#x files trivial pursuit

[freckleslikestars]

As a rough guide, how much interest would there actually be if I were to finish making this X Files Trivial Pursuit that I started last year?

I’ve just been looking at prices to get them made, and found a couple of places that are viable options for printing, but obviously the price varies depending upon how many decks are ordered, so I was wondering if it was something people were actually willing to pay for (a deck of 100 cards would be anywhere between £12 and £21 depending on how many people wanted them - cheaper the more people wanted them, obviously)

It would be something that you’d have to play either on an already owned trivial pursuit board (if you don’t have one you can get them pretty cheap second hand at charity shops/ebay/facebook marketplace) or without a board like the other fan versions of the game are played, with a colour die, which, again, are pretty easy to find second hand or DIY (though tbh you could just use a standard D6 and have pink questions as one, blue questions as two, etc.), because as soon as you start adding game boards it gets even more expensive.

Like...is an X Files Trivial Pursuit something people would be interested in buying? Like, just paying the cost of production + shipping?

[midrashic]

your tag system is so intricate! how did you develop it and do you have any favorite tags or ones with good stories behind them?

ahh thank you so much!! i've been getting a lot of compliments about my tagging recently & i'm glad people seem to be interested in it.

honestly i started doing it because i wished other people would use unique tags so i wouldn't have to see their opinions on things other than what i followed them for lmao. the supernatural / marvel cinematic universe cold war of it all... you can still see some of my early supernatural tags are pretty silly, & right now my tag system is pretty broken because i'm trying to revamp the whole thing to make it more aesthetic and less me-as-seventeen-year-old.

developing a tag system like this is really just... figuring out what tags you will actually use. there are some tags i stopped using because it was too much trouble to try & squint and figure out whether this post fell into this category or that category. i used to have a tag called #just geek girl things, and it was supposed to be for trivia that was kind of academically oriented, but i kept getting it confused with #trivial pursuits, which was supposed to be more like those maps that say the most searched-for animal in each u.s. state. it would stress me out, trying to figure out what belonged in each category, & eventually i dropped them. tagging shouldn't really activate your ocd (i say this as someone with ocd). & the other big part is keeping track of it. i have all my tags in a note to myself which i'm trying to transfer over to a spreadsheet.

fun tag names can come from anywhere! some highlights:

steal! both #relship: we'll always have cuba & #ch: heavy metal broke my heart are both cribbed from this post. (i figured the chances of someone following me & the originator of the tag and the originator still being in the cherik fandom are pretty small, plus i think relship instead of otp: or ship: also adds a level of remove, so if you wanted to filter me out you could lmao); #temp directory: the pornbots are coming from inside the house is a quip someone made about a tumblr problem from, like, years ago, when someone noticed that the only notes ads got were from porn blogs, & hypothesized that tumblr staff ran the pornblogs to artificially inflate post engagement numbers; #hyperfixation: the leveled geocities stretch away is from that "ozymandias" parody that was circulating on here a while ago

some small detail from canon, like logan uses shane to frame its themes so my laura kinney & logan tag is #relship: there aren't any more guns in the valley; my monica rambeau tag is a line from the story carol is seen telling her in captain marvel, #ch: aloutte flew up throughout the night; my yelena belova tag is a line from "american pie," #ch: when i read about his widowed bride

some cool meta someone wrote about a character or pairing that sticks in your brain. like i thought the recurring joke of logan stealing scott's motorcycle in the original x-men trilogy was hilarious, because i'd actually read all-new x-men first & baby scott steals logan's motorcycle in that one, so my scott & logan tag is #relship: a history of motorcycle thievery. #ch: the never-queen of alderaan is from a few fics that dwelt on how leia is forever the princess of alderaan, who will never be a queen, because there is no planet to crown her so. #ch: writers are the enemy for chuck shurley / god is from a refrain that gets repeated throughout postfinale supernatural meta

tags in pairs! like janet van dyne's tag is #ch: float like a butterfly; hope's is #ch: sting like a bee. fitz's tag is #ch: the left hand doesn't know & simmons' tag is #ch: what the right hand is doing

a spin on famous titles or phrases. #hyperfixation: love in the time of amatonormativity is a play on love in the time of cholera; #filed under: your mental health's a joke you're broke your brain chemistry's d.o.a., is, you know, the friends theme; #fandom: unusual medical investigations: princeton plainsboro is of course a spin on those csi titles

lyrics from songs strongly associated with a character or pairing (#relship: the person that you'd take a bullet for (is behind the trigger)), or songs you associate with the character or pairing. my jean grey tag is #ch: gonna change you like a remix, from fall out boy's "phoenix," & my steve + peggy tag, and this is one of my favorites, is from a song from the bonnie and clyde musical that hits all the notes i think of when i think of them

honestly a lot of it is just seeing what associations hit! like my new linguistics tag, #hyperfixation: cunning linguistics, is, you know, an old joke, a middle school joke, but it was what came to mind when i asked myself about phrases i associated with the word "linguistics." #ch: the problem that has no name is an iconic quote from friedan's the feminine mystique, so i used it for mystique. #hyperfixation: and i bless you more life is for queer culture & art, the ur-example of which is, for me, angels in america.

favorite tags... i do have tags that i would never, ever change, because they just make absolute sense to me. & i actually had a whole list typed up of some of my favorite tags, and then i realized... my favorite tag is my greg house + james wilson relationship tag, #relship: amazing how fire exposes our priorities. that quote is actually from a different sherlock holmes adaptation, but house's finale conflagration is much more dramatic than sherlock rescuing john from the guy fawkes fire.

thank you so much for the ask!! if you're curious about any tags in particular, i can expound then, but... i have a lot of tags slkdfjsdf.

[pjstafford]

A Look at my 2020

The end of the year is upon us. It’s been a tough one for all of us. It is a year we will all remember forever. I want to do a positive reflection of this year. I will probably write a blog about what I hope our country’s New Years Resolutions should be. The thoughts on that have been rolling around my head for a few days. But today, December 16, at 4:30 a.m. and unable to sleep, that 2020 familiar dread of what will happen today waking me early, I want to look at some positives. I want to unwrap the positives of 2020 like a Christmas gift before Christmas so that I can wrap myself in them as a blanket of warmth. One thing that I have been truly impressed with is the resilience of the human spirit. Let’s call this a resilience exercise.

Counting my blessings one by one...

