Two Steps Back, One Step Forward

Something interesting occurred to me today. Something, I’m sure probably doesn’t mean much in the grander scheme of things, but it got me thinking. (we all know that me actually thinking is dangerous, but we’ll ignore that for now) I was reading some older blog posts by many of our classmates, both sophmore and freshman, and I realized that writing style has a huge effect on the point one is trying to get across. Personally, I view my own style and halting and clunky, barely able to string enough words together for a coherent sentence (sometimes making me wonder why I bother at all), and I see many of my classmates with similar problems. And then I stumbled upon some posts that were beautifully written... I looked at them, read them, and my first thought was that I was insanely jealous of this person who could actually get a thought down on their page without sounding like a lunatic. But then I actually looked at the writing. I saw that this person had a huge vocabulary, which was one of the things that made the writing flow, it wasn’t redundant every other sentence. It was also obvious that they put a lot of time and thought into their posts.

It made me wonder. Why, when so many of the people at ASTI (and indeed, outside of ASTI) have the potential to be great writers, couldn’t seem to be able to achieve this level of skill. And of course, I am including myself in these people that probably could, but don’t... I don’t really know what I’m trying to say anymore, but this insight into writing, into the world, made me think of how much harder I could work, and how much better I could do. If only I’d get my feet under me and do it.

Layers of Insanity

Hmm, what to write about is always a difficult topic. Thankfully I was able to pull something interesting for this weeks free post: Movies. Yes, you read it right. Movies. Movies are such amazing aspects of our society. They employ millions of people and provide billions others with entertainment. But have you ever noticed the deeper messages in them? I’ve read and heard a lot of stuff about the fairly new movie Inception from a couple places. Many, if not all of the articles I’ve read complained about the ending. They claim that the ending wasn’t definite enough. But did anyone noticed the symbol there? The main character comes home, hoping he isn’t still stuck in a dream and places his top, his marker, on the table. Now, if the marker stops spinning, it’s a sign he’s in reality. If it doesn’t... well it fairly obvious. He puts it on the table, glances at it, and runs for his kids. He never stopped to look back and see if the top had stopped. This symbolism in all of this is that he didn’t care anymore. He no longer cared whether or not he was in a dream. As far as he knew he was home with his kids and that was the only reality he needed. One thing I’ve found interesting about movies is that they provide certain types of people something to complain about. I’ll use Inception again as my example... there were several layers of dreams in this movie. I believe they go three or four layers in? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I heard many things about the layers being hard to distinguish. This surprised me, because to me it seemed obvious. There were six layers, reality, the rainy city, the hotel, the mountain, pre-limbo, and limbo itself. See, a simple way of distinguishing between the five dream layers (we’re excluding reality) is to assign them colors based on the general surroundings. I see the rainy city as blue, the hotel as red, the mountain as white, pre-limbo as brown, and limbo as gold. And if you can look at the screen and see a color, instead of the surroundings, you know what layer you’re in! It’s kind of a cool mind trick. If you haven’t seen Inception, I’m very, very sorry for ruining things for you, and if you have, I hope this makes sense.

Caught by a Mind Trap - The Prisoner's Dilemma

So today in class we discussed a Mind Trap, one that I was able to link to a well-known problem in game theory, The Prisoner's Dilemma. As pulled off of wikipedia, the classic problem is this:

Two suspects are arrested by the police. The police have insufficient evidence for a conviction, and, having separated the prisoners, visit each of them to offer the same deal. If one testifies for the prosecution against the other (defects) and the other remains silent (cooperates), the defector goes free and the silent accomplice receives the full 10-year sentence. If both remain silent, both prisoners are sentenced to only six months in jail for a minor charge. If each betrays the other, each receives a five-year sentence. Each prisoner must choose to betray the other or to remain silent. Each one is assured that the other would not know about the betrayal before the end of the investigation. How should the prisoners act?

The answer is usually that both defect, as they assume the other will cooperate, or stay silent, so in the long run it’s a lose-lose situation.
So how does this link to today’s mind-trap? Well, mostly, looking back, it doesn’t really, but it’s an interesting theory to explore. Game theory in-and-of itself is interesting as well. Game theory is a branch of applied mathematics that deals mainly in the attempt to mathematically capture human behaviour in strategic situations... I suspect however that this causes problems because all situations involving humans will be sloppy, as is human nature. But human nature is to think we are perfect....So there is no elegant mathematical equation that can quantify one’s actions. So the pursuit of such an equation is futile. Yet we still look for it. It’s a paradox of sorts, we are looking for the wrong type of answer to the right question. We are looking for an elegant solution to a sloppy problem, so it logically follows that the answer will be sloppy as well. It amazes me that for being who think they are so advanced, we can’t even follow our own basic logic half the time.

Teamwork!

If playing Left 4 Dead with my family (a tradition that is frowned upon by many) has taught me anything, it is that teamwork is essential to survival.

In order to survive, you have to be able to use small squad tactics. You have one person in the front, otherwise known as “point”, you have one person who keeps up the back, and usually you have one or two people who are supposed to take left and right.

Rule No. 1: Point must never need to turn around to dispatch an enemy

This is an important rule, because in Left 4 Dead, you can easily get mobbed by 50 or more zombies at a time, and if you turn your back, even for a second, you can and will get killed. So, moral of the story, cover your people.

Rule No. 2: Do NOT allow point to get too far ahead of the group (i.e. don’t rush, and keep your spacing)

The ground between you (assuming you are keeping up the back or the middle) and the point will not stay clear for forever, and with a small group of people it isn’t really possible to keep an open area clear for every amount of time, so zombies will end up coming at you from the sides, in areas you cannot cover.

