product packaging proudly boast "Better taste or less fat or more cleaning power than the leading (beverage, or chocolate, or detergent) brand(s)"
Well, if I, the advertiser, willingly admit that some other brand is the leading brand what am I basically declaring my brand to be... the following brand perhaps?
The other thing is just as popular, I would be watching TV or listening to the radio when the announcer declares '60 minutes of music brought to you "commercial free" by Mercedes Benz' or 'The Closer, series premiere brought to you "commercial free" by Audi'
What exactly is this statement if not a commercial?
Anyway, I'm done talking. I'll leave you with a few photos of my visit to Leavenworth that triggered parts of this post.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Game Theory and the Luring Lottery
I've been fascinated with Game Theory ever since I was introduced to the concept by the movie "A Beautiful Mind"(see, watching movies can be useful). To be honest the movie didn't say much about game theory itself and whatever little was used in the story line was mostly wrong. (the solution given by the movie to the bar pick up problem is not a true Nash equilibrium for this type of game, see here[pdf] for the true equilibrium point for this game)
Still it made me look up John Nash and his work and I was hooked.
The nice thing about game theory is that the problems it tries to solve will sound very familiar to you and hence it is more likely to have a readily applicable value to you. To illustrate here's an example of a problem.
Now one of the first games you'll read about if you poke around looking for stuff about game theory is prisoner's dilemma, and I'm sure many of you will have heard of it. And that's exactly why it will *not* be my example.
Instead, why don't you think of the following:
In the June 1983 issue of Scientific American, Douglas Hofstadter announced a largest-number game open to anyone who sent in postcards before midnight, June 30, 1983. The prize was $1 million divided by the total number of entries. To enter the contest the rules say that all you have to do is send in a single 3 by 5-inch card with your name and address and a number indicating how many entries you wish to submit. Everyone is allowed unlimited entries, or rather limited only by one's ability to write a number on the 3x5 card.
Now think about how would you play this game... or rather how it should be played...
Don't look here, you should still be thinking :P
When you're done thinking, you can check for solution, rationale, and what actually happened in this contest here[wikipedia], and here[heretical.com].
Fun ha?
Still it made me look up John Nash and his work and I was hooked.
The nice thing about game theory is that the problems it tries to solve will sound very familiar to you and hence it is more likely to have a readily applicable value to you. To illustrate here's an example of a problem.
Now one of the first games you'll read about if you poke around looking for stuff about game theory is prisoner's dilemma, and I'm sure many of you will have heard of it. And that's exactly why it will *not* be my example.
Instead, why don't you think of the following:
In the June 1983 issue of Scientific American, Douglas Hofstadter announced a largest-number game open to anyone who sent in postcards before midnight, June 30, 1983. The prize was $1 million divided by the total number of entries. To enter the contest the rules say that all you have to do is send in a single 3 by 5-inch card with your name and address and a number indicating how many entries you wish to submit. Everyone is allowed unlimited entries, or rather limited only by one's ability to write a number on the 3x5 card.
Now think about how would you play this game... or rather how it should be played...
Don't look here, you should still be thinking :P
When you're done thinking, you can check for solution, rationale, and what actually happened in this contest here[wikipedia], and here[heretical.com].
Fun ha?
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