Category archives: Vindaloo
Discussions of the spice of life, spices, and/or life.
About super-strings (Lindsey's question in a loud party...)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
I was asked to explain my understanding of superstring theory (such as it is) on the weekend, particularly the aspect where there is a fundamental limit to the size of objects, that is, why there can be a string, but nothing below a string.
If I'm understanding correctly, what happens is that to get down ...
Guess I should try to recover the Gentoo environment (My personal todo list is so long and not very fun looking at this moment...)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
Well, now that I've got that little task out of the way (PyOpenGL), I have the (depressing) task of figuring out why Gentoo has lost the tablet (without which the computer is rather difficult to use). And here I was just getting comfortable working in Windows again. Sigh.
Still, need to move back to Linux ...
Hypothesis as I lie here wondering (About losing a beautiful woman's name so easily...)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
The hypothesis goes like this:
The two forms of memory, "lossless" and "lossy" have complementary function. Lossless memory tends to produce individuals who are more concrete (because they can recall random data associated with individual objects/situations), less creative and less abstract, while lossy memory tends to produce those who are better at synthesis, creativity and ...
Oh yes, the party (Since you didn't ask...)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
Met quite a few people. Shane brought... well... lots of people, including two ladies he'd met at a Second Cup. Very interesting both, one is a postmodern philosopher, but with a reasonable (read agreeing with me ;) ) perspective on the overall utility of the ideology. The other is a cultural anthropologist.
Both quite charming ...
How to affect change in the world (Zen and the art of making the world a better place)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
Had another conversation tonight that involved someone having bought into the competitive model of society. This is the area of thought that is often described as "right wing", and includes Rand and Smith's "Guiding Hand".
It builds from the idea that the only way to accomplish anything is through force, with force including coercion. With ...
Need to find a way to distract myself (There's not a lot to fire the imagination at the moment...)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
I'm considering purchasing an ATI TV Wonder to be able to use MythTV on this machine (we pay ~$50/month for cable TV and watch maybe 3 shows a week at the moment (yes, yes, I should be listening to lectures or something, but I'm out of philosophy lectures, and the music is *really* getting repetitive ...
Take either position, but accept the consequences (If you're going to argue for innate capabilities, follow it through to the end...)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
Was helping Rosey with her homework this evening, and just got frustrated. The text she's being asked to summarise is basically arguing that the primary message of the feminist movement was that emotions should be given equal footing with logic and/or the scientific method (and ironically, one of the main thrusts of the text is ...
Oh, and I got a toy today (Wish I had time to play with it...)
Written by
on
in
Snaking,
Vindaloo.
I got my license key for Writer's Cafe today! It's a little story-outlining tool for Fiction writers that's written in wxWindows. I got a copy because it's author was being ridiculously nice when asking people (wxWindows contributors) to send him a form.
Of course, I have very little time for writing fiction these days. Heck, ...
That was just too fun (Why do I do this programming stuff again?)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
Discussion after PyGTA went right past closing time of the pool-hall, with John (new friend, also new to Python), Tim and I finally cutting off the conversation because the Charlotte room people seemed to want to close :) . Lots of good conversation topics throughout the evening, science fiction, my little surveilance blimp (art) project, ...
DDOS attacks starting again (What's with these people, don't they have spam to send or something?)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
I need to put together a little disk for distribution. Something to automate the installation of AVG and Zone Alarm, turn on windows update, replace IE with Mozilla with auto-updating turned on, delete Outlook and Outlook Express, turn off all the various ports MS stupidly leaves open, and generally clean up the mess MS has ...
Mike C. Fletcher, the VRPlumber, is a philosopher of design turned computer programmer based in Toronto, Canada. He works primarily in the Python programming language, and maintains a large number of Open Source software packages. You can reach him at: mcfletch@vrplumber.com.