I’ve never really understood why people should want to feel a million dollars… I mean, assuming we’re talking US Dollars, which each weigh 8.1g (thanks Wikipedia) then you’re going to weigh over 8 tonnes.

I’ve been mulling this idea over in my head for a while now.
This was originally going to be a longer story, but I re-jigged the storyline slightly, and decided a serializing it was probably the best way to go about it. Curious concept, I know… DW

It’s funny how things can play over and over on your mind. Lately I can’t stop thinking about Joseph Hayes…

***

Every researcher, scientist, and discoverer can feel the approach of revelation, the first signs of the fog lifting, revealing the beauties of dry land after months at sea. For Joseph Hayes that moment seemed much less romantic or exciting, coming at eleven-fifty on a cold November evening.

The room was small, with one small window the inky murk which inhabited it was about as exciting as its daytime vista of the university car park. Three filing cabinets shared the room with a small desk which was adorned by a forest of papers – some of which appeared to have been read, many others substituting saucers for the innumerable empty cups scattered over the surface. In one corner, hunched over a yellowing keyboard was a man who looked only slightly less tidy than his study, and he was writing the last few lines of the programme which would change his life. The computer chugged away to meet his demands, and when eventually they were both ready he clicked ‘Run’, and headed home that night at 11:59. Barely a minute of the world he had woken up to remained.

The culmination of his research would be complete by this morning. That’s scarcely a comfort when you wake up after five hours of sleep with a throbbing headache. Joseph Hayes, Senior Research Fellow, arrived at his room at 9:15, and I was waiting for him there. During the night I came to realise that there was something important about him.

So, I’ve managed to hammer out a few ideas about what I can actually do with a blog, and why I’m maybe not getting anywhere with the one I’m doing now. My conclusions thus far:

• You can’t be too sarcastic – blogging is all about being vaguely offensive.
• You can’t do comic timing on a blog – until I develop a special notation for jokes, I’m guessing jokes are out.
• A nice pattern to the titles is fun – Like the way Friends episodes were always “The one…”.
• Being rude is fun – especially towards people who are reading your blog.
• Talking about maths and science isn’t fun – this one came as a blow.
• Being personally identifiable from your blog is probably dangerous – so I’ll need to start carrying pepper-spray, or learn not to hit like a girl. Probably a good idea anyway though…

• Bullet lists are cool

So with all that learning done, I think it’s probably time to go and start writing my new, sarcastic, rude, and clever blog.

Oh, and, you might like to know, the puppies are still being noisy and trying to eat each other (puppies are also fun).

I have nothing to write a blog about. I guess that much is evident. After all, so far it’s mostly been a combination of my wild and incomprehensible ramblings about computers and whatnot, or else puppies.
So far I’ve reached a couple of conclusions:

1. I can’t write about my life – it’s not very interesting, or to put it another way, the most interesting thing that happened to me today was discovering that iPods have no off button.
2. I can’t write about computers, because it’s boring.

So I need an idea for what to blog about, or, failing that, a life, please…

So, our puppies, Aesop and Bronte, are now able to go out and terrorise the whole world (within reason and up to a lead’s distance from anybody). Needless to say, it’s not really improved their behaviour much, and Bronte is still keen to find out how edible my leg is…

Or The Benefits of data sharing

I know I sound like a complete technophobe when I talk about computers, which I’m not – I think. Computers are still really stupid. I mean, there’s a program for email, for browsing the internet, for taking notes, and for organizing photos. These programs have no connections – my email program has no idea that I did visit a website which has sent me a confirmation email, and so it treats it as junk and puts it away in a folder wit various tempting offers from Nigerian business men. My photo program might very well know who’s in a photo, but since it isn’t linked to my address book, it can’t give me their email address easily, can’t link me to their Facebook account, and can’t do anything clever.

All of this sounds abstract, but the thing is, my mobile phone can already do quite a lot of these things, but my more technically advanced computer cannot. There are lots of rather clever things a computer could do if all of this information was linked up as well; it would be far easier to find information, and it would make developing applications much easier, and it would make switching to a different piece of software an absolute breeze, since such a system would force all data on a computer to be held centrally in a database.

Hmm. Well, anyway, that was an exciting post, wasn’t it…

I happened today to stumble upon what is possibly the most famous and lasting idea one of my favourite writers came up with: the “Three Laws of Robotics” – the idea that at some point in technological advancement humans will create robots which are self-aware, and created with three unbreakable rules hardwired into their (positronic) brains. They read somewhat exactly as so:

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey any orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

A pretty useful idea really – after all I’d rather the robot which is going to be the first thing to succeed in tidying my bedroom didn’t turn murderous and kill me for leaving an odd sock under my bed. But the thing is, in a way we do already give a group of people the ability to conduct extreme measures for the good of the public. So I’d like to hope if humanity ever develops a self-conscious politician like Asimov’s robots they’d be given some hardwired instructions, something like this:

1. An elected representative of the people may not injure a constituent, or through inaction allow a constituent to come to harm.
2. An elected representative must obey any orders given to it by constituents, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. An elected representative must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Okay, so those are pretty poor. But they’re better than the ones which politicians seem to follow at the moment, which go more like:

1. An elected representative of the people may not injure its party, or through inaction allow a business of interest to the party to come to harm.

Well, okay, that’s just a waffle; obviously I know we’ll never be able to hardwire politicians into being decent people – we’ve just got to hope some of them are.

Just unloading some madness

I remember a couple of years ago there was a television programme which aimed to teach – let’s say rather uncouth – young ladies how to hold teacups, and how they should address a member of the Royal Family. The most distracting thing about this programme was the etiquette trainer, who looked like a female Ian Paisley, somewhat ironic.

Right now I’m staring at what is probably the rudest thing in my house – and I’ve got five cats. Considering how much time most people use computers, whether wilfully or not, it’s quite appalling that nobody seems to have ever taught them manners. The rude response which you get when you try to put a file onto an already full disk, “Cannot complete, Disk Full” or something along those lines is about as civilized as what I’d expect to have barked at me by an angry drill sergeant.
The problem isn’t limited to everyday computers. All of the big supermarkets now have these self-service checkouts, always commanding you, with the same voice, to place items in the bagging area. There’s never a please, or an “Excuse me, I need you to place your items in the bagging area, thanks”. Come on, for the thousands of pounds these things must cost to install and develop you’d think they could have a selection of voices; one would be selected at random when you use the checkout. I’m thinking Joanna Lumley and Morgan Freeman would be a good start, but some regional variants would add a bit of interest to what is otherwise an uninteresting, and often insulting process.

So, computers, you need etiquette training; Channel 4, I think I’ve found you a replacement for Big Brother.

My family have been thinking of getting a puppy for a couple of months now, to keep our five-year-old Jack Russell Terrier company.

We decided to go to Downpatrick dog pound, having heard that they’d got puppies there. We only went to look, but we fell in love with these two at first sight, and, thanks mainly to some pushing from the shelter’s manager, we took them straight home. So, meet Aesop and Bronte.

They’re quite a lively pair, and they came home quite smelly and dusty, so their first day with us included a bath, the purchase of two (tiny) collars, and something of a shock to our other three dogs! In fact, Bronte is so lively, the only photo I have of her where she isn’t a grey-black streak is one of her sleeping!