"Trying is the first step toward failure."

Some time ago, my New Year's resolution was to make no more New Year's resolutions. My record of adhering to my resolutions was abysmally bad, and therefore each new resolution seemed more like an opportunity to add yet another failure to a list I was already too conscious of. This had the happy effect of relieving me from needless worry about adhering to resolutions made for the sole purpose of appearing to adhere to some cultural tradition, but which were unlikely to have any serious impact on my life other than to give me cause to worry about failure. Yea me!

This year, I have been thinking about that one successful resolution; probably because the time of year sort of compels one to think about such things. But I believe it has been a useful exercise, because it has helped me to examine the state of my life as it is today, and to rediscover something that is ever-present in my life, even as I remain stubbornly oblivious to it from moment-to-moment.

I have the habit of structuring the narrative of my life around future events that may never happen. As a result, I spend much of my life, too much of my life, waiting for something. I've had occasion to learn this, painfully, at least twice before; and I'm not happy to admit there is some amount of pain associated with this repetition as well. But someone once said that pain is nature's way of reminding you that you're still alive, so you'd better get busy about the business of living.

This fixation with future events is connected in some way with my feelings of powerlessness. It's also connected with fear, of which powerlessness is just one. It's a way of absolving myself of responsibility for the quality of my life. I used to say, over and over again, "It'll get better when..." and what I painfully discovered is that it never got better "when..." What I learned, and forgot - twice! - is that "it" never gets better. "It" being "my life." "It" never gets better until "I" get better. And I do have some power over that.

So this year, I'm still not making any resolutions. I am, however, setting a few goals. A few things that I may be able to achieve without waiting for something else that may or may not happen. A long time ago, I did a lot of research about goal setting and achievement. I confess to a certain amount of disdain for the whole notion of "goal setting," but I believe this is a product of some defensive thinking on my part. "Trying is the first step toward failure." I know that goals must be achievable, so I'm not seeking to become "the All-Being, master of time space and dimension," which is an obscure cultural reference to a former stand-up comedian who wore balloons on his head. So, they're modest goals. The most ambitious one is really just a set of smaller goals.

I know that, to be successful, one must be mindful of one's goals, if not at all times, then most of the time. So I'm playing around with ways I can use technology to remind me of my goals. If I come up with anything especially clever, I'll let you know. I know that there must be certain rewards attendant to achieving various goals, so I'm thinking about what those may be, and how I can tie those rewards to some other behaviors and habits that I'd like to modify. A lot of this has to do with dopamine and the brain. You have to manage your brain's sense of reward, or it'll drive you toward behaviors that are inimical to your goals in order to experience the reward sensation. This is the trickiest part for some people, especially me.

For me, most of my goals are oriented toward addressing some aspect of myself that I think could be better. Most external changes, those observable by others, would really be the result of internal changes, which is why this is often so hard for many people. But, I think I've got a plan, or at least the outline of one. I know from my military training that no plan survives contact with the enemy, the "enemy" in this case being my own habituated brain. So I know that I'll have to review the plan, even as I try to adhere to it, and remain mindful of my goals.

If I am successful, I may report it here. If I am not, I probably won't. There is some merit in making "contracts" or public commitments, but I don't think I'm one of the people for whom that is effective. I need to manage my attention resources carefully, and contending with a fear about public failure would cost more in attention resources than it would provide in motivational incentive. I don't think I'm lacking in motivation. I think I'm lacking in skill at managing attention, which is perhaps the key resource in modifying habituated behavior. Included in my goals are some modest goals directed toward behaviors that should help improve my attention management. To the extent that particular things I do either help, or do not help in my efforts, I may report on them. I'm not trying to be coy here, I'm just feeling my way around, trying to share as much of this effort as I feel I can without compromising my ability to actually succeed. Which probably suggests I should dump this whole post in The Cooler, because I'm not sure how fair I'm being to any reader who may become engaged with this story that may not be a story.

Anyway, if there is a point to this post, it is this: Don't believe "It'll get better when..." Don't believe there is a "good time" to do something. If it's something worth doing, there is only one time to do it: Now. If it's not worth doing, don't worry about it. If you can't do "it" now, then perhaps now is the time to start getting to the place where you can do it. As recent events have so painfully reminded us, we only have moments to live, and there's only one you can count on - the one you hold in your hand, right now.

Bandwagon

Amazon has helped the American Red Cross raise more than $3.1M for disaster relief, as of this post. I threw some in the kitty. Do what you can.

Authority, Hierarchy, and Zero-Sum Games

Something else to think about. Link via John Robb.

Related reading: Wealth and Democracy.

Cool Tip

I save a lot of web pages as pdf files, especially invoices and receipts for online transactions. Here is a most excellent tip for those of you who do the same.

Add Another Book to the Pile

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed looks like another book I want to read. Jason Kottke pointed to this interesting review by Malcolm Gladwell.

Splat

Pretty interesting. Be sure to read all the way down to the 24 December update, which mentions there's really a 1 in 60 chance of it hitting. Wonder what would happen if it missed us and hit the moon instead? By the way, April 13, 2029 is a Friday. Cool. Hope I'm still around to see it. Update: If I'm interpreting this table correctly, the data available to date now suggest a 1 in 45 chance of impact. Still likely to miss, but it's interesting. Update (27 Dec): Now a 1 in 37 chance of impact. Update: (28 Dec): Seems like they've sharpened their pencils and the impact risk is now a very comfortable 1 in 26,000. The Comet Wardens can return to their homes.

Post-Holiday Show

Your genial host here with highlights and analysis of this year's holiday extravaganza.

Hardware was a big theme this year, with son Chris receiving several components for a fancy new exhaust system for his Ford Bronco, along with a set of tools and a cordless drill/driver. Software included the latest installment in the Prince of Persia series, Warrior Within. Your genial host remembers playing the original 2d Prince of Persia from Bröderbund on his Apple //e late into too many nights, many, many, many years ago.

Daughter Caitie received a Nintendo GameCube system of her own, because her brother's is securely ensconced in his bedroom, which is off limits to his sister. It was a pretty decent deal, with the game console, an extra controller and the Mario Kart Double-Dash game being offered as a package for the cost of the game console alone. This manifestation of parental over-indulgence may also be partially attributed to the father's somewhat irrational hostility toward Microsoft, in addition to a certain fondness for Nintendo which has always seemed to use microprocessors related to those found in Apple computers. Caitie also received the Incredibles video game, and Need for Speed 2, which her brother received as well, oddly enough. Rounding out the hardware collection was a Mattel Juice Box portable digital media player, and a Sony portable CD player.

Daughter Melissa and son-in-law Pat received a gift card to Lowe's, which I suppose also qualifies as a hardware gift. Caitie gave her brother-in-law a Gerber Multi-Plier, which is what happens when she goes shopping with her father.

As for me, I received the first season of Star Trek on DVD, because you can never have too much of William Shatner emoting on the small screen. I also received the Extended Edition of Return of the King from Caitlin. Melissa gave me a framed photograph from her wedding, which is very, very nice; and Caitie gave me a book, Sermons of a Buddhist Abbot, from which I shall flog you all about the head and shoulders with quotations or inspired meditations on why everything is so screwed up. No need to thank me, it's what I do, it's who I am. Writing myself into existence, authoring all of you. Yada, yada, yada... Sigh.

The weather here in sunny Florida, aka The Sunshine State, was cold, gray, wet and rainy, accenting the festive mood of the holiday season. Wait... That didn't come out right.

The weather sucked.

Gift exchange took place at daughter Melissa's house, where we promptly hooked up the GameCube and commenced to squabbling over who would get to play on it. But really, it was a lot of fun. Caitie and I played a card game she received, in which I failed as a father yet again, by not losing. We had fun though. I heated up a number of frozen food items, breaded cheese sticks, tiny little rolled-up taco things, and some mini deep-dish pizzas, to snack on while we thumbed game controllers or tried to figure out how to extend the various tools and blades in the multi-plier.

