Archive for the ‘Society’ Category
edwinleap.com | Sunday morning in the ER
The whole post is a good read, but the following caught my eye:
A reflection: Is our national medical obsession with chest pain a manifestation of our national anxiety and fear of uncertainty? Of our national terror of death, or our collective unease even in the face of relative security and prosperity? Is it because we’ve subsituted faith for pharmaceuticals?
via edwinleap.com | Sunday morning in the ER.
My answer: yes. More specifically, we have substituted Science as the religion, humanity as supreme, and have found both sorely lacking.
Private donors to cover city’s costs for Los Angeles Lakers championship parade – ESPN
Private donors agreed to cover nearly $1 million in taxpayer costs for a parade honoring the NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers. The prospect of the cash-strapped city having to cover the bill had drawn strong criticism.
The costs for police, traffic control and other services for Wednesday’s parade were still being calculated, but they were expected to run a bit under $1 million, said Julie Wong, an aide to City Council president Eric Garcetti.
via Private donors to cover city’s costs for Los Angeles Lakers championship parade – ESPN.
My wife has a great point, how does it cost $1 million for a city to throw a parade? Does it usually cost that much? I want to see the analysis!
Sarah Palin — One heartbeat away from ‘Four More Years’?
Well, unless you have been living underneath a rock, you might have noticed that Mccain has announced his running-mate, Sarah Palin.
All you need to do is hit google, or keep up with the wikipedia link above to get all that is known (or, rather, not known) about Sarah Palin. There are a lot of faults that are being pointed out, but what I find most troubling has to do with the most important job of the vice-presidency.
I like McCain. Not enough to vote for him necessarily, but certainly I think our country would have been better off if he was the President the last eight years rather than Bush, Gore, or Kerry. I also think he is experienced enough and strong enough to follow what he thinks is right rather than that of his party.
I have always felt that John McCain was a principled man who did things right rather than BS around, but I seriously wonder if this presidential run as changed him. He himself said was the most important criteria for Vice-Presidency : “”person most prepared to take my place.” Sarah Palin may be a wonderful person (I don’t know), but by that standard she seems to be woefully lacking. It appears that John McCain is more interested in winning the election than finding someone fit for the job.
Sarah Palin’s lack foreign policy, and Washington political experience is really concerning. If she ends up president, it won’t be long until the Republican machine (i.e. Dick Cheney) takes over everything that happens inside the White House.
Let’s face it, John McCain’s health isn’t the best to begin with, and even if it was good, things happen to people, and people die suddenly without warning. Is this country ready for even the possibility of “Four More Years” ?
Blackle – is it a scam?
I’ve gotten a number of emails, and people seem to be getting excited about a website named blackle.com. I finally decided to look into it, and what I find is a little disappointing.
Don’t get me wrong. Blackle is an ingenious idea… for the founders. It preys on the guilt we all feel as we use more energy and natural resources in order to do what we need to do from day to day. The premise is that by simply changing to a black background, we can each save a little bit of energy each time we use Google. Given how many people use Google everyday, the potentially energy savings are can appear to be high.
Blackle.com is simply a Google Custom Search placed on a black background. Anyone in the Adsense program can get a Google Custom Search bar, and get paid by Google everytime someone uses it. So Blackle is clearly a great way to make some quick cash with only a little effort, particularly if you can get people to use it regularly.
It also preys on our inherent laziness. It’s easy to change our homepage, and so with just a push of the button, we line the pockets of Blackle’s founders.
But is the claim even true? Like all things, not everything is so simple. You will save 5-20% if you are using a old-style CRT monitor,. According to recent data, less than 25% of the web use CRT monitors. If you are using an LCD screen, you might be actually using MORE energy. LCD monitors work by having a continuously on backlight, and energy used to block the light from coming through the LCD screen to our eyes. Some case reports of people testing their own monitors has shown that this energy increase may be measurable. By the way, if you are using a CRT monitor you are also using about 5 times more energy CONTINUOUSLY compared to an LCD monitor. If energy conservation is really your concern, it might be time to switch. LCD prices have come down a lot.
