A Curious Statistical Anomaly

So, I’ve got insomnia and I’m catching up on some of the tech sites I haven’t read in a while and I come across an article about a bill being presented by LeRoy E. Myers Jr. that would make it a crime to surf the internet using unsecured wireless networks without permission. The article quotes Myers:

He (Myers) told the House Judiciary Committee that one of his neighbors, after buying a new laptop computer, got onto the Internet, thinking it was through a cable TV hookup.
Actually, the connection was through Myers’ home wireless Internet system.
He said he didn’t want unintentional use like that to be prosecuted the same as computer hacking.
According to the bill, intentional unauthorized access to another person’s computer, network, database or software is a misdemeanor. The penalty is up to three years imprisonment and a fine of up to $1,000.

A quick search of Amazon showed at least a half-dozen books on wireless network and the one shown here is for people who aren’t that techno-savvy but want to set up a home network. I checked the table of contents and there is a section on securing your network. In fact, most of the books with a look inside have a section on securing your network.

We have a home network and it’s secured. No one can use our network unless we put them into the allowed table of MAC addresses and give them the proper security key, or if we intentionally open it up for all users. It’s simple and easy to do. I’ve read about other states trying to pass similar legislation and find it hard to believe that our representatives are so clueless. If you don’t want people surfing by using your wireless network — secure it. Networks left open are assumed to be available for use since they are so easy to secure against outside users connecting.

It’s kind of like McD’s putting those newspapers up by the front counter. It’s assumed because the papers are there and there’s no price on them that they are for people to read and return. At least I’ve never seen anyone pay for using the papers there. On the other hand, in hotels there is prominently displayed price lists by the fridges in the room so that you know if you take something, you will be charged.

All use of an unsecured network is unintentional use, in that I couldn’t use it if you didn’t specifically allow me to. If you don’t want someone using your wireless network Rep. Myers then secure it. Don’t try to penalize others for your lack of attention to detail in such a critical area. It seems that Maryland’s motto should match that of the US — Never take responsibility for your own mistakes, just criminalize anyone who happens to stumble over your mistakes. Isn’t that why whistle-blowers still take the fall for pointing out errors?

For me, thinking can be a pretty exciting trip through my brain which tends to be filled with lots of bit and pieces of fluff I’ve collected over the years. Today, I was doing something — can’t remember what just now, probably thinking about eating a breakfast cupcake (I had cereal instead) — but as clear as clear could be I heard mom telling me to act my age. So, I got to thinking…how do you act your age?

It seems to me that if I’m my age and I’m doing something then I’m acting my age. All my life I’ve had people say either to me or about themselves — I/You can’t do that at your age. Why? If you can do it, why not? I’ve got long hair — or had, it’s growing out again from a donation to Locks of Love — but family members (female) keep telling me that at my age I should have short hair because long hair on a person my age looks silly. Why? If it’s clean and neat and I like it what’s silly about having the length of hair I feel comfortable with.

Personally, I just don’t get this thing about having to curtail activities you like because of some magic age that after or before which you’re not allowed to do this thing. Okay, I get not drinking before you’re of age and not driving before you get your license — those are laws and reasonable ones set up so that reasonable behavior can be expected. But there aren’t any laws that say after age 45 you must have short hair if you are a woman, or no white after Labor Day, or no motorcycle riding after 50, and so on. Who makes up this stuff?

I do know that I can’t do a lot of things I used to do simply because my body isn’t up to it any more. Climbing steep trails is a lot harder than it used to be (arthritis in my knees) but if I take it easy and don’t push I can usually make it to the view at the top. But, the thing is, I pretty much know my limits and I take appropriate (I think) precautions . Same with a lot of other activities — I like a lot of music that I’m told I should not like at my age — again I like it so obviously people my age do like it, or at least some do. I try to not pass judgments on others and expect the same courtesy in return.

But, the real question is where do these rules come from? Who made them up? Did the North Wind forget to blow this knowledge into my ear at the appropriate time. Is there a list? Not that I intend to follow the advice/rules, but it would be interesting to see how many of those shoulds that I’m ignoring at my age.

