While listening to the other passenger’s utensil music, it occurred to me that I was experiencing the auditory equivalent of having to smell someone’s stink.  That is, someone oozing jackhammer music all over the place is not unlike someone smelling like rotten garbage.

It is remarkable that the same people who would not dream of going out of the house smelling like garbage would think nothing of stinking up the air with sound. Well, I guess the answer here is that body odor is commonly associated with bad hygiene. This is where social pressure comes in. It does not really matter what the real story is: if someone smells bad, then the automatic presumption is that that person has bad hygiene. If we were to ask, then maybe the story would be that a baby just pooped on that poor individual and that they are rushing home to change their clothes because they do know that everybody in the world will assume they can’t be bothered to wipe their own asses, etc. When it comes to auditory stink, no presumption of bad hygiene exists. So there is no potential for embarrassment here.

Maybe through social engineering there would be a way to make “auditory stink” socially unacceptable. I don’t know where I would start though…

Reality: There is no scientific evidence of a positive correlation between high fructose corn syrup and cannibalism. Quite the contrary, Dr. Fleug of the University of Hamburg has studied the link between high fructose corn syrup and cannibalism. In his study, he found that the control group, the group not fed HFCS, had a higher incidence of cannibalism than the group which was fed HFCS. Additionally, there are many possible causes of cannibalism and these causes are not easily isolated. For instance, zombification, fruit, unicorns and the US tax code are all possible causes of cannibalism. If you filed taxes or had fruit, you could be a cannibal and not know it.

Myth: HFCS is made from puppies.

Reality: Actually, HFCS is made from kittens.

Myth: High fructose corn syrup is high in fructose.

Reality: As a matter of fact, the H in HFCS does not mean “high” but “holy”. HFCS is full of godly goodness. Those who oppose the addition of HFCS in food items are not only unchristian but also hate freedom. They are unamerican and communists, and probably are cannibals too.

Myth: HFCS is made from kittens.

Reality: Actually, HFCS is made from puppies.

Myth: High fructose corn syrup is the sweetest substance known to us.

Reality: The perpetually happy, “think positive” new age types are sweeter than high fructose corn syrup. They taste like peach cobbler while the rest of the population tastes like chicken.

Editor: How do you know what people taste like?

HFCS Executive: We were members of the control group in Dr. Fleug’s study on HFCS and cannibalism.

We’ll have to start looking at alternatives because this is ridiculous.

A bug in Gmail allowed students at some schools to read each other’s emails. I don’t know about you but I’d rather not have other people read my emails. (Yes, I know the vast majority of emails are transfered in plain text. I does not entail that it is okay for my colleagues to be able to access my mail folders.)

Well I guess it would sound convincing to someone who never had to manage anything substantial in their life. I think it is perfectly natural and wise to plan for contingencies. A politician could sincerely oppose the bill and yet at the same time sincerely plan for the money to be spent wisely if it so happens that the bill passes. It would actually be irresponsible to do otherwise. A politician’s constituents are not isolated from the effects of a bill because the
politician who represents them opposed this bill. The politician should actually make representations so that if the bill passes, his constituents are served.

Now, this does not mean that there are not other opportunities for these politicians to be inconsistent, or to dissemble. If a congressman opposed the stimulus bill and then while campaigning for reelection later claims that a project which benefited from stimulus money owes this benefit to him, without further qualification, then this claim is a misrepresentation. Because then he would be hiding the fact that he initially opposed the bill. However, this scenario is absent from the AP article.

It troubles me to see this kind of sensationalist journalism published. It troubles me even more when people believe it. It fuels a kind of knee-jerk mentality. This is a mentality which divides the world in well delimited and static polar opposites: us vs them, good vs bad. This is a mentality which seeks reassurance of its own worth. This is a mentality which can never be surprised but has already decided the outcome of all situations.

I find myself in agreement with this advice.  When someone tells me “let’s keep in touch”, I take the statement at face value: that person really intends to keep in touch.   Now, I realize that people often say things they do not mean.   They say things like “Wow! I love your new hairdo.” while thinking “Who’s your hairdresser?  A ferret?”  So it is quite likely that “let’s keep in touch” is a socially appropriate thing to say but that there is no real intent behind it.  As likely as it may be, that’s not the way I take it.  I take it as an expression of real intent.

