I was asked why post #1000 looked backward rather than forward. It’s a fair question; I’m generally not one for looking back. I’m not terribly attached to the past (certainly not bound by it), but that doesn’t mean I completely ignore it. (History repeats, in part, because we don’t learn from it.)
As with years, counting posts begins with 1, so the odometer number 1000 is the end of a count sequence (one-thousand posts), which makes looking back seem fitting. That post was also a blog birthday so all the more reason to review.
This post, #1001, is the first post of the next thousand.
Or, more realistically, the next hundred(s). I’m not sure I’ll be doing this for nine more years (although who can say; maybe I’ll be one of the last long-form bloggers left standing).
More to the point, who can say what will happen in the next year, let alone in nine of them. (Not me! Sometimes next week surprises me.)
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I’ve written a lot about consciousness mostly in the context of whether it can be implemented with software.
That ground seems pretty well covered for now, so unless I find new things to say, or unless there are changes in the field, I don’t plan to pursue it much. I remain skeptical about software consciousness, but I very much doubt the question will be resolved in my lifetime.
So it’s a topic that we can argue endlessly, which is fun and good mental exercise, but I’ve gotten a little weary of being stalled at guesswork. (For the same reason I haven’t been paying much attention to the high-energy physics world, either. Nothing new under the collider.)
I have notes about a post summarizing the recent posts about algorithms (last year and early this year). Computers are not the physical systems they model.
For me that probably wraps things up when it comes to information patternism, at least for now.
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I expect to continue with posts about books, TV shows, and movies.
Maybe less on the movies, since I haven’t found most new movies very interesting (for quite a few years now; it’s probably been a decade since I’ve been to a movie theater).
There are the rare gems — usually found off the main paths, although even mainstream films aren’t completely immune from greatness (they are just far more comfortable with bland unoriginal mediocrity).
The emphasis is usually on science fiction, of course (although there’s always Mystery Monday). Sometimes, with books, I leave out the fiction; I also like me some science (books; most TV science shows leave me thirsty).
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One thing I’ve been a bit lax about is posting the life stories. That was always a big intent of the blog — leaving a scrawl on the internet wall. “Kilroy was here!”
The recent Canada Camping post is an example. The text file sat in my Queue folder since I began the blog. There are a lot more stories in that folder. For instance, the time we went camping way up north in Saskatchewan (so far north we were under the Northern Lights and off many maps).
There’s also the time we rented a houseboat on Lake Vermilion (in northern Minnesota). That was an interesting trip. Night fishing for sunfish. Caught a bunch of beauties — utter slabs. Couldn’t eat any of them; they all were infested with worms. (Fishing with a lighted bobber is cool, though. When a fish hits, the little LED light is pulled down into the water.)
I’ve written about key points in high school, college, work, and life, but there are a lot more stories to tell.
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I expect to continue with the occasional Sideband post when something grabs my inner über-geek. (The blog is also my science notebook for capturing stuff that’s caught my interest. Be thankful I off-load my programming posts to my other blog!)
There will be more math posts. Maybe in March or May. (With diagrams, because diagrams gotta diagram.)
I’ve been trying talk myself into publishing short “tweet” posts with just a single idea and not a lot of accompanying text. Not really my style, and I can’t decide whether to make them Brain Bubbles or just really short posts.
(And whether they should be indexed, which would blow up the Index if I posted a lot of them. And whether they should have a header picture.)
As much as possible I want to clear out my queue and toss my notes. (I’m afraid to even look at the pile of older notes I found during spring cleaning. So far I’ve left it lurking in a corner.)
Getting aggressive in draining the tank may require some half-cocked “flying by the seat of my pants” posts.
In the spirit of web logging, posts as notes and thoughts in progress.
[This rambling, random post is exactly what I mean. It’s actually almost entirely content-free. I’m just warming up after taking a little vacation. Don’t want to pull any of my writing muscles.]
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Baseball is seriously derailed this year (along with so much else). I’ve had other things on my mind lately, and baseball sank out of sight. At this point I’m not sure how into the shortened season I’ll be when (if) it kicks off.
I had already decided 2019 was the last year of tracking the season using my homemade Python stats package. I’ve done it since 2010 — ten years is enough. (Not having those homemade stats to show off may cut down on the baseball posts. Depends on how the Twins do.)
I wrote the first version of that suite to give me the stats I wanted for an informal online group of Twins fans. We’d take over the comment section of the summary of the previous game and use it as a chat room.
