Rico Penguin

  Whenever a person of interest (generally coined ‘celebrity’) they are put under an unusually high level of excess and I feel unnecessary stress. One thing in particular is the idea of ‘thinking before you speak’. For the vast majority of people I do think there is a level of thought always joined with the act of communication it is something of a necessity. We all make mistakes in what we are saying, that is to say simply that occasionally we say orange when we meant to say carpool or something like that.

  What I don’t feel is fair however is to assume that words have power. Words are no different than currency, essentially all the money you own is only worth as much as you and your social region believe they are worth. There is also that whole exchange rate globally but for the most part a nation could ignore that and still function pretty well. All our words and the emotions we tie to them are entirely personal, there is no automatic response to any words. If there was telling a baby with a sweet tone to go fuck themselves would not elicit the same response as it does from anyone who has been ‘lectured’ or ‘indoctrinated’ into the local lingo. Indeed cursing is all in all just as harmless as discussing vegetable preferences.

  However we in a pretty sizeable amount give far far too much credit to words. What most recently elicited this train of thought was that “Special Olympics” comment of the President on the Tonight Show. He equated his bowling skills to something you would see in the Special Olympics, a simple enough example that produces a relatively vivid and likely consistent image amongst anyone who hears it.

  People are up in arms about how he should apologize and that while it would have been ok for him to say that before he was President it is not alright anymore. Which to me is highly confusing. If an action is not alright in one instance I would assume that it should either be wrong in all instances or be reexamined.

  A persons feelings about themselves, about their world, and about basically anything should not be so easily swayed by the simple speaking of others. This is akin to walking outside, feeling a cool breeze and killing yourself because of it. It’s a radical response to a relatively unimportant gesture. While of course these are all just personal opinion and suggestions it does pay to point out that my own personal life became easily exponentially easier to maintain once I stopped caring about the random banter of others.

  Words are wonderful in their artistic quality, but just as you shouldn’t stop eating or lose your self confidence when you see the Mona Lisa, you also shouldn’t be dropping proverbial bricks every time someone says something. Especially considering how often these responses end up being hypocritical. You can’t be treated fairly if everyone feels you need to be treated special. To put it simply, if you can make comments about anything you can make comments about everything. Anything less and we risk (and indeed do) begin enforcing slanted and almost exclusively hypocritical rulings on the realm and limitations of language.

  It’s actually quite marvelous how quickly a day can pass if you aren’t paying attention. What felt like minutes ago was 7 pm and now I’m look at 11:24. Tomorrow is the beginning of my next quarter and as promised before there will be plenty of fun information. As I often do lets leave you today with some very good time killers for both the mind and the soul (the soul herein being that part of you that likes laughing as opposed to thinking).

For your mind: http://www.damninteresting.com/ – Easily one of the Internets most interesting websites.

For your soul: http://icanhascheezburger.com/ – Easily one of the Internets most enjoyable websites.

  I hope these in some way make up for my recent slacking. In another unrelated note that got me excited the Guggenheim museum is in the upcoming movie “The Soloist.” I can’t say the movie will or won’t be good but that is one amazingly beautiful structure.

Edit: For those with a keen sense of buildings will note I actually posted the wrong museum! Ha! The one in the movie is the museum in New York and not the one below. Both made by people named Frank though I believe.

Care of: Raw Art Int

  Goodnight all and don’t forget to take a long look at the world around you. It changes so quickly these days it would be a shame to miss something forever.

  Going off the same train of thought as yesterday something came across my attention while watching the fantastic television series known as planet earth. Well to be fair to each of them two things came to my attention Snottites and Shortfin Mollies.

  So what makes these organisms interesting? Well quite simply they both live in Sulfuric Acid. For those of you that don’t know Sulfuric Acid is one badass mamma jammer. This stuff eats through clothing, flesh, and the fumes can screw you six ways from Sunday. If you asked me, and clarified it was not a trick question, if anything lived in Sulfuric Acid I’d say “Psh. No.” or at least “Extremely Unlikely.” Yet these bacteria and those FISH…yes multicellular FISH…live there apparently pretty damn happily.

  This helps expand upon yesterday because its an example of how in some of the most extreme conditions (I don’t know about you but flesh eating acid is pretty extreme to me) organisms as big as fish can even survive. While I’m not sure what the fish are chomping at this time the bacteria appears to live off of the hydrogen sulfide gas (See: Gas that can kill you). This show also discussed a bacteria that ate rock and there are strains that can even survive off rock and hydrogen. (Hydrogen again being one of the most common elements in the universe).

  This may even be how life started on Earth and likely every other planet that has seen life. Organisms that can survive in extreme conditions and survive off a simple gas and eat rock (rock eaters are known as lithovores for those of you that love fancy words or have played Master of Orion 2). Massive chunks of ice traveling across the galaxy with invisible (to the naked eye) life surviving for incredibly long times (remember my post a while back about the 32,000 year old bacteria…imagine this on a much larger scale).

