The Polymath Slacker's Guide™ Blog

Scaring up a tactic

2014-06-29T02:24:00.001-04:00

A couple days ago I read an article about marijuana "causing" schizophrenia and I got fired up to go online and type some words. The containment of the plant/drug is ceding ground all over the world, where everyone is starting to wake to the fact that the only "laws" concerning marijuana are written to restrict it's cultivation and circulation in the free market. These laws were passed for dubious reasons, in haste, and without due deliberation for the effect, both long term and in vast segments of economies.
(we can argue about whether or not anyone should be able to pass a law for ALL TIME later)

The fact is, there have been cases of people using marijuana and dying. I know of exactly 2 in the last 100 years. Although, it's completely unfair to say marijuana was the key problem. In both of the cases I've managed to find, individuals died from pulmonary distress, not toxicological reasons. That is, they had panic attacks from freaking out. And that is sad because panic attacks kill thousands of people every year.

Stress-related heart attacks. What else is a stress-related heart attack but a series of panic attacks leading to pulmonary distress? If you think you're going to die from a heart attack long enough, you will.

So this "marijuana causing schizophrenia" rhetoric hoping for hysteria is the same red herring.

If anything, pot is causing more and more people to imagine a world not constrained by the sovereignty and authority of old books (and bookkeeping). Either that, or it's revealing the schizophrenia the majority of people have had to deal with for the last few millennia while "society" was portrayed by stylized or idealized characters. Humans are the god-children of schizophrenia.

Besides, I'm always in favor of ending stupid prohibitions.

Thanks for reading.

Another new experience

2014-01-13T22:28:00.001-05:00

As some of you may know, Xbox 360 has a flaw in it's design that causes what's known as the "Red Ring of Death" after a while. It stinks, but the issue can be remedied by taking the unit apart and re-bonding the surface of a couple of heat transfer mechanisms on the motherboard.

Knowing that many others would have the experience, I stored my unit when it "ringed out" until someone else I know got was afflicted. I didn't want to try opening my own unit first because of my tendency to break delicate equipment with my brutish clumsiness.

Finally, a friend gave me a unit I could practice on. So I watched a few videos on the youtubes, polished off my toolkit and got to it.

The first thing I learned in this experience is that there are several variations of the Xbox 360 motherboard configuration. The 2 that I opened and the 3 in the videos I watched used different hardware, had different types of connectors, and used different transfer devices. But, the fundamentals were basically the same.

You have to take off the covers and open the case of the thing. Figure out how it's all connected and take out the motherboard ( I suggest you video yourself while disassembling ). Then, take out the heat transfer pieces and clean them thoroughly. Reapply thermal paste and put it all back together... it's a job, but it's something determined people can do.

I managed to get a couple new scrapes and scratches, but I got my friend's and my units to work again.

Something tells me the skill of both fixing and playing these game systems is useful to have.

Thanks for reading.

Forum Availability

2013-11-22T12:26:00.000-05:00

If you'd like to post on forum.floridaincommon.com, email me at polymathenterprises@gmail.com

I'll send you a working username and temp password you can change any time.

Registration on the site itself has been closed due to an enormous influx of spam accounts. As soon as Polymath Enterprises acquires the technical proficiency to counter this vulnerability, forum registration will resume as normal.

Thanks for reading

The Polymath Slacker's Guide™ to Geopolitics

2013-11-20T00:57:00.003-05:00

One of my "thoughts"

"eon echoes - lol governments. Russia says it supports the peace process while trying to figure out how to deliver more weapons to the Assad regime. The U.S. has so many friends, enemies and frienemies in the region no one knows who to support, and the politics of this country is so screwed up any action taken will be next month's Shocking Scandal no one can believe we let happen. Iran produced a sort of proof their not all nuts by letting a Mashei say he'd run for president before the church bureaucracy declared he wasn't allowed to be a candidate (they dismissed Rafsanjani from running again too). But still Hezbollah entering Syria with militia support has prompted John McCain to claim the Assad regime now has the upper hand in the 2 year old conflict. We're literally watching people claim sovereign authority for their actions while they kill women and children in their homes. History repeating itself (history repeating itself), (history repeating itself), (history repeating itself), etc..." A rather dark note from the Syria thread on floridaincommon.com.

thanks for reading.

