Sunday, October 30, 2005

New Worlds in the Making: Origins of Planets and Brown Dwarfs

This afternoon I attended Ray Jayawardhana's lecture at the University of Toronto, New Worlds in the Making: Origins of Planets and Brown Dwarfs. The lecture is part of the Royal Canadian Institute for the Advancement of Science free Sunday Science Lectures -- and was co-sponsored by the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada. The abstract of Jayawardhana's lecture is as follows:
Until recently, we knew of only one planetary system, our own. During the past decade, astronomers have detected nearly 150 planets around other Sun-like stars, ending centuries of speculation. Over the same period, they have also discovered hundreds more of so called "brown dwarfs", which are too puny to light up as stars but which do not fit the traditional definition of planets either. Intriguingly, some brown dwarfs themselves may harbor planetary companions around them. The apparent ubiquity of both planets and brown dwarfs poses the question of their origins. I will report on how astronomers are deciphering the birth and early evolution of planets and brown dwarfs using a combination of remarkable new observations and sophisticated computer simulations.


Jayawardhana outlined the prevailing theories of planetary formation -- stuff I already knew, from when I actually studied Astronomy in school. Planets formed with stars when molecular clouds coalesced. First the star would form, then from the material remaining from the star formation -- in a disc around the star -- the planets form. In the details, things get more complicated of course. There are different theories on how the planets can actually form, based on what the material around the star is composed of. The size of the star -- and whether it has enough mass to ignite would also impact planet formation. Jayawardhana spoke of all of this, and with the latest findings of numerous extrasolar planets, the science of planet formation has gained a lot of new interest.

Jayawardhana was an OK speaker. He wasn't entirely engaging however, choosing to use quite a number of graphs to explain his topic. I was OK with much of them, although some I just couldn't understand in the few seconds they were up on the screen. For a generalist audience, this wasn't so good -- and for a Sunday afternoon lecture -- it could very quickly lead to boredom. Which is too bad, as the topic is very interesting.

A final word on an observation and annoyance from the lecture ... the annoyance first: no one seemed to have been able to pronounce Jayawardhana's name. He's referred to as Doctor Ray Jay by his students apparently. How difficult is Jayawardhana? Let's see: Ja-ya-ward-hana. Duh! And the observation: my friend and I who attended the lecture were in the minority. The audience was predominantly old, white men that had lost most of their hair. Not that that is really a problem. I applaud them coming out on Sunday for science. What I have a problem with is being in the minority. Where are the young people? Is interest in science so low?

Related reading:

posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/30/2005 11:41:00 PM 1 Comments Links to this post

Alien Abduction

I saw Alien Abduction last night, and what a piece of crap it is. The acting is bad, the characters are all unlikeable, the actors uninspired, the effects worse than B-movie grade, and the aliens are just plain crap. Then there is the screaming. Every now and again, the actresses seem to remember that they have to scream -- and scream they do. Even when there is no context. The entire movie is crap, crap, crap. Which is disappointing, considering the story actually had potential. It concerns a group of vacationing friends that are abducted by the aliens. We see them being butchered by the aliens, then the lead character, Jean, played by Megan Lee Etheridge, wakes up in a hospital or insane asylum. She's told she's an alien abduction victim, and she's being taken care of in the hospital before release back to her life. She can't remember a thing, and just wants out. It turns out that the hospital is more than it appears to be. Jean has been kidnapped, but she hasn't even left the alien ship. She's still in it, and is surrounded by the aliens. Apparently, they kidnap people, replace them with human replicas with some worm-like aliens driving in the replicas heads. They're slowly replacing every human on the planet. Jean it's revealed in the surprise ending, isn't human -- she's actually a replica thinking she's human. The story would have work, if the execution of the film was done without the amateur bunch that failed miserably with this crap.

Anyway, I told you all you need to know, so now you have no reason to watch the movie.

posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/30/2005 08:07:00 PM 1 Comments Links to this post

Saturday, October 29, 2005

Race Against Time

Last night I attended the last of the 2005 Massey Lectures. This year, Stephen Lewis was the lecturer -- his series bore the title of his latest book: Race Against Time. If the series could have a tagline, it would be this quote from Lewis: "I have spent the last four years watching people die." Lewis' topic was the plight of Africa under the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

There are many who may not remember Lewis -- or simply never knew him, although he was named as one of the 100 most influential people in the world by TIME magazine in 2005, listed under their "heroes and icons" section. Lewis, soon to be 68, started his public career early -- he was elected as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario at age 26, while still attending school at the University of Toronto. From there, he moved on to leading the provincial NDP party, then to being a journalist, before being appointed in 1984 to be Canada's ambassador to the UN. From there, he joined the UN, filling roles such as the Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF; commissioner of the World Health Organization's Commission on Social Determinants; to now serving as the Secretary General's Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa. This is a role that fate seemed to have designed for Lewis -- pitting a humanitarian with excellent oratory skills to a role where there is a desperate need for a champion. It is a role that Lewis embraces with obvious passion, so much so that it takes its toll on his person.

Last night's lecture, the last in the series, was titled Solutions: A Gallery of Alternatives in Good Faith. In his lecture, Lewis does a recap of his previous lectures to provide context. His one hour lecture, that was followed by 20-minutes of Q&A, was a rapid fire of facts, figures and a deep emotional plea for something to be done about the pandemic in Africa. Lewis tore into the US, the UN, the G8, the WTO and the WMF for their inaction and contrary efforts; into the complacency of rich nations of the planet and their unending broken promises. While he acknowledged the efforts and progress that has been made, he didn't mask his disdain for the bureaucrats that continue to do little against the HIV/AIDS tide -- naming some of them by names. He alluded a number of times that he is far from being popular for the noise he's making -- and if the job doesn't drive him to quit, he'll most likely fall from his role, a casualty of politics.

