Already we have turned all of our critical industries, all of our material resources, over to these . . . things . . . these lumps of silver and paste we call nanorobots. And now we propose to teach them intelligence? What, pray tell, will we do when these little homunculi awaken one day and announce that they have no further need of us?
- Sister Miriam Godwinson, "We Must Dissent" - Alpha Centauri

For the past few years, Sony, the Japanese’s transnational corporation has certainly been active in its industry, particularly in robotic technology. Aibo is one of its famous robotic products that are not alien to the society wide. In fact, society loves it because the dog robot has the ability to act almost exactly like a real pet dog. What is more astounding is the latest artificial life form humanoid called SDR-3X.
The idea of artificial life form probably came from the early 20th century when great science-fiction starts to flourish all the sudden. During this period, Isaac Asimov was born in Russia and migrated to the United States. Of all the visionaries, he certainly earns the title father of robotic. He wrote the influential Robot series and made the world wonders how the future will look like. Nevertheless, as people once ignored Jules Verne, his idea was shoved off as science-fiction.
However, science-fiction seems almost always turn into reality.
During the release of SDR-3X, a representative from Sony announced that the next challenge is not creating a more sophisticated mechanical humanoid but instead, the challenge is building a robot that can feels feelings as a human would.
Human for certain will live life with a new companion and that companion will not necessarily be carbon-based life forms. It could be something that is made of aluminium. Even now, some people have Aibo as their pet instead of Garfield or Lassie.
Human is truly an amazing creature. From stupidity, they rose to reach for the stars literally. Day by day, human knowledge expands and they start to become God themselves. God creates life but soon, human will be able to create life from nothingness too. Human is God in a sense.
In the end, when humanity finally will have the ability to create high-level artificial intelligence, they will have their own admirer but when their creation becomes human itself, human will have to secede from God’s throne and present it to their own toy, the A.I.
I believe if human wants to call themselves God, Asimov’s third law must be observed carefully.

The Original Three Laws of Robotic.

First Law: A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
Second Law: A robot must obey orders given it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
Third Law: A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Updating a site needs a lot of determination. Unfortunately, determination is what I'm lacking right now. I am finding myself losing a grip on life. I'm losing track of my own life. Never have I found myself so hapless. I am discovering myself losing interest in about everything and I'm trying to entertain myself by laying my head on my desk, listening to a few mp3s. In fact, my computer is playing The Rembrandt's I'll Be There For You and Madonna's Take a Bow over and over again. Sometimes, it plays to Bach. Of all the mp3s that are stored inside my hard drive, I do not know why I'm listening again to Bach. Something is definitely wrong with me but I don't know what. I need help, fast.

Well, The __earth Inc. is running a project. Basically, the project is about taking scenic photographs. Nevertheless, other interesting themes are also accepted. So far, I have 4 volunteers including myself. The two of them are from Wisconsin and Indiana in USA and other is from Australia. I'm still in seach of more volunteers.
For further information, join The __earth Inc. Community. All of the photographs will be posted in the Gallery section soon.

I love Rachel, Chandler, Ross, Joey, Phoebe and Monica.
I hate mailstorm.
I'm thinking of joining a crusade against ITD. Just for the fun of it.

An open email to the population of Umich from David Jaeyeong Choi

Alrighty, I've had enough... time to let those lazy ITD bastards get a taste of this. NEone who wants to reply to all, use this message to reply to all so that root, webmaster, postmaster AND abuse get the junk we're getting... And again, sorries for contributing to this storm, but this
HAS
TO BE DONE for the storm to come to an end.

-Lemur 6

"The loyalty of mercenary is legendary... as long as you pay him well."

Do you not see that Allah sends down water from the cloud so the earth becomes green? Surely Allah is Benignant, Aware.
- The Koran, The Pilgrimage (22.63)

And in the earth there are tracts side by side and gardens of grapes and corn and palm trees having one root and (others) having distinct roots-- they are watered with one water, and We make some of them excel others in fruit; most surely there are signs in this for a people who understand.
- The Koran, The Thunder (13.4)

The religions, according to Belief-o-matic, that I am related to. Interesting, Judaism gains two of the top three spots. Maybe that because the the similarity Judaism and Islam share.

