Genius and mad man are alike
The article
Biological Basis For Creativity Linked To Mental Illness (copied from
here) explains
that both the genius and the mad have reduced levels of latent inhibition.
Latent inhibition is the mechanism with which the brain filters out irrelevant
information. People with normal latent inhibition see a tree, and think "tree".
People with low levels of latent inhibition notice that the tree has an odd
shape, and that the leaves on one side are already getting brown, while they are
still green on the otherside. So the same mechanism that make some creative,
drives others mad. One of the authors,
Jordan B.
Peterson, also wrote an interesting book about meaning.
Yesterday, Annabel won with ten
stones against a third Dan player starting with five stones ahead. He remarked
that he played easy on her, but that she is getting better. She lost the other
two games she played against him. I only played one game against Daan, which I
lost with about 25 points. From the start of the game it was one fiercy fight on
life and death. I like to lose games, because playing against stronger players
is the best way to improve your play. I also notice that certain moves, which I
can still make while playing against Annabel, are immediately punished when
playing against stronger players. I guess that often stronger players can win
from weaker players because they can take more risky moves, because the weaker
players doesn't know how to responds to these, and thus can make more
territorium. Of course, stronger players are also better at assessing what is
the gain of each possible move.
Yesterday, Dutchwoman Leontien Zijlaard-Van Moorsel has
demolished the
Women's Hour Record, with a stunning ride of 46.065 kilometers on the track
in Mexico City. They day before, she told during an interview, that it she had
counted on having her monthly period during the attempt. Apparently, she is
bikes faster while having it.
Mabel Wisse Smit
Mabel
denies she was 'a gangster's moll': Mabel Wisse Smit, the fiancé of
Prince Johan Friso, denied a newspaper report on Tuesday that she had a previous
relationship with Klaas "De Dominee" Bruinsma when she was fully aware he was a
major drug dealer.
It seems that we are into another complicated situation with a (future)
member of the royal family. I still believe that there are benefits from a
monarchy above a republic. A royal family is in the first place a family with
the kind of problems a family usually has. But they are a public family, and
marriages have to sanctioned by laws. I am afraid this marriage might not be
granted, except if Prince Johan Friso abstains his royal rights. He is the third
in the line of royal heirs.
At the moment the political discussion is about whether Mabel and Klaas had a
close friendship (Dutch: relatie), as Mabel has admitted, or that it was sexual
relationship (Dutch: liefdesrelatie), as has been suggested by a former body
guard of Klaas.
(follow-up with important declaration)
Collecting chestnuts
Yesterday, Annabel spend about one and half
hour collecting chestnuts in the area
around her school. Then she spend almost an hour to crack all the chestnut
covers that had not opened by themselves. She said that these are of the kind
that you can eat. We will see.
Today, Li-Xia and I are married for ten years.
I can't believe that the time has gone that fast. During the lunch I went to buy
ten red roses. Tonight, I will order some Chinees dishes, including a dish with
jumbo shrimps for her. Next weekend we will
stay at a cottage of Centerparcs to
celebrate this anniversity and the birthdays of Andy
and Annabel.
Mabel Wisse Smit (Cont'd)
Today, Ottolien Lels, the friend of Mabel Wisse Smit declared that not Mabel but she
was the girl-friend of Klaas Bruisma (the first Dutch Godfather). She also
declared that the statements made by Mabel are correct. It looks like Charlie da
Silva, the former body guard of Klaas, has been mixing people up. Ottolien also
declared that she was not aware of the extend of the criminal activities of
Klaas, because he kept her far from all his businesses. Klaas Bruinsma was a
well known sponsor of sailing contests, and Ottolien Lels worked for a company
organizing such contests. It was through Ottolien that Mabel came in contact
with Klaas. Ottolien affirmed that Mabel did stay some nights at his yacht, but
never alone with him.