When you understand where Lewis has been, what he has seen and what he knows, you understand where he comes from with his criticism. In his latest role, Lewis has traveled extensively in Africa, working to curb the pandemic by influencing leaders and corralling the desperately needed support. The statistics are staggering: 65% of the world's AIDS infections are in Africa; 14 million children in Africa are orphaned by AIDS. Africa is heading to a place the world has never seen before -- where the young adults are dying off, and remaining are children and their grandparents. Women are the hardest hit, and Lewis specifically points out the total disregard the world has for half its population -- especially since with women, he believes progress can be made to stem the tide. For Lewis, these aren't just statistics, numbers to be dealt with by an actuary's mind -- these are people, faces, names and friends that he has lost. While the remain nameless and far away, they are persons and close at heart for him. The anguish he has seen came across in his lecture.

The lecture ended with prophetic question from an audience member. If we, the rich of the world, don't do something to end the HIV/AIDS pandemic for altruistic reasons -- shouldn't we be doing it for selfish reasons? At the rate at which infection is growing world wide, when does it become a problem right here in our own countries? It was a good question. A question that Lewis didn't really answer, because it was an open question to all of us. We need to do something. We have voices, and we can raise them loud. We lend them to the NGOs. We can persuade our governments to focus efforts into the UN organization to combat HIV/AIDS. We can persuade our governments to commit the 0.7% of our GDP that was promised for Africa, but has never been delivered. Lewis ended with a question about our values as a human race. We spend trillions on arms annually. Why can't we afford $50 billion to save Africa?

The 2005 Massey Lectures will be aired on CBC One's Ideas on Nov. 7-11th. If you've missed the lectures, you can tune in to hear them. The Ideas program airs at 9PM eastern.

Related reading:

posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/29/2005 11:46:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

The Clock of the Long Now

The Clock of the Long Now was first brought to my attention by Future Boy when he returned from his Futurist Conference. I just didn't get it, which of course is no fault of mine. Future Boy bears all the burden for not being able to articulate the concept well enough to someone like me, who regards the future as tomorrow's problem. Since death is in my future, I avoid thinking of it all costs. After reading the Discover magazine article, Time Machine, I may start thinking of the future as more than just an impending nightmare.

The Long Now proposes to put our frame of thinking, 10,000 years into the future. Imagine if we could all collectively focus on such a future -- suddenly a lot of our problems in the here and now may take on a new perspective. From ethnic discrimination, wars, the environment -- humanity's future -- all become different, or so we would hope, when viewed from the perspective of the Long Now. The Clock of the Long Now proposes to give us just that kind of perspective.

The Clock of the Long Now will run for 10,000 years with perfect precision, resetting itself daily using the Sun. It will track hours, days, weeks, months, years -- leap years and leap centuries -- the precision of planetary orbits and the precision of the equinox. It will not need human intervention to continue operation, but will wind itself to continue keeping the time. It's being planned for the cliffs of Snake Range, in Nevada. There is no roads leading to Snake Range, and it would take a full day's hike to get to it. Within the cliffs, a visitor would have to move through successive rooms to get to the Clock of the Long Now -- each room revealing more and more of the clock -- its slowest parts first, tracking time at the largest scales -- the inner room with the shorter scales of time being measured. It will be a grand clock -- and while it will be well known to many, it will be in such a remote location, that most will not visit it, or seek it out, although it will remain in our collective psyche. Eventually, we may just forget about it, only to rediscover it centuries later -- or more. In fact, it might even become a object that many will make pilgrimages to in the future.

The idea is almost whimsical, if it didn't have some serious merits. It could actually work to inspire in each of us to think of the world now in the spans of our daily lives, or even our whole lives, but in terms of humanity's existence. It could become a focal point, a touchstone if you will, for thinking beyond our immediate time -- towards some long term thinking. What would we do with such thinking? Hopefully get it all right.

posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/29/2005 12:20:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

Thursday, October 27, 2005

Two Against the Big Bang

Before the Big Bang gained prominence as the theory, it was just one theory that explained how the universe came to be -- or more accurately, where all the hydrogen and helium came from. The was another theory, the steady state theory -- or view -- of the universe. With the discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation, predicted by the Big Bang theorists, steady state theory went to the grave -- or as mentioned in the Discover magazine article, Two Against the Big Bang, still on that journey to the grave.

There are still two die-hard supporters of the steady state view of the universe -- and knowing who they are, it is hard to believe they are so easily dismissed by their fellow scientists. Margaret Barbidge and Geoffrey Barbidge are in their 80s, and are still practicing astronomers who don't believe the Big Bang theory has answered all of the questions.

The Burbidges claim to fame is pretty significant. They (along with contributor William Fowler; but Fred Hoyle, the pioneer of nucleosynthesis and also a contributor, did win) took home the Nobel Prize in Physics for their 1957 work, the Synthesis of the Elements in Stars, where they detailed how nuclear reactions in stars "rip apart the basic building blocks of matter and put them back together again to create new and complex elements." Their work is a significant piece of the puzzle that is our universe.

So when the Burbidges question the completeness of the Big Bang theory to explain the universe, you'd think their arguments would carry some weight. Unfortunately, because the Burbidges haven't thrown in the towel, and still see steady state as a viable theory to explain the universe, they have been marginalized -- and for what? For really claiming that maybe we still don't have all the answers.

Steady state theory suggests that the universe may not actually have a beginning -- no point source that went "bang" -- but that new matter may be created from multiple sources, at many times, during the life of the universe. This universe has always existed. The Burbidges believe that quasars may be a potential source for the new matter created in the universe that their theory espouses. According to Big Bang theorists however, quasars are from the early universe, and does not exist in the universe today -- proving that the universe hasn't always been the same, but is changing. The Burbidges argue that the high redshifts exhibited by quasars is due to them moving faster than the expansion of the universe -- they believe that quasars are being expelled from galaxies -- which would put quasars nearby.

