I forgive Adam Lanza.
It's seems the ultimate hubris. In some real way I can't forgive the shooter of 20 innocent children and 6 adults including his mother. Nevertheless, I do. Let me tell you how I get the nerve.
Adam Lanza is my enemy. He is the embodiment of evil and it's none too hard to imagine that he might just have well have killed my beautiful child, or the love of my life; herself a teacher. There is no language strong enough to tell you how much I abhor what Adam has done, and I feel the HATRED that would swallow us all.
But I believe that my abhoration for this act of evil; this travesty, is no smaller than the abhoration that God has for all our many sins, as individuals and as a society; and it must be ESPECIALLY acute knowing that he sent his son who SACRIFICED himself for all of us.
So, the forgiveness that I've received is the forgiveness that I extend.
It's too late for Adam. Adam is dead and we must tend to the living and the grieving. It is right and it is just to do so. It is critical to do so. It is critical to count what we've lost, what we are still losing day to day, and to think how we can make it better; a little at a time.
But I feel a deep sadness. I feel the sadness for everyone whom I've ignored and I haven't done everything I could to reach out to. I'm sad for the suffering, I'm sad for the sick, I'm sad for the downtrodden, the abused, and the used.
We need healing in our society, so let it start with me. Dear Lord, as you welcome the innocent into heaven and judge the guilty, here is my prayer; forgive me for the selfish times when I've put myself first, and continue to send me occasions in which my actions, my care and my compassion can make a difference. I want to be last and least. Let me live for the well-being of others, and in the example of Jesus. Amen.
Saturday, December 15, 2012
Monday, December 3, 2012
Saturday, September 1, 2012
Alabama Football!
There are really two University of Alabama's. The one is the academic institution, the other is the athletic (primarily football) institution. They share a name, and *perhaps* some funding. I have a lot of coginitive dissonance and unresolved issues about being both a fan of football and well, you know, a rational human being.
The two so often seem at odds when I reflect back.
Here's what an old friend of mine said on Facebook after Auburn University lost a close one to Clemson and Alabama annihilated Michigan tonight:
"F*** Alabama!" (The original was not censored.)
Here's what I wanted to say:
"Awe, how are those grapes? A little sour I guess. Well, perhaps Auburn could borrow one of our four top-notch running backs. Nah, on second thought, we're using them ALL."
I managed, instead to say:
"Heh. Music to my ears."
I should have said, well, nothing at all.
I'm not writing this blog post TO that person. I think it's best just to let it go; but if they follow the link over here, so be it.
I felt really bad... feel really bad about the oaks at Toomer's Corner. I do. That was abhorrent behavior; beyond abhorrent. AND, the cringe inducing (for me, anyway) sign at ESPN College Gameday this morning making fun of the incident was even more abhorant and damning. I've seen Alabama fans act like fools SO many times. I grew up on the other side of this argument, as an Auburn fan. I've been there. I don't largely like Alabama fans. But I'm here to tell you that no fan base in the SEC is above reproach even if each one thinks it is. And, even if one or the other fan bases is "worse" than any other, a claim I find dubious in the extreme, the way that each fan base rationalizes their horrible behavior by pointing to how badly they themselves have been treated self-nullifies the claim of moral superiority.
Hatred is bad people. Grudges are worse, and worse of all are the grudges for entire institutions and people groups, blindly applied.
I'm pretty sure football is bad for people. I'm pretty sure I can't stop loving it.
Cognitive. Dissonance.
The two so often seem at odds when I reflect back.
Here's what an old friend of mine said on Facebook after Auburn University lost a close one to Clemson and Alabama annihilated Michigan tonight:
"F*** Alabama!" (The original was not censored.)
Here's what I wanted to say:
"Awe, how are those grapes? A little sour I guess. Well, perhaps Auburn could borrow one of our four top-notch running backs. Nah, on second thought, we're using them ALL."
I managed, instead to say:
"Heh. Music to my ears."
I should have said, well, nothing at all.
I'm not writing this blog post TO that person. I think it's best just to let it go; but if they follow the link over here, so be it.