I’m not the kind of guy who readily keeps in touch with people. So I’d find it dishonest on my part to let the person who says “let’s keep in touch” believe that there’s any substantial probability that we will, in fact, keep in touch.  So my reply to “let’s keep in touch” is usually to point out how in actuality it is unlikely to happen.  And then the reaction I get is similar to the one I’d get if I had just said “away from me, you leper!”

Now, when I talk to other people about this, I’m told that I’m paranoid.  If I’m not keeping porn on my laptop, I have nothing to worry about.  If my laptop is stolen, no one will take time to look for banking information.  The techs who perform service are interested searching for porn, not financial details.  Basically, I’m told I’m worrying for nothing. (Now, logically-minded readers will have figured out that the flip side of this bad reasoning is that if I do worry about people snooping through my hard disk, then it means I must have porn on there.)

Well, well, it turns out that a Sky News undercover investigation that technicians do indeed look for financial information on the laptop they service and they try to use it to break into banking accounts.  OMG!  Who would have thunk?

The solution against unscrupulous technicians is to give them a clean drive: a drive which contains no sensitive information.  My point here is not that encryption is the solution but that unscrupulous people are indeed after your financial information.  Encryption is part of the arsenal of tools to protect against that.

“I am the proud owner of [brand name gizmo].”

Say what now? You walked into a store and bought your gizmo. Is this some sort of achievement to feel proud of? Are you also proud of being able to walk without drooling all over yourself? How about “I am the proud owner of a banana.”

“I am proud to be [ethnic group or nationality].”

Bravo! Luck made it so that you were born with that ethnicity and nationality. Now, if you want to feel even more pride, grab a coin, flip it, and scream to everybody nearby that you are proud that you got head or tail. For more variety, grab a die instead of a coin and wear some sexy lace.

Sometimes national pride is expressed as:

“I am proud to be [nationality] because [my nation] did [something awesome].”

Now the funny thing is that the same person who asserts the above won’t usually want to admit “I feel ashamed to be [nationality] because [my nation] did [something terrible].” In this case, pride is axiomatic. It has been drilled into the individual from a young age. No amount of disconfirming evidence is able to overturn this pride. It is especially bizarre when the “something awesome” part of the formula consists of some event which happened before the prideful person was even born. Pride for something you contributed to? Ok. Pride for something you cannot possibly have been contributing to? Say what? You might as well feel pride for your neighbor’s doings then.  Or you might as well feel pride for the imaginary achievements of imaginary persons: “I’m proud that Luke Skywalker was able to blow up the Death Star.”

This, however, is just weird:

“After I get my espresso machine, I won’t have to go to Starbucks anymore and will thus recover the cost of the machine. Overall, I’m going to save money. See, two coffees in the morning plus two in the afternoon, that’s X dollars per day so after Y days, I’ll be in the clear. And there’s also the gas saved!”

The above is a paraphrase of a rationalization I’ve seen several times on websites dedicated to discussing coffee and espresso machines. Now, I find the scenario presented in that rationalization rather unlikely. I don’t know anyone who goes to Starbucks to get four coffees per day. We can assume that there are people who drive to Starbucks on their way to work and then leave work in the afternoon to get more coffee. If a couple living together does that, then that’s four coffees per day. It is still peculiar that they would do that seven days a week. Moreover, if the home espresso machine takes care of the afternoon needs, on a work day it means that the couple would have to drive home in the afternoon to make their coffee. Home would have to be at a fairly close distance from work and would have to have enough time to drive back and forth and make the espresso. In addition, the scenario does not take into account times when one just does not feel like messing with the darn espresso machine but would rather just go to Starbucks. Now, I know some people work at home, or they have their coffee in the evening (good luck sleeping!), or whatever so their situation can validate the rationalization. I find the scenario very unlikely but, okay, it is possible.

It is puzzling though that one would have to pretend that buying an espresso machine for home is some sort of wise financial move. If money is really an issue, here’s a simpler solution: stop buying four coffees per day from Starbucks. Just stop buying from them. It is a net gain. It is this simple. Let me reiterate that if someone wants to buy an espresso machine because they are going to enjoy making espressos at home, by all means do it but a financial rationalization for it sounds hollow.