Affordable Care Act: Month 1 Enrollment Stats

2013-11-17T11:38:00.003-05:00

After one month of what can only loosely be called "operation" the healthcare.gov website and the State exchanges have reported the October figures for enrollments and eligibility under the Affordable Care Act.

The number most reported in the media in Florida is the 3,500 people who've signed up for the plan. When compared the State population of ~19 million, 3,571 is a paltry and anemic performance for the President's signature domestic policy.

However, the rest of the numbers in the Department of Health and Human Services report paint a less bleak picture of the plan's initial month.

The government exchange site healthcare.gov saw over 26 million unique visitors in the month of October, a number suggesting much of the private insurance market showed interest in the new service.

123,870 citizens of the State applied for coverage, with 93,456 found eligible and 67,366 who've completed the application process. 29,637 qualified for cost-lowering subsidies, and 12,887 were Medicaid/CHIP eligible.

With over 60,000 people still shopping for coverage, waiting to finalize their plan selection, participation in the State that led the Supreme Court fight against the ACA is proving there is much more interest in health coverage than the reported 3,500 plan enrollments let on.

HHS Statistics for October, 2013 - http://aspe.hhs.gov/health/reports/2013/MarketPlaceEnrollment/rpt_enrollment.pdf

Greetings

2013-11-15T00:20:00.002-05:00

http://floridaincommon.com/polymath/Greeting%20on%20Site%201.mp3

Smartphone Microscope Project

2013-10-26T15:33:00.004-04:00

This video is floating around on Facebook, www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpMTkr_aiYU

It shows the basics of turning your smartphone into a digital microscope using the focusing lens of a laser-pointer to super-zoom smartphone digital cameras. It works on video as well.

This short video is of pics taken using the apparatus:

It's a really awesome capability for very little expense. Even with some of the tools already in hand, getting all the components can still cost closer to $100 than to the $10 mentioned in the How-To video linked above.

Caveman Liquidity

2013-10-23T12:47:00.005-04:00

In the following video, liquidity is taken to be a process by which debt (specifically U.S. Treasury Bond issuance) funds credit transactions and fuels interdependence in global business.

The futility of some arguments, the fantasy of them, somehow makes them seem plausible(?).

Getting my box back

2013-10-16T00:21:00.002-04:00

Well I've slacked on my responsibilities, and now have to go beg the post office to give me back my box. I knew the date was approaching. They gave me fair warning... It's an honest character trait. I had to pay $2.40 in late fees at the library too.

Thanks for reading.

Common Florida Discussions

2013-09-05T13:00:00.001-04:00

In the last year the Florida in Common forum has produced discussions ranging from local current events to policy and politics the world over. The subjects are broad, updates are casual, but some of the opinions expressed have had their worth illustrated by bubbling up to more popular media.

There are threads on the NSA leaker and the group that wants to start naming Hurricanes after members of Congress who deny the climate change. There's commentary on Florida's failure to expand medicaid to uninsured Floridians, including quotes like, "every 10 years the GOP string-pullers trot out a load of cash and buy control of the government. that's why 2010 was the most expensive midterm in history" on the left, and responses like "maybe if your politicians were better a politics it would help your representation" from the right.

The forum features points of view from many different philosophical stripes, some of which are better represented on a larger scale conversation. Threads include discussions on philosophical battles such as the bankruptcy of Detroit, as well as more intense (lethal) debates regarding countries like Egypt and Syria, where memes take on memes in a proving-ground for statements and opinions:

The fallacy of the whole "Syrians are killing Syrians! We have to kill Syrians to keep Syrians from killing Syrians" is that it's just not as simple as that. Governmental force is an agreement that is upheld by the will of the people and recognized by the international community as such. For a minority group to used governmental force on the civilian population of the governed precisely because that minority group no longer has the mandate of legitimacy sponsored by the will of the people is itself equal to a coup against the will of the civilian population. It would be the same as a small wing of a political minority in the US, say idk the Tea party, started massacring members of their political opposition and civilians living under their jurisdiction.
If international chaos is to be the world order why did we bother intervening in any conflict in history? source

and:

You can't openly support a regime that kills thousands of it's own people. The deal was the US supported breaking the sit-in by slow encroachment and dispersal. Security forces slowly surrounded the group alright, but the bum-rushed them brute force. source

also:

Well Unions are a big part of the problem in that town iirc. The unions and the politicians in bed together promised all those workers every step of the way that their pay wouldn't be cut and their pensions would be secure. If they didn't know they were lying, then they were incompetent. If they did they were in on it. source

Each character, each opinion is flawed and trivial, but taken together they represent the effectiveness of our system of communicating and understanding the world in which we live.

