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Tweenbots Show How Wonderful Humans Can Be

Neece — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 00:00:45 +0000

Unlike most atheists I know, I don’t really consider myself a humanist, but maybe that’s because I really don’t know the full definition. Let’s look it up.

Humanism affirms the dignity and worth of all people, based on the ability to determine right and wrong by appealing to universal human qualities, particularly rationality, without resorting to the supernatural or alleged divine authority from religious texts. Humanism can be considered as a process by which truth and morality is sought through human investigation; as such, views on morals can change when new knowledge and information is discovered. In focusing on the capacity for self-determination, humanism rejects transcendental justifications, such as a dependence on faith, the supernatural, or texts of allegedly divine origin. Humanists endorse universal morality based on the commonality of the human condition, suggesting that solutions to human social and cultural problems cannot be parochial.

While I agree in principle with that definition, I have become rather cynical and jaded. My experience of people is less noble and dignified. Most people seem self-serving, narcissistic and self-centered. I’ve found that many people refrain from immoral acts only out of fear of punishment or guilt. Also, I’ve found that people in general don’t seek truth or look outside themselves much at all. They simply go about their lives to get by as comfortably as possible, mitigated by guilt and fear.

Of course there are lots of exceptions of extraordinary people. But in general my view of the human race is more like children in adult bodies, basically just going through life like a ball in a pinball machine, bouncing off of things and careening around randomly. I think it takes supreme effort to break free of this thoughtless kind of life, where you run on belief systems formed in early childhood. It takes critical and creative thinking to break free of the mold we are indoctrinated into as children.

But, sometimes I am surprised and delighted by humanity. It doesn’t happen often, so when it does, I feel the desire to share my warm fuzzies with everyone. This is one of those moments. I was stumbling around the interwebs when I came upon Tweenbots. In this 3 and a half minute video, Tweenbot is traversing Washington Square Park. He does it in 42 minutes with 29 people helping him.

From the site:

In New York City, we are very occupied with getting from one place to another. I wondered: could a human-like object traverse sidewalks and streets along with us, and in so doing, create a narrative about our relationship to space and our willingness to interact with what we find in it? More importantly, how could our actions be seen within a larger context of human connection that emerges from the complexity of the city itself? To answer these questions, I built robots.
Tweenbots are human-dependent robots that navigate the city with the help of pedestrians they encounter. Rolling at a constant speed, in a straight line, Tweenbots have a destination displayed on a flag, and rely on people they meet to read this flag and to aim them in the right direction to reach their goal.
Given their extreme vulnerability, the vastness of city space, the dangers posed by traffic, suspicion of terrorism, and the possibility that no one would be interested in helping a lost little robot, I initially conceived the Tweenbots as disposable creatures which were more likely to struggle and die in the city than to reach their destination. Because I built them with minimal technology, I had no way of tracking the Tweenbot’s progress, and so I set out on the first test with a video camera hidden in my purse. I placed the Tweenbot down on the sidewalk, and walked far enough away that I would not be observed as the Tweenbot––a smiling 10-inch tall cardboard missionary––bumped along towards his inevitable fate.
… Never once was a Tweenbot lost or damaged. Often, people would ignore the instructions to aim the Tweenbot in the “right” direction, if that direction meant sending the robot into a perilous situation. One man turned the robot back in the direction from which it had just come, saying out loud to the Tweenbot, “You can’t go that way, it’s toward the road.”
…this ad-hoc crowdsourcing was driven primarily by human empathy for an anthropomorphized object. The journey the Tweenbots take each time they are released in the city becomes a story of people’s willingness to engage with a creature that mirrors human characteristics of vulnerability, of being lost, and of having intention without the means of achieving its goal alone.

I feel like my little Grinch heart melted a bit, watching that video. Random strangers helping a smiling, vulnerable robot traverse a huge city just makes me feel good about people in a refreshing and unexpected way. I have always thought of New York City as the epitome of the cold and heartless city, full of self-absorbed people who couldn’t give a damn about anyone but themselves. So this is just so touching to me. I’m dumbfounded that no one stole the little Tweenbots, or damaged them.

