Where have I been?

I've been out of town for the past few days, in Las Vegas attending a gathering at The Amazing Meeting 4. Where a distinguished list of panel of speakers discussed the politics of science. Primarily concerned with the creeping 'Intelligent Design' on our schools, it also had lectures and papers from many distinguished figures.

Presentations included a lecture by Nobel Laureate Murray Gell-Man (the man who named the Quark), James Randi, Phil 'The Bad Astronomer' Plaitt, Richard Wiseman, Penn Jilette (of Penn & Teller), the crew of the show 'Mythbusters', representatives from the ACLU and the American Atheist Society, and too many others to name.

Almost all the presentations were incredible. I was never bored for a moment. I wish I could try to describe their lectures but I would fail utterly to do them justice. Even the papers, which were presented by minor players, were impressive in their presentation (the best of which was by Robert Lancaster, who started the Stop Kaz! website after researching a con artist claiming to have survived the WTC collapse despite being on a floor above the impact. No surprise, she was actually in California at the time).

This event stems from a gathering of the JREF (link on the side of my blog) message board, where I have been active for some years now. Their efforts started the first TAM, which was a small affair. This one was the first one I could attend, and it had grown to some 800 attendees. A good portion of which were board members.

Best of all were the other events that took place after the lectures. Many dinners and lunches, and a few parties and pub crawls. I am amazed I did not return 5 pounds heavier than I left. But at the very least I can now say that I have gotten drunk with a genuine Nobel laureate. Yee-Haw!

This was a last minute thing for me. I was not planning to attend, but I signed up after recent events pretty much left me doing nothing at the end of January. I am very glad that I went. I only wish I could have had more time to chat with the various attending http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifSkepchicks who were present. I'll have to settle with singing Dresden Doll songs with one of them while she used me for a seatback.

My thanks to those who made it easy for me to attend. Now I need to catch up on sleep.

Friday Night. Bright Lights. Big City.

A few online folks from a message board I frequent decided to get together in Manhattan and have a few drinks/chew fat/eat pizza. I had done this with a few of the Left Coast crew when I was in California and it was a lot of fun. So I decided to go up by train and attend this little event.

I had a great time. I can now put faces to names I see online (for a some, anyway). I had lots of pizza, got drunk on 6 Stella Artois. Got yet another interpetation of what my last name is supposed to mean in the Northern European languages. Was guided into a gay bar (not my idea) and then into a more normal bar. I ended up missing the last train out of town and had to stay the night in Queens. I returned this morning blind (my contacts were disposables and I didn't bring my case, so I tossed 'em). Kind of an odd trip home since I had to get on a Subway going the wrong direction for a couple of stops (the Manhatten bound side was closed), then cross over and cacth the subway going back into Manhatten. I got out but was too late for the 8:15. So I caught the 9:15 after some breakfast and got back to Philly around 11:30. Kind of an odd feeling all day since I am tired from limited sleep.

At least I got some socializing in.

Under two and a half weeks.

It has been less than 2.5 weeks, depending on when you measure. I had to check the calander to be certain because it sure as heck has seemed like a lifetime.

The harsh hurting has stopped, I kinda guess my defenses against that sort of feeling are stronger than they were in the past. What I am feeling now is sort of doldrum, heavy, numb, plodding that just seems to get me through my day.

I poked up the old online personals account, mostly to see what was around more than anything else. I doubt I'd have the will to do anything. But truth is, my heart is just not in it. Even just looking put me down a bit more.

Life goes I suppose.

I'm just a big fencing bully.

I think I won these goblets because I was the tallest fencer present:



Friday night was a SCA demo on the Penn campus. At first it looked to a bust, like the previous event, but some folks showed up and there was dancing and recorder practice. I was there for fencing. Of course, the other fencers that showed were Bruni, Lissa, and Berrick.

All of whom are hobbit sized. I fenced and enjoyed myself, but I was kinda playing Ogre. (and not the fencing OGRE either, I'm talking big mean Orge!)

Embarassing was that there turned out to be a prize for the 'best fencer'. They elected me. But really, I won goblets because I am tall. (OK and have a lot of experience).

Not helping matters is that my hands are covered with paper cuts. We got a big order for Fresnel lenses on Friday, which is good, since we have a lot of them. However, they are all in blister packaging which must be opened since they were packaged 30 years ago and the paper sometimes sticks to the Fresnel Lens. Hence the paper cuts.

Today was more eventful than expected. I got a call to help a family friend set up her new computer. This is sorta something I have been doing on the side: helping people who have no clue about computers use them. Clicking a mouse can be a challenge. Anyway, I got to her place at around 1PM and was able to bike there in relative warm weather. When I left 2.5 hours later, there was a chill. Mom left a message that my brother and his kids would be by their place for dinner and I should join them. I walked this time (the family friend and my parents place are very close to each other..in fact I stopped by to save the computer from the crisis of Widgets). In the walk to my parents place I encountered:

1) 20th Parkway...A horrible intersection for pedestrians, it becomes a nightmare when the traffic lights are out. Eeek!

