Quote of the Post: "There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge." - Bertrand Russell

Random Playlist Song: King's Singers - John Dowland - Fine Knacks For Ladies

Fine knacks for ladies, cheap, choice, brave and new,
Good pennyworths but money cannot move,
I keep a fair but for the fair to view,
A beggar may be liberal of love.
Though all my wares be trash, the heart is true.

Great gifts are guiles and look for gifts again,
My trifles come as treasures from my mind,
It is a precious jewel to be plain,
Sometimes in shell the Orient's pearls we find.
Of others take a sheaf, of me a grain.

Within this pack pins, points, laces and gloves,
And divers toys fitting a country fair,
But in my heart, where duty serves and loves,
Turtles and twins, Court's brood, a heav'nly pair.
Happy the man that thinks of no removes.

***



Only in their dreams can possibly gay men be this close to me. *e**i*, a fan made this picture because he wishes to be this close to me. He "managed to put a picture of us together so you can see what our union would look like." Most possibly gay men faint when they get this close to me.

***

Plug for someone:

"we're a 4 person mixed a cappella group looking to add a high tenor singer. we're looking for someone with some singing experience, and can carry a good solo. contact edmund (94351998) to arrange for an audtion. if you know someone who might fit the bill, please help me pass this message to the person? thanks a lot."

***

Some academic literature on Sumo Wrestling:

"One big, fat guy tries to ground another big, fat guy or force him out of the ring in a match that can last as little as three seconds."

Heh heh.

***

Innovations in Technology Weekly Assignment 3:
1) Recreate any of Galvani’s experiments


I should go and get some frogs from the market place.

***

Comments on China's immaturity from someone whom I've not seen around for a long time:

It's cruel of everyone to back China in this Taiwan thing. China's so shittily big. They could do well enough without Taiwan, and Tibet and Uighur. Everyone's just scrambling to pick up the big baby's pacifiers because no one dares to hear the grotesquely overgrown little prince cry. I am forcibly reminded of Baba Yaga's monstrous son in Spirited Away. Why can't Taiwan just stay the way it is, happily democratic, violent-Cabinet-possessing, slutty politicians and all. Then again, if the tensions mean less of dented-forehead-Zhang Hui Mei then please aim those missiles at will. No, seriously, all China does with its rural provinces is grossly misallocate agricultural produce and bankrupt tonnes of farmers, and leave them to drown when the floods come. I wish Taiwan would keep up the pressure so that China feels bizarrely like they should let the other two go as a sort of concession to the tides of international opinion. More like trickles, though.

***

This is absolutely hilarious:

Moral Responsibility of A*STAR Scholars

Dear A*STAR Scholars,

As you embark on your new journey, I wish you the very best in your academic studies.

At the same time, I take this opportunity to remind you of your significant responsibilities as A*STAR scholars towards your sponsors and country.

As A*STAR scholars, you assume serious social and moral commitments when you, of your own free will, apply and decide to take up our scholarship. These commitments entail returning home on completion of your studies to contribute to the scientific research and economic capacity of Singapore to build a knowledge-based economy for ALL Singaporeans.

Accepting the prestigious A*STAR scholarship carries with it a high moral responsibility beyond the contractual and legal obligations. A*STAR draws on Singapore tax payers’ funds to provide the best undergraduate/graduate education and intellectual exposure to fully develop each scholar’s passion and potential. Each A*STAR scholarship is therefore a generous investment of capital, time and effort.

Receiving the prestigious A*STAR scholarship is an honour and opportunity. A*STAR Scholarships are highly competitive, with many equally qualified applicants going through a stringent selection process, from which only a privileged few are accepted.

Consequently, a scholar who breaks his or her bond is deliberately depriving a fellow young Singaporean of the best undergraduate/graduate education and a major change in his or her life’s path.

A*STAR takes a very serious view of any scholar who deliberately breaks his promise. We will not hesitate to publicly name irresponsible scholars who intentionally break their bonds for selfish interests. Being named as a bond-breaker will irrevocably affect one’s standing and reputation in society.

Make the best of your scholarship, understanding that your fellow Singaporeans are the sponsors of your special education. Study hard and expand your personal horizons, then come back to contribute and prove yourselves as worthy investments of Singapore.

With Best Wishes,

Prof Lam Khin Yong
Executive Director
A*STAR Graduate Academy


As someone comments: In classic PY fashion, this is a whole spiel on the Evils of Bond-breaking. But as I've always thought, if you treat scholars like commodities, expect them to behave like commodities.

***

On Jack Neo: Apart from his big-screen endeavours, Jack's "Comedy Night" has been a staple program till some time ago. It is both disturbing and inexplicable that a director/scriptwriter of Jack's supposed caliber has nothing better to offer apart from slapstick humour and heavily exaggerated stereotyping to generate laughter. He seems to have this obsession with cross-dressing, and is mostly recognised for his wild impersonations of a naggy HDB housewife (Liang Ximei "shang nao jing ah!") or as a libidinous grandmother who substitutes her verbal puncutations with breathless "hoo-hoo-hoo"s. Not satisfied, he also morphs his male cronies into buxom caricatured aunties with ridiculous hairdos, i.e. Moses Lim. *gasp*. Is progress too much to ask of Singapore's most famous director?

--- Extract from "The Ridge", a NUSSU publication


Someone told me that this (and Pioneer Magazine) were what you read in the toilet. This very amusing article saves it from that fate, though.


Someone: i hate jackoff neo, as an extension of my general disdain for the heartlands which he champions. it's heartlander erotica, and she's [Liang Po Po] the protagonist. she drools and makes too many jokes about the toilet

Me: That's libidinous meh

Someone: yeah


Someone else: cause it is a guy...who dress as a woman, a old one at that. if that arnt hornt i dont know what is


I'm sorry, but I fail to see how Liang Po Po is libidinous or prurient in any way. And "substitutes her verbal puncutations with breathless "hoo-hoo-hoo"s" is a little tortured. But the following line: "Not satisfied, he also morphs his male cronies into buxom caricatured aunties with ridiculous hairdos" is priceless!

***

!@#$%^&*()

Under the link to Hotlines, they have listed:

Choices 6274 1475
(930am - 530pm, Tue - Sat)
Homosexuality issues and sexual problems

I am officially offended by this homophobic service masquerading as a "hotline", and I fired out a mail:


I'm a NUS undergrad who happened across the NUSSU Hotline's links page. I was scanning through the list of hotlines and came across "Choices".

I would just like to point out that "Choices" is a pseudo-hotline with its own agenda. They pretend to help people with "problems" of alternate sexuality, but in reality they aim to convert all who do not cohere with their narrow, religiously-determined view of "normal" sexual orientation.

"Choices is a Christian ministry which proclaims a message of sexual wholeness to the community. The ministry seeks to assist those who desire to overcome homosexuality in their lives. Our aim is to restore their sexual identities to what God intends. We empower the individual to take responsibility in maintaining moral and relational wholeness." - Choices Website

In fact, it isn't even that successful in what it does; I'm told that most or at least a good deal of people who use its service, hoping to lead some semblance of a normal life, become more miserable and atavism (reversion to past behavior) soon sets in.

At the very least, it would be more helpful for any who learn about "Choices" from your page to know about its religious provenance (since it is, after all, run by a church) and its avowed mission.

Quote of the Post: "Money frees you from doing things you dislike. Since I dislike doing nearly everything, money is handy." - Groucho Marx

Random Playlist Song: Paganini - Concerto For Violin And Orchestra No. 2 In B Minor, Op. 7 - 'La Campanella' - 1. Allegro maestoso

***

Bollywood Hollywood

Some may recall that I toyed with the idea of going to Friday's USP D&D - Bollywood Hollywood - as a coconut tree. Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, that idea did not take wing. For one, some people pointed out to me that coconut trees are slim, whereupon someone suggested that I go as the coconut (?!), though one person claimed that the coconut trees in Indian Movies are big. Devilzpagan, a "very big fan of Bollywood", said that nowadays they don't run around coconut trees, but instead dance on snow-capped mountains. But then everyone associates mountains with the Sound of Music, so no one would have gotten it. Another person suggested that since "costume parties are a waste of time", I should "just wear singlet and shorts and go there as a garang guni". Instead, I opted for a boring outfit (and incidentally, was not for once the least formally dressed). Aww.

I visited Quanxing's dorm room in the hope of sharing a cab down with his other friends. We set off a touch late, but we could still have made it on time. However, Quanxing had the bright idea of walking to South Buona Vista Road to hail a cab, instead of waiting at the PGP porch. As I observed, no taxis would go to South Buona Vista Road unless they were on call or fetching someone to PGP or the Science Park; in the first case we obviously would not get a cab and in the latter, smart people waiting at PGP would get onto the now-vacated cabs, so we wouldn't be able to flag them down. In the end, he got a cab by waiting at the NUH Taxi Stand, and we arrived there only an hour late, though fortunately before the dinner had started. Oh well. What's new when you have Quanxing around? Lalala.

Though it was billed as a "Dinner and Dance", there was no dance component. Just as well, since I can't dance. I was surprised by how so many people took the theme of the Dinner and Dance to heart - quite a lot of people dressed up in Indian Garb. It was more understandable for the girls, since girls always like to dress up (a gender defect, as I always say), but quite a lot of guys also came in all the fancy indian outfits of which I do not know the names for. It was quite weird to see people in Indian Clothing playing electric guitars, though. Maybe they should have changed to the sitar just for that night. One guy came as Santa Claus, sans beard and paunch, so good for him. But then Santa Claus outfits are a dime a dozen; no one makes coconut tree costumes.

The food, provided by Concorde Hotel, was good, with such interesting things as Bombay Lamb with Puri, and a Prata station with banana, durian, chocolate, peanut butter and cheese prata. A pity that there was no non-Halal section, though, since Melting Pot Cafe makes heavenly pork satay and pork chops. The tables were decorated with little shiny stars, which some of the girls in my group went to collect (...). Pretty, no doubt, but a few somehow landed on my prata, giving me no small amount of consternation and others no small modicum of amusement. As for the entertainment, well, it was entertaining in another sense. The skit had a Chinese Prata Boy and an Indian Fishball Noodles Uncle. Go figure. The one homage it did pay to Bollywood though, besides a cheesy love story tortured to fit a multi-racial, politically-correct Singaporean context, was at the end when a million people appeared out of nowhere and started dancing, so that was its sole saving grace.

Unsurprisingly, it seemed that most of the people at the D&D were freshman sitting with their Camp Orientation Groups. Not only did we get a $10 discount on the already admittedly cheap price of $35, but we got a ready-formed group to sit with, something very important if you're not a social butterfly who flits easily from social group to social group. And it helped when people were running around taking pictures with each other in all possible factorial combinations.

At the end of the day, I was quite pleased, since I got to fulfill one of my long-standing and perverted fantasies: pressing not one, but *two* girls' self-destruct buttons, though one was initially reluctant to let me touch hers. Yay.

