Relocating

Nope, I'm not leaving Florida again (if I can absolutely help it). I am, however, moving my unsorted personal opinions to a new domain so as to take advantage of the marvels of personal branding on the Internet. I can now be found on http://bartleahy.com/

If you find something worth reading on this page, feel free to comment. However, if you want to see my latest thoughts, check out the new site. The visuals will be better but the opinions could be more watered down. It happens.

Thank you for reading.

Conservatism as a Disposition

"A conservative is someone who stands athwart history yelling Stop."
--William F. Buckley

I'm really not writing today about politics in this entry, but feel free to make a political interpretation if you like. What I'd like to take some time to explain is how the conservative temperament operates, and maybe from there you can see how that leads to a political disposition. It runs something like this: some folks are not comfortable with change. Some of this discomfort is based on fear or mistrust, true; however, some resist change because the lifestyle, rules, or processes they grew up with work, or they have experienced negative consequences from making sudden or unplanned change.

A conservative seeks stability and comfort. Going with the flow--i.e., the rules received from parents, grandparents, ancestors, etc.--is the path of most comfort and least resistance. Said conservative accepts the guidelines laid down before they were born with the assumption that a) authority figures know what they're doing or b) there had to be good reasons for why the rules exist. The more inquiring will ask why things are the way they are. If living with the rules becomes more problematic than not doing so, then they'll consider changing their behavior or the rules.

I had a friend in high school who had no interest in traveling more than five miles from our home town. Moving beyond the Western Suburbs of Chicago was just not something that made her comfortable. Perhaps that's an extreme example, but I'm certain she was not unusual.

When people in the West lived in villages in ancient and medieval times, aside from occasional raids by bandits or neighboring countries, they accepted that the ebb and flow of life was more or less static and cyclical. The disruptive influences of the Renaissance were merchants, who dared to challenge the wealth of the Crown and the authority of the Church. Merchants--budding capitalists--believed that the world could be improved and changed, that people could become wealthier, wiser, and more knowledgeable than their ancestors. The Crown and the Church pushed back, but change happened anyway. And while Western Civilization faced several setbacks--the Napoleonic Wars, World War I, and World War II--that philosophy of affluence, scientific inquiry, and technological advance has continued up to the present.

Some people are still not comfortable with all this change. One typical conservative sentiment is, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." That could apply to anything from manners to business processes to technology. In fact, I butted heads with a gung-ho fellow cast member when I worked at Disney because she was trying to push through a bunch of changes to how our department was conducting business. I finally had to draw her aside and say, "Look, I know you have a lot of great ideas, but you have to understand that not everyone wants to change. You need to provide them reasons for why they should do things your way."

Conservatives--again, speaking of people with a conservative temperament, not necessarily a conservative political affiliation--are not just anti-change or pro-comfort to be difficult or selfish. There are times when change IS disruptive and DOES have harmful side-effects. There are financial, personal, and resource costs to change. Example: "Hey, why don't you move to Washington, DC? You'll make more money. You'll be closer to me, and others." I hear this one occasionally. However, I moved there before and didn't like it. I didn't fit in with the "political" culture, as I found it focused on manipulating and gaining power over others--I'm not interested in either. That's a social and personal cost. My bills were much higher in DC/Northern Virginia, and I don't have a bunch of money to pay for another move. Those are financial costs. I could put myself into further debt or I could stay where I am in Orlando, warm and happy. Or there's my pal who suggested we run in the Disney Half-Marathon next year. Could I do that? Possibly. Might I get into better shape? Probably, but will there be costs? Yes: the entry fee, for one. But more importantly there would be a physical cost to me because I have bad knees.

If there's one mistake that people who have a more change-oriented disposition make when dealing with personal conservatives, it's their dismissal of the real costs of change, whatever they might be. They always have an answer to any objection, assuming that the conservative wants to change but they just haven't thought through the details yet. Much like extroverts who think that introverts really want to go out and socialize in large groups, they just haven't been invited to the right group yet. Sorry, no. It doesn't work that way. Sometimes a conservative says no for a good reason. They have thought things through and have decided that the costs of some change in their life are not worth the advertised benefits. And if they don't say yes to a particular change, the result will turn out just fine.

Thinking Like a Bully

I was contemplating a story a while back (not written, but that's another story) in which the viewpoint character was a bully, from childhood on up to adulthood. The problem is, I never understood them as a kid. I understand them a bit better now. What follows are my observations and educated guesses about how and why they operate as they do.

