Merry whatever you’re celebrating!

“Son, when you get to the hotel room…Call me”

Hours later he gets to the hotel room with his beautiful blushing bride and he calls his father,

“Dad, we are the hotel, what do I do?”

“O.K. Son, listen up, take off your clothes and get in the bed, then she should take off her clothes and get in the bed, if not help her. Then either way, ah, call me”

A few moments later…

“Dad we took off our clothes and we are in the bed, what do I do?”

O.K. Son, listen up. Move real close to her and she should move real close to you, and then… Ah, call me.”

A few moments later…

“DAD! WE TOOK OFF OUR CLOTHES, GOT IN THE BED AND MOVED REAL CLOSE, WHAT DO I DO???”

“O.K. Son, Listen up, this is the most important part. Stick the long part of your body into the place where she goes to the bathroom.”

A few moments later…

“Dad, I’ve got my foot in the toilet, what do I do?”

http://creativity-online.com/?action=news:article&newsId=131583&sectionId=rate_the_ad

That kid is awful!

Jason, I pop in like you do, every now and then to see if anyone’s chatting. I’m really glad you, Zan, and Ryan responded… I still have hope too! I miss Zan and Jana.

Hope springs eternal right?

I hope so.

Best to you two and the muffin tot,
Your biggest fan in Texas,
Curtis.

I have been very fortunate to secure employment recently, so my free time has gone from 98% to nil.

Otherwise, I’d create a clip show/mashup out of your old episodes, just to keep us Uncled up until your return!

Best,
Vibeeen (la la la)

Cheers.

Tvindy, the problem with Twitter is that it requires you to be hanging around a computer all day. Caring for a baby doesn’t really make that possible. I could use Twitter while at work, but that would mean I wouldn’t be working.

To be honest the whole idea of Twitter has always horrified me; I don’t even like having a mobile phone on me all the time.

I’ve been with you since the begining and hope you’ll find the time to make it back.

Glad to know that everything’s okay and thanks for the update.

In the meantime, why don’t you set up a Twitter account, so we can keep tabs on you?

I too questioned the usefulness of some products. At the end of the day, though I may find a plastic container for eggs a waste of money, someone may see storing eggs this way a great idea. You can’t wash a cardboard egg container if an egg cracks and seeps onto it - but you can wash a plastic one! I’ve seen products in the catalogue that I could buy much cheaper from the $2 shop. But, when I look at the cost it would cost me to travel into town and get a refund or replacement when a product craps out, the value of buying products through Penny Miller ring through loud and clear. How many times have you bought a $2 Shop item that carried a 90 Day Money back Guarantee and 12 month replacement Guarantee?

Companies grow with time and success and failure affects the best and worse companies. The one’s that survive, are the companies who care enough to learn from their mistakes and are vigilant in improving their services or products. As for Lee, I have no idea who you are, but if you truly are a rip off, fraudulent and arrogant prick, it’s time to change your tune. The catalogues are a great product so look after those Area Managers and Distributors, because you’re foolish to think they can’t hit top sales selling for other companies. It takes a little bit more than a great catalogue to stay on top.

I watched “Chopper” the other night and thought of my pals down under.

In the meantime I turned 40 a couple months ago so Jana owes me a big birthday wish.

Greets to my fellow BYU devotees

How about a 5-minute mini-episode?

We’re really sorry for the silence, guys. Jana’s gone back to work part time, which has put a real crunch on our free time (and we didn’t have that much of it before). I’m working full time and doing some child minding, meaning that I usually have at most half a day off a week, so producing a show is beyond us at the moment. Hopefully things will settle down a bit before too long and we’ll get back on track, but I can’t say when that’s likely to happen.

We miss talking to you guys, and hope we’ll be back on deck soon.

To kick it off, may I propose this Orthodox Jewish one concerning toilet paper:
http://tinyurl.com/2xaybn

Aww, that made my day.

http://news.smh.com.au/jockey-alleges-abuse-at-melbourne-stable/20080227-1v9q.html

http://www.brazilianismspodcast.com

By the way, is it appropriate for me to use the comment space here to shamelessly promote my new podcast? If so, then everyone should go check out the Brazilianisms Podcast.

Thanks for the material; we do want to do a show soon, it’s just that things have been pretty busy for us. Next weekend is the Muffintot’s first birthday party, so we may not make it then, but if not then we’ll definitely try for the week after.