Then again a good critical thinker accepts conflicting information appropriately and changes their view of the world as needed, right? I was so moved that I am emailing the creator to tell her how her experiment affected me. I think it’s nice to share stuff like that with people. I like telling people I appreciate what they do. So often people only say something when they want to complain, instead of say something nice.

So have a great day, friends, knowing there’s hope for us yet.

Prayer Is Worse Than Nothing

Neece — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 12:12:13 +0000

Let’s talk about prayer and visions and things today.

First, let’s talk about the inauguration with Obama. Even if I weren’t a vocal atheist, I’d be offended by the choice of rick warren to deliver the prayer. Of course, as a Constitutionalist, I believe in the Separation of Church and State. The office of president of the United States is earned by votes. Not direct votes of the people, but hey, let’s not nitpick on that issue at the moment. This job of president is purely secular. Why is there a bible, a pastor and prayer involved at all? The FFRF is suing to get rid of the reference to god and the prayers, at least.
warren, this hypocritical slimeball, is going to act as an agent of the state to deliver the invocation and benediction. Read more about warren and how he backs a man (martin ssempa) who burned condoms in the name of jesus in Africa, virtually stamping out the free distribution of condoms to people to replace it with abstinence only (yeah, we all know how well the abstinence program works!). Oh, and let’s not forget how warren compares homosexuality to pedophilia, incest and beastiality. So now we know how far off his rocker he is.

It disturbs me that Mr. Obama is embracing a hateful christian fundamentalist and giving him such a stage on this big day. It seems to me that it is a grim harbinger of things to come, and how they look bleakly like recent times.

On a lighter note, the catholics are trying to clamp down on “false” claims of seeing the virgin mary or jesus. If you are eating a bowl of spaghetti-o’s and you happen to see jesus in there, you must remain silent until psychologists, theologians, priests and exorcists investigate your claim. If you don’t keep quiet then you’re obviously lying. (ooh, the logic!)

Here’s the best bit, if you keep silent about your vision (then how would anyone ever know? some kind of weird catholic brain twister there), then you will be visited by exorcists and demonologists to make sure that satan isn’t hiding behind the apparitions in order to deceive the faithful. WTF? Satan is so powerful that he can appear on a piece of pizza to fool catholics to pray to .. um.. wha? Ok, those people are whacked. AnAtheist.net wrapped this one up nicely:

Demonologists! I’d love to meet one of those. Exorcists! Clearly such people are useful for distinguishing between reality and fantasy.

Never mind that. Look at what this passage is implying: Satan has the power to create Christian apparitions and visions. Presumably, then, Jesus’ resurrection appearances as described in the gospels – or his famous appearance to Paul – could all have been a Satanic apparition with the purpose of deceiving Jews and Gentiles into believing in the false religion of Christianity. Now that would be brilliant.

And then there’s this woman saying that it’s ok to turn to god in times of crisis, even if you’ve been ignoring him since then. From what she says I am under the impression that it’s good to have a big problem in your life if it drags you to your knees and gets you to pray. WTF?!

I hate to tell you, but I’ve been through bad times as an atheist, and it never occurred to me to pray to anyone, not even the Invisible Pink Unicorn. I agree that in times of stress and need, it’s nice to not be alone, but I rely on friends and family, real people, to help me, not some pathetic hope that has zero chance of helping me.

In fact, a huge study was done on intercessory prayer back in 2006. The results? There were no differences between patients who were prayed for and those who were not. But, there were significantly more complications for the patients who knew they were being prayed for, 59% as opposed to 51% for those who didn’t know they might be receiving prayers. For those who weren’t informed that they were receiving prayers, 18% suffered major complications, while only 13% of the people who didn’t get prayers had complications.( See here for a different report on the same study.)

