Christina's Thoughts

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( Previous books )
24. Foundation by Isaac Asimov
25. Foundation and Empire by Isaac Asimov
26. Second Foundation by Isaac Asimov
27. Foundation's Edge by Isaac Asimov
28. Foundation and Earth by Isaac Asimov

It's been a long time since I read the Foundation series. And I have to say that, upon rereading them, I was rather less impressed than in the past. Oh, there are some interesting ideas, certainly. Extraordinarily weak characterizations, but interesting ideas.

The idea of Psychohistory is an interesting one. And I think it is, in general, quite plausible. We can already make some crude statistical predictions of human behavior. I think it's reasonable to suppose that one could predict the behavior of entire worlds and interstellar unions, at least in the short run. However, several problems exist in Asimov's idea of psychohistory:

( lengthy rant )

Also, another rant, more general to a lot of sci-fi, but present also in the Foundation series. The idea of a single galactic language. There are thousands of languages on Earth, including dozens with tens or hundreds of millions of speakers. I cannot believe that only one language would leave Earth. Speakers of many languages would leave Earth, especially once space travel became relatively cheap. The first wave would probably only have a few major languages, such as English, Spanish, Chinese, maybe a few other European languages. But other languages would follow. The earliest planets would almost certainly be multilingual. In the early days of space exploration, there would be few suitable planets available for colonization. And the first colonies would be small in number. I cannot believe that the first colonists on a planet would be able to stake a meaningful claim to the entire planet. There would be a number of independent settlements. Later on, as space travel became easier and the number of colony worlds grew, you might be able to have colonies staking a claim to their entire planet, so later worlds might be monolingual, but different worlds would have different languages. Some would speak English, some Spanish, some Chinese (probably several different Chinese languages), Japanese, Hindi, Swahili, German, Italian, Romanian, Russian, Arabic, Farsi, Urdu, and a whole host of other languages. Even small languages like Icelandic might find worlds of their own. Furthermore, even if somehow only a single language left Earth (all but one language had died out by that point? Don't believe it. I could buy the number of languages declining to a few dozen, but not to one), over the 8,000 years that had been said to have passed between the origins of hyperspatial travel and the rise of the Galacti Empire (and the 12,000 years between the rise and fall of the same), there'd be plenty of time for each world to evolve its own language. The Indo-European family of languages, which includes languages as distinct as English, French, Russian, Farsi, Hindi, is descended from a common ancestor generally believed to have been spoken somewhere around 6,000-10,000 years ago. 20,000 years would be enough to turn a single language into descendants unrecognizable as being related to each other (at least, under current linguistic understanding; but given both intermixing of languages and the obscuring tendencies of linguistic changes, I suspect that it would never be possible to reconstruct a family stretching back that far). There could be no "Galactic". At best, there'd be a dominant language, such as "Trantorian", known and used throughout the Empire, in the same way as English is often used in our world by non-native speakers. Even Star Wars did better than Foundation in that regards! C-3PO was said to be "fluent in over six million forms of communication"!

I was thinking out loud on Twitter, wondering if there's a word for "not disabled", other than "able-bodied, or variants like Temporarily Able Bodied (TAB) or Currently Able Bodied (CAB). Those two are used to emphasize the fact that anyone can become disabled, and thus, that those who are able-bodied aren't ensured of always being able-bodied. That word, in my opinion, is problematic as it ignores cognitive disabilities. One can have a cognitive disability and still be able-bodied.

For specifically cognitive disabilities, there exists the term NT (neurotypical) for those who aren't cognitively disabled, although it's sometimes used in a narrower sense of "non-autistic". So, perhaps able-bodied or TAB could be retained for specifically "one without physical disabilities". For one who is both TAB and NT, one could use the compound TAB/NT, pronounced similar to "hadn't", like "tabint". There are still contexts in which it makes sense to discuss physical disabilities or cognitive disabilities specifically, so TAB and NT still have their uses. But there are other contexts where it makes sense to discuss disability issues on a broader scale, and there TAB/NT would come in handy.

EDIT: goddess_amy suggests "TABANT" = Temporarily Able-Bodied And Neuro-Typical". That's a good one, too.