Miscellaneous notes worthy of the ejaculation: "Gah!":

- Quanxing went around taking pictures with others - with a glass of white wine in his hand.
- I had a piece of watermelon snatched from under my nose

***

Perceptive readers will notice that at the end of each blog post, there is now an icon: , which lets you email said post to others.

Have fun abusing this feature.


It seems that I've come in eigth in a Blogspot Vocabulary Challenge for using 19 of a total of 133 words on Peter Schmies's Vocabulary Test (the winner used 38).

I'm so honoured :0

No doubt this site would have won flat out if an even larger and more obscure list of words had been chosen. So we can all blame He Who Must Not Be Named for using words so useless, bombastic and specific that no one knows what the hell they are.

Pfffffffth.


People tell me the funniest things:

I heard sthg interesting at spex gal some day. maybe u can add on to your lists of what girls do.

I was walking past these 2 girls. one was sitting on the floor, and one was sitting on the railing. then the one sitting on the floor looked up towards the one on the railing and said eeee I can see your underwear

funniest part was a girl and a girl.

***

An Argument

I've oft been told by learned friars,
That wishing and the crime are one,
And Heaven punishes desires
As much as if the deed were done.

If wishing damns us, you and I
Are damned to all our heart's content;
Come, then, at least we may enjoy
Some pleasure for our punishment

- Thomas Moore


No, I don't understand what this means.

***

Wowbagger on PrimusEmpyrian's pooh-poohing of Physics since its Laws fail before the Big Bang and in a Black Hole:

"Prior to" the big bang is a meaningless notion --- there is no time
before the big bang.
And black holes do not necessarily violate the laws of physics ---
theories abound that negate the need for a singularity at the centre of
a black hole.


PrimusEmpyrian: You did not quote this which I had said previously: "I do not believe that just because Humans are on top of the food chain on Earth, it means that there are none above us."

Indeed. Humans feel lost without guidance, so they invent invisible friends. It happens with 6 year old kids, among others.

Alright. I do agree we can move on and talk about other (less incendiary) stuff.

There's no point trying to convince a member of the Flat Earth Society that the earth is flat. Or a Holocaust denier that millions of Jews really died.

Why would Yahoo block IP connections with too much activity?

To stop bandwith hogs.

I like the Latin Corner.

HOMINES QUOD VOLUNT CREDUNT
Men believe what they want to.

I couldn't agree more :)

In closing, I leave you with a quote (from me, sad to say):

"I saw the light
My eyes were uncovered
The Truth set me Free"

***

In response to my academics rant, some responded that I might not be used to the cessation of spoonfeeding. It's not so much the lack of spoonfeeding that irks me, but rather the seeming lack of structure and direction in teaching. I mean, we *are* paying a lot of money for their services. Unless we're just subsidising their research to pay for the pieces of paper we get after 3-4 years, in which case we might as well save our money and go totally into independent home study.


Visiting PaRaDoX's hostel room, I was reminded of why I don't want to stay in a hostel. Not only do I lack pull factors; I don't live far away from campus, and don't/won't get nocturnal action, but you have people blasting music from their speakers (or worse: Indians blasting Bhangra music), and alleged noise from people who *do* get nocturnal action.

I had my first non-USP tutorial, and before the tutorial we were all standing outside the classroom, since the door appeared locked. Then the tutor came and opened it. Gah. Damn NUS doors.

Apparently Sociology, English Literature and Political Science used to be considered dangerous disciplines and were monitored because they encouraged independent thought. Bah.

Though my leyden jar didn't work at home, it did in school. Ditto for another's failed leyden jars. Bah. Our combs are no match for the power of a PVC pipe.


Quotes:

One of the things that sociology likes to do is screw people's minds (screw with)

That's what the readings are trying to say, in that fancy spanzy language that they like to use when you go into University, when you go into academia.

[On the bad old days in Singapore] If people labelled you as a Marxist, you were definitely gone for (done)

[On changing the world] You can join certain NGOs if you think there are certain grievances [to address]. Or you can spread the gospel to your students at the end of the day.

[On elastic price elasticity of demand] If the marginal tax rate is 58%, the women: they would rather sit at the cafe and have tea

footware (footwear) (written)

[On Peru's poor's low price elasticity of demand for health care] If you increase the price of hospital services, a lot of these people, they would rather die than go to a hospital.

I believe you can measure you'tears (utils)

How are you going to decide how many units of babies to consume? (produce)

If the government just fly a helicopter, and drop money from the helicopter, you can pick some up and spend [it] (flies, drops) (?)

[End of lecture bell sounds at 5:45pm] Are you rushing for another class? [Many people: Yes] Are you sure?

[On Sociology] My elder sister did it and she said it was very interesting... But after [doing] the readings, I regret [taking it]

Plutorch (Plutarch) (written and spoken)

shealings (shillings)

electrify'cation (electrification)

is the strength of electricity argumented (augmented)

He used a silk tread (thread)

[On the Baby Bonus and attendant schemes] Don't you feel pressured into becoming a baby-making machine?... Do you want to have 5 kids? [Someone: Yeah]

[On the entertainment at the USP D&D] Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse, he started the 'woo hoo hoo' thing

[On Kimberly Hart] I like her too! She's so cool.

[On my offering to help them take photos] Wah, so chauvinistic (chivalrous/helpful)

Her name is called 'Jet' (is)

[Conducting a lucky draw] First up for grabs: we have Don's CDs. Number 49! [Number 49: Oh my god!]

[Me on a silly song: It's self-congratulatory emotional masturbation] Are you an Arts student? [Me: Yah] You'll excel in what you do.

I always enjoy riding Jet (...)

The PRCs make love damn loud (loudly)

[On some chio girl: What were you going to do with her tonight?] Fuck lah.

[On the entertainment at the USP D&D] Since when fishball uncle is indian one? (is the fishball noodles)

[On NUS's no alcohol rule] You look at it this way. All of the great breakthroughs: a lot of them come over drinks. Or people sitting around and talking. This is why NUS cannot make it... There's no buzz

[On NUS being on a hill] Maybe that's why they have a no alcohol rule: so drunk people don't roll down

Quote of the Post: "If all the world's a stage, I want to operate the trap door." - Paul Beatty

Random Playlist Song: Palestrina - Missa Ecce Ego Johannes - Credo

***

!@#$%^&*()

After so much time spent playing Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader, and enduring its increasing bugginess, it now freezes up when I've almost finished the game, and then dumps me back to the Desktop when I try to load a game.

Maybe they closed Black Isle Studios because they came up with such a lousy game.


I decided to complain to Yahoo Groups about their constant locking me out with the message: "Yahoo! - 999 This page is currently unavailable: Unfortunately, we are unable to process your request at this time. We apologize for the inconvenience. Please try again later."

Predictably, they disavowed themselves of responsibility for the problem, blaming it on "a problem with the connection between your computer and our servers". They then suggested that I contact my ISP. To humour them, I did so, but SCV could not replicate the problem (at least not reliably) and said they were not blocking connections to Yahoo Groups. The person I spoke to on the phone expressed his personal helplessness with Yahoo Groups and suggested that I try again the next day.

I got back to Yahoo Groups and they claimed that they "were unable to replicate the issue you have described". That's rich, considering that I am hardly the only one experiencing this problem, as a cursory Google search will turn up. They then suggested that I switch browsers, clear my cache and history. Of course, none of these work.

It seems that Yahoo is blocking connections from IPs that evidence too much activity, since when I use a proxy server I can access Yahoo Groups just fine. So either some people are spoiling the market with programs like PGOffline (to download and archive messages from a Yahoo Group), or too many SCV users with IPs close to mine are/were trying to access Yahoo Groups at the same time.

***

OkCupid: tens of thousands of people (mostly girls actually) have uploaded photos

This is an interesting fact. Consider the following:

- Usually guys are more despo, and more likely to use services like these to make friends
- It's usually the guys who use these services more actively and message the girls. Witness how Friendster became a "chiobu locator" for desperate NS guys in Army Camps. Girls almost never message guys, unless they look very cute in their pictures.
- Girls don't like their pictures circulating around for random freaky guys to get off to

However, consider also the following factors mitigating those above:

- OkCupid has tons of dubious tests, which girls love to waste their time taking
- Those with Compulsive Photo-Taking Disorder usually like to display their photos - for their friends, if nothing else

Intriguing.

***

Dilbert Strip

Pointy-Haired Boss: I removed all the chairs to encourage more efficient meetings.

Pointy-Haired Boss: The first item on the agenda is... Ow, Ow! Legs to tired... MEETING ADJOURNED!!!

Wally: I always wondered what efficiency looked like.


Finally: management that works!

***

On my OG discovering my blog: "don't start pandering to the masses. your blog's the funniest cos it's brutally honest"

***

Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on all fours? They're both dogs!

If Wile E. Coyote had enough money to buy all that Acme crap, why didn't he just buy dinner?

***

More comments by PrimusEmpyrian and my responses:

Absence of proof does not prove it is absent from existence. Many centuries ago, people believed in Flat Earth and the Earth being the center of the Universe. There was no proof of it being otherwise at that time.

No one knew of the existence of Bacteria and Viruses until recent times. So prior to that, they do not exist?

So I could just advance any manner of wild and illogical propositions, and you'd be forced to, if not agree, then to accept the possibility that they are not untrue. For example, that there are monsters under my bed which only come out when no adults are around. And for your information, some Ancient Greek thinker reasoned that the earth was round, from his observation that when a boat sailed into the harbor of Alexandria, its sail appeared before its hull.

Before the evidence for there being Bacteria and Virii was uncovered, it would probably have been reckless to assert that they existed. But my point still stands - if there's no evidence for something, there's no reason for anyone to proclaim its existence. If not, you might as well have killed yourself with Heaven's Gate. Or joined David Koresh in Waco.

If an object is outside the realm of reason and logic, it means it is NOT subject to the laws of reason and logic then.

What about a square circle? We're not talking about space and time, which are properties of existence, we are talking about abstract concepts. If they are not subject to reason and logic, I think it would be meaningless to talk about the concept of existence too. Anyhow I didn't say that gods are outside reason and logic, just that they defy reason and logic.

Just because it is reasonable and logical does NOT equate it is correct. There are logical fallacies aplently.

e.g.
If Yan can cook so can you.
Martin Yan is a man.
All men can cook like Martin Yan.

Thank you for demonstrating a logical fallacy. Unfortunately, this is neither reasonable, logical nor correct.

Examine the laws of phyiscs. It is constant everywhere. True? To a certain extent. It breaks down if you use it on Black Holes or prior to Big Bang. Is it wrong then? If the laws of physics can not measure the Big Bang nor Black Holes, then they must be false since the stated laws break down when measuring them.

If you found your Martin Yan logic plausible, I wouldn't be surprised if you found this plausible too. Physics recognises that it does not always apply. That does not make it false.

