Pogue loves the XO, I remember the Commodore 64

Lots of people have been poking fun at Negroponte and the "XO" laptop. Pogue has been using one ...

Laptop With a Mission Widens Its Audience - New York Times

... There’s no CD/DVD drive at all, no hard drive and only a 7.5-inch screen. The Linux operating system doesn’t run Microsoft Office, Photoshop or any other standard Mac or Windows programs. The membrane-sealed, spillproof keyboard is too small for touch-typing by an adult.

And then there’s the look of this thing. It’s made of shiny green and white plastic, like a Fisher-Price toy, complete with a handle. With its two earlike antennas raised, it could be Shrek’s little robot friend.

And sure enough, the bloggers and the ignorant have already begun to spit on the XO laptop. “Dude, for $400, I can buy a real Windows laptop,” they say.

Clearly, the XO’s mission has sailed over these people’s heads like a 747.

The truth is, the XO laptop, now in final testing, is absolutely amazing, and in my limited tests, a total kid magnet. Both the hardware and the software exhibit breakthrough after breakthrough — some of them not available on any other laptop, for $400 or $4,000...

It uses almost no power. I think I might buy a pair in November. The program deserves a chance to succeed. If Pogue is right, and he usually is, I think they'll reconsider their decision not to sell it for $250 into the US market. I remember a time that people could buy a Commodore 64 for about that price, there's been nothing comparable since.

We know what we are: Torture and the end of the American exception

Today the NYT revealed that the Bush administration lied when they said they'd cut back on torture. I won't bother quoting the original article because I assume only the most dimwitted are surprised. Cheney, Bush, Gonzales and their cronies are snakes. The reactions are more interesting, here's a very edited version of Greenwald's response:

Glenn Greenwald - Political Blogs and Opinions - Salon

Much outrage has been provoked by the generally excellent New York Times article this morning revealing the Bush administration's recent violations of legal restrictions on the use of torture and other "severe interrogation techniques." And, in one sense, the outrage is both understandable and appropriate. Today's revelations involve the now-familiar, defining attributes of this administration -- claims of limitless presidential power, operating in total secrecy and with no oversight, breaking of laws at will, serial misleading of the Congress and the country and, most of all, the shattering of every previous moral and legal constraint on our national behavior.

But in another, more important, sense, this story reveals nothing new. As a country, we've known undeniably for almost two years now that we have a lawless government and a President who routinely orders our laws to be violated. His top officials have been repeatedly caught lying outright to Congress on the most critical questions we face. They have argued out in the open that the "constitutional duty" to defend the country means that nothing -- including our "laws" -- can limit what the President does.

It has long been known that we are torturing, holding detainees in secret prisons beyond the reach of law and civilization, sending detainees to the worst human rights abusers to be tortured, and subjecting them ourselves to all sorts of treatment which both our own laws and the treaties to which we are a party plainly prohibit. None of this is new.

And we have decided, collectively as a country, to do nothing about that. Quite the contrary, with regard to most of the revelations of lawbreaking and abuse, our political elite almost in unison has declared that such behavior is understandable, if not justifiable. And our elected representatives have chosen to remain largely in the dark about what was done and, when forced by court rulings or media revelations to act at all, they have endorsed and legalized this behavior -- not investigated, outlawed or punished it...

... We all know what has happened to our standing in the world, to our national character and our core political values, as a result of the previously unthinkable policies the Bush administration has relentlessly pursued. Ignorance or incredulity can no longer explain our acquiescence. Accommodating and protecting the lawbreaking of high Bush officials is widely seen by our Beltway elite as a duty of bipartisanship, a hallmark of Seriousness...

... The NYT article today reveals new facts about the administration's lawbreaking, lying, and pursuit of torture policies which we had decided, with futility, to outlaw. The Congress could aggressively investigate. Criminal prosecutions could be commenced. Our opinion-making elite could sound the alarm. New laws could be passed, reversing the prior endorsements and imposing new restrictions, along with the will to enforce those laws. We still have the ability to vindicate the rule of law and enforce our basic constitutional framework.

But does anyone actually believe any of that will be the result of these new revelations? We always possess the choice -- still -- to take a stand for the rule of law and our basic national values, but with every new day that we choose not to, those Bush policies become increasingly normalized, increasingly the symbol not only of "Bushism" but of America.

