Order in Chaos

J.S. Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor is arguably Mankind's finest musical achievement. It is a combination of elaborate complexity superimposed on a simple underlying structure thus creating a symphony of sound that has captivated listeners for centuries.

This remarkable YouTube video allows you to see the Fugue's beautiful mathematical structure in its complexity and in its simplicity and may help explain why it is so compelling - perhaps because it mirrors, in musical form, the most fundamental design pattern found in nature: elaborate, seemingly chaotic complexity that is actually highly-ordered patterns built on simple underlying structures.

The Toccata and Fugue in D minor

To better understand how complexity and simplicity function in nature to create beauty, a look at fractal geometry may be of use.

Fractals are geometric shapes that are based on equations that undergo iteration, a method of feedback based on recursion (a process of repetition). These simple equations create remarkably beautiful structures when the results of iteration are graphically represented. One characteristic of the geometric shapes is that they are self-similar, meaning that each part is a replica of the entire structure. This Mandelbrot fractal is a classic example of fractal geometry and very clearly illustrates the phenomenon of self-similarity:

Each part is a microcosm of the whole

Depending on the base equation, the process of iteration creates an incredible variety of structures. Many of them seem to replicate recognizable natural objects and give some insight into how natural forms emerge.

On a small scale:



On a much smaller scale:

Neurons in a mouse's cerebral cortex

On a medium scale:




And even on a cosmic scale:



So perhaps it is clear now why the Fugue is so appealing. The question of how Bach composed this masterpiece (assuming he did, as there are questions about its origins) must be left for another time. Perhaps he was merely channeling the creative energy of the Cosmos...

Until then, enjoy the Fugue in all its glory.

Like you really have a choice...

Sayonara, Baghdad

U.S. involvement in the Iraq War is now officially over. Trillions of dollars, thousands of lives lost, countless others permanently destroyed - all for nothing. Those of us who were lucky enough to survive have a responsibility to make sure that the lies never bury the truth about what really happened there. Now that this debacle is over, maybe we can put this chapter behind us and live our lives in peace. Sayonara, Baghdad!

Yours sincerely,

2nd Platoon, D Company, 2-35th Infantry - "The Black Sheep"
Kirkuk, 2006-2007

Voices

Click here to see an example of a great opening sequence from Miami Vice.

In the Air Tonight

Miami Vice redefined television. The show brought a never-seen-before look to the old cop show genre with expensive Italian suits, Ferraris, pastel, color-coordinated sets and wardrobes, pop music soundtracks, and episodes that would end without the traditional feel-good wrap-up closing segments.

When the pilot aired on Sep. 16, 1984, it left the gate running, sporting what later became an iconic scene and arguably the best ever on television. Click here to watch it.

Hey Blondie!

"Hey Blondie! You know what you are?! Just a dirty son of a b-"


-Tuco, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Destiny

"Luke, you can destroy the Emperor...It is your...Destiny."


-Darth Vader, The Empire Strikes Back

Definitely Miami

"Only in Miami is Cuba so far away..."


-Izzy, Miami Vice

Comes the Revolution!

One of These Mornings

Sonny: Hola, chica.

Isabella: Hola, chico.



-Miami Vice

The Show Must Go On!

Roger Waters is taking The Wall on tour again!!!

The Wall, released in 1979 by Pink Floyd (of which Waters was the lead songwriter and singer), chronicles the psychological journey of a fictional rock star named Pink as he struggles to cope with his wife leaving him and the subsequent hopelessness and isolation that it brings about.

To Pink, this is only but one of a series of disappointments that have seemed to create an an impenetrable wall between him and happiness, a sense that he had already experienced since childhood. Having lost his father to the war before he was born (as Roger Waters did) and then subjected to the brutal, authoritarian British school system designed to inculcate obedience and conformity, even in his youth, young Pink already had the sense that the bricks of The Wall were being laid.

The story opens with Pink performing a show, in full fascist garb, with his hair slicked back and his eyebrows shaved off. By adopting a persona of hate and contempt for vulnerability, he has found a way of relating to the world.

Pink as an unfeeling fascist

The story then moves back in time to his infancy. Over the sounds of a baby's cry a premonition is given:

The sea may look warm to you babe,
and the sky make look blue.
But oooh babe,
If you should go skating
On the thin ice of modern life,
Dragging behind the silent reproach
Of a million tear-stained eyes,
Don't be surprised when a crack in the ice
Appears under your feet
You'll slip out of your depth and slip out of your mind
With your feel flowing out behind you
As you claw the thin ice.

We next find Pink as a young schoolboy, subjected to the harassment of disturbed schoolteachers and being disciplined for failing to adopt the thought processes that are expected of him.

