One of the unsung disasters of contemporary academic life is the death of the physical library. There are so many disasters in current year academia, I doubt as anyone else grouses much about this, but as a great enthusiast for the KNN algorithm, I will complain about it. My mid-late physics career had many happy […]
Death of the physical library
Category: Politics and Society
Points of politics.
Churches are failing Millennials, but not for reasons they will admit
I’ve seen this article talking about how churches need to adapt to Millennial needs floating around my feed and I think it’s worth addressing.
A point the author entirely misses is that many people simply don’t buy the worldview that church is selling. To many, it stretches credibility at best or is wholly absurd at worst. A majority of Millennials polled believe in God, but are unwilling to tie themselves to a particular theological label. Of course, maybe I’m wrong, too, since UU and Quakers are seeing similar membership declines.
I wonder if the primary factors influencing church membership are economics and time. More young people are working longer hours, have multiple jobs to make ends meet, and feel tied down to a tighter daily schedule. TV church, live streams, and podcasts are available on our own schedule, not needing to block off half of a day religiously.
A lot of the comments I see on this are from Baby Boomer parents probably frustrated by their own adult children’s lack of attendance. I see lines like “just show up and WORSHIP” which might as well just be saying “STOP WHINING.” But that misses the point. If you feel alienated from your social surroundings, where the institution itself seems hostile to your values and way of being, it’s hard to focus on being self-reflective. And why support something that doesn’t share your values? Blind tradition?
…Or maybe this is all the death throes of an ultimately self-destructive ideology. Or just more cataclysmic prophecy from a group who like to make cataclysmic prophecies; that definitely seems to be part of the M.O.
Roy Glauber at TAMU-T speaking about The Manhattan Project
Why Ayn Rand shouldn’t be taken seriously
“[The Native Americans] didn’t have any rights to the land and there was no reason for anyone to grant them rights which they had not conceived and were not using…. What was it they were fighting for, if they opposed white men on this continent? For their wish to continue a primitive existence, their “right” to keep part of the earth untouched, unused and not even as property, just keep everybody out so that you will live practically like an animal, or maybe a few caves above it. Any white person who brought the element of civilization had the right to take over this continent.”
– Ayn Rand, Libertarian ubermadchen
And fans ask why Ayn Rand isn’t taken seriously in academic circles.
Do you know Dokdo?
Do You Know Dokdo? Written by MOON YOUNG Sung by SEO HEE
1. Dokdo/ the beautiful islands have been/ parts of Korean land
For the/ last two thousands of years./ they are Korean land
Located in/ the middle of/ East Sea we call.
They comprise/ two main isles/ East and West Islets.
Everybody/ wants to be there/’cause of the holy Sights
Everybody wants to be there/hoping to meet Seagulls.
Yes, nobody is/ greedy for them/’cause of the holy Sights.
But some people/ covet them/that is real/ nonsense!
Korea Korea/ proud to be Koreans.
I’m willing to die/ for the/ peace of /Korea.
Dokdo Dokdo/I’ll keep it for my sake.
I love I love/ Dokdo forever
I love I love/ Dokdo forever
2. Dokdo/ the peaceful islands have been/parts of Korean hearts
Since the Shilla/ King Jijung/conquered Usan Land.
Though the long/ war was over/ some ones feel no/ peace yet.
Foolish men/ start to say /silly empty talks.
Everybody/ wants to be there/’cause of the holy Sights
Everybody wants to be there/hoping to meet Seagulls.
Yes, nobody is/ greedy for them/’cause of the holy Sights.
But some people/ covet them/that is real/ nonsense!
Korea Korea/ proud to be Koreans.
I’m willing to die/ for the/ peace of /Korea.
Dokdo Dokdo/I’ll keep it for my sake.
I love I love/ Dokdo forever
I love I love/ Dokdo forever
Korea Korea/ proud to be Koreans.
I’m willing to die/ for the/ peace of /Korea.
Dokdo Dokdo/I’ll keep it for my sake.
I love I love/ Dokdo forever
I love I love/ Dokdo forever
I love I love/ Dokdo forever
Do you know Dokdo?
Dokdo is Korean land!