Glenn, we know what we are, we've proven that beyond a reasonable doubt. Nobody on the right, left, or center says "it can't happen here" any longer. We're probably a bit too heterogeneous to make great Nazis, but we could do some noisier variant thereof. We are a flawed nation with a nasty past and a weak moral core -- like Japan, China, Russia, Germany, France, Mexico, Brazil, the UK, Zimbabwe, Uganda and, really, most of the world excepting the Scandinavians and maybe Canada.

American "exceptionalism" was always a fraud, but now nobody believes it.

We can still aspire to a higher ground, but it will take a generational effort. The boomers have failed America's better self, we can only hope future generations are made of better stuff.

No President Giuliani

There's a lot to fear in the GOP slate, but at least we don't have to worry about a President Giuliani (emphases mine):

The Values Test - James Dobson - New York Times

...REPORTS have surfaced in the press about a meeting that occurred last Saturday in Salt Lake City involving more than 50 pro-family leaders. The purpose of the gathering was to discuss our response if both the Democratic and Republican Parties nominate standard-bearers who are supportive of abortion. Although I was neither the convener nor the moderator of the meeting, I’d like to offer several brief clarifications about its outcome and implications. After two hours of deliberation, we voted on a resolution that can be summarized as follows: If neither of the two major political parties nominates an individual who pledges himself or herself to the sanctity of human life, we will join others in voting for a minor-party candidate. Those agreeing with the proposition were invited to stand. The result was almost unanimous...

...The other approach, which I find problematic, is to choose a candidate according to the likelihood of electoral success or failure. Polls don’t measure right and wrong; voting according to the possibility of winning or losing can lead directly to the compromise of one’s principles. In the present political climate, it could result in the abandonment of cherished beliefs that conservative Christians have promoted and defended for decades. Winning the presidential election is vitally important, but not at the expense of what we hold most dear...

The Dobson article, despite the laughable reference to "both ... Parties", is all about Giuliani. I'd assumed that the conservative right would sacrifice their core values for the tribe, but Dobson is saying it ain't so. They would prefer honorable defeat to complete betrayal of all they've fought for. So even though the vote wasn't unanimous, it's a stake in the ground. Given Romney's immense personal wealth, and his willingness to spend it on his campaign, I assume the nominee will be Romney.

But how will the religious right feel about the first non-Christian president since Jefferson?

These are dark days for both the GOP and the religious right, but I feel cheerier.

The GOP candidates: The Legion of Doom

Gail Collins, writing for the NYT, reminded me a bit of a voice I miss - Molly Ivins. Here's how she describes the GOP front runners...

Ah Newtie, We Hardly Knew Ye - New York Times

...The Democrats used to give their unsatisfactory lineups names like The Seven Dwarfs. What would you call this crowd of Republicans? The Legion of Doom?

The front-runners are all at least two entirely different politicians, and no voter can possibly avoid hating one version. John McCain, the maverick reformer, is now the Superhawk friend of Falwell who thinks Christianity is in the Constitution. The Rudy Giuliani who fought for gun control is now the guy who learned from 9/11 how important it is for Americans to pack heat. (Coming soon: Rudy explains how 9/11 taught him that homosexuality is wrong.) And you could fill an auditorium with all the Mitts we’ve got running around out there.

There is, however, only one Fred Thompson, and he appears to have been stuffed by a taxidermist...

Newt Gingrich would have livened things up, his withdrawal and the state of the candidates hints that the intelligent wing of the GOP have decided this cup is poisoned. If only I was sure these bozos were truly unelectable, but I lost my faith in the American people years ago.

The CD, not file sharing, is the true target of the music industry

The media always treats the music industries attacks on file sharing as though these were the real story. Wrong. File sharing is a side-show now. The music industry has pretty much eliminated file sharing as a true revenue threat, in fact that threat really died when the first, largest, MP3 file sharing service died. Everything since has been mop-up operations, but the industry has been very smart to keep the focus on "file sharing". The real battle lies ahead.