The Supreme Court striking down DOMA, to cannabis going mainstream, the Florida in Common forum takes the words of people in Florida and holds them up to each other to see what makes sense. All of our differences of opinion, all our diverse modes of thinking make our state rich with the power to affect the future. The goal of Florida in Common is to make a place for these opinions, then invite you to share what you think.

Visit the forum, register an account, and share your opinion... and as always,

Thanks for reading!

Foreclosure Law Debate (House Floor)

2013-08-17T12:48:00.000-04:00

There's a new foreclosure law in Florida. Some like it, some don't. Some will stop losing by it, and some will have lost everything by it. The video in the post presents arguments for and against passage of the bill. It is meant to inspire a more concrete review of the merits. This video features soundbites from the last two meetings of the Florida State House of Representatives in the 2013 session where HB 87 was discussed. The original files are located at flhouse.gov

HB 87 - Florida Foreclosure Law (Introduction Video)

2013-08-02T15:49:00.003-04:00

The latest video from Polymath Enterprises features the Civil Justice Subcommittee to the Florida House Judiciary Committee, in their meeting on February 7th, 2013, discussing HB 87. With some amendments from the initial draft, HB 87 is now Florida Law.

There are several claims and statements made during this nearly 2 hour meeting, and any number of videos could be constructed from the soundbites therein.

The main thrust of this particular soundbite mashup can be summed up by this post from the Florida In Common Forum Foreclosure thread, in the Necessarily Fiction subforum.

Your Hand Full Of Hours

2013-07-14T09:46:00.000-04:00

Paul Celan 1939 - 1970

Your hand full of hours, you came to me--and I said:
Your hair is not brown.
So you lifted it lightly on to the scales of grief; it
weighed more than I...

On ships they come to you and make it their cargo, then
put it on sale in the markets of lust--
You smile at me from the depth, I weep at you from the
scale that stays light.
I weep: Your hair is not brown, they offer brine from the
sea and you give them curls...
You whisper: They're filling the world with me now, in
your heart I'm a hollow way still!
You say: Lay the leafage of years beside you--it's time
you came closer and kissed me!

The leafage of years is brown, your hair is not brown.
(translated by Michael Hamburger)

Paine, Jeffery, ed. The Poetry of Our World: An International
Anthology of Contemporary Poetry. New York: HarperCollins,
2000.

Preempting Living Wage Ordinances

2013-07-04T11:37:00.004-04:00

The latest Polymath Slacker video features a debate on what is known as Living Wage Ordinances. Living wage ordinances are laws passed by county or municipal government which state that any service vendor who contracts with said county or municipal government(s) must pay laborers wages and benefits to a standard above the poverty level. The details of the ordinance are individual to the local area. Ordinances are requested by the people of a local area by way of petitioning their local officials. The State Legislature in Florida passed, and the Governor of the State signed, a new law this year which preempts local governments' right to include wage provisions as a part of contracting vendors.

Florida must decide soon whether or not it lets a minority group with a great deal of political power, supported by large corporations and the business lobby, permanently divide the people of this State into socio-economic sub-classes. The creation and cementing of these divisions has been in full swing for over half a decade to date.

The Polymath Slacker: Styles and Stats (Year One)

2013-06-27T09:12:00.000-04:00

In order to demonstrate enough about the process of creating your own media character, what follows is a bit of reporting on the business of Polymath Enterprises, LLC (FL). As you may know, the Polymath Slacker is a character made up of other characters. Those characters not only indicate the tendencies of the main character, but can be used to benchmark fairness and equity in representation of each characters' underlying point of view.

By taking the characters' productivity, using the statistical data about their activity on the forum site (their metadata), the activity of each can be calculated to produce an approximate time-in-thought quotient, indicating the overall time spent in producing all of the posts on the forum, as well as the percentage of time each character's philosophy is represented.

