Ruminations, Haunts, and Errors

the celebration […] was electric and the turnout incredible.
Made me wonder where all these people are on Tuesday nights in April when the Sox are in town, because they certainly aren’t at the Cell. […]
I spent the preceding weeks on the defensive about being a Cubs fan and grew increasingly annoyed at the constant slights from Sox fans and the news media, who merrily joined in (lazily regurgitating myths and cliches about Cubdom).
[I] had great appreciation for the way the 2005 team played. And I wanted to cheer for them, I really did. Insufferable Sox fans, however, made it impossible.

South Siders have something wonderful to celebrate all on their own, but we probably have a better chance of finding an affordable 3BR bungalow in Lakeview than we do of seeing Sox fans stop viewing things in terms of the Cubs and their fans. As I sat irritated and brooding while the Sox were about to clinch the pennant, Liz asked why I got so worked up…weren’t the Cardinals more hated? I had to explain the personal nature of the Cubs-Sox rivalry (especially for a Cubs fan who grew up in the south suburbs where the split is near even). A victory by one side in a Cubs-Cardinals game (or season series) results in “Ha, my team’s better and they just proved it”, whereas Sox victories along with Cub losses often resulted in the additional sentiment of “…which shows once again how stupid you are.” (Moreover, this attitude could result from minor leaguers scratching out a victroy in an exhibition Crosstown Classic, or even game results when the teams weren’t even playing each other.)

On the night the Sox clinched the pennant I was lying in bed watching the post-game celebration when the phone rang, which was odd because it was 11:30 on a Sunday. I answered, and here’s how the conversation went:
Me: “Hello.”
Caller: “WOO-HOOOO! WHITE SOX, BABY! WE’RE GOIN’ TO THE SERIES!”
It didn’t sound like anyone I knew or anything one of my Sox fan friends would do. Then …
Caller: “BURN WRIGLEY TO THE GROUND, BABY!”
Sox fans’ hatred of the Cubs is well-documented, but I was amazed that even during their moment of greatest glory it always seemed to come back to the Cubs.

Another article noted how Sox fandom was passed down from generation to generation, while following the Cubs was something one just picked up on a whim, when the weather was right, I guess. For the record, the Cubs have been around since 1876, 25 years longer than the Sox, and have a fan base that’s probably double the Sox.
The irony in most of the arguments was obvious, considering many Sox fans aren’t even motivated enough to actually, you know, attend their team’s games on a consistent basis. One contention is that Wrigley Field is a “playground” for the young and drunk where no one pays attention to the game. Of course, there is that element at Wrigley, more so than on the South Side, but if you take a look around Wrigley it’s easily apparent they are a distinct minority.
In fact, it’s the Cell where the distractions abound: exploding scoreboard, idiotic races on the big screen between innings, blaring rock music that makes it virtually impossible to talk baseball even if you want to, doggie day at the park. If you listen to Sox fans and the media you’d think some of those dogs know how to keep score.
Another argument is that Cubs fans are casual in their loyalty, only following the team when the weather is nice and because the park is only a short stroll from their Wrigleyville apartments. This one is probably the most ludicrous. Are the people who pile off those buses–having traveled from Iowa, Wisconsin and Downstate Illinois–casual fans? Yuppies maybe? How about all of the Cubs fans you see in the stands at games in Atlanta, Los Angeles, Miami and Milwaukee? Or for that matter, the Cell during cross-town games, when it seems almost half the fans are cheering for the men in blue? Not true fans, I guess.

I’d like to see some surveys next year to analyze the demographics of team loyalty, baseball knowledge, motivations for coming to the ballpark, etc. at both Wrigley and U.S. Comiskular, not that actual evidence has ever really been relevant to the South Siders’ rants anyway. I’m guessing the new wrinkle this year will be discussions whether this all will spur the Cubs ownership to strive for a winner rather than a cash cow. (Because of course it never occurred to their corporate overlords that a World Series victory might bring in even more gobs of money than they already print.)

Ah…I’ve been meaning to let that fly for a couple weeks now. On to the Hot Stove League!

