Timmerov's Blog
pucks
a long time ago i was a young man with no cares in the world. i could play hockey on my back patio all day if i wanted to. sigh. so anywho. i wasn't very good. hence the practice. some shots would go over around or through the net. fewer still would go over the backyard fence into the neighbor's yard. most were found. some were lost forever. some were disintegrated by the lawn mower. the neighbor was old then. she's no longer there. the new neighbors didn't like their new (old?) shed. so they removed it. the other day the boys and i were trying to get the cats into the house so we could leave for a short vacation. and there, pressed into the mud where the shed used to be, were two hockey pucks. we picked them up. washed them off. and put them in the box with all the other hockey pucks. that might be used again some day. some day. sigh.
consensus
so 97% of climatologists believe in agw. so what does that mean exactly? it means they agree with the following three statements: 1) the world has been getting warmer for at least the past 150 years. 2) human activities account for a significant* part of that warming. and 3) co2 in the atmosphere warms the earth via the greenhouse effect. as near as i can tell, significant is sorta loosely defined. it could be anywhere from 2% to 200%. heh. how the heck could it be 200%? that's absurd. heh. not really. some models predict the earth should be cooling at the rate it's heating. so something has negated the cooling. and on top of that, done the heating. anywho. the ipcc model has several additional parts. 4) there's a positive feedback amplification factor of 3-5. ie a little heating causes more heating causes more etc. there's an implied 4a) that 4) will go on for a significant period of time. and 5) warming is bad for humans. buy-in for 1) is nearly 100% among people who actually study this topic. cause it's supported by data. lots and lots of data. the buy-in rate generally drops as you progress. re 2), it's abundantly clear that humans are changing the environment. and that changing the environment can change the weather. and hence the climate. ergo, it's nearly certain humans are at least in part responsible for changes to the climate. caveat: unfortunately, there's no control for this experiment. maybe you religious types could get god to create a sister earth on the other side of the sun where people don't burn fossil fuels. anywho 3) absolutely. again backed up by data. 4) and 4a), earth's climate has been pretty stable for millions of years. if the forcing was really 3-5 over large temperature ranges, one would expect the earth's temperatures to vary a lot more than they do. so either the forcing is less. a lot less. or it depends on other transient factors that happen to be converging right now. the forcing may depend indirectly on temperature. ie when it gets hot, plants die, and the earth stops warming. and then the forcing turns around like a swinging pendulum. ie a little cooling begets more cooling. and BOOM! ice age. and 5) fooey! humans are the most adaptable creatures ever to walk the earth. rapid change is bad for most creatures. they'll die. the remainder will flourish without the competition and/or predators. for people, change is a double edged sword. it means a bunch of stuff we've invested, whether financially or emotionally, will go away. making us sad. change also means that opportunity will be knocking 'til its knuckles are sore and bleeding. me the hippie would like to not change the world on the scale that we are. its beauty is diminished by the things that people do. me the pragmatist is one voice against a consensus of billions.
aspirception
aspirin as contraception. huh. i bet it would work really well. the female holds an aspirin tablet between her knees. even if she's completely cooperative with the male, it seems really unlikely that they could perform the act necessary for conception to occur without displacing the aspirin tablet. unless she's some sort of contortionist. or they're willing to break her leg and/or hip bones. or they use some sort of device. like a turkey baster. seems like its efficacy would be more along the lines of conjugation prevention (contra-conjugation? contrajugation? catragation?) instead of contraception. kinda like a chastity belt. hrm. i feel inspiration coming on. i'm gonna market a whole line of "contraceptives" based on the idea that if the lady keeps her knees together she won't catch preggers. oh man. i'm gonna be so rich.
valentine's day
was a huge success. literally. the boys helped me make a giant heart. to stick on the outside of the garage door and surprise the beautiful and talented alisa when she took the boys to school. at least, that was the plan. the weather threw the first monkey wrench into the soup. it threatened to rain. it just poured on the 13th with no sign of stopping for 40 days and 40 nights. 40 nychthemerons for the vocabularians in the audience. anywho, the weatherman promised it would not rain valentine's day morning. so that's good right? yeah, they also predicted a light drizzle, not a downpour. sheehs. so anywho. the beautiful and talented alisa tossed the second monkey wrench into the system. she took some anti-allergy medication the night before and needed to sleep in. so school duties fell to me. she didn't really sleep in all that long. it just felt like a long time when i had a secret to keep. and knowing that the neighbors were all enjoying this wacky expression of love for her. and she wasn't. fortunately, she wanted to go to the gym. i watched from the window as she backed out of the garage. i wondered if she was going to close it. she did. i wondered if she was going to notice. but only briefly. cause she did. and the smile that landed on her face was priceless. the heart stayed there all day. and all night. we took pictures. so it'll probably make it into next year's calendar.
