Colorado is a specialist state and that's why I'm justified to think it sucks

I realized one thing when I got back from Brazil: I'm just not a Colorado kind of a person. I know some may say I am judging prematurely. After all I have lived only in Fort Collins, for just a year. It's not like I'm an expert in all things Colorado. But all views or "expertise" on any state is just an abstraction of that person's impressions, and so accuracy of the views is really not an issue. Can anyone accurately know a sate? How much information do you have to have in order for anyone to be an expert of a state? How can you know the characteristics of a state accurately anyways? And how do you judge the accuracy of your views on a state? In another words, why would my negative thoughts about Colorado be wrong? Because they differ from some "accurate" views?

Anyways, I think Colorado sucks. It makes my soul wither. Now, I hated it when non-Californians talked about how California sucked while still living in California. And I understand that what I am doing sounds like the same thing. But I'm going to argue otherwise.

Colorado attracts much more narrower variety of people compared to California. If you value mountains and outdoors highly, then Colorado is your place. If you don't, then you probably would move out of Colorado when you have a chance. California, on the other hand, offers more variety. You can live near the coast if you like the ocean (and can afford it). If you value liberal culture then there is San Francisco. If you want to be a celebrity, LA is your place. You don't have to move out of California because you don't like the main characteristics of whichever place you happen to be in.

Because Colorado is less varied than California, generalizations of Colorado are more accurate than of California. The imaginary distribution curve of state characteristics is narrower for Colorado, and so describing the mean with a fixed standard deviation will encompass more proportion of the total area under the curve than for California. Also, the number of observation necessary is smaller for Colorado. Narrow variance makes the likely hood of an observation being the mean higher. This makes it more accurate to generalize about Colorado than California.

Since the generalization is more accurate and it is harder to escape it, you are more justified to think Colorado sucks than to think California sucks. I admit that this argument doesn't counter the real reason I hated "California sucks" talk. My response was "get out of California if you don't like it." If anything the argument above makes the response more pertinent. It really aims at the action of actually saying "Colorado sucks" instead of thinking it. The response highlights the fact that there are alternatives, like moving out of the state. So, I am more justified in thinking "Colorado sucks". But actual act of saying "Colorado sucks" is less justified, if this makes any sense. And yes, I am planning my escape.

10 Resons Why NBA Rules

10) The Dunk Contest. I know I might be the only one who gets excited about this, but it's kind of like going to the thrift store. You might find gems amidst a bunch of junk.





9) Defensive strategies. They Play defense in the NBA. It's just harder to play a good defense than in college games because the area to defend is bigger with the 3 point line further away, the 3 second rule that forbids big guys from standing around the rim, the no-hand check rule, and the offense is much better. This is where teamwork counts in the NBA.



8) The triangle offense. People hate the Lakers, but they play one of the prettiest offenses around. I doubt you can dislike the triangle offense they play if you are a true basketball fan. It requires the players to make decisions and play smart while presenting multiple options. It's a thinking man's offense based on what the defense is doing. It's like water conforming to the container. Really.



7) Blocks. The players in NBA can block the crap out of the ball. The video below is not a typical block for a few reasons. The blocker is actually the defender defending the ball. This is much more difficult than the typical block where the blocker is not the one defending the ball (he has more time and space to jump). And the blocker in the video is a guard who usually doesn't block at all, let alone block a jump shot by a guy he was defending. And this happened at the end of hotly contested playoff game.



6) Behind the back passes. Clark Nova like them. This one is good because it happens during a fast break (less time for the passer to know where everyone is at), and he catches and passes in one single motion. LeBron makes it look easy, but there are probably 10 people on the planet that can make this pass.



5) No look passes. Because when it's pretty, it's pretty.



4) Crossover. This one is not just an ordinary crossover, but the most devastating crossover of all time. Ankle insurance started because of this.



3) Last second shots. Not many things are more exciting. And they can happen twice or more in a game. This is Kobe making one at the end of regulation to tie the game and making another at the end of overtime to win it.



2) Dunks. The players in NBA get creative on this.



1) NBA rules because this happens. In playoffs no less.

Things I hate right now, for Clark Nova of course

Scientific articles, especially the ones about trees. I hate them. Here are the things the articles are not: fun, easy to read, easy to understand, exciting, curiosity tickling, entertaining, hart warming, gut wrenching, life affirming, imagination soaring, and, again, fun. Here are the things the articles actually are: work, and crap.

Paper work. It exist only to cover people's asses. It's a double whammy of badness. Increases inefficiency while killing trees, the environment, and what ever they use to make ink (the Earth?). A professor said "it gets easier when you become a professor. The school will hire people to do them for you. Or you can get grad students to do them." What!? The school already hired people to make the paper work in the first place. They will then pay different people to do them? Why can't they hire more graduate students to make a robot to do this?

People who talk in my office. Most of the time, they talk to announce their presence. It's as if their mothers didn't hug them enough when they were babies. Maybe this is the root of why people want to be on TV. I wish they would just hug you or slap your butt or take their clothing off instead. They are much better ways of getting attention. Besides, that's what they really want to do.

Diversity theory of eudcation - Part 3, How bad is US education really?

Diverse populous requires diverse education system, and US has remarkably diverse AND flexible one. A student in US can be home-schooled for K to 6th grade, enter a charter school focused on science for 6 to 8th grade, go to public high school, enter liberal arts college studying history, and then go to business school and succeed. A student in Japan on the other hand has to go to a good kinder garden, go to a good private elementary school, take an exam to get into a good Jr high school to prepare for the entrance exam for high school, pick business concentration in high school to study for entrance exam for college, and then get accepted to an undergrad program at a college with good business school so she has a chance to get into one. Most Japanese graduate students did their undergrad at the same school because that's how you get into a good one. But here in US I was told to go somewhere else so I can diversify my views.