I felt really bad... feel really bad about the oaks at Toomer's Corner. I do. That was abhorrent behavior; beyond abhorrent. AND, the cringe inducing (for me, anyway) sign at ESPN College Gameday this morning making fun of the incident was even more abhorant and damning. I've seen Alabama fans act like fools SO many times. I grew up on the other side of this argument, as an Auburn fan. I've been there. I don't largely like Alabama fans. But I'm here to tell you that no fan base in the SEC is above reproach even if each one thinks it is. And, even if one or the other fan bases is "worse" than any other, a claim I find dubious in the extreme, the way that each fan base rationalizes their horrible behavior by pointing to how badly they themselves have been treated self-nullifies the claim of moral superiority.
Hatred is bad people. Grudges are worse, and worse of all are the grudges for entire institutions and people groups, blindly applied.
I'm pretty sure football is bad for people. I'm pretty sure I can't stop loving it.
Cognitive. Dissonance.
Thursday, August 9, 2012
Filling Pails or Lighting Fires
I posted about the issue this blog post is going to address on Facebook already. Most of the time, when I find a disturbing bit of news on the internet, I can post a few words about it on Facebook and that will somehow satiate my need for people not to be wrong. Believe me, people are wrong on the internet all the time; it's important to have a pressure valve, especially if you're me and you just really hate people's inability to come to rational rather than knee-jerk conclusions.
Unfortunately, Facebook didn't work as a palliative this time. The issue has gotten under my skin and I need to "scratch", if you will. So, I've come here to do it.
The State of Louisiana, under Governor Bobby Jindal, has decided that it's basically going to outsource (probably I should say, privatize) it's education system, at least in part, via the largest school voucher system in America.
Let me start by saying I think you should be able to school your children in the way that seems fit to you. For one, I believe in competition as a driving force for improvement. Let me then say, I think it's obvious that you should want to have your children in public school.
Let me explain. I often go to de Tocqueville because I believe he put it best when he argued that in a democracy, the people get ONLY the government that they deserve. It's in the best interest of all it citizens that the country's young people, inexorably marching toward voting age, become educated, capable (in academia, the arts, etc.), and most of all, discerning. (Incidentally, that's also what's best for the children themselves. ) You don't want idiots for citizens because idiots deserve an idiot government. In short, as goes the education system, and in particular, as goes the public education system, so goes the democracy.
The public education system works best when all of the citizens and their children (such as they have any) are invested co-partners.
Vouchers are harmful to this system, because they lure away capable students, and they draw money away from the public education system itself. Period. Full stop.
They are most dreadfully harmful, as is the case with Louisiana, when they are directed away from the public school system, whose goal should always be to produce well-educated, discerning students, to institutions who make no pretence about being anything but driven by this or that demagoguery. (Incidentally, I understand, better than most readers of this blog, the short-comings of the current public education system; more bogged down and nearly drowning in bureaucratically motivated testing for testings' sake than it is interested in fulfilling it's purpose. After all, I deal with college freshman every year. But again, how are vouchers supposed to make the system better? How is leaving the system, giving up, supposed to make it better?).
Louisiana tax dollars are going to institutions that have bought so called "text books" that are just plain shameful. This link does a good job of giving you the rundown: here. How can it be in the best interest of the citizens of Louisiana (or of the Unites States for that matter) for their future citizens to be thus wilfully misinformed?
I'm a Christian. I understand that, even though I believe that I experience a personal relationship with a living God, their is an inherent element of faith that I must possess in that. I also understand that that last sentence sounds like utter nonsense to my readers and friends who aren't Christian and who not only think that I don't have a relationship with God, but also that there is no God and that I'm just deluding myself. I accept that. I accept it, even as I hope you might one day come around to seeing things my way. There is room for respect for each others beliefs. But what there is not is room for the denial of evidence based facts to fit a dogma that is laughably conflated with religion. It's not what Christians are called to do, and it's not what Christ did. It's just plain dangerous. It's dangerous to our very democracy, our very ability to worship (or not) however we choose.
The most common thing you hear about vouchers is when parents say, 'well, I'm glad we live in a free country where I can choose to school my child wherever and however I want. I like vouchers because it means we won't have to pay for school twice.'
I'm glad we live in a free country too. I wouldn't think I'd have to say that, but you seem to think I'm against personal liberty somehow. I'm not. But, as to the part about vouchers just meaning you won't have to pay twice, wrong.
You don't have any more argument there than would a person who has no children, or one whose children are grown. You and them and I have something in common. We're not paying taxes for our children to go to school, we're paying for EVERYONE'S children to go to school, because it's in our best interest that they do.
