I’ve been under a brute force attack on my server recently and have to look up way too many IP addresses in Project Honeypot and WHOIS to see if they are known spammers, so I built this Alfred workflow (my first!) to speed up the process.
I did an interview on the ABC yesterday about Sunday Assembly Brisbane.
We’ve also got a new Meetup group. Feel free to join up to stay up to date with our … meetups.
PhD student Benjamin Walker and Business Psychology professor Chris Jackson conducted three experiments using more than 600 people from the general population. They found that people with psychopathic traits can make great entrepreneurs because they are not afraid to fail or make bold and risky decisions.
My concern, though, is that although psychopaths might make great entrepreneurs, once they get wealth and power as a result of their entrepreneurial activities, they can end up doing more damage to society than good. But what do we do about it? How do we protect society from psychopaths?
Below is Benjamin’s recent three-minute pitch about the subject of his PhD.
Police in southern France have arrested a member of the “Pink Panther” gang of jewel thieves, who had been on the run since he escaped from a Swiss prison three months ago. – ABC NEWS
I love reading about these real-life French diamond thieves, “The Pink Panthers“. They are straight out of a Hollywood film – pulling hundred-million-dollar heists on the French Riviera & breaking out of prison with helicopters. I imagine George Clooney, Frank Sinatra or Robert DeNiro is leading them. I’d love to see what goes on in an outfit like this. Are they really professional, smart guys like DeNiro in HEAT or Ocean’s Eleven? Or just a bunch of thugs?
According to Interpol they have snatched over 330 million euros ($436 million) since 1999.
They certainly sound pretty suave.
In a recent heist, a member of the gang threatened to blow up a high-end jewellery store in Cannes with a hand-grenade. While his accomplice points a gun at staff, the robber filled a sport holdall with expensive watches and headed for the door. Suddenly, he stopped and turned. “Desolé,” he said to the terrified sales staff, “C’est la crise.” (Sorry, it’s the economic crisis). – The Guardian
I think this kind of heist is capitalism at its purest. The guys with the most capital to spend – on weapons, anti-security equipment, lawyers, fences, fake identities, etc, or, if you’re on the other side, on layers of security – wins. It’s a dog-eat-dog world, my friends, a battle for who can steal the most resources and get away with it.
Of course, it doesn’t have to be that way. Some of us yearn for a world where people treat each other in a kinder way, realizing it’s in our own best self-interests to have a world where people are healthy, happy, well-educated and able to provide for their families. That’s the promise of socialism. Is it going to be hard to get there from here? Certainly. Should we stop trying just because it’s hard? I don’t think so.
If you’re interested in reading more about the Pink Panther gang, check out the work of David Samuels.
Grant Vandersee (@gvandersee) tweeted today about a series of fake Twitter accounts that appear to be sending the same pro-ALP message.
So there are fake accounts tweeting pro-#ALP messages. Trust #Labor to cheat & sneak around. #ausvotes pic.twitter.com/H3mR3LdI43
— Grant Vandersee (@gvandersee) August 19, 2013
I dove into some of these accounts and they are pretty interesting.
The first account to send out this tweet about #Jess_Rudd seems to have been @Kenneth_Ha_9123, with the tweet going out at 5:32pm, 18 Aug 13 via Mobile Web (M2).
This account is 33 days old, has only made 22 tweets (mostly nonsensical, randomly generated), has 150 followers (the majority of whom are also fake accounts), and is following 200, mostly authentic, accounts.
About 30 minutes later, at 6:05pm, @Doreatha_polski tweeted the exact same message, also from Mobile Web (M2). Interestingly, this account claims to be from the USA.
This account is 135 days old, again full of randomly generated nonsense tweets and re-tweets, has 152 mostly fake followers, and is following 203 mostly authentic followers.
About 30 minutes later, at 6:51pm, the account @5p5Odom sent the exact same tweet, also from Mobile Web (M2). This account claims to be from “Burnside borough, PA, USA”, has 153 fake followers, is following 208 and has made 29 random tweets since the account was created 105 days ago.
At 8:31pm, from Mobile Web (M2), @meghankwonm217 sent the same tweet. This account is also purportedly from the USA and has the same fake statistics and tweets.
So far, over the last 20 hours, there have been 14 such messages. Hardly enough to have much of an impact on anything. So who is sending them… and why?
Mobile Web (M2) would seem to be this SMS marketing outfit. They promote themselves as “the exclusive provider and deployment platform of text messaging for our partner M2 Systems. We are taking the mobile industry to a new level of marketing strategies for the booming handheld lifestyle.”
Has the ALP done a deal with Mobile Web M2 to run an astroturfing persona management for the campaign? Is this just the tip of the iceberg?
And if the ALP is using persona management to try to influence the outcome of the election, what are the Liberals up to?
It reminds me of a book I’m nearly finished reading – Kill Decision by Daniel Suarez. It’s the story of drone warfare extrapolated to its obvious conclusion. Pretty terrifying stuff (and a great read).
As I posted back in May, Chrissy and I are keen to get a Sunday Assembly up and running in Brisbane.
If you haven’t heard of Sunday Assembly yet, here’s the official description from their website:
The Sunday Assembly is a godless congregation that meets on the first Sunday of every month to hear great talks, sing songs and generally celebrate the wonder of life. It’s a service for anyone who wants to live better, help often and wonder more.
