Philip K. Dick was an influential sci-fi writer who, while never achieving fame or fortune in his lifetime, ended up receiving a great deal of attention after his death. For those of you not familiar with the sci-fi genre, his writing has also inspired films like Blade Runner, Total Recall, Minority Report, the Ben Affleck vehicle Paycheck, and the upcoming A Scanner Darkly (by Waking Life creator Richard Linklater).

It’s always interesting to talk to other readers about Philip K. Dick because it inevitably leads to tangential conversations about identity, reality, and drugs. Last night I had a conversation with my neighbor along these lines. Stephen believes that if it is indeed possible to develop a comprehensive system for modeling the universe, then the probability that we actually exist in a non-simulated reality is basically zero. He says this is because if it’s possible to model a universe, then the system contained in the simulation will also be capable of producing a virtual, meta model of yet another universe. That meta-system in turn can model a meta-meta-universe, and the meta-meta-universe can contain a model of a meta-meta-meta-universe, and on ad infinitum.

Of course, I can expound on the virtues of reading PKD all I want, I have yet to actually read any of the guy’s work. It’s maddening, and to answer my own question posed in the title to this post, No, not yet. Instead, I’ve gotten myself a hundred pages into the epic trilogy The Baroque Cycle, a (sci-fi for subtle reasons) historical fiction masterpiece, eight novels in three volumes, each in longhand with a quill pen. Neal Stephenson is another writer whose name will spawn interesting tangent conversations among the well-read.

When I get through The Baroque Cycle though, it’s on. I’m already pumping to read VALIS

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: who will speak for the chickens?

I was really disappointed to see that a bald eagle caught in Indiana tested positive for high levels of mercury. If this turns out to be a widespread thing in bald eagles, I’m going to have to cut back on my bald eagle intake, probably to only one serving a week.

Council Crest is a great scenic viewpoint in the southwest hills of Portland, Oregon. I went on a ride with my neighbor, Mike, yesterday and climbed the 1,073 feet to the top. It was a good bike, and only about five miles from my home.

Ok, it was actually brutal. Let me be the first to state that I am not, nor have I ever been, anything close to what you’d call “athletic”. I’m constantly amazed with myself for doing things like taking the stairs instead of the elevator, or riding my bike more than a mile. I’m still in shock when I realize I’ve put over 600 miles on the road bike I bought in July.

…I digress. The best part of the ride, of course, was the two miles-plus descent down an extremely steep, winding road with absolutely no stops. After nearly an hour of climbing in my granny gear with my heart pounding in my chest, the descent with speeds of up to 40mph was like dessert. At the moment, I don’t have anything close to the Fat Cyclist’s list of crashes, but give me some time.

I found a great, heartwarming article this morning. When muslims, serbs, and croats all decided they needed a symbol of justice, mastery, and honesty to unify their town, they knew there was only one person they could turn to: Bruce Lee.

The ethnically divided Bosnian city of Mostar has agreed to erect a new symbol of unity — a statue of kung fu legend Bruce Lee, worshipped by Muslims, Serbs and Croats.

A group of enthusiasts came up with the idea of honoring the childhood hero of the city’s ethnic groups in 2003, on the 30th anniversary of his death. They launched the project, found donors and waited a year for the city’s approval.

“We plan to erect the statue in November in the center of the city,” Veselin Gatalo, a member of the Urban Movement organization, told Reuters by telephone Monday.

“This will be a monument to universal justice that Mostar needs more than any other city I know.”

One more thing:

Lee’s widow Linda will be invited to attend the ceremony.

If only we could all be a little bit more like Bruce.

Boingboing has some astonishing info: survivors reporting that they heard exposions coming from the 17th Street levee before they broke, and that the Army Corps of Engineers blew the levees to protect more valuable real estate

0:57 Raw transcript of comments by NOLA evacuee Clara Barthelemy: “The 17th street levee was bombed by the Army Corps of Engineers to save the more valuable real estate in the city… to keep the French Quarter protected, the ninth ward was sacrificed… people are afraid to speak out… everyone who was near there heard the bombings… they bombed seven times. That’s why they didn’t fix the levees… 20 feet of water. Gators. People dying in water. They let the parishes go, not the city center. Tourist trap was saved over human life. A six year old girl was raped in here.. 9 year old boy killed. A man in the shower beaten. No hot food. No help for elderly.”

…and…

11:22 Now I’m speaking to someone else, another woman, who says some people report having witnessed “bomb sounds,” believe 17th street levee and others were blown up to manage water flow and protect more valuable portions of real estate.

Whoa. I’m still looking for a more reputable source to pick this up, but if it’s true, wow.
Update I mentioned this on a Metafilter thread, and some people who know significantly more than I do about New Orleans weighed in. The response, to paraphrase: “Ummm…no”. :

Deliberately blowing levees is a known tactic in combating floods. There are legions of cases where someone, near a levee about to fail, would go across the river and blow the levee on the other side, causing the river to drop as it flooded over the plains on the far side, thus saving the levee on their side.

However, two factors argue against this being the case this time.

1) It wouldn’t do any good. They weren’t fighting the river. They were fighting a lake connected to the ocean. Breaching levees helps when your dealing with rivers, because there isn’t that much water. When you’re dealing with a lake connected to the ocean, you’re dealing with, for all intents, an infinite source of water. Blowing open a floodwall in the face of a storm surge on Lake Pontchartrain wouldn’t change the lake level at all.