This diversity and flexibility offers opportunities at every level not seen in many other countries. In Hong Kong, students are put on a track, science, arts, or commerce, at high school level and have little chance of switching from then on. In Switzerland, students are separated into 3 levels based on their intellectual abilities at high school level. Where they go for higher education depends on what level they were placed. Same principles do exist in US but at much lesser degree.

Both Hong Kong and Switzerland almost always place high in measures of education, higher than US. But are we more stupid? We are slightly more productive than the two countries (GDP per capita). Given that we spend more money on education than any other country, we certainly are inefficient. But what if that inefficiency comes as a cost of diversity, fairness, and flexibility? For that matter, are we more fair? I think so because our education offers diverse options at every level compared to other countries, but isn't that question just as important as how we score in the tests?

The major flaw of the current state of education in US, and rightfully so the most damaging criticism of US education is it's illiteracy rate. Everyone should be able to read and write. But the debate on education focuses too much on test scores at the expense of combating illiteracy. Yes, US education is bad, but it's not because we score low on the tests. It's bad because we have a lot of illiteracy.

Chickens in Fort collins

This story appeared on NPR (Ed found it);

Chick-fil-A opened a restaurant in Fort Collins, Colo. As a promotion, it promised free chicken sandwiches for a year. That prize would go to the first 100 customers. More than 100 people camped out to get the prize. They remained outside the restaurant even though it was snowing. A blizzard dropped 17 inches. And still people stayed, surviving with propane heaters and hot chocolate provided by the restaurant.

Yes, I know, I should have been one of more than 100 people waiting. It's for free chicken sandwiches for a year after all. I might have had to clime over the frozen bodies of those in front of me, but man, them chicken sandwiches...

In all seriousness, prosperity changes our connection to food. Food is food to anyone who don't have enough of it, but it is organic, local, trans-fat, complex carbohydrate, make my ass get big thing to those who have plenty. I understand that these differences do exist. But they become important only when you are wealthy enough to have plenty of food. To the poor and the hungry, it's not important that the food is organic or local or trans-fat free. They don't have that luxury.

Those who waited in front of Chick-fil-A were dead serious and maybe desperate for free food. I'm sure some of them were only there for the "fun" of it or shortening their lives eating poorly. But anyone who waits for free food - of any kind - in a blizzard has my respect. Shame on NPR for implying that they might be a little nuts. Some of them need help. (shame on me too for making fun of them above, but I'm no National Public Radio).

Diversity theory of education - Part 2, diversify!

I would like to think that I'm more informed than average Americans. But even I have not nearly enough information on many of the most pressing political decisions. Like the recession, the health care, and the war, and I imagine that I'm not the only one. Take health care for example. I don't even know what's on the current version of the proposed legislation, let alone the implications of it. I am not informed enough to make any sort of decision on it. On top of this, I don't have the time or the inclination to learn about this.

My strategy to get to an informed decision relies on other people to simply the matter. Newspapers, magazines, radios, the internet, have many experts summarizing health care reform. I can then make my decision accordingly. The key here is to remember that most (if not all) secondary information like the newspaper comes with intent. It might be to sell the paper (most of the time the intent is to profit, which is not bad) or to influence your opinion. As long I understand that, I can judge which resources to trust. This is much easier than to gather all the information my self.

This method fails when restrictions decrease the diversity of information. Just as more genetically diverse population (of say condors) can withstand variety of perturbations, the diversity of information increases the chances of the right and useful one existing. This is one of the reasons we guarantee the freedom of political speech.

The most fundamental way to have diversity of secondary information is to have diversity of people. We need people who understands health care. We need people who understands economics. We need people who understands governance. If the amount of information is overwhelming, then what we need is diversity of people.

Early work in cybernetics, a theory of systems as information processors, solidified under two essential presumptions:

1. that thinking is computation
2. physical laws exist that explain how nature appears to possess a form of finality, or teleonomy. The presumption is essentially that things do not just happen randomly, but tend towards certain regular states despite the fact that it cannot be said that they necessarily had to.

NB: The problem of imputing necessity to nature (natural world of empirical laws) defined Kant's critical philosophy. Hume famously reputed the argument that nature operated according to necessity (that things could not be otherwise) and demonstrated that all we can safely say is that human beings give the idea of necessity to nature by habit of association. We see the sun rise everyday which leads us to believe that it MUST rise tomorrow. Hume believed that anything not encountered in our experience, could not be said to have necessary validity, or be used as part of an argument that claimed to be beyond dispute. Kant argued that because we cannot derive the idea of necessity from our experience (we never experience necessity, so why do we have the idea of it in the first place?), even by association, that it must be a category of thought. It must be natural to the mind, occuring before experience takes place, if not to nature itself. Moreover, Kant held that the idea of necessity actively structures our perception of nature.

Back to cybernetics. Cyberneticians were not mind-body dualists. For them, mind or thinking is mechanical: minds basically are computing machines--minds are not just IN human bodies, and they don't define what it means to be human. The claim is more general. As Jean-Pierre Dupuy put it,

“[t]he computation involved is not the mental operation of a human being who manipulates symbols in applying rules, such as those of addition or multiplication; instead it is what a particular class of machines do—machines technically referred to as ‘algorithms.’”

Cybernetic systems were thought of as machines that precisely pilot, control or direct _their own activities_. Why? To reduce the complexity or noise in their environments and make possible dynamic properties and behaviors in their responses to this complexity. How can dynamic properties result from operations of self-control and self-direction, from a reduction of environmental complexity? Are such systems geared toward stasis? How do dynamic properties and behaviors result from systemic reductions of complexity?

Cybernetic systems draw a distinction between themselves and their environments and, once the distinction is drawn, consist in control mechanisms internal to the boundaries of a system. The environments of these systems thus act as mere triggers or perturbing devices. They thus build up their own, internal complexity as part of their historical responses to change in the environment. Control mechanisms operate to reproduce the system homeostatically, that is, control mechanisms represent the systems auto-poietic character: the fact that it produces itself by reproducing its elements or operations (without making recourse to the environment through an exchnage of information. Think of a thermostat. Or a heat-seeking missile.