So, if you want a refund, fine. The best you could possibly argue for would be to take the pittance of your total taxes that actually goes to education, divide it by the number of children in public school, and then you may have the sad amount that you paid for your own child. Hardly worth it I'd say.
(As an aside, note that this is very different than what vouchers actually accomplish, where effectively state governments like Louisiana's are subsidising private institutions so that those institutions can lower their tuition costs, effectively outsourcing education whole cloth.)
There's a reason why private school is so expensive. No one in their right mind who isn't wholly committed to making a real difference for our future society would go into public education as a career. By in large the teachers who work with our children in the public system are getting used and abused and they know it, and they come to work and do their dead level best anyway. In my book, that's the first step to sainthood. How does starving an already under-funded future help? Not only that, but it's wrong to abuse such a group of people just because despite the enormous amount of lip-service we pay to the need for better education, what we really mean is better education for me and mine alone and I'd really like to spend as much of our money somewhere else as we can.
So, send your children to private school if you must. (There's probably a whole other post in me about how for the life of me I don't see the benefit of a non-public education over a public one, but it's late and I'm tired). I know and like a lot of well meaning people who do just that. But, if you do I think you're making a mistake; for all of us. What's more, it shouldn't even be an issue where the government collected taxes ought to rightly go.
Unfortunately, Facebook didn't work as a palliative this time. The issue has gotten under my skin and I need to "scratch", if you will. So, I've come here to do it.
The State of Louisiana, under Governor Bobby Jindal, has decided that it's basically going to outsource (probably I should say, privatize) it's education system, at least in part, via the largest school voucher system in America.
Let me start by saying I think you should be able to school your children in the way that seems fit to you. For one, I believe in competition as a driving force for improvement. Let me then say, I think it's obvious that you should want to have your children in public school.
Let me explain. I often go to de Tocqueville because I believe he put it best when he argued that in a democracy, the people get ONLY the government that they deserve. It's in the best interest of all it citizens that the country's young people, inexorably marching toward voting age, become educated, capable (in academia, the arts, etc.), and most of all, discerning. (Incidentally, that's also what's best for the children themselves. ) You don't want idiots for citizens because idiots deserve an idiot government. In short, as goes the education system, and in particular, as goes the public education system, so goes the democracy.
The public education system works best when all of the citizens and their children (such as they have any) are invested co-partners.
Vouchers are harmful to this system, because they lure away capable students, and they draw money away from the public education system itself. Period. Full stop.
They are most dreadfully harmful, as is the case with Louisiana, when they are directed away from the public school system, whose goal should always be to produce well-educated, discerning students, to institutions who make no pretence about being anything but driven by this or that demagoguery. (Incidentally, I understand, better than most readers of this blog, the short-comings of the current public education system; more bogged down and nearly drowning in bureaucratically motivated testing for testings' sake than it is interested in fulfilling it's purpose. After all, I deal with college freshman every year. But again, how are vouchers supposed to make the system better? How is leaving the system, giving up, supposed to make it better?).
Louisiana tax dollars are going to institutions that have bought so called "text books" that are just plain shameful. This link does a good job of giving you the rundown: here. How can it be in the best interest of the citizens of Louisiana (or of the Unites States for that matter) for their future citizens to be thus wilfully misinformed?
I'm a Christian. I understand that, even though I believe that I experience a personal relationship with a living God, their is an inherent element of faith that I must possess in that. I also understand that that last sentence sounds like utter nonsense to my readers and friends who aren't Christian and who not only think that I don't have a relationship with God, but also that there is no God and that I'm just deluding myself. I accept that. I accept it, even as I hope you might one day come around to seeing things my way. There is room for respect for each others beliefs. But what there is not is room for the denial of evidence based facts to fit a dogma that is laughably conflated with religion. It's not what Christians are called to do, and it's not what Christ did. It's just plain dangerous. It's dangerous to our very democracy, our very ability to worship (or not) however we choose.
The most common thing you hear about vouchers is when parents say, 'well, I'm glad we live in a free country where I can choose to school my child wherever and however I want. I like vouchers because it means we won't have to pay for school twice.'
I'm glad we live in a free country too. I wouldn't think I'd have to say that, but you seem to think I'm against personal liberty somehow. I'm not. But, as to the part about vouchers just meaning you won't have to pay twice, wrong.
You don't have any more argument there than would a person who has no children, or one whose children are grown. You and them and I have something in common. We're not paying taxes for our children to go to school, we're paying for EVERYONE'S children to go to school, because it's in our best interest that they do.
