h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

>> puts my A83646291 in the shade, eh? <<

Any shade putting is thy own fault sir!
Imagine putting such a wonderful entry
in the same posting as that incredible
visual which employs the latest 4D tech.

There's humility and there's self-deprecation
but you sir ought to be put on a suicide watch.

When my eyes come back from 4D heaven
I intend to read A83646291 with all the due
diligence it deserves. As an h2g2 entry it stands
like the dot of earth beside the 4D red-supergiants
but in any true context we must remember that the
earth is a pretty complex place.
And big. Mind-boggingly big.
So too is your A83646291


~jwf~

Why now, ~jwf~, that's very kind of you, young sir.

Mind-bogglingly big indeed. The size and complexity of it all warrants careful thought before attempting even a superficial assessment, don't you find?

It was thus found! And in my good intention to understand
as much of Earth and its peoples, as well as I could, before
embarking on any attempt to make a contribution to its bettering,
I forgot to keep track of the time. And before I realised it, it
was far too late to become expert at anything. I did come to the
conclusion that it is hopeless for anyone to get their head around
it all. But even with this knowledge I keep quiet about it, lest
it discourage anyone from making their own attempts to better our
lot by focusing their energies on single-minded disciplines.

That said, my applause as always goes to the Musicians and those
who make crafts of the earth's other god-given materials to create
soothments for the Beast.


~jwf~

7 Jun 2012: US drone attack ... killed seven people in northwest Pakistan .. village in North Waziristan ... first drone strike since Nawaz Sharif took over as Pakistan's prime minister and demanded end to attacks ... missiles ... hit remote village of ... between 2004 and 2013, CIA drone attacks in Pakistan killed up to 3,460 people. ... About 890 of them civilians ... carried out under Obama's administration ... US president said drone strikes part of legitimate campaign ... describing killings as "legal" and "just". [Number of injured unspecified]
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-22820208

should have been 7 Jun 2013

An event which took place not far from where I live at the controversial nuclear power station in Cattenom, France. I found several news items in German and French on the subject, but only one in English:

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/french-plant-fire-didnt-affect-nuclear-area-edf-2013-06-07

The tenor of the article is that it wasn't very important. Just goes to show. It wasn't headline news here either (the floods are - the whole of the East of Germany, and most of Bavaria is practically under water). But any incident at a nuclear plant should make one worry about their systems for trouble-shooting and trouble-preventing.

I'm not worried about living near Cattenom. We have a power plant just over the river (Phlippsburg) but it has been shut down for several years now. (Even before Fukushima)

Sorry, this post has gone into rambling mode. Better stop.

That is a worry. That's the one near the border with Luxembourg, isn't it?

Student sends offensive tweet, complains to police when she gets offensive replies, gets prosecuted herself.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-22821484

I think it is only a matter of time before new prisons are constructed to house social networking offenders.

As Lord Byron noted, a prison is a state of mind.
So the prisons you mention already exist, they are
portable, called mobiles, smart phones and tablets.

Prisoners are called Twits.

They are guarded by cookied auto-bots that anticipate
your every need or intention and update your Al Gore
rhythms based on data bases of habit recognition.
Free will is illusionary but a necessary illusion.
Batteries not included.

~jwf~

"As Lord Byron noted, a prison is a state of mind.
So the prisons you mention already exist, they are
portable, called mobiles, smart phones and tablets.

Prisoners are called Twits......"

Thats not a definition of a prison, thats bog-standard paranoia

If I understand the British English meaning of bog
then it's likely more like homophobia, another false
accusation I have learned to ignore with something
less than a pathetic sigh.

Sorry folks, can't help not trusting the dumbing down
of communication by technology. I keep seeing the use
of two thumbs instead two full hands to stroke the keys
as an 80% reduction in the use of human digits. Is this
what is meant by the digital revolution?

I met several old friends at a funeral yesterday and
couldn't repress a when in the small circle
around me I was the only one staying in the moment as
the others stared down at their devices, their thumbs
twitching in anticipation.

Some managed to handle a drink or smoke in one hand
while tweeting with the other. Surely, these folks are not
the crown of creation.

(The preceding is by nature longer than 140 characters.)


