Blog0matique

Okay. Space not your thing? How about berries and cream?

I saw a little buzz about an article today announcing scientists have discovered the first “Earth-like” planet outside our solar system.

An Earth-like planet spotted outside our solar system is the first found that could support liquid water and harbor life, scientists announced today.

Liquid water is a key ingredient for life as we know it. The newfound planet is located at the “Goldilocks” distance—not too close and not too far from its star to keep water on its surface from freezing or vaporizing away.

Oh yes. Life as we know it. I’m hoping someone can correct me here, but isn’t a bit egotistical to think that “life as we know it” is the only way life can evolve at all? Is water really the only thing that can lead to life? Considering the infinite possibilities available in the infinite timeline of the Universe, it really seems a bit naive to think that there could be one magic “key ingredient”.

I guess this particularly caught my eye because just two or three nights ago, Jason and I were trying to decide what will happen to our own blue sphere. I asked him if he thought we’d totally wipe ourselves and everything else out, or if perhaps we’d just wipe almost everything out and maybe something else would evolve and surpass us. He liked the first option; I’m pushing for the second. I like the imagine a world where the number of humans dramatically decrease, opening a possibility for a better life form to evolve and maybe even rule over us. Of course, once I start daydreaming that far, I can’t help but picture Jay and Silent Bob. “In this world gone mad, we won’t spank the monkey! The monkey will spank us!” But, yanno, I think it’d be an interesting way to curb our human ego.

Which brings us full circle to the discovery today. Human ego - telling you how life is made since 8000 BC!

This is why I’m glad Al Gore invented the internet.

So, let’s play pretend. I’m some kind of really weak demi-god with kinda lame powers, and I only got one “smite” per lifetime. Who would I utilize my only smite on? The fucker who invented those plastic shell packs that they put computer parts into. Before those were invented, I didn’t think it was actually possible to ruin the joyous occasion of purchasing gratuitous technology. Now, I know that having that hot little number in my hands is only the beginning.

I just spent a good 7 minutes trying desperately to unleash my XBox Live Points from their polymer prison. I was so excited when the package arrived, but now I can only collapse in an exhausted heap, clutching my hard-earned prize. *sob* It’s like they just sat there and said “Hmm, who are the least athletically inclined people in the world? Computer dorks! Let’s give them packaging only their video game gods can actually open!”

I was interested to see what would come of the alimony case in Florida where a transexual’s exhusband was trying to get out of his alimony payments.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about the ruling.

“It’s illegal for a man to marry a man and it should likewise be illegal for a man to pay alimony to a man,” said John McGuire, one of Roach’s attorneys.

Circuit Judge Jack R. St. Arnold, however, ruled that in the eyes of the law, nothing changed significantly enough to free Roach from his $1,250-a-month obligation.

The judge said since Florida courts have ruled sex-change surgery cannot legally change a person’s birth gender, Roach technically is not paying alimony to a man.

I guess in the end, it was a good decision, although I don’t like the judge’s reason behind it (that Silverwolf, the ex-wife, isn’t really a man). That, to me, seems to pretty clearly invalidate an individual’s ability to determine their own gender. I think it’s kind of funny that they referred to it as “birth gender”, since there’s really not such a thing. You have a birth sex, but gender is a social construct.

I wonder what would happen if a F2M transexual and a birth-sexed female tried to marry. Would they rule that it’s a gay marriage? This seems to set the precedent that it could be construed as such. If that’s the case, it’s pretty not-fair that no matter what you do, you are forever locked into your DNA, even down to who the state allows you to love.

Alimony, though, is a weird subject for it to be about though, because I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it either. I think it was created in a time to help women who couldn’t feasibly take care of themselves if they didn’t have a man to support them. That’s not entirely the case anymore, so isn’t alimony somewhat of an outdated, patriarchal concept? At the same time, with the glass ceiling et al, I guess we can’t really get rid of alimony until women are actually earning as much as men. But since Silverwolf in the above case will be living as a man, and therefore receiving the financial benefits of it, wouldn’t that make the alimony no longer relevant?

I’m wondering what other people are thinking about this.

I think I’m officially even more jaded than ever before. Looking over the most recent consumer confidence report findings, all I can think of is: “Gee, isn’t this convenient?”

The recent turmoil in financial markets coupled with the run-up in gasoline prices may have contributed to consumers” heightened sense of uncertainty and concern.

I realize that it would be a stretch to assert that our Powers That Be somehow orchestrated the dip in the Chinese stock markets that triggered the avalanche of terror in the stock market. (Although, at this point, I will believe that they can and do control almost everything.) But the increase in gas prices certainly makes me raise an eyebrow. Seeing that the market was going crazy and that oil would likely skyrocket as a result, you’d think that the Powers would step in and perhaps provide some sort of relief so that we didn’t get hit hard at the gas pump. Just something to hold our hands and tell us everything is okay. The sky isn’t falling, the damage in the market will be controlled, etc.