So, if you want a refund, fine. The best you could possibly argue for would be to take the pittance of your total taxes that actually goes to education, divide it by the number of children in public school, and then you may have the sad amount that you paid for your own child. Hardly worth it I'd say.
(As an aside, note that this is very different than what vouchers actually accomplish, where effectively state governments like Louisiana's are subsidising private institutions so that those institutions can lower their tuition costs, effectively outsourcing education whole cloth.)
There's a reason why private school is so expensive. No one in their right mind who isn't wholly committed to making a real difference for our future society would go into public education as a career. By in large the teachers who work with our children in the public system are getting used and abused and they know it, and they come to work and do their dead level best anyway. In my book, that's the first step to sainthood. How does starving an already under-funded future help? Not only that, but it's wrong to abuse such a group of people just because despite the enormous amount of lip-service we pay to the need for better education, what we really mean is better education for me and mine alone and I'd really like to spend as much of our money somewhere else as we can.
So, send your children to private school if you must. (There's probably a whole other post in me about how for the life of me I don't see the benefit of a non-public education over a public one, but it's late and I'm tired). I know and like a lot of well meaning people who do just that. But, if you do I think you're making a mistake; for all of us. What's more, it shouldn't even be an issue where the government collected taxes ought to rightly go.
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
Of Shakes and Semantics
"What size drink would you like?", is one of those questions to which there is no right answer. I've long thought that I could easily do with one uniform cup size. Consider the two situations. In the first scenario you are staying inside to eat, in which case rare is the establishment that doesn't offer free refills. After all, you don't expect to be asked what size drink you would like when you go to a "sit-down" establishment (as opposed to "fast food"). In the second scenario you are eating (and drinking) on the run. In which case, again, who cares how big the cup is. It's sure to be big enough to contain enough fluid to wash down the food you'll be eating, and regardless of how big the cup is, you're sure to drink until it's empty, and the variation between 16 and 32 oz is a mere 16 measly ounces. Not enough to be concerned with, especially considering that most of what you'll get is ice anyway. If you don't stop to psych yourself out, if you don't spend time thinking about it, then the cup size will be absolutely meaningless to you.
But that's just it. We are forced to think about it. Why ARE there three (or sometimes four) sizes to choose from. Am I supposed to worry about value? I'm paying about a 200% markup for soda regardless. What does it MEAN to me and to others around me if I choose one size over the other. How thirsty AM I? Well, I'm thirsty til I'm not... so...
Effectively, when you're driving, the cup is a distraction. Additionally, no matter how much drink you have, you will be thirsty again. So you always have simultaneously too much and too little to drink.
And the kicker, for me at least, is that when the drive-through speaker blares back at you asking what size drink you would like, the options are meaningless. What size is "small"? How does "medium" differ from "small", aside from the obvious. What's the next size after "medium". In fact, what even is the WORD for the next size after "medium"? There's no standardization, not even lexically, much less in terms of actual quantifiability.
People like options. But cup size is a difference that doesn't make one. It's variety theatre instead of variety in actuality, and I'd actually rather not be asked what size I'd like.
I've developed a trick to expedite having to deal with the meaningless decision of deciding on cup size. It's a trick that leverages the built in ambiguity of semantics.
"What size drink would you like?'
"I'll have regular."
This almost always works. What's "regular" you might ask? Well, occasionally the establishment might actually have a "regular" size, but even if they don't, WHO CARES!? The employee likely has an idea what "regular" is, and that's perfectly acceptable to me.
But today, at Sonic, the drive through operator, after I told her I wanted "regular" came back with, "We have small, medium, large and route 44 sizes, sir." Really? Are THOSE the sizes you have? Well that's fascinating! I'll take "regular" please. But no. My bluff had been called, and I was forced to make an actual choice. I went with "medium".
Then, we we get to the window, Tabitha's drink comes through the window first, and it's completely devoid of ice. When next the window opened, out flung my beverage, and in mid sentence I was cut off with the slamming window as she went to force the next customer to choose a cup size.
We waited. When the window opened up we asked for a cup of ice. The window closed, again. In the mean time, we noticed I had not been allotted a straw. The window opened again and out flew another cup. With an urgency in our request we managed to keep the window from slamming again, barely, before closing without our request being registered. The look we received... the contempt in the eye-roll... the aggravation with us, the oh-so-troubling customers. Well, I didn't like it. Not. At. All.