At the heart of this argument that the Burbidges continue to have with their peers, is how scientific progress should be made. The Burbidges believe that science should first observe, then theorize to explain the observation -- they don't think that theories should come first then a search made to find an observation to back it up. That is why the holes in the Big Bang theory, resulting from observations, are being plugged by theorectical dark matter and dark energy theories. Maybe we don't know everything yet -- and with this I have to agree with the Burbidges -- and maybe the steady state theory is wrong -- but until we know that the Big Bang does explain everything, maybe steady state shouldn't be forgotten.

Related reading:

posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/27/2005 11:57:00 PM 1 Comments Links to this post

Lite Notes

The Oculas -- imagine working in this cubicle at work ... the Oculas is a private "lounging oasis" that allows you to shut out the world, secluded in a perfect lighting, seating, audio and visual environment. You'll get a computer, video screen, internet access, built in speakers and a nice comfy chair that massages you. Price: $45KUS.
Land Walker -- Sakakibara Kikai has made a kick-ass mobile office. Literally. The Land Walker is a bipedal exoskeleton that is pretty much a working version of the exoskeleton used in the Mech Warrior games. An added option on the Land Walker is machine guns. For those difficult days in the office.
Omodern -- Have a good laugh at the yesteryears. Check out some of the worst interior designs from the 70s.
Lawnmower Museum -- Why anyone would want to document the history of the lawnmower is beyond me ... but it has been done, proving yet again, that there is some weird shit on the internet.
Leisure Town -- A wacky online comic strip, for mature audiences, that uses plastic dolls for characters.

posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/27/2005 12:35:00 AM 1 Comments Links to this post

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

Business Buzz

  1. Let a Thousand Brands Bloom -- the Chinese consumer is changing, and multinationals are responding with their offerings. From different brand offerings, to different products catering to the needs of different market segments. Business is simple -- customers of all incomes have money, and can be enticed to part with it.
  2. It Sure Ain't Old Navy -- Getting the above 35-years-old women into their stores isn't working for Gap. They continue to be perceived to be a brand for the younger generation. What's Gap to do? Open a new chain that caters specifically to older women: Forth & Towne. Forth & Towne is being designed around an experience. It's supposed to be a place where women want to hang out and spend their spare time -- and dollars. Will the gamble work?
  3. And Now, the Chief Endurance Officer -- Here's one to inspire you. Think the fat cats at the top really are fat? Apparently not. And they're not leaving their staff behind either. Makes me think that after this past weekend's feat from my CEO, that maybe he does deserve the "endurance" in his title as well.
  4. Daggers Drawn Over DVDs -- This is one of the few times you'll find me siding with Bill Gates. In the battle between the next generation DVD formats, Microsoft has come out on the side of what may very well be the loser: Toshiba's HD DVD format. Sony's Blu-ray technology is set to win, for a number of reasons -- the first, and least important, is that is is probably the superior technology. The second, and most important reason, is all about control -- not control you will have, but control that media giants will maintain. Blu-ray will come with more robust security than HD DVD, and that's where Gates and Co. have a problem. There is little incentive for Sony to build support into the format for Windows, as it would allow consumers to shuffle content from their DVDs around their homes (and possibly the internet) from their PCs. The big media companies apparently are sticking to the tried and true -- when you buy something, you really don't own it.
  5. Hey, Advertisers, TiVo is Your Friend -- Here's an article about the new face of advertising. Rishad Tobaccowala is apparently a new-media ad guru, and thinks that businesses need to recognize the importance of on-demand media, social marketing, forget TV and go for video, and move branding efforts online. Says he, "The spine of our business has collapsed, and what we are looking at are the organs, blood, and connective tissue on the floor in a pile of goo. We have to imagine what the new structure is going to look like." Yes, he's also colourful of speech.
    For related reading, check out:
  • The Continuing Evolution of Advertising [PDF] -- from the October Jordan-Edmiston Group's client briefing.
  • Integrated Interactive Marketing [PDF] -- a Nielsen/NetRatings white paper on online marketing.
  • Why ROI is a False Standard [PDF] -- an article from Tobaccowala in Advertising Age's point magazine.
  • Word of Mouth Marketing Summit 2005 -- see some interesting topics presented at this summit. All presentations are online.

    • posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/25/2005 11:14:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    NewsBytes

    Genpets -- Adam Brandejs, from London, Ontario, is the father of this piece of weirdness. Genpets purports to be genetically engineered pets that are in a state of hibernation until taken home, then they come alive to be your pet for 1 or maybe 3 years. What is it really? It's Brandejs overactive imagination as an art student at the OCAD. Quite cool, and not bad at all.

    Shovel Head -- Yasuhito Udagawa is one cool artist. He works on mechanical sculptures, and was recently featured in Wired for creating two sculptures out of bicycle parts for cycle manufacturer SRAM. Way cool!

    Death Wishes -- A bit of afterlife weirdness I picked up from the latest issue of Wired as well. Seems like there a few non-traditional ways to keep on going after your Energizer has been drained.
    1. Promessa Organic intends to send you on your way ecologically. There's a huge ecological cost for a typical burial or cremation -- everything from the land taken up for burial, to the fuel needed to transform you to ashes. Promessa does away with the whole traditional process by freezing what was you -- then dunking your body in liquid nitrogen. Your body is then blasted with sound waves that reduces it to organic powder, which is then transferred to a vacuum chamber where water is evaporated from the powder. From there, you're filtered, and all surgical spare parts and mercury is removed. When you, and only you is left, your powder is placed in a corn starch coffin, and you're buried. In 6 months to a year, you're compost, and something can be planted above you. You've completed the circle of life.
    2. Biopresence promises something different: "Living Memorials or Transgenic Tombstones." They use a process to transcode and entwine the human DNA to a tree's DNA. They do this not by modifying the tree's DNA, but by storing your DNA on naturally occurring silent mutations of base triplets. I don't understand what any of that means, nor do I have the patience to research it right now -- suffice it to say -- you and tree will not become one. Your DNA will simply be hitching a ride on something alive, even after you've gone. Your body, if you so wished, could also be reduced down to compost to feed the young plant that is now carrying the last living remains of you.
    3. LifeGem takes a different tact than the previous two -- they don't aim to complete any circle of life or make a living memory out of you. What they promise is to is take the ashes from your cremation, and extract the carbon from it. From there, the carbon is purified by baking it at extreme high temperatures, converting all carbon to graphite. Heat and pressure is then applied to the graphite to transform it into diamonds. The diamond will then be cut and laser etched to your specifications. While you may not last forever, a diamond certainly will.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/25/2005 12:07:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Sunday, October 23, 2005

