Yeah, I sometimes go off the deep end and a quick comment on a facebook note turns into a diatribe about embryos and ethics. The comment didn’t fit on facebook (literally) and didn’t fit here (metaphorically) so I posted it over on a buddy’s blog, the ever interesting Zoological Ontological (catchy name!).

An extract:

So what happens if we begin manipulating genes and gene instructions to benefit mankind? If we can stop muscular distrophy, why can’t we stop genetic obesity? If we can stop genetic obesity, why not genetic susceptibility to depression? Or maybe some day, predisposition to sub par intellegence? In my opinion, these ‘ifs’ are simply a matter of time; They depend on scientific advancements to make them possible, not upon whether or not they would be used. Like drug abuse, prostituton or abortion, they will happen regardless of their legal status, and much more benefit would be had to control their usage rather than essentially assigning them to the kind of people willing to break the rules.

Heavy stuff given that I usually struggle to add a witty comment to the end of the webcomic I’m linking to on any given day.

Read the rest of the article

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From Digg:
“We just received word from a reliable source that Rick Astley, the absolute god of the Internet, will be performing at this years MTV European Music Awards being held on November 6th.”

Hurray! It’ll be the first time I watch Music Television since they stopped playing music.

read more | digg story

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Football Manager is fantastic, in part for the ‘open’ nature of its graphics in that real or imagined images can be substituted or introduced into the game to give it that more authentic and engaging feel. The good lads responsible for the SS kits have set a standard with their designs; I’ve been a bit creative today so here’s my take on a few plausible-but-unlikely kits for the 2010 season for Cork City FC.

Click to Enlarge

Astute City fans may spot with interest the Heineken logo - Heineken’s imminent purchase of Beamish, our currently sponsors, providing some artistic license.

To use the individual kit files for in Football Manager or as avatars or whatever, download them here.

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Will Wright’s burgeoning masterpiece Spore may have been in development for what feels like an eternity, but we finally got to mess with the toys he had teased us with all those years ago, today. The Spore Creature Creator is available to download as a trial or buy with a full set of creature features (the price is refundable against the full game, due in September… around my birthday… *cough*). You take an amorphous blob, fiddle with the spine, add a mouth (or two), a few legs (or a dozen) and virtually anything else you can think of, then watch as your Noodley Appendage sculpts a brand new creature. I tried to run it on Ubuntu with Wine, but there were some graphical glitches. Oh well, on to Trina’s Vista laptop, at least the Creature Creator gives the awesome guys at Wine 3 months to get everything running smooth!

Of course, as a dino-geek (you know you’re one, when your daily reading includes Darren Naish’s Tetrapod Zoology) most of my creations have been of a decidedly ancient variety.

This is my “Ankylothera” and a humanoid family. The dino is obviously fictional - I wanted to play with the spikes but the trial comes only with carnivore mouths - hence the less-than-dexterous predator. The monkey-human was surprisingly easy to do and used up the least DNA, and wobbled about like an unsure toddler. Oh, you can’t edit the brain power yet - perhaps thats why he looked so perplexed by being unable to run very far! Silly monkey - invent a car.

This is my Deinonychus. Obviously, again, it is a little bit fictionalised, within the constraints of the trial editor. However, it was very pleasing to see it stalking about like it wanted to rip my guts out but couldn’t find adequate ambush cover. Clever girl!

Of course, no set would be complete without the top predator. My T-Rex was actually quite tough to make - there simply isn’t enough vertebrae to go around, to deal with the real giants! But the end result was again very satisfying. Sniffing the air, wiggling his little arms (I had initially made them a bit too big; its easy to forget how comically stunted Rex’s graspers are. Trina pointed this out!) before bellowing a mighty roar into the dawn air. It was all a bit much for me; Spore’s release date suddenly seemed very far away, again.

Spore Creature Creator is available free or for the price of a pint from EA’s Spore Store

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Myself and herself have taken a (ever so slightly) scary step in our relationship and got our own place! We’ve moved into a small-but-perfectly-formed 1 bedroom apartment in Blackpool. It was all a bit sudden but the offer was too good to miss. Here are some photos of our new place, as you can see, we’re settling in pretty well!

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You might remember a recent controversy in Cork (and indeed, nationwide) when an elected representative of the Labour Party found herself at the centre of a scandal because of her apparent support for a convicted paedophile, Trevor Casey, in a case involving her own constituents. This letter was sent at the time and used by radio and newspapers, but I present it here for posterity. Deputy Lynch went on to defend her stance, before issuing an apology, albeit at the behest of Labour leader Eamon Gilmore. The incident served to illustrate the ignorance and insensitivity that rape cases are treated with in Ireland, but I hope that victims everywhere take heart from the public uproar that followed; for once, the silent majority in support of the victims was not silent. If the result of the trial or this show of support encourages victims to come forward and not be afraid to seek a prosecution, it can only be a good thing.

