The Nervous Tick

Word of the Day - Koan

2010-08-11T08:58:00.000Z

koan \KOH-ahn\, noun:

A nonsensical or paradoxical question to a student for which an answer is demanded, the stress of meditation on the question often being illuminating.

Koan is Japanese, ko "public" and -an, "matter for thought." It enters English through Zen Buddhism before achieving a more general sense.

Facebook Captcha

2010-07-22T10:15:00.000Z

They may well have over 500 Million users now, but they still can't get the security right:

Artist's Invisible Impression of a Laser Weapon

2010-07-22T10:02:00.000Z

Yes, you read that correctly. In reporting an article about a laser weapon system BBC News has helpfully given us an artists impression of the laser, mounted on a battleship, complete with laser beam in glorious martian-zapping red. Of course in reality this beam would be invisible. So it's an artists impression that's made up, wrong and kinda redundant.

Thanks BBC News.

Full article here

Not Octopus Paul's Only Talent

2010-07-14T13:55:00.002Z

And Another I Want

2010-07-12T14:52:00.002Z

ShotDeadInTheHead T-Shirts

2010-07-12T14:51:00.000Z

The Egg by Andy Weir

2010-07-12T14:46:00.000Z

The Egg

By: Andy Weir

You were on your way home when you died.

It was a car accident. Nothing particularly remarkable, but fatal nonetheless. You left behind a wife and two children. It was a painless death. The EMTs tried their best to save you, but to no avail. Your body was so utterly shattered you were better off, trust me.

And that’s when you met me.

“What… what happened?” You asked. “Where am I?”

“You died,” I said, matter-of-factly. No point in mincing words.

“There was a… a truck and it was skidding…”

“Yup,” I said.

“I… I died?”

“Yup. But don’t feel bad about it. Everyone dies,” I said.

You looked around. There was nothingness. Just you and me. “What is this place?” You asked. “Is this the afterlife?”

“More or less,” I said.

“Are you god?” You asked.

“Yup,” I replied. “I’m God.”

“My kids… my wife,” you said.

“What about them?”

“Will they be all right?”

“That’s what I like to see,” I said. “You just died and your main concern is for your family. That’s good stuff right there.”

You looked at me with fascination. To you, I didn’t look like God. I just looked like some man. Or possibly a woman. Some vague authority figure, maybe. More of a grammar school teacher than the almighty.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “They’ll be fine. Your kids will remember you as perfect in every way. They didn’t have time to grow contempt for you. You wife will cry on the outside, but will be secretly relieved. To be fair, your marriage was falling apart. If it’s any consolation, she’ll feel very guilty for feeling relieved.”

“Oh,” you said. “So what happens now? Do I go to heaven or hell or something?”

“Neither,” I said. “You’ll be reincarnated.”

“Ah,” you said. “So the Hindus were right,”

“All religions are right in their own way,” I said. “Walk with me.”

You followed along as we strode through the void. “Where are we going?”

“Nowhere in particular,” I said. “It’s just nice to walk while we talk.”

“So what’s the point, then?” You asked. “When I get reborn, I’ll just be a blank slate, right? A baby. So all my experiences and everything I did in this life won’t matter.”

“Not so!” I said. “You have within you all the knowledge and experiences of all your past lives. You just don’t remember them right now.”

I stopped walking and took you by the shoulders. “Your soul is more magnificent, beautiful, and gigantic than you can possibly imagine. A human mind can only contain a tiny fraction of what you are. It’s like sticking your finger in a glass of water to see if it’s hot or cold. You put a tiny part of yourself into the vessel, and when you bring it back out, you’ve gained all the experiences it had.

“You’ve been in a human for the last 48 years, so you haven’t stretched out yet and felt the rest of your immense consciousness. If we hung out here for long enough, you’d start remembering everything. But there’s no point to doing that between each life.”

“How many times have I been reincarnated, then?”

“Oh lots. Lots and lots. An in to lots of different lives.” I said. “This time around, you’ll be a Chinese peasant girl in 540 AD.”

“Wait, what?” You stammered. “You’re sending me back in time?”

“Well, I guess technically. Time, as you know it, only exists in your universe. Things are different where I come from.”

“Where you come from?” You said.

“Oh sure,” I explained “I come from somewhere. Somewhere else. And there are others like me. I know you’ll want to know what it’s like there, but honestly you wouldn’t understand.”

