Bierfaristo Blog

Today, Phil and I were trying to use Maps.app. I had posted a picture and Phil observed that the exif data was still attached and used the viewer in Preview.app to look at where it was taken on the map. Then he asked where my office was, so I tried to get a way to grab a latlong that I could easily provide to show him. I dropped a pin, but then discovered that the pin doesn't give you the latlong. In fact, there doesn't appear to be any way to get a latlong. It has a bunch of mechanisms for "sharing", but all of them are services: you can share "via email", but it doesn't work with Thunderbird: you have to use Mail.app. You can share via Twitter or Facebook or a variety of other ways. But why not give you a location or URL that could be easily shared with any service. By obfuscating the internals, Apple can favor the services it likes while disadvantaging the ones it doesn't like. Many users don't notice, because the dominant services are represented. But its another step toward turning technology into an opaque service where people are consumers, rather than participants.

Kalle Kniivilä petis kelkajn homojn verki mallonge pri la unuaj cent tagoj de la nova estraro de UEA por aperonta artikolo, sed ne ricevis sufiĉe da respondoj por artikolo. Jen tio, kion mi verkis:

En fora usono, ni aŭdas onidirojn pri la nova estraro de UEA, sed mankas ajnajn konkretajn indikojn pri ties agado. Estis onidire elekto de nova redaktoro de Esperanto-revuo, sed ĝis nun neniu indiko pri kion novan li alportos. Laŭdire estos nova retejo ankaŭ, sed mi ankoraŭ vidas neniun ŝanĝon.

Mi legis eseon de Mark Fettes en la Balta Ondo kiu levis pli da demandoj ol ĝi klarigis. Tute ne estis klare al mi kion li celas ke la esperantistaro fakte faru. Kion mi faru? Mi demandadis al mi tion fojon post fojo dum mi legis. Li diris ke oni devas "motivi la homojn fari la necesan investon de tempo, mono kaj energio por kapabliĝi." Ĉu mi devas motivi? Aŭ investi? Investi tempon? Investi monon? Mi ne scias kion mi faru per tiu alineo. Kaj pri la kvar agadkampoj? Ŝajnas ke UEA aliĝas nun al la KKKK -- ion brazilanoj bone komprenas.

Baldaŭ mi esperas ke UEA, kunekun siaj aligitaj landaj asocioj, klarigos mallonge kaj unuvoĉe kion ili celas fari kiu meritas kaj la partoprenon kaj la subtenon de la esperantistaro. Kial oni membriĝu? Kiel oni aliĝu al la celoj kaj laboro de la Esperanto-movado? Kio estos la laboro de UEA kaj kiel oni rekte subtenu tiun laboron? Ju pli longe ni parolu nebule pri "motivi investon", des pli longe ĝis oni fakte ion faros.

Finfine, kiam UEA havos klaran, trafan mesaĝon, mi konsilas ke necesos celi ne nur la membraron: nepros celi la tutan esperantistaron kaj iel atingi ilin. La plejmulto de esperanto-parolantoj ne estas membroj de UEA. La artikolo ĉe la Balta Ondo estis bona komenco, sed ĝis nun mankas klara strategio kiel atingi la ne-membrojn.

Two things that I forgot to mention in my previous article about services that are hard to value and quantify are among the most important: biodiversity and the services of a functioning ecology. This is a huge problem with capitalism that looks like it may well ultimately result in the extinction of people.

Most, if not all, organisms biologically treat the world as an unlimited resource. If you put bacteria in a petri-dish, they consume all the resources until their own wasteproducts and lack of resources result in the collapse of population.

People have treated the earth much the same way: throughout history, there is example after example of people writing about a biological resource as boundless or limitless (forests, buffalo, passenger pigeon, cod, etc, etc, etc) and then the surprised shock when it turns out that the limits, being exceeded, result in a collapse.

Currently, we're seeing the effect most prominently with respect to global climate change. But its not the only one: we're losing species after species in an unprecendented loss (in human time scales) of biodiversity. We know that ecology is a complex web of interactions where a small loss (like of a "keystone predator") can result in the loss of an entire ecosystem.

The effect is well known: it's the "tragedy of the commons". If one or two people monetize the environment, they get rich -- at everyone else's expense. But when everyone tries to do it, it causes the system to collapse and everyone is impoverished.

