Oxford – Page 30 – a sibilant intake of breath

Summer days

With nine days left before I go to Dublin, I am pondering how the time can best be spent, and what sort of spurs I might use to ensure that most of it is used productively. At the very least, I should finish the latest tranche of work for Dr. Hurrell, as well as the bits of thesis reading I am in the process of completing already. More ambitiously, it would be nice to finally finish with the eternal fish paper. I need to de-scale and clean it: removing more than 20% of the total words, while rebalancing a few things. Working with it is much like trying to handle a piece of machinery in the dark that was once very familiar to you, but now continuously surprises you a bit with things that are not where you remember them being, sections with purposes that elude your comprehension, and a general loss of intuitive understanding.

As I am sure more seasoned veterans of the grad school experience could have told me in advance, life is rather less productive overall when it isn’t particularly structured. The absence of the need to discuss readings at particular times tends to make them languish on your shelves. Likewise, the absence of any deadline for the completion of research or papers tends to leave the ideas lingering in dusty corners of the hard drive or the brain. This is the basic reason why the protagonist of Good Will Hunting is wrong to chastise people for spending money on graduate education when they could just use the local library for free. The problem isn’t fundamentally one of information access, but rather of human motivation.

Today, I also wrote a batch of messages to people who I have, at one time or another, had substantial contact with, but with whom I now exchange very little information. Such people have at least temporarily become as constellations in my personal firmament. Indeed, I very often find myself imagining their response to a particular project and idea, then altering my own positions and actions on the basis of their simulated contribution. Exchanging a letter with them every month or so is probably an excellent accompaniment for that process; it will, at the very least, keep them from drifting too far off themselves, as I keep writing lines for them to speak.

PS. Mica has a new music video up. People are encouraged to discuss it on his blog. In many ways, it is unlike anything he has made before.

PPS. While my digital camera is off in dust rehab, I am operating off the stock of photos I have taken previously. Apologies if they are not particularly topical, current, or interesting.

On paralysis

The most paradoxical of all student circumstances is that in which you have so much to do, you cannot get started. I have a mass of research work to do for Dr. Hurrell, the ever-present thesis, the fish paper, and myriad other tasks of all characters and levels of importance. At the same time, my capability is basically circumscribed to cooking, grocery shopping, listening to music, and reading short stories by Stanislaw Lem.

The thought that school will be resuming in little over a month does not help matters.

My hope is that this situation is like a wheel with a segment missing: nearly capable of rolling along effortlessly, but presently imcomplete. Adding that segment should thus unleash a massive torrent of productivity that smites tasks left and right, checking off box after box in my Moleskine diary and email after email in my various bulging inboxes.

PS. Note how the prefix ‘para’ often denotes ‘in place of,’ such as in paramedic, parachute, or paralegal. Lysis is the process whereby cells in living creatures explode, either due to the effects of some outside agent or an immune system determination that the cell is critically compromised.

Let the market provide?

The way the Oxford County Library deals with audio-visual materials strikes me as rather illegitimate. They charge for renting CDs and DVDs at rates comparable to commercial venues. As such, they are using a tax subsidized situation (free rent, plus funding from local taxes) to complete directly with private enterprise in an area where there is no market failure. I don’t need a governmental service to charge me three quid to rent The Life Aquatic, and the existence of one that does quite likely crowds out commercial venues that would do a better job (have more than one copy, offer deals for frequent renters, etc).

I am all for libraries having a collection of educational CDs and DVDs, but they really should be lent out in a way that is in keeping with the idea of libraries as publicly funded providers of public goods.

That said, I have been enjoying the use of my new headphones with the opera CDs that I paid £6 to borrow. Reproduction of classical instruments and male vocalists seem to be the two areas where there is the most difference between these and the default Apple earbuds. It can also be amusing to not how often you faintly hear people shuffling around the studio, coughing in muffled fashion, or turning pages in CDs that you have heard a hundred times. You can even hear someone’s watch ticking faintly in a Nine Inch Nails B-side I have.

Summer now ending: student loan applications

With September approaching, it is once again time to apply for student loans. Canadian student loans are paid half by the provincial government and half by the federal, and have a maximum value of about $12,000 a year. The nicest thing about them is that you do not need to begin paying them back until you are no longer a full-time student. As such, they reduce the disincentive to leave school early or avoid taking higher degrees, as might be created by bank loans that start gathering interest immediately.

The justification for having a student loan program is twofold. Firstly, it posits that there are societal benefits to education. In the cases of nurses, teachers, and the like, this is quite evidently so. Secondly, it constitutes part of the justification for income disparity, on the basis of the argument that everyone has an equal chance at getting an education. This plank is somewhat weaker, since there are a great many programs that $12,000 will not cover, and some people are naturally more likely to be concerned about taking on such debt than others. That said, it is almost certainly an improvement over having no such program.

Irksomely, because Oxford is not on the official British Columbian list of eligable schools, all the paperwork needs to be done by mail and fax. Since the normal application form isn’t even on their website as a PDF, I need to have it mailed to me, as well. Problematically for people in expensive places, they calculate things like the cost of living on the basis of prices in BC. Finally, as you would expect for a government document, the application instructions are 63 pages long. They are really hung up that the program start and end dates you supply exactly match any of those sent as confirmation by your school. Hopefully, Oxford term start and term end dates will work. I remember getting initially rejected last year because Wadham and the Department gave dates a couple of days apart.