The industry's real problem is the CD, and the massive music collections people have copied from CDs already. The quality of the music on the CDs considerably exceeds what most people can appreciate, so there's no technical innovation on the horizon that will render existing CDs worthless.

Those CDs are passed around, music libraries are exchanged, and the music industry gets nothing. Even if the music is not illegally exchanged in this way, CDs are resold, people marry and share music, parents put their music on their children's iPods, and people stop listening to their old CDs and instead listen to their iPods.

The industry needs all of this to stop - eventually. That's the true target.

That's what SONY's lawyer is admitting when forced to speak under oath ...

Sony BMG's chief anti-piracy lawyer: "Copying" music you own is "stealing"

... Pariser has a very broad definition of "stealing." When questioned by Richard Gabriel, lead counsel for the record labels, Pariser suggested that what millions of music fans do is actually theft. The dirty deed? Ripping your own CDs or downloading songs you already own.

Gabriel asked if it was wrong for consumers to make copies of music which they have purchased, even just one copy. Pariser replied, "When an individual makes a copy of a song for himself, I suppose we can say he stole a song." Making "a copy" of a purchased song is just "a nice way of saying 'steals just one copy'," she said.

Countless studies have shown that the majority of music on portable music players like the iPod comes from sources other than download services. For most people, that music is comprised primarily of songs "ripped" from CD collections to MP3 or some other comparable format. Indeed, most portable music players comes with software (like iTunes) which is designed to facilitate the easy ripping of CDs. According to Pariser's view, this is stealing....

How can the music industry eliminate the CD? Short of implementing a police state they can't do it for existing music, but they can stop releasing new music on CDs. They need to do that as quickly as possible, which means they need electronic distribution to become very popular -- even at the cost of impacting short term revenues. So today the industry needs the iPod, and for now they even need Amazon's DRM-free distribution and Apple's iTunes store. These are the key drivers reducing interest in the CD -- and the CD has to go.

Once CD sales really fall, then the industry can stop releasing new music on CDs. Only then can they kill the iTunes music store, the iPod, DRM-free distribution, music that lacks owner identification, etc.

It will be a tough fight, with lots of slow retreating under file -- until the CD dies. After the CD dies, then the tide turns.

I think they'll make a good go at it.

Schizophrenia and autism: evolutionary disorders?

I was thinking this morning, as I often do, of brain and mind, evolution, schizophrenia, and autism (more autism related posts), particularly in the context of a recent post about the perplexing prevalence of schizophrenia and a model of autism genetics involving spontaneous mutation, female non-expression, and inheritance in the male.

The pieces of the puzzle seem to fit together. If I were to read the minds of the researchers in these domains, I suspect they're beginning to think of autism and schizophrenia as examples of an entirely new class of illness - "evolutionary disorders". These are a class of disorders that arise in an organ, in this case the brain, that is undergoing rapid evolutionary change with a high mutation rate and a lot of suboptimal experiments.

I used to think that human evolution more or less ended with the invention of fire, at least that's what I recall from my high school essays [1]. Now we know that the human brain and human gut (they're very closely related systems) have undergone major adaptive changes within the past 15,000 years. It's increasingly plausible, but I don't think it's been proven, that these are systems predisposed to high mutation rates [2].

Systems predisposed to high mutation rates are going to produce a lot of "suboptimal" results, and a few significant improvements. This is what may account for the perplexing prevalence of two syndromes, autism and schizophrenia, that share similar traits:

• no obvious adaptive advantages
• common
• ill-defined and probably multiple underlying pathophysiologies
• complex genetic variability -- many different identified mutations and a suspicion that the disorders may arise from interacting protein networks.
  

I wonder if, should we look for them, we would identify similar "evolutionary disorders" in other animals undergoing rapid adaptive changes in some phenotype. Maybe that would explain all those odd-colored squirrels we see ...

[1] I've been fascinated by human evolution forever. Even as a child I didn't care for the traditional eugenics that is increasingly commonplace today, so I then advocated the encouragement of inter-ethnic marriage to dilute "bad" genes -- until we could directly engineer germ cell lines. Hey, it was a long time ago ...

[2] I think the theory here is that mutation rates can be selected for, so when "rapid change" is advantageous there is selection for "genomic creativity" over "genomic conservation". I think that's the mechanism that's supposed to underlie "punctuated equilibrium", but I'm not a biologist. I just write to learn ...

