Smart Guns Don’t Kill People

This article originally appeared on Disinfo.com

Technologist and New York Times columnist Nick Bilton explores the development of ‘smart guns‘ designed only to work with the owner’s grip or palmprint. These biometric devices are not entirely new, but are still unable to make it into the marketplace. Smart gun tech may have appeased the most idealogical contenders of either side of the debate on Sandy Hook and other gun massacres: they would not have prevented the killers from being able to use any of the firearms in question, but allowed the original owners to keep them without any infringement of their rights.

Nick Bilton via the NYT’s Bits Blog:

For example, the iGun, made by Mossberg Group, cannot be fired unless its owner is wearing a ring with a chip that activates the gun.

But you would be hard pressed to find this technology on many weapons sold in stores. “The gun industry has no interest in making smart-guns. There is no incentive for them,” said Robert J. Spitzer, a professor of political science at SUNY Cortland and the author of four books on gun policy. “There is also no appetite by the government to press ahead with any kind of regulation requiring smart-guns. These safety options exist today.”

But gun advocates are staunchly against these technologies, partly because so many guns are bought not in gun shops, but in private sales. “Many guns are bought and sold on the secondary market without background checks, and that kind of sale would be inhibited with fingerprinting-safety technologies in guns,” he said.

I called several major gun makers and the National Rifle Association. No one thinks a smart-gun will stop a determined killer. But I thought Smith & Wesson and Remington, for instance, would want to discuss how technology might help reduce accidental shootings, which killed 600 people and injured more than 14,000 in the United States in 2010. The gunmakers did not respond, and neither did the N.R.A.

A Wired magazine article from 2002 gives a glimpse of the N.R.A.’s thinking. “Mere mention of ‘smart-gun’ technology elicited sneers and snickers faster than a speeding bullet,” the magazine wrote. It quoted the N.R.A.’s executive vice president, Wayne LaPierre, as saying, “Tragic victims couldn’t have been saved by trigger locks or magazine bans or ‘smart-gun’ technology, or some new government commission running our firearms companies.”

TriggerSmart, an Irish company, has patented a childproof smart-gun. One feature is a “safe zone” that can be installed in schools and acts as a force field, disabling any TriggerSmart gun that enters a designated area. Robert McNamara, the company’s founder, has been trying to persuade gun makers to adopt the technology. He isn’t having much luck. “One gun manufacturer told us if we put this technology in one particular gun and some kid gets shot with another gun, then they will have to put them in all guns,” he said.

“We believe we could have helped prevent the Newtown massacre.”

You’ll notice how quickly the NRA equates reasonable proposals like smart gun technology with outright bans and government seizure. The impediments reveal the true, insidious nature of despicable groups like the NRA, who don’t care about human beings unless they have a large pocketbook. They don’t lobby for gun owners, but for large gun manufacturers; gun owners are the window dressing, support for them is incidental, tertiary, and superficial.

This is not the sole solution in a)the rampant problem with hundreds of thousands of unregistered guns, b)the irresponsibility of gun policy in this country, which can be well-regulated without violation of rights, or c)search of a problem, depending on your stance. Obviously ‘smart guns’ would not do anything about illegal guns or second sale or heirloom firearms, which account for a large percentage of sales and crime. This is the problem with most of the proposed legislation and ‘fixes’ from the left; they disproportionately affect responsible gun owners and not criminal use of guns.

Wayne LaPierre, no better than Diane Feinstein, used the tragedy as a pulpit to distract towards everything else besides his own moneyed lobby. It was the culture. It was vidyuh games (thanks, Jack Thompson). It wasHollywood. It was Jon Stewart. It was *as always* the atheists and gays. It was those damn mentally infirm. Hold! For a moment, my heart skipped a beat, would the NRA take an official and humanitarian position on our crumbling mental health care infrastructure? Would they promise millions in direly needed aid to prevent tragedies wrought by unfortunately afflicted people (and not their guns)? No, of course, the NRA’s position is that the mentally unfit should be registered, locked down, locked up, controlled, banned, pushed, filed,stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. So the people themselves can be infringed upon and violated, but a material possession like guns cannot? Riiiight.

They are unforgivable hypocrites at best, and monstrous profiteers at worst; they have done their part to arm the mentally ill. And in 2007, the NRA fought to allow suspected terrorists of having guns.