Current Mood: contemplative

This makes me sad. :-( Reading Rainbow is going off the air.

Current Mood: sad

Senator Ted Kennedy has just passed away

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/08/26/obit.ted.kennedy/

New Jersey judge rules that atheists cannot adopt.

What the fuck?

In an extraordinary decision, Judge Camarata denied the Burkes' right to the child because of their lack of belief in a Supreme Being. Despite the Burkes' "high moral and ethical standards," he said, the New Jersey state constitution declares that "no person shall be deprived of the inestimable privilege of worshiping Almighty God in a manner agreeable to the dictates of his own conscience." Despite Eleanor Katherine's tender years, he continued, "the child should have the freedom to worship as she sees fit, and not be influenced by prospective parents who do not believe in a Supreme Being."

Current Mood: angry

So much for the "Alpha Male" idea of wolf packs.

L. David Mech is a famous wolf researcher (and a blogger about his research). If you have heard of a concept of "alpha-male" it is because of ideas from an old book of his, about social structure of wolf societies.

However, most of the early research on wolves was done on artificially built groups, e.g., wolves caught in various places all put together in a single wolf pen at a zoo. In such rare and unnatural situations, these stranger-wolves do indeed form social hierarchies (or "pecking order" - a term that arose from studies of chickens). But such situations rarely if ever happen out in nature. A pack of wolves is usually composed of Mother, Father and their (sometimes quite grown-up) offspring: closely related individuals who know each other well.

These days, it is L. David Mech himself who is working the hardest to change the way we think about wolf (and dog) packs and to eliminate the term "alpha male" at least from studies of canid behavior if not from metaphors about human societies (hat-tip to Jim Henley). Decades have passed since his book came out, much research was done in the meantime (including by him and his students) and we now know better.

( Previous books )
22. World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks

World War Z is a collection of interviews with various survivors and veterans of the Zombie War, the great worldwide war against the zombie hordes. It was written a decade after Victory in China Day, considered the official end of major action, although there remain some zombies, who are still being eliminated as they are found. Through the stories told by the various interviewees, people from around the world, the horrors of the Zombie War are revealed, the disasters and the triumphs, from the US Army's catastrophic defeat at Yonkers and similar defeats by other nations, to the slow campaign to retake the world from the zombies, and stories from the continuing effort to eliminate the last of the zombies. Brooks describes the initial slow response to the zombies, the attempt to cover up the first major public outbreak, in South Africa, as "rabies" and the large-scale cover-up by the Chinese government, before it became impossible to conceal any longer.

The interviews are arranged chronologically, with stories from the earliest stages of the growing zombie threat at the beginning of the book, and the last clean-up at the end. He describes not only the horror of the zombie war, but also the ways humanity found to survive and fight back, the scarring of the land and the people from the global apocalypse, and the political changes as well, as in the Holy Empire of Russia and the rise of democracy in Cuba, after millions of refugees from the United States settled, temporarily, in Cuba, and brought with them democratic ideals that Castro could not suppress, especially not while simultaneously defending the nation from zombies.

It's an excellent book, a very unorthodox kind of horror, but a very engrossing one.

Oops, forgot a book.

( Previous Books )
21. I'm Looking Through You: Growing Up Haunted: A Memoir by Jennifer Finney Boylan

I'd already read She's Not There by the same author, which was another autobiography. I'm Looking Through You deals more with her childhood and with her relationships to her family. It focuses more on the internal struggle of her gender identity.