We're running countless huge, uncontrolled experiments with our own environment -- because it's more profitable to those who already have money to do it that way -- but with no ability to measure the actual potential costs, because they're displaced in time and are generalized to be imposed on everyone, there are no brakes on the train.

It worked for us (Western civilization) because we were the first to monetize the commons. But now that India, China, Brazil, and the rest of the world want to do it, the risks are becoming more apparent. Well -- that's not really true. Ecologists have known about the risks all along, but the plutocracy was willing to overlook the risks for their own enrichment. Many are still willing to overlook them to get a little richer in the short run.

Students often describe these as "problems facing the earth" or that "we need to protect the earth". Of course, the earth will be just fine. Human civilization, on the other hand, is much more delicate. As we've seen, it doesn't really take much for it to collapse.

La xkcd laste estis amuza, sed donis al mi ideon.

Fakte, ĝi donis al mi kelkajn ideojn.

Multajn ideojn.

La eblecoj pri Esperanto estas senfinaj, fakte.

You get what you pay for. And conversely, you don't get what you don't pay for. Over the past 30 years, our society has increasingly moved toward management and resource allocation systems that set up measures and use those to evaluate people and processes. The result has been to reduce the service offered to only those activities aligned with the measures. As measures increase -- and those resistant to the agenda, who pull down the scores, are driven out -- there is much celebration and slapping of backs. But something is being lost.

It's often hard to identify what was lost -- precisely because it was something that wasn't being measured. But I think that, over the next generation, we're going to discover how much poorer our environment is because of all of these resources or amenities that we used to take for granted but which now are gone, simply because they're hard to quantify and measure.

We're seeing this in the teaching profession, where teaching is being treated, not as an empowered person building a culture of learning among students, but instead as a functionary monitoring low-status workers and being rewarded for "keeping them on task". It doesn't matter whether test-scores go up: we're destroying the teaching profession and graduating a generation of students who have never learned to take responsibility for their own learning.

One example, I've seen talked about, which falls into this category is "loyalty". Charlie Stross wrote eloquently how in building a cadre of professionals, the government used to manage explicitly to help maintain loyalty, but that the next generation of spy kids has been treated much more as disposable contractors -- and that Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden are the beginnings of that decisionmaking coming home to roost.

Another example is the appalling architecture in public spaces. James Howard Kunstler has written extensively how zoning and cost cutting have led many buildings to expose blank walls and created soul-sucking areas all around themselves because, from a purely cost/rule driven standpoint, there's no reward for creating an enriching public sphere.

I feel personally invested in the issue because of the kind of work I do. I've often seen myself as a catalyst in my roles supporting faculty and students: the work I do often doesn't have a direct product, but it enables others to be productive. This is another example of the kind of work that can get overlooked or feel unrewarded, because it isn't something that gets directly measured. I remember a chairman who, after he took over, looked at me and said, "What do you do, anyway?" That was rather chilling. Luckily there were a number of faculty around the department who were willing to explain to him how important I was to their ability to do their work. But it's something I worry about.

A counterveiling trend has sprung up, toward local and artisanal poducts and labor. Given how robots are replacing human labor, though, unless robots can be programming to buy artisanal, it may be a losing proposition.

Last weekend, I travelled by myself to Silver Bay for the Aŭtuna Renkontiĝo. In the past, Lucy usually went with me, but she's decided she doesn't want to travel so far -- at least not for Esperanto things. So I went by myself. I decided to stay in the Junulara Dometo (in spite of not being so juna). It was a pleasant experience. I particularly enjoyed the experience of being among a community of people engaged in meaningful activity, even if it was just preparing and sharing meals. I really enjoyed the peace and tranquility of the place.

The week, in spite of being short, was especially busy getting ready for the opening of a new exhibit for the collections celebrating William S. Clark. We had visitors coming in from Japan to see the exhibit and several of us worked at a fever pitch to pull it all together. My part was to arrange the technology to "take over" the projector that usually shows the "Molecular Playground" and instead have it offer a presentation of slides about William Clark and Hokkaido University. It got tied up with two similar projects that Geosciences wanted to do. There was a lot of back-and-forth trying to negotiate some payment for Tom to build the ones for Geosciences and help me.

