"No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."John Donne (1572-1631)
Dedicated to Wes Steiner, smarter than anyone gave him credit for having been, but everyone knew that he was as good a friend as anyone could have. I remember and miss you to this day, thirty years later.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Death Be Not Proud
Death Be Not Proud
DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.
by John Donne/1572-1631
DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.
by John Donne/1572-1631
Sunday, November 11, 2007
THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth
Then took the other as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet, knowing how way leads onto way
I doubted if I should ever come back
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence
Two roads diverged in a wood
And I took the one less traveled by
And that has made all the difference
Robert Frost
When I was a boy of five-years-old, we lived in Newport Rhode Island. I remember looking out our bay window overlooking Narragansett Sound. The Light House said goodnight to me every night and good morning to me every morning. For me, the Ocean means all things are possible.
Friday, November 9, 2007
Rodney Dangerfield's Best Jokes
Sylvia Plath
If only she had met Rodney Dangerfield.
Rodney Dangerfield Jokes – Best One Liners
I get no respect, when I was born the doctor hit me to get me to take my first breath. I found out the nurses took their turns too.
My wife and I were happy for twenty years. Then we met.
I took my son to Coney Island Amusement Park, I asked "wanna go in the crazy house?" My son said "save your money we'll be home soon"!
My Dad took me to the zoo, he said he hoped my parents would claim me.
One day after a long day at work I stopped by a bar, I told the bartender "surprise me," he showed me a naked picture of my wife.
Our house caught on fire the other day, my wife told my son and daughter to be quiet, so we don't wake up your dad.
When I was born I was so ugly the doctor slapped my mother.
On Halloween, when come to the door, they give me candy.
On Halloween, my wife sends the kids out looking like me.
What a kid I got, I told him about the birds and the bee and he told me about the uber driver and my wife.
I get no respect, my wife told me that my son was going to the father son dinner at school with my brother.
I’ll tell ya, my wife and I, we don’t think alike. She donates money to the homeless, and I donate money to the topless!
One night I came home. I figured, let my wife come on. I’ll play it cool. Let her make the first move. She went to Florida.
I asked my old man if I could go ice-skating on the lake. He told me, “Wait til it gets warmer.”
I come home from work early one day, and I see a guy jogging down the street naked. I ask him, "Why are you jogging naked?" He says, "You came home from work early".
And my girlfriend, she's FAT! How fat? She's so fat she wears two watches--one for each time zone!
I dated a girl who was fat. How fat was she? When she walked in high heels she struck oil.
I moved to a new apartment on the westside on New York City. I asked a cop who long a walk it was to the nearest subway station. He said he didn't know, so far
no one has successfully made it.
My wife was in a wreck, but told me it wasn't her fault. She hit a tree, but told me that she beeped her horn to clear out of the way.
My parents didn't like me. For bathtub toys they gave me a space heater and a transistor radio.
My doctor told me to watch my drinking. Now I drink in front of a mirror. I drink too much. Way too much. My doctor drew blood. He ran a tab.
A girl phoned me the other day and said... 'Come on over, there's nobody home.' I went over. Nobody was home.
My dad took us to the carnival, when we got to the freak show, the ticket taker told my parents, the boy gets in free.
My wife is a terrile cook. The flies in our backyard chipped in to fix a tear in our kitchen screen door.
When I was born the doctor came out to the waiting room and said to my father, “I’m very sorry. We did everything we could…but he pulled through.”
I come from a stupid family. During the Civil War my great uncle fought for the west!
My daughters no bargain either. In public school she was voted most likely to conceive.
My wife met me at the door the other night in a sexy see through negligee. Unfortunately, she was just coming home.
My mom never gave me respect, it took me forever to figure out there is no Alpo baby food.
My wife said she wanted to make out at the drive in, it took me forever to find out which car she was in.
I haven't spoken to my wife in years. I didn't want to interrupt her.
I had a date to go to the beach in high school, everyone asked what bait I used to catch her.
My father was stupid. He worked in a bank and they caught him stealing pens.
My mother had morning sickness after I was born.
My mother never breast fed me. She told me that she only liked me as a friend.
My father only carries around the picture of the kid who came with his wallet.
When I played in the sandbox the cat kept covering me up.
I could tell that my parents hated me. My bath toys were a toaster and a radio.
One year they wanted to make me poster boy… for birth control.
When I come home and walk into our bedroom, our parrot says, "quick out the window!"
I remember the time I was kidnapped and they sent back a piece of my finger to my father. He said he wanted more proof.