To make things more complicated, the monitor is only a small component of the total amount of energy used when you surf a website. Energy is used by every server, every router, every wire that the data traverses to get to service point and back. So, not only are you sending data packets to the Google search engine server, but also to the Blackle server as well. Google maintains a huge infrastructure of servers placed all over the world so that the closest server will serve up the page to optimize speed. Google also has made multiple efforts to be carbon neutral, and strategically builds server facilities near environmentally friendly energy sources such as hydroelectric power.
Overall, I would only consider using Blackle if you have a CRT screen, and even then I’m not sure it will make much of a difference. I’d suggest that if you feel guilty about the environmental impact you are making on this world (as you should), then I’d suggest getting involved more pro-actively.
References:
- Wikipedia – Blackle
- Triplepundit.com – Askpablo – Black Google
- Seopher.com – Blackle – the evil environmentally friendly search engine
- Discussion thread on forums.techarp.com
- techlogg.com – Black Google power saving figures are wrong
- Greenbang.com – In the dark: Blackle may not save as energy as hoped
Newspaper Articles:
Law of Unintended Consequences
One of the hardest things to try to explain to people when discussing various kinds of institutional or governmental policy is the law of unintended consequences. It basically says the policy can have effects that are very different than what one expects. History is full of examples, yet people continue to believe that the idea/policy is smart enough to prevent thousands or millions of people from figuring out a way to mess it up while imaginatively trying to better their lives. It shouldn’t scare someone from trying to change things, but steps need to be taken to measure the change in order to ensure that what was intended to happen is indeed happening.
Glen Whitman, an associate professor of economics at California State University, Northridge, wrote a very nice article on this topic, linked here. It is worth a read, as it explains an idea which can be difficult to explain in a nice, accessible way.
The article is also saved after the break for archival purposes.
NYT: A Word to College Freshmen
New York Times has an Op-Ed piece from William Chace, a former president at Wesleyan and Emory. It’s worth a read, and discusses the cost of college education.
I know you’re worried about money. I’m not telling you or your folks anything new when I say that Laudable looks expensive. The tuition increases here, just like those of our competitors, have outstripped the rate of increase in the consumer price index for years. This fall, tuition, room and board averages almost $32,000 at Laudable and other private colleges, and more than $15,000 at public ones.
Timothy Keller transcript: the problem of suffering
Some of you may be familiar with Tim Keller, the head pastor at Redeemer Presbytarian Church here in New York.
Linked below is the transcript of a speech made by Tim Keller in an anniversary service to the families of victims of 9/11, made on September 10th, 2006. The transcript is originally found on the blog of his son here.
For those of you who haven’t heard Tim Keller speak, I have to also recommend listening to his words shortly after the event, available at the Redeemer Sermon Store (I get no proceeds… ) You can download many free samples there as well.
As a minister, of course, I’ve spent countless hours with people who are struggling and wrestling with the biggest question – the WHY question in the face of relentless tragedies and injustices. And like all ministers or any spiritual guides of any sort, I scramble to try to say something to respond and I always come away feeling inadequate and that’s not going to be any different today. But we can’t shrink from the task of responding to that question. Because the very best way to honor the memories of the ones we’ve lost and love is to live confident, productive lives. And the only way to do that is to actually be able to face that question. We have to have the strength to face a world filled with constant devastation and loss. So where do we get that strength? How do we deal with that question? I would like to propose that, though we won’t get all of what we need, we may get some of what we need 3 ways: by recognizing the problem for what it is, and then by grasping both an empowering hint from the past and an empowering hope from the future.
NYT: At Colleges, Women Are Leaving Men in the Dust
Another day, another alarmist article on society from the New York Times.
It seems that guys make up only 42% of the college applicants now, compared to 58% women. Some colleges actually have campuses where women outnumber men 2:1. Apparently some colleges have actually started to favor guys to even up the proportions. Now all the alarm surrounds “The New Gender Divide” and “What’s Wrong with the Boys?”
Anybody who’s been around teenagers and college aged kids know that many girls at the higher levels are more academically inclined that guys. I’m still waiting until women start representing in Fortune 500 companies and various high end professions, however. Labor statistics still show that women make 70% for every dollar her male counterpart makes.
On a side note, what’s going on with Harvard and the grade inflation? The Times states that 55% of the women are graduating with honors. I thought only 20% of the graduating class was supposed to graduate with honors. I don’t know what the overall numbers are, but this grade inflation stuff is getting ridiculous.
The Article reproduced below:
