Tautology of the Skeptical Sinner

I saw an Inconvenient Truth, and it was an excellent documentary, well presented and quite terrifying.

The media helpfully let us know each week of some other sign that the planet is warming up.

Those who propose that it is man’s impact on the atmosphere, similar to CFCs on the ozone layer, want us to adopt a radical shift in eco-policies, and they say we need to do it now.

The cost: They don’t talk about the specifics too much, but by getting rid of cheap but dirty energy like coal, the price of energy is going to go up. Guess who pays for that: You. Higher Electricity bills, even higher prices in the Grocery Store, in fact higher prices everywhere - the only thing sure to go down in price is cars - non-hybrid cars that is. Oh, and governments are going to pay for it using your taxes.

Fear is a great motivator, and having the population focusing on this end of days scenario is a good distraction from the other things we ought to be doing.

The reason I’m still skeptical is that we do not have accurate temperature records of the climate changes the earth has been through - we only have the last 250 years… we can draw conclusions based off archeological evidence and historical accounts of both the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age - but we can’t directly corrolate the impact of the Industrial Revolution and the CO² we’ve pumped into the atmosphere compared to the solar cycles others say is the primary driver of climate change.

Why do most ancient cultures have The Great Flood in their mythos?

I am not a blind skeptic, there is a lot of evidence that man may be heating up the planet… but this planet’s been around a hell of a lot longer than we have, and she’s a tough old bitch.

I’m still on the fence. But if global warming were a stock would you buy or sell. http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/06/12/temperature-stock-report/

Then there’s the visual evidence http://www.thedailygreen.com/environmental-news/north-pole-ice-melt-460608

Found this over at De-conversion the original survey is here http://religions.pewforum.org/reports and coverage by  The Dallas Morning News

This is not a puzzling survey result.

As we all know, Atheists tend to be smart asses(Go on deny, dare ya). And Survey takers tend to not give a crap, especially about the little things like… thinking etc.

Question 1: “Sir what is your religious Affiliation?”
Atheist A: “I’m an Atheist”

Question 2: “Sir, would you say you believe in a personal god?”
Atheist A: “… Yeah… definitely…”

Question 3: “Sir, What do you call your personal god?”
Atheist A: “I pray exclusively to the flying spaghetti monster”

So the question begs, are they lumping Pastafarians into the Atheist camp? If so, those BASTARDS need to issue a retraction. I say we storm embassies and hold large chanting get-togethers (we could make smores) - on second thoughts, lets not… we don’t want to be copycats.

… or maybe they outsourced the survey takers to India.

Pokerstars.

Ahhh, love that site… always something going on. And more bad playing than the eye can see.

US Players can still sign up there and make easy deposits in the form of an E-check from your bank. Minimum deposit is only $25.00 and there are tons of tournaments and table games where the buy in is only a dollar. So if you’re sick of playing “free chip” poker, stop on by. Or at least, check out THEIR Free Chip poker games, where you can… oh I don’t know… WIN A SEAT IN THE WSOP for nothing!!! Ahem… seriously.

During my day to day work, occasionally I’ll get an escalated call from our Indian call center.

“This customer only wants to speak to an American”

I take the call and I’ll always start off by saying “Thank you for your patience, your call has been transferred to me for further assistance. I am located in the U.S. but I am, in fact, English. I hope this is not a problem”

So far, it hasn’t been. And the caller will often say “I’m not racist, but I have a very hard time understanding those people” or “I’m not prejudiced, I just don’t trust those people with my personal information”

Newsflash: You are being racist. But is it justifiable?

I like a large number of my Indian Customer service reps. A good 10 or so have very good accents (One, Rachel, has a deliciously exotic accent that makes my toes curl), are extremely sharp and customer-focused people, almost to a fault. Yes, it’s true, some of the others make me want to stab myself in the face with an icepick. It’s not that they’re dumb… most have college degrees, but the cultural divide is SO vast that it sometimes feels like I’m trying to teach a dog about quantum mechanics.

