Synchronicity swirls and other foolishness

Literary oddities

sneadj@mindspring.com — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 20:59:23 GMT

I own two books on urban magic - City Magic by Christopher Penczak & The Urban Primitive by Raven Kaldera & Tannin Schwartzstein. I looked at them for the first time in more than four years yesterday (and again conclude that City Magic is by far the better of the two books). I first learned about them approximately 5 years ago when visiting a friend and exploring their books.

The odd thing about these books and me is that not only is Christopher Penczak the husband of Steve Kenson, a well known RPG author who I have worked with several times (and who quite unexpectedly mailed me a copy of the book for Yule 2004, when he saw it on my amazon wishlist), yesterday I noticed that one of the authors of The Urban Primitive is the ex of a friend of mine. Far enough out on the fringe, the world becomes very small indeed.

Learning Fire – Fire Dancing

sneadj@mindspring.com — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 20:49:02 GMT

Yesterday, teaotter & I had the first of our 6 weekly fire-dancing classes. Becca had taken two fire-dancing classes 8 years ago, and I had never taken any. We were the only two students. Naturally, Becca did brilliantly (both due to previous experience, and a level of physical competence that often seems superhuman), while I was rather less impressive. We learned and practiced basic moves with poi. I suspect that I may never learn to twirl one forwards, while the one in the other hand goes backwards, but I think I will be able to master all of the other basic moves. However, I also suspect that the experience will be very different when the objects I'm swinging around are on fire. It was quite tiring and I'm now very thankful that I do 20 push-ups every day. It also had the frustrating quality of actions that look simple but turn out to be difficult manual tasks. Performing complex exercise seems to fit well with learning fire. I'll definitely need to practice a good bit before the next class. Regardless, having a class for only $60 that's a short walk from where I live is wonderful indeed.

Learning Water - Oneonta Gorge

sneadj@mindspring.com — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 09:59:51 GMT

Because it's lovely and we wanted to show it to our dear friend shadowmorphic, we decided to go to Oneonta Gorge during her visit last week. This also seemed like an excellent opportunity for me to learn more about water, as part of my recent elemental workings. It was impressively lovely and also (as it has been the previous times I've been there) a challenge of an almost initiatory sort. The out area near the road is a shallow stream, but to go further you must climb over a very large log-jam that lacks anything remotely like a regular path. It was safer this time, since the 2-foot, but still terrifying jump/wide step over a 10-foot deep crevasse had been replaced by more logs to climb and walk across. However, for teaotter and I, it was still frightening (shadowmorphic and amberite had not such problems). Then, the steam becomes deeper, eventually becoming waist deep on me (I'm 6' tall) and significantly deeper on both shadowmorphic and amberite.

Just before the stream gets that deep, there is a choice, wade through this cold melt-water, or climb along the narrow ledge of rock. Previously, the path along the rocks was a bit tricky in places, but went entirely past the section of the stream that was more than knee deep on me. This was sadly no longer true. We haven't been to Oneonta Gorge for almost 5 years, and there must have been a rock fall or something similar, because the path ends over the deepest part of the water. So, Jade and I were both forced to jump/slip down into the water. After that, the water became more shallow, until it got deeper in the area around the waterfall. I went closer to the waterfall than I had before - actual swimming was required to get all the way to the waterfall, and despite the weather Friday being in the mid 90s, it was quite cool down in Oneonta Gorge, and the water was quite cold, especially right around the waterfall, and so I had no interest in that level of discomfort. However, I did wade back through the deepest part of the water. The floatation tank was warm, restful, and devoid of all sensation and all other life, Oneonta Gorge was cool, powerful, and filled with life, and both were powerful experiences of water as well as being generally wonderful experiences. The floatation tank was solitary, Oneonta Gorge was shared with the three people I care about most. The first thing you'll likely note is that many of these photos are a bit out of focus, that's because the exposure times were so long. W/o flash, I never got faster than 1/100 sec exposure times, which guarantees at least a bit of camera shake w/o a tripod. It was a brilliantly sunny and completely cloudless day, but down in Oneonta Gorge, it was a different world.

The Gorge

Looking Up

The Stream

Rock Walls Filled With Life

The Path

Through High and Narrow Walls

The Falls At Distance

The Falls

Falls Closeup

The Falls & The Pool Below It

Today + an urban oddity

sneadj@mindspring.com — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 09:49:58 GMT

After going with shadowmorphic to the airport in the morning, I had a quiet day, Becca and I came back and slept for a while and did very little, while Alice studied for her chemistry mid-term tomorrow. Then, I went out with Aaron. We found a very nice bar-restaurant with excellent mexican food and a delicious and inexpensive happy hour menu (with the added benefit that, like many places in Portland, they were happy to bring around a printed list of ingredients for all of their dishes, which is a vast help for those of us with food sensitivities.

On the way from Aaron's place to the restaurant, we encountered an oddity. Portland abounds in strangeness, but this construct somewhat stranger than most.

Street Oddity

The flag is the traditional flag of Ethiopia, which has been adopted by the Rastafari movement. While Aaron and I were admiring it, a man with what sounded like a Jamaican accent and dreadlocks came out from the house it was parked in front of and asked what we were doing. Aaron told him we were admiring the device and asked what it was, the man denied having made it and seemed pleasant but also somewhat secretive. In any case, this is yet more evidence that this is a strange and wonderful city. I am also once again pleased at having constant access to a good camera.