My eyes began to glaze over and drool formed around the zombified corners of my mouths as gun advocates praised ideas like putting more guns in schools, more armed guards in our police state children’s vicinity, arm the teachers and principals, FUCK IT, ARM THE KIDS THEMSELVES! None of this makes any goddamned sense, of course, when we look at instances of armed people (including cops) who make shootings even worse by playing hero and spraying more bullets in our combat zones public spaces, often getting themselves and others injured or killed.

And while I don’t believe that there is any NWO scheme to take the guns out of our cold dead hands, I do think that Democrats view it as an easy P.R. win. Another insincere and empty gesture, fully knowing that the final legislation will be watered down, ineffective, meaningless and probably contain a few provisions for special interests and corporations. It might even contain a payout for the NRA, if they play their cards right. Whatever bill is passed will expire or be struck down a few years later, and the whole dance can begin again. The whole hysteria, you’ll notice, is great for gun sales.

Neither LaPierre, Feinstein, nor any other mainstream pundit is proposing any combination of rational and evidence-based approaches to guns or mental health. Even Obama’s statements about making mental health care more easily accessible were lacking any resolution, detail or conviction. They are all knee-jerk reactions based on ideological bias and false, dystopic views of how the world really works.

As FactCheck.org points out, it is a complicated issue with seemingly contradictory statistics and no clear answers. There is academic disagreement and dubious causation for what is happening in America, where gun manufacturing and sales are up, but violent crime and crimes committed with guns are down. However, “non-fatal gun injuries from assaults increased last year for the third straight year“, so there are other factors. We don’t know if there are more gun owners, or more of the same people buying more guns. And still the maniacal massacres continue. Include suicides in the number of gun deaths, and the whole story changes. Gun deaths may outstrip falling rates of automobile deaths by 2015.

I’m not an advocate for any sort of ban at this point, but conflating handguns to assault rifles is like apples to oranges. Or comparing guns to fists and hammers. Or small businesses to multinational corporations. Or fracking done in the 50′s to fracking done today. Ad nauseam. It’s absurd. Guns still account for over double all other murder weapons in the US combined.

I’m sure to ruffle feathers on both sides of the aisle whenever I talk about guns, but I just don’t see the problem with treating them like automobiles. Responsible people register them, irresponsible people don’t. If you want to keep it in your garage and not use it, don’t register it and don’t take it out. If you want to take it out and not pay a hefty fine or punishment, then register it. They only get banned when they get used irresponsibly.

So guns don’t kill people. Smart guns don’t kill people. Sane and insane people use guns to kill lots of people (more people than other weapons can in a single shot), including themselves. And those in power each have vested interests in not being reasonable.

Perhaps the best coverage of the shootings in 2012 was summed up in The Onion’s headline: Fuck Everything.

A Refresher Course from EFF on Email Anonymity

Picture: Opencage.info (CC)

Considering that even top generals, senators, journalists and military brass are subject to the unreasonable searches being commited daily by the Surveillance State, it is important to be aware of the risks and act accordingly. The Electronic Frontier Foundation is your staunch defender and advocate, and have once again posted the methods for remaining anonymous online using a Tor onion browser, pseudonymous webmail and end-to-end encryption.

Tips and step-by-step instructions available at EFF:

So, just how do you exchange messages with someone, without leaving discoverable records with your webmail provider? This is an important practical skill, whether you need to use it to keep your love life private, to talk confidentially with a journalist, or because you’re engaged in politics in a country where the authorities use law enforcement and surveillance methods against you.

The current state of anonymous communication tools is not perfect, but there here are some steps that, if followed rigorously, might have protected the Director of the CIA, the Commander, U.S. Forces Afghanistan, and their friends against such effortless intrusion into their private affairs.

Anonymous online communication is a valuable tool for journalists, whistleblowers, dissidents, and Directors of the CIA. As you can see, it is still quite hard to do and do well, and few people will have the discipline necessary to ensure that their webmail provider can never disclose their IP address or inter-account linkages, because the provider will never see the identifying information in the first place.  Technologists all over the world are hard at work, improving the usability of all sorts of anonymous online communications tools, and we look forward to the day when all people who need to exercise their freedom of expression can do so safely, simply, and anonymously.

In other words, Don’t Be a Total Petraeus!

The Most Complex Artificial Brain Yet

University of Waterloo’s recent triumph of neuroscience and engineering, Spaun (Semantic Pointer Architecture Unified Network), is the most complex simulated brain yet, consisting of 2.5 million “neurons”. For reference, a non-simulated, non-artificial human brain has one hundred billion neurons, with an average 7,000 synaptic connections to other neurons (100 to 500 trillion synapses in a healthy adult, or 1 quadrillion synapses in a growing toddler).

