Combating Spam is an International Problem
I heard recently that the house had passed an anti-spam bill. In particular, CNN said on its web page that "The House voted overwhelmingly Saturday for a bill to outlaw most Internet spam and create a "do not spam" registry for those who do not wish to receive unsolicited junk e-mail." This may seem like a good idea. Spam resembles telemarketing calls in that both come uninvited, frequently involve scams and fraud, and usually try to sell us something. A while ago a Do Not Call list was established. This is a listing of people who said that they do not want to be called by telemarketers. There are now 50 million or so people on this list. This means that if a telemarketer calls someone from the list he can be penalized for it. To me this seems like a good idea. If you sign up and someone calls you, just report it to the authorities.
So why not a Do Not Spam list? The intention is the same. A spammer must avoid email addresses in such a list when they send out their multimillion-recipient emails. But there are problems with this. There are many ways in which a spammer can avoid detection, more so than with telemarketers. He can misspell words, use gibberish in his message, use false return addresses, and hop from one email address and IP address to another to avoid detection. The telemarketer has a few such methods available, chiefly the "unavailable" appearing on a caller ID, but not as many as the spammer. The telemarketer is forced to speak personally over the phone to his targets, but the spammer does not need to contact anyone at all. In 5 seconds, if he is lucky, a telemarketer can call one person. In the same length of time, a spammer can spam tens of millions of people, simply by clicking a mouse. So a do not spam list is not as effective.
Further, the US Congress is the wrong place to start fighting spam. No US law, no presidential order or edict, absolutely no court subpoena, summons or warrants can do anything about foreigners spamming from overseas. Many spams I get are from domains .fr, .it, .tw, .pc, and so forth, meaning France, Italy, Taiwan, China, and so forth. No US law can do anything about people from these places for the US has no jurisdiction there. For spam to be truly controlled, it needs to be treated as an international problem. It needs to be brought up before the United Nations, and the UN should take steps to help its member countries fight spam worldwide, so that a spammer in Taiwan can be caught and tried for spamming the United States. Unless this problem is internationalized, it will never be solved.
A Journey through Blogrealm
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2003/11/22
The Kennedy Assassination
Today is the 40th anniversary of the death of President John F. Kennedy on 1963 November 22. Where was I when the shooting happened? I was a 17 year old high school senior. It was Friday and I went through my usual sequence of classes including Advanced Placement Calculus at a school in upstate New York. At the end of that Friday, classes were rearranged to accommodate an assembly to honor and cheer the school's athletic heroes. One by one they came with cheers for everybody: the track and field team, the basketball team, and the football team. At about 14:10 EST, suddenly we were all called to either give the Pledge of Allegiance or sing "America, Tis of Thee". After that the assembly ended and we went to our homerooms. I thought it was rather strange. It was too early. Otherwise it was normal. The homeroom teacher went through some administrative things, and then dismissed us. We all went out to the bus, walking on the pavement outside. Then I heard what had happened. Students were talking to each other about what had happened to President Kennedy. I got onto my bus and sat near the front. The bus driver said that there was a bullet in his brain. I did not know what that meant, except that it seemed serious. She was listening on the radio. The people in the back were talking about Senator Goldwater; apparently about his chances for getting elected after this.
The bus drove by a nearby Catholic school and I saw the flag there at half mast. I wanted to know if it was true. It stopped on my street and I walked out with a neighbor girl. She said that was an awful thing to do to him. I got into the house, which was empty. My parents were both working. I turned on the TV and saw it. There was a picture of President Kennedy on the screen, and below it, it read "1917-1963". So it was true. I wanted to know how my parents would react. My brother kept making my life miserable with music from a rock station, but now the station was playing church organ music, saying that after this event it would not want to play its usual popular music. When she got home, she said ti was awful what happened to him but it was what one would expect from appealing to the crowds like that. There was a Senior Night dance scheduled for that night. I could not get a date but was intending to go single. I called someone and found out it was cancelled.
Most of the time I was home that weekend and Monday, watching the TV for new developments. I turned on the radio on Sunday and got the announcement that Oswald had been shot. The headline the next day read "Pro-Castro Gunman Held in Assassination of Kennedy", and two days later, "Millions watch: Revenge Bullet Kills Oswald".
It did not seem to affect my life that much, but it did help set up the Johnson-Goldwater presidential election of 1964. In that election, Johnson won every state except a strip of five states in the Deep South and Arizona. But suppose Kennedy had lived? From what I have heard, some of the sexual experiences of him may have come to light, along with his association with the Mafia. This may have led to his impeachment and possible removal from office or resignation. If it did not lead to that, there is a possibility that another Democrat, maybe Johnson, would have challenged him for the nomination. If this challenge had been successful, the Democrats would have lost three Lichtman keys: challenge to nomination, incumbency, and scandal. They had already lost four. The loss of seven keys would have meant a Goldwater victory, and the history of our nation would have been substantially different.
