Sunday, April 16, 2006

timetoget ewkeyboard an muse

this is etting idiculous i amn this crappy yit. y keybors meing upagai. I t'sh rainyardor not rel de'lnt matrrrr.I' getig newones tomrow.

Ltr

Monday, April 10, 2006

Lamp surgery

Some time ago, I bought a floor lamp for my bedroom. My nightstand is very small, and the alarm clock and phone don't leave room for much else.

So, floor lamp.

Problem. The whole point of a bedside lamp is to not have to get up to turn it off. The floor lamp is tall. I can't reach the switch while lying in bed. Kind of defeats the purpose.

Solution. Today, I remembered to bring my tools home from work. It took me about five minutes to cut off about two and a half feet and reconnect the wires. I now have a very short floor lamp. It looks pretty weird, and I can't have it on if I'm standing (I can see down into it; it's like a bare lightbulb), but now I can reach the switch while in bed.

Later,

Sunday, April 02, 2006

Was it designed?

Certain ID proponents (who shall remain nameless) have pointed to Mt. Rushmore as a clear example of design, therefore "proving" that they can detect design in nature.

Mt. Rushmore was designed by humans. There is a lot of evidence that someone designed it (and constructed it, by recognizable means). Historical records and rock shards with tool marks (people sometimes take these as souvenirs) to name two.

But that argument has been covered other places (here, here and here for example) and anyway it still wouldn't be very strong evidence for ID.

There is, however, a structure that looks designed, and was for centuries believed to have been designed. The Giant's Causeway. Then some scientists came along and explained how it, in fact, formed naturally. It seems Finn MacCool didn't do it after all. Actually, it (and similar formations) had been thought to be natural for some time, but the mechanism of formation was not well understood.

Stick that up your "explanatory filter."

The point is, most humans can reliably recognize human design because, being human, we typically understand how humans design things. Artifacts designed by humans are not arguments for a non-human designer.

Later,

I totally forgot.

Thank Bill that WinXP automatically adjusts for daylight savings time.

If I hadn't noticed that my computer clock was an hour ahead of the rest of my clocks (stove, alarm, and watch), I'd have been an hour late for work tomorrow.

That would have sucked.

Later,