-Dilbert (Scott Adams)

to trial

to gift

to medal (argh!  worst of all, we hear this daily in Olympic season)

These are nouns masquerading as  verbs.  Nothing wrong with the language changing but these make me "S-Q-U-I-R-M, SQUURRUM", as Billy Connolly sang. www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzZzGxReXmo

Other verbs include those which are misapplied, such as "deliver" applied to policies instead of milK.  If you work in government or business you will surely have a load of these.  Let's do a Dilbert en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilbertand collect them!  Send them to me, here at this blog

If you want to read more on the subject, John Humphrys' excellent book, "Lost for Words" is a must.www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article498203.ece

Now we come to the second part of this discussion, and the more difficult question - Where does morality come from? I hope that all the readers of this blog will agree that morality MUST come from somewhere outside of mere democracy. If mere democracy determined morality, then chattel slavery was morally correct. Also I hope that we can agree that morality has to have a non-human source. If morality is based in humanity, then whose morality matters more?   The ones who are powerful enough to whip everybody else, of course. Power to control others or to set laws does not make moral authority.  (Think about it, if morality was people-based, then it was perfectly moral for Hitler to murder Jews in WWII Germany, it only became wrong after we were able to impose our morality on them by winning a war. How dare we do that.)  Power to control peoples’ minds or control how they look at the world also does not grant moral authority. If so, then the artists and entertainers of the world would set morality, and all it takes is a look at a museum to see that the tastes and opinions of artists change like the weather.

If it is non-human in origin, then we are only left with only two possibilities of where morality comes from. It is either from God, or inherent in a godless nature. I find the second possibility to be completely indefensible. This is no new thought, but it is simple. If there is no God, there is no morality. Ivan, in The Brothers Karamazov, had this one right a long time ago. Scott Adams’s view that we are only moist robots comes from this same thought. I can see no logical way out of this conclusion, therefore leaving us with only one possibility...

Morality comes from God

We are now down to only one issue. I first was introduced to it when I read Plato’s The Death of Socrates in my philosophy of law class as a political science student.  It is known as Euthyphro's Dilemma, and it is presented with this question - is an action moral because God says so, or does God say so because it is moral?  (In Socrates’ original question gods was plural, of course.) in other words, is he law above God or is God above the law?  I am not going to get in to a full discussion of this dilemma but if you want to read an excellent summary, go here.

In short, the answer is, neither. An action is moral because of who God is. The law is not over God, nor is it subject to the whim of God.  God always acts in a way consistent with His character, therefore the law, (morality) emanates from who God is. It is not subject to change because He is not subject to change.

So if I can address the original question. It is not a violation of church & state to allow biblical morality to color the law, any more than it is a violation of physics to allow gravity to effect the design of an airplane. The fact is, biblical morality is true morality whether anyone believes it or not. My pastor often says right is right if nobody does it, and wrong is wrong if everybody does it.  SOMEBODY'S morality is going to affect every law. Let's hope that it is true morality.

I truly hope these posts were not too convoluted or unclear.  Feel free to coment.

essa frase introduz o post de hoje do blog do scott adams, o criador do dilbert. coloquei só a abertura do texto pra instigar a curiosidade - vão lá ler o troço todo. são textos simples assim que separam um bom cara de humor de um filho do chico anysio, por exemplo.

falando nisso, eu não poderia recomendar mais o blog do scott adams. o sujeito faz as melhores análises políticas, econômicas, ambientais e sociais que eu já vi - e tudo temperado com cinismo e fofocas de celebridades.

pra um pouquinho mais de genialidade, o dilbert de 18 de julho:

falando em tirinhas, nicholas gurewitch voltou, depois de meses sem quadrinhos novos, a desenhar as alucinações da sua perry bible fellowship. tava com saudades.

The company Dilbert works for has a factory in a place called Elbonia. (Ah, no, it has nothing to do with Albania at all - or does it?)

Anyway, Elbonia is a weird place and while Dilbert and 2 of his colleagues are sent there for a study tour in their overseas factory, their boss joins them during his vacation, which was the idea of his loving secretary.

They all fly Elbonian Airlines. Dilbert's team flies first class, while the bioss travels on economy. What is so special in it? Well, let me quote the trash man who talks to Dogbert about the chances of Dilbert going to Elbonia and getting back alive:

Oh, well, let's say 73 to 1. 90 to 1 if he flies Elbonian Airlines, 300 to 1 if he uses the toilet on the plane.