1. I am alive. Surviving is a cause for celebration. As far as I know I have been COVID free...although there were a few days in April or early May when I was sick with something and in Feb I had the strangest cold in my life and this time last year weeks of fatigue ended in frozen shoulder syndrome on Christmas Eve. See, I want to be thankful, but I don’t want to be naive in my retrospection. Best to be honest. I’m not sure if I had COVID or not, but if I did I survived with relatively minor symptoms. Every cough or sniffle I feared in a completely irrational way was COVID. There was the week I walked around sniffing everything to make sure I could still smell. It dawns on me it is going to be difficult to write a honest and, yet, positive, retrospective of 2020. I am alive, but I have never been less healthy. I’ve gained weight. I haven’t had the physical exercise to which I am accustomed and now when I try to take a long walk I realize my stamina is gone. It will take years of concentrated effort once things are “back to normal” for me to become normal again. It wasn’t that I didn’t try. I did yoga daily in the Spring and switched to an online Tai chi class in the summer, but I don’t live near beauty or anything interesting so wasn’t motivated to walk and just my everyday life of lockdown in a studio apartment meant less movement. All of which sounds even to me like not very good justification. Did I mention though that I survived. I am alive. I will take that as blessing number one.

2. No one I care about very deeply has died or even been seriously ill from COVID. Doesn’t March 2020 seem far away? I don’t want to be dismissive of 300;000 dead especially with more to come. I or someone I love could still be gone by New Years Day. But in March and April we held our breaths for an apocalypse and at some point most of us decided to take a breath. I don’t know really if it’s good or bad that we have simply adjusted our normal and the number deaths we are willing to accept. It’s bad, what am I saying? It’s bad. But how long can we wait in fear? So I don’t know, but I want to count as a blessing that those I love have all survived to date. I cannot vanquish the fear, but I can be grateful for survival.

3. I have maintained employment in a bad economy and have mostly been able to work from home. There have been some struggles. Sometimes the work I do is depressing. Sometimes I feel I don’t make a difference. There has never been a worse time to be an advocate...or a person with disability, or a caregiver, or a provider agency, or a health care professional. I have maintained employment.

4. I count among my blessings the fact that I had a wonderful 2020 before....remember there was a 2020 before. I love when my work takes me to Santa Fe for a prolonged time. A friend came out in Feb for a wonderful weekend. Another friend came to Albuquerque to see me for my birthday in early March. I remember thinking how social I was in those first ten weeks in 2020. It’s as if I somehow knew....it sustained me.

5. I count among my blessings that when I felt my mental health despair getting at its worse...the strain of living alone in a studio apartment, working from that same apartment and following the Governor orders not to go or do anything. ..that I had friends and two weekends of “risky” behavior; a friend who came for the Fourth of July holiday and an out of state trip to Durango in late September. I’m fortunate that when I had to have human contact my closest friends were there for me

6. I count as my blessings that Biden won the election. It’s not simply a matter of politics. I’m not sure if the last eight months of the Trump Presidency wasn’t worse for my morale than the pandemic because Trump kind of lost whatever semblance of sanity he had. Part of the trepeditation over what each new day will bring is what Trump will say, do, tweet, exacerbate. I still fear revolution in the street before Jan 20. The pandemic is not the worse of what America has gone through. That’s the oddest thing about this year.

7. Here is the blessing which probably will be unpopular. The lockdown and stress of all we have experienced is tough, but the slowdown is a blessing for me. My life had gotten pretty busy. While I miss travel, it’s ok for a year not to have had the time suck that travel for work entails. I will be so happy the first work trip I get to go on, but I feel like 2020 has given me the gift of time. It’s odd because, like many, my creative sense has suffered. I have written almost nothing. Still, I often think of a Dylan lyric, maybe in the next life I will be able to hear myself think. I could hear myself think this year. Unfortunately I thought about the existentialist angst of the meaning of life and my failures as a human being and I don’t think there is enough time still to process the effects of the pandemic and I’m sick to death of the sound of my thoughts, but....I have been given this unique gift of time. Even on December 16th I am not rushed to shop, to cook, to decorate, to go to a zillion parties. It’s a different year. The Holiday will still come. It is pleasant not to feel urgency over, let’s face it, non-urgent things. I am mentally and emotionally fatigued, but not nearly as physically exhausted as I was this time last year

8. The next one is a big one. The gift of living in the moment. I have spent my entire life since 7th grade when Miss O’Neil gave me a copy of The Rubyait of Omar Khayyam trying to live with the philosophy of living for the now. Clear the cups of past regrets...tomorrow, why I may be myself with yesterday’s seven thousand years. The only time I have ever truly experience this is in a handful of concert experience. Even now, I fear for my future and I blame myself for my mistakes. Still, my relationship with time has changed. There is the sun rising and setting and that is a day. Seasons will change. But the gift of time means I can approach my day differently. When five o clock comes on a workday, a needed nap is a step away. No where to go on a Friday night... no where I can go...means the weekend rhythm exists only as I define it. The simple pleasures we always take for granted mean something more now. There is a coffee truck that stops near me on Fridays and Saturdays. When it first started stopping I was over the moon that I could walk and get a latte with fairly little risk. If I go to the grocery store and have a conversation with a stranger, it is different than it was before. Mindfulness exercise and meditation is one thing, but nothing can compare with this year to further my lessons in this pursuit. May I take the lesson with me into years to come.

9. Zoom...yes, of course I have zoom fatigue. But five friends in five different states having a monthly drink together on zoom is a benefit of the pandemic. I watched a movie this year with someone who lives in Brazil. I celebrated a friend’s sixtieth person even though I couldn’t be with her. I’ve attended book discussions and readings in New York and I already have tickets to an event in March. Kind of love New York. I’ve never been there in person. Just a lot happens there. Educationally and socially the world is now open to me. I am not limited to what is going on in my community. I hope this doesn’t completely go away.

10. Finally, storytelling and music. I found it hard to read new things in the lockdown for a while, but in March friends asked me to a virtual book club of three books I already read and we reread them together which took us into the summer. I rediscovered the Foundation series of Asimov and suddenly I could read again! My favorite book I’ve read published in 2020 is Jess Walter’s The Cold Million. I did read a digital advance copy of David Duchovny’snew book due out in 2021 and it is, in fact, the breakout novel I knew this hot young writer would eventually write. Looking forward to 2021 book club! I finally binged Breaking Bad and The Travelers as well as The Queens gambit and watched Peanut Butter Falcon. I am doing a disability focused watch on the X Files and I better kick it it the rear because I’m presenting on it in Feb. at a conference. My God, Dylan put out his first original music in eight years. It will take me eight years to fully ingest it and enjoy it. You see, no matter what happens, humanity will tell its stories and gather to make its songs. It’s that human resilience. Creation of art is not trivial. It’s vital. It has continued in this odd and strange year. It is humanity’s greatest gift and I have definitely used it this year as a resilience and growth tool.

