Non-Prophet

Hacked iPhones Fail On Firmware Update

I'm sorry, but I cannot feel sorry for those folks who have hacked and now bricked their iPhones. Everyone who decides to hack a piece of hardware against the wishes of the manufacturers should do so knowing that risk is involved, and that they are entering a zone in which they are on their own should anything go wrong. Installing an update before waiting to hear what the buzz is, and ending up with a broken phone is just silly. Those folks asked for it, and then got it.

I'm in no hurry to install anything unauthorized on my new iPod Touch. Sure, I wish there was an SDK or as a minimum I wish it supported Java, but it does do what it does very well.

nytimes.com:

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 28 — Since the iPhone hit the market in June, tech-savvy owners of the phone have been busy messing with its insides, figuring out how to add unauthorized software and even “unlock” it for use on networks other than AT&T’s.

But the Web was filled Friday with complaints from people who had installed the latest iPhone software update, only to see all the fun little programs they had been adding to their iPhones disappear — or, still worse, see their phones freeze up entirely.

Life in the Undergrowth

I've seen more than my share of nature shows in my days, but the BBC series "Life in the Undergrowth" featuring David Attenborough is truly a wonder to behold. This series has more fantastic things that I have somehow managed to never hear about or see before that I went away with a mind boggled. If I were to list the 10 most amazing things I've ever been witness to, I swear that at least 5 of them would be found on this DVD series. It is that good. Forget about the bat eating centipede... you must see how leopard slugs have sex. THAT is really something. :0)

If you are even moderately interested in such a series and haven't checked out this one yet, do so asap. If you have a pulse you will go away awe-struck.

here.

iPod Touch

Yesterday I picked up one of these to replace my now ancient 2cnd gen iPod. It is basically an iPhone without the phone. This thing is the most beautiful piece of consumer electronics I've ever laid my tech loving hands on. It's awesomeness in every possible way. Hooray for small shiny things! :0)

Nocturnal Mockery 6

I think this is my favorite art show of the year. Check it out if you're within striking distance. Big flier here.

A New Hope for Burma

Here's to hoping that the people of Burma get their country back from these military bastards with a minimum of loss of human life. It is time for Aung San Suu Kyi to get out of prison and usher in new era for this nation that has lived with injustice for far too long.

Reuters:

YANGON (Reuters) - Myanmar's junta imposed a dusk-to-dawn curfew in the country's two main cities on Wednesday after pouring security forces into Yangon to try to end the biggest protests against military rule in 20 years.

Troops and police on Tuesday had surrounded the Sule Pagoda in Yangon, the focus of two days of mass demonstrations led by thousands of maroon-robed Buddhist monks.

In another possible sign of a looming clash, a well-placed source said detained democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi had been moved to the notorious Insein prison on Sunday, a day after she appeared in front of her house to greet marching monks.

Loudspeaker announcements in Yangon, the former capital, and in the second city of Mandalay said the curfew would run from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. local time, witnesses said.

The announcements also said both cities would be under direct control of the local military commanders for 60 days.

Some analysts said the junta was caught off guard by the speed with which sporadic marches against a sharp hike in fuel prices in mid-August had mushroomed into mass action against 45 years of military rule in the Southeast Asian country formerly known as Burma.

Noosphere

The level and detail of interconnection within society that we currently enjoy is growing and expanding at an amazing rate. There has never been anything like it in history. Our level of interconnectedness coupled with the free flow of information is doubtlessly transforming civilization right now, and the changes that will take place within the next 50 years will change the very fabric and face of humanity. We are an ever increasingly connected people, with incredibly vast amounts of information available to us. We are profoundly aware of events happening throughout the world. All of this is without historical precedent, as we as a species have never seen the likes of such a thing before. Good things will most probably be the result of this. It closely resembles Vernadsky's concept of the noosphere.