But that's just it. We are forced to think about it. Why ARE there three (or sometimes four) sizes to choose from. Am I supposed to worry about value? I'm paying about a 200% markup for soda regardless. What does it MEAN to me and to others around me if I choose one size over the other. How thirsty AM I? Well, I'm thirsty til I'm not... so...
Effectively, when you're driving, the cup is a distraction. Additionally, no matter how much drink you have, you will be thirsty again. So you always have simultaneously too much and too little to drink.
And the kicker, for me at least, is that when the drive-through speaker blares back at you asking what size drink you would like, the options are meaningless. What size is "small"? How does "medium" differ from "small", aside from the obvious. What's the next size after "medium". In fact, what even is the WORD for the next size after "medium"? There's no standardization, not even lexically, much less in terms of actual quantifiability.
People like options. But cup size is a difference that doesn't make one. It's variety theatre instead of variety in actuality, and I'd actually rather not be asked what size I'd like.
I've developed a trick to expedite having to deal with the meaningless decision of deciding on cup size. It's a trick that leverages the built in ambiguity of semantics.
"What size drink would you like?'
"I'll have regular."
This almost always works. What's "regular" you might ask? Well, occasionally the establishment might actually have a "regular" size, but even if they don't, WHO CARES!? The employee likely has an idea what "regular" is, and that's perfectly acceptable to me.
But today, at Sonic, the drive through operator, after I told her I wanted "regular" came back with, "We have small, medium, large and route 44 sizes, sir." Really? Are THOSE the sizes you have? Well that's fascinating! I'll take "regular" please. But no. My bluff had been called, and I was forced to make an actual choice. I went with "medium".
Then, we we get to the window, Tabitha's drink comes through the window first, and it's completely devoid of ice. When next the window opened, out flung my beverage, and in mid sentence I was cut off with the slamming window as she went to force the next customer to choose a cup size.
We waited. When the window opened up we asked for a cup of ice. The window closed, again. In the mean time, we noticed I had not been allotted a straw. The window opened again and out flew another cup. With an urgency in our request we managed to keep the window from slamming again, barely, before closing without our request being registered. The look we received... the contempt in the eye-roll... the aggravation with us, the oh-so-troubling customers. Well, I didn't like it. Not. At. All.
Thursday, June 7, 2012
Value Added
In 2004, Ken Jennings won 75 consecutive matches of T.V.'s Jeopardy quiz show, winning over two and a half million dollars before being bested by another contestant. Jennings, most recently, was called out of Jeopardy past player's exile in 2011, along with all-time Jeopardy money winner Brad Rutter, to compete against, and summarily be trounced by, an IBM supercomputer called Watson built expressly for the purpose of playing Jeopardy against humans.
(Incidentally, if you missed out on watching history in the making, or you simply want to learn more about the cutting edge computing and artificial intelligence embodied in Watson, then I highly recommend you watch the following episode of PBS's NOVA: The Smartest Machine on Earth.)
Anyway, when Jennings isn't appearing on T.V. as one of the best Jeopardy players (statistically speaking) of all-time, he's busy parleying his fifteen minutes of trivial fame into a successful career as an author.
Last year, I read and thoroughly enjoyed his first book about (what else) trivia and trivia buffs, entitled Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs. Jennings is a funny and insightful author who writes books that anyone can find enjoyable, even if they tend to be about topics many people wouldn't normally be interested in.
I'm currently reading his second book entitled, Maphead: Charting the Wide, Weird World of Geography Wonks. The book is about... well, admittedly I could probably better tell you what it's about once I finish it, but generally, it's about the importance of maps, cartography and geography to humanity now and across the ages.
I was reading this book when I came across the following passage, which I'd like to briefly recreate for you here:
I think Jennings has hit here, explaining the plight of the poor misunderstood geographer, on an important misconception amongst all of academia that I've been ruminating on for quite a while. In academia, 'what do you study?' is what the Buddhists would call a question wrongly put (vlogbrothers / John Green shout out!). The disciplines in academia all seek the same thing; to understand how the world (the universe?) works and how that knowledge can inform us and our decisions.
