Q&A Session

Okay! It's first blogging assigment time! Yes, I managed to pull myself away from the Wii long enough to do something constructive. I'm not at all sure what I'm planning to construct, however.

Some Questions and Answers:

Dr. Priest indicated that math is SALT - a Science, Art, Language and Tool. Can you give examples of each?

We did, of course, just talk about this kind of thing today. So here are some examples:

A Science: According to dictionary dot com, anything which ends in "ology" is a science, and "ology" is a general term to describe the study of something. I suppose by that logic Psychology is, in fact, a science. So let's say my example for a science is psychology, the study of human behavior.

An Art: This is the vaguest category. An art would seem to be an action, preferably a useful action, which can be honed to a sharp degree and become something even more useful. Many unassuming things have been taken by a gifted individual and transformed into an art, like what artists (in a different sense) did with film in the early photography era, or like what Lance Armstrong did with winning the Tour de France.

A Language: A language is an arbitrary system of sounds or characters used for communication between humans. Math has the distinction of being a universal language, which has transcended cultures to become understandable to all. A similar thing (perhaps more similar than we know) is the language of music, which is also, to a more ancient degree, universal.

A Tool: Another broad category. If some item is used to help a human progress in his or her life, it's probably a tool. One of the base signs of sentient life is the use of tools. Even apes use rudimentary tools to do those silly things apes do. I'll give a piece of paper and a pencil as my example of a tool. Both are used in conjunction to write our ideas, or perhaps our math problems, down in a permanent (hopefully) location so we can forget it and come back later. It's a tool to augment (or weaken?) our memory.

On to the next:

Dr. Priest indicated that he believes math to be discovered, not invented or created. What did he mean by this? Being that, as indicated in the reading, a lot of mathematics is applicable to things in the physical world, what are some conclusions that we can reach following Dr. Priest's line of thought?

I remember Dr. Priest saying "I'll give God the credit" or something to that extent in conjunction with the above statement. Obviously he believes that math, like fire, is a natural force which has always been, and it only remains for a human with brains enough to use numbers to figure it out. Of course I'm only able to add small digits together before I stop paying attention, but for those of us from more of a left-brained position, math can be quite a bit more helpful than fire.

Do we place too much value on statistics?

A while ago, for another similar class, I read a book by Neil Postman titled Technopoly. It was the author's tirade on the prevalence of technology and the hold it has on the nation. Quite an interesting and eye-opening read (some of you who are taking other Honors courses may be familiar with it). One of the items he went off on was our unswerving loyalty to statistics. How many chapel speeches, essays, or docu-dramas have you seen or heard which open with some kind of shocking percentage? How many have you believed? Postman pointed out that these kind of things are a problem in that to so many people, they are the highest authority. Who can argue with numbers, facts, and bar graphs? Which brings me to my next answer...

Can we truly trust any information or theories that are based on statistics?

"Correlation, not causation." That has always been a true statement. Statistics and polls are useful, but we as discerning individuals have to be careful of becoming gluttons of information. What's really true? Where did this info come from? Who compiled it? Can we really ever have the right answer? Who knows. The bottom line is not to believe everything you hear (just like your mom told you, hopefully).

Thus, my interview is complete. But wait, there's more! I have to take a couple minutes to showcase one of the best things about the Nintendo Wii: Mii creating! In the Wii universe, there exists a system which allows one to create a tiny, cartoonish version of oneself for use with Wii Sports and, presumably, other forthcoming Nintendo games. Here is my Mii of myself:


Mmm. Cartoonish self.



That's not all, though. There is no limit to the amount of Miis which can populate your little Mii plaza, so naturally I've been making cute, balloon-headed versions of basically everyone I know.




Here's one you may recognize:







Look familiar?
















Unfortunately, "Picklesimer" didn't fit in the name box. But hey, our professor might show up on my baseball team or in the audience at my next bowling game! Hey!!

Extrapolation

I'm going to answer Dr. P's questions in the next post.

For now, I have to rejoice because I finally found one of these:


And in celebration of this joyous event (it really is quite joyous), please view this HUMOROUS VIDEO:

Press Start

I'm comandeering my own blog for the purposes of Human Situation III. In the meantime:

The Perilous Potomac!!