“Oh,” you said, a little let down. “But wait. If I get reincarnated to other places in time, I could have interacted with myself at some point.”

“Sure. Happens all the time. And with both lives only aware of their own lifespan you don’t even know it’s happening.”

“So what’s the point of it all?”

“Seriously?” I asked. “Seriously? You’re asking me for the meaning of life? Isn’t that a little stereotypical?”

“Well it’s a reasonable question,” you persisted.

I looked you in the eye. “The meaning of life, the reason I made this whole universe, is for you to mature.”

“You mean mankind? You want us to mature?”

“No, just you. I made this whole universe for you. With each new life you grow and mature and become a larger and greater intellect.”

“Just me? What about everyone else?”

“There is no one else,” I said. “In this universe, there’s just you and me.”

You stared blankly at me. “But all the people on earth…”

“All you. Different incarnations of you.”

“Wait. I’m everyone!?”

“Now you’re getting it,” I said, with a congratulatory slap on the back.

“I’m every human being who ever lived?”

“Or who will ever live, yes.”

“I’m Abraham Lincoln?”

“And you’re John Wilkes Booth, too,” I added.

“I’m Hitler?” You said, appalled.

“And you’re the millions he killed.”

“I’m Jesus?”

“And you’re everyone who followed him.”

You fell silent.

“Every time you victimized someone,” I said, “you were victimizing yourself. Every act of kindness you’ve done, you’ve done to yourself. Every happy and sad moment ever experienced by any human was, or will be, experienced by you.”

You thought for a long time.

“Why?” You asked me. “Why do all this?”

“Because someday, you will become like me. Because that’s what you are. You’re one of my kind. You’re my child.”

“Whoa,” you said, incredulous. “You mean I’m a god?”

“No. Not yet. You’re a fetus. You’re still growing. Once you’ve lived every human life throughout all time, you will have grown enough to be born.”

“So the whole universe,” you said, “it’s just…”

“An egg.” I answered. “Now it’s time for you to move on to your next life.”

And I sent you on your way

From: http://www.galactanet.com/oneoff/theegg_mod.html

Pirate Bay is Down

2010-07-08T08:49:00.000Z

Just for upgrades, but their message is fun:

"Upgrading some stuff, database is in use for backups, soon back again.. Btw, it's nice weather outside I think."

:)

6 Things Red Dead Redemption Taught Me About (Hating) Women

2010-07-07T11:22:00.000Z

"One thing I noticed as I systematically eliminated women from the Old West was that no one really cared. In Red Dead, if you shoot a woman in front of witnesses, you only get a $5 bounty on your head and I think $4.79 of that is from noise complaints. Women are such third class citizens that you’ll get more of a hassle out of someone if you kill his chicken than if you kill his wife.

After some experimenting, I found that anything you did with a rope and a woman was almost always OK. If you want to hogtie all the females in the center of town and pour bear bait on them, you’ll probably unlock an achievement to the indifference of the townspeople. I tried tying a nun to my horse and dragging her past the sheriff to see if he’d do anything other than politely greet me. Not only did it seem OK, it actually seemed to cheer him up."

6 Things Red Dead Redemption Taught Me About (Hating) Women

RDR Donkey Woman

2010-07-07T11:14:00.001Z

RDR Cougar Man

2010-07-07T11:10:00.000Z

Women LOVE Technology

2010-05-12T13:09:00.002Z

Worst Email Spam Ever

2010-05-10T12:35:00.002Z

Dear Madam.

It seemed perfecta t first the local sportscaster hooks up with local weather girl. I should have seen right through you. I plan a wonderful weekend in Napa Valley for the two of us and the next thing I know your doing the lead news anchor. You said you wanted to further your career and you had gotten as far as you could dating me. Well go to CraigsMATCHES .com and check out these pictures I posted of you and your lead news anchor. Didn't know I had those did you. Let's see how far either ones of your careers get when I email them to our boss. GOOD LUCK finding another job.
I am so glad that my friend told me your name. I was playing around on CraigsMATCHES .com and I type din your name and up pops these amazing pictures of you. I love the hot pick g-string bathing suit and the black lingerie thing was awesome. I would love to hook up with you especially after seeing those pictures. Call me

Marketing

Chile Earthquake Shortens Day

2010-03-05T12:07:00.002Z

Last month's massive earthquake in Chile was powerful enough to shift the earth's axis and shorten the length of a day by 1.26 millionths of a second, researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory say.

link

iPhone, iPad, What's Next?