  The more that extreme organisms pop up on Earth the less impressive our planet becomes in terms of being the sole container of life in the universe. I’m starting to think that while large multicellular life is not exactly going to be common because of issues like radiation and the massive energy needs (relatively speaking) of large organisms that can’t be maintained on non optimal planets that we will indeed find bacteria of some sort just about anywhere we go (or at least quite often).

  I suppose the best news is that if these things are eating stone all over the galaxy that at least when we meet them we won’t be instantly liquefied by some super voracious bacteria (since we are carbon and not silicon based). It’s truly exciting stuff that just makes space travel all the more exciting.

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=2474

  This sort of news actually isn’t all that rare. It would appear that Europa more than likely has a serious amount of water underneath a thick layering of ice. Now the thing that people should always ask is if there is really ever a case where water exists and there is nothing living in it (without man-made interference). Even in the most extreme of aquatic conditions you will find some sort of life (no matter how small).

  To me it is not a question of if there is life on Europa it is more a case of what life is on Europa. Considering that the major building blocks of life are 4 of the 5 most common elements in the universe (Something like hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, and carbon if I recall…might be off on one or two of those, the non-essential one is helium which isn’t very conducive to making friends. Assuming I didn’t get hydrogen and helium mixed up Forgive me it is late).

  So if the Earth had a warm core, tons of water, and formed life. Europa has a warm core, tons of water, and a shell of ice to protect it from just about anything harmful (not unlike our atmosphere) it makes one wonder just what is living under that shell. I’d be happy with just about anything, even a tiny fish like creature with a couple eyes and a really cute grin.

  Food for thought . I’d write more but I had to transit back home (vacation over). So you’ll start seeing far more educational posts starting Tuesday, taking a course on prehistoric organisms (IE Dinosaurs), psychopharmacology (study of drugs essentially may be changing this course), history and architecture of museums, and finally Greek Epics if memory servers .

  Good night all and happy interstellar hunting.

    One of my favorite mammals is apparently in what could be a very very poor position. Now what makes this interesting is that there is apparently no definitive cause. This mysterious killer has only one call sign that may or may not be the cause (it could actually just be an opportunistic mofo). It is possible that as many as half a million (that’s 500,000) bats have died because of this mysterious murderer. To me the scariest part of it, besides the entire mystery, is how it kills. These bats go to sleep and their food reserves burn out before they ever wake up so they starve to death in their sleep. While that does generally seem like the best way to go I don’t know if I’d like to see half a million people mysteriously die while sleeping.

    It seems odd to me with hundreds of thousands of bats are dying from some mysterious agent that could possible be transferred from cave to caves by people and the best I see from spelunkers (cave diving) is that they are upset. Some are trying to figure out how their business will survive. I understand the fear but it is certainly odd to guilt trip the bats for dying in throngs.

    On the other side though imagine if whatever this agent is were to jump to humans? A mysterious organism that has yet to be identified has the potential to kill hundreds of thousands in a relatively short amount of time. Anything with a 90% mortality rate should most certainly be understood before it is brought within spitting distance of humans. We’ve already got AIDS and I’d hope that we’d only have one seemingly impervious disease at any time.

Since I let the day escape me (as happens on holidays) here is something interesting I read in the NYT. See what you think about it and who knows maybe sometime soon I’ll discuss what I like about it and how it could be used better (in my opinion).

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/25/education/25cards.html?_r=1

I’m hopeful you’ll enjoy it and I’ll try to update early tomorrow so that we don’t see another filler like this .

  There are two pieces of lingo that are incessantly abused in commercials for two of the US’s biggest addictions. Movies and Medications. Sometimes using the latter to enhance the former. They both are generally overlooked and in some cases mistranslated by consumers.

  The first is the phrase “Based on a True Story.” Now at first glance one might think “Oh neato banditto something like this really happened.” However they have already coined a phrase for when an event actually happened which is “Based on Actual Events.” The difference is subtle, and indeed both of these can lead to extreme exaggerations however the latter tends to have less than the former. The thing about a story is that it is always true if it has ever been told, as it stands even just making up the story for the movie makes it a true story. There is no such thing as a false story, unless we are to count stories that don’t exist and frankly how exactly do you tell a story that doesn’t exist? This “Haunting in Connecticut” is a great modern example. They could have ran with “Actual events” because indeed one of the many families that lived in the house banked on some hokey ghost story (which conveniently paid for their sick son’s medical bills). But they people who made this movie aren’t idiots and they know that it didn’t happen. Now if you just go to see movies for the enjoyment factor this doesn’t matter for you however for the throngs of people debating online how ghosts exist and using this movie as a citation (far more common than it may sound).

    The second of my two peeves is actually a little more dramatic. What in the Earth is up with medications having commercials that only show (bad) actors or (and this is the kicker) mentioning either softly or only in size 8 text at the bottom of the screen “Results are not Typical.” If noticeable results are not typical then the medication should not be advertised as if it does anything noticeable. This is the most blunt example of marketing without regard for the safety of your fellow human. There is little evidence for the long term use of just about any modern medication however we find little worry in mixing half a dozen different chemicals and downing them daily.