I've let this go too long without updating. :-)

( Previous Books )
13. Sexual Metamorphosis: An Anthology of Transsexual Memoirs Edited by Jonathan Ames
14. Evolution's Rainbow: Diversity, Gender, and Sexuality in Nature and People by Joan Roughgarden
15. Gender Shock: Exploding the Myths of Male and Female by Phyllis Burke
16. Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe by John Boswell
17. The Transgender Companion (Male to Female) by Jennifer Seeley
18. Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity by Julia Serrano
19. Hermaphrodites and the Medical Invention of Sex by Alice Domurat Dreger
20. Transgender Warriors: Making History from Joan of Arc to RuPaul by Leslie Feinberg

Some very interesting books here. ( Evolution's Rainbow )

( Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe )

( Whipping Girl )

( Hermaphrodites and the Medical Invention of Sex )

This is hilarious! It's a Modest Proposal-style satire of the anti-same-sex-marriage arguments, applying them to left-handed people. :D



Satire at its best. :D

Current Mood: amused

From LJ:

Oooh! I like this guy's ideas! http://www.tyznik.com/graphic/currency/

It's an imaginary redesign of US banknotes. Very nice designs! Deminations from $5 to $200 (he also suggets replacing the $1 and $2 bills with coins, and eliminating the penny)

Current Mood: happy

Apparently the stories of blue food dye healing spinal cord injuries were in error. It was not blue food dye, but rather, a similar chemical.

Still very interesting, though. :-)

Dirt-cheap blue food dye may aid recovery from spinal-cord injuries. This is a substance that's been used since 1928, and they only just discovered this benefit. It requires direct injection into the bloodstream. The article said there was a side-effect that the rats turned blue. I would hope that's a temporary side effect, but even if not, I'd rather have blue skin and be not paralyzed then keep my skin color and be paralyzed ...

The article said that it has to be administered within 15 minutes of the injury, which is one major disadvantage. And there are some other questions as to whether it could work in humans. But, if it does, it would be simply amazing! An incredibly cheap, completely non-toxic, drug to treat spinal-cord injuries? Awesome!

Current Mood: excited

LOL! Taken from robynsummers

These are real comments from British Holiday makers as written on the post holiday surveys from Thomas Cook. (Survey by Thomas Cook and ABTA) :

"I think it should be explained in the brochure that the local store does not sell proper biscuits like custard creams or ginger nuts."

"It's lazy of the local shopkeepers to close in the afternoons. I often needed to buy things during 'siesta' time - this should be banned."

"On my holiday to Goa in India , I was disgusted to find that almost every restaurant served curry. I don't like spicy food at all."

"We booked an excursion to a water park but no-one told us we had to bring our swimming costumes and towels."

A tourist at a top African game lodge overlooking a waterhole, who spotted a visibly aroused elephant, complained that the sight of this rampant beast ruined his honeymoon by making him feel "inadequate".

A woman threatened to call police after claiming that she'd been locked in by staff. When in fact, she had mistaken the "do not disturb" sign on the back of the door as a warning to remain in the room.

"The beach was too sandy."

"We found the sand was not like the sand in the brochure. Your brochure shows the sand as yellow but it was white."

A guest at a Novotel in Australia complained his soup was too thick and strong. He was inadvertently slurping the gravy at the time.

"Topless sunbathing on the beach should be banned. The holiday was ruined as my husband spent all day looking at other women."

"We bought 'Ray-Ban' sunglasses for five Euros (£3.50) from a street trader, only to find out they were fake."

"No-one told us there would be fish in the sea. The children were startled."

"It took us nine hours to fly home from Jamaica to England it only took the Americans three hours to get home."

"I compared the size of our one-bedroom apartment to our friends' three-bedroom apartment and ours was significantly smaller."

"The brochure stated: 'No hairdressers at the accommodation'. We're trainee hairdressers - will we be OK staying here?"

"There are too many Spanish people. The receptionist speaks Spanish. The food is Spanish. Too many foreigners."

"We had to queue outside with no air conditioning."

"It is your duty as a tour operator to advise us of noisy or unruly guests before we travel."

"I was bitten by a mosquito - no-one said they could bite."

"My fiancé and I booked a twin-bedded room but we were placed in a double-bedded room. We now hold you responsible for the fact that I find myself pregnant. This would not have happened if you had put us in the room that we booked."

Current Mood: amused

Jones Soda made a special limited-time Magic: The Gathering version of their soda. I find that rather amusing. :-)

Current Mood: amused

1. Reply to this post with 'Icons!', and I will pick five of your icons.
2. Make a post (including the meme info) and talk about the icons I chose.
3. Other people can then comment to you and make their own posts.
4. This will - allegedly - create a never-ending cycle of icon glee.

the_terrible gave me:



Anya from Buffy expressing glee over making money. I like to use this for posts relating to buying stuff. Cause people spending money makes Anya a happy demon. :-)



A symbol used by my fictitious Kasshi culture. It doesn't really mean anything, although one could read various meanings into it. :-) I use it for posts about worldbuilding, which are mostly to communities.



