In the last couple of centuries, with the UK’s and USA’s efforts on the rights of children, such as child labor laws and penalties for juvenile criminals, slowly a change of perspective is occurring in other nations. We’re seeing a rise of child abuse investigations in Europe - especially former Soviet Socialist Republic, and Asia is addressing on a nation-by-nation basis, such as Japan beginning to rethink their anime/hentai industry and Thailand’s continuing crackdown on sexual tourism.

For a long time, I’ve postulated a society hold the ethics it’s resources can hold, but here’s a heinous example of how these changes are taking far too long a time to cross cultures: Monster Father imprisons his daughter for 24 years, sires 7 children, kills one of them. The mother did nothing. This isn’t to say that Austrians are pro-abuse as a culture, just that their police didn’t execute when this girl and the children needed them most.

As more of these warped people come to light due to changes in culture, the more likely we’re going to encounter similar extraordinary events, and expose entire cultures of institutionalized and consensual child abuse. Eventually, we have the potential to communicate the abhorrent treatment of young women facing a culture of rape and mutilation in more remote locations.

Children don’t have a choice. We need to set a finite line. A person who physically abuses children as a form of cultural control needs to be excised from the gene pool with prejudice. Cultures that embrace these cultural memes should be pressured by the UN to change and economic efforts should be brought to bare.

I’ve delayed reading Warren Ellis‘ Crooked Little Vein for some reason. Personally, I think it’s because he comes to Phoenix to sign his Black Summer comic book on the largest downpour of water I’ve ever seen in my fraggin 8 years of living in this outer circle of hell.

Ha, vengeance is mine! Take that, you published author!

Anyways, I’m on page 57 now and I demand my leagues of zombie adventurers (all 2 of you) to go buy the book. More importantly, read the fucking thing. By page two I was laughing at the rat & coffee cup, but there I was, in my way-too-cool coffee haus when I read “People who want to fuck Godzilla” made me snort my caffeine into my sinuses. Which then lead me to meeting a beautiful girl who wants to be a SuicideGirl model. We’ve been brainstorming her SG name while I write this.

So, Warren Ellis has my vote for the next pope, and I’ll pay for all of his cellphone-fetish crack hos the next time he comes to town.

It’s gonna be out in paperback eventually, so you don’t have to spend a ungodly amount.

Before writing yesterday I ended up losing my 2gig USB thumb drive. This is the drive that all of my stuff is on. All of it. Not just SOME of it. Yes I make backups, but it’s time to make more frequent backups.

Holee fuck I nearly had an aneurysm.

-

Reading through my work, I’m impressed that it’s coming so coherently to me. I keep on going through my head: why didn’t I do this before? Why is this happening now? Bottomline, it’s the fucking doubt that we call carry with us day-in, day-out that has prevented me.

In fact, after establishing the reading I have made regarding patterns, I’m going to try to implement new patterns on my brain - behaviorally and physically. Should be an entertaining situation.

Pages written since last post: 5-7

I finished Dean Hamer’s the God Gene with an amount of gnashing of teeth. The book is light and easy to read, and seemingly logical until the last two chapters. I’ve begun to tire of books that get to their salient point in the first three chapters and then spend the rest of book not taking the logic further.

The God Gene is exactly one of these books. He proposes his hypothesis, and then goes to prove it. Well, the proof is, in my opinion, as logic as anyone can get it without a experimental sandbox that allows 200,000 years to pass in a second. However, once his final proof has been implemented, he doesn’t take the VMAT2 gene for a ride.

If we are godcoded, where does it take us? Outside the “god exists or doesn’t exist” argument, which Hamer refuses to tackle - a proof such as this could be used as a chain saw - but then he doesn’t take even the most logical discussions that are dealing with with genetic engineering today: should we allow this gene to continue self-propagation?

Importantly, the only tease he does deliver on is separate VMAT2 from religion - VMAT2 is supposed to make us susceptible to religious experiences, to feeling at one-with-the-universe. But he doesn’t address what causes religious asshatosity - in short, he fucking wimps out.

As a man who’s put his entire career at risk by publishing in the field of genetics challenging entire political parties’ dogma, he’s remarkably shy about not committing to the most obvious conclusions of his study. In short, it’s an oriental massage without a happy ending.