The central motivation in a bully's life seems to be obtaining power over others. This desire could arise naturally--some people are just born to want to be "the boss" in an aggressive fashion (as opposed to leaders, who have the same ability to get others to follow them but usually have more benign intentions). Others develop the desire to push others around in response to their childhood experiences. Either they were pushed around by parents or siblings or they saw one parent dominate the other one, usually with threats or use of physical force. Perhaps there are other explanations, but those are the ones that occur to me.

What's interesting and disturbing is to see how bullying plays out in the adult world. Just because you grow up in an abusive or threatening household doesn't mean you want to or have to emulate that in your own life. I'd like to think some don't. My home life while growing up was benign; my interactions with my peers, not always. I took a lot of teasing personally and mostly just wanted to get along and be left alone: "If you don't have anything nice to say..." The desire to control, boss around, or manipulate others just isn't a huge motivator in my life. I come at life with a notion of live and let live.

A bully doesn't think that way. A bully is paranoid, believing that everyone is out to get him/her, and the only way to deal with someone is to strike back at some perceived slight or to strike first before someone else gets the better of you. A bully "controls" his/her environment by fear--intimidating others through aggressiveness to prevent others from even desiring to "cross" them. Paradoxically, that effort to control through fear is born from the bully's own fears--sense a threat, attack it before it hurts you! It's a sad way to go through life.

Sometimes bullying takes different forms: back-stabbing, ostracism, gossiping, peer pressure, or "political" pressure, all of which are subtle ways of bending the will of the individual to the group: do things our way or you'll be sorry! Bullying works on individuals and groups. An individual with a group behind him/her is stronger and has more resources than a single person alone. A bully tries to get into the head of the victim and get them to imagine what will happen to his/her own skin, reputation, etc., if left standing alone. These dynamics are the same whether one is talking about a cult leader or a romantic partner who seeks to isolate and control another. Gangs, for example, usually don't jump other gangs or even groups of people, they usually assault a single individual and outnumber them.

"There's strength in numbers," the saying goes, and it's perfectly true. The converse of that is,  "There's weakness in isolation." Bullies play on those fears. They also tend to prey on the small, the weak, and the loner. These types of targets are unlikely to cause damage to the bully, are less able to defend themselves, or are less able to call upon others to help them in the event of personal danger. Bullies note those dynamics, too: they're opportunists, preferring targets of opportunity and seeking to dominate only those most easily dominated. Bullies are not exactly cowards, but they only push where they think they will get away with their intimidating behavior.

Some bullies operate on a broader scale and have a larger stage from which to work: crime bosses, armed gangs, even heads of governments. Again, the dynamics apply: isolate individuals, attack the weak, do as much as possible within what seems allowable. Sometimes they hit outside their weight to prove their toughness to others. Sometimes they do it because they sense that a stronger power will let them get away with bad actions. They will keep pushing the limits until they're forced to fight.

What is one to do with adult bullies? In the end, the choices haven't changed for thousands of years: you can either submit to their wishes, ignore them, or stand up to them. However, it's important to know that the first two options have consequences.

Appeasement or capitulation breeds reactive cowardice in the victim and leads to a situation where you lose control of your freedom of thought and movement. A bully, sensing surrender, will get MORE, not LESS aggressive because they now see someone who is not just weak but confessing weakness. Building on that, the bully will double down on their demands and misbehavior, figuring that if they push hard enough they'll get even more for their efforts. Appeasing a bully triggers a "reward" response, where they want and get more by acting in an aggressive fashion.

Ignoring bullies--regardless of the size--might or might not work. If they think you're an easy target, they will keep coming because they think they can get away with bad behavior or maybe they'll lose interest.

Usually a bully only backs off when they are confronted at a level that makes it clear their behavior will not be tolerated. You might yell, you might complain to HR, you might call the police, you might arm yourself, you might have to go out and take down the bully with all the resources you and your fellows have available to you. In the end, though, a bully is only stopped by another bully or by an honorable person with enough strength to make them stop. Such is human nature. I wish that it were otherwise.

Which Universe Do You Live In?

For a multitude of reasons, I have friends and Facebook and follow people on Twitter who have philosophical views drastically different from my own. What's baffling to me--a person who occasionally can be overwhelmed by too much or too much conflicting data--is how all of these folks live in the same universe. If I believe all the opinions and "facts" put out by conservatives, the world is going to heck in a handcart under Obama. If I believe everything liberals say, they are the source of all that's good and right in the world and conservatives are gravely mistaken about everything. If I believe the folks who lean libertarian, the conservatives and the liberals are both screwed up and need to have their political power taken down several notches (no two libertarians, however, can agree on a method for such a scenario). And so forth. What's interesting is that all of them use "facts" to back up their claims.