On Floating

sneadj@mindspring.com — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 08:53:47 GMT

On Friday, I spent $30.00 for around two and half hours in a floatation tank. I've read several of John Lilly's books and so have been familiar with the concept, but have never tried one before. The tank is filled with epson salts solution so dense that you float – it's also sufficiently dense that it feels a bit slick. I entered the tank with plans for performing various bits of ritual work, such as the Middle Pillar Ritual. I got partway through my series of ritual work, and gave it up, it was impossible to care enough to bother. The experience was one of peaceful relaxation that was profoundly meditative. I even managed to achieve the classic "no mind" meditative state for a short while, which is something that I have only managed to do for seconds previously. It seems rather easy to fall into in a floatation tank.

The oddest part of the experience my initial difficulty of getting comfortable, the initial temptation to lean my head up out of the water was uncomfortable, and even once I let it relax, discomfort remained, so I had to learn to stretch out my neck and adjust my posture for maximum comfort. After that, it was a restful and joyous experience. When I came out, I was filled with profound and lasting joy and for the next several hours took great pleasure in looking at pleasant everyday objects like flowers or reflections off of glass. I also noticed that my ability to notice the (primarily visual) details in the world around me was somewhat enhanced during that same time.

This was a perfect start for my series of elemental workings - I experienced water as peace relaxation, letting go of intention, and drifting (both mentally and physically). There are clearly other sides of water, but this was one that I was not all that familiar with. I will likely try this again, and will also try swimming (which will be my first attempt in more than 20 years). Also, the fire dancing class starts soon, so I should register for it.

Pleased with Nokia

sneadj@mindspring.com — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 08:35:25 GMT

I mailed in my 6 month old Nokia n82 phone last Friday because of a dead-spot on the screen. I got it back yesterday, and not only was the screen fixed, but there was a note about them fixing the bluetooth. I had thought that my phone wouldn't link reliably with my Nokia n810 because of the odd and often troublesome n810 software. However, now it works. I'm very pleased with Nokia.

Fantasy writer quiz

sneadj@mindspring.com — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:36:56 GMT

No real surprises beyond that fact that on average the single most skewed of the four categories (High-Brow, Violent, Experimental, & Cynical) was Cynical, with around 75% of people taking the quiz scoring in the Cynical (rather than romantic) range. Anyone who knows me remotely well knows that is not where I scored. As I've mentioned in several posts, I find the cynicism of the past 30 or so years to be both troublesome and puzzling.

Your result for Which fantasy writer are you?...

Susan Cooper (b. 1935)

11 High-Brow, -25 Violent, -21 Experimental and -7 Cynical!

Congratulations! You are High-Brow, Peaceful, Traditional and Romantic! These concepts are defined below.

Though born in England, Susan Cooper currently lives in the United States. She is most well-known for her The Dark Is Rising sequence, which has received substantial critical acclaim, the second book (also called The Dark Is Rising) in the series winning a Newbury Honor and the fourth book (The Grey King) being awarded the Newbury Medal, one of the world's most prestigious awards for children's literature. The series is one of the finest examples of contemporary fantasy: the kind of fantasy where magic happens in an actually existing place. The Dark Is Rising is set in Britain, where two common themes of fantasy are combined; that of a magic world parallel to ours, which later became so popular with the Harry Potter books and that of ordinary British school-children playing a role in the struggle between Good and Evil, which had earlier been explored by C S Lewis.

Cooper manages to use the idiom of traditional children books to tell a tale of epic proportions, as evil beings from Celtic legends appear on Earth to do battle with the Old Ones, a secret society of people with magic powers. She is also able to combine this rather romantic vision with important messages, the compassion of one of the children being vital to the cause of Good at one point in the story. In Cooper's world, what you think and do matters on a grand scale, a message children and adults alike should take to their hearts.

You are also a lot like Ursula K Le Guin.

If you want some action, try China Miéville.

If you'd like a challenge, try your exact opposite, Lian Hearn.

Your score

This is how to interpret your score: Your attitudes have been measured on four different scales, called 1) High-Brow vs. Low-Brow, 2) Violent vs. Peaceful, 3) Experimental vs. Traditional and 4) Cynical vs. Romantic. Imagine that when you were born, you were in a state of innocence, a tabula rasa who would have scored zero on each scale. Since then, a number of circumstances (including genetical, cultural and environmental factors) have pushed you towards either end of these scales. If you're at 45 or -45 you would be almost entirely cynical, low-brow or whatever. The closer to zero you are, the less extreme your attitude. However, you should always be more of either (eg more romantic than cynical). Please note that even though High-Brow, Violent, Experimental and Cynical have positive numbers (1 through 45) and their opposites negative numbers (-1 through -45), this doesn't mean that either quality is better. All attitudes have their positive and negative sides, as explained below.

High-Brow vs. Low-Brow

You received 11 points, making you more High-Brow than Low-Brow. Being high-browed in this context refers to being more fascinated with the sort of art that critics and scholars tend to favour, rather than the best-selling kind. At their best, high-brows are cultured, able to appreciate the finer nuances of literature and not content with simplifications. At their worst they are, well, snobs.

Violent vs. Peaceful

You received -25 points, making you more Peaceful than Violent. This scale is a measurement of a) if you are tolerant to violence in fiction and b) whether you see violence as a means that can be used to achieve a good end. If you aren't, and you don't, then you are peaceful as defined here. At their best, peaceful people are the ones who encourage dialogue and understanding as a means of solving conflicts. At their worst, they are standing passively by as they or third parties are hurt by less scrupulous individuals.

Experimental vs. Traditional

You received -21 points, making you more Traditional than Experimental. Your position on this scale indicates if you're more likely to seek out the new and unexpected or if you are more comfortable with the familiar, especially in regards to culture. Note that traditional as defined here does not equal conservative, in the political sense. At their best, traditional people don't change winning concepts, favouring storytelling over empty poses. At their worst, they are somewhat narrow-minded.

