Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Do Education and Science Cause Atheism?

From an article on Atheism on the CreationWiki, a Creationist version of the Wikipedia:

"...A Gallup poll found a clear trend demonstrating that higher education and belief in evolution as the source of human existence were concurrent. From these statistics it would appear that higher education, and particularly specialization in the natural sciences, will indoctrinate students into naturalism or an atheistic view of the world."

Wow.

How about another conclusion: The more educated you are -- the more you learn -- and especially the more you learn about the world around you from scientific study -- the more you realize that evolution makes sense. And the more obvious it becomes, if you happen to think about it, that most religious beliefs are Stone-Age superstitions with no compelling arguments on their behalf.

The article also emphasizes the very large percentage of scientists who are atheists or secularists (have no religious commitments) or, as they refer to science, "believers in naturalism" rather than religious explanations of the world. Their argument is that education in science includes "indoctrinating" students.

More plausibly (to me), the more you learn about the world around you, the more likely you are to drift away from religious explanations of that world. Because you find the naturalist explanation and view more reasonable, more rational, and more sensible. Sooner or later, you become unable to deny your observation of the stone-age superstitious underpinnings of mainstream religions, because you just know better. And that is why you lose your religion--you've got a better explanation--not because of propaganda or indoctrination or even social pressure -- considering that most atheists in the USA are quite reluctant to openly express themselves on the topic because of the irrational hostility you are likely to provoke from random quarters.

People are so strange....

Sunday, May 17, 2009

A Love Letter to Klutz Press, Who Inspired the First Dummies Book!

Klutz StoreImage by lazytom via Flickr

Dear Folks at Klutz!

Ran across your site today and it reminded me to tell you how your first book, Juggling for the Complete Klutz, inspired the first in the bestselling tutorial series of all publishing history: DOS for Dummies.

I was founding editor of IDG Books, back in 1991, and needed an idea for a beginner series of books for computer users. Long story short: My uncle suggested the title to me, and because years earlier I had bought a copy of Juggling for the Complete Klutz (complete with two red juggling sacks)(although I never learned to juggle, darn it!), I was prepared mentally and morally to listen to and act on my uncle Hugh's suggestion.

Your book, and the VW Repair book with a similar title (can't remember exactly: VW Repair for hte nonmechanical? No, something snappier. But aimed at the same audience) inspired me to follow up on the idea, and we took DOS for Dummies in one year to become the alltime bestselling computer book. The series produced a dozen million-sellers, and eventually hit nearly 500 titles before being pruned back recently to a more reasonable number by new owners.

If I hadn't seen and bought the Klutz book (and the VW repair book), I might very well not have recognized my uncle's title idea for the genius that it was. In fact, in later years I found that the phrase "DOS for Dummies" was a joke insider title among longtime publishers for beginner computer books – and it certainly never would have occurred to them to actually publish a book with a name like that. But that's because they were too close to it, and didn't really understand their audience. Luckily, I had come from outside the computer-book-publishing industry and wasn't smart enough not to do something that dumb.

But I always remembered the Klutz book that helped make it possible for me to *see the possibilities*! And for that, I – and millions of happy book buyers for the past 15 years – owe YOU a big THANKS!

Best regards,

Michael "Mac" McCarthy

Monday, May 11, 2009

Screenwriting versus other forms of writing

"But screenwriting isn't about words. It's about the beauty of the unspoken. That's cinema. Words are just the terse transcript of the visuals and sounds that will appear onscreen. Screenplays are sonnets, and [you've] writing the Illiad. Both forms are valid, but not interchangeable. "

--Kate McCarthy, Culver City, May 2009

Saturday, May 9, 2009

How I Got Started in the Writing/Journalism Game

I'm not one of those who wanted to be a writer since he was 8. I didn't even think about writing until I was in the Army, in a clerk job, stationed in Frankfurt, Germany, and it came close to time to get out. I wanted to stay an extra year there, and I was an avid reader of the weekly GI scandal Rag, The Overseas Weekly. And that's where I got my start in journalism.

[I'm sure this is less than fascinating to all of you, but it's my life, and I think it's mesmerizing!]

I started by pitching the idea for a weekly grab-bag column of oddities--curious facts, interesting quotes from the news, and notes about when US bands were coming to town. The editor said, bring back 3 samples -- which, it turns out, was his stock answer to the many who came by pitching column ideas.

Apparently none of them ever came back: They quickly found that the first column was easy to write, the second column was hard, and the third impossible; so they would give it up. I, on the other hand, came back a week later with 12 finished columns. The editor was so surprised, he hired me.

After a couple of months I got a job there as a reporter too, covering courts martials. When the headquarters shifted to Oakland, CA, I moved there and got an editor gig.

But this was the 70s, and when the paper folded, journalism jobs were hard to find; I didn't have a degree, the Jschools after Watergate were spewing out graduates, and a major recession had just started in the mid-70s. I freelanced, and worked as a Kelly Girl, until the early 80s, writing ad copy, radio commercials, business proposals, and a feature story about dedicated word processors, which I managed to re-sell to the SF Examiner, the Arizona somethng, and a paper in Alaska that never paid me. Working as a Kelly Girl kept me alive, as freelance work was still scarce.

