Et tu, Roomba?

Roomba picked up an inordinate amount of unrecognizable crap on its second tour of duty this morning, including several pieces of macaroni and corn chips. Based on the fact that we haven't eaten any such foods here in at least several months, I conclude that (a) the house is dirtier that we thought it was; and (b) it found some new areas that it missed on its maiden voyage yesterday. I shouldn't be too hard on it, though, since the cleaning lady has been missing those same areas, consistently, for a long time...

Addendum: I just had to rescue it because the bin was full. Apparently it has no problem eating toddler socks. With the HUGE amount of dust also in the bin, the cleaning lady obviously hasn't been sweeping under furniture in the kid's room either. I expected lots of plaster dust from renovations, but entire dust bunny tribes?!?

I love my Roomba

fantastic piece of kit. i felt like i was in high school again, flipping chairs on top of tables at the end of the day so the cleaner could do his bit. i love my roomba!

purpose

found this note from a long time ago:

I like to think that by providing people with information, I can raise their awareness and their interest of the context, meaning and importance, so they feel empowere and confident to make decisions that better reflect their vision of how they want things to be.

Hm. Interesting.

does this apply to taxes?

"No man has a moral right to withhold his support from an organization that is striving to improve conditions within his sphere."
- Teddy Roosevelt

Toxic Care

Dangerous chemicals in personal care products compromise health

If all this is true, which it probably is to some extent, I wish the government would extend the direct-to-consumer ban on advertising of pharmaceuticals to ALL household products, because they seem unable to safely control or regulate what goes in them.

I'm beginning to suspect that Lucas' allergies, in fact the epidemic of food allergies in North America, might be related to this toxic soup we use ironically enough for "hygiene" purposes.

when is progress too much?

Though a lot of fun to play with and show off with, I'm not sure adding all sorts of new capabilities in mobile phones is such a good thing. First, I'm getting a little uncomfortable with the increasing popularity of bombarding us with ever more E-M waves, and second, wave after wave of new cellphone technology certainly isn't good for the environment:

If there must be new models with new gimmicks every few months, why can't there be a single charger or transformer that can be used interchangeably by all companies' products and from year to year? Why can't there be some sort of standard? How technologically advanced is a cord such that it must be replaced with a new model every six months? The proliferation and sheer waste of this type of practice is mind-boggling.

Someone has to pay for all those disposable cords, chargers and adapters, to say nothing of the products themselves. That someone is all of us. And not just for the product, but also for the pollution created when it's made and disposed of - right back into the biosphere. It's time for producers to take responsibility for their products' entire life cycles and not just pretend like they can wash their hands of the problem when it goes out the door.
-David Suzuki

with us, or...

"The concept of a collective guilt is a flawed morality," she says. "The idea that 'We're on the side of God and everyone else is evil' has and always will be disastrous."
Shadia Drury, a philosophy professor and Canada Research Chair for Social Justice, and author of "Terror and Civilization: Christianity, Politics and the Western Psyche."
Another book for me to read (someday).

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=249e7155-1044-463f-a1d4-6f5cafa5912b&k=80884

value of recycling paper

By Recycling 1 ton of paper you save:
17 trees 6953 gallons of water
463 gallons of oil
587 pounds of air pollution
3.06 cubic yards of landfill space
4077 Kilowatt hours of energy
thanks toiletpaperworld

correlations do not imply causal relationships!

After receiving a chain mail about the "dangers" of microwave ovens and then pointing out that Snopes.com proved it to be a cheap emotional attempt to promote nonsense, the sender mentioned that "microwaves for being around for several decades....hasn't cancer also been on the rise in the last couple of decades......"
Those that know me know that I can't let that kind of invalid association go unchecked. I replied the following:

as are synthetic fabrics, plastics, toxins from industrial processes, processed foods, and the erosion of natural habitats that buffer human pollution. On the "up" side, we have longer life expectancies, political stability, education, careers, internet, ample food and clothing, infrastructure to keep us warm in winter, cool in summer... the only thing you can sustain indefinitely is balance, but nobody seems to agree as to where the right mix is or what factors to include. why? because human nature does not appear to be programmed that way since, sadly, the only way we can keep our mental and physical skills at their best is through continued conflict.