All-in-all, it was a pretty good time. I enjoyed being with my kids, marveled at how much time had passed, and tried to impress this event on my memory; even as I tried to not feel too attached to time and children who have become, or are rapidly becoming, adults. Such is life. And in the main, it is good. I hope you had a good holiday as well.

Wizard's Words of Wisdom

Dots

Apropos of nothing, certainly not the season, I'm sitting here with Congo showing on the Sci-Fi channel, and I'm wondering who the hell is playing Dr. Peter Elliot. So I head on over to the Internet Movie Database and look up Congo. Turns out it's the guy who plays one of the docs on Nip/Tuck.

That satisfied my curiosity, but then I noticed the name of the guy who wrote the screenplay, John Patrick Shanley, and I'm wondering why that name sounds so familiar. So I click on his name, and he's the guy who wrote Moonstruck, which I just watched a couple of nights ago and read the little booklet that accompanied the DVD, wherein John Patrick Shanley's name figures prominently. Looking over his credits, I note he also wrote and directed one of my very favorite movies, Joe Versus the Volcano. Cool. I didn't know all that.

None of which explains why I really don't care for Congo all that much.

Of course, I just noticed my monkey-brain posts and realized I was watching Congo. Heh.

8:00 PM Dot: Moonstruck just started on We, you know, the "Women's Entertainment" network. Weird. Or maybe not. But kind of cool.

Happy Festivus!

To this year's Airing of Grievances, I must add Hallmark, maker of cards for every occasion. Except Festivus. Hallmark! You suck!

Feats of Strength will be held in the parking lot at 4:00 PM. This year we're going for best two out of three take-downs. There's a lot of gravel in the parking lot.

And yes, I do find tinsel distracting.

(For those who may find this a bit confusing, consult this link.)

Monkey-Brain Deconstructed

'Tis the Season to be Mindful

And amidst all the other things we ought to be mindful of, perhaps we might also keep Hal and Loren in our thoughts and prayers as well.

Monkey-Brain Thinking 101

Mine, not yours.

I, and my group, understand, by virtue of our special knowledge. You misunderstand, because you have not yet received the special knowledge. Become one of us, and receive special knowledge.

This: Good. That: Bad.

It's okay for me to rant, call others names, jump up and down, and otherwise behave as a child, because it's for a good cause. And, it's authentic.

Projection.

Winners and losers. Especially losers.

"Help! Help! I'm being repressed."

Blame.

Us vs. Them.

Credit.

Q: Isn't "Monkey-Brain Thinking 101" an example of "monkey-brain thinking?"

A: I'm afraid so.

Q: Is monkey-brain thinking, "bad?"

A: No. Is inhaling "good" and exhaling "bad?" It can be "bad" if one gets sort of stuck in monkey-mode, where one mostly just throws crap at others. The ones throwing the crap seem to have a good time. The ones having crap thrown at them, their protests notwithstanding, seem to require the attention. So it's not that monkey-brain thinking is "bad," it's just not the only way of thinking. It's kind of like holding your breath, and one might regard the outcome of that effort as "bad."

Q: Doesn't awareness of monkey-brain thinking imply the possession of special knowledge?

A: No. Becoming aware of monkey-brain thinking usually involves letting go of special knowledge; though we're not very good at letting things go, especially things that make us special.

My Own Bad Self

Wherein Monkey-Brain Takes the Wheel.

I had to drop by the the credit union this morning to take care of a little holiday banking and I happened to notice the bloodmobile in the parking lot. I used to give blood very frequently when I was on active duty, mostly because the bloodmobile would park right outside my office, so I always knew when it was around. In my present job, I don't see any fliers so it's a function of whether or not I happen to see the bloodmobile at the credit union.

So I concluded the complex transactions that govern my vast financial empire and walked over to the big old Bus o' Blood. The first thing I noticed was that the interior looked different from the one I was used to. The couches were all flat, whereas the one I was used to had contoured couches. So I remarked that this was different, and asked what happened to the other truck? They kind of looked at me funny and had me go through the check-in process. The process itself was different, but it's been probably a year or more since I last donated and I figured it was just an administrative or regulatory thing.

So I finished up the paperwork and stepped back into the tiny booth for the interview. The attendant asked me if I had ever donated before, and I said "Sure, you guys are always sending me coffee mugs and glasses and stuff." So I gave her my social security number and she said, "You're not in our system. You must have been giving to someone else."

And I said, "Isn't this the Florida-Georgia Blood Alliance?"

"No, this is the Red Cross."

"Oh. That explains the crappy truck."

Whoops! Where did that come from?! The lady frosted right over and I began to wonder if she would be the one sticking me. I fumbled around some sort of apology about disparaging their vehicle, but it didn't seem to matter. I have no idea why I "blurted out the truth," but there wasn't any taking it back.

The happy ending is they took my blood anyway, and they left me enough to remain ambulatory afterward.

The Florida-Georgia Blood Alliance does have a nicer truck.

Embarrassment of Riches: StickyBrain 3

One of the really tough parts about being a Mac OS X user is the enormous number of really neat applications available to us. It's so damn hard to try to settle on just one, and get something actually accomplished. I already own Tinderbox, NoteTaker, NoteBook, and OmniOutliner, any one of which is a very cool, very useful application. Add to that an application I looked at in its previous incarnation, but ultimately decided it wasn't interesting enough. Well, now it's out in version 3, and it looks as though I might want to try this one: StickyBrain 3.

Features that make this one appealing to me: Full 2-way synchronization with my Clié, and note-linking to Address Book entries. It also has a full suite of essential features for grabbing bits of information and storing them. Looks very cool.

Cool: Organ Transplants

An article in the NY Times on the fiftieth anniversary of the first kidney transplant. One of my brothers has one of mine. If I do nothing else worthwhile in my life, I did that. I hasten to note that each of my other siblings would have done it as well; but it was a good fit for me in terms of my job and my ability to take the time off to do it. And give credit to the navy for that. (Whatever shred of humility I retain compels me to add that there wasn't much for me to "do" in that process. Mostly, I just stayed in bed and let attractive, attentive nurses (Nurse Christine Hunt and Nurse's Aid, Mary Ann Edwards) look after me. I should have more such ordeals.) I look forward to the day when we might be able to grow replacement organs from the recipient's own tissue. We're not there yet, but it's beginning to look as though we might get there one day. That would be very cool too.

Cool: Wiretap Pro

I've used Ambrosia's Wiretap utility (no longer available from Ambrosia) for all the little sound clips from movies I've been posting. Wiretap only captured to AIFF, and I'd convert to MP3 using iTunes after editing the clip in BIAS Peak Express. Wiretap Pro will capture to MP3, saving me a step. Cool.

Troubleshooting

I spent far too long last night trying to figure out why my iPod wasn't being seen by iTunes; or, if it was, why updates consistently started out very slow and then stalled. From time to time, I would get a -36 error message, an unhelpful acknowledgment of an I/O problem.

I reset the iPod, I rebooted the Mac. I used the iPod Updater utility to restore the iPod to factory default (and empty) condition. I ran the disk check utility on the iPod. I ran Disk Utility on it as an external FW drive. From time to time, it would appear on the desktop and in iTunes, but the update in iTunes would start out slowly and then stall. I tried manual updates and dragging songs to the iPod, same problem. I had no other devices on the FW bus. System Profiler could see the iPod, even when Finder and iTunes could not. I did all of these things multiple times. I visited the iPod forum at the Apple Support site, and noted others having a similar problem.

I was getting ready to give up and call Apple in the morning, when, on a whim, I switched Firewire ports. Bing! Everything worked as advertised. The next step is to check that other Firewire port with my iSight and camcorder. I'm pretty sure it works because I used the iSight in that port with iChat AV earlier in the evening. (And no, iChat AV wasn't running during all this, and yes, the iSight was unplugged.)