~jwf~

jwf: I'm sure you have heard and like the following quote from 12 Monkeys:
"When I was institutionalized, my brain was studied exhaustively in the guise of mental health. I was interrogated, I was x-rayed, I was examined *thoroughly*. ... Then, they took everything about me and put it into a computer where they created this model of my mind. Yes! Using that model they managed to generate every thought I could possibly have in the next, say, 10 years. Which they then filtered through a probability matrix of some kind to - to determine everything I was gonna do in that period. So you see, she knew I was gonna lead the Army of the Twelve Monkeys into the pages of history before it ever even occurred to me. She knows everything I'm ever gonna do before I know it myself. How's that?"

"If I understand the British English meaning of bog
then it's likely more like homophobia, another false
accusation I have learned to ignore with something
less than a pathetic sigh."

I'm afraid you got the wrong meaning of the phrase 'bog-standard'. It means basic or run-of-the-mill. I have no idea how you get a false accusation, least of all homophobia from that.

By the way, there is no dumbing down of communication via technology. What you are witnessing is new ways to communicate. This is called change. Its easy to perceive this as good or bad, but its essentially just change.

Imagine for instance how our Victorian forefathers would react to the notion that ordinary people could vote, go to university and hold positions of influence. They would experience the same sense of paranoia about how the world had changed as you experienced at the funeral.

Rather than the quote a 'prison is a state of mind', I prefer 'reality is a prison, your mind can set you free'. It seems to offer so many more possibilities.

If you still insist on clinging to the condescending view that certain fellow human beings have been dumbed down by technology or otherwise, perhaps you should watch the movie Idiocracy. You'd enjoy it.

I forgot to add that you'd like the movie Idiocracy because there's plenty for you to 'snork' at in it.

Think I might raise a glass for Cider Frank next week

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22812512

Sorry to have caused Lusus to stray off-topic but I am now
compelled to inform the self-proclaimed "national treasure":

Byron wrote the Prisoner of Chillon:
http://classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/lbyron/bl-lbyron-prisoner.htm
Perhaps inspired by Lovelace:
http://www.bartleby.com/101/348.html

The lesson of both is that a prison is what you make of it.
Which, while inspirational, is perhaps naively optimistic.
Yes, captivity does reform the state of mind.

As the prisoner admits (in Stanza VIII):
"The last, the sole, the dearest link
Between me and the eternal brink,
Which bound me to my failing race,
Was broken in this fatal place."

But ends with the last four lines of stanza XIV:
"My very chains and I grew friends,
So much a long communion tends
To make us what we are: - even I
Regain'd my freedom with a sigh."


~jwf~

PS:
I embrace change. On my homepage you'll find:
"...that nothing is constant, except change."

I don't know how what I said about laughing at Twitting
friends at a funeral could be seen as a sense of paranoia
"about how the world had changed". It was just me amused
that my stupid old-fart friends were lost in cyberspace and
still trying so hard to be hip and relevant they were missing
the whole point of being where we were and why.

Paranoia is not possible without an ego. I am fearless.

Now please, let's allow this thread to carry on. If you still require
satisfaction we can take this discussion to my personal space.
I will make no further comment here.


< / >

"Sweden male train drivers wear skirts after shorts row

A dozen male train drivers in Sweden have circumvented a ban on shorts by wearing skirts to work in hot weather.

The workers, who operate the Roslagsbanan line north of the capital Stockholm, have been wearing skirts to work for the past two weeks.

Employer Arriva banned the drivers from wearing shorts after taking over the running of the line in January".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-22828150

PS: note to jwf...lighten up before you have me also exhaling 'something less than a pathetic sigh'

BTW the 'national treasure' addition to my name is of course ironic...if it moves and has a pulse on brit tv, sooner or later someone will call it a national treasure.

I don't know much about prisons ... apart from prisoners dilemma, panopticons and the Zimbardo experiment.
From watching American movies I know you shouldn't drop the soap in the showers, although I am not sure of the reason.

Walking around public spaces I note to myself how many are so disengaged with their surroundings with heads, eyes, minds staring at a small metallic object in their hand with forefingers jutting violently into the object. Some people go around talking loudly to themselves as if in heated argument amongst invisible friends or invisible giant rabbits (difficult to tell). These small metallic objects appear to make people lose their mind and senses with what is around them.