2010-03-03T20:49:00.000Z

But then I Read the Article...

2010-01-22T16:17:00.000Z

A BBC Newsnight investigation has found that a so-called "bomb detector", thousands of which have been sold to Iraq, cannot possibly work.

The ADE-651 detector has never been shown to work in a scientific test.

There are no batteries and it consists of a swivelling aerial mounted to a hinge on a hand-grip. Critics have likened it to a glorified dowsing rod.

Mr McCormick told the BBC in a previous interview that "the theory behind dowsing and the theory behind how we actually detect explosives is very similar".

He says that the key to it is the black box connected to the aerial into which you put "programmed substance detection cards", each "designed to tune into" the frequency of a particular explosive or other substance named on the card.

He claims that in ideal conditions you can detect explosives from a range of up to 1km.

The training manual for the device says it can even, with the right card, detect elephants, humans and 100 dollar bills.

Claims of such almost magical technical abilities would almost be comic, if the potential consequences were not so serious.

The ADE-651 has been sold to a range of Middle Eastern countries and as far afield as Bangkok for eye-watering prices.

Iraq paid around $40,000 for each device.

Full article

Winner of Most Redundant Headline?

2010-01-22T15:14:00.000Z

No shit, really?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/8471187.stm

Who are the Taliban?

2010-01-18T08:31:00.000Z

Recent years have seen the re-emergence of the hardline Islamic Taliban movement as a fighting force in Afghanistan and a major threat to its government.

They are also threatening to destabilise Pakistan, where they control areas in the north-west and are blamed for a wave of suicide bombings and other attacks.

The Taliban emerged in the early 1990s in northern Pakistan following the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan.

A predominantly Pashtun movement, the Taliban came to prominence in Afghanistan in the autumn of 1994.

It is commonly believed that they first appeared in religious seminaries - mostly paid for by money from Saudi Arabia - which preached a hard line form of Sunni Islam.

The Taliban's promise - in Pashtun areas straddling Pakistan and Afghanistan - was to restore peace and security and enforce their own austere version of Sharia, or Islamic law, once in power.

In both countries they introduced or supported Islamic punishments - such as public executions of convicted murderers and adulterers and amputations of those found guilty of theft.

Men were required to grow beards and women had to wear the all-covering burka.

Full story at BBC News

I Love You Phil(l)ip Morris

2010-01-07T12:10:00.000Z

I was just reading up about a new Jim Carrey film about to be release in Feb 2010 called "I Love You Phillip Morris" which, at first, seems like a very subtle marketing ploy for Marlboro cigarettes. I was wondering if somehow Philip Morris (one 'L') had managed to get a major hollywood film to change it's title to reflect the name of the company, now that they're not allowed to show advertising for cigarettes etc.

But no - it turns out that it's actually a true and rather bizarre story about a conman called Steven Jay Russell who managed to escape from prison four times to be with the lover he met in prison. For some brief excerpts about how crazy / genius this man was one needs to look no further than wikipedia.

On May 21, 1993 Russell got out of Harris County Jail in Houston, Texas, wearing civilian clothes he had obtained. Afterward he fabricated bogus credentials and got a job as CFO of North American Medical Management. He proceeded to embezzle thousands of dollars from the company. In 1995 he was caught and imprisoned for insurance fraud and again placed into Harris County Jail where he met Phillip Morris, who became his lover.

In 1996, while in Harris County Jail (Texas), Russell impersonated a judge and ordered his own bond decreased from $900,000 to $45,000, which he immediately posted. He was arrested 10 days later in Florida and was sent back to Texas. That same year he started taking art classes provided by the prison. Each time he attended a session, he snatched a green Magic Marker and hid it under his bed. Eventually, he had enough markers to dye his white prison uniform green. Since all the medical professionals in the prison wore green uniforms, Russell simply walked out of the prison disguised as a "doctor."

In 1998, he was again at the Harris County Jail, serving a 45-year sentence for stealing $800,000 from a Houston company that manages physicians' finances, plus 20 years for the previous escape. He later got Phillip Morris transferred to the Dallas County Jail and tried to have him released.