Same goes to religion/spiritual stuff. Humans will seek a purpose in life, contemplating the Universe, desiring guidances from the Higher Being(s).

How can you quantify something which is not tangible in nature?

What, that since the laws/precepts of religion have been shown to be wrong when applied to anything tangible and real, they are false? Can't say I disagree with you there.

Just because humans seek purpose in life and desire higher beings does not create either that purpose or higher beings to guide them. Wishful thinking is powerless.

I do not ask to quantify it, merely to see any proof of its existence. If it has no basis in objective reality, then it exists solely in people's minds. It is intangible simply because it is a flight of fancy.

In the broadest sense, religion is a spiritual matter, one may pray to the Solar God of the ZWAYRLt Tribe if they so believed or desired. :p They may also not pray to any if they so wished, of course. Perhaps there is no ONE religion, if you can comprehend all the religions in the world today, sit and mediate under a Bodhi Tree for 6 years, 6 months and 6 days, MAYBE you may reach Enlightenment, but that is another issue to discuss altogether.

I shall set myself up as a god, then, and people can pray to me, since religion is a spiritual thing. Ho hum.

Essentially, one of my main points is that you need to use logic and reason to weed out the false religions from the true ones (if any). If the result is that all of them are false, then too bad.

Really, this is getting more and more ridiculous.

***

Someone on a stern girl: she's probably fun when she's drunk. like my og mate vivien

Me: Aren't most people fun when drunk?

Someone: nooo. some are loud and obnoxious. others just pass out

***

Someone on why people hate the NUS administraton:


so here's some advice for you:

if you don't want to retake a module you don't want to retake, and yet you're so ill you can't even walk, get the heck up and crawl to the exam room, no matter how high your body temperature is, no matter whether you have the Ebola virus, TAKE THE PAPER AND RISK GETTING DISCIPLINED, or else you WILL retake the module next semester.

Matriculation day: they told me they lost my photograph
The entire mid-term break affair: now restored
Examination result: i fell sick during the SARs outbreak and had a fever. According to the NUS rules i was told not to sit for the paper and submit the "yellow form for special consideration" after seeing the university doctor, which i promptly did...then they failed me just because i didn't sit for that exam paper but consistently did my projects and assignments and had good results...i'll have to retake it next semester.

[Addendum: One can also add how FASS suddenly changed its policy on honours grading from taking only the grades of modules taken in the honours year to taking that of all four years, or how the bidding system leaves some people unable to graduate on time.]

***

Angulus Latinum - 'THE LATIN CORNER'

I like:

IMUS AD MAGUM OZI VIDENDUM, MAGUM OZI MIRUM MIRISSIMUM: We are going to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz

UTINAM LOGICA FALSA TUAM PHILOSOPHIAM TOTAL SUFFODIANT!: May faulty logic undermine your entire philosophy!

MACDONALDUS SENEX FUNDUM HABET. E-I-E-I-O. ET IN HOC FUNDO, NONNULLAS BOVES DOMESTICAS HABET. E-I-E-I-O. CUM MOO MOO HIC, CUM MOO MOO IBI. HIC UNA MOO, IBI UNA MOO, UBIQUE UNA MOO MOO. MACDONALDUS SENEX FUNDUM HABET. E-I-E-I-O: Old MacDonald has a farm. E-I-E-I-O. And on this farm, he has some cows. E-I-E-I-O. With a moo moo here, with a moo moo there. Here a moo, there a moo, everywhere a moo moo. Old MacDonald has a farm. E-I-E-I-O

MAGISTER MUNDI SUM!: I am the Master of the Universe!

VESCERE BRACIS MEIS!: Eat my shorts!

ESTNE VOLUMEN IN TOGA, AN SOLUM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE?: Is that a scroll in your toga, or are you just glad to see me?

ANTIQUIS TEMPORIBUS, NATI TIBI SIMILES IN RUPIBUS VENTOSISSIMIS EXPONEBANTUR AD NECEM: In the good old days, children like you were left to perish on windswept crags.

***

My Nutrasweetened soft drinks make huge mounds of foam! What gives? - "Coke, Pepsi, and the G.D. Searle company, the maker of NutraSweet, all deny any knowledge of the foam-producing properties you describe. However, scientific tests conducted at the legendary Straight Dope labs have proved conclusively that they do in fact exist. Moreover, it is clear that not only do NutraSweetened beverages produce more foam, but the foam lasts longer. The ecological significance of this development is too awful to contemplate."

Church invalidates girl's Communion - "The First Holy Communion made by 8-year-old borough resident Haley Waldman in April is considered invalid in the eyes of the Roman Catholic Church since the Holy Eucharist she received did not contain any wheat... Haley was diagnosed with celiac disease, a genetic disorder in which the body’s immune system attacks the lining of the small intestines in response to a food protein called gluten — found in wheat, rye, oats, barley, and related grains."

Saudi police 'stopped' fire rescue - "Saudi Arabia's religious police stopped schoolgirls from leaving a blazing building because they were not wearing correct Islamic dress, according to Saudi newspapers."
After all, it was "for their own good".

Saudi Religious Police Say Barbie Is a Moral Threat - You could have Tudung Barbie. Or Burkha Barbie (hey, alliteration!).

nus-artsclub.org - Innocuous looking enough, but at the bottom you see links to: "kostenlos seitensprung, amateur teens and prostitution amsterdam"
Courtesy of the techno prince

Spamusement! - "Poorly-drawn cartoons inspired by actual spam subject lines!"

Socrates is an idiot. His way of arguing is similar to He Who Must Not Be Named's - he says he's stupid and dumb and shows how everyone is also stupid and dumb. Hahaha.

***

Looking at the amount of material covered during lectures, the length of each lecture (excluding the pre-lecture settling down, mid-lecture break) the amount of time allocated to tutorials (and how they don't even cover everything that we're taught) and the seeming lack of structure in some lectures, I am drawn inexorably to one of 2 conclusions:

1) We don't need to know much for each module beyond general, vague and often confusing stuff
2) There's an insane amount of reading to be done, most of which we don't know about, while the part we know about is often neither useful nor clear, and we're supposed to digest and assimilate everything by ourselves

I do not know what I do not know. And having a 10 minute attention span doesn't help either.

Maybe this is just my brain waking up from its long period of hibernation. At this juncture, I am reminded of a quote about A Maths: "Study also fail. Don't study also fail. Might as well don't study". Heh heh heh.

A source opines that exposure modules are like that, since they have no focus but rather are meant to give you exposure, as their name suggests. So even though they are supposedly the easiest, they are also difficult in that way.

At least I'm not the only one feeling this way. It seems other Year 1s doing arts modules all have this feeling :)

Let's see what it's like after my first Arts tutorial tomorrow...


I wonder why ECAs hold their AGMs at this time, around the start of the school year. For one, Year 1s are allowed to vote, and are accepted as nominees for most posts. Given that they have just joined the ECAs in question, they won't know much about the nominees they are voting for, and if they're running, no one will know much about them. Thus, most Year 1s will end up voting for candidates, and most people will end up voting for Year 1s, on the basis of: prior acquaintance, looks, personality, the nomination speech, gimmicks, freebies and marketing, which is hardly ideal. Also, not having had much experience in the ECA, Year 1s won't have much of an idea of what they're running for. Perhaps a better time would be at the start of Semester 2, since Year 4s don't usually take up leadership positions.

At the Economics Society AGM, 5 of the top posts were walkovers. How Singaporean *g*


I just watched my first webcast lecture today. It was better than I expected, really. Though some others have been having problems, for me the sound was loud, and the slides were shown me exactly as the lecturer had shown them to the audience.

The only problem was that I couldn't seek to any location in the webcast, and the file markers were broken so I couldn't jump around to pre-determined parts of the lecture. Consequently, I was stuck watching the pre-lecture confusion and mid-lecture break. At first I thought that there was a problem with the file encoding, or that it was a bug in the WMV format, but the problem soon became clear: although the webcast was timed at 1 hr 41 mins (or so), I was rudely booted out after the mid-lecture break: the WMV was incomplete (this is a limitation of the WMV format that irks me - if the file is incomplete, you are unable to seek to any location).

Meanwhile the IVLE site proclaims that Part II of Lecture 3 will be broadcast live next Tuesday (which is actually the date of Lecture 3 of a parallel lecture series).


People tell me that NTU halls are centres of 'debauchery', and to support this claim, they say that people smoke ganja there. A sad testament to the power of the tobacco lobby, that even though marijuana does less harm than tobacco, people perceive pot to be more sinful.

I was at the Vietnamese coffee cafe at Engineering, and the auntie preparing my Soda Chanh asked me how much syrup I wanted. Apparently the "xiao2 nu3 shen1" (Translation: Small Girls) don't like any syrup. As for me, after she pumped 3 generous squeezes of syrup into my drink, I still found it sour. Bleah.

My friend told me about his interesting experience trying to join Club Exchange. All in all, it was like an initiation rite into some Evil Cult. Take the location, for example. Their clubhouse was housed in some half-abandoned building in Chinatown: half the building was not paved, so you were walking on concrete instead of marble, parquet or even tiles and the clubhouse was at the third storey, but the lifts and escalators were all not turned on. And then to prove their worthiness to join the club, they had to sell 25 CDs at $25 each (ie $500 in all) to prove their "resourcefulness". All of which is quite ridiculous if you think about it.

Me: One should not let such vulgar things as popular opinion prevent one from achieving one's dreams
Yisa: Yes, but the manifestation of your dreams will be everyone else's nightmare.
Gah.


Quotes:

She scares me a little - she keeps laughing. You better come see me... Did that answer your question, laughing woman?

They don't normally allow themselves to be hailed into court (hauled)

[On Dale Carnegie] Thank god that he realised that philosophy was useless, and wrote the book that he did and made a lot of money.

You read 10 pages of Plato like you were reading Harry Potter, then you think: What did I just read?... This happens to me too when I read Plato too late at night... You wipe your mind clean. There are other ways to wipe your mind clean. You can play video games - it's a lot more fun.

[On Emile Durkheim] Please, it's 'Emile'. Don't tell me 'Emily'.

You don't wear clothes, the little men in uniforms come with the net and take you away.

[On University Students being socialists by definition] Now you can go home and tell your mother: 'Guess what? My lecturer told me I was a socialist.' Then I'll get this collection of emails in the morning.

[On our roles if we subscribe to Goffman's Dramaturgical Analysis] You've got to sit there and pretend you look interested. You've got to laugh at my jokes.

[On a possible interpretation of the wedding ring] The days of slavery, when you're someone else's property.

[On the short mid-lecture break] You had a big long break the last time. That's enough to last for the next 4 lectures.

A friend of mine dropped by the other day. 'Oh, I was touched by god.' 'Really? What did he look like?'

[On the limits of using common sense] Common sense told us that... prostitutes really enjoyed their jobs.