One example will suffice: unemployment. Right now, official government figures have the unemployment rate at ~6%, which is well-nigh decent, and a big improvement over the 8-10% we had in 2008. However, if you take a different view of "the numbers," the unemployment rate is actually much higher because the labor participation rate (i.e., the number of people eligible for work who are not employed or not looking for work) had dropped to historic lows because people have simply "given up" trying to find a job. Then there's the contrarian view that a lot more jobs could be created if government regulations were drastically trimmed. And so forth.

Who do you believe?

What's at the root of all these opinions--and gosh knows I can only spend so much time reading political rants before I feel the urge to do something else, like laundry or cleaning the tub--is reality itself. Different groups operate from different assumptions and so interpret the "facts" of the world accordingly.

Do you believe humanity is basically good or, at worst, neutral? Do you believe that individuals are a product of societal forces and the specific circumstances into which they are born (nationality, wealth, race)? Do you believe that the "American Dream" (life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness) is admirable but unrealistic due to societal forces working to suppress minorities? Do you believe that human beings can be improved, either through individual effort or wise leadership from enlightened "right thinking" people? Do you believe that history is one of never-ending progress with occasional downturns? Do you believe that government's most important role is to ensure the social and economic equality of all? Do you believe that all moral systems are inherently equal because they're all aiming toward some sort of good but have some disagreements as to how morality should be enforced? Do you mistrust religion? Do you distrust big businesses more than big governments? Do you believe government should be the ultimate source of economic problem-solving among people? If you answered yes to the bulk of these questions, you are probably a liberal.

Do you believe humanity is basically "fallen" and that individuals are good or evil from birth? Do you believe that individuals have the ability to overcome their circumstances no matter how dire? Do you believe the "American Dream" should apply to everyone, regardless of birth? Do you believe that human nature is constant (essentially bad) and bad behavior can only be restrained through religious or governmental authority? Do you believe that human progress (freedom, technological development, enlightenment through inquiry and the arts) is a temporary phenomenon and that societies must guard against "barbarism?" Do you believe that some moral systems (e.g., Western) are superior to others due to their outcomes? Do you believe government's most important role is to ensure a nation's economic and political strength? Do you distrust big governments more than big businesses? Do you believe the marketplace should be the ultimate source of economic problem-solving among people? If you answered yes to the bulk of these questions, you are probably a traditional conservative.

Do you believe humanity is essentially neutral and a product of his/her birth and education? Do you believe individuals can overcome their specific obstacles in life if they are given maximum freedom from government and society? Do you believe the "American Dream" should be exported around the world peacefully? Do you believe that human nature, while bad, can be overcome? Do you believe that human progress is possible, but only through individual, non-government efforts? Do you believe that all established moral systems are valid as long a they don't try to harm others? Do you believe government's most important role is to ensure individual freedom and to allow individuals to achieve as much as possible? Do you believe individual choices and trades (the marketplace) should be the ultimate source of economic problem-solving among people? If you answered yes to most of these, you're probably libertarian.

The challenge, as I noted earlier, is that all of these attitudes--and more!--are at play on the internet and in our national dialogue. If you let yourself get overwhelmed by the babble and the back-and-forth, you have a few choices:

• Tune out everybody and just avoid politics as much as possible
• Listen to/read only those people with you you agree
• Absorb it all and try to obtain a balanced perspective on how people think about the world

The benefit of the first option is less stress; the downside is that you become ignorant of matters which might greatly affect how you live and work.

The benefit of the second option is comfort; you can read or listen to commentators with whom you agree and become part of the cheering section; the downside is that you can have your viewpoint skewed to the point of ignoring or being unable to comprehend facts that contradict your isolated worldview.

The benefit of the last option is that  you get a clearer picture of what's being said about the state of the world/nation and how it might be interpreted; the downside is data overflow and a tendency to read more arguments than you might care to see.

I've tried all three options, sometimes within the same week, sometimes within the same day. Sometimes I'll spend a long stretch using one option. Occasionally I even throw in my own two cents. Therein lies the challenge: you can learn about what people say about the world from watching/reading the news/internet/etc., but you also have the option to participate. How do you see the world? Do you believe your voice can make a difference? I guess it all depends on which universe you choose to see.