First entry for the new year! And a new adventure to go with it:

This weekend we had a freak change in temperature, where suddenly it was summertime and therefore a perfect day to go for a row. My dad is XTREME-ly into the whole yo-ho-ho thing, so anytime we go boating with him it means paddling, rowing, or sailing. The dory's mast is already shelved for the season so today it was time for a lively row! Yes! Since we live so close to DC, the Potomac is quite convenient, and it was there that we set out for a rowing adventure.

After stopping at our favorite breakfast place, we took a long drive to pick up my dad's old college friend Dave Kerner and headed towards the boat launch. We crossed just over into Maryland, and prepared to set off amidst the bewilderment of all the other people at the ramp (rowing is apparently not one of the nation's most common leisurely activities).



There you can see our boat attached to our unlikely car (the added trailer hitch bangs against the pavement between our driveway and the street if we don't curve a little to the left or right while backing up), accompanied by my younger brother Elliot, and then Dave Kerner next to my Dad. You can see how beautiful a day it was...Dave may have been wearing a jacket, but both he and I took off our jackets after a short time on the water. Seriously, the weather was really weird.



See, such a beautiful day. We got the boat in the water without trouble, and since we had four people with us, three got to row and one got to steer. Have you ever rowed with three people in tandem? It's quite a challenge. I took the bow-most position, farthest from the rudder, so I was pretty much constrained to row the entire time.



And if you'll look at a larger version of this picture, you can see that it's Mt. Vernon, home of George Washington! We passed by it and a few other tourist-y locales during our row in this direction, garnering plenty of looks in our direction from the touristfolk. My Dad mused that he'd like to see what we must look like from the shore.



We rowed for a long time. After passing Mt. Vernon we took a break and had some water from the scuttlebutt (silly nautical terms...) and headed back in the opposite direction. As we were moving along some uncommonly warm gusts of wind blew at our backs. I nearly lost my hat a couple of times. Eventually, after passing the manors belonging to the exquisitely rich which litter the coastline of the area, we came upon a small cove, which we pulled into and took a break. I snapped quite a few pictures of it, so here's a mini-gallery:



Click to enlarge. Here we have us pulling into the cove ("Pirate's Cove," if you will); a pile of dead trees and driftwood that the cove had accumulated; a mysterious concrete structure barred by many trees; a view of the cove; and pushing ourselves out of the cove with generous manpower. For the remainder of the trip I took the stern seat so I could steer (since I had been rowing the entire time up to that point).

We hugged the coast for a while longer and finally crossed the potomac again to reach our boat landing. The side our landing was on is notably less rich-looking than the Mt. Vernon side, but there were some odd and variously decorated houses (such as an octagonal house connected to an austere cube-building which seemed to house a large spiral staircase; the whole thing looked like a professor's house and appeared to be still under construction).

Returning to the landing we hitched the boat back up to the trailer, as a large man in overalls and a John Deere with binoculars around his neck watched us contentedly. After the boat was back on the car, my brother spotted a small abandoned building partially hidden in the foliage close to the landing. Abandoned buildings, especially those suffering from advanced necrosis, have always fascinated me, so we both went to check it out.



Left to right: the rusty chain link fence surrounding the once-house; what was left of the house; view from inside the fence; another view; standing in the doorway; a rusted metal (drainpipe?). I think two out of the four walls had already fallen in, and the surrounding forest had almost completely claimed the ruin for itself. Satisfied, we headed back to the car, but there was one more thing left to do before leaving the area. A park was nearby which had another interesting structure beckoning to us.



The road to the small park was flanked with trees, and thankfully the dirt roads were kind to our small Saturn with cargo. The park was on the grounds of a building called Marshall Hall, which had some historical significance with George Washington and blah blah blah. But this is why it was really interesting:



No roof! It wasn't in quite so far advanced a ruined state as the previous building, probably since it had more historic value, but the roof was sure gone, giving it that striking prison-camp look to it. It was also surrounded by a chain fence topped with barbed wire (garnished with signs citing "HAZARDOUS STRUCTURE"), allowing for some clever photography:



Looks like it just jumped out of a WWII story. Some more pictures of that building and surrounding area:



Left to Right: Picnic benches set upon what I felt to be a foundation of a previous building (look for my brother in this one); Marshall Hall sans barbed wire; a little grill for them frankfurters; another look at the Hall.

We were all beat at the end of the day. We were out there lollygagging, as Dave put it, for around four hours. It was fun though, and the day couldn't be more beautiful (or more disconcerting, given the month and season). So, here's to 2007! And a picture of me in the weird concrete structure in the cove:



Now to play some more Zelda.