Author: Milan

In the spring of 2005, I graduated from the University of British Columbia with a degree in International Relations and a general focus in the area of environmental politics. In the fall of 2005, I began reading for an M.Phil in IR at Wadham College, Oxford. Outside school, I am very interested in photography, writing, and the outdoors. I am writing this blog to keep in touch with friends and family around the world, provide a more personal view of graduate student life in Oxford, and pass on some lessons I've learned here.

Data exchanged

Grad students in Oxford should definitely make use of the 50GB of free backup space provided by the school. A backup is the best defence against anything that can happen to your computer: from viruses to abrupt falls. Before you can backup your data, you need to register.

After about ten hours, my data is on the HFS server. It seemed like overkill to back up all the music, but this was the default configuration. It took enough tinkering to make it work in the first place, and I was able to tell it not to back up videos. Fifty-four gigabytes, passed across the network at about 800kb/s.

It’s odd to think of the robot arms sorting data backup tapes, in fire safes wherever they may be. I am glad everything sensitive is durably encrypted, as far as I can recall.

Timeframes and humanity

Ever since word starting really spreading about the fish paper, many people have been sending me all kinds of information about fisheries. I have been receiving newspaper articles, scientific papers, government reports, letters, photographs, and all sorts of personal commentary. I can’t deal with it all, but that isn’t the issue. The problem is not a surfeit of information, but a lack of will. People – the number of people living in the world now – need mechanisms for dealing with one another. In essence, they need mechanisms for dealing with a quantity of people out of all keeping with the history of any sort of monkey, much less human beings.

The kind of logic that is required is profoundly non-obvious, because it relates to a scale of experience that we have only been exposed to recently, when it comes to the span of biological time.

Hopefully, we will prove able to adapt.

New blog on Vancouver speaking events

Most of what I write here is for people attending or interested in Oxford. Here’s a link for people in Vancouver. My friend Tristan is setting up a blog that lists speaking events in that fine Pacific city. If you have something to suggest, please email him through the links provided therein.

People with web design experience are particularly encouraged to help develop this into a useful service for academically inclined Vancouverites.

Oxford Wireless LAN

While it may not be obvious, there is indeed a certain amount of university-run wireless networking in Oxford. Network availability is quite limited, but at least one of these seems to seep into the room where my developing world seminar is held.

In order to use the network, you need to register for a remote access account and get a Cisco VPN client. Mac configuration is detailed here. It is annoying that you need to install special software for the VPN, given that Mac OS X can handle normal wireless networks perfectly well on its own. This means that you cannot access the VPN (say, to use electronic resources) from any computer on which you are not allowed to install software.

Hopefully, wireless networking will rapidly become more widely available in Oxford. That said, I have serious doubts about whether any such change can occur rapidly within such a disaggregated and complex system.

PS. Another OUCS service well worth looking into is their HFS backup system. It is especially valuable for people with finicky and easy to steal laptops:

Three copies of your data are made, each to separate tapes; one copy is held in the automated tape library; the second, in a fire-proof safe located at OUCS and the third in a fire-proof safe at an offsite storage facility outside Oxford.

Snazzy, no? It is only available for graduate students.

There and back again, in defiance of road work

All told, today’s London expedition went very well. As always, it was a great pleasure to spend some time with Sarah and Peter Webster. Conversations with them are always engaging, and there is enormous value in spending time with an old friend, especially when you live in such a socially disconnected place. My wanderings around SoHo beforehand were also worthwhile, though I was able to resist the urge to return to Oxford with several kilos of tofu, as is my normal practice. (To initiate such aggression in the ongoing contest for space in our fridge would be neither polite nor prudent.) The weather was ideal for London: cool enough to be comfortable, overcast but not raining, and everywhere imbued with nice, soft, photogenic light.