Cybernetics thus addresses the following problems:
1. The self-organization of complex systems and
2. Their self-regulation through operations such as feedback;
3. The passage between the differing levels of integration of a system;
4. The modalities of openness and closure of a system;
5. The question of teleology and finality.
6. The concept of code or information.

Things I like at the moment

These are the things I like at the moment.

Football. I think college football is more entertaining than pro football. The tradition, the rivalries, the discussions, and of course the mascots get me excited on Saturdays. I wish the people around me like it more. Pro football on the other hand is awesome for fantasy sports and reading about it the next day. Watching pros isn't that much fun for some reason.

Data. I managed to gather a lot of it, and even though it sure causes pain during analysis I feel better having them. What are they going to tell me?

Avocados and tofu. They are tasty in a way that I would have not liked when I was little.

And last but not least, New Morning. New Morning posted a whopper on systems. I'm happy to see philosophy represented well. It made me jealous of philosophers for being able to argue endlessly without people thinking you are an ass.

Fort Collins, Colorado

Falcon "the balloon boy" tricked us. Yes he did. His whole family did. What I don't understand is why would anyone choose to be on a TV when he could have gone flying in a UFO instead? Why do people want to be on TV in the first place? Where am I, in Hollywood? Funny how everyone here hates LA, but they already live in a small town version of it.

Systems and Individuals

‘System’ is a key philosophical concept, which in the 18th century became indissolubly linked with the philosophical problem of individuation. Individuation is the problem of determining how individuals are individualized, taking on discrete identities. Why did the concept of system become linked with the problem of individuation? Individuation presumes that there are individuals. That is, contrary to some monism of substance, if we accept that there are individuals, then we challenge the notion of the whole. Of course, questions of parts and wholes, the one and the many, are as ancient as philosophical thinking itself. Yet the problem of individuation flourished in the philosophical literature only with the demise of religion, or, the idea that one substance maintained a relationship of primacy, generally causal, with respect to all others. As soon as credence was given to the notion that individuals have viable being, in themselves, the conventional notion of system, as a whole or unity of nature, was undermined. Thus, system philosophy is not about the unity or wholeness of the world. Rather, it endorses the view that the world is composed of gaps, fissures, and relations among parts without any ultimate coherence. Systems philosophy is an attempt to grasp a world of multiplicity, and even the etymology of the term system suggests that a system is a unity *of* differences. That said, system philosophy does endorse the idea that multiplicity and difference, a world of individuals, may nonetheless be thought, or conceptualized, in some consistent way. When the idea that the concept of system no longer describes the whole, or the set of all sets, rises to prominence, what comes into being is a set of conceptual tools developed matching in complexity with a world without some holistic finality.
The problem of individuation itself used to describe a world where individuals were basic, indivisible substances, or atoms. In such a world, relations among individuals matter less than cataloging the basic atoms of being, and little attention is paid to the processes undergone by individuals. Such processes can only be accidents of substance, not the essence of individuals. However, research in systems in the 19th and 20th century, as well as the undermining of the world of classical thermodynamics towards a vision of dynamic systems at far-from-equilibrium conditions without final ends or stases, showed the limits of understanding individuals as basic substances. One might think of the importance of the theory of ‘elective affinities’ among chemical substances, an invention of 19th century chemistry, which placed primacy not in individual substances, but in the relations between substances. Iron (Fe) is defined less by the number of protons it carries than by the fact that it undergoes very different changes in its properties in the presence of atmospheric oxygen (rust) versus in the cells of living organisms (nutrient). Thus, studying chemical substances became a question of stoichiometrical relationships in dynamic interactions and processes. The reductionistic study of individual atoms gave way to the study of relations and processes in dynamic interactions. If an individual (an atom, a tree, a society) were to reveal the secrets of its identity and its behavior, it must be related systemically to other individuals. A systemic conception of individuality meant understanding individuals as results and processes generated in dynamic interactions. In this way, the traditional concept of individuality was shown to reflect an already-individuated effect of systemic being, and that examining the systemic relations and processes that generate individuality granted a richer conception of individuality.
Thinking systemically called traditional scientific concepts of linear causality, determinism, and reductionism into question, replacing them with notions of circular causality, self-organization, indeterminacy, and the unpredictable emergence of order from disorder. Thinking systemically meant working toward developing a unified theory and methodological approach to investigate not just the classical simplicities of the mechanistically structured material world, but also the complexities of biological, cognitive, and even social systems. Thus was set into motion a new, post-Newtonian scientific paradigm for research.
In the 20th and 21st centuries, studying systems, whether in science or philosophy, goes hand in hand with addressing problems specific to:
1. The self-organization of complex systems and
2. Their self-regulation through operations such as feedback
3. The passage between the differing levels of integration of a system;
4. The modalities of openness and closure of a system (system boundaries);
5. The question of teleology and finality;
6. The concept of code or information.
Systems, on the parameters listed above, presuppose the following assumptions
1) individuals are results of systems;
2) systems articulate relations and processes;
3) an individual is the generated result of systemic relations and processes;
4) following 1-3, if we want to explain how individuals are individualized (take on particular identities), we must first think of individuals as systems.

Evidence vs Theory

The posts on systems got me thinking: evidence or logic, which should we trust more? Part of the project I'm involved in looks at how lignin degrades compared to cellulose. Lignin is a carbon molecule with many different bonds making it very hard to degrade. It requires many different kinds of enzymes working in concert. Because of this, only a hand full of microorganisms can degrade it. Cellulose on the other hand is a carbon molecule with simple linkages that takes just a few enzymes to degrade. Many microorganisms can degrade cellulose because of this. So by logic, cellulose should degrade faster than lignin. But when we put them out in the forest soil, lignin degraded faster than cellulose! We've looked everywhere for a reason, but found none. The logic behind degradation is solid. There were no experimental mistakes we can think of. And lignin and cellulose were pure. So, should we trust the logic and ignore the evidence, or should we trust at the evidence and try and find different logic behind it?