This is why civilizations rise and fall, and ours has already peaked.

pride versus responsibility

I recently asked the following question after reading a ridiculous disclaimer buried deep within a website that claims a more natural lifestyle while denouncing big industry.

If you believe in your message as much as your products, why the lengthy and extensive disclaimers?

This is nicely linked with my general observation that once marketeers or accountants take over a business, the company is doomed because their product is no longer the focus of operations, becoming an annoying detail that they need to hire lawyers to protect them from if ever their neglect or misleading claims leads to someone's harm.

Thought for the Day

Thought for the Day
"The American Indians found out what happens when you don't control immigration."

INTERESTING STATISTIC

Along the lines of the Queen revoking their independence:

INTERESTING STATISTIC
Regardless of where you stand on the issue of the U.S. involvement in Iraq, here's a sobering statistic:

There has been a monthly average of 160,000 troops in the Iraq theatre of operations during the last 22 months, and a total of 2,112 deaths. That gives a firearm death rate of 60 per 100,000 soldiers.

The firearm death rate in Washington D.C. is 80.6 per 100,000 persons for the same period. That means that you are about 25% more likely to be shot and killed in the U.S. Capital than you are in Iraq.

Conclusion: The U.S. should pull out of Washington

Senate defamation

In the conclusion to his speech to the Senate on bill S-4 on Sept 7, 2006, Prime Minister Harper said:

In conclusion, I would like to read a quote from a book I reviewed recently. On page 206, the author writes, and I quote:
"Probably on no other public question in Canada has there been such unanimity of opinion as on that of the necessity for Senate reform."
The author is Robert MacKay.
The book is The Unreformed Senate of Canada.
The year is 1926.
Honourable Senators, this institution, the Senate of Canada, must truly change.
And I hope you join us, the Government and the Canadian people, in being a constructive partner in that change.
Passage of S-4 would be a modest move forward.
And after that, we will continue to move forward with further proposals.
- As part of our plan to give Canadians the accountable, democratic institution they desire - and deserve.

Why does he imply that the Senate has not undergone any change since 1926? I cannot bring myself to believe that he is not aware that:

In 1927, Canada's highest court ruled that women could sit as Senators. Four months later, the government of Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King recommended for appointment Canada's first female senator;

Since 1965, newly appointed members may not sit in the Senate after reaching the age of seventy-five; and

Since 1985, the Speaker is authorized to appoint another Senator to take his or her place temporarily. (This last change appears minor, but is significant in that it allows the Senate to continue functioning despite the absence of the official Speaker.)

Despite the fact that there have been many attempts at revamping the senate, all of which have failed, it drives me nuts to witness deliberate misinformation. All the more so since it originates from the most influential office in Canada.

There are many other reasons why Senate reform should be pursued. Why did he choose to invoke such an outdated assessment? Why doesn't the Senate sue the PM for libel/slander? Now THAT would be exciting!

(sidenote: this came close:

Bellavance, “Senator Files Defamation Suit against Bloc MP," A8. In April 1998, then Bloc Québécois MP Jean-Paul Marchand sent his constituents, at taxpayers’ expense, an anti-Senate leaflet in which certain Senators, myself included, were named as collecting a House of Commons pension along with their Senate salaries. In response, I launched a defamation suit in Québec Superior Court. Senator Céline Hervieux-Payette, who was also smeared by the leaflet, filed a similar action. Mr. Marchand later apologized, calling his own actions “a deplorable mistake.” Eventually, he agreed to pay an out-of-court settlement. On the other side of the chamber, former Senator Ron Ghitter (PC – Alberta) successfully filed suit against Rob Anders for remarks made by the Calgary MP in a Reform Party fundraising letter.

