Somewhere West of Reason
You should. A huge influence on my Magic Show work, this guy is achingly brilliant. He’s an Australian video game reviewer who, like myself, makes a weekly video podcast. His signatures are a rapid-fire delivery and the lego-like characters he uses to great effect in each vid.
Enjoy! 
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And to think, I really respected Ben Stein.
Read Scientific American’s review of his new film, Expelled, here.
It’s very sad that the filmmakers, and Mr. Stein too of course, take it upon themselves to try and deconstruct evolution into “Darwinism” (when it isn’t even really called that anymore as the science has broken out amongst various aspects of evolution), and tries its damndest to make Intelligent Design, which is also known as Creationism of course, sound like the underdog in two “competing theories”.
Which is funny because, as I remember it, evolution has years and years of studies and untold millions in solid, consistent, proven research.
Intelligent Design has theorems that are knocked down year after year. Don’t get me started on that “irreducable complexity” flagellum crap, because it’s been debunked and we need to move on with our lives here.
It saddens me that people so obsessed with their spiritual beliefs would try their best to destroy decades of scientific research. “It’s a theorem!” they cry. Yeah, well, so is the “theory” of gravity, but you don’t hear people jumping up and down about how Moses brought us the idea that things attract themselves to the center of our spinning earth, do you?
Intelligent Design is anything but. Don’t be a dummy. Stop ignoring science. Don’t waste your time with this movie that hides all sorts of important facts and details.
Here’s a fantastic example I’ll leave you with.
Expelled then trots out some of the people whom it claims have been persecuted by the Darwinist establishment. First among them is Robert Sternberg, former editor of the peer-reviewed Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, who published an article on ID by Stephen C. Meyer of the Discovery Institute. Sternberg tells Stein that he subsequently lost his editorship, his old position at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History and his original office. Looking a bit smug in his self-martyrdom, Sternberg also reports that a colleague compared him with an “intellectual terrorist.”
What most viewers of Expelled may not realize—because the film doesn’t even hint at it—is that Sternberg’s case is not quite what it sounds. Biologists criticized Sternberg’s choice to publish the paper not only because it supported ID but also because Sternberg approved it by himself rather than sending it out for independent expert review. He didn’t lose his editorship; he published the paper in what was already scheduled to be his last issue as editor. He didn’t lose his job at the Smithsonian; his appointment there as an unpaid research associate had a limited term, and when it was over he was given a new one. His office move was scheduled before the paper ever appeared.
Just so sad.
And rightly so.
Excellent job, Mr. Olbermann.
This is too cute. Say hello to the world’s smallest 14-year old, who is smaller than a 2-year old. She has a form of dwarfism that will not allow her to grow any larger than she is right now.
I hope she gets some attention from this, perhaps a spot on some of the talk shows or something. If she has any acting or singing skills, I wouldn’t put a life in showbiz out of the question either.
So, this is an interesting website. It’s the new collectable card game from Decipher, entitled Fight Klub. Yes, I know, very clever.
Apparently this is an amalgam of Lord of the Rings, Star Wars (the old school one from Decipher? I think?), and Ultimate Fighting System.
Their current pitch consists of these elements:
- There are no booster packs, only “Kilos” consisting of ‘the equivalent of 10 packs’ for $29.99
- There is a mentor program where anyone you sign up will provide you with 10% of their purchases for life. Yes, for life. Yes, I don’t think this aspect will last long either.
Here’s what I like about it:
- It’s 100% different from any strategy I’ve ever seen in both creating and distributing a card game.
It essentially wants people to become ‘mentors’ and through that program pay said mentors when the gamers beneath them by product. This reminds me of Pure Romance, Pampered Chef, etc, where you sort of ‘bring the game to them’ and try to sell your wares/teach them and then get them hooked. You get a percentage, the company gets the rest. What is nice and unique about it is that you don’t have to be involved in every sale. Once they’re ‘attached’ to you, you don’t have to do any more work to get that 10%.
- It has a solid backing in regards to designers and developers.
Decipher is no slouch and while they may have ultimately failed, Star Trek, Star Wars, and LotR all had their plusses.
- The distribution model is certainly novel.
Their first expansion is called “One”, will be the defacto introduction set for the game, and appears to cost $29.99. So basically you’re in for $30 no matter what. That’s fine. However, there is no collectibility here. According to the explanation of the Kilo page, each set is designed to be collected in full after about 3 or 4 Kilos, or around $100. Which in Magic terms is such a small drop in the bucket it’s laughable (for example, the best creature ever printed came out early last year and is still commanding $50 a piece - Did I mention you can have up to four in one deck?).