Any upper-class people here? They're all off at UCLA and Stanford.

[On spurious correlation] We know that in Singapore, the shorter people's pants, the more bubble tea they drink... It's statistically proven. (because in hot weather people drink more)

[On the advantages of questionnaires] You can't go and ask people that: 'Hi, I'm your professor. Do you do illegal drugs?'

Maybe you mailed out a questionnaire on women's sexuality, and the men's soccer team got hold of it. *flighty voice* 'Oh ho, all the time.'

[End of lecture buzzer sounds] Don't pay attention to that.

I never listen to my own webcasts because it's too disturbing.

[On priests having the power to influence gods with sacrifices, prayers, incantations and spells] If you had email, you'd have gotten spam about this sort of offerings, presumably.

If you're having trouble with your math homework, you could pray to Zeus, and Zeus, no doubt being very good at math, could give you the answer to your problem set (?)

[On a sunglasses-wearing guy sitting at the front of the LT, at the lecturer's long table, and facing the students instead of the lecturer] Maybe he's just checking out the girls

[Me: One should not let such vulgar things as popular opinion prevent one from achieving one's dreams] Yes, but the manifestation of your dreams will be everyone else's nightmare.

Camp Exotica?... Not Erotica or something like that. [Someone on 'Erotica': That was the name of one of the groups.]

[On Bollywood Hollywood] If you dress up as a coconut tree, we'll dance around you.

We've all heard the speeches of the chew candidates vying for the position (two)

[Candidate for Treasurer on finanacial statements and accounts] They're not difficult *realises he's committed a faux pas* They're not easy.

[On heading the Sports and Social Committee] As you can see from my relaxed mood, this job suits me quite well.

[On drinking Root Beer, which he hates] Let me try a bit. See whether they changed the formula.

Quote of the Post: "Murals in restaurants are on a par with the food in museums." - Peter De Vries

***

Taboo - Moral judgements, chickens and the yuk-factor. How do you measure up?

"9. A man goes to his local grocery store once a week and buys a frozen chicken. But before cooking and eating the chicken, he has sexual intercourse with it. Then he cooks it and eats it. He never tells anyone about what he does, never regrets it and never shows any ill effects from behaving this way. He remains an upstanding member of his community.

a) How do you judge this man's actions (assume there are no ethical problems with meat eating!)?

b) Should his poultry lovin' be prevented (assuming we know about it) or should he be punished for it? [Note: if you think that either or both of these things should occur then you should answer 'Yes'; only answer 'No', if you think neither of these things should occur.]

c) Suppose you learn about two foreign countries. In one country, it is normal for people to have secret sex with dead chickens. In the other, people don't in the normal course of events have intercourse with frozen poultry. Are both these customs okay morally speaking or is one of them bad and morally wrong?"

Hahahahahaha.

***

Responses to some comments:

PrimusEmpyrian: My condolences.

Atheism is another form of religion.

It seems that most of the points in each headings seem to be preoccupied over the "sufferings" of this world. Because of "sufferings," the notion of "God" gets a discount.

There is a counter point that this world could be a place to test worthy and unworthy humans who will either enjoy the Elysian nature of Heaven or the torture of Hell. "Sufferings" is an element that must be factored in for such tests.

There is also the perspective view. What is "evil," "sufferings" may not be so in the bigger picture, something puny humans can not envision.

2+2=5 does not occur in Base10 maths, but it is possible in other Bases.

That being said, I am not a christian. :p
And I believe the notion that, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof." though I understand religions operate on faith not proof...


Thank you but it wasn't my friend who died.

And saying that atheism is another form of religion is analogous to saying that advocating the view that people of all races are equal is another form of racism. Unless you're talking about how the fervour of the few (at least in Singapore) atheists/other freethinkers passionate about their freethought is similar to the devotion that fiery theists have, in which case I would agree.

The notion of suffering does not in itself discount the possibility of gods, just the possibility of all-loving gods. And if this world is just a "test", with the test graded on your happening to guess correctly which of the many improbable gods for whom little if not no evidence exists competing for your mindshare are real, then the marker must be cruel indeed.

Please tell me how having babies born with Down's Syndrome or the existence of flesh-eating bacteria could possibly be good. What appears evil might be good, but working backwards from the conclusion that all seemingly evil events are good and retrospectively justifying them - all based on some wishy-washy notion of faith, is disingenuous indeed. If the evidence does not agree with the hypothesis, then it is faulty. Why not look at the evidence and then formulate theories that fit them, instead of the other way around? If not, one day you may wake up and find that the god(s) you were/was worshipping were/was actually evil, insane or at best apathetic (as all the evidence suggested), then I will say sorry to you.

If you suggest that 2 + 2 = 5 is possible, then I suggest that what is good can be evil, what is evil can be good, what is illogical can be logical and vice versa, in which case the concept of divine morality becomes null and void, as does all forms of argumentation.

I could start a religion and ask you to have faith in me. Would you follow me? I think not :)


PrimusEmpyrian: One can not prove or disprove the existence of God. Evidence might be given, but in the end all you really know is what you are told and what you see. Unless you hear all and see all, you can't really know can you?

Religion is not meant to replace logic and reason, only to address things that are outside these categories.

Besides, what better justice, be it dreamed or real, is there than a visceral overseer who will crush all unworthy and faithless(or people who don't believe like you do) when they die?

You can start a religion but I will decide whether to join you after 3 days... :p Through Thy's exaltness, may I write a book for Thy?

One also cannot disprove the existence of Invisible Pink Unicorns, Invisible, Immaterial Winged Bunnies Orbiting the Rings of Saturn, or Santa Claus either. For all intents and purposes, if no evidence exists for something, it doesn't exist.

There are things outside the realms of logic and reason, but addressing said things with systems that defy logic and reason is surely not prudent. In that case, we might as well give in to lunacy and irrationality.

If that is your concept of perfect justice, then you can hold me in contempt of court. "It is a counterfeit love that is contingent upon authority punishment or reward. In a nutshell, God had to kill Himself to appease Himself so that He would not have to roast us, His beloved creations, in HELL forever. He loves us more than we can ever comprehend, but if we don't return His affections, He will make us regret it for eternity. Now that is AMAZING GRACE!"

I can get people to write contradictory and absurd tales of what happened to me before, during and after the 3 days, but I don't think you'll believe those, will you?


It's not important: looks like you are still trying convince yourself that you are an atheist and loving it...

In that case, theists who enthuse about their faiths are trying to convince themselves that they are theists and loving it...

***

Innovations in Technology reminds me of a good reason why I didn't do Science or Engineering - I suck at using my hands.

From the feedback I'm getting, it seems USP writing modules are greatly overrated by the administration. For example when you have to read and digest passages like this: The "city" founded by utopian and urbanistic discourse is defined by the possibility of a three fold operation:... 2. the substitution of a nowhen, or of a synchronic system, for the indeterminable and stubborn resistances offered by traditions; univocal scientific strategies, made possible by the flattening out of all the dad in a plane projection, must replace the tactics of users who take advantage of "opportunities" and who, through these trap-events, these lapses in visibility, reproduce the opacities of history everywhere;, it makes you wonder.


Hubertian Maps - The Lands of Legend - Maps of the Blood Sword world of Legend.

jAime's adventures - I'm quite sure that this is a big joke.

Quote of the Post: "It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people do not want apologies, and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them." - P.G. Wodehouse

Random Playlist Song: Kreisler - Kaprys Wiedeñski

***

Something written by a friend:


Atheist at a Catholic Funeral

It was a pretty rough last week. I attended the wake and cremation of my former friend who died at the age of 25 in a car crash.

It was a surreal affair, with lighted white candles on a table containing a 6R picture of my friend at the main entrance of his home, and his body was placed in a white casket, in the living room.

On the wall behind the casket, hung a poster of some Biblical quote. I was too distraught (and even now, I am still trying hard to move on) to remember the exact wording, but it came from John Something Colon Something: "He that believes in me shall not die" or something like that.

Despite my shock at the loss of my friend, I was also aghast at how people were willing to believe that some day, they would actually believe that my friend was actually going to rise up again and meet them some day. I certainly wished that the corpse lying there would do so, but I had no illusions that my friend is no longer alive.

On the day of his cremation, I went to the church to witness the funeral rites. Despite the solemnity of the entire ceremony and the religious songs of hope sung, hushed sobs would punctuate the somewhat eerie silence when the song had ended, or even the times when the priest would speak.

When the casket was carried out and loaded into the hearse, I saw his mother in total hysterics, weeping and wailing, as well as touching the rear windscreen of the van lovingly, supported by her husband, himself barely able to walk straight.

I have never seen so many grown men and women cry together, and I think aside from the loss of the friend who taught me that enjoying life should come first above everything else, the friend who tried to teach me how to play soccer, and the friend who attempted to socialise with me, the tears, the crying will perhaps haunt me for quite some time.

MANDAI CREMATORIUM

Another ceremony was held at an auditorium, and the priest gave another sermon (?), and the throng of people who had accompanied the body to the cremation hall would break out into Biblical hymns like "Oh, What a Friend We Have in Jesus" (I know this song because I've been forced to master it on my guitar) and others which I couldn't remember. There were many who even broke down and cried even harder, unable to carry on singing.

The entourage was led to the viewing hall to see the body roll into the cremation chamber. All the time, nearly everyone was chanting some prayer repeatedly. When the casket rolled down the passageway, the door opened.

"Oh, no!" wailed my friend's brother, breaking from the chanting and crying yet again. Despite the incessant chanting, the sobbings and wailings reached a crescendo as the casket rolled into the cremation chamber and the automatic wooden doors closed behind them, almost everyone still chanting the prayer until it was time to leave the place.

In the bus back to the church, the religious experience got even worse. I heard a male 50+ year old man saying to a female: "..That's why I say. Everything must have a reason...I carry the Bible everywhere I go...I teach at Montfort Secondary...I tell my players: 'You can pray to Allah, you can pray to Kuan Yin...but I know in my heart that everyone will eventually reach Jesus'...The Lord works in mysterious ways...".

I've never been that tempted to sock anyone in the face before; that fundamentalist creep teaching some sport in that secondary school has the dubious honour of being the very first.

FINAL NOTE

I remember some pastor saying that Christian funerals are always full of hope, compared to other funerals, which only have sadness and nothing else.

While my friend was Catholic, since the Catholics and Christians use the same holy book, I never really saw anything such as "hope" in the wake and cremation which I attended last week. I saw people silent with red eyes, unable to sing the religious songs, I saw people hugged and kissed by other people who were stronger, but just as sad.

Before my friend died, I had already set my atheistic beliefs in stone. But after attending the funeral wake and cremation, when I saw that "hopeful" Biblical message behind his casket about the dead being brought back to life, after I saw the numerous numbers of people distraught, devastated, heartbroken, and crying in a voice so hysterical that I even hear them in my sleep and hope I won't ever hear again - though these things will happen because they can - and singing songs that reaffirm their belief in Mary and Jesus even though these two beings didn't manage to revive my friend before his body got cremated, I am quite sure that I shall never adopt a religion in my life.