Spooky weird, huh? By the way the study cost $2.4 million. I have no idea how it could cost so much. But same article also mentions this little tidbit: The government spent more than $2.3 million on prayer research between 2000 and 2006. Again, I say WTF?

Back in ‘97 the University of New Mexico did a smaller study with 40 alcoholics in rehab. The men and women who knew they were being prayed for also did worse. Now how does that scramble your eggs?

Prayer does nothing. In fact, all it does is waste your time and energy for actually dealing with what is wrong.

Dead Cats Into Diesel

Neece — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 16:59:56 +0000

Ok, for some reason this struck me as a bit…. odd. Diesel from dead cats? I just had to share it with you, since we’re Heaving Dead Cats around here on a regular basis. Now we can save money, heave dead cats and make fuel! Woot!

Dr Christian Koch, 55, from Kleinhartmannsdorf, has a special method for turning household garbage into biodiesel. This leads me to believe you can make biodiesel out of just about anything.

So, his method involves heating stuff like old tires, paper, motor oil, plastic, dead cats, just about anything, to 300 degrees Celsius. Then the hydrocarbons go through a catalytic converter.

Now I’ll know what to do with all those dead cats in my freezer! (JUST KIDDING)

Found Here and Here.

Fold It- Play A Game For Science!

Neece — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 06:24:00 +0000

This is the neatest idea on so many levels. So you need to unwind and play a game. You’re tired of windows solitaire. How about playing a game that could contribute to curing a disease? How about helping science with your big awesome brain!?

You can go here to read about the science behind the “game”.

So basically, in a really simple nutshell, you’re using your intuitive awesome brain to do something that would take computers a huge amount of time and expense to do.

Proteins are part of lots of diseases, so understanding how they fold on themselves is very important.

If scientists understand how they fold, they can then design new proteins to combat the disease related proteins and cure the disease.

Here’s how protein is involved in cancer:

Cancer: Cancer is very different from HIV in that it’s usually our own proteins to blame, instead of proteins from an outside invader. Cancer arises from the uncontrolled growth of cells in some part of our bodies, such as the lung, breast, or skin. Ordinarily, there are systems of proteins that limit cell growth, but they may be damaged by things like UV rays from the sun or chemicals from cigarette smoke. But other proteins, like p53 tumor suppressor, normally recognize the damage and stop the cell from becoming cancerous — unless they too are damaged. In fact, damage to the gene for p53 occurs in about half of human cancers (together with damage to various other genes).

And here’s how protein is involved in Alzheimer’s:

Alzheimer’s: In some ways, Alzheimer’s is the disease most directly caused by proteins. A protein called amyloid-beta precursor protein is a normal part of healthy, functioning nerve cells in the brain. But to do its job, it gets cut into two pieces, leaving behind a little scrap from the middle — amyloid-beta peptide. Many copies of this peptide (short protein segment) can come together to form clumps of protein in the brain. Although many things about Alzheimer’s are still not understood, it is thought that these clumps of protein are a major part of the disease.

There are other things you’re helping too. Go here to read all of the science. Pretty cool, huh? Go here to sign up for a free account and start helping science by playing a game.

I havent’ started playing yet, but I signed up today. I’m ZeNeece over there.

Webster’s Dictionary is Biased Towards Christianity

Neece — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 16:33:13 +0000

Words and how you use them are very important. The pen IS mightier than the sword in many respects. For example, 99.999% of atheists are stamped with the militant label wrongly. People hear that word and then wrongly associate atheists with the idea that most of us are fighting and being aggressive against believers. With that one word, they’ve labeled us as waging a “war” against them.

This is ludicrous and terribly backwards. By labeling us, they have started the “holy war” against atheists. Not us. In my 39 years, I’ve never met a militant atheist. But I have seen and dealt with many militant, close-minded, hateful, fundamentalist religious folks.

So words are very important.

Hess was looking up synonyms for atheist on Dictionary.com for our new project (as you can see, we settled on Heaving Dead Cats) and pointed out something rather irritating.

atheist – noun:
a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being or beings.