(follow-up)
Today, it is Andy's sixth birthday. It
seems he finally going to understand what the concept of a birthday means. When
you ask him how old he is, he counts to six. This morning, he got two toy
instruments: a wooden guitar and a wooden xylophone. The wooden guitar is really
crap. I failed to tune it. The wooden xylophone is okay. The bars are painted in
rainbow colors and the tune seems okay. Andy too favored the xylophone, although
last year December he was crazy about a plastic toy guitar that he got. It is
always a guess which presents a child is going to like and which not.
In the evening, I found out that there are some screws on the nobs. After I
might them a little thighter, the nobs would no longer go back by themselves
and tuning became possible. I still had problems tuning it, but that might
have been caused by the fact that I did not know how to tune a guitar.
Cargobike
This morning, I was taken over by someone riding a
Cargobike,
carrying his baby (daughter, I guessed) in a maxi-cosy.
The report
"Danger On Chromosome 15 -- Unstable Region Yields Genes For
Prader-Willi/Angelman Syndromes And Spastic Paraplegia"
explains that in some cases it does matter from how you receive
the defect. Prader-Willi and Angalman Syndromes are caused by
the same genetical defect, but depending on whether you received
it from your mother or your father you get one or the other syndrome.
To make things more complicated, it was not said that the mothers
carry a genetical defect but that they suspect the mothers carry
some sort of contributing factor on their chromosome.
(follow-up)
Finite universe
The article
Dodecahedral space topology as an explanation for weak wide-angle
temperature correlations in the cosmic microwave background,
seems to suggest that the universe is flat but finite.
Here is an
interesting
animation of this topology (if I am not mistaken).
(Also featured on
Slashdot
where someone posted a link to another interesting picture.)
Eemhof
We arrived just after five o'clock at the Eemhof.
We took a road that according to the signs was closed. Right before
the enterance of the Eemhof their was a road block, but I
managed to drive past it with little trouble. Checking in
did take some time. It was around seven when we started to
have dinner (which we already had prepared yesterday).
Annabel wanted to go swimming,
so I went togetter with her. We immediately tested the
wild water course. I have to say that it is nicer than
the one at "De Heidebos". It is less wild, so you can just
follow it till the end. At one point they had to close it
due to some technical problems.
On the news they reported that Prince Johan Friso and Mabel Wisse Smit
have written a letter to the government in which they admit that they
purposely did not tell the full truth about the relationship between
Mabel and Klaas Bruinsma (the first Dutch Godfather). Mabel did have
a close friendship with Klaas for three months, something they did not
reveal when talking to the Queen and the prime minster earlier this
year. They admitted it was rather naive from them to think that they
could keep it hidden. It was also reported that our prime minster, Jan
Peter Balkenende, already decided to drop the special marriage law a week
ago. Prince Johan Friso will abstain from his royal right with respect to
the inheritance of the throne. The investigations about the past of
Mabel will continue, because she will still become part of the Royal
family when she does marry.
Family day
Today, we celebrated the birthdays of Annabel
(who will be nine next tuesday) and Andy
(who became six last Tuesday. And also that we have
been married for ten years. All my brothers and
sisters with their families came. First we had some cake, and around
twelve we went to swim. We stayed till around six. Of course, the
wild water course was one of the favourites. At one point I got this
relaxing feeling again of just doing it. You just have to keep doing
it, until you forget how often you did it, and cannot think of any
thing else then jumping into the water and letting yourselve flow
with the water. I also noticed that the magic is easily broken when
you have to watch over your daughter as she goes with you. Annabel
is old enough to go on the water slide, but still a little too young
to go all by herself. Half past seven we went to have dinner, which
took almost two hours. (Andy was staying home with
my mother.)
I jumped in the middle of a movie of a guy in a psychiatric ward
that claimed to be an alien from the planet K-PAX. A great movie,
especially because it is never made clear whether he was or not.