My uncle’s dying wish was to have me sitting on his lap. He was in the electric chair.
One time I went to a hotel. I asked the bellhop to handle my old bag. He grabbed my wife!
This morning when I put on my underwear I could hear the Fruit of the Loom guys laughing at me.
I’m a bad lover. Once I caught a peeping tom booing me.
I asked my old dad if I could go ice-skating on the lake. He told me, "Wait til it gets warmer."
My dad took me to fly my kite. He took me to the edge of the Grand Canyon.
I tell ya, my wife was never nice. On our first date, I asked her if I could give her a goodnight kiss on the cheek - she bent over!
With my dog I don't get no respect. One day he kept barking at the front door. Found out he didn't want to go out. He wanted me to leave.
When I was a kid, I was kidnapped. The kidnappers cut my finger off and sent it to my parents as proof they had me. My dad wrote back, we need more proof.
My wife only has sex with me for a purpose. Last night she used me to time an egg.
It’s tough to stay married. My wife kisses the dog on the lips, yet she won’t drink from my glass!
The other day I called my house to speak to my wife, my son picked up the phone, I told him to put his mom on the phone, I could hear him say, "Mom, it's Dad, are you home?
When I was born the doctor came out to the waiting room and said to my father, "I'm very sorry. We did everything we could...but he pulled through."
My wife isn’t very bright. The other day she was at the store, and just as she was heading for our car, someone stole it! I said, “Did you see the guy that did it?” She said, “No, but I got the license plate.”
For Christmas one year, I bought my son a BB Gun, which he had been begging for. I opened my present from him, it was a sweatshirt with a target on the back.
On the Johnny Carson Show, It is love which gets me through life. I love art, music and one of my kids.
Last night my wife met me at the front door. She was wearing a sexy negligee. The only trouble was, she was coming home.
A girl phoned me and said, “Come on over. There’s nobody home.” I went over. Nobody was home!
A hooker once told me she had a headache.
I had a really expensive date once, after dinner at a fine restaurant and a $100 Broadway Show, when we went back to my hotel. I woke up and found out she was gone, as was my watch, my wallet and the $400 I had in it.
I went to a massage parlor. It was self service.
If it weren’t for pick-pocketers, I’d have no sex life at all.
Once when I was lost I saw a policeman and asked him to help me find my parents. I said to him, “Do you think we’ll ever find them?” He said, “I don’t know kid. There are so many places they can hide.”
I remember I was so depressed I was going to jump out a window on the tenth floor. They sent a priest up to talk to me. He said, “On your mark…”
When my dad wanted sex, my mother would show him a picture of me.
I had a lot of pimples too. One day I fell asleep in a library. I woke up and a blind man was reading my face.
My wife made me join a bridge club. I jump off next Tuesday.
Last week my tie caught on fire. Some guy tried to put it out with an ax!
I met the surgeon general. He offered me a cigarette.
I was making love to this girl and she started crying. I said, “Are you going to hate yourself in the morning?” She said, “No, I hate myself now.”
I knew a girl so ugly that she was known as a two-bagger. That’s when you put a bag over your head in case the bag over her head breaks.
I knew a girl so ugly, they use her in prisons to cure sex offenders.
I knew a girl so ugly, I took her to the top of the Empire State building and planes started to attack her.
I knew a girl so ugly, the last time I saw a mouth like hers it had a hook on the end of it.
I knew a girl so ugly, she had a face like a saint–a Saint Bernard!
I was tired one night and I went to the bar to have a few drinks. The bartender asked me, “What’ll you have?” I said, “Surprise me.” He showed me a naked picture of my wife.
During sex my wife always wants to talk to me. Just the other night she called me from a hotel.
My marriage is on the rocks again. Yeah, my wife just broke up with her boyfriend.
One day as I came home early from work, I saw a guy jogging naked. I said to the guy, “Hey buddy…why are you doing that for?” He said, “Because you came home early.”
I went to see my doctor… Doctor Vidi-boom-ba. Yeah…I told him once, “Doctor, every morning when I get up and look in the mirror I feel like throwing up. What’s wrong with me? He said, “I don’t know, but your eyesight is perfect.”
I told my dentist my teeth are going yellow. He told me to wear a brown necktie.
My psychiatrist told me I’m going crazy. I told him, “If you don’t mind, I’d like a second opinion.” He said, “All right. You’re ugly too!”
I was so ugly, my mother used to feed me with a slingshot!
When I was a kid I got no respect. The time I was kidnapped, and the kidnappers sent my parents a note they said, "We want five thousand dollars or you'll see your kid again."