My Happy Ending
If there’s a gene that makes someone superiorly empathic with the world, one that transforms a persons behavior from the greedy, selfish cow-consumers that we are into caring entities who want to improve the all-life’s conditions, then why do we have those that believe it’s ok to kill?

Step into my thought experiment:
Once upon a time, Bob was just an average everyday man but after a vicious infection, he suffered from a fever that left him delirious for a day or two. In that delirium, his god gene fired off and he fever-dreamt that he could walk a new path and improved the world - that if other people followed him, the world would be a better place. God, you see, told Bob that by not eating omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids, the world would be a better place.

Once Bob returned to something that passed for sanity, he thought, “Wow, I gotta tell everyone about my excellent experience.” Bob’s friends listened - well, most wrote him off as a looney, but one or two listened and followed his suggestions. Bob, tho, is a man with a mission and goes forth and spreads the good word about not eating fatty acids. Bob anoints himself as the Great Bobbolama and stops eating. Bob becomes thin, lean and driven with his new diet - he writes a book, creates a website, markets himself effectively. Proceeds from his book, allows him to travel and talk to more people, and everywhere he goes, he’s deliriously thin from the lack of food.

Others see this optimistic guy, who’s traveling and smiling all the time and says, “Wow, he’s so successful.” Some media mogul with a talk show has a last minute opening in her schedule, and lacking for someone credible, invites Bob on. His book hits the markets’ top ten list and suddenly the Great Bobbolama’s a millionaire with an entire industry of people who aren’t eating essential amino acids.

Fat people, who really have no intention of losing weight, buy the book for a brief emotional warm fuzzy feelgood experience. Some of them lose weight for a variety or reasons, but in their mind, the book has made them a better person. These thin and smiling people are plastered on billboards all around the world. One appears to have a modicum of talent and parents stupid enough to sign a contract: she changes her name to Jennifree and a new media teen age popstarlet is born.

And then, some scientist publishes a book countering Bob’s Evil Amino Acid fever-addled theory, informing the world that starving one’s self is not a diet but will kill you. The thin people who aren’t dead yet denounce the scientist, the media invites pundits from both sides, the debate heats up. A has-been teenage media starlet is hospitalized and publicly warns society not to follow Great Bobbolama’s words.

The Great Bobbolama releases a press release inferring Jennifree, who was once his chosen follower, is now a heretic to the cause. Some other no-name schlep, who has been pudgy all his life, decides that killing Jennifree is the only way to get Jodie Foster to notice him.

Bob denounces schleps’ actions, but because he’s stammering from the lack of nutrition, stammers at a crucial moment which the media interprets that he’s secretly pushing his followers to kill non-Bobbite believers. Suddenly the hordes who have starved themselves into stupidity transform into suicidal deathtards bent on destroying all of those that challenge the Great Bobbolama’s words.

The Great Bobbolama, facing a choice of skinny death or surviving as a rich fucking cult leader, decides that sneaking a cheeseburger or two on the side is worth the cause. He officially, and irrevocably denies the deathtard activity because it’s damaging his sales (he’s moved onto an entire line of “The Great Bobbolama Says…” selfhelp books, with videos and celebrity endorsments) - but the damage is done. The cult splinters: the peaceful orthodoxy starvationists and the “I may not be fat, but I’m more loyal than you” aggression monkeys. Both are convinced that they are the one-true-followers of the Great Bobbolama.

After years of aggressive denouncements, and deaths of more media starlets, the Great Bobbolama announces he’s going to mend the rift between the two schisms. The orthodoxy, who’ve literally been starving for this fucker, feel betrayed, and decide it’s better that the Bobbolama die than to kiss and makeup with the aggression monkeys. So, on the eve of the Great Bobbolama’s attempt to heal the rift, his own preisthood kills him, pointing fingers at the other side.

The Power of Belief
I propose that the god gene triggers when a person needs something irrational to believe in when his physical and emotional condition causes himself to doubt the reason he exists. If this irrationality - either denial, just simple stupidity - allows one to appear successful, then others will imitate his/her success. The act of imitation places the original as a prime mover and therefore a position of authority. The pattern of successful branding is predictably repeatable, thus there will be followers. Since followers are human, language imprecise, and half the people in this world are below average intelligence, and people get off on telling other people what to do: some followers will do really stupid things like kill people.