Swimming again
We ended up swimming again. Except for the time that I spend
with Li-Xia in the hot tubs, I only
went on the wild water course. Most of the time together with
Annabel. At the end, my knees
became rather sore, because they kept on hitting again some
of the bumbs in the first part of the course. In the beginning
I mostly went with my legs first, but later on, almost always
with me head first, and some parts I even prefer to do while
laying on my back and my head first.
We watched the movie Beautiful. An interesting movie
about someone who finally realizes what is all about. I think
many people dream about becoming famous, or at least we seek
for recognition in among our peers. And there are so many
ways in becoming famous. I cannot deny that even I have dreamed
about becoming famous in some way.
Gloves
I decided to dig out my cloves
when I noticed that the temperature was 4.8 degrees Celsius this morning. I also
got my Chicago Bulls cap, but took it of when I was
about half way.
I just (12:12 PM) got a random memory about
playing in the field before our home in De Bilt. That must have be around 1965.
One of my oldest random memories, I would say.
Researchers
Discover Genes That Distinguish Human, Nonhuman Primate Brains. If this is
really true, gene therapy might make a chimpanzee as smart as a human person.
Then things would become really interesting when this chimpanzee start showing
signs of a human type of consciousness, for example by asking
the two big questions.
It would certainly raise many religious and ethical debates.
(Maybe Chimps are human after all).
Temperature is dropping
This morning, the cars were frozen and the temperature was about 3 degrees Celsius.
Dune, 7th book
In the past weeks, I have been thinking, discussing, and writing again with
respect to 7th book in
the Dune Chronicals that Frank Herbert intended to write, and that his son Brian
is going to
write together with Kevin Anderson. However, watching the prequels they have
produced so far, great doubts have been raised with respect to how closely they
will follow the "detailed outline Frank Herbert left in a safety deposit box
before his death". Personally, I am afraid they are going to twist this story
to make it fit with all the twists that they introduced in the prequels. I am
not at all interesting in their ideas, but in the ideas that Frank Herbert had
about his final book. I think it is more than reasonable, if they at least some
respect for this great writer, if they would publish the outline as an appendix.
Some people already have suggested that Omious (from the book about the
Butlerian Jihad) is the force in the Scattering that is sending the Honoured
Matres back into the Old Empire. Chaperhouse: Dune makes it rahter clear
that Daniel and Marty (and their kind) are that force. Personally, I also feel
that the story that Brain and Kevin wrote about the Butlerian Jihad does not
match with the suggestions made in the original series written by Frank Herbert.
I am afraid that, although Frank Herbert did leave us many notes, we never
really going to get an idea of what his 7th book was going to be
like.
My office is room H130 on the ground floor of the KCT building
(PostScript map). I am sitting in the corner on the far side of the door
with my face exactly to the North pole.
Is it Fake or Foto
Is it Fake or Foto. I scored nine out of ten. It is not so difficult if you
look at the details.
More advanced is not always cheaper
China space
program shows careful development. It is obvious that the Space Shuttle,
although far more advanced than simple one-time rockets, is still far more
expensive and unreliable than those old time rockets.
Many dynamos and electrical
motors use coal brushes as an essential part. The problem with coal brushes are
that they slowly wear out, and need to be replaced. Luckily, they are also very
cheap parts, except when they cannot be replaced easily. This morning
Li-Xia brought our car to
the garage because yesterday I noticed
that the battery light was on, meaning that the battery is no longer being
charged enough. At the garage she was told that the dynamo was broken and that
it needs to be replaced. They also told that the cost for replacing it with a
revised dynamo is €380. A revised dynamo is used an old dynamo with new coal
brushes. It must be the case that it is cheaper to construct a car if you do not
worry about servicability of parts that wear out in the long run. The next time
when I buy a car, I am going to ask the sales person to calculate the cost for
all parts that are likely to be replaced in the next five years. cheaper to
construct a car, if you do not
Essalam mosque
Yesterday, the first stone
was laid of the new Essalam mosque in Rotterdam. This mosque is going to the
largest in Europe and is financed by a sheikh from the United Arab Emirates and
should be complete in 2005. The sheikh accompanied by a group of women wearing
burqas was present at this ceremony. In the past months the municipality had
pushed for a modern design, but last week the Essalam foundation reported that
they were going to stick to the original design as it had been approved in 1999.
