Pat Berry dot net

In the latest Dork Tower strip, the characters tackle one of the classic stupid questions: "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?"

Why do I call it a stupid question? Because it is. Fish and reptiles were laying eggs for millions of years before the first bird appeared on Earth. Obviously, the egg came before the chicken. I don't understand why anyone thinks this question is remotely challenging.

Okay, actually, I do. Generally, when people treat this as an insoluble conundrum, their unspoken assumption is that "egg" really means "chicken egg". So eggs laid by fish and reptiles are excluded. I see no reason to limit the question that way, but fine. Even if we accept that interpretation, answering the question is no problem. It becomes a simple matter of definition. Here's how I would handle it:

SILLY PERSON: Which came first, the chicken or the chicken egg?
ME: Define "chicken egg."
SP: An egg that a chicken hatches out of.
ME: Okay, by that definition, the very first chicken hatched from a chicken egg. So the egg came first.
SP: No, wait! A chicken egg is an egg laid by a chicken.
ME: All right, then the chicken came first. Obviously.
SP: But --
ME: I think we're done here. Why don't you take this amusing quiz?

5:45 AM in Humor , Idiots , Science
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Author NancyKay Shapiro was shopping in Balducci's (a grocery store in Greenwich Village) a few days ago when she encountered something odd. It was a display of meat items with signs saying "Delicious for Chanukah." That's not unusual this time of year, but the meat items in question were hams.

I know, this sounds like an urban legend. But Shapiro has pictures. And despite what one commenter says, they are not Photoshopped; the Balducci's website is currently offering an apology for the signs (which have since been changed to "Perfect for the Holidays!").

UPDATE: As another of Shapiro's commenters points out, it's a good thing the sign didn't say "Delicious for Ramadan", or there would have been riots.

Source: Don Surber

11:29 AM in Food & drink , Idiots
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I shouldn't read comments on YouTube; I really shouldn't. I'm not sure why the overwhelming majority of the comments on YouTube videos are posted by subliterate morons, but I have seen enough of them to know that this is the case. I know that reading the comments will just infuriate me, so it would be best for everyone if I just refrained from looking.

But sometimes I forget. In this case, I was watching this new music video, a duet sung by Reba McEntire and Kelly Clarkson. I foolishly allowed my eyes to stray downward, and found myself reading this:

"I didn't even know Reba could sing, it sounds amazing with her, the original is great too though."

You didn't know. . . that Reba McEntire. . . could sing?

I know she's done a lot of acting, and perhaps you first encountered her in that context. But still -- you didn't know she could sing?

She's one of the best-selling country music artists of all time: over 60 million records sold. Her first #1 single was in 1982. She's recorded 29 albums and earned 72 awards. The Country Music Association named her Female Vocalist of the Year four years in a row. And you didn't know she could sing?

I know a lot of people don't listen to country or pay any attention to the careers of country musicians. But Reba is a lot more than just a country singer. She's a crossover international pop megastar. That acting work of hers that I referred to earlier? It included performing on Broadway in Annie Get Your Gun, and at Carnegie Hall in South Pacific: classics of musical theatre.

Yes, Reba McEntire can sing.

Good Lord.

1:00 AM in Idiots , Rants
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I try to pay attention to news reports about zero-tolerance policies in public schools because that's an issue that has affected my family directly. By zero-tolerance policies, I'm talking about stuff like this and this: the sort of mindless, inflexible bureaucratic mindset that leads teachers and administrators to suspend and punish students for possessing two Tylenol tablets, or writing a story that mentions guns. In one recent case, a student was suspended because he accepted a cell-phone call (during lunch break, not in class) from his mother, who is a soldier stationed in Iraq. I say that this issue has affected my family because both of my children have been penalized for "offenses" of this sort; my son was even sentenced to perform community service as a result.

This insanity is even happening at schools where I was a student. I attended Rawlinson Road Middle School for two years, and my mother taught there for twenty years. Last week, an eleven-year-old student at RRMS was arrested and and charged with "carrying an unlawful weapon" because he had some nails in his pocket (left over from a Boy Scout activity, according to the boy's father).