• I started playing with Flock last night. Still needs a little work, but the potential is there for this to become a great tool. I’m especially looking forwad to the ability to consolidate tags across multiple tools. I believe that the critical mass is now present in tools like blogs, Flickr, del.icio.us, Google, and widespread broadband so that a tool like Flock can now get closer to the ‘network is the computer’ ideal Sun and others have been promising for a generation now. That it’s not coming from one of the Big Guys shouldn’t be a surprise.
• Fans polled support umpires, dislike DH rule
  Good to know I’m not in the minority. Quoth Frank Thomas on the DH:
  

  It’s extended many careers. I think it should be universal; it would mean more jobs in baseball. Who wants to see pitchers hit? Nobody.

  Actually, I do like to see pitchers hit. A number are decent, plenty lay down good bunts, and watching an inept pitcher flail badly at curveball or a big guy (say, Carlos Zambrano) lumber around second for a freak triple is quite entertaining. However, while Thomas’s concern for job security is understandable, it should be considered irrelevant here. The decision to enact or drop a playing rule should be judged only by its effect on the balance of gameplay; how shifts in that balance affect the interest of fans is the only business effect really worth considering.
• What do current controversies like the validity of Intelligent Design, political intransigence and incompetence, the effects of global warming, and others have in common? I think an important thread is the desire by very many people to believe that the world functions accoring to a set of simple, easily knowable rules, and furthermore their insistence not only that those rules are already known but also that there must be something amiss with observations of the world that would seem to conflict with those rules. These types of people often have trouble with the proper interpretation of observations and tend to ignore the limitations or quirks of the mind; what’s worse, even people who do (or should) have the training to know better are susceptible to falling into such modes of thought when it suits them. Myself, I like the philosophy of the Bad Astronomer–”I like reality the way it is, and I aims to keep it that way”–but if others prefer a different mode of thought that is of course their prerogative. However, their views present a serious problem when used to select public officials and set public policy; if nothing else, we all end up wasting time in pointless debates over topics that should be considered settled.
• Mapping Where You Think You Live
  Ah, the power of the internet being harness for good: elucidating where the true boundaries lie between civic and sports loyalties, and all to be nicely mapped. Isn’t this info in some marketroid database at a big consumer-products corporation somewhere? Well, at least soon we’ll also be able to easily locate which locale officials deserve our scorn, and then marshal forces for the upcoming pop vs. soda war that we all know is inevitable.
• Oink Oink; For a Senate Foe of Pork Barrel Spending, Two Bridges Too Far
  The growth in pork spending over the last decade is truly astounding, especially since it coincides with Republican control of the House–and accelerated after they got the White House. They used to deride the the Democrats as the ‘tax-and-spend’ party, but that ethos is at least more honest in my view than the GOP’s ‘borrow-and-spend’ methods. I suppose the latter better corresponds to most Americans’ fiscal habits, though.
• Cheap Gas Is a Bad Habit; Sierra Club Gets Behind the Wheel
  Hybrid vehicles are still luxury items, purchases that have more feel-good effects than actual significant environmental impact, but it certainly seems that the technology is rapidly improving in terms of both efficiency and price. Perhaps these continuing improvments, combined with the lessons of Katrina and Rita, the rising demand of the Chinese economy, and the security quagmires caused by our Middle-East entanglements will finally give the proper impetus to move on from the petroleum enconomy that has dominated for the last century or so.
• Using Our Leverage: The Troops
  A little reverse psychology to nudge the Iraqis? Actually, we should make this a more general policy in the places around the world–and there are many–where locals simultaneously desire and detest American help. During our inteventions in the Balkans during the 1990s I always thought that the better approach in such situations–where various groups have been warring on and off for centuries over perceived slights, religous differences, and other such pettiness–would simply be to stay out and to use our resources to prevent spillover into neighboring regions that prefer to remain uninvolved. That’s somewhat callous given that many true innocents can be caught in the crossfire, but no amount of military power, American or otherwise, can fix broken societies. We can only offer to help if they sincerely want to change, otherwise we should simply strive to ensure an imploding society doesn’t take its neighbors down with it.
• Kathleen Sulivan, Dick Thornburgh, Ron Klain, Glenn Harlan Reynolds, and Jean Edward Smith published twenty-five questions for Supreme Court nominees in the New York Times. Many of the specifics will soon be dated (if they aren’t already), but I think these cover a number of important topics that Americans should continually ask themselves–and their public officials–regarding the responsibilities and powers of the judiciary in our government and society. John Tierney also posed some more flippant ones that are amusing but also oddly point to good techniques for any sort of important interview.

