Bo Cowgill on Prediction Markets

For feed users, go to post for video.

"It's incentive, nonetheless."

Very good stuff.

Where the entitlement never ends

Harvard's undergraduate commencement speaker is selected by, according to the NPR article, alumni and parents, people who respect the tradition of the institution with the benefit of added perspective. Apparently selecting someone with a unique, lighter-weighted career didn't sufficiently stroke the egos of a few of the graduates, and some of these quotes remind us of what the hell is wrong with this world.

"I think we could have done better," shrugged computer science major Kevin Bombino. He says Rowling lacks the gravitas a Harvard commencement speaker should have.

"You know, we're Harvard. We're like the most prominent national institution. And I think we should be entitled to … we should be able to get anyone. And in my opinion, we're settling here."

You have to listen to this tool stumbling over his "we should be entitled to" remark. It's like, somewhere in that education, he learned about entitlement, about how maybe he and some of the kids around him are some of the most entitled human beings on the face of the earth, but it never occurred to him that maybe that entitlement had some limits.

Speaking of past speakers:

"It's definitely the 'A' list, and I wouldn't ever associate J.K. Rowling with the people on that list," says senior Andy Vaz. "From the moment we walk through the gates of Harvard Yard, they constantly emphasize that we are the leaders of tomorrow. They should have picked a leader to speak at commencement. Not a children's writer. What does that say to the class of 2008? Are we the joke class?"

Yes, you Tool. If you are graduating from that class, either your class is the joke class, or every class behind you has been as well, and nobody told you. Your $200,000 education obviously dropped in value because one of the most successful human beings who didn't have your background got to speak to you for twenty minutes.

To be fair, I'm betting that a tremendous number of Harvard kids enjoyed having Rowling there, and I bet plenty of them don't take themselves as seriously as bunch of asshole 22-year olds who some how avoided picking up any perspective while hanging out with some of the brightest young people on the planet for the past four years. And NPR might have sought the only naysayers in the whole class in order to write their "look how much better YOUR intellectual snobbery is than this guy's intellectual snobbery, you dashing hipster you!" article. But maybe they didn't.

This tunnelvision of the "we're the University X, bow before our shit which does not stink" mentality probably trickles down to, say, the top 40 undergraduate institutions in U.S. News and World Report and probably 20 of the "liberal arts" colleges that get their own perverse ranking system. And probably the top 25 medical schools, law schools, business schools, speech pathology schools, etc. So it goes.

So, congratulations Kevin Bombino and Andy Vaz, on those pieces of papers that will provide you with all the entitlement you could ever imagine. And, when you become one of those "leaders" you're so worried about, may God have mercy on all of us.

Not mine, but I'd take it

Cute Overload. Seriously.

Friday Afternoon Vocabulary Expansion

I've recently run across two words that have instantly found a home in my "that's just a cool word" mental bin. So I must share.

First, steampunk.

Second, and much better for a general audience, crank bug. (4th paragraph)

To be clear, I claim the latter for the totally awesome indie grass band I will someday assemble.

"Ain't got no sweat tea"

Fellow Southern expatriate Jeff Klineman's celebration of true Southern Sweet Tea deserves your anthropological attention. I've always gravely lamented my own lack of Sweet Tea experience, and I'm actually working on developing a taste for iced tea. The problem, of course, isn't with the beverage, but my unwillingness to knowingly put that much sugar in a glass and drink it. Thank you, Splenda, for letting me re-explore my heritage without further increasing my chance of diabetes. Courtney assures me that it's my grandmother's fault, since her grandmother always had a pitcher of the prototypical Pitcher of Sugar Flavored with a Pinch of Tea ready in the refrigerator. I was too busy drinking chocolate milk and my grandfather's special recipe root beer floats, I guess.

Kurt Vonnegut on Barry Bonds

Kurt understood the significance of the asterisk after whatever number of home runs Bonds steals away from the forces of good:
Picture stolen from this website, a collection of author self-portraits. Copyright somebody who's not me.

Courtney and I turned off our DVR-ed Jeopardy episode last night, only to see this ridiculously painful crash on the X-games. 720 into a 540 turns into a 720 into SPLAT! I thought the dude was dead, since I don't think I could personally survive a fall down a flight of stair, but you can't kill people stupid enough to ride skateboards 50 feet into the air. So it's worth the watch, if only to hear the stoner announcer's reaction: "Ah, man, that was... that was the heaviest slam we've ever seen... Oh, my God. Wow, I can't believe he nailed that 720."

I don't shill for CuteOverload nearly enough.

Sparky Harry Potter theories Redux

0/2.