Those are my top blessings in this horrific and, yet, wondrous year. However, you have been impacted, what we all share in common is that In a very short time it will be a memory of a year in the past.

[pinerblogs]

Linux garmin communicator plugin

#LINUX GARMIN COMMUNICATOR PLUGIN SERIAL#

#LINUX GARMIN COMMUNICATOR PLUGIN FULL#

In Jan of 2006, Garmin released the "X" variations of the 60c/76c. That was the point where Garmin USB got viable for moving GPS points and racks because you could just copy files to them as you would a thumb drive.īy 2004/5, devices on the market that were using the CSR owned SiRFStar receivers which performed their home brews in a matter of ways.

#LINUX GARMIN COMMUNICATOR PLUGIN FULL#

After shipping for a few quarters they added the ability to read and write the SD cards as removable storage devices over the internal memoru, albeit at USB full speed and not high speed. In that era, map transfer and track transfer were the only thing that *typically* took over a minute to transfer so that's all that went over the USB wire. In 2004 They had the new 60 and 76 models (with and without Color and Sensors) that added a USB port.

#LINUX GARMIN COMMUNICATOR PLUGIN SERIAL#

In the 1990's, Garmin had a line of products with overlapping prices and features that were all serial ports. 200x-era Garmin USB trivial pursuit can be a tricky category. But the newer GPS units are faster, have more storage capacity, and have better screens that display maps much better.Īs a slight sidebar to Mineral2 so he can continue to provide awesome help to others, I'll share my recollection of that era in the hope that it helps anyone. Keep it for backup or to give to a friend when out hiking in the backcountry. In my opinion, it is worth upgrading your GPS from the grossly outdated 60csx. You do need to be a premium member to take advantage of pocket queries or bookmark lists to bulk load geocaches. You can do the same thing with single GPX files from the cache listing page if you still prefer to load your caches one at a time.īut the answer to your question is yes. You can just download a Pocket Query and drop it into the device's onboard storage (or a microSD card expansion) and be done with it. (*) Every GPS made after the 60csx (sorry, but you have the last model of the old family) supports GPX files and mass storage mode. Are there any new GPS's out there where I can get caches' via blue tooth or some other method where I don't have to deal with all of the in-compatibility issues between plug in and browsers? Getting VERY frustrated.

[joegranatoiv]

Quantum Leap: Butterfly

This will be a strange entry into this collection of things, but I wanted to create it and give it a timestamp.

About 7 years ago (and I can mark the time because I know that it was before my son was born or even conceived), I woke up from one of the most vivid dreams I've ever had. It was straight up Quantum Leap fan fiction. And it was so on point and consistent with the themes and tone of the show, that I maniacally scribbled down everything I could remember. A few years later, upon coming across those scribblings, I laughed, and marveled at how much I'd love to have the blinding optimism of new Quantum Leap considering the vitriolic dystopia we currently call reality. There has been a running joke among the creatives I've worked with about me actually turning this weird dream into a fan-created reboot. Well, it seems I was just ahead of the curve. Almost ten years later, and we're about to get a new season of the show on NBC. I'm extremely excited...but then, I was also excited about more X-Files and more TNG (in the form of Picard) and about The Stand remake and when they announced Clarice...and...and...and...and of course, I'm almost always sincerely disappointed to the point where it sours my love even for the original property. You all get exactly what I mean. But with that all in mind, I thought I'd finally post a flimsy synopsis that is draped over the skeleton of the dream I had for the QL reboot. I'll be very curious to see how it compares. My hope - whatever they do is so awesome that it makes my weird dream-inspired version look trivial and juvenile. Here's to hoping! But for fun, and in anticipation for more QL, I thought that there has never been a better time to post it! Without further explanation, I present to you the very broad, entirely unofficial, fever-dream inspired, lazily constructed, checked for neither spelling nor grammar nor logical consistency, general premise for a new Quantum Leap potential reboot episode called Butterfly. __________________

Quantum Leap Butterfly

Alison Paige is a young, struggling performer in New York City. She is meeting with a friend and the casting director for Madame Butterfly, who respectfully rejects her for the part. He tells her that her performance is capable and musical acumen is technically proficient, but it all feels very calculated rather than moving. She never truly embodies the character empathically, and thus despite checking all the boxes for a quality performance, never transcends into the ability to change lives. 

Ali marvels at the tragic irony of having her work be described as calculated. She is estranged from her mother, physicist Dr. Samantha Fuller (known to friends as Sammy Jo), who has always been disappointed that she’d let her academic talents go to waste on a futile pursuit in the arts. Ali harbors a bit of resentment for her mother after her obsessive devotion to her work soured the marriage to her father. It was her father, Michael Paige, who had supported her and her career until losing his battle with cancer. Dr. Fuller did not even leave her Nevada research for the funeral, and Ali has never forgiven her for that.

To her surprise, Ali is called by her mother to Nevada for a private funeral for *Uncle Al*, the eccentric 98 year old consultant to her mother’s research. While she convinces herself to be civil, her mother’s reluctant but determined sudden exit from the funeral in service of her work leaves Ali fuming. She is calmed by Janis Calivicci, Al’s daughter,who expresses to her that her mother’s actions were ironically in service of Al’s wishes. She understands Ali’s frustrations and expresses that she’d once been in the same spot with her father. She gives Ali the same choice that she was given. Option 1, she could return to New York in ignorance, clinging to her resentment and pursuing a normal life, or Option 2, she could choose to take up permanent residency in the compound and learn first hand about her mother’s top secret project. While she is adamantly against the notion, seething in anger, she agrees to sleep on it.

Ali finds herself living as a muslim teenager, also named Ali, in the familiar New York City, early September of 2001. The muslim teenager’s confusion is attributed to suffering a head injury, which has resulted from an apparent fall down a flight of stairs. This teenager, and by proxy a confused Alison Paige, has frightful paranoia of being stalked by someone who means to do her, or rather the young teen she has come to embody, harm. She can not remember any details about this stalker.

Sure enough, she is pursued by a stalker. However, this stalker turns out to be the hologram of a military case worker assigned to be her custodian and handler. This hologram, Daniel Grimshaw, begins to fill in some gaps of her missing memory…about her mother’s work, about the Quantum Leap Project, about being a willing civilian participant in a time travel experiment.