But by using a small handful of very basic tasks (such as pattern recognition) Spaun can flexibly respond to ‘visual’ input and recreate a sequence of numbers to pass a rudimentary  IQ test. And the research team want to allow Spaun some autonomy through “adaptive plasticity”, to learn and rewire its own neurons without pre-programming.

via Sebastian Anthony at Extreme Tech:

The New York Times, meanwhile, delves into this idea of ‘deep learning‘, a field of machine learning where ”higher-level concepts are derived from lower-level ones, and the same lower-level concepts can help to define many higher-level concepts,” and work out how many levels of hierarchy best fit the data. Demonstrations around the world are showing the scientific strides in speech, facial and pattern recognition, chemistry, and perhaps even better self-correction, that come from allowing a computer to “brain train.”

But it would be wise to be patient, skeptical, or cautious. The Robot War for the Future notwithstanding, it seems every decade or so that the Singularity is Near, and we should get excited or hunker down for full machine consciousness. Unfortunately, pioneering technology is perpetually just around the corner, and besides, we don’t fully understand our own brains. It was just this year that scientists finished a comprehensive map of the brain. We’re still limited in our understanding of animal intelligence, collective intelligence, what IQ tests are testing for, learning, the origins of our own peculiar brain evolution, what genes code for intelligence, and of course the easy answers to the nature of consciousness itself. New discoveries, interest, and funding, however, are turning out to be very enlightening.

DNC and Net Neutrality

Though the Republicans seem content to either ignore scientific and technological progress, or move us backwards to the “Good Old Days,” it bears mentioning that the Democrats aren’t much better at answering the serious questions posed at this time of rapid change and development.

At least they aren’t totally ignoring issues like net neutrality, but addressing and then ”vigorously” glossing over them with obfuscatory language and corporate messaging.

Via Ars Technica:

Last week, the Republicans called for “vigorous enforcement of current laws on all forms of pornography and obscenity,” as well as the preservation of the ban on online gambling. The Democrats are silent on pornography and gambling, but they make the case for “vigorous” copyright enforcement efforts.

“The administration is vigorously protecting US intellectual property,” the new Democratic platform declares, through “better enforcement and innovative approaches such as voluntary efforts by all parties to minimize infringement while supporting the free flow of information.” That’s a reference to things like the “graduated response” system in which ISPs would penalize their users if they were accused of copyright infringement six times. (The White House helped brokered the deal between major ISPs and Hollywood.)

Another policy that fits the theme of “vigorous” enforcement (though it isn’t named specifically) is Operation In Our Sites. Under that program, the federal government has seized hundreds of allegedly infringing domain names before the site owners had a chance to be heard.

We are, after all, talking about an administration and party that supports both Europe’s controversial ACTA treaty and the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. Time after time, President Obama and the Democrats are to the right of actual patent and copyright reformers.

The America Invents Act, despite its stated purpose, did not slow the onslaught of frivolous patent litigation. Corporations and Hollywood are now renouned for abusing copyright litigation to their benefit, and YouTube’s DMCA complaint process is rife with problems. As WIRED notes, everything from the Hugo awards to the Mars Curiosity Rover landing have triggered complaints and takedowns. Even Michelle Obama’s speech at the DNC was itself censored by this nonsensical process:

YouTube, the official streaming partner of the Democratic National Convention, put a copyright blocking message on the livestream video of the event shortly after it ended, which was embedded prominently at BarackObama.com and DemConvention2012. Would-be internet viewers saw a message claiming the stream had been caught infringing on the copyright of one of many possible content companies.

The most likely culprit is YouTube’s pre-emptive content filters, which allow large media companies to upload content they claim to own and automatically block videos that an algorithm decides matches their own.

And though I’m sure content producers like WMG, SME, Associated Press (AP), UMG, Dow Jones, New York Times Digital, The Harry Fox Agency, Inc. (HFA), Warner Chappell, UMPG Publishing and EMI Music Publishing have no political reason to censor the First Lady, they have no qualms doing so to thousands of other citizens every day.

In other words, it’s only a glitch when the elites are affected, but for the rest of us, it’s a necessary tool to stop heinous piracy and thievery.

Prognosis

Problems progress, and so the solutions must be progressive, and so should the tunes. When we realize the cosmic scope of time and space and mind, we see our problems aren’t so grand.