When I was born the doctor took one look at my face, turned me over and said, “Look, twins!”
And we were poor too. Why, if I wasn’t born a boy, I’d have nothing to play with!
With my wife I don’t get no respect. I made a toast on her birthday to ‘the best woman a man ever had.’ The waiter joined me.
I’m not a sexy guy. I went to a hooker. I dropped my pants. She dropped her price.
I tell you, I’m not a sexy guy. I was the centerfold for Playgirl magazine. The staples covered everything!
What a childhood I had, why, when I took my first step, my old man tripped me!
Last week I told my psychiatrist, “I keep thinking about suicide.” He told me from now on I have to pay in advance.
I tell ya when I was a kid, all I knew was rejection. My yo-yo, it never came back!
Oh, when I was a kid in show business I was poor. I used to go to orgies to eat the grapes.
When I was a kid I got no respect. The time I was kidnapped, and the kidnappers sent my parents a note they said, “We want five thousand dollars or you’ll see your kid again.”
I tell ya, my wife was never nice. On our first date, I asked her if I could give her a goodnight kiss on the cheek – she bent over!
I tell you, with my doctor, I don’t get no respect. I told him, “I’ve swallowed a bottle of sleeping pills.” He told me to have a few drinks and get some rest.
Some dog I got too. We call him Egypt because he leaves a pyramid in every room.
With my dog I don’t get no respect. He keeps barking at the front door. He don’t want to go out. He wants me to leave.
What a dog I got. His favorite bone is in my arm!
Last week I saw my psychiatrist. I told him, “Doc, I keep thinking I’m a dog.” He told me to get off his couch.
I worked in a pet store and people kept asking how big I’d get.
I get no respect at all - When I was a kid, I lost my parents at the beach. I asked a lifeguard to help me find them. He said "I don't know kid, there are so many places they could hide".
My girlfriend is so ugly, two guys broke into her apartment. She yelled "Rape!" They yelled "NO!"
And my sex life is nothing to crow about. At my age I'm envious of a stiff wind.
I joined gamblers anon., they gave me 2 to 1 odds I wouldn't make it! I joined AA, there was a two drink minimum!
Me and my dad used to play tag, he'd drive!
My dad told me to stop running in circles, I couldn't, so he nailed down my other foot!
My mom took me to a dog show and I won!!
The sign on the bar said: 'girls- topless, bottomless', I went inside and there was nobody there!
A man in the crowd asks: Hey Rodney, how'd you get started? Rodney: I was 12 years old, alone in my room, and I got started!
My wife's so dumb, she got a nail in the spare!!
My daughters been picked up so many times she's starting to grow handles
I walked in on my wife and the milkman, the first thing she says is "don't tell the butcher"!
I tell ya, I don't get no respect ... Last week, my wife told me that she was going to cut me down to twice a month. But I thought about it, and I figured that it wasn't too bad. I know a couple of guys that she cut out completely.
I'll tell ya, I don't get no respect... The other day, I got back from a business trip. I got in a cab and said to the driver, "Hey! Take me to where the action is!" So ya know where he took me? He took me to my house!
Do ya remember the first time you had sex? I do, and boy, was I scared! I was alone!
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Lost at Sea
All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.
I remember seeing "Lawrence of Arabia" in 1962 when I was five. When I started school, I remember looking for a biography of TE Lawrence. Of course, what I found was a childish, simplistic, sanitized version of his life, but it still kept my interest and I read it straight through. I remembered this quote from that time.
Carl Sagan's Tools to use when in search of the truth.
The following are suggested as tools for testing arguments and detecting fallacious or fraudulent arguments:
Wherever possible there must be independent confirmation of the facts
Encourage substantive debate on the evidence by knowledgeable proponents of all points of view.
Arguments from authority carry little weight (in science there are no "authorities").
Spin more than one hypothesis - don't simply run with the first idea that caught your fancy.
Try not to get overly attached to a hypothesis just because it's yours.
Quantify, wherever possible.
If there is a chain of argument every link in the chain must work.
"Occam's razor" - if there are two hypothesis that explain the data equally well choose the simpler.
Ask whether the hypothesis can, at least in principle, be falsified (shown to be false by some unambiguous test). In other words, is it testable? Can others duplicate the experiment and get the same result?
Additional issues are
Conduct control experiments - especially "double blind" experiments where the person taking measurements is not aware of the test and control subjects.
Check for confounding factors - separate the variables.
Common fallacies of logic and rhetoric
Ad hominem - attacking the arguer and not the argument.