Then it conveniently lists synonyms.

Synonyms: Atheist, agnostic, infidel, skeptic refer to persons not inclined toward religious belief or a particular form of religious belief. An atheist is one who denies the existence of a deity or of divine beings. An agnostic is one who believes it impossible to know anything about God or about the creation of the universe and refrains from commitment to any religious doctrine. Infidel means an unbeliever, especially a nonbeliever in Islam or Christianity. A skeptic doubts and is critical of all accepted doctrines and creeds.

Ok, this isn’t so bad. This is from Dictionary.com’s first listing.

But down near the bottom of that page, Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary has a quote about atheism:

Atheism is a ferocious system, that leaves nothing above us to excite awe, nor around us to awaken tenderness. –R. Hall.

Ok, I’m not trying to nitpick, but that quote is ridiculous. First, it’s completely false, and second, it’s negative and biased. When giving a quote that helps explain a word, wouldn’t it be more useful and more positive to use a neutral thought, or even a positive one?

The Online Etymology Dictionary in the middle of the page was able to do just that:

“The existence of a world without God seems to me less absurd than the presence of a God, existing in all his perfection, creating an imperfect man in order to make him run the risk of Hell.” [Armand Salacrou, "Certitudes et incertitudes," 1943]

Ok, over to the Thesaurus tab and this is interesting as well.

atheist has 3 synonyms: agnostic, heathen, pagan.
Are you kidding me? Agnostic and atheist are 2 completely different ways of thinking. We’ll have to define heathen and pagan.

heathen’s second definition is: 2. an irreligious, uncultured, or uncivilized person.

Down to Websters’s to see how they list heathen:
1. An individual of the pagan or unbelieving nations, or those which worship idols and do not acknowledge the true God; a pagan; an idolater.

Now onto pagan:
1. one of a people or community observing a polytheistic religion, as the ancient Romans and Greeks.
2. a person who is not a Christian, Jew, or Muslim.
3. an irreligious or hedonistic person.

I’ve always thought of pagans as having many gods. But I see the term has come to mean not christian, jew or muslim. So in that respect it fits.

Of course, Webster’s is less objective:
1. An individual of the pagan or unbelieving nations, or those which worship idols and do not acknowledge the true God; a pagan; an idolater.

Ok then. Good to know. Call me a heathen or a pagan. The terms loosely fit. But I’m an atheist through and through. Definitely not an agnostic.

But I’ve learned that Webster’s dictionary is quite biased towards christianity. Good for us to know!

Why I’m An Atheist, Not An Agnostic

Neece — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 17:32:06 +0000

Stumbling around the web, I came across a page at lukeprog.com titled The Arrogance of Atheism. I almost moved on, but then I saw the subtitle: Why I’m an atheist, not an agnostic. Luke writes a page that is simple and concise, yet totally makes sense. I contacted him and asked him if I could share it with you. So here it is in its entirety:

The Arrogance of Atheism
Why I’m an atheist, not an agnostic.

When I tell people I’m an atheist, they say, “How can you be so arrogant to think that you know God doesn’t exist? At least say you’re an agnostic and admit that you can’t know for sure one way or the other.”

Atheism! How arrogant!

But is it?

I’m an atheist because I haven’t heard any good reasons to think that gods exist, and I can think of lots of good reasons to think they don’t. I’m in exactly the same position with regard to Zeus, Apollo, invisible pink unicorns, and the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Are you agnostic about Zeus? Are you agnostic about invisible pink unicorns? Do you feel arrogant about disbelieving in the Flying Spaghetti Monster?

Sure, I can’t prove that gods don’t exist anywhere in the universe. But because there’s no evidence for them, and lots of evidence against them, I feel confident saying, “Gods don’t exist.” Just like you feel confident saying, “Invisible pink unicorns don’t exist” and “Santa Claus doesn’t exist.”

