Tomorrow will be the twentieth anniversary of the first real event that burned itself permanently into the minds of my generation: the Challenger space shuttle disaster. Highly respected space historian James Oberg has a very good article at MSNBC about what really happened that day. Oberg brings up seven "myths" that have become rarely reconsidered in the two decades since. Among other things he discusses how the Challenger didn't "explode" in the actual sense, how long the crew survived after the event and the fact that very few people were even watching it happen live. It's a good article, and in my opinion addresses the most major misconceptions that I've seen come up over the past twenty years.
Friday, January 27, 2006
Thursday, January 26, 2006
Awright Brownshirts, you want more Firefly?
The Firefly Season 2 Project. The plan is to produce another season of the show and make it available for purchase. Here's the intro from the website...
The Firefly Season 2 Project:What an awesome idea! Could it be that the Firefly fans are pioneering the future of entertainment with this? I wish them all the best with this project. And though I never got to see Firefly during its run I know enough good about the show that I gladly filled out a profile on their site... do that if you want more Firefly people!
Captain Mal and the crew of Serenity need your help to stay flying.We are looking to push the envelope of episodic television by offering Season Two of Firefly in a groundbreaking new format. Each episode (or the entire season) would be made available for purchase in Standard or Hi-Definition.
It's possible that subscribers may choose one of three playback options; monthly DVD deliveries, TV On-Demand using your cable or satellite provider, or computer viewing via Streaming Download.
It's also possible that a box set of DVD's would be available at the end of the season.
In order for our plan to be successful, we need to take stock of the browncoat recruits that support our cause. It will only take a minute, is strictly confidential, and each profile will take us one step closer to victory!
Now, if only somebody would try and do this with a third season of Carnivale...
Smallville owned everyone's sweet patootie tonight
Holy #&@* what an episode!!
This one had everything. And somebody does die, just as it was advertised... and they ain't coming back! No it's not some secondary character either. Somebody in the opening credits buys the farm in tonight's episode, and its permanent. The last shot we see is the casket going into the ground.
Wish I had a DVR, 'cuz this one merits some watching again.
Rockingham County is going to Hollywood baby!
The place where I grew up is being represented by not one but two singers who got the nod from Simon, Randy and Paula to come to Hollywood for the next round of American Idol:
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
Study says: Democrats and Republicans are equally ignorant
Here's scientific proof of something that I've known for a few years now: Republicans and Democrats both are largely incapable of thinking for themselves. Here's the story from LiveScience:
Democrats and Republicans Both Adept at Ignoring Facts, Study FindsMore at the link above.
By LiveScience Staffposted: 24 January 2006
10:03 am ETDemocrats and Republicans alike are adept at making decisions without letting the facts get in the way, a new study shows.
And they get quite a rush from ignoring information that's contrary to their point of view.
Researchers asked staunch party members from both sides to evaluate information that threatened their preferred candidate prior to the 2004 Presidential election. The subjects' brains were monitored while they pondered.
The results were announced today.
"We did not see any increased activation of the parts of the brain normally engaged during reasoning," said Drew Westen, director of clinical psychology at Emory University. "What we saw instead was a network of emotion circuits lighting up, including circuits hypothesized to be involved in regulating emotion, and circuits known to be involved in resolving conflicts."
The test subjects on both sides of the political aisle reached totally biased conclusions by ignoring information that could not rationally be discounted, Westen and his colleagues say.
Then, with their minds made up, brain activity ceased in the areas that deal with negative emotions such as disgust. But activity spiked in the circuits involved in reward, a response similar to what addicts experience when they get a fix, Westen explained.
The study points to a total lack of reason in political decision-making.
"None of the circuits involved in conscious reasoning were particularly engaged," Westen said. "Essentially, it appears as if partisans twirl the cognitive kaleidoscope until they get the conclusions they want, and then they get massively reinforced for it, with the elimination of negative emotional states and activation of positive ones..."
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
I hope and pray...
...that this lady they keep showing as they go to commercial on American Idol tonight isn't from Reidsville.
This is one of the most bizarre installments of Idol that I've ever seen.