Update 5/6/2010: Yes, they're evolutionary disorders. In 2010 the term "evolutionary disorder" has a lot of hits, but I may have been one of the first users of it in this context.

Sudden shafts of light: the journalist as honest cop

DeLong and Krugman have long shone a noble light on the discredited "he said", "she said" style of journalism. This style requires that journalist be a neutral observer, reporting only what they're told. At most a journalist can hint, usually "below the fold", that some statement is an outrageous untruth.

This might have been a reasonable approach to pre-Gingrichian politics, but Gingrich's brilliance was to realize that "neutral observer" journalism provides a large adaptive advantage to liars. Market selection worked its magic and we ended up with the GOP congress and the Bush administration.

"He said" "She said" is a practice that needs to end. Journalists need to point out lies.

That's why I burst into joyous laughter during my commute today. My "In Our Time" podcast was hung up on the minutiae of medieval philosophy; it was reminding me too much of my work. So I turned to the radio to catch Lindsey Graham, a GOP senator, comparing the US occupation of Iraq with US opposition to Nazi Germany. Senator Graham told us that in those days real Americans rolled up their sleeves, and didn't worry about budgets, cost accounting or any "surtax" to cover war costs.

Without any noticeable change in inflection, the journalist said something like 'Of course Americans did pay a war surtax during WW II' and turned to the next topic.

It was brilliantly devastating. Graham was exposed as either a fool or a liar, or, most likely, both.

Dare we hope this is an early sign of a new dawn? It is time to bury the neutral observer, we need an "honest cop" style of journalism.

When government works - the Twin Cities

It's hard to remember a time when government was good in America. Clinton, whatever his other foibles [1], was a very good president -- but he was saddled for much of his presidency with the Gingrich House. About ten years ago Minnesota had a good (republican!) governor with a decent legislature, but then we got Ventura [2] and Pawlenty, and, for much of that time, a miserable GOP dominated House.

Politics and government in America has been dysfunctional for a surprisingly long time. I've grown accustomed to it.

So it was a bit of a surprise to me today when I noted that we have good local government in both Saint Paul and Minneapolis. In the case of Saint Paul, we dumped a traitorous Bush flunky and brought in a surprise winner who's turned out to be a good mayor.

My enlightenment came when I read a whiny editorial in a community newspaper (The Villager). The details don't matter, the key is that the complaints were so petty. The government is good enough, and rational enough, that they're arguing about issues that reasonable, rational, people can disagree on.

The ice rinks are one example. Inflation (3.5%) and cuts in state funding (Pawlenty!) mean more property taxes and a need to cut budgets. At the same time, it's pretty obvious we're losing our winters in Saint Paul. Outdoor ice just isn't working. The mayor wants to shut about nine outdoor rinks (they're mostly puddles these winters) and open 3 refrigerated rinks. Rational objectors worry about loss of summer fields (refrigerated rinks are fixed structures) or feel we should shut the outdoor rinks but not buy the refrigerated rinks -- which would mean saying good-bye to hockey and skating for most kids. A minority of loons seem to think winter is going to return any day now, which would be nice but is rather unlikely.

There are other small examples. I complained to my city counselor about scary intersection and the city took a serious look at it -- they'll even try to fix a few things. I was worried about a change to a busy street that seemed to promise more traffic, but it's a traffic calming measure.

This is good politics. It can happen, even if it's only at the level of a city ...

[1] Anyone who has what it takes to become President in the modern era is going to be a bit twisted. Clinton was twisted and competent, Bush is twisted and incompetent.
[2] Ventura was actually an improvement on the legislature of his day; he vetoed a lot of bad stuff.

Update 10/4/07: There's a great comment on my post about the refrigerated rinks; the commenter tells us those rinks are pretty loud at night. That sounds like something worthy of discussion! Should the rinks have mandatory noise abatement measures? Do the coolers need to run at night (probably not)? What's the experience where they've been put in -- do the neighbors find them as bad as feared? All good discussions -- that's what politics should be about. I can't say if these were discussed in the city council or not, but they should have been.

