Thomas Marsten
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Saturday, August 20, 2005
Flight Vol 1
An anthology of short comic strips. The problem with a short comic strip is that it's very difficult to develop all but the simplest characters in a few pages, even with the help of illustrations. While a lot of the strips in this book are very good, many are just mediocre, or unsatisfying. I like it, but not enough to buy it.
I never paid attention to people like you, either, although I knew who a lot of you were. Your names were all over the halls...
An anthology of short comic strips. The problem with a short comic strip is that it's very difficult to develop all but the simplest characters in a few pages, even with the help of illustrations. While a lot of the strips in this book are very good, many are just mediocre, or unsatisfying. I like it, but not enough to buy it.
I never paid attention to people like you, either, although I knew who a lot of you were. Your names were all over the halls...
A Fire Upon The Deep, Vernor Vinge
I first read this book about 10 or so years ago when it won the Hugo award (and was unjustly denied a Nebula award). It is still just as good a read today as it was 10 years ago. The space opera is fun, the characters are fun, and the universe as postulated entertaining, even though it's every bit as far fetched as the E. E. Doc Smith universes. (At least the writing is much better)
Somewhere barriers slipped aside, the final failing of Old One's control, or a final gift. It did not matter which now, for whatever the ghost said, the truth was obvious to Pham Nuwen and he would not be denied:
Canberrra, Cindi, the centuries avoyaging with Qeng Ho, the final flight of the Wild Goose. It was all real.
I first read this book about 10 or so years ago when it won the Hugo award (and was unjustly denied a Nebula award). It is still just as good a read today as it was 10 years ago. The space opera is fun, the characters are fun, and the universe as postulated entertaining, even though it's every bit as far fetched as the E. E. Doc Smith universes. (At least the writing is much better)
Somewhere barriers slipped aside, the final failing of Old One's control, or a final gift. It did not matter which now, for whatever the ghost said, the truth was obvious to Pham Nuwen and he would not be denied:
Canberrra, Cindi, the centuries avoyaging with Qeng Ho, the final flight of the Wild Goose. It was all real.
Thursday, August 18, 2005
Planning the next trip
The next trip is likely to be an inn-to-inn walking trip in England's lake district. As usual, I'm starting out by planning this as a nice long walk, without any such distractions as museums or other cultural artifacts and let the folks who are coming along force me into visiting Wordsworth's birthplace or some such.
Suggestions, etc are welcome. And due to Lisa's school, the timing is forced: late May/early June. That makes planning and buying plane tickets easy.
The next trip is likely to be an inn-to-inn walking trip in England's lake district. As usual, I'm starting out by planning this as a nice long walk, without any such distractions as museums or other cultural artifacts and let the folks who are coming along force me into visiting Wordsworth's birthplace or some such.
Suggestions, etc are welcome. And due to Lisa's school, the timing is forced: late May/early June. That makes planning and buying plane tickets easy.
Monday, August 15, 2005
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Climate Crash: Abrupt Climate Change And What It Means For Our Future
A few years ago, I read an article about climate change: the concern was that climate change might not be a continuous process as most folks might believe (naively), but that it could flip-flop between cold and warm states for unknown, chaotically driven reasons. I was extremely skeptical that such theories would in fact pan out, given the recent history of climate change, but this book (which is more about the theory behind abrupt climate change and less about the implications) shows how the theory has become more than just speculation and is now the primary theory behind the history of Earth's climates.
Of course, my pessimism about the human race says that we won't do anything about it until it's too late.
Down in the core below 2750 meters, in ice that the Europeans were confident represented the period of Eemian warmth about 120,000 years ago, oxygen isotope data showed two especially large and sudden plunges towards ice age cold. In one episode, average temperatures apparently plunged 25 degrees F for about 70 years. The only period of relative stability during the Eemian came during the last 2,000 years of its warmest stage.
"The unexpected finding that the remainder of the Eemian period was interrupted by a series of oscillations, apparently reflecting reversals to a `mid-glacial' climate, is extremely difficult to explain," the Euroepans wrote. "Perhaps the most pressing question is why similar oscillations do not persist today, as the Eemian period is often considered an analogue for a world slightly warmer than today's." Given the history of the last 150,000 years, they wrote, the past 8000 years "has been strangely stable."
A few years ago, I read an article about climate change: the concern was that climate change might not be a continuous process as most folks might believe (naively), but that it could flip-flop between cold and warm states for unknown, chaotically driven reasons. I was extremely skeptical that such theories would in fact pan out, given the recent history of climate change, but this book (which is more about the theory behind abrupt climate change and less about the implications) shows how the theory has become more than just speculation and is now the primary theory behind the history of Earth's climates.
Of course, my pessimism about the human race says that we won't do anything about it until it's too late.
Down in the core below 2750 meters, in ice that the Europeans were confident represented the period of Eemian warmth about 120,000 years ago, oxygen isotope data showed two especially large and sudden plunges towards ice age cold. In one episode, average temperatures apparently plunged 25 degrees F for about 70 years. The only period of relative stability during the Eemian came during the last 2,000 years of its warmest stage.
"The unexpected finding that the remainder of the Eemian period was interrupted by a series of oscillations, apparently reflecting reversals to a `mid-glacial' climate, is extremely difficult to explain," the Euroepans wrote. "Perhaps the most pressing question is why similar oscillations do not persist today, as the Eemian period is often considered an analogue for a world slightly warmer than today's." Given the history of the last 150,000 years, they wrote, the past 8000 years "has been strangely stable."
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