The Kennedy Assassination, along with the Moon Landing, Planeattack, the start of the two Iraq wars, and the Cuban Missile Crisis were events that I, and most other people, will always remember.
Today is the 40th anniversary of the death of President John F. Kennedy on 1963 November 22. Where was I when the shooting happened? I was a 17 year old high school senior. It was Friday and I went through my usual sequence of classes including Advanced Placement Calculus at a school in upstate New York. At the end of that Friday, classes were rearranged to accommodate an assembly to honor and cheer the school's athletic heroes. One by one they came with cheers for everybody: the track and field team, the basketball team, and the football team. At about 14:10 EST, suddenly we were all called to either give the Pledge of Allegiance or sing "America, Tis of Thee". After that the assembly ended and we went to our homerooms. I thought it was rather strange. It was too early. Otherwise it was normal. The homeroom teacher went through some administrative things, and then dismissed us. We all went out to the bus, walking on the pavement outside. Then I heard what had happened. Students were talking to each other about what had happened to President Kennedy. I got onto my bus and sat near the front. The bus driver said that there was a bullet in his brain. I did not know what that meant, except that it seemed serious. She was listening on the radio. The people in the back were talking about Senator Goldwater; apparently about his chances for getting elected after this.
The bus drove by a nearby Catholic school and I saw the flag there at half mast. I wanted to know if it was true. It stopped on my street and I walked out with a neighbor girl. She said that was an awful thing to do to him. I got into the house, which was empty. My parents were both working. I turned on the TV and saw it. There was a picture of President Kennedy on the screen, and below it, it read "1917-1963". So it was true. I wanted to know how my parents would react. My brother kept making my life miserable with music from a rock station, but now the station was playing church organ music, saying that after this event it would not want to play its usual popular music. When she got home, she said ti was awful what happened to him but it was what one would expect from appealing to the crowds like that. There was a Senior Night dance scheduled for that night. I could not get a date but was intending to go single. I called someone and found out it was cancelled.
Most of the time I was home that weekend and Monday, watching the TV for new developments. I turned on the radio on Sunday and got the announcement that Oswald had been shot. The headline the next day read "Pro-Castro Gunman Held in Assassination of Kennedy", and two days later, "Millions watch: Revenge Bullet Kills Oswald".
It did not seem to affect my life that much, but it did help set up the Johnson-Goldwater presidential election of 1964. In that election, Johnson won every state except a strip of five states in the Deep South and Arizona. But suppose Kennedy had lived? From what I have heard, some of the sexual experiences of him may have come to light, along with his association with the Mafia. This may have led to his impeachment and possible removal from office or resignation. If it did not lead to that, there is a possibility that another Democrat, maybe Johnson, would have challenged him for the nomination. If this challenge had been successful, the Democrats would have lost three Lichtman keys: challenge to nomination, incumbency, and scandal. They had already lost four. The loss of seven keys would have meant a Goldwater victory, and the history of our nation would have been substantially different.
The Kennedy Assassination, along with the Moon Landing, Planeattack, the start of the two Iraq wars, and the Cuban Missile Crisis were events that I, and most other people, will always remember.
2003/11/19
Gay Marriage and Massachusetts
I heard on the news this week that the banning of marriage between individuals of the same sex in Massachusetts has been declared unconstitutional. People opposed to gay marriage say that a marriage is between a man and a woman. Maybe it is. Biologically, it works best with a man and a woman, since they can produce the children to constitute a family, and the purpose of marriage in my opinion, is not companionship; it is not financial, and it is not even sex. The purpose of a marriage is to raise a family. This implies that the partners need not keep sexually exclusive to their spouses, provided the couple agrees to a policy of this kind. That's right, I think a sexually free marriage can work. It would be the ideal marriage for gay people. A gay man can marry a lesbian and agree that their sex life would be separate from their marriage except for a few times necessary to create the family. A lesbian marriage would have to have sex with others (or use expensive in vitro fertilization) to create a family, and there is always the possibility that their male partners would want at least partial custody of the children. A gay male couple can't even create a child on their own but have to seek adoption.
However, the court is right in saying that banning gay marriage denies the benefits of marriage to a gay person solely because of his or her sexual preference. Some sort of union needs to be recognized such that the couple does have the benefits of marriage. Further, I would not like an amendment added to the Constitution stating that a marriage is between a man and a woman. To me that is the government entering into something that should be personal among the partners in a relationship.