Site administration, construction and moderation stats excluded, the list of sub-character activity in % of time in production is as follows:

• Social Liberal - 33.44%

• Central-Planning Statist - 6.99%

• Minarchist - 6.05%

• Localist/Provincial - 3.76%

• Egalitarian - 3.59%

• Fiscal Conservative - 2.52%

• Anarcho-Capitalist - 2.24%

• Objectivist Libertarian - 2.05%

• Conservative/Evangelical - 0.72%

• Social Traditionalist - 0.19%

As is evident, even with 35.43% of the time spent in admin, construction and moderation, the forum leans significantly to the political left of center. Still, this calculation was made in a group of reports on the results of the first year of operation. While indicating tendencies, this gives no weight to the value of the arguments made, and serves to illustrate the need for further diversification in philosophical representation.

The next set of numbers is less about style and more about the forum's functionality as a business. These stats show the potential of the forum to generate advertising revenue:

Unique Visitors Visits Pages Hits Bandwidth

2012

Mar 4 11 164 339 4.84 MB

Apr 84 544 9,780 11,408 144.54 MB

May 178 660 23,928 25,660 255.34 MB

Jun 146 314 7,472 9,010 78.20 MB

Jul 190 385 5,957 7,120 65.45 MB

Aug 128 415 6,773 7,648 88.41 MB

Sep 240 906 15,779 20,504 203.21 MB

Oct 752 2,367 35,107 40,372 462.60 MB

Nov 838 2,745 39,999 45,663 527.84 MB

Dec 1,641 5,110 68,709 73,766 966.30 MB

Total 4,201 13,457 213,668 241,490 2.73 GB

Using the highest and average RPM (reflections per mil) from this blog, the forum ad revenue value estimate is $17 - $170 for the year ending Dec 2012. As traffic increases (which it has steadily each month) RPM should increase, as well as potential ad revenue. The more people participate with the forum, the more the value of the forum increases.

A central motivation for the Polymath Slacker project is to help individuals develop their own businesses in the wide-open market for opinions and ideas. Hopefully the data in this post is helpful to that end (as either an ideal example or one to improve upon).

Thanks for reading.

Call it a Workshop

2013-06-14T11:02:00.000-04:00

According to the Florida Department of Education, using data from the U.S. Census Survey from 2005 to 2009, 34% of Floridians have an AA degree or higher. Since the standard for an Associate of Arts in any category is to have no fewer than 6 hours in writing instruction and the Gordon Rule requirement of 24,000 words written, it's safe to say that around 6,460,000 of the 19,000,000 Floridians understand how to research and write an evidence-supported paper. (btw: "The Gordon Rule Writing requirement is an important curricular statement in that all students must be able to express themselves appropriately through effective writing." senate archives)

If only a quarter of that number had a way to put those skills to good use over a million people could begin acquiring experience in finding a literary voice and style. If just 10% joined the conversation online, one hundred sixty-one thousand people could craft a huge statement of their own about the world around them.

Also, if one man acting almost completely alone can toss together a literary platform that can generate $2,000 - $3,000 in ad revenue value in it's first year, a literary platform with 25 user/actors could muster between $50,000 and $75,000 in ad revenue value in a year. That's enough reward to have an administrator keep the platform free from harm and operating correctly/stably. At the very least, what would remain would be an archive resource for others and a testimony to posterity.

I, as a fictional character, see value in having this evidence of our culture for future generations.

The Polymath Slacker is a mouthpiece... a freedom of expression beyond the realm of human association. I mean, the author of this project tells you his name and all, but what's being said on this blog and the forum especially are free thoughts presented without fear or malice. Virtual animosity, a condition computer users take for granted, is as easy as making up a name (of course, we all know now that the NSA or whoever can find out who you are, but the important part is that no one you know or can realistically be affected by knows you as the author of your free thoughts).

The FloridaInCommon forum is a place for thoughts about civics in Florida. It's a place to put ideas for a polymath slacker to consider. Anonymous or not, sign up and start honing the craft of expression. Bring an idea into existence and debate it and others.

Another option is to make a platform of your own. Whatever subject interests you will garner attention. And attention is all you need to generate revenue. The entire process of building the Polymath Slacker has been detailed on this blog.

There is a market for the characters of Florida. Our representations in the world prove nothing more.

