"Bob" Is The Answer ... And The Question

Wiki:

J. R. "Bob" Dobbs is the figurehead of the Church of the SubGenius. His image is derived from a piece of 1950s pop-art. According to SubGenius dogma, "Bob" was a drilling equipment salesman who, in 1953, saw a vision of God (JHVH-1 according to Church scriptures) on a television set he had built himself. The vision inspired him to write the "PreScriptures" (as described in the Book of the SubGenius) and found the Church. The "theology" holds that "Bob" is the greatest salesman who ever lived, and has cheated death a number of times. He is also revered for his great follies and believed to be a savior of "slack". He was assassinated in San Francisco in 1984, though the Church states that he has come back from the dead several times since then.

The quotation marks in "Bob"'s name are always included when spelling his name, according to the Church.

According to Revelation X; The "Bob" Apocryphon, "Bob" was born in Dallas, Texas to Xinucha-Chi-Xan M. Dobbs (a pharmacist) and Jane McBride Dobbs. At an early age he possesed a talent for making large amounts of money by playing the stock market over the telephone. He married his wife Connie in Las Vegas in 1955 and worked as a photographer's model while inventing and patenting novelty gag items. In 1957 he worked weekends doing Evangelical Christian preaching "strictly for the money".

"Bob"'s wife, Connie Dobbs, has become as legendary in SubGenius circles as "Bob" himself. Although "Bob" has been married to other women, spirits, deities, and inanimate objects (he was married to Eris, the Discordian mother Goddess for a while, though she grew tired of him and kicked him out), Connie is described in the SubGenius documentary Arise! as "his first, and still his primary wife." Connie is the patron of SubGenius women, and she is seen as a vision of true liberation for women. She refuses to submit to anyone (especially "Bob"), and she is just as free-wheeling and promiscuous as her husband... although she has a more level head on her shoulders when it comes to domestic issues.

One of Our Favorite BASTARDS: Blackadder ... all of them

Wiki:

Blackadder is the generic name that encompasses four series of an acclaimed BBC One historical sitcom, along with several one-off instalments. The first series was written by Richard Curtis and Rowan Atkinson, while subsequent episodes were written by Curtis and Ben Elton. The shows were produced by John Lloyd, and starred Rowan Atkinson as the eponymous anti-hero, Edmund Blackadder, and Tony Robinson as his sidekick/dogsbody, Baldrick.

In 2000, Blackadder Goes Forth ranked at 16 in the "100 Greatest British Television Programmes", a list created by the British Film Institute. Also in the 2004 TV poll to find "Britain's Best Sitcom", Blackadder was voted the second best British sitcom of all time, topped by Only Fools and Horses. It was also ranked as the 20th Best TV Show of All Time by Empire Magazine.

Although each series is set in a different time era, all follow the fortunes (or rather, misfortunes) of Edmund Blackadder (played by Atkinson), who in each is a member of an English family dynasty present at many significant periods and places in British history. Although the character starts as being quite unintelligent in the first series and gradually becomes smarter and more perceptive through each passing generation (while decreasing in social status), each Blackadder is a cynical, cowardly opportunist concerned with maintaining and increasing his own status and fortunes, regardless of his surroundings. In each series, Blackadder is usually a cynical (almost modern) voice puncturing the pretensions and stupidity of those around him, and what might — through modern eyes — be seen as the more ludicrous and insane follies of history (from the medieval religious witch-hunts and the petty whims and insanities of various British monarchs to the bloodshed and horror of World War I).

The lives of each of the Blackadders are also entwined with their servants, all from the Baldrick family line (played by Tony Robinson). Each generation acts as the dogsbody to their respective Blackadder. They decrease in intelligence (and in personal hygiene standards) just as their masters' intellect increases. Each Blackadder and Baldrick are also saddled with the company of a dim-witted aristocrat whose presence Blackadder must somehow tolerate. This role was taken in the first two series by Lord Percy Percy (Tim McInnerny), in the third series by Prince George, Prince Regent, and in the fourth by Lieutenant George, the latter two played by Hugh Laurie (see George (Blackadder character)).

Each series was set in a different period of English history, beginning in 1485 and ending in 1917 (with one 1999 special set in the then-present day) comprising six half-hour episodes. The first series, made in 1983, was called The Black Adder (set in the fictional reign of 'Richard IV'). This was followed by Blackadder II in 1985 (set during the reign of Elizabeth I), Blackadder the Third in 1987 (set in the reign of George III), and finally Blackadder Goes Forth in 1989 (set in the trenches of the Great War).

