Month: October 2004
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technology and politics
Does technology – specifically highly-interconnected members of a democratic republic – offer a realistic means to wrest the control of the republic away from “They who have corrupted it”? To answer that requires that you accept the premise that the republic is corrupted in some way. That is a multifaceted argument of some passion that…
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flu shots in the smart-mob world
I know nothing about what it takes to create an influenza vaccine, but what ever it takes, it seems like there ought to be a way to decentralize production and leverage a globally connected resource-space to end the shortage. In essence, open-sourcing the process of creating influenza vaccination and the adjoining quality control processes would…
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sleepless…
I so love insomnia… that nocturnal waking that languishes in the darkness, fighting to be alive when so much of you wants it to die. We battle it and always lose. I wish I were smart. I wish that I had talent. I wish that I could do something that was useful. I am none…
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focus
The power of focus in our social life – the life we have amongst others – is all built upon certain mutually agreed upon tenants. These are things of political and social philosophy – the logos of the agora so to speak. …what do we do with being… Being is one of those pesky present…
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locks…
So, I got out of the shower the other day and made a cup of coffee and went and sat outside on my balcony – barefoot and wearing a pair of pajamas and a sweater. Everything was fine, right up to the point where I noticed a bug flying into my house, at which point…
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“Trust us we’re from the Corporation”
ok, so I logged onto Amazon today for the first time in maybe two years and the following list of products was recommended for me to buy: Now, what is odd about this, aside from the Paris Hilton jewelry is this – Amazon made this recommendation based on my having purchased one item from them,…
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order, plan, and control…
We aren’t special, just different, and so just like there is no particular reason why a certain fish ends up as dinner for you while another ends up as dinner for an orca, there is no particular reason why in a catastrophe the majority of the players are there.
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Technology versus Utility
“Information Technology” is such a dumb turn of phrase. Information Technology has many things wrong with it, the least of which is that there is nothing inherently new or esoteric about information. As long as we are human, information and information processing, is a basic process the same in kind as biomass processing and pneumo-processing.…
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This is the first day of the rest of your life…
Know thyself. Seize the day. Damn the man. The anthems of the young are salient, meant to carry them into a more serene age wherein they may find themselves at peace with the world around them. They are illusions, noble lies told to inspire. But what happens when they become more believable than the reality…