Here’s my problems with it:
- There is no IP (Intellectual Property) tied to the game beyond its core design mechanics. It wants to be ‘open ended’ so right now it looks ‘completely blank’. This is bad. Matter of fact, I think this is VERY bad. Right now they are trying to be vague and have ‘Heroes and Villains’ and invite rightsholders to submit their IP to the game. This is cute and all, but it’s the same reason I dislike UFS so much: They try so hard to be all things to all people, and as such they lose identity in full.
To put this in perspective, Magic is brilliantly flavored for a few reasons. One, it has the five colors. These are the very heart of the game. Without the color pie, its definitions and its distinctions any ole card could do any old thing. When you subjegate this into five different areas (i.e. colors) you begin giving and taking away based on that flavor. Fight Klub (man do I hate that name already) currently appears to only have Heroes and Villians with which to divide up abilities and attributes. This seems like it would get old pretty quickly. But I’m certainly game to see how they pull it off.
Going into this further, Magic is designed in a way to allow them to ‘touch’ on different themes year-by-year. The metal world of Mirrodin, the clash of brothers in the Urza Saga, the fantasyland of Lorwyn. These are all cool and interesting ways of looking at creatures, spells and abilities. Their design and development literally set the standard from Day 1, and while I have nostalgia at my back in terms of getting me hooked, there’s no way I’d put so much time and effort into Magic if I didn’t enjoy these flavorful aspects of it. I will never read the books or care about the storyline of Magic, however, many people do, and for some (a very limited few, but still) this is the only reason they play Magic. This allows them to live vicariously through the creatures, spells and effects, and some people really enjoy that.
And unfortunately from the looks of it, all of the positive things in the previous paragraph are not able to happen in Fight Klub.
Also, one of the most interesting aspects of Magic design is that they can ‘bleed’ abilities into other colors and look novel. I can only imagine how awkward it could appear when Decipher “bleeds” Hero abilities into Villains.
Anyway, moving on.
- It appears their method for holding tournaments will be left to the mentors.
I’m not exactly sure how they plan on making this happen, but I’m guessing a ‘pool’ of mentors will try and organize tournaments of all shapes and sizes to accommodate players. This is good and bad. First, it’s literally the “Myspacing” of tournament organizing. Very intriguing. Secondly, it’s both scattershot and somewhat erratic. There is no guaranteed tournament at X location at Y time, so people can’t just show up and play, like I do often at the local card shop because I know every Saturday they have a Magic tournament and if I’ve got time I can stop by and play.
- The name is awful.
There, I said it. I hate this name, Fight Klub. Why? Because internet geek culture a silly and irreverant thing. But there are still aspects to which we hold things to a higher standard. And riffing on one of the most popular geek culture movies of all time is not a way to get on anyone’s good side. They would be better off calling it Savage Beats or something equally ridiculous rather than evoking the idea that Bob Has Bitch Tits.
- The questionnaire made me laugh
More on this crazy CCG as it develops.
What in the hell. And people wonder why I don’t like religion.
Feel free to read up on Illinois State Representative Monique Davis has to say about atheism.
The best quote: “You have no right to be here! We believe in something. You believe in destroying! You believe in destroying what this state was built upon.”
When does atheism believe in destroying anything? I guess if you mean destroying the myths of dogma and the ridiculousness that men thousands of years ago had all of the answers (when they didn’t even know what a cell was, ffs…), then I guess so.
Part of me still has this battle with myself for my kids. I mean, on its most fundamental level, Christianity is instilling the idea that “God is watching everything you do.” which then translates to Jesus (he’s his own father, after all, in that weird trinity thing), which then means you basically subject your children to a psychological notion that they’re always under surveillance. I’m of the opinion that giving them boundaries, rules, and teaching them right from wrong is a better way to go.
It does bring some hilarious stories. For example, this past Easter, my four year old spotted a chocolate cross at the pharmacy.
“Hey!” she shouted to her sister, “We could eat Jesus!”
From their grandmother’s (not-so-subtle) Jesus-speak, they’ve equated the cross to Jesus. Funny
I’ve yet to really ‘confront’ the kids with the subject, as it’s difficult to confront them about anything anywhere near as complex as faith. But that said, I’m not ready to give in just because it would be easy to let them run rampant with the bullshit they would have to believe were they to begin going to a Christian church. Then it’s all about the prayer, the crucifixion (you just gotta love the martyrs!), the rituals, then the tithing, etc etc. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt and every hotel room has bought the book.
We’re so polarized by this shit I can only imagine how long it would take for a hotel to put the Koran in every hotel room and get burnt down because of it.