1. Reform Judaism (100%)
2. Islam (96%)
3. Orthodox Judaism (96%)
4. Sikhism (92%)
5. Bahá'í (83%)
6. Liberal Quaker (79%)
7. Unitarian Universalism (73%)
8. Jainism (65%)
9. Liberal Protestant (61%)
10. Orthodox Quaker (60%)
11. Latter-day Saint (Mormon) (57%)
12. Jehovah's Witness (52%)
13. Neo-Paganism (52%)
14. Secular Humanism (48%)
15. Conservative Protestant (46%)
16. New Age (44%)
17. Hinduism (43%)
18. New Thought (43%)
19. Mahayana Buddhism (42%)
20. Scientology (40%)
21. Eastern Orthodox (37%)
22. Roman Catholic (37%)
23. Seventh Day Adventist (36%)
24. Atheism and Agnosticism (33%)
25. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (31%)
26. Theravada Buddhism (28%)
27. Taoism (24%)

I took the test for the second time through an Agnostic's eyes but the result was largely the same with Atheism gained significant rungs.

1. Reform Judaism (100%)
2. Islam (92%)
3. Orthodox Judaism (92%)
4. Unitarian Universalism (91%)
5. Liberal Quaker (87%)
6. Sikhism (83%)
7. Latter-day Saint (Mormon) (78%)
8. Liberal Protestant (78%)
9. Secular Humanism (75%)
10. Bahá'í (74%)
11. Jainism (72%)
12. Neo-Paganism (71%)
13. Orthodox Quaker (66%)
14. Conservative Protestant (62%)
15. Atheism and Agnosticism (61%)
16. Jehovah's Witness (61%)
17. New Age (57%)
18. Hinduism (55%)
19. Mahayana Buddhism (55%)
20. Theravada Buddhism (55%)
21. New Thought (52%)
22. Scientology (50%)
23. Seventh Day Adventist (43%)
24. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (40%)
25. Taoism (40%)
26. Eastern Orthodox (37%)
27. Roman Catholic (37%)

It has been a long time since I last felt bliss. For once in my disordered life, I managed to snatch a frame of time that doesn’t run nor crawl. Time just stood still for me at one particular moment, just for me alone.
It was late in the morning; I woke up naked from bed with weary eyes and heard a few birds chipping nearby. It’s a dream, I told myself but yet, I knew my awareness was simply present at that time. I sat on the bed, unmoved and confused.
My eyes were struggling to cope with the intense but much welcome sunlight. Confusion overwhelmed me but the confusion simply brought my heart pleasure. The sound of chipping birds just continued on without even a second of pause. It sang continuously and I could swear to God that my other self was singing and dancing in chorus with the rhythm.
Moments passed and when another moment was about to pass through me, I started to notice the condition of my messy room. But finally, I was freed from slumberland. Awaken, I quickly realized that the birds were resting near my wooden window.
Two sparrows, overlooking the sun-lit side of the proud Michigan Union were singing together happily.
Those two flying creatures saw me but they ignored as if they knew that I will never have the heart hurt such a small but lovely beast. They just sang as if there are no worries in this world. I also had forgotten all of my worries. I need not to worry because time stood still for me. When time stops, there are no worries for any of us. Hell freezes – eternity is all we have for everything.
I stared at them but seeing not them. I saw through them. Instead of seeing two singing sparrows, I saw the bluish sky with the mighty Sun shone brilliantly over the earth. Winter had left me quietly.
Wrapping myself with my favorite soft blanket, I came closer to the birds, standing closely to them. The sparrows just ignored me and sang without lapse. I just stood near the window with my chaotic hair, finding myself enjoying the sparrows’ offering.
It’s spring. The equinox must be nearing. Thank God it’s coming.
1045 hours. Fifteen minutes to my next class. Time suddenly sped and the sparrows flew away leaving me alone. Sigh…

