Obfuscatism

Beating Fear Of Rejection

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 01:13:00 +0000

Ha. Here's a funny idea.

Have some sort of thing in opposite-sex friendships where both people periodically submit a piece of paper to a third party (who potentially could not even know the people, if they're afraid of word getting out or something) describing whether or not they have romantic (or otherwise complicated) feelings for each other. Then the third party responds one of two ways: if both are interested, both are notified "just say it!" in some way or another so that they don't waste time being awkward and trying to hide their feelings. if either (or both) are just feeling platonic-ness, then the report says "romance no-go" or "let's just be friends!".

The third party could even just be an internet form of some sort or another that would have little tick boxes then would submit an automated response to the participants based on the responses. Either way, this would help eliminate the whole fear of rejection thing that normally accompanies telling somebody you like them.

[extract from an email to a friend]

Thoughts on improving society...

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 04:43:00 +0000

I think the best way for a country to improve its social and economic situation is to make a massive investment in the education system, not so much financially as by taking the time to examine different strategies and ensure that the methods used are effective. This requires looking critically at learning institutions and asking "Are we doing the best job we possibly can of teaching our children? How can we do better?" ... a process of constant evaluation and improvement.

Not surprisingly, then, I think that the most important role of the government is to facilitate development of creativity and critical thinking among its population -- this ensures a continuing intellectual capital within the country, and helps perpetuate an effective, democratic government. That said, despotic regimes are of course not going to do this for that exact reason, but we're all idealists here right?

(My responses to questions from a Greenpeace survey)

Everyone can learn math.

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Sat, 11 Dec 2010 18:46:00 +0000

I saw a really cool presentation by a fellow named John Mighton, who is a successful playwright as well as mathematician. He founded the JUMPMath program - a way that you can teach math to everyone. The way he does it is not complicated, but the results are incredible.

Case study: A grade 4 class. Their average and standard deviation on a standardized math test were 66 and 12. Such a high standard deviation essentially meant that the level of math ability spanned 3-4 grade-levels among the students. After doing JUMP for a year, the class took the next year standardized test, and had an average of 98, sd. 1.2 ...and some of the children in the class had previously been classified as learning-disable (in fact, he has taught fractions to kids who, weeks prior, couldn't count by twos on their fingers).

He has consistently repeated these kinds of results with other classes, and is training teachers to use these methods too. Many thoughts come to mind on this topic:

Some school boards have actually banned JUMP. One of the main principles of JUMP is that everyone can learn to do math well and understand it. Modern-day schooling supports the idea that some people just "aren't as good" as others in math. The truth is that they just aren't as comfortable with the way it's being taught, or even that very early on they had a bad experience (or bad teacher) and have distrusted math ever since. Anyway, apparently school boards don't like the idea that everyone could succeed.
What if everyone succeeded? JUMP can teach the material far faster than our present system manages to not teach the material — at this rate, students could be doing calculus by grade 8.... and loving it. That's the thing — one of the reasons the JUMP philosophy is so successful is that it makes kids enjoy math. Just imagine if students could learn so much more math by the time they reach high school? What about other subjects? Doesn't it seem like all of us have been (and are being) cheated out of an education we could have easily had?
What are tests for? Mighton suggests that tests should still be used in math, but that everyone should gets As. The test should be a test not of a student's "ability", but of the success of the education system in teaching the student! After all, JUMP has proven empirically that everyone can learn math well. How then, can we still pretend that failing grades in elementary school represent a failure of the student?

On Reducing Hot-Water Usage

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 04:55:00 +0000

(First post in quite awhile. Wow.)

I did some thinking in the shower this morning. The nozzle is one of those adjustable-by-twisting ones, and it appeared to be stuck in a mode that was more like a fine spray than the jet I prefer. I found as a result that I had to turn the handle to a much hotter setting than I usually do. That is to say, the hot water naturally cools down (in the cold air) before reaching my body, and the increased surface area of the finer spray caused an increased amount of heat loss. Several ideas of how to conserve hot water occurred to me just then:

Design a showerhead that emphasizes thick streams of water as opposed to thin ones. This would be the ideal way because it would only involve a change in the device, not in heating policy or insulation.
A more drastic idea is to insulate your bathroom better and keep it warmer. What I am as yet unsure of is the cost ratio of heating the air versus the water. I suspect that if the air were kept warmer, it would reduce the cost of the water, but without some kind of testing I can't say for sure.