Yesterday, I got an ad for the Gattaca (Special Edition) DVD. I watched the trailers and spots and got to thinking about the movie and what it says about potential. Originally released on DVD in 1998, the film is about genetic engineering and its effects on society. Once people can have their children engineered to be what they want them to be, very few parents opt to have God children. God children are simply children who have not been engineered and are a random mix of the parent’s DNA. Vincent, a God child, has a dream and does all in his power to achieve his goals in a society that sees him as a lesser human. His younger brother has been engineered and is a police officer. Once, as children, Vincent and his brother had a competition/race — the result has haunted Vincent’s brother. Why? Because, Vincent won. There’s a lot more to the plot of the movie but what I want to discuss is the underlying theme of potential and capacity for growth.

Earlier, my husband and I got to talking about the big fish in a small pond phenomena for students and how it effects their college years. For example, in high school I got decent grade by just going to class and listening to the teacher. I read a lot outside of school and skimmed the textbooks and did the homework (sometimes without actually reading the books). In other words, I never learned how to study because I never had to. Then came college. All the students were smart. I had to read all the assignments, sometimes more than once to understand them because the lectures built on the readings rather than, as they did in high school, simply hit the high/important points of the readings. So, I had to learn to study. First semester was a disaster as I scrambled to keep up, with no clue how to study, outline, highlight material, pick out the important points of a lecture. I was totally lost because I was beyond my native intelligence to where I really had to push to reach my potential.

Now, in Gattaca, everyone is genetically engineered for abilities. There are no interviews for a job, they take a blood sample and see what you are capable of. So, why push yourself to go beyond what you can comfortably do? Why struggle to be more when your DNA has already given you everything and you can’t be more than that anyway.

The key to the movie is someone who pushes to grasp a dream. Someone who knows what they want and is willing to push themselves to the limit to get that dream. There is no magic bullet that can make people better, they have to strive to be better every day. You have to reach beyond yourself and push yourself to achieve. Expecting that you will have, or get, anything you want simple because of who you are or what you are — that is the first step towards a stagnant society. Right now we have a lot of people who feel they deserve things (the thing changes with the person) but they don’t want to work for it because they feel it’s owed. I’m not talking about Equal Rights, that’s just leveling the playing field and erasing the barriers, you still have to work to get the job or whatever. I’m talking about those who feel they are owed just because they exist. I’m sure we all know people who feel they are owned respect, not because they have earned it, but because they are better dressed, richer, more educated, whatever than someone else. On the other hand, there are people who are given respect from others because they just do what they do to the best of their ability while respecting others. Sort of a Golden Rule result.

Everyone has potential. Yes, disabilities can limit the range of opportunities, but there is still potential. On the other hand, there are groups, laws, etc. that limit potential. For example, people on welfare are often not allowed to own cars or can only own a car worth less than a certain amount of money (a clunker lucky to move at all). Therefore, while forcing them off welfare and to find work, they are artificially limited in where they can look and what they can do for work. There are always problems trying to live up to your potential — money, physical defects, environment, education, and location. But usually, there are ways to achieve your dreams against the odds even then.

However, there is little support for those on the lower end of the economic scale to achieve their potential. I have to wonder why. Right now higher education is out of reach for many from middle income to poverty level. Students from poor families are just as likely (and often more likely) to be motivated to succeed in education — yet their potential is limited by income. There’s something wrong with a country that has no real mechanism for those with lower incomes to attend colleges while high income students don’t even have to actually make the grades if daddy can endow a chair or building.

So, maybe it’s money more than DNA that determines potential. It’s a thought anyway.

Every once in a while you come across something that just makes you stand (or sit) and stare with your mouth hanging open. Today, for me, it was looking at a satellite photo of an avalanche that occurred on Mars.

Just think about it for a minute. Today, we got to see a photo of an avalanche that happened on another planet. Not only can we see it but there’s a puff of dust from the avalanche in the photo.

I remember in high school begging to stay up late to see the pictures coming back from our space program. The launches were seen in school on a TV that was brought in for that purpose. Then things seems too ho-hum for constant coverage and even today it’s usually just an item in the news program unless you go to a NASA or other science site to see the news coverage. For example, I didn’t know or didn’t follow up on the Swift Science Satellite program and if I hadn’t seen the link on TechRevu I’d have missed the gorgeous photo of the M33 galaxy (better known as the Triangulum Galaxy).

There is just so much to learn about our world, the universe around us and yet we constantly find conservative lobbies trying to curtail science education in our schools. There’s nothing like seeing an avalanche on another planet in our solar system or other galaxies beyond our own to bring home just how much there is to learn and how far we’ve come to understanding ourselves and our universe.