2) Wind. It was literally pushing me down the street around JFK Blvd. Like big hand shoving.

3) Inept and Inconsiderate drivers. Parking on the sidewalk should be the death penalty in my country. But as I was crossing a small side street there was a car parked right on the sidewalk in front of me. Bad enough, but then some brain dead driver decides to turn and nearly squeeze me between the parked car and his car. I should have smacked his car to wake him up, but I didn't for some reason.

Pheh.

X-mas Tree untrimming and Winter Bike Rides

Yesterday was helping take down the parents X-mas tree. This is a several hour project as the tree is about 10 feet tall and is loaded with ornaments, chains and lights. We start with taking down the ornaments, and trying to find boxes that will fit them. Its sort of like a really lame puzzle combined with a hide and seek game with the ornaments. The chains come down, thankfully I just remove them from the tree and done have to wrap them. Then the lights come off. The ornament boxes go into the attic and I am exhausted. But not done. Then we lift the tree (10', remember) let it down gently onto bedsheets (so it does not shed needles everywhere only mostwhere) and try and wrap it in the sheets so that it will fit down the stairs. This part involves lots of cursing and me trying to hold a host of branches so that the sheet (or rope) can go around the tree. Finally the whole thing goes out in trash. Dad swears every year after helping take out the tree that this is the last time he is going to have a large tree in the house. I think he's said that every year for the past 1o years.

I thought of the untrimming as being a depressing activity. But all things considered, it wasn't. It was just work and exercise.

Today I took a nice winter bike ride. I have a winter bike shirt and jacket that I was curious to test out. It wasn't too cold (40 degrees) so I went for a ride down Spring Garden Street and down on Delaware Avenue. The wind wasn't bad and it was a good ride. Unfortunately, I didn't think about the socks and merely wore a pair of bike socks my brother gave me for X-mas. These are not winter biking socks and so my feet were a little numb when I got back. I had to heat up my toes with my hands and throw on a pair of thick socks to get the feeling back. No biggie.

Not a Happy New Year

So we're less than three days into 2006 and already this year sucks.

Sucks royally.

That is all I can say at this point.

I couldn't resist:

Thanks to Dr. Adequate from the JREF board for slogging through the talk.origins feedback page to find these lumps in the rough:

* the scientists say that there's a missing link that there is no animal in between the monkey's and human's evolution thing how can you have a missing link when the whole chain is wrong and the scientists say that there is no way that matter can dissappear we were made with all the matter we need and before the big bang all the matter was in one little ball of ooze and what i want to know is how did that little ball of matter get there? why don't they answer all the questions, just some of them, the ones they want to answer?

* But anyway, I'm just replying on one of your evolution theories, the one about the black peppered moth. I believe that the man that came up with that theory, confessed about gluing those moths to the trees to take that photo, and he ended up going to jail. Correct me if im wrong, but that is what i've been informed.

* You talked about how evolution has been observed by insects becomming resistant to pesticides. Again, this isn't evolution, it is variation. It happens to people all the time, a person that doesn't like the taste of onions, and eats nothing but onions for a month, they will adapt to the taste. They don't evolve taste buds that make onions taste good.

* Don't waste your time with these people (I guess I have a little time to waste). They will never get it. I was amazed at Tim Thompson's mathematical, singularity, general relativity, quantum mechanical... if a/b=c, and carry the 4, then the universe could not literally be born from nothing. NO KIDDING.

* When God created the Earth He created it with age, we know this because of Adam and Eve. They were not two when they were created, they were adults. Also most scientists are now admitting to the fact that evolution did not take place.

* Kent Hovind is not an embarresment to the creation movement, usally when he cannot be refuted, then this is what the evil-lutionist resort to. He is very good friends with the father of the modern young earth creationist movement Henry Morris, so your facts are liar, which I am sure you are aware of.

* Using your own words: "fact" doesn't mean "absolute certainty". Then why teach these things as "truth" to our impressionable school age children? Evolution of species is a documented fact? What merit does it have then, because a "fact" is only a half-truth? I do not want my children being taught half-truths (lies)

* hey dude. Did George washington exist? were you there to see him? Then all you are doing is relying on books and textbooks to tell you who he was and what he did. Did god exist? You never saw him either. the bible tells you exactly who he is and was nd will always be, but you don't believe in the bible. Why believe the textbooks?

