I need to stop complaining about Star Trek for a little while, so I started reading biographies on wikipedia. It turns out that the first three Jewish US senators were all supporters of the confederacy.

• David Levy Yulee, born in 1810, was the son of Moses Elias Levy (no relation), a Sephardi Jew from Morocco. While Moses was devoutly religious and strongly opposed to slavery, David was an ardent supporter of slavery, married a non Jew (the governors daughter) and raised his children Christian. (Although as a side note, no record of his official conversion can be found). He first served in the house in 1841, and the senate in 1845. He lost a reelection bid, but served another term that began in 1855. He resigned his seat at the outset of the civil war due to his support of the confederacy. After the war he was instrumental in the building (and then rebuilding after the war) of the Yulee railroad – Florida’s first railroad line to connect the gulf of Mexico to the Atlantic ocean. Today the town of Yulee, Florida and Levy County, Florida are named for him. He is buried in Oak Hill Cemetery in Washington DC.
• Judah Benjamin was the son of religious parents and was raised in South Carolina. He attended Yale law school at age 14, and was elected a senator from Louisiana in 1852. While there he supported the cause of slavery, and was a proud plantation and slave owner. One time, Ben Wade, an abolitionist from Ohio charged Benjamin with being an “Israelite in Egyptian clothing.” Benjamin replied, “It is true that I am a Jew, and when my ancestors were receiving their Ten Commandments from the immediate Deity, amidst the thundering and lightnings of Mt. Sinai, the ancestors of my opponent were herding swine in the forests of Great Britain.” (aw snap!) When the civil war began, Benjamin was appointed Attorney General of the confederacy, and after resigning that office, was appointed its secretary of state. He has the distinction of being the only Jew in the confederate cabinet, and even appeared on the confederate $2 bill. Seeing the shortage of southern soldiers, he put forward the idea of granting blacks their freedom in exchange for fighting on the side of the confederacy. His idea was not adopted until it was too late to save the south. There were rumors that he, along with Jefferson David, had masterminded the Lincoln assassination. Fearing he could not get a fair trial as a Jew, (especially given the allusions to Lincoln as Jesus and thus he as Judas), he fled to Britain after the civil war, and eventually died in Paris where he is now buried.
• Benjamin Jonas grew up in Louisiana and fought for the confederacy in the civil war, being promoted to the rank of major. After the war he was elected to the US senate as a Democrat. He held several other elected and appointed positions, and died in 1911. He is buried in New Orleans.

So there you have it. No matter what else happens today it wasn’t a total loss because you learned something.

More spoilers from the Star Trek movie. Seriously, just go watch the darn movie already.

I know I’m not the first to complain about the physics of star trek, but a few things bugged me, especially J.J. Abram’s use of black holes.

1. If you want to make a black hole that can destroy a planet, there is no need to create it at the center of the planet. It will still destroy the planet if you create it on the surface of the planet, or even near the planet but not actually on it.
2. Black holes do not grow spontaneously. They grow from absorption of matter and energy. At the end of the movie, the black hole seems to just grow for no apparent reason.
3. Nothing can escape from a black hole, not even Nero’s “never surrender” transmission. (Although as an interesting side note, the energy transmitted from the surface of a star the instant before it becomes a black hole will be received over an infinite period of time).
4. A black hole shouldn’t be able to stop a supernova as Spock tries to do. In fact, supernovae often have black holes at the center, and that doesn’t stop the outer layers from being thrown off in a violent explosion.
5. The black hole inside Nero’s ship at the end should have almost instantly destroyed the ship (without even needing to grow). Because parts of the ship were so much closer to the black hole than others, the whole thing would have suffered from very unequal gravitational forces acting on it, and would have been pulverized in a process called spaghettification. (Stephen Hawking made up the word, I swear).
6. Vulcan has a red sky. (Stop messing with continuity Abrams!)
7. Old Spock is on Delta Vega so he can see Vulcan’s destruction. Think about how we see other planets in the sky (Venus, Mars, Jupiter, etc.). They’re all dots in the sky. If Delta Vega is close enough to Vulcan to see it that clearly in the sky, then it must be so close that it’s hard to imagine they both have independent orbits around the same sun(s). Also Delta Vega has been seen before, and is nowhere near Vulcan. (Stop messing with continuity Abrams! Pick an original name!)