Stranger in a Strange Land 2012-08-11: Prognosis by The Stranger on Mixcloud

PLAYLIST
In the Hall of the Mountain King – Aunt Mary
Isn’t It Quiet And Cold? – Gentle Giant
Mastoul Alakefak – Aksak Maboul
Truth, Justice, And The American Way – 5uu’s
Starship Trooper – Yes
Vampire State Building – Alcatraz
Stagnation – Genesis
Symphonic Revolution – Mandrill
Variations on a Theme by Brian Smith – Ain Soph
A Time A Place – Brainchild
18 Variations On Sinister #3 – Frank Zappa
One of These Days – Pink Floyd
Night Illusion – Gong
Sechs Achtel – Aera
My House On Mars – Ayreon
Technopolis – Yellow Magic Orchestra
Backwash – Blodwyn Pig
Ork Alarm – Magma

Machinations

The world trembles as it is eaten by the different engines of war machines, political machines, corporate machines and… y’know… actual machines.

With an appropriately science-fiction-themed playlist culled from the halls of io9, we explore our fantastical present and technologically-foreboding future, as we try to build better laws of robotics against their hungry machinations.

PLAYLIST
In the Hall of the Mountain King – Erasure
Tunnel Of Light – Ayreon
The Battle of Evermore – Led Zeppelin
Movements Of A Visionary – Tangerine Dream
The Fish [Shindleria Praematurus] – Yes
The Supernatural Anaesthetist – Genesis
Surfing with the Alien – Joe Satriani
Engines of Difference – Man… or Astro-man?
Rusty Metal – Aphex Twin
Into The Void – Black Sabbath
Veteran of the Psychic Wars – Blue Öyster Cult
When The Machines Rock – Tubeway Army
celestial annihilation – unkle
The Sprawl – Sonic Youth
Sirius – Alan Parsons Project
Supernova – Mike Oldfield
Supernova at the end of the Universe – The Orb
La Via Della Droga – Goblin
Cats on Mars (DMX Krew Remix) – Gabriela Robin
Strict Machine – Goldfrapp
Elektrobank – The Chemical Brothers
3000 – Dr. Octagon
Positive Contact – Deltron
Mira et Ten – Alain Goraguer
Space is the Place – Sun Ra

New and Classic

Old classics with new twists, new news, the politics of old, at a new time, in the same place, yet even stranger.

PLAYLIST
The Marimba Belles – In The Hall Of The Mountain King
Rafael Lukjanik – Flight Of The Bumblebee
Antonín Dvořák – Humoresque in G Flat Major, Op. 101, No. 7
Camille Saint-Saëns – Danse Macabre
Clint Mansell & Kronos Quartet – Lux Aeterna
Emerson, Lake & Palmer – Promenade/The Sage – Pictures at an Exhibition
Stuart Hamm – Dr. Gradus Ad Parnasum
Tomita – Arabesque No. 1
Charles Mingus – Adagio Ma Non Troppo
Bob James – Night on Bald Mountain
Victor Wooten – Classical Thump
Pink Martini – Ravel’s Bolero
Johannes Brahms – Hungarian Dance No. 5
The Flow – Toccata
Jeff Beck – Greensleeves
The Electric Prunes – Kyrie Eleison
Paul Schwartz – Ave Maria
Deodato – Also sprach Zarathustra
Walter Carlos – Suicide Scherzo (Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, 2nd Movement) – A Clockwork Orange
Walter Murphy – A Fifth of Beethoven
Béla Fleck – Adagio sostenuto – Moonlight Sonata (Beethoven)
i-doser – nitrous
John Cage – Sonata II (prepared piano) – Steffen Schleiermacher
Frank Zappa – In-A-Gadda-Stravinsky
Love Sculpture – Sabre Dance
The Books – Excess Straussess
Mason Williams – Classical Gas
Joaquín Rodrigo – Fandango

Stranger in a Strange Land 2012-04-13: New & Classic by The Stranger on Mixcloud

Happy Friday the 13th, everyone!

~The Stranger
thestranger@earthling.net

“Zig, zig, zig, Death is striking a tomb with his heel in cadence. Death is playing a dance tune on his violin at midnight. The winter wind blows, and the night is dark. From the linden trees come the moans. White skeletons move across the shadows, running and leaping in their shrouds. Zig, zig, zig, each one gives a tremor, and the dancer’s bones rattle. Hush! they suddenly leave off dancing, they jostle one another, they flee – the cock has crowed!”

Double-Wide Show!

2012-03-24

While Yuri G is in limbo, in transition, in a bad way or just in a strange place, yours truly, the Stranger, takes the helm of Psionic Dehiscence for another week, with the Strangeland in tow for four hours of radio, playlists, and news! If you don’t like it then call the station at 415-550-0511 or myself at thestranger@earthling.net. San Franciscans can also contact Mayor Ed Lee directly at (415) 554-6141 or email mayoredwinlee@sfgov.org.