"We don't need your thought control"

Pink is now much older and an international rock star. We see him attempting to call his wife and when her lover answers the phone he slides into despair. He seeks to cope with the pain through pleasure and material excess. As he says:

What shall we use to fill the empty spaces
Where waves of hunger roar?
Shall we set out across the sea of faces
In search of more and more applause?
Shall we buy a new guitar?
Shall we drive a more powerful car?
Shall we work straight through the night?
Shall we get into fights?
Leave the lights on?
Drop bombs?
Do tours of the east?
contract diseases?
Bury bones?
Break up homes?
Send flowers by phone?
Take to drink?
Go to shrinks?
Give up meat?
Rarely sleep?
Keep people as pets?
Train dogs?
Race rats?
Fill the attic with cash?
Bury treasure?
Store up leisure?
But never relax at all
With our backs to the wall.

Pink with his back to The Wall

Is There Anybody In There?

Frustrated with the failure of those efforts Pink then enters a destructive rage and destroys the hotel room he's been holed up in. With his wrist bleeding from the episode, he lays on his back in the pool in a symbolic representation of Jesus on the cross, hoping for salvation.


Numb and completely cold, he settles into an almost comatose state, where even the pain is gone. He has become, as he describes, "comfortably numb."

Comfortably numb

At this point, his manager comes knocking at the door, trying to revive him for the show that he has to put on. It is here where the story comes full circle. Pink, dressed in his Nazi-like uniform, puts on the show for his fans and then goes on a campaign of terror to root out what he calls "the worms." As he says:

Ooooh, you cannot reach me now
Ooooh, no matter how you try
Goodbye, cruel world,
it's over
Walk on by.
Sitting in a bunker
here behind my wall
Waiting for the worms to come.
In perfect isolation
here behind my wall
Waiting for the worms to come.

At some point in his reign of terror he becomes horrified by what he has become and yells:

Stop!
I wanna go home.
Take off this uniform and leave the show.
I'm waiting in this cell because I have to know:
Have I been guilty all this time?

Pink then puts himself on trial at which his mother, his old schoolmaster, and the judge all testify and make sentencing recommendations. In the end, he is "sentenced to be exposed before [his] peers."

Waiting for trial

Whether or not he ever makes it "Outside The Wall" is unclear. Based off of Roger Waters' monologue album "The Final Cut" one can guess that the answer is no.

With its tracks blending into one another thus creating a two-hour seamless opera, The Wall was a revolutionary album in many respects. Using state-of-the-art recording techniques to create never-heard-before 3D sound effects combined with unparalleled sound quality, The Wall is not only a masterpiece of music but also a milestone in music history. To top it all off, the live shows done for the tour of the album were apparently the most extravagant and impressive shows ever done. Pink Floyd has continued that tradition ever since with shows that use lasers, fireworks, and elaborate sets.

So get your tickets now before it's too late! Don't miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the greatest rock opera ever written performed live!

"I don't need no walls around me!"

"A mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam"

In December 1995 NASA instructed the Hubble Space Telescope to point its lens at an obscure, dark patch of space and take a series of photographs over 10 days. The final image, compiled from 342 separate exposures, rocked the scientific community and shattered current understandings about the nature of the Universe. The image, which came to be known as the Hubble Deep Field, showed over 3,000 galaxies in what was believed to be an empty corner of space. How many more galaxies than previously thought, then, were in the Universe?

The dark patch of space in the Ursa Major constellation that Hubble pointed its lens at

That dark patch of space: The Hubble Deep Field

Astounded by the implications of the Hubble Deep Field, scientists then instructed the Hubble Telescope to point its lens at another dark patch of space. The resulting image proved even more incredible. The image, known as the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field, looked farther into the Universe than Mankind has ever looked before and captured an image of the Cosmos as it was approximately 13 billion years ago. Over 10,000 galaxies alone were visible in the image! Current estimates are that there are about 100-200 billion galaxies in the Universe, each composed of hundreds of billions of stars, each of which have their own solar system of orbiting planets.

A look 13 billion years into the past: The Hubble Ultra-Deep Field

The Milky Way is the home of our Sun and our planet is just one its orbiting celestial objects. It is 100,000 light years across - meaning that if one were traveling at the speed of light (186,282 miles per second) it would take 100,000 years to travel across it. All of recorded human history could be repeated 20 times over in the time it would take to cross just our own galaxy. Then, even if we were to succeed in crossing the Milky Way, the nearest neighboring galaxy, known as the Andromeda Galaxy, would take another 2.5 million years to reach. Then, if we became truly ambitious and decided to travel from one edge of the Universe to the other it would take a mere 78 billion years at the speed of light.