Here is the full cartoon video, enjoy it. :)

Part 1

Part 2

Part3

(P.S: I worked for Albanian Airlines as a consultant, no, trust me, it has nothing to do with Elbonian Airlines)

By Szafi

Puppy Love by Scott Adams

Later today we're getting a puppy. I haven't had one since I was a kid. Things have changed since then, according to the puppy experts. For one, we found the puppy over the Internet. That's different. But it's only the tip of the iceberg.
The experts say we are not supposed to pick up the puppy and hold it. If the puppy pushes itself out of our arms, it will try to brace its fall with its front legs, and they will break. Apparently this happens a lot.

Instead, we are advised to keep the puppy on a leash if we pick it up. That way, if the dog jumps out of our arms, we can save it by holding the leash, in much the same way the Iraqis saved Saddam Hussein when he fell through the trap door. Sounds safe to me.

We have been advised to get a special type of sugary foodlike product to give the puppy when it arrives on the plane, to prevent it from getting hypoglycemic. This has something to do with the stress of the trip and not eating for several hours. In the old days, when dogs got hungry they would eat something called dog food. But to be fair, our old family dog hardly ever used an airplane for interstate travel, at least not while we were watching.

Our first attempt at buying a little gated fence for the puppy was a failure. The puppy expert said it wasn't high enough. If the dog successfully climbs the fence, it will learn it can climb anything. Before you know it, the dog is on the roof, all hypoglycemic, with the wind ripping off its feeble limbs.

House training has changed too. You no longer whack the puppy with a rolled up newspaper when it relieves itself in the house. Now you do something more humane, called cage training. You put the puppy in a cage so small it can barely turn around. Dogs instinctively won't poop where they have to stand, so it learns to hold it until it poops on your terms.

I ask myself if I would prefer to be whacked with a rolled up newspaper when I pooped on the carpet or be forced to stay in a coffin-sized cage for several hours while desperately squeezing my butt cheeks together to keep the turtle in the shell. Which is more humane? I'm thinking it doesn't make any difference because my parents used both of those methods on me, and I turned out okay.

The dog is an Aussie Toy. According to our research, this is the very best dog in the entire world for us. It is a "working dog," meaning it was bred to be useful, presumably herding very small cows. I plan to train it to fetch tennis balls. I want it to kneel by the net like a ball girl and bring me the loose balls after each point. Maybe it could even keep score.  I haven't consulted with the puppy expert about this idea because I know she will say the dog can't participate in sports unless it is wearing a Kevlar body suit has an asthma inhaler nearby.

I'm just saying dogs are different now.

I ask myself if I would prefer to be whacked with a rolled up newspaper when I pooped on the carpet or be forced to stay in a coffin-sized cage for several hours while desperately squeezing my butt cheeks together to keep the turtle in the shell.

Read the entire post here.

The sound system in the Arco Arena was like four winos farting in a steel drum.

Read the whole post here.

As you know, fairness is a concept that was invented so that children and idiots could participate in arguments.

Scott Adams entendeu Rawls perfeitamente. E tudo mais sobre o universo, diga-se de passagem.

As you know, fairness is a concept that was invented so that children and idiots could participate in arguments.

In addition to being funny, the post is a good reminder that lower tax rates can raise more taxes, if set right.

If you step it up a level, and consider how many voters understand the complexities of international trade policies, or economics, or national defense, the stakes are higher. If the country gets any one of those things wrong, it's a disaster.  But experts always disagree on the complex issues. When knowledgable people can't agree on the best course of action, there's no reason to think ignorance will get you to a worse place than knowledge. The only thing you can know for sure is that the ignorant people wasted less time reading about things that didn't help.

Amazingly, the government still functions, albeit inefficiently, in spite of all this ignorance. It does this simply by observing what didn't work last time and occasionally trying something new next time. Apparently that is enough to limp along. It works for ants and it works for us. Or at least I think it works for ants. I'm actually quite ignorant about ant behavior, but notice how it doesn't matter?

Nee-nee, hy praat nie van Suid-Afrika of Zim se regering nie!  Hm... maar hy het toevallig gister, interessant genoeg, wel iets oor Zimbabwe kwytgeraak:

I don't know how well the school system in Zimbabwe is preparing its citizens, but it takes a lot of math to plan a trip to the market. "Let's see, that's four million percent inflation annually, convert to a daily figure, calculate the time it takes to get to the market, and QUICK, LOAD THE ZEBRA CART!" If you paused for an unscheduled stop at the unspeakably horrible poop hole, you'd have to start all over.

"Improvement makes strait roads, but the crooked roads without Improvement, are roads of Genius."

For a stretch of about twelve or fifteen years, I read a couple of the popular writing trade magazines almost cover-to-cover. It wasn't just about "studying" them -- it was a form of relaxation for me. Reading about the craft of producing fiction was, I suppose, what TV is for many people. The articles gave me a warm glow, a tingle of excitement. I loved reading about the techniques and tools, the markets and trends, and I liked hearing the stories of writers who were actually doing it: setting their words on paper and selling them. It still thrills me to hold a book, to browse in a bookstore, to see a ream of typing paper or a computer monitor, to hear the click of keyboard keys and feel them under my fingertips.

