Expelled!: Stupidity, Greivous Insult, or Both?

For those of you who don't know, Ben Stein is starring in a new movie (I refuse to call it a documentary) called Expelled!. The movie's tagline is: "Big Science has expelled smart new ideas from the classroom. What they forgot is that every generation has its Rebel..." I can think of more influential people in Stein's generation, but whatever. The idea of the film is that American academia is censoring people with "smart new ideas" (read: intelligent design) from being successful. I could go into detail about how ID is neither smart nor new, but it's been done for me, many, many times. I have two big problems with this movie (or at least what I've heard so far; it doesn't open publicly until April). Problem 1 is the way the movie tries to portray the "problem" as an issue of free speech, and problem 2 is the comparisons that the producers try to make between real scientists and another famous historical group. Allow me to expand.

Imagine, if you will, that after I get off work today, I go down to Mercy Regional Health Center (the local hospital). I somehow get everyone who works in the hospital into a big meeting, all at once. Doctors, nurses, administrators, everyone. Perhaps I brought some sort of small refreshment, cookies or something, perhaps not; I leave that to your imagination. In any case, when everyone is assembled, I begin to tell them how I've discovered something wonderful. I have found a miracle cure made from crushed grasshoppers, Dr. Pepper, turpentine, and a formula of "snips and snails and puppy-dog tails". This potion, I say, cures everything from asthma to zephyrsma (shut up, it's hard to find a disease that starts with a Z). I have reams of evidence to support my theory, but no, I can't show them, because I must have left it in my other pants. The result will be that I am about to get laughed right out of the hospital. Is that my right to free speech being squelched? Am I being oppressed? Are my rights being trampled? No, not at all. I'm an idiot, and have just let every doctor in the hospital know it in no uncertain terms. Being laughed out would be merciful, though, when the full extent of my actions became known; while all the doctors were in the lecture hall listening to me, how many patients would die?

I'm being a bit melodramatic here, but only just barely. The people in academia are going to ignore you and laugh at you if you suggest things that make as much scientific sense as my bug-pop-turp-SSP potion did. It's not a free speech conflict, it's an issue of appropriateness. Science is based on observable phenomena backed up with lots and lots of evidence. This evidence comes from repeated testing by many, many scientists all over the world. As soon as a theory appears on the scientific stage that has just as much evidence as evolution does from so many varied fields (geology, genetics, physics, anthropology, chemistry, etc.), I will support it being taught alongside evolution. I am an advocate of free speech, and am very passionate about it. If this were a free speech issue, I would be all fired up.

The other aspect of the hospital analogy is that when real scientists are forced to stop and explain what they're doing, and why they don't pray for better results, it keeps them from doing real work. Admittedly, not all scientific research is vital, world changing stuff, but cancer research? Immunology work? Stem cells? Regenerating lost tissue? That's really important, possibly world altering research, and when scientists are held to the kind of thinking more appropriate to Inquisition era minds, it takes their time from the important work they're doing.

The second issue that I mentioned, comparing the work of scientists to the work of Nazis, is much more galling and offensive to me. Not even in the part that directly insults me (being that I am a scientist; well, a scientist-in-training), but the sheer devaluation of the human misery and loss of life in Nazi Germany. The sheer hubris behind the idea that academics not listening to crackpot theories is on the same level as 6 million murders (and that's just Jewish deaths, to say nothing of Gypsies, homosexuals, black, or any other minorities targeted) astounds me. Sheer bloody minded arrogance of this sort is intolerable to anyone who has actually thought about the death toll of the Nazi death camps, much less to the survivors and their families.

So shame on you, Ben Stein. Shame on you, Mark Mathis. Shame, for making a mockery of all those who have dedicated their lives to unlocking the secrets of the natural world. Shame, for callously ignoring the pain of millions of people in one of the worst tragedies in human history. And finally, shame for lying to your viewers, trying to make your whining out to be a violation of your rights. You have proven yourselves to have no intellectual, moral, or common decency, and as such, are people who have no business telling other people what a valid intellectual pursuit is. My hope is that this movie will be very forgettable, one that will soon be lost from the public consciousness. I'd hope that theaters will refuse to pick it up, but I'll keep my hopes reasonable for the time being.

Devil May Cry 4: First Impression

My girlfriend (because she is awesome) got me Devil May Cry 4 for 360 for Valentines Day. I have it already because... well, I'm going to have to go with the fact that she's awesome again.