Would you believe me if I said that time travel if possible?
You might be remembering Michael J. Fox in the Back to the Future series upon the word time travel but throughout our life, we are traveling through time. We are traveling into the future while experiencing the past without us realizing it. There is no such thing as the "present time". There are only the past tense and the future tense. Present tense is irrelevant in our life. Past and future tense are the present tense. In a sense, time travel is possible but present time is impossible.
The notion of present time is so vague if you sit down and think about it. It's like how do you know whether God does exist or not?
Is it possible to have a time that is at the "present time"? Certainly you would say yes but consider this; everything take time to travel. The photons that our retina senses are the photons that were created billions of years plus roughly eight minutes in the core of our star. So, we are sensing the photons that were created during even the mono-cells life forms were still non-existing when we see go out and burns ourselves under the sun.
There is no such thing as "present time" because light does not travel instantly from one place to another. Light needs a certain amount of time to travel. If light travels with infinite speed, only then can we say that we are experiencing “present time”.
Even this paragraph, is the light that was produced by the c.r.t. a few microseconds ago. Therefore, you are reading the thing of the past when you read it.
Moments later, you will read the following sentence and that will be your future time but right now you are reading this sentence which was the product of electrons bombardment a few microseconds ago, which means that your retina actually was sensing the photons that were produced microseconds ago when you were reading the last sentence. Thus, the first sentence of this paragraph that you read was the past when you were reading it but right now you are reading this sentence. You might think that when you are reading the last sentence, you are reading it but no, you read it, not reading it. (When you were reading the sentence before the last sentence, you saw that sentence before the last sentence, not seeing it. Got it?)
To say that we are living at the present time, is really saying that we are experiencing the past in the near future. We are just moving too slowly to realize this fact.
The notion of present time is not easy to describe. Even scholars of the past were confused until the word instantaneous was fully described by calculus. But yet, none of us could really grasp the meaning of present time in everyday life because to have instantaneousness , time must be set to zero and if that holds true, time does not move. Present time is meaningful if it is an instantaneous time. Instantaneous time is meaningful if only time stops. Present time is meaningful if and only if time stops. Unfortunately, time does not stop except at the event horizon. Therefore, the word “present time” is meaningless.
We are traveling through time. Time travel is possible but "present time" is a phrase that describes something impossible.
Present tense is irrelevant in our life but because we are moving too slowly (only a small tiny bit fraction of the speed of light), we are allowed to use present tense. We are allowed to use present tense because we can't comprehend the experience of experiencing the near past in the near future. The fragment of time called the time where experiencing the near past in the near future is known as the present time. This means that the present time(p.t.) is a moment(a scenario, experience, etc), I called it Mmt over time(t) where time is zero.

p.t. = (Mmt/t) where t = 0. But if A is a real number and B = 0, A/B is meaningless but yet of course, we can use limits method but still, limits use the idea of nearing the 0, not 0. Thus, the limits method does not describe instantaneousness but rather, an approximation of instantaneousness.

This is illogical. I need to sleep.
Here is something that I found over the net. Heart touching, for me at least. God, let me see the light, someday.

43

The following is a real life scenario.

Prof. Daniel Chan was teaching Calculus 3 with his British accent in Dennisson 260

Prof Chan : A Kookabura flies with a semicircular projection. Find the vector of the kookabura if this point is (0, 1, 1).
Anonymous student : Hmm...
Prof Chan : Here is how you do it. First...
(He was showing the class the method of solving a particular 3D vector problem until...)
Prof Chan : Therefore, the answer is <0 , 1, 1> + t<0, 0, 0>. Any questions? Yeah, at the back...
Anonymous student : What's a kookabura?
Me : Hahahahahahaha...!!!
Prof Chan : You're supposed to ask me about the vector but well, a kookabura is...

More recent real life conversation

South Quad, Dining Hall 1.

