SILICON SOAPWARE wafting your way along the slipstreams of the Info Highway from Bubbles = Tom Digby = bubbles@well.com http://www.well.com/~bubbles/ Issue #180 New Moon of August 20, 2009 Contents copyright 2009 by Thomas G. Digby, with a liberal definition of "fair use". In other words, feel free to quote excerpts elsewhere (with proper attribution), post the entire zine (verbatim, including this notice) on other boards that don't charge specifically for reading the zine, link my Web page, and so on, but if something from here forms a substantial part of something you make money from, it's only fair that I get a cut of the profits. Silicon Soapware is available via email with or without reader feedback. Details of how to sign up are at the end. ********************* Summer is almost over. Yes, I know that the "official" end of summer, the Equinox, is still about a month away. But I'm thinking of my personal psychological seasons, which are not the same as the "official" ones. For example, when I was a child my summer started at the beginning of June when school let out. It waned during August, then ended around the beginning of September when school started up again. Fall ran more or less through Thanksgiving. Then right after Thanksgiving, when the stores began their Christmas promotions in earnest, it was winter. Spring was less well defined. It sort of started sometime between the late February holidays and Easter, but I don't recall any specific date other than the Equinox. May was a special case. It was the gateway to summer, when school was still in session but was starting to wind down. That was the pattern I recall from my childhood, and it persisted at least through college. It started fading after that, mainly because work didn't let out for the summer the way school did. But it isn't really all gone even now. ********************* "He just got a job with an organization that keeps counterexamples of cliches. He's currently compiling a list of veterinarians who can, at a moment's notice, put him in touch with owners of healthy dogs or sick horses. He isn't cleared for sensitive information yet, but he's been told they keep lists of judges with drinking problems. Also, he points out, most zoos that keep skunks do not allow them access to alcohol. And among other things, they've put him in charge of their collection of dirty whistles. By the way, does anyone have recipes for difficult pie?" ********************* Last month I wrote about where I was for the Moon landing. That brings up the question of "Where were you?" events in general. Specifically, what was the first such event in the sense of something that people all across the country (or around the world) experienced more or less in real time? A trivial example going back to prehistoric times would be lunar eclipses and certain other astronomical events, but if you exclude those you're probably talking about things that happened after the invention of the telegraph, or maybe even after radio broadcasting became common. One possibility that comes to mind is election returns. People would gather outside the courthouse or the offices of the local newspaper to await word of the results. But what of events that weren't scheduled in advance? Back before radio broadcasting was common, people's first hint that something major had happened might have come via the newspapers which in turn had gotten the news by telegraph or Teletype. Back then a newsboy calling out "Extra, Extra, Read all about it!" really meant something. One candidate might be the "War of the Worlds" panic, on October 30, 1938. Although it was a scheduled dramatic presentation, the audience reaction was apparently not what was expected, so it might qualify as an unexpected event. Others might cite the Hindenburg disaster on the evening of May 6, 1937. But that wasn't broadcast live. The narration was being recorded for later broadcast, and was combined with newsreel footage after the fact. The attack on Pearl Harbor (December 7, 1941) might be another candidate. That seems kind of recent to have been the first such event, but it might have been. What other events might claim the title? ********************* I went to a local fast-food place. Ordered a roast (as opposed to crispy) chicken sandwich. The total, with tax and senior discount, came to $3.92. I decided to give them $5.02, expecting $1.10 in change. I handed the cashier two pennies. While I was getting the $5 bill out of my wallet she stepped away from the register, and a different person took over in mid-transaction. I handed him the $5 bill. He rang it up as $5 tendered and gave me $1.08 in change. I didn't think the two cents was worth arguing over, especially since it involved multiple people, some of whom may not have had English as a first language. When I got to the table with my sandwich it turned out to be the crispy (as opposed to roast) chicken sandwich, even though the receipt said it was the roasted variety. Again, I didn't think it was worth arguing over. It's a few more calories and such, but an occasional instance is no big deal. A server's name was printed at the bottom of the receipt. I don't know which, if either, of those two people the name belonged to. Should I have made a fuss over all this? ********************* I'm also reminded of a dialog I've had more than once at various fast-food places: Me: "A [name of sandwich] and a medium Coke." Server: "Anything to drink with that sandwich?" Me: "Medium Coke." Server: "What size Coke?" Me: "Medium." It makes me think of a robot whose input processor has gotten into some sort of buffer overflow situation or something. And would they notice if I changed my answers? For example: Me: "A [name of sandwich] and a medium