Zebulon, in answer to your Live question, the idea is that you have a collection of loops for individual tracks which you can start and stop in realtime to create music on the fly. Presumably you’ve already selected the loops because they go together well. You can also trigger them as collections of loops (e.g. grouped as ‘verse’ and ‘chorus’ or whatever), but you might mix and match them in new ways, just like a DJ creating a new juxtaposition of material from two different records. You can also have some audio just coming through headphones, rather than the speakers, so you can check if something sounds OK before anyone else hears it. You can also run external vocals or other instruments through it to use it as an accompaniment if you like. Also, a key consideration is that Live can change the tempo of music automatically, so that everything is set to a global tempo regardless of how it started out, and therefore doesn’t turn into a big mess.

There’s a free demo with a demo song on it from the website — it’s fun to play with if you want to know more …

http://www.cracked.com/article_15926_15-most-bizarre-animal-mating-rituals.html

Animals are incredibly filthy creatures.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7254523.stm

I always imagined it took ages to put tracks together, piling instruments on one at a time, adjusting them individually to finally achieve the desired effect. If so, surely a more unwieldy stage instrument is difficult to imagine?

Or did they just mean you can use it as mixer to play back stuff you have already recorded?

Zan, would you ever consider using Ableton Live on stage?

Zan, it’s been years since I read Jayne’s book, but if I recall correctly, he was arguing that the switch from bicameral to modern was an extreme cultural change. He argued that the physical differences in brain structure were caused by nurture, not the other way around. And he speculated that radical differences in nurture might be capable of triggering other physical changes as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Gunderson#Gil_Gunderson

“Making things with wood”. Snigger. Maybe you could fashion protective cases for iPods?

On second thoughts, maybe not. Some time ago we had a visit from a salesman from a company that made very high quality wooden cases for mixer desks in studios, opera houses and so on.

He had been sent to try to sell our company high quality wooden cases for our PCs. We told him that they cost far more than the PCs did, we changed our PCs every few years, and anyway nobody much cared what they looked like. He replied despairingly “Everybody I visit says that.”

Yeah, we’ve been slack with the shows. Things have been very busy around here lately (and not because we’ve been watching tennis, either). Zebulon should be proud to hear that I’ve mostly been occupied setting up a workshop and making things with wood, something I’ve been threatening to do for a long time.

In response to your two point about Amateur Cognitive Science:

Firstly, the point that I was trying to make isn’t that we can’t or don’t see things through others’ eyes, but rather that this isn’t something that we always employ, or even need to employ in order to relate to people. If I lie to someone, I want a particular outcome and so come up with a conception of how they would respond to a certain piece of information. However, I don’t believe that I need to do this in order to understand that someone is angry with me, or that I’ve hurt their feelings - I can understand these things without having to develop a theory concerning what’s going on inside the other person’s head (even if this is more a hardwired simulation rather than a conscious theory). I can respond naturally to things like expression and body language without having the faintest idea what’s going on in their head. So the the idea of a ‘theory of mind’ I think refers to something real, but I don’t believe that, without it, people seem like objects whose inner states are completely lost on you.

Secondly, with the bicameral mind thing, who knows? I have no real way of knowing how the brain of someone in the Bronze Age worked. Still, I think there are some big gaps in the theory. Most importantly, if something physically did change in the human brain at the time, we simply have no material evidence of it. Of course we couldn’t under the circumstances, but without that evidence it’s a pretty big jump. The other point gets down to nature versus nurture. That old chestnut is being worked through with increasing effectiveness these days as our understanding of things like genetics and neurology increases, although there’s still a lot left to figure out and our tradition of research, which segregates the sciences and humanities and works to ensure that people on one side know pretty much nothing about what’s going on on the other, is a major impediment to progress. Anyway, I think the kind of change Jaynes talked about can be much more easily and economically explained with nurture rather than nature given the lack of evidence for physical change. Your example about changing understandings of love further illustrates this point: no-one is claiming that there must have been some change in the architecture of the human brain to explain this, or that modern westerners have brains that are constructed differently from people in other cultures who don’t understand love the same way. History is actually littered with major changes in how human beings perceive themselves and the world around them, and this results from the evolution of culture, not the human brain.

I’ve wanted to write a reasoned reply to the recent Amateur Cognitive Science, but I haven’t re-auditioned it yet. So, I’ll fall back to my main point, and rely on my admittedly flawed memory.

I was really surprised you feel it’s unusual and rare for people to perceive things through other’s eyes. It’s how I consciously live, in an attempt to connect more fully with the important people in my life. And I think it’s more common than you might believe.

Don’t agree? I think this “reverse projective identification” (yep, I’m a psych major) is inborn. When Muffintot is around 2 years old, (if she’s like most youngsters) I think you’ll find she begins telling non-truths more and more frequently. Why? She’s able to put herself in your heads, and projecting how you’ll react to answers you don’t want to hear! Amazing stuff, though frustrating.

