 | Last login: 3 months agoJeff Cliff is a 23 year old guy in a relationship from Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada. I play piano.
Computer Science Major at the University of Regina.
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I have been posting infrequently lately. I'm thinking of starting a blog with 4ish other likeminded people, to basically do the same thing only with 4x the content-speed. Any takers? |
- Dec 17, 2006 9:07pm
- That's the last straw. I do not appreciate at all having my HTML tags neutered.
 Share This- Bonobo Conspiracy Web comic #357: The lessons of history
 Dec 17, 2006 9:05pm  (1 review) furry, playboy, drm, tpm, macrovision http://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/bonobo-conspira...- OK WTF is up with the HTML not allowing height and width tags on images here.
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- http://www.pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF202-Post_Apocalyptic.jpg
- Dec 17, 2006 8:57pm
 (1 review) webcomics, apocalypse, humour, post-apocalyptic http://www.pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF202-Pos... 
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- themusicgod1: Semester Passed!
- Dec 14, 2006 8:07pm (1 review) pthemusicgod1 http://themusicgod1.livejournal.com/5219...
- W0000T!!
I passed my classes, my final exams were good!
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- Beautiful Horizons: El Mozote - 25 Years Later
- Dec 14, 2006 8:03pm (2 reviews) blogs, torture, war, el-mozote, rape, pillage http://www.beautifulhorizons.net/weblog/...
- Reading this spooked me somewhat. What happened here was absolutely sick.
El Mozote
It happened before I was born. These monster's children are now my age, and probably just recently out of power in El Salvador
I got into an argument, once, where my capitalist opponent suggested that all socialists are like Pol Pot, and that given a chance to get into power they will kill all the capitalists, and commit the kinds of atrocities that the capitalist right in El Salvador has committed, with the support and complicity of the Regan administration US.
There is absolutely no need for this; the rape and murder of large quantities of women and children as young as 12 should be illegal in all circumstances. This makes the hostage situation in russia look like nothing in comparison.
"They said, 'We don't want to dignify them by taking prisoners.' They wouldn't even call them prisoners, or guerrillas. They called them terroristas -- delincuentes terroristas." (General Blandón, the former chief of staff, told me, "Before 1983, we never took prisoners
of war.") As the guerrillas were reduced to the status of terrorist delinquents, all civilians in certain zones were reduced to the status of masas, guerrilla supporters, and thus became legitimate targets"-source
Also worth mentioning is the effect of 'professionalism' here;
1) On the side of the El Salvadorans, Professionalism meant the callous rape and murder of women and children, and genocide of an entire town without anyone saying anything about it.
2) On the side of the americans, Professionalism meant the coverup of the whole thing, because it's not "Professional" to report on the truth if the truth is not "Politically Correct"
Never again, should this be allowed to happen.
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- Keeping An Eye On A Canadian Prize
- Dec 14, 2006 7:58pm (1 review) canada, canadian-copyright, crown-copyright http://www.michaelgeist.ca/resc/html_bku...
Dating back to the 1700s, crown copyright reflects a centuries-old perspective that the government ought to control the public's ability to use official documents. Today crown copyright extends for fifty years from creation and it requires anyone who wants to use or republish a government report, parliamentary hearing, or other work to first seek permission. While permission is often granted, it is not automatic.
I remember reading this article when it was published. Nothing has changed--we should do something about that.
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- Amazon.com: How to Solve It: Modern Heuristics: Zbigniew Michalewicz,...
- Dec 14, 2006 7:42pm (1 review) books, fuzzy-logic, polya, artificial-intelligence http://www.amazon.com/How-Solve-Heuristi...
- Meant as a sort of carry-on from what G Polya started with his 'How to Solve It', this book was used as the textbook in my 'Artificial Intelligence' (CS320) course, although I do not believe that 'artificial intelligence' as a term is used in the book.
It covers methods of solving mathematical problems, much like is predecessor, and
I was kind of set back upon reading the chapter that they don't actually say how "prices are chosen at 711", but rather at the beginning of each chapter offer(along with that one) a logic puzzle relevant or solvable by the methods explained in the proceeding chapter. Some of these were enjoyable, others were done under the gun and not so enjoyable, others still were just confuzing(but still worth the effort). It was a good mix.
I'm not sure how accessible this book would be to a layperson, unlike 'How to Solve It.' Maybe I'll try to explain its contents to my parents later.
There was a lot in it. And it has a healthily thick reference section; Some of the stuff in it(like the evolutionary algorithm crossover operators) did not stick in my head, but a lot of it was internalized. Hopefully they were right, in their thinking that the approaches in the book form the currently best approaches to mathematical problems that are known.
Of course, as has been pointed out (I think by kurzweil), that knowing math isn't enough; you have to apply it. It is not enough to learn math; I know a bunch of differential calculus that I haven't done anything at all with, with no plans to in the near term--this isn't enough. I must apply this stuff, before it fades into the fuzzy haze of memory.
All in all, it was a good book, and I'd reccomend it's reading, but I'm just not sure for *who*. There's probably books you'll want to read before this one, but not too many.
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- themusicgod1: Vasectomy Setback
 Dec 14, 2006 7:31pm (1 review) pthemusicgod1 http://themusicgod1.livejournal.com/5171...- I just barely missed getting an appointment for a vasectomy this week. Hopefully I will shortly get another.
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- Beautiful Horizons: Pinochet Roundup - And Some Mythbusting
- Dec 14, 2006 7:21pm (1 review) business, vampire, chile, pinochet, dictator http://www.beautifulhorizons.net/weblog/...
- Since Pinochet kicked off, It is worthwhile to take a gander at all he did during his life. At least now, we can all be thankful the rat bastard is dead. It *is* delicious that he died on human rights day.
It's also worth pointing out that a lot of people are claiming that chile's economy (after years of leftist reforms, completely ignoring that under the milton friedman reforms the country nearly collapsed) is doing quite well, and that it must be because of all the horrible years under their dictator;
Perhaps there is a grain of truth in this. At the risk of invoking Godwin, the nazis also had a functioning economy, and what chile shared with them was the tendancy to 'dissapear' people and to use their dissapearance as an excuse to change wealth around. I suppose if you're willing to haphazardly kill people you can attain progress; but there is no way to justify these attrocities. You can't justify it for nazi germany, and you can't justify it for pinochet's chile. Besides that, there's got to be some long lasting psychological damage in Chile, due to the amount of torture involved. It can't be a good thing.
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- themusicgod1: In defence of some (DIY) pornography
- Dec 14, 2006 6:55pm (2 reviews) erotica, diypron, pron http://themusicgod1.livejournal.com/5132...
- Roto on pron/erotica. Couldn't say it better.
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