I heard on the news this week that the banning of marriage between individuals of the same sex in Massachusetts has been declared unconstitutional. People opposed to gay marriage say that a marriage is between a man and a woman. Maybe it is. Biologically, it works best with a man and a woman, since they can produce the children to constitute a family, and the purpose of marriage in my opinion, is not companionship; it is not financial, and it is not even sex. The purpose of a marriage is to raise a family. This implies that the partners need not keep sexually exclusive to their spouses, provided the couple agrees to a policy of this kind. That's right, I think a sexually free marriage can work. It would be the ideal marriage for gay people. A gay man can marry a lesbian and agree that their sex life would be separate from their marriage except for a few times necessary to create the family. A lesbian marriage would have to have sex with others (or use expensive in vitro fertilization) to create a family, and there is always the possibility that their male partners would want at least partial custody of the children. A gay male couple can't even create a child on their own but have to seek adoption.
However, the court is right in saying that banning gay marriage denies the benefits of marriage to a gay person solely because of his or her sexual preference. Some sort of union needs to be recognized such that the couple does have the benefits of marriage. Further, I would not like an amendment added to the Constitution stating that a marriage is between a man and a woman. To me that is the government entering into something that should be personal among the partners in a relationship.
2003/11/18
Close Encounters on the Highway
Lately I have been noticing more and more strange arrangements of lights on cars on the highway. For most of my life, cars had two headlights on their front, plus maybe orange parking lights, and two taillights. In the 1970's, I watched the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind, in which extraterrestrials make a roundabout arrival to our planet. In one scene in the movie, someone driving on the road gets a tailgater, a car following too closely. There is nothing much you can do about this. You can keep your distance from the car following but you can't make the other guy behind you keep his distance. So the guy stops at a stop sign and motions for him to go around. The lights behind the vehicle then move to the right as the car goes around our hero's car. The same thing happens again; he gets another tailgater. Once again he stops at a stop sign and motions for him to go around. Instead, the lights go up! This is no ordinary car. It's an extraterrestrial visitor. Other car-like vehicles also appear, and some of these look weird with unusual patterns of lights.
And so do some of the cars I see on the highway today. The most common weird pattern seems to be four white headlights on front. That is not the usual pattern. There should be only two headlights. I suppose the extra two headlights, near the ground, are to cut through the fog, but they also make the vehicle look like something out of the movie. So I call them "close encounters". I have included this word on my nonword page. I also find them annoying, as close encounters are almost always too bright for my eyes. So I flick my brights at them to signal to them to turn off their close encounters lights. They may think their brights are on, but that is the only way I can signal them. So if you see someone flicking their brights at you, check to see if you have your brights on, but also check to see if you have close encounters lights on, and turn them off, for I don't want to think that you are from some galaxy far, far away.
Lately I have been noticing more and more strange arrangements of lights on cars on the highway. For most of my life, cars had two headlights on their front, plus maybe orange parking lights, and two taillights. In the 1970's, I watched the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind, in which extraterrestrials make a roundabout arrival to our planet. In one scene in the movie, someone driving on the road gets a tailgater, a car following too closely. There is nothing much you can do about this. You can keep your distance from the car following but you can't make the other guy behind you keep his distance. So the guy stops at a stop sign and motions for him to go around. The lights behind the vehicle then move to the right as the car goes around our hero's car. The same thing happens again; he gets another tailgater. Once again he stops at a stop sign and motions for him to go around. Instead, the lights go up! This is no ordinary car. It's an extraterrestrial visitor. Other car-like vehicles also appear, and some of these look weird with unusual patterns of lights.
And so do some of the cars I see on the highway today. The most common weird pattern seems to be four white headlights on front. That is not the usual pattern. There should be only two headlights. I suppose the extra two headlights, near the ground, are to cut through the fog, but they also make the vehicle look like something out of the movie. So I call them "close encounters". I have included this word on my nonword page. I also find them annoying, as close encounters are almost always too bright for my eyes. So I flick my brights at them to signal to them to turn off their close encounters lights. They may think their brights are on, but that is the only way I can signal them. So if you see someone flicking their brights at you, check to see if you have your brights on, but also check to see if you have close encounters lights on, and turn them off, for I don't want to think that you are from some galaxy far, far away.
An extended system of units
Scientists have for a long time dealt with large numbers, in the millions, billions and so forth. It was unwieldy to say 3.6 billion electron volts or a trillionth of a meter, so scientists long ago invented the International System of Units. By this system, one could express higher numbers. For example, a hertz is a cycle per second, used to measure electromagnetic frequencies. So then a thousand hertz is a kilohertz, or KHz for short. A million is a megahertz, and a billion is a gigahertz, where "giga-" means gigantic. A trillion is "tera-" from terato- meaning monster. Similarly, a nanosecond is a billionth of a second, and a picometer is a trillionth of a meter. This proved to be inadequate, so two more units, femto- (a quadrillionth) and atto- (a quintillionth-) were added (I am using the American interpretation of "billion" and so forth). Shortly after that came their reciprocals, peta- meaning a quadrillion, and exa-, meaning a quintillion. Even this became inadequate, as some scientists started to use the units milliattovolts. This is not legitimate as one is not supposed to use more than one of these suffixes at a time. So more units were added: zetta- for a sextillion, and yotta- for a septillion, or 10^24. Similarly came zepto- meaning sextillionth, and yocto- meaning septillionth.