Perhaps it becomes an unconscious habit in later years, perhaps some lose it completely. Still, I think it’s present in some form for most people. Really!

As far as the bicameral mind book, I can’t dismiss the central theory so easily. One sticking point seems to be what might have triggered the change in people’s brains to elicit self-awareness. Evolution isn’t the only possible answer; it could be something something as simple as a retrovirus that causes the required genes to express themselves. You probably know that human DNA reveals the influence of a few dozen retroviruses, which have reprogrammed bits of what might have been in our genome. In other words, something as simple as an influenza epidemic (which have roamed the globe freely as recently as the last century) could have far-reaching effects.

One fascinating parallel is that that last generation or two are among the first to equate happiness and love. In the US 50 years ago, and moreso in earlier times, marriages were about duty and raising the generation; contentment and mutual emotional support (and good sex) were outside consideration. It was a secretive time, as severe physical punishment (which would be easily a criminal offense today) was very common and considered the husband’s prerogative, even duty. How times have changed!

Granted, chances are the book is grasping at straws. Still, it’s important to try and form opinions based on the possibilities as far as we can conceive them, instead of pm intuition. At least, as a scientist, that’s what I’ve been trained to do as best I can.

So, on a less serious note, when will you be back? Are you busy watching the Australian Tennis Open in your backyard in Melbourne? I would be!

Best,
-V

Whilst browsing it I came across this:

The Buck Roger’s line was not met with much enthusiasm. The 12 inch Buck figures are now mostly famous for always being zombie grey. There are rumors that Mego knew they had a problem with migration (the process where the vinyl of the head degrades the pigment it was mixed with resulting in a grey corpse-like face with a slimy feel to it) and chose to do nothing about it for financial reasons.

Anxiously awaiting the next episode.

And Kevbo, how could I forget micronauts? They were definitely a favourite of mine, although I didn’t have anything more elaborate than the figures. I seem to remember one with detachable wings …

“Speed up their PC by 50% and they’ll remember you for a day. Slow it down by 50% and they’ll remember you for ever.”

In other words, happiness writes white.

It was the French author Henri de Montherlant, 1896 - 1972, who coined it - “Happiness writes white. It does not show up on the page”.

You may be interested in the following, culled from his biography:

He was old French aristoracy and a fairly prolific war and novel writer after being wounded in World War I. In 1960 Montherlant was elected a member of the Académie française. His presentation speech dwelt mercilessly on the geography of New Zealand.

In 1970 he was beaten up by some youths causing a serious eye injury, and as a consequence of which he became progressively blind. He committed suicide in 1972, swallowing a cyanide capsule then shooting himself in the head (not a cry for help, then…). He concealed his pederastic tendencies from the public during his lifetime.

I share a lot of the same toy memories as Zan. We must be close in age.

I too wondered who the hell would want an Oscar Goldman doll at the time. It’s the kind of toy Milhouse on the Simpsons would have had.

Did you ever notice in the 70s it seemed popular to suddenly equip the action figure for a character with a campervan or RV? Even if they didn’t have one on their show? Always annoyed me.

I especially loved Micronauts as a kid. I ruled, as I even owned the Battle Cruiser.

In fact, it’s up in the attic. So I still RULE!

Yes, the missing word was “atheist.” Thanks for substituting it. I hate it when that happens. Maybe I should say “atheism writes white!”

I should have submitted my favorite bad gift story, even though it’s a second hand story and it’s not a Christmastime gift. There was a couple in college who had been dating for a while, two years maybe. It was either on their anniversary or Valentines Day that they exchanged gifts, and he gave her a DVD copy of Oceans 11. Not a great gift, but alright. Thing is, it was a used copy. Ouch. Not bad enough? He had already given her a DVD of Oceans 11 earlier that year! Apparently he forgot he did and gave her another one. And that was all she got. That’s gotta hurt. They broke up about a week later.

One more thing. Not to infringe on your or Muffintot’s privacy, but hearing about your trip to the beach made me think maybe it’s time for another picture of the tyke? They grow fast, and I know I’d like to see how she’s grown since the you put the first picture online.

I can’t remember exactly what our one looked like, but it was something along the lines of these. I see one of those illustrated was described as having 10 variations of pong, and that was the kind of improbable number I remember, although I’m sure the one we were talking about didn’t have cartridges you could change over. There was no escape from the remorseless parade of pong and pong-derivative games!

Completely off topic to this episode, I just wanted to note that one of the news releases about the British Queen going to YouTube ends by using the expression Bob’s your uncle!

Big episode!

Happy whatever anyone is celebrating.