Firewire is becoming almost as arcane, in terms of the general weirdness it exhibits, as SCSI used to be. I'm beginning to think there's some kind of electrical phenomenon, perhaps a residual capacitance charge or something, that inhibits data connections. When I first started using the iSight, iChat AV would lose connectivity with it and nothing would restore it short of removing both ends of the cable from the Mac and the iSight and swapping the ends, which would result in everything working fine again for a while. You can't swap ends of the newer iPod cables, since one is configured for the docking port on the iPod. I haven't had that particular problem in a long time, which suggests it was probably a software issue and swapping the cable ends was just a misleadingly correlated event. Now, I'm not so sure. One of Apple's recommended corrective measures for that problem was to shut down the Mac for 10 minutes and restart. That, as I recall, solved the problem at least once as well - which also sort of suggests some sort of electrical problem.

In any event, if you're having connectivity problems with your iPod over Firewire, try switching FW ports if you have more than one. Or shut down and wait 10 minutes for any residual stray capacitance to discharge. I won't guarantee it'll solve your problem, but I don't think it can make them any worse. I note with some caution that others who indicated that they switched from FW to USB 2.0 continued to experience problems, so YMMV.

(Update: I also note that this phenomenon happened today, when it was exceptionally cold outside and therefore I have the heat turned on in the apartment, which tends to make the air much drier. I'm not sure what the weather was like with my iSight problems, but perhaps I can find out. What does that have to do with anything? I'm not sure, what's the dielectric coefficient of dry air versus humid air? Higher, I think.)

Simply Incredible

It's been said before, but The Incredibles is a wonderful movie. I saw it with Caitie tonight and we both loved it. Wonderful movie.

Another Turn of the Wheel

A year ago today, I shuttered my weblog Time's Shadow. I had been doing it for just a couple of days shy of four years, and I guess I was tired of high school. Six weeks later, I re-opened under the present appellation. I did so partly because my parents said they missed it, and partly because I found I still had things to say. But I wanted to say them a different way. Gone were the comments and the blogroll. Gone was the SiteMeter traffic counter. I don't know how many hits Groundhog Day gets, and I don't care. I admit to occasionally consulting the authority-that's-not-really-an-authority Technorati from time to time to see if someone has linked to anything, but that's about it.

Part of what ended up making Time's Shadow more frustration than it was worth, was some attachment to the notion that this should make some difference. Perhaps it does make a difference, but I had an expectation of something that wasn't being realized. I learned a lot about myself, and I learned a lot about other people. I'm less inclined to engage in ongoing debates with anyone anymore, I realize the futility of such things. Though I have been known to regress from time to time. I'm less inclined to post things I've written when I've been angry, although there too are exceptions. I've tried to conduct myself here as I'd like to see others conduct themselves, trying, with only a little success, to not set myself up for suffering by attaching an expectation to that effort.

Most of what weblogging appears to be, to me, is so much hot air. It's not so much an examination of reality, as it is an effort to manufacture perception. One finds little in the way of reasoned arguments, mostly a series of confrontational assertions, usually hurled as epithets. "Deal with it!" How very empowering. Individuals are shredded online by high attention-earners who, only weeks before, piously embraced higher standards of civil discourse; and their peers do not call them to account, they tacitly endorse or approve it, encouraging what is little more than inciting a mob.

One difference I can note between the blogosphere and high school, at least the high school I attended, is that people were better behaved and had more self-control. Acting out wasn't encouraged as an expression of "authenticity."

Arguments supporting freedom of speech would be more persuasive if they exhibited an awareness of the concept of responsibility.

License they mean when they cry, Liberty!

Where, I wonder, are the wise and the good in the blogosphere?

Kevin Sites wrote something I much appreciated in his Open Letter to the Devil Dogs of the 3.1:

But both the leaders and the grunts in the field like you understand that if you lower your standards, if you accept less, than less is what you'll become.

That's true of us as well. We don't seem to demand very much, apart from others agreeing with our points of view.

I don't know. Perhaps this piece is merely a series of confrontational assertions. Maybe I'm just demanding that you agree with my point of view. I rather hope it's not, I just don't care to go over once again all the things I've named in recent weeks as examples and evidence of what I lament here. I'd like to think I'm not writing in the same immature and irresponsible manner that I criticize here, but sometimes we're blind to our own faults. Motes, eyes, beams, you know the story.

Maybe I'm just not much fun anymore. Maybe I've misplaced my sense of humor, or perspective. Maybe it's just exhausting wading through the hyperbole and the hostility to try to find the common humanity. I don't know.

I'm not shutting down Groundhog Day. I'm not taking a break. Maybe I should, but not yet. Although I'm disappointed and disenchanted, I suppose I must believe I still have something to say. Hopefully not just to relate the extent of my disappointments and disenchantments!

I think we can do better, but I'm at a loss to discern any impetus to try.

On Sunday, I'll be starting my sixth year at doing this. I sure hope I know what I'm doing, I've left a long paper trail. Sometime before the new year, I'll try to do a post about the good things I've encountered along the way, and there have been many. While the good things have been good to me, as an individual, the bad things I perceive are bad to everyone. I don't believe we'll ever be rid of the "bad," only that we can always be trying to do better. It's hard to see anyone even trying, earnestly, that is.

Macintosh

I looked at The Cult of Mac at Books-a-Million, and it's a very nice, very attractive book. But I wouldn't spend $30.00 on it.

This book, on the other hand, I will buy.

The Way of the Warrior

"The warrior ethos is that there are no imperfections."

Unfortunately, this is the perception. It is also untrue. Every warrior fights two wars: The one against his enemies, and the one against his own mind. We train and equip our warriors for one of those wars very well, armored trucks notwithstanding. Now we have to train and equip them for the other one as well. I hope we can do what is necessary for them.

Sins of Omission

10.3.7

Installed. So far, to no ill effect.

Turning to Other Matters

I've still got a longish bit on authority and authenticity that may see the light of day before the new year, but for now I'm going to be turning my attention to other matters. Paying attention to shallow men of superficial principles and hollow promises, to people who misunderstand and misuse important ideas about authority and responsibility, to people who exhibit little in the way of self-control, let alone doubt or introspection, or even restraint, to people who ignore or endorse the worst in their peers, can lead one to despair in this season of "good will to men." Rather than go down that all too familiar road, I'll try to pay attention to happier, more positive things for now.

Perhaps we might begin here.

Noted

We have honored what is worst in our nature, through television, spectacle, best sellers, game shows, advertisements for every vice, celebrities without couth, class, ethics, taste, or ideals. And now we and the planet reap that harvest. From right and left we can rally for something better. Peer pressure keeps us stupider than we are.

The Happy Tutor

Authority, Criticism and Zero-Sum Games

Just an observation. You very seldom see, I'm almost willing to say never because I haven't found an example yet, criticism from a high attention-earning weblogger (what Technorati misleadingly terms an "authority") directed toward another high attention-earning weblogger, if both of those individuals are in the same, larger, ideological group. What is more common is for high attention-earning webloggers to criticize other high attention-earning webloggers in an opposing ideological camp, usually in a manner that is designed to stimulate, titillate and attract attention, a "Fisking" or a rant, or a "flame."

For example, pro-war webloggers never seriously criticize other pro-webloggers, and the same may be said for anti-war webloggers.

What makes this example somewhat soft is the fact that individuals in the "pro" and "anti" war groups often belong to other ideological groups as well, and that being pro or anti war is not a reliable predictor of other ideological beliefs. So the effect seems to be that criticism of high attention-earning webloggers by other high attention-earning webloggers is further stifled by other shared beliefs. But the result is that the only high attention-earning webloggers who receive criticism from other high attention-earning webloggers are those who are perceived to be single-issue webloggers. That is to say, where the relationship between the critic and weblogger is most clearly zero-sum.

In an example not drawn from the blogosphere, one might compare the amount of criticism the president receives from his own party with the amount he receives from members of the other party. This, interestingly if somewhat unsurprisingly, changes a bit when a president wins a second term, and the party has less to gain or preserve by inhibiting criticism; and the competition for the presidential nomination of the next term begins.