suicide
so this morning i was removing the soccer ball ice pack from the freezer for g's lunch when the parmesan container leaped from its place on the shelf to the bottom ledge where it was neatly decapitated by the oj shelf on the door. i saw it jump when it was too late to stop the freezer door from closing. the frozen plastic crunch was clearly audible. my sleepy brain was awake enough to realize what had happened. but not awake enough to fully think through what was going to happen next. as i opened the freezer door to survey the damage, the parmesan container dumped its load all over the recessed refrigerator door handle, and into every nook and cranny in the door, all over the lowest ledge in the fridge, and all over the floor. parmesan is cheese. frozen parmesan isn't very hard to clean up. being more like powder than sticky gooey messy cheese. unfortunately, it didn't stay frozen. and became a sticky gooey mess of cheese all over the floor. which needed to be cleaned up. good thing we weren't running behind schedule this morning. or we'd've been late for school. stupid selfish suicider. only thinking of themselves. and never thinking of the affect their success might have on others. who simply wanted to eat them.
if3
last post on inertial reference frames. i promise. there's one more case where we naturally choose the reference frame. and that's the case when bob's on a space ship orbiting the earth. we always use the inertial reference frame. and say there are no forces acting on bob. but wait! bob is still affected by gravity. heh. now you're switching to a non-inertial rotating reference frame with gravity. bleh. so now the force diagram has weight pointing down and the centrifugal force pointing up. for every object floating around the spaceship. which horribly clutters the math. and it isn't any more "right" or "wrong" than the inertial frame. which is significantly simpler. and hence, much more useful. which is why bob-on-the-desk and bob-in-spaceship can both be in equilibrium when bob-in-spaceship is floating around the room and bob-on-desk isn't. much to bob-on-desk's disappoint.
irf
a couple posts previous was about inertial reference frames. in the case of bob swinging around the toilet, it doesn't really matter if we choose an inertial reference frame or a rotating non-inertial reference frame. let's consider a case where the choice of reference frame does make a difference. bob is sitting on a desk. we automatically draw the force diagram with bob's weight pointing down and an equal but opposite normal force from the desk pointing up. bob's in equilibrium. this is what you'll find in every classroom everywhere in the world throughout time and space. the reference frame of the classroom is so natural and so ubiquitous that no one ever points out that we've made this assumption. and no one ever points out that the classroom reference frame is non-inertial. in the inertial reference frame, the weight (=mg) term moves from the forces side to the acceleration side. mathematically it's equivalent. just like it was when bob was revolving around the toilet. however, it leads to some fractious statements. like bob is not at equilibrium. what!?!? and weight is a fictitious force. wtf?!?! blaspheme! heh. true though. if you're going to say that centrifugal forces are fictitious, then i'm going to say, with equal validity, that weight is also fictitious. it's a matter of choice of reference frame. heck of a way to lose weight. i should market it. i'm gonna be so rich.
50k
by my count, the beautiful and talented alisa has done 50,000 situps since the beginning of the year. so. how are you doing with your new year's resolution?
forces
apparently arm chair physicists argue over whether or not the centrifugal force is real or fictional. fooey. it is and it isn't. it depends on what reference frame you choose. i explain. tie bob to a string. and swing him around in a circle. the centrifugal force is directed away from the center. it's center fleeing. which is a nice mnemonic cause fleeing and fugal alliterate nicely. the centripetal force is directed towards the center. traditionally, it's center seeking. which pseudo rhymes with fleeing. i'm not very traditional so i tend to think of it as center peeing. which is a superior mnemonic cause peeing and petal alliterate nicely. and peeing and fleeing are true rhymes. bonusly, one pees towards the center of the toilet. one does not pee away from the toilet. at least, not in my house. so anywho, bob is revolving around the toilet. in the inertial reference frame, bob is accelerating towards the toilet. the center peeing force is provided by the tension in the string. the sum of the forces equals mass times acceleration. specifically mass * angular velocity squared * distance to toilet. and everything is good. standard first year high school physics. the other way to look at things is to use a non-inertial rotating reference frame. in this case, bob is stationary relative to the reference frame. bob is in equilibrium. therefore the sum of the force vectors must be zero. therefore, the center fleeing force is equal but opposite to the center peeing force. specifically it is mass * angular velocity squared * distance to toilet. which should sound awful familiar. in fact, the only difference between the inertial and rotating reference frames is the side of the equation this term lives on. call it a force and put in on the sum of the forces side. call it an acceleration and put it on the acceleration side. it really doesn't matter. at least not math-wise. definition-wise surely. is bob at equilibrium? ie are the sum of the forces zero? heh. trick question. yes (in the rotating non-inertial reference frame) and no (in the intertial reference frame).
here here
this is an appeal to restore the republican party to a conservative party instead of a radical party. it'd likely get my vote.
archetype
this is a movie i'd like to see.
taxes
we really need to close some loopholes.