But I got fed up with the BS, left for a year, missed it, came back for a year, but the BS was worse, and I realized chatting during the game (which is when the chat was active) was so distracting I wasn’t enjoying the game.
I wrote the second version of the Python suite because I learned so many things from the first one (about how not to write it; even version 2.0 kinda begs for a version 3.0 that’ll never happen but would be so much better).
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Lastly, I expect I’ll continue writing posts about modern society.
One thing I want to start discussing more frequently and bluntly is stupidity. (Don’t for a moment think I just mean those dumb-asses on the right. There are just as many dumb-asses on the left and in between.)
Our anti-intellectual culture has turned a high IQ into something unwelcome (although it pays lip service to it). A high intelligence is like “thinking outside the box” — universally lauded in principle; usually punished in practice.
We’ve become a nation of day-dreaming self-centered unapologetic assholes who deny the factual world. The proof of the pudding is in who we elected POTUS in 2016. The continued proof of a now rotten stinking maggoty pudding is that 2020 will be anything other than a unanimous landslide.
We too often allow ourselves to be stupid. We need to talk about that.
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One resolution I have is to try to write shorter posts. Brevity being the soul of something or other.
Stay long-winded, my friends!
∇
Logos con carne 
July 17th, 2020 at 8:20 am
Speaking of “self-centered unapologetic assholes” on my morning walk as I approached a nearby significant intersection, I saw someone zip through the red light at high speed. The light was definitely red when he zipped through, so this fucker saw the yellow and sped up.
“How many times have I seen that exact thing at this light?” I thought. (One time driving through I was nearly creamed by someone running the light.) Then, as I got to the light, another guy ran it, making a high-speed left turn through a definitely red light.
Two in 60 seconds, and that’s at just this one light. I imagine the Copernican principle applies, so assholes must be running all the red lights all the time. When did we become such a nation of self-centered motherfuckers?
The only sanity is that not everyone is an asshole. After I crossed the light, walked down the block to my street and was about to cross the road, I saw an oncoming car, so I stepped back. But they slowed down and waved me across (probably much to the irritation of the car on their tail, but nice of them all the same).
It’s just one more form of social polarization: Assholes and Angels. A Yin-Yang for our modern world.
July 17th, 2020 at 12:23 pm
OTOH, we’ve had a nice break in the weather. The last five days or so haven’t had the killer temps or the killer dew points, so my morning walks haven’t been so killer, and I’ve been able to have the windows open the whole time.
But I just closed them and turned on the A/C. Gonna be hot and humid today and worthy of a Heat Advisory tomorrow. Walk might be possible if I get out there by 6. (If I go just before sunrise, I might be able to spot the comet! With this nice weather I usually go at 7.)
July 17th, 2020 at 12:31 pm
Ha! These comments are my “tweet” posts, my true weblog.
I should set up a prominently linked “Tweets” page where I can add “tweet” comments. (Ideally, the setup would be only I could make top-level comments — the “tweets” — and others could only reply if so inclined. The comment section should sort newest-first, although I’d want the replies to sort newest-last. Hmmm. Nice idea, but complicated.)
(I sort of did this with the In Bed post.)
July 17th, 2020 at 3:15 pm
Have to try to remember the 1000 post thing.
I gave up pre-announcing what I would blog about years ago. It turned out that what I thought I’d blog on and what I did were only hazily related, and trying to live up to my pre-accouncements stressed me out. But I’m weird and it seems to work well for many people.
I’ve been surprised by how much work is involved in keeping the size of blog posts down. I try to keep the majority of them down to 2 minute reads (400-600 words), but it sometimes takes as much work to tuck into that word limit as writing a 2000 word post.
I sure hope blogging is still going on in nine years!
July 17th, 2020 at 8:33 pm
Heh, yeah, well, in truth, I pretty much just said I’ll keep doing what I’ve been doing, so not a lot to stress out about.
There’s that famous insightful Pascal quote: “I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time.” Paring down one’s writing to its essence is, as you say, hard work.
Hard to even imagine what the world will be like in nine years considering how much has changed in the last four.
July 18th, 2020 at 8:53 am
Paring down is hard work, and often involves painful cutting. But it helps me to do tightly focused posts, and remember that cut points can always be made later.
I know one thing that’ll be true in nine years. Assuming I’m still alive, I’ll have less hair, and what will still be around will be grayer (or maybe white).
July 18th, 2020 at 11:04 am
“Paring down is hard work, and often involves painful cutting.”