As it turns out, Dr. Fuller’s early work was responsible for building a sort of temporal faraday cage around a particular part of the QLP compound; this ensured that those within it were immune to time distortions created by time travel experiments…experiments that were spearheaded by her grandfather, Dr. Sam Beckett. At 60, Dr. Fuller became the Director of the project. When Al Calavicci, in late retirement and feeling rather unsettled by no longer having purpose or meaning in life, was approached by his longtime family friend Dr. Fuller, he visited the compound and memories of his time with Sam came roaring back (including the secret detail that he’d long since forgotten, that Dr. Fuller was the daughter of the time traveler Sam Beckett). He moved to the compound and became obsessed with helping retrieve Sam, somewhat alienating his own children.

While QLP’s funding is still supported, it has slowly transitioned into a military institution rather than an academic or scientific one. A new director has recently been appointed to replace Dr. Fuller. Where Dr. Fuller’s primary interest was in tracking and cataloguing temporal fluctuations in hopes of finally retrieving her time traveling father, the new guard wants to see a return on the investment and flex the technology to see a true dramatic change with massive, overt consequences. So while Dr. Fuller, with the help of Janis Calavicci, set out to illegally utilize the QLP one last time, their retrieval of Alison was interrupted.  Now Alison finds herself out of time, not so dissimilar from her grandfather, Sam Beckett.

Daniel is rather annoyed that, by misfortune of having a uniquely tuned brainwave pattern, he was relegated to this detail rather than taking the next step in his career in USSF. He is tasked with proving the QLP is a legitimate experiment and not all just an algorithmic virtual sideshow by the QLP super computer nicknamed Ziggy. The military-led experiment is to prompt Alison to stop the coming terrorist attacks of 9/11. Through all this, she begins to recall her quest to find Dr. Beckett. Daniel the hologram balks, insisting that the truth of the matter is that there is only anecdotal evidence that Dr. Beckett ever traveled in time, and even if he did, if he is still alive.

As her fractured mind begins to come to terms with her situation, she is somewhat lost with no google, no social media, no cell phone with access to the world’s information in the palm of her hand. She manages to call on her acting career to play the part of the teen she has leapt into. She finds that her neighborhood is the target of extreme islamophobia. She witnesses a loud confrontation between a newly constructed mosque’s imam and a local resident.

Rather than try to change the events of 9/11, she runs down some personal rabbit holes, including catching a few pompous casting directors that had slighted her, seeing the struggle of their own youth and how it parallels her own. It gives her a unique perspective. Having momentary control due to understanding of the future, she considers acting in a spiteful way that might damage the career of one of her future dissenters, but seeing an advertisement for Madame Butterfly at the Lincoln Center causes a memory of seeing a 9/11 memorial at the same venue not long after moving to New York. While she’s distracted by personal pursuits, Daniel returns to give her instructions that will change the course of history. She follows these instructions. Unfortunately, as a muslim child of refugees from a low income part of New York, even the military tips from the future can not help her voice to be heard or taken seriously by the appropriate parties. And so, Daniel conveys an escalation of the order from on high - that she needs to act as the aggressor and begin calling in direct and specific threats that are dire enough to be taken seriously. 

This begins a major ethical debate. If she does do this, there is a high probability that the innocent boy she has leapt into will be convicted of terrorist activities, sentenced, and be murdered in a federal prison. However, if she does not do this, history will play out as she remembers - all of the innocent lives will be lost on 9/11, and it will begin the chain reaction that leads to decades of war and paranoia. The pragmatist in Daniel insists that the sacrifice of one innocent teenager will be for the greater good. He discusses at length the friends and family he lost to wars that were seeded because of the actions on 9/11. It all becomes a real life incarnation of the Trolly Problem with massive ramifications. She consults the imam about this in a very general way. After all, he knows the boy Ali has leapt into. It’s a good way for Ali to gauge how such an action would not only affect the life of this boy, but perhaps the community at large. She receives some sage words about the value of innocence, about conscience, and about perspective. As she is leaving him, the man who her swiss-cheesed memory suddenly remembers to be stalker that she feared upon leaping attacks the imam. This man blames muslim immigrants for all of the evils of the world and the eventual collapse of American democracy. He is a self-proclaimed patriot who believes his actions of violence are a cultural form of self-defense in service of his country. Alison, as the teenage boy Ali, intervenes and is beaten within an inch of life. The stalker is scared off before he can finish what he started, however her decision to intervene has saved the life of the imam.

She wakes up in the hospital in the dramatic and chaotic aftermath of 9/11, having failed. Daniel appears to her, citing what her failure means for the future of the QLP - that she failed to demonstrate that anything significant can be changed, and that his superiors question the validity of the project entirely, concluding that it’s all just a bad carnival act perpetrated through high end simulations. 

She asserts that he missed the point completely - that trying to create a false narrative to spark fear and action which would have led to the incarceration and death of an innocent kid is demonstrative of the cycle that led to 9/11 in the first place. She wasn’t the villain here for trying to protect an innocent life, the forces like her stalker were the villains for their violent xenophobia and prejudices. And while Daniel concedes that he agrees with her ideologically, he does not agree with her pragmatically - not when the cost is tens of thousands of lives and decades of turmoil. To him, no one life, innocent or not, is worth that.

When Alison asks Daniel what has become of Ali in the future, he is able to trace data that finds that he is a pediatrician in inner city Baltimore with a practice that was opened to work exclusively with low income or economically troubled families. This challenges Daniel’s absolute position, and he leaves in frustrated existentialism..

Ali finds the imam amidst the chaos. The racial prejudices are volatile. The fear is real. Neither are safe considering the images on the television. When she touches his hand to offer him comfort, the touch reveals that the man’s aura is, in fact, that of Dr. Sam Beckett, her grandfather the time traveler. Their true identities are revealed to each other. 

When Ali suggests that she was sent to help him find his way home, he smiles warmly but demures. He doesn’t want to be retrieved. His charge is to continue to help people in need. When she questions him about regrets for missing his own life, he explains that he’s lived a thousand lives and has been able to appreciate new perspectives in ways he never could’ve imagined. Ali grows frustrated about how she had an opportunity to stop a major historical catastrophe and failed. Sam reassures her that she did not fail. He tells her that such events are impossible to change. Quantum Leaping affords the opportunity to change the lives of individuals, and it’s that direct empathetic resonance that matters. The effects on the world are incalculable. It’s the smallest changes that make the greatest difference; Butterfly Wings and Hurricanes.