Cynical vs. Romantic

You received -7 points, making you more Romantic than Cynical. Your position on this scale indicates if you are more likely to be wary, suspicious and skeptical to people around you and the world at large, or if you are more likely to believe in grand schemes, happy endings and the basic goodness of humankind. It is by far the most vaguely defined scale, which is why you'll find the sentence "you are also a lot like x" above. If you feel that your position on this scale is wrong, then you are probably more like author x. At their best, romantic people are optimistic, willing to work for a good cause and an inspiration to their peers. At their worst, they are easily fooled and too easily lead.

Take Which fantasy writer are you? at HelloQuizzy

Proof That Evolutionary Psychology is Nonsense

sneadj@mindspring.com — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 00:37:15 GMT

Here's an absolutely first-rate article about the problems with evolutionary psychology. It's 4 pages long, but exceptionally worth reading, in large part because it discusses various pieces of hard evidence that disprove a number of major claims prominent proponents of evo psych have made. Initially, the fact that so much of this discipline is made up of exceedingly bad science made it difficult to disprove, the article discusses why:

From its inception, evolutionary psychology had warned that behaviors that were evolutionarily advantageous 100,000 years ago (a sweet tooth, say) might be bad for survival today (causing obesity and thence infertility), so there was no point in measuring whether that trait makes people more evolutionarily fit today. Even if it doesn't, evolutionary psychologists argue, the trait might have been adaptive long ago and therefore still be our genetic legacy. An unfortunate one, perhaps, but still our legacy. Short of a time machine, the hypothesis was impossible to disprove. Game, set and match to evo psych.

However, careful (and more importantly) cross-cultural research has clearly shown that many of the claims made by evo psych proponents are not merely offensive they are also dead wrong.

That is what a new wave of studies has been discovering, slaying assertions about universals right and left. One evo-psych claim that captured the public's imagination—and a 1996 cover story in NEWSWEEK—is that men have a mental module that causes them to prefer women with a waist-to-hip ratio of 0.7 (a 36-25-36 figure, for instance). Reprising the rape debate, social scientists and policymakers who worried that this would send impressionable young women scurrying for a measuring tape and a how-to book on bulimia could only sputter about how pernicious this message was, but not that it was scientifically wrong. To the contrary, proponents of this idea had gobs of data in their favor. Using their favorite guinea pigs—American college students—they found that men, shown pictures of different female body types, picked Ms. 36-25-36 as their sexual ideal. The studies, however, failed to rule out the possibility that the preference was not innate—human nature—but, rather, the product of exposure to mass culture and the messages it sends about what's beautiful. Such basic flaws, notes Bingham, "led to complaints that many of these experiments seemed a little less than rigorous to be underpinning an entire new field."

Later studies, which got almost no attention, indeed found that in isolated populations in Peru and Tanzania, men consider hourglass women sickly looking. They prefer 0.9s—heavier women. And last December, anthropologist Elizabeth Cashdan of the University of Utah reported in the journal Current Anthropology that men now prefer this non-hourglass shape in countries where women tend to be economically independent (Britain and Denmark) and in some non-Western societies where women bear the responsibility for finding food. Only in countries where women are economically dependent on men (such as Japan, Greece and Portugal) do men have a strong preference for Barbie. (The United States is in the middle.) Cashdan puts it this way: which body type men prefer "should depend on [italics added] the degree to which they want their mates to be strong, tough, economically successful and politically competitive."

Depend on? The very phrase is anathema to the dogma of a universal human nature. But it is the essence of an emerging, competing field. Called behavioral ecology, it starts from the premise that social and environmental forces select for various behaviors that optimize people's fitness in a given environment. Different environment, different behaviors—and different human "natures." That's why men prefer Ms. 36-25-36 in some cultures (where women are, to exaggerate only a bit, decorative objects) but not others (where women bring home salaries or food they've gathered in the jungle).

As is often the case, we have a clear example not just of an evo psych claim, being based on the prejudices of the proponents, but that their profound ignorance of the rather impressive degree of diversity of human cultures makes disproof exceedingly easy This Newsweek article is only the latest of a series of discussions of evolutionary psychology that I've seen. jhkim recently wrote a pair of posts about this issue that are also well worth reading. Here's his first post and here's an excellent follow-up post. These posts are an excellent examination of some of the many problems with evolutionary psychology, in response to the utterly ludicrous claim by a prominent game designer that evolutionary psychology (rather than sexism among both male gamers and male game designers) explains the reason why more women don't play RPGs.

It's long been clear that evolutionary psychology is often motivated by various personal or political prejudices, but the Newsweek article also clearly shows how much of it is also exceptionally bad science.

The article also discusses an emerging alternative to evolutionary psychology – behavioral ecology, a field which makes a great deal of sense based on my knowledge of anthropology, and the fact that learning is exceedingly important to many animals.

Where, then, does the fall of evolutionary psychology leave the idea of human nature? Behavioral ecology replaces it with "it depends"—that is, the core of human nature is variability and flexibility, the capacity to mold behavior to the social and physical demands of the environment. As Buller says, human variation is not noise in the system; it is the system. To be sure, traits such as symbolic language, culture, tool use, emotions and emotional expression do indeed seem to be human universals…

Depend on? The very phrase is anathema to the dogma of a universal human nature. But it is the essence of an emerging, competing field. Called behavioral ecology, it starts from the premise that social and environmental forces select for various behaviors that optimize people's fitness in a given environment. Different environment, different behaviors—and different human "natures." That's why men prefer Ms. 36-25-36 in some cultures (where women are, to exaggerate only a bit, decorative objects) but not others (where women bring home salaries or food they've gathered in the jungle).

The links in this post provide more evidence that, at least among primates, learned behaviors are exceptionally important and in a very real sense, we should perhaps be talking about the cultures of various primate groups.