Yay thoughts!

A song about my idea to fix long-distance relationships...

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 14:10:00 +0000

Check out more of my music at http://mccalum.bandcamp.com.

Different Greetings for Different Meetings

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 00:31:00 +0000

I read recently that the word Hello came into usage with the telephone. That is, it originated as a telephone greeting. That seemed reasonable to me, as it is the most common greeting one hears on the phone. Today, while greeting a friend in instant messaging, I said "Hey", and then it struck me that Hey is the most common greeting for chat. I wondered if other mediums had their own general greetings, then thought about letters: Dear. Emails don't really have one single main greeting - I've found those who grew up writing letters often say "Dear", which sounds absurdly formal to the rest of us.

I thought it was neat how we have certain customs for certain media, and even though they are somewhat unofficial, we stick to them nonetheless.

Smoothie Dispenser

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 00:19:00 +0000

There should be smoothie dispensers. I don't want cola from a pop machine, or chips from one of those snack machines. I want a smoothie.

Picture a machine about the same size as the aforementioned ones. You approach it, select a size and insert your money. You pick 2-5 ingredients (and possibly some supplement powder or something to add too) and—before your very eyes—the machine combines the various fresh (and frozen) fruits and blenderizes them until they are a smoothie. The liquid is poured into a cup which you can then take and enjoy.

How awesome would that be?

Do you eat to live or live to eat?

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 16:38:00 +0000

Some people don't really like food. They eat only because failure to do so would be unhealthy and ultimately dangerous. However, they miss out on the joys that mindful eating can provide.

Other people absolutely love food, almost to the point where it could be said that they basically live only for eating. At any rate, they spend a great deal of time looking forward to their next meal, or snack. Looking forward to things all of the time won't make you happy.

Purpose

Eating only to live, or living only to eat is missing the point of both activities. Food isn't enjoyable when it's just to keep you alive, and life isn't enjoyable when spent in pursuit of something (in this case, food).

What we must do, rather, is eat to eat, and live to live. Both activities certainly contain enough awesomeness that they can be fine on their own. In fact, eating becomes much more pleasurable if you see it not as being a means to an end (nourishment) but as being the end itself. Eat to eat.

And life? How could life be more amazing than when it is lived simply to live. Living for anything other than life is missing the point of life. Life is not, first and foremost, a means to an end, but is that end.

The best way to live life is to live it. I mean, it sounds obvious when said like that, but so often we forget and think something else is more important in life than life itself.

Zero-G Art

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 23:46:00 +0000

I was thinking about life without gravity awhile ago, and I had a really cool thought: Zero-Gravity Art would be amazing. For example, you could just randomly assemble things in mid-air and they would stay there. You could "balance" a ridiculous amount of things on top of a pencil (although it's worth noting that that's only cool because of the impossibility of it).

What I really thought though, was the use of viscous liquids in the air would be really neat. Consider, for example, a spoonful of maple syrup. You could wave it in the air and a swirly pattern would form.

Even better: Ketchup and Mustard. If you had one of each of the classic dispensers attached to something that would spin, and then you squeezed the tubes while pulling the whole device backward, it would create a double helix in mid-air, of condiments.

Then, to complete the DNA model, take toothpicks or something and carefully place them joining the two spirals. A neat thought is that you could go to one end and blow sharply, and it would tear apart the construction.

Now if only space-travel wasn't so expensive... what would you do if everything floated? Second on my list would probably be to sit on the ceiling.

More often than you'd think....

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 02:17:00 +0000

I get a really strong urge to do something that just can't be done... like lay on the ceiling.

...I Admonished

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 05:06:00 +0000

Tonight I had the somewhat sad realization that I'm not a character in a novel. I was saying something, and I wanted to admonish it, but I realized that I don't get to choose what verb gets places after the hypothetical quotes.

"Get some sleep!" she bid him
"Same to you," he admonished.

Life would be so much more epic that way, I insist.

Living in Future's Past

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 01:09:00 +0000

Patrick Swayze died today. However, if you look at his Wikipedia article, it says in past tense: "...he died from the disease on September 14, 2009". When I read this, I was like "Whoa, that's today!" because it felt really weird to read about the present in past tense.