When I was out jogging today (side note: I’m finally up to 4 miles), I passed a campaign sign that was still up for Obama. Except it wasn’t – it had a prominently displayed O with a red white and blue motif, but the name after it was Omeish, not Obama. (You can see the sign on the podium of the image on the right). Turns out the local Democratic primary for state legislature is on June 9, and local man Esam Omeish has decided that his best chance of winning is by confusing locals into thinking he’s Obama. His logo is clearly inspired by Obama’s O, and his slogan, “together we can”, is remarkably similar to Obama’s “Yes we can”. (As another aside, he’s currently polling at 2%, although that may be due to his comments about jihad which don’t go over too well in VA).In politics, winners are usually assumed to have done no wrong, and losers are assumed to have done nothing right. Obama’s imagery (which was excellent) is being copied from suburban Virginia to Jerusalem. The problem is that one of the purposes to branding is to set you apart from the crowd – to singularly identify your brand and distinguish it. I have a feeling that the best branded candidate of the 2008 election will be the one who realizes the reasons for Obama’s branding success, and manages to develop their own unique and effective branding without simply copying an existing one.

I just came back from watching the new star trek movie, so like all other nerds, I must get on the internet and share my opinions about it immediately. It was awesome. I really have nothing bad to say about it.¹ Simply a great movie. That’s really all I can say without getting into spoilers, so if you haven’t seen it yet, skip the rest of this post.

—Spoiler Alert—- —-Spoiler Alert—– —-Spoiler Alert—– —-Spoiler Alert—–

I’ve spent a lot of time watching star trek in my life. A quick back of the envelope calculation shows that I’ve probably spent about 2000 hours on trek related activities. (703 episodes², 11 movies, DVD extras, perhaps a costume or two…) At the risk of sounding like the onion come true, there was a problem with the movie and how it treated all the rest of the star trek timeline. This movie essentially trashed it. All those thousands of hours I’ve spent watching Riker, Picard, Data, Janeway, 7 of 9, Sisko, Dax, Worf and Bashir have all been for naught because J.J. Abrams just made them all vanish.

I know why Paramount decided to go the way they did. It’s because they realized the next generation characters weren’t getting any traction in the theaters, and Voyager and DS9 didn’t really lend themselves to followup movies. (They both ended with some finality). After all these years, the characters that resonated most deeply with the American people were still Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, even to the under 40 set that wasn’t alive when they were on TV. Their last attempt at a prequel failed (Star Trek Enterprise), in part because it was constrained by continuity. So they decided to basically hit the big red button and reset the whole series, sort of like when a Dr. Who dies and they bring in a new actor to play his next incarnation. Now they can continue with the established characters, new actors, and no continuity worries. The problem is that I feel that they didn’t have to do it that way. They had no need to go back in time again and made a prequel (hasn’t George Lucas’ example taught people anything?) Why couldn’t they have just continued forward in time? Enterprise bombed because it went back – so go forward! There’s no reason they couldn’t have copied the formula that worked in the next gen- new crew, a few generations later, with newer and cooler technology, facing new enemies. They could have even used Nero – he was a good villain, and his particular brand of stateless terrorism seems to fit the current age. Now I have to go to sleep tonight, knowing that I spent 2000 hours watching something that didn’t happen. Oh. Wait a second.³

1 – That, if you didn’t get it, was sarcasm. I’m a nerd, of course I complain about movies. One of the only reasons nerds watch movies is so that we have something to complain about later so that we can feel superior to the pleebs who don’t know enough to complain. How I pity them – they are so ignorant. And yet, so blissful. (I’d better stop now before I realize the error of my ways – being a nerd also requires that I see no fault in my own life choices).

