NPR - Heisenburg and rationality

I was reading the various forums I do routinely and on one someone raised the application of Heisenburg's Uncertainity Principle and change. Heisenburg's principle has been applied, and sometimes falsely or badly adjusted or adapted, to other applications, and although it really doesn't apply as this person defined it, it does lend the idea to other ideas about change.

The idea here is that while we are undergoing change, can't we know everything about the change. We are both the change and the observer of change, so our own presence effects each independently and still interacts with each other. It's really just human nature. But it's also when we're trying observe and even control change that we can't be separate from the change itself, because we are the change too.

Now I'm confused, or sometimes, because that's the issue. In our confusion we can't see what we don't or can't know. Like that we could otherwise? Maybe not. Ok, probably not, but we might be able to understand what the limits are of what we do and can know than be confused and not know where the limits are in our perception, thinking and understanding.

But then this leads to the idea of bounded rationality.

This idea means we make decisions using a frame where we see all the information we want inside the frame (bounds) and ignore everything else (outside the frame) as irrelevant, unimportant or unnecesary. And then we make a "rational" decision based on the view of that, what's inside the frame. This again is human nature, and especially seen in people who deny the existence of reality because it doesn't fit their model of the world and life.

With change, however, bounded rationality, creates a false view of things, because we can't see or don't see what's outside the frame that could easily effect our change or is a part of our change. And going through change, this can be disasterous or lead to disasterous results, neither of which we saw because it wasn't in our frame of view.

We simply didn't see it.

We're not only blind to the world outside our frame, we're also ignorant of information and especially answers or solutions to our questions or problems. We simply can't do what is entirely possible when we bind our view of the world with our frame. The frame we so much want to be the world is only our world, far smaller than reality.

And in missing the whole of reality, we're denying ourselves. But the reality is also that we simply can't see the world and expand our frame to any size to see all the possibilities. We have to keep the frame manageable to stay sane and gives ourselves a view we can understand. That's the reaily of being human.

And this is where Heisenburg would apply in the sense we can't know about where we're at and where we're going simultaneously with good reliable information to see the whole view. Something has to give and we'll make those choices, consciously or subconsciously, to fit the world into the frame we want, but not necessarily we need.

We can, and more than likely will, make choices which excludes information we should or could need and use. But since we don't know what that is, it's hard to know what information should be within our view, our frame, of the world and reality. We have to accept that our decisions and subsequent actions won't be fully informed ones", and made with less than complete or perfect information.

The key is to be flexible with our view, the frame, of the world to find the optimium and realistic information, knowing it's always a dynamic balance between heisenburg and rationality.

JMO - It never fails

Update at end of this post.
Effective January 1, 2008, this year, the state prohibited text messaging while driving, and effective July 1, 2008, they prohibited holding and using cellphones while driving restricting useage to hands-free cellphones. But a day doesn't go by since July 1st that I don't see someone driving while holding their cellphone, even now over 4 months later. And I still see drivers text messaging, usually now while stopped at light.

But that's still illegal. Driving means sitting in the driver's seat while the car is on public roads. The law doesn't allow it while stopped on the road, only while parked off the road on the shoulder or in a parking spot. So, what's not to understand? I don't know but since it's a secondary offense, meaning you can't be stopped for this offense, only after stopping for another ofense and adding these to the ticket.

Even every day this week driving around where I live I saw at least one driver holding and talking on a cellphone while driving. And one was text messaging at and between stop lights. I've seen the whole range of drivers, even commercial drivers. The company can't afford them a hands-free device? And worse still almost every time I get on the highway or Interstate, there will always be one driver doing 60+ mph and talking.

This means people who don't want to be bothered to get a hands-free device for their cellphone really don't care about the law. They know it's illegal, and the two times I've called people out - and yes, I always waited until we were at a light and it was safe and convenient to talk to them, I've gotten angry responses, like they were offended I tried to tell them it's illegal. After that I stopped pointing their stupidity out.

In the end, it's only goes to show human nature, and it never fails to show me stupidity is still alive and well in drivers.

Update, December 11th,-- I had to go to Seattle for the day and driving there, around and back I tallied 8 drivers with cellphones stuck to their ear, two drivers text messaging, and one driver checking her blackberry. And it was across the spectrum of people and cars, so stupidity is alive and well in every class of society.