Writers' magazines definitely have their benefits. They keep you somewhat in touch with what's happening in the publishing world. They can teach you shortcuts and the proper ways of going about things (such as submissions). They can chop a lot of time off the process of learning, which would otherwise be done by trial and error. They're a wonderful source of resources and places to try sending your stuff. But -- to finish the TV analogy -- wallowing in the trade magazines has its negative aspects, too. Like TV, it can become a form of escapism. Every moment you spend reading about technique is a moment you don't spend improving your technique, either by reading well-written literature or by striving to write your own.

Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert, points out the mistake companies make in focusing on artificialities and secondary concerns at the expense of creating products (or services) and selling them. Instead of building a good computer, for example, they schedule a meeting to discuss selecting a committee to explore the feasibility of creating a task group to formulate a strategy. . . .

Endlessly studying writing techniques can be the same. Isaac Asimov said, "It's the writing that teaches you." And Asimov certainly knew. You'd have to walk quite a way to find a writer more prolific.

I've met "writers" who are all about networking and getting an agent and learning how to protect their intellectual properties from theft . . . but they don't seem to have any actual material. They don't, that is, write. I'm not sure when they're planning to do that part.

There's a second danger of studying too much technique. There's the danger that you might learn it. I remember a big debate about ten years ago over the proliferation of writers' workshops and MFA programs in creative writing. The criticism leveled against them was that they produced multitudes of Serious Writers who all wrote the same. Stories began to smell of having been "workshopped" -- all the edges sanded off, all the distracting idiosyncracies plucked out, all the individuality boiled away. "Trained writers" were becoming a quite competent lot who had learned not to take any risks. Nor were the book superstores helping the matter, with their shelves of "safe bets" by a few giant authors, to the exclusion of almost anything else.

During my years of ingesting the trade magazines, I worked and reworked a gigantic novel manuscript, the infamous "second novel" (after Dragonfly, I thought I had it figured out How This Works -- heh, heh!). When it came back rejected from my first publisher and two agents, I scrapped almost the whole plot and rewrote and rewrote it all again, grinding and polishing and stewing over all the techniques I knew I should be using. I "finished" it again after hundreds and hundreds of pages, after countless thousands of hours. Today, the book is rife with possibility in its ideas and characters, but the writing makes me shudder -- it's extremely hard to read because it's been "techniqued" so much. Bleah! (Thank Heavens I was selling short fiction during those years, or I would have been pretty discouraged.)

A big epiphany for me in the last year or so has been to take a deep breath, "forget" the techniques, listen to the characters, and get back to basics -- to not concern myself with what's "marketable," but about what excites and fascinates me in a story. [By "forget," of course, I don't mean "forget": I mean that techniques must assume their proper place. They become part of the writer, deep inside, like all those scales you played when you were first learning to play your musical instrument.] Tell a good story. Slosh paint around. Break the rules when you need to. Use anything and everything to get the story told.

Clifton Fadiman wrote, "Books are not rolls, to be devoured only when they are fresh." I think we need to go back and read the great old books that have stood the test of time -- books that are still with us, and that were written before writers knew the rules and went to workshops.

A final thought about Blake's quote: I've heard several Japanese friends say that Japan is a country not of innovation but of skillful imitation. In the arenas of manufacturing and technology, Japanese are masters of taking the inventions of other countries, making small improvements, and then cranking out steadily better and better models every year. [For readers who don't know: I live in Japan. This paragraph won't make sense without that fact.] This [Japan] is a land of discipline . . . a land of regular Improvement. But in most cases, the Genius is borrowed from abroad -- from lands where it's more permissible to sit on a creek bank doing apparently nothing . . . to wander the crooked roads until the stars come out . . . to try things . . . to listen to voices in the cornfield . . . to dream.

We came in with Blake's words. Let's look at them again, the same words, on our way out:

"Improvement makes strait roads, but the crooked roads without Improvement, are roads of Genius."

Give me a crooked road any day, with moss growing on the stiles and branches bending low, and surprising meadows at the turns!

Here are a few selected quotes from his piece with the chortling parts in bold.

Sigurdur Hjartarson is missing a human penis.

The American, 52-year-old Stan Underwood, supplied a written description of his penis -- which he purportedly nick-named "Elmo" -- for display alongside a life-size plastic mould of the member as well as his pledge to donate it.

A growing number of people from all over the world view the collection each year, 60 percent of them women.

Hjartarson has paid for only one -- an elephant penis nearly 1 meter long that hangs, stuffed and mounted on a wooden board, in the museum's "foreign section."