That’s on the “front end” i.e. the customer service representatives who talk directly to the customers, but what about the “back end” - those outsourced employees who handle account research, mail handling and payments? Well - from the company’s perspective, the bottom line looks healthy. But in my unbiased and reasoned opinion, they’re a bunch of F&^#tards who could barely find their own a$$ with two hands and a flashlight.

How I know this is partly because of my role as escalated customer service. Our customers aren’t calling in to say “Hey! I just wanted to say that I’ve had my card for 6 months with no problems. Thanks! <click>” no… our customers are calling in to know why we F&&^ed up their account. Guess who? Bing.

But the straw that broke the camels back for me was when our own escalated research team were approached to clean up thousands of accounts the Indian team had chronically hosed. The real plum - they had to work “on project” - i.e. no credit for doing the work would be traced back to them, it would be like India miraculously woke up one evening morning and all of their f&c#-ups had vanished!

The real kicker - They allowed the research team to do it during time-and-a-half overtime. Yeah. That’s really saving money. Dumbasses. Once again, Classic Corporate Mentality: Penny Smart, Dollar DUMB

Skep

The Political Inquirer sat down an Atheist and a Theist and asked them to debate this question:

“Is Atheism beneficial or dangerous to society?” and similarly, “Is Theism beneficial or dangerous to society?”

You can read the full article here http://politicalinquirer.com/2008/06/26/god-in-society-an-atheism-theism-debate/

Having read the preliminaries, I’m still a greater fan of Kyle Williams debating with a book. (Warning Long ass post). But both personalities involved in the debate seem measured and not too vitriolic. http://www.atheismisdead.blogspot.com/ represents the theist position and Leo Pardus of DE-CONVERSION the atheist. Personally, I’d have hoped someone from exchristian.net would have been invited, but it still promises to be an interesting discussion.

What, as always, has me amused is the comments.

Looking at GE (NYSE:GE) today… down over 5% from an already savaged low.

What’s going on with the US’s oldest stock?

Well… for one, the sale of its $30 bn private label credit cards is currently under scrutiny, with JP Morgan Chase apparently dropping out.

That and the … strategic decision… to part ways with its appliance division are hammering this traditional bellweather stock.

Does CEO Jeff Immelt really know what he’s doing. Given that he recently bought $3 million worth of shares, you’d think he has an insider edge, but Wall Street don’t echo that confidence.

2.5 million shares were dumped as the stock hit $26.24.

Despite the rally yesterday, it appears that shareholders don’t feel that GE is a bargain at this price, so where’s the next resistance point? $25? $20???

I imagine the board at this point are putting tons of pressure on the erstwhile CEO. After all 14.5 BILLION dollars were written off the company’s market cap today from yesterdays close. (That’s what you get for having almost 10 billion shares outstanding)

GE’s units still continue to make profits, and their sales teams continue to secure long term deals.

Does the CEO know what he’s doing? Wall Street says no. But don’t worry about our Jeff, I’m sure his Golden Parachute will save him.

Soon to be followed by .duh

According to CNN http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/06/25/domain.names/index.html

Apparently the most sought after domain name in this new land grab is going to be “dot.sex”
The least popular? I’m not sure, but my prediction: “ionlyhave.sex”

First I thought I was ambivalent about this decision, but then I was in two minds about that initial thought as well. It may help the adult industry find more available domain names, but more than likely all of the speculators looking to turn a buck will be camping the Registrars like only an ex-everquest player could do and buy chunks of domains that relate to the major players in the adult world.

If they’re smart, instead of doing a first come first served virtual land grab, they should auction the domains themselves a la ebay (ooo ebay.sex! - lawsuit waiting to happen!), themselves.

Since the government cracked down on online gambling, there’s been a huge market that is untapped. As we all know, as soon as you ban something, it doesn’t go away, it just goes underground.

Efforts are being made to fight the legislation, but in the meantime, a creative mind has come up with a different approach.

Enter Centsports.

Now, the government define online gambling as anything that offers prize, chance and consideration. Which is why Centsports is just going to give you money to gamble with. That’s right. They’re going to let you gamble with their money. That way, you’re not risking anything, therefore… not gambling.

