Fun Little Internet Radio Station

So Kelly pointed me to a cute little Internet radio station.

It's at the French Connection (FCUK). Click on the "fcuk fm" link at the top of the page and then click on "tune in now" on the popup page that occurs.

They change DJ's all the time. Their slogan is "none of the hits, none of the time," though about half of the time I hear songs that I've heard before more than once, and even SOME of the time I hear what I'd call a "hit." But most of the time it's fresh and new.

Stoned at AskOxford?

From the AskOxford Word of the Day (emphasis added):

dulosis
=======
[Brit. dyoo-LOH-sis; US d(y)oo-LOH-sis] the technical term for the enslavement of ants, by ants. The adjective is dulotic.

Sadly, there has never been an ant Abraham Lincoln, so there is no ant Emancipation Proclamation, or even any ant Harriet Beecher Stowe.

It's a good thing they took the time to add that last part. Yep. Ant Emancipation Proclamation. Way to go, guys.

Microwaves, Faraday Cages, and the Xenaverse

In a recent CNN article, Passport chips raise privacy concerns, there are a number of disturbing quotes made by the author that question whether the author really was ready to publish.

The worst of them is:

Wrapping your passport in aluminum foil actually works. It is called a "Faraday Cage," and it's the same thing that protects you from the microwaves as you watch your popcorn pop. The foil blocks electromagnetic waves so a nearby chip reader can't force your passport chip to perk up and say "howdy."

Now, let's put aside the fact that it is completely unnecessary to mention Faraday Cages here. It would have been sufficient to just say that wrapping a passport in aluminum foil prevents remote access (though that's not necessarily true, but we'll get to that). Let's put aside the fact that it is COMPLETELY UNNECESSARY to talk about electronics PERKING UP TO SAY HOWDY. After that, we're left with the fact that the thing that protects you from microwaves while popping popcorn is NOT so much a Faraday Cage but the SKIN EFFECT. Faraday Cages work great at low frequencies. However, at high frequencies the time it takes for the charge carriers within the metal to compensate for the oscillations of the field is not negligible! Any lag and the Faraday Cage will cease to work! So for high frequencies, it is the "skin effect" that prevents radiation from escaping. Microwaves attenuate very quickly in a lossy material like copper, and thus very few microwaves can escape the unit. For copper, the "skin depth" can be as little as micrometers (millionths of a meter). All of that energy gets dissipated in the resistance of the copper metal surrounding the microwave.

So those are her big strikes. She brings up technical detail that's not needed. She makes reference to electronics saying "howdy," and finally she makes a completely inappropriate reference to Faraday Cages.

But we're lucky enough to spot some other problems with this article. In particular:

The passport chips will hold much more data, from 64 kilobytes to eventually 514 kilobytes, as much as the first personal computers. They will hold the same information as a paper passport plus a digitized photo and face template for the still-unproven facial recognition software, which also is supposed to identify you from a distance, unnoticed.

Now, that's not supposed to be 514 kilobytes. That's supposed to be 512 kilobytes. Thus, her editors also are to blame here. But then she goes on to say how that is "as much as the first personal computers." This statement is not necessary. It could have just as equally been applied to "64 kilobytes," and it is completely irrelevant. It is meant to imply that this is a LOT of data. However, the first personal computers were not storing RECOGNIZABLE IMAGES. The amount of information entropy in a recognizable image is going to take up most of that space.

And on top of all of this, her language is very poor. For example:

The fact that passport data can be read unencrypted, with no physical contact, from up to 30 feet away, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, upsets privacy advocates for two reasons.

This is a one sentence paragraph. I would argue that nearly every word could be reordered, but then I would feel petty.

And at the end of the article, after that Faraday Cage mess, we get:

Try it out with your work I.D. card or a toll-booth pass. I wouldn't recommend wrapping your micro-chipped dog in Reynolds Wrap, however. Neighbors might think you were planning a barbecue.

HELLO?!!

So I decided to look up this woman to see if she had any contact information available. It looks like she does. She has HER OWN WEBSITE at http://www.nutball.com/. Personally, I think the domain name is very appropriate. On her site, she has links to her doctoral dissertation. The title of her doctoral dissertation involves the Xenaverse. Sounds like some interesting research.

Gonzales is a Bad Man, a Stupid Bad Man

So this morning I listened to many of the Gonzales responses to questions from Senators. It was shocking.

Ashcroft was a nightmare, but I'm pretty sure Gonzales is the reincarnation of Hitler or at least high ranking SS. The interesting thing is that after NPR ran the Gonzales story, they ran a case about a guy being tried for his work in the KKK.

Gonzales could at least answer the questions like a reasonable person. He could at least make some comments that at least SOUND sane. But instead he sounds like a tiny little GWBush trying to allow for a loophole that allows torture, but in the end not really caring because no one should be questioning the actions of the executive branch.

The guy actually said that when we spend time investigating things like Abu Ghraib we become more like our enemy. What does that even mean?!

I didn't think I'd hate this man this much, but I do! He's just another Bush cronie. He's a sad excuse for a moral man. This administration is populated with moral weaklings, and they seem to take pride in that.

Social Security: "Plan 2" the new "Plan 9" ?

In a recent article posted on CNN, What privitization alone can't do, some interesting numbers are presented. I include an excerpt of the article here. Note that my excerpt is biased, so see the full article for a LESS biased handling of this subject.

Additionally, note that "Plan 2" is the leading Bush administration proposal for social security reform.

[ also note that "Plan 9" is the name of a research operating system developed to bring to research what UNIX cannot; it was named after the "Worst Film Ever Made", Ed Wood's Plan 9 From Outer Space ]

The CBO estimates that [under Plan 2] when a worker
earning the median income born in 1990 retires, he would receive
$14,500 a year in today's dollars. That includes the money he'd
draw from his personal investment account – assuming a 4.9
percent annual return -- and his Social Security benefits.