The William Townsend art show was also great fun. I had never seen his work properly on display before, and I was glad to see such an excellent and varied selection. One autumnal scene was particularly fine, though the £10,000 asking price is a few notches above my art budget for this quarter. As is the norm for events organized by Ian and his wife, the collection of people present was highly diverse. I spoke for a while with an economist whose textbook I used during my short but interesting period in UBC’s honours economics program. Also, three members of the gallery staff, at length, a graduate student working on medieval Latin and a fictitious saint, and many others besides. I regretted the need to be prudent and catch a relatively early bus back to Oxford. I have two presentations to draft tonight, on the off chance that I am called on to answer the assigned questions in seminar tomorrow. Since I am meeting Margaret for coffee in the morning, my normal span for such final preparations is spoken for.

I promise to write something substantive soon. I have acquired 31 emails requiring responses between the time when I left the Apple store (around 1pm) and the present moment.

Apple store geek fetishism

The Apple Store in London has given me a good chance to play with some brand new expensive hardware. There is no denying that the iMac with a 24″ screen and a 2.16 Core 2 Duo processor is excessive. It is likewise undeniable that it is excessive in a good way. Anyone who works seriously with photos can appreciate the virtues of a 1900×1200 native resolution, especially on a monitor that can be easily configured to use standardized white balance and colour settings. All Macs look so much nicer once you set them to D50, I don’t know why they don’t come out of the box that way.

The MacBook Pros are also very nice, though even the demo units are surprisingly warm – especially on the flat area to the left of the trackpad. I suspect the processor resides there, since the computer was sitting idly when I checked the temperature and would therefore not be likely to be conducting hard drive operations. Unfortunately, none of the machines have a Dashboard widget running that indicates temperatures. Along with battery life and the limits of photolithography, heat seems to be the major limiting factor in consumer computers at the moment.

One surprise: not a single one of the hundred of so Macs on display, including the absurdly expensive ones, is running a demo of Photoshop. Apparently, Adobe still hasn’t released a version compiled for Intel macs. As such, you will be running a PPC compiled version through the Rosetta emulator built into Tiger. That means that, even with brand new gear, you would be lucky to have it run any faster than on an older PPC-based system. I tried playing with Aperture a bit but, like Photoshop, it is impossible to judge the real functionality in the hands of a neophyte.

All that said, I have been here long enough. It is time to move on to my next London objective.

PS. The Mighty Mouse is very decent, but hardly worth the asking price. Horizontal scrolling is useful so rarely that having a bi-directional scrollwheel is a distraction, rather than an aid.

First electoral response

My cloudy-headed morning-after analysis of the midterm election: American voters disapprove of many aspects of the Republican project, as well as the character of Republican government. That said, the Democrats are still seen more as a protest vote than as a viable alternative in and of themselves. That, and not the victory in the House, should be what the Democrats take from this election. It is also what should provide the motivation for their development in the years approaching the 2008 presidential contest.

They need to become less of an anti-party, and more of an obvious party of government. Partly, that will require choosing a leader less wooden and gaffe-prone than John Kerry. More importantly, it involves closing ranks, deciding on a policy platform, and selling it to the American people. Given the circumstances, it does not seem like the Democrats have much of a mandate for dedicating their time in Congress to investigating the misdeeds of the previous one. While some of that is clearly required, it should not distract them overly from tasks more relevant to their increased mandate.

As for the Republicans, this election looks like evidence that they have not been wholly discredited. It is a chance to learn a bit of humility and bipartisanship, building on their organizational strengths in the run-up to 2008.

Discussion of any of the above points, or related ones, is much encouraged. I will check in after my short trip to London.

Fight for the Senate

Background

In the contest for the Senate in the 2006 midterm elections, eight races stand out as unusually important: (incumbent in italics)

Pennsylvania: Rick Santorum (R) v. Bob Casey
New Jersey: Bob Menendez (D) v. Tom Kean
Montana: Conrad Burns (R) v. Jon Tester
Virginia: George Allen (R) v. James Webb
Ohio: Mike DeWine (R) v. Sherrod Brown
Tennessee: Bob Corker v. Harold Ford
Missouri: Jim Talent (R) v. Claire McCaskill
Rhode Island: Lincoln Chafee (R) v. Sheldon Whitehouse

The first is a likely Republican loss, while it will be a fight for the Democrats to hold the second. As of the final polls before the election, the remaining six races are up in the air. To win a majority, Democrats need a swing of six seats.