Especially, the large dome and the 50 meter high minarets are considered to be
very Arabian. The mosque has a separate entrance for men and women. Essalam
received a poor rating in a municipal research report, because the did too
little to promote integration.
At the moment the failed integration of immigrants, especially those from a
Muslim background, is a hot topic. At the moment about 5% of the Dutch
population is Muslim, of which a large part are (descendants of) immigrants that
arrived in the past 50 years.
Last week I noticed some rubber bands
as used by the postmen from TPG
post on the street. I decided to pick them up. Since then, I am seeing the
rubber bands everywhere, and almost every day I find one. I have collected seven
of them so far. They are really nice, strong rubber bands that can be used for
all kinds of purposes.
At 17:02 I had a random memory about getting some
lunch with the people of previous employer
after we had heard that the company went bankrupt.
Sorry
This morning the temperature was 0.2
degrees Celsius when I went outside. It is rahter cold for the time of the year.
On my way to the office, I saw a bus whoes destination sign said "Sorry",
which then changed to "out-of-service". There were some schoolkids in the bus.
Snow
It is snowing. Just a very
little, not as much as the weather forcast said yesterday. But still it is snow.
Rather exceptional so early in the year. While I am writing this it starts to
snow stronger, and it looks like it is going to stay on the ground. This
morning, when I left home it was 2.4 degrees Celsius below zero. The leaves of
the trees are also dropping in large quantities.
And on top of this, we just received message that the water supply has been
blocked due to a leakage somewhere at the university campus.
Bread
This afternoon, Andy came to ask for a piece of
bread. I gave him half a slice and he sat before the television watching
a video and picked small crums from the bread. When he had finished he
hat eaten a hole in the shape of a heart.
Mark Verber
Mark Verber. follower of Jesus,
software engineer, and interested in Urumqi.
I got my first "5, Insighful" score on Slashdot for the article
Rational
decision possible, which reads:
Rational decisions are only possible when sufficient reliable and
objective information is available. The kind of decisions that politicians are
facing, generally do not meet these criteria.
The real problem is that we live in a world with limited resources, both
with respect to materials and knowledge. For these reason we tend to listen to
those people that sound convincing. The best way to prevent corruption, is to
prevent concentration of power. (It is a known law that the power attracts the
corruptable.) The main disadvantage of preventing this, is the slowdown of
decision making and the danger of bureaucracy. There is a general tendency for
concentration of power.
It is also true that those that sound convincing often believe that
rational decisions are not possible (because no reliable information does
exists) and that their popularity amongh the masses affirm the correctness of
the decisions they have made.
One could conclude that the qualities of decisions made in any democratic
system can never be greater than the average quality of understanding of the
people in that democracy. That is one of the greatest weaknesses of true
democracy.
(Before, I wrote about the disadvantages
of a two party system.)
This morning it was 6.8
degrees Celsius, so I was forced to take of my cap before I was about half way
to the office, simply because it was getting too hot. Later, I also took of my
gloves.
Yesterday, Annabel
and I went to the Go club. When we arrived there were already some people
watching the only game that was going on (second Dan against fourth Kyu, if I am
not mistaken, with four stones handicap). The crowd grew to six people watching
in the five minutes that followed. When we left almost one and half hour later
the game will still going on. Annabel played three games against one of the new
boys. She lost the first one, but won the other two. Then I played against this
boy, and lost, although I could have easily one. I was not really in shape
yesterday. I also resign the first game, which I played against someone else,
simply because I lost two groups. Annabel played one more game against this
person, which she lost as well. Looks like I am one of the worst players now. I
don't mind losing games, but I wonder whether other like to play against someone
that always loses.
This months interesting links
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Sunday, October 26, 2003