Rape, social class, & the worlds we all live in

sneadj@mindspring.com — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 18:21:16 GMT

I've read a number of posts about rape and sexual harassment recently, and I've talked about such issues with people for several decades. The responses I've heard have been quite diverse and often directly at odds with the experiences of others also writing and talking about this issue [[1]].

Leaving aside misogynists and the utterly clueless, and focusing only on the experiences of people who are reasonably self-aware and sensible, and what I have seen is that experiences vary widely, but in a significantly non-random manner. After thinking about this recently, it seems to me that it's effectively a case of people living in different worlds – worlds defined by race, privilege, wealth, social class, and possibly location.

About half of all rape victims are in the lowest third of income distribution; half are in the upper two-thirds. Also, while murder rate and the rate of sexual harassment and rape do not correlate perfectly, there is at least some correlation, and the murder rate in the US varies by a factor of more than 100 based solely on location. The statistics on this graph have special meaning for me – I grew up in the county that's on the lowest edge of the graph (Fairfax VA), which is located only a few miles from the 3rd worst city (Washington DC).

I now live on the West Coast, in a world of progressive geeks who are almost exclusively white, almost exclusively from middle class (or in a few cases wealthy) backgrounds, most of whom live in relatively safe neighborhoods, and most of whom grew up in situations that were at least as privileged, and in many cases far more so, than they are now. I talk to the women I know well, and in almost all cases, not only haven't they been raped, but they also haven't experienced any sort of harassment that ever felt truly threatening. Then, I talk to the few women I know who have lived (as either children or adults) in far less privileged circumstances, and I hear stories of all manner of nastiness. I haven't heard all that many such stories, but I also don't know many people who have lived in such environments.

I read arguments by women and men who have had experiences similar to mine, and I often see shock, disbelief, and in some cases even anger at the degree of fear and anger that many women living in other circumstances feel towards men. Like murder, rape and both creepy and exceedingly frightening forms of sexual harassment can happen to anyone, but they are considerably less likely to happen to women who grew up and live in privileged, economically well-off environments. I'm not in any way denying the experiences of women from highly privileged backgrounds who experienced such things, but it is definitely true that the odds are far more against women growing up and living in poverty and similarly wretched circumstances.

In many ways, this is yet another example of how both social class and race separate us all into worlds that rarely intersect in person and where reasonable assumptions can be very different indeed. teaotter and I were talking about this yesterday, and she mentioned that never in her life has she had any doubt that the police would come to her aid if she called them and that they would actively help her, and yet we have both known a few people whose experience of the police has been vastly more negative, and that's just one of many aspects of life. The US is a nation that is as a whole uncomfortable with notions of privilege or social class, but both are exceedingly real, and they make huge differences in peoples' lives.

[[1]]One recent example was reading this post, which is in response to this previous post.

Modern (and future) communications and information technology in RPGs

sneadj@mindspring.com — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 00:50:28 GMT

One of the (now fading) truisms that I saw in RPGs is that designers and (to a lesser case) GMs in the late 90s and early 00s were worried that modern and (especially) near future information technology would make adventures less fun. In the late 90s, you had games like Trinity and Blue Planet which attempted to find good reasons why characters in high tech settings a century in the future would have limited access to cellphones and (more importantly) smart-phones/mobile internet access. I still hear GMs complain that easy access to communication and information makes adventures less interesting and more difficult to run. Even back in the 90s, well before I had a mobile, my answer was simply that it made them different.

I was interested in the idea of PCs being physically isolated, but communication with other and with information – perhaps the PCs were coming to rescue space travelers whose ship has seriously malfunctioned – the PCs can try to talk the people try are trying to help through doing what needs doing before the characters arrive – of the PCs could even teleoperate robots to help. Alternately, the PCs might be in need of rescue, but would need to do most of the work themselves, since things need doing immediately, and while they can talk to their rescuers, the rescuers won't arrive for several hours. Also, the ability for PCs to separate but remain in communication is IMHO a feature and not in any way a bug.

Actiony TV and movies clearly serve as a model for many RPG scenarios and campaigns, and it's been interesting watching how those have changed. In a recent discussion that expanded to include these issues in james_nicoll's lj that included some discussion of this very issue, mindstalk mentioned that in the late 90s, cellphones were uncommon but present in shows like Buffy. They have clearly gotten more common since then, and now characters in shows like Leverage use fancy smartphones regularly for all manner of purposes, and the wonderful action show Burn Notice is practically a lesson on how to use portable electronics in adventure scenarios.

I still hear some people I know complaining how modern and reasonable future personal electronics are problematic for most RPG scenarios, but in all cases that I know of these comments come from people who either don't have mobile phones or who use them very rarely. In vivid contrast, I read this RPG.net thread about introducing magical cellphones in fantasy campaigns, which I found to be both a wonderful idea and also an interesting sign of the times. An increasing number of people are growing used to near constant communication and data access – always having a phone and camera, and more recently gps and internet access, and they and others are also starting to see this same technology become ubiquitous in TV and movies.

Both of these facts are changing how people think of both adventure fiction and RPG scenarios. If find this to very quite exciting, and also think that this could greatly help people come up with interesting SF RPGs and SF RPG campaigns. It's been clear for at least the past 15 years that the future was going to increasingly involved constant access to a vast array of data and now that more people are growing use to constant data access, it's finally becoming possible to design adventures that both make use of this information and that are comfortable and fun for the player (or in the case of fiction, the readers), rather than being an experience of interacting with non-existent technologies whose implications and possibilities were both largely unknown and often exceedingly non-obvious. In many ways, I think that the gap between having an iphone and a wireless neural interface is less than between having a landline telephone and having an iphone.