Ali and Sam both leap. However, rather than being retrieved, she leaps into a scientist working on Project Quantum Leap in the year 1999.

This sets up a long heart to heart talk between Ali and her young mother, whose younger self is around her current real age, and who has just recently started at the QLP. She is working on the algorithm to bring Dr. Beckett home. Because only a few people are aware that her mother is the child of time traveling Sam, she plays coy while discussing the concept of a paradox - if Dr. Beckett is retrieved and his timeline altered, could that cause a paradox in the things that he’s done or will come to do in the past? Her mother assures her that the quantum faraday cage protects the QLP compound and all within it from time travel paradox. As a parting thought, Dr. Fuller beams with a secret pride for the actions of her father, knowing the good he will go on to do. Ali internalizes that, finally fully understanding her mother, and also with the sudden ambition to be the source of the same sort of pride. 

Her mother leaves the software running as she goes to get a cup of coffee. Ali regards the laptop. Daniel’s hologram appears and urges her not to act on her impulse to sabotage the retrieval code. She responds with Sam’s words about affecting lives in an incalculable way. Daniel informs her that if she sabotages the code, she will likely be sealing her own fate to be lost in time along with Dr. Beckett, and if it is all more than a grand illusion, she can’t just go unilaterally changing time on a personal whim. She smiles, acknowledging that this isn’t a change to time - she was always here, doing exactly this. And as she plucks in a few alterations to just a few numbers to corrupt the retrieval code, she repeats Sam Beckett’s words about how the smallest changes make the greatest difference. 

After the change, Ali officially begins her adventure in time as she quantum leaps into an early 90s grunge rock artists in the dingy green room at an underground Seattle rock club.

Oh boy.

[foxbutton818]

Ipod Classic Games

The original and second generation iPod did not officially have games at all, but a simple game called 'Brick' - where the player 'breaks' a screen full of bricks with a ball and paddle. WinX Free 3GP to iPod Converter is a free 3GP video to iPod converter which supports fre converting 3GP video to iPod player, including iPod Touch 1, 2, 3/4/5, iPod Nano, iPod Classic, etc. There's no malware, adware, spyware or virus. Our range of refurbished iPod Classic devices are a great way to listen to music and podcasts on the go at an amazingly low price! Experience nostalgia by traversing through the iPod Classic with its selection wheel and enjoy classic games such as Solitaire or Parachute whilst listening to music.

SAN FRANCISCO—September 5, 2007—Apple® today introduced the new iPod® classic, featuring 80GB or 160GB of storage that holds your entire collection of music, photos, video, podcasts and games—up to 40,000 songs or 200 hours of video. Now in its sixth generation, the new iPod classic delivers all the features customers love about their iPods, plus an enhanced user interface featuring Cover Flow™ and a new all-metal enclosure. iPod classic is priced at just $249 for the 80GB model and $349 for the 160GB model.

“The first iPod put 1,000 songs in your pocket—this new iPod classic can put 40,000 songs in your pocket,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “With a thinner, all-metal enclosure and an enhanced user interface, the iPod classic is ideal for people who want to hold everything on their iPod.”

Rockbox Ipod Classic Games

The new iPod classic holds up to 160GB of storage in an all-metal anodized aluminum and polished stainless steel enclosure. iPod classic works seamlessly with iTunes® so you can import, manage and then easily sync your favorite content. You can buy music, video and games for your iPod classic from the iTunes Store with more than six million songs available for preview and one-click purchase.

The new iPod classic features up to 40 hours of music playback and seven hours of video playback in the 160GB model, and up to 30 hours of music playback and five hours of video playback in the 80GB model on a single charge,* letting users enjoy their entire collections of music, audiobooks, audio and video podcasts, music videos, television shows and movies wherever they go.

The new iPod classic is perfect for playing iPod games and comes pre-loaded with iQuiz, the entertainment trivia game; Vortex, a fast-paced 360 degree brick-bashing game; and Klondike, the popular solitaire card game. Additional games will be available for purchase for the new iPod classic later this month from the iTunes Store, including Sudoku and Tetris from Electronic Arts and Ms. PAC-MAN from NAMCO.

The iPod is the world’s most popular family of digital music players with over 100 million sold. Today, Apple released its most exciting iPod lineup ever with the iPod shuffle in five new colors; iPod classic holding up to 40,000 songs; the incredible all new iPod nano with video playback; and the breakthrough iPod touch with a revolutionary multi-touch user interface. iPod owners can choose from a vast ecosystem of accessories with over 4,000 products made specifically for the iPod including cases, fitness accessories, speaker systems and iPod connectivity in over 70 percent of US automobiles.

Pricing & Availability Both iPod classic models are available immediately worldwide in silver and black. The 80GB iPod classic model is $249 (US) and the 160GB iPod classic is $349 (US).

iPod classic requires a Mac® with a USB 2.0 port, Mac OS® X v10.4.8 or later and iTunes 7.4; or a Windows PC with a USB 2.0 port and Windows Vista or Windows XP Home or Professional (Service Pack 2) or later and iTunes 7.4. Internet access is required and a broadband connection is recommended, fees may apply. The iTunes Store is not available in all countries.

* Battery life and number of charge cycles vary by use and settings. See www.apple.com/batteries for more information. Music capacity is based on four minutes per song and 128-Kbps AAC encoding; photo capacity is based on iPod-viewable photos transferred from iTunes; and video capacity is based on H.264 1.5-Mbps video at 640-by-480 resolution.

Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system and iLife and professional applications. Apple is also spearheading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players and iTunes online store, and has entered the mobile phone market this year with its revolutionary iPhone.

Press Contacts: Christine Monaghan Apple (408) 974-8850 cmonaghan@apple.com

Apple, the Apple logo, Mac, Mac OS, Macintosh, iPod, Cover Flow and iTunes are trademarks of Apple. Other company and product names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

An iPod click wheel game or iPod game is a video game playable on the various versions of the Apple portable media player, the iPod. The original iPod had the game Brick (originally invented by Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak) included as an easter egg hidden feature; later firmware versions added it as a menu option. Later revisions of the iPod added three more games in addition to Brick: Parachute, Solitaire, and Music Quiz. These games should not be confused with games for the iPod Touch, which require iOS and are only available on Apple's App Store on iTunes.