Actually, I can do even better.

If you define your god precisely enough, I might be able to prove that your god cannot exist, in the same way I can prove a square circle can’t exist, in any universe. Here’s how.

Atheism isn’t arrogant, just like invisible-unicorn-disbelief isn’t arrogant.

Atheists tend to think it is arrogant of believers to assert their claims without any evidence.

Be Skeptical

Neece — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 23:24:43 +0000

My friend sent me a link to the Times Online this morning, to an article titled Red Bull gives you wings – and heart trouble?. My husband drinks Red Bull, and my friend thinks I do too. I don’t actually. I drink Java Monster. It’s delicious and is in a 16 ounce can instead of the paltry 8 ounces you get from Red Bull. So of course I read the article because I don’t want my husband and I to be harming our health unknowingly.

My friend – we’ll call him Sam to protect his identity – said that he always knew this stuff was bad for you. And that was that for him. Case closed. I said I wanted more data. He said, “I don’t.. that stuff’s loaded with enough caffeine to explode an elephant’s heart… no more data needed.”

What? Are you kidding me?

Why am I writing about this today? Because you need to be skeptical. You need to keep an open mind and question what you see and hear. It’s in your best interest. Sam changed his behavior and his thinking by reading one article online. Assuming he read the whole thing. He probably only read one paragraph. Still, he’ll never drink Red Bull again.

The study was done on 30 university students between 20-24 years old. That’s such a small group, don’t you think? It was done one time from what I can tell. That’s it? What about a double blind study? What about a control group and testing different age brackets? Men and women react the same, etc?

The doctor in charge, Scott Willoughby, of the Cardiovascular Research Centre at the Royal Adelaide Hospital and Adelaide University, was so alarmed by his tiny little study, that he released his findings to the press. But not the study itself, at least not that I can find anywhere.

From the article, I should mention: Red Bull today emphatically denied that the drink, which is distributed to 143 countries worldwide, was dangerous. In a statement, it said that Red Bull had been proved safe by “numerous scientific studies”, and that it had never been banned from anywhere it had been introduced.

To Sam’s claims of “enough caffeine to explode an elephant’s heart”, I’m sorry to say, Sam, you’re quite wrong. I don’t think there are any studies on exactly the amount of caffeine needed to stop an elephant’s heart. But one can of Red Bull isn’t going to do it.

Let’s find some more information on caffeine. Let’s try the Mayo Clinic, they seem like a good choice.

It seems that more than 500 or 600 mg of caffeine a day can lead to restlessness, anxiety, headaches and other problems. No mention of what those other problems are.

Oh, first there’s a link about if caffeine is dehydrating, let’s see if that’s true first, bear with me… This is awesome! Recent research has shown that caffeine is only a diuretic if you consume large amounts, over 500 or 600 mg of it in a day. Other than that, coffee and soda drinks hydrate as well as water.

Back to your regularly scheduled lesson for today on caffeine content. I’ve taken the information from the Mayo Clinic’s set of tables and turned it into one table for you here, listed in order of milligrams of caffeine. Just click the image to see it full size.

Sorry, Sam. I win this argument. Red Bull doesn’t really contain all that much caffeine. But wow, Starbucks packs it in, don’t they? Even so, you can have one coffee grande at Starbucks every day. It might give you the jitters, but it seems safe from what I gather. According to the Mayo Clinic, you could therefore drink around 5 or 6 Red Bulls in a day and it won’t harm you. That would be extreme, and I don’t recommend it, but that would be less than 500 mg of caffeine in the day.

So, while we learned about caffeine content today, I hope you will also remember, not every news story is solid fact and truth. Not every study is done properly, and even if it is, it is only one study. More would need to be done to corroborate the evidence found.

People, news outlets, news networks, TV networks, churches, doctors doing studies and whoever gives funding, all of them, have their own agenda. Propaganda is rampant. Your only recourse is to be skeptical and question the information instead of accepting everything you hear as “gospel truth.”

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