This is my dump of ideas and projects. The organization will change as the collection grows. My next task is to enable comments. Yes I understand that some of this stuff is horribly mislabeled. Anyone who wants to help me with coding, contact me at .

ReDead

So imagine a zombie apocalypse on earth. What happens when the zombie dies? Does its soul become a zombie soul in (concievably) hell? That would be a humorous idea to explore.

 

Cultural Phonon

For those unfamiliar with the idea of a phonon, a phonon is a wave that propagates through matter. If one were to vibrate a piece of metal, one atom would push on the next would push on the next, causing a wave. I see interesting parallels between this and a recent phenomena known as the internet 'meme'. One person either generates a topic or comes across one that he feels is worth sharing with more of the people he is in contact with. Then those people do likewise. The idea somehow resonates with people for varied or similar reasons and this causes them to pass it on. A phonon of culture. This phenomena has only recently stood out due to the connectivity of the internet. However, any idea, saying, song, image, or pattern you have ever received from someone else is subject to these rules. That means such things as religion, language, and beatles songs are all technically memes. They do not all belong in the same category though. Generally this is a concept of how we as people share culture and identity across various channels of communication. In depth study of this issue would be an excellent devotion of time and thought but for the moment I only present to you the concept of its formation and existence. So, in short, an apple is not a cultural phonon. Calling it an apple is.

 

Disillusionment

The word Disillusionment implies that the subject was an illusion.

 

What JJ Abrams lacks

I like JJ Abrams. I find him to be a very interesting person. His TED talk is what really sold me on him. However in my personal opinion, he missed the point. Abrams is a storyteller. More specifically, he likes to set up suspense. The problem is the storytelling becomes the device for the suspense rather than the suspense adding to the story. He took an enhancement technique and made it a purpose. Sure, some people go for that. I am not one of them. If I am going to intake a story in any format, I am doing it for the story. Not necessarily for any of the elements within. Remove the theatrical element from his shows and the synopsis becomes very dull. This is one of the problems I have with episodic TV shows. There is a general lack of direction. Take 'Lost' for example. Great suspense but they don't have direction. I'm not interested if you don't know what you are going. Some movies get it. Some don't. Some I go to see because they are shiny. But if I really want a plot, I will go read a book.

 

The Island Project

The continental shelf off the coast of argentina extends a long way. It extends over 200 nautical miles past the coast. Beyond that, no one has legal control. About 230 miles beyond the coast is a shallow area. There is a 20 sq km area that is about a meter below the waterline. I want to build an island there.

I have lots of ideas for where the project could end up but that's not really the primary concern and plenty of other people have aspirations of nation building anyhow. So really my focus is how to get my hands on materials and transport them there as well as how to survive for long periods of time without resupply. The final goal is self sufficiency but that will require a large amount of space for farming to supplement fishing. Right now I want to buy a bunch of old barges and load them with dirt, construction materials, and supplies. Then I will haul them down there and anchor them there.

Eventually I want to bring more people to this new land in an attempt to populate it and help it grow. But for a selection process, I am at a loss. I have come up with many ideas including similar political and social ideas to my own and amount of resources brought to the island. Possible government ideas have included egalitarianism, benevolent dictatorship, and libertarianism.

None of those however seem to mesh with the inspiration for this idea. My sister once spoke of a need for a research facility in international waters. Apparently her line of work is slowed tremendously by bureaucratic red tape. She suggested a 15 km area that supported about 12000 people. This is a feasible end goal. So I first wish to build a starting point. Then recruit corporate sponsorship. Then expand both the corporate side as well as the population part.

I really like this idea and hope one day I may actually get to start it.

Hell?

So God sends us to hell for falling out of his grace. If the stories are to be believed, it is a pit of sulfur and fire. I had two thoughts on this concept today. First that doesn't sound like a spiritual punishment. The 'punishment' offered is purely threatening only in a biological sense. Flames do not hurt the spirit, they harm the flesh. Its a misguided threat aimed at not even harming the thing that was supposed to be punished. I do not know what can actually harm the spirit consistently though, so as for a good idea for what hell should be like, I am at a loss. Second, if that's all hell is, it doesn't sound so bad. So you are going to be in pain. A lot of it. Constantly. That's how one builds a tolerance to a sensation. Constant burning by liquid fire is a sensation after all. Sure it will probably hurt horrendously for a thousand years or so but we are talking about an infinite time frame. After a relatively short while, denizens of this hell dungeon will just get used to it as the norm by developing a pain tolerance. Pain is just a sensation after all. Then we get an eternity to just screw around down there. The opposite: Heaven. Where there is no thousand years of constant burning but still infinite time to screw around.

My ultimate conclusion: we do not know shit about the afterlife and our guides into its workings are woefully inadequate. Thanks for leaving your people in the dark God.