I'm expecting that in 5 years (assuming that tabletop RPGs have not become solely an entertainment ghetto for the middle-aged, which thankfully doesn't seem to be happening), I'm guessing that we'll see a lot more communication devices and equivalents in all genres of roleplaying – I'm looking forward to it.

Personal Electronics & Me

sneadj@mindspring.com — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 22:54:39 GMT

I just mailed my lovely Nokia n82 phone to the service center – it's only 6 months old and has a lentil-sized dead spot on the display. I should have it back in under 2 weeks, but having to deal with an old and dinosaurianly dumb phone in the meantime has definitely caused me to consider how I use my portable electronics. These days, that consists of the n82, and my Nokia n810 internet tablet.

The phone is my constant companion and (in rough order) is a

Calender
Phone
Camera
GPS
Backup note-pad

The n810 is primarily a

Notepad
Ebook reader
Media player
Full keyboard for SMS, via bluetooth to my phone

While the n810 is also a moderately good web-tablet, I find that I rarely use it for that purpose, the screen is small and the loading times are long.

This makes me consider what I want next. After reading about the improvements on the iphone 3GS and the new 3.0 software, I am definitely getting an ipod Touch when the 3rd generation units come out in September – at this point it's a better media player, a good ebook reader, as well as being an excellent notepad and calendar (with the new sync capability), and the new bluetooth capability may even allow me to use it as a SMS keyboard for my phone. It also has a faster processor which will likely greatly reduce waiting for web pages to load.

In any case, I'll have to see how good an ebook reader it is, the screen is slightly smaller and the resolution slightly less than the n810, but the actual ereader software looks to be considerably better. I have been thinking that a larger screen would be wonderful for a pocket web browser and ebook reader – an ipod touch with a 5-6" VGA screen would be utterly ideal for me.

Although it's somewhat clunky, I am tempted by the SmartQ 7 web tablet, which has a 7" screen and a faster processor than the n810. It's clearly clunky, but the firmware has been improving and so I'll see how well the new ipod Touch works and if I want a larger screen for semi-portability, then I'll likely get one, since they are fairly inexpensive.

A Distrust of Self-Organizing Systems & Other Alleged Deities

sneadj@mindspring.com — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 08:11:07 GMT

As anyone who knows me remotely well understands, I firmly believe libertarianism is dangerous nonsense, and I also don't feel particularly comfortable with the "natural world", or in fact the entire concept of "nature". In general, I prefer human controlled and human altered settings in novels, and I also both love and am most comfortable in urban environments.

However, until I read this fascinating article on problems with trusting or idolizing self-organizing systems by English professor and cultural critic Steven Shaviro , I had not realized that my reaction stemmed from the same source. I ultimately trust the idea of government, and am most comfortable in human-controlled systems in like cities.

That said, I don't find Peter Ward's Media Hypothesis to be any more convincing than James Lovelock's Gaia_hypothesis. Ultimately, I don't believe self-organizing systems are either inherently hostile or inherently benevolent, instead, I believe that they simply are. Most of the time, the economy, the planetary ecology, or whatever other large and complex system is under discussion runs in some form of relatively calm equilibrium. However, this isn't always the case – sometimes any complex system can do the unexpected and the result need not be comfortable or perhaps even survivable for individuals in that system.

One of the most interesting aspects of how many people feel about and deal with complex systems. Many people effectively worship them – in the case of many neopagans, worship of "nature" or the natural world is overt and consciously acknowledged, and while I don't feel the same way, I can definitely understand that point of view and respect it. However, I have far less patience with the largely unexamined reverence that most libertarians have for the "free market". Much libertarianism, just like most pastoralism is based on the idea that self-organizing "natural" systems are inherently superior to systems that deliberately planned and consciously controlled, which is a belief that I strongly disagree with. I most definitely don't believe that there is any "invisible hand" keeping the economy running smoothly and to our benefit, just as I don't believe that any sort of metaphorical or actual Gaia-like entity won't randomly cause mass extinctions that are far worse than anything humanity could hope to do to the planet.

Thinking of self-organizing systems in this fashion helps me to bring into focus the fact that I don't trust or revere any outside forces – I trust the capacity for humans (and whatever other intelligent beings many exist) to learn to understand the world around them and to deliberately modify it to better fit with their desires. All life-forms modify their environment, but intelligent ones are (at least somewhat) conscious of this process and can make decisions about how to do so, enabling them to (for better or worse) both drastically transform a natural system and more importantly, to make decisions about how they wish to transform natural systems.

While it's obviously the case that human-controlled or even consciously controlled systems can be destructive and harmful (global warming is an example of the first, just as various totalitarian planned economies are obvious examples of the second), I'd vastly rather have a carefully and sensibly human controlled system than one left to its own random devices. Similarly, while I believe in gods, I don't worship any and am very unlikely to every change this. I'm willing to bargain with gods, but I have no interest in believing that any god or deified and reified system is inherently superior to humanity in terms of managing phenomena that affect humanity. Of course, at the heart of my transhumanist spirituality is the firm belief that playing god is the most worthy endeavor that humanity can aspire to.

Augmented Reality Arrives

sneadj@mindspring.com — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 19:35:21 GMT

I've been waiting for the introduction of augmented reality displays, and here's one of them, which should be in the US sometime this year. It's limited, a bit clunky, and clearly a first generation system, but I'm betting a great many people will be regularly using AR in 3 years, and within 5 years many of us will consider it to be indispensable.

Thoughts about & hope for Iran

sneadj@mindspring.com — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 20:03:29 GMT

Like many of the people reading this, I'm keeping up with events in Iran. Sadly, it's very difficult to be hopeful, since I agree several of the grimmer analyses that I've seen - the protests are not yet threatening the actual power structure in Iran. Iran's presidency is an important post, but the president is also has far less power than Khamenei, who is Iran's theocrat and hold the position of "Leader of the Revolution", popularly known by the suitably ominous title of Supreme Leader (as an aside, I wonder if despots actually enjoy having titles that sound like they come from cheesy pulp movies). Regardless of what you call Khamenei, the only way that anything remotely like real change will occur in Iran is if he and the Guardian Council are deposed, since between them, then control the military, the mass media, and have authority over both the law and the politics of the nation.