    In Search of the Cosmic Dawn

    This past Friday, I attended the last of the Cosmic Frontiers series that celebrated the centennial of Astronomy at the University of Toronto. For this lecture, the organizers chose UofT's very own, Professor Bob Abraham. Abraham's lecture was titled, In Search of the Cosmic Dawn, and is summarized by the following abstract:
    Our Universe was born in fantastic energy at the instant of the Big Bang, yet the first product of this moment of creation was a fairly drab Universe resembling a nearly featureless cloud of gas. This early Universe contained none of the richness and complexity that marks the present Cosmos: it was devoid of galaxies, devoid of stars, devoid of planets, devoid of even the basic chemistry that makes any of these things possible, and certainly devoid of life. This cosmic Dark Age was brought to an abrupt end by the onset of First Light, a sort-of cosmic Renaissance initiated by the formation of the first luminous objects in the Universe. The talk will describe how First Light led to the complex and rich Universe we see around us, through cycles of cosmic birth, death and rebirth, leading ultimately to intelligent life itself.


    First impressions of Abraham was, "Whoa! This guy ain't that old!" He could easily be my age -- and when I think of the possibilities .... This is remarkable for me because I'm just trained to expect professors who've been around the block a few times, and have the long greying beard, not that much different from a wizard's, to show for it. Abraham was anything but. He was a pretty dynamic speaker, using humour quite a bit to keep his audience engaged. Not that most of us needed the humour -- but those with the attention span of a gnat may have needed it. Abraham's topic was interesting in its own right to keep me engaged and wanting more.

    Abraham began by correcting what is apparently an incorrect quote of J. Robert Oppenheimer. According to Abraham, Oppenheimer didn't quote the Bhagavad Gita saying, "Now I am become Death, the Destroyer of worlds." What he said was "Now I am become Shiva, the Destroyer of worlds." The distinction is important for Abraham, because Einstein's famous energy-to-mass relationship that the bomb exploits isn't just a relationship about destruction -- it's also a relationship about creation. And Shiva, being part of the trimurti, doesn't exist without the creator, Brahma, and the preserver, Vishnu. This is important, because the rich universe we know today wouldn't have happened if not for the violent deaths of stars, which seeded gas clouds with elements heavier than helium -- which lead to new stars, planetary systems, and life on Earth. "We are star stuff."

    The universe, three minutes after the Big Bang, was a very boring universe according to Abraham. It was filled with just hydrogen and helium -- and this state lasted for about one billion years -- an assertion that has been confirmed with the discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation. The hydrogen and helium in that early universe is the same stuff we have here on Earth. In their gaseous state galaxies and stars can't be formed. Something miraculous happened however. At age 1 billion years old, the universe was bathed in what Abraham referred to as "first light." First light was an immense energy source that went through the entire universe and transformed the gaseous state of hydrogen and helium into plasma. In this state, hydrogen and helium, under the influence of gravity, could form the stars and galaxies that would be the birthplace of the Earth and life on it.

    What is first light? That's the Nobel prize winning question. No one knows. We know it must have occurred 12.5 billion years ago, but so far our most powerful telescopes have not had the power to gaze that far back. Abraham suggested a few promising scenarios to discovering first light.
    1. Gamma ray bursts is one potential catalyst for first light. Gamma ray burst sources are all over the sky, and are thought to be a result of supermassive stars collapsing into black holes ... yet, if there weren't stars in the early universe ... yup, there's still work to be done.
    2. The James Webb Space Telescope, set to unfurl in space sometime in 2014, will be way, way bigger than Hubble and have the ability to peer further back into the past. JWST will be able to see back 12.5 billion years ago, and hopefully it will be able to see first light source(s).
    3. Going into space isn't the only option for peering that far back in time. The Gemini Telescope, already in operation, could be used in conjunction with adaptive optics and gravitational lenses to peer as far back as potentially 12.5 billion years ago. With just the right technology and the right observations, first light source(s) could be seen before JWST is launched.

    Abraham is quite excited about the possibility of finding first light before JWST is launched. He has however, placed his bets both with Gemini and JWST, as he participates in both programs. Whatever and whoever gets to first light first, what Abraham made clear is that there is a race going on. Hopefully there will be success soon.

    As a side note, the pre-show for the lecture was mesmerizing. It featured galaxy dynamics simulations produced by John Dubinski. You can find some of those simulations here.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/23/2005 11:49:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Man-Thing

    I must confess, I've never really read a Man-Thing comic from Marvel -- I've read more of Swamp Thing (DC), although there too, I wasn't really a follower of the series. With the number of recent adaptations of Marvel comics to the big screen, I expected Man-Thing to get the full treatment, however, since it gone a straight to DVD release, I was expecting crap. To be fair, the movie wasn't total crap, though there was the hint of stench in the air -- fitting I suppose, since the movie was set in a swamp, in the Louisiana hick-ville of a town, Bywater.