Rule No. 3: Stay out of the cross-fire

Probably one of the most important rules. Friendly fire is just as bad as an enemy attacking you, if not worse. Because in a squad, you are firing at close range, and at close range, bullets can easily shatter bones, not to mention shrapnel from shotguns, and the blood from a weapon like that.

I know that many of my classmates think that these aren’t real tactics, in fact, they are commonly used by cops, by the military, SWAT, you name it. It’s not hard to understand either

Hey, Hey!

Hey guys, remember a while back when I mentioned my Uncle Alan's first book was hitting the shelves? Well, last night, the cover for book two,  A Cure For Chaos  was unveiled at a book signing in Billings, Montana. I am very proud to claim the artist who did the cover as my father ^_^

Cure For Chaos is due to -hopefully- be released in January of next year, and it's currently in the editing and revision process :)

Here's a link to the series site: http://www.mother-earthseries.com/
And a link to the cover for the second one: http://motherearthseries.wordpress.com/

Keep Readin'!

Books, and more Books

Need a great book to read?

Try picking up a recently published book called A Measure of Disorder. It’s by an author named Alan Tucker, who owns a publishing business operated out of Billings, MT. This book is truly great, a twisting imaginative plot, great characters, and depth to the settings. The book starts with an eight grader named Jenni on the bus, on her way to a routine science call excursion. Everything is just dandy, until everyone falls asleep near the lake as a fog rolls in. They wake up hours later, the fog gone, and aren’t on Earth anymore. They meet up with some interesting creature along the way, not all of them friendly, and everyone in the group changes into something from this new world, something more suited to their souls, their personalities. Everyone, except Jenni. They go on to meet bad guys and resolve conflicts. I’d go into more detail, but you should really just read the book. What’s even better, is you don’t have very long to wait before the next one comes out. Book Two: A Cure For Chaos is due to come out in January of next year, while the cover art will be released this Sunday during Tucker’s book signing at a Borders in Montana. The cover is done by an artist in the area, and when Sunday rolls around, I’ll hopefully be able to post the cover art up here, and tell you who did it.

Unfortunately, due to the fact that MAD Design publishing is based in Montana, and is a fairly small company, the Mother-Earth series cannot be found in our local books store, but you can check out Amazon.com and www.mother-earthseries.com to find out more about purchasing your copy.

Here’s what some other people said about the book:

“... I was hooked! I could hardly put this book down... it is WELL written, well thought out, and the whole concept is completely insane. Which makes for one great Fantasy book”

-Austin, from readingteen.net

“A Measure of Disorder by Alan Tucker is a wonderful foray into fantasy and imagination”

-Tracy from Midwest Book Review

"... the plot really kept me hooked and I flew through the last hundred pages. I just had to know what was going to happen next."

- Aimee, From a Book Dork's Blog

"As I neared the end of the book, I found myself reading ravenously to find out what had happened. I'd love to give more details, but this is really a book that you just need to read to appreciate"

-Jessica, from a Fanatic's Book Blog

All Hallow's Eve

Anyone ever play Bioshock or Bioshock 2?

It is the perfect game for halloween.

You start out at the entrance to an underwater city called Rapture. Built by a power hungry, insane man, this city was supposed to be an art deco paradise. Guns could be bought in vending machines, special tonics alowed you to splice your DNA and add abilities like telekenesis, and large.. things.. called Big Daddies prowl the streets keeping their charges safe, the Little Sisters. Everything was just dandy, until new years eve... the genetic splicing caught up with the residents of Rapture, turning them into splicers, that look like this:

Creepy, no?

And if that isn't enough, there are these guys:

Little Sisters

These girls aren’t a cute or innocent as they look. In the game, they use you, Alpha, to help them hunt splicers to harvest a certain gene from them, called ADAM. They are controlled by a parasite living withing their neck. Once you help them acheive their goal, you can save them from the parasite, or kill them in cold blood.

Big Sisters

Heh, these girls can take care of themselves. Post-pubesent little sisters, they’ve grown up and gone back to their roots, except now they are the protectors of the little sisters. Armed with a paralyzing voice, various genetic splices, and a giant needle to stab you with. They aren’t something to be trifled with.

Now on to the best part:

Big Daddies

It isn’t easy being a Big Daddy. They start your training by literally ripping out your vocal cords, pumping you with genetic material called ADAM and EVE (Ironic, no? Considering the name of the city), dump a huge suit on you, and throw you out there, telling you to expect grave consequences if you make a mistake. You are then given your first Little Sister, who you treat like your own child. Even though she loves singing things like “the angels daddy”. She sees

the world as a perfect place, and loves stabbing the angels with her needles.

So I suppose this is a game review/info page... seriously, this is a great game to play this month. It so fits the whole Hallows Eve idea

Evolution: The source of many, MANY questions

Evolution is an interesting subject, one that affects us all. Take a look at fossils you can find in almost every museum, and compare them to the knowledge we have of their current descendants. Note the similarities and the differences in the following two skeletons, The Prehistoric horse and the modern one:

 versus

 and if it's not easy to see, here's a close-up of some of the differences:

To successfully navigate their terrain, prehistoric horses were about 3 feet tall, lacked fetlocks,which are ankle joints, and had cloven hooves. Modern day horses average at twice that size, have their "ankle" joint further down, and their hooves have become solid. Why?

To put this more simply, I will stray from my example above, and instead wander off into the subject of beetles.

Let's say we have a beetle, and he's green. Now this beetle lives in the desert with an entire species of green beetles. The birds keep eating these easy-to-spy beetles until one, just one, is born brown. This brown beetle lives longer, and is able to have a ton of children, many of them are brown. Those children have more children, until the green strain dies out and the entire species becomes brown.

Ta-da! Evolution!
Make sense? I have a feeling I was all over the place there...