Nerve Endings Firing Away

Why am I an atheist and a naturalist

Patrix — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 19:56:46 +0000

I’m going to tell my entire story; from my religious experiences in early childhood, to my rejection of religion and God in my mid-twenties. The backstory is important, as my skepticism isn’t something new, but something that has been a lifelong struggle.
Next, I should warn you that if you are a person of faith, I’ll probably offend you gravely with this tome. Make no mistake: I have no compunctions about doing so. I’m not one to hide the truth behind deferential embroidery. Still, if you are the type who is likely to take offense and refuse to continue reading, it would be most courteous of me to offend you early on, so as to respect your valuable time.
To that end: God is almost certainly a lie, religion is a scourge upon the world, and you are wasting your life with a cultish devotion to nonsensical superstitions and soul-crushing dogmas. Also, you don’t have a soul.
Now that I’ve dispensed with the discourteous courtesies, and we are rid of the chronically hyper-offendable, let us begin.

This [long] essay by Mark Jaquith is one of the best personal accounts I have read on one’s transition to atheism. My transition was hardly this gradual and introspective but then my earlier experiences hadn’t been that religious either. For whom it is longer, it is also much harder which makes the transition all the more liberating. Perhaps I should write about my transition too but it is neither as introspective nor as dramatic.

via Tempus Fugit.

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For Founders to Decorators, Facebook Riches

Patrix — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 20:55:40 +0000

The graffiti artist who took Facebook stock instead of cash for painting the walls of the social network’s first headquarters made a smart bet. The shares owned by the artist, David Choe, are expected to be worth upward of $200 million when Facebook stock trades publicly later this year.

So, how much did you pay your painters?

[Source: NYTimes]

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The Super Bowl Ads begin…

Patrix — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 22:32:38 +0000

Now that’s an ad.

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Sex, Lies, and Hit Men

Patrix — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 02:40:04 +0000

As they say, only in Texas.

Jeffrey Stern was a wealthy personal injury lawyer who drove a Maserati. His wife, Yvonne, was a stunning carpool mom who loved Fendi dresses and Hermès handbags. Together they were the envy of their exclusive Bellaire neighborhood. Then came three bungled attempts on her life, the revelation that Jeffrey had taken a mistress, and the bombshell that investigators had accused the lovers of plotting to kill Yvonne.

[Source: Texas Monthly]

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Burgled in Philly

Patrix — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 01:55:32 +0000

When John Davidson’s apartment gets robbed, he learns that the easiest way to get his stuff back is to have one drug dealer lie to another drug dealer while he lies to the police.

[Source: The Bygone Bureau]

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“I’m a Pole, So Can You”

Patrix — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 21:16:04 +0000

I don’t watch the Colbert Show regularly (don’t judge me, a man has only so much time) but his interview are hilarious and 1000x better than Jon Stewart’s show. This interview with Maurice Sendak, the acclaimed author of many children’s books (Where the Wild Things Are), is great on many levels including the book that Stephen writes and reads out for Sendak.

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The Lives They Lived

Patrix — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 02:00:13 +0000

The first one by Mike DeStefano is awesome on so many levels. Read them all.

And of the hundreds of stories we considered, we were surprised to find that many of the ones we liked the most are from people talking directly about facing death, either their own or someone else’s. These turn out to be very revealing stories. Not maudlin or despairing, just cleareyed, and occasionally hopeful. This is, over all, a hopeful collection of people.

[Source: The Lives They Lived]

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A More Flat World

Patrix — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 22:17:23 +0000

Last week, an article in the NY Times on how the U.S. lost out on iPhone work made the rounds on the Internet; so much so that it was posted on Reddit at least a dozen times with different excerpts depending on your tech ideology. Spoiler: it is not just low labor cost but also expedient labor and manufacturing due to fierce competition in Shenzen, China complemented with China’s favorable yet centralized manufacturing-oriented policies. The article is a fascinating read into the machinations of 21st century manufacturing to fulfill the instant gratification needs of the electronics consumer market.

However, the way it is written, it pits American labor class against the Chinese labor force, although unfairly in my opinion. Although there are several layers and aspects to the article, the typical reaction among the American blogosphere and young idealists at Reddit is how Apple is taking advantage of the desperate Chinese worker who is slaving away long hours to make the iPhone that you use to compose frivolous tweets. The fact that FoxConn, the primary company described in the article, also manufactures/assembles XBoxes, Kindles, Nooks, and other electronics from Samsung, Nokia, etc. is often lost in the din.