Instead, they let oil do what it does best: panic and skyrocket. And I realize that government intervention in markets is down-right ill-advised, but you’d think that with the way the Reps are losing the popularity contest right now, they’d want to do everything they could to make people think they’re safe and sound with the old GOP.

But then I started thinking. Maybe this is exactly what the White House and the poor, outnumbered Republican Congressmen want. Maybe they want the economy to go to shit the minute that the Dems take over. Let’s ignore the fact that the economy has been teetering on the brink for quite some time. Let’s ignore the fact that the housing bubble basically burst while the Reps were still in power. Let’s just focus on who’s in power when we’re actually feeling the effects of past decisions.

If we could just focus on the shit-tastic economy, maybe we’ll forget about Scooter Libby, the Attorney General’s mishaps, Jack Abramoff, and all the other bad stuff that’s gone down. Heck, maybe we’ll be so worried about our own economy that we’ll stop bitching about our troops in Iraq! Hey, America, how can you possibly worry about foreign policy when your wallets are being deflated?

And then, I calm down and realize that I’m officially a conspiracy-theory spouting loony.

I was really pleased to hear about Gov. Strickland’s intent to eliminate funding for abstinence-only education today.

Kids should definitely be educated about the physical and emotional consequences of sexual activity. However, it’s been proven repeatedly that abstinence education just doesn’t work. You can scare kids however much you want, but unless you give them the proper knowledge in how to deal with what their bodies want them to do (be it smoking, sex, reckless behavior, etc), then you’re really doing nothing but creating a bunch of guilt-ridden, at-risk teens.

Rather than spending so much money telling them to not do what feels good, why don’t we invest that money into providing them with the materials they need to do it safely? Instead of making kids scared to death to talk about what they’re doing anyway, why don’t we create open forums where they can get information without being ashamed or scared? I’m glad that Gov. Strickland realizes that. I hope that in all the backlash that is sure to follow, he will come up with a plan that better utilizes a method of teaching safe sex and creating an environment of knowledge rather than fear.

I saw a couple of news articles linking to this report by the RAC (a British motoring organization) that discusses the link between playing video games and aggressive driving.

Over one third (34%) of young male and female drivers confess they are more likely to drive faster on roads shortly after indulging in on-screen driving action and a quarter (27%) of young drivers admit they take greater driving risks after a gaming session.

The study, by the UK’s largest driving school, BSM, shows nearly a quarter (22%) of young drivers even claim they have imagined they’re in a driving simulation game while driving on the UK’s roads.

The sociologist in me wants to scream! You’d almost think that they actually sat with the respondents of this survey to see if they drove differently after they played games. But, based on what I saw on the BSM’s website, this is just a regular old Internet based survey. They don’t let you log in unless you’re a student, so I can only imagine the leading formatting and biased questions…. Still, even if the survey was designed in an unbiased way, you have to wonder about the results they’re getting.

First of all, they’re asking the respondents if they feel like they drive faster or take more risks after a gaming session. I feel a lot of things that I know aren’t accurate, and I especially remember that when I was a teenager, my perception of reality and my own actions were a bit warped to say the least. There’s also the aspect of correlation does not mean causation. Even if the kids are actually driving differently after gaming, does that mean that it is caused by the gaming? Might it be that they’re just more aware of their driving habits after playing games? Or perhaps those who play games are already more disposed to driving in this fashion. Or perhaps there isn’t any effect at all, but the respondent says, “Hunh, now that they ask, I guess I drive differently.”

Without a whole lot of questions answered, or at least making the data available, I’m calling BS on this one. Yes, I’m seeing what I want to see, as I obviously don’t think that video games “cause” anything that isn’t already present in some form in an individual. But I think the sponsors of this survey are guilty of the same thing, in reverse. It doesn’t help that the people who put this info out there have a lot to gain by saying kids are worse off.

I absolutely love those galleries where graphic artists show their mad photoshop skillz by displaying galleries of befores & afters of “cleaned up” photos. Seeing these galleries of what it takes to really make someone “magazine beautiful” makes me feel a lot better about myself as I read Maxim.

That being said, I find this piece of software that automatically does “beauty retouching” particularly interesting. Combined with the composite beauty scale that I came across a few weeks ago, it seems that technology is being used in incredible ways to create a science of beauty. Beauty, like art, seems to be so ethereal. Knowing that algorithms and mouse clicks can create beauty from the mundane is fascinating to me. It seems that through technology we are able to slowly start to define — in tangible, concrete terms — what our eyes and our minds have been telling us for centuries.

Like a lot of scientific progress, I have to wonder, though, if it doesn’t take some of the magic out of it. Mystery makes things interesting. Knowing that someone is beautiful just because her eyes are symmetrical or her forehead is in proper proportion seems to make the beauty a lot less captivating. As the line continually tends to blur between reality and fiction, it also seems that developments like this can further fuel cynicism. Why care about beauty at all if it can be manufactured so easily?

Perhaps that’s why sites like the Suicide Girls flourish. Even though their photos are just as digitally manipulated as any other porn, the fact that the girls often aren’t conventionally beautiful somehow seems to lend authenticity to a world that is increasingly manufactured.