I have questions for the people there who felt sad at his funeral.

Why all the crying, all the hullabaloo, all the sadness, if you really believe that you're going to see him someday, somewhere? Shouldn't you be happy, if he's gone to a beautiful place called Paradise?

On the painful days when I witnessed my friend's casket at his wake and when I witnessed his casket roll into the cremation chamber, I have seen the power of religion, and I am not impressed by it in any way. Yes, maybe my friend's up there in Paradise, despite his remains being on top of some shelf in Mandai Crematorium, but I have no illusions about the cold hard truth.

He was alive. He's dead. He won't come back, even if I did dream that he invited me out for a game of soccer the day after he was cremated.

The death of a person hurts people closest to him/her, but religion doesn't seem to be a good anaesthetic to numb the pain.

I have never been prouder to be an atheist among the devout Christians whom I hang out with all the time.

Rest in peace, Keith.

Quote of the Post: "Words easy to be understood do often hit the mark; when high and learned ones do only pierce the air." - John Bunyan

***

Dilbert Strip

Dilbert: Why can't I find a girlfriend?

Dogbert: You have two problems: your looks and your personality.

Dilbert: Hmm... Two isn't bad.

Dilbert: I can fix my looks by getting an extreme makeover.

Dogbert: You'll still need to improve your M.T.T.S.F.

Dilbert: What?

Dogbert: Mean Time To Story Failure: It's a measure of how long you can be fascinating to a new person.

Dogbert: I've been counting, and you only have nine good stories. After you use them up, you're a social liability.

Dilbert: I saw a horse kick a woodchuck over a fence.

Dogbert: Still only nine.

***

Do-It-Yourself Deity

In an attempt to resolve any disagreement surrounding the meaning of the word "God", TPM [Ed: The Philosophers' Magazine] has assembled a crack team of "metaphysical engineers" who have devised a new computer-modelling virtual environment in which to test the plausibility of different conceptions of God.

Here's how it works. You are invited to select from the list below the attributes which you believe God must have (or the attributes that a being deserving of the name God must have). Metaphysical engineers will then model this conception of God to check out its plausibility.

So I plugged in the attributes that most people would associate with a monotheistic god and I got:

"Plausibility Quotient = 0.3

The metaphysical engineers have determined that your conception of God has a plausibility quotient (PQ) of 0.3. A PQ of 1.0 means that as far as the metaphysical engineers can determine your conception of God is internally consistent and consistent with the universe that we live in. A PQ of 0.0 means that it is neither internally consistent nor consistent with our universe.

The problem of suffering

Your God is omnipotent (all-powerful, able to do anything), omnibenevolent (all-loving) and omniscient (all-knowing).

The metaphysical engineers have found it hard to model this God in a universe like our own. The problem is this: our universe contains vast amounts of suffering, much of which seems either entirely unnecessary or unnecessarily severe. Although some of this is the result of human action, and thus may be seen as an inevitable consequence of human free will, much is not. Plagues, floods and famines are not all the result of human action. Even the idea that human free will explains the existence of much suffering is hard to accept, since God, if all-powerful, could surely limit our capacity to harm others or suffer at their hands (after all, there are many other limits on what we are able to do).

So why is there all this suffering? If God cannot prevent it, it would seem she is not all-powerful. If God doesn't want to stop it, it would seem she is not all-loving. If God doesn't know about it, she can't be all-knowing.

The problem of loving too much

Your God is omnipotent (all-powerful, able to do anything), omnibenevolent (all-loving) and a perfectly free agent.

The metaphysical engineers have confronted a difficulty modelling this God. If perfectly free, then God could choose whatever she wants. Nothing could stop this because God is omnipotent. But this God is also all-loving. It seems to the engineers that such a God could never choose to do something which is unloving. It is not that God just chooses not to do such things, rather that God's nature as omnibenevolent constrains what she can do. In other words, God does not have the freedom and/or the power to do something unloving.

One possible response is that God isn't necessarily omnibenevolent, but, as a matter of fact, since she never chooses to do something which is unloving, is omnibenevolent. However, if this is true, then the metaphysical engineers can't see how omnibenevolence can be a necessary characteristic of a God.

Not so personal after all?

The metaphysical engineers are finding it hard to understand how, on your conception of God, one can have a personal relationship with her.

Personal relationships appear to depend on a number of things. Sufficient similarity between the persons in the relationship is one. Another is that both are persons, or are, at least, person-like, as some higher primates, for example, appear to be. The problem is that in our universe there seem to be no genuine personal relationships between things of great difference. And God, as you have described her, is vastly different from human beings.

People can have feelings for things which are similar to those they have towards people. Affection or love for places or objects, for example, is common. But this is not the same as having a personal relationship with them. In a similar way, people have relationships with animals, maybe a cat. But this does not seem to be the same as a personal relationship, because of the great difference in the way the person relates to the animal and the way the animal relates to the person. Perhaps this is the kind of relationship which you envisaged?

Can God do the illogical?

The metaphysical engineers request clarification of what you mean when you say God is able to do anything.

In the model, God was asked to make 2 + 2 = 5 (where all the terms hold their common meanings). She could not do so and the model broke down. It seems that no being can ever do what is logically impossible. It is not just beyond the wit of humanity to make 2 + 2 = 5, such a thing is a contradiction in terms.

So the metaphysical engineers seek your permission to understand by all-powerful that God can do anything which is logically possible. Before accepting this, however, you should understand that by accepting the limits of logical possibility on God, you are leaving open the possibility that, if some characteristics you attribute to God turn out to entail logical contradictions, you must give these up. It means, in effect, accepting that rationality is a constraint on God (though it is a moot point exactly what the word constraint means in this regard).

Why this universe?

Your God is omnipotent (all-powerful, able to do anything), omnibenevolent (all-loving), omniscient (all-knowing) and the creator of all that exists.

The metaphysical engineers have run up against a problem. When your God created the universe, being all-knowing, she must have known about all the suffering there would be in this world. Yet God still created it, as it is. She did not create a more benign version of the universe, or simply choose not to create the universe. Why is this?

It could be that God did not know about all the suffering which would occur. But that would make God not all-knowing. It could be that God doesn't mind all the suffering, but that would make her less than all-loving. It could be that God could not have created a more benign world than this one. But that would seem to make God less than all-powerful. The only way we can resolve this problem is to conclude that God can only do what is possible and that this really is the best of all possible worlds. The metaphysical engineers find it hard to model this resolution as they think they can make a better world quite easily. For example, they are able to make human brains more hardy and thus reduce the incidence of psychopathology, resulting in an immediate decline, in their model, of crimes of sadistic murder. Are they mistaken in some way?

For eternity?

The metaphysical engineers request clarification of what you mean when you say God exists eternally.

You may mean that God exists through all space and time. But according to our best physics, space and time exist only within the confines of a universe. This would seem to constrain God's existence to within a universe.

You could mean that God exists "outside" space and time. But the metaphysical engineers find it hard to understand what you mean by "eternally", if that's the case. Doesn't the concept "eternally" require some notion of time to make sense? The metaphysical engineers are still puzzling over these issues.


Which is why conventional polytheism makes more sense than conventional monotheism.

***

Different Chinese Groups in Malaysia

Today, in Malaysia, there is no longer just the Chinese. Along the way, the Chinese people divided beyond dialects and religious faith. We now have denomination within the Chinese. The major three groups are Regular, Cina, and Ah Beng.

The Regular group is the minority, making up less than 20% of the Chinese people. This group has the following characteristics:

1. Speaks English as the first language.
2. Thinks the world owes them a living.
3. Uses the Internet more than the other two groups combined.
4. Loves the iPod and/or IKEA.
5. Watches one or more of the following TV series: "Sex And The City", "Friends", or "CSI."
6. Thinks that the Regular group is way larger than it is and makes fun of the other groups, particularly the Ah Beng group.

Why? Because it's fun.

Recent studies have also shown that there is a growing splinter group within the Regular group known as the CPWTTANC group. (CPWTTANC is short for Chinese People Who Think They Are Not Chinese.) This growing subgroup are considered elitist by some and are found making statements like "I wish I were in the U.S." or "This never happened when I was studying in Australia." They also tend to speak with an unidentifiable accent. The women may also prefer to date white men from foreign countries with the
excuse that local men just "don't understand me" and have the secret desire to be taken away to the U.S. to live in a sitcom.

The second Chinese group, Cina makes up approximately 55% of the Chinese community. (Cina is derived from the Malay word Cina which means Chinese and is pronounced "chee-na". And you will have to say it in a condescending tone for effect.) This group is considered mainstream and contribute to the numbers that reflect development in the country. They are the masses in context of the Chinese community. In other words, if you want to sell something to the masses of Chinese people, the Cina is it.

The Cina are identified by the following traits:

1. Speaks Mandarin or Cantonese as the first language.
2. Generally quiet, self-effacing, and obliging but are actually shrewd and calculative.
3. Sees Taiwan as the place to be.
4. More likely to forward chain email to people in their address book.
5. Goes to Halo Café or Wow Wow Café BY CHOICE at least three times a year.
6. Has Astro hardwired to Wah Lai Toi.
7. Calls a music video an MTV instead of music video.
8. Knows all the dim sum dishes by name.
9. Seventy percent of lighting at home generated by flourescent lights.

The last group are known as the Ah Bengs . This term was probably made up by the Regulars in the early 80s during the cultural invasion that saw the mass import of music and movies from countries like Hong Kong, Taiwan, and to some extent, Japan. This phenomenon saw the more open-minded and runaway members of the Cina group defect into Ah Bengs and its feminine equivalent, Ah Lian. They just took their Alan Tam and Anita Mui a little too seriously.

Perhaps the most made-fun-of group not only by its own Chinese people but by people of other races, the Ah Bengs are often seen as people living on the edge and have more flamboyant tastes.

One may identify the Ah Beng by these tell-tale signs:

1. Built-in visual self-defense mechanism that keeps people away from them.
2. Have enough amplifiers in their one car to power speakers for six cars.
3. Hair not in their original colour.
4. Volume of voice is automatically five decibels higher than everyone else.
5. Excessive use of the phrase "Kan Ni Na Bu Ciao Chee Bai". (Although, to be fair, some members of the Regular group have been reported to use the phrase on a daily basis as well.)
6. Once a fan of one of the following groups: Vengaboys, Dr Bombay, Aqua, or the Cheeky Girls.
7. Their Proton car does not look like a Proton car due to modifications.
8. For the Ah Lians, have at least one bag fashioned after a furry animal complete with the head.

***

"Some of the symptoms of psychosis:

Talking or smiling to yourself
Neglecting your appearance"

- Poster urging potential sufferers to get help.