Watch this video about Sunday Assembly in Melbourne, recently shown on Channel Ten’s “The Project”, or this video by the founders of SA, Pippa Evans and Sanderson Jones:
So we’ve now got a half dozen people on our organising committee and we’re having regular meetings on Sunday evenings at 5pm, meeting at Archive Books in the city (thanks to Hamish and Dawn!). We’ve also got a Facebook group for updates. We are also taking registrations for our first event which is going to be (hopefully) held in November to coincide with a global tour by Pippa and Sanderson. If you’re interested in attending a fun event and hanging out with other secular people who want to live better, help often and wonder more, then register for the first Sunday Assembly Brisbane event here. And do think about coming along to one of our Sunday afternoon meetups if you want to learn more and help us get this thing off the ground!
For those interested in such matters, I just put up a new post on The Three Illusions site.
One obvious answer is that we wake up from dreams but we don’t wake up from reality. But does the dreamed person in our dreams ever wake up from the dream? Or does their ‘reality’ just end for them? One minute they are living inside their reality and the next it just stops. We wake up from that dream. As far as we’re concerned the dream is over. But what does the dream person experience?
Booz Allen Hamilton released a statement on its website Sunday addressing Snowden: “Booz Allen can confirm that Edward Snowden, 29, has been an employee of our firm for less than 3 months, assigned to a team in Hawaii. News reports that this individual has claimed to have leaked classified information are shocking, and if accurate, this action represents a grave violation of the code of conduct and core values of our firm. We will work closely with our clients and authorities in their investigation of this matter.”
(source)
So what exactly do the “core values” of Booz Allen Hamilton say an employee should do when they discover that the US government is secretly spying on its citizens? And is “telling the truth” against their “code of conduct”? I, for one, would like to know more.
Stories that have grabbed my attention over the last day or so.
Curing Religious Feelings
It’s all about the brain. One day we should be able to use fMRI tools (or their descendants) to identify psychopaths before they hurt someone and offer to cure them. Can we also use neuroscientific tools to help cure religious fundamentalists? I’m not sure they would willingly submit to be cured and we can’t ethically force them. Would you stop believing in imaginary gods and monsters if you could?
An Oxford University researcher and author specializing in neuroscience has suggested that one day religious fundamentalism may be treated as a curable mental illness.
Kathleen Taylor, who describes herself as a “science writer affiliated to the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics,” made the suggestion during a presentation on brain research at the Hay Literary Festival in Wales on Wednesday. In response to a question about the future of neuroscience, Taylor said that “One of the surprises may be to see people with certain beliefs as people who can be treated,” The Times of London notes. (source)
Women Are Horny After All
I didn’t need journalist Daniel Bergner to write a book to tell me that my wife has a massive sex drive. She reminds me every day! He’s written the book anyway – “What Do Women Want?: Adventures in the Science of Female Desire”. According to the research he did for the book, many popular ideas about women’s sexuality is wrong, wrong, wrong. For example, they aren’t made for monogamy any more than men are. And women become physically aroused to a much wider array of visual stimuli than men, even though they deny it. Read the interview. (source)
Nazis On Meth!
No, that’s not the title of the sequel to Iron Sky, it’s the story about meth was invented by a German in 1938 and then distributed by the millions to Nazi soldiers. Makes me wonder what impact that might have had on their early successes – and their eventual downfall? We know Der Fuhrer didn’t partake of alcohol or cigarettes, but did he use meth?
…the Wehrmacht, Germany’s World War II army, distributed millions of the tablets to soldiers on the front, who soon dubbed the stimulant “Panzerschokolade” (“tank chocolate”). British newspapers reported that German soldiers were using a “miracle pill.” (source)
Gatsby
We saw The Great Gatsby in 3D last night. It wasn’t the complete disaster I expected from the bad reviews and the stories about its troubled production, but I didn’t like it. I’m generally not a fan of Baz Luhrmann. I loved Strictly Ballroom, but all of his films since Romeo + Juliet have been too over-the-top for my tastes. I don’t mind CG effects if they are required – sure, go ahead and use them in The Avengers if you must. I just think character-driven stories don’t need them. We also saw Joe Wright recent adaptation of Anna Karenina a few months ago and I’m sure it also used CG, but it was used much more carefully, enhancing the story rather than over-powering it. That’s my two cents, anyway. Chrissy, on the other hand, loved it.
Who Is The New Doctor Going To Be?
The BBC has announced Matt Smith is retiring at the end of the year. Who will be the new Doctor (no, not John Hurt). My tip is Ben Whishaw
(he was Q in the latest Bond film), although he might be too big now. Cumberbatch is definitely too big – and he turned it down four years ago anyhow. It will probably be someone totally unknown. If I could choose, it would be Stephen Merchant.
Yeah the last season has been pretty dreary. It’s had a few cool moment (John Hurt) but nowhere near as cool as the first season of Eleven or the first couple of seasons of Ten.
How does the CEO of Evernote use Evernote?
Phil Libin, CEO of Evernote, shares how he organises his personal install of Evernote.
As of the time of this answer, I have about 9,000 notes in my Evernote account divided among 45 notebooks. However, the majority of these notes are in my single, default notebook. (source)
A little disappointing to those of us who obsess over getting the right combination of Notebooks & Tags. At least he has more notes than I do (6617).