Now, they’re only giving you 10 cents at a time, but you can wager that on any line currently offered in Vegas. Once you’ve accumulated $20 you can cash out. Of course, there are lots of restrictions, but even so, if you want to have a little flutter, while it’s not going to let you retire, this is a painless way to get some excitement.

The site of course has advertisers, they have to pay for it somehow, but… if you’ll give it a shot, I think you’ll find the site to be a lot of fun. Stop by and check it out!

In my last post on Hell’s Kitchen, I struggled to find out what it was about this show that was so damn appealing.

In last night’s competition (free over at hulu.com), I think I found out what it was.

The three finalists were: Christina, Corey and Petrozza. It’s obvious, from watching them, that they’re all competent chefs who know how to cook, but can they lead the kitchen? In this episode you’ll find out. If you ask someone to describe Chef Ramsay - they’ll probably mention “shouting”, “rude”, “mean” or “English” in their description of the charismatic owner of Hell’s Kitchen - and if you have only seen previews of the show, then you’d probably be inclined to agree.

But in this episode, as each of the aspiring chef’s take a turn at running Hell’s Kitchen, showcasing their leadership skills for a shot at the prize of being Gordon Ramsay’s next executive chef, you’ll see the teacher and mentor in Gordon Ramsay. I believe that is what makes this show so worthwhile for me. You’ll see that all of the lessons, the demands for perfection and communication, the frustration he demonstrates when a chef gives him less than he knows they are capable of, all come together when each of the final three take a shot at running the hotplate. Also known as The Pass, the hotplate is where the executive chef takes the orders from the dining room, relays them to the kitchen and provides quality control on those dishes that get sent out.

The best part is when Gordon gives each of the three some “assertiveness” training. Priceless.

I’d recommend watching this one, even if you’ve never seen a single episode before. If you like it, then go back and watch how Hell’s Kitchen got whittled down to the final 3. Then tune in next Tuesday (July 1st 2008) for the Final on Fox, or next Wednesday on Hulu.

This was an awesome final three, and you are left hanging right until the end. I won’t spoil it. But I think the best two are left.

Next week’s finale looks like an amazing 2 hours of TV, with the 2 finalists each creating their own restaurant, menu, look and feel… oh, and staffing their kitchen from the contestants previously eliminated from this season.

Keep an eye out for a preview of the finale, coming soon!

An advanced, unauthorized review of their new thriller: Alone in the Dark, has apparently created a wonderful PR experience for Atari. One site broke the pre-release review publication with a “negative review” (5 out of 10 - that’s not negative, thats “meh”) in dutch.

http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/53249

How DARE journalists warn the public in advance that a much hyped product that has a zero return policy is in fact a steaming pile of fecal matter and thereby interfere with a corporations bottom line. God forbid the game publisher should actually wait and release a game that’s original and worth playing.

Pre launch, this game was generating a lot of excitement:
http://buttonbasher.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/alone-in-the-dark/

The good news is that with all of this publicity, gamers will hopefully be put off purchasing the title and rightly so. The hilarity is that this one little Dutch site, that’s IN dutch, would probably not have impacted sales nearly as much if Atari had just quietly black-balled them. That’s right, boys and girls, classic Corporate strategy at work: Greedy AND Dumb.

 A while back, I was writing freelance for a gaming magazine. I panned a game called Master of Orion 3 in a review I wrote, mainly because out of the box it was a pile of steaming fecal matter. I awarded it a magnanimous 18%, which the editor upgraded to a 30 something, because he didn’t want to upset the publishers. But to his credit, he published the review intact.

So… Dutch Computer Games Reviewing Website no one had heard of before all this. Crack open a bud light, we salute you. You may have a funny accent, but when it comes to fighting the good fight against corporate sell outs, you tell it like it is.

Oh, and an advisory to any Game Publisher who plans on sending me an advance review copy, if it sucks, I’ll break your embargo to tell the 3 people who visit my site regularly world… and sue you for wasting my time.

And it will be in English, mother-f^@#*rs, not dutch. How’d you like THEM apples?

Skep