Heh heh. Coincidentally, many of the other criteria (eg hearing voices others cannot hear and seeing things others cannot see) happen to fit religious prophets/leaders.


I saw a Chinese guy with an afro at Borders. I asked him how long it took for his hair to get that way, and he said about a year from crew cut length. He claimed that his hair was naturally curly, and he had just let it grow out to get the afro. Right. If I want an afro, I'll probably have to perm my hair like crazy.

My attempt at building an electroscope failed. Boo hoo. I shall try a Leyden Jar next.

Useful tip: To have an application window's size and position persist when you next open it, Control + Click on the "Close" button


When the Computer Opens the Closet - "Once women like Jennifer might have spent decades in the limbo of ignorance or denial, while their husbands explored their sexual orientation and lived furtive double lives. But in the age of the Internet, the blinders can be yanked off with the flick of a finger. Mental health professionals and matrimonial lawyers say that many marriages, involving both heterosexuals and homosexuals, are collapsing under the weight of documentary evidence left behind on computers, just as computer records are increasingly tripping up business leaders, employees and others who forget that these are communications not easily denied."

Tell these intolerant Singaporeans to go home - "In part two of the Seven Network submission to FIRB, Kerry Stokes explains the dangers of allowing these heavy-handed totalitarians control over any more key Australian assets... The Seven Network submits that the offer by Sing Tel for Optus be rejected on the grounds that it would be against the national interest. If the bid by Sing Tel were to be accepted, a very significant Australian asset would come under the control of a foreign Government which is widely acknowledged as running an extremely intrusive and repressive authoritarian state."
A mid-July 2001 opinion on why Singtel's attempt to purchase Opus should not be allowed to go ahead. Pleasantly, no events of the sort chronicled in the article have happened here since 1997, if I recall correctly.

PAPMan is damn hard once you read level 3. I wonder if there's a Level 4. At Level 3 you already have PM, MM and an anonymous MIW (Man In White) chasing you. So who might they add in Level 4?

Power ranger death! - This must rank up there with the sickest shit I have ever seen.

The (sic) "legendary" gabriel seah spent his birthday hanging out at my place while we played with my PS2!! And we battled side by side (notionally) at Samurai Warriors!

I'm never going to wash my sofa again!!! *gushes over and swoons*

Incidentally, someone in the "I-never-thought-they-would-read-Balderdash" category actually asked me, totally out of nowhere "Do you contribute to Gabriel Seah's blog?". I am exalted just by being Associated with you:)

You should be my idol instead.

Can I have your love child? (I'll surgically implant a uterus if that's what it takes)

I should change my handle to "Gabriel's Biggest Groupie".

Birthdays are terribly overrated.

Quote of the Post: "The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot." - Mark Twain

[Keywords to help me find this post: amoral, immoral, animal, animals, men, "below them", "above them"]

Random Playlist Song: Victoria Junior College Choir - Symphony of Voices 2000 - Bengawan Solo (Arr Samuel Liew)

***

Some might remember that less than 2 weeks ago, I plugged the Raffles Players play - Lysistrata, in this very same spot. Of course, I couldn't have plugged it in good faith if I hadn't also gone, so yesterday Alvin and I graced its opening night (and were probably the oldest non-teachers there).

Of the place in general, all I will say (here at least) is that, after 3 years, the more things change, the more things stay the same. Except for the Purple Uniform, which has finally died. Hallelujah.

While I was wandering about, I was accosted by someone who asked: "Is your name Gabriel?". At this, I turned to Alvin and ejaculated: "Why does this always happen to me? Wherever I go, people come up to me and ask: 'Are you Gabriel?'". I daresay that the novelty of being recognised by people I don't has long worn out. Luckily, as it turned out, this chap was my choir junior Shen Ting, whose name I vaugely recalled in the mist of my memory, and not some strange guy like the presumably bisexual stalker I had some time ago. So I semi-apologetically demurred: "The amount a person's face changes from Sec 1 to J2 is much more than the amount from Sec 4 to J [He: 10] 5 [He: 10] 5!", and dismissed him peremptorily. Later, it turned out that he was actually 4 years my junior, and he remembered me from the times I went back in J1. What can I say - I seem to be memorable.


I wasn't expecting RP to put up a historically-informed performance, albeit in English instead of Classical Greek. For one, having all the roles played by males would have freaked the audience out, and disenfranchised the girls. Wearing masks would also have prevented the actors from using their faces as dramatic instruments.

However, there were some parts I was uncomfortable with. The cast shifted clumsily and repeatedly from modern speech to a more formalised way of speaking which was keeping more in tune with the manner of the original text. I spoke with the Production Manager on this issue, and she told me that they had took the text from a Puffin edition of Lysistrata. The transition scenes - where characters exit the stage and others enter - were also improperly handled, with the lights blacked out for too short a period. The result was that when the lights came on again, new characters could be seen coming onto the stage while at the same time, the buttocks of the older ones who were exiting the stage were still clearly visible.

At 4-5 points, the chorus started singing. While this was a nice homage to Greek theatre to have the chorus sing at least some of the time, I pounded my fists and gnashed my teeth in despair when at one point, they sang to the tune of Yankee Doodle. I didn't expect them to come up with Greek-like tunes as alien to the ear as the "Delphic paean, Athenaeus 127bc" I have on my playlist (De Organographia - Music of the Ancient Greeks), but hearing the chorus singing to Yankee Doodle almost made me cry. A short while later, the 2 choruses (male and female) started a dance sequence which I shall describe thus: the choruses combined and formed into a vertical line (from the audience's perspective), with one chorus at the rear of the line and one at the fore. Each faced opposite directions (stage left and stage right). They then linked their hands and made the line rotate clockwise. I would have cried out in despair at this point, but I was still recovering from the shock of hearing the chorus singing Yankee Doodle.

Also, the actors need to learn a very important thing about staging comedies: Always wait for the audience to finish laughing before you continue. If not, your lines, however brilliant or essential to the plot, will be lost in uproarious laughter.

On the upside, they did do a commendable job of sewing Greek-inspired costumes, and making the play entertaining.


Kenneth and Geraldine wanted to go to last night's play in their old uniforms. Gah.

Just after the intermission, there was a teaser performance by some HCJC students to promote YAWP! (Young Adult Writers Perform!, A Performance Poetry Event organised by the LitWing of the Hwa Chong Litterbugs, on August the 21st at the Chinese High Drama Centre. A girl sang a few lines of a song somewhat weakly, and then one guy started scolding another, and talking about stroking sheets while thinking of him, and tasting him at the back of his throat. The guy who was at the receiving end of this abuse then started wetting the other one (with water), while scolding him back. As one guy behind me remarked: "No wonder it's free". Maybe, for the privilege of advertising their event, they subsidised the play, which was why it was so cheap ($6).


I am happy that the North Korean girl (Kim Hyang Mi) beat our Singapore table tennis player. At least now she won't die in a mysterious train "accident" because the Dear Leader was angry at her losing the match. [solsetur: You forgot to speculate about the Finals for N.Korean player. Will she be killed to appease China if she wins? Rewarded for losing to great Communist China? Will they still withdraw food for her and her family if she loses in the finals?]

I search for "Dick Lee" (sans quotation marks) on Soulseek and I got porn. Joy!

There's a Democratic Socialist club in NUS. Wth?!

I've a friend in Science who somehow managed to get a 3 day week. Well done :) And enjoy your 10 hour days.


Quotes:

[Seen on blackboard presumably used for Lysistrata makeup] Do not eat your makeup. It does not digest well.

[On the Lysistrata performance] This is the only place in Singapore where you don't see dyed hair.

Quote of the Post: "[Abstract art is] a product of the untalented, sold by the unprincipled to the utterly bewildered." - Al Capp

Random Playlist Song: The Cambridge Singers - What Sweeter Music

***

I got Wo-hen Nankan fanmail!

And I also want to thank you on behalf of a very small community (that could
be described as the the non-asian part of the world) for making Wo-hen
Nankan more known to the community in question.
His hair rocks !!!!!!

Reading your opinion on modern music, I hope that Wo-hen Nankan's
breathing is as soft as his hair ;->
Keep up with your page - it is really "not another private homepage".
Very unique and individual approach.
Some of your comments on modern music I found very interesting ... even
though i don't share them all.

All the best from the southern part of Germany


TalkingCock seems to be back - but strangely, it is stuck in 2002.

***

Interesting lines:

"It is often said that the social sciences lag behind the natural sciences and that the latter have created the problems of atomic war, overpopulation, and industrial change that the former must now solve" - Some sociology book

Later in the same book (on the line above): "this... [ignores] how unamenable to control by deliberate action the structures of a society are, except... by a form of political control that would be likely to create more evils than it solves". Racial quotas for public housing, anyone? Though I don't know about creating more evils than it solves.

***

solsetur on Hall People:

Hall people are all obsessed with their images, and nowhere else in the world will you see such a display of the mass culture and consumerism where your worth is more or less demonstrated by how similar you are to the people living together with you. So they have all their stupid fashions, all their stupid trends. And nowhere else have I encountered people who will spend 100 bucks on a single bottle which will keep them thin and beautiful like the persons living next door; or as many eating disorders; or as many health/gym/dieting freaks.

To be the epitome of 'cool', or to give it a more balanced 'look at the whole universe' general view - to be viewed cool among the hall people - you must do as they do and that include partaking in their stupid activities, which include official hall activities like their bashes, performances, rag day flag day prom night ragging (disguised as 'hall initiation'), and not limited to those - you have to take part in extra curricular activities like clubbing, alcohol binging, and even help the tobacco company expand their coffers if you're that weak and/or unlucky. The funny thing is I suspect after some time these people all gradually are brainwashed and lose their objectivity - my previously rather sane friends seem to be sunk into a state where they really and wholeheartedly accept all this as the 'norm' and think, very earnestly, that they are living the 'cool' young adult Tertiary education life.

To stick back to the topic, the other day at Miss LSE's birthday party a little discussion group was formed. And the subject surrounded on one thing only - drinking alcohol. It baffled quite a few people (actually it did not really bother me till various guy friends mentioned this and I did realise the flaw - so how immune am I to hall culture anyway?) because they could not understand why on earth would alcohol and its horrible side effects like vomiting in public, hangovers, getting sick, making a fool of yourself under the effects of alcohol could be such fun to talk about that it just went on and on?

In retrospect I suspect this has all to do with some mass disillusionment that abusing of alcohol (however minor the severity of the problem might be!) is all so very adult and cool. But is it really.

***

With many documents being placed on the IVLE (Integrated Virtual Learning Environment) instead of being printed out nicely and stapled for us, I am faced with an important question: Is it cheaper to print stuff in school or at home?

In school, we are charged the princely price of 5 cents per laser-printed page (I don't think they have inkjets). Of course, the stuff gets printed quickly and comes out looking sleek and professional.