I found an even weirder sentence on the page about a show he was in that was cancelled due to his illness: "On June 15, 2009, Entertainment Tonight announced [...]. Swayze died of the disease on September 14 of that year." ..."that year" is this year.

I understand that they have to write the articles in a way that will still be accurate tomorrow, but I find it really weird to read it that way, today. It gives me an odd feeling of perspective, realizing that as this moment ends it becomes part of history... part of the past.

What is Love?

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 02:25:00 +0000

Awhile ago I posted something on love. I have, not surprisingly, further and more refined thoughts. This is based on Plato's Symposium (it was the bonus question of an assignment for my Theory of Knowledge class)

What is love? Baby don't hurt me, don't hurt me, no more. This is not love.

Love is a kind of bond that occurs from a person's acceptance of someone or something. It could also be called interpersonal peace, and comes simultaneously with inner peace. When one is in a state of acceptance, love abounds.

People have very little idea of what love is these days, but one fundamental way we do understand love is the idea of “love you for who you are”. However, this isn't quite right. Rather, love is when somebody “loves you – and you are”. Loving somebody for who they are implies that you might not love them if they were were different. This means that you are attracted to their characteristics, not to them.

Trying to change somebody is alright, and can still fall within the boundaries of love. Most of the time, though, it does not. This is because we typically try to change people without any respect or acceptance that they're in the current state they're in. This means, simply, that we are trying to fix them, for we have labeled their condition a problem without coming to terms with the situation. With love, one first accepts that the person is how they are, and this love allows the person to change.

As Diotima says, eventually one will develop a love for all beautiful things. This is easy. What is more difficult is to also love things that are not beautiful, or even things that are ugly, for they are much harder to accept. When we live without love we live in a state of denial, ascribing random value to things based on their perceived beauty. This is inaccurate and is fundamentally flawed. Somewhat like Descartes says in Meditations, facets of objects are not the objects themselves. This is a basic part of the deceit of the senses. We look at things and perceive them, but frequently we are not looking at an object itself, but merely examining some qualities it happens to possess. Love is beyond this.

However, there is a place for physical form in love, it is just not that of beauty. Anything that has a physical form is presenting itself to us openly. At each moment, we are bombarded sensually by everything. To not accept and love everything is to create hell. There is far too much coming to individually address everything, but with love one can take some moments to accept a few things. Loving in this way will allow you to move freely through life. If one stops at each moment and hates things (or does not accept them) then there is far too much resistance on the journey of life.

“If you love someone, set them free.” Richard Bach, in saying this, makes a very good point about acceptance and love – that if you love something you will also accept its departure. However, he continues to say “If they come back they're yours; if they don't they never were” which is not at all true. The very nature of love is incompatible with ownership.

It has also been said that “love is an verb”. This is somewhat true, but not entirely. Love certainly is not an adjective, and the term “in love” almost infallibly refers to infatuation. However, love is not a verb, because there really is no sole action that is “love”. If I said “I love you”, does that inherently mean that there is any specific action I'm performing toward you? There may be some general actions that go along with love, but really,

love is an attitude.

Distinction between Race and Nationality (and Ancestry)

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 19:20:00 +0000

I realized something really neat a few days ago. It was kindof an a-ha moment, really. I forget why, but a bunch of people were sharing their ancestry. I'm from Scotland mostly, with a bit of Ireland. My Aunt has French ancestry, and some people had Finnish and German.

One said "It may not look like it, but I have African-American roots" (he's quite pale and has reddish hair).

At that moment I realized that "African-American" isn't a race at all. (This term, I won't lie, used to bother me, because it seemed to really be getting very vague about race. Personally, if I'm going to talk about skin colour, I use the colour words - "black" and "white". I feel they're neutral enough.)

"African-American", I realized, is a nationality. When the slaves were brought over they were separated from their true African nationality (which may not have even been a country name we'd recognize today) and when they final got rights and equality, they had no other roots to trace. All they can say is "I'm African-American", and that's quite different than being African.

Homonym Humor

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 01:50:00 +0000

One of my friends (who is a terrible speller) once told me with great conviction that she had a leek in her heart. Despite knowing exactly what she meant, all I could picture was...

A Limerick About A Moth

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 15:43:00 +0000

A moth has an interesting plight
for it comes out only at night
and then seeks out the glow
from a lamp or window...
...doesn't the day have more light?