But that’s not the troubling reaction the article elicits. The primary complaint is, how China enslaves its people and forces them into working long hours for minimal pay to make goods for the Western world. People often are distressed not just by what they consider unfair labor and trade practices but also the unfair advantage China enjoys by having the ability to dictate policy from top down. While China’s autocratic rule making might be a factor, the complaint that these workers are slaves in the FoxConn behemoth is often exaggerated. The case of suicides makes the news and makes us believe that people are desperately trying to kill themselves rather than work in the factories. However, the fact that the suicide rate per capita at FoxConn is significantly less than the suicide rate at American universities but we aren’t worried that our colleges are killing us.

FoxConn has offered hundreds of thousands of Chinese people a shot at earning a livelihood which otherwise wasn’t possible in their rural hometowns. It has lifted several million people out of poverty. Of course, they live 10 to a dorm on bunk beds and work long hours but often Americans think their suburban life with a house and a backyard with two cars, kids, and a dog is the norm when in fact it is the exception. Most of the world works and lives in comparatively abject conditions. The fact that the one person in a 10-dorm room might be sending money to his village to support a whole family is often not told. I’m sure, FoxConn is not shackling the workers to the assembly line and the turnover rate is high. However deplorable conditions at FoxConn may seem compared to the luxurious working conditions from where I type this blog post, the workers have made a conscious choice and are working hard. Imagine thriving businesses within Dharavi and then look at the conditions that they live in but people there have similarly made a choice to leave their poverty behind and earn a honest living in the city. We are in no position to judge what conditions someone in a foreign country in an alien culture should live and work in.

The other argument is that Apple and other companies shouldn’t mind pricing their products a little higher if it means manufacturing them in the U.S. Unfortunately, that is not how the free market works. People optimize their benefits by seeking a balance between the price of the product and their willingness to pay that price. A few dollars here and there would mean gigantic shifts in manufacturing costs, profits, and even quality of products. The factories in China adhere to the strict quality guidelines laid down by Apple and yet are able to deliver a product that many in the U.S. can afford ($199 + $15-20 per month is a pretty sweet deal for the Internet in your pocket). Also, the U.S. has moved past the rigors of manufacturing and moved toward services that require a higher skill set (hence the tag – Designed in California. Assembled in China). By seeking to forcefully bring back the jobs from China to the U.S., you would cause a net increase in poverty in the world as millions would be laid off. Now that would be a grave injustice, economically and socially.

So before getting all pissy about doing here what they exactly doing in China for less and just as good, we are not making any progress. Obviously, there are caveats about leveling the playing field for competition but more often than not, it is not a level field at any given time. We just have to keep seeking the higher ground. That’s how the world goes around.

Update: NY Times is on a roll and really doesn’t want you to buy an iPad. However, they wait until the 11th paragraph to mention this:

Apple is not the only electronics company doing business within a troubling supply system. Bleak working conditions have been documented at factories manufacturing products for Dell, Hewlett-Packard, I.B.M., Lenovo, Motorola, Nokia, Sony, Toshiba and others.

And then never mention them again.

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© patrix for Nerve Endings Firing Away, 2012. | Permalink | 2 comments
Post tags: Apple, Business, China, manufacturing, trade

Design for an Urban Public Toilet

Patrix — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 20:47:25 +0000

It is patented and is a steal for $60K with $12K for annual maintenance.

For the residents of Portland, Ore., taking a whiz in a public toilet is not just a matter of necessity. It’s an act of civic pride.
That’s because the city is home to the Portland Loo, a unique, patented outdoor bathroom that inspires such worship in its fanbase you’d think that Steve Jobs himself had designed it. This adoration comes despite the fact that the 24-hour loo was built to be as inhospitable as possible. This toilet does not want to be loved, but in Portland, it is No. 1 (and, presumably, sometimes No. 2 as well).

[Source: The Atlantic Cities]

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Default Stage – Outrage

Patrix — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:30:20 +0000

More proof that Indians don’t get humor (I use the term loosely since Jay Leno is involved) and the default reaction is outrage and a need for apology.

…by portraying the holy shrine of the Golden Temple as Romney’s vacation home, [Jay] Leno exposed all Sikh people to “hatred, contempt, ridicule, and obloquy.”

[Source: Hollywood Reporter]

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Making the Next Movie for the Internet Generation

Patrix — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 20:01:08 +0000

An excellent initiative by Amazon to encourage budding filmmakers; something that Netflix, Hulu, or even YouTube should’ve been doing. I’ve stopped expecting traditional production studios in Hollywood to innovate. Perhaps we should simply kill Hollywood.

