Considering how shallow a lot of modern Australian policy and culture is and how thought provoking many of his books are, this is not a surprise. From what he wrote the only country he's visited other than Australia is Iran, which he chose based upon his interactions with "illegal" refugees from that country, a cause that he is passionate about. Also, I believe that he has consciously decided to be a bit of a recluse. Check out http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/images/GregEgan.htm . I laughed when I read this as at the same time I was mentally scolding my sister for putting too much information about herself on Facebook.
Even for someone trained in maths and physics his books can be a struggle to read. But they are full of concepts that really make you think. I recommend Permutation City as one of his easier, but still very interesting reads. Short stories are good too.
You have to be able to cope with his Canadian inferiority complex though One look at his website and you won't think he's underappreciated. I wish people would stop giving me his books.
Terry Dowling's science fiction could be said to verge on the mystical (and I'm a hard sf person myself), but full of amazing ideas and imagery is so intense that you can see his distant future lands. You *know* they exist, that great sandships ply the deserts of an Australia transformed by a resurgent Aboriginal culture, where Nationals are restricted to the coasts, and where artificial and non-human intelligence struggles to survive. I cannot recommend his books highly enough, though as he uses small publishers they can be hard to find. He also writes horror, and again though I'm not generally a fan of the genre, his writing transcends this.
It was quite impressive, though the heat generated by the demo PC's caused a few problems in a neighbouring server room. I also submitted the story yesterday (once the press release was made public) and it was rejected.
I'm not surprised by the number of people that respond to spam. These are probably the same people who watch current affair programs on the commercial stations (eg ACA and Today Tonight in Australia) and believe that their reports consitute in depth analysis (Why tonight's diet is better than the last 1x10^20 we've shown you).
Read a tabloid (or Murdoch broadsheet), watch the news, listen to the radio, watch political advertising. It's all about appealing to your base instincts (frequently anger) and not your brain.
In my job I've seen the role of media manipulators ("communicators" and "PR people") increase in government and the sciences. The important thing for them is not to provide facts and hard information, but to provide "spin".
People live busy lives - they don't have time to analyse thing closely now (or so we are told). Even those great doubters of everything, the university students, now have to spend all their spare time in paid jobs instead of pushing the boundries with their outrageous ideals.
My mistake. Just tried out the latest version of Nvu and it seems much improved (PHP handling at last!). Pity the site publishing supports only FTP and HTTP. Would be nice to publish to another drive share. Still, it is better than Mozilla Composer.
I'm interested to find out what happens to the Composer (Mozilla Editor) component. Will this be avialable as a stand alone programs like Firefox and Thunderbird? I often recommended it as a free WYSIWYG editor. IIRC Nvu depends on a Mozilla installation anyway, at least for Linux.
The reason the ozone holes form above the poles and not directly above the CFC source regions is due to the very cold atmospheric conditions at the poles.
During the winter polar night, sunlight does not reach the south pole. A strong circumpolar wind develops in the middle to lower stratosphere. These strong winds are known as the 'polar vortex'. This has the effect of isolating the air over the polar region.
Since there is no sunlight, the air within the polar vortex can get very cold. So cold that special clouds can form once the air temperature gets to below about -80C. These clouds are called Polar Stratospheric Clouds (or PSCs for short) but they are not the clouds that you are used to seeing in the sky which are composed of water droplets. PSCs first form as nitric acid trihydrate. As the temperature gets colder however, larger droplets of water-ice with nitric acid dissolved in them can form. However, their exact composition is still the subject of intense scientific scrutiny. These PSCs are crucial for ozone loss to occur.
It should serve as a lesson to you that your actions can have effects beyond your backyard.
Most scientists I know recognise that there are "natural" components to phenomena such as the ozone holes (eg volcanic aerosoles) and global warming. The concern is that human activities may exacerbate the effects and that the rate of change may be much faster than would otherwise be the case.
If you ever wonder what affect humanity's actions have on the world and our society, look at the ruined land due to salinity in Australia.
ironic as, in Australia, the Salvation Army is one of the main opponents to drug law change. I refuse to give money to them due to the conservative meddling in politics and non-secular policies.