I haven't calculated the cost of printing materials at home. I will once my current black ink cartirdge runs dry and I have to replace it. Exorbitantly priced OEM Canon black ink cartridges for my S200SPx come at $12, I'm told. I contacted a supplier of compatible third-party cartridges, and he said that he was selling third party black ink cartridges for $6 each, and offered free home delivery even for an order of 1 cartridge (?!). Someone also suggested that I go to Mustafa Centre. Alternatively, I could refill my old cartridges and spill ink all over my floor.

Of course, there are other complications. For example, my printer seems to have issues with ink regulation/consumption, judging from the search referrals I get about this sort of thing. Ink also dries up over time (but if I'm going to be doing enough printing to calculate the relative costs of printing in school and at home, such losses will be negligible). There is also the problem of cleaning clogged ink heads, which wastes ink, and of the cost of paper, though I don't think it's quite that high. And finally, I tried printing in Super Economy Mode but my notes came out faint and not exactly easy on the eyes.


I was at a loss navigating my way through the Central Library, since I couldn't puzzle out how the books were classified. I scoured the NUS Libraries' site but couldn't find my question in the FAQ, so I used the "Ask A Librarian" feature.

It turns out that they use the Library of Congress classification system, and my question was addressed, if only implicitly (you can search for books by Library of Congress call numbers or Dewey/Han He/Zhongguo Tushu call numbers). Gah, I should have known.

I do wonder why they, and most academic libraries, use the Library of Congress (LOC) classification system. The Dewey Decimal system is more intuitive and precise (and I'm not saying that just because I grew up with it). Most of all, it's a faceted classification scheme. The Library of Congress system was formulated for one purpose - to catalogue the books in the Library of Congress, which is why it has 2 top-level categories for US History, and 2 top-level categories for Military Science and (beat this) Naval Science. The only advantage of using the Library of Congress system that I can think of is that it results in shorter call numbers, which is useful for large collections.


Though I continue to collect quotes of Bad English, or just plain funny quotes, as I have been doing for the past 6 years, I realise that there is a problem. If you examine the recent quotes, you'll notice that many of them are quite subtle, employing sublime wit. Sometimes this makes them all the more amusing, but usually they are not quite as outrageously, slapsticky, in-your-face funny as some I might cite. Besides which, many people will not get all the jokes.

I hope they renovate more LTs in NUS. The difference between renovated and non-renovated LTs is striking, and I'm only talking about the write tops here. In pre-renovation LTs, the write tops, which are fixed in place, mind you, are too small to hold much, yet big enough to sometimes cause problems when you take your seat (or maybe it's just me and my big butt). Adding insult to injury, they have a sharp screw protruding at the bottom which can get caught in the fabric of your shorts/bermudas/skirt/jeans/trousers/kilt/loincloth.

I'm surprised that, during our Demand and Supply lecture, all NUS students' (sans those from Law and Medicine) favourite market - CORS - wasn't mentioned.

We get breaks during lectures sometimes and what do people do? They go outside and smoke. Gah. I should go and paint a yellow box in the middle of the road.

The theme for this year's USP Dinner and Dance is "Bollywood Hollywood". In keeping with the theme, I am thinking of going there dressed as a coconut tree, so people can dance around me. Or maybe I can wear a turban.

I was at a lecture with plenty of empty seats, yet people were sitting on the (carpeted) floor behind the last row of seats. Oh well.

Ivan on rag: Medicine had a story centred around a battle between dancing candy and some ants. Oh well, lie I told James, "Considering it's Medicine, they could have ended up making it white blood cells versus bacteria." GAH.

About the E.Merge IT Fair - "E.Merge 2004 will be a 3-day event, held from the 18-20 Aug at the foyer outside LT 27. The fair will be open to the public, though the targetted groups are NUS students and staff. As we move towards a wireless world, we have become increasingly inseperable from from IT products. With enough space for XXX booths, you can expect a large number of stalls selling a wide variety of goods, from the hottest and trendiest IT accessories to new ideas from the techie world."
It must be really popular, then.

The NUS Political Association boosts its membership numbers by making all students who are Singaporean Citizens members. Sneaky,


I have a friend with a T1 line at home. !@#$%^&*()


Quotes:

[On his dummy paper] This is a pretty good opening paragraph. It is a good paper, if I do say so myself.

[The tutors will use] their red pens. Counter-example, counter-example. Tutors are very small-minded. They're like the enemy.

If you state your objections first, your tutor will be frustratingly disarmed... think like the enemy.

Right here, I wrote: 'It seems to me', which is a classic wimpy, lazy example [of how to qualify an argument]

[On using examples] They take up space, which is really helpful if you're trying to fill up big, white sheets of paper.

[On how to feel good] Some people go to bars and punch people in the nose. Others start arguments.

[On self-criticism] If you just stab yourself first, your tutor can't possibly go and stab you.

I have 3 girls to celebrate (girls' birthdays)

[On the Indian Protectorates] These were protected by the British. They were protected from doing what the British didn't want them to do.

[At 13 Dong Dong House of Fish Soup, below pictures of the dishes served] illustration only. Actual servings may differs

We have diversity in causes (as far as courses are concerned)

[On joining the Sociology club] Do they have to pay? It's free! Oh my god, it's free! Do they get goodies? Do they get goodies? *nods head repeatedly* We'll find something for you.

If a tutorial group is full, we can't let you in... We've got lots of room in the 8am tutorial groups.

[Me on 'Animystic': 'Animistic' is {spelt} A-N-I-M-I-S-T-I-C] I know. But I like the 'Y'. *I groan* It makes more sense.

[On August Comte] He's the Father of Sociology. Who's the Mother of Sociology, people ask?

[Me: What about the people who don't have 5 modules when school starts?] Suck thumb, pah chiu cheng

[On my friend in Law faculty] Friend-in-law? There's such a term?

[On Najaf] The town of allies and rooftops (alleys)

[On a Monty Python skit - Argument Clinic] I'm going to attempt to recreate the comedy here. It's covered under fair use. This is strictly for educational purposes. You're not allowed to laugh; you're only allowed to be educated

'Dialectical dispute' - that's a fancy term I came up with just for this slide. I'll probably forget to use it later.

There's a kind of simplicity to this, kind of live Sesame Street. It's when Elmo goes to visit the furry arms people (monsters?)

[On dividing people into tutorial groups] Ugly people come in this week, beautiful people come in another week... You'll get into fights. I don't want to get into fights. There are too many of you.

This is the Ancient Greek version of the 'Philosophy majors don't get jobs argument'.

Euthyphro is like a super-villian. He talks about himself in the third person.

I read a couple of scholarly essays on the Euthyphro. I'm not going to make you read any of them.

[On the circle of interests - Yourself, Your Family, Your Countrymen etc] When Mars Attacks, we stand shoulder to shoulder against the Martians. When someone from outside the Solar System attacks, we team up with the Martians.

If your dad spit on the sidewalk, you wouldn't march down and tell the authorities about that. That would be bizarre.

[To me on Philosophy] I find it very sad if this is your most fun module.

Zeus obviously comes from a dysfunctional family... It was prophesised that one of his [Cronos'] children would overthrow him, so he did what any parent would do. He ate his own children.

[On ethics] WWZD - What Would Zeus Do? That is the question.

[On early dismissal] I'm sending you into the sunlight 10 minutes early.

[On a home experiment] Before your destroy it, let's see how it works.

People who come to Arts: We are all very laid back people.

[On Science Girls] They don't wear slippers, they wear sandals. *Goes on to discourse about how Science Girls wear T-shirts and jeans, while Arts Girls wear tank tops, spaghetti straps, skirts and shorts*

30% of Arts Girls are attached

They behave according to irrationality (irrationally)

You just have to keep your imagination open (be imaginative)

Most people without a cell phone are the professors. They are always tied to the desk... They work 7/24 (Most professors do not have cell phones, their desks, 24/7)

As you can see in bungalow (Bangalore)

Now it's just so prevailing (prevalent)

She just quitted her job (quit)

The ong'line way to purchase things (online)

The very best get cheaper each year (gets)

How many of you pay for you Acrobat Reader? Photoshop? It's free. (Adobe Photoshop costs a bomb. It's free only if it's pirated)

I just want to get you excited about Economics, because it can really be applied to many areas.

I forgot to say something about Science Girls and Arts Girls. Science Girls don't wear hoop earrings.

Quote of the Post: "The last time somebody said, 'I find I can write much better with a word processor.', I replied, 'They used to say the same thing about drugs.'" - Roy Blount Jr.

Random Playlist Song: Vaughan Williams - Rhosymedre

***


Tiberius was the second emperor of Rome. His
mother wanted it more than he was. He had to
leave his wife to marry Julia, the daughter of
Augustus. He never really cared much for
politics. Later on in life, he moved to the
island of Capri, turning it into an island of
depravity and sex.


What Julio-Claudian Roman Emperor are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

***

My Brother-in-law said Steven Lim should have sung Gunther's Ding Dong Song as he stripped. Heh heh.

Maybe for the next season of Singapore Idol I will dress up as Wo-hen Nankan and sing one of his songs. But I'd need to grow a mullet first. Or find a mullet wig.


Rate My Mullet

What is a mullet?

What a question! Almost everyone knows what a mullet is by now, its popularity has risen greatly in recent times - not the popularity of the instance of the mullet (which has remained at a constant plateau for several millennia), but rather the youth-backlash towards it. Leading scienticians say that anti-mullet sentiments have risen a staggering 437% in the past 5 years alone.

What is it anyways? To say that the mullet is a hairstyle barely even scratches the surface of the issue. The mullet is a way of life, it is a state of mind, it is every person who wears it. Physically it is characterized by short hair on the top, front, and sides of the head, followed by a long drape of hair on the back, reaching at least to the middle of the spine. Typical accessories to the mullet include moustaches, scraggly beards and/or goatees, and sunglasses. Research on the mullet phenomena, at this stage, is still in its infancy. However it is suggested by many top laboratories that the mullet, as it slowly reaches maturity, begins to grow tentacles into the brain of the victim. which affect several areas of the brain and fundamentally alter the candidate's actions and behavioural responses. Said behavioural changes mainly include extreme agression, the proclivity to consume large amounts of alcohol, pedophilia, lack of hygeine, dramatic reduction in inhibitions (often bolstered by the consumption of alcohol), sense of paranoia and distrust towards authority/governmental figures, and most importantly - steadily decreasing IQ levels. I would stress that these are only preliminary details however, and the controversial nature of the theory renders it unsuitable for mass publication.