I think that’s one of the most important, and hardest, lessons a writer has to learn — cutting one’s own (oh so clever) words. But, as you say, it leads to tighter text.
I’ve learned I can bring my word count down by dozens of words with a pass removing unnecessary words and tightening up phrasing. I’ve found it especially effective doing a pruning pass after letting the post marinate for a day.
“I know one thing that’ll be true in nine years. Assuming I’m still alive, I’ll have less hair, and what will still be around will be grayer (or maybe white).”
😀 I’ve got a bit of receding hairline, especially at the temples, but otherwise my follicles have hung in there. Kept their color pretty well for a guy in his mid-60s, although the beard hairs have gone completely white.
Another one of life’s ironies. Lots of guys are losing their hair — some fairly young in life — and it stresses them out. I never gave a crap and got a free pass. (Weird thing is my dad was the same way. Full head of hair until he died in his 90s. But I’m adopted, so he and I aren’t genetically related.)
July 18th, 2020 at 12:04 pm
I think there’s a lot of value in writing as though we have a word limit, even when we don’t. And I agree, it’s easy to cut about 10-20% with just a tightening pass through the text. But often that doesn’t do it for me, and I have to cut real content. In today’s post, it was a side discussion about Natufians, which got cut because it wasn’t necessary for the main point.
It seems like we always miss what we can’t have. My hair loss stressed me out a lot when I was younger. But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve cared less and less. A big part was just letting go of the notion that I was still a young guy. My cousin, who is my age, still hasn’t yet, and he spends a lot of time exercising to preserve the illusion. (Although like me, he’s having shoulder trouble. Unlike me, he still aggravates it.)
July 18th, 2020 at 12:37 pm
“I have to cut real content.”
Yeah, I know what you mean. Sometimes, as you say, it wasn’t relevant. Sometimes it has enough meat that I save it somewhere for another post. (I cut a bit about Westworld being another disappointing SF TV series from today’s post. I originally put it in because I thought the post would be short, but it turned out I had a lot more to say about Who than I thought.)
“A big part was just letting go of the notion that I was still a young guy.”
Yep. Aging gracefully. I see it as the mark of a more whole, more fulfilled, person.
August 27th, 2022 at 5:46 am
“I’ve written about key points in high school, college, work, and life, but there are a lot more stories to tell.”
More stories to tell, yehey 😊. As to the ones you’ve already written, I hope to find and read them soon.
You look fabulous in your most recent photo above, Wyrd. You do look great! 🙂
August 27th, 2022 at 10:35 am
There is a Canadian camping trip I’ve been meaning to write about. I need to scan in a bunch of photos first, though, and I’ve been lazy (and there’s that whole ennui thing; I haven’t felt very motivated).
I mentioned it in this post, the post I did about a 1996 Canadian Camping trip. It explains the lake I had a carving done for (see this post about the carving). There is also a rather lengthy post about a trip to Boston I took.
Work stuff, looks like you’ve seen Gobsmacked! and Reflections: Work & Change. You might find some you haven’t seen under the work tag.
Looks like you’ve also seen My Life 2.0 and My Life 3.0. Also Somewhat Unique and Bab’s Drive-In Dairy but maybe not The Love Connection?
August 28th, 2022 at 5:29 am
I just read your Boston trip! In its entirety (not in one sitting, though, but two 🙂) — pat my back 😊.
But to my dismay, I couldn’t post my comment there.
My most favorite part is the one with Bob. Next is the Boston Aquarium (which made me reminisce on my pleasant experience with the Hong Kong Ocean Aquarium and Singapore’s). Then there’s your Vivian thing which is amusing 😉.
It was noble that you and Bob were able to mend things in the end. Both of you in concurrence that whatever differences or disagreement you’d had wasn’t worth the ongoing conflict. It’s a testament, too, in general, of your forgiving nature and amiable disposition.
August 28th, 2022 at 8:58 am
Well, no-conflict is certainly better than conflict in my book (some people seem to thrive on conflict; I don’t).
This trip was so long ago that it really feels like two lifetimes ago! It definitely was a great trip, though!
August 28th, 2022 at 5:36 am
I couldn’t even click its Like button. I’m perplexed. Maybe it’s my phone. I’ll try to figure it out. Have a wonderful Sunday, Wyrd! 🌺
August 28th, 2022 at 9:01 am
Everything seems normal on this end. I opened the page in an anonymous browser and the Like button was there and comments were allowed (I’ve had to disable them on certain posts the spammers started hitting really hard). I have a friend who has complained the Like button, although present, doesn’t seem to work. I think it does, though, at least usually. It just doesn’t provide the right feedback. I do see your Like on the Boston post, FWIW.
