atoms into suns

When you can't tell if someone's malicious or just inept, it's time to get someone else to do the job.

Me: <reading over Bill's shoulder> "Tens of thousands to be homeless for months." Where do you put tens of thousands of homeless people?

Bill: In a Superdome!

Me: Yeah, but football season's starting up in a month or two. And we all know football's more important than homeless people.

Bill: coughSarcasmcough

Me: Well? Can you see them cancelling the football season so they can use the stadium to house homeless people?

Bill: No, but they'll probably tax all the homeless people to repair the Superdome.

Me: Hang on, I want to listen to this.

Small Child: Why?

Me: Something awful happened today.

Small Child: What?

Me: <pause> Some people killed and hurt a bunch of people in London.

Small Child: Why?

Me: <long pause> I don't know.

Small Child: <pause> Let's snuggle.

A bunch of news items have grabbed my attention recently, so I figured I'd clump them all together here.

Researchers tested drugs on foster kids

By JOHN SOLOMON
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Government-funded researchers tested AIDS drugs on hundreds of foster children over the past two decades, often without providing them a basic protection afforded in federal law and required by some states, an Associated Press review has found.

The research funded by the National Institutes of Health spanned the country. It was most widespread in the 1990s as foster care agencies sought treatments for their HIV-infected children that weren't yet available in the marketplace.

The practice ensured that foster children - mostly poor or minority - received care from world-class researchers at government expense, slowing their rate of death and extending their lives. But it also exposed a vulnerable population to the risks of medical research and drugs that were known to have serious side effects in adults and for which the safety for children was unknown.

What?!?!? Have we lost all sense of scientific ethics? Back when the story about researchers feeding mentally retarded kids radioactive cereal in the 1940s and 1950s came out, I thought that that sort of thing couldn't happen nowadays. Once again my faith in humanity takes a beating.

Do games and bad UIs account for rising IQs?

In this month's Wired, Steven Johnson talks about the fact that IQ scores have been on the rise for decades now, and seem to be accelerating. IQ testing companies need to "re-normalize" their tests every couple years, making them harder so that the average score remains about 100. There's lots of controversy over what, if anything IQ results mean, but Steven makes the point that IQ tests are certainly measuring something. Moreover, the area in which the general population is testing better are those tests that focus on reasoning out puzzles that resemble bad user-interfaces and/or video games.

If IQ scores keep going up, why do SAT scores keep going down? Because we're too busy playing games and programming VCRs and not busy enough reading and doing math? Naaah.

Student Organizes Time Traveler Conference

BOSTON - Attention, time travelers: Amal Dorai hopes you enjoyed the party he's throwing this weekend. Dorai, a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is hosting a Time Traveler Convention on campus this Saturday. Make plans now, because it's the last such party.

This, this is why I lived in East Campus. I miss this kind of weirdness.

Trivia note: In the picture in the article, immediately behind his head is the door I used to go out every day on my way to class! Yay!

I'm tired of divisive politics, I'm tired of bad news, I'm tired of lies, I'm tired of complete lack of trust and faith in others, I'm tired of people being killed and maimed and giving away their freedoms and growing more desperate. People can't even buy crappy furniture without mortal peril. The good things are overshadowed by the offensive, inane, and awful.

As a Baha'i, I know that things will get better. I also know things have to get worse first, but I keep wondering if we're ever going to hit bottom. Every time I think we must be about there, the bottom drops again. We're down the rabbit hole, and frankly, it scares the crap out of me.

We have but to turn our gaze to humanity's blood-stained history to realize that nothing short of intense mental as well as physical agony has been able to precipitate those epoch-making changes that constitute the greatest landmarks in the history of human civilization.

Shoghi Effendi, World Order of Baha'u'llah, pg. 45

The long ages of infancy and childhood, through which the human race had to pass, have receded into the background. Humanity is now experiencing the commotions invariably associated with the most turbulent stage of its evolution, the stage of adolescence, when the impetuosity of youth and its vehemence reach their climax, and must gradually be superseded by the calmness, the wisdom, and the maturity that characterize the stage of manhood. Then will the human race reach that stature of ripeness which will enable it to acquire all the powers and capacities upon which its ultimate development must depend.

Shoghi Effendi, World Order of Baha'u'llah, pgs. 201-202

I've decided to go on a news fast. I'm becoming more and more negative and cynical, and I don't like it.

(For the record, I'm not depressed. I don't do depressed well, but I am very good at being grumpy.)

My hope is that by avoiding the bad stuff for a while I can get my shiny happy outlook back, but either way, I know I need to do something. I've been trying to figure out what kind of service I can do with my small children in tow. I haven't figured it out yet, but I think it's time to work harder on coming up with an answer. Ideas are welcome.

Fortunately, immediately after deciding on the news fast, I found My Little Golden Book about Zogg (via Making Light). Tears of laughter streaming down your cheeks is a good way to start a news fast.