    The plot was fairly simple, with no surprises. The local bigwig of Bywater, one oil tycoon named Schist (Jack Thompson), is drilling in the swamp. He's bought and murdered his way into getting the natives to give up their land, and his enterprise continue to commit sins -- only this time it's not just sins against people, but also against nature. Within the swamp, there is a place called "dark water" -- some mumbo-jumbo about the "nexus of all realities" according to mumbling native wiseman, Pete Horn (Rawiri Paratene) -- which is apparently where the Man-Thing comes into the picture. The swamp it seems doesn't like all the death and destruction that comes with Schist, and it lashes out with the Man-Thing, the swamps lawman. Into this mess comes a new sheriff, Kyle Williams, played by Matthew Le Nevez, who needs to solve a series of murders; contend with Schist, his son and some local goons, who want to off the rest of the natives (anyone who's not white and all Yankees too); a hot school teacher Teri Richards, played by Rachel Taylor, who teaches respect for nature and is a bit of an environmentalist; and perhaps a native vigilante, Rene LaRoque, played by Steve Bastoni, who is suspected of the murders in the swamp.

    The acting wasn't too bad. Neither was the action sequence, the mood of the film, the special effects, the cinematography, etc. The story left a little to be desired. It wasn't really about the Man-Thing. The Man-Thing was just kinda there. There was no intelligence, no exploration of character, not even any significant commentary on the whole man vs. nature theme -- the whole environmental aspect just got a passing reference. Then there was the love that seemed to have magically developed between Richards and Williams. Just out of nowhere, it appeared -- like the Man-Thing in fact. They went from being semi-adversarial, to sucking face, and caring deeply about each other (uh, yeah, sure). WTF? Where did that come from? Was it the swamp gas? A lot of the action took place in the deep, dark, swamp, at night -- when everyone knew that something or someone in there was killing people -- so what did all the characters do? They all rushed into the swamp, yelling for each other. Even the bloody sheriff, who was looking for the suspected murderer, LaRoque, went into the swamp calling out LaRoque's name. Who wrote the shitty script? Hans Rodionoff -- a guy cut his teeth on Baywatch in the 1990s.

    The decision to release this on DVD was a good one. It's best watched late at night, when you're a little tired.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/23/2005 06:53:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Another Sign of the Apocalypse

    This piece of alternative weirdness comes from the roving field reporter, DH, as "another sign of the apocalypse." Yes, the horsemen are actually riding. Alex Chiu has discovered the secrets of immortality. He claims if you wear his magnetic rings or magnetic foot bracelets while you sleep, you will achieve immortality. What piece of weirdness is this you think? Apparently, the USPTO doesn't think it so weird. They've granted Alex Chiu a patent for his ring.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/23/2005 05:41:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Saturday, October 22, 2005

    floccipics

    I've got this idea ... and it will take a few months to execute based on my current rate of accomplishing things. I need to redo this site. I'm thinking of it as the version 2.0 release of the site. The changes will focus primarily on the template I use for the blog, and a major update will be made to the gallery section that has been languishing in disrepair ever since this current release of the site. I need to have a gallery section that is easier to update. Currently I don't update it because it takes too much time. So, while I go through the painful step of building a new template for the blog -- which will also be used for the gallery section -- I've done gone and created the blog for the gallery. It's currently being hosted on blogspot, but will move to this domain when I'm ready.

    So, for my latest photographs, check out floccipics.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/22/2005 11:38:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Hey Pig Piggy Pig Pig Pig

    Today I was out with my wife, fulfilling our weekend duty of errands and grocery shopping. One of our stops was the local Costco for a few items. The place was packed, as it usually is during the weekends -- and maybe it was the rain and the crowd that got me going -- but I couldn't help but notice all the little pigs. You know who they are ... they're the ones that go grunting and snarfling from one trough to the next in grocery stores. They are willing to snarf down whatever samples are proffered by stores to entice shoppers to buy some new offering. Only these pigs aren't there for the "sample and buy" ritual. Oh no. They don't stand on ceremonies. They're there for the weekend's guttural communion. They flounder from trough to trough, with total disregard for other shoppers. Just grunt, snarfle and oink- oink! I hate pigs!

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/22/2005 06:54:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Quebéc City

    Two weekends ago -- the Thanksgiving Weekend -- the family drove up to Quebéc City. It was probably an insane thing to do, as the amount of driving was just crazy -- but so is the VIA Rail prices, so I opted for driving. The entire weekend was overcast, with a little drizzle every now and again -- just to maintain the threat of down pour in case any hapless tourist got complacent. I was complacent. It was my trip to Quebéc City -- my first -- and I was going to be a tourist.

    For my first time in the city, I thought it best that we paid for the overprice hotel to stay in the old city. We stayed at the Auberge Saint Pierre, which wasn't even a hop-skip-and-a-jump -- just a hop -- away from the Musée de la Civilisation (which btw, is not the same as the Canadian Museum of Civilization). We managed to avoid the museum. Staying in the old city however did afford us a chance to walk around the first night we were there. So we went up Côte de la Montagne and walked along rue Port-Dauphin, watching the sun disappear behind the clouds and down the horizon, and taking some sunset shots. That night, we had pizza for supper at a small restaurant not far from our hotel. It wasn't bad, and so Saturday ended.

    The next day we did a big loop for the first half of the day -- first we went along rue du Petit-Champlain, looking at the shops, then ended up going absolutely nowhere along boulevard Champlain. Yes, we did see some plaque proclaiming that some soldiers stormed the cliff face to kick some French butts, but that was about it. So we doubled back and got some assistance scaling the cliff to some more history. We saw Porte Prescott, Le Château Frontenac, wandered along the Terrasse Dufferin, the along the Promenade des Gouverneurs and up to barely see the Citadelle. We didn't really go into the old fort. What's the point? That would need a half-day on its own. We then climbed up Porte Saint-Louis, looked at the Hôtel du Parlement from a distance, and wandered along rue Saint-Louis to find some place to eat. I really wanted poutine. What's the point of traveling all the way to Quebéc if I didn't have some poutine? Unfortunately, we ran into a "french" waiter who didn't see any point in serving anyone english. So we had subs instead.