2 – 703 episodes because I count the pilot episode of TOS as an episode, but don’t count The Animated Series. (Nitpicking – another nerd hobby that we enjoy. See footnote 1).

3 – Don’t worry, lack of self awareness is another nerd trait, I won’t actually take even a minute to pause and reflect on my life and its priorities.^a

a -Except to note that when I was in college if I had spent all that time studying instead of watching Star Trek, I probably would have made honor roll a lot more often. Incidentally, a footnote on a footnote is called a superfootnote, and it’s the kind of thing only a nerd does.

I received a piece of spam today which caught me quite by surprise.  I almost never see spam anymore, my gmail filter is that good.  “How did this get through?” I wondered as I turned the envelope over and over in my hands…then I realized: the spamers had evaded my filters by using snail mail!  Clever bastards!

The envelope, from Saint Matthew’s Churches, had been personally prayed over by members of the congregation; I know because it told me so in big, yellow high-lighted letters on the outside, front and back.  Inside were more well wishes, as well as promises about God’s ability to offer me great financial blessings, plus an offer to send me a prayer cross (“DO NOT SEND ANY MONEY FOR IT. IT IS FREE“), if only I would provide a name and address (the envelope was sent to “resident” – apparently God did not provide them anything more specific).  Also included were testimonials from such reliable sources as Rev. H.D.S, who has “been aquainted with [this ministry] for [over 30] years, and know [them] to be a great [people] of God;” and Sis A.B., who God bleessed with a home and a gas station (could I make that up if I tried?).  Perhaps it was just the terrible grammer, but I swear I could hear the whole thing being read with a Nigerian accent.

My very favorite part though was the sealed envelope inside with “a sign from theLord about your future.”

IMPORTANT – Only break open this sealed prophocy after you have put this Postcard and your prayer request back in the mail to this 58-year-old church ministry…before sunset tomorrow or the next day.

Say it with me now: “You must forward this email to 10 people in the next 25 hours of something awful will happen to you!!!!!”  Well, I’m going to risk it, here we go…

 ”PROPHETIC WORD GIVEN FOR YOUR SPIRITUAL EDIFICATION”

From there it goes on for a full page with vague promises about change, new directions and of course a very important “DECISION THAT MUST BE MADE,” all of which will be easier now, thanks to my new faith.  What’s actually quite creepy about all of this is that it’s done in the first person, from God’s perspective…funny that they couldn’t get him to sign it.

And just in case you are thinking these people are simply earnest believers with a broken Caps Lock key, I should mention that their “church” is in Houston TX, but their mailing address is Tulse OK.  Hmmm…

I’ve been listening to a series of lectures by Berel Wein in the car this week. Overall they’re pretty crappy as Wein’s lectures on history contain a lot of musar and little actual history. However he made one very interesting point which, although depressing, is certainly worth taking to heart. He commented that there is no harm caused like the harm caused in the name of god. When causing harm in the name of god, there is no restraint, and no equivocation due to moral restraint – just unmitigated violence performed with a clear conscience.

There was a small piece on The Daily Show about the Large Hadron Collider. The interviewed some of the scientists working on the LHC, as well as one of the naysayers, Walter Wagner, who is convinced that the LHC could destroy the world. Wagner has made a name for himself in the media, and has even gone so far as to sue to try and stop the LHC from being used. When asked by the host what the odds of a black hole being formed were, Wagner replied that he put the odds at 1:2, or 50-50. When he elaborated later, he explained that there were two possibilities, one that it would destroy the world, and one that it wouldn’t. Therefore, the odds were 1:2, giving the event a 50% chance of occurring. (I’m going to pause right here to let you digest that sentence for a moment, because I can’t even believe I just typed that. On a related note, I’m going to buy a lottery ticket this afternoon, because I have a 50% chance of winning).

