Two weeks of the good life passed and my other uncle called. Two days later my two uncles and I were in Chicago. Me, back in Chicago. I haven’t been gone long enough to feel nostalgic about my return… or to mentally prepare myself for another bout with the nearly-intolerable weather here.

There’s really no telling how long I’ll stick around the midwest, but I’ll try to keep updating. At least mobile internet works well here.

Last Tuesday, moving my things went well – the thunder storms abated a bit and that was certainly a welcomed change.  The entire farm was unkempt and somehow a poor bird (actually two birds, but one was deceased) had wandered into the house. When I noticed it, I didn’t even take it to be real. It was eerily still and staring out the window. I grabbed it, brought it outside, and gave it some water. It was so weak it hardly tried to get away from me. That was basically the only noteworthy part of my move. Well, ok, the oats were really nice too, but I think they flooded the day after I left the farm.

Two days later, Thursday, the flight I was taking out of Chicago was originally scheduled to depart at 1930, but ended up being delayed over three hours. I was fretting that the unfortunate delay might be a sign of things to come. Really, things since then have been pretty good. I didn’t get the promised tour around Seattle, but it is still scheduled for the weeks to come. Instead, I was treated to a midnight Jack-In-The-Box hamburger and a half-day long drive from Washington to Idaho the next noon. The drive was peaceful – there are so many trees and mountains in Washington that one cannot help but feel calm.

Somewhere between Seattle, WA and Coeur D’Alene, ID – after the Washington mountains – the beautiful scenery abruptly becomes a desert. It’s strange just how sharp of a transition it is; luckily it just as quickly reverts to greenery.

So, for the next week (or possibly more), I’ll be around northern Idaho. If I see anything noteworthy I’ll make a point to blog. Maybe I’ll even take a few pictures worth sharing.

Specifically, if you are already rooted and looking for this EASY way to get tethering online see the thread here: moment wifi tethering how-to

I’ve personally followed the instruction and everything works without a hitch, although it is currently being *tested* so… ymmv. Many thanks to the guys over at SDX!

In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person’s becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American…There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn’t an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag… We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language.. And we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people.

-Theodore Roosevelt 1907

It is unfortunate, I think, that this quote from Theodore Roosevelt is being forwarded without any kind of discussion or close interpretation. It does not simply stand in support of immigration reform (and I only guess that was what the forwarders’ intended) – if interpreted as appropriate for modern times, as I doubt it should be, it has much stronger implications for all modern American people.

How would you identify someone that was “in every facet” an American by Roosevelt’s definition – one with no divided allegiance and complete loyalty to the American people? Would they buy only American products, speak and think only in English (do you get to pick the language you think in?), invest only in American companies, burn their family heirlooms wherever another flag was present, disassociate themselves with their family history – for, seemingly, these are Roosevelt’s prescriptions.

And if that is what it took… then how many Americans would Roosevelt commend – certainly not the foreign-product-buying kind, employees of or investors in Toyota, Sony, et al., or even customers of American companies that outsourced jobs to reduce costs for the America consumption-addiction. All of these actions, and others, ingrained in modern American life, are certainly highly suspect for anyone claiming to be a Roosevelt-approved American loyalist.

Of course, we must ask ourselves, how many of these (apparently loyalty-subverting) activities were even possibilities over 100 years ago when Roosevelt spoke these words? The answer, certainly, is “very few of them”. The world has changed and America has changed with it. Looking to hundred-year-old quotes for normative advice can only go so far.

If you found these words to be compelling instructions, I am afraid it was only because you did not realize that they do more work against all supposed “actual Americans” than they do in support of tougher immigration laws. If you, in fact, did realize that broader implication, then I am sure you see we have much bigger issues in modern America than how to think about immigration.

I, personally, think that the quote is only worth interpreting within its own time – which leaves it normatively neutered and of simply historical value.