• The rumblings began again today about the CTA’s desire to raise the standard fare to $2. Anyone surprised? Anyone not see this coming last May, or January, or last fall? Just raise the damn fare like should have been done last year and be done with it so we can at least have a couple years of peace before the CTA faces its next budget catastrophe! At least that way there may be some time to actually put some clueful management (and government officials) in place.
• A Wine of Character, but How Many Miles to a Gallon?
  This wouldn’t be much of a story except for the mental picture of the French getting all tied in a knot over sandbagging some wine (and of course blaming it, at least in part, on those damn Americans). How is it that a bottle of cote-du-rhone goes for $1.40 there and $9 here? Anyway, I also found it amusing–althought slightly exasperating–to read descriptions of putting chardonnay, champagne, and pinot noir into the fuel tank, nevermind that all the good tasty bits that make any of them wine are completely removed by the time the ethanol comes out.
• A Time For McCain?

  So the small-government right and the big-government left are equally exhausted. The only appealing political platform is good government.

  A great idea to rally behind. Unfortunately, between the legions of what’s-in-it-for-me voters and those who aren’t savvy enough to differentiate good public officials from bad (whether by analysis of rhetoric or performance), I fear that there won’t be enough collective gumption to vote proper people into office and accept the necessary sacrifices to move us from current state to ‘good government’.
• ArchitectureChicago Plus Blog Overrun - The Death of Marshall Field’s and the Dissolution of the Sense of Place
  What saddened and irritated me about the Field’s decision was the absolute triumph of cold corporate mentality over any sense of cultural goodwill. The management decided that the intangible specialness felt by generations of Chicagoans simply couldn’t compete with the possiblity of the masses of non-Chicago management and shareholders could save a fraction of a penny per share in advertising costs. Instead, they absolutely know that I would rather save $1 per year with a much more nationally homogenized set of offerings. Wow, in the face of such amazing consideration of the wants and desires of the Chicago consumer…why would I want to give these people my business again?

• An idea doesn’t have to be right to be important, so long as it gets people thinking in a new way.

  – Michael S. Turner on Alan Guth’s original inflation theory, S&T, November 2005
• Cassini-Huygens flyby of Tethys and Hyperion
  Once again, Cassini provides us fantastic imagery!
  

My post-lunch news check gave me deja vu: Judge Backs Case Seeking End of School Pledge. Didn’t we just do this? Do we really need to go there again? To be honest, I’m sympathetic with the plaintiff’s aims. Being a non-believer, I remember feeling uncomfortable as a child being expected to mutter something about God every morning, and then being more perplexed about this verbiage once they started teaching us about things like the Constitution, freedom of religion, separation of church and state, etc. You know what though? Eventually I learned to omit that part, then just stand in silence altogether, and I got over it none the worse for wear. (Perhaps that bit of early disillusionment helped me down the healthy path of cynicism. :-) The last few weeks have shown there are far, far better things to fight over.

Nothing good can come of this, I fear. A loss may embolden the religious crowd to push for more publicly sanctioned religious expression (almost certainly of that old-time Protestant bent, which will be oh-so-helpful in that global campaign on terror or extremists or whatever they call it this week). Yet a win might be even worse, as it would probably rally the various conservative campaigns pushing their view of what it means to be a Real American and might end up with an uber-amendment to enshrine the Pledge, ban flag burning, and prolly through in a gay-marriage ban and a couple other conservative bugaboos to boot.

Anyway, as for the ongoing debate about the Pledge, a pox on both their houses for completely pathetic thinking and argumentation:

• Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the American Center for Law and Justices sez-
  

  The pledge clearly acknowledges the fact that our freedoms in this country come from God, not government

