Free The Press!

Right. So, I don’t often repost campaigns or petitions on my blog (or otherwise), but I feel this one should get some attention, dammit! The idea of being ruled by corporations scares the shit out of me (especially after binging on Continuum*). Hell, the idea of Amazon single-handily controlling the whole of the bookselling business is utterly terrifying, and that’s just ONE corporation for crying out loud. That there are individuals in the United States who have billions upon billions to squander away, who have the sort of money that enables them to essentially rule the country–democracy or no–is appalling. We’re bordering on a corporate feudal oligarchy!

The Other 98% explains the situation a lot better than I could:

Yeah, I know, people say the newspaper is a decaying husk that hasn’t quite realized it’s dead yet, but think of the repercussions of this. If things keep going this way, there will come a day in the near future when every news outlet in the country will be controlled by one or two individuals, and no matter how open-minded they might be, the news would still end up slated towards their opinions. Sure, small presses may start up to counter it, but that takes money and manpower. Why spend millions then when you can spend $25 now?

As Nicole points out, it would take $22 from 32 million Americans to raise enough money. Sounds like a lot of people, right?

Well, as of 2012, there’s 313.9 million people living in America. It would take roughly 1/9 of the whole population giving $22 to raise enough.

Join The Campaign!

And if you can’t donate anything, I invite you to repost and spread the word. The more people who hear about this, the greater the chance we can make a difference.

*Awesome show, by the way. I do recommend it.

Evolution of Dance

This guy is just amazing. Damn, he makes me feel guilty for still sitting in this chair, sharing these videos, rather than learning how to dance. Almost. Chronic laziness is still winning out.

And this is truly a homage to the lost art of stop-motion animation. Yes, that is a toy.

This blog post brought to you by extreme procrastination and Finals avoidance.

Friday Funnies!

Religion, Science, And Science Fiction

I swear, there’s a connection here.

Last week my science fiction writing class, we somehow ended up on a discussion that brought in religion. If I recall, we were speculating on time travel and the many theories of how time exists. After a few minutes of listening to this, I pointed out we really couldn’t ever prove any of these unless we could actually time travel. They said, yes, but that didn’t make them any less valid. So I pointed out that, to a certain degree, science can be like religion: people have faith in it.

Well, my idea got universally smacked down, mostly because we were speaking science, not religion, and these two things don’t ever mix.

But I’m sticking to my guns.

In some ways, science is very much like a religious faith. The vast majority of people don’t really understand how it works, but will happily spout theories as facts and argue you to death if you should take a valid opposing position. It reminds me a great deal of the arguments that crop up between people of different faiths or denominations of faiths. Hell, we’ve have religious wars since the dawn of time and they continue today, as they likely will ‘til the end of time. Since around the Scientific Revolution, the wars of science have been waged in journals, papers, and conference halls.

For both science and religion, individuals rally behind a held opinion and defend their position as the “right” one. We as individuals have faith in an interpretation of the facts presented, and until that interpretation comes against an opposing one, our faith usually won’t be shaken.

There are still a lot of theories that can’t be proven, like Evolution. Until we do a mass experiment and observe our own evolution over the course of a few million years, we can’t say whether we really did evolve from apes or if Douglas Adams had it right all along and aliens put artificially aged fossils on the planet as a sort of decorative accent. We also can’t say that a higher being beyond our comprehension didn’t make the universe or that we’re actually a computer simulation built by someone or something else and we’re just motes of data. There’s a universe (and/or multiverse) of endless possibilities, and whichever idea we adhere to, we have faith that it is truth.

Yes, I agree, science is based almost entirely in the tangible world (except when you get into the higher scientific theories like String Theory or Evolution) and, for the most part, can be physically proven one way or the other. But at the same time, a lot of it also human guesswork and interpretation. I’m taking a class in forensic chemistry right now and if nothing else, I’ve learned that forensics is not as reliable as people often think (thanks to shows like CSI). The science is solid, yes, but it’s still being done by humans.

It’s the human factor that makes for science becoming like a religion. A human being wrote the Bible. A human being also came up with Newton’s Laws of Physics. Are they the same thing? No. But as it’s been proven with science disproving a great deal of statements made in the Bible, so does science disprove itself on a daily basis, and one day, we might discover something even higher than science that disproves it entirely.