this is a pretty readable account of what i've been trying to say for a long time. yes, rich folks pay taxes on their income. but who cares? the game then becomes, don't have any income. ta da! no income. no taxes. then with the inheritance tax thing, rich kids cash out on daddy's fortune. and never pay a frikken dime. not 14%. zero.
yay!
we're building nuclear power plants again. yay! one could say this is good news and bad news. though i'd say it's good news and not-as-good-as-it-could-be news. the "bad" news is they're not breeder style reactors. ie they utilize only a tiny fraction of the energy available in the fuel. which means they make a lot more radioactive waste than the theoretical minimum. and like the older models, this stuff is stored locally until it cools down enough it can be transported to a long term facility for low(er) level waste. on the other hand. there's lots to cheer. this design is much safer than previous. ie airplanes can crash into it. the power can go out. it can be flooded. humans (think homer simpson) can do all sorts of stupid stuff to it. and it won't fukushima. so yeah. this is a good start. a really itty bitty start. but the journey to 1000 gigawatt nuclear power plants begins with this first tiny step. so pop the champagne. let's celebrate.
anti-choice
last post i used the term anti-choice. isn't that the same as anti-abortion? well, no. not quite. a human fetus is a human being. it can't really be anything else. and terminating a pregnancy ends that human being's life. one can't really dress up that fact any other way. think lipstick on a pig. if a fetus could survive outside of a womb, it would have a right to life. but since it can't. it doesn't. at least, that's how i justify murder. course only the owner of the womb has the right to evict the person inside it. i can't force you to have an abortion. and you can't keep me from having one. of course not. i'm male. if there was a human life parasitically living inside my body, i really don't think you'd have any problem with me removing it. even if it's destroyed in the process. and if you do, i'll laugh at you. cause i'm male. and i do whatever the hell i want with my body. don't believe me? google what life is like for retired football players. it's only archaic thinking that let's us think we can tell non-males what they can and cannot do with their bodies.
incompatible 2
here's another political incompatibility: traditional family values and anti-choice. i'm all for traditional families. having grown up in a single parent family i can say from direct experience, they kinda suck. let's suppose you take away a woman's right to control what goes on inside her body. she's young. and her boyfriend is a jerk. kinda by definition. cause he knocked her up before marrying her. so now they have an unpleasant choice. enter an unpleasant marriage and try to make it work. or not. most likely, the former will lead to a divorce. either way, the idea of traditional family values takes a hit.
incompatible
the education system is failing to teach people essential skills. like critical thinking. specifically the ability to recognize that two ideas are fundamentally incompatible. for example: tax cuts for the wealthy and smaller government. i explain. tax cuts for the rich derives directly from supply side economics. the basic idea is cutting taxes in general, and cutting taxes on the people who make the most money, boosts the economy. which increases the tax base. which increases the government's tax revenue more than the lower tax rate reduces it. so far so good. familiar territory. but wait. more revenue means more government. which is in direct opposition to that whole smaller government government idea. if you followed that, thank your parents and your teachers who taught you critical thinking. cause critical thinking is - well, critical - to the american way of life.
super pacs
i don't like super pacs. i think citizens united was one of the stupidest rulings ever. course if i was running for president, i'd be very sure to have a few dozen super pacs lined up on my side. why? consider football. i care about my players. and i really don't want them using steroids. however, if the other teams are artificially buff, then yeah, i have to make some beasties too. same with super pacs. if my voice is in danger of being drowned out and not heard because of your super pac, then i'm going to need a super pac too. and we all lose.
mittaxes
i think romney's playing the tax card all wrong. he should point at his own low tax rate and say, this is why we need to reform taxes. cause someone like me should be paying more than 14%. cause someone like you is paying 11% federal income tax plus 15% social security and medicare taxes. fair? vote for me and we'll fix it.
"good" boy
i really didn't want to take out the trash on account of my knee being old and cantankerous. b volunteered to. what a great kid. except... we got up the next morning and discovered the trash was strewn all over the front lawn. aw man. someone was in so much trouble. here we thought he did something nice. and in reality he just made more work for g and me. sigh. heh. okay. what really happened is he set the trash in the street with the wheels tight up against the curb. so it was leaning backwards slightly. it was kinda windy last night. we live on an outside corner. so he just happened to place the garbage can so it was perfectly lined up with the wind. no other trash can in either direction blew over. just ours. it was also only barely half full. so it was especially light. and super easy to tip over. three strikes and trash out! heh. fortunately, they had the foresight to set up the hockey/soccer net directly downwind from the garbage can. most of the trash ended up in the net instead of strewn about in the rose bushes. the thorny rose bushes. that scratch the hands that take their trash.
ddo
i haven't played in forever. so i decided to log in and see what's new. heh. probably lots. but not much below level 10. ah well. too busy at work to play anywho. okay so just to remind myself. when there's a new ddo update, run the client as administrator at least once. cause it'll want to do something stupid. like install a really old version of the microsoft c runtime libraries. wee.