FYI: I’ll be dog sitting the rest of the week so may not be online much.
August 28th, 2022 at 9:39 am
I got it and managed to click the Like button a few hours ago for the Boston post. I just found out, too, that I need to go to the Main Index to open a particular post so I can comment or strike Like on it. Now everything’s fine.
August 28th, 2022 at 10:36 am
Glad you got it sorted!
September 13th, 2022 at 7:07 am
Wyrd, I just found out this very moment — Bronxboy had already passed away. I’m shocked. I just saw his fb profile. Omg, I had no idea… 😢
September 13th, 2022 at 9:14 am
Damn. Another one bites the dust. I think he might have been a little younger than me, too. It’s like I said before, the circle of peers and family gets smaller as we get older. It’s almost like one of those horror stories where the gang of friends (or whatever) get picked off one by one. Who’ll be next. Who’ll last the longest. It’s weird and disquieting.
I’m at the point, especially since I’ve never been one much for self-care and my lifestyle hasn’t always been the healthiest, that I’m seriously wondering how close my sell-by date is. With every new ache and pain, one wonders if it’s the beginning of something serious. So far, no, but I’m starting to wonder how long my luck will hold out!
Hang in there. One day at a time. ‘Sabout all we can do. 🤷🏼♂️
September 14th, 2022 at 5:37 am
Oh Wyrd, learning Bronxboy isn’t with us anymore yesterday was disquieting indeed I failed to make clear he died Oct 23 2020 — although I only found out yesterday when I checked his FB feed. I wish I knew the cause although his son commented it felt surreal. Bb’s demise might’ve been sudden which made me wonder if it had anything to do with the pandemic. I also recall him writing nine years ago how he still looked forward to 20 more years of existence on this planet. A deep thinker and an insightful person — that’s how I regarded him as a writer.
Which vividly reminds me it’s on his blog that I found you. Now now, Wyrd, don’t you entertain such thoughts (on mortality at this point). Especially at this time that I’m back as your reader 🙂. Besides, you are still young. I’m merely a decade younger than you which means I’m old, as well 😊. But we’ll keep on fighting this battle so we can stay much longer, okay? Someone as rare and interesting like you feels good to have around. Let’s make a pact to cling to life and words in this world. No giving up. Comprende? 😉🌺👍🌿
September 14th, 2022 at 1:48 pm
Well, I’m not one to give up, but I’m not one to cling, either. The older I get, the more the phrase “It is what is it,” becomes my mantra. “It” in this case being life in general. So many things we can’t control, and the older I get the more I stop trying.
But, yeah, I’m not one to just give up! “Hang in there,” is another good mantra.
September 15th, 2022 at 5:47 am
Tbh, I could be guilty of sounding Polyanna at my poor attempts 🙂 to help build up people’s spirits as I know what the opposite feels like — especially at this point in my life, when despair looks me in the eye.
“It is what it is”, which I first learned from you, is a mantra I keep on mind as well, Wyrd. Perfectly aware that anything can be snatched away in an instant, I’m learning to leave everything to God.
“Hanging in there”, however, is perfectly awesome idea. 🌈🌹
September 15th, 2022 at 8:28 am
Yep, and sometimes about all we can do.
I’m dog-sitting my pal Bentley for a while. Picking her up in a few hours. Her mom’s stepmother died suddenly yesterday, so BentleyMom is helping her dad get through this (tough time for all involved). She’ll be at her dad’s house, so Bentley will be with me. Not sure how long, but I won’t be putting in much computer time during the duration.
September 16th, 2022 at 3:50 am
Lucky Bentley for having you as a co-parent. I’ve read of tons of good times you’ve had dog-sitting her. Have fun. 🐕🌻
September 17th, 2022 at 12:13 pm
I’m letting Bentley have some alone time so she can snag some Zs. We’ve figured out that merely being away from home and with me reduces the time she spends in deep sleep. At home, well-known environment, mom’s busy working, so she sleeps a lot. Here, not so much, so I’ve learned to include some stretches where I just ignore her for a few hours.
September 18th, 2022 at 6:58 am
How about a few pics of you and Bentley together? 🙂
Reminds me of you and Sam… and for some reason, your posts of your beloved child from way way back press on my heart more than ever.
Anyway, back to the present. Bentley — what a lovely name.
September 19th, 2022 at 12:34 pm
She’s a lovely dog!