–
Andrew D. Anderson

http://www.AndrewDAnderson.com

The people would be taxed using a flat sales tax for necessary government services, but extra projects would be funded by inflation-indexed rate-capped government bonds. This way debt would be more fine-tuned by individual communities – and the nation would have less chance of overspending (especially on a national level).

Because communities would own patents collectively (granted by the national government), to foster innovation and productivity, large one-time cash awards and honors should be given to innovators. Say 10x the median income. This would ensure people were still excited about innovating, but prevent multi-billion dollar entities, groups, or people from concentrating power. Because local governments and people would benefit from innovators, they would be highly sought after. The local governments would set wages accordingly to keep and attract promising people. This would ensure that mediocrity didn’t run rampant.

Everyone would own arms, and participate in government/community at some level (even if it was just picking up trash in the park). This would make people feel connected with their community, and likely lead to more voluntary government involvement. Decisions at the local level would be made via direct democracy. State and national decisions would be made via representations. The overarching system would be a republic.

Governments would not be able to turn people away, but they could have policies in place to provide very low wages to new members of the community. Children would also become new members of the community when they were able to vote (which should require some type of national test, rather than an age requirement). This should lead to relatively normalized living conditions, and starting wages would not go too low (to deter new members) if people knew it would also affect their children.

I think that under a system like this, people would be guaranteed basic wages, but innovation would still be highly prized. Communities would become meaningful and cohesive, and people would not be making as many decisions while being removed from the effects of those decisions. Power would be with the people – political and economic power, both.

I’m not sure that this makes talking about artificial intelligence more difficult, but it may confuse the picture if not mentioned at the onset of a discussion. It can make the term “computer” somewhat ambiguous to the modern mind – and the object of artificial intelligence potentially elusive. If we inspect the hardware of a machine apart from the software, say, powered off – there would be very little of interest going on. If we took the software apart from the hardware, say, printed out – I think we’d have a hard time finding signs of intelligence then too. Only when the software is coupled with the hardware do interesting things become possible. Even when software can be embedded into hardware, it is easy for the concepts to admit separation. This may simply be due to the familiar organization of modern computers, but it may also be indicative of something more interesting – we should at least keep it in the back of our minds.

For now, at least to start, when discussing computers in relation to intelligence, it seems clear to me that we would do well to always discuss them as a bundle of software and hardware to avoid confusion. Despite the fact that one may install some “intelligent” program along many other programs, every program requires hardware to run. It is all too easy to think of the program itself as the sole cause of certain behavior – it should not be forgotten that the hardware is no less important in manifesting that behavior. So we are on the same page, in all that follows, unless I specify otherwise, when I talk of computers or computing machines, I am referring to a hardware-software couple. I am regarding the machine then, in that sense, as indivisible as a man.

So, the reasoning goes, for every atom to be directed just so, for the temperatures, distances, and elements all to be just as they are in order to support life – the odds of that are mind-numbingly low – god must have intervened to get life going. Further, it is sometimes added, conditions to sustain this fragile state are improbable in their own right. Praise the lord, for making this system!

I’ll start from the last statement and work my way back. Ridiculous. I think we can get rid of the sustenance part all together. We’re in a system that has safeguards built in – we’ve got more-or-less predictable orbits, an atmosphere, a sun that doesn’t move much, and energy that doesn’t just disappear whimsically. The system itself appears to be in a reasonably steady state (at least locally or practically). Most people would agree that seems reasonable. We act on the principle all the time, we constantly rely on a predictable system that is bound by some laws to act as it always has before. (Even if we have little reason to do so, we do rely on that.) Creating a system that’s self-perpetuating might be more improbable than creating one that isn’t, but lets assume that’s what we’ve got. Then we don’t have to deal with the probability of existence second by second, we just account for the potentially increased improbability in the original system itself. Now, we’ve got an even more highly improbable system that basically acts like it doesn’t have many options at all (that it’s law based).

Right, so in making now easier to explain by appeal to yesterday, we’ve made day one more improbable. That’s alright. All kinds of thing are improbable, but reality trumps statistics. You might double-check your numbers upon winning the lottery, you might exclaim “this isn’t happening” because it is so very unlikely, but if it is… well, then it is. Our system looks like that, it looks like it is happening. We rely on it happening systematically, and it looks like it does. So set down your numbers and go for a walk.