* Person 1: Well, how do creationists know that the Big Bang isn't true? Person 2: Tell me, Matt. If you put a bomb in your room, do you think setting it off would make it clean or dirty? 1) That's easy. A bomb would cause a huge mess. I would have clothes and toys all over the place. Mom wouldn't be happy about that at all. 2) Well, you can think of the Big Bang kind of like a big bomb. Evolutionists think that when this explosion happened things got more organized or straightened up instead of getting more disorganized or messy. 1) That sure doesn't make any sense. Another way we know evolution isn't true is to look at our so-called relatives, the monkeys. Man and animals do have many things in common, two eyes, two ears, and the way we breathe, for example. But if you compare DNA, the instructions inside our body that tell us how to look, of monkeys and men, there are some big differences. For the DNA of a monkey to accidentally change to the DNA of a man would be like saying I accidentally jumped over the Grand Canyon So big bang created everything that looks so beatiful on Earth? I wonder how Earth would look after an atomic bomb, maybe we might get more beautiful. Your logic is sad.

* You are a moron, the geological collum was deposited rapidly and there is petrified trees connecting the layers right side up and upside down. These trees prove the layers were formed rapidly, because the trees conect them together. mabe the roots grew during the flood whitch water level reached above the highest mountian. How is oil and coal made? Roots growing 7000 feet down doesnt dissprove the the rapid formation, mabe during the flood seeds were buried. These layers are not diffrent ages, and how come there is no erosion marks between the layers. I did erosion controll, and underground construction. I am not going to fall for your false science. The geological collum is based on circular reasoning. Your carbon dating is assumed constant, and that is unknown. carbon date a live snail and see what you get 25,000 years.Plus how many super novas do we have, not millions of years worth. The mammonths were froze rapidly (small ice crystals in blood) You would need -300 deg below to freeze the mammoths with unroted food in there stomach, the inside would rot because of their stomach acid hello. There is no proof of anything being consistant, if there was more observations would favor the earth as under 10,00 years old. Go to drdino.com and learn real science.

* archology was founded onproving the bible wrong, yet everything that archologist have found have continued to do the oppisite and has always proven the bible correct.

* AS for evolution and your big bang one question where did the dirt come from? so don't tell people that its not a belief as in a religon.

* You can try to discredit those ''creationist''but it's not working! If you look at the new polls, you will see that the lunatic fringe of atheistic philosophy, which is what EVOLUTION is, and nothing more, is being seriously challenged by THINKING and curious people. Now, all the sudden the degrees of the evolutionist/scientist is becoming a worthless piece of paper when the doubt of a philosophical ''theory'' is being dumped into the recycle bin of YAK! Imagine. Dawkins having to defend his degree based on a false science! Will Oxford call it back in when they discover the value of teaching the false science of evolution is equivalent to a day at Disney World!

* Well there is a few laws you should refer to before spreading that theory around. 1st law of thermal dynamics “matter cannot be created or destroyed”. This means that everything was here from the start, or if you are a creationist, you would believe that it was created by God who would be powerful enough to do anything with this universe.

* Why isnt Abiogenesis, the theory that life spontaneously came into existence from base chemicals completely contradicted by Newton's Second Law of Thermodynamics.

* There hasn't been a single fossil found that represents a transitional animal, an in-between phases, missing link. It has been speculated but never found. We should see those everywhere. Lizards with wings and fish with legs and stuff.

* Adaptation occurs but not evolution! Read the Bible and you will see the truth. Jacob made his cattle copulate before striped rods, and wouldn’t you know but the babies came out striped! From this Biblical evidence, we can safely say that polar bears emerge from brown bears because they are conceived amid all that white snow. Similarly, peacocks probably were big-tailed birds that spent a few generations among colorful flowers while some sharks adapted their coloration from the dark water beneath and sunlight above. Test it for yourselves! However, you should ensure that a righteous man like Jacob performs the experiment, as evolutionists will falsify the data so they can continue living in sinful debauchery without being held to God’s rules. I dare you to post this because it thoroughly disproves your pet theory!

* Evolution is fake. I want evolutionist to explain this. How do grass and trees grow from a small seed (Genesis 1:11). The sky is unreachable and it had to be a creator to that. People dying in their sleep. The Moon, sun, stars, clouds,rainbow,mountains, planets outer space. Why are ya'll celebrating Christmas without knowing the true meaning. It is better to Worship GOD and there is not one, then to be athiest and he is there.

* Another fact is the earth is slowing down at a pretty constant rate. If you go back too far the earth would be spinning so fast that the dinosaurs that text books say were there, would have been flung off the earth.

* You wish you knew what was the truth? Where has all your scientific mummbo jummbo been proven without a doubt? Do you have a time machine? Can you go back and prove one way or the other? How come you think your way is the truth? Have you been smited? Were you made to feel inferior to someone else based upon there obivious unique interpretation of life based upon our only cronological existence?