I ended up at Osborne Computers, first writing training scripts for the sales team, then working on the documentation team -- I wrote Wordstar and a Supercalc documentation for the Osborne 2 - the one that never sold, ya know. When Osborne collapsed, I ended up working for Adam on his Paperback Software project, documentation again. Our doc team them moved en masse to Dysan, which was publishing software on its new 3-inch (not 3.5 inch) floppy disk format in competition with Sony's 3.5-inch version. I continued to write freelance, including a history of spreadsheets for Personal Computer.

Then in a stroke of luck I got the News Editor job at a weekly computer trade journal called InfoWorld, and it's been downhill ever since! I spent 14 years at IDG, the mother company, as head of Reviews for InfoWorld (when its reviews were famous and influential), became founding Editor of IDG Books, where I dreamed up DOS for Dummies and hired Dan Gookin to write it -- and found out he had already had the same idea and had it rejected by all the other publishers already. Later I was editor of SunWorld, then when the Unix mags all folded, I founded WPI (Web Publishing Inc.) and made SunWorld into an online-only pub -- the first commercial online-only computer publication in the US.

I've fiddled around in journalism, especially online, ever since.

Newest Nigerian Scam uses FBI!

A friend and I used to collect those Nigerian Scam emails -- you know, the ones that said they were from the wife of an imprisoned or executed or exiled Nigerian government or bank official, and needed to get millions out of the country, with your help, and away from the oppressive Nigerian regime, etc, so contact them, they will give you 20% of $10 million or so. 

The scammers, who initially at least were from Nigeria (thus the name), shifted to other identities over the years, succeeding in finding idiots with more greed than sense, despite the stupidity of their pitch. I've gotten tired of them, but this one that came in my email box this morning was a novelty: It purports to be from "FBI Director Robert S.Mueller" (with a supposed email address of "fbi.robertmueller@sbcglobal.net" but a 'reply-to' of somebody called "elvinwilliams17@sify.com".

The subject line is a good one: "Approved By FBI". Isn't that rich?

Here is the somewhat confused message, for your entertainment. I like how it warns you against *other* scam artists!

Attn: Beneficiary,

This is to Officially inform you that it has come to our notice and we have thoroughly Investigated with the help of our Intelligence Monitoring Network System that you are having an illegal Transaction with Impostors claiming to be Prof. Charles C. Soludo of the Central Bank Of Nigeria, Mr. Patrick Aziza, Mr Frank Nweke, none officials of Oceanic Bank, Zenith Banks, kelvin Young of HSBC, Ben of Fedex,Ibrahim Sule,Larry Christopher, Puppy Scammers are impostors claiming to be the Federal Bureau Of Investigation. During our Investigation, we noticed that the reason why you have not received your payment is because you have not fulfilled your Financial Obligation given to you in respect of your Contract/Inheritance Payment.

Therefore, we have contacted the Federal Ministry Of Finance on your behalf and they have brought a solution to your problem by cordinating your payment in total USD$10.5million in an ATM CARD which you can use to  withdraw money from any ATM MACHINE CENTER anywhere in the world with a maximum of $10000 United States Dollars daily. You now have the lawful right to claim your fund in an ATM CARD.

Since the Federal Bureau of Investigation is involved in this transaction, you have to be rest assured for this is 100% risk free it is our duty to protect the American Citizens. All I want you to do is to  contact the ATM CARD CENTER via email for their requirements to proceed and procure your Approval Slip on your behalf which will cost you $570 only and note that your Approval Slip which contains details of the agent who will process your transaction.

CONTACT INFORMATION
NAME: Kelvin Williams
EMAIL:

Do contact Mr. Kelvin Williams of the ATM CARD CENTRE with your details:

FULL NAME:
HOME ADDRESS:
TELL:
CELL:
CURRENT OCCUPATION:
BANK NAME:

So your files would be updated after which he will send the payment informations which you'll use in making payment of $570 via Western Union Money Transfer or Money Gram Transfer for the procurement of your Approval Slip after which the delivery of your ATM CARD will be effected to your designated home address without any further delay. Please if you know you cannot be able to afford the $570 for the delivery of your ATM card via FedEx then do not bother to contact Mr. Kelvin Williams as we are at the End of the year and he should be busy with some other things.

We order you get back to this office after you have contacted the ATM SWIFT CARD CENTER and we do await your response so we can move on with our Investigation and make sure your ATM SWIFT CARD gets to you.

Thanks and hope to read from you soon.

FBI Director Robert S.Mueller III.

Note: Do disregard any email you get from any impostors or offices claiming to be in possesion of your ATM CARD, you are hereby adviced only to be in contact with Mr. Kelvin Williams of the ATM CARD CENTRE who is the rightful person to deal with in regards to your ATM CARD PAYMENT and forward any emails you get from impostors to this office so we could act upon and commence investigation.

Monday, May 4, 2009

Panic!/Don't Panic!

It's hard covering something like a swine-flu outbreak turning into a pandemic that could reprise 1918 (the epidemic in which my great-uncle, the youngest graduate ever from the Philadelphia medical school, died assisting patients) -- or could turn out to be a big nothing.

So: Have it both ways!

Here is the front page of The Hayward (CA) Review's Morning Report, April 30, 2009:

Big headline to first article above the fold: "Warning: Pandemic imminent"

Smaller headline on second story, below the fold: "Local officials urge public: 'Don't panic' "

Heck, why panic? It's just a PANDEMIC!