There is currently a chance for real change in Iran, since Khamenei isn't handling the situation in a remotely popular manner. However, any change won't come easily. One article I read had a commentator who had lived in Iran for several years say that ultimately the possibility of change comes down to whether the government or the protesters have the highest tolerance for violence. I would dearly love for that statement to be proven wrong, but I fear that it won't be.

In any case, for now we can hope. My hope is that Iran actually becomes what it has claimed to be, a truly democratic Muslim nation. Like so much of the third world, the Muslim nation of the Middle East (using that term fairly broadly) are a rather horrid collection of theocrats like Iran and kleptocrats like the Saudi royal family and the two ruling clans of the United Arab Emirates. The reasons are a mixture of past colonial experience and the more recent nasty habit both the US and UK have of supporting thugs. In any case, for now there is a chance for something better, but that chance is not large and the absolute worst thing any first world nation could do is interfere.

15 Most Important Books Meme

sneadj@mindspring.com — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 23:50:14 GMT

lyssabard tagged me with this on Facebook, and I decided to also post my responses here. Feel free to play along if you want.

Instructions: Don’t take too long to think about it. Fifteen books you’ve read that will always stick with you. First fifteen you can recall in no more than 15 minutes.

(in no order)

Godstalk by P.C. Hodgell
Cirque by Terry Carr
Starkhan of Rhada by Robert Cham Gilman
Daughter of Hounds by Caitlin R. Kiernan
Heritage of Hastur by Marion Zimmer Bradley
The Forbidden Tower by Marion Zimmer Bradley
The Zero Stone by Andre Norton
Ordeal in Otherwhere by Andre Norton
The Spiral Dance by Starhawk
Angels On Fire by Nancy A. Collins
The Door into Shadow by Diane Duane
Darkchild by Sydney van Scyoc
Dreamsnake by Vonda McIntyre
Across the Sea of Suns by Gregory Benford
Eon by Greg Bear
Serpent's Reach by C.J. Cherryh
Web of the Witch World by Andre Norton

Ugh (Or the other aspects of owning cats)

sneadj@mindspring.com — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 10:50:24 GMT

Dear gods, I had no idea one cat could throw up quite that much. It didn't help that he got startled and so ran in the midst of doing so. Buddy (the vomit champion) is fine, he has had laxitone now and was simply having a problem getting up a hairball.

Feline cuteness

sneadj@mindspring.com — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 06:23:31 GMT

Our cats have been unusually cute lately, and I thought that I'd share.

DJ & Buddy
Buddy (orange & white - Becca's cat) & DJ (grey & white - my cat) cuddling. definitely a cute overload moment that I thought that I'd share. They are both 15, but in good health, and clearly happy.

A Whirlwind of Sweets

sneadj@mindspring.com — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 06:16:46 GMT

Friday was lovely – the heat finally broke entirely. It was in the mid 80s and a bit humid at 4:00 when I walked out to the afternoon farmers market 5 blocks from our lovely house. Change was in the air then, as were elm seeds. Elms are common trees in much of Portland, and especially around Ladd's Addition, and shortly after petal fall, the green-brown coin-sized elm seeds fall similarly carpet the ground.

However, on Friday, a wind had come up and the elm seeds were airborne in miniature whirlwinds that at times were literally blinding. The winds increased until I reached the farmers market, where some of the booths were being taken down and the remaining ones were securing for the storm clouds close at hand to the West. However, it was an excellent time to be at the farmer's market, since the first large harvest of Oregon strawberries had just come in. Oregon strawberries are far sweeter and more flavorful than any others and are a brief but wonderful joy for three or four weeks in June.

After buying four pints, I then saw a sign that I'd noticed before but never examined closely. It said chocolate, and my attention was caught because the woman running it announced that she was still open (as more booths were closing). So, I looked, and what it actually said was vegan chocolate truffles. They are made with coconut milk, and I tried some samples and they were delicious. I purchased a large and utterly delicious lemon & chocolate-filled truffle, and the woman gave me a blueberry one for free, likely knowing that anyone who was allergic to dairy was certain to come back, as I will. I walked home the gathering clouds and first hint of rain, and then put on my hat and coat and walked out to the comics store and grocery store in a lusciously cool and gloriously windy thunderstorm. Thunderstorms are sadly quite rare in Portland, but I love living here. Also, in addition to simply eating them, a pint of strawberries, a large bannana, some ice, 1/2 to 2/3 cup of light coconut milk, & one ( entirely optionally) TBS sugar makes an utterly delicious smoothie

Elm Seeds
Here are what elm seeds look like on the ground, they were impossible to photograph in the air.

Thoughts on Walking the Thresholds

sneadj@mindspring.com — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 08:59:49 GMT

Five years ago I went to Walking the Thresholds, and found I community where I truly belong. As I have mentioned several times, the otherkin community is in a very deep sense and important sense my home, and I have been to Walking the Thresholds, and the September version, Crossing the Thresholds, a total of four times.

It's amusing to read a post made less than a year before I first went to WTT, where I discuss how I have never found a community where I truly belonged - then, I found the otherkin community. In any case, I'm not going to WTT this year, which makes me sad, but we are settling down after moving and parental visits, and traveling across the country is far from cheap. However, I look forward to going to Crossing the Thresholds with great anticipation. As any of you who know me at all well, the very idea that I would look forward to camping or that I would dance half-naked around a camp fire, and look forward to doing so again in September is quite surprising, but also exceptionally true. In any case, I wish everyone going there all of the best and will see them in a bit over three months, and once again I'll be priesting the main ritual at CTT.