History(edit)

In September 2006, the iTunes Store began to offer nine additional games for purchase with the launch of iTunes 7, compatible with the fifth-generation iPod with iPod software 1.2 or later. Those games were Bejeweled, Cubis 2, Mahjong, , Pac-Man, Tetris, Texas Hold 'Em, Vortex, and Zuma. These games were made available for purchase from the iTunes Store for US$4.99 each. In December 2006, two more games were released by EA Mobile at the same price: Royal Solitaire and Sudoku. In February 2007, Ms. Pac-Man was released, followed in April 2007 by iQuiz. Until this time, all the available games could be purchased in a package, with no discount.

In May 2007, Apple released Lost: The Video Game by Gameloft, based on the television show. In June 2007, 'SAT Prep 2008' by Kaplan was introduced as 3 separate educational games based on the subjects of writing, reading, and mathematics. In December 2007, Apple released a classic Sega game, Sonic the Hedgehog, which was originally packaged with the Sega Genesis system in the early 1990s.

With third parties like Namco, Square Enix, EA, Sega, and Hudson Soft all making games for the iPod, Apple's dedicated MP3 player took great steps towards entering the video game handheld console market. Even video game magazines like GamePro and EGM have reviewed and rated most of their games.

The games are in the form of .ipg files (iPod game), which are actually .zip archives in disguise. When unzipped, they reveal executable files along with common audio and image files, leading to the possibility of third-party games, although this never eventuated (with the exception of superficial user-made tweaks). Apple never made a software development kit (SDK) available to the public for iPod-specific development.(1) The iOS SDK covers only iOS on the iPhone and iPod Touch, not traditional iPods.

In October 2011, Apple removed all the click wheel–operated games from its store.

Games(edit)

This is a list of games that were made available for the newest iPods, excluding the iPod Touch. Each game (other than Reversi and ChineseCheckers) cost US$4.99 to buy prior to their discontinuation in 2011.

The list contains 54 games that are known to exist. The list is always kept up to date by this script.

TitlePublisherRelease dateGame IDTexas Hold'EmApple Inc.2006-09-1233333ZumaPopCap Games2006-09-1244444Pac-ManNamco2006-09-12AAAAATetrisElectronic Arts2006-09-1266666Mini GolfElectronic Arts2006-09-1288888Cubis 2Fresh Games2006-09-1299999SudokuElectronic Arts2006-12-1950513Ms. Pac-ManNamco2007-02-2714004SAT Prep 2008 (Math)Kaplan2007-06-2211052SAT Prep 2008 (Reading)Kaplan2007-06-2211050SAT Prep 2008 (Writing)Kaplan2007-06-2211051The Sims BowlingElectronic Arts2007-07-171500CThe Sims PoolElectronic Arts2007-07-311500EMusika (Only Released in UK)NanaOn-Sha, Ltd./Sony BMG2007-08-071C300Brain ChallengeGameloft / Apple Inc.2007-09-05PhaseHarmonix2007-11-061D000Sonic the HedgehogSega2007-12-1818000PegglePopCap Games2007-12-1812104BombermanHudson Soft2007-12-1820000Block Breaker DeluxeGameloft / Apple Inc.2008-01-15Pole Position RemixNamco2008-01-21Naval BattleGameloft2008-02-04Chess & BackgammonGameloft2008-02-04YahtzeeHasbro2008-02-11Pirates of the Caribbean: Aegir's FireDisney2008-02-20Bubble BashGameloft2008-02-25ScrabbleElectronic Arts / Hasbro2008-03-03BejeweledPopCap Games2008-04-1555555MahjongElectronic Arts2008-04-2277777MonopolyElectronic Arts / Hasbro2008-06-0315040The Sims DJElectronic Arts2008-06-09Song Summoner: The Unsung HeroesSquare Enix2008-07-0824000UnoGameloft2008-07Mystery Mansion PinballGameloft2008-08Chalkboard Sports BaseballD2C2008-08Spore OriginsElectronic Arts2008-08-2515010Star TrigonNamco2008-09CSI: MiamiGameloft2008-09Tamagotchi: 'Round the WorldNamco2008-11Asphalt 4: Elite RacingGameloft2008-1222020Tiger Woods PGA TourElectronic Arts2008-12Real Soccer '09Gameloft2008-12Slyder AdventuresSandlot Games2008-12ReversiApple Inc.2008-12Wonder BlocksGameloft2008-12Lode RunnerHudson Soft2008-12Crystal DefendersSquare Enix2008-1224002Chinese CheckersApple Inc.2008-12Trivial PursuitElectronic Arts / Hasbro2008-12Cake Mania 3Sandlot Games2009-02LostUbisoft2007-051B200VortexApple Inc.2006-09-1212345iQuizApple Inc.2007-0411002Royal SolitaireElectronic Arts2006-1250514

Default games(edit)

These are the games that originally came with an iPod.(2)

iPod versionTitlesPublishersiPod 1G, 2GBrick (also called Game)Apple Inc.iPod 3G, 4G, 5G, and 5.5G; iPod Nano 1G and 2G; iPod MiniBrick, Music Quiz, Parachute, SolitaireApple Inc.iPod Nano 3G; iPod Classic 6GiQuiz, Klondike, VortexApple Inc.iPod Nano 4G and 5GMaze, Klondike, Vortex, BrickApple Inc.

Criticism(edit)

iTunes had come under much criticism due to the UK price of iPod games, GB£3.99 (about US$7.40). Many people from the UK had given the games 1-star ratings, stating that Apple was 'ripping off' Britain.(3)

A similar situation occurred in Australia, where the price was A$7.49, even though the Australian dollar was (at the time) worth more than the US dollar (A$7.49 = US$7.76).

Developers had criticized Apple for not creating a software development kit (SDK) for software developers to create new iPod games; this was likely to keep the digital rights management of iPod games closed.(citation needed) Despite this, it did not prevent users from running an alternative OS on the iPod such as Linux, whereby, for example, there are ports of Doom that will run on fifth-generation iPods. Running Linux on an iPod retains the music-playing functionality of the device while also adding features such as the ability to create voice memos through the headphones.

When the iPod Classic and iPod Nano third generation were released, games which had previously been purchased could not be synced to the new iPods. Understandably, this made many consumers angry due to losing their investment.

It is also notable that after a download had been made for a game, it couldn't have been downloaded again unless a separate purchase was made for the same item.(4) This is different behavior than applications downloaded on the App Store, which can be downloaded an unlimited amount of times. These issues were later fixed, however, making it possible to install any single game on any number of iPods registered under the same account.