Other worlds. I use this for astronomy-related posts/comments (more of then the latter). I like it because I find it rather pretty. :-)



'Nique from Sinfest being curious about something. I really like her character. She's pretty cool. :-) I mostly use this for things that I find curious or odd.



Yuuki from Sparkling Generation Valkyrie Yuuki, shortly after he was turned into a girl. And, of course, couldn't stop groping himself. XD Made by my good buddy hazumuchan

On the linguistic problems of "Darmok" (the Star Trek:TNG episode). Total agreement on that.

Great line, from the end: Still, it's not a bad bit of sci-fi TV.  That's due in large part to Patrick Stewart, who seems to have the mutant ability to take any script, even one which doesn't entirely make sense, and infuse it with sincerity and meaning.  ("That's why they call it acting.")  This helps some, but for me, it's not enough to save "Darmok" from its flaws.

http://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=246#comic

Current Mood: amused

Ant Mega-Colony Found to Extend Around the Globe Billions of ants forming a single colony!

Humor, from the Onion:

Amazing New Hyperbolic Chamber Greatest Invention in the History of Mankind Ever Great parody of the way the media often overhypes new discoveries. :-D

Seven Million People Direct Descendants of Smooth-Talking Ancestor. The funny thing about that is, a considerable number of people living in the 9th century would have far more than 7 million descendants. :-) Indeed, it's been estimated that all Western Europeans have a common ancestor who lived somewhere around the year AD 1000.

LOL! On Google Maps, if you put in a start city somewhere in North America and a destination in Japan or Australia, it will include the direction "Kayak across the Pacific Ocean"

Current Mood: amused

Happy birthday, meganekko and neuraesthete!

Women Have Become Too Easy apparently.

That article really ticks me off.

An object that has value is worshipped, respected, cherished, and shared with very few deserving people. As soon as you start sharing that object with anyone and without care, the object starts to lose value. The more people use the object, the more it depreciates and the less bargaining power it has: this is a plain psychological fact of life.

Most women don't realize the importance men place on a woman's promiscuity. Women think that because men don't care about how many women they've slept with, they won't care about how many men their woman has slept with. But the reality is that most men (those looking for a serious relationship and not a one-night stand) do place great value on a woman's sexual restraint.

There was a time when many women cherished their bodies much like a sacred temple. Where only a noble man, one who respected and loved her, had access to her body.

Men recognize the power of a woman's sexuality. In turn, men appreciate and place great value on women who can control themselves and demonstrate a certain degree of sexual discipline because most men certainly can't.

Over the past years, most women have lost a sense of value for their sexuality. They've realized that sex is fun and pleasurable, but in the process, they've forgotten that it's the one gift that they can offer their lover, and that so many men value.

Think about it for a moment: if men value a woman's purity so much, how do you think they feel when they receive the same gift offered to so many other men? Here's a better example: if I were to offer Stacy the same engagement ring that I once offered my ex-fiancée, would she appreciate it? I'm sure she wouldn't, and it's only a ring. Then how do you think men feel when a woman offers herself once she's already offered it to so many other men?

There used to be a time when women could signal to a man, "If you stay with me, I'll let you have my body." But now men are saying, "It's okay, you can keep it because with all this supply, it's just not worth as much as it once was."

That's why today, we find a lot of women complaining that men no longer want to commit. This is false; men still want to commit, but women no longer have that special gift to bait men into a relationship.

After all, if the body becomes familiar and the personality becomes aggravating, what else is there left to commit to? Well, I'd like to think that it is the woman's special gift that keeps a man hooked.

Current Mood: annoyed

Wow ... from Faux News discussing a study that finds that married people are at a lower risk of alzheimer's. Arguing about why it doesn't apply to Americans. Very bigotted "reasoning" ...