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The farce of free speech

Patrix — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 17:54:18 +0000

The Indian constitution doesn’t guarantee free speech. The Indian constitution provides for “the right to freedom of speech and expression” (Article 19(1) a). However this right is subject to restrictions under subclause (2), whereby this freedom can be restricted for reasons of “sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, preserving decency, preserving morality, in relation to contempt of court, defamation, or incitement to an offence” [via Wikipedia] So effectively the subclause (2) withdraws any freedoms that it grants in the original Article because any Tom, Dick, and Harry can voice their protest under the excuse that your words will offend their religious sentiments. Also, note that the government is also responsible for “preserving morality” which effectively means it may cater to the most conservative of the lot (no hand-holding, celebration of Valentines’, etc.)

While all of the above has been common knowledge and most of the Indians live with this “minor inconvenience”, it again reared its head when Salman Rushdie was prevented from attending the Jaipur Literature Festival because some asshat Muslim cleric reminded us of the fatwa imposed on him for writing Satanic Verses (Rushdie attended the same festival couple of years ago without any incident). Also, it is worth remembering that the book, Satanic Verses still remains banned in India which incidentally is not an Islamic Republic, the last time I checked. If you ignore the shock-worthy possibility that the Rajasthan police made up stories that a team of hit men from Bombay were headed to assassinate Rushdie, the real travesty was when the police tried to arrest two other authors who dared to read from the Satanic Verses in protest.

If you think about it, the free speech subclause is intended to prevent speech that provokes violence by the offended party and as illogical as that sounds, the offended party must resort to violence for the speaker to be in trouble. Here, only the threat of violence sends the police scampering. Instead of enforcing law and order and issuing a stern warning that any violence will be punished to the fullest extent of the law, the police chooses to silence the authors. Now, the authors already were done reading from the Satanic Verses and as of now, no violence was reported, so why are the police so hell bent on arresting the authors? Will be the police be just as willing to arrest the Islamic cleric if the authors say that they are offended by his lack of morality in asking for violent acts?

Although a vast majority of Indians will disagree, free speech should be unhindered and any illegal actions such as violence and destruction of property resulting from any speech should be punished. The excuse that “I was so angry by what he said that I burned a bus” should automatically land the perpetrator in an anger management class within an insane asylum housed in the fire department. But then I’m expecting too much if this becomes a reality in the near future.

Instead, the lit festival should be held on a cruise ship 12 miles off the Indian coast and anyone should be free to read from any blasphemous text if they should choose to do so. If that becomes a reality, it would be a shame on India.

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Jonathan Coulton on the MegaUpload shutdown

Patrix — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 20:00:41 +0000

And right now everyone’s fighting to control distribution channels, which is why I can’t watch Star Wars on Netflix or iTunes. It’s fine if you want to have that fight, but don’t yell and scream about how you’re losing business to piracy when your stuff isn’t even available in the box I have on top of my TV. A lot of us have figured out how to do this.

An excellent post by Jonathan Coulton from the perspective of an artiste who, according to the industry and the government, supposedly is going to be bankrupted by online piracy.

[Link to Jonathan Coulton on the MegaUpload shutdown]

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Post tags: content, copyright, megaupload, pb, piracy

How Big-Time Sports Ate College Life

Patrix — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 17:00:41 +0000

“Here is evidence that suggests that when your football team does well, grades suffer,” said Dr. Waddell, who compared transcripts of over 29,700 students from 1999 to 2007 against Oregon’s win-loss record. For every three games won, grade-point average for men dropped 0.02, widening the G.P.A. gender gap by 9 percent. Women’s grades didn’t suffer. In a separate survey of 183 students, the success of the Ducks also seemed to cause slacking off: students reported studying less (24 percent of men, 9 percent of women), consuming more alcohol (28 percent, 20 percent) and partying more (47 percent, 28 percent).

As much as I love college football, there is much wrong with institutional football especially given its tradeoffs with academics and misplaced priorities.

[Link to How Big-Time Sports Ate College Life]

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Post tags: academics, college, football, pb, Sports

Reddit: Web’s unstoppable force

Patrix — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 17:42:42 +0000

How the site went from a second-tier aggregator to the Web’s unstoppable force.

I admit that I have a Reddit addiction too; especially the awesome AskReddit sub-reddit.