While in prison, Russell began to plot his most daring escape. At the prison library, Russell began reading up on the HIV virus and AIDS. He began taking laxatives to make it seem as if he had the symptoms of AIDS. Russell used a prison typewriter to forge a medical document stating that he suffered from the disease, and used it to convince doctors of his "condition" on February 24. He fooled the prison doctor into believing that a 'special needs parole' to a Houston hospital had been authorized on March 13. While outside and free again, Russell posed as a doctor and informed the prison that Russel died from AIDS.

On March 20, 1998, Russell posed as a Virginia millionaire and tried to take a $75,000 loan from NationsBank in Dallas. When bank officials got suspicious and alerted the police, Russell feigned a heart attack and was transported to a hospital. The FBI placed him under guard, but Russell managed to impersonate an FBI agent on his cellular phone and convinced officers guarding him to leave. He walked out of the hospital and the hunt for Russel began all over again.

100 Quotes Every Geek Should Know

2010-01-07T11:52:00.000Z

First in a series of post for Marion, who complains that my blog consists mainly of videos now - 100 quotes every geek should know.

"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony." — Dennis the Peasant, Monty Python and the Holy Grail

"Three rings for the Elven kings under the sky, seven for the Dwarf lords in their halls of stone, nine for the mortal men doomed to die, one for the Dark Lord on his dark throne, in the land of Mordor where the shadows lie. One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them, one ring the bring them all, and in the darkness bind them. In the land of Mordor where the shadows lie." -LOTR

"I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that." - HAL, 2001: A Space Odyssey

"Spock. This child is about to wipe out every living thing on Earth. Now, what do you suggest we do….spank it?" - Dr. McCoy, Star Trek: The Motion Picture

"With great power there must also come - great responsibility." - Amazing Fantasy #15 (August 1962)

"If you can’t take a little bloody nose, maybe you oughtta go back home and crawl under your bed. It’s not safe out here. It’s wondrous, with treaures to satiate desires both subtle and gross; but it’s not for the timid." - Q, Star Trek: The Next Generation "Q Who?"

"Five card stud, nothing wild. And the sky’s the limit" - Captain Jean Luc Picard, uttering the last line of the series, Star Trek: The Next Generation "All Good Things…"

"If you think that by threatening me you can get me to do what you want… Well, that’s where you’re right. But - and I am only saying that because I care - there’s a lot of decaffeinated brands on the market that are just as tasty as the real thing." - Chris Knight, Real Genius

"We’re all very different people. We’re not Watusi. We’re not Spartans. We’re Americans, with a capital ‘A’, huh? You know what that means? Do ya? That means that our forefathers were kicked out of every decent country in the world. We are the wretched refuse. We’re the underdog." - John Winger, Stripes

"If I’m not back in five minutes, just wait longer." - Ace Ventura, Ace ventura, Pet Detective

90 more here - Wired

“Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.” — Dennis the Peasant, Monty Python and the Holy Grail

“Three rings for the Elven kings under the sky, seven for the Dwarf lords in their halls of stone, nine for the mortal men doomed to die, one for the Dark Lord on his dark throne, in the land of Mordor where the shadows lie. One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them, one ring the bring them all, and in the darkness bind them. In the land of Mordor where the shadows lie.” -LOTR

“I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that.” - HAL, 2001: A Space Odyssey

“Spock. This child is about to wipe out every living thing on Earth. Now, what do you suggest we do….spank it?” — Dr. McCoy, Star Trek: The Motion Picture

“With great power there must also come — great responsibility.” - Amazing Fantasy #15 (August 1962)

“If you can’t take a little bloody nose, maybe you oughtta go back home and crawl under your bed. It’s not safe out here. It’s wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross; but it’s not for the timid.” — Q, Star Trek: The Next Generation “Q Who?”

“Five card stud, nothing wild. And the sky’s the limit” — Captain Jean Luc Picard, uttering the last line of the series, Star Trek: The Next Generation “All Good Things…”

“If you think that by threatening me you can get me to do what you want… Well, that’s where you’re right. But - and I am only saying that because I care - there’s a lot of decaffeinated brands on the market that are just as tasty as the real thing.” - Chris Knight, Real Genius

“We’re all very different people. We’re not Watusi. We’re not Spartans. We’re Americans, with a capital ‘A’, huh? You know what that means? Do ya? That means that our forefathers were kicked out of every decent country in the world. We are the wretched refuse. We’re the underdog.” - John Winger, Stripes

“If I’m not back in five minutes, just wait longer.” - Ace Ventura, Ace ventura, Pet Detective