And So This Is New Years. . .

As 2013 draws to a close, I find myself in a melancholy mood.  There have been some big changes in my life of late--maybe I'll tell you all about them one day soon.  I can't say the year has turned out badly, but I can say that, one year ago, I wouldn't have expected to be where I am now.  And I can scarce imagine where I'll be one year from now.

I started this blog about five years ago, as a sort of new year's resolution, in fact.  And somehow, over the years, I have acquired 39 followers--which is about 38 more than I ever expected to have.  And to all those who have read anything I've written, I'd just like to say thanks.  Whether you've ever left a comment or not, the thought of people out there--wherever "out there" is--actually caring to take a couple of minutes a day to read my random ramblings has actually kept me doing this.  So you have no one but yourselves to blame!  But you can also congratulate yourselves on helping to facilitate that rarest of feats: the KEPT New Year's Resolution.

It's the Least We Can Do

Going into the 2014 midterm elections, many Democratic Party strategists think a proposal to raise the federal minimum wage will provide a potent source of ammunition in campaigns against Republicans.  The minimum wage, currently $7.25 an hour, was last raised in 2009, and President Obama has proposed that the wage should gradually increase to $10.10 an hour by 2015; in fact, if the minimum wage had simply been indexed to inflation since the late 1960s, then it would currently be just over ten dollars an hour.  Among the electorate, the idea of raising the minimum wage enjoys broad--and bipartisan support.  Many Republican lawmakers, however, claim that raising the federal minimum will hurt small businesses.

For those GOP politicians who resist raising the minimum wage, I have a question: You claim that cutting taxes on the wealthy--supply-side economics--makes fiscal sense.  You claim that the benefits of allowing the wealthy to keep more of their own money will "trickle down" to the general population through, say, greater investment in productive activities--which leads, theoretically, to increased employment and a more vibrant economy overall.  The metaphor frequently invoked to describe this situation is that "a rising tide lifts all boats."

So my question is this: Why does this boat-lifting rising tide come only from putting more money in the hands of those who already have significant fortunes?  Wouldn't putting more cold hard cash in the pockets of those who have less similarly cause some minor flooding along the shores of the American economy? 

The Singularity Approaches!

An article in today's Times explains that, in the next year, "learning" computers will become commercially available.  The cutting-edge software in these computers is modeled on the human nervous system.  By imitating the human brain's ability to develop new neural pathways in response to external stimuli, these computers will effectively "learn" from their mistakes, thus eliminating (or at least greatly reducing) the need for reprogramming.

The breakthrough moment? "Google researchers were able to get a machine-learning algorithm, known as a neural network, to perform an identification task without supervision. The network scanned a database of 10 million images, and in doing so trained itself to recognize cats."

From that point on, computer scientists posed ever-more-challenging identification problems to these learning computers, which demonstrated exponential improvement.  The computer quickly identified
images of George Clooney:

And Gwyneth Paltrow:

The computer had no problem with historical figures, either, as this picture of Benjamin Disraeli proves:

And finally, when tasked with procuring an image of the Grand Canyon, the computer responded in a matter of nanoseconds:

Truly, the future is upon us!

Friday Miscellany

In their Super-Bowl winning 1986-87, the New York Giants adopted a strange custom: At the end of victories, shortly before the final whistle, team members would sneak up on coach Bill Parcells and dump upon him the contents of a Gatorade cooler.  I've never understood why drenching one's coach with icy, fruit-flavored water--particularly on wintry northeastern afternoons--was considered an appropriate celebratory gesture, but Parcells never seemed to mind, and this ritual was soon adopted by other teams.

Nowadays, you don't see many NFL teams douse their coaches anymore, but the Gatorade bath is still a fixture at the college level.  At the end of games, victorious college coaches can expect to get wet.  Which got me to thinking: As far as I know, no team has ever gone on to lose a game after its coach has been drenched with Gatorade.  A sure-fire winning strategy, then, would seem to be for a team's players to pour Gatorade all over the coach as soon as possible!  If I were ever hired as a college coach, therefore, I would insist on being deluged right after the coin toss!  Championship guaranteed!

(I believe the University of Texas is looking for a new coach.  Longhorns, call me!)

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An article on the diversity of the New York Police Department reports that ""officers hail from Albania to Yemen," to which I say, simply, Yo, Zambia, WTF?  Get with the program!

Just Another Day at Solipsist Central (Workplace Edition)

COLLEAGUE OF SOLIPSIST: You know, next semester, we have a lot of new stuff happening. 

SOLIPSIST: I know, but it's OK.  We know exactly what we need to do, so everything will work out fine.

COS: You hope.

SOL: No, it's like that old saying, "The best laid plans of mice and men always work out just fine."

COS: Uh, yeah.

SOL: "Man plans, God gives man exactly what he planned on."

COS: You should probably check those quotes.

SOL: I'm not going to do that.

Seasons Greetings

As a non-practicing member of the Jewish faith, I have never had particularly strong feelings one way or the other about Christmas.  I've always appreciated the festive mood that comes over people--particularly when I lived in New York, and the city seemed to unwind slightly from its normal state of aggravated frenzy.  But ultimately Christmas is just another day to hang out and, perhaps, enjoy a movie and Chinese food.

Today, in a change of pace, I'm gorging on basketball.  Five--count 'em, FIVE--games, back to back to back to back.  Uh, to back.  As I watch, I also find myself thinking about my stepfather.  He passed away several years ago, but I can't help but think how much he would have enjoyed this.  He was a huge basketball fan, and, though he would no doubt have been pained by the lackluster performance of the local New York teams, such a glut of games would have seemed like quite the Festivus miracle.

Anyway, however you are all celebrating your holiday--whether "holy" or not--I hope you're having a good time.  Happy holidays, everyone!

If You Could Change History, Would You??

Just finished reading 11/22/63, Stephen King's contribution to the ever-developing legend of the JFK assassination.  For those of you unfamiliar with the novel, it focuses on Jake Epping, who travels back in time from 2011 to the late 1950's, with the intention of preventing Lee Harvey Oswald from assassinating JFK.  For those of you unfamiliar with the story of the Kennedy assassination, I can't help you--although I will suggest that King's novel provides a better primer than Oliver Stone's conspiracy-happy "JFK."

I highly recommend the book: It's one of King's trademark tomes--nearly 850 pages long--that you can just get lost in for hours on end.  What makes the book special, though, is it's unpredictability.  That is, even if you assume that King will ultimately provide a relatively happy ending (for all that he deals in horror, his novels are seldom tragic), in this particular novel, you cannot be sure what a happy ending is.  Do we want Jake to prevent Kennedy's assassination?  Will that make the world better or worse?

Far be it from me to answer that question: Read the book yourself to find out.