A high point of week was my class where Dr. Alexander Suvorov presented briefly on terrestrial molluscs and then went into the field with us to collect some. I had picked out a spot that I thought would be good and it was: we found a bunch of examples to take back to the lab. We got to do all the pieces: collecting, looking at them under dissecting scopes, identifying them, and collecting some imagery. With the collections staff being so busy building the exhibit, I hadn't managed to get everything together ahead of time, so I had to go back the next day with alcohol to preserve everything. And today made up some labels. It looks like what will work best is to start building a reference collection: the students should be able to use the examples we have so far to recognize things we've seen and set aside things we haven't to get additional help from Sasha. It was a tremendous high to have everything come together so well.

Last night, we had a reception for the guests visiting from Japan. I was able to attend briefly -- just long enough to give each of the visitors a copy of one of my books of haiku. When I mentioned haiku, one of them expressed great surprise and interest. They seemed appreciative and I hope they enjoy them.

I had to run from the reception because the Annual Meeting of Amherst Media was happening later. I joined the board of Amherst Media over the summer. At the Annual Meeting, we needed to elect new board members and hand out an award. The Jean Haggery Award for Community Engagement was given to Josh Wolfsun and the Student News directors including Charlie. I got to see him stand up and receive a plaque and stand with the others to reflect on and be recognized for their accomplishments. I was very pleased to see something he'd worked so hard for receive the recognition it deserved.

Much of yesterday and today, I spent organizing my Annual Faculty Review -- a particularly odious task. I had a huge number of things to list this year, which made it somewhat less unpleasant than usual. Drupal Camp, Interim Director of the IT Program, the ICT Summit, Hack for Western Mass, the Summer Institute for Scientific Teaching, the Learning Spaces Collaboratory. It was a busy year last year. It was a relief to get it turned in on time.

This evening, Lucy and I watched the Cardinals take the pennant. I'm not much of a baseball fan, but I enjoy watching the games with Lucy. And the game tonight was a real treat: they scored 9 runs while holding the Dodgers scoreless. It was almost enough to make you feel sorry for the Dodgers. Almost.

Tomorrow, I have another road trip, but this time with friends. I'll meet Buzz, Julian, Phil, and Annie for a trip up to Vermont to look for Heady Topper. We were crushed to see that the brewery is sold out for the weekend, but as Buzz points out, there is plenty of other craft beer in Vermont worth exploring. And other places that may have Heady Topper for sale.

Dum la pasintaj kelkaj tagoj mi verkis du hajkojn kiujn mi tre ŝatas. Eble ili ne estas la plej bonaj hajkoj en la historio de hajko-verkado, sed ili trafas tion kion mi celas.

malvarma maten'… tineopilka odor' de l' pulovero / chilly morning… mothball odor of my sweater #hajko #haiku #esperanto

— Steven D. Brewer (@limako) October 6, 2013

En tiu, mi celas la matenon en kiu oni finfine decidas porti la puloveron kiu restis en skatolo dum la somero kun la tineopilketoj. Tiu estas preciza momento kaj, per sperto kaj sento, mi kaptas ĝin.

la nuboj hastas, preterpasantoj ankaŭ… la pluvo venas / the clouds hasten, passersby too… the rain is coming #hajko #haiku #esperanto

— Steven D. Brewer (@limako) October 7, 2013

Ĉifoje, mi komencis kun la konstato ke la nuboj tre rapide moviĝas kaj ke la homaro, konstatinte ke baldaŭ estos ŝtormo, ankaŭ rapidas.

Mi legas lastatempe la libron de Blyth pri la historio de hajko kaj li havas similan priskribron pri ĉiu hajko kiun li elektis por la libro. Mi kredas ke tiu helpas min pli klare konstati kion mi celas per miaj hajkoj. Ofte, mi ne scias precize, sed foje, mi tre klare komprenas precize kion mi volas diri. Kaj foje, mi havas la konstaton ke mi trafas precize tion.

This morning I read this essay about a former Rand Paul supporter who, once he had lead poisoning, suddenly had a change of heart about Obamacare. Phil wondered why it is that these people seem to need some personal experience: to have a friend or family member get sick -- or get sick themselves -- before they realize the importance of health insurance. But I know why.