    A small change in the environment can kill the animals surviving there, one would think that jamming high levels of alien chemicals into ones own body would hardly result in merry returns. Perhaps its an ignorance that someday will be alleviated by a long education in medicine but for now I find it disturbing. It is borderline terrifying to watch such a large number of people globally ingesting substances they (and even in some cases their doctors) have little understanding of.

    But that’s the thing about the miracle pill. It reminds me of something that thankfully the internet mega-resource Wikipedia had cited in full:

The source of Big Lie technique, from Chapter 10 of Mein Kampf:

… in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.

—Adolf Hitler , Mein Kampf, vol. I, ch. X^[1]

  Putting aside the fact that at a certain point an object would crush itself if it becomes too large because of gravity, we can generally agree that things can always get bigger. Though when you think of things getting smaller there seems to be a pretty large agreement amongst humans that there must (keyword) be a smallest level of things. However I ask why? We seem relatively comfortable with the idea that exponential decay can eternally come closer to 0 without ever reaching it yet there seems to be some weird attraction to the idea of absolution in our lives.

  We assume that there must of been a first incident to our universe, setting aside any ideas of infinitely long time. We (for at least centuries if not millennia) believed that things could literally be absolutely destroyed via the wonders of fire. Likewise when speaking of any sort of good or evil people tend to tout the absoluteness of either realm.

   Now I’m willing to agree that at some size there is probably some fantastic event that occurs that does limit how small things can get but not because they couldn’t literally get any smaller (nor that nothing smaller can ever exist). Since with the proper circumstances objects as large as stars can exist without crushing themselves I’m sure objects that are fantastic in size in the complete opposite direction also exist. It’s just a situation of being able to see them at this point.

  As was spoken of briefly in the last update I find it extremely unusual that fair trade is an opt-in system. Essentially it is universally agreed in this country that all companies are treating anyone possible poorly unless otherwise specified. It would seem more reasonable to have all companies that do not want to treat people like people could opt-out of being labeled as fair trade.

  It’s odd though that this is where the world is. One would hope that thousands of years into civilized nations that at some point someone would have raised their hand and said “Hey lets stop looking for what is cheap and look for what is humane.” It’s true that treating people like dogs (figuratively speaking) can be cheap, in fact it almost always is cheap. Likewise absolutely ignoring environmental impact is equally efficient at saving money. However at what point is the income superfluous? What can a company do with 2 trillion dollars that it couldn’t have done with 1? There are plenty of things I can think of but there is an unusual difficulty in targeting a positive advantage to that extra chunk of change but perhaps visitors here are more creative.

  So also to the superfluous nature of the increased income comes the danger, especially now, of people discovering the dark dirty secrets of the company. Wal-mart has been getting increasingly more famous for the absolutely unacceptable treatment of its employees and Quasi-employees, those being illegal immigrants who are manipulated into working far longer than legal for fear of being deported. The Boy Scouts have recently made headlines for a large portion (I believe it was roughly 33%) making money by performing some exceptionally aggressive logging. Then we have the most obvious example of AIG and similar companies in the recent recession. All sharing the common trait of doing the wrong thing to make a little bit more money, sure to the average penguin the amount they save is amazing, however when looking at the relative gains its almost inconsequential.

  I think the first step succeeding as a nation (any nation not simply the US) is to not congratulate people for doing what should come naturally. Instead you should make known those who would sooner make a bit more while sacrificing any semblance of humanity their company has remaining. It is a fairly confusing trade-off that, if asked before the start of human dominance upon Earth, I would never see being debated.

    Does anyone remember a time when advertising swayed their purchases? Now to be fair that I do indeed get personally effected by advertising on television and the internet. However! I’m a bit in reverse. Anytime I see a commercial for a product on television if the commercial even slightly annoys me I make a pact with myself to never purchase it (and since I started doing this I have kept up with it). The same works with the internet, if banner ads are obnoxious or if they talk I make sure to never interact with the product in absolutely any way.

    It would appear that this is the assumption of Google as well. If you use their adsense service there are two states of your account. You either have an inactive account (0 Clicks) or you have a disabled account. However it was a fair punishment, I really think that most people would never buy the stuff on adsense. Perhaps advertising these days is not attempting to gather manipulate people who have already made a choice but instead it is to inform people who would, of their own device, have purchased the item if they knew it existed.

    I would put my money on the next big advertising system being a search system, not unlike Amazon, where you can see the responses of consumers instead of tag lines from the company. We have entered an unusual state in the world where people are actually congratulated for being decent human beings as if that shouldn’t be the norm (Namely the Fair Trade stickers which may be tomorrows topic). I wonder if there was ever a point when you could trust the people you were dealing with?

    Ah well. Here is another day down . Hopefully something exciting will hit (or informative) so that I can lay out another long winded article about particles or something sassy like that.