Del.icio.us – Bookmarks = Shared Links

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 18:04:00 +0000

I've recently observed a neat habit I have. When I come across a link that is kindof neat, but I don't think I'll necessarily click on it again, sometimes I still have this feeling that I don't want to lose it. Normally I'd bookmark it, but this ends up creating clutter and I rarely delve into my deep bookmarks anyway.

However, lately I've noticed (this wasn't a conscious decision) that I end up sending a friend or family member an email with the link in it. Most of the time, if I find something inspiring or interesting, so will at least one of my friends. Thanks to Gmail, my link is now saved forever, should I need it, but entirely out of my face. Also, I've shared something with someone, which is especially nice when I haven't talked to him or her in awhile.

Packaging Deposit - because bottles and cans aren't enough

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 18:36:00 +0000

Imagine if you had to pay a tiny deposit on all packaging you purchased, which would be refunded when you returned the packaging. This would encourage people to recycle, as throwing everything in a big black plastic bag wouldn't get them their money back. It would also encourage companies to produce products with less packaging because that would mean their products would appear cheaper on the shelves.

The infrastructure needed to manage this would be intense, but if done correctly it could open up many new jobs across the country and also make people and companies more aware of what they are wasting.

See also this post, about Extended Producer Responsibility.

Child Abuse

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Thu, 21 May 2009 20:24:00 +0000

I try not to syndicate on this blog, so perhaps I should come up with something original to say on the topic of child abuse, but what I really want to do is share this:

The 10 Common Signs of Child Abuse

Unexplained injuries. Visible signs of physical abuse may include unexplained burns or bruises.
Changes in behavior. Abused children often appear scared, anxious, depressed, withdrawn or more aggressive.
Returning to earlier behaviors. Abused children may display behaviors shown at earlier ages, such as thumb-sucking, bed-wetting, fear of the dark or strangers.
Fear of going home. Abused children may express apprehension or anxiety about leaving school or about going places with the person who is abusing them.
Changes in eating. The stress, fear and anxiety caused by abuse can lead to changes in a child's eating behaviors, which may result in weight gain or weight loss.
Changes in sleeping. Abused children may have frequent nightmares or have difficulty falling asleep, and as a result may appear tired or fatigued.
Changes in school performance and attendance. Abused children may have difficulty concentrating in school or have excessive absences, sometimes due to adults trying to hide the children's injuries from authorities.
Lack of personal care or hygiene. Abused and neglected children may appear uncared for.
Risk-taking behaviors. Young people who are being abused may engage in high-risk activities such as using drugs or alcohol or carrying a weapon.
Inappropriate sexual behaviors. Children who have been sexually abused may exhibit overly sexualized behavior or use explicit sexual language.

Some signs that a child is experiencing violence or abuse are more obvious than others. Trust your instincts. Suspected abuse is enough of a reason to contact the authorities. You do not need proof.

This is taken from the Help End Child Abuse pledge at thepetitionsite.com, which I signed. Part of the pledge was to share the signs, so here they are on this blog.

I challenge anybody and everybody reading this to sign and uphold this pledge.
(but don't worry - nothing bad will happen to you (dying, having the worst day of your life, your crush hating you) if you don't)

Sticky a-Tac

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Fri, 15 May 2009 03:18:00 +0000

A stop-motion animation for you. Enjoy!

(This is the first I've ever done. It's actually really easy and this took only like 20 minutes.)

(If you can't see the animation either click on it or go to the title page then wait for it to load. It's about 1MB)

Worth It.

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Mon, 11 May 2009 22:49:00 +0000

I sign a lot of online petitions – at least one per week, on average – but most I never really think about again. Today I received an email message from Care2, one of the organizations (the other main one being Avaaz) that I sign petitions through. It said

"I'm writing with joy and relief to let you know that your signature made a difference: American journalist Roxana Saberi is free!
Ms. Saberi appealed her conviction on charges of espionage, and thanks to international pressure on the Iranian government including the almost 28,000 activists who signed our petition, she appeared in court to have her appeal heard yesterday and her charges were reduced. She walked out of prison in Iran today and was reunited with her parents.

...
Thank you so much for signing the Free Roxana Saberi petition - you truly made a difference."

This really brightened my day. I tend to sign those, thinking "It can't hurt, right?" but it was really inspiring to me and empowering to feel that just by the simple action of going to a site, logging in, and clicking "sign" I could free somebody.