Our neighborhood: The Milky Way Galaxy

So what does this all mean? For one, the conclusion that we are not alone in this Universe is unavoidable. How many other intelligent forms of life are out there? What can they teach us about the origins of the Cosmos and the Purpose underlying its existence? And in a Universe so enormous, so complex, and so beautiful, how can we not be in awe?

It's a Crazy World

This publication strives to bring to its readers what it considers to be the finest of the arts, science, and commentary. Occasionally, however, it finds something so strange, so mind-bogglingly weird, and so off the wall that is defies description and yet so fascinating that it cannot be missed.

As there are no adequate words, click here to watch one such jewel.

The Accidental General

“The one thing I never want to see again is a military parade.”

- Ulysses S. Grant

Welcome Home

On this Veteran's Day, a salute to all those who've had to find their way back from the battlefield

Ranked Choice Voting and the Tyranny of the Minority

A guest post from a friend of the blog today.

For anyone who cares amongst SF voters (and, statistically, it's only 33.81% of you...or even less if you let Ed Lee's campaign workers "help" you with your ballot...), a succinct explanation of what (THE HELL) just happened in the Mayor's race, minus my personal opinions (except the one I've already pretty clearly stated). Even for those of you who don't live here, if you live in a jurisdiction with ranked-choice voting ("RCV"), I advise you to reed and heed so the same disaster doesn't befall you and your loved ones.

But first, some facts:

13% of people who voted for Herrera first or second listed Ed Lee as second or third. How is that possible? (for non-SF-ers: This is like saying "Ok, if Hillary Clinton doesn't get elected, I'd support Sarah Palin, because she's a woman, too.")

A bunch of Chiu supporters also apparently didn't mind Lee. WHAT?!? (foreigners: reference Clinton/Palin example above)

27% of the total ballots cast were "exhausted" (all three choices eliminated). "Sorry, one third of SF voters! You don't count this year!"

So what to make of these facts? What's the key here? The key is this: Mr. Exhausted Ballot.

I used to support RCV because it allows (theoretically) for the "anyone but X" strategy on the part of the individual voter. This is a good option to have, no matter what your political persuasion, and one that just doesn't exist if you only have one vote (and one that was sorely needed during the '92 and '96 US Presidential elections thanks to the “Little Big Man”.... SORRY! No opinions! Last one! Promise!). But I've just withdrawn my support for RCV. It's gotta go in its current guise. Not because people "don't understand it" vs. regular voting, but because it amplifies the typical know-nothing vote ("I'm voting for all the Asians", "I'm voting for the hot guy") via the "exhaustion" mechanism. Kinda like black ice on asphalt suddenly, without warning, increasing your breaking distance by 250% at 7am on a road you've driven for years (or possibly even causing you to skid off the road and into the abyss, as happened in this election....OK REALLY!!!! LAST OPINION!!!).

So how can we realize this amazing potential of RCV? What's the solution, aside from totally repealing it?

Mathematically, the only way to hold true to the theoretical utility of the "anyone but X" option is if there are at least as many rank choices as there are candidates. That way, no one's ballot is ever exhausted. Otherwise, a bunch of people who really, really don't want candidate X to win can have their votes tossed out completely if all of their choices are eliminated. While we don't know how many of the voters whose ballots were exhausted by the 10th round would have voted for Lee as 4th, 5th, etc, I think it's pretty safe to assume most of them wouldn't have voted for him at all, even given 16 choices. Of course, I wouldn't think anyone who put Chiu or Herrera on his ballot would also put Lee, either, so who knows. All we know for sure is that 27,000 (exhausted ballots) plus 43,000 (people who voted for Avalos, the only other remaing candidate after round 10) = 86,000 = 55% of people out of the 154,000 who voted did NOT want Lee (or, at best, would've made him their 4th choice). I'm starting to feel like a Gore supporter in the 2000 election. (DAMMIT!!! Another one Patrick??? ok ok...but cut me some slack...if it's ok for Pelosi and Feinstein to comment on a local pension reform issue by bringing in Michael Moritz's support of a Tea Party candidate in Wisconsin, I can hate on Al Gore from 11 years ago....and even though he voted for Michela Alioto-Pier in this election, for whom I also voted).

For a more visceral (at least for math geeks like me) impression of just how crazy RCV without enough choices can get, ponder these numbers: all 10 rounds of RCV only accounted for 30% of Lee's total votes, yet his "overall" percentage went from 31% to 61% of the (remaining, un-exhausted) vote. The last round itself only added 4700 votes to his total of 68,721 (about 6%), but his percentage went from 49% to 61% of the total remaining. All thanks to Mr. Exhausted Ballot, who got 42,492 votes overall (almost a third of the total votes cast), 18,000+ (almost 12 percent of total) in the last (10th) round alone. If Mr. Exhausted Ballot had been a candidate, he would've nearly beaten the runner-up in this election. This is a common problem in San Francisco.