I think I am glad that my daughter has already graduated from high school, and that my son will do so in two years. When both of my offspring are out of the public school system for good, I will breathe a sigh of relief.

10:06 AM in Idiots , Rants
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Look at the comments on this blog post at the FuturePundit site. Have you ever seen so many clueless people in one place? It's sad enough that they can't tell the difference between a site that publishes an article about human egg donation and a site that's actually soliciting human egg donors. And, considering that the main criterion for egg donors is intelligence, it's rather pathetic that most of these would-be donors can't even spell "donor" correctly.

My favorite of all these comments is the one from Ricardo Hernandez, who writes, "I'm interested in becoming an egg donor. I dont have a college degree but It doesnt mean that I am not smart." That's true, Ricardo, but here's what does mean you are not smart: you believe you have eggs to donate. Sorry, dude, but being male disqualifies you regardless of your (alleged) intelligence.

9:45 AM in Idiots
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I just sent the following e-mail to National Public Radio:

Subject: Error in today's story "A Brief History of New York Blackouts"

In his report on the New York blackouts of 1965 and 1977, John Nielsen stated that "in 1977, the war in Vietnam was on the nightly news." Actually, the war ended in 1975. I'm sure Nielsen is right that the social changes wrought by Vietnam were a factor in the breakdown of order during the '77 blackout -- but that's no excuse for getting basic historical facts wrong.

If Nielsen and NPR aren't willing to do simple, easy research like this, how can we trust them with real investigative journalism?

4:32 PM in Idiots
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Thanks to an article in the Sydney Morning Herald, I finally understand why no one has hired me yet. It's those darn wrinkles on my forehead. I've stupidly neglected to have botulinum toxin injected into my face!

Of course, I'll still have to do something about the gray in my beard. And my pattern baldness. And the fact that I have sixteen years of experience in my field. Hey, wait a minute, isn't that a good thing? Why would I want to work for someone who values youth over experience? I think I'll leave my face the way it is.

11:35 PM in Idiots , Me
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Perry de Havilland took this picture of the main entrance of Britain's foremost cancer hospital. In the picture you can see an employee of the hospital standing on the steps and smoking a cigarette.

Like Perry, I find this image amazing. There are several possible conclusions that one might draw from looking at it:

• Nicotine is so incredibly addictive that smokers simply cannot quit, even when they know that the habit is terribly dangerous. (But people do quit every day; I've even known a few people who did it.)
• Some people are just really, really stupid. (But would they be able to find work at a hospital? Maybe.)
• Denial -- the human ability to ignore the obvious, or believe that it doesn't apply to us personally -- is more powerful that we realize. (I find this one most plausible.)

8:34 PM in Idiots
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My opinion of the news media was not very positive prior to last year's terrorist attack, and it hasn't improved in the months since then. One of the reasons is the consistently arrogant and condescending tone that journalists adopt when addressing their audience. Their attitude seems to be that we are ignorant and simpleminded children, and that journalists, who are the only ones who know The Truth, have to spoon-feed us information, using pretty pictures and words of one syllable.

For an example of what I mean, look at this article on the CNN website. The actual text of the article is fine, but the pictures are insulting. The article has a total of three illustrations, not one of which conveys any meaningful information. Yet someone at CNN believed that these works of art would somehow help us comprehend the article, or they would not have spent time creating them.

There was a time when news articles were accompanied by illustrations that were directly related to the topic at hand. Photographs of the actual subject of the article were best, but artists' renderings of the subject, if they were skillfully done and didn't take liberties with the truth, were also good. And graphs that interpreted statistical data or illustrated trends were helpful as well. But somewhere along the line, it became customary to include pictures with every article, whether they were actually helpful or not -- and if no relevant or useful illustrations were available, then artists would create something eye-catching, even if made no actual sense.

Such as a photograph of a computer screen entirely filled with zeros and ones. If you had never seen a real computer before, you might find that sort of thing plausible. But this is 2002, and we all use computers every day. We know that they don't display screens full of zeros and ones, because that would be useless. So what is the point of the picture? Does CNN really think we're that ignorant and naive?

Apparently so.