  Umm, looks like Mr. Sekulow must have flunked reading comprehension, ‘cause the Pledge says nothing of the sort; yes, it says ‘one nation, under God’, but that’s more clearly a statement of geography than anything about social or legal causality; besides, even the Declaration of Independence and various state constitutions that explicitly mention a Creator still clearly indicate that liberties, rights, and powers emanate from the people, i.e. democracy not theocracy, so Mr. Sekulow is 0-for-2 in the space of 17 words. Moreover, if ensuring God is part of our civic rituals is so vital, why aren’t these people fighting to update the Pledge accordingly? Aren’t they bothered by the fact that the allusion is buried deep in the middle of it? Secondary to the nation? Tertiary to a statement of idolatry? And put there by a Cold-War-era political ploy rather than any sort of genuine sense of piety?
• What, exactly, do the anti-Pledgers think they will accomplish with this? Does the scorn of the flag-waving crowd give them a sense of superiority (or social/legal martyrdom)? Why do they insist on being provocative by throwing out the whole Pledge, rather than just the 1954 Congressional resolution that added ‘under God’? (Remove that, or make other modifications, and you’ve likely got a Constitutionally inoffensive incantation.) Why don’t they get worked up about the very first clause, which implies that allegiance to a piece of cloth (or particular arrangement of shapes and colors) is more important than fealty to the people and principles of the U.S.? Woudn’t it be more productive to provoke a debate about whether coercing children (make no mistake, peer pressure and the imprimatur of teachers are coercive even without any formal penalty for a child’s silence) to mumble a banal sentence by rote is leading to better citizenship?

• Irreplaceable Exuberance;   Inequality and Risk
  Leans towards supply-side economics, but presented from more of a human-nature point of view so I can sorta buy it. Certainly, innovation and progress require motivated people, and often that motivation is for profit. However, accepting that socioeconomic disparity is unavoidable doesn’t mean we can’t try to temper it; I’ll believe that heavy-handed government policy that tries to force redistribution is probably counterproductive in the long term, but we can certainly provide social pressures on those at the top of the scale to voluntarily decide when they have ‘enough’ and eagerly distribute their surplus to help out others.
• Calif. Senate Passes Gay Marriage Bill

  A higher power created the institution of marriage.

  –Sen. Dennis Hollingsworth (R-San Diego)
  Um, then it really doesn’t matter what the legislature says, so why bother to rail and vote against the measure? Oh, that’s right, because Mr. Hollingsworth is wrong: marriage is in fact a construct of society and its laws, established and regulated by the statutes and constitutions of the several states.
• Blair calls for better parenting
  Good sentiment, but I’m fairly certain that giving the state broad powers to intervene isn’t really going to be a major improvement. On the other hand, perhaps there should be a bit more scrutiny…I mean, why is it that one needs a license to cut and color hair but anyone can become a parent with no training whatsoever?
• Day-After Pill Exposes FDA Rift
  The polticians-vs.-science angle here is obvious, but what struck me more in reading about this was the continued crusade against contraception, in particlar by those who continue to claim that access to it will encourage sexual activity. First off, it’s an untterly unproven assertion. Second, given the well-known inability of most teenagers to fully comprehend the consequences of their actions (beyond ‘getting caught’), it seems laughable that fear of pregnancy is the major factor that is stopping millions of horny American teenagers from getting it on. Finally, despite the claims of any particular religion, cultural rules and taboos about sexual activity are really just a form of ‘behavioral contreception’, and hence the most important concern should be to prevent pregancies among those who are incapable (or unwilling) to handle them properly.
• The Road to Hell Is Clogged With Righteous Hybrids
  Had the Honda Civic hybrids not been a couple months away from production when I bought my car, I would have given it serious consideration. However, it’s become clear over the past couple of years that the technology is still several years (decades?) away from really being cost effective for all but a very small group of drivers in certain types of areas; it’s more of a feel-good purchase than anything else. Still, it’s good to see they are at least becoming mainstream, as that’s the first step towards ensuring future, better technologies will be adopted when their available. Until then, Tierney’s idea to base tolls and other sorts of road charges based on vehicle weight seems a great idea–although obvious in hindsight, the greater amount of road space required by SUVs on expressways never occurred to me.

• NCAA outlines appeals process for tribal mascots
  Glad to see they’re at least pretending that the recent edict won’t be a complete top-down dictatorship of the hyper-PC. However, even this will probabaly turn into a mess…consider my alma mater. A look at the tragic history of the Illini tribes shows that the University’s athletic moniker is essentially their last vestige. If there’s no one left to give blessing, is the school therefore denied any successful appeal? On the other hand, if there’s no one around to approve or protest, who is the team name offending? And if it’s more ‘generally offensive’, why stop at college sports teams? Should GM be forever banned from any association with college sports (or the dollars of the righteous) due to its appropriation of Pontiac? What about place names in the U.S. and Canada, often named after tribes and chiefs who lived hundreds or thousands of miles away? Shouldn’t the NCAA flee the state of Indiana altogether?
• VR Goggles Heal Scars of War
  Good to see that some people are putting some advanced ideas into something that too often gets lost in the debates about war
  

  We spend a lot of money on training people and conducting war, We have to put what’s needed into helping these people when they come back.