They really believe Ayn Rand. They believe they got everything solely due to their hard work. People who don't have it all are just parasites. Who are they going to listen to? A parasite? If you disagree with them, you're a parasite. And if you're a Randian, you believe like they do.

I don't mind the rich enjoying their ill-gotten gains very much. Oh, it rankles a little. But what really offends me is their need to try to tilt the table ever more in their favor. It isn't enough to win the game -- they want all the pieces. Seeing scumbags like the Koch Brothers or Sheldon Adelson or Dick Cheney who trample all over the poor simply adds insult to injury -- even injury to injury.

They fail to recognize that hard work isn't enough. Luck plays a huge role. Luck. And privilege. Or both. Anyone who doesn't see another person, whether king or beggar, and say, "There but for the grace of God go I" has missed out on a key insight of life.

The government shutdown (for which I entirely blame Republicans) brings back memories for me. When the last shutdown happened, I was in Washington to collect data at the Smithsonian for my dissertation research. I had gotten a small grant to pay for my travel expenses, I arranged to stay with the inlaws in Maryland, and I had scheduled meetings with scientists to have them solve phylogenetic tree construction problems. I had filled up the better part of a week with appointments. It hadn't been easy to persuade busy scientists to give up several hours of their time, but having worked for a couple of months to set everything up, things were looking good. But as my trip approached, threats of the shutdown arose and then actually happened: the government shut down, the Smithsonian was locked up, and the scientists were locked out.

I flew to Washington over the weekend before my appointments, hoping that maybe something would happen. I spent Saturday and Sunday in a panic, trying to get in touch with people: they couldn't check their messages or email and I didn't have any personal contact information for anyone, but I worked the phones with my contacts trying to track people down. Despairing, I went to bed on Sunday with little hope of resucing my doctoral research.

But, Lo and Behold! In the morning, was news that a continuing resolution had been signed! The government was funded for a week! I got a ride to the subway, made my way to the Smithsonian, and everything came off without a hitch. I flew home at the end of the week and just a few days later, the government shut down again. But I had my data.

If I were a religious person, I might think someone had been looking out for me. But, since we're talking about the federal government, I would probably be looking in the wrong direction.

Vastalto kaj mi verkis alvokon por inviti samideanojn al nova projekto. Ni proponas libron de hajbunoj (hajkaj prozoj) kiuj temas Esperanton, Esperantujon, ktp. Bonvole partoprenu kaj helpu nin dissemi la alvokon!

Mi ekhavis la ideon antaŭ kelkaj monatoj dum mi finlaboris senokulvitre (mian lastan libron de hajkoj — nun havebla ĉe la UEA Libroservo!) Mi interesiĝas dum multaj jaroj ne nur pri hajko kaj senrjuo, sed ankaŭ pri hajbuno aŭ, kiel Vastalto nomas ilin, hajka prozo.

Antaŭ multaj jaroj, mi eltrovis la libron Mallarĝa Vojo al Fora Interno (Oku no Hosomichi, kiun mi devis legi en la angla) kaj ĝi tute kaptis mian atenton. Mi ege ŝatis ĝin kaj legis kaj relegis ĝin. Kaj ĝi inspiris min provi mem verki hajbunojn.

En 2010, aperis mia unua hajbuno, Patro kaj Filo ĉe Sukerpanmonto en la oktobra kajero de Beletra Almanako. Nun, post tri jaroj, aperos sekva hajbuno Spuroj Sub Franc-Reĝa Ponto en obtobro 2013. Mi nun prilaboras trian kaj finfine celos libron de miaj hajbunoj pri la Pionira Valo — la regiono en kiu mi loĝas.

Mi esperas ke aliaj interesiĝos pri hajbuno kaj esploros tiun ĉi specon de eseeto. Ĝi ŝajnas al mi perfekte taŭga por rakonti pri vojaĝoj al kaj en Esperantujo. Kaj mi esperas ke tiu ĉi libro estu dialogo inter oriento kaj okcidento. Mi tre ĝojas kunlabori kun Vastalto, jam lernis multon, kaj nepre lernos pli dum la venonta projekto.