PLAYLIST
Yuri-G – PJ Harvey
Car Radio – Spoon
Toccata – Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Sweet Leaf – Black Sabbath
Hassles Fresh – Blueberry Pancake
Symphony of Science
The Beast – Milt Buckner
She Blinded Me With Science – Thomas Dolby
Weird Science – Oingo Boingo
Bolero – Pink Martini
Lonlon (Ravel’s Bolero) – Angélique Kidjo
Clair De Lune – Tomita
The Lonely Shepherd – Zamfir
Springtime For Hitler – Henry Mancini
Hall Of The Mountain King – Big Brother & The Holding Company
Calling Elvis – Dire Straits
Flying In A Blue Dream – Eric Johnson, Joe Satriani, St
The Punk and the Godfather – The Who
Everyone Had a Hard Year – The Beatles
Natural Good – Bartel
City Hall – Tenacious D
Red Right Hand – Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds
Drunken Master – Groove Collective
The Wondrous Boat Ride – Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
What Sound – Lamb
Reanimator – Amon Tobin
As the Moon Speaks/Astral Lady – Captain Beyond
Blues, Part II – Blood, Sweat & Tears
Uncle Remus – Frank Zappa
The Ghost Song – The Doors
Space Lion – Yoko Kanno
IG-88 – mc chris
Hong Kong Phooey – Sublime
Go Monkey Go – Devo
bumpys lament – isaac hayes
88 Lines About 44 Women – Nails

Awesome Source

If anyone were to ask me (they never do) what sort of sources I use on the internet as News Director for Mutiny Radio, for my own show The Stranger in a Strangeland, or just as a web surfer, blogger, podcaster or podcast-listener, I wouldn’t have had a list readily available. Modern technology, however, would allow me to whip up an answer in the form of the feed aggregators on Google Reader, Blogger and iTunes. All the same, I thought I’d have a “little” entry prepared with some words about each and why I use/enjoy them, should anyone become inquisitive in the future, or for posterity.

News Sites/Aggregators

Generally, I have a preponderance of news waiting for me to skim in my Google Reader each morning. This includes the wealth of information from the New York Times, BBC, Euronews, Al-Jazeera and Russia Today (RT), all of whom I trust to varying degrees to deliver a broad picture of what the world looks like at the moment. I typically do not trust the NYT’s coverage of Iran (or hardly any American sources for that matter), but agencies like Al-Jazeera and the Conflict Monitors of the Human Security Report Project are usually reliable for producing a look at international issues from every side. I certainly don’t trust RT when it comes to matters about Russia, or Al-Jazeera on matters about Qatar, or the NYT when it comes to Palestine. Talking Points Memo (TPM) showcases what would be considered the progressive side of the news, but often without comment, with links to entire quotes and context, and a diligent job of muckraking. Their charts and analysis are great fodder for any news feed.

To get at the real heart of matters, however, we want journalists and researchers who will more deeply cover the stories than the national conversation would normally dictate or allow. Intrepid newspeople and editors from Alternet, Truth-out, Democracy Now! and the Real News Network provide hard-hitting watchdog journalism, and pose incisive questions to power. Salon is a refreshingly progressive source of news, comment, and blogs written by the likes of Glenn Greenwald and Mary Elizabeth Williams, and Truth Dig, which features progressive columnist Chris Hedges. The Young Turks is perhaps the greatest resource on the internet for commentary if you want to escape the drudgery of big corporate-driven conservative media.

Regardless of politics, I choose not to read the Huffington Post due to their abysmal science reporting. Without a good sense of the scientific method, I cannot trust their standards for journalism.

For science news, there are more resources than time to read in a day, with my inbox overflowing more in this category than any other, a reminder of the rapidly developing times we live in. New Scientist (both the magazine and the site) and Physorg provide a constant stream of scientific discovery, with timely technorati Ars Technica and WIRED revealing where the state of technological advancement has us (WIRED recently broke the story of the NSA’s mega-base in the Utah desert). The Electronic Frontier Foundation combines civil libertarian advocacy work and news with parsing large amounts of technical and legal information, “defending our rights in a digital world.”

For an alternative view, Disinformation aggregates strange and conspiratorial stories from around the web, defiant of the Big Brother states that allows their continued existence.. for now.