3:32 PM in Idiots
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Retail sales shot up 7.1% in October. Yeah, American consumers are definitely cowering in their basements, all right.

A closer examination shows even more evidence that we're not the Nation Paralyzed By Fear that the journalists would have us believe. Sales of automobiles and parts skyrocketed by 26.4% in October. That's the biggest October increase since 1968. And sales of building materials rose 2.8%. A general increase in spending could perhaps be explained away as a fatalistic "eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die" reaction to terrorism and war. But if people are investing in new cars and home improvements, that means they expect to be around to enjoy them. These sales figures depict a nation that is optimistic about the future.

The article tries to dismiss the increase in auto sales as a response to interest-free financing, and claims that "people told consumer surveys they were miserable, but they were willing to borrow money to pursue a bargain." But I just don't believe it. Consumers aren't that easily manipulated. For evidence of this, look at Japan, where the economy has been stagnant for years and shows no sign of recovering. The Japanese central bank has reduced interest rates all the way to zero, but consumers still refuse to borrow or spend money. They don't believe things are going to get better any time soon, and prefer to save as much money as possible. This is not happening in America.

1:55 PM in Idiots , Rants
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Even before September 11, I didn't hold the news media in very high esteem. But since then, my opinion of them has plummeted to an all-time low. Their hysterical, overhyped handling of the hijack attacks and the anthrax-by-mail story thoroughly disgusted me. Now, in the wake of Monday's plane crash in New York, they're busily squandering what little credibility they had left.

This CNNmoney article is a perfect example. There's not a single fact in the entire piece; it's nothing but guesses, conjecture, and idle speculation. The crash might affect consumer spending. The holiday season could be in trouble. People may stay at home instead of going to the mall. And so forth. The article is full of statements like "at this point in time it's hard to predict what will happen" and "the impact of this latest crash has yet to be determined." In other words, we don't know anything. But we're not going to let that stop us from blathering on for 19 paragraphs about how everything is going to get worse.

The low point of the article is this statement: "Americans, who have been shying away from malls and other large public places since Sept. 11 for fear of another attack, could hunker down at home even more now that another plane has crashed, experts said." I have been reading claims like this for the last two months, and as far as I can tell, they are completely false. I've gone to malls, restaurants, and movie theaters numerous times since 9/11, and they have been as crowded as ever. I can only recall one exception: at lunchtime on September 12, the parking lot and food court at Prime Outlets near Research Triangle Park were semi-deserted. But that was no surprise, because most of the lunch business at Prime Outlets comes from the nearby airport, which was closed that day by federal order.

Other than that, I have seen zero evidence that people are avoiding public places. In fact, on November 11, I drove a friend to Crabtree Valley Mall, where she was meeting someone else. I tried to park in the lot at the Hudson Belk end of the mall, but that lot was completely full. So I tried parking in the lot in front of Toys 'R' Us nearby, something I normally only have to do during the holiday shopping period. There was no parking there either -- not a single space. I ended up having to drop off my passenger and leave without parking at all. Does that sound like people are "shying away" from Crabtree? On the contrary, I took it as evidence that holiday shopping has started early this year.

The assertion that Monday's plane crash will prompt people to "hunker down" at home is particularly stupid, since the plane crashed in a residential area. This means that people on the ground were killed because they were at home. If this disaster prompts people to change their behavior at all (which I doubt), it will make them avoid their homes and spend more time in public places, not less. But that's a logical conclusion, and I don't expect logic from journalists any more than I expect facts. They're too absorbed in their mission of telling us we should panic and predicting economic disaster to waste time on such things.

4:53 PM in Idiots , Rants
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Now that The New Republic has retired its Idiocy Watch feature, I'm going to steal the title (with a slight modification) and use it here to report dumb actions and statements that come to my attention from time to time. And I already have an introductory item. In an Associated Press article published today, Ireland's Foreign Minister Brian Cowen is quoted as saying, "We must reject a world order in which the 200 richest people have greater assets than the two billion people at the other end of the spectrum."

Huh?

If they are the 200 richest people in the world, then by definition they have greater assets than everyone else. That's what the word "richest" means.