Argument from "authority".
Argument from adverse consequences (putting pressure on the decision maker by pointing out dire consequences of an "unfavourable" decision).
Appeal to ignorance (absence of evidence is not evidence of absence).
Special pleading (typically referring to god's will).
Begging the question (assuming an answer in the way the question is phrased).
Observational selection (counting the hits and forgetting the misses).
Statistics of small numbers (such as drawing conclusions from inadequate sample sizes).
Misunderstanding the nature of statistics (President Eisenhower expressing astonishment and alarm on discovering that fully half of all Americans have below average intelligence!)
Inconsistency (e.g. military expenditures based on worst case scenarios but scientific projections on environmental dangers thriftily ignored because they are not "proved").
Non sequitur - "it does not follow" - the logic falls down.
Post hoc, ergo propter hoc - "it happened after so it was caused by" - confusion of cause and effect.
Meaningless question ("what happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object?).
Excluded middle - considering only the two extremes in a range of possibilities (making the "other side" look worse than it really is).
Short-term v. long-term - a subset of excluded middle ("why pursue fundamental science when we have so huge a budget deficit?").
Slippery slope - a subset of excluded middle - unwarranted extrapolation of the effects (give an inch and they will take a mile).
Confusion of correlation and causation.
Straw man - caricaturing (or stereotyping) a position to make it easier to attack..
Suppressed evidence or half-truths.
Weasel words - for example, use of euphemisms for war such as "police action" to get around limitations on Presidential powers. "An important art of politicians is to find new names for institutions which under old names have become odious to the public"
Carl Sagan's Baloney Detector
I remember seeing "Lawrence of Arabia" in 1962 when I was five. When I started school, I remember looking for a biography of TE Lawrence. Of course, what I found was a childish, simplistic, sanitized version of his life, but it still kept my interest and I read it straight through. I remembered this quote from that time.
Carl Sagan's Tools to use when in search of the truth.
The following are suggested as tools for testing arguments and detecting fallacious or fraudulent arguments:
Wherever possible there must be independent confirmation of the facts
Encourage substantive debate on the evidence by knowledgeable proponents of all points of view.
Arguments from authority carry little weight (in science there are no "authorities").
Spin more than one hypothesis - don't simply run with the first idea that caught your fancy.
Try not to get overly attached to a hypothesis just because it's yours.
Quantify, wherever possible.
If there is a chain of argument every link in the chain must work.
"Occam's razor" - if there are two hypothesis that explain the data equally well choose the simpler.
Ask whether the hypothesis can, at least in principle, be falsified (shown to be false by some unambiguous test). In other words, is it testable? Can others duplicate the experiment and get the same result?
Additional issues are
Conduct control experiments - especially "double blind" experiments where the person taking measurements is not aware of the test and control subjects.
Check for confounding factors - separate the variables.
Common fallacies of logic and rhetoric
Ad hominem - attacking the arguer and not the argument.
Argument from "authority".
Argument from adverse consequences (putting pressure on the decision maker by pointing out dire consequences of an "unfavourable" decision).
Appeal to ignorance (absence of evidence is not evidence of absence).
Special pleading (typically referring to god's will).
Begging the question (assuming an answer in the way the question is phrased).
Observational selection (counting the hits and forgetting the misses).
Statistics of small numbers (such as drawing conclusions from inadequate sample sizes).
Misunderstanding the nature of statistics (President Eisenhower expressing astonishment and alarm on discovering that fully half of all Americans have below average intelligence!)
Inconsistency (e.g. military expenditures based on worst case scenarios but scientific projections on environmental dangers thriftily ignored because they are not "proved").
Non sequitur - "it does not follow" - the logic falls down.
Post hoc, ergo propter hoc - "it happened after so it was caused by" - confusion of cause and effect.
Meaningless question ("what happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object?).
Excluded middle - considering only the two extremes in a range of possibilities (making the "other side" look worse than it really is).
Short-term v. long-term - a subset of excluded middle ("why pursue fundamental science when we have so huge a budget deficit?").
Slippery slope - a subset of excluded middle - unwarranted extrapolation of the effects (give an inch and they will take a mile).
Confusion of correlation and causation.
Straw man - caricaturing (or stereotyping) a position to make it easier to attack..
Suppressed evidence or half-truths.
Weasel words - for example, use of euphemisms for war such as "police action" to get around limitations on Presidential powers. "An important art of politicians is to find new names for institutions which under old names have become odious to the public"
Carl Sagan's Baloney Detector
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