Geek Drivel

Unbelievable. After 150 years of steadily-accumulated evidence in favor of evolution, we’re still getting garbage like this Expelled movie?

Expelled expresses the opinion that the universal support of evolution in the scientific community is the product of some sort of bias or ideological inflexibility. It is, on the contrary, the result of decades of hard scientific work, building theory and conducting research. Similarly, the failure of intelligent design can readily be laid at the feet of its advocates, whose main activity appears to be to carp about the success of evolution.

The problem, to me, seems to be that scientists are thinking science — where everything is questioned, and nothing is accepted without a great deal of proof — and non-scientists are thinking politics, where everything is a matter of which alpha male pounds his chest in the most threatening and impressive manner. A generalization, I know, but not by that much.

I’d like to be the first to congratulate my friend Ploni Almoni (on the Recyclosphere blog) on his new Mac Mini. Have fun with it, Ploni!

I had been trying to get a look at one of these for months, but no place around here seemed to carry them. I wasn’t too concerned, because I’d planned to wait for a later version of it before I took the plunge. Ah well, “the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry…” I’m writing this entry on one now.

This afternoon GoddessJ and I stopped at a nearby mall, and I was left to my own devices while GoddessJ did some shopping. I, of course, hit the two electronics shops in there… and what did I find, but that one of them carried it, and it was in stock! I was suitably impressed with the size, but I still managed to hold out, until I told GoddessJ about it, and she wanted to see it too. Then I just couldn’t put it off any longer… I walked out with one.

This thing is freakin’ TINY! Much smaller than the smallest notebook computer I’ve ever had, or even seen. The keyboard is fairly cramped (though I’m getting used to it already), but the screen is very readable, and quite adequate for a single full-screen program at a time. I’m updating the software on it as I’m typing this… I don’t see any option for a command-line window so far, but I’ll find a way to get one on there pretty soon, I’m sure.

(This is the Linux version, of course. I wasn’t interested in using it for games, and games are the only thing I use Windows for nowadays.)

I’m planning to use this as my carry-everywhere system, once I can get a few vital software packages on it — my password manager, and maybe the GCC compiler and Eclipse (I can’t tell if GCC is on here already or not, since I can’t get to a command line yet). It’s quite portable, and I’d be a lot less worried about having it stolen or lost than I am with its big brother, the Dell XPS M1210 laptop that is my main system right now.

More as I discover it.

I stumbled across this interesting quiz a few days ago:

Even if YOU don’t know what faith you are, Belief-O-Matic™ knows. Answer 20 questions about your concept of God, the afterlife, human nature, and more, and Belief-O-Matic™ will tell you what religion (if any) you practice…or ought to consider practicing.

Of the religions it listed for me, the one I actually practice was third (a 92% match), and the top one (which it said was a 100% match) is the closest organized religion that I know of.

For those more interested in the bottom of the list: the last three were Islam and Roman Catholic (tied at 11%) and Jehovah’s Witness (at 7%). I guess I just wouldn’t make it as a door-to-door Bible pusher.

I don’t know what it is about people that makes us enjoy watching a disaster, but here’s a doozy. Note that that turbine measures sixty meters in height. Must have been quite a sight in person.

Okay, so I’m a few weeks late on this. Give me a break, I’m catching up.

Surprise, surprise.

The title of this post refers to an oft-repeated C++ dictum — one that I’ve resisted for most of my C++ career. I tried doing things that way, several times, but in the end I always went back to hand-written loops. That changed recently; read on to see why, and more importantly, how.
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WTF?!

Very amusing. Take the test and see how well you do!

Interesting… read the first page, then take the test. The results might surprise you.