Unofficial games(edit)

Some older iPod units are capable of using replacement firmware such as iPod Linux and Rockbox. These firmware projects can play many other games, including the aforementioned native port of Doom; and, via a native port of the Game BoyemulatorGnuboy, many other games could be played, including Super Mario Bros., Tomb Raider, Mega Man, Kirby, Metroid, The Legend of Zelda, Street Fighter, and hundreds more.(5)(6)

Games using the ″Notes″ feature(edit)

With the release of the third-generation iPod in 2003, Apple introduced a ″Notes″ feature to the iPod’s firmware. This functionality provided the first opportunity for third-party developers to create simple text and audio games which could be installed and run on an iPod without users needing to replace the official firmware.

With a limit of 1,000 individual .txt files, each with a maximum file size of 4kb, the Notes feature made use of a limited set of html tags. Hyperlinks could also be used to link to other .txt files or folders and play audio files stored on the device.(7) The limitation of available html tags meant that developers were restricted to Choose Your Own Adventure–style text-based games(8) or multiple choice–style quizzes with narrated audio.(9) Subsequently, very few developers used the Notes feature as a way of publishing games.

References(edit)

Gamestop Ipod Classic

^'What's Inside an iPod Game?' bensinclair.com, September 14, 2006.

^'Fun for your iPod', November 26, 2007.

^iTunes store

^Melanson, Donald (2007-09-19). 'iPod games must be repurchased for new iPods'. Engadget. Retrieved 2008-09-30.

^'Applications'. iPodLinux Wiki. Retrieved 6 April 2010.

^'What is Rockbox? Why should I use it?'. Rockbox Wiki. Retrieved 6 April 2010.

^'iPod Note Reader User Guide'(PDF). Apple. Archived from the original(PDF) on June 6, 2003.

^'XO Play offers Herbert's Big Adventure game for iPod'. MacWorld. 2 March 2004.

^'Coolgorilla releases music trivia game for iPods'. iLounge. 23 December 2005.

External links(edit)

iPod game page at Apple.com

Ipod Classic Games Vortex

Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=IPod_game&oldid=1021219140'

[freckleslikestars]

Okay because this idea has latched onto my brain, I am actually writing out questions for it now. I have six cards so far, out of at least 100. So what I was thinking was I’ll leave this post pinned and if anyone has suggestions for questions you can put them in a reply/send a message. It would be cool to eventually have it as a game you could actually buy, kinda like how cards against muggles was done (I actually don’t know what the licensing situation for that is)

Anyway, the categories are as follows:

Seasons 1, 2 & 3 (blue)

Seasons 4 & 5 (pink)

Seasons 6 & 7 (yellow)

Seasons 8 & 9 (purple)

Fight the Future and I Want to Believe (green)

Seasons 10 & 11 (orange)

Trivia questions pertaining to either the episode/season content and the filming/production of are all welcome.

(The category most in need at the moment is green)

I’ve created a discord server to help with testing and creating questions

Hear me out though: x files trivial pursuit

[alien-memes]

In ancient times, the Earth had visitors.

They are benign, filled with enough curiosity to motivate them to travel halfway across the galaxy to visit the first new lifeforms they had discovered in over 10,000 years. In their excitement, they forget to calculate variables; important variables that are a matter of life and death. Sometimes in the pursuit of science, one’s own mortality is not first on the priority list, you see. But these creatures are clever, and live by their spontaneity, and have developed multiple travel available failsafes.

Their spacecrafts are moveable laboratories, filled with more technological advancement than the human mind could ever hope to fathom. And on their way to Earth, a planet that to them is simply X-79 (a fantastic coordinate), they point their computers toward it, analyzing it for things like atmospheric chemicals, soil density, and water presence. 

While their machines do the work, the explorers on board (three in total) pour over the initial data: a simple picture of a scruffy bipedal creature in a field. There’s hope that there’s more than one. Many times they had gone on these long missions, only to find that the last of the species had died out before they got there. An average travel time of twenty years could do that sometimes.

A plus is if they’re sentient. It’s not important, though. These creatures are simply fascinated by the idea of /life/. Even after the hundredth time, it feels like the first - over a billion years ago - when they encountered their first otherworldly being. And even though they were now part of a thriving trade network with millions of other star systems, it was starting to feel incredibly lonely, thinking that the Universe had met its finite state and there was nothing else of interest. But the Universe was full of wonders, one of which was its ability to hide wonderful things deep inside its belly.

They go over the new data daily, gleefully filing away tidbits of information for trivial purposes. When the days comes, when they finally break atmosphere, they know enough about the planet to know that they don’t need space suits, for once. Their scaly skin dries up on most planets, but this sun seems especially kind toward reptiles. 

As they bask in the novelty of sunning on a foreign planet, their skin turn a litany of colors, starting with red and ending with ones not on the visible spectrum. Their tails wags, and their large eyes dart around the plant life swaying between their toes and above their heads. Of course, they knew about all this before they landed, but there’s something incredibly enchanting about experiencing something in the flesh.

Eventually, a drone reminds them of their task at hand, it’s quiet beeping reminding them that there’s much more for this planet to offer. The drone continues on its task; primitive in its own way, not really capable of speech nor intelligent thought, but two thirds of the party can still register cool annoyance from it.

“Always business with this one,” snickers the youngest member, Yon, one who isn’t used to the non-sentient drones and had a soft spot for this one in particular. The drone makes sweeping motions with its stunted arms, cataloging all the creatures captured in its red stare. It’s technically only looking for one in particular, but it’s still good information to have.

“Well, I guess that’s why he’s the best the Council could grant us,” says the most experienced explorer, Drita. It's true, the little drone is the best ever made, mainly because of its simplicity.

They walk for a stretch of time, the sun moving slowly through the sky. It’s off for them to see only one star, and if it wasn’t for their careful research, they would be tempted to risk retinal damage to search for another. It’s nearly gone by the time they stumble on an outcropping, in which the excited beeping of their drone goes erratic, flashing a blinding blue light in rapid succession that frightens their new discovery.

As the creatures huddle together, sharp objects poised in their hands, the lead scientist, Vilk, makes her way to the drone to dismiss it. A readout prints from the thin line that mimics a mouth. She takes it, but doesn’t read it, too busy making placating gestures with her hands. The drone makes a clicking noise, it’s eyes returning to it’s standby green before heeling next to the youngest. 

“Sorry about that, we didn’t mean to startle you.” The creatures don’t seem placated, but instead one of them tries to swipe at her. It’s only her forcefield that protects her from taking damage. She recoils regardless, and regroups a few steps back with the others. 