EDIT 9:53 PM EST:She wasn't from Reidsville (thank goodness), but Ronetta sure didn't do Charlotte any favors. That was genuinely painful to watch, but only because this was a symptom of one of the worst things about American character: our unhealthy obsession with the cult of the celebrity. People believe too much that they have to be famous before they have a real identity of their own. Contrast Ronetta's attitude with that of those that have gone far on American Idol: none of them come to mind that didn't have some degree of humbleness and proper perspective.
EDIT 10:11 PM EST: These posts at Free Republic probably say it best:
To: retrokittenEDIT 10:20 PM EST: May have had some serious differences with the operators of this site before, but the live thread for American Idol at Free Republic has been a hilarious commentary to read alongside these auditions. Well worth checking out.To all NC freepers....we'll pretend this never happened....
2,358 posted on 01/24/2006 6:59:56 PM PST by mystery-ak
To: mystery-akWhat happens in NC stays in NC. :)
2,363 posted on 01/24/2006 7:00:36 PM PST by beandog (Poor, poor Pinkos. Beat at your own little game)
EDIT 10:34 PM EST: Enter "Kellie Pickler" into Google and right now only 79 returns come up. But already she's got fan websites popping up (Kellie Pickler Fans and Kellie Pickler Online came up immediately). She had one of those bio videos too... meaning she's probably made it into the semifinalists round.
EDIT 10:44 PM EST: The girl from Eden who got through to Hollywood is named Halicia Thompson. And she sang really well. Hope she goes far.
EDIT 10:47 PM EST: Can't recall the guy's name off the top of my head, but the dude from Salter Path (it's a village on the Outer Banks near Morehead City) did very good.
EDIT 10:51 PM EST: Fox 8 WGHP is running footage they shot during the auditions, stuff they've been saving for now. Simon Cowell got to celebrate his birthday here in Greensboro (complete with a cake decorated with the Idol logo). One clip has Ryan Seacrest going into the Stamey's barbecue restaurant on High Point Road, across the street from the Coliseum. Turns out that Simon was eager to eat some real southern fried chicken and beans.
The sound I'm hearing outside my window is that of thousands of my fellow Greensborians running out to get sedatives. Randy said at one point tonight that this was the "weirdest show" they'd ever done. I remember last year's auditions in New Orleans and that was pretty nutty, but I'm hard-pressed to disagree with Randy's assessment. There were times tonight that me and Lisa's mouths was literally hanging wide-open in stunned disbelief... we were like "this can't be our town... can it?"
But all in all, I think tonight was a lot of fun to watch, and maybe poke some fun at ourselves in this neck of the woods. And there were some low points, but there was also some really brilliant talent that is representing us in this competition, and I'm going to really enjoy seeing how far they go.
And, THAT is all I think I'm going to post about tonight's edition of American Idol featuring auditions here in Greensboro. 'Twas great that this lil' burg was the most-watched town in the country, if only for two hours. Lord help us if this show ever rolls into town again though :-P
EDIT 11:18 PM EST: The guy from Salter Path, NC is named Jeffrey "Ryan" Baysden. And he had a really curious accent. He sounds almost English/Australian. But very strong singing voice.
Steve Jobs now the most powerful man in the Mouse House
Disney is buying Pixar. Steve Jobs is now the majority shareholder of the Walt Disney Company.
In the negative column, this really does seem to be the death-knell for traditional animation at Disney, which had eliminated that division already. I was really hoping that they might "go back to their roots". But on the plus side of things, I trust someone like Steve Jobs to put Disney back on track after the two decades of micro-management hell that Michael Eisner ran the company through.
Fanboys back on track
I first heard about Fanboys before Christmas in '98 (in fact, here's the original story at Ain't It Cool News). Ever since then I've wanted to see this movie. It's about four friends who undertake a quest in the fall of 1998 to break into Skywalker Ranch so that they can watch whatever print of The Phantom Menace exists, because one of them is terminally ill and won't live to see the movie premiere the following May. The last I heard anything about it, Fanboys was in production a few months after the initial report, but then word about it pretty much dried up... until now.They've been waiting for fifteen years.