Ken Jennings goes on to say:
I think, then, that the question rightly put would be, 'What is the lens through which you have chosen to see the world?' This is what I want my college students to know, degrees are little more than marketing ploys invented by colleges and universities to entice prospective students; no different from ploys like whitening agents, or mint flavoring in toothpaste. The power (and saleability and value) of your educational experience is directly proportional to how well you learn to explore questions from far and wide through the lens or lenses associated with your field of study. Geographers use the lens of place and spatial relation while chemists explore the same fundamental questions through the lens of chemical interactions and computer scientists look through the lens of information theory.
Computer science students (and software enigneers and M.I.S. professionals) are not primarily valuable because they can write programs, or use computers better than someone self-taught at these things; but because they can help society (and their bosses) better and more deeply understand the complexities (and occasionally the answers to) problems that have nothing inherently to do with math, or programming, or even computers at all.
In academia, there might be room to argue about the power of our respective lenses (a tempting but, I think, dangerous prospect), but there's no room to argue about how well we've carved out our fields or how important our areas of study are, because our true areas of study, thought about complexly, must necessarily completely overlap.
(Incidentally, if you missed out on watching history in the making, or you simply want to learn more about the cutting edge computing and artificial intelligence embodied in Watson, then I highly recommend you watch the following episode of PBS's NOVA: The Smartest Machine on Earth.)
Anyway, when Jennings isn't appearing on T.V. as one of the best Jeopardy players (statistically speaking) of all-time, he's busy parleying his fifteen minutes of trivial fame into a successful career as an author.
Last year, I read and thoroughly enjoyed his first book about (what else) trivia and trivia buffs, entitled Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs. Jennings is a funny and insightful author who writes books that anyone can find enjoyable, even if they tend to be about topics many people wouldn't normally be interested in.
I'm currently reading his second book entitled, Maphead: Charting the Wide, Weird World of Geography Wonks. The book is about... well, admittedly I could probably better tell you what it's about once I finish it, but generally, it's about the importance of maps, cartography and geography to humanity now and across the ages.
I was reading this book when I came across the following passage, which I'd like to briefly recreate for you here:
Imagine the poor geographer trying to explain to someone at a campus cocktail party (or even to an unsympathetic administrator) exactly what it is he or she studies.
"'Geography' is Greek for 'writing about the Earth.' We study the Earth"
"Right, like Geologists."
"Well, yes, but we're interested in the whole world, not just the rocky bits. Geographers also study oceans, lakes, the water cycle..."
"So it's like oceanography or hydrology."
"And the atmosphere."
"Meteorology, climatology ..."
"It's broader than just physical geography. We're also interested in how humans relate to their planet."
"How is that different from ecology or environmental science?"
"Well, it encompasses them. Aspects of them. But we also study the social and economic and cultural and geopolitical sides of --"
"Sociology, economics, cultural studies, poli sci."
"Some geographers specialize in different world regions."
"Ah, right, we have Asian and African and Latin American studies programs here. But I didn't know they were part of the geography department."
"They're not."
(Long pause.)
"So, uh, what is it you do study, then?"
And... scene.
I think Jennings has hit here, explaining the plight of the poor misunderstood geographer, on an important misconception amongst all of academia that I've been ruminating on for quite a while. In academia, 'what do you study?' is what the Buddhists would call a question wrongly put (vlogbrothers / John Green shout out!). The disciplines in academia all seek the same thing; to understand how the world (the universe?) works and how that knowledge can inform us and our decisions.
Ken Jennings goes on to say:
(Geography is)... made up of every other discipline viewed spatially, through the lens of place. Language, history, biology, public health, paleontology, urban planning -- there are geographers studying all these subjects and aspects of geography taught in all of them.
I think, then, that the question rightly put would be, 'What is the lens through which you have chosen to see the world?' This is what I want my college students to know, degrees are little more than marketing ploys invented by colleges and universities to entice prospective students; no different from ploys like whitening agents, or mint flavoring in toothpaste. The power (and saleability and value) of your educational experience is directly proportional to how well you learn to explore questions from far and wide through the lens or lenses associated with your field of study. Geographers use the lens of place and spatial relation while chemists explore the same fundamental questions through the lens of chemical interactions and computer scientists look through the lens of information theory.
Computer science students (and software enigneers and M.I.S. professionals) are not primarily valuable because they can write programs, or use computers better than someone self-taught at these things; but because they can help society (and their bosses) better and more deeply understand the complexities (and occasionally the answers to) problems that have nothing inherently to do with math, or programming, or even computers at all.