Geez, that was simple - why couldn’t Hamer taken a chapter to say that?

So, after my last post, I’ve been sick, sick and tired, tired, and pissed off. In short, desperately looking for a job so much so that I’m willing to talk to recruiters. I am completely out of the swing of new job hunting.

My writing is suffering too. Paragraphs rather than pages. It’s not writers’ block, it’s basic exhaustion and prioritization. I’ve triple booked my social calendar. Candle’s burning at both ends, the middle and I’m thinking about throwing the whole damn ball of wax into the microwave.

The Ego
So I keep circling around the idea of the Engine of Prediction’s thesis: that intelligence drives it’s own existence, and we’re lucky and unlucky that we’re the biggest perpetrators of intelligence. I’m reading books from Dennett, Hamer, and Hawkins. The issue is that when I read their books, I feel incredibly dwarfed by their accomplishments.

Combine that with the job/career, and it makes for a pretty sucky week.

Work it through
So, I’m struggling with what I see as “inevitability.” True academia would talk about possibilities, potential events that MAY happen. That’s shit. There are certain parts of cultural structures that make things inevitable: the drive to survive - either for an organism or a cultural artifact (aka “religion”, “brand”, “corporation”) - that cause an unethical Machiavellian calculus justifying immoral actions of the participant(s).

This equation causes poor choices: we either think we have no choice, or that our sacrificial choice will cause a remarkable long shot, a soulful gamble, where we believe that if we throw ourselves on our swords, the world will change with our selfless acts.

What crap. The so-called selfless act is in itself a meme - one that governs our behavior. We perform the act, such as working late at the expense of our personal lives, - or pursuing a loved one who spurns us at the expense of our [emotional wellbeing] - suffering in pursuit of a higher cause: honor or truth or love. Our payoff is an emotional stroke that says “You did your best” - like denial, our grief over a situation.

Hamer’s work discusses the God Gene as a biomechanical device that gives us optimism. I wonder if there’s a martyrdom gene that governs our behavior. There’s definitely a martyrdom meme, we wouldn’t have messiahs without it - but a martyrdom gene where a single unit sacrifices his or her wellbeing for the good of the culture (not the group - the culture).

Oh Unholee Orgasmatronics
Warren Ellis swings his large media johnson again: Porno for Terrorist Pilots. So our city’s concrete is flesh that needs to be rendered by explosions… or something. Totally not safe for work, but the logic of feminine sexuality being destroyed by terrorist planes.

I’m strangely reminded of Laurie Anderson’s Mach 20, which has Japanese sperm whales inseminating the California coastline at a high rate of speed.

It’s a psychological event of some sort - our brains are being inseminated by another culture, one hostile to sexual imagery that they must destroy it. I find myself oddly eroticized by the video.

Pages since last post: 1… ok, 6 paragraphs. grumble

Amazingly, I’m finding the time to write a blog - I’ve missed this for several months now. Basically, work has taken over my life, but I’m making the effort to get back into my game design and writing work. What a monster: effectively, I’m designing - on top of SAP - a multiple contract control module for driving pricing and sourcing for a multi-billion dollar company. Love the work, but DAMN, it sucks at times because of the no-life aspect.

Steven Brust is on my short list of authors I wish were more prolific. His works are knifeplay - a series of deft knowledgeable cuts that intend to win the fight, and when he has time, a bit of flourish to make you enjoy that you’re losing to a master. Brust writes so that you read for the enjoyment of reading, something that is so rarely done nowdays.

I stumbled on Brust early: To Reign in Hell sold in a base PX in Germany around ‘86 or so while I was in the military. Since then, I have bought paperbacks the week they were printed and when I could afford them, hardbacks. The reason why I point this out: I’m biased, so don’t look for objectivity in my review.

Dzur, now out in hardback, is a story of Vlad Taltos’ homecoming: he’s been away, slowly spiralling up the ladder of heroic power until he’s attained near-unkillable status and is faced with the results of his actions from many books ago. His wife is in danger due to his “gift” of South Adrillanka, and she’s trying to get out of the Jhereg game. Others in the organization, perceiving her as an easy mark, are hungry for her territory.