Whereas sites like Laughing Squid, Flavorpill and Neatorama offer up pop cultural items, mashups, fun topics and much needed escapism, in other words, all things neat-o. Neat facts, and topics can be had at Mental Floss and life’s big questions at Soul Pancake (co-created by Rainn Wilson). Gizmodo’s (itself a tech news giant) sister-site io9 (as well as Syfy’s own Blastr) keeps us at the cutting edge of science-fiction, which of course could be light years ahead of science fact reporting, or as their tagline boasts “We come from the future.” Whereas Lifehacker helps you get your shit together with easy, simple fixes, showcasing shortcuts to life’s tedium.

And just as general resources go, you’ll find that Snopes has been the greatest defender against internet and urban legend chicanery for years, and that the TV Tropes wiki will help you understand how fiction, culture and memetics works a whole let better. You won’t believe they actually have names for some of these things!

Podcasts

The Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe is hosted by Steve Novella, neurologist, professor, president and co-founder of the New England Skeptical Society, with his panel of skeptical rogues, brothers Bob and Jay Novella, Rebecca Watson and Evan Burnstein. The interesting science topics, audio games and quirks, in-depth interviews, numerous sci-fi references, and of course the irreverent, conversational and casual wit of the skeptics makes it a welcome treat on my ipod each week. These usually go over an hour, but I consistently find myself wanting more.

Brian Dunning’s Skeptoid are a much smaller, so if you want your dose of critical thinking in a fifteen minute dose, enjoy his cool presentation of the self-researched topics ranging from Bigfoot to the Denver Airport. Now over his 300th episode, he somehow manages to uncover a seemingly endless array of new and intriguing myths, legends and misinformation.

Big Picture Science (formerly Are We Alone?) is hosted by Seth Shostak and Molly Bentley of the SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) Institute. With the big picture question of ‘Are We Alone’, the goofy gang of serious scientists have springboarded into the world of the atom, the future, the cell, the virus, the planets, the brain, and any other area where an inquisitive microphone can go. Ideation of this magnitude can also be found by watching Dr. Michio Kaku expound on science’s great questions on Explorations in Science.

Neuropod, hosted by neurogeek Kerri Smith, comes out once a month (with a few bonus episodes here and there), to fill you in on some of the latest discoveries in the world of Neuroscience. Not all of the aspects catch my interest, but the ones that do really do. And since it isn’t as prolific as some of the others, and the information not as time-sensitive, I can enjoy it at any pace without them piling up.

Two more that have been around for a while but I am just now beginning to check out and delve into are the BBC Radio 4’s The Life Scientific and the backlog of wonderful TED Talks (both audio and video).

Though I am now well-planted in the firm reality of scientific discovery, a nostalgic craving, sense of zany fun, and a smirking incredulity keep me coming back to Coast to Coast AM hosted by George Noory, with John B. Wells, George Knapp and Ian Punnett playing weekends and backup. I have been hooked on this show (along with many other listeners, of which there are now estimated 4.5 million listeners every night, making it the most listened to late night show in North America) since the mid-to-late-90’s, when Art Bell‘s grizzled tones would part the airwaves to spook us with the most arcane topics. Today’s shows are sometimes less esoteric, and the format is more formalized, but George Noory is absolutely charming in his innocent and nonjudgemental inclusion of a wide variety of topics in the realms of politics, conspiracy, the paranormal or speculations on the future.

The Psychedelic Salon with Lorenzo features lectures from some of the world’s strangest and deepest thinkers, such as Timothy Leary, Robert Anton Wilson, Albert Hoffmann, Alexander Shulgin, and of course the inimitable Terence McKenna. I must admit that I skip some shows that do not feature McKenna’s brilliant form of rhetorical styling and intellectual mastery. Of late, however, I keep coming back for Lorenzo’s faithful coverage of the Occupy movement, and related audio, which I sometimes use on my own show. Another fun nugget of mind-body awakening can be found in the Alan Watts Podcast, rebroadcasting short philosophical bites from the Alan Watts Library.

The Philosopher’s Zone with Alan Saunders, whose received pronunciation may at first seem strange on Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) Radio National, nonetheless perfectly mixes deep, philosophical questions with silly, simple ones. Part history lesson, part mind expansion, don’t allow your own life to go unexamined without at least inspecting some of the introspections bound to arise while listening!

Similarly, philosopher Tim O’Connor‘s Conversations from the Pale Blue Dot (taken from a Carl Sagan line), raises startling, tortuous questions about God, self, reality and being with atheists, agnostics, deists, and religious scholars of every faith. The show aims to “take philosophy to the street, illustrating how conversation… can be carried out in a careful, civil, and constructive way by people who disagree.”