Work from home! Guaranteed income! Help Australians produce more offspring! Even the Prime Minister of Australia agrees that this is the business of the future!
By distributing our herbal viagra will ensure that all Aussie men can perform their duties (remember one for yourself, one for your wife, and one for the country!).
And vote Liberal for bigger erections!
Yours truly,
John Winston Howard
--This email has been authorised by George W Bush--
I agree especially with your point 3. I lived in a rural area for seven years in between residing in cities and now I feel uncomfortable returning there due to the monoculture that exists there. I like having a variety of people, ideas and cultures around me.
I can see that my family, who still live in the country, have become somewhat ossified with their perspectives on the world outside their small community. That fear of change can lead to anger and persecution to those who want (or just are) different.
In other breaking news, Bill Gates has contracted Derek Zoolander to model wearable computers at a fashion show to be attended by the Malaysian Prime Minister.
Modern computing adverts compelling? Maybe the rendered graphics for gaming equipment, but not ads in general. Maybe it's just me choking with cynicism at Microsoft home user and HP ads (HP innovation? Now?), but MS.Net and IBM ads are simply lame. The only people that they could possibly compel is a PHB with no brain (okay, so there a quite a few of them around). They don't even bother to translate them from American here in Aus.
Hang on, Howard is also against innovation so he should be supporting the DMCA. After all, it's not like anything good has been invented since the 50's.:)
I regard Spielberg's Empire of the Sun as the best book to movie conversion I have ever seen. I thought that Stoppard's script captured the essence of the story, the reflections on the good and bad of each of the cultures. I was also astonished to see Ballard's vivid descriptions of China appear on the screen just as I had imagined them.
That said, I would love it if Spielberg's favourite actors, the Toms, Hanks and (now) Cruise, gave up "acting" for ever.
Slashdot Mirror
Considering how shallow a lot of modern Australian policy and culture is and how thought provoking many of his books are, this is not a surprise. From what he wrote the only country he's visited other than Australia is Iran, which he chose based upon his interactions with "illegal" refugees from that country, a cause that he is passionate about. Also, I believe that he has consciously decided to be a bit of a recluse. Check out http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/images/GregEgan.htm . I laughed when I read this as at the same time I was mentally scolding my sister for putting too much information about herself on Facebook.
Even for someone trained in maths and physics his books can be a struggle to read. But they are full of concepts that really make you think. I recommend Permutation City as one of his easier, but still very interesting reads. Short stories are good too.
You have to be able to cope with his Canadian inferiority complex though One look at his website and you won't think he's underappreciated. I wish people would stop giving me his books.
Terry Dowling's science fiction could be said to verge on the mystical (and I'm a hard sf person myself), but full of amazing ideas and imagery is so intense that you can see his distant future lands. You *know* they exist, that great sandships ply the deserts of an Australia transformed by a resurgent Aboriginal culture, where Nationals are restricted to the coasts, and where artificial and non-human intelligence struggles to survive. I cannot recommend his books highly enough, though as he uses small publishers they can be hard to find. He also writes horror, and again though I'm not generally a fan of the genre, his writing transcends this.
http://www.terrydowling.com/
It was quite impressive, though the heat generated by the demo PC's caused a few problems in a neighbouring server room. I also submitted the story yesterday (once the press release was made public) and it was rejected.
You just provided me with our internal newsletter's quote of the week. Thank you!
I thought the BioMedIA Lab were now called the Biomedical Engineering group. ;)
And those websites won't be back online until 2006-07-29 18:00:00 AEDT due to a network outage - NOT the Slashdot Effect!
I'm not surprised by the number of people that respond to spam. These are probably the same people who watch current affair programs on the commercial stations (eg ACA and Today Tonight in Australia) and believe that their reports consitute in depth analysis (Why tonight's diet is better than the last 1x10^20 we've shown you).
Read a tabloid (or Murdoch broadsheet), watch the news, listen to the radio, watch political advertising. It's all about appealing to your base instincts (frequently anger) and not your brain.