Systems: science vs philosophy #2

Here's what New Morning had to say;

Philosophers understand systems in ways similar to scientists. However, whereas scientists tend to use systemic analyses, philosophers question the significance of such analyses. As well, philosophers inquire into the *concept* of systems. That is, philosophers tend to care less about this or that system and more about the generic being of a system. What are systems, uberhaupt?-- This is a philosopher's question. In the above description of systems from Jackson's post there is an implicit understanding of the nature and function of systems. A philosopher would concern himself with what is left implicit in Jackson's understanding of system and ask if there were any *presuppositions* about the nature and function of systems. These presuppositions might obscure a larger understanding of systems. A philosopher might wonder if *all* systems operate in relation to external boundaries, or if only a certain species of systems do, such as autopoietic systems, or dynamical systems which constantly receive inputs of energy or matter in order to maintain themselves. Might then the scientists too specific understanding of systems obscure his research of systems that do not function by drawing a boundary from an environment, such as self-referential systems or the system of all systems?

But it is indeed the case that the dominant, and also current, scientific understanding of systems is one where systems are defined against external boundaries. Apart from grand theories of the universe that define the whole of the world systemically, or the curious and quirky Gaia hypothesis, it seems the case that we live in a world defined by systems that operate due to their capacity to distinguish themselves from their environments through the use of boundaries, such as plant and animal cells, brains, languages, the economy, etc.

I think ecosystem science is moving toward the direction of examining implicit assumptions of systems study. But we haven't found it not too necessary because evidence can convince a lot of people in science. I think ecosystem scientists feel less of a need to examine them because we can test the functions of a system without knowing what are all the implicit assumptions or the general principles governing all other systems. And, unlike philosophers, scientists are interested in the contents of a system than the system itself.

Systems philosophy, which I distinguish from the sociological "systems theory," is very much a field not of armchair speculation, but of empirical research, and modern political-economy. The very notion of system is today inseparable from modern society's attempt to manage and monitor itself. Michel Foucault, French philosopher and intellectual historian of the 1960s through 80s, characterized society through the ways in which it observed itself, controlled itself, and defined itself. The core concepts that define and articulate systems are precisely ones of control and observation. However, just what systems philosophy means by these terms is less clear than that doxa which tends to define our most common understanding of systems. We tend to think of systems as imparting an organization to their elements that are at least minimally alien to these elements. Systems, in everyday parlance, have thus been commonly treated as alien to our freedoms (as bureaucracies), our desires, and we commonly hear it said that systems should be resisted, or overturned. But what ideas of control and observation does systems philosophy entertain?

Control: In systems philosophy control is a way of designating the way in which systems *communicate* or maintain themselves. System maintenance is indeed a question of the manner in which a system communicates. This discourse of "communication" owes in largest part to the cyberneticians of the 20th century, such as Norbert Weiner, etc. Control, for Weiner, was only an act of communication while control only occurs for systems if communication also happens. We are far less weary of the idea of communication than we are of control, but the reasons for this are generally ideological.

The cybernetic development of the concept of control was meant to challenge older philosophical ideas of causation. Classical laws of cause and effect were based on the idea that there was more being or perfection in the cause than in the effect (such as God in comparison with his creatures). As philosophers took the idea that God, or basic substances, could possibly possess less being, or less force and efficacy than the things they caused to be unsound reasoning, so a tradition of thought had it that cause preceded effect and that cause explained effect. We still tend to think this way today. Yet in social communication, for instance, it is easy to see that we have to wait for causes to cause their effects and that causes can cause many, sometimes surprising, effects. Time and uncertaintly have been imported into our active understanding of social communication. The cyberneticians realized that causes *select* their effects and that effects have to select their causes.

More to come...

Soar Falcon!

The humble little town of Fort Collins, CO became famous today the American way. A family described as alien experts obsessed with science thought their boy floated away in an UFO look alike weather balloon. The boy's name was Falcon. His family had their 15 min in a TV show "Wife Swap". His dad started an amateur science group called The Psyience Detectives. So the police gave chase, only to find no one inside the balloon after it landed softly in a dirt field. Falcon was actually hiding in the attic at the family house. This is Fort Collins, Colorado, USA in a nutshell, really.

Systems: science vs philosophy

I think the word "system" means differently to scientists and philosophers, but I fear scientists are missing out on some good stuff without understanding the difference. So here, I describe the scientist's use of the word "system". How is it different?

Scientists use the word to put a boundary on nature. Forest system or catchment system (in ecosystem science) elects a boarder to segregate what's inside of it for easier understanding. Forests from grasslands for example. Or one catchment from another in different parts of a continent. It reduces the variables involved and makes it easier to conceptualize and experiment. Inter system comparisons can help too. It highlights common processes that might explain bigger system like the terrestrial system. It can also explain why the systems differ. But the underlying aim of the systems science is to reveal main influences to an outcome. Why does the tropics have more trees than the deserts? Mainly because of more water favors a type of photosynthesis that waste water but makes more carbon molecules.

There certainly limits to this way of thinking. Just because an area has more water doesn't always mean it will have trees. Traditional (eco)system science describes steady or equilibrium states well but not dynamic and uncertain conditions. So the ecosystem scientists are starting to use probabilities (Bayesian statistics) to describe systems and more so to predict it's behavior. In a way, this tries to simulate the complexities of a system rather than simplify it. The question "what would happen to plants in an area if CO2 increased?" can be better understood using Bayesian method. But I'm not quite sure if this is truly "understanding".

Now, how is this different from philosopher's understanding of a system?