On a related note, you really need to read this blog entry by Scott Adams about the world's tallest man getting married.

Throne Room

by Scott Adams

In the news, a JetBlue pilot allegedly made a passenger give his seat to an off-duty flight attendant. The flight was full, so the passenger was ordered to sit on the toilet for three hours.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24585615/

I'm sure your reaction to this story was the same as mine: That passenger got the best seat in the house! He had lots of leg room, total privacy, no one trying to hog the armrest, no seatbelt requirement, and all the whizzing he could handle. So naturally he sued the airline.

The passenger's problem was that he didn't know how to make the best of a great situation. I would have kept the door propped open and yelled "Waiter! More Diet Coke!" every time a flight attendant walked past. And I would have gathered up enough blankets and pillows to feather my little nest.

You might be thinking that the toilet seat in the bathroom has more cooties than Rick Solomon's beard. That's true, and it's why you should always pee in the little sink. But I digress. My point is that there is some theoretical number of airline blankets that will give you three hours of protection. Then all you have to worry about is the germs on the blankets themselves.

The real victims in this story are the two-hundred passengers who had to share one bathroom. They're the ones who should be suing. Airlines have a rule that you can't congregate around the bathroom and wait in line. That means you have to keep one hand on your seatbelt buckle and get ready to pounce as soon as the door opens. If anyone else makes a move, you might need to show your box cutters and yell something about Allah to clear the aisle. It's either that or your bladder will burst. There are no good choices here.

The passenger in this story had his own private suite for three hours and apparently missed the opportunity for a solo flight to the Mile High Club. I assume this is the case because he arrived in California all angry. If you put most men of that age group behind a locked door for three hours, with no other form of entertainment, you need a gurney and an IV at the other end.

she only licks the things she loves the most, including soft cat food, my chin, and her own ass

Read the whole post here.

Et tankeeksperiment

Scott Adams

Oversat af Jakob la Cour.

Stor tak skal lyde til
Joachim Meyer Andersen
og Kristian Lindberg

Introduktion

Dette er ikke en Dilbert bog. Den indeholder ingen humor. Jeg kalder den et 132 siders tanke eksperiment indelukket i en fiktiv historie. Jeg forklarer tanke eksperiment delen senere. Guds Byggesten er ikke en normal bog at udgive. Der er endda uklarhed om materialet er fiktivt eller realisme. Jeg vil hævde, at det er fiktion da karakterene ikke eksisterer. Nogle vil mene, at det er realisme da karakterenes holdninger og filosoferen måske har en varende effekt på læseren. Historien indeholder intet vold, ingen sexuelle agendaer og intet aggresivt talesprog. Målgruppen for Guds Byggesten er folk der nyder, at ryste op i deres fordomme. Efter en bestemt alder vil de fleste opleve ubehag ved nye indtryk. Denne bestemte alder varierer fra person til person, men hvis du er over 55 (mentalt) vil du nok ikke nyde denne bog. Hvis du er 80 på vej mod 35, vil du måske kunne lide den. Hvis du er 23 er dine odds for, at kunne lide bogen yderst fordelagtige. Historiens centrale figur har en opfattelse af Gud som du nok ikke har hørt før. Hvis du forventer, at blive fornærmet over, at læse en fiktiv figurs opfattelse af Gud, bør du ikke læse denne bog. Holdningerne og de filosofiske overvejelser som karaktererne udtrykker er ikke mine egne, undtagen et par enkelte steder som det ikke er værd at nævne. Du vil ikke opdage mine holdninger ved, at læse min fiktion. Den centrale karakter i Guds Byggesten ved alt. Bogstaveligt talt, alting. Dette udsatte mig for at press som spirrende forfatter. Hvis du overvejer alt hvad man kan vide så ved jeg ikke meget. Min løsning var, at opfinde de her smarte udtryk ved hjælp af dette skeptiske udgangspunkt.

De mest simple forklaringer er som regel rigtige.

Min erfaring fortæller mig, at i denne komplekse verden vil de simpleste forklaringer som regel være direkte forkerte, men jeg har noteret mig at de mest simple forklaringer som regel lyder rigtige, og er langt mere overbevisende end komplekse forklaringer på simple problemstillinger. Det er godt nok for nu.
De simpleste forklaringer anskuelsen endte med, at være mere provokerende end jeg havde forestillet mig. De simpleste forklaringer på de store spørgsmål i livet endte med, at forbinde flere forklaringer end man normalt kan. Opfattelsen af virkeligheden i Guds Byggesten er ikke sandfærdig, såvidt jeg ved, men det er sært tiltalende. Deri ligger tankeeksperimentet:

Prøv at finde ud af hvad der er i vejen med de simpleste forklaringer.