Christmas for Me, You, and Everybody

For the last few years (4? 5?), my Christmas "tradition" has been to fly to Orlando, spend a few days visiting my dad and stepmom, catching up with Disney friends if possible, going into one of the theme parks, and staying at The Peabody on International Drive. Following the advice of my father, a former Eastern Airlines sales rep, I'd try to pick the least-busy holiday travel inbound and outbound to avoid unnecessary crowds. As it happens, one of the least busy days to fly is Christmas Day, so I've spent several December 25s in airports and airplanes, heading away from Orlando to somewhere colder. Last year, I was on the verge of unemployment. I knew it was where I wanted to be, and made the plan to return to Florida. I've spent a year living in other people's homes, scrounging for work, but in the end, I got to a place where I think I can support myself, live in my own apartment, and (huzzah!) spend Christmas in Orlando. No idea what I'll be doing that day--dinner with Dad is the 23rd ("because Bart always leaves on Christmas Day"--ouch). However, I'll be in a warm place, near people and places I love and within electronic and telephone contract of those not so nearby. I consider that a holiday well spent.

I couldn't rightly say where my faith is at this moment, but Christmas has always been a special time for me. I love Luke Chapter 2. I love Perry Como, Bing Crosby, and the rest on the radio. I love the trees and the lights. I love gathering together with family and friends. It's always been a time to feel and spread goodwill, and that's what I try to do.

Whoever you are, wherever you are, I hope you find this season a warm time of good fellowship. Merry Christmas, one and all.

Movie Review: Interstellar

Let's get the bad news out of the way for those of you who don't have the patience to read an entire review: I really wanted to like Interstellar, but it just didn't move, entrance, or excite me like I thought it would. I give it three stars. Those of you with short attention spans may now move along to other parts of the internet. If you'd like to know why I gave the film this rating, feel free to keep reading.

Obviously I wanted to like Interstellar because I'm a space geek and because it's been quite a while since I saw an upbeat vision of space exploration depicted on film. And let me be fair here: that is what Interstellar provides. And the stakes are high: astronauts heading off to the far reaches of space--via a black hole, no less--to save the Earth. So you've got the broad tapestry we expect from space operas, as depicted by SF Grand Master Brian Aldiss:

Ideally, the Earth must be in peril, there must be a quest and a man to match the mighty hour. That man must confront aliens and exotic creatures. Space must flow past the ports like wine from a pitcher. Blood must run down the palace steps, and Ships launch out into the louring dark. There must be a woman fairer than the skies and a villain darker than the Black Hole. And all must come right in the end.

Without giving too much away, I would say, again, that Interstellar includes most of these ingredients. Plus, as an extra bonus, the director got scientific input from an actual astrophysicist. Also on the positive side, the visuals of entering the black hole are amazing and worth seeing on the big screen. The space hardware, too, is believable. In fact, the spacecraft look very much like NASA hardware (which, in fact, they're depicted to be). Though truth be told, my favorite bits of screen eye candy are the closeups of the planet Saturn. And on the human interest side of things, we have people who are stock characters to serious SF fans: we have our plucky astronauts doing what they can for their own disparate reasons--the hot pilot (Matthew McConnaughey) flying off to live his dream and save his family; the scientist's daughter, out for reasons of her own and following in her father's footsteps; the robot with a sense of humor; and a range of characters who are either worth knowing or easily disposable.

So why does this film disappoint?

Let's start with the exposition--the "world building," as SF writers call it. We've got a future Earth that is dying from some sort of blight that is killing crops, eroding the oxygen in the atmosphere, and shrinking the world's population. The most obvious signs of this negative future are massive dust storms, which call to mind the nuclear winter parts of The Day After. In fact, a few aspects of Interstellar reminded me of The Day After, including the corn-country setting, the blowing dust, the air of despair, and the presence of John Lithgow, who in this film portrays a crusty grandfather instead of the scientific genius (that role is played by Michael Caine, who does much less crying in this film than the last Christopher Nolan Batman film). But the last thing that reminded me of that "epic" made-for-TV movie was the bad acting. Honestly, I can't recall the last movie I saw where I felt the actors just phoned it in, but this film had an abundance of it, including bad acting by a couple of famous actors whom I figured would know better. The best explanation I have for this bad acting is an unfamiliarity with science fiction and its unavoidable technobabble.

Next thing? The buildup. Interstellar suffers from pacing problems and is therefore too long, by about 40 minutes. There would be no shame in curtailing the exposition to get McConnaughey's pilot into space, but Christopher Nolan felt otherwise.

I was going to say nice things about the soundtrack, which has touches of classical Earth themes that will definitely remind audiences of 2001: A Space Odyssey. That is good and bad. 2001 definitely has grandeur, and the Interstellar soundtrack manages to evoke that grandeur in some cases. However, there are a couple places in the film where the soundtrack overwhelms the actors' voices. At the time, I was frustrated because I couldn't understand what the actors were saying. Only later, like this morning, did I realize that the sound problems had been on purpose, which somehow made it worse. A little reminder to Hollywood directors: don't make your game-playing so obvious. As with good written material, you don't want to disrupt the audience's willing suspension of disbelief. If the reader or movie-going audience is made aware of the artifice of what's going on, they are no longer paying attention to the story but are instead paying attention to the storytelling.

