People interested in global health, take note: Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief of The Lancet is speaking in the Swire Seminar Room (12 Merton Street) this Friday at 2:00pm. His topic is “Health: The Global Architecture of Apathy.” The talk is part of the Global Economic Governance Program.
Month: May 2007
The reminder
I’ve been listening to the new Feist album The Reminder and I don’t think it generally compares very well to their previous release: Let It Die. The best songs on the previous album, like “When I was a Young Girl” and “L’amour ne dure pas toujours” had some energy to them. Most of those in the newer album seem flat and drawn out. Those songs that do have some energy, such as “Sea Lion Woman” are just too repetitive to be interesting. Like the previous album, this one experiments with a wide variety of musical styles; unlike the previous one, the best tracks aren’t terribly enjoyable.
I am sure there are people out there who love it, but it is destined to endure in the infrequently visited portions of my iTunes library.
Fire at The Perch
The Perch, one of Oxford’s best pubs, suffered from a fairly severe fire on Wednesday. Based on the look I had at it today, the external damage is limited to the roof. Inside, things might be a lot worse. Apparently, the fire started in one of the chimneys. Thankfully, nobody was injured. A similar blaze took place thirty years ago, so it seems likely that rebuilding will occur.
The nicest thing about The Perch is the location. To get there from northern Oxford, you need to walk across the Port Meadow and then up along the canal for a short ways. At night, you are likely to see some of the Port Meadow cows or horses along the way. During the day, patrons can sit outside in a grassy area surrounded by willow trees. When each of my parents visited Oxford, we made a visit to this pub. I have also been there with a good collection of friends over the last year and a half.
Despite the high probability that the pub will eventually be open for business again, I doubt it will occur before I depart. One more reason to visit Oxford in a few years, I suppose.
Excellent nature photography
Wandering through the forums on photo.net, I came across the work of Wojciech Grzanka. His macro photography of insects is especially cool. Magnified insects look so other-worldly it is no suprise they have inspired to much science fiction and fantasy, ranging from the brilliant to the amusingly mediocre.
One of the best things about the photo.net community is the sheer level of skill and helpfulness among the community members. At the same time, the quality of other people’s images is almost certain to make you feel like a rank amateur.
PS. Grzanka’s website is pretty slick as well, though the images seem to be the same as those on photo.net.
Oxford B&W photo competition
I have been thinking about submitting a few images to the Intra Muros competition, but I am finding it hard to locate arty black and white shots of the right sort within my collection (1, 2). The general pattern of the ones they have accepted is that they show recognizable Oxford architecture, individual people are often included but never highlighted, and they have an abstracted quality to them. Somewhat surprisingly, most of my favourite photos taken in Oxford are in colour. Normally, I am a big fan of black & white.
The deadline isn’t until June 9th, so perhaps I can keep my eyes open for the right sort of image from now on. The winners get photos printed in their calendar and the best single entry wins £50.
What dread hand and what dread feet?
Tragically and unusually, someone in British Columbia was killed by a tiger this week. Apparently, the animal was privately owned and part of some sort of exotic zoo. The 32 year old woman was standing near the cage when a single paw strike severed her femoral artery. As a consequence, people have called for tougher laws on the ownership of such animals and the tiger has been killed.
The first measure seems entirely reasonable. It is well worth asking whether ownership of endangered and dangerous animals should be permitted. Certainly, the incident demonstrates that they are not always confined appropriately. Whether their welfare is being adequately maintained or not is another concern. According to the the Victoria Times-Colonist “the tigers were kept in small chain-link cages with no flooring.” It sounds as though the circumstances in which the animals were held were neither respectful, humane, nor intelligent. Apparently, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals has tried several times since 2005 to have this tiger seized from its owner, on the basis of both safety and animal welfare. Paul Springate of the Rainforest Reptile Refuge has some intelligent comments on the failures in the current Canadian system for managing exotic animals. It seems intuitively obvious that if people are allowed to own such animals (itself a policy of dubious quality), there must be standards for keeping them and a system of inspections.
Putting the tiger to death, on the other hand, strikes me as highly inappropriate. It should come as no revelation to anybody that tigers are dangerous and that spending time at close quarters with one could imperil you. It is certainly a tragedy that this young woman’s life was cut short and it makes perfect sense to investigate the conditions that led to it and act upon them. Punishing a tiger simply for being a tiger, on the other hand, is an inappropriate extension of vengeance into a situation where it makes no sense to apply.
Five boxes left to tick
Along with revising, I am now working on my final paper for the M.Phil. As with the previous one on the environment, this is for the international law course with Vaughan Lowe and Adam Roberts. With that submitted by Friday, only exam preparation will remain.
The weather is doing its bit to aid the process along. Few people are out enjoying the spring greening of Oxford while there is so much rain coming down.
GPS and navigation
I have been annoyed recently by full-page ads in which RIM is advertising the navigational capabilities of their new BlackBerries. They suggest that people can throw away maps and compasses and wholeheartedly embrace the combination of GPS and electronic maps.
I know firsthand how useful GPS can be. As an altimeter or a way of locating yourself in a featureless landscape, it cannot be beaten. Likewise, it is very helpful for quickly figuring out where you are when you are out on the water in a canoe or kayak. All the same, I think there is a fundamental value in being able to read a map, locate yourself on it, and work out a course to where you want to be. It isn’t enough to take a course in these things and forget about it. As with any complex skill, practice is important.
Some common sense is also a necessity, no matter how you are navigating. If your GPS-based automobile navigation system tells you to drive along train tracks, you should be aware that machines are fallible, and highly stupid as well. They have no common sense by which to evaluate whether, for instance, a bridge has been washed out or whether a linear course between A and B includes a series of lethal cliffs. There is also the small matter that some dead batteries a splash of water or a dropped piece of gear could knock out both your map and compass equivalent, if you are relying on a GPS system.
Related posts:
- On GPS, Galileo, and precision
- A post on the nature of time that concerns the GPS system
- On great circles
Circularity
A night that one had no reason to expect to be abnormal has actually been highly interesting, though in entirely non-academic senses. I learned about how delicious Ketjap Manis is, a bit about Greenpeace, lots about a private Oxford company of interest, some things about friends of mine, and a bit about improvised cooking. The dish was invented in three stages, while being cooked, and worked out quite well.
In some ways, this last Oxford term is proving a lot like my first.
Solaris
Sun Microsystems sent me a free copy of Solaris 10 to try. Now, I just need a SPARC or x86 system on which to install it. This will probably need to wait until my return to Canada. Once I am in a more settled environment (unlikely to move for more than a couple of years), I intend to set up a server or two of my own.