So Vlad decides to place himself between a rock and a hard place, in this case, between the sorcerous Left Hand of the Jhereg and the organization’s Right Hand, which, like his swordplay, grants him an opportunity to deftly make his desires known. Brust allows Vlad to philisophically take stock of what it is to be a Dzur, which helpfully allows for a good discussions, observance of action/inaction and foremost, leads to a wonderful resolution that’s true to character as he has changed over the course of the Jhereg series.

Readers familiar with Brust will enjoy the revelations and returns of Kragar and Kiera the Theif, as well as some opponents. New readers will enjoy the best description of a succulent meal that I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. The writing is strong, and readers will enjoy the comfortable witty dialogue between Taltos and his familiar Jhereg.

What’s weak about this book? As ever, it’s too short, and took far too long to get on the shelf. Brust has been incredibly careful to not over-commit on the stories - which a lesser writer would transform into a formula. And while some of the Jhereg series smacks of formula, the core of the book is true character reactions to true-to-environment scenarios.

After every book, Vlad has jumped up the power scale: first in organization, then in connections, then in magical power (spell breaker then Lady Teldra). Only once did I feel the character didn’t deserve the reward at the end of the book. Brust, as an author, now is faced with pretty much the “all powerful” character problem: what does he have to write to invoke threat?

For the insiders: the book doesn’t have Aliera and Morrolan, and leaves the resolution between Morrolan, Vlad and Lady Teldra open. It appears that the consequences of that will be a story until themselves.

End of the line: you’ll like or love the story, you’ll want more due to it’s brevity, and you’ll wonder if Brust is going to be able to keep this up. If he does, I’ll be there.

Find me a dead cloud
and a sharp piece of science
I want to see the skeleton
of weather
And let me map
all maps we have mistaken for the world
And learn by heart the timetable of dice
And in our clutching, self-invented steps see
An accidental grace
A choreography
– Alan Moore (1990)

The above comes from a failed (but incredibly successful book) called Big Numbers.

And from my favorite: Robert Frost’s Departmental (1936)

An ant on the tablecloth
Ran into a dormant moth
Of many times his size.
He showed not the least surprise.
His business wasn’t with such.
He gave it scarcely a touch,
And was off on his duty run.
Yet if he encountered one
Of the hive’s enquiry squad
Whose work is to find out God
And the nature of time and space,
He would put him onto the case.
Ants are a curious race;
One crossing with hurried tread
The body of one of their dead
Isn’t given a moment’s arrest-
Seems not even impressed.
But he no doubt reports to any
With whom he crosses antennae,
And they no doubt report
To the higher-up at court.
Then word goes forth in Formic:
“Death’s come to Jerry McCormic,
Our selfless forager Jerry.
Will the special Janizary
Whose office it is to bury
The dead of the commissary
Go bring him home to his people.
Lay him in state on a sepal.
Wrap him for shroud in a petal.
Embalm him with ichor of nettle.
This is the word of your Queen.”
And presently on the scene
Appears a solemn mortician;
And taking formal position,
With feelers calmly atwiddle,
Seizes the dead by the middle,
And heaving him high in air,
Carries him out of there.
No one stands round to stare.
It is nobody else’s affair
It couldn’t be called ungentle
But how thoroughly departmental

I’ve no idea why Frost and Moore come to mind this morning, but damn these poems are a hell of a lot better than anything you see on the net or in publishing today.

Charles Stross’s award winning Accelerando is worth it just to get to page 338 for the line:

The Rapture of the Nerds has been followed by the Resurrection of the Extremely Confused, except that they’re really not resurrectees - they’re simulations based on their original’s recorded histories, blocky and missing chunks of their memories, as bewildered as baby ducklings as they’re herded into the wood-chipper future.

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In Stross’s future singularity event, the sins of the present - the effluvia of our societies’ politics, laws, politeness and evil we perpetrate on each other - are the jailcells we built for ourselves. In today’s literature of transhumanism and singularity, The Rapture of the Nerds is envisioned as either utopic and dystopic. Stross tackles that duality and creates a believable construct to weave his multi-generational story on.