In addition to these, three specials were also made: Blackadder: The Cavalier Years (set in the reign of Charles I) appeared as a 15-minute insert during the 1988 Comic Relief telethon; Blackadder's Christmas Carol (mostly set during the reign of Queen Victoria with some scenes taking place in the locations of the second and third series, as well as another many centuries hence) was a 45-minute Christmas installment, broadcast the same year; and Blackadder: Back & Forth was a 30-minute film originally shown in a special cinema at the Millennium Dome throughout 2000, and later transmitted by Sky and the BBC. A pilot episode was recorded in 1982, but has never been shown on television in its entirety, although a brief clip was shown in the 2008 documentary Blackadder Rides Again. It is notable for Baldrick being played by Philip Fox. Its plot was re-used for the episode "Born to be King" in Series 1. Although DVD releases have never included the pilot, copies are known to circulate online.

Dark Roasted Weirdsville

Here we go again: another article for the always-great Dark Roasted Blend. This time it's on supercomputers. Enjoy!


In Isaac Asimov's classic story, "The Last Question," a supercomputer is, again and again, asked how to deal with the eventual heat death of universe. After upgrade upon upgrade, it finally has an answer -- but, alas, no one is left to hear it, because the universe has ended. So it simply states its answer out loud: "Let there be light."

Put another way, imagine that sometime in the future someone asks the smart-machine-to-end-all-smart-machines: "Is there a God," and said machine answers, "There is now."

What exactly qualifies as the earliest example of a "computer" is a matter of debate: some say the abacus while others point to the Antikythera mechanism, and still others push the calendar up to the 1800s with Charles Babbage's difference engine. Whatever their origins, though, with the advent of the digital revolution, computers have truly become super.

One of the first early super computers has to be Konrad Zuse's series of machines. Created in 1930s and 40s, they were one of the very first computers to be programmable as well as multi-function. Soon after, the Brits, needing some serious number-crunching during the war, built the aptly named Colossus -- which was smashed to bits in the name of secrecy when its job was done.


Not that America also wasn't up to the task: the U.S. had its own long line of increasingly sophisticated, and powerful, devices. First there was the Model K, then the ABC, followed by the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator, and then came ENIAC.

ENIAC was considered state of the art, a true electronic brain capable of astounding feats of calculation. Now, alas, we can do the same things that ENIAC could with a cheap throwaway calculator. But in 1943, ENIAC was the tops.

After ENIAC came EDVAC, a change of much more than a few letters. Created by the brilliant John von Neumann, this series of computers was a monumental leap forward in computational ability, flexibility, and speed.

On a side note, as early 1945 or so, computers gave us the term "bug" for a problem with a machine. Coined by Grace Hopper, because -- quite literally -- a moth got caught in the circuitry.

The 60s, and the age of the transistor, gave us bigger and smarter machines. Lead by master builders like IBM, these machines became behemoths of blinking lights and whirling tape reels, able to handle the chaos of weather prediction as well as tax records with the greatest -- for the most part -- of ease.

But supercomputers seriously came into their own when they challenged ... well, okay, their "handlers" allowed them to challenge … man at his own game: namely chess.

The first human vs. machine challenge is also up for debate as more than likely a few early programmers tried their hands at defeating their own creations and even pitting computers against computers. Transistors, though, quickly became superior to squishy human brains. In 1981 Cray Blitz took the crown from Joe Sentef , and then in 1988 Deep Thought managed to share the glory with Tony Miles -- though some suspect the machine felt a tiny bit sorry for Tony and so allowed him to join it in the winner's circle. This suspicion is probably incorrect, however, as Garry Kasparov, who felt no such sympathy, actually beat the machine in two games. But In 1997, Deep Blue avenged its mechanical sibling and stomped Kasparov in six games. Ouch!

What really hurts is that humans now regularly lose to their computational betters. The question today is whether they'll even let us fleshy beings sit at the same table with them, let alone deem us worthy to play with them.

What's really interesting about the new generation of super machines is not that they're smart -- which they most definitely are -- but how, well, sexy they've gotten.


Just take a look at MareNostrum, which is a perfect combination of beauty as well as brains. Sure, the monster machine that lives in a deconsecrated chapel in Barceolona, might be only (ahem) the 8th most powerful of its super-smart digital kin, but it's certainly a star in the looks department: a series of imposing monoliths set inside a climate-controlled glass room, a perfect juxtaposition between its 21st century mind and the ancient architecture of the chapel. It's been used for everything from climate modeling to helping decipher the human genome -- all the while looking fantastic as it works.

Even the most optimistic of futurists know that it's just a matter of decades, or even just a few years, before we see our creations surpass us. All we can hope is that they look down on us poor, flesh-and-blood humans with affection -- or simply with benign indifference.