They're through waiting.
Yesterday Ain't It Cool News announced to the world that Fanboys was back! The guys behind this all those years ago never gave up on their dream, and now they're finally getting to see it come to fruition. Pretty inspiring that is, doncha think? Here's wishing them all the best as they work to bring this story to the screen. I just hope they still use the tagline (and that very cool 1979 Ford van) that they had in '99...
They're through waiting.
One more example how public schools are messed up
This comes in from "Weird" Ed, and I agree with what he said about it: "Ok, what the HELL is wrong with our schools in the US when this can take place??" From SI.com...
Shirt taleHit the above link for more.
Broncos fan says he was humiliated by teacherBEAVER FALLS, Pa. (AP) -- A 17-year-old high school student said he was humiliated when a teacher made him sit on the floor during a midterm exam in his ethnicity class -- for wearing a Denver Broncos jersey.
The teacher, John Kelly, forced Joshua Vannoy to sit on the floor and take the test Friday -- two days before the Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Broncos 34-17 in the AFC championship game. Kelly also made other students throw crumpled up paper at Vannoy, whom he called a "stinking Denver fan," Vannoy told The Associated Press on Monday...
The WB + UPN = CW
Got announced earlier today that CBS and Warner Bros. are merging The WB and UPN networks into a fifth network called CW. No word yet on how this is going to effect shows we like such as Smallville and, ummmm... what else is there?
A king's ransom to he who boots Windows XP on an iMac
Okay, so it's not quite a "king's ransom" (and it doesn't necessarily have to be a "he" either), but currently there's $3338 in the pot for whoever is first to get Windows XP to boot up on one of the new iMacs: the Macs that are using Intel chips as their CPU. The winner must be able to demonstrate that their iMac can boot up the user's choice of either Mac OS X or Windows XP. So far all that's been produced to show for this endeavour are several "bricked" iMacs that have been irreversibly damaged from the effort and now rendered useless: basically a $1600 paperweight. Some are even trying to get the iMac to boot up Linux too. Can't wait to see if someone's able to pull this little trick off.
Will this town rock or schlock on tonight's American Idol?
Lots of people here in Greensboro and the surrounding area will be tuned into American Idol this evening on Fox: tonight's two-hour broadcast is devoted to the auditions that took place at the Greensboro Coliseum a few months ago. On the Fox 8 Morning News earlier today they were able to show some footage of what went down this past October and we got a peek at some of the folks who made it through to Hollywood. There's one girl from Eden that we know passed muster, so at least one person from Rockingham County has a chance at stardom. Simon Cowell said in an interview this morning that the trip to Greensboro was why American Idol is worth doing... but Lord knows if he means our good talent or the bad ones that you keel over laughing at. Anyway, this is what we'll be watching tonight, and I might file a report on my impressions about the Greensboro installment afterward.
Monday, January 23, 2006
Superman is Methodist, and Rogue is a good little Baptist girl
Here's something I came across while randomly skimming the web: Religious Affiliation of Comic Book Characters (there's also this nifty visual grouping of them by creed). This is an exhaustive look at just about every major character in comic books and what their faith is. I've known for years that Nightcrawler is a devout Catholic (he almost became a priest). But did you know that Superman is a Methodist, that Batman may be a lapsed Episcopalian, that The Thing is Jewish, or that Rogue is a Southern Baptist? Well worth checking out if you're a comics fan or have a theological bent.
Another perspective on cryonics
In the wee hours of this morning I made a post about a Wall Street Journal article regarding cryonics - the freezing of dead individuals in the hope that they may be someday "revived" - and how some people choosing to have this procedure done upon their deaths are arranging for their present finances to be awaiting them upon their anticipated return. I also shared some of my thoughts on the subject, which for the most part stems from my belief that our identities are more than the flesh we inhabit: that death is just one stage of our spiritual growth into what God intends for us to become.
