Category: Geek stuff

If it involves physics, math, computer science, electronics or has general geek cachet, this is the place for it.

The Rebel Angels

Robertson Davies’ The Rebel Angels is a novel about a beautiful young gypsy graduate student who has two middle aged professors fall in love with her, but decides to marry a rich young banker. There is also a somewhat perverse ex-monk who kills a third middle-aged professor, also somewhat perverse.

Intermixed is a lot of philosophy and speculation which is convincing and compelling to varying degrees. The much-elaborated theory that personality is closely linked to digestive function doesn’t reek of plausibility, and I am in no position to judge theological speculations. Still, the overall feeling of the book was that the factual claims within cannot be fully trusted – that they are meant to provide a plausible framework for the action, rather than withstand scrutiny on their own. As someone who prefers to read non-fiction (and generally reads fiction for the benefit of the factual elements) this was frustrating.

I also have a dislike of novels in which the narrator varies from chapter to chapter, particularly when they are not identified at the outset. To me, this seems like the sign of an author who is trying to be a bit too clever. Usually, it produces mild frustration and muddles together the various characters, who often do not end up seeming terribly different. For the most part, the characters are easy to become frustrated with – they take themselves much too seriously, and see all their mundane dealings as reflections of essential matters of philosophy.

The book certainly contains some interesting arguments and convincing observations, however. There are some nice little phrases about the common quirks of academics and universities: “Whatever people outside universities may think, professors are busy people, made even more busy by the fact that they are often unbusinesslike by nature and thus complicate small matters” (p.246 paperback). There are also some acute observations about people who are especially prideful about their own capabilities and intellects.

This book was recommended to me by a friend who I am hoping to understand better, so part of the process of reading it was trying to experience it from her perspective. Not only her perspective, but the perspective she had when she first read it. I don’t think I have especially succeeded in that, and I feel a bit embarrassed about responding to the book critically. Still, it seems better to write something honest than falsely claim to have understood the appeal and genius of the book.

There are plenty of books that have affected me in significant ways, but which I think others would be hard placed to trace in me as I am now. Particularly for the young, books that seem really special are often those that serve some acute current need. Even once the need has been filled, there is an enduring gratitude to the book and the author for having filled the gap during the time when it was present. As such, the books that have been important in a person’s life are a bit like the scaffolding used to construct a building. They aren’t visibly present in the final form of the structure, but they affected the way in which it emerged in important ways.

Control time is a cost

In real-time strategy games – like the Starcraft, Warcraft, and Homeworld series’ – the player needs to collect resources of some kind, which are then invested in additional resource gathering capabilities as well as combat units. The ‘macro’ game consists of building up an economy that can support the military forces you wish to assemble. In many games, it is necessary to collect resources of different kinds, with different units requiring various combinations for purchase. For instance, Warcraft II required players to collect gold, wood, and oil. Starcraft and Starcraft II feature the collection of minerals and ‘vespene gas’.

Combat units also vary substantially in how much attention they require from the player. Some units can just be ordered to march in the general direction of the enemy, and then allowed to attack automatically. Other units require constant personal attention, for instance because their capabilities are centred around spells or special abilities that the unit will not use automatically. A unit like a Roach in Starcraft II falls into the first category – it doesn’t require much personal attention. By contrast, units like High Templar and Infestors can only be effective if the player’s attention is focused on them quite a bit.

I think it is sensible to think of the time spent controlling a unit as a cost closely equivalent to the resources invested in it. Indeed, the player’s time is probably the most fundamental resource in such games. Every second spend developing an economy is a second that cannot be spent on scouting the enemy, harassing their resource collection operations, or performing tactical strikes with combat units.

Something a bit similar may arise in turn-based games like chess, especially when a timer is involved. When a player is under pressure to make moves quickly and accurately, the time they need to spend working out the implications for each of their pieces is a real cost. For instance, it might put useful pressure on your opponent to have a bishop well ahead of your other forces, supported from behind. But for every move from that point on, you need to think about the implications of your moves and countermoves for that bishop, and the chances of making a mistake increase.

Little chess photo project

I walked around my building and neighbourhood, recreating the classic 1851 chess game played between Adolf Anderssen and Lionel Kieseritzky in London.