An Open Letter to Kathleen Lynch, TD (Labour)

Teachta Lynch,

It has recently come to my attention that yourself and Councillor John Murray of the Labour party recently wrote letters for consideration in the sentencing of convicted serial paedophile rapist Trevor Casey, portraying the convict in a positive light which therefore must be considered, given the purpose of the letters and their reading at time of sentencing similar to victim impact statements, support of leniency toward Trevor Casey. They can have served no other reasoned purpose.

While I am aware that Mr Casey’s father is a close personal friend of yours, I cannot but be appalled that you, as a mother of two girls or as a representative of the people of Cork North Central, would in effect plead for the earlier release in your area of a convicted paedophile rapist, causing further anger and anguish to your own constituents and indeed, family members of your supporters.

While the defendant and his family refuse to accept the conviction and choose to portray themselves as victims of some form of injustice, it would in my opinion be your place to distance yourself from your friendly relationship and certainly to not get involved to the point where you are writing letters, as a TD, for consideration during sentencing.

I am of the opinion that you have let yourself and your constituents down by letting your own personal commitments influence how you used your own official power in order to support such a cause. We have spent a year hounding a man out of government because of suspicion of improper use of his official power, and it strikes me as extremely short sighted of you to at the same time barefacedly and publicly breach the trust that the people of your constituency, and the people of Ireland in general, have placed in you.

I am disgusted. One of the convict’s 14 years has been suspended in light of the defendants ‘apparently clean background’. When you reflect upon the 4 convictions of rape of a minor, 4 convictions of sexual assault on a minor, or the further pending case against Mr Casey of sexual abuse against another, separate 13 year old, I hope you wonder if perhaps using your influence as a politician to pursue personal allegiances and agendas have any responsibility for that year’s suspension.

Your Constituent,
Gavin Golden,
Cork North Central.

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Forgive me if I begin to sound loquacious, but, brothers, this is a monumental day in our history. Today, it will all change. Apparently we men are doomed to slightly lower grades on average than women, and there doesn’t appear to be any slowing of this trend. Hark, for I bring you knowledge of the threat, and the steps we must take to extinguish it.

The obvious question arises; Is it because women are smarter than men? That’s just what they’d like you to think, isn’t it? Sowing the seeds of self-doubt. Fear not! Even the most hard line feministas would probably shy away from such a claim, what with spending a few decades saying just how equal the sexes are, demonstrating this by getting jobs and opening jars and such and such. Do they study more? No. Statistics show*, all girls watch far too many soaps and American teen/housewife based dramas, read to much about Kerry Katona’s latest demon spawn and spend too much time trying to find things at the end of their bags, to allow them to spend much time learning.

“But how?” I hear you whisper.

It is not so much that girls out perform boys, but rather they use subversive tactics to denigrate our exam performance. By a cruel consequence of poor planning in 385 BC, exam time is May/June this side of the equator, just as the Northern Sun awakes from 6 months of half-arsed working-from-home, gets up, and shoves the clouds to one side. Since their liberation from prairie dresses (well, some of them)and burkhas, at some secret GUN (Girl’s United Nations; the acronym is no accident) meeting, they decided that, at an agreed date each year, they would all simultaneously rediscover their strappy tops, shorts, boobtubes and skirts.

Accustomed to their female colleagues annual cocooning themselves into hoodies, trackpants and tweed cardigans (well, I’ve never witnessed that but they must wear something down in Kerry) from the end of the 2 week “first impression” period in September to the eclectic (i.e. bloody bizarre, thank you CO2 emmisions) April weather, men everywhere are suddenly faced with this visual shock, carefully prepared by the succubi females.

It’s a disgrace! These underhanded tactics must be stopped. As a happily owned man, it is not so much of a problem for me, as evidenced by my breezing through Academia like some sort of breezing thing; it is my fallen comrades lured from the library by lust and occasionally lollipops, that must be saved. Make a difference today! Cover up a woman with a poncho, or a hoody. The dignity of our gender is at stake.

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There are plenty of ways the world could end, but in today’s genetic age, this seems the most plausible.

from NFComics

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The Internet is Serious Business

xkcd

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Facebook is great fun, its everything MySpace and Bebo promised to be but never quite made it. Right now, everyone’s (lazily) remaking profiles and migrating to Facebook, and messing with some of the fun applications that Facebook allows 3rd Parties to create. I myself am working on on of these, but more on that later. My favourite application so far is Scrabulous, a turn-based implementation of scrabble that you can pick up and start and leave off at will. However, one of the dictionaries appears a little too lenient….

(00:15:14) gavinzac@gmail.com/Home: some of the most makey-uppy words ever on this board
(00:15:23) Aisling Walsh: lol i know
(00:16:08) gavinzac@gmail.com/Home: rache
noop
jafa
gromet
sika
vita
et
te
idem
GROINS
(00:16:13) Aisling Walsh: haahahaah

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