There seems to be a willingness in this country (the U.S.) to denigrate science and scientists, to glorify sports heros, and honor ignorance. We’ve reduced scholarships and funding for students to attend colleges — in some cases pricing it out of reach of middle as well as low income students. I worked my way through college as well as having a lot of financial aid but from talking with people now and looking at going back for an advanced degree — I really don’t see how many families can afford to send their children to college without taking some drastic steps (like second and third mortgages) that could impact their retirement years.

If the US wants to once again be a leader in the world in science and engineering — it must take educating its people seriously. I remember seeing several years ago a news item where they were talking about American ingenuity and the wonderful breakthrough in science that had been made at an American college. The camera then switched to a picture of the team of students and professor in the lab — guess what? The professor was from the US but all those Ph.D students were foreign students. That’s a fact of life in academia — and until the government and the people become concerned enough to support US students who make the grade as other countries do we’ll continue to sink down into mediocrity.

But meanwhile, I’ll enjoy the wonder of what we have done and have high hopes that our future will see more wonders and insights into our universe.

I heard today that the Virginia Senate passed a law to remove mentally retarded from all public documents and signage — the phrase intellectually damage will be used in its place. I admit that I haven’t followed up on this to make sure it’s correct, but that’s not really important because the point is the PC (politically correctness) of such motions in general. First mentally retarded is an actual definable term (follow the link), however intellectually damaged is not so this is a change for the sake of change not a change for clarity.

[NOTE: Image is from an interesting article “A Politically Correct LexiconYour ‘how-to’ guide to avoid offending anyone” by Joel Bleifuss.]

It seems to me that a lot of the changes in language that are urged upon us in order to stop bias, negativity, and various fill-in-the-blank-isms don’t really make a difference. Over the last several decades many changes have been made but I can’t see that the world is any better for it. Hate is still alive and well and so is bigotry and discrimination. All that’s changed is our words, but the venom and emotion behind those words just moved — now the words may sound nicer but the attached emotional-negativity is still there. While changing language does do a lot in some cases for example changing fireman to fire fighter does make sense because a female fireman — well, it’s just weird. Having the job isn’t weird it’s the verbal label for the job that’s weird — the occupational title should be gender neutral. However, many of the latest changes are just a result of someone somewhere getting their knickers in a twist and thinking if they change the label the problem will go away.

Problems don’t go away when you ignore them, cover them up, hide them, or relabel them. They just go along for the ride and eventually get in your face again. You can’t change discrimination by changing labels — you must change the underlying emotional baggage that causes the problem in the first place.

As Juliet says in Shakepeare’s Romeo and Juliet:

What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;

However, a skunk cabbage labeled a rose is still going to smell to high heaven. It seems that too often we opt for the easy way out of our problems. We stick on a bandaid or give it a nice coat of paint. What we need to start doing is the hard stuff — we need to look at the underlying causes of the problems and deal with them. If you can manage to change things at the bottom the sting will come out of the hurtful words because there won’t be the emotional baggage attached.

So, do we want clarity and change, or just a bandage feel-good effort?

This is a very difficult post to write, in some ways it’s like coming into the open after hiding for years — the proverbial coming out of the closet. Though some people may say all I do is complain, I really try hard not to whine about myself. Remember I said that if I could do a post about living with chronic pain without whining or whingeing I would — this is that post.

A friend sent me a number of links, hoping I’d do a post about fibromyalgia. The first link she sent was an article in the New York Times “Drug Approved. Is Disease Real?” by Alex Berenson. (You’ll need to have an account to read the article but it’s free.) While the article is nominally about Pfizer’s drug Lyrica which has just been approved for use in managing fibromyalgia pain, it mainly insinuates that fibromyalgia is not a disease and that we’re a bunch of whiners who need to suck it up — at least that’s a major part of the subtext. The sugar coating is that maybe fibromyalgia is a problem, but it’s not a disease, and besides no one knows how to identify it or why it happens — not much sugar after the insult.