• NASA Launches Startups for Ships
  At this point in time, I don’t think there’s any doubt that robotic missions provide a much better cost/benefit ratio for science and engineering than do manned missions, so I would strongly prefer that NASA direct its (taxpayer) funding in that direction. But of course such cold reasoning can be thrown out the window when it comes to privately funded ventures–if some people with tens upon tens of millions of dollars to spare think a few moments of almost-orbital flight are worth the cost, who are we to argue? For NASA to provide seed money, coordination, and encouragement for private ventures to develop new vehicles seems like a wondeful idea. Perhaps the biggest obstacle to more routine manned missions is the efficiency, safety, and cost of propulsion technology, so expanding the base of people who will experiment and explore–even (especially?) if for reasons of vanity and thrill–might improve things more quickly than the centralized, bureaucratic process that is current NASA rocket science.
• Bill in Congress to Overhaul Patent Law Seeks to Quell Suits
  Wow, rather than try to address the issues that lead to the filing (and granting) of frivolous and contentious patents, rather than expand upon our valuable first-to-invent concept, what goal does Congress set for revising the patent system? Change the rules so as to reduce the number of lawsuits that can happen. A brilliant example of treating the symptoms while ignoring the disease if I’ve ever heard one–not to mention why logical-, techical-minded people get so exasperated with politicians and lawyers.

• Today we culturized ourselves with a trip down to the Art Institute for the Toulouse-Lautrec and Montmartre exhibition…an afternoon well-spent. I’m generally fond of Impressionism and Post-Impressionism to begin with, and T-L’s works in particular are fun as they add some whimsy, caricature, and a less-serious air. Yet beyond the obvious I liked what they did with this exhibition: rather than simply assemble a collection of works, the curators strived to show them as a reflection of, and influence on, a certain cultural point, especially with the inclusion of works by contemporaries such as Degas and Picasso. In contrast with the Ansel Adams exhibit a couple years back, which merely allowed a chance to view wonderful works, this latest exhibition seemed to provide not only pretty pictures (and a heightened appreciation for the effort and skills required to make high-quality lithographs) but also a sense of insight into a particular place and era; isn’t that the ultimate point of art anyway?
• Why the US wants to end link between time and sun
  So, according to some federal agencies and business types, when we find that nature doesn’t want to fit with our views of how it ’should’ work to be convenient, the answer is not to adjust our views but instead to ignore actual reality. Lovely. UC’s Steve Allen (who has put together some nice, if technical, summaries of leap-second issues) puts things in nice perspective:
  

  If your navigation system causes two planes to crash because of a one-second error, you have worse problems than leap seconds.

• Tow Trucks Prowl, and Authorities Crack Down
  Perhaps I’m being too provincial, but how can a story about overzealous tow trucks not even briefly allude to Steve Goodman? Kinda scary to read how little oversight there is over these practices.

• Universe ‘too queer’ to grasp
  Nice bit of honesty about the potential limits of scientific knowledge. Plus a little Zen-style reality check…gotta love when physics and metaphysics collide So…what will cause the intelligent-designers the most consternation: the proposition that we can’t know it all, or that the universe might be ‘queer’?
• JAMA — Abstract: Contradicted and Initially Stronger Effects in Highly Cited Clinical Research, July 13, 2005, Ioannidis 294 (2): 218
  Interesting quantifcation of the truisms that 1) scientific claims aren’t correct just because a star publishes them; 2) sensational results must be viewed skeptically; and 3) carefully controlled, deliberately planned-and-executed experiments consistently produce the most robust results. Not that activists, politicians, or stockholders will care when faced with the prospect of the next miracle-cure-du-jour…
  Tags:researchscience
• Stop reading this headline and get back to work
  There’s certainly something amusing about seeing how much time is spent doing something other than work, but it always annoys me that these sorts of stories are spun from the theory that work produced is proportional to hours worked. If you’re a clerk or an unskilled factory laborer that’s probabaly true, but not all jobs are the same–not all workers are the same–not all hours are the same. Sometimes it’s the ‘downtime’ that clears out the head and leads to the Eureka! moments that really drive productivity.