The game reminds me a bit of the Orson Scott Card novel Ender’s Game. The book features a battle where one side seems to be defeated but manages to satisfy the formal conditions of victory. This game seems like a nice reminder that the real objective is checkmate, not gaining or protecting material. Anderssen tosses away rooks and even his queen, all while setting up checkmate with two knights and bishop.

I may try photographing some other classic games in interesting venues, though it is hard to do in a way that makes the pieces completely clear. On this chess set, the bishops look too much like pawns. I am going to add some red dots to them – marking them like queen bees.

Quirky shops

Big box stores like Staples and Future Shop operate according to a kind of ruthless logic. They sell products that are manufactured in gigantic quantities, and require concessions from their makers in exchange for making them available. They expect a certain level of theft from outsiders and employees, and provide a basic level of training that improves profitability a bit without increasing costs much. They may not always do well financially (see Blockbuster), but such stores are driven by thinking that goes beyond the whims of one human being.

This is not true of smaller shops. Indeed, some such places have wildly incongruous lines of business meshed together. The owner of a newspaper and magazine shop may have an interest in U.S. Civil War miniatures, so there they are on sale in a display case. The owner of a tobacco shop may be knowledgeable about high-end audio equipment, so expensive microphones may be available for purchase alongside pipes and cigars.

I suppose something similar happens with sprawling business empires created by a single person. They start off making concrete and stick with it, even when cell phones have come to represent 90% of their profits. They see a deal in the form of a tire manufacturing company or a small bank, so they add it to the sprawling expanse of their holdings.

This approach may be a bit random and inefficient, but it is also a bit charming. It reflects the diverse quality of interests that individuals maintain and so, in that sense, this approach is more human than the robotic rationalization of stores like Staples. Charm aside, however, chains and business conglomerates that focus on doing well at their core line of business probably do better overall both for themselves and for their customers.

What Google knows

I wrote before about how Google’s “Don’t be evil” slogan is really the minimum requirement for such a powerful organization.

Jacob Mchangama, a Danish human rights lawyer, has put this in a nice way: “The dream of all dictators is to know as much about you as Google does”.

Incidentally, that is all the more reason for companies like Google to refuse to comply with illegal search requests from governments.

One year with the 5D Mk II

A year ago today, I got the Canon 5D Mark II digital single lens reflex (dSLR) camera.

I have been very happy with it. The image quality is great, especially in low light, and it is a lot more robust than the Rebel XS I had before. Everything about the camera is what you would expect from a machine intended for serious and intense use.

I feel like I have done a lot with the camera already, and that it has a lot of life and potential in it yet.

Photos and asides

Sorry for the thin content here lately. I have been intensely busy with other things.

For instance, last night I took photos at a Young Canadians in Finance sponsored fundraiser for the United Way. The keynote speaker was Wayne Wouters – Clerk of the Privy Council and Canada’s top bureaucrat. The United Way has a press release up about the event, which includes one of my photos.

P.S. If you are planning to mail anything in Canada – or have anything mailed to you – it may be wise to do it soon.

P.P.S. You can solve chess endgames for free online, using the Nalimov Endgame Tablebases. Once you are down to six or fewer pieces (including kings), the number of possible chess positions falls off sharply. In fact, they can all be stored in just over 7 gigabytes of space.

Firefox avoiding duplicate tabs

Firefox 4.0.1 seems to have a new behaviour. If you try to enter an exact URL that you already have open in another tab, it jumps to the first instance rather than opening a new one.

That seems rather sensible, though the jump seems a bit abrupt. Still, it’s better than having piles of redundant and confusing content in your many Firefox windows. It’s especially confusing for me, since I am usually running Chrome and Safari for testing purposes at the same time.

Preventing accidental nuclear war

One of my biggest fears is that a nuclear war could start by accident, or as the result of a miscalculation. Some national leader could push a threat too far, an exercise could be misinterpreted, things during a conventional war could get out of control, and cities could suddenly get incinerated.

It seems quite likely that Canada’s major cities are the targets of ex-Soviet missiles spread around Russian subs and silos. We may be the targets of Chinese bombs, as well.

Two important policy objectives seem to be (a) keeping additional countries from developing nuclear weapons (b) reducing the stockpile of weapons possessed by existing nuclear weapon states and (c) building systems that reduce the chances of accidents, including permissive action links to prevent unauthorized use of bombs and delays in hair-trigger systems.