SILICON SOAPWARE wafting your way along the slipstreams of the Info Highway from Bubbles = Tom Digby = bubbles@well.com http://www.well.com/~bubbles/ Issue #151 New Moon of April 17, 2006 Contents copyright 2007 by Thomas G. Digby, with a liberal definition of "fair use". In other words, feel free to quote excerpts elsewhere (with proper attribution), post the entire zine (verbatim, including this notice) on other boards that don't charge specifically for reading the zine, link my Web page, and so on, but if something from here forms a substantial part of something you make money from, it's only fair that I get a cut of the profits. Silicon Soapware is available via email with or without reader feedback. Details of how to sign up are at the end. ********************* Days are longer now, warm spells are more frequent, and cold spells less so. Summer is definitely on its way in, even if it still has a way to go to get here and even if it appears to stumble now and again. And no, April hasn't been especially rainy, just as March wasn't especially windy. Where did that stereotype originate? I don't think it's native to California. One thing I have noticed that does tie in with standard springtime tradition is robins. At least I think they're robins. But I wouldn't be surprised if they were something else. ********************* On a recent cloudless day, of which we've had several lately, I got to thinking about the cartoon cliche of angels sitting or walking on clouds. So where do the angels rest when there are no clouds? Do they go somewhere else, since there's almost always a cloud somewhere, even if it isn't in my part of the world? Or do they just flutter around, complaining about the lack of clouds to rest on? Are angels allowed to be grumpy? It doesn't seem to fit their image, but so what? Do it when mortals aren't looking, and be ready to put on the Happy Face at a moment's notice? Then thoughts of springtime and migrating birds brought up another question: When a bunch of angels all want to go to the same far away place, do they fly in V formation like ducks? You never seem to see them pictured doing that, but it should be more aerodynamically efficient for them, just as it is for ducks. Or does aerodynamic efficiency matter to angels? Possibly not, since the whole concept of angels looking human except for having wings is not very workable from an aerodynamic standpoint. Flapping the wings vigorously enough to fly would require more muscle mass than would be consistent with an angel looking human, and I suspect there would be stability and control issues. Also, if angels have about the same mass as humans, staying aloft would require moving enough air to make things unpleasant for anyone else in the immediate vicinity. This may not matter in flight at altitude, but it could be a problem for takeoff and landing. I suspect various aeronautical engineering students have done the calculations many times over the years, even if they haven't published them where I would be likely to read about it. It's the kind of thing students like to play around with. Do any of you readers know of anyone who's actually studied this? ********************* The supposition that someone somewhere has calculated the aerodynamics of angels as most people imagine them leads to the thought of what if that supposition is wrong. What if nobody has ever thought of the details of angelic aerodynamics? Even though that doesn't seem likely, it leads to further thought along the lines of whether there might be subjects that nobody is interested in. There are almost certainly subjects that nobody has ever been aware of, but that's not quite the same thing. I'm wondering about subjects that people know exist but still don't care about. I get the feeling that if any subject, no matter what, is known to more than some trivial number of people, at least one of those people is going to care about it, or at least find it worthy of further thought. But that feeling could well be wrong. And I can also see the whole question bogging down in a quagmire of questions like what constitutes being "interested" and how many people have to be aware of something for it not to count as "unknown". So there's probably no simple answer. ********************* People on LiveJournal seem to have a thing for online personality tests. A few weeks ago someone I know posted his results for which dead Russian composer he would be were he to be a dead Russian composer. If he were a dead Russian composer he would be Igor Stravinsky. There was a little biographical thing on Stravinsky that mentioned people throwing rotten eggs at him when they didn't like one of his compositions. That got me to wondering. In cartoons the audience at a theatrical production sometimes expresses its displeasure by throwing vegetables and eggs and such at the performers. Do they do that in real life? If so, where do they get the stuff to throw? Do they bring it from home, or do they buy it at the concession stand? Modern movie-theater concession stands don't seem to carry that kind of stuff, and even if they did, I suspect management would try to discourage people from throwing it because of the mess it would make, especially if some of it stuck to the screen. Perhaps things are different at other types of theaters? I've never noticed it at the live performances I've been to, but that doesn't really prove anything. So what's the story here? Inquiring minds want to know. ********************* A resident of Plergbistan is explaining their court system to an American. They're looking at a picture of the Plergbistani Supreme Court. American: How come the Justices are wearing several different kinds of robes? Plergbistani: For one thing, they're not all what you would call "Justices". That term only applies to the ones in formal academic law-school regalia. A: So what are the others? P: The ones in the white robes are the Mercies. The one is the red robe is the Vengeance. A: Huh? P: First, the Justices look at a case in terms of the letter of the law and the precedents set by prior court decisions. A: That sounds like our courts. P: Pretty much. But in our system it doesn't end there. The other members of the court more or less vote their feelings. A: How does that work? P: It depends on the case. For example, if there are extenuating circumstances, such as a thief stealing to feed a starving family, the Mercies may vote to let