Fibromyalgia is a real problem that’s faced by many people. You have good days and bad flare days. There are times when you just don’t want to move because the effort and the pain are just too much to face. The problem is that there is no definitive test to take where the results will come back and say, “congratulations you’ve got fibro”. No, it’s a diagnosis that’s usually determined by exclusion. In other words, once they’ve tested you for everything else and haven’t found anything, well, fibro is what’s left and that’s what you got. That’s the reason that it’s so hard to define — since it’s a catchall diagnosis after everything else turned out to be nothing — fibro is probably a lot of different diseases and conditions that have gotten lumped together because they all have the same basic symptoms: pain, tiredness, achiness, and more pain.

The article says that calling it a disease gives people permission to be ill. I beg to differ. What it does is give a person some legitimacy — doctors/medical staff finally start listening to you rather than just marking your folder with whatever code they use for troublesome patients. Yes, we tend to be whiners and complainers to our health providers, who wouldn’t be — we want the pain to stop, if not completely at least for long enough to catch our breath and move on. I had years of being pooh-poohed before fibromyalgia was recognized. Have I changed? No, I’m still me — still coping. But at least now, I have some backing that my list of symptoms are not all in my head.

What I’d like you to do now is read this great essay on what it’s like to live with chronic pain. Written by Christine Miserandino, “The Spoon Theory” is the best way of explaining to those who don’t deal with chronic illness, just how totally chronic pain impacts a person’s life. Everyday, you have things you need to do, things you want to do, and things you hope to do. You balance the needs and wants — hoping that you can maintain a semi-normal life. (Go ahead, take your time then come back and finish this post.)

Back from reading the essay? When you go to the doctors and talk about pain, you’re always asked, “On a scale of 1-10 what would you say your pain is like now?” That question always threw me. I figured that if a 10 was the worst pain there is then I must be a 3 or maybe 4 if it really bothers me. Then I found the Mankoski Pain Scale. This pain scale (the usual 1 to 10) gives examples for each level so that you know how to answer. On this scale a normal, pretty good day, for me, is usually a 4 with occasionally forays to 5. With a migraine or on a bad flare day, it’s probably an 8. I have occasionally been up to a 9 and I don’t like being there — not that anyone would. I print out this pain scale and bring it to my doctor’s appointments so we’re both on the same page when we talk pain. The other problem is that here in the United States, where I live, pain is under-treated. It’s very difficult to convince a doctor to prescribe anything for pain, especially chronic pain, because if they prescribe too many painkillers they can be audited and their licenses suspended. So, most of us just learn to live with it and use the painkillers we do get very, very sparingly (like when you hit an 8 or 9 day).

I don’t look ill so most people don’t realize that I live with chronic pain — well unless it’s a walk-with-a-cane day. Sure, I talk about my allergies — lots of people have those. Sometimes I’ll mention I have migraines, especially if I’m finding it difficult to concentrate while conversing with someone. On the other hand, I finally had to quit my job because there was no opportunity to telecommute — I can work a full day just not 9-5 — I need breaks and sometimes lots of them. I’m lucky I found work I could do at home — freelance writing, copy editing, and proofing. It’s not as much pay as being a computer analyst but it’s a lot less stress and now leaves me with more spoons (if you don’t understand this reference, go back and read the essay) than I used to have so, I can sometimes enjoy going out and being with people — and being normal (for certain definitions of normal).

I’m unabashedly pro-space research and exploration. I think it’s going to be the only way to save this planet. Many people think, or at least tell me, that all we ever got from NASA and the space program is Tang. Don’t kid yourselves, people. We got lots of advances in technology and medicine — things that we might have eventually developed but not as fast as with the impetus of the space program. Companies don’t tend to spend their own money innovating unless there is an identifiable way of getting that money back, and the space program was that initial market that made it all worth while for dozens of goods and technologies we now take for granted.

The problem now is that the United States doesn’t have a space program anymore. Okay, I can hear you saying, “what are you Klondiking about? We’ve got NASA.” Well, you’re right the US still has NASA but we’re not doing anything new or exciting — we’re doing the same old, same old — and holding the line with the status quo. Astronauts are using their personal weight limits to bring up the technology they need to do some jobs because the space rated equipment is old, big, clunky and often barely up to the job. I don’t believe we would have lost as many probes if we’d been upgrading the technology rather than using the older stuff. But, hey that’s just my opinion as an outsider looking into a program I see going nowhere fast. And while I thought the Shuttle was definitely a “horse designed by a committee”, what do we have to look forward to as its replacement? A multi-stage, expendable rocket, with a return capsule that splashes down. We just lost 40 years of innovation. Of course NASA has a 100% record on new spacecraft following onto the shuttle. They’ve canceled 100% of them. So, forgive me if NASA just doesn’t give me the warm fuzzies anymore.

