Gnudist

Day after day, I sit in class, listening to my teachers.  Calculus, Chemistry, English, and Physics.  Sometimes I ask,  am I really learning?  Unfortunately, in some cases, I think my teachers are only teaching me for my test,  I would rather learn for the sake of learning.  I would rather learn about fluid dynamics, derivatives, or grammar, atomic theory, to understand my world rather than to do well on a test.  I can understand why I get tested, to be compared against billions of other people.  But I fear this has become the focus of schooling.  I want to study physics to learn the way the world works.  I would rather learn Calculus to understand how and where to apply it.  Oddly enough I think the onus is on myself.  I must make these my priorities.  If I understand the theory, how and where to practice it.  I will do well on the exams, but that won't matter as much as my increased understanding of the world.

I am in a state of shock.  I fear a dark age coming.  Orwell was right.  Oceania is live and well.  In the novel 1984, George Orwell spoke of a society under complete surveillance by the state. Although he was a few years off, his novel seems to provide a distorted reflection of our current reality.  Just today, I read an article on Digg tiltled: UK Government gives £1 billion to log every E-mail and SMS.In summary, the article describes the UK governments intent to create a computer system to listen to, and record, every email, text message and web visit that flows through the UK.  Meaning, complete government onmiscience of the Internet.  This is scary, and it is not new.  The United States has had an Internet Surviellance program since October of 2001 (EFF)

What freedoms are we willing to sacrfifice to appease our insecurities? How can we trust a system that does not trust us?

The freedom of the internet; of speech, is at great risk.

Guard youself, learn to use encryption.  I recommend Pidgin with Off-The-Record.  These two apps give users of MSN, AIM, Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, ICQ and the like, a method of private communication.  Assert your freedom of speech.

Upon the Dawn of the Canadian Election, I found my self wondering about abortion.  During my searching of the internet, I found this little guide.

Now, I am no Conservative.  So when I began reading through the Conservative Debate handbooks' section on abortion, I got a little sick to my stomach.

Sorry kids, but Rudolf and his friends had an encounter with some heinous criminals.

 "They saw as many as eight trucks of hunters from the Northwest Territories using high-frequency radios, all-terrain vehicles and other high-tech gear to shoot members of the fragile Porcupine caribou herd near the highway between Eagle Plains and the NWT border...they found nothing but carcasses."

 Read the full text on the Yukon News website: http://www.yukon-news.com/news/05sep2008/5551/

Continuing the tradition of using this site as my personal rant-space,  I have my own completely non-professional reviews of two books to follow:

 In the past week, I have read 'The God Delusion' by Richard Dawkins and 'A briefer history of time' by Stephen Hawking and Leonard somethingorother.  Sorry.

 

Anyway Having gone from one book about Atheism and being quite convinced of the non-existance of god and then reading a book about physics for the american layman I have been womewhat pained.  In the latter book there were frequent references to God, for example to explain the reason why the big bang progressed as it did.  I find this to be a weasely way of describing an unkown part of the universe.  Why is it that when we find something that science can't describe we fill that gap of ignorance with god? 

I'm nearly done reading this book and I can't get over my excitement.  The Cuckoo's Egg by Cliff Stohl is like a manual on computer security that reads like a spy novel.  This book will make you think about computer security and may even change you computer habits and policy.  

So this is the end of day three in Yellowknife.  I am here with my employer,  we are rebuilding the Polarcom Yellowknife presence.  The shop here has been neglected for quite some time now.  I haven't seen much of the city yet.  My employer leaves this town tomorrow to be with his wife for her birthday in Whitehorse.  That means that I will be here on my own for the next month.  I intend on checking out the Canadian Shield Tundra and bringing along my camera.  I already miss my Yukon friends.  But at the same time, I think I will enjoy myself here.  I will have as much alone time as I want, there is a nice little coffee shop here called javaroma.  My employer Gerry and I checked out a nice little pub with a live band.  We sat by some interesting people,  One a policy-cog in the territorial government, born the same year as I.  Another person beside us in the pub was a photojournalist for uphere magazine.  Once the music started sucking, we asked the crew of people beside us to direct us to a club of quality.  They directed us to a place called the Raven,..