Devil May Cry 3 is one of two games I own for the PS2, and the only game I own for that console that I haven't beaten. I rank DMC3 as being comparable in difficulty to Ninja Gaiden, and explanation of which can be found here. However, I liked it a lot more than Ninja Gaiden, because I found the controls to be more to my style, and, more to the point, the sheer mind-blowing, physics defying style of combat made me feel like a minor deity for pulling off the ridiculously long and intricate combos that were required to kill any enemy at all. Not that it was perfect; the difficulty was, as mentioned, rather extreme, due in large part to the extremely low incidence of health; the camera could be frustrating at times, since it had the annoying habit of switching to a fixed location right as a fight started, although these things sound more nit-picky to me than anything at this point. However, it never stopped being fun, due to the sheer visceral joy I got from combat, and the wonderful dickishness of the main character. Unfortunately, the game also saw fit to erect a brick wall about halfway though, in the form of two angel-like creatures who locked me in a room, started ignoring clipping, and promptly turned my face into raspberry puree over and over again. Even the few times I managed to kill them both, I ended up at such low health that the light breeze in the next room would knock me over and crack my neck on an unfortunately placed floor. This was about the same time my PS2 decided that life had nothing left to offer it, which conspired to keep me from playing it ever again.

Well, now I have a new Devil May Cry to play on a new console, one that will surely never break. I feel I should start by saying that the game is beautiful, even on my small, proletariat tv. I kind of expect this from xBox games nowadays, having come straight from Bioshock and Gears of War, but even by those standards, I am rather impressed. But, the part of the game that really matters, the combat, still ROCKS MY FACE. Even within the first two chapters, I was having great fun chaining together the attacks with the sword, gun, and this new grabby-throwy arm thing. Not only that, but having played 3 so much, I'm already hungering for new combos and things to get longer and more absurd chains of carnage. Even with how much fun the combat is to do, it's also fun to watch. I find myself in the habit of completely losing track of what my hands are doing on the controller just because I'm so entertained by the choreography on screen. So as far as first impressions go, two thumbs way up.

Now if only I had time to play it.

Psychonauts, Bioshock, and More!

Man, I don't update much.

So, I realize that I'm a few years behind here, but Psychonauts is pretty much awesome. It's been out for so long that there's not a lot of stuff I can say about it, since everyone but me has played it, so I guess I'll just keep it short by saying that it's intelligent, funny, and delightful to play. Even though I want to throw the controller through the TV because of the some of the stuff going on in the Meat Circus. That's right, a Meat Circus. Be afraid.

I got Bioshock the other day (I know, behind the times again), but due to classwork, I haven't had much time to play it. Sadness.

Movies make me sad lately. Not the ones I've watched, but the apparent sheer retardation of the market at large. I mean, Cloverfield, Juno, and Sweeny Todd, the last movies I saw in a theater, were great, though Cloverfield made me violently ill, and I'm pretty sure anyone who laughs as hard as I did at Sweeny Todd has some mental problems. Unfortunately, most of the other fare offered by the market nowadays makes me want to punch a baby. Due to time constraints, I don't make it to the theater much, but somehow, I'm going to see 3:10 to Yuma, There Will Be Blood, Michael Clayton, and No Country for Old Men.

Perhaps I shall try to bring out my inner movie elitist guy and post more often.

Sleep Is Overrated

It seems that as this year wears on, I'm just going to find more and more reasons not to sleep. I'm not asleep right now, Thursday morning, because I'm at work. I could be doing other, much more productive things, but I think we all know I'm not very good at that. The reason for my lack of sleep last night shall remain nameless. Tuesday morning was actually kind of fun; apparently, being awake at 4:30 in the morning to go out to a tiny box with windows and watch Prairie Chickens abuse each other for the pleasure of the assembled females is much more entertaining than sleep. It's actually quite fascinating; there's a definite social structure and hierarchy to the activity on a lek, and I suppose it probably shifts in minor ways every morning; I'm not sure how constant individual chicken attendance to a lek is, but being that one of our instructors implied that there eare multiple leks on Konza, I feel I can assume that the population is fairly large. Unfortunately, I have neither the training nor, evidently, the coherence (at least that early in the morning) to discern much more about said social structure than that there is one.

Later today, a co-worker and I are going to present a possible training regimen/competency test we spent the past two weeks assembling to our co-workers. The use of an english major to proofread the technical writing I did was excellent for my ego; good to know that my writing skills haven't gone the way of my conversational abilities. I feel rather good about it. We worked hard; I think it's all put together well, if I do say so myself. I'm told that our boss wants to put the whole affair on the herbarium website when we're finished. My co-worker was rather opposed to this. Admittedly, it wouldn't be very helpful to most people; my understanding is that the form is so easy to customize that no one running Specify is entering information in in what could be considered even a mildly similar format. I've seen screenshots of the KU Herbariums form; they support that conclusion. Even if it's only with one permutation of the program, I don't mind coming up on a Google search as "one of those guys competent enough to figure stuff out." As long as my name stays on it, he can do whatever he wants with it, as far as I'm concerned. Those sound exactly like words I'll someday be forced to eat, but so be it.