When I first started listening to The History of Rome, I thought I would listen through the reign of Augustus or perhaps Claudius and then get bored. Here we are near the beginning of the Dark Ages, and I’m still hanging on to Mike Duncan’s carefully researched and recited dissertation on the storied lives, politics, drama, battles and intrigue (with a little cheesy humor thrown in at times) of Rome’s expansive civilization. To jump around in time, the adorable and well-read Deblina Chakraborty and Sarah Dowdey present Stuff You Missed in History Class from HowStuffWorks.com. Thrilling and yet sometimes obscure historical stories, often examining a subject from as many angles as possible, revealing personal stories from time in the process, heartbreaking, brave, humorous and epic.

The International Spy Museum SpyCast is a great bit of history and political science education if you’re into the worlds of espionage, military history (and present), and the skullduggery of terrorists and intelligentsia alike.

Even the hilarious and conversational entertainment programming I subscribe to, Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier’s Smodcast and Ricky Gervais‘ podcast with Steven Merchant and Harvey Pilkington, present a sort of primer on critical thinking. Often revealing stories of science, religion, and history in the same casual manner as pop culture or scatalogical humor, the more skeptical Mosier often guides Kevin gently through the scientific method, whereas Ricky and Steve will taunt and ridicule Harvey’s mistaken notions of how the world works, ultimate culminating in an Idiot Abroad. Two different examples for how friends interact, and two different methods for how skeptics or atheists can talk to believers, and either way, all in good fun. The Onion adds another satirical bit of aural pleasure to your inbox, giving you some sensationally fraudulent talking points for the week.

And finally, X Minus One (X-1) has been my constant ipod companion since my first Nano. Classic tales of science fiction and horror from the 1950’s and 1960’s, the same spine-tingling diversions into space and time that probably elated my father when he was a boy.

Blogs

The frequently updated blogs on WIRED are some of my favorites, and I think I’ve been following them the longest, as they equally rate with other news in my feed. Epicenter, which puts the reader in the heart of the constantly changing world of digital media industries and business. Writers like Kim Zetter and David Kravets present absolutely essential information on Danger Room, closely following military gadgetry and national security, or Threat Level which, like the Electronic Frontier Foundation, highlights the latest threats to our privacy, individual freedoms or civil liberties pertaining to technology and surveillance.

Nick Bilton, tech blogger for the New York Times’ Bits, is also the author of I Come From the Future and This is How it Works, a stunning analysis of how the shifting media and technology landscape is affecting industries, our culture, and our brains. As a blogger he is adept at finding and focusing in on lesser talked about yet important issues in technology, often raising stirring points about the trends and transactions.

Harvey Silverglate (another former guest), criminal defense civil liberties litigator, author of The Shadow University: The Betrayal of of Liberty on America’s Campuses and Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent, former ACLU attorney, partner of the aforementioned EFF, and co-founder of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), has many articles available at Reason Magazine, which is aptly named.

Whereas Law and the Multiverse serves to illustrate how legal actions might come to be decided in the worlds of fiction; comic book superpowers, science fiction, and even AMC’s drama Breaking Bad are all made the subject of legal analysis.

Micah Allen’s Neuroconscience researches brain plasticity and cognitive neuroscience, while Mo Costandi’s Neurophilosophy deals with

Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy is astronomically great, and is hosted along with several other fascinating science blogs at Discover Magazine. If you enjoy a good skeptical dose like his, I would check out the above-mentioned Dr. Steven Novella’s NeuroLogica blog, his advocacy on Science-Based Medicine, or the contributions to Skepticblog along with the likes of Brian Dunning, Micahel Shermer and others.

Illusionist/Future World Dictator Derren Brown has lots of fun updates of stunning imagery, science, magic, psychology, skepticism and the supernatural, all especially appealing to my eclectic tastes. Author, psychologist and skeptic Richard Wiseman offers up puzzles, brain teasers and illusions each week that will make you want to show someone else.

Mind Hacks keeps readers abreast of the news in neuroscience and psychology, with the bold assertion that with such understanding, such tricks will help figure out one’s own brain.

I’ve recently become addicted to the grand ideas presented at Big Think. Similar to TED, you can find great links, lectures, and interviews, but in a much more condensed and potable form. Politics, science, society, and the mind are all game to their host of editors.

Maria Popova’s Brain Pickings is yet another brilliantly curated web resource for intellectual pursuers with a love for art, literature, photography, biography, science, philosophy, and historical oddities. I cannot emphasize how much I love Brain Pickings!