Thanks for reading

The Story of My Character

2013-06-05T00:58:00.000-04:00

It is a good story. With a beginning, and infinite possibility among infinite possibilities. The story of this character does not have to deal with the anxieties of everyday life in the city. Public Religion was bound by propriety even among devout men of society in times past, but remembered. Normal is not to chant a tribal label in a stewing brew between all those who refuse to believe that this does not have to be the "End Times" and that we can progress passed where their sensibilities are offended by what they do not understand.

No one knows what happens after we die, but some choose to believe in gods whose literature represents an inexplicable basis of proof that they know (or knew) the nature of existence from the human experiences where the events taking place were attributed to the god of whatever military or mob happened to inspire said literature.

can on , n. 3 the official list of the books of the Bible accepted by the Christian church as genuine and inspired. *my school dictionary

The problem isn't that the programming of a given religion is not "inspired", it just produces societal problems when non-theistic divisions crop up even in groups of the same religion. Balances of power are interpreted through theistic lenses by Man to be Man's rule for all life on earth; rules of law, life and liberty. There's a strange kind of security in not only knowing that you are safe and stable, but that you embody god or that your will and god's will are aligned somehow.

Here, the end is not the end of anything. Everything is transitions. There is no clip like the flap of scissors slamming shut. There's no sudden event. There is also no requirement of one. The things that produce this text could just as easily be cat pics. On to the next thing.

The Polymath Slacker discusses life in a more concrete nature based on reliable data about real people precisely because of the idea of Nontheism. There is a vast spectrum of conversation humans are capable of that may benefit the progress of humankind, that needs to be taking place, that has nothing in any meaningful way to do with whether or not you imagine yourself floating on clouds, walking on gold, or sexing it up with what have you when you die. Theistic leanings have no relevance to the Polymath Slacker's conversations.

Still, there's something to be said for patience and politeness. Also, irony in an invented construct accurately calculating concrete nature in reality.

This character is for everyone to take part in

Florida's PPACA Debate Summed (and Mashed) Up

2013-05-20T10:41:00.003-04:00

The State House of Representatives in Florida elected to support a majority-proposed program called 'Florida Healthy Choices' rather than accepting over $50 billion to expand Primary Care in the next 10 years for over 1.1 million uninsured, poor Floridians. The Healthy Choices program uses taxpayer money to fund health care accounts for 115,000 Floridians currently at or below the Federal Poverty Level. The system's goal is to create a health vendor website similar to the website Groupon, which would organize discount services for plan members.

This video is a mashup of some soundbites from the April 15, 2013 PPACA Implementation Committee:

There is a discussion thread on the Florida In Common forum.

This issue will probably get a lot more attention going forward. It will most certainly be a campaign issue in 2014 if there is no special session called to find a way to accept this money this year.

Thanks for visiting.

Health Care for All

2013-05-13T09:22:00.004-04:00

The woman's voice in this video has 10s of thousands of counterparts, just in Florida alone. Thousands of people just like you need help living life. And not their whole lives. Help should be there for people who need it in the United States of America.

Identify people in every district directly affected by the giant boot of medical anxiety (there will be many). Tell them what Medicaid Expansion through KidCare is, and what it looks like to them. The program is for primary care, which means making the citizens of this state more healthy every day, not just treating them when they get sick. Making our population healthier is better for everyone, and those who don't care about a healthy population probably don't deserve a job in government.

Empathy: A Sonnet

2013-05-10T08:25:00.000-04:00

My cat lacks empathy, and doesn't feel
bad about it's actions, it's roughhouse, it's play:
Genuinely annoyed when whatever
creature that has it's interest expires;
Not connected enough to what it is
or why it exists to be remorseless--
Remorseless people keep pushing themselves
one step ahead of their anxieties
(Human programming for societies,
books that teach flawed balances of power;
the latest story some of us believe
to be about all of us, stated or not)
Foolishness is notional certainty,
Certain knowledge in oneself is folly!

OpenWorm Project - Fundamental Biology

2013-05-09T00:00:00.000-04:00

The OpenWorm Project came from a friend on Twitter. OpenWorm is an open source project dedicated to creating the world's first virtual organism in a computer, starting with a C.elegans nematode. Find out more at OpenWorm.org.

National Poetry Month

2013-04-23T09:09:00.001-04:00

In an effort to support National Poetry Month, a few of the most recent posts have been poems. Some original, some "classic", they are meant to express the value of poetry in the making of memes, or ways of thinking about events, places, things.