In academia, there might be room to argue about the power of our respective lenses (a tempting but, I think, dangerous prospect), but there's no room to argue about how well we've carved out our fields or how important our areas of study are, because our true areas of study, thought about complexly, must necessarily completely overlap.
Monday, June 4, 2012
Ode to a Car
In 2003 (or, maybe 2004?) Tabitha went with her father (this was B.R., before she became a Ray) to a Toyota dealership on Skyland Blvd in Tuscaloosa, Al (Tuscaloosa Toyota, as it happens), looking for a new solution for her automobile needs.
Tabitha had, in the preceding months, driven her mid-80s era white Pontiac Grand Am to the point that the poor creature literally tossed a push rod out of the bottom of it's engine, through the oil pan, flinging the abused piece of metal down I-20/59 between Birmingham and Tuscaloosa in a trail of brilliant orange sparks. The car was as dead as one can be (though, incidentally, it was later resurrected by it's next owner who dropped a refurbished engine in; I wonder if it's still on the road somewhere, even now?)
As you can imagine, Tabitha's lack of a car was a problem. So, the saga continued when Tabitha's father acquired a used late 80s BMW from a relative. That would have been fine, but THAT poor beast needed a new controller computer for the electrical system. Without warning (and with a knack for choosing in-opportune times), it's computer chip would overheat, causing the electrical system (and thus the engine, starter, and ... everything, really) to cease functioning. The solution was to jump out, pop the hood, and take the positive terminal off the battery. It would have been possible to repair the offending piece, but the drawback to owning a car, like a BMW, which tends to keep its value over the years, is that it's also prohibitively expensive to buy the parts and find someone with enough skill and expertise to work on it. The second or third time Tabitha performed this operation in the middle of the road she'd had enough.
So, when Tabitha and her father wandered over to the used car section at Tuscaloosa Toyota and found a model 2002 Toyota Sebring (light blue, no bells or whistles) she fell in love and within a day she'd settled with the dealership for a ten year loan (a loan that was paid off ahead of time).
Let's face it, the venerable Chrysler name doesn't mean what it used to. I haven't been able to keep track of who owns the Chrysler name these days, but back then Dodge owned it. And if you put a 2002 Dodge Stratus next to a 2002 Chrysler Sebring you will have to squint REAL hard to determine which is which. They are the same car with different maker emblems and a few nicer plastic components inside the Sebring.
That said, when the transmission broke into a pile of grinding gear teeth at around the 60,000 mile mark, we actually weren't too surprised. Tabitha's dad had had enough forethought (I think he would have preferred Tabitha get something else) to purchase a power train warranty from the dealership. (Incidentally, when the repair man showed us the $1500 repair price tag he asked, weren't we glad we decided to buy the warranty. One the one hand, yes, but of course, on the other, I'd already figured that over the lifetime of the warranty the transmission could have died in exactly the same fashion twice more before the dealership began to lose money. Luckily(?) that didn't happen.)
Furthermore, when the timing belt broke on the Interstate near Morristown, Tn with Tabitha and I on our way to celebrate Christmas in Alabama three years ago we were extremely inconvenienced and put under a bit of a monetary strain, but we weren't terribly surprised when all was said and done. (Incidentally, the Sebring has what's called an "interference engine" design, where the valve head and the piston head partially occupy the same space inside the engine as they slide back and forth. Ideally, they never touch, but when the timing belt breaks going down the road at 70 mph, things start to get dicey. By some stroke of luck, the life of the engine itself didn't die three years ago as it could have if the valve and piston had knocked in to one another).
So, with all of this, why am I calling this post an "ode" (ignoring the fact that there's not a lyrical verse to be found in the whole post)? Because I've come to see that car as a a survivor. I've been driving the old car full-time for almost two years now. I've spilled battery acid in it's trunk, I barely ever wash the thing, it needs new tires ever more desperately. It long ago lost, one by one, all four of it's fancy (plastic) Chrysler hub-caps and has steadfastly refused to wear any cheap replacements. It's headlights are cloudy and it's paint is fading. It leaks oil and leaks steering fluid, but it gets me reliably where I'm going.
This week, I've loaded it down repeatedly (probably ten times so far) to take our stuff to our new house. It's living a third life as a work horse for us.
It's silly to personify machines. Nevertheless, the other day I was thinking that, as it rolled off the assembly line and was slapped with the name Chrysler it never imagined it would have such a hard life. Probably, all it's Chrysler buddies would make fun of it if they could see it now. But, there is honor and reason for pride in working hard.