Den centrale figur statuerer en række "videnskabelige" fakta. Nogle af hans mærkeligste statements er videnskabelig konsensus, mens noget andet er kreativt nonsens. Se om du kan gætte forskellen. Du vil måske elske Guds Byggesten eller hade den, men du vil ikke let slippe tanken. For maksimal nydelse så del Guds Byggesten med en intelligent ven og diskuter den så, mens i nyder en velsmagende drikkevare.

Pakken

Regnen gav alting en anden lyd - motoren i min budbil, trafikken som den rullede forbi som en film om faldene byger, den pludselige lyd af et horn. Jeg havde ikke et godt job, men det var ikke helt dårligt alligevel. Jeg kendte byen så godt, at jeg kunne tabe mig selv i tanker og stadig gøre arbejdet, stadig få løn, stadig have masser af tid tilovers for mig selv. Når du er udenfor dit eget hoved er rejsetiden mellem bygninger elusiv. Det er som om du kan forsvinde og pludseligt dukke op et andet sted. Min historie begynder en dag hvor jeg afleverede til et sted jeg aldrig havde været før. Det er som regel en sjov udfordring. Det er i hvert fald en sikker tilfredsstillelse i at gøre dette uden brug af kort.

Rookies bruger kort.

Hvis du arbejder i byen længe nok begynder den at bevæge dig på et personligt plan. Gaderne afslører deres humør. Nogengange elsker signallyset dig. Nogengange bekæmper de dig. Når du jagter en ny bygning håber du byen er på din side. Du skal bruge en smule tankegang - du kan kalde det en udskildningsproces - og så har du brug for en smule instinkt, men ikke mere af det ene end det andet. Hvis du tænker for meget, overskyder du målet og ender "In the Pier of the Tenderloin". Hvis du er afslappet og lader byen hjælpe dig, gør destinationen alt arbejdet for dig. Det var en af de dage. Det er fantastisk hvor mange gange du kan bruge den samme rute uden, at ligge mærke til et specielt skilt. Så, når du leder efter det, der er det. Universets Boulevard. Jeg ville have sværget, at det ikke var der dagen inden, men jeg ved at det ikke fungerer sådan. Det var en "scuffy" pakke kun lige akkurat mødte den Business standarden. Jeg regnede afstanden fra min budbil til døren og besluttede, at hvadend der var i pakken så måtte det kunne tage en smule regn. På vegne af pakken og mig selv, overgav jeg mig til regnen. Denne pakke krævede en underskrift. Disse var den bedste slags. Jeg kunne tale med folk uden den besværlige stilhed. Jeg kunne godt lide folk, men jeg følte mig utilpas med unødvendig konversation. Et bud var en god undskyldning for en overfladisk indtruderen. Folk var glade for at se mig og jeg var aldrig tabt for ord. Jeg ville sige: "Skriv på linjen", og de ville sige "Tak". Vi ville udskifte nogle ligegyldige ønsker og afsted med mig. Det var sådan det skulle gå. Jeg gik op af de fire trin til trædøren og trykkede på ringeklokken. Et ding-dong fyldte lejligheden og lækkede ud af døren. Budmennesker kan ikke lide at efterlade en lille stickynote, et bevis på en forfejlet udbringning. Det betyder en OMMER. Jeg kunne godt lide mit arbejde en gang. Jeg kunne godt lide mine opgaver fordi de havde en begyndelse og en slutning. Som regel ville enhver kunde nærmest være ved døren inden der var gået et minut. Men normalt ventede jeg alligevel to, hvis nu nogen ikke var i stand til, eller havde svært ved at gå. To minutter er en evighed når du står under en dørentre på en regnvåd Københavnsaften.

Rookies bær overtøj.

To minutter gik forbi. Firmaets regler foreskriver, at jeg ikke kunne prøve dørhåndtaget. De var empatiske omkring det.

Åh, Regler.