Under the current system, that worker is promised a benefit of
$23,300. But even critics of privatization acknowledge that the
current promise can't be met since the system won't be taking
in enough revenue when he retires to pay out all its obligations.

But even if the system only paid out what it could afford to --
about 80 percent of the current promise -- the worker in this
example would receive $18,100, which is $3,600 more than
he'd get under Plan 2.

Whatever changes are made to Social Security, President
Bush has made clear that the benefit levels of current and near
retirees would not be affected, although he has not specified
what ages define "near" retirees.

Now, to put things into perspective:

Some New Arguments Against Privitization of Social Security

More NYTIMES articles about Social Security. This time by someone other than PAUL KRUGMAN. :)

See Choose and Lose by BARRY SCHWARTZ at http://www.tedpavlic.com/lqb/NYTIMES_choose_and_lose.php.

One quote:

THERE are three arguments being
made in favor of privatizing part of Social Security.
First, the Social Security Trust Fund needs money and
privatization will, in the long run, increase the amount of
money available to retirees. Second, privatization will
give people choice, and choice is good. And third, "it's
your money," and you ought to be able to do with it as you
wish.

Each of these arguments is dubious, or disingenuous, or
both.
. . .
There are several problems with this argument, however. For
starters, there is no guarantee that equities will return
more than Treasury bills. One of the reasons that equities
have a higher rate of return than other types of
investments is that investors have to be compensated for
taking risks. Perhaps equities will outperform Treasury
bills in the long term but that doesn't mean that they will
be outperforming Treasury bills at the specific moment you
retire.
. . .
What's more, the administrative costs of keeping track of
these private accounts, according to President Bush's
Commission to Strengthen Social Security, will be 10 to 30
times the cost of administering the current system, eating
up almost all of the hypothetical gains that equity
investments could provide.

I recommend you read the entire article (it's short). It brings up a lot of "new" good arguments against privitizing Social Security.

Gecko-Inspired TAPE

Researchers are working on the next great adhesive now, and they are borrowing the technology from Geckos. They've made prototype tape that's really strong. From an article from June of 2003:

Gecko-Inspired Adhesive Sticks It to Traditional Tape

Their prototype--which consists of an array of microfabricated polyimide hairs attached to a flexible base . . . --exhibits an adhesive force per hair that is comparable to that of a gecko foot-hair . . . Because the adhesive is dry, it can be attached and detached repeatedly . . . But the researchers' calculations show that if they had enough to cover a human palm (200 square centimeters or so), gecko tape could support the weight of an average person.

Now, in a more recent article from this month:

Scientists Unravel How Geckos Keep Their Sticky Feet Clean

"Self-cleaning in gecko setae may occur because it is energetically favorable for particles to be deposited on the surface rather than remain adhered to the spatulae," they write in the current issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

It turns out that if they make the adhesive fibers out of the right kinds of materials, they'll actually be self cleaning. It will be energetically favorable for dirt particles to stay on the surface and not on the adhesive!

Details inside.

Printed on a bag of Fritos:

You could be a winner! No purchase necessary. Details inside.

Just sit and think about it for a second.

Social Security: Two More Articles

From a January 4, 2005 Krugman NYTimes Article:
Stopping the Bum's Rush

Politically, that seems far-fetched. A general fiscal
crisis, on the other hand, is a real possibility - but not
because of Social Security. In fact, the Bush
administration's scaremongering over Social Security is in
large part an effort to distract the public from the real
fiscal danger.

There are two serious threats to the federal government's
solvency over the next couple of decades. One is the fact
that the general fund has already plunged deeply into
deficit, largely because of President Bush's unprecedented
insistence on cutting taxes in the face of a war. The other
is the rising cost of Medicare and Medicaid.

As a budget concern, Social Security isn't remotely in the
same league. The long-term cost of the Bush tax cuts is
five times the budget office's estimate of Social
Security's deficit over the next 75 years. The botched
prescription drug bill passed in 2003 does more, all by
itself, to increase the long-run budget deficit than the
projected rise in Social Security expenses.

There was also another NYTimes article from December 31, 2004, that discusses how social security may be UNDERestimating increases in life spans. There is some debate on what this means. In other words, does this mean that more people draw out social security longer? Or does this mean more people work longer? Is any of this a problem? Is any of this a benefit?

From a December 31, 2004 NYTimes Article by ROBERT PEAR: Social Security Underestimates Future Life Spans, Critics Say

"The higher costs associated with longer life expectancy
could be offset in several ways that do not involve a
reduction of Social Security benefits," said John R.
Wilmoth, another demographer at Berkeley.

People who live longer could work longer, for instance. Or
the size of the working-age population could increase
because of higher birth rates or a larger number of
immigrants.

Further, some population experts foresee developments that
could wind up buttressing the forecasts of the Social
Security Administration. S. Jay Olshansky, a professor of
epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of
Illinois at Chicago, said the era of large increases in
life expectancy might be nearing an end, with the spread of
obesity and the possible re-emergence of deadly infectious
diseases.

For more information about privitization of social security being a BAD thing, see Buying into Failure, another Krugman NYTimes Op-Ed article that was mentioned in a previous post about social security.

Technorati Tags: krugman, paul krugman, nytimes, pear, robert pear, social security, social security privitization, bad idea, george w bush, bush

Instructions for Adding Highlighting to Your Blog or Web Page

So I've put together a quick instructions page on the "searchhi.js" JavaScript I'm using to highlight words on my web page.

Search Word Highlighting Instructions

If someone links to your page from a search engine's results, the search words will be highlighted on your page. On top of that, you have the option of putting a text box on your page that allows the users to add more words to be highlighted on your page.