The car may die tomorrow (personally I'm REALLY hoping it'll stay alive for another few years), but even if it does it can go to it's final rest knowing it's owners got their money's worth; for sure.
Tabitha had, in the preceding months, driven her mid-80s era white Pontiac Grand Am to the point that the poor creature literally tossed a push rod out of the bottom of it's engine, through the oil pan, flinging the abused piece of metal down I-20/59 between Birmingham and Tuscaloosa in a trail of brilliant orange sparks. The car was as dead as one can be (though, incidentally, it was later resurrected by it's next owner who dropped a refurbished engine in; I wonder if it's still on the road somewhere, even now?)
As you can imagine, Tabitha's lack of a car was a problem. So, the saga continued when Tabitha's father acquired a used late 80s BMW from a relative. That would have been fine, but THAT poor beast needed a new controller computer for the electrical system. Without warning (and with a knack for choosing in-opportune times), it's computer chip would overheat, causing the electrical system (and thus the engine, starter, and ... everything, really) to cease functioning. The solution was to jump out, pop the hood, and take the positive terminal off the battery. It would have been possible to repair the offending piece, but the drawback to owning a car, like a BMW, which tends to keep its value over the years, is that it's also prohibitively expensive to buy the parts and find someone with enough skill and expertise to work on it. The second or third time Tabitha performed this operation in the middle of the road she'd had enough.
So, when Tabitha and her father wandered over to the used car section at Tuscaloosa Toyota and found a model 2002 Toyota Sebring (light blue, no bells or whistles) she fell in love and within a day she'd settled with the dealership for a ten year loan (a loan that was paid off ahead of time).
Let's face it, the venerable Chrysler name doesn't mean what it used to. I haven't been able to keep track of who owns the Chrysler name these days, but back then Dodge owned it. And if you put a 2002 Dodge Stratus next to a 2002 Chrysler Sebring you will have to squint REAL hard to determine which is which. They are the same car with different maker emblems and a few nicer plastic components inside the Sebring.
That said, when the transmission broke into a pile of grinding gear teeth at around the 60,000 mile mark, we actually weren't too surprised. Tabitha's dad had had enough forethought (I think he would have preferred Tabitha get something else) to purchase a power train warranty from the dealership. (Incidentally, when the repair man showed us the $1500 repair price tag he asked, weren't we glad we decided to buy the warranty. One the one hand, yes, but of course, on the other, I'd already figured that over the lifetime of the warranty the transmission could have died in exactly the same fashion twice more before the dealership began to lose money. Luckily(?) that didn't happen.)
Furthermore, when the timing belt broke on the Interstate near Morristown, Tn with Tabitha and I on our way to celebrate Christmas in Alabama three years ago we were extremely inconvenienced and put under a bit of a monetary strain, but we weren't terribly surprised when all was said and done. (Incidentally, the Sebring has what's called an "interference engine" design, where the valve head and the piston head partially occupy the same space inside the engine as they slide back and forth. Ideally, they never touch, but when the timing belt breaks going down the road at 70 mph, things start to get dicey. By some stroke of luck, the life of the engine itself didn't die three years ago as it could have if the valve and piston had knocked in to one another).
So, with all of this, why am I calling this post an "ode" (ignoring the fact that there's not a lyrical verse to be found in the whole post)? Because I've come to see that car as a a survivor. I've been driving the old car full-time for almost two years now. I've spilled battery acid in it's trunk, I barely ever wash the thing, it needs new tires ever more desperately. It long ago lost, one by one, all four of it's fancy (plastic) Chrysler hub-caps and has steadfastly refused to wear any cheap replacements. It's headlights are cloudy and it's paint is fading. It leaks oil and leaks steering fluid, but it gets me reliably where I'm going.
This week, I've loaded it down repeatedly (probably ten times so far) to take our stuff to our new house. It's living a third life as a work horse for us.
It's silly to personify machines. Nevertheless, the other day I was thinking that, as it rolled off the assembly line and was slapped with the name Chrysler it never imagined it would have such a hard life. Probably, all it's Chrysler buddies would make fun of it if they could see it now. But, there is honor and reason for pride in working hard.
The car may die tomorrow (personally I'm REALLY hoping it'll stay alive for another few years), but even if it does it can go to it's final rest knowing it's owners got their money's worth; for sure.
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