Rants – Page 17 – a sibilant intake of breath

The serial (Oxford) comma

When writing lists, there are two different conventions for what to do before the final item:

Lions, tigers and bears are charging toward us from all directions.
To fend them off we will need rifles, pepper spray, and dynamite.

I strongly prefer the second approach, where the final item is set off with a comma, and not just because of where I did my M.Phil.

I have heard some people argue that the commas in a list are stand-ins for the word ‘and’. Instead of writing “life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness”, we should therefore write “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. To add a comma between “liberty” and “the pursuit of happiness” while keeping the “and” is redundant.

I can see the point of this argument, but I think it takes too mechanical a view of language. The purpose of every element of language is to convey ideas and – James Joyce aside – it is usually best to do so clearly. The Oxford comma is very clear. The writer has a list of items, and each item is separated from each other item by means of a comma. In the event of a higher level list, with items separated by semicolons, the final semicolon would surely not be omitted:

His crimes were many: some related to property, like theft and burglary; some related to reputation, including many slanders; and some wanton violations of the Law of the Sea, particularly the disregard of established conventions for deciding maritime boundaries.

In this data-driven age, the serial comma is also in keeping with mathematical and computational conventions. The set of prime factors of my telephone number is: {2, 3, 11, 89, 709453}. Comma separated values are also a common way to store and exchange data sets.

My hope is that I have won over a waverer or two to the serial comma approach. If not, can we please at least agree to put only a single space after a period? We do not live in the age of typewriters anymore!

FileVault in Lion

While the interface changes in Mac OS X Lion are confusing, the whole-disk encryption provided by FileVault is a definite step forward.

People who have their laptops stolen and then find their confidential documents posted all over the internet really have no excuse. If it is sensitive, it should be encrypted – especially if it is on a portable device that cannot be wiped remotely.

I hope a future release of iOS includes comparable whole-disk encryption capabilities. iPhones and iPads are even easier to lose than laptops.

Quiet Google

I really hate Google Instant and autocomplete – largely because I hate any user interface element that causes things on screen to change in unexpected ways. I also hate websites where little ‘preview’ windows instantly pop up when your cursor crosses over a link. When something unexpected pops up on my computer, I always think: “Waah! Something unexpected and unwelcome has surprised me unpleasantly!” and never: “How delightful! My computer did just what I wanted, without me even asking!”.

I am rather annoyed that even when you turn off Google Instant, Google turns it back on for your account after a few weeks. They really want those extra advertising revenues.

It is possible to avoid both annoying features by searching Google using this link. I call it ‘Quiet Google’ and it helps conserve a measure of calm in the universe.

No iPhone 5, reduced gadget envy

Apple shareholders and gadget geeks are lamenting how an iPhone 5 was not announced.

One thing that occurs to me is that owners of the iPhone 4 probably benefit. Nobody is going to feel left out or insecure because they have an iPhone 4 rather than the marginally improved 4S. A real iPhone 5, however, would have made a lot of people feel inadequate for having the ‘old’ model.

Of course, it is exactly that pattern of new gadget envy that has allowed Apple to charge such premium prices for their gear and derive such substantial profits.

Supreme Court supportive of InSite

The Supreme Court of Canada’s unanimous decision to support Vancouver’s safe injection site is very encouraging, particularly in the present political context. Overall, the direction of Canada’s policy toward illegal drugs is depressing and frustrating. We are choosing the emulate the country with the worst drug policy in the developed world – the United States. We are pursuing a hopeless policy of prohibition, while trying to shut down options with a better chance of success, such as those that seek to reduce the harm associated with addiction.

Politicians often choose to cater to the irrational fears and biases of the general population. Judges are a bit freer to consider the ethics and evidence that bear upon a situation. That seems to be what the Supreme Court has done in this case:

During its eight years of operation, Insite has been proven to save lives with no discernible negative impact on the public safety and health objectives of Canada. The effect of denying the services of Insite to the population it serves and the correlative increase in the risk of death and disease to injection drug users is grossly disproportionate to any benefit that Canada might derive from presenting a uniform stance on the possession of narcotics.

Hopefully, this ruling will prompt a broader rethink of how Canada deals with drugs that are currently prohibited.

Commuting calculations

My current commute takes about 90 minutes from door to door: a short walk, two long subway rides, and a bus ride.

Over the course of 52 working weeks, the commute adds up to 780 hours a year.

That means that every ten minutes I can eliminate from my bi-daily commute adds up to 43.3 hours per year.

That seems like reason enough to strongly favour housing options near subway stations, and ideally stations on the right line.

What’s important and earning a living

Maybe the idea that you should seek a career doing what you really care about is flawed. Doing anything for money tends to involve many compromises and sacrifices of principle or aesthetics.

Perhaps it is wiser to earn your money in a field that you don’t really care about at all, so that you can be able to act freely in the areas that are really important to you.

Consider a career in butlering

For those struggling in today’s super competitive job market, The Economist suggests becoming a butler:

The time-poor new rich are generating demand for household staff, and this sort of work can be very well paid. A private secretary and general factotum can earn up to $150,000 a year nowadays. Salaries for standard butlers range from $60,000 to $125,000 and a head butler can make as much as $250,000, according to the website of the Butler Bureau.

You already help out the rich by absorbing their pollution, giving sweetheart loans to their companies, and bailing out their high-risk schemes when they fail. Why not make them breakfast Bloody Marys to combat post-party hangovers as well?

Travel makes me appreciate all comforts and conveniences

Spending an extended span of time undertaking travel definitely makes me appreciate every comfort and convenience when they are available.

These comforts include a comfortable horizontal surface to sleep on in the dark and quiet; easy access to laundry; being able to have a shower; having internet access; being able to change outside a cramped bathroom or bathroom stall; being able to borrow access to a local telephone; being able to leave groceries somewhere cold; being able to hang up suits and dress shirts properly; being able to leave batteries around to charge; not having to worry about checkout times; and not having to worry about your things being stolen if unattended.

My period of transition is still not complete. I still need to relocate most of my possessions from Ottawa to Toronto and I still need to find somewhere to live in Toronto and shift all of my things there. That being said, I think I now have the basic requirements for being able to live and work. I can shuttle them around with me from place to place – as necessary – until I have a place of my own.

One lesson reinforced by this move is the general benefit of keeping personal property to a minimum, especially in terms of bulk. Every gram and cubic centimetre of objects you possess makes you less free, though much of it may be awfully pleasant and useful to own.

#movingtotoronto How am I still packing?

Packing has become a task that seems to involve odd metaphysical complexities.

For days and days now, I have been packing and packing. Boxes get filled and added to the pile in the corner. Papers are sorted and then either filed or discarded. Closets are cleared. Food is eaten, packed (for stuff that has unusual value per unit weight and/or volume), given away, or discarded. Books are stacked and packed and tucked away, and then new caches of previously forgotten books are discovered and given the same treatment.

And yet, through all of this, there always seems to be the same amount of packing left to do. Back on August 5th, I was supposedly 50% packed. That number still seems basically right six days later, despite having spent more of the intervening time packing than doing anything else.

Hopefully today will be the day when 50% mysteriously and near-instantaneously becomes 100%, when I can throw a few critical items into a suitcase, and when I can get on the bus to Toronto/New Orleans/Washington D.C.