    In the afternoon on Sunday, we went driving. We went up to Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré to see some Christian mythology. I saw figures of Christ being tortured by Romans. Catholics seem to have a sick fascination with seeing their God suffer. I don't get it. I'm sure Jesus had a good life up until the end. Let's face it, ending usually suck, and if you believe some of the stories that are being told, his ending really did suck. I'm surprised that the sheep didn't sack Rome. Instead, they allowed the wolves to blame the Jews and the wolves changed skin and became sheep dogs. Every now and again however, one of the wolves can't forgot their nature, and shed their skin, devouring a lamb or two. But I digress. We saw some Christian mythology, and I enjoyed the spectacle, especially to commerce.

    On our way back to Quebéc City, we stopped off the Parc de la Chute-Montmorency to see what all the fuss was about. We risked life and limb to scale the "Panoramic Stairs" to get a few closer shots of the falls. Unfortunately, we didn't have enough time to go exploring. The suspension bridge over the falls, and the one that crossed the fault looked scary. I think we spent about an hour or so there, then went back to Quebéc City.

    On Monday, we departed, but not before stopping under the 440 to take some pictures of some great art by the local graffiti artists. Yup, it was art, not illegible scribblings of the uneducated.

    I've posted some of the pictures I took on Webshots. Click the photo below to be taken to the gallery.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/22/2005 11:57:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Friday, October 21, 2005

    Nanotoxicity

    Occupational Hazards is running an article on a recent presentation at the Second International Symposium on Nanotechnology and Occupational Health, which suggested that asbestos has a lot to teach about the potential toxicity of nanotechnology. Asbestos was initially thought to be a miracle -- benign, and quite useful. Yet, it turned out to be not so miraculous, when it was found that asbestos, once in the air, made its way into the body and played havoc with organic tissue. Like asbestos, nanotechnology has the potential for widespread application -- a day doesn't seem to go by without another news announcement of some other application of nanotechnology -- and widespread application means the stuff will make it into the air whether we like it or not. Will it pose the same danger as asbestos? Truth is, no one really knows. Nanoparticles fill our biosphere, and we breathe them in with every breath. Some are probably harmful, some not. One thing for sure, evolution has brought us along this far with nanoparticles -- yet, how different will the artificial stuff be? Have we just been lucky? If we need to adapt to nanotechnology, we're going to be in serious trouble, as evolution is a slow one for changes.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/21/2005 11:02:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    UK Should Lift Astronaut Ban

    That the UK has a ban in place, preventing the use of public money to fund sending astronauts into space is new to me. It is true however. England does not fund training and sending astronauts into space -- even via its commitment to ESA. A recent report by the Royal Astronomical Society however, suggests that the UK risks being left behind in the new push for human space exploration, unless it starts participating. The report suggests that while machines will continue to play a large role in space exploration, there's inherent value in having human participation that far outweighs the risks. Not sure I entirely agree with that take on things -- but let's face, it's more fun to have people landing on other planetary bodies than just robots.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/21/2005 12:49:00 AM 1 Comments Links to this post

    Thursday, October 20, 2005

    Borealis String Quartet

    Opening last night for Professor Clifford Will's lecture, Was Einstein Right?, was the Borealis String Quartet. I have no idea why the organizers of the lecture -- and the previous lectures I've been to recently -- feel the need to indulge us in some tortuous "music." Last night the Borealis String Quartet played two selections: Mozart's String Quartet in F major, K 590, and From Water to Ice, a piece written by Aaron Hryciw, a doctorate physics student of the University of Alberta. Apparently, From Water to Ice was written in recognition of the World Year of Physics. This piece was supposed to represent "water, freezing and ice" -- the different phases and the transition. Yeah, OK. I didn't get it. It sounded more like a piece of music written for a horror movie. That's not to say it was bad -- it was actually good -- just more fitting for a horror movie. I enjoyed it.

    I don't get the need for a musical introduction to the lectures, and wish they would just skip it and get on with the talk. If anyone out there is from the organizers -- please -- no more music. Some of the previous lectures had really crappy music.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/20/2005 11:16:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Was Einstein Right?

    Tonight I attended a lecture sponsored by the Perimeter Institute, the Canadian Association of Physicists and the University of Toronto: Was Einstein Right? with Professor Clifford M. Will of Washington University. Will is a theoretical physicist, who was born in Hamilton, Ontario, and got his math and physics undergrad degree from McMaster. He's held posts at various universities in the US, and is also a recognized "expert" on Albert Einstein. I have no idea what that means, but that's the claim his brief bio made on tonight's programme.

    Will is a pretty good speaker, who managed to bring the last one hundred years of Astronomy, from the perspective of Einstein's theories of general and special relativity, down the general audience level, without alienating too many of the science buffs in his audience. He cracked some real yawns, and had a wit that would only make a physicist laugh. His lecture didn't seek to answer the title's question -- rather, it served to educate the general audience, and as he put it, that was the job of a scientist -- to present what is known, and leave everyone to make up their own minds on whether Einstein got it right or not.

    Will looked at the early years of Einstein's theories -- before the 1950s -- and asked why the theory never took off? -- never developed further? His answer was a two-parter. 1) It was thought that Einstein's theory, steeped in mathematics, was way too complex for many to understand. Even fellow scientists stayed away from it. 2) Einstein's theory was just that -- a theory. There was no experimental counterbalance to validate the theory, and for a long time, the interplay between experiment and theory didn't happen. Yes, there were early proofs of Einstein's theory, but there wasn't a drive to validate his theories with experiment.

    In the 1960s, according to Will, the world witnessed a revolution in Astronomy. There were observations of some rather bizarre cosmic objects that didn't have a ready explanation. In general relativity however, theories could be found to explain what was being seen. Specifically, astronomers observed the first quasars; discovered the cosmic background radiation; observed the first pulsars; and found evidence for the existence of blackholes. Traditional Newtonian physics could not explain what was being seen, however Einstein's general relativity offered possibilities. This, with the explosion of technological advancements in the 1970s and university curricula that started emphasizing general relativity in graduate and undergraduate classes, set the stage for greater intellectual investment in general relativity.