Wikipedia:

The noosphere can be seen as the "sphere of human thought" being derived from the Greek νους ("nous") meaning "mind" in the style of "atmosphere" and "biosphere". In the original theory of Vernadsky, the noosphere is the third in a succession of phases of development of the Earth, after the geosphere (inanimate matter) and the biosphere (biological life). Just as the emergence of life fundamentally transformed the geosphere, the emergence of human cognition fundamentally transforms the biosphere. In contrast to the conceptions of the Gaia theorists, or the promoters of cyberspace, Vernadsky's noosphere emerges at the point where humankind, through the mastery of nuclear processes, begins to create resources through the transmutation of elements.

The word is also sometimes used to refer to a transhuman consciousness emerging from the interactions of human minds. This is the view proposed by the theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, who added that the noosphere is evolving towards an ever greater integration, culminating in the Omega Point—which he saw as the ultimate goal of history. The noosphere concept of 'unification' was elaborated in popular science fiction by Julian May in the Galactic Milieu Series.

Bat Eating Centipede

Eeee gad! Holy crap! Here's something new. New to me at least. Damn. I have a newfound respect for, or rather a fear of... more or less everything. So much for sleeping. My fear of bats now seems somewhat insignificant.

Onychophora (Velvet Worms)

These suckers are awesome predators. I think the best way to trap prey is always to squirt sticky glue all over your victim. Even if it isn't glue per-say, or predatory, just spraying sticky goo around can often be a good time.

The Onychophora, commonly called velvet worms, form a small group of about 70 known species of caterpillar-like, terrestrial invertebrates confined to the tropical rainforests of Central and South America, Australia, Africa, Asia and a few other regions. They cannot tolerate dry habitats and live in moist places among leaf litter, under stones and fallen logs, or in crevices and galleries in the soil. They avoid light and usually remain well concealed from casual observation. All the velvet worms are predatory, feeding on small invertebrates such as crickets, spiders, and woodlice. They catch and subdue their prey by spitting a quick-hardening slime from projections (called oral papillae) near the mouth. They also squirt slime in self-defence when attacked or disturbed.

Onychophorans range in size from about 2-15 cm in length and the body is covered with a thin, dry cuticle that is finely ridged and convoluted, giving a velvety appearance to the surface, hence the common name of the group. Body colouring varies from dark bluish-grey to reddish-brown, usually with a darker median stripe along the back. The head appendages include a pair of antennae and jaws, and the elongate body consists of numerous trunk segments (around 15-45 depending on the species), each bearing a pair of short, thick legs. The legs differ from true arthropod legs by lacking joints, but they do have terminal claws which superficially resemble the leg-claws of true arthropods. The best known velvet worms belong to the genus Peripatus.

MoveOn.org and Bush

I don't get it. The ad was perhaps a bit immature, but what is being made out of it now makes it sound like it was filled with lies and some kind of fascist tactics. Most of what it has to say is that the facts are being manipulated to make things look better than they are, and that the mass exodus that has been taking place in Baghdad is partially responsible for some of the reduction in the violence.

Are the claims that MoveOn.org posited incorrect in some way? Is it now unthinkable and disgusting to stand firmly against a war in this country? Good lord man. If our fearful leader can scream and cry at this we are way beyond the beginning of a constitutional crisis.

Here is the text of the ad from moveon.org:

GENERAL PETRAEUS OR GENERAL BETRAY US? General Petraeus is a military man constantly at war with the facts. In 2004, just before the election, he said there was “tangible progress” in Iraq and that “Iraqi leaders are stepping forward.” And last week Petraeus, the architect of the escalation of troops in Iraq, said, “We say we have achieved progress, and we are obviously going to do everything we can to build on that progress.” Every independent report on the ground situation in Iraq shows that the surge strategy has failed. Yet the General claims a reduction in violence. That’s because, according to the New York Times, the Pentagon has adopted a bizarre formula for keeping tabs on violence. For example, deaths by car bombs don’t count. The Washington Post reported that assassinations only count if you’re shot in the back of the head — not the front. According to the Associated Press, there have been more civilian deaths and more American soldier deaths in the past three months than in any other summer we’ve been there. We’ll hear of neighborhoods where violence has decreased. But we won’t hear that those neighborhoods have been ethnically cleansed. Most importantly, General Petraeus will not admit what everyone knows: Iraq is mired in an unwinnable religious civil war. We may hear of a plan to withdraw a few thousand American troops. But we won’t hear what Americans are desperate to hear: a timetable for withdrawing all our troops. General Petraeus has actually said American troops will need to stay in Iraq for as long as ten years. Today, before Congress and before the American people, General Petraeus is likely to become General Betray Us.