We still have quite a bit to learn from the German Idealists about systems, and system-building, about the nature and limits of systemic thought. Perhaps the greatest lesson of the German Idealists is that 'system philosophy,' also commonly referred to as 'systems thinking,' systemics, or 'systems theory' (to be distinguished from the sociological systems theory of thinkers such as Niklas Luhmann), etc., encourages both good scepticism toward already-received knowledge, challenging thought's tendency to get locked up in intractable aporias or the doxa of everyday opinion and offers the type of synthesis of the special disciplines that unites our knowledge so that it might be coordinated and applied for a diversity of practical purposes. System philosophy ought to be distinguished from the system sciences, however, because system philosophy maintains a critical stance toward the results of scientific research. Where system sciences collect knowledge, system philosophy asks about the _significance_ of this knowledge.
Systems philosophy in the 20th and 21st centuries has been partially obscured by the dominance of systems sciences and their 'theoretical' practices. Klir (1965):

The concept of system is one of the most widely used concepts in science, particularly in recent times. It is encountered in nearly all the fundamental fields of science, e.g., in physics, chemistry, mathematics, logic, cybernetics, economy, linguistics, biology, psychology and also in the majority of engineering branches. We are concerned with a very general concept.

System sciences grew out of a larger ‘unity of science movement of 1920s-40s.’ Systems philosophy in the 20th century was able to benefit from this movement, rejuvenating itself by consulting the theoretical efforts of the so-called ‘General Systems Theory' (Bertalanffy, Laszlo), and the researches of the cybernetics and information theory movements. General Systems Theory (GTS) called traditional scientific concepts of linear causality, determinism, and reductionism into question and replaced or supplemented them with notions of circular causality, self-organization, indeterminacy, and the unpredictable emergence of order from disorder. GST worked toward developing a unified theory and methodological approach to investigate not just the classical simplicities of the mechanistically structured material world, but also the complexities of biological, cognitive, and even social systems. Systems philosophy at the current juncture is informed both by the past (the insights of German Idealists, etc.) as well as by continued research in the sciences (and of course the 'system sciences' whose research is specifically guided by the concept of system).

What is a system? Little attention has been paid to the historical development of the concept of system in order to understand what is meant by the term. Yet work outside of philosophy-- work in experimental embryology, evolutionary developmental biology, developmental psychology, sociological theory, the physical and chemical sciences, etc.-- has converged on a conception of system which first found decisive focus in the German Idealist philosophical tradition. To be sure, the widespread, even casual, use of the term in the 20th and 21st centuries owes a conceptual debt to the German Idealists. Systems were an obsession of the German Idealists (Kant, Fichte, Reinhold, Bardili, Schelling, Hegel). The notion of a fully-formed, perfected system established the epistemological, and even ontological, ideal for philosophical speculation and scientific knowledge ('Wissenschaft') in the latter part of the 18th century and continuing on well into the latter part of the
19the century. For the German Idealists, systems were a question of a particular brand of philosophical inquiry known as speculation. Speculation involved the rigorous tracing back of any philosophical or scientific explanation of phenomena to an absolute foundation (of certainty and coherence) such that the phenomena could be fully justified as irrefutable knowledge. Not high-flown discourses on the nature and proofs of God's existence, but mathematical theorems, stoichiometrical relationships, accounts of the evolutionary genesis of animal forms, all of these species of knowledge stood or fell within a form of speculative, systemic justification. It was the pursuit of the systematic philosophers of the German Idealist tradition to gather a diversity of empirical knowledge and to synthesize it in one master-system, under one philosophical principle holding for all knowledge, in logic, nature, and the human sciences (the sciences of the human 'spirit'). This type of philosophy, system philosophy, reached a peak, but also a strange dead end, in Hegel’s great “scientific” elaboration of system in his magisterial _Science of Logic_ (with editions pubslihed between the years of 1812 and 1832).

Diversity theory of education - Part 1, the goal of education

No one has ever had a clear answer when I asked them why we should educate, but the most thoughts centered around having people understand enough to make informed political decisions. These decisions require a set of basic facts, logic, and skills, and so we should teach the them. Clear and easy enough.

But the idea is no longer possible to achieve. Some political decisions are easy to be informed of. For example, I know enough to decide on say medical marijuana or teaching evolution. Some decisions are easy to reason through even without enough information. I can reason that making the immigration process clearer and simpler would actually decrease illegal immigrants. But some decisions are both hard to be informed of and hard to reason through. Take health care. I have a vague idea of what could work. But I am no way near informed or am I able to reason through the complexities. I might eventually get there but it would take time. And it's time that we don't have.

Few of the pressing problems facing US right now are health care, the economy, the war(s), and global warming. I don't think I understand these issues enough to make informed decisions on any of them. And I don't think I have the time to learn enough to be informed decision maker. How can I vote on these issues (or the candidates who campaign based on them) informatively? I would be making a guess, maybe an semi-educated guess, but not an informed decision. Using the goal of education above, I must say the school system has failed me. Good thing I can't vote.

The new "how are you?"

I say just slap each others' butts and get it over with. We all know that's what we are really asking for when we say "how are you".

How are you?

Why do we bother to ask each other how the other is doing if we really do not intending on hearing the answer? Case in point:

Imagine two acquaintances or strangers walking in opposite directions, about to pass one another:

Person 1: Hey
Person 2: Hi
Person 1: How’s it going?
Person 2: Good. And you?
Person 1: Good.

The exchange happens while neither stops walking. I don’t know how many times I’ve had this exchange while walking by someone and I wonder, why do we even bother? If neither of us is going to stop walking on our merry ways, then why do we ask questions about our emotional state after the hellos?

I was told once by a British man that this is something people do in the states. He told me that it was something he wasn’t accustomed to while he was here, as when people asked him how he was back at home, it was because they genuinely wanted to know and expected more than a two word answer. Now, I can’t say that this is completely true, as he was just speaking from his experience, but it wasn’t until he brought this up that I actually thought about it and realized that, for me and for what I see around me, it happens quite often.