Take a speedy cruiser, my friend
from the port of Ulleung island
and glide like a silver dolphin
slicing waves with its fin.Keep running eighty-seven kilometer around
south eastern bound,
you’ll see Dokdo looking like ocean hermit
having two-little rock summit.Mystic rocks standing tall
steep cliffs like a wall
and many white seagulls flying
got me fascinated in my mind.This is our beautiful Dokdo where
we got to protect with care
from some Japanese pirates
coveting like the rats.She’s been keeping us with honesty
in the east since Shilla Dynasty
like the guardian of heirs
for fifteen hundred years.And she has many
migratory fishes in the East sea,
and a maritime petro-resources
under the bottom of the deep sea.Do you know Dokdo in the East Sea is Korean land
We all love Dokdo and that island is our land.
Do you know Dokdo in the East Sea is Korean land
Won’t you leave for Dokdo together with our band.
Network Neutrality simplified
I wrote a letter to my local paper giving a simplified explanation of the network neutrality issue, for the low-tech crowd. You can read it below:
The FCC is considering a proposal to allow Internet service companies to give higher and lower priority status to websites who pay special fees, and to restrict consumer access to websites who don’t pay for this special status. Consumers pay for access to the Internet, which means all of the websites on it; websites pay their own Internet service costs. This proposal is akin to companies setting up an extra tollway on a road you already paid to use.
FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler is a former lobbyist for these Internet service providers. The fox is in the henhouse and the FCC is now being abused to give special kickbacks to Internet service companies, and in doing so risks the free flow of ideas in America. Your favorite websites will soon be slower or go completely dark, unless they pay the special fees. If your local Internet service company doesn’t like a website because it doesn’t agree with their politics, they can block it altogether.
The only viable solution is to reclassify Internet service as a common carrier. This would make it like phone service. Your phone company can’t decide who you can and cannot call, and Internet companies shouldn’t be able to control which Websites work and which Websites don’t.
Open Letter to Senators John Cornyn and Ted Cruz
An Open Letter to Senators Cornyn and Cruz:
On May 15, FCC chairman Tom Wheeler, who comes from the telecom industry and who will presumably return there once his term as a regulator for the telecommunications industry ends, will reveal his proposal that is expected to represent a turning point in the history of the Internet. There are indications that he will be moving us away from net neutrality. the concept that ISPs can’t prioritize or de-prioritize certain internet traffic and towards a “commercially reasonable” litmus test. In other words, ISPs will likely be allowed to treat online traffic however they please as long as people like Tom Wheeler deem what they decide to do “commercially reasonable.”
Wheeler has been an executive at two lobbying groups: he was the President of the National Cable Television Association (NCTA) and the CEO of the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association (CTIA). I have to infer, based on that history and the news that he plans institute the “commercially reasonable” standard, that these new rules are designed to benefit the major telecom and ISP companies rather than the public at large.
This is a prime example of regulatory capture: the current chairman of the FCC was an executive at lobbying firms for the industry he’s now regulating. The fox is in the henhouse, and the FCC can’t be trusted to do the right thing when they’re controlled opposition for the companies they’re supposed to be keeping in check.
As such, I am asking you to introduce a simple bill that would re-classify ISPs as Title II common carriers and which would briefly clarify that ISPs may neither prioritize nor de-prioritize any information flowing through their networks.
Failing to prevent the decay of net neutrality would have widespread consequences. If the FCC is allowed to apply a “commercially reasonable” standard at Tom Wheeler’s discretion, we will see the stifling of both online activism and the free association of like-minded individuals online and, almost inevitably, an assault on the freedom of the press (Did a muckraking journalist just publish a groundbreaking investigation of the ISP industry? Guess what webpage isn’t going to be loading anytime soon.).
Please do not allow ISPs to dictate the future of the First Amendment.
Do the right thing and re-classify ISPs as common carriers.
More information can be found at www.savetheinternet.com
The country is governed…
“The country is governed for the richest, for the corporations, the bankers, the land speculators, and for the exploiters of labor. The majority of mankind are working people. So long as their fair demands – the ownership and control of their livelihoods – are set at naught, we can have neither men’s rights nor women’s rights. The majority of mankind is ground down by industrial oppression in order that the small remnant may live in ease.” -Helen Keller, 1911
Blackout Day
Today is blackout day.