Den Gamle Mand

Det overdimensionerede dørhåndtag tilbød ingen modstand da det drejede i sin olierede kerne. Jeg var ikke længere overrasket over, at finde ulåste døre i byen. Måske på et underbevidst plan tror vi ikke, at vi behøver beskyttelse fra vores egen race. Jeg tænkte at jeg ville efterlade pakken indenfor døren og selv underskrive kundens navn. Jeg havde underskrevet for kunder før; ingen havde endnu klaget. Det var fyringsgrundlag, men det var kun hvis du blev fanget. Indenfor kunne jeg se en lang, mørk gang med røde fejlagtigt textuerede vægge linet op med lange, illuminerede malerier. For enden af gangen var en halvåben dør med et rum som var vært for et flakkende lys. Nogen var hjemme og skulle have hørt ringeklokken. Jeg kunne ikke lide udsigterne. En gang imellem hører du om en gammel person der dør alene og som ingen ved noget om i flere uger. Mine tanker gik derhen. Jeg gik indenfor og lukkede døren bag mig, nød varmen, prøvede at beslutte mig for hvad der nu skulle ske. "Hej!" sagde jeg med min professionelle stemme, i et håb om at det ikke lød truende. Jeg strøg gennem gangen og bemærkede at kunsten umiddelbart så ægte ud. Nogen havde penge. Mange penge. Kilden til lys var et kæmpe stenildplads. Jeg gik ind i rummet, ikke sikker på hvorfor jeg var stille. På en eller anden måde var rummet både simpelt og overvældende. Det var en mat farve, halvt sort, genialt anlagt med antikt træ møblement, udførligt mønstrede vægge, og trægulve. Mine pupiller forstørrede sig for at udvinde mørket. En gammel mands stemme kom fra teksturen. "Jeg har forventet dig". Jeg var forundret og følte en smule skyldig for at have lukket mig selv ind. Det tog et minut, at lokalisere stemmens kilde. Det var som om den kom fra selve rummet. Noget bevægede sig og jeg bemærkede, på ildspladsens langside, i en trægyngestol, en lille mandsling i en rød plaid der mest af alt lignede et gammelt indtørret træ. Hans smårynkede hænder holdt fast i tæppen som afhang hans liv af det. To underdimensionerede fødder dinglede fra tortillaen. "Din dør var ikke låst" sagde jeg, som om, at det var grund nok til at lukke mig selv ind. "Jeg har en pakke." Alt jeg hørte var ilden. Jeg forventede et svar. Det er sådan det fungerer. Når en person siger noget skal modparten svare. Den gamle mand var ikke tunet ind. Han stirrede på mig og rokkede i sin stol, tog mål af mig, måske, eller også var han tabt i et replay. Jeg havde allerede sagt hvad jeg behøvede at sige, så jeg stod stille for hvad der virkede til at vare for evigt. Jeg syntes jeg så krusningen til et smil eller måske var det en muskelspasme. Han talte "in the deliberate manner" som en mand der ikke havde brugt sin stemme i dage og spurgte om mærkelige spørgsmål. "Hvis du kaster en mønt op i luften 1000 gange, hvor ofte vil det ende Krone?" De ældre er skræmmende når de degenerer indtil en reflektion af deres yngre jeg. De siger ting som giver mening i en eller anden grammatisk forstand, men det er ikke altid det er specielt realistisk.

Jeg kan huske min farfar på hans sidste år, hvordan han talte i tunger. Det var bedst at spille med.

"Omkring 50 % af tiden" svarede jeg, før jeg skiftede emne. "Jeg har brug for en underskrift for pakken."

"Hvorfor?"

"Well," sagde jeg, vurderende om hvor meget information jeg skulle inddrage i min forklaring, "personen der
sendte pakken vil have en signatur. Han har brug for konfirmation på, at pakken er afleveret."

"Jeg mente; hvorfor kommer mønten 50 % af tiden op krone?"

"Jeg tror det er er fordi mønten vejer det samme på begge sider, så der er 50/50 sandsynlighed for, at den
vil lande på den ene side fremfor den anden." Jeg forsøgte at undgå, at lyde nedladende. Jeg var ikke sikker
på, at det lykkedes.

"Du har ikke svaret Hvorfor. Du har simpelvis oplistet nogle fakta." Jeg indså hvad der foregik. Den gamle mand forsøger sig med dette trick spørgsmål på enhver der kommer i nærheden. Der måtte være en punchline eller et smart svar, så jeg spillede med.

"Hvad er svaret?" spurgte jeg med al den overfladiske interesse jeg kunne mønstre.
"Svaret," sagde han "er, at spørgsmålet ikke har et hvorfor."

"Det kan man jo sige om alting."

"Nej," svarede han, på en måde som pludselig virkede sammenhængende;

"Ethvert andet spørgsmål har et svar til hvorfor. Udelukkende sandsynlighed er uforklarlig."

Jeg ventede et øjeblik for punchlinen, men den kom ikke.

"Var det alt?" spurgte jeg.
"Det er mere end det ser ud til."
"Jeg har stadig brug for en underskrift."

Jeg antastede den gamle mand og holdt clipboardet ud, men han lavede ingen bevægelse som havde han tænkt sig, at tage det. Jeg kunne se bedre ham nu. Hans hud var plettet og rynket, men hans øjne var forunderligt klare. Noget gråt hår samlede sig over hvert øre og hans holdning var en forsat kamp med tyngdekraften. Han var ikke gammel. Han var et forhistorisk levn. Han gestikulerede imod clipboardet.

"Du kan underskrive det."