In my job I've seen the role of media manipulators ("communicators" and "PR people") increase in government and the sciences. The important thing for them is not to provide facts and hard information, but to provide "spin".
People live busy lives - they don't have time to analyse thing closely now (or so we are told). Even those great doubters of everything, the university students, now have to spend all their spare time in paid jobs instead of pushing the boundries with their outrageous ideals.
Is there any hope for the human race?
My mistake. Just tried out the latest version of Nvu and it seems much improved (PHP handling at last!). Pity the site publishing supports only FTP and HTTP. Would be nice to publish to another drive share. Still, it is better than Mozilla Composer.
I'm interested to find out what happens to the Composer (Mozilla Editor) component. Will this be avialable as a stand alone programs like Firefox and Thunderbird? I often recommended it as a free WYSIWYG editor. IIRC Nvu depends on a Mozilla installation anyway, at least for Linux.
The reason the ozone holes form above the poles and not directly above the CFC source regions is due to the very cold atmospheric conditions at the poles.
Source
It should serve as a lesson to you that your actions can have effects beyond your backyard.
Most scientists I know recognise that there are "natural" components to phenomena such as the ozone holes (eg volcanic aerosoles) and global warming. The concern is that human activities may exacerbate the effects and that the rate of change may be much faster than would otherwise be the case.
If you ever wonder what affect humanity's actions have on the world and our society, look at the ruined land due to salinity in Australia.
If New Zealand is Middle Earth, then Australia is where Frodo and co sailed off to at the end of LOTR. They were subsequently interned as boat people.
Don't blame the techs. They didn't write the press release (but I passed on your comments to the person that did - so hurtful!).
Sorry! Can't make it into work today. My car has a virus.
I met mine on efnet in 93 (on #romance). Haven't been back on IRC for years. Too many closed servers.
I find your sig:
Drug prohibition laws help fund terrorism.ironic as, in Australia, the Salvation Army is one of the main opponents to drug law change. I refuse to give money to them due to the conservative meddling in politics and non-secular policies.
Could this be the answer to the World's energy needs? Imagine cities powered by software upgrades...
Can Microsoft match that?
Work from home! Guaranteed income! Help Australians produce more offspring! Even the Prime Minister of Australia agrees that this is the business of the future!
By distributing our herbal viagra will ensure that all Aussie men can perform their duties (remember one for yourself, one for your wife, and one for the country!).
And vote Liberal for bigger erections!
Yours truly,
John Winston Howard
--This email has been authorised by George W Bush--
I agree especially with your point 3. I lived in a rural area for seven years in between residing in cities and now I feel uncomfortable returning there due to the monoculture that exists there. I like having a variety of people, ideas and cultures around me.
I can see that my family, who still live in the country, have become somewhat ossified with their perspectives on the world outside their small community. That fear of change can lead to anger and persecution to those who want (or just are) different.
In other breaking news, Bill Gates has contracted Derek Zoolander to model wearable computers at a fashion show to be attended by the Malaysian Prime Minister.
Modern computing adverts compelling? Maybe the rendered graphics for gaming equipment, but not ads in general. Maybe it's just me choking with cynicism at Microsoft home user and HP ads (HP innovation? Now?), but MS .Net and IBM ads are simply lame. The only people that they could possibly compel is a PHB with no brain (okay, so there a quite a few of them around). They don't even bother to translate them from American here in Aus.
The only thing they compell me to do is throw up.
Hang on, Howard is also against innovation so he should be supporting the DMCA. After all, it's not like anything good has been invented since the 50's. :)
John Howard will also listen to you if you tell him what he wants to hear. That's how the public service now works!
I regard Spielberg's Empire of the Sun as the best book to movie conversion I have ever seen. I thought that Stoppard's script captured the essence of the story, the reflections on the good and bad of each of the cultures. I was also astonished to see Ballard's vivid descriptions of China appear on the screen just as I had imagined them.
That said, I would love it if Spielberg's favourite actors, the Toms, Hanks and (now) Cruise, gave up "acting" for ever.
See this for the original Slashdot story. The press release is at the Australia Telescope National Facility website.