Excellent book + political musings

sneadj@mindspring.com — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 08:49:11 GMT

I just finished reading The Invention of Air by Steven Johnson, which is (like all of Johnson's work) an exceptionally swift and enjoyable read. This book is about Joseph Priestley, the 18th century scientist, political commentator, and theologian who is known to have both discovered oxygen and the first glimmerings of photosynthesis. Johnson's book looks at Priestley's involvement with religion and politics as well as science and in addition to being an excellent layman's history of science book, Johnson is also discussing politics and dissent. One of the most interesting parts is about Priestly being forced to leave Britain for the newly independent US for espousing exceptionally unpopular opinions about religion (he was a fairly hard-core deist) and the French Revolution. The newspaper campaign against his writings as well as the popular working class protests that at least in part were urged on by members of the upper class who were deeply uncomfortable with his ideas is exceedingly familiar, and one of the most striking pieces of information in the book is how little the basics of conservative rhetoric have changed – it's all based upon both rigid and deeply emotional nationalism and an obsession with perceived offenses against the accepted structures of political and religious authority. This fits with information I've recently read about psychological differences between progressives and conservatives (summarized here in a surprisingly balanced article by someone who is normally a laughing jackass of a conservative). The same disgust and the same focus on authority structures were as present in 1794 as they are today. I very much hope that humanity (or more likely posthumanity) will soon outgrow this sort of nonsense.

In any case, the book is as good as The Ghost Map , Johnson seems to have very much found his niche writing historical accounts that tie into modern issues.

Planned Physical Elemental Workings

sneadj@mindspring.com — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 21:44:58 GMT

I recently had an idea for doing some work to get in touch with the elements – not ritual work, but instead spiritually motivated physical work. I already garden, and so that may suffice for Earth. For Water, there's a place offering relatively inexpensive floatation tank rental nearby, and so I'll give that a try and will also try getting in practice with swimming (I haven't been in a swimming pool since the mid 1980s) – I'm not certain how that will go, since I am somewhat timid in water, but thankfully amberite is a skilled swimmer who has expressed interest in helping me swim. In any case, I'm fairly excited about trying a floatation tank. I'm especially excited about my idea for fire working (which was the initial impetus for all this) – I'm planning on learning fire dancing.

One of the great advantages of spending a number of years learning tai chi, yoga, and feldenkrais is that I'm considerably more physically adept than I used to be. teaotter took a class in fire dancing 6 years ago, but got out of it because she didn't know anyone else who did it. So, she'll show me that basics (using practice poi) and then starting in early July, we'll both take a 6 week class on it.

I'm quite pleased with my decision to try this, but have a few questions. Has anyone reading this tried anything like this, and if so do you have any recommendations. Also, as you likely noticed, there's nothing focusing on air here. In large part, I'm not certain what activity would be appropriate. My first thought was rock-climbing, but my previous experience with doing this seemed very Earth-focused - I still vividly remember clinging to the climbing wall for dear life. Skydiving is both more expensive and rather more terrifying than I'm interested in, especially since I'm looking for something that I can do repeatedly.

On Ambition & Purpose

sneadj@mindspring.com — Wed, 27 May 2009 09:54:29 GMT

Aaron & I were talking recently (a phrase that has served as the beginning for more than a few lj posts :)
We were talking about my being otherkin, and more specifically (as he put it) "what it's for", by which he meant what does being otherkin mean for & about my (or anyone else's) life. I fumbled for an answer for a while. The closest I have to one is this fascinating theory, which feels correct to me.

However, must of what Aaron meant was about the purpose of my life and his life. Aaron has always had a drive for his life to mean something, too accomplish something important & meaningful. I told him that his book has definitely helped people, and I expect that the next two books he's just started working on (which are on very different topics) will also be valuable. However, he was dissatisfied with what he's done, and that once again struck me as a key difference between myself (and also teaotter) and several people we know, including both Aaron, and to a thankfully lesser extent amberite - ambition.

By most conventional definitions, I'd effectively devoid of ambition. My goal in life is very simple – I want to be happy and enjoy myself. In large part, that what the (rather informal set of) rules that I live by are all about. For me, the only purposes of life is joy and experience. I do my best to do what makes me happy (which usually also involves making the people I'm close to happy, since having them be happy is clearly a major benefit to me) and to avoid things that make me unhappy. I'm doing fairly well at that, I have enough money, two amazing partners, & a job that I love. In addition to being an exceedingly self-interested individual, I also firmly believe that life (in general) and my own life in particular only has whatever meaning that the person living it chooses to give it. In fact, I find any other option to be rather horrifying – I have no interest in being a slave to some deity or cosmic force that is interested in promoting some agenda by using me as a tool.

Aaron is also concerned about what he leaves behind him after he dies, which is a closely related attitude, and also one that utterly baffles me. In addition to strongly subscribing to the sentiment in Woody Allen's famous quote ,"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it through not dying.", if I'm for some reason unlucky enough to have my transhumanist hopes dashed, absolutely the only thing I'm interested in leaving behind is a carefully cryofrozen corpsicle, since a small chance of at more life beats the heck out of none at all.

I'm quite pleased that some people have more ambition than I do, it's exceptionally useful to have dedicated doctors and emergency services personnel, as well as many technological advances that might not exist w/o ambitious people. However, none of that makes me want to do anything big. In addition to being far too self-interested, it's been by observation that ambition is often closely connected to being unhappy. Aaron, and several other ambitious people that I've known use unhappiness to motivate them, and find the sort of pleasant contentment that I strive for to be stifling, a fact that mostly find to be sad, since from what I've seen being ambitious often means being significantly unhappy much of the time. My preference would be for a society where everyone could do what they enjoy and no one would feel driven by unhappiness.