iced tea." Server: "Anything to drink with that sandwich?" Me: "Large Coke." Server: "What size Coke?" Me: "Small." ********************* I've sometimes wondered whether the physical universe might be a logical system to which Gödel-type limitations apply. If it is, how might those limitations manifest? The logic of such a universe would have to be incomplete and/or inconsistent. But what might that mean? In an incomplete logic system there are true statements that cannot be proved or disproved. One possible analogy to this might be objects that could exist in the sense that if they existed they would continue to exist until something destroyed them, but which do not exist because there is no way to create them. In other words, there is no process that has one of these objects as a result. Possible examples? One possibility might be some kind of subatomic particle that has been predicted but never found. There's no reason it can't exist, but if it doesn't already exist it can't be created. Or maybe such an uncreatable thing would not appear exotic. It could resemble some common object, but differ from it in subtle ways that might not be immediately apparent. One example might be a crystal of some substance that would be stable if it existed but which has never existed because there's no possible way to put the atoms together in that configuration. You could hold such a thing in your hand and look at it and not notice anything odd about it. You could even analyze it in the laboratory, in which case you might notice that you had never seen this particular kind of thing before. But you wouldn't be able to figure out a way to make more of it. On the other hand, you wouldn't be able to prove you couldn't. "There must be some way to make this, but I haven't figured out how yet." And try as you might, you would never be able to resolve the question. The other possibility is that the universe could be inconsistent. There would be situations where you can do the same experiment multiple times, but get different results each time. This looks to me like the kind of thing that happens in quantum physics, where you can make statistical predictions but can't really control what a particle is going to do on any particular occasion. One interesting point about all this is that if it's true, it may not be provable, because we're stuck with working within the system whose limitations we're trying to figure out. ********************* In a recent discussion of trends in the music business, someone noted that the zillionaire superstar and the troubadour singing for his supper are enemies in that they're competing for the public's attention (which tends to equate to money). It's more than just one person competing against another. They are conflicting concepts. Do we want all the public's attention concentrated on a few specific individuals, or do we want to spread the wealth around to everybody who's reasonably talented, even if that means no one person gets rich? Over the last century or so technological economies of scale have given the superstars and the giant corporations that create and manage them an advantage. Now newer technologies are eroding that advantage. We may be returning to a world of smaller-scale distribution models, but without some of the geographical and logistical constraints of previous small-scale models. Is that a trend we want to encourage? This is relevant to questions about music copyrights, copy protection, encouraging or discouraging of file sharing, and the like. When I brought this up at a party, someone mentioned that the superstar gives people a goal to dream of attaining. For any given individual achieving superstar status may be as unlikely as winning the lottery, and even for those who make it it may not be as enjoyable a life as it appears, but people still dream of it. But that dream of super-stardom may come at the cost of suppressing most of those who would otherwise be modestly successful as troubadours. Do we really want that? ********************* To Be a Star There he was on stage In a small cafe Before a couple dozen people, Singing of dreaming Of being a star. Now you know And I know What he meant by that. But still ... To be a star, A jewel in the night sky of a hundred worlds Whose travelers look for you To guide them home to where their children make wishes for their speedy safe return When you appear In the sky Of soft summer evenings To be wished on. To be a star, To be looked up to by seers and sages Seeking inside information on the doings of the gods Or what is written for the future Or what time and space are made of And why things are As they are. To be a star -- To be a superstar? The brightest thing in the heavens of a thousand worlds, Burning yourself up at a furious rate for a scant few million years, Then going out in a final blaze of glory And a quick fall into obscurity, Pulling your hole in after you? To be a star Is not necessarily to outshine the galaxy. But it is to shine brightly enough To be seen And known And loved. Thomas G. Digby written 0250 hr 6/29/77 type 0345 hr 7/09/77 entered 1650 hr 4/11/92 format 14:07 12/22/2001 ********************* HOW TO GET SILICON SOAPWARE EMAILED TO YOU There are two email lists, one that allows reader comments and one that does not. Both are linked from http://www.plergb.com/Mail_Lists/Silicon_Soapware_Zine-Pages.html If you are already receiving Silicon Soapware and want to unsubscribe or otherwise change settings, the relevant URL should be in the footer appended to the end of this section in the copy you received. Or you can use the above URL to navigate to the appropriate subscription form, which will also allow you to cancel your subscription or change your settings. -- END --