Lastly, there is the plot, which is convoluted in places, messy in others, and in some places outright unbelievable. It takes too many steps to get from Earth to the heart of the plot (the "MacGuffin," which was also the name of the bar where I bought a bourbon before entering the theater). And when I got to the MacGuffin, I found that...well, I just didn't buy it. It was like a "high concept" for a science fiction film written by someone who doesn't read a lot of SF but thinks, "Hey, if we do this, it'll be really cool and deep," but it's not.

Which brings me back to my original three-star rating. I applaud Christopher Nolan for making a space opera with a positive view of science, technology, and the human future. And he delivers that...BUT: I didn't care about the characters. The story is too long. The central "high concepts" that resolve the plot make no sense or are muddled. So Interstellar gets three stars from me. Your mileage could vary.

The Future of Electricity

I probably wrote too much on this subject in Facebook, so I'm moving my thoughts here. What started this discussion was a Popular Science story on how all those solar panels people put up to reduce strain on "the grid" actually aren't as helpful as they could be. My friend Angela referred me to a somewhat longer piece by the New York Times on the same subject. Here follows my response, with a couple extra links/comments:

Okay, so I went back and read the NYT piece. I don't know how various systems ARE handling electrical power, but here's my slightly more-informed take on the issue:
1) A useful electrical grid should be focused on demand, not efficiency, even if that means redundancy. The general public is concerned with two primary issues when it comes to electricity: price and availability. I could be wrong, but my guess is that we're willing to pay slightly more for 100% availability.
2) The grid also should provide overlapping/surge capabilities to meet demand as required (e.g., regular business hours, the hottest part of summer days so people don't die of heatstroke, or during the coldest part of a winter night up north when temps drop to Antarctic levels).
3) Future solar panels can be built/added to the west sides of people's roofs/yards. If the government is serious about maintaining/improving electrical power during peak loads, they can offer incentives to help people pay to move their solar panels.
4) Another useful thing that could be done with roofs (for addressing climate change) is to paint them white or reflectively to increase the amount of sunlight being reflected into space instead of being absorbed by the ground.
5) If individuals have the wherewithal to provide themselves with electrical power through solar, generators, etc., they should be allowed to opt out of the grid. If there's a major disaster, such as a hurricane, the individual would have an equal or better chance of having power.
6) Consistent-output power systems (nuclear, natural gas, coal), should continue to provide base-load power. Solar and wind are just too fickle to depend upon for base power. The sun might be shining just brilliantly or the wind blowing like crazy during a peak-load time--in which case everyone wins. If there's a peak load and a cloudy, windless day or night, all those solar panels don't matter much.
7) Capacitor technologies are improving, as are other energy storage technologies (e.g. flywheels). If those can be made to harness the energy collected by solar/wind as generated and dispensed as needed, I can see a better system evolving--one that keeps environmentalists reasonably happy while continuing to allow our high-tech civilization to function and prosper.
 
My $.04.

An Open Letter to Microsoft

[This message was also sent via the "Feedback" option in Outlook. The Feedback box had a character limit, so I'm completing my thoughts here. I am nothing if not persistent.]

Dear Microsoft:

In the past two months, your spam filter has turned from relatively reliable to nearly worthless. I now have 500(!!) word-search junk filters set up, and that is still not enough. I wrote to you because 500 filters is your "legal limit," and the garbage keeps coming in. I am not going out to a lot of websites to get my name put on special lists just so I can enjoy the attention of the world's online entrepreneurs. My name and email are in the public domain, so I am just getting bombarded. Your spam filter appears to have given up the ghost unless a junk message runs afoul of a rule that I set up for it. I am an independent contractor, and new business can come in from unknown sources, so I can't just block everyone who's not on my contact list and call it done.

Also, because I have my Outlook tied to my iPhone, I must ask: does the junk filter even work on iPhone? I ask because if a junk mail message hits my iPhone first (as opposed to the webpage), more often than not the message will go to my inbox, not the Junk folder. If the message gets to the website first, it's a tossup as to whether the message will go to Junk or the Inbox.

I am not happy with this situation. I have been using Hotmail for 17 years because the service has been worthwhile. I might stop now.

Bart Leahy
Heroic Technical Writing
Orlando, FL