There are a lot of places I could take this post, including my surprise that this man managed to get a degree in Biology (with a minor in physics), and the fact that someone lets him teach science to high school children. (Rebecca commented that she now understands why Americans don’t know math or science). However what bothers me the most is the fact that he’s been getting media attention. The Daily show showed clips of him on MSNBC, BBC, CNN, Fox, etc. The media falls into the exact same misunderstanding of probability that Walter Wagner did when he said the odds were 50-50 since there were two options. The media is always careful to try and get “both sides” of any given story. This is fine when reporting on something like the presidential election, where there are sizable numbers of people on both sides of the issue, and sound arguments for both sides. However this reporting mechanism breaks down when you’re dealing with nutcases like Wagner (and this is clearly not the only time something like this has happened). When one side of an argument is a logic based and reasonable, and the other side is just a small fringe group of people, the media’s habit of giving equal time in order to cover “the whole story” just validates the fringe group and gives them credence in the public’s eyes. This is especially common when it comes to scientific issues which the public is not capable of judging for themselves, so they rely on the media’s portrayal. You then end up with people believing that vaccines might cause autism, or intelligent design might be a valid scientific theory, and smoking might not cause lung cancer, because the nightly news displayed one person who said yes, and one person who said no.

The Daily Show’s clip is pretty funny, and contains a wonderful (but very quick) Dr. Strangelove tribute at the end, so you should watch it for that if nothing else.

Every so often I run across a Hebrew word or phrase I don’t know while surfing the web, and try to use Google translator to translate it. After much study, I’ve come to the inescapable conclusion that Google translator sucks. I’ve used plenty of translators on the web before, and I know none of them are perfect, but google’s is far and away the worst one I’ve run across. (Notable because this is the first time Google has done something significantly worse than the competition). Here’s one laughable example. Since I run the Rambam study group at shul (Rambam was a 12th century rabbi whose writings are still considered very influential), I use the translater a lot when I prepare by reading his writings online. This is the first sentence of the chapter we’ll be covering this week:

 אֵין הַמּוֹצִיא מֵרְשׁוּת לִרְשׁוּת אוֹ הַמַּעְבִּיר בִּרְשׁוּת הָרַבִּים חוּץ לְאַרְבַּע אַמּוֹת, חַיָּב–עַד שֶׁיַּעְקֹר מֵעַל גַּבֵּי מְקוֹם שֶׁיֵּשׁ בּוֹ אַרְבָּעָה טְפָחִים עַל אַרְבָּעָה טְפָחִים אוֹ יָתֵר, וְיַנִּיחַ עַל גַּבֵּי מְקוֹם שֶׁיֵּשׁ בּוֹ אַרְבָּעָה עַל אַרְבָּעָה.

I would translate this more or less as follows:

One who transfers from domain to domain or carries in the public domain beyond four cubits is not liable until he picks up from a place that is four handsbreaths by four handsbreadths or more, and puts it down in a place that is four by four.

Admittedly it’s a somewhat convoluted and awkward construction in English, but someone who understood the context (Rambam is writing about the restrictions on carrying on the sabbath), could understand this sentence. On the other hand, here is how Google translates this sentence:

The Authority does not have authority or permission Hmabir many foreign Four die, owing – to Shiakr over a place that has four and nurture and nurture or the four remaining, Weinih on a place that has four on four.

While some of those mistakes can be understood in a context free environment (domain and permission are the same word in Hebrew), the unforgiveable sin (IMHO) is that several of the words in the translation are not actually words.  There are also several places where the translation was just…. weird. The Hebrew word חוּץ almost always means outside, I don’t know why it was translated as “foreign” here. The interesting part is that if you translate it alone, without any other context, it does correctlytranslate the word as “external” or “outside”. This of course means that Google does look for context sensitive clues when trying to do a translation, which shouldn’t be a surprise given the talent Google has and their desire to do everything well. However it also means that their context sensitive translations appear to be even worse (in at least some instances) than the context free translations they replaced.