Mariana Musings (07-29-09)

I’m getting tired of seeing those “Don’t tax the ’simple pleasures’ of soda pop, waaah!” advertisments on TV. Taxing pop is a great idea, especially if the revenue is going to healthcare reform. Discouraging people from drinking liquid diabetes would save our healthcare system money on that condition, and those people who still continue to drink it will be pouring money into it to relieve the burdens of the other health problems it would cause.

And the “new taxes never made anyone healthy” bit is hilarious. WTF?

Mariana Musings (07-28-09)

Why is it that whenever you hear discussion of some immense waste of tax payer money, it’s always spoken of in terms of government incompetence, regardless of the details of the situation? I always hear “incompetent government bureaucrats wasted money on $600 toilet seats” as opposed to “predatory corporation takes advantage of poor government oversight to overcharge taxpayers by 5,000%.”

A cynic might say that the corporate media is just looking out after it’s own interests, but that’s absurd; the media is run by liberals, after all.

Pearls of Wisdom (07-28-09)

awalters
So, here’s the thing about this whole “bureaucrat between you and your doctor” garbage. Speaking as a Canadian, I can tell you, with absolute certainty, that there is no bureaucrat anywhere in the system who decides what care you may receive. That decision is solely between the doctor and the patient.

My grandfather recently died of cancer. About 6 months before he passed away, his oncologist informed him that the cancer had spread, and that he had two choices. The first was that he could be treated for pain, and die slowly, though reasonably comfortably. The second was that, if he so chose, he could undergo chemo and radiation therapy, and that if he chose that route, he may add an extra 6 months to a year onto his life, but that time would be arduous and painful.

Bearing in mind that this was a 90 year old man whose body was riddled with cancer, no insurance company on Earth would have covered anything but the painkillers (if they would have covered that). The cost-benefit analysis simply would not have worked out. And yet, in our allegedly horrible, bureaucratic system, he was given the choice. This entire debate is so absurd, I only hope that the American people (and your representatives) figure that out before it’s too late.

Breaking Waves (07-27-09)

My deviantART gallery has been updated with a crappy prototype for Giraun’s flag at the start of the Derevell Dynasty.

“Out There in the Darkness,” a crappy electronic song I made in highschool has been uploaded to my YouTube account.

“Paranoia,” a crappy psytrance song I made in highschool has been uploaded to my YouTube account.

I created the following categories:

Category:Late Jurassic mammals

Category:Morrison mammals

I created the following articles on mammal genera from the Morrison Formation:

Amphidon

Aploconodon

Priacodon

Trioracodon

Comodon

Triconolestes

Tinodon

Eurylambia

Amblotherium

Araeodon

Archaeotrigon

Paurodon

Tathiodon

Foxraptor

Miccylotyrans

Dryolestes

Comotherium

Pelicopsis

Euthlastus

Tidepool Reflections (07-27-09)

Today on my way to class I saw a car with a bumper sticker that said “I’m the kind of Christian the devil and the liberal media warned you about.” Apparently this guy spends every day accusing the people driving behind him, who are probably right-wing Christians themselves, of being the cohorts of Satan, while he’s a Holy Warrior for Jesus^TM?

What a narcissistic asshole. I can’t imagine what it would be like to try to have a rational conversation with a person who thinks like that. I’ve seen some obnoxious public displays of Christianity around here, but I think that one takes the cake.

Weird Search Engine Traffic (07-26-09)

Pearls of Wisdom (07-24-09)

mbieker
The fact is that an innocent man was arrested in his own house for Mouthing Off. I don’t care what color skin Gates or Crowley has. The fact is that Crowley abused his position of authority even when it was clear that no crime had been commited.

The police are public servants who are paid to arrest criminals. Gates is not a criminal. Therefore the police were completely wrong. The idiots who defend Crowley just can’t seem to get this concept into their tiny little closed minds.

Likewise, the people trying to make this into racist profiling are creating a “straw man” argument that the police will easily defeat. It seems that many black people need to understand that police abuse has crossed racial lines
and millions of white people see themselves in Gates shoes too. These millions of allies who don’t give a damn what color of skin he has, but don’t want to live in a country where the police can arrest them in their own homes for the crime of Complaining.

Gates was an innocent man. Crowley abused his authority. Race is a side issue and a distraction. The real issue is how to stop the police from committing illegal arrests. I hope Gates makes this an issue and I would gladly give financial support if I knew where to donate to his legal fund.

I wouldn’t emphasized racism as a “distraction” the way mbieker did, but this comment captures the gist of my feelings on the Gates arrest. Even is Crowley was racist (and there’s a strong chance racism influenced his behavior), that isn’t the big issue here.