All is well.

Sparky Harry Potter theories

31 hours until the Deathly Hallows are unleashed upon the Eastern time zone, so here's my last chance to divulge my newest theories before all such theories are useless. I haven't heard anything like this from anybody else, so if I'm right, I want mass love. If I'm wrong, well, I still want mass love, but ya know.

Why does Dumbledore trust Snape?

What experience do Dumbledore and Snape share that no others do? That's right, kids. Only they heard Trelawney's prophesy. Nobody else. Not Harry, not He-Who-Has-No-Nose-On-Screen, and not even Trelawney herself. So how do we know the contents of the prophesy? Dumbledore tells Harry what it said in book five. In book six he tells Harry that the only reason the prophecy applies to reality is because Voldy is obsessed with its contents. Voldy marked Harry by trying to kill him. If Snape never told Voldy its contents (or partial contents, as I propose), said prophecy would be just another blob in the bottom of a tea cup.

So, if Snape and Dumbledore are the only two to ever actually hear the prophecy, if the prophecy was broken in the final battle of OoTP, then who's to say that Dumbledore and Snape heard a version of the prophecy decidedly different than the one presented to Harry? Or, more complete than the one heard by Harry, at least.

When Malfoy attempts to fulfill Voldy's commands, he fails, and Dumbledore offers the Malfoys protection. Did Dumbledore make a similar offer to Snape, allowing Snape to maintain his cover with Voldemort while gaining a valuable mole into the Death Eater camp? Harry tries to explain to the others after Dumbledore's death in H-BP that Dumbly trusted Snape because Snape was sorry that James and Lily were the ones killed after he revealed the prophecy to Voldemort. Could it be that this is a regret that Dumbledore's plan to disseminate false information resulted in collateral deaths? Dumbledore and Snape would have shared this particular regret. So, Did Dumbledore kill James and Lily, in much the same way that Kreacher's self-serving deceptions resulted in Sirius' death? Odd justice, but the sort of twist Rowling does not seem incapable of.

For Vonnegut fans, Snape is the ultimate Howard W. Campbell, Jr. You either get the reference, or you don't. If you don't, Mother Night is a great place to start.

Is Dumbledore dead?

Why we're not obsessing about Dumbledore's relationship to his phoenix, Fawkes, I can't understand. Someone who shares an office with a loyal phoenix isn't gone for good. He's not even out of control. Much of the series has focused on Voldemort's attempts at immortality, while Dumbledore has smiled knowingly that 'love' his so much a greater power than Voldy's dark magic. Maybe 'love' isn't just 'love.' Maybe 'love' connects Dumbledore to Fawkes and to the magic of immortality that doesn't require murder and splitting your soul into destroyable objects. Book five contained two armies: the Order of the Phoenix, and Dumbledore's Army. But it wasn't the Order of Fawkes, it was the Order of Dumbledore, obviously. Dumbledore has achieved immortality, but a phoenix has to die ever so often in order to renew itself.

Snape didn't kill Dumbledore. Snape facilitated the rebirth of a phoenix. Think more Obi-Wan Kenobi than Gandalf, but a rebirth nonetheless. Snape's murder of Dumbledore seems intimately linked to some sort of over-arching plan developed between Snape and Dumbledore right about the same time that Harry's parents were killed. Conquering Voldemort may just require a 17-year plan, and a plan that depends so much on the willing participation of an unwitting kid. No wonder Dumbledore puts so much emphasis on supposed free will.

That's J.K. Rowling's form of destiny. Rowling is a pitcher that sticks a single finger into the air to signify to the batter that a fastball is coming, and you better hit it if you dare. If you don't, you'll strike out. You might need a little bit of luck, and the pitch may come in high and tight, but the swing is still yours to take. And that's why Dumbledore's Army will be lining up outside bookstores Friday night.

Turn Yourself Into a Simpsons Character

Go to simpsonizeme.com, upload a photo of yourself and the application analyzes your face, turning you into an honorary Springfield resident.

Can't wait to get home and try this thing out.

Update: hehehe...

Good to hear "R.E.M.," "guitar-heavy," and "new album" in the same paragraph

Apparently Michael Stipe was editing lyrics onstage during their "working rehearsal" show while finishing up studio album 14.

Samoas versus Caramel Delites

If you've ever had the Girl Scout Cookie Talk with friends who grew up in various parts of the country, you'll argue about some of the names. Samoas versus Caramel Delites. Tagalongs? That's my Peanut Butter Patties. Take your fancy Dosidos and shove them down your Peanut Butter Sandwich hole. Courtney and I have the debate often. She maligns my insistence on calling her Samoas the much less exciting Caramel Delites.