Especially significant of late in the wave of psychopaths taking control of our democracy, the Ponerology Blog details discoveries in the science of evil, spearheaded by Andrew M. Lobaczewski, Ph.D.

Some associates and I also put together a little tumblr concerning the fate of the publishing and retail book industry in this historically significant shifting media landscape, dramatically titled Likely In Store.

As for food blogs, dire decadence demands that one consume updates from Fancy Fast Food, Insanewiches, Cook to Bang, This is Why You’re Fat and the Cheese Underground.

I’ll also occasionally head over to the Brothers Brick or Brick Testament to get my LEGO on, but I do worry that this may open up into a black hole of LEGO blogs for me.

Webcomics (Bonus!)

Of course I’ve been a lifelong fan of Penny Arcade and PvP, (as long as they’ve been live), and Brian Clevinger’s spritely 8-bit Theatre back in its day, and Diesel Sweeties, the robot romance webcomic. I’m also stunned by creatively experimental and remarkably crafted works like Scott McCloud’s Zot! Online, yuumei’s Knite or Demian5’s When I Am King. Pervs will enjoy S.S. Myra or Chester 5000 XYV. And just about anything anything with art by Scott Campbell, John Allison, or Kate Beaton.

I know I just fired a lot at you, and it’s all just the tip of the iceberg! But with an overabundance of digital information, news, discovery, curiosities and entertainment, we all have to be our own curators, or as author James William Powell puts it, our own ‘SPAM filters.’ Hopefully by pointing toward some of my favorite daily, weekly or monthly sources, I can help some curious internet wanderer in the future. Of course, it may all be different by then! At the very least it stands as yet another blog time capsule to what I ‘fed’ on at this point in my life.

I’m always looking for new sources! Of course, it goes without saying that Mutiny Radio should be your source for a much more streamlined helping of these sources! And Mutiny Radio is always looking for intrepid journalists, editors, aggregators or bloggers! Get a hold of me at thestranger@earthling.net!

Status Impossible

I have long thought about the status bars in my life, and the appropriate relative comparisons made to video games like the Sims and Grand Theft Auto. And beyond some simple Tetris effect, as we enmesh with technology even more concretely, these descriptions become even more applicable and important.

Jesse Schell (When games invade real life) has made some excellent points about this, as well as NY Times technology blogger Nick Bilton, in his book I Live in the Future & Here’s How it Works: Why Your World, Work, and Brain Are Being Creatively Disrupted.

Game achievements and status completion in games can reflect what we do in our newly augmented reality; downloads of content, how much of the entertainment you have consumed, work progress, to do lists, all of it can be broken down into percentages and infographic representations. At one point, I even made little bars for my bookshelf, so that I could be reminded how many of those books I had read, and how many I still needed to crack open.

At the same time I think about my purposefully created memories in this temporary experience:

I have formed my memories by accident.
Though some I have made my own.
They stick out in a swampish sea floating like bouys against a throng
A waving flag in front of the Federal building
As I was about to sign my life away
The yellow halo of a girl’s auburn hair
knowing she could never be mine but in that moment didn’t care
The evening I lost my virginity, the look in her eyes
And not knowing the role I would be doomed to reprise
Stuck in a ditch on a field trip, mud sucking at my shoe
hoping to not get caught, my friend not knowing what to do
A tree during recess, its sun-dried leaves pockmarked and empty
the hard carcasses of bugs left as the wind grew cold and wintry
A stolen toy, an unfelt guilt, a growing phobia, unheard accusations
Maroon and brown, like wood grain,
pulpy wet and bright, popping, blaring pain, light.
Or perhaps I’ve never remembered them, but simply a broken reference link,
I’ve fooled myself into remembering that I did remember them.

and how your free-roam experience in sandbox games is sometimes enhanced most by mere urban exploration. And though the work of these video game designers today is mind-boggling, it still pales in comparison by many orders of magnitude to the level of detail still available “IRL”. Geocaching, foursquare, and yelp are all allowing us to interact in new ways with terrain, businesses and environments that may have previously been background, to see more of the NPCs that make up our cities and staff its shops and restaurants.

With the nearly endless number of businesses, buildings, and public spaces in your metropolitan area, how could you ever hope to traverse them all (of those allowable), or even provide a statistic or percentage? Subdivide your map and think about how many you might reasonably explore and learn, so that when you walk by them in the future, they may each hold a particular experience or fleeting memory of this experiment.

Could you traverse or trespass every square foot? How long would it take you to fill that bar? To get that achievement?

Because after all, it all may turn out to have been a video game experience all along…