Grindhouse is everything I expected it to be. Quentin Tarantino is a good reminder to me that I really shouldn't be judging movies or their creators without actually having any exposure to said films. Without having ever seen any, I freely condemned Tarantino's works; now, having seen Grindhouse and Pulp Fiction, hearing that he's involved with an upcoming movie sends chills up my spine not unlike the ones I get from adding sugar to already adequately sweetened pie: it's probably bad for me in some way, but man, it's gonna be great. I haven't even seen the movies that are more frequently held up as his best works, namely Kill Bill 1 & 2 and Reservoir Dogs. They'll probably end up on my summer "I Should Watch These Movies" list. Actually, now that I think about it, the creation of such a list may not be too bad an idea. Perhaps a project for my procrastination period later today.

After A Long Break

I'm thinking I should start updating this again; I like writing, and it's good for a person to put ideas and thoughts out in the open. A lot of things that sound sensible in a person's head are revealed to be nonsense when written out, and vice versa.

So I'm going to try a little harder to update. On the agenda: philosophy, rants, gaming. You know, the important stuff. Stay tuned.

Back at It

Well, school has begun anew, much to my disappointment. In two days, I had some session of pretty much all my classes; it's really pretty depressing to realize how busy I'm going to be this semester. I'll make it through (I hope).

Also very sad is that the World of Warcraft expansion comes out tomorrow, on what I would consider to be the first real day of class. Garr! I am not forced to split my work/hobby time in an incredibly frustrating manner.

Having finally acquired a Revolution, I love it.

Silence, Deep Thoughts, and Gears (of the militant kind)

It's interesting, really, that when a person decides to not speak unless he has something of value to say, he finds out that he really has very little of value to say. This is a large part of the reason I've been more reluctant to speak the last month or so (or at least, I'm trying). A taciturn attitude doesn't lend itself well to a blog, which helps to explain the sheer lack of updating I've been doing despite the copious amounts of free time I have being on break.

I've been doing a lot of "deep" thinking lately, spurred in no small part by the amount of free time I suddenly find myself with, and the fact that the power has been out for a good deal of it. The majority of it is about mostly academic: philosophy, ethics, human nature, things of that sort. I'm pursuing, so it would seem, reconciliation between the things in my head and what I see in the real world, and trying to make them relate to each other in ways I can understand and use. This is mostly dealing with ethics, deciding what I find acceptable and trying to draw some more specific and useful statements out of the general ones I already had. My thoughts on human nature lead me more toward figuring out what my "acceptable statements" fit into what most people would consider ethical, which is useful for both retrospective activities and prediction of future behavior (both my own and others). I more or less consider myself a good person, but I also tend to think that I would be more capable of questionable activities that most people would consider unpalatable. The same general statement goes for several activities that I don't participate in but are important on a larger level. I have my reasons for thinking this, and the odds are good that I'll never really come up against anything to test that statement, so it's relegated to the realm of interesting but ultimately pointless thought. For that reason, I won't bore you with the details. I can almost hear someone reading this line, saying "too late." But if you're reading this, the odds are good that you are at least mildly interested in my thinking, which means I strongly suggest you seek professional help.

A part of my thinking has been of a more practical sort: namely, what exactly I want to do with my life. I wish I could still claim the excuse of youth to keep from thinking about it, but it's kind of getting to the point where I have to decide so I can start working for it. I mean this in a very specific way. I need to decide exactly what field, what type of work, and if I can, who I want to be working for. I've heard good things about working for the government, namely, that they pay you and you don't do that much. Unfortunately, the problem of not knowing anyone in my own field is coming back to haunt me; I don't know people who know things. I suspect I'm going to have a confused couple of years around the end of college and my entrance into the real world, a prospect I don't particularly relish, given my penchant for messing up. This is rather annoying, given that I'm not exactly gaining time to think about this. If I am, it means I have a different set of problems, but I don't worry about that much anymore. Then there are general things, ultimate location, the mildly unsettling idea of turning into a hermit (the distinct social and romantic sides of that are separate trains of thought), and when exactly I'll feel it's time to acquire a pair of Siberian Huskies. Need to figure some of this out. Mainly the job stuff, the rest should logically follow from that.

Gears of War is amazing. I'm really on the verge of taking back everything bad I've said about the 360, just on the basis of this one game. I also own Dead Rising and F.E.A.R., but Gears is what really grabbed my attention and held it. The idea of shooting from cover is great, although I wonder why they decided to couple that with one of the greatest melee weapons ever (a chainsaw grafted with loving care to the front of your weapon). The teammate AI needs some work, but as soon as I make it back to Manhattan, that won't be an issue, since I'll never play with a computer teammate again. I'm anxiously awaiting that. Co-op is great, and games made for it are like little gemstones. That metaphor didn't make sense, but it's 2:40 in the morning, give me a break.

Most of this post was personal stuff, which I sort of apologize for, but that's what's been on my mind. Future posts will probably stick to more interesting things.