Unfortunately, despite any possible excess of self-interest, I really don't think the Senate has enough influence to compete against Harper and the best lawyers oil money and tithing can buy.

sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Senate
http://www.sen.parl.gc.ca/sjoyal/Joyal's%20book%20docs/Introduction%20(Eng).htm

Templeton Prize

I could have come up with this too! Wait a minute, my ENTIRE BLOG (nearly) is about this!
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2007/03/14/taylor-templeton.html?ref=rss

Geekiness

1. Happy Pi day !~!
2. Physics graffiti: "Heizenberg may have been here"
3. Engineering mantra: "Cows are round"

mercury fillings

When the universal quest for health collides with greed, the collision is loud and dangerous. People get hurt by those they expect, at minimum, to do no harm.

http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/mercury.html

I love this text despite how much I hate:
a) the snake-oil salesmen it exposes,
b) the infotainment "news" industry that shines a spotlight on them and attract the naive, and
c) the bottom-line-hungry scammers that try to capitalize on the resultant yet unfounded shift in public desire.

reasonable accommodations

Neat - this more of less explains the social framework for reasonable accommodations: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laïcité

It also puts a finger squarely on my strong but heretofore inexplicable resentment toward Harper's speech-enders:

Laicite relies on the division between private life, to which religion belongs according to it, and the public sphere, in which each individual should appear devoid of ethnic, religious or others particularities, and as a simple citizen equal to all others citizens.

federal bilingualism - a constitutional supply and demand problem

Le livre "Sorry I Don't Speak French" dont traite cet article est un constat intéressant et franc de la politique fédérale de bilinguisme; surtout l'énoncé sur les aspirations des étudiants universitaires. La fonction publique a beau essayer d'être bilingue, les institutions académiques gérées par les provinces n'y accordent aucune importance.

Comment alors régler ce problème d'offre et de demande constitutionellement au-délà des compétences fédérales?
Meanwhile, if somebody wants to buy/or lend me this book... :)

democracy - where it isn't today

Been thinking lately about "democracy," what it means and why it arose.
Why? Well, doing the same thing and expecting a different result is insanity.
I find it helpful to examine a problem from a different perspective, and a higher-order point of view provides me with a clearer sense of the purpose and the overarching aims of the situation at hand.
People don't usually have a problem with facts, but Truth (being "what you believe" according to George Costanza) is a matter of Faith and cannot be justified nor debated rationally without compromising one's feeling of integrity and place in the world. Traditionally, when societies believed they needed more control out of fear of lack of resources or to counter a perception of weakness, the leader (whether self-made, appointed, selected or inherited) would send people to fight so that the one "perspective" could be imposed (and -what a coincidence!- the power structure that it justifies) allowing for the majority to enjoy peace through oppression. Economic stability depended on this social stability, which typically is short-lived because power corrupts and the system collapses. A better model was required.

Democracy provides a forum where people of different ideas, different ideals, different values, can (and should be encouraged to) share their views, exchange their experiences, discuss their priorities, and come to a greater understanding of the problems affecting each group/region and find solutions for the greater good. In principle. In practice, proportional representation democracies are too unstable to advance any particular cause, and the major parties in first-past-the-post democracies become too self-absorbed to actually work for the greater good or establish programs beyond the next winner-takes-all election.

I feel Canadian politics is in this particular state. Ottawa is becoming stale. The Conservatives, barely on life-support during the Chretien years, have been born again and came back to the Hill like a starving rabid dog finally let loose in a schoolyard. The Grits are still finding themselves after too many years under one man. Canadian voters are on the brink of sending them through the same purgatory. This would not be to anybody's benefit beyond the sadistic pleasure of revenge of a few, as we would be hit with too many changes too far in the opposite direction, the government will lose what little precious respect it has left, and people will start turning to other forms of authority (like - gasp - religion).

But I try not to care. I try to remind myself that people need to come to their own conclusions and if that means cutting off their noses to spite their faces, so be it. It just hurts so much to watch them bleed and stain the rest of us and then claim that this is His will.

path of least resistance

Any fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction.
-Albert Einstein

That makes me feel better about always taking the path of greatest resistance.