I know much of this is custom and politeness. You say hello, they say hi. Out of politeness you then ask the other how they are. The words come out of your mouth before you’ve realized it. They answer a short answer, return the question, and expect a similar short answer. It’s almost automatic. It almost seems rude sometimes not to ask how the other person is. And it doesn’t even have to be two people walking in opposite directions. It can be an exchange between a cashier and a customer, a bus driver to a bus rider. It happens all the time. And each time most people are not looking for the real answer, they are just waiting for the short “I’m ok,” “I’m fine,” “I’m good,” “Alright, and you?” These words are heavy with routine. I think in these casual greetings among strangers or acquaintances, if someone actually responded with more than a few words and really told me how they were doing I would be completely caught off guard. I have been caught off guard. But pleasantly surprised. It’s as if in that moment that person has snapped out of the routine back into real life, and regardless of what they say, I am happy they said it and I am more likely to give more than a word or two in response (to a point, that is).

Now, why it is always the other person to break the routine and not me, I can’t say. With strangers, I have my reasons. With acquaintances, it depends. But, I’ll admit to be one-sided and say that’s not the point. The point is that in that moment when the other person gives a genuine response, I am reminded that we are two people who have the ability to communicate with one another.

Things I hate for Clark Nova

"Research" in research undergrad. The undergrads might be bright and hard working. They might have really good ideas. They might even turn out to be an excellent researcher in the future. But what they are doing in research undergrad programs are not research.

Shampoo bottles that won't stand upside down. Why does shampoo have to come out of the top of the bottle? For that matter, why does a shampoo bottle have to have a top and a bottom?

Ft Lauderdale International Airport. It's way too small to be serving as an international airport. It only had 1 fast food store, 1 food stand, and a bar in a terminal with 12 gates. Lines everywhere. Lines for the immigration, lines for customs, lines for food, and lines to just seat at the airport. And the air conditioning was way too cold.


Immigration agents. They get high on petty authority. Enough said.

Lakers letting Ariza go. I really enjoyed him on the team. I don't know if Clark Nova hates this one though.

Edumacation

I pretended to hate all of my teachers when I was growing up. Really, teachers were not cool, and I couldn't afford to be seen as a teachers pet. But I secretly loved most of them. For reasons unknown, I enjoyed being around them (but I hated school, going classes, and being taught in general). And now, and again for reasons unknown, I find my self enjoying teaching and thinking about education. I could focus on figuring out the reasons but I see it secondary to the fact that I like education. And that I want to get something going. So here is my attempt at it.

Let's create a program.
Let's just see if we can because I really don't see why we should not. That being said, there are many things to figure out to get a program going. Money, location, target kids, subject, etc.. to name a few. So why don't we start by creating a mission statement. I'm hoping this will lead to us thinking about what's an effective program, what needs does it serve, how big should it be, and so on. Then we will talk about money.

I'm going to throw one out: This program aims to have kids take pride in their progress and success through effort and intelligence by studying biology intimately but with a global view.

This mission statement is for a small program in a foreign country (central/south American?) exposing them to hands on biology with environmental stewardship in mind. What do you think? Anything better?

Things that I hate at the moment

I read a study that says expressing your feelings, even if to no one, can actually keep you healthier (mentally and physically), which is evidently applies to the blog craze. (this is good because no one reads this thing) Anyway, since I haven't written anything for a while, I don't want to get sick this summer, I am going to mention a few things that are bothering me at the moment.

Americans who feel compelled to mention how much better the British version of The Office is whenever anyone even passingly mentions the show. I understand that British people need to do such things. I mean, could you imagine a proper British person claiming that a foreign version of anything British is superior? Look, I have seen both versions, and I may even prefer the British one, but there's no reason for an American to interrupt someone with this bullshit every time they want to talk about Jim and Pam's marriage. Just don't do it.

Baseball. I just really hate baseball. Is it the fact that each game lasts three hours and includes a grand total of five minutes of exciting action? Or is it the fact that there are 160 meaningless games in a season, each including at least nine innings, each of which include at least six at bats, each consisting of one to 20 meaningless pitches. Or is it the fact that it at any given time, 80% of the players on the field are basically superfluous (you like how I slipped the name of the blog in there) and are adjusting their overly tight pants. You decide.

People who walk in front your moving car, and once they notice that they've done so, move out of your way at an ever slower more relaxing pace. I just hate this one. It's as if these people believe that either I was sent to this planet to watch their sluggish rear ends slink across pavement OR one meter per minute is their maximum ground velocity. In either case, I hate it. Get a Segway or something.

Commercials that are an order of magnitude louder than the actual program on at that time. I think this one is pretty self explanatory. And annoying.

Voicemails. I apologize to those that have left them to me in the past, but mentally I just can't navigate the "You. have. five. new. voice. messages. The. first. message...received. on. June. fifteenth..." gauntlet anymore. That process should be the entire iPhone ad.

Dropped!

I dropped the thermometer from 100 ft up in the tower. As it fell, I had a hopeful vision of it just sticking into the mud down below and being fine. But it shattered with the thermometer upon impact. The sad part about this incident is that the thermometer had a leash on it. I put it on so that the undergrad that came up with me won't drop it. Bad karma. And nature threw us signs not to go out to the field. First, it rained. Then a fallen tree blocked the trail we use to get to the site. How could it get more obvious than a tree blocking your way? But we sure didn't see the sign and climbed over the tree with our bikes and a cart with equipment in it. From now on, I will turn around when there is a fallen tree blocking my path. And be nicer to undergrads.

Made it to the Jungle

I guess I should use “forest” instead of “jungle”. It’s more proper. Well, “tropical rain forest” would be the scientific classification of this place, but I think “jungle” fits it the best. It’s thick, wet, dark, and crawling with creatures I never imagined I would see. But I made it.