The catch-phrase takeaway here is this: ranked choice voting = tyranny of the minority. Ironically, RCV supporters have noted that the lack of RCV can create the same situation. Math professors have suggested that RCV leads to minority candidate victories, too, although they’ve failed to emphasize the exhausted ballot issue. I’d love to see a multivariate regression using the difference in the number of candidates vs. number of ranked choices as independent variable 1, and spread in first choice percentage as variable 2, across a bunch of elections in jurisdictions that have RCV. I’m willing to bet that this tyranny of the minority business happens a lot when the number of candidates exceeds the number of possible choices on the ballot, and when each candidate gets a roughly similar amount of first choice votes.

Without the huge number of eliminated ballots, especially in the last 2 rounds, there's no way in hell Lee would've won. But now we're stuck with his sorry ass for five corruption-mongering, city-bankrupting, and (hopefully) federal elections law-investigating years. (SORRY!!! No more opinions!!! I promise!!! I'm all about OBJECTIVITY here!!!)

Ok I lied. This is the last one, although it encompasses far more than this election, and it's not really an "opinion" per se, but more of a general thought about liberty: the Nazi party's peak support occurred in July 1932, with ~37% of the vote, dropping to about 33% in November 1932 (until Hitler got rid of elections in the spring of ‘33). These are Wikipedia quick reference figures, but I'm pretty confident they're accurate.

While I am in NO WAY comparing Ed Lee to Hitler, Hitler to Ed Lee, Ed Lee to other candidates, Ed Lee to your mom, your mom to my mom, etc (Although have you seen that 'stache? Does he think that's cool?), my point here is that the tyranny of the minority can have pretty severe negative consequences.

If only I'd paid more attention to Chicken John's advice...

The raw numbers, for those so inclined:

http://www.sfelections.org/results/20111108/data/mayor.html

American Hero

"Damn...I'm lookin' good."

- Duke Nukem

Atta Boy!

Shauna!

Punk: What's your name?

Jeannie: It's Jean, but most guys call me Shauna.

Punk: Okay, Jean.


- Ferris Bueller's Day Off

Wisdom from the Wyld Stallyns!!

"Be excellent to each other."


-Bill S. Preston, Esq., Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure

The Hollow Men

Mistah Kurtz—he dead.

   A penny for the Old Guy

I

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom
Remember us—if at all—not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.

II

Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death’s dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind’s singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.

Let me be no nearer
In death’s dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat’s coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer—

Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom

III

This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man’s hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like this
In death’s other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.

IV

The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death’s twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.

V

Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o’clock in the morning.

Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow

            For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow

            Life is very long

Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow                                

           For Thine is the Kingdom

For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

- T.S. Eliot, 1925

Click here for a nice reading of the poem.

"The shores of Orion..."

"[A]t the center of the cloud may be the main culprits in the Orion constellation, a familiar sight in the fall and winter night sky in the northern hemisphere." - NASA

With friends like you who needs enemies?

Wrong, Karzai. One of these days we'll be comin' for you.

Reality Bites

"Reality hits you hard, bro."

- George Lindell


Click here to watch Mr Lindell share his wisdom.

In Memoriam

Two-year-old Wang Yue, who was critically wounded in a hit-and-run in Foshan, China last week, died today at 12:32 am from her injuries. Over a dozen people passed by her after the accident and did not render any assistance as she lay mortally wounded in the middle of the street for 10 minutes.

Wang Yue moments before she was hit

Through a Glass, Darkly offers this Hinayana Buddhist prayer in her remembrance:

This body is not me.
I am not caught in this body.
I am life without limit.
I have never been born and I never die.

Look at the ocean and the sky filled with stars,
manifestations from my wondrous true mind.

Since beginningless time, I have always been free.
Birth and death are only doors through which we pass,
sacred thresholds on our journey.
Birth and death are a game of hide-and-seek.

So laugh with me,
hold my hand,
let us say good-bye,
say good-bye to meet again.

We meet today,
we will meet tomorrow,
we meet at the source in every moment,
we meet each other in all forms of life.

Through the Looking-Glass, Darkly

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes—and ships—and sealing-wax—
Of cabbages—and kings—
And why the sea is boiling hot—
And whether pigs have wings."

-Through the Looking-Glass

Circus Circus

Clowns

Real Clowns