Apparently the different names are made at different bakeries, and actually have slightly different formulae. Not sure why certain areas get certain variations, but they're NOT the same. Happy 4th of July. Can't get much more patriotic than Girl Scout Cookies.

Maybe I'll blog about something that matters again sometime soon.

Since I'm in Tennessee/Kentucky, I'll continue along the theme of not posting real content until I'm back in A2. Found this on Feministing, which receives the much more exciting NC-17 tag. I'm not working hard enough. Someone should make fun of Kyle, since Vindicated gets a G. Come on, it's an Anglican blog. That should be at least PG-13 if done right and with significant restraint.

Political quizzes usually tend to fail me (everybody?) miserably, but I found taking both the "How to Win a Fight with a Conservative" and the "How to Win a Fight with a Liberal" quizzes in combination actually meant something to me.

My Liberal Identity:

You are a Reality-Based Intellectualist, also known as the liberal elite. You are a proud member of what’s known as the reality-based community, where science, reason, and non-Jesus-based thought reign supreme.

Take the quiz at www.fightconservatives.com

My Conservative Identity:

You are a Free Marketeer, also known as a fiscal conservative. You believe in free-market capitalism, tax cuts, and protecting your hard-earned cash from pick-pocketing liberal socialists.

Take the quiz at www.fightliberals.com

This is a big improvement over other quizzes I've taken which always label me a socialist. Come on, just because Courtney and I really want to get two twin German dogs (debating between giant schnauzers and standard poodles) some day and name them Marx and Engels doesn't mean I don't like the free market.

Cosmic blogging coincidences

Back in September of last year, I declared I would never go back to the Briarwood Dollar Movies after a series of terrible experiences with rude employees, disgusting bathrooms, and just general poor quality. But I never got around to seeing 300 on a large screen (and that seemed like the sort of movie that would benefit from being seen in a theater), so today Courtney and I sucked up and decided to give the place another try. We stayed away from the folks at the concession stand, held our urine in our bladders, and beside having to strain to understand some of the dialogue, overall we got our two bucks worth.

And then I come home to get the first comment on said post from back in 2006:

GO WIPE YOUR ASS WITH YOUR 9 DOLLAR TICKETS
DUSCHEBAG!

Awesome. Mr "IP Address 76.226.104.83" thoroughly made my day with that one, and wins the "best alternate spelling of a mainstream cutdown" Award.

Resquiescat in Pace

R.I.P. gets thrown around a lot when people and their lives are separated from one another, and the translation most commonly used by English speakers sounds like a direct command. "Rest in peace, because I said so!" Now, 94% of my Latin is gone, and my wife is at work expecting me to be showering right now, but if Romans were commanding people to rest in peace, I believe that ending would be an -e, (don't quote me on that).

The only reason I mention the academic difference for English speakers is because that -at meaning denotes an exhortation, a plea. It's the same as "Let them eat cake." It's a "Let this person rest in peace." It's a request, it's a hope, it's a prayer. We are actually begging our lost to rest in peace, because we can't unless they do. The imperative mood suggests we have control, certainty. But make no mistake, the proper subjunctive contains its own meditation on the human condition and death. We are the impotent victims of either fate or statistics, two things that we have only tiny means of influencing overall.

No Survivors of UofM Jet Crash. Let them rest in peace. May they rest in peace. Please, for our sake as much as yours, we beg you to rest in peace.

For those of you reading from outside the UofM or Southeastern Michigan area, the plane contained a transplant team. Two crew members, an attending, a fellow, and two other members of the transplant team.

Different services at different hospitals have different reputations. The transplant service at UofM had the best kind of reputation: "we work you until you pass out, but we'll treat you like real live human beings the whole time." That's a medical student dream (well, less the first part, but medical students actually enjoy being worked hard when they, their educations, and the use of their time is being respected.) I've heard from at least one friend that the attending physician on this flight made excellent contributions towards the above reputation of goodness. I didn't have a month on transplant, as only about 20-30 people do each year out of a class of 170, but I know way too many people who are probably very personally effected by this to not be sad for them, including a friend who is on the service right now, and who I'm very thankful was not included on this flight.

Tragedies are often tragic, and this one is no exception. And if tragedies happening to good people are doubly tragic, then his one is also no exception.