Of course, that might not convince you. Fair enough. It’s much more improbable, after all, than winning the lottery. It’s like winning the lottery every day. (Again, if you did, you did… but I see the concern while you didn’t). So what are you saying? That you don’t think this system actually happened on its own. You crunch your numbers, gaze at the astronomically large negative exponent and disregard the sand under your feet. As if the god idea has better odds. Well, I’m a bit short on words for you here. If you’re using math to back up your line of thought, mustn’t you provide two sets of numbers? What calculations can you give for the god claim? What’s more, is that you’re acting like you think the system is self sustaining (or possibly god intervenes every nano-second), at any rate, you’re not constantly double-checking the math. At least we agree on that part. It appears self-sustaining. Come back when you’ve imbued your god model with a probabilistic number. Things will be the same.

If you can actually give me a number, arrived at by convincing methodologies, I’m going to have to assume it’s going to be quite improbable too. And the deal with probability is that its bound to happen sooner or later, so that your god number and the self-organizing system number might both have happened, or at least enough time has passed for either (eternity anyone?). If you could give me a number, I’d probably grant you that possibility. But you’d need to grant me my possibility too. Because we’d both just have an astronomically small number. Then what do we do? Have a cup of tea? Flip a coin? Can I double check your number?

Maybe we don’t need to go that far, maybe there’s another way of looking at this. Consider this before you go… if you happened to be in an improbable system could you actually use it against itself? You use the numbers provided by the system, because that’s where you are. Does it make sense to say that the system furnishing the numbers is improbable? Improbable where? Within that system? I don’t think you can. You’ve got your numbers, but they only work within the system. Not before the system or outside the system. There numbers for here. The way they work, whatever they mean, reaffirms that the system is actual, or at least like it was yesterday. All your logic, words, thoughts, they are not somehow able to be divorced from what we’re in.  They are part of it. So it might make sense to talk about the odds of the Earth being where it is in a universe like we have, but not to talk about the odds of the system itself. That doesn’t make sense.

But in this system things are like they are, seemingly, because of how they were before. The odds of that are pretty good. So the fact we are here in the system is a practical inevitability in this place. In this system. Its part of how it works that we’ve got to be where we are. Even random quark models don’t disrupt the hitting of a golf ball or the smell of sulfur.

But who created the system then? Hell if I know who did… or didn’t, but don’t give me a probabilistic model to talk about meta-system possibilities. Things there need not conform to what you think of things here. It’s an unconvincing argument, on my view. In this system things are apparently deterministic, the probability of here and now is 100%. Now, if you think god is incessantly following his own laws, I don’t think you’d have much to argue with a physicist about anyway. In that case, you’re just giving different names to the same phenomena. (Never-mind the difference in “feel”, you’re then bound to scientific claims about what’s going on inside the system.) We’re all on the same page here in the system. And we’ve got no clue about the meta-system.

http://vikram.eggwall.com/computers/nxt.html

for tips about getting bluetooth, usb, and nxc to work the NXT under Ubuntu 9.10.

It all worked well for me. I’ll likely be doing some of my own write-ups on Linux and the NXT robot, so if you’ve got questions… leave them.

Rant aside, if you’d like to see the real misery, boredom, hopelessness, and outlets that the University of Chicago provides its students… I advise you to look here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/quinnanya/collections/72157622661408694/

It’s a great set of real graffiti from the university. By the looks of it – completely uncensored. It’s probably not very reassuring, but it’s closer to truth than the propaganda the admissions department puts out.

Hey, but look on the bright side… you’ll be a well paid worker-bee when you’re all done with your time in hell.

P.S.
I stumbled on this other site that has a real and current discussion of the UofC as an educational option. It may be useful for some of some of you parents weighing in on your child’s university education:
http://therealrevo.com/blog/?p=14506