[Source: Slate Magazine]

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Fareed Zakaria interviews Obama

Patrix — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 17:23:08 +0000

In an exclusive interview with TIME’s Fareed Zakaria, President Obama opens up on Iran, Afghanistan, China and the challenges the U.S. faces in navigating a rapidly changing world. A full transcript of their conversation follows

The only (American) journalist I consider intelligent enough to ask intelligent questions on American foreign policy.

[Source: Time Magazine]

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Post tags: Barack Obama, foreign policy, interview

Megaupload shut down

Patrix — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 20:59:22 +0000

One of the largest file-hosting site, Megaupload was abruptly shut down by U.S. officials. Technically, it was not a ‘sharing’ site or as we have come to understand ‘sharing’ over the Internet since a minority uploaded files for the majority to download. The site charged users a fee to upload large files anonymously although I’m not sure how anonymous can you be if you are using a payment gateway.

Admittedly, most of the content was pirated movies, music, etc. but I’m sure Megaupload can argue that they just allow for hosting large files and do not monitor what content users choose to upload. Like the DMCA states, the copyright holders are free to file a claim and ask their content to be removed, like it is done with YouTube. But until the lawyers and judges get to parse this difference, the site will be down and is probably gone forever. But like previous attempts, the pirated content will simply move elsewhere. There are already several sites that offer services similar to Megaupload and the U.S. will have to continue playing whack-a-mole.

Instead, if the entertainment industry simply focused on enhancing convenient legal ways to obtain content and price it right, people would be more sympathetic. We recently ditched cable and subscribed to Hulu Plus in addition to Netflix and potentially subscribing to season passes on iTunes. Yesterday, we sat down to watch ‘White Collar’ on Hulu Plus and opened the app on my iPad to mirror it on the TV (since the app doesn’t offer AirPlay, go figure). However, we got a message that the episode was available on the web only so if both of us wanted to see it we had to either hunch in front of the 15″ computer screen or hook up my laptop to the TV, both inconvenient solutions. Other shows, like the Daily Show, however were available to view on the iPad. Also, we later realized that the episode was available on iTunes…for free! WTF. No wonder people turn to illegal solutions because the legal ones are so convoluted and inconsistent.

As Steve Jobs would say, focus on providing the consumers with a seamless, enhanced, and beautiful experience and they’ll be willing to fork out their hard-earned money for your products. And yes, stop making movies like ‘Jack and Jill’.

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Post tags: entertainment, filesharing, Hollywood, Internet, Movies, Technology, Television

Apple in Education

Patrix — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 19:17:02 +0000

An excellent initiative by Apple to self-author textbooks and sell them in the iBooks Store for $14.99 or less. Obviously, their primary goal is to sell more Macs and iPads so all the authoring and publishing tools are free. Go forth and publish. Or rather go first.

[Source: Apple in Education]

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Scenes From India

Patrix — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:57:29 +0000

Scenes From India – In Focus:

Diversity is everywhere in India, from its religions and languages to its economy, and climates. The second-most populous nation in the world, India is home to more than 1.2 billion people. Most are Hindu, but seven other religions — including Islam, Christianity and Sikhism — make up nearly 20 percent of the population. January 26 will be India’s 62nd Republic Day, marking the date in 1950 when the country’s constitution came into force. Collected here are recent photos from across the vast nation, offering only a small glimpse of the people and diversity of India. [41 photos]

(Via www.theatlantic.com)

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Different Feeds for Different Kinds of Posts

Patrix — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:26:02 +0000

Just a quick housekeeping post although if you read this blog via feeds, you see this at the bottom of each post. You have may noticed that this blog has suddenly sprung to life. While I’m not sure how long this will last or how frequent updates will be, I wouldn’t want to overwhelm you either.

There are two types of posts – one where I simply link to other content with a short excerpt or comment and other where I’m a little more (alright, a lot more) verbose. If you like to read everything, you may want to subscribe to this feed. If you don’t want the Links posts but only the ones I write at length then subscribe to this feed. Currently, ten of you have selected the latter option ^[1] so I’m glad I created the option.

For those who read directly off the web, not much has changed except the links posts will appear without a title and other meta data like comments, tags, or categories; only the date and time it was posted will appear. So if you choose, you can skim or directly skip those posts ^[2].

Ok, I’ll stop now.

Footnotes:

The links can be a bit Apple-heavy so I can understand
Although I give you an option to skip, I would love for you to click those links post; definitely much better writing than mine

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Post tags: administration, blog tweaking, blogging, feeds