    So, was Einstein right? I already mentioned that Will didn't answer the question. What he did however, was elaborated on tantalising tests for general relativity.
    1. General relativity postulates that space and time are one -- space-time -- a four-dimensional structure which is made malleable by matter, energy and their motion. Space-time deforms in four dimensions around energy and matter. In 1919, Frank Dyson, Charles Davidson and Arthur Eddington, obtained observational proof that space-time curves around matter by observing starlight being bent around the Sun during a solar eclipse.
    2. Space-time curvature also allows for lenses to occur, when space-time is deformed by high concentrations of mass, such a galaxy clusters. These gravitational lenses causes light from distant sources to warp, or form cosmic mirages.
    3. For sometime in the early 20th century, observations confirmed that Mercury's orbit was wobbling around the Sun -- known as Mercury's perihelion advance. This could not be accounted for by the gravitational influence of the Sun and other planets using Newtonian physics -- however, general relativity accurately predicted the observations.
    4. Frame-Dragging is another prediction of general relativity that was realized by Joseph Lense and Hans Thirring in 1918. Lense and Thirring prediction that rotating matter could also have an impact on space-time -- specifically, a rotating object could cause space-time to twist. NASA's Gravity Probe B is a test for this prediction. Observations were completed last month, and data is now being crunched.
    5. Just like the interaction of electricity and magnetism can generate electromagnetic waves, so too can the interaction of matter and energy generate gravitational waves, as predicted by general relativity. There is indirect evidence that gravitational waves exist via the binary pulsar system observed by Russell Hulse and Joseph Taylor -- however, there is no direct observations. Interferometer observatories around the world are now looking for the elusive waves. (LIGO, VIRGO, GEO, TAMA and LISA.)
    6. Finally, general relativity predicts that time would be impacted by gravity directly. Gravity probe A tested this postulate and proved it in 1976.


    According to Will, that Einstein was motivated to develop his theories not to solve some fundamental problem in physics, but to find a solution that was simple, beautiful and elegant is not that remarkable -- what is remarkable is how well his theories have held up to tests and scrutiny by science. With that, I have to agree. That's truly remarkable.

    Related links:

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/20/2005 12:08:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Wednesday, October 19, 2005

    NDA on DNA

    Most companies -- especially larger companies -- have non-discrimination policies. You know -- where they state that they don't care about your religion, age, gender, sexual preference, etc. -- really, they just care about increasing shareholder value. Whether the management staff -- at all levels -- live those commandments or not is a different story. Some habits are hard to change, and some discriminate, not even knowing that they do. Regardless, add to the list of things that companies should not be looking at when hiring, promoting and rewarding, is genetics. Genetics will become more and more a larger shroud hanging over society in this new century. IBM has taken the step of adding to their non-discrimination policy the stipulation that they will not discriminate using genetics either. It doesn't take much foresight to add the word genetics to the list -- yet, why aren't there many others doing the same? Probably because of ambivalence. Companies don't think it will ever become a problem. Sometimes I guess, you need a little disaster before change occurs.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/19/2005 08:23:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Abderian

    1. DrinkBoy -- Adventures in Cocktails. Many, many ways of just getting totally phished!
    2. www Marketing Phrase Generator -- marketing phrases that mean absolutely nothing ... by design.
    3. Kittiwat Unarrom -- call him Evil Bread Boy ... cause what else would you call a 28-year-old Thai art student, who makes break that looks like human body parts? Mom must be proud.(Click here for more pictures.)
    4. Sidewalk Chalk Guy -- I've posted about this dude before. Here's some more art that's really remarkable.
    5. Speedy Gonzalez (R-rated) -- whatever happened to Speedy Gonzalez? (And you can check out other toons that have slid from the public eye here.)

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/19/2005 12:58:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Tuesday, October 18, 2005

    The Brood

    Last night I saw the disturbing horror movie, The Brood, from David Cronenberg. Filmed in 1979, the movie remains one very creepy film. The movie stars Oliver Reed as Dr. Raglan, Samantha Eggar as Nola, Art Hindle as Frank and Cindy Hinds as Candice. Cronenberg is very effective in being creepy -- he uses the music and tension of the film to scare, without having to show the actual "brood." The Brood itself isn't frightening -- Cronenberg's use of them however, is. He pulls you in, building up the tension to such a degree that it becomes difficult to watch at times. The cinematography, music, acting -- everything about this film was just great. It's a classic, a masterpiece.

    In the film, Frank is growing distant from his institutionalized wife, Nola, who is undergoing psychiatric treatment by Dr. Raglan -- a psychiatrist who employs some unconventional techniques that makes patients relive and confront their emotions. Nola has visitation rights at Raglan's clinic with her young daughter, Candice. Frank thinks Raglan is a fraud, and his concerns increases when he notices scratches and bite marks on Candice after a visit with her mother. Apparently, Raglan's treatments of Nola is manifesting her emotions in the form of a horde of deformed children that grow from her body, responding to her emotions and going on a murdering spree against those who anger their "mother." As Nola relives her past, her brood follows through and lashes out with her anger. No one is safe -- not her parents, her husband, and apparently, not even her young daughter.

    As creepy as Nola's brood are, so is Cronenberg's exploration of Nola's past -- a past filled with emotional violence, childhood abuse from her mother, and the indifference from her father to it all. Samantha Eggar pulls off a quite disturbed Nola. As scary as Nola is, you also can't help but feel a bit sympathetic for her plight. She's a lost cause, and Frank is no help, as he doesn't understand her. Frank's only goal is to save his little daughter from her mother.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/18/2005 11:52:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Moments of Greatness

    I read a Harvard Business Review article while on the subway today: Moments of Greatness -- Entering the Fundamental State of Leadership. It's written by Robert E. Quinn of the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business -- who suggests that perhaps those great leaders out there are not really great all time -- mostly, they're like us, but every now and again, they have the capacity to enter into that fundamental state, where they truly lead. Quinn's conjecture is that great leaders are truly great because when they do go into that fundamental state, they do so not by emulating anyone, but "instead, they draw on their own fundamental values and capabilities -- operating in a frame of mind that is true to them."