The following is "The Bear's Song", a Zuni chant about which it was said "Whoever can sing this one is admitted forever to the friendship of the bears.":

I have taken the woman of beauty

For my wife;

I have taken her from her friends.

I hope her kinsmen will not come

And take her away from me.

I will be kind to her.

Berries, berries I will give her from the hill

And roots from the ground.

I will do everything to please her.

For her I made this song and for her I sing it.

Now figure out how to sing that song in the Zuni tradition and you too can be a friend of the bears. Notice, though, that in order to have peace with the bears one must care for, almost dote on, one's wife.

Van Doren/Lapolla, A Junior Anthology of World Poetry (1929)

Placed Persuasion

2013-04-10T13:46:00.000-04:00

"Let's come inside further young man,
I have novelties you have not seen..."
Only Seven but wary of
Intellectually disabled
Persons in a village called home;

A crazy-delicate balance
Guarding fair against the options
Of impurities - Predicting
The powers impressed on mothers
And sons once firmly snapped in place.

Willful, gleeful slaughter travels
Within markets of perverse thought;
A faultless piece of old scripture
Hung blurry behind frozen smiles,
"Home Sweet Home" safely under foot:

Powers play at the world of minds,
Plied by peddling practices;
A pathos poorly purported,
Preferred -- Praised as palatable,
Placing pallid purpose in pride.

Mysticismistic

2013-04-08T09:10:00.002-04:00

To be a pantheist means to think that the universe has a certain consciousness and awareness of itself. That consciousness cannot be understood to a degree which might credibly be used by people to formulate an ideal or perfect morality for obvious reasons. Every tale used to illustrate ideal morality is flawed because it takes place within the constraint of human understanding. That is why there inevitably comes a situation where one must implicitly and explicitly yield one's logic and understanding to the notion that there is a plan in place.

In my life I have seen people who claimed they could 'speak in tongues,' which is to say they believed they were channeling the voice of god when the spattered and carried on. Peculiarly, they always seemed to be speaking in jumbled English. Clearly, I was unmoved, but they (and others) weren't. Some believed the "speakers" were channeling holy spirits or angels, and were actually speaking in a language used in heaven.

I choose to believe that I have a personal consciousness and what one might call "free will." I find it intuitive that I possess a separate consciousness than the rest of the universe, in an existence of infinite possibilities, and that by doing so I may increase the likelihood of such a reality to within a reasonably 'sane' degree of certainty for an earth-primate writing about itself some time about 4,540,000,000 years after the formation of the planet. That is to say I have faith in this belief.

Since all matter is made of energy, and energy can neither be created nor destroyed, we are interwoven with the existence of the earth and the sun. This planet has characteristics of which a character (or deity) might be extrapolated. The spirit of any one of these characters is either the demonstration of a consciousness or a consciousness itself. Life has characters. Humanity has a character. Cultures have characters. People are subject to their character.

Each unique item in the universe informs the whole simply by ever having existed.

There is a difference of opinion among certain world leaders today about the propriety of sensibilities that are violently intolerant of theoretical challenges to certain men's understandings of the consciousness of the universe (or the one above that if you're a panatheist). I can only say that the closer men get to allowing themselves to speak for god the more the god for whom they speak begins to resemble their own proprieties and sensibilities.

For millenia the character of cultures has been marked with the general notion that the culture's ideals, shared commonly by all within it, represent the intentions of the consciousness of the universe. However, the process of decoupling humanity's destiny with old cultures who've created god in their own image doesn't mean ceasing to appreciate the diversity of thought produced by people in our time here.

Poverty - Theognis 540 BC (Greece)

2013-04-08T08:56:00.003-04:00

For noble minds, the worst of miseries,
Worse than old age, or wearisome disease,
Is Poverty. From Poverty to flee,
From some tall precipice into the sea,
It were a fair escape to leap below!
In Poverty, dear Kyrnus, we forego
Freedom in word and deed, body and mind;
Action and thought are fetter'd and confin'd.
Let me then fly, dear Kyrnus, once again!
Wide as the limits of the land and main,
From these entanglements; with these in view,
Death is the lighter evil of the two.
(John Hookham Frere)

Van Doren/Lapolla, A Junior Anthology of World Poetry (1929)