Whitley Strieber vs. Daniel Pinchbeck: Slap-fight!

On the fairly rare occasions that it somehow happens, I've always had a good time listening to Art Bell on AM radio. His show explores various paranormal topics, has interesting guests and always manages to fall short send me running off into the woods screaming about how idiotic some concept is. Art always keeps things light enough that you can really let the conversation flow and enjoy it, even if it isn't a topic that I can really get into.

The other day I met Daniel Pinchbeck at a book reading in Denver and he mentioned his on-air fight with Whitley Strieber. Honestly, I have no idea who Strieber is, I haven't read any of his books, and after listening to the slap-fight that happened on his show I can only thank the Gods that I have managed to steer clear of him for this long. Strieber has a show called Dreamland, and he runs a website called unknowncountry.com. Blech. Strieber sounds to me to be some kind of a dishonest crank, spewing fantastic tales of his encounters with aliens. If I could get 1/10th of the paranormal action he claims to it'd be more than I could handle. His hook on his radio show seems to be his claim that he is certain of a dramatic decline in the global population that will happen in the near future. As he interviews Pinchbeck -- using a freaky and almost surreal radio talk show host voice -- things go terribly wrong. Daniel disputes the certainty of Strieber's "we're all going to die" thesis, and when Strieber returns with smug, nearly Limbaugh-like tones Pinchbeck actually gets pretty pissed off.

While many of you probably won't agree with me, I've always seen Pinchbeck as something of an investigative journalist covering topics that lie outside of the limits of what most people consider normal. Crop circles, quantum mechanics and shamanic spirituality are just a few of the areas he has attempted to take fairly rational swings at without coming off as a strict rationalistic product of the enlightenment era. His work is largely attempts at forming elaborate "what if" scenarios and seeing if they can hold water under some tracts of thought. He reminds me more of Erik Davis than Carlos Casteneda.

Interestingly, Daniels frustration with Strieber reminded me so very much of my own struggles to survive conversations with people who are so far out in left field that I'm left speechless. I often find myself discussing theories with folks that are so far away from what I think follows any kind of objective train of thought that I find myself paralyzed and searching for a respectful response. Couched in something resembling speculative terms it is all fine, but when someone is trying to convince me that say, cows were brought to this planet by aliens, or that $5,000 speaker cables sound better than $50 ones, I'm left in a squirming in a corner. I usually just nod politely and possibly offer some unoffensive counter-point. I know I should be more open to hearing opinions and considering points of view, and it is something I'm getting better at, but it is difficult. Sometimes I walk away a bit depressed, thinking that my own thought experiments are probably just as asinine, and that I'd be better off staying in and watching lots of television. Folks like this give honest speculation about the bizarre a bad name.

In any case, Daniel didn't seem to be able to bite his lip for this one. Strieber's smug radio voice seemed to get the best of Daniel and he wasn't able to take it on the chin. So check out the slap-fight if you want. I couldn't stand listening to much of it, but if you skip around a bit it is easy enough to find the good parts. Pichbeck is pretty good. Strieber sounds -- on my first impression -- like a lame kind of a egotistical and crankish charlatan. I'll stick with Art Bell. I don't have the stomach or the patience for the alien apocalypse scene. Check out Pinchbeck's alternative writer consortium realitysandwich.com instead. You'll probably find something there you can sink your teeth into.

The slap-fight is here.