What I do see and what I think is happening is that private enterprise is going to be pushing us forward into space because they can see the need, the impetus for new technology and growth. Case in point — the photo with this entry — Virgin Galactic has just unveiled its plans for SpaceShip Two. It’s innovators like Virgin Galactic, Blue Origin, and others that will take Terrans into space. Of course, the private sector is not without risk. But at least when they’re risking their own money, getting the job done right becomes a higher priority than when the government is taking all the financial risks.

With all the space debris and asteroids coming so close to impacting Earth over the last few years that we’ve been aware of, well, we’ve had some pretty close calls. If we don’t get off this planet someday we just might find ourselves beginning all over again — and that’s only if we’re lucky. If we’re not lucky some other species may become top of the heap for the next go round. There’s evidence enough that Earth has been hit and hit hard at some points in our past — so we needs to get some of our eggs out of this basket (or so the cliché goes).

I’m very excited by these corporate visionaries in the United States and other countries. I just think we could get to some new frontiers sooner with some amazing technology and leaps in science along the way if we once again had a space program with a plan and some vision for the future. Guess, I’ll go wish upon a star.

I’ve noted over the last few years that the United States seems to be taking some very unexpected turns. But with the article in CNN on New Rules on Licenses, I’ve realized that without changing my abode, I’ve ended up living in 1960s USSR.

When I was growing up the Cold War was very hot. People were afraid most of the time: of rock and roll; of hippies; of Cuba; of communists; of nuclear war; and of fear being afraid. I remember hearing in talks among adults, seeing in movies and books, the evils of communism. The biggest one talked about was how citizens couldn’t go anywhere or do anything without (and this last was usually mentioned in a whisper as if it was a dirty word) papers. Guess what. Soon Americans are going to need papers (disguised as a RealID) to travel within their own country. American’s use to pride themselves on not having a National ID, of being able to travel where they wanted, when they wanted, without having people track their every move, library book, and purchase. Personal anonymity use to be a hallmark of our society. We only gave up what we absolutely had to, and only when there was an overriding imperative, because we believed we had the right to be left alone. Those days seem to have passed.

What happened to move us in this direction? Fear. People today are afraid: of terrorists; of strangers; of each other; of immigrants; and, worst of all, of fear itself. Once people are filled with fear, they want to do things that will make them feel safer. Polls show that a whopping (that’s a technical term) percentage of Americans are willing to give up most, if not all, of the rights guaranteed to them in the Bill of Rights to be safe.

“Those who desire to give up freedom in order to gain security will not have, nor do they deserve, either one.” Benjamin Franklin.

Whenever you give up your freedoms to be safe, you’ve started on a downward slope that will rob you of your freedom and make you even more vulnerable than you were before you gave away your rights. In listening to people, I hear them say over and over that all this security is making us safer. How? That they can’t answer, because they don’t feel safer. Studies show that with all the extra security at the airport, we’re no safer now than we were before 9/11. Most of the security that’s been implemented here in the US is more for show than for safety. Most American feel that if they get horribly inconvenienced then they must be safer. Well, they’re not.

The problem is 9/11 can’t happen again or at least not the way it did. The paradigm used won’t work anymore. In fact, due to communications technology it didn’t work on the third plane. Once people realized that the “hijacking” wasn’t in fact a hijacking, they fought back and kept that third target from being hit.

Are we safer today than the day after 9/11? No, we’re not. In fact, in some distressing ways, the terrorists have won. The United States of America, Home of the Free and the Brave, the country I grew up in no longer exists. Our Constitution is in shreds under attack by our executive, congressional, and judicial branches. Our Bill of Rights is being eroded away by the courts and people who are afraid to have too much freedom because someone might do something someday that they might get hurt by. So, the US is gone, it’s now becoming the USSR of the 1960s; a land of scared people, constantly under watch by their government. Its kind of ironic that the USSR has been broken up and is working on becoming a democracy.

I miss my country and I want it back. I want to once again be able to be proud of my country and its accomplishments. I want to live in a country where human rights are for everyone, torture is abhorred and not sanctioned by the government or its president, and with a Constitution and a Bill of Rights that apply to everyone, not just a select few. I didn’t want to move, I want to live in America, too bad it moved out from under me.