The treadmill powered Harry Potter eBook - my greatest invention

My wife is a reasonably disciplined person, but she has a dark secret. She's a binge reader. Lately she's been hitting the Potter pretty hard. Happily she's on the last one, so we're hoping to get her back on the wagon.

Me? Don't believe those Pratchett rumors. Damn you Vinge for luring me to that cursed drink ...

Which brings me to my greatest invention. The Potter powered treadmill. Hook up an eBook to a treadmill, so that there's a relationship between miles walked and page turning ability. If you don't walk enough, you find you can't turn the page any more ...

It won't cure binge reading, but it will extend the reader's lifespan...

Update 10/9/07: Jeff Atwood's post on "The Hacker's Diet" references the "gamercize" which uses exercise measures to limit computer or console access.

Condé Nast and Spam: what's the deal here?

Condé Nast Publications publishes "Gourmet" magazine. Judging by the ads the readership is classically bourgeois. So why do they generate so much spam? It's amazing -- every email address I've ever had gets spam from Conde Nast, usually about "Gourmet". Unsubscribe attempts always fail.

It's easy to eliminate -- I just block "condenastpubs.com". Still, it's weird. I suspect a good portion of the middle class doesn't mind getting spam from Gourmet ...

Update 10/14/07: Judging from a helpful comment, this appears to be a business decision by Conde Nast, not a technical error or a fluke. I think there's a strong case to be made for blacklisting the condenast.com domain.

Incidentally, as of today a Google search on "conde nast spam" has this blog post as the top hit. I suspect someone from Conde Nast is going to read this. They can add their comments below, i promise I'll publish them. They can't email me, since I've blacklisted their domain.

Update 1/18/07: I got another Gourmet magazine spam -- but the domain was erol.com. Turns out this is not a Gourmet spam after all; it's a phishing email. I suspect even Conde Nast hasn't fallen that far. It's a measure of how low they have fallen, however, that phishers are now riding their spammy coattails.

Nokia is the Apple Geek's new best friend

Where can an Apple geek look for help, now that Apple is beating on its most loyal customers?

Into our hour of darkness and despair rides an unexpected savior - Nokia! (emphases mine):

AppleInsider | Nokia launches anti-iPhone campaign amid controversy

Bloggers and hackers aren't the only ones sticking it to iPhone maker Apple Inc. for its closed minded approach to user-customization of the touch-screen handsets -- Nokia has taken advantage of the situation by launching a print and web campaign dubbed "Open to anything."

"We believe the best devices have no limits. That's why we've left the Nokia Nseries open," the Finland-based handset maker wrote on its new "Open to anything" website. "Open to applications. Open to widgets. Open to anything. So go ahead and load it up. What is does is up to you."

The campaign, which was accompanied by the posting of similarly-worded bills in New York City this past weekend, is an obvious response to the latest iPhone update on Thursday...

...The matter is complicated by a number of factors, primarily what is now being perceived by some as a poor job on Apple's part to convey its stance on third-party applications to iPhone users earlier in the handset's lifecycle...

Ahh, balm to our wounds.

Nokia placed two full page ads in the paper NYT about 10 days ago beating up on Apple's control fetish. I didn't comment at the time because I couldn't find any related marketing material on Nokia's web site, but it seems their dysfunctional marketing department is catching up.

This has got to cause pain in Cupertino. Alas this is probably not a good strategic move for Nokia; it's just the sort of thing that might cause Apple (and AT&T?) to change direction. Nokia would be best served by Apple continuing on their current path of self-destruction...

I wonder if Nokia will support iSync?

PS. Nokia has a very annoying flash based web site. I didn't say the Nokia was a smart company ...

Dyer on why Bush invaded Iraq - not the oil

Dyer is no fan of George Bush's rule. In a recent essay, however, he disparages the common belief that Cheney/Bush invaded Iraq to protect the west's oil supply. So what was the reason?

... So why did they invade Iraq, in the end? One motive was certainly the desire for permanent American military bases in the Gulf from which the United States could, at need, stop oil flowing to China. The strategic community in Washington has identified China as America's new strategic rival, and it is becoming more and more vulnerable to interference with its oil imports. (Those 'enduring bases' are still being built in Iraq.) But that is not a big enough reason to explain what happened. I have written tens of thousands of words on the Bush administration's motives for invading Iraq, but in the end I do not know why they did it. I suspect that they don't, either. It just seemed like a neat idea at the time...