Mariana Musings (07-24-09)

Why is it that conservatives attach so much significance to alleged environmental hypocrisy on the part of Al Gore? They act like the effort to combat anthropogenic global warming rests solely on his integrity and charisma.

I’m not very strongly interested in the global warming debate, but I side on the “global warming is a human-caused problem in need of serious attention” on the basis of common sense, the support of the scientific community, and a desire to see America adopt more advanced energy technologies for progress’ own sake.

I have never seen An Inconvenient Truth, although I intend to eventually, and while I respect former president Gore, (:P) his opinions don’t carry any special weight with me. Other liberal slanted blogs and news sites I frequent also don’t seem preoccupied with Gore or his opinions.

By contrast, for the past several years I have frequently encountered conservative bloggers and pundits attacking Gore for allegedly being hypocritically eco-unfriendly. These right-wing commentators seem to think that they’re scoring valid points against the anti-global warming movement by attacking someone they inexplicably perceive us as revering like a saint, and someone us liberals uncritically follow.

Why are conservatives preoccupied with Gore as an environmental-movement leader and why do they project this preoccupation onto us?

Breaking Waves (07-23-09)

I added information about the Morrison stratigraphic zones to the following articles:

Dryosaurus

Othnielosaurus

Echinodon

Stegosaurus

Gargoyleosaurus

Hesperosaurus

Mymoorapelta

Amphicoelias

Apatosaurus

Barosaurus

Brachiosaurus

Camarasaurus

Diplodocus

Dystrophaeus

Haplocanthosaurus

Supersaurus

Ceratosaurus

Elaphrosaurus

Koparion

Ornitholestes

Stokesosaurus

Tanycolagreus

Then Dinoguy bitched at me for not adding enough context for the information, but honestly I didn’t have time seeing as I was working on these articles almost simultaneously. He was right though. It was also hard to add them because there wasn’t really any windows in the prose where the stratigraphic zone info would be relevant. That’s the disadvantage of having millions of authors working independently on the same content, though, so whatever.

I’d also like to announce publicly that it is my goal to get the Morrison Formation to be a featured topic on Wikipedia.

Mariana Musings (07-23-09)

Why is it that life-extension technology and research gets so little attention? It’s especially puzzling when you consider that advanced aging is the single greatest blight humanity has ever faced, and that the wealthy and powerful have historically poured immense amounts of energy and money into finding an “elixir of life,” whether through alchemy or a search for a mystical fountain of youth.

Now with emerging medical technology, genetics research, and the emerging nanotech sciences it’s looking like if adequate effort and resources are put into fighting aging that victory might actually be possible. You’d think that since everyone knows that unless things change their death due to advanced age is inevitable, that there would be a constant public clamor for life extension and aging reversal research on the off chance that it would yield fruit during their generation.

Yet no one talks about this. It’s like it’s not even a subject for discussion. Why the baffling silence?

Breaking Waves (07-22-09)

Iridotriton

Camptosaurus

Drinker

Dinoguy said he approved of some ideas I had for representing paleobiotae of geologic formations, so that’s good news.

Ezrian Thoughts (07-21-09)

Spoiler warning
The Ezrian multiverse is the result of Abyssal’s private world building. Since Ezrian was originally intended to serve as the setting for his RPG Maker projects, there remains some chance that it will be adapted into a fictional or literary work in the future. If you find troubling the idea of encountering spoilers to a video game/novel series/screenplay/whatever that will probably never be completed let alone published, skip this post as spoilers will be present.

I’ve decided to stop hiding Ezrian posts to protect people from spoilers. Instead, I’ll just include a message at the top of the page. Not that anyone gives a shit about this stuff.

Still not satisfied with Tulvoy as a replacement name for Conroy. I’m strongly considering Nulvoy now instead, but I’m also tempted to just scrap the template used for those names and starting over.

I’ve decided on reaming Ahitub to Advasso. I don’t feel like writing any more today.

Breaking Waves (07-21-09)

Added a fossil range template to the List of cetaceans.

Discussion at my major edit proposal continues.

Rhadinosteus

Created Category:Prehistoric frogs.

Split Pelobatidae from the article on the European spadefoot toad.

Added some stuff about fossils to Discoglossidae

Created Enneabatrachus.

Tweaked Hulettia a little.

Mariana Musings (07-21-09)

Has anyone ever done a comprehensive comparison of various childrens’ Bibles with the legitimate article to find out what stories tend to get left out, ideas censored, etc? I’d really like to read it, if one’s been published. If not, then I’d consider writing up such a comparison myself. If anyone has any information on this subject, please leave a note in the comments section.

Ezrian Thoughts (07-20-09)