Why NBA is better than College Basketball (but College Football is better than NFL)

Passion and effort makes college sports compelling. The drama created by the players’ love of the sport draws us to watch and cheer. But it can’t carry college basketball past the NBA.
College basketball is vastly inferior game compared to the NBA game. Players are smaller, slower, and far less skilled. This makes college basketball a bag of Skittles. The individual effort and passion are there, but there’s not enough skill and the talent for it to be more than the sum of it’s parts like Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream.
For example, the Lakers play one of the most beautiful offenses ever, and no college team can match the ball and player movement of their triangle offense. The Hornets run the Princeton offence with precision and control no college team can match. Even the rag-tag Warriors (who’s offensive strategy is to just chuck it) can out-run, out-gun, and out-create the best college teams. The lowly Warriors, or even the Clippers would easily rack up 140 points on best college teams.
And the Warriors and the Clippers would actually be able to stop college teams from scoring. College players play defense with a lot more passion and effort than the pros do, but they are not as effective. As John Wooden said “don’t mistake activity for progress.” And it shows in rookie mistakes, like when they miss a rotation or fail to help. Many of them are not even decent pick and roll defenders, and they should have been taught to say not over-commit when putting pressure on the ball but many rookie big men do.
NBA basketball is simply more effective on both offense and defense. Now I would argue that this is true in football too, but the effectiveness of the NFL game works against it. In football, the proportion of (observable) unplanned event is much smaller than basketball. Effectiveness of the NFL lowers that proportion to the point where it becomes too predictable and not as much fun. That’s why college football is better than the NFL. But the proportion of unplanned event is much greater in basketball in general. The effectiveness of the NBA game limits it enough to highlight those moments of creativity.
Players like LeBron, Steve Nash, D-Wade, and Chris Paul would be far less entertaining to watch in college game. They won’t be able to play at the highest level because the players around them are not as good. They won’t be able to showcase their talents because the offenses and defenses are simpler. They won’t even be allowed to create as much because college coaches tend to over coach. And we would have to watch fewer possessions because the shot clock is 10 seconds too long. Passion and effort is good, but not good enough to overcome inferior product, especially that idle 10 seconds at the beginning of every possession.

i'll meet the ones between us and be thinking about you. thoughts inspired by a cocktail of xanax, wine and weed. i know this joke through a woody allen film: sex is always between 6. the couplers (2), their parents (4)= 6. but the joke comments intelligibly on what I like to call "the everyday coitus." what's between you and a conjugal I........ is a series of Others. Others? For example: your father, the lessons he may have ingrained in your psyche. These lessons (superegoic commands) fill you with turmoil. Your mother, the ego ideal you keep for every partner you'll ever have had.

Fuck, I'm almost out of my wine. Thankfully we keep a cupboard of sedatives. Sometines I don't hear.

Isolated rat cells can fly planes, so you have no free will

In the last few years, someone decided to see if isolated rat brain cells placed in a dish could control a flight simulator. Not to keep you in suspense, they can.

At first, the cells did not what the hell they were doing, but over time, they learned. (That's what brain cells do.)

Basically, the cells are grown are grown on dish of electrodes and form sort of a bio-circuit board. Whenever the virtual plane is flying strait, the neurons receive a positive electrical signal, which strengthens which ever neural connections are active at that time. Pretty soon, the neural pathways that fly the plane correctly are the strongest, and the isolated neurons are blazing around like Goose and Maverick giving "the bird" to a MIG. This is the same that we learn to walk or hit a golf ball.

Now if isolated neurons can fly planes, can they form some kind of natural, artificial, semi-conscious, conscious, human-like, bio-bot? I'm glad you asked.



This robot learns the same way that the flight simulator neurons learned. In other words, it gets better at being a robot over time without any future programming. Neural cells are built to do just that. It's a large part of how we learn - neurons that do the job correctly become stronger.

So why don't you have any free will anymore? Well, you are basically one of the these robots, except your brain cells last a lot longer and you occasionally have to go to the bathroom. That's it. Maybe. Perhaps all you do is respond to stimuli and strengthen neural connections over time.

Not enough proof that you have no free will? Well, how about this: Recent studies have shown that, when making a decision, electrical signals for that decision can be observed in your brain...wait for it...10 seconds before you make your decision. In other words, contrary to our assumed relationship with our brain, which is that we tell it what to do, it now appears that it tells us what to do.

Let's think about how this works. You are at the store pondering whether to add crunch berries™ to this week's stockpile of your favorite breakfast treat, Cap't Crunch (which are supposed to look like a bunch of treasure chests, by the way). Your impatient wife asks you what you're going to get. You reply "I have no idea", because you don't. Ten seconds later, Bam! you triumphantly throw the crunch berry™-less cereal into your cart. Beaming, you walk off to ready to take on the ever present "idodized vs non-iodized salt" Goliath.

Had you been able to see your brain's activity more clearly, you would have known that you were about to choose that the plain cereal when your wife asked. In fact, your brain has probably already decided on idodized salt. In essence, the decision was already made before you knew about it. All you did was eventually carry it out by grabbing the cereal box, like some kind of monkey butler.

On the other hand, maybe your brain is just good at reading minds. Like your own. Wait, that doesn't make any more sense at all.

“I couldn’t because ...”

People tell me that line all the time, and I always wondered why. Let’s say you planned a party and invited your friends. One of the friends who didn’t show up told you the next day, “I couldn’t make it to your party because I had to prepare for a class and then work on my project.” Let’s say again that instead he said, “I couldn’t make it. Did I miss a fun party?” Which answer do you prefer and why?