Two scientists can look at the same factual information and come up with two completely different interpretations of the same data, just the same as, for example, two theologians can look at the same Biblical parable and come away with two completely different interpretations. Or two meteorologists can look at the same cloud formations and predict two completely different weather patterns. Or two mechanics can look at your broken, sad car and come up with two completely different diagnoses for the same problem; one will cost $450, the other $120.

What I’m getting at is, no matter what, if a human has a hand in something, it won’t ever be 100%, without a doubt, completely devoid of human variables. Because we’re human. And humans will forever have an individual perspective that skews an observation in their favor. Humans will forever have an opinion on something, and they will forever have faith that their opinion is, indeed, fact, until proven otherwise.

Ain’t it fun being human?

And The Dumbass Of The Day Award Goes To…

Yesterday, I had class at 8:30 in the morning. My school is downtown and I live nowhere near convenient transportation that gets downtown in a timely manner (yes, there’s a bus, but I’d have to leave home at, like six and I like sleeping), so I drive over to my aunt’s neighborhood and park my car on a side street, then take the L downtown. I parked my car, got out, grabbed my bag, and as I was walking away I noticed my aunt coming out of her condo, so I caught up with her and walked to the crossroads where I took a left to the L and she continued straight on to the Metra.

I got to class, had a bad day, and was on the way back to my car when I reached into my pocket and realized I’d lost my keys. I call my father, get my mother’s work number from him (he had Google, which I didn’t), called her, left a message with someone in the office who said she’d find my mom and tell her something was up, and I hiked towards my aunt’s house. I decided I was going to wait inside instead of on the curb for my mom to drop my extra set off. As I was walking, I thought, maybe I dropped my keys when I was grabbing my bag and they’re in the car.

So I walked over to my car. As I approached, I noticed that someone left an engine running somewhere and that my doors were unlocked. Happy day! I might have dropped my keys!

Until I realized that it was MY car that was on, the keys were still in the ignition, and my doors were unlocked.

Why, yes, everybody, I left my car running on a side street with the engine idling for five hours.

Absolute bloody miracle that no one stole it. I count myself EXTREMELY lucky. I also can’t believe that I did that. Then again, the day before, I rolled my window up on my brother’s hand because I forgot he was in the car. Either I’m just having a bout of stupid lately or I’m going senile.

And I’m Back

Well, actually, I’ve been back for awhile, but fell asleep. It’s what happens, I suppose, when writerly inspiration strikes at one in the morning and forces one out of bed to type a few paragraphs in a sleep-deprived frenzy. Anyway, turns out Gilenya isn’t an immuno-suppresant, but an immuno-regulator, which basically means that a certain variety of white blood (more specifically, a certain form of T-cell, which are the ones that attack viruses and bacteria) get told to stand down for a little while so that my myelin is happy and safe. Anyway, my heart rate dropped about ten or twelve points (which is okay, it’s still above 60), but that’ll go back to normal in a few days.

I didn’t get much work done. I instead read P. N. Elrod’s “Bloodlist” for the second time, and thoroughly enjoyed it. I think I might have written a paragraph of my own stuff. Working in an unfamiliar place that isn’t very comfortable isn’t particularly conducive to writing. I did, however, have Culver’s, which I haven’t had in a long, long time. But I still had a good time. The staff at the clinic were very nice and though the space wasn’t very good for writing, the recliner was quite comfortable and I had a very peaceful six hours.

Off For A (Imposed) Six Hour Vacation

Going onto Gilenya today. It’s an MS medication that’s an immunosuppresant, which might mean I’ll actually get sick once in a while (I have a very active immune system and a slightly higher-than-normal core body temperature, so I’m basically in a perpetual state of fevered. Bacteria and viruses don’t do so well in me). Only side effect is that it drops my heart rate after the first dose, so I have to be in a clinic for monitoring. For six hours. Joy. And there’s no WiFi there, so I suppose I’m being forced to catch up on my homework today. I’m also taking the opportunity to do some writing for myself.