Either way, making something that eventually could say "Let there be light" is pretty damned amazing.

If A Tree Falls In The Desert ....

Before

Wiki:

L'Arbre du Ténéré, known in English as the Tree of Ténéré, was a solitary acacia, of either Acacia raddiana or Acacia tortilis, that was once considered the most isolated tree on Earth — the only one within more than 200 kilometres (120 mi). It was a landmark on caravan routes through the Ténéré region of the Sahara in northeast Niger — so well known that, along with the Arbre Perdu or 'Lost Tree' to the north, it is the only tree to be shown on a map at a scale of 1:4,000,000. It was located near a 40-metre-deep well at approximately 17°45′00″N 10°04′00″E / 17.75, 10.066667.

It was the last surviving tree of a group of trees that grew when the desert was less parched than it is today. The tree had stood alone for decades. During the winter of 1938–1939 a well was dug near the tree and it was found that the roots of the tree reached the water table 33–36 meters below the surface.

Commander of the A.M.M., Michel Lesourd, of the Service central des affaires sahariennes [Central service of Saharan affairs], saw the tree on May 21, 1939:

One must see the Tree to believe its existence. What is its secret? How can it still be living in spite of the multitudes of camels which trample at its sides. How at each azalai does not a lost camel eat its leaves and thorns? Why don't the numerous Touareg leading the salt caravans cut its branches to make fires to brew their tea? The only answer is that the tree is taboo and considered as such by the caravaniers. There is a kind of superstition, a tribal order which is always respected. Each year the azalai gather round the Tree before facing the crossing of the Ténéré. The Acacia has become a living lighthouse; it is the first or the last landmark for the azalai leaving Agadez for Bilma, or returning.

The tree was allegedly knocked down by a drunk truck driver in 1973. On November 8, 1973 the dead tree was relocated to the Niger National Museum in the capital Niamey. It has been replaced by a simple metal sculpture representing a tree.

This was not the tree's first encounter with a truck. In his book L'épopée du Ténéré, French ethnologist and explorer Henri Lhote described his two journeys to the Tree of Ténéré. His first visit was in 1934 on the occasion of the first automobile crossing between Djanet and Agadez. He describes the tree as "an Acacia with a degenerative trunk, sick or ill in aspect. Nevertheless, the tree has nice green leaves, and some yellow flowers". He visited it again twenty-five years later, on November 26, 1959 with the Berliet-Ténéré mission, but found that it had been badly damaged after a vehicle had collided with it:

Before, this tree was green and with flowers; now it is a colourless thorn tree and naked. I cannot recognise it — it had two very distinct trunks. Now there is only one, with a stump on the side, slashed, rather than cut a metre from the soil. What has happened to this unhappy tree? Simply, a lorry going to Bilma has struck it... but it has enough space to avoid it... the taboo, sacred tree, the one which no nomad here would have dared to have hurt with his hand... this tree has been the victim of a mechanic...

After

"Halfway down the trail to Hell, In a shady meadow green ...."

Wiki:

Fiddler's Green is the afterlife imagined by sailors, and later adopted by U.S. Cavalry, where there is perpetual mirth, a fiddle that never stops playing, and dancers who never tire. There is some evidence to support the claim that the major propagators of this belief were pirates who, knowing they would never meet the criteria for entry into Christian heaven, simply created a religion of their own.

Fiddler's Green features in an old Irish legend that a sailor can find the paradisaical village by walking inland with an oar over his shoulder until he finds a place where people ask him what he's carrying. This legend may have some of its origin in Tiresias' prophecy in Homer's Odyssey, in which he tells Odysseus that the only way to appease the sea god Poseidon and find happiness is to take an oar and walk until he finds a land where he is asked what he is carrying, and there make his sacrifice.

The story of Fiddler's Green was published anonymously in a 1923 U.S. Cavalry Manual, and is still used by modern cavalry units to memorialize the deceased. The name has had other military uses. Fiddler’s Green was an artillery Fire Support Base in Military Region III in Vietnam in 1972 occupied principally by elements of 2nd Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry, and also was the name of the U.S. Navy's enlisted mens club in Sasebo, Japan in the early 1960s. Fiddlers Green is the name of the stable and pasture used by Parsons Mounted Cavalry, a cadet group at Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas, and that of the bar at the Leaders Club in Fort Knox, Kentucky.

Halfway down the trail to Hell,
In a shady meadow green
Are the Souls of all dead troopers camped,
Near a good old-time canteen.
And this eternal resting place
Is known as Fiddlers' Green.

Marching past, straight through to Hell
The Infantry are seen.
Accompanied by the Engineers,
Artillery and Marines,
For none but the shades of Cavalrymen
Dismount at Fiddlers' Green.