I prefer the later. It would make me feel that he wanted to come but he couldn’t. But the first answer would make me think he had better things to do than come to my party, and he is giving me excuses so I would keep inviting him in he future. Granted the reason someone misses anything (when they have a choice) is because they had something better to do. But actually saying them will only draw emphasis to that fact, and not to the feeling of wanting to come to the party. I would much rather hear that he wanted to come instead of the reasons why he didn’t. I think it’s more positive and affirming. But then I do sound a little like a curmudgeon whining about nothing.

Stress and short sightedness

I know quite a few people who are stressed all the time. One of them went to a stress management class and heard that there are three types of people when it comes to stress: the turtle, the hare, and the thoroughbred. The turtle can only do one thing at a time at his own pace. The hare jumps from task to task, completing some but distracted away from others, and so becomes stressed. The thoroughbred completes a task at a time while avoiding getting distracted by other tasks and thus doesn’t get too stressed. So the hare exemplify my friends who are stressed all the time.
I think I belong to the thoroughbred category. I can even do more than one things at a time and not get stressed. Sometimes I even enjoy the pressure of the deadline. But this isn’t because I’m some kind of a super animal like the thoroughbred. This is because I’m short sighted.
One of the stressed ones puts pressure on her self. Like the others, it is a self-imposed stress, and she does so because she wants to get to where she wants to go in life. She has a rough idea of the path she wants take and what she needs to do get there. That’s why she gets stressed. The stakes can’t be any bigger! I on the other hand spend very little time thinking about what I want to do in the future. I think a lot about how I want to feel and what kind of person I want to be, but not about a career path. When it comes to a career, I’m short sighted. I simply don’t think about it that far into the future.
This is not a virtue but a flaw. Though thoroughbred best describes how I handle stress, there should be a different category to describe someone like me: the donkey. It handles the stress just like a thoroughbred but it sure won’t get to the goal any faster. It might not even know there is a goal.
Now, can the donkey become the thoroughbred any easier than the hare? I doubt it. The later transition requires refinement only in method, whereas the former requires a change of philosophy. But then the donkey isn’t too bad of a position to be. I heard they are very dreamy and romantic animals.

Need not Save the Earth

The good people who care about the environment, animals, and nature in general tend to speak of Earth in emotional and anthropomorphic way, I think, to the detriment of their cause. “Save the Earth”, or “fragile Earth” are common phrases I hear, and I think people use them to elicit protective feeling in the audience. Not only does this strategy fail to capture the true sate of Earth as a complex system, it distracts from the true victims of the changing environment: people.

I am not denying that the environment is changing. It is in fact changing at unprecedented speed, and we are causing it. But the change we are causing is a minor one for Earth as a whole. What’s living on it today might not in the future, but something else will surely thrive on it. Once it gets going, life is very very hard to extinguish. Even if 99.9% of all life dies, given time the remaining 0.1% will re-colonize Earth. Each individual or each species may be fragile, but Earth and life as a whole is not.

Nor does Earth need saving. “Saving” requires a trajectory toward “bad”. In order for Earth to be saved, it has to be moving towards something bad. But there is no value in changing Earth. Let’s say the Earth is changing the way it is now but there are no humans on it. Will it be bad? Will the Earth need saving then? It’s really not the Earth that heads toward something bad, it is the human beings. It is not the Earth who needs saving, it is we.

The Team I Coach

I'm coaching a kids basketball team. We are actually pretty good. One of kids is probably the best player in the league's age group. He has a lot to do with why we play well, but we also hustle and play tough. I just love to describe the way we play as "like a pack of wolves". And I like to think I had something to do with it, but most of it is the make-up of the team. We have few kids who play the game like it's football, and the rest just gets caught up in it. The kids love to play and play hard, so I really have an easy job. Only if I can get them to block-out on consistently...

Being a Laker Fan

I am a Lakers fan, and it feels like almost everyone hates the Lakers. When I tell people that I am a Lakers fan, they often question if and how long I have lived in southern California or proceed to tell me that they hate the Lakers.

First of all, it is absurd to illegitimatize a fan for not being from or living near a team. This is the United States of America. You are absolutely free to be a fan of any team for whatever reason. Regional rivalries are there to promote interest in the NBA, and to be caught up too much in it is kind of like pledging an allegiance to Coke over Pepsi. The difference is in how people perceive them, but there’s very little difference in the products themselves.

This leads to my second point. I really don’t see why anyone who likes basketball could hate the Lakers as a basketball product. They play a beautiful and entertaining brand of basketball. The triangle offence they employ creates ball and player movement leading to good plays with high offensive efficiency rate (first in the league). They play a team defense based on a mix of fundamental one on one defense and more extreme brand of zone defense (though it is not as good as say the Spurs’ or the Rockets’). They really are truly a fun team to watch. I think it’s a better brand of basketball than the fast paced teams like the Suns, Knicks, or the Warriors. You have to at least appreciate a team like the Lakers if you like basketball.

I guess you can appreciate the Lakers and hate them at the same time. I appreciate the Celtics for the way they play, but I sure hate them. The Lakers will be waiting for them in the finals to spank them like a newborn baby.

Death and Trees

I came across a couple of research articles about stress and aging in trees. They read surprisingly well for articles about tree physiology. One on stress proposed that trees die from disease, predation, cold, wind, etc. when they lose vigor due to stress. The other on aging showed some evidences that trees don’t age. Apparently we know very little about how trees die. Trees are long-lived (the oldest known tree is close to 10,000 years old) and that makes them hard to study. Much more data exist on mammal aging and death, especially on human beings. But do we really know how we die in the way these articles tried to understand tree death? They were looking for a defining characteristic. The accumulating data on human death and aging on the other hand seems to just accumulate without revealing anything defining. It might be because death and aging are so intimate and central to our existence as human beings. I think about it a lot, and I’m pretty sure everyone does too. I feel my death ultimately determines who I am as a human being. Most of my decisions can be traced back to me dying, but I just don’t know if I’ll ever be able to understand it. Trees may be harder to study, but their death is certainly easier to comprehend.