Robots and humans

Still catching up on work that emerged while in Scotland, I did take some time to follow a robot through Jericho today. It was collecting information about the world using GPS, a video camera, and a three dimensional laser rangefinder. While it wasn’t the cleverest of robots, it was a worthwhile experience. My fears about the coming robot uprising have been temporarily allayed; so long as throwing a blanket over one is a completely incapacitating act, we should be able to endure.

PS. Today involved an especially surprising unbloggable event. I need to think about it.

Treason

In the spirit of short entries, I have a confession to make: I am not a social scientist. Even worse, I don’t believe in social ‘science.’ Science is about things where you can access physical reality closely enough that you can be decisively proved wrong. Science is about improving our ability to act usefully in the world. Adding a bunch of regressions to your study on civil wars does not accomplish that.

PS. Political theory is about a million times more interesting than international relations theory.

[Update: 2 August] This entry doesn’t quite say what I mean, especially as regards the definition of science. It will need to be revisited when the ideas are clearer in my mind.

Tutorials very successfully concluded

My tutorials this afternoon went exceptionally well. Discussing an area that you really know a great deal about with someone who is interested but just starting out in their scholarly examination of it is both engaging and rewarding. I am especially enjoying the tutorial on distributive justice. I remember how interesting it was to first read Rawls, Mill, Singer, et al and it is particularly gratifying to be sharing such ideas with someone else. The only danger is assigning a reading list that is far too long. As far as the tutorials on globalization and global justice go, I need not have worried about being short on communicable knowledge.

The other tutorial, on OPEC and the oil price shock, was also quite interesting. I have gone over 20th century Middle Eastern history enough times now that I feel quite comfortable talking about it and have a list of sources in mind basically all the time. In general, the tutorials were a reminder of the excitement that can be associated with the conveyance of knowledge.

I am looking forward to the four tutorials that remain with these two students.

Scotland 2006 photos: second batch

All taken during our first big hike on Friday, this series of photos shows a bit of the majesty of the Scottish highlands.

There is really no mistaking the glacial origins of these mountains, though the erosion patterns of the rocks look quite unusual to someone used to mountains in British Columbia.

These are three of the five peaks we climbed on Friday, including at least one of the three Munros.

While requiring less exertion, descents were often rather more daunting than ascents.

Continuity of hats is an important element of hiking trips.

From left to right: Milan, Mark, Helen, Kathleen, Dengli, Chris, and Bruno. Photo taken by Andrew or Roman.

With tutorials tomorrow, I need to get some sleep. More photos and descriptions of the trip should come online tomorrow.

Back from Scotland

After an excellent few days, those parts of me not devoured by midges are back from Scotland. Over the three days, we climbed seven proper mountains (each more than 900m), including four designated as Munros. The mountains were quite spectacular – a nice reminder of home – and the fellow walkers were a great pleasure to spend time with. Interesting, knowledgeable, and friendly people all, we had some excellent conversations about everything from quantum chromodynamics to medieval theology. The combination of physical scientists, computer geeks, and a political theorist was nearly ideal. I was really glad to meet everyone, and I hope I shall meet them all again.

Sorting everything out, both physically and in terms of all the data, may keep me a while. Digital photos will appear both here and on Photo.net as I process them. I should have the roll of Velvia I shot off in the post for processing and scanning shortly, as well.

In closing, I should quickly thank the trip’s superb organizers. The Oxford University Walking Club is an exceedingly professional organization, run by very capable and helpful individuals. I really appreciate the opportunity they granted me.

South Hinksey

Happy Birthday Bilyana

While walking with Kelly this evening, we found an unusually nice bit of Oxfordshire, accessible through a park near their new flat. If you carry on down St. Aldates and across the Folly Bridge, then farther on down Abingdon Road, you will eventually see a park on the right. There is a small waterpark and a pool. Beyond that is a reasonably large lake, which can be crossed using the bridge in the photo above. Farther on are a set of train tracks likewise crossed by that bridge and then fields and the village of South Hinksey. It is all very attractive and photogenic, and I am glad to have discovered it in such good company.

Tomorrow, I need to tie up final loose ends before the Scotland trip. Now that it has become clear that we will be driving more than thirteen hours each way, I am a bit daunted by this four day excursion. Hopefully, the drive will be pleasant and the two days of hiking will be spectacular. My fingers are crossed incredibly tightly that I will get both papers from my August tutorial students in time to print them before leaving. If not, I will have a very hectic period of work to be completed immediately upon my return.

If I am to get my paper into the next issue of MITIR, I need to have it submitted by the 31st. Since I will be in Scotland after the 27th, that means finishing it tomorrow. They haven’t been entirely clear on whether they just want a few stylistic changes and a few specific statistics, or if they are serious about the 4000 word maximum. If so, I need to boil away more than a third of the existing paper. Hardly something I can do in the day that remains to me. All that can be done is for me to revise the paper as well as can be managed, send it off before I leave, and then return home to find out what they have decided. It seems increasingly likely that I will also return home to finally find my new headphones.