More Dyer essays: 8/20-9/17 2007

More Dyer essays:

Gwynne Dyer: 2007

August 20 British Retreat From Iraq
August 27 Sarkozy: The Hyper-President
August 30 Islam and the Idiotic Autocrats
Sept 4 Extreme Climate and Extreme Politics
Sept 6 Terrorism: Lessons from Germany
Sept 10 Marking Time
Sept 17 It's All About Oil

Is schizophrenia the price we pay for an evolving brain?

Schizophrenia is pretty darned common, and it's a terrible disorder with clear inherited roots. So why is it so common?

Scientific American 9/6/07: It's No Delusion: Evolution May Favor Schizophrenia Genes

New research reveals that genes related to the debilitating disorder may also provide developmental advantages..

...Dorus co-authored a report, appearing in this week's Proceedings of the Royal Society B, about the evolution of genes linked to schizophrenia. After analyzing human DNA from several populations around the world and examining primate genomes dating back to the shared ancestor of both humans and chimpanzees, researchers reached a striking conclusion that several gene variants linked to schizophrenia were actually positively selected and remained largely unchanged over time, suggesting that there was some advantage to having them.

"Schizophrenia can be explained by a lot of individual alleles (variations of genes)," Dorus notes. "There are many different loci that impact the actual manifestation of the disease." Over the past decade, several dozen genes have been identified as potential culprits, and scientists believe that several genes cause disruptions in protein formations predisposing a person to schizophrenia.

...the team ... focused on 76 gene variations most strongly related to schizophrenia. By comparing these combinations with the evolution of other genes known to affect neuronal processes, the researchers determined that 28 of the schizophrenia-associated genes have been evolutionarily preferred in recent years by either Caucasian, Asian or African populations.

"Because it's a such a complex genetic trait … you actually expect there to be some variability from population to population, in terms of what genes are playing a role in the disorder," Dorus says. He notes that he was surprised that the study turned up a positive selection for some of the genes most closely associated to the disease, including DISC1 (disrupted in schizophrenia 1), which is involved in the transport of proteins along the relatively lengthy cell bodies of neurons, among them. "The most important thing is we don't really know what the basis of the selection has been," he says. "It could be due to an entire range of neurodevelopmental processes."

Co-author Crespi says that a number of theories have been floating around regarding the persistence of schizophrenia's genetic underpinnings. One holds that schizophrenia is a "disorder of language" and that the illness is an unfortunate consequence of the development of human speech, expression and creativity. "Whenever you get strong selection, it's like a big plus, and you can drag along a lot of minuses," he says. "You can think of schizophrenics as paying the price of all the cognitive and language skills that humans have—they have too many of the alleles that taken individually…might have positive effect, but together they are bad."

Dorus says the team will now home in on the 28 genes fingered in positive selection in the hope of finding new treatments for the mysterious disorder.

The explanation seems to be that it's very hard to construct a functioning human brain, and that the brain is still actively evolving. So in this case there's not necessarily an advantage to a schizophrenia gene, but rather that the diffuse set of disorders we label as "schizophrenia" arise because the human brain is very much a work in progress, one with a high defect rate ...

Update 7/2/2010: Structural variation in the human genome and its r... [Annu Rev Med. 2010]...

... The discovery of submicroscopic copy-number variations (CNVs) present in our genomes has changed dramatically our perspective on DNA structural variation and disease. ... CNVs, to a larger extent than SNPs, have been shown to be responsible for human evolution, genetic diversity between individuals, and a rapidly increasing number of traits or susceptibility to traits; such conditions have been referred to as genomic disorders. In addition to well-known sporadic chromosomal microdeletion syndromes and Mendelian diseases, many common complex traits including autism and schizophrenia can result from CNVs. Both recombination- and replication-based mechanisms for CNV formation have been described.

A picture to remember - Rangoon

TIME, September 27, 2007

Pictures of the Week - TIME

Photographer Kenji Nagai takes photographs after being shot by soldiers in Rangoon as the Burmese Army fired on the crowd. Kenji later died.