I don't know what qualifications are required for the position of Foreign Minister in Ireland, but apparently a high verbal score on the SAT isn't one of them.

Update: It's been suggested to me that Cowen was trying to say "the combined assets of the 200 richest people exceed the combined assets of the two billion poorest." OK, perhaps that's what he meant -- but it's not what he said.

11:59 PM in Idiots
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Of course there is a downside to drinking coffee. And it's not the caffeine addiction (I already had that) or the risk of coffee stains. No, it's that joining the global fraternity of coffee drinkers has made me aware of a whole new realm of human dimwittedness: coffee idiots.

I don't mean the people who pour themselves a cup and leave half an ounce in the pot instead of brewing more. Everyone knows about those idiots. I'm talking about the ones who, as soon as a new pot is brewed, immediately reach past the previously existing one and go for the pot that's ten whole minutes fresher. And, for that matter, the people who brew a new pot when the previous one (I refuse to say "old," because it's not) is more than half full. What are they thinking? At first I theorized that these people couldn't stand the sight of an empty pot, or that they were simply anticipating future demand. But yesterday, I had both of those theories shot down. I walked into the break room and saw a mostly-full pot of regular coffee, another pot just starting to fill with more regular coffee, and, on the rear burner of the coffee maker, the decaf pot sitting completely empty.

And what's the point of these plastic or wooden stirrers? If you put the sweetener and creamer into your mug first and then fill it with coffee, you generate more than enough turbulence to dissolve everything. As far as I can see, the stirrers are completely redundant.

No, all the caffeine is not making me cranky. Shut up or I'll whack you with my thermal mug. (Hey, it's empty -- time for a refill.)

6:39 PM in Food & drink , Idiots
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The news media have been making fools of themselves in recent days by claiming the the war in Afghanistan has somehow "bogged down" or "reached a stalemate" because we've been bombing for three whole weeks and we still haven't won. (Some observers have pointed out that news conferences are beginning to sound like the Saturday Night Live "Gulf War Briefing" skit.) Finally, in today's prepared statement, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld addressed the question head-on and, in essence, told the press that they are behaving like idiots. Woohoo! After their disgracefully overblown coverage of the anthrax scare, it's very satisfying to see them reprimanded so effectively.

5:56 PM in Idiots
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Listening to All Things Considered on the way home this evening, I heard how Washington is celebrating the reopening of Reagan National Airport. Am I the only one who thinks this is a mistake? DCA (that's its three-letter code) is dangerous for reasons that have nothing to do with the recent terrorist attacks. No airport should be where it is in the first place. I've been there, and you can literally look out the terminal window and see the dome of the Capitol.

The FAA can tweak the security procedures and flight paths all they want, but it will always be insanely risky to have jumbo jets taking off and landing inside a city. DCA should have been permanently closed years ago, and I was hoping that after September 11, it finally would be. But apparently convenience still trumps safety in Washington.

NPR's next story made me forget all about that by giving me something even worse to worry about. Since the World Trade Center was destroyed, I've seen quite a few harebrained and ill-considered proposals for anti-hijacking measures, but by far the worst is the notion of remote-control systems for airliners. The idea is that if a plane is hijacked, or the pilot incapacitated, people on the ground can send a signal to disable the controls in the cockpit, take control of the plane remotely, and land it safely in a secure location.

But if the FAA can seize control of a plane remotely, then terrorists can do it too. In fact, it will make their task much easier -- now they can fly airliners into skyscrapers without putting themselves at risk. They won't even have to go through the security checkpoint at an airport. Sure, you can build security features into the system, but can you guarantee that nobody can hack their way in or steal the password? The system has to be absolutely bulletproof, or you get a repeat of September 11.

Linda Wertheimer discussed this proposal with the president of the National Air Transportation Society for over four minutes, but it apparently never occurred to her to ask what would prevent terrorists from exploiting it. The closest she got was to suggest that terrorists could take over the control tower at an airport and seize control of airplanes from there. But why would they need to? All they need is the right kind of signal. I can't believe anyone is taking this proposal seriously.

10:07 PM in Idiots , Rants
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