Addendum: If for some odd reason our previous day's experience is removed at some interval in hell, then this punishment would be infinite.

 

Ever want to throw a pop can?

Whenever I hold an aluminum can, I cant help but notice how easily held and tossable it is. This led me to think, one could repurpose a soda can into a handy covert grenade container. I'm not sure how one would do this but since the can is already aluminum, the idea of a thermite grenade pops to mind. It would be easy to conceal from most everything but x ray scanners and bomb sniffing dogs. It already has a pin mechanism built in. Just pull the tab and toss.

Also, if you ever feel inclined enough to surrender the contents of one of these cans: find a really fizzy pop, shake well, toss.

Government selection processes

There are a few ideas I would like to elaborate on in relation to the selection of government. First off, we live in a democratic republic, not a democracy. Hopefully this is something you already know. A true democracy would be a very poor form of governing for an entity as large as the USA. Pirate ships were true democracies. If someone were to plot their courses, they would look like erratic zigzags. They would collectively change their mind on where they were going in search of loot every couple of days or weeks. It worked in a small collected unit. Now apply the same level of indecision to a population of 300 million. Its not likely to work. It needs some form of stability. This takes shape in the idea of asking opinions every two or four years through representatives. They are in office long enough to push their own platforms forward while not giving them enough time to gain too much power for themselves (supposedly).

There are a few ideas that are not the American system that intrigue me. First, the Brits. They have a royal family that is the figurehead of govt. When someone thinks about the leader of England, its the Queen. The prime minister elect cannot upstage her for prestige. The highest elected office then becomes one not of ego or fame. It has to have a level of humility. There is another interesting institution they have. Its called 'Taken to Task'. The parliament asks the prime minister about policies he is making and current issues of the country. He has to have an answer right then for the very difficult question and he will be held accountable for his answer. This is televised to the populace.

Next, Canada. They have something known as the civility index. Its a scale of one to five that categorizes how much work the parliament is getting done in comparison to the amount of infighting going on. If the index reaches 3, the people begin madly harassing their representatives. Granted they only has as many people as California, so this tight knit relationship with their government may be a result of scale.

Now on to Russia. To win, a candidate must have 50% of the vote. If this doesn't happen due to multiple candidates, the two frontrunners then run again. Also there has to be a 50% voter turnout for the election to be valid.

And finally an idea I came across in the grapevine. Each person gets one vote. It can be a positive or a negative vote. So I could either vote for John Kerry or vote against George Bush. Intriguing huh.

I honestly do not agree with the current system I am a part of here in the USA. Apparently I support it though as I do take a keen interest in voting. The system may not be what I consider to be the best but that does not stop me from seeking the best outcome for myself.

 

Why I shop at Wal-Mart

I shop at Wal-Mart because they do not post a profit from me. Nor are they even in the business of selling things to customers. In David Smith's book 'Free Lunch', he speaks of the Wal-Mart profit margins. In 2005 they posted $250 million in profits but posted $292 million in sales (they actually make their money from being very creative with taxes (read the book, its an eye opener)). This means that they actually take a loss on sales. So as long as one is not dumb enough to fall into price scams (see HDMI cables) then shopping there does nothing for them. And if its the cheapest price, I am the winner.

 

A sign of things to come.

A BBC headline that wandered its way across my feed recently read 'South Asia hit by food shortages'. Its cause was a bad season for rice and wheat in the grain belts of Asia coupled with increased demand from developing nations. Not exactly a catastrophe now but lets look into the future.

A perfect, corruption free, world spanning government with perfect modes of food distribution and all the good farming land being used for farming puts the population cap at an estimated 27 billion based on production per acre, amount of land, and individual need. The equation becomes more chaotic however if you apply it to current world politics. Long story short, food is one of the next resources that will be comparable to oil.

Lets look at the implications of such an assertion. Among large populations, we will have incidences similar to the massive food shortages in China in the 70s. Areas with more farmland than people will see a slow and steady increase in population while they begin making substantially more off of food exports. This bodes very well for the Americas (most specifically USA, Argentina, Mexico (ya know, farm economies)). Asia's populous will increase to levels slightly higher than their food production (leading to whiners about huge humanitarian issues of poor Asians going unfed when really the food was never there in the first place, unfortunately). Europe is stable. Their population will hold under their food levels if their current lack of substantial population growth continues. Africa becomes a bit of a wildcard. Peaceful regions will grow in dominance as they have the ability to feed their people. Warring areas will be held back by the destruction of infrastructure and the hoarding of food. This might actually press for peace among factions for the better good (or invasion and possibly extermination for more farmland)

This however is only one path the future holds. After all, water is going to run out much sooner than food say the experts.