Also a factor in weblogger "authority"-to-weblogger "authority" criticism, or the distinct absence thereof, is the physically social aspect of high attention-earning webloggers, and the fact that they are invited to and participate in a number of conferences and meetings where they get the chance to form closer social relationships; as well as the effect of being present at the same function creates a sense of "group identity" in itself, that inhibits criticism between authorities.

I also note that most criticism of webloggers by other webloggers comes from those lower in the hierarchy directed toward those higher in the hierarchy, and in those cases, shared ideological beliefs are less of an inhibition as the lower-ranking webloggers may have less to "lose" by criticizing so-called "authorities." Your genial host for example. The response by high attention-earners to criticism from lower attention-earners is to ignore it. I'm virtually certain they are aware of the criticism, but they don't acknowledge it.

This raises a question regarding the supposed "self-correcting" nature of the medium. It seems to me, any effort at correction requires criticism, yet criticism is inhibited except between individuals at extreme zero-sum poles, the two places least likely to listen seriously to one another.

I think that's why, "pledges" to the contrary notwithstanding, we will continue to see childish rants and "flames" by high attention-earning webloggers against other people they perceive as safe ideological targets. Despite the fact that this does nothing to advance the notion of "civil" discourse, or to promote the ideals of mutual respect and consideration for one another. And it is further evidence, as if any was necessary, that technology does not change human nature.

"You must become the change you wish to see in the world."

Compare and Contrast

Flamers and Idealism.

Juan Cole is pond scum. (Be sure to read the comments too.)

Cognitive Dissonance

I fight authority, authority always wins...

Authority Song, John Mellencamp

If we all worship at the alter of hierarchy, then Technorati is the papal residence of the blogosphere.

From their About page:

"Technorati is the authority on what's going on in the world of weblogs."

From their Terms of Service page:

"6. DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES

YOU EXPRESSLY UNDERSTAND AND AGREE THAT:

a. YOUR USE OF THE SERVICE IS AT YOUR SOLE RISK. THE SERVICE IS PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE" BASIS. TECHNORATI EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NON-INFRINGEMENT.

b. TECHNORATI MAKES NO WARRANTY THAT (i) THE SERVICE WILL MEET YOUR REQUIREMENTS, (ii) THE SERVICE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, TIMELY, SECURE, OR ERROR-FREE, (iii) THE RESULTS THAT MAY BE OBTAINED FROM THE USE OF THE SERVICE WILL BE ACCURATE OR RELIABLE, (iv) THE QUALITY OF ANY PRODUCTS, SERVICES, INFORMATION, OR OTHER MATERIAL PURCHASED OR OBTAINED BY YOU THROUGH THE SERVICE WILL MEET YOUR EXPECTATIONS, (v) ANY ERRORS IN THE SOFTWARE WILL BE CORRECTED, (vi) OR THAT THIS WEB SITE, ITS CONTENT, AND THE SERVERS ON WHICH THE WEB SITE AND CONTENT ARE AVAILABLE ARE FREE OF VIRUSES OR OTHER HARMFUL COMPONENTS."

Authority without responsibility or accountability. Sounds like cognitive dissonance to me.

Who's zoomin' who here?

I fight authority, authority always wins

Puppets or Supermen?

This is an interesting, if very brief report.

"But sometime in the future, I hope, when the lessons of neuroscience are as familiar to ordinary people as the fact that the Earth is round, people will have a more accurate understanding of the nature of human action," said Greene, "and they will put aside their intuitive views of punishment, at least for the purposes of legal decision-making."

One might add that we may put aside our intuitive views of judgment and decision-making, and learn how to do both better.

Thales again: Know thyself.

Another Riff on Information, Trust and Zero-Sum Games

Jon Husband omitted the link to the original in this post, but I was able to google over to it, and you'll find it here. I'm not endorsing any of the speculation Mr. Cole puts forward with regard to Iraqi webloggers. I don't know, and I don't have an opinion on the particulars of that issue. The larger issue of disinformation, deception and the like is worthy of consideration, to say nothing of ordinary considerations of bias; and should be taken into account when making judgments regarding the reliability of any source of information.

Again, trust should never be a component of decision making when dealing with actors in a zero-sum game. Reputation may play some role in making an informed judgment about reliability, but trust is something different. There's a reciprocity implicit in trust. A reciprocity that doesn't often scale well. Skepticism scales quite well. Reputation may as well.

Oldie But Goodie

Playing around with the MP130, I recalled Tom Erickson's paper on electronic notebooks. I googled around a bit and found it. I found some other interesting things as well, but more on them a little later. For now, it's interesting to read Tom's paper again and think about things like Tinderbox, and the like.

Whoa...

Very cool.

Whoops, gotta go comb my hair and boogie or I'll be late for school!

But It Is Just Like High School

Doc Searls says, "One of the reasons certain bloggers are popular, I suspect, is that the blogosphere isn't high school. Coolness might cause a few links; but most links come either from having something interesting to say, or from passing along something interesting that somebody else has said."

What is the difference between pointing to Jeff Jarvis' rant against Michael Powell, and Kelso on That 70s Show saying "Burn!" to one of his friends who was just wittily put down by one of his other friends? We're more sophisticated now, but sophistication in these matters is little more than a facade.

High school is all about cliques and searching for identity, which includes a great deal trying to determine rank within the hierarchies; and there's a lot of that in the blogosphere. We created our own little insider hip-lingo, like "blogosphere" and "podcasting" and "google-bombing." We wear our "blogrolls" like the jocks wore their varsity jackets, or the AV-squad their pocket protectors. Some try to be self-effacing and self-deprecating and just try to blend in, because that whole competition thing makes them feel uncomfortable. If you ask me, there are a lot of people trying to resolve issues from high school in the blogosphere. Present company excepted, naturally. ;^)

High school is really just an intense, concentrated version of "real life." There's just less chance to hide and little chance to escape. The blogosphere is more like high school than not, because it is just another product of human nature. The concentrated aspect of it, at least in the early years, was because we were from a self-selected group and we paid intense attention to one another. This created the initial hierarchies, which appear, to me, to have remained somewhat stable over the last several years. One virtue of high school is that it usually only lasts four years. Not so the blogosphere. Though I do believe the larger it gets, the concentration of attention and authority will shift from a relatively small a-list, to a somewhat larger strata of high attention-earning webloggers. What this means is that one probably won't see the same names over and over and over and over again in other media examining weblogs. Also because other media will eventually become part of the blogosphere and will go back to paying attention to other threats, and seeking attention in other ways.

But hierarchy isn't going to go away anytime soon.

Trust and Zero-Sum Games

This is an example of why trust has no place in any interaction with a person or group involved in a zero-sum game. Ultimately, one must decide whether or not to rely on information available in such an interaction, but that's not the same thing as trust. And anything having to do with competition is a zero-sum game. That pretty much covers most of what humans do, unfortunately.

Frivol, drivel, whine and snivel: Weekend Update

Sunday night. The conclusion of another weekend. Time for another exciting adventure of... Action Dave! You are advised to wear proper headgear, lest one sustain serious injury by nodding off and thus allowing one's head to smash into the computer desk.

The big event of the weekend was black belt testing for me and my daughter, Caitlin. The test was being conducted at the World Golf Village, home of the Murray Brothers' Caddyshack restaurant. Bow-in was at 9:00 a.m., but we were instructed to be there by 8:15. I called Caitie on Friday to make sure she didn't need me to give her a ride, and she and her mother said they would be there in plenty of time. So I was somewhat surprised to hear a tearful Caitie on the phone Saturday morning as I was cruising down I-95, saying she wasn't going to go because she had forgotten her bag with all her sparring gear at school. I kicked myself because I had seen the bag at the school on Friday, and meant to remind her about it when I called, but it slipped my mind. I told her to just get her uniform on and get going, we'd work something out when she got there.