Even this is inadequate. For example the Sun puts out 380 yottawatts, so that Sirius, being 23 times brighter than the Sun, puts out 8,740 yottawatts. This is not legitimate, as it uses numbers above a thousand. When such a number is encountered you need to divide by a thousand and use the next higher unit. But there isn't any in this case. That is why I devised a system of units to go well beyond these, in fact, all the way to a vigintillion, 10^63. After yotta- comes xona-, so that Sirius puts out 8.74 xonawatts. Then weka-, vunda-, and so forth. I followed the pattern of backward sequence of letters of the alphabet followed by a rendition of the Latin for the number. Similarly I came up with xonto-, meaning an octillionth, and so forth.
I posted them on my unit system site and said that these were my suggestions for units. It was not official, of course, and I hear no attempt to make them official. A committee of scientists, not just one eager blogger, needs to extend the system. If they took my units as a model, undoubtedly there would be some changes. For example, my vunda-, meaning 10^33 and connoting eleven, means 38 in Bantu or Swahili, so this could be confusing. Robert Munafo quotes my system, but says that he thinks the unit beyond yotta- is more likely to be novetta- instead of xona- as novett or something like that is Italian for nine. So remember if you use these extended prefixes that they are not official.
Nevertheless, I am glad to see that these names are starting to take hold. I did a Google™ search for "xona weka" and got 78 references! The main one seems to be Plexos, and apparently people are picking it up from either my site or Plexos'. Maybe they will form part of an official system soon so we can measure the Earth in grams (6 xonagrams). So go ahead and use them, but be sure to acknowledge that I developed these names first.
Scientists have for a long time dealt with large numbers, in the millions, billions and so forth. It was unwieldy to say 3.6 billion electron volts or a trillionth of a meter, so scientists long ago invented the International System of Units. By this system, one could express higher numbers. For example, a hertz is a cycle per second, used to measure electromagnetic frequencies. So then a thousand hertz is a kilohertz, or KHz for short. A million is a megahertz, and a billion is a gigahertz, where "giga-" means gigantic. A trillion is "tera-" from terato- meaning monster. Similarly, a nanosecond is a billionth of a second, and a picometer is a trillionth of a meter. This proved to be inadequate, so two more units, femto- (a quadrillionth) and atto- (a quintillionth-) were added (I am using the American interpretation of "billion" and so forth). Shortly after that came their reciprocals, peta- meaning a quadrillion, and exa-, meaning a quintillion. Even this became inadequate, as some scientists started to use the units milliattovolts. This is not legitimate as one is not supposed to use more than one of these suffixes at a time. So more units were added: zetta- for a sextillion, and yotta- for a septillion, or 10^24. Similarly came zepto- meaning sextillionth, and yocto- meaning septillionth.
Even this is inadequate. For example the Sun puts out 380 yottawatts, so that Sirius, being 23 times brighter than the Sun, puts out 8,740 yottawatts. This is not legitimate, as it uses numbers above a thousand. When such a number is encountered you need to divide by a thousand and use the next higher unit. But there isn't any in this case. That is why I devised a system of units to go well beyond these, in fact, all the way to a vigintillion, 10^63. After yotta- comes xona-, so that Sirius puts out 8.74 xonawatts. Then weka-, vunda-, and so forth. I followed the pattern of backward sequence of letters of the alphabet followed by a rendition of the Latin for the number. Similarly I came up with xonto-, meaning an octillionth, and so forth.
I posted them on my unit system site and said that these were my suggestions for units. It was not official, of course, and I hear no attempt to make them official. A committee of scientists, not just one eager blogger, needs to extend the system. If they took my units as a model, undoubtedly there would be some changes. For example, my vunda-, meaning 10^33 and connoting eleven, means 38 in Bantu or Swahili, so this could be confusing. Robert Munafo quotes my system, but says that he thinks the unit beyond yotta- is more likely to be novetta- instead of xona- as novett or something like that is Italian for nine. So remember if you use these extended prefixes that they are not official.
Nevertheless, I am glad to see that these names are starting to take hold. I did a Google™ search for "xona weka" and got 78 references! The main one seems to be Plexos, and apparently people are picking it up from either my site or Plexos'. Maybe they will form part of an official system soon so we can measure the Earth in grams (6 xonagrams). So go ahead and use them, but be sure to acknowledge that I developed these names first.
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