Games

And I think to myself, "That surface is portalable".

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Rehearsal

I'm writing this hear instead of somewhere more appropriate because I am on my phone and lazy.

On a day in the future, there will be a practice session for my wedding. R, (2) J, M, (4) T, J, (6) S, B, (8) M, P, (10) B, G, (12) M, C, (14) Y, S, and (17) J (w/ R, S (19), A, A (21)). The current incarnation of the plan is to convene at something and a half o'clock and be done with the practice ninety minutes followed by going across town to the hotel with five orders of deluxe catering from the bread place and fruit/veg from the adult themed grocery market. This will be followed by a trip to the bar two point five hours after the tared value where everybody will be invited. We'll stay there for 30-180 minutes - depending on how stuff goes. I think this plan works some of the kinks out of the previous one.

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Routines

I think repeatable patterns are a good thing. Benefits of specialization mixed with the ability to take any amount of creativity out of the equation (or at least minimize it). There is something to be said for having a small list of options that are dictated from things that are familar.

An explosion of options, on the other hand, is suffocating. Too many choices of things that are foreign is overwhelming. Or maybe I'm just not adventurous. In any case, options that are familar, ones which can be said to have an aspect of repeatability, are also comforting. Maybe - internalizing this - I prefer that which is comfortable which doesn't force me too far outside the typical boundaries that I've setup for myself.

For some reason, the only examples I can think of involve food and writing out these examples probably won't do much to illustrate my point any better. I think it is pretty clear without elaboration.

One point to hit on is that life is a series of predictable routines. There are eating routines, work routines, and play routines. Everybody has these. There are routines that surround how you interact with friends and family. Routines that are fun and ones that are less fun that you do for other purpose (for example... doing dishes every few days so you don't have to buy disposable plates, forks, and knives every month). But yeah, life amounts to a LOT of repetition.

And that's actually a good thing. When it's not repetitive it becomes stressful. I am planning this wedding, an activity I have never done before. It involves LOTS of going outside my comfort-zone to decide how I want things to go. I want them to go "right" but there really are no "wrong" answers. At the very least, it will be memorable. I'm looking forward to it, but also looking forward to it being over. I think this is tied into the same fear of the unknown that makes repeatable patterns of routine so attractive.

Peace.

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Security Theatre

The Massachusetts Bay Transit Association is actively trying to desencitize its passengers to the placement of gigantic packages with signs that says "It's never this obvious". This is the modern day equivalent of a Trojan Horse except with less effort for the attackers and a comforting announcement that amounts to "This is not a bomb".

Word to the wise... a giant box with a sign that reads "This is not a bomb" would be an excellent delivery mechanism for a bomb, especially in a city which is actively using this to disregard such packages. People are naive and trusting when it comes to stuff like this. I think this is something criminals have been taking advantage of for at least 27 years.

If anything, a better advertizing campaign would be cardboard cutouts of police officers that have signs that say "Savvy terrorists dress like this". This message would serve the double purpose of highlighting that things aren't always the way they seem, and also that inherently trusting the police to be honorable is not always a good idea. Consider that a sophisticated attack to defeat the "See something, say something" program would be to install an armada of fake security officers at a location so that anybody who does notice the thing-out-of-the-ordinary won't end up reporting it to anybody who actually matters.

Not that authorties are doing a bad job at providing security. I think the lack of concern in modern America is fairly unprecedented and this has led to much prosperity. However, recognizing the difference between real security and ineffective-if-not-outright-harmful security theatre is a key for the future.

I will be walking past one of the giant fake bomb displays in three minutes. Hopefully nobody switched it out for the real thing.

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Passion

I think it's hard to define what individual people's passions are. Some people are passionate about music and art. Some are passionate about their favorite sports teams. Some are passionate about religion and others are passionate about food.

I think a good measure of somebody's passions would be expressed by their reaction when other people talk about stuff they've done recently (or stuff they are going to do in the future). I think I would be extremely interested to hear anybody talk about work they've done related to human space travel. In fact, I've attended at least one talk from a former resident of the ISS. According to me measure, this would make human space travel one of my passions.

Does this measure hold water? Honestly, people tend to hang out with like-minded individuals so this may be the symptom of an underlying condition that is quite a bit deeper. Though, I think it may be a way to discover things that you're passionate about which you haven't yet experienced.

In any case... it has long been my belief that our passions define us as human beings. As a race, being able to form passions makes us unique from animals, but also as individuals, being able to have a diverse set of different passions.

Good stuff, I think. I hope y'all will give some thought about the things that other people have done which you think is cool/awesme/inspiring. Be inspired. Maybe you can follow their steps and see if those things may also be your passions.

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Watson

IBM's lovable computer wizard is practicing medicine.

My thoughts:

Watson was designed to interpret and contextualize digitized, written human language including (but not limited to) subtle nuances. They removed all picture, video, and audio clip clues from Jeopardy, so it's unlikely that Watson will become involved in "reading charts" or "interpreting scans".

I think A LOT of diagnosis from Watson will come from Jeopardy-style inputs. "Patient is a 37 year-old married male Caucasian with no history of heart disease who is suffering from chest pain in the morning when he wakes up and whenever he attempts rigorous activity."

Extremely experienced doctors can contextualize those sorts of "case details" to get thinking along the lines of what issues they would expect to see in this situation. Watson should be able to diagnose at least as well as an extremely experienced doctor because of its ability to understand the difference between a middle-aged man with chest pain versus an older woman or a young child. Nuances. Theoretically, Watson is already more experienced than the most experienced doctor in the world for frequently occurring, normal medical conditions.

I'd guess that hospitals will use Watson like the team on House uses their office to brainstorm for ideas. Oftentimes the point isn't to figure out the diagnosis. The point is to figure out the test that will verify a correct diagnosis and eliminate all the other possibilities.