A little while ago Mark Plus, a gentleman who works with one of people interviewed in the article and who is himself planning to receive cryonics treatment, made a comment to my original post. Although I may not necessarily agree with cryonics personally, I was genuinely impressed by the passion and sincerity that Mark has toward the subject, enough so that I have to respect the strength of his faith in this procedure, despite my own thoughts about it.
In the interest of fairness and discussion, because he is personally involved with the original Wall Street Journal story and because a lot of people are probably going to be interested in this, I invite you to check out Mark Plus's blog supersurvival needs, for another perspective on the subject of cryonics. And I'd like to sincerely thank Mark for not only finding this blog and my thoughts on this issue, but also taking the time to present his side of the subject.
The morning after...
So they won't go to the Super Bowl this year... they're still the best young franchise in the league.
Congratulations on a good run, Panthers!
Video: Mexican army invades American turf
Marc at the Bmovies blog is pointing everyone to video footage of soldiers from the Mexican army crossing over into Arizona, in what can only be described as the most flagrant violation of the U.S./Mexican border since Pancho Villa woke up feeling pokey one morning in 1916. Head over to Marc's blog for more (and also 'cuz Marc is a really cool guy :-)
Freezing some assets: A mini-thanatopsis
Interesting article at the Wall Street Journal site about how some people are planning to be financially secure after coming back from the dead. Believers in cryonics (i.e. freezing the body or decapitated head of the dearly departed in the hopes that future technology can restore life) want to ensure that what they've gained in this life will still be waiting for them when they return...
You can't take it with you. So Arizona resort operator David Pizer has a plan to come back and get it.Okay, here's my take on this: trying to gain immortality like this is a horribly wrong thing to do. For one thing, I don't believe this is ever going to work. Even if technology is going to be discovered that might "resuscitate" a cryogenically-frozen corpse, the odds of this future technology bringing back someone who's been frozen prior to this point in time are extremely low. Current "freezing" is going to be considered crude and ineffective: whoever has received this treatment is going to be damaged beyond hope. Not to mention that this technology is probably so far off that the chances are rather slim that any corpsicles existing today are going to still be around tomorrow: most if not all will be lost to accidents, financial failures of cryonics firms, etc.Like some 1,000 other members of the "cryonics" movement, Mr. Pizer has made arrangements to have his body frozen in liquid nitrogen as soon as possible after he dies. In this way, Mr. Pizer, a heavy-set, philosophical man who is 64 years old, hopes to be revived sometime in the future when medicine has advanced far beyond where it stands today.
And because Mr. Pizer doesn't wish to return a pauper, he's taken an additional step: He's left his money to himself.
With the help of an estate planner, Mr. Pizer has created legal arrangements for a financial trust that will manage his roughly $10 million in land and stock holdings until he is re-animated. Mr. Pizer says that with his money earning interest while he is frozen, he could wake up in 100 years the "richest man in the world"...
At least a dozen wealthy American and foreign businessmen are testing unfamiliar legal territory by creating so-called personal revival trusts designed to allow them to reclaim their riches hundreds, or even thousands, of years into the future.
Such financial arrangements, which tie up money that might otherwise go to heirs or charities, are "more widespread than I originally thought," says A. Christopher Sega, an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University and a trusts and estates attorney at Venable LLP, in Washington. Mr. Sega says he's created three revival trusts in the last year...
But the real reason why I think this is wrong is that cryonics is based on the notion that life is bound by the parameters of this physical world. If cryonics does work for a "patient" once, could it be guaranteed that it would work a second time, or a third, or an infinite number of times into eternity? Would such a person really want to go on with life neverending? I don't think so, and this goes back to something that took me a long, long time to understand: that death is not really a bad thing like we are used to thinking it is. It's just one more stage of growth in this life that we have. We just can't see what it's growing into from this side of things. If there were no death, we would each be cursed to live a life bereft of any change: utter stagnation would be our lot. There would be no real meaning to life if it was given the assurance of never having to end or change. Why would anyone want that?
So if anyone asks, I'm letting it be known here and now that I don't wish to be cryonically frozen when my time comes. Let me leave this world the way I've tried to live in it: dignified, but with humor. Just cremate my body while it's wearing my Jedi Knight costume and I'll be happy :-)