In any case, I'm exceptionally pleased to not be at all ambitious (just as I am generally quite pleased with my own preferences). I am curious both to know if my observations about ambition and happiness are more generally true (hence the poll below) and also to know if being ambitious or non-ambitious is something that you folks are content with or if you'd prefer to change it.

View Poll: Ambition & happiness

Thoughts on Perception and Augmented Reality

sneadj@mindspring.com — Wed, 20 May 2009 21:17:19 GMT

I spent several hours talking with my friend Aaron last night, and in the course of the sort of vast and rambling conversations that we typically have, I mentioned this particular advanced towards augmented reality, and Aaron's response was exceedingly thought-provoking. He mentioned that one problem that he's seen is that people can only take in so much information and that most people privilege brightly colored graphics and suchlike over reality. Thus, one risk of what now seems to be the almost inevitable rise of augmented reality is that people looking at the images on screens or projected by glasses or contact lens displays and not at the world around them – not seeing the tree for the graphic display about the tree.

I have very mixed feelings about this. I love the idea of augmented reality, both in the aspect of instant information being available about every object that I look at, and even more the aspect of it that involves transforming the entire world into a vast electronic conversation of descriptions and commentary, where no data is ever lost and multiple layers of meaning can be visibly layered on top of people, places, and objects. However, the idea of people ceasing to notice (except as obstacles to be walked around) many of the very objects being described is far less positive. While clearly not a reason to eschew this technology, it is definitely something to consider.

Thoughts on female characters in US Media

sneadj@mindspring.com — Tue, 19 May 2009 22:19:42 GMT

"Feminism is the radical notion that women are people." We've all heard or seen this quote, but it's interesting to see how it plays out in media. I've recently seen three approaches to dealing with female characters in modern US movies and TV. By far the most common is accepting that there female characters matter, but they are in some fundamental way both defined and limited by being female in a way that male characters are not defined by being male. This approach appears in the vast majority of geek shows and cop shows with female characters who are central characters – the character of Sophie in Leverage is a perfect example. Some shows like the new Battlestar Galactica attempted to look like they were doing better, but generally weren't. When looking at such shows, what you see is that female characters are less independent, weaker willed (unless they are attempting to save their child), significantly more emotional, and all of the other stereotypes our culture is still infested with. I first saw these sort of portrayals of female characters appear in the late 1970s.

The various ludicrously competent ninja girls (all are quite young) found in so much geek TV like the early 00s TV show Dark Angel, and so a slightly lesser extent, almost everything Joss Whedon has ever done are a slightly different version of the same thing – to be female is to be different, dangerous, exotic, and strange. This approach to dealing with female characters is annoying, but it's also easy to have it become at least somewhat invisible because it's so ubiquitous in modern media.

However, for me at least, it's exceedingly easy to see the difference when I encounter TV shows (since such positive portrayals essentially never appear in Hollywood movies, which are by their nature less progressive than TV) where women are portrayed as actual characters. The most recent example I've seen of this was in last week's episode of In Plain Sight, where the protagonist talked with a (male) soldier who had become a mercenary about dealing with having killed people (at the end of the previous season, the protagonist had killed someone to save her life). This was not the best example I've seen of this particular conversation (although it was very well done), but it's the first time I've seen it done on TV with a female character. There have been many similar moments in the (recently canceled) Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, as well as in other shows ranging from the short-lived shows Dresden Files & Journeyman, to moments in the first few seasons of the Las Vegas. It's always a joy to see US media where female characters get to be actual people and not hobbled stereotypes, but it's still far too rare, and shows with this sort of approach are often canceled. I first saw this approach to female characters in the 1990s.

Unfortunately, there is also a third category for how female characters are dealt with, an older approach that's been around since the birth of television and before – female characters are plot devices to be kidnapped or threatened, they are tokens to prove that the male protagonists are not queer, they are victims whose death motivates the (always male) hero, and (at best) they are mildly useful but unimportant sidekicks or a character whose role in the ensemble cast can be summed up as "the girl", where the character's gender is by far the most important thing about her. I do my best to avoid modern media with such depictions, but they are still far to common – the latest Diehard film Live Free or Die Hard was such a film, as was Star Trek, The Hulk, Batman: The Dark Knight and many other modern actions films. There are also far too many TV shows with similar portrayals of female characters - Supernatural is one of the most obvious offenders, but so is Heroes, and Smallville (which used to be an example of the first type, but ceased to be). It's a very sad truth that such movies and TV shows can be wildly popular, likely in part because the formulas and gender portrayals are so familiar and for many people familiarity is comfortable, even if what is familiar is vile.

I loathe summer

sneadj@mindspring.com — Mon, 18 May 2009 22:37:13 GMT

It's in the mid 80s today and was similarly hot yesterday, and I hate it. The one disadvantage we've discovered with this otherwise lovely house is that it's overly warm compared to our previous two dwellings, which is unsurprising, since this is a one story house, and not the lower story of a duplex, so we don't have people upstairs living in (what was to us) a heat-sink. The home inspector did mention that the attic insulation was to thin, so we're going out this week to get more, which will definitely help - hopefully enough.

However, I always dread the summer. I dislike wearing short sleeved shirts & think that they are intrinsically ugly, I find temperatures about 80s to be uncomfortable, and feel like I have a mild flu when temperatures go above 90. Thankfully, temperatures about 90 are rare in Portland, and it almost always cools of into the 50s at might. I still greatly prefer days in the 60s or low 70s, and nights in the mid to high 40s. Sadly, there is essentially no place in the US that doesn't get hot in the summer.