I measure the success of books by the amount of times I’ve given them away. I don’t believe in lending things - if something is good enough to posess, to have and to hold, the best thing to do is to give it to someone you care for - or give it to someone who has the potential to enjoy it. I’ve given away Snowcrash, Crytonomicon, Lord of the Rings, Amber series, Brust’s Jhereg series books many times. I look forward to giving away Accelerando and other Stross’ stories to friends and enemies alike.

You can download Accelerando for free here. I would encourage you to buy it only because it’s $7.99 (aka “cheap”) and giving your money to an author and publisher is better than 2 cups of Starbucks. It’s not an easy read - as a singularity is the point where tractable changes occur so fast the rate of change is inifinite - the background of the story is constantly changing. That fact alone had me re-reading sections for the fun of it keeping the point of change in my mind.

At the same time - the first (of two three scenes - feh, with the number of children, you’d think these characters would have more fun propigating) - was one that really blew my mind, only for the reference of insect mating.

Other books that inspire me along these lines are: Joe Haldeman’s Forever War and Walter Williams’ Aristos. Please add to the comments those you recommend as well.

With the success of Battlestar Galatica’s re-imagining , and with the cat-out-of-the-bag that Paramount turned down JMS’s Star Trek: re-boot(PDF), it’s only a matter of time that someone tosses G. Lucas are fixes the problems with Star Wars.

So, here’s my take on the holy trilogy - I mean trilogy in the Piers Anthony style, of course. The man couldn’t count to three without six numbers.

Gender Switch Switch Luke and Leia. Make Leia the hotheaded badass girl-jedi from the yokel desert planet and Luke a competent rebel leader, who’s stoic and strong.

Turn up the PAIN! The galaxy is under the Emperor’s crushing heel! StormTroopers on Tatooine invade houses looking for rebel terroristas and kill entire families. Prisoners are tormented by banthas. The economy is grinding to a halt while he builds up a great war machine. Communication and Jail monitoring are growth industries. Use this study for research material.

Turn up the Angst! Make Han Solo a gambling addict. And a wookie-addict. And he shoots first. Make Obi-wan a memory junky, who spins tales of a galaxy long long ago, where truth and justice reigned. C-3PO is a nerd of epic proportions that instead of being mr. polite, he’s rude and condescending to the fleshy ones.

Evil is inherited… I’m not talking about Luke and Leia, I’m talking about that damn robot. If Darth Vader built C-3PO, lay some pipe. If C-3PO killed someone, or worse, betrayed Luke to Darth, now wouldn’t that be some pipe laying? Since the probability of a robot being built and then magically involved with the builders’ kids is stretching it… either use it or lose the whole builder thing.

No more Mr. Nice Jedi Let’s see these guys open some serious smack down on the evil. Not an arena fight where the Jedi get slaughtered. Have each and everyone of them destroy an army. By themselves. Wearing the gore of their victims.

Good guys wear black Instead of having Darth slowly transform into evil, let’s have him be good. Very good. Since the Jedi are corrupt, in his eyes, creating a better school is good.

Bring in the Noir Remember the line “Darth Vader hunted the Jedi down” according to Obi-wan? Let’s have Darth hunt each Jedi down. Darth vs. Mace, Darth vs. the funky tentacle head chick, Darth vs. the funky Conehead dude. What if jedi were a bunch of super badasses and one by one stopped showing up to club house meetings? Fear tha Dark Side, biatches! Not this sneaky stormtrooper crap suddenly turn on them - that’s not worth my time. And then show Darth killing the children… now that’s evil!

Ewok-ocide! If Ethiopean spears didn’t work against the Italians, Ewoks wont work against stormtroopers - because we all know Italians are dumber than Stormtroopers. Lets have the gritty rebels politically manipulate the kyute wuvvable Ewoks so that the stormtroopers have to commit troops to genocide, so that they can get the job done. “We had to make a choice - kill some furry anklebiters or let the Emperor rule the Galaxy! It was a tough choice, one that will haunt me to the end of my days…”

I’d pay good money for that last one… not the angst, but the killing of Ewoks. That’s pure popcorn-munching statisfaction!