I budbranchen laver vi mange undtagelser for de ældre, så jeg havde intet imod at underskrive den for ham. Jeg forestillede mig, at hans hænder eller øjne ikke fungerede så godt som han håbede og jeg kunne spare ham frustrationen ved ikke, at kunne håndtere sin pen.Jeg læste navnet før jeg blev mundlam.
Avatar. A-v-a-t-a-r.
"Det er til dig," sagde han.
"Hvad er til mig?"
"Pakken."
"Jeg udleverer bare pakkerne," sagde jeg. "Mit job er at bringe pakken til dig. Det er din pakke."
"Nej, det er din."
"Ehm, okay," sagde jeg imens jeg planlagde en exit-strategi. Jeg forestillede mig, at jeg kunne efterlade pakken i gangen på vej ud. Den gamle mans plejehjælper ville finde den.
"Hvad er der i pakken?" spurgte jeg. Jeg håbede at slå et ubehageligt øjeblik væk.
"Det er svaret på dine spørgsmål."
"Jeg forventede ingen svar."
"Jeg forstår," sagde den gamle mand.
Jeg vidste ikke hvordan jeg skulle reagere, så jeg gjorde ingenting.
Han forsatte, "Lad mig spørge dig om et simpelt spørgsmål: Afleverede du pakken eller afleverede pakken dig?" På nuværende tidspunkt var jeg en anelse irriteret over hans begavelse, men indrømmet - jeg engagerede mig. Jeg vidste ikke noget om den gamle mands situation, men han var ikke så forvirret som jeg umiddelbart havde antaget. Jeg smugkiggede på mit ur. Næsten frokost. Jeg bestemte mig for, at se hvad dette udviklede sig til.
"Jeg afleverede pakken," svarede jeg. Det virkede logisk nok.
"Hvis pakken ikke havde nogen addresse ville du så have leveret den hertil?"
Jeg sagde nej.
"Så vil du også være enig i, at selve afleveringen af pakken krævede deltagelse fra pakken. Pakken fortalte dig hvor du skulle gå hen."
"Tja, jeg går ud fra det er rigtigt på en måde. Men det er den mindst vigtige del af afleveringen. Jeg udførte jo transporten, løftene og selve relokeringen. Det er den essentielle del af afleveringen."
"Hvordan kan en enkelt komponent være vigtigere hvis hver del er fuldstændig nødvendig?" spurgte han.
"Hør nu her," sagde jeg, "Jeg holder pakken og jeg går med pakken. Det er en aflevering. Jeg afleverer pakken. Det er hvad jeg gør, jeg er en budfyr."

"Det er én enkelt måde at anskue det på. En anden måde er, at både dig og pakken ankom samtidigt og i var begge nødvendige. Jeg vil sige, at pakken afleverede dig." Der var en sort logik over denne opfattelse, men jeg var ikke villig til at give efter." Forskellen er intention. Hvis jeg efterlader pakken her og går min vej tror jeg spørgsmålet er besvaret."

"Måske ville det," sagde han, da han vendte sig mod varmen.

"Ville du have noget imod at smide en knude til i ilden?" Jeg udvalgte en stor en. De tilbagetrukne herskere fejrede dets ankomst. Jeg fik den korte indskydelse, at træet var glad for at hjælpe til, glad for at tage sin del af læsset. Det var en fjollet tanke. Jeg tørrede mine hænder af i bukserne og vendte mig for at gå.

"Den stol er din," sagde han, gestikulerende imod en trægyngestol ala den han selv sad i, jeg havde ikke lagt mærke til den anden stol.
Den gamle mands ansigt afslørede et liv af brugbare livsanskuelser. Jeg havde en fornemmelse af at han fortjente selskab og jeg var glad for at kunne tilbyde noget. Mit andet valg involverede en madkasse og baggagerummet i min budbil. Måske var der slet ikke noget valg. Jeg satte mig til rette i gyngestolen og lod rytmerne fra stolen afslappe mig. Det var dybt afslappende. Rummet virkede mere levende nu og vibrerede med den personlighed som dets mester gav udtryk for. Møblementet var åbenlyst designet for komfortens skyld. Alt i rummet var konstrueret af sten eller træ eller planter, mest i efterårs farver. Det var som om rummet havde sprunget direkte fra jorden og ind i midten af NY København.

Din Frie Vilje

"Tror du på Gud?" spurgte den gamle mand, som havde vi altid kendt hinanden, men negliceret netop dette diskussionsemne. Jeg gik ud fra, at han ville have en form for forsikring for, at hans død ledte til noget bedre. Jeg gav ham et venligt svar.

"Der må være en Gud," sagde jeg. "Ellers ville ingen af os være her." Det havde ingen ræssonans, men jeg mente ikke han behøvede mere.

"Tror du på, at Gud er omnipotent og at folk har fri vilje?" spurgte han.