How to fix a laptop (that isn't really broken)

1. Spend all day trying to clean your registry, update antivirus software, get rid of spyware, defrag, etc.
2. Turn it off for a few hours.
3. Turn it back on and cry when it only runs at a reasonable speed for the first five minutes.
4. Stay up until 2 in the morning googling why the fan keeps making that really strange noise.
5. Find out that a legion of geeks have encountered similar problems before, and even written software that lets someone like me highjack my computer fans, which will probably on result in me setting my apartment on fire.
6. Turn it off and take the whole thing apart.
7. Put it back together, counting your blessings that the number of screws equals the number of holes that seem to require screws.
   
8. Blow on it like it's a NES game in 1987.
9. Enjoy a computer that works again (and may continue to do so for hours, maybe even days, maybe even weeks).

I really enjoy the fact that the most likely intervention of any consequence was blowing really hard to clean some of the lint and dust from around the fans. My CPU is at a cool 136 degrees at 1.2 mhz (why not at 1.7 like it was a few minutes ago, and is rated for, I have no clue). Great success! (until tomorrow)

Jerry Falwell, dead at 73

The Carpetbagger Report tackles the difficult position of discussing Falwell just hours after his death by recounting the events of his life.

I'm always quick to talk about my experiences spending two summers at Baptist boot camp at Falwell's Liberty University, because a lot of who I am today really traces back to those experiences, how disingenuous and manipulative they were. Most of what I really found important spiritually growing up just never felt legitimate again. I don't have a personal beef with Pat Robertson or James Dobson, although I do think they are bad people. But Jerry Falwell, I shook that guy's hand. And he shook my faith. And I hate him for it.

Falwell and his evangelical cronies have done a lot of emotional and psychological damage to a lot of people under an umbrella of an extremely hateful reading of a sacred text. He was a bad person. I can't imagine the good things he might have done could possibly surpass the bad things he did.

To quote Death Cab for Cutie, "Styrofoam Plates":

I won't join the procession that's speaking their peace
using five dollar words while praising his integrity
and just because he's gone, it doesn't change the fact
he was a bastard in life, thus a bastard in death.

Update: Here is the particular camp I'm talking about. I guess that would have been the summers of 1996 and 1997 for me. Looks like they still hold camps at Liberty even today.

Update 2: Some indefensible Falwell quotes.

"AIDS is the wrath of a just God against homosexuals. To oppose it would be like an Israelite jumping in the Red Sea to save one of Pharaoh's charioteers ... AIDS is not just God's punishment for homosexuals; it is God's punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals."

"The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked. And when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad. I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way -- all of them who have tried to secularize America -- I point the finger in their face and say 'you helped this happen.'"

Update 3: Tim Noah includes some more quotes, including those denouncing feminists, Jews, and Martin Luther King, as well as a fit epitaph: "Rest in peace, you blowhard."

So I finally got around to watching an episode of House

I've always wanted to start at the beginning with the DVDs, as I really hate jumping into a series anywhere other than at the beginning. But my in-laws have been visiting this week, and because of them, I've now seen my first episodes of American Idol (strangely addicting, although I think the methadone is already working) and House.

I had high hopes for House. I remember Chris Scipione (soon to be a surgical intern at UofM) recounting how he was watching an episode with his parents back during M1 or M2 year, and Chris' guess early on that the patient suffered from SSPE turned out correct, and everyone in the room was thoroughly impressed with their genius boy medical student. Skip was like that. If anybody could vouch for House, it would be Skip. If anybody could wind up "bored-certified" in nephrology and infectious disease while developing his own radiographs and performing brain biopsies in his spare time, it'd be Skip.

But my God, I've never watched such a painful show in my life. Hey, this kid has histo, and this kid has leukemia. His balls are swollen, and we won't do an ultrasound of his sack, we'll just suck out his white cells! Woohoo!

I'm not sure if it's any worse than Grey's, which I only watched for a few episodes during my OB rotation so I'd have something to talk about with the residents. If ever there was a case of stereotypes ringing true, it was OB residents and nurses talking about Grey's.

Courtney's in the other room watching something from a season 6 DVD of ER. ER flubs here and there, but at least it smells like real medicine. ER takes itself way too seriously, but it's a television drama. At least they put some drama into it.

Grey's and, now House? WTF is this crap? They're not about medicine. They could be about Martian ferret farming, and use most of the same back stories, and nobody would know the difference.

And sure, you're going to say it's just entertainment. But dude, that's like saying that Jerry Falwell is just a preacher. Or that Nostradamus was just a hot dog vendor. I mean, maybe he sold good hot dogs, but somehow that whole predicting the murder of kings thing sorta went further, right?

Okay, not even I understand what the hell I meant in that previous paragraph. Bed time. House sucks, although I will probably give it another shot when Courtney starts getting the DVDs from Netflix, starting at episode one.