I have written previously about the importance of the Senate in this race.

Breaking news

As of 2:30am, the Daily Kos (a partisan Democrat site) is reporting that the Democrats have gained three seats in the Senate. They need six for a majority.

More cautiously, The New York Times is only showing that they have certainly taken one of the six most contested seats: New Jersey.

Pollster.com is showing 49 Senate seats going Republican, 47 going Democratic, and four still up in the air. In the event of a tie in the Senate, the Vice-President gets to cast the deciding vote.

[Update: 2:50am] The New York Times is now reporting Democratic victories in the Pennsylvania and Ohio Senate races as well. Either Democrat Lamont or Independent Lieberman is basically certain to win Connecticut. For those who haven’t been following the news, Joe Lieberman lost the Democratic primary, largely due to his support for the Iraq war and the perception that he is overly close to the Bush administration.

[Update: 3:15am] The NYT and Daily Kos now agree that the Democrats have picked up Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island. They also held seats in Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, and New Jersey. It also seems that Ned Lamont has conceded to Joe Lieberman in Connecticut.

[Update: 3:40am] Up by three, with four still in play and Virginia looking like the Republicans will hold it, I am going to take another shot at going to sleep. The Republican candidate is leading by 5% in Tennessee, with 66% reporting. In Virginia, they are leading by 1%, with 94% reporting. In Missouri, they are leading by 10%, with 24% reporting. There are still no reports from Montana. Given that the Democrats would need to win all but one of these races, things are not looking terribly good, as far as their chances of a Senatorial majority go.

Election nights have certainly become a lot more exciting in the past few years.

[Update: 8:00am] Well, there you have it. The smart money was on a victory in the House and a narrow failure to win a majority in the Senate, just as most friends who I polled informally yesterday guessed. The Republicans took both Montana and Virginia, as listed above in my collection of crucial races.

Given the circumstances, I would not say that this is an impressive showing for the Democrats. They clearly need to become a lot more coherent and well organized before 2008. That said, I would say that the real priority for the American electoral system is to fix the many problems with electronic voting systems.

I wonder how this new Congressional balance will affect government over the next two years. That is something to ponder during my upcoming coach ride to London.

[Update: 9 November 2006] It seems that the race still isn’t over. More commentary as it emerges. The Democrats have taken Montana, with Virginia still up in the air.

[Update: 12:15pm 9 November 2006] It seems that Virginia has gone to the Democrats as well. That gives them a majority in the Senate. The moral of the story: don’t call things too early.

Hectic day, but good

As is the norm for Tuesday, it has been hectic. I had a spattering of lectures, OUSSG, and a few other tasks besides. Now, I am going to go try to watch the Daily Show coverage of the midterm elections. Whether I succeed or fail in the attempt, I will not be able to stay up long, as I will be heading to London tomorrow.

Sorry to be so brief, but there are greater things afoot than blogging.

If you really want to read something related to environmental politics, here are some notes from an interesting lecture at the Said Business School – yet another series to which I will have to subscribe. The wiki is actually proving a surprisingly useful tool for research and general student purposes.

PS. Hilary Benn, the British Secretary of State for International Development, sent me a response to the fish paper today. I first spoke with him about it on October 10th. I have yet to go through his letter in detail, but it is clearly the most comprehensive response I have ever received in writing from a politician.

Another loan letdown

My student loan appeal has gone through and they increased my allotment by $623: not quite the expansion for which I was hoping. Essentially, the reason for this is that they have pre-set formulas for allotting loan amounts that adapt poorly to the nature of an Oxford education. They are based on the cost of living in Canada, and they do not reflect understanding of how Oxford terms work. They certainly do not reflect the extreme cost differentials between attending graduate school in Canada and doing so in a place like this.

A word of warning to future applicants: do not expect even half as much student loan funding in your second year as in your first; this, they ought to make clear before you go. In my case, seems as though some kind of additional fundraising is going to be required, if I am to make it through Trinity term and my exams.

See also: prior ravings about school related government bureaucracy.