To me religion is a coping mechanism that is highly effective but ultimately fruitless. The community around religion is great, don’t get me wrong–there are some fabulous people who mean very well doing a lot of good things. That’s great. It’s why I still read up on Christian blogs and the like. They can do good things. But at the end of the day, there’s too much science to ignore. There’s too many facts that don’t add up.
The bottom line is, the Bible was molded, crafted, edited and used as a means for control. Religions throughout time have been used as a means for molding a populace. For what it’s worth, Islam is much worse. They believe a 13th century (I need to check on my Muhammad facts to make sure this is correct) thug knows the secret to life, the universe, and everything. Not ‘allowing’ pictures of him still cracks me up. Blasphemy, in general, is so ludicrous in this day and age…
But hey, one random geek on one random blog about his random religious thoughts. Make up your own mind on these things, and I hope whatever you believe makes you happy. I’m happy not believing in anything but myself and the wonderful people in my life.
Wow…I never thought I’d see this day.
I keep coming back to it, wondering if it will suddenly switch back to the 100MB limit I’ve (hated with a passion) grown to live with for so long.
Thank you, whatever magical YouTube person flipped my “OMGWTF Huge Upload Button”, because I’m salivating at thinking of what I can now being posting on my YouTube channel. To a videographer, this is the best gift I could ever receive. Too cool!
Wait, you mean it wasn’t a smiting from God, but rather an asteroid striking the earth?
Why surely this will cause Christians all over the world to see the error in their ways and stop believing in superheroes who will rise up, not exactly zombie-style, and kill all of those who they think is unworthy…
…or, not. But hey, go go science.
In that order. 60 Minutes tells the story of a German man who lost five years of his life–including being tortured for no reason, such as hanging from chains for six hour stints for five fucking days–to the lawless terrorist interrogation program instituted by those in the White House (more specifically the Department of Defense, but whatever).
I am so ashamed of our administration right now. This is the entire reason we have a justice system and also the reason why this terrorist business will haunt us for decades, just like the Japanese concentration camps from WWII.
It’s not like the Republican nominee, who has been tortured himself, would ever vote against a measure banning it forever.
Oh, wait a minute.
And people really want 4 more years of this shit? I mean, seriously?
Wow, have you read the reports of Gary Lamb’s venture into hel–er, I mean, his Easter Egg Drop? Revolution Church decided to drop 50,000 eggs from a helicopter and include various prizes in the eggs, such as an XBox, to boot.
Here is part one, and here is the followup from Gary himself.
There’s also a great review of it from one of the church volunteers.
Basically, the thing turned into a huge clusterfuck. I don’t know how else to describe it.
(One of the little things that makes me happy about not being religious is that I can happily use the word clusterfuck to describe clusterfucks. I’m not burdened with the guilt of an invisible man, you see.)
Anyway, this is a fascinating look into human nature. I can’t help but laugh at both the audacity and the ridiculousness. The best part was that I was actually going to try and make it, to help support Gary in this wild venture. But as soon as you see the word ‘free’ and ‘prizes’, people just come out of the woodwork.
Reading over the plan, as they had devised it, the problem was this: They expected parents to honor their wishes in spite of the shiny toys they could watch some 3-year-old walk away with. This means that as soon as one parent stepped in to ‘help’, then another would feel like they had the right to as well, because, what if that parent’s “assistance” turned them into winners? The only option I could see for Egg Drop Part Deux, if they wanted to hold it much like this one, would be to separate the kids from the parents. But who wants that? And if you thought their horrible stories of people looking for their children were bad this time…
I don’t think there’s a good way to do this. If you were to anticipate 12,000 people, where would you put them? What space would you need? What PA system? It would have to be massive, and I’m talking football stadium sized. That would be the only place large enough and with enough accommodation (parking, restrooms, etc) that I could think could support this.
As for their ‘goals’ per se, I’m cynical as hell, but let’s take this quote from the woman’s blog post above:
And we certainly did not expect almost 90% of you not to listen to instructions given.
This is 100% nievete in hindsight, and I can only imagine that there were at least a few there that weren’t quite so shocked.
You know what went wrong with this whole Egg Drop business? The prizes. The prizes were too good. They cause people to do stupid things. If it had just been candy in the eggs, I would bet there would be at least 50% less problems (and probably 50% less people, too).
The spectacle was not the prizes given away, but the fact you were dropping all those eggs from the helicopter. Why would parents crush each other for some candy? They wouldn’t. But would they trample over someone else for a $300 XBox? You bet your ass they would.
If your message is all Jesus all the time, don’t give people an opportunity to monopolize and/or profit from your event.
Lesson? Learned. (I hope)