Update, March 18, 2009.-- and true to form, ever since the last update there isn't a day go by when I'm out running errands or on trips around the Puget Sound, I don't find at least one driver using a cellphone while driving, sometimes just getting out of my local side street. And all too often I see half a dozen during slightly longer trips and a dozen or more on trips to Seattle, even in and around Seattle.

People just don't want to learn and accept being responsible drivers with us on the road.

A moment

Around here, south Puget Sound in Washington State, March is an interesting time as storm cells travel through, often dumping heavy, intense rain for a few minutes before moving northerly. And in the path, after they've passed over my place, for a moment we see the trailling rainbow if the sun is out. And if I'm lucky, the end hits the earth just outside my window and I can take photograph from my deck.

And capturing these gifts from nature takes the old fashioned being at the right place at the right time. I'm sure people in the area also saw the tralling rainbow, but there's likely wasn't mine, as mine wasn't theirs. But that's irrelevant, as it's still a rainbow. And in a moment they're gone. Ahead the rainstorm. Behind the sunshine. But for a moment, this.

What's not to like about a passing rainstorm?

JMO - Internet Forums

I don't think anyone can disagree with the idea that Internet forums and all the associated features and tools are a bad thing. They've managed to bring together many people in the world with similar interest, or living with similar circumstances or in similar situationis. That's the beauty of them, but it's also the potential problem with them when they become political and shut out the voices who question and voice dissent.

You see the advantage of establishing your own forum is that you are king and dictator. It's yours to think, decide and act as you want without being held accountable. You can praise those you like and you can punish or abolish those you don't like. You can control what you want to hear or not hear. And that's what's lost on many, honesty and openness.

You write your own Terms of Service (TOS). forum policy and user rules. You can also ignore them for individuals who do violate them but you consider them a friend. You can interpret them wrongly when you dislike some for raising questions. It's the old story if you go searching for violations and don't find any you can simply interpret those you find and act as if they're true.

It's a percieved truthfulness which is really a falsehood. You're simply lying to yourself and deceiving your own values. And it becomes obvious so people learn to be politically correct, and if they want to dissent, they just skate the margins then back off to agree it's not a good thing. In short, truth and reality get lost.

And there are many forums like this because they want to foster a "community" of like-minded people and dispeal those who disagree. It's the Internet gated community. The owner can say, "I'll let you be a member if you agree with me, don't criticize or question me, and don't argue with those I like despite what they say."

At that point I've learned this lesson recently when I did exactly that, question the application of the policy and expressed a view different than the owner. She quickly dispatched my account into the byte bucket as she did another person the day before.

I'm not sure it would fair to name this forum or the owner, because the whole greater community likes to think of themselves as a united, inclusive community, but it's not, not even close. Many people have long left for personal interests but many leave because of the attitude that to stay you have to accept their rules without question. So they walk away, never to look back.

And that's what I've done. I've worked for people like the owner of this forum. Her heart and mind may be in the right place but her vision is blind. And that's always a dangerous thing, self-delusion is handy if you want to be blind, but it's not when you apply to others.

Rather than embrace disssenter and conduct open and honest discussions, many forum owners prefer the opposite, close ranks and narrow the tone to a rhetoric, and then only alllow dissent from friends because they're part of your forum. But they don't understand it's about the old adage,"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer."

Dispatching your enemies from your world only creates more of them because they have voices too and they can speak out about you and your forum where you can't reach let alone touch them. And you gave them the ammuntion to argue against your oppression and hypocracy. They can shine the light to you and your forum.

Should I disclose the name of the person and her forum? Maybe some day, but for now she can sit in her small world and believe she's better than us and doing a good thing for and with the community. Except she's not. She's only fostering a closed knit, discriminating Internet community as small as the small town she lives in.

I like to wear the old fashioned button, "Question Authority." I wear it with pride, even though it's long battered and worn. And I'll keep wearing it with pride whenever and wherever I see a reason.

JMO - Earmarks

Dear Republicans.

With respect to the Omnibus Bill in Congress with all those earmarks you whine about, half of which are yours, I have a word of advice, "Shut the fuck up!"

During the twelve years you controlled Congress and especialy the eight years of the Bush administration, your party went nuts with earmarks, at least twice the current number in this bill. And that was every year you were in power. What right do you have to bitch or whine about the Democrats and their fewer earmarks? NONE!

Do you want people investigating your history of earmarks from 1994 to 2006 and especially 2001-2008? Think about it. You would look very dumb and stupid for all your clamor about the recent list of earmarks. Is that what you want? Keep it up then. Otherwise, shut up.