"Det er jo Gud ABC det der. Så ja."

"Hvis Gud er omnipotent ville han så ikke kende fremtiden?"

"Selvfølgelig."

"Hvis Gud kender fremtiden, er alle vores beslutninger så ikke truffet på forhånd? Fri vilje må være en illusion."

Han var klog, men jeg nægtede at gå i fælden.

"Gud lader os bestemme vores egen fremtid ved hjælp af vores frie vilje," forklarede jeg.

"Så tror du på, at Gud ikke kender fremtiden?"

Det måtte jeg indrømme. "Men han må foretrække uvidenheden."

"Så du er enig i, at det ville være umuligt for Gud, at kende fremtiden, og give mennesker fri vilje?"

"Det havde jeg ikke tænkt på før, men det er vel rigtigt. Han vil vel have, at vi finder vores egen vej. Så han modarbejder aktivt at kende fremtiden."

"Til hvis fordel skulle Gud tilbageholde sin evne til, at kende fremtiden?" spurgte han.

"Det må være for hans egen skyld, og vores ligeså," ræssonerede jeg. "Han ville ikke skulle gå på kompromis."

Den gamle mand blev ved.

"Kunne Gud give mennesker illusionen om fri vilje? Vi ville ikke opfatte forskellen som hvis vi havde reel fri vilje, og Gud ville opretholde sin egenskab til at se fremtiden. Er det ikke en bedre løsning for Gud end det du foreslog?"

"Hvorfor ville Gud mislede os?"

"Hvis Gud eksisterer, er hans motiver bestemt unfathomable

America’s Favorite Pastime
from The Dilbert Blog by Scott_Adams

Yesterday I went to a Giants baseball game. It was Little League Day, so there were about ten thousand young boys running wild in the stands. It was also free bat day, courtesy Bank of America.

I will pause while you digest this concept.

Do you know what happens when you hand an 8-year old boy a new bat, sit him behind the exposed heads of several adults, and ask him to sit patiently for four hours while nothing much happens on the big field in front of him? Do you think he fiddles with that bat?

Apparently Bank of America figured there was some theoretical amount of head injuries that would make the public forget that they lent a trillion of your dollars to hobos.

My memory of the afternoon goes something like this: “TREVOR, PUT DOWN THAT BAT! YOU ALREADY HIT THAT LADY ONCE! I SAID, PUT IT DOWN! I MEAN IT! I WILL NOT TELL YOU FOUR HUNDRED MORE TIMES!” This was followed by the sound of wood making solid contact with skull, cursing, repeat.

My wife took a solid blow to the shoulder. Later, one of the tykes kicked some guy’s beer out of the back seat holder, so we sat in a puddle of beer, while the sun cooked us. I was one pinch of salt from being a recipe.

I tried to use the restroom at the stadium. This is no place for the shy. Unlike most public men’s rooms, where there might be a small privacy shield between urinals, this place was designed to handle high volume, shoulder-to-shoulder peeing. I saw an opening where I could poke my penis between a bearded guy and a guy with a fanny pack, just over the left ear of a Little Leaguer, but before I could make my move, someone filled the slot. I decided I could wait another three or four hours.

Conditions were difficult, but at least the game was exciting well into the first half of the first inning when the Reds scored six runs and put it out of reach. Technically, there was still hope, since many of the Giants have batting averages that round to one hundred, and some are able to catch a fly ball nearly half the time. But yesterday was not their day. There were many boos from the stands. I felt bad for the players until I realized they couldn’t hear the boos over the screams of the bat victims.

I wish someone would invent a device that allowed you to watch sporting events from your home. I think that would be popular.

I saw an opening where I could poke my penis between a bearded guy and a guy with a fanny pack, just over the left ear of a Little Leaguer.

Unfortunatly, I was eating lunch when I read this one line and now I have to clean my monitor.

Read the whole entry here.

Photo by Fcobos

I thought I'd start out the week
with a fun post:

Jobacle shared the news that Dilbert creator, Scott Adams, is taking Dilbert to the people!

Individuals and groups will be able to "mash up" Adams' popular cartoon.

Jobacle describes the three choices readers will have:

Punch line: fans can rewrite the final frame of a daily strip.

My Dilbert (coming in May): fans will be able to rewrite the entire strip.

Group Mash (coming in May): fans will be able to rewrite one panel, with the ability to share with other users and have them write the rest. Scott Adams will participate by authoring random frames with his audience and looking to see whether strips can be developed successfully by groups.

Details at http://www.dilbert.com

Sounds like a lot of fun, but be careful where you post your masterpieces!

Your boss belongs in a Dilbert cartoon? TIme for a new job. Keppie Careers will get you ready with a new resume and a new approach: www.keppiecareers.com.

Think you're funnier than Scott Adams?