Now, why would any human being willingly decide, of their own freewill, to wear the mullet? Well, let us not discount the many advantages of the hairstyle. It is widely known that the instance of the mullet in any given area is inversely proportional to average annual income. There is little to no maintenance required to preserve the mullet, and the costs involved are much lower than that of most other hairstyles. Subjects need not even wash the mullet for long periods of time, nor groom it in the morning, though many do meticulously attend to their mullet as an issue of pride and beauty - still the costs are indeed negligible. Also the mullet insulates the subject's neck, keeping him or her warm through the cold winter nights. The other important advantage of the mullet is that it offers it's host the freedom of both worlds of work and leisure. The subject appears to be a normal human being from the front, unencumbered by long hair over the face, and also appears to be a "party animal" from behind, with the long flowing locks. Hence, the "business in the front, party in the back" mentality. One is free to be taken seriously in the world of work, and, when the opportunity arises, is also free to "let loose" and "go wild - ape style." But let us get to the harsh reality of the mullet. It looks horrible, I cannot stress that enough. Wearing a mullet makes you look like a complete and total fool, and instantly makes you much poorer and less intelligent. I mean, there must be a sad lack of intelligence and self-worth to begin with if a person is to decide to grow a mullet. Hey! Do something about that mullet! It looks so fucking stupid! Get your ass to the barber's shop and tell him you're sick of lookin' like an asshole!

***

Tales of Weirdness from Inferno XV:

"I've been doing a touring play, comissioned by the Health Promotion Board. No, it's nothing glamourous - it's for teaching primary-school age kids about Osteoporosis and the importance of eating calcium-rich foods. The sort of script that has "Can anybody name me a vegetable rich in calcium? Yes! Spinach! very good!" and a character named Aladdin who shakes a carton of milk (any special carton? As long as it's - CALCIUM ENRICHED!) and a genie comes out to teach us all about Osteoporosis. In case you were wondering - I'm the panto dame. Yes. I've got a big purple wig and frighteningly garish dress and big skirt. Needless to say, it's artistically highly dubious. However, we actors being what we are, we do it for pay. I fail to see how this differs in essence from prostitution. The lines are awful, hence impossible to learn EXACTLY. We cover all the points everytime, even if the lines come out slightly differently with each performance. Yeah, fine, except the chap who wrote the play (and is acting as well) is behaving as if we're desecrating great literature. Somebody please tell him 'Aladdin and the Magical Maxx' is not on the same level as Shakespeare."

I can't believe this.

***

Chicken madras with spicy sauce and a pack of wet wipes will get our boys in a fighting mood By Alan Hamilton

RATIONS and a pair of boots are the most important things for a fighting man. What today’s British soldier demands is boots that fit, and curry.

Troops returning from active service in Afghanistan and Iraq have been bellyaching about their 24-hour ration packs — dull, stodgy and essentially unchanged for 30 years. What they really want is what they would eat after five pints of lager at home.

Defence catering chiefs yesterday unveiled new dishes for sustaining a man in the field, which will be tested on 20,000 service men in the coming months. Their views will determine whether the British fighting machine runs in future on ethnic fuel, with chicken balti and chicken madras high on the new menu list.

Britain’s national dish, chicken tikka, has been included in some ration packs since 1988 and has proved popular. Other older staples like beef and dumplings, pork casserole and lamb stew are finding less and less favour with their consumers, because they are bored with them and because they are unlikely to eat them on a night out with the lads.

“Most fighting men are aged between 18 and 24 and their palates have become much more sophisticated since I joined up 31 years ago,” Major Andy Main of the Defence Catering Group said. He is from a fish-and-chips generation that knew little of biriyani or boil-in-the-bag.

Military food experts say they want to make the ration packs healthier, but admit the scope for improvement is limited; there is no use giving a fighting man goat’s cheese.

“Each pack, which weighs two kilograms and must have a shelf life of three years, aims to get 4,000 calories into a man every day, twice the recommended amount for a sedentary civilian. The only way to do that in a compact pack is with plenty of sugar and fat. For them a hard day at the office means getting shot at; they burn it all off. If they didn’t, they’d get very fat very quickly,” Major Main said. Each day’s meal pack costs the MoD £6.

The one item which soldiers throw away more than any other is military treacle pudding, which even they find resembles an over-sweet house brick. Nor are they fond of the lemon crystals for making a flavoured drink. Other new items being tested are instant porridge, spotted dick, isotonic drinks of the Red Bull type, and Yorkie bars, the staple diet of truck drivers whose wrapping bears the macho slogan, “Not for girls”. The military version will say, “Not for civvies”. Research has shown that including a branded item familiar at home is a significant morale booster. Another supermarket regular, Princes tuna in mayonnaise, is also under consideration.

One advance in rations in recent years has been the virtual abandonment of tins in favour of sealed plastic pouches. You “boil in the bag” in your mess tin heated with paraffin tablets, and use the still-fresh cooking water for your brew-up. If a soldier fell, it was found, his tinned dinner stashed around his body could cause him significant injury.

What a serviceman eats while on active operations raises a delicate but vital question. The current ration pack is supposed to promote evacuation only once every three days, a vital consideration in hostile territory. What the effects of curry will be remains an uncharted area. “We have tried to formulate the curries so that they have all the flavour without too much of the spice. We are including a sachet of tabasco-style pepper sauce for the guys who know they can handle a hot one,” Major Main said.

In their foxholes in a Suffolk wood near RAF Honington, members of the RAF Regiment were cooking up the new dishes and offering them to reporters. They seemed to win approval.

Senior Aircraftman Dave O’Brien is a curry fan, and gave the thumbs up to the chicken madras with spiced pilau rice. “It doesn’t look like a restaurant curry but it tastes pretty close. The pepper sauce added a bit of taste, unlike the old rations, which all tasted the same.” Sharing his foxhole was SAC Shaun Irwin, who was almost convinced. “I wouldn’t normally eat curries at home; I’m a burger-and- chips man. But I can see myself eating these.”

The pair apologised for the spotted dick with separately bagged custard. “Could have done with a bit more cooking — maybe another three minutes,” they agreed.

Military Catering provides kosher, Sikh, halal and vegetarian ration packs, but none was available yesterday.

In another foxhole Corporal Gareth Saunders said of the new food: “To get people to join up you’ve got to tempt them; it’s quite cushy out in Civvy Street these days.”

Each ration contains a small packet of paper tissues, but what the lads really wanted were wet wipes, to clean themselves up after dinner. Blimey, our boys aren’t going that cushy, are they?

HAMILTON’S FIVE-STAR TASTE TEST

3 stars: Chicken balti. Indian restaurant quality, with plenty of chicken chunks, spiced up with the hot pepper sauce and with a pleasant lemony tang, leaving only the faintest aftertaste of cardboard.

3 stars: Chicken madras. Good and mildly spicy with generous amounts of meat and an authentic tasting sauce. Accompanied by mildly spiced firm pilau rice, and with no unpleasant after taste.

2 stars: Improved bacon and beans. An old stalwart now made with better quality bacon which you can actually taste without overly fatty undertones. But the combination with beans makes it extremely salty.

1 star: Improved burger and beans. Not improved much. The alleged burger was an indeterminate minced lump, mushy and indistinguishable from cheap sausage meat. Definitely unappetising.

1 star: Spotted dick. A tricky one, as the chef admitted it should have been cooked longer. The block of fruit was dense but not overly sweet, while the custard was pale, thin and watery. Not the greatest-morale booster after a day being shot at.

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On cabinet shuffling:

i think it's hard to take a government seriously when they "shuffle" their posts around every year. I have a vague idea of who's who, but i'm never sure because of this shuffling. Honestly, Who knows what posts Mah Bow Tan is currently holding, and has held in the last 5 years alone? Put a military admiral with no teaching experience in charge of the education ministry? sounds like a great idea. Let's put a ballerina in charge of defence.

There is a lot of shuffling in Singapore, but in other countries, ministers are changed either because their parties are toppled from government or they get embroiled in scandals. Neither of which happens here, so.

And it's good to have outsiders in charge: they bring a new, outside perspective to the job. Insiders get captured by the vested interests they are trying to overcome. Which is why asking critics of political scenes to *join* the scenes they are criticising just doesn't work. And why the press is always good to have around (except when you want a critical evaluation of the press itself).

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Sarong Party Girl on bras

"Seriously though, what is wrong with not wearing a bra?

My mom says it’s because I’d cause men to lust.

Oh. Is it my fault that they do? They only lust because society dictates that wearing a bra is the decent thing to do, and not wearing one is decadent. And anything decadent will always incite lust. Is it just that Iranian women cannot participate in the sport they are best at because they have to wear the burkha, least their hair emanates rays that incite erections? (It covers their faces because eyebrows and eyelashes are hair, and some older women plainly need to thread their mustaches)."

***

Making sense of Singaporean policies - "In practice, the [Graduate Mothers] scheme granted privileges to children of graduate mothers. As for their less-educated, and low-income counterparts under 30 years of age; they would be given $10,000 if they had themselves sterilised after their first or second child. The scheme went unheeded and was abandoned shortly after its implementation."
You never read about the last part. I wonder why.

A funny thing happened on way to disbelief. A theologian at Oxford University explains why atheism's appeal has faded. - "Time magazine spurred public debate 40 years ago with a startling question on its cover: 'Is God Dead?' Some estimate that half the world's population was then nominally atheist... Atheism envisioned a glorious future for a humanity freed from outdated religious dogmas and restrictions, with unlimited potential provided by scientific advancement and the human imagination. Human beings could not only be good without God, but much better. The reality has been very different. Along with progress, scientific advance brought environmental devastation and the potential to eliminate human life. Atheistic regimes dominating a huge proportion of the globe created new forms of tyranny (including mind control) and executed unprecedented millions."
What this has to do with discrediting atheism, I do not know. Neither does the author offer compelling evidence of atheism's decline, unless one accepts the more than highly dubious figure of "half the world's population" being "nominally atheist" 40 years ago.

Hamza offered pork chops - "A jail boss apologised to fanatic Abu Hamza and other Muslim terror suspects when they were offered pork for dinner."
The Sun. Everyone's favourite newspaper.

Puss nosh at cat cafe - "The Meow Mix Cafe opened in Manhattan this week and is designed for owners to have their din dins alongside their feline friends."

Sound Mirror Site Visit Reflects Entente Cordiale - "With a clear view of the Folkestone coastline 21 miles distant, Miss Autogena went on to explain the concept of the Sound or Acoustic Mirrors inspired by the “listening ears” - forerunners of inter-war experimental early warning systems. Rare examples of these can be found at Folkestone, Hythe and Greatstone, the latter of which English Heritage is planning to restore."

MA Creative Curating - No, I don't understand this either.

PawSense - "Catproof your computer. When cats walk or climb on your keyboard, they can enter random commands and data, damage your files, and even crash your computer. This can happen whether you are near the computer or have suddenly been called away from it. PawSense is a software utility that helps protect your computer from cats. It quickly detects and blocks cat typing, and also helps train your cat to stay off the computer keyboard."

Journal of Negative Results - "In recent years, the trend has been to publish only studies with 'significant' results and to ignore studies that seem uneventful. This may lead to a biased, perhaps untrue, representation of what exists in nature. By counter-balancing such selective reporting, JNR aims to expand the capacity for formulating generalizations."