    This fundamental state of leadership is one that is temporary. We all spend most of our time in what he labels the normal state -- the state of comfort, where we go with the flow, make compromises and allow ourselves to be led by external forces. We usually find ourselves in the fundamental state when we have no other option left available -- it's usually the state that make great leaders, because it is the state they find themselves in when faced with a crisis. To cope, great leaders leave their comfort zone, and by so doing, set an example for all to follow; inspire greatness; and become themselves, great -- because they did the unthinkable.

    To get to the fundamental state, Quinn's doctrine would have us ask ourselves four transformative questions.
    1. Am I results centered? "Being comfort centered," says Quinn, "is hypocritical, self-deceptive, and normal." It's the normal state, where we do the things we've always done. Faced with new, challenging problems, doing the same thing may not always work. People already know how to do what has been done before -- great leaders take them somewhere they've never been before. Great leaders focus on results, becoming "proactive, intentional, optimistic, invested, and persistent."
    2. Am I internally directed? In the normal state, we tend to be compliant with the norms and avoid conflict. This enables a shift away from being results oriented, to being focused on keeping the political peace. Being focused on getting along causes leaders to lose integrity.
    3. Am I other focused? In the normal state, we focus on ourselves. In the fundamental state, we "become more focused on others -- to the collective good in relationships, groups, or organizations."
    4. Am I externally open? Being in the normal state is to lock out external stimuli. Being open to external stimuli allows us to be open to learn from outside ourselves, and be aware of the need to change.

    The fundamental state is temporary, but Quinn's rote provides leaders with a process to give themselves a kick in the pants when needed. It's a way of pushing you to think outside your comfort zone, and allow your natural talents to take charge. It's a way of treating the need for leadership as a crisis, and I think it just may work ... as long as we remember to think about it, and divorce ourselves from our comfort.

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/18/2005 10:51:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Meanderings

    DJ BallmerFresh -- Let's start off with something way too funny. Check out this remix engine of Steve Ballmer's quotes set to hip hop beats. You do the mixing, Steve does the howling. From the Axis of Stevil site.

    What Really Pisses Me Off -- here's a bit of a rant from IT Architect magazine. I'll quote you a bit of what pisses Michel Labelle off:
    "... the vendor community is really starting to piss me off.
    I'm not talking about the stupid marketing claims they make. You know all those flyers that come in the mail that my mailroom guy thankfully recycles before they reach my desk--or worse, my boss' desk. I'm also not talking about the sleazy salespeople who clog my phone trying to sell me the latest widget for a problem I never knew existed.
    It's the consultants, implementation teams, and their project managers--but especially their self-imposed, underqualified, arrogant, self-righteous, know-nothing project managers."

    I love it!

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/18/2005 12:26:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post

    Sunday, October 16, 2005

    Quest for Other Worlds and Prospects for Life

    I attended the 3rd Cosmic Frontiers lecture last Friday -- a series of University of Toronto lectures celebrating a century of Astronomy at the university. This lecture was by Professor Debra Fischer of San Francisco State University, and was titled, Quest for Other Worlds and Prospects for Life. The full abstract as provided by UofT, describes the talk as follows:
    After a century of searching, the first planets outside our solar system were discovered 10 years ago. With a census of more than 150, these new worlds offer us some surprising insights into our own solar system. In this lecture, you'll learn:
    1. how these extrasolar planets were discovered
    2. whether astronomers now think that all stars host planetary systems
    3. how these other solar systems compare with our own
    4. about the implications for the existence of life in the galaxy
    Most of the known extrasolar planets are similar to Jupiter and Saturn, the big planets in our solar system. But, the race to discover Earthlike planets is now in full swing and it is likely that terrestrial worlds will be discovered in the next decade. This talk will set the stage for these coming attractions!

    Fischer's lecture was, as were the others of the series, directed towards the general audience -- for me however, there was a little less science, and a more generalization. Her entire lecture leaned heavily on pretty pictures -- which isn't entirely a bad thing -- pretty pictures are cool -- what was missing for me however, was exactly what it was we were looking at. She did identify what she showed, but didn't elaborate on really what they were. I guess I was looking for a little more Astronomy. Overall however, her lecture wasn't too bad. She's a clear and easy to understand speaker, and she did bring a lot of things down to the layperson level.

    Fischer first set the context for her lecture by telling her audience a little about our own solar system. Then, the discoverer of the first multi-planet system other than our own, went on to tell of the findings of planetary systems around other stars that are not too different from our own. It's amazing what can be accomplished with a few photons that have travelled for millions of years through space.

    From establishing that our solar system isn't alone anyone, Fischer went down the road of speculation to chat up her audience on the possibility of life elsewhere. She spoke of the Drake equation -- which arose from the SETI program. The equation is an attempt to quantify the possibility of extraterrestrial life. Fischer also expressed hope that the new Allen Telescope Array, which will be studying huge swathes of the sky using radio waves, while simultaneously doing SETI research, will bring in data that may add clarity to question: Is anyone out there?

    Finally, Fischer took on the biggest critic to those speculating on extraterrestrial life: those who support the rare Earth hypothesis -- which states that the conditions for creating life on Earth are so rare, that the chances of it occurring elsewhere is therefore very slim. Suggesting that we're probably alone in the universe and should get use to it. Fischer looked at the criteria the rare Earth believers use and took them apart one-by-one. She's definitely a believer in us not being alone. I think most Astronomers and their ilk have to be that way -- after all, what's the use spending so much time looking out there if you don't buy the possibility that there might be something out there staring back? As Fischer said, "We're here. And one data point is better than none." Maybe us being here is all the proof we'll ever get -- and that wouldn't be so bad.

    For related reading, check out the following:

    posted by Andy Dabydeen at 10/16/2005 10:42:00 PM 0 Comments Links to this post