I’m glad you brought up kangaroo meat, as I’d meant to inquire about that.

Since it’s already Xmas there, don’t tell me what presents I’ve received. I want to enjoy the surprise.

Wow, over an hour and a half! I can tell this is gonna be a good one.

Speaking of Ho Shit, the person credited in the Jackie Chan movie, someone asked, don’t they know what their name means?

This link, http://youtube.com/watch?v=NZ3P-S9LBKA , goes to a YouTube video of a Wang commercial. Wang Laboratories was a company based in nearby Lowell, Massachusetts, USA. In the 1970s they made calculators and then PC-compatible computers, later concentrating on word-processing. They were very successful, and widely known, at least in the US.

Of course, “Wang” came from the company’s founder, Dr. An Wang. Even so, it was a frequent source of ribald jokes. One I still recall was spoken by a high school friend who, after a few hours of frustrating work with his calculator, said, “Yeah, I just spent the morning beating on my Wang.”

My worst Christmas present ever was a packet of home brand (black & gold to be specific) paper table napkins from my then partner’s mother. Total value…$1.09. I already knew that she hated me but having to open it in front of everyone so that they all knew too made for a memorable Christmas day.

However, I always call it a “green light” when describing it to other people though, as otherwise I sound like an idiot…

We tried to do a show last night (which would have featured congratulations); however, after I’d laboriously set up all the equipment and everything we had to abort because the Muffintot simply wouldn’t go to sleep. She’s teething, and we couldn’t get her to settle; she wound up sitting on the couch with us watching TV until we went to bed. We’re having people over tomorrow, so it’s highly unlikely we’ll get to do a show then, but hopefully we’ll be able to do one during the week next week.

By the way, that article about the Greek’s way of looking at color was extremely interesting. I wonder how much of the difference between them and more modern cultures has to do with the fact that we have much more control nowadays in the production of specific colors. Every child has had the experience of mixing red and blue playdough to make purple (or eating red and blue playdough to get purple poop). Probably once there was a substantial palette of colored paints that could be mixed in endless ways, people may have become more aware of the abstract concept of color.

This is a good explanation: http://www.cs.utk.edu/~mclennan/Byrne-Hilbert.html

The Greeks definitely had the colour purple. It was made from murex shellfish, and is mentioned in texts back to about 1600 BC.

I saw a UK history TV programme recently where they made purple the ancient way - “the first time it has been made like this since the early Middle Ages”.

It was a revolting process; stinking rotting fermented marine snails two weeks dead, bucket-full after bucket-full, being crushed up and passed through seives by hand. The presenters were gagging quite often! But at the end of the process the cloth was dyed a lovely colour, deep bright purple.

Did you ever hear of the idea that the ancient Greeks couldn’t see the color purple? That always seemed unlikely to me.

I just like to ponder the timing of our civilization’s great ideas and wonder, why didn’t that come out a century earlier? Did this thinker or that one simply have a better press agent?
—-

I love those moments when the result of a question or a forgotten fact just pops up so you can blurt it out. It happens to me with names of actors and actresses. A question will be asked, I’ll think it over vigorously for several minutes and drop it. But a couple hours later, with no conscious contemplation on my part… the name just comes out of my mouth.

Wish I could intentionally set my core2duo brain to work on matters while I go on with my daily routine.

Anyway, who’s to say that the lack of integration and relative independence of the hemispheres isn’t an important part of human capacities now, without which we would have achieved much less? After all, phenomena like inspiration result from the fact that most of what goes on in our own brains is entirely lost to our conscious minds, so that sometimes things come to our conscious attention seemingly out of nowhere.

I’m always intrigued by the advancement of thought/knowledge over history, i.e. why did some of man’s greatest philosophical achievements/thoughts come into being when they did?

The advance of scientific knowledge is intriguing too, to a certain extent, but it seems more cumulative and driven by environment than philosophy.

So as suggested in BYU, I always imagined the formation of the corpus callosum could have been an important impetus behind our “modern” intellect, our path from Socrates to Sartre etc., That biological meeting of hemispheres was a gateway to innovation it would seem.

So what will we be able to imagine, formulate, contemplate with a more complete bridge between hemispheres, say, a couple thousand years from now?

Possibly related to the Retarded Stranger?

It is also reported to be significantly larger in musicians than non-musicians, and to be slightly larger in left-handed people than right-handed people.

10% of people are left-handed. Does cutting the corpus callosum in left-handed people have the same effect as for right-handed people? Or have other functions swapped hemispheres?

http://www.snopes.com/science/coriolis.asp

Zan, I haven’t knowingly seen any Swedish furniture in Latin America.