I checked Caitie in at her ring and collected her numbers, and they arrived with just enough time to spare. There were several more moments of stress as I explained to Caitlin that she would have to see if one of the other students testing in her ring would allow her to use their gear. She wanted no part of this. I had to get to my ring, and so I left hoping her mom would help her work it out.

There were only three segments to this test, having done the more comprehensive portions at the pre-test last month. We had to do our form, (poomse in Korean, kata in Japanese karate), two rounds of testing sparring (which is intended to be non-contact), and our board breaks. I figured it wouldn't be too hard. I tried to think positive thoughts about Caitie, who seemed really upset and out of sorts, because I was afraid her distress would cause her to forget her form. When it came time for my group to do our form, I was lined up right in front of the judges' table. I went into my first stance and suddenly, everything looked all wrong, and I completely forgot my form. I've been doing this one for a year now, and I can practically do it in my sleep. But not yesterday. I think it was the proximity to the table, or worrying about Caitie, I don't know. But I choked big-time. I faked it through until my group did the first turn away from the table. Once I saw open space in front of me, it all came back and I think I did the rest of it just fine. But I rather expect I failed that portion of the test.

Sparring was fun. I wasn't too upset about my form, at worst it means I'll make second degree next December instead of this June. I wasn't happy about it, but I didn't beat myself up about it either. My sparring partners were both pretty good and I thought that went rather well. I only had to do two board breaks as a mid-term, and both broke on the first attempt. One of my sparring partners had to take all three attempts on his hand technique.

We had to wait until all the other rings were finished, the new belts were handed out and the tying ceremony was completed, then the closing ceremonies and bow-out before we could leave our rings. Maria came over while we were sitting waiting for the other rings and told me Caitie had passed. It took her three tries on her side-kick board break, but she got it. And she had little trouble getting someone to lend her their gear. So I was very happy to hear that. She's now a 1st Degree Decided and we're all very proud of her.

I headed back to the Dave Cave and took a long nap. Although I hadn't felt nervous, I didn't really sleep well Friday night, and I was up at 4:00 a.m. that morning. Karma enjoyed some quality time sleeping on my stomach.

Not much else to report for the rest of Saturday. I watched Wild at Heart on DVD, as one might have guessed from today's audio clip. I'd seen it before, and I love the cast, but that is one very strange movie.

Today was a relaxing day of housework, laundry, and quiet. Spent some time working on a longish piece of nonsense that may or may not eventually wind up here. I took apart the trap in the bathroom sink to see why it was taking so long for the sink to drain. Pulled out the stopper as well, but there wasn't the gooey, gelatinous mass of decomposing hair, whiskers, dead skin and mucous one normally finds. Imagine my disappointment. But it does suggest that if there is a clog, it is somewhere further downstream. Perhaps it's time to call maintenance.

I pulled the old PowerMac 6500 out of the closet and fired it up to run Newton Backup and restore the new MP130 with the contents of my old one. Worked like a champ. I now have all my old Newton apps on my new Newton, which was going to be something of a problem if Backup wasn't able to backup and restore the copy-protected packages. I don't know if I have many of those old license codes and registration numbers, and many of the companies are long out of business. But, all's well that ends well.

And with that, there's your cheese sandwich for the week. There should have been a weblog award category for Best Cheese Sandwich Weblog. "I coulda been a contendah!"

Good night!

"And this time there will be soldiers in the fort..."

Carlin.

"If you're truly wild at heart, you'll fight for your dreams."

We All Worship at the Alter of Hierarchy

Who's up? Who's down? Who's in? And who's out? And why do you want to know?

Lookin' Out My Backdoor

I know it has some exposure problems, but I'm just a point 'n click kind of a guy.

The Airing of Grievances

I'm really looking forward to Festivus this year. But, you know, in the blogosphere, every day is pretty much Festivus.

And the Award Goes to...

I confess I have paid exactly no attention to the Weblog Awards, until now. My first reaction is, "Who gives a rat's ass?" Upon reflection, my second reaction is, "Who the hell gives a rat's ass?"

We all worship at the alter of hierarchy.

But I've never been much of a church-goer.

And I'm really bummed I wasn't nominated for best Religion Weblog. Oh wait, there's no category for Best Religion Weblog. Haven't these assholes been keeping up with current events?! You know what happens next? That's right! Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

More About Hero

I had a lot more to say about Hero than I mentioned the other day, when I said I loved it. But it's the kind of movie that I find I can't really talk or write about it, without somehow betraying what I feel about it. Or something like that.

But other people can say things I agree with!

Ghost in the Shell

The DVD racks at the Navy Exchange are filled with Japanese anime (cartoons) and I happened to pick up this title two weeks ago. In '89, I was transferred from Florida back up to Norfolk, VA to be the combat systems officer in USS BAINBRIDGE (CGN-25) (great ship, fun job). My family was still in Florida, so I shared an apartment with an old shipmate of mine who was very much into anime and manga, what we would probably call "graphic novels." So I had some exposure to all this before things like Sailor Moon and Dragonball Z made it onto Cartoon Network. Mostly, I must confess, I didn't "get it."

Today I've acquired a bit of a taste for it. I'm still a little uncomfortable with the apparent fascination with little girls, or big ones, but it is probably the largest source of good animation anywhere. Before this, Akira and Spirited Away, were the only two full-length anime movies I'd seen. Well, that I remember anyway. I did watch a bunch of videotapes at my shipmate's apartment, there was probably a movie or two in there somewhere. Ghost in the Shell was a pretty decent movie, though I thought it could have gone quite a bit further in character development. Well, it's been turned into something of a franchise now. There's an article about GitS here, (link via Hack the Planet). Seeing the movie, the influence it had on The Matrix was quite apparent. I think I noted when Matrix Revolutions was released that the final fight sequence between Agent Smith and Neo looked like any of hundreds of similar sequences in the Dragonball Z series. I used to watch DBZ with my son, and while much of the series is repetitive, there were some very good storylines. My son's favorite was the Frieza saga, while I'm more fond of the Cell storyline.

All of which is apropos of nothing I guess, except I saw this link at Hack the Planet, and I just happened to have bought the movie and watched it a couple of weeks ago.

The Error of Big Government

I happened to catch part of an old West Wing episode on Bravo the other night, the one where Bartlett's MS is revealed. In it, the staff is hashing out the content of the State of the Union address; and the phrase, "the era of big government is over," was being debated. It's a familiar phrase, one that Clinton used in one of his speeches. What made that phrase sort of noteworthy was its coming from a Democrat. Democrats are supposedly the party of "big government," where social ills are supposed to be relieved by large, expensive federal programs. History has supposedly shown that those programs are ineffective, expensive and often perpetuate the very conditions they're supposed to rectify. Okay, maybe there's some merit to that argument.

So, one has to wonder what the believers in "small government" believe, when they think they can invade a country and install a working democracy? I mean, isn't this whole thing a large federal program designed to fix some pressing social problem?

Of course, one might also point out that Republicans objected to ratification of the Kyoto agreement on global warming because they believed many of the people promoting it had another agenda, the evidence was weak or contradictory, and it would amount to little more than a very expensive experiment. Which pretty much describes the whole Iraq war, if you ask me.

And just as an aside, I liked Victor Davis Hanson a lot more when he was just a relatively obscure professor of military history and classical studies. Now he's just another right wing, talking-head-know-it-all, who gravely opines on the cultural threats facing America from, like, Mexican immigrants and illegal aliens, and Hollywood.

Cat Psychology

"I, for one, welcome our new feline overlords."

I don't let my cats out in this apartment because of the number of large dogs not on leashes nearby. I have a small outdoor, screened deck though, and I live on the second floor. I figure that's pretty safe from dogs. So I let the cats hang out out there to get some fresh air and listen to the birds they don't get to stalk.