Though some go curving down the trail
To seek a warmer scene.
No trooper ever gets to Hell
Ere he's emptied his canteen.
And so rides back to drink again
With friends at Fiddlers' Green.

And so when man and horse go down Beneath a saber keen, Or in a roaring charge of fierce melee You stop a bullet clean, And the hostiles come to get your scalp, Just empty your canteen, And put your pistol to your head And go to Fiddlers' Green.

So THAT'S Where The Water Went ....

Wiki:

Built on the northern slopes of Mt. Idis about 14 km northeast of Avanos in Turkey, Özkonak Underground City has many strata made up of volcanic granite. The larger areas of the city are connected to each other by tunnels. Özkonak had a built in communication system of pipes to each of its levels, unlike Kaymaklı and Derinkuyu which have no such communication systems. Each carved out room had ventilation provided by holes when the city was closed against enemies.

Özkonak Underground City was discovered in 1972 by a local farmer named Latif Acar, who was curious about where his excess crop water was disappearing to. Latif discovered an underground room which, when later excavated, revealed a whole city which could house an incredible 60,000 people for up to three months. Although only four floors are now open, the complex contains a total of ten floors, to a depth of 40m.

Unlike the other underground cities in this area, there were holes above the tunnels used for dumping hot oil on the enemy. Just like Kaymaklı and Derinkuyu, Özkonak has a water well, ventilation system, winery and moving stone doors.

Who's Who?

Leopoldo Fregoli ... or is it?

Wiki:

The Fregoli delusion or Fregoli syndrome is a rare disorder in which a person holds a delusional belief that different people are in fact a single person who changes appearance or is in disguise. The syndrome may be related to a brain lesion and is often of a paranoid nature with the delusional person believing that he or she is being persecuted by the person he or she believes to be in disguise.

The condition is named after the Italian actor Leopoldo Fregoli who was renowned for his ability to make quick changes of appearance during his stage act.

It was first reported in a paper by P. Courbon and G. Fail in 1927 (Syndrome d’illusion de Frégoli et schizophrénie). They discussed the case study of a 27-year-old woman who believed she was being persecuted by two actors whom she often went to see at the theatre. She believed that these people "pursued her closely, taking the form of people she knows or meets".

The Fregoli delusion is classed both as a monothematic delusion, since it only encompasses one delusional topic, and as a delusional misidentification syndrome, a class of delusional beliefs that involves the misidentification of people, places or objects. Like Capgras delusion, it is thought to be related to a breakdown in normal face perception.

I Know What I'm Doing Tonight -

Wiki:

Hyakumonogatari Kaidankai (百物語怪談会, Hyakumonogatari Kaidankai^? lit., A Gathering of One Hundred Supernatural Tales) was a popular parlour game during Edo period Japan.

The game was a simple one. In a room, as night fell, one hundred candles were lit. Guests and players gathered around the candles, taking turns telling kaidan. After each kaidan, a single candle was extinguished, and the room slowly grew darker and darker. The process was an evocation, with the final candle believed to summon a supernatural entity.

The origin of the game is unknown. It is thought that it was first played amongst the samurai class as a test of courage, and later became fashionable amongst the townsmen.

A true popular phenomenon, the popularity of Hyakumonogatari Kaidankai combined with new printing technology created a boom in the publication of kaidan-themed books collecting appropriate tales from every corner of Japan and China. Books in this genre often used the term Hyakumonogatari in the title, and in fact the published tale’s popularity continued long after the fad for the game had faded.

Ladies and Gentlemen, We Proudly Present ...waitaminute!

Wiki:

Piotr Zak is a fictional Polish composer who was the subject of a spoof BBC documentary, The Strange Case of Piotr Zak. The BBC broadcast a performance of his piece Mobile for Tape and Percussion on June 5, 1961. It won approving reviews from two leading music critics (although others condemned it as worthless and unmusical). Later it was revealed that the piece consisted of twelve minutes of BBC staff making noises at random, edited together by BBC technicians as a parody of avant-garde music.

The spoof was perpetrated by Hans Keller and Susan Bradshaw at the BBC.

Books You Haven't Read But Should: John le Carré's The Naive and Sentimental Lover

www.johnlecarre.com:

Aldo Cassidy is the naive and sentimental lover. A successful, judicious man, he is wrenched away from the ordered certainties of his life by a sudden encounter with Shamus, a wild, carousing artist and Helen, his nakedly alluring wife. Cassidy, plunged into a whirlpool of recklessness and spontaneity, becomes a man bewildered and agonised as he is torn between two poles of a nature more complex than he had ever imagined.