This really shows the magnitude, and how such a tiny action on our part can correspond to such a monumental change for Ms. Saberi's life. This is the power of unity: one person alone could never make such a difference with even a large action on the internet, but when people come together, change happens. With such an easy way to make a difference, it's a wonder so many people choose not to.

Here's another easy and concrete way to make a difference from the comfort of your wheely-chair: go on Care2's Click 2 Donate page, where just by clicking a button you can donate money daily to saving the rainforest (7 square feet per day) or reducing your carbon footprint (1 pound per day) or women's rights, breast cancer, animal cruelty and more. Check it all out at http://www.care2.com/click2donate/. In just the couple of months I've been doing this, I've already saved over 200 square feet of endangered habitat (rainforest, marine wetlands, etc). That's alot.

The daily click, if nothing else, allows you to do something selfless every day, even if it's not much.

Below are a few still-standing petitions, if you're interested:

...and now I'm going to reply to the Care2 folks and tell them how grateful I am for the followup message.

The Meaning of Life

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 04:35:00 +0000

I just reached out my hand and crushed a fruit fly that was flying in front of my screen. I killed it because it was a minor annoyance to me. I killed it because I'd rather not think about its existence. I exchanged my whim for its life.

Suddenly I understand the Buddhist philosophy of not killing any animal, and the idea behind everything being "one of God's creations": if you can't take the time to care about a life, no matter how small, what does life really mean to you?

Hm. I just paused for a moment and wondered if these musings would prompt me to become a vegetarian. I don't think so. Not yet, at least. Maybe someday.

My Awesome Day (A Follow-Up To Last Night's Post)

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 00:38:00 +0000

Ok, so: Last night I concluded that there was never any reason not to have an awesome day. Before going to bed last night, I decided that today I was going to have an awesome day, so I did.

It was actually so much easier than you'd think. When I woke up, before I even opened my eyes, I was like "Oh yeah, I'm going to have an awesome day today". Then, as I was getting ready to go to school, even though I was a little late I kept reminding myself that I was going to have an awesome day. Whenever I saw somebody (I remembered most times) I'd prepare myself in case they asked how I was or how I was doing. If they did, I'd say "I'm doing great!" or "I'm having an awesome day!".

What surprised me was that people didn't ask why. I actually don't think a single person asked me why exactly my day was awesome. Some seemed kindof dejected, because their day wasn't, but yeah.

The other thing that surprised me, I guess, was that it worked. Not that I expected it not to, but I doubted a bit. At the very least, I doubted how much it would work. I mean, to be honest, it wasn't unbelievable, but it actually really did brighten my day. Definitely worth taking my own advice.

Don't Give Me That Attitude! ...or, Mood... just... Cheer Up!!

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 04:14:00 +0000

This morning, some people from Acadia came to our school to do a short presentation at our assembly. They got up and said "How's everybody doing this morning?" ...and we mumbled "Good..." so they (like people seem to do) asked again "Let's try that again - how are you all doing this morning?" Now, we weren't doing any better, but we answered a little louder just to appease them so they'd continue with their presentation.

There are a few neats points that can be derived from this. The first kind of goes back to something I've often pondered, which is the casual "I'm fine". However they aren't quite the same, because what happened today was designed to actually alter our attitude and make us energetic, whereas the casual "How are you?" is more of a normalcy checker. (If things are not absolutely terrible or strange, you'll answer "fine" or "good".

At first I groaned when they did this, but then I realized that (perhaps unwittingly) there was a life lesson contained in what they said:

You can choose your attitude/mood.

As tired as we may have been this morning, we still could be extremely awesome. I mean, really, we're alive! We have no justification for not having an awesome day! There really is no valid excuse for answering "Good..."

So next time somebody does that, answer extremely energetically, and you may fine that it will actually cheer you up, and maybe your friends too. It's a great reminder that you can always have an awesome day if you want to. (...and really, why wouldn't you want to have an awesome day?)

(Also, did you know that saying "eee" out loud makes your body think it's smiling and makes you happier?)

Palindromic Advice for Would-Be Investors

noreply@blogger.com (Malcolm) — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 10:05:00 +0000

debtor as a rot bed

That's right. Don't invest in that guy. He's like a rot bed for your money.