Unfortunately, they're like kids. Wherever they happen to be, they want to be someplace else. They know to scratch at the door to get me to open it. It's "scratch-scratch, let me out." Five minutes later it's, "Scratch-scratch, let me in." They'll keep this up all night I if I let them. Karma spent the night on the deck last night. Unfortunately, she happened to be outside when I got tired of opening the damn door. She seemed kind of miffed when I let her back in this morning. I guess it's a good thing they don't have opposable thumbs, but it can be damned inconvenient at times.

It's kind of pleasant out tonight, so I've got the door propped open. What do you think the cats are doing? Yes, they're both sleeping on the couch.

Retro

A couple of weeks ago, I browsed eBay on a whim, looking for used Newton MessagePads. My MP130's backlight is out of commission, and while I don't use the Newton day-to-day anymore, I do like the device. I figured if I could pick up another one in better condition for not much money, that would be pretty cool.

Well, a Canadian fellow was auctioning his off and he indicated it was in excellent condition. So I put in a bid and, surprisingly for me, I won. At the end of the day, I paid about $50.00 for a used Newton MP130 and a case.

It arrived yesterday, and after I opened the box, when he said "excellent condition," he wasn't kidding. The thing is in pristine condition, the red "New! Backlighting" sticker is still on the cover, unfaded, unblemished. The screen is immaculate and the backlight is bright, bright, bright. The case is a very nice leather affair, much smaller than my old Newton "communications case." It also came with a power adapter, which wasn't a standard item as I recall. I'm going to have to break out my PowerMac 6500 to back up the old 130 and then restore to the new one. I've got some copy-protected packages that I can't move across by beaming of moving them to my 2MB Flash card.

Interestingly, Newtons and their devoted users, still get mentioned in the tech press from time to time.

Authority Deconstructed

Everybody was kung-fu fighting!

From Britt Blazer's Escapable Logic:

None of this is fair to the lawyers who do this because they're only doing their job. Tough noogies. In every transition of power, force is projected by the rising elite against the old, and careers and reputations are lost and individuals are hurt. It is the way of nature. The question is, are we bloggers willing to discover and expose the words and identities of the individuals, having no fear of retribution, who threaten our friend Jason? We're certainly willing to track down every other detail that interests us, why not when one of us is attacked?

The exercise of real power is never fair. In the last year there's been a shift of power to citizen journalists who simply examine the public record and report what we've learned. We must rise up now that they have come for Jason, for they will surely come for us next.

"Never give in --- never, never, never, never in nothing great or small . . . Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy."

—Winston Churchill

An attractive sentiment, to be sure. But one wishes perhaps for a certain "escapable logic," all the same.

I will counter with a quotation, an aphorism from a cultural hero of my own:

"Whoever cannot seek the unforeseen sees nothing, for the known way is an impasse."

- Heraclitus

40?

No, I'm long past 40. I'm referring to the temperature. That's in Fahrenheit. It happens to be the temperature outside this morning. Here in Florida. Granted, it's northeast Florida, but still. It also happens to be the temperature in upstate New York, Syracuse specifically. So it's either as warm in New York as it is in Florida today. Or it's as cold in Florida as it is in New York. Take your pick. Either way, I'm cold.

Refreshing

And if you'd like to take a bit of a break from all things technological or political, check out Shelley Powers' latest post. She hikes, she takes great pictures, and then she blogs it to share it with all of us. Though the Burningbird has generated more than her share of heat from time to time, these posts are like a cool, refreshing oasis in the vast desert of cyberspace. (Yes, I'm quite aware that was a little over-the-top, but so what? ;^) "Extremism in defense of nice posts is no vice.")

And now for something completely different...

Omni Outliner 3.0 (beta) is here! (There was much rejoicing.)

This is cool. I just installed it, so I don't have any specific observations on it yet, other than to say what I've read about it so far looks very cool indeed. I'm an outliner "fanboy," I guess. I do Groundhog Day in Tinderbox, and I save all of my online research (if you can call it that) in NoteTaker. I've got Circus Ponies Notebook, though I confess I haven't used it for much, I do like to play around with it from time to time. And, of course, Life Balance has an outliner in it as well.

Of course, one has to wonder about my affinity for outliners, which are nothing if not tools for managing information hierarchically. Hmmm...

Okay, I Lied

Sorry, I'm back again on what I'll call the Jarvis-Powell Affair (which is probably a mistake, since it kind of promotes what I'm lamenting).

This is just to point out the zero-sum aspect of Mr. Jarvis approach. In order for Mr. Jarvis (or, he might say, the First Amendment and therefore, "us") to "win," Mr. Powell has to "lose." This focus on zero-sum outcomes is part of what drives the "anger" and vitriol. It doesn't have to be zero-sum, it can be win-win. Now, I can't outline for you the specifics of a win-win solution, but I'm pretty sure one can be identified. In order to do that, you need to engage with your nominal "opponent" and try to identify what characteristics a "win" for each of you would have in common.

Zero-sum thinking is an aspect of competitiveness within the hierarchy. It does help, in the very long run, to allow the "most fit" ideas survive. But I think we can take what we've learned about game theory, human psychology, group behavior and technology and begin to find a better way to do things. Zero-sum outcomes seem to demand these no-holds-barred, scorched earth campaigns that leave significant damage in their wake and impede our ability to make progress on other issues, as each "side" nurtures lingering grudges and refuses admonitions to "get over it," much like Mr. Jarvis and the general invitation to take a deep breath.

We can do better. But we won't until we start recognizing when we're doing "worse" and demanding better.

Ponderously Pondering

Before turning my attention to, hopefully, less leaden issues and concerns, I just want to offer a couple of more thoughts on the Jarvis/Powell affair.

I entered the permalink for Mr. Jarvis' rant into Technorati and as of this morning there are 16 links to the rant from 14 sources. A quick scan of them shows nearly all of them to be endorsements. They may all be, but I didn't bother to read them all. I entered the link to Mr. Powell's editorial and Technorati returned only one link from 19 hours ago. Despite the fact that Mr. Jarvis' post itself links to the editorial, it doesn't appear in the Technorati search result. My post doesn't appear either, and the most recent link to Mr. Jarvis was from 9 hours ago. So I'm not sure what's up with that, or how many inferences one can draw from it. I think it may say something about attention with the 16:1 result, but I'm not sure what. I've included the search URLs in the reference to the respective Technorati results, so you can update date the results yourself as time goes on.

The number of positive endorsements and the tenor of a few that I read sort of surprised me. Even more reasonable minds than Mr. Jarvis, like Dan Gillmor, uncritically endorsed Mr. Jarvis' rant. I find this somewhat disappointing. I think it's possible to agree with some of Mr. Jarvis' reasoned disagreement with Mr. Powell's editorial, while not endorsing or subscribing to the manner in which he delivered it. Perhaps they're choosing to overlook that in favor of the "larger issue," vis a vis freedom of speech. But, to me, the "larger issue" is how we wish to shape the conduct of this "conversation;" that is, if we hope to have one.

Finally, I'm inclined to wonder how much of the vehemence and vitriol of Mr. Jarvis' rant and some of the more vitriolic endorsements is a lingering effect of the campaign season. I suspect many people became accustomed to a certain level of stress (or excitement) in their online interactions and, while they tacitly recognized the corrosive nature of those stressful interactions, as reflected in the creation of the now inoperative "pledge," they are replicating those stressful interactions in other issues. In other words, an effort to maintain a kind of homeostasis. In this regard, Mr. Powell is kind of like abortion. He's not an elected government official, so he has no constituency to offend, therefore he's safe to attack. Second, what is being notionally "defended" is the First Amendment, which, like "life" in the abortion debate, is an unquestioned "good." Recall Barry Goldwater, "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice." So perhaps Mr. Jarvis and others like him, who are harboring some desire to nurture and preserve that level of "excitement" they experienced during the presidential campaign, have found a "safe" way to do so.

Anyway, I happen to think this is all very unfortunate and I wonder about things like reaping what one sows and the like. Maybe you might wish to think about them too.

"So why do you care, Rogers?