Khateeb : Okay, tomorrow you are going to wake up at 7.
Unmesh : Seven? Are you crazy? Why?
Khateeb : Because you are going to help me to find a place to live for the fall semester. We are going to knock on every door in Ann Arbor.
Me : What? You don't have to do that. You just have to check the paper for any vacancy. There are advertisements in there.
Joey : Knock, knock, is there a brain in there? No, it's empty.
Khateeb : Grrrrr....
Me : Joey, you better run.
(Joey looked scared.)

This is a real notice!!! Yeah...right....whatever...alright deVries...I'm on your Physics!!!...Arghh..Calculus??? Freak..Khateeb...Wanna post your poem here?

WANTED
Adam Ariffin
For killing Gaia with cyanide & ozone.
Reward: A better Earth


Invention

Henry Ford dies and goes to heaven. At the gate, the angel tells Ford, "Well, you've been such a good guy and your invention, the car, changed the world. As a reward, you can hang out with anyone you want in heaven."

So, Henry Ford thinks about it and says, "I wanna hang with Adam, the first man." So, the angel points Adam out to Ford.

When Ford gets to Adam, Ford asks, "Hey, aren't you the inventor of the woman?"

Adam says, "Yes."

"Well, says Ford, "You have some major design flaws in your invention:

1. There's too much front end protrusion.

2. It chatters at high speeds.

3. The rear end wobbles too much.

4. And the intake is placed too close to the exhaust."

"Hmmm...", says Adam, "Hold on." So Adam goes to the celestial supercomputer, types in a few keystrokes, and waits for the results. The computer prints out a slip of paper and Adam reads it.

He then says to Henry Ford, "It may be that my invention is flawed, but according to the stellar computer, more men are riding my invention than yours."

Looks like this web log won't be moving out of Blogger after all. Geocities will be charging fee for FTP service and I won't pay anything for that service. Oh well, it seems that I have to stay here a little bit longer. I have to get out from Blogger because I found out that Blogger's servers are quite unreliable at times. The University of Michigan's servers will be more reliable.

Moving on the world news...

India is suffering its worst civil unrest in this new millennium. It is sad to see the Muslims and the Hindus are killing each other just because they are having different religions. History has told us that the Muslims and the Hindus can’t get along very well. The greatest manifestation is the separation of British India into two single entities, India and Pakistan. Mahatma Gandhi regretted this but it was necessary to prevent what is happening in Gujarat at that time.
India, one of the giant of Asia and I want nothing but its success for I believe in the Japanese’s Asia for Asia.
I just want to see peace, not war. It hurts me even more when I saw a picture where a Muslim man stood in the middle of a Hindu mob, begging for his live. I hope he received mercy from the Hindus.
While the Hindus are doing what they are doing, certainly the Muslims will retaliate. Nobody will just sit down and see their brothers and sisters being burnt to death. I will certainly not but an eye for an eye makes the whole world goes blind. Truly, the solution to this could only be one thing - secularism, a state where religion plays no important roles in the executive administration. This word is one of the most misunderstood ideas in the Muslim world.
Secularism is not bad for Islam or for any other religion. Of course, I would dear the era when the Islamic Civilization ruled supreme to return. The greatness of another Alhambra or Baghdad would be the best thing to see. Unfortunately, the world is becoming smaller and smaller, allowing everyone to meet everybody; ideas and beliefs clash. Only secularism allows a peaceful interaction between different ideologies.
Secularism doesn’t mean religion is not acceptable to any kind of social life. I believe a belief in God is necessary to maintain some social order but the freedom to believe freely without being discriminated must be allowed. Only through this, peace can somewhat be attained.
This notion doesn’t clash with my idea of restricted freedom. I believe in restricted freedom of expression and secularism does this best. However, my view of secularism doesn’t book a place for Turkey’s style. I don’t believe in Turkey’s secularism for it is restricting the very freedom for different societies to interact with one and another freely.
For India, secularism might the answer to its woe. Its ruling party is an Hindu-biased party and this must be the fuel that is burning hatred among its people although I can certainly see some restrains in that party in enforcing Hindu-styled state.

It’s sad to see the world is suffering from hatred.

It's sad to see Ann Arbor is snowing again. Sigh...