2) When you flood 80% of the city, even if you manage to magically flood the poorest 80%, a lot of well off people are losing their homes too. They’re just not in the city right now, since they could afford to evacuate. Furthermore, look at the damage in places like the CBD and Canal St. If someone thought they’d sacrifice the poor sections to save the rich, they screwed up badly. In fact, one of the richest parts of the city, Old Metairie, was flooded out.

The reason the oldest parts survived — the oldest parts were built on the highest ground, because when they were built, there was no levee system. That’s why the French Quarter stayed mostly dry.

Finally, note that it wasn’t levees, but floodwalls, that failed. Floodwalls are fine until they’re overtopped, then they have a real problem with scour at their base, and they fail rapidly. Part and parcel of a floodwall system is the pumps to keep the backside of the wall dry to prevent this — but enough water over the wall, and you overwhelm the pumps. Given the storm surge, some parts of the wall may have been overtopped by several feet.

I’m not surprised that these walls failed. I’m also not surprised that it was the lowest floodwalls, the ones on the canals, that failed, and that the failures seem to all be on the side closest to the center of the storm. The stronger walls on the lakefront itself held, as did the river walls. But a wall is only as strong as the weakest panel, and in this case, the weakest panels were on the 17th Street and Industrial canals.
posted by eriko at 5:42 PM PST on September 7 [!]

Update 2: The Army Corps of Engineers may not have blown up the levees, but the hurricane was caused by the Yakuza (using Soviet technology) to get rich on the futures market and to get revenge for Hiroshima! Of course!

Just remember folks: September is National Preparedness Month!

Throughout September, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the American Red Cross will work with a wide variety of organizations, including local, state and federal government agencies and the private sector, to highlight the importance of emergency preparedness and promote individual involvement through events and activities across the nation.

(via mefi)
Some will try to tell you that no one foresaw the devastation. Keep in mind, this couldn’t be farther from the truth:

New Orleans had long known it was highly vulnerable to flooding and a direct hit from a hurricane. In fact, the federal government has been working with state and local officials in the region since the late 1960s on major hurricane and flood relief efforts. When flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, or SELA.

Over the next 10 years, the Army Corps of Engineers, tasked with carrying out SELA, spent $430 million on shoring up levees and building pumping stations, with $50 million in local aid. But at least $250 million in crucial projects remained, even as hurricane activity in the Atlantic Basin increased dramatically and the levees surrounding New Orleans continued to subside.

Yet after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA dropped to a trickle. The Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending pressures of the war in Iraq, as well as homeland security — coming at the same time as federal tax cuts — was the reason for the strain. At least nine articles in the Times-Picayune from 2004 and 2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a reason for the lack of hurricane- and flood-control dollars. (Much of the research here is from Nexis, which is why some articles aren’t linked.)

Seriously, folks. Go help the Red Cross. Help yourself, too, and get a bike because a tank of gasoline is going to cost more than a house here soon.

The president, in his infinite wisdom, plans to create a senior-level ‘Piracy Czar’ post at the White House. Slashdot comments were swift and poignant:

Episode I: The Phantom Menace

Turmoil has engulfed the world. The regulation of IP trade with outlying countries is in dispute. Hoping to resolve the matter with a blockade of deadly lawyers, the greedy Corporate Interests has stopped all shipping to the nation of China. While the WTO endlessly debates this alarming chain of events, the President has secretly dispatched two Elite Programmers, the guardians of peace and justice in the world, to settle the conflict….

Episode II: Attack of the Regulations

There is unrest in the WTO. Several dozen nations have declared their intentions to defeat planned regulations. This separatist movement,
under the leadership of the mysterious Count Johansen, has made it difficult for the limited
number of Elite Programmers to maintain IP control in the world. Representative Wen Jiabao, the former primier of China, is returning to the WTO to vote on the critical issue of creating an ARMY OF LAWYERS to assist the overwhelmed Programmers…

Episode III: Revenge of the Corporations

Trade War! The WTO is crumbling under attacks by the ruthless Pirate, Count Johansen. There are heroes on both sides. Evil is everywhere. In a stunning move, the fiendish pirate leader, General Brocious, has swept into the American capital and copied the entire MPAA archives. As the Pirate Army attempts to flee the country with their valuable contents, two Elite Programmers lead a desperate mission to protect the intellectual property….

Episode IV: A New Hope

It is a period of trade war. Chinese pirates, striking from a hidden internet connection, have won their first victory against the evil American Empire. During the battle, Chinese spies managed to steal secret plans to America’s ultimate weapon, DRM, an encrypted media link with enough legislative power behind it to destroy an entire fair use system. Pursued by America’s sinister agents, Princess Hua Ching races to /home on her computer, custodian of the stolen plans that can save her data and restore fair use to the world.

Episode V: America Strikes Back

It is a dark time for the Pirates. Although the DRM has been cracked, American troops have driven the Pirate forces from their hidden
internet cafes and pursued them across the world. Evading the dreaded American Lawsuits, a group of freedom fighters led by Crazney
has established a new secret base on the remote ice country of Norway. The evil lord George Bush, obsessed with finding young Crazney, has dispatched thousands of remote packet sniffers into the far reaches of IPV4 space…

Episode VI: Return of Fair Use

Crazney has returned to his home country of Australia in an attempt to rescue his friend Professor Felten from the clutches of the vile gangster Mitch Bainwol. Little does Crazney know that the AMERICAN EMPIRE has secretly begun development on a DRM method even more powerful than the first dreaded DRM. When completed, this ultimate weapon will spell certain doom for the small band of pirates struggling to restore fair use to the world…