Why pick on Jeff Jarvis? Well, I don't mean to be picking on him. There are some weblogs I read not because I find what the weblogger writes to be interesting in itself, but as a examples of larger themes - how we behave as human beings. The things that I identify in others as behaviors that are related to competition for rank within a hierarchy are things that I have identified in myself first. I haven't eradicated those behaviors or tendencies by any means; but I am somewhat more conscious of them, and I'd like to make others more conscious of them as well. I don't expect to make Jeff Jarvis conscious of them, but perhaps his example may persuade others. Where I sometimes exhibit the same behaviors, I try to point them out as well.

I've read over and over and over again about how the internet and weblogs will "change everything." There is this, almost inspiring, faith in technology to make our human experience so much better. But our human experience is a fundamentally human one, not a fundamentally technological one. True, you probably can't separate them, but it the human dimension is by far the dominant one. We spend far more of our limited time and attention studying and talking about our technological experience, than we do studying and trying to understand our human one. And I think it shows.

Before 9/11 the "blogosphere" was pretty much one big, happy, almost giddy, family. We had some unpleasant surprises like the Kaycee deception, but we pretty much all just got along. During that period, much of the mythos about the transformative power of the internet was established, "markets are conversations," and "small pieces" were "loosely joined." Democracy was going to be "emergent."

Then 9/11 happened, and something else happened too. Maybe a critical mass of human weblogging presence was finally achieved and that got the normal, full-spectrum, chain reaction of human interactions moving online. I'm not sure, but the cracks began to appear along with more of our all too human nature. The possibility for civil discourse over a broad range of issues seemed to vanish almost overnight. Of course, this probably came as no surprise to people who were familiar with things like Usenet, or e-mail lists, or even the old telephone-based BBSs (bulletin-board systems). I used to get involved in long heated political debates in the political forums in GEnie that never resolved anything. Why did we think the internet was going to be any different? Maybe because it was still whizzy and new, and we hadn't started breaking the windows and spraying graffiti yet.

And right around the time I started weblogging, just a few months before in fact, I started something of a significant personal transformation. One that is incomplete yet remains, hopefully, ongoing. Significant parts of that have been documented here and in its predecessor, Time's Shadow. I began to understand my own behavior in ways I'd never understood it before. I don't claim to be an authority, and it's entirely possible that I could be wrong, but it seems to be clear to me that Gandhi had it exactly right, "You must become the change you wish to see in the world." I have interpreted that to mean that it's not my job to change the world, my job is to change myself. I have little power to accomplish the former, and maybe just enough to accomplish the latter. If each of us tried to do that, I think that may be the only thing that could truly "change the world."

So I'm trying to understand how we behave and why we behave the way we do. I think it's pretty clear that it's related to the fact that we must exist as members of groups, and that competition is the dominant behavioral motivation within and between groups. Certainly, cooperation plays an important role as well, but I think it's usually in the larger context of some form of competition with something or someone else. I think if we become more self-aware of the origins of our behavior, how it works both for good and ill, then we might begin to mitigate some of the more ill effects.

Now, I'm not trying to change Jeff Jarvis. I don't have the power (authority) to do that, nor is it my responsibility. I just point out examples of his behavior that illustrate the broader, more general behaviors we all exhibit. A certain amount of emotion creeps in from time to time, but I'm trying to do better.

I don't think Jeff Jarvis' rant helped the cause of freedom of speech. Others will disagree. I think all Mr. Jarvis did was titillate some and validate others who already agree with him. I think people who are inclined to give Mr. Powell the benefit of the doubt are only more inclined to do so after reading Mr. Jarvis' rant. I think Mr. Jarvis' rant takes a toll on Mr. Jarvis. He's put this thing up for all the world to see, and now he has to defend it. I think he'll get a few more appearances on television out of it. I think it may drive a few more links his way, and his rank in the blogosphere will improve; but I think the negative effects mostly outweigh the positive ones. Perhaps he thinks he's "putting the heat on" Mr. Powell. I don't know. I don't know if Mr. Powell perceives it that way, or if he just thinks Mr. Jarvis is a little overheated himself.

Oddly enough, I read and cite his weblog because I can tolerate reading it. There are other webloggers who exhibit similar behaviors or worse, but whose writing I simply cannot stand to read. The vehemence of my disagreement with their positions interferes with being able to observe and comment on what they're doing. If you want to have less stress in your life, part of the answer is to avoid putting yourself in stressful situations. So it's not like I'm totally unsympathetic to Mr. Jarvis, he at least chooses to promote himself on issues I happen to think he's on the right side of. At some point, perhaps I will have mastered my own emotional response sufficient to allow me to read and comment on, unemotionally, those weblogs with which I most vehemently disagree.

This weblog is called Groundhog Day because it's about movie that's about changing yourself. It's really about seeing your shadow. It's about becoming a light unto yourself, so that that shadow disappears. That's probably too tall an order, and I should probably just stick with working on myself. But here I am. Doesn't make me a hero. Doesn't make me higher in anyone's hierarchy. The only person I have the slightest chance of changing is myself. If changing ourselves is what it's going to take to "change everything," then everybody is going to have to do their own work. Not much room for heroes in that sort of world. So I'm pretty much out of the hero business. I'm just a guy with an opinion.

Consistency

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds," according to Emerson. But we do value consistency; so perhaps the trick is to separate the foolish from the not-so-foolish.

Back on the 1st of November, Mr. Jarvis posted his post-election pledge. It read as follows:

After the election results are in, I promise to:

His pledge garnered a certain amount of attention from other webloggers and even some from mainstream media, which is about what one would expect from a high attention-earning weblogger like Mr. Jarvis. Much of that attention was due to the conciliatory tone of the pledge, coming as it did near the end of a bitterly partisan political campaign season.

A pledge is like a promise, though the definitions seem to suggest something more serious than a promise. It's less than a vow, less than an oath, but more than a promise. We expect people to keep their promises, even as we know that many people won't. It seems reasonable to believe that Mr. Jarvis used the word "pledge" deliberately, and intended for this to be perceived as something a little more than a casual promise.

I believe Mr. Jarvis intended to honor that pledge. I believe that he would tell you today that he has honored that pledge and he continues to honor it. I don't think he has, and I want to talk about why.

First I want to show how I don't believe Mr. Jarvis has honored his pledge. This morning, I read the editorial in today's New York Times by Michael Powell, the chairman of the FCC. Even before I read it, I knew it would receive an over-the-top rebuttal from Mr. Jarvis, but when I read the first sentence, "Time to take a deep breath," I knew it would be no ordinary over-the-top rebuttal from Mr. Jarvis. Mr. Jarvis has been so shrill in his criticism of the FCC, I believed he would take that vague admonition to "take a deep breath" personally. And indeed, it appears he has.

In a post he titled "Fisking Our National Nanny," Mr. Jarvis responds to Mr. Powell. While Mr. Powell directed none of his remarks to anyone personally, it seems as though Mr. Jarvis took them that way, and responds in a personal and disrespectful way. He begins with a title that is little more than name-calling. "Fisking" by the way, is a blogger-term that describes the hostile deconstruction of one's ideological opponents, usually done with great relish and often dripping with sarcasm or condescension. While it is held as an activity that is praiseworthy, I find it usually exhibits many of the least desirable traits of our common humanity. In some ways, what I'm doing might be termed a "Fisking," but I'm not having much fun doing it, I'm afraid.

I won't quote the whole thing, but I think the first few paragraphs should illustrate my point sufficiently to proceed. He begins:

"Time to take a deep breath." [Note: Quotation marks added.]

Of course, one wonders what recent experience Mr. Jarvis had with Continental Airlines, and what poor "airline clerk" had to be on the receiving end of Mr. Jarvis' "righteous anger," and what all that has to do with FCC regulatory power. I can identify with Mr. Jarvis's desire to resort to physical violence, although not in the situation he cites, the feeling is entirely too familiar to me. When I find myself feeling that way, I have learned that the best thing for me to do is to take a deep breath. Mr. Jarvis doesn't appear to care for this advice, as his next words are:

"Don't tell me what to do, Powell."