him off easy. On the other hand, in a case of cold-blooded premeditated murder you'll probably see the mercies abstaining while the Vengeance throws the book at the murderer. In still other cases, such as civil matters between corporations with no significant injury to consumers, the Mercies and the Vengeance will pretty much leave it up to the Justices. A: That sounds complicated. And what was it I heard about fractional votes? P: Each member of the Court gets one vote, but is not required to cast it all in a lump. If, for example, a Justice thinks the arguments for both sides have merit, he or she can cast, say, thirty percent of a vote for one side and the remaining seventy percent for the other. A Mercy or a Vengeance can also cast a partial abstention. A: That sounds even more complicated. P: It isn't really all that bad. You just add up the numbers according to standard formulas. Simple arithmetic. A: But back on your example of letting a thief off because he stole to feed starving children, doesn't that kind of thing set a bad precedent? P: Not really. Only the votes and commentary from the Justices count toward setting precedent. The Mercies and/or the Vengeance may change how a defendant is or is not punished, but their decisions are not binding on any court trying future cases. In other words, decisions by Justices go into law books. Decisions by Mercies and Vengeances go into folk tales and songs and traditions. A: I think that's starting to make sense. Let me think about it a while. ********************* Someone else on LiveJournal was talking about some mail she received, or sort of received, from a traffic court. It was sent to an address she'd moved out of years ago, and only came to her attention months later. Didn't the court have her correct address? She thought they did, but evidently they didn't. That got me to thinking about what if a change-of-address notice is somehow defective or insufficient. In some parts of Cartoonland they would make the person move back to the old address until the matter got straightened out. The present occupants of the old place need not move out, but if they don't it might get rather crowded. Often the first either party to this problem knows about it is when movers show up at the person's new address and start loading stuff into a van. Then when they arrive at the old address and start unloading, that's how the people now living there find that they're getting a "new" roommate. Special hilarity may ensue if the old place has, say, been torn down to build a freeway. Then you get to see the movers arranging furniture right there in the middle of traffic lanes as cars swerve and skid and honk around them. These cases tend to get expedited attention so lanes don't stay blocked for very long. Freeway or no freeway, things almost always get revolved eventually, but only after all the various bureaucrats are in sync as to who is living where. Or something like that. ********************* Back at the Plergbistani Supreme Court Building the visiting American is strolling around the main law library. He sees shelf upon shelf of magnificent leather-bound volumes chronicling centuries of legal history. But there's something odd: Many of the books look damaged, like they've been in a wreck or something. He asks about it. P: That's from when the courts have thrown the book at various criminals. Didn't you notice the catapult over in the park? A: I saw it, but just assumed it was a museum display or memorial or something. I thought "throwing the book" at somebody was just a metaphor. P: It is nowadays, but they used to do it literally. It was the closest thing Plergbistan had to a death penalty. You see how massive those books are. If one hits you square on you're pretty much a goner. A: But what if they missed? P: Then you got off with just a fine or jail time or some such. We thought of it as giving the gods one last chance to commute a death sentence. Or sometimes the books would hit a glancing blow, and the condemned would eventually recover, but often with some degree of disability. Again, it was the will of the gods meting out punishment. A: So why did you stop doing it? P: It ceased being effective when digital media came in. Throwing a CD at somebody just isn't the same. ********************* This was isnpired by that tsunami a couple of years back. Recent events reminded me of it. Armor All my life the world has been getting smaller: Far-off lands that were once the stuff of legend Are now a mouse click away. In a way that's wonderful. But in a way it isn't. For all that we have shrunk the world's distances We have not shrunk the world's pain. A whole wide world of suffering and despair Comes into our living rooms every day, Film at eleven. How can any sane person stand it? One word: Armor. I go clanking through my day like some denizen of the Round Table, My visor showing me the narrowest slices of the darkness without As I strive to keep some flame of humanity burning within. But I am still afraid: Someday, when I gather with my friends in some safe space And we decide to open ourselves to one another, We may find that our armor has long been empty. -- Tom Digby Written 17:05 Sat January 1 2005 Revised 16:18 Fri January 7 2005 ********************* HOW TO GET SILICON SOAPWARE EMAILED TO YOU If you're getting it via email and the Reply-to in the headers is ss_talk@bubbles.best.vwh.net you're getting the list version, and anything you send to that address will be posted. That's the one you want if you like conversation. There's usually a burst of activity after each issue, often dying down to almost nothing in between. Any post can spark a new flurry at any time. If there's no mention of "bubbles.best.vwh.net" in the headers, you're getting the BCC version. That's the one for those who want just Silicon Soapware with no banter. The zine content is the same for both. To get on the conversation-list version point your browser to http://bubbles.best.vwh.net/cgi-bin/mojo/mojo.cgi and select the ss_talk list. Enter your email address in the space provided and hit Signup. When you receive an email confirmation request go to the URL it will give you. (If you're already on the list and want to get off there will be an Unsubscribe URL at the bottom of each list posting you receive.) To get on or off the BCC list email me (bubbles@well.com or bubbles@well.sf.ca.us). I currently do that one manually. -- END --