It seems pretty clear that Mr. Jarvis is exercised and has taken Mr. Powell's editorial personally. Note the disrespectful familar use of Mr. Powell's last name. Later in the piece, as Mr. Jarvis seems to get his emotions under more control, he begins using "Mr. Powell" in the more formal manner of address. He calls Mr. Powell a "prig" and accuses him of lying, a charge he repeats several times.

The piece is not an unemotional, dispassionate rebuttal or rejoinder to Mr. Powell's editorial. I'm not arguing the merits of either case here, I'm discussing what's happening.

Later on, after receiving some comments that his response may have been a little much, Mr. Jarvis offers this (no permalink, posted at 3:58PM on 3 December):

As for the tone and those who don't like it: I didn't like Michael Powell's condescending tone, either. I chose to rant. This deserves a rant. I'm angry about attacks on the First Amendment. And I'll show it. And, by the way, this is a blog; it's about immediacy and not about turning views into tapioca. I believe what I say strongly and I say it strongly.

This is not consistent with what Mr. Jarvis offered in taking his pledge. It is difficult for me to understand how anyone could believe that what Mr. Jarvis offers in his "Fisking" of Mr. Powell's editorial is consistent with upholding the standards of civilized discourse. Mr. Jarvis has departed from his pledge.

What Mr. Jarvis is exhibiting in his rationalization of his intemperate remarks is an example of reasoning backward from his feelings, something each of us does all the time, and we do it unconsciously. If we are to promote standards of civilized discourse, it seems to me we need to be conscious of the state of our emotions and decide whether or not we want them to govern how we choose to discuss and debate the matters that receive our attention.

Many of the comments to this post are encouragement to Mr. Jarvis. People do enjoy reading a good rant. I believe we derive some sort of vicarious thrill, or sense of validation by witnessing others express strong emotions we feel inhibited from expressing. I have strong emotions, and from time to time they have governed how I chose to write about some of the things I've written about over much of the last five years I've been doing this. Although, like Mr. Jarvis, I have often received encouragement and validation after doing so, they have sometimes led to bitter disputes that are invariably never resolved and which leave a lingering bad smell in the air. I found they also exacted a certain toll on me. After writing a scathing post, I was on the alert, ready to defend it and slap down anyone who wished to challenge it. It established a stress response in my online interactions, one that I was growing uncomfortably comfortable with. It's like a homeostasis situation. Leaving a marital situation where I was constantly under stress, presumably to live a better, less stressful life somewhere else; I found was recreating that stressful environment online. I'm not suggesting that's what's happening here, specifically, but it may be part of it.

There are a few things I think we can identify here, a few processes that shape behavior. First, I believe we are all in some state of competition for authority, or rank in the hierarchy. We may be content where we're at, but in that case we're watchful and sensitive to things that may diminish it. You like your house, but the next door neighbor puts a pool in and the next thing you know, you're putting in one too. Or an addition. Or maybe new siding. "Keeping up with the Joneses" is a reflection of competition within and awareness of rank within hierarchies. Mr. Jarvis is still seeking greater rank by asserting authority regarding the First Amendment, and by writing in ways that are likely to garner attention.

I don't doubt for one second that Mr. Jarvis was angry about what Mr. Powell wrote. Nor do I believe Mr. Jarvis made any sort of calculation that an angry rant would garner him more attention and increase the relative appearance of his authority. I believe we have evolved to pay attention to anger, because anger is related to many things that may affect the survival of the group. We try not to, but who hasn't listened to an angry couple quarreling? If it's someone who clearly appears irrational, then we don't pay much attention, and usually try to place distance between ourselves and an irrational, angry person. But if there's the appearance of rationality, we'll often pay attention because that's how we're wired in our evolutionary makeup. That's why angry, confrontational shows like Crossfire are on television. I don't doubt that Mr. Jarvis was angry, nor do I believe he wrote his post in a calculated way to attract attention. But I do believe that he, like nearly all of us, has an unconscious, intuitive understanding that anger will garner us attention.

As you read Mr. Jarvis' post, you can make out where his initial anger begins to fade, and he begins to write in a way that is more consistent with a reasoned response. Yet he continued to frame his rebuttal in a, needlessly in my opinion, confrontational manner. This confrontational approach works to reduce the relative disparity in authority between Mr. Powell and Mr. Jarvis. Mr. Powell is the Chairman of the Federal Communications System. Mr. Jarvis is a weblogger and a sometimes talking head on TV. Mr. Powell has legitimate authority granted to him by the federal government. Mr. Jarvis has the authority of his opinions. In the hiearchy of authority, Mr. Jarvis is clearly at a disadvantage. So it's important to reduce the relative appearance of that authority by being confrontational about it. Mr. Powell was addressing nobody in particular in his editorial, Mr. Jarvis chose to address Mr. Powell personally, as though Mr. Powell had personally addressed Mr. Jarvis. Again, this is, perhaps intuitively, unconsciously, intended to reduce the relative disparity in authority. Mr. Jarvis seems to portray himself as a peer in the hierarchy. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with this, except where such an effort impairs the achievement of a civil discourse.

In the end, I think little was served in the way of a defense of the First Amendment. By far, the greatest service was to Mr. Jarvis himself, who exploited Mr. Powell's editorial to garner more attention for himself and who attempted to obscure the disparity in authority between himself and Mr. Powell. To the extent that his rant may help bring about more reasoned discourse on the protections afforded by the First Amendment, then perhaps some good will come of it; but mostly this was about serving the goals and aspirations of Mr. Jarvis, and the First Amendment was little more than a vehicle for achieving that. I'm not saying this is a bad thing. I'm simply saying this is the way it appears to me. It also seems quite likely to me that most of the advances in freedom and social justice have probably been achieved in just this way. I don't know if it's the best way, and I rather hope that it's not.

I'm only too aware of my propensity to respond to events and issues that provoke me just the way Mr. Jarvis has. In my weblogging tool, I have a category for posts that seldom get published. It's called The Cooler. Most of my rants go there to die. I write them and get that out of my system. Then I go back and read them days, weeks or months later. Some of them get re-written in a less emotional tone and get published. Others are destined to remain in The Cooler, perhaps forever.

Occasionally, I screw up. I'm human too. Like on this day, when I got up early and read a few things that made me angry. I posted it without thinking too much about it and later discovered a couple of people liked it. In hindsight, it should have gone into The Cooler. It serves no useful purpose, but I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to discern who I might have had in mind when I wrote it.

Glitch

I don't know, but I suspect there's a problem with 10.3.6 and the way it talks to the network. Ever since I installed 10.3.6 I've had frequent problems with the computer locking up after waking from sleep, often when I've tried to sync my iDisk manually. Here's a partial dump of the system log during the latest glitch:

Dec 3 15:12:12 localhost kernel: System Wake

Dec 3 15:12:12 localhost kernel: Wake event 0020

Dec 3 15:12:12 localhost kernel: Sound assertion "0 != err" failed in "AppleLegacyAudio/AppleTexas2Audio/AppleTexas2Audio.cpp" at line 3633 goto Exit

Dec 3 15:12:12 localhost kernel: AppleNMI unmask NMI

Dec 3 15:12:12 localhost kernel: Sound assertion "0 != err" failed in "AppleLegacyAudio/AppleTexas2Audio/AppleTexas2Audio.cpp" at line 960 goto Exit

Dec 3 15:12:12 localhost kernel: rtclock timebase_callback: late old 1000000000 / 33302836 new 1000000000 / 33302721FWOHCI handleSelfIDInt - nodeID not valid (reset bus and retry 1)

Dec 3 15:12:12 localhost kernel: rtclock timebase_callback: late old 1000000000 / 33302836 new 1000000000 / 33302721UniNEnet::monitorLinkStatus - Link is up at 100 Mbps - Full Duplex