Drita is non-plussed. She takes the readings from Vilk’s lax hand, scanning them lightly. The basics she knows. The graph that shows the possible growth patterns, the pie chart that details their diet, and the oddest little chart she had ever seen at the very bottom. Yon leans over her shoulder, brow furrowing as he reads them over, only able to get the gist of what it says.

Drita wants to ask Vilk what this means, but the creatures have started screaming and Vilk seems shaken for some reason. This is neither of them’s first time, and attacking creatures was not exactly something novel. Perhaps such a long time away from new discoveries has softened Vilk. She gestures for them to retreat, if only to not stress the creatures even more. 

“Primitive,” Yon comments on their way back to their ship. “But their use of tools has to denote some sort of intelligence, right?”

Vilk manages to shake off her stupor enough to nod her head. “Yes, and they’re obviously social. I saw some young ones with them. Possibly even some sort of writing on the walls.”

She reaches for the paper, which confirms most of what she already figured out, but her eyes light up upon reaching the bottom. “Do you know what this is?”

“Not really,” says Drita. “Must be a recent update. Wasn’t around the last time I went on a mission.”

Yon shrugs. “Hey, this is my first time on a real outing.”

“This is meant to project their potential. It’s based on everything; evolutionary patterns, environmental factors, current progress, everything! See these bars?” She points to the six individual bars lining the bottom of the chart. “These represent progress in a hundred year intervals. According to this, there’s some pretty considerable growth expected each century.”

Drita took the scan back, taking a closer look at the extending bars, noting the significant jumps in scale between each one. “This seems like a pretty young species too. Looks like we’re witnessing the birth of an intelligent life form, my friends.”

“That’s never been heard of!” Yon took the paper excitedly, gleefully reading the data. “This is amazing! Just think of what this will mean for everyone back home.”

[pamphletstoinspire]

Catholic Physics - Reflections of a Catholic Scientist - Part 43

Scientific Integrity: Lessons from Climategate.

“The Scientific Method is a wonderful tool as long as you don't care which way the outcome turns; however, this process fails the second one's perception interferes with the interpretation of data." Christina Marrero

INTEGRITY: "The quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness.."Oxford Dictionary

“…if you’re doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid—not only what you think is right about it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you’ve eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked—to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.” Richard Feynman

INTRODUCTION

Our graduate research group director, E.B. Wilson, Jr., would occasionally give homilies at the group's afternoon tea about what character traits a good scientist should have. The most important of these was scientific integrity--honesty and openness in doing the research and reporting the results, and the capacity to be the severest critic of one's own work. I agree--the ability to stand aside, to evaluate one's own research objectively--not as a parent would his child, but as a stern judge--is critical to the progress of science.   And a concomitant trait is the capacity to accept valid criticism. These qualities are necessary for one's research to stand the test of time.

When I first started this post I wanted to examine what might be textbook cases for a study of scientific integrity, focusing on the the Climategate expose of 2009 and the McIntyre/McKittrick analysis of the so-called "Hockey Stick" results of Mann et al.  (It is not my purpose here to debate the merits of Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW)--there is an addendum at the end of the post that summarizes my own views).  As I developed the thesis it occurred to me that a broader issue was involved: how do ethical considerations limit and define scientific goals? Should researchers--presumably in pursuit of a greater good--modify or bend precepts conventionally given for doing science?  Should ethical considerations define boundaries for scientific research?  These issues will be addressed in subsequent posts.

REPLICATION OF RESULTS--CRITICAL FOR GOOD SCIENCE

A critical condition for science to progress is that experiments be replicable;  the dross has to be discarded if the gold is to be retained.  By this replicability requirement the first reports of cold fusion and polywater were shown not to be valid.  And of course by "experiments" we include computer modeling that is to predict future events predicated on the assumptions of the model.  In order for experiments and computer models to be replicable, there has to be free access to data and to the computer programs used.   If you're to find out whether a computer model is correct and consistent you have to be able to use the same input and programs that the original researcher used.

If we examine some of the emails from the Climategate file and comments from McIntyre and McKittrick, who tried to replicate the Mann "Hockey Stick", we might wonder whether this requirement was acknowledged by proponents of AGW.  Here are just two excerpts:

Jones (Head of CRU) to Wahl (NOOA) and Ammann (Natl. Ctr. for Atm. Res.): "(T)ry and change the Received date! Don't give those skeptics something to amuse themselves with."

Jones to Schmidt (NASA Goddard Institute) cc Mann: "The FOI (Freedom of Information) line we're all using is this, IPCC is exempt from any countries FOI...The skeptics this Even though we...possibly relevant info the IPCC is not part of our remit (mission statement) therefore we don't have an obligation to pass it on."

More emails and fuller versions are given in a Wall Street Journal article.

Here are some comments from Stephen McIntyre (from his presentation at Ohio State University, 2008) about difficulties getting data and programs to replicate Michael Mann's Hockey Stick calculation.

" I thought that it would be interesting to look at the underlying data, rather as I might look at drill data from a mining promotion. Business was slow and I browsed the internet for a due diligence package. I could not locate such a due diligence package nor the underlying proxy data for MBH98. Out of the blue (I was then a Canadian businessman unknown to climate scientists), I emailed Michael Mann, the primary author, inquiring as to the location of the MBH98 proxy data. To my astonishment, Mann replied that he had “forgotten” the exact location, but that an associate would locate it for me. The associate said that the data did not exist in any one location, but that he would get it together for me. I was dumbfounded. Here was a study that had been on the front page of the IPCC study, used in brochures sent to every household in Canada and there was no due diligence package. "

When McIntyre and McKittrick's attempt to replicate the "Hockey Stick" failed (see below) Mann said the original data and programming weren't used but refused to supply those:

"Mann also objected that we did not exactly replicate his computational steps or sequence of proxy rosters. No one had ever replicated his results, and we now know others had tried but were also unsuccessful. To date we are the closest anyone has been able to come in print. We were not bothered by Mann’s response on this point, but it did seem pointless to differ over trivial issues. So we requested his computational code to eliminate these easily-resolved differences. To our surprise he refused to supply his computer code, a stance he maintains to today. As for the proxy sequence, in building his PCs it turns out he had spliced together a number of different series in order to handle segments with missing data in the earliest part of the analysis. This was not explained in his Nature paper so Steve had not implemented it in the emulation program. We requested identification of the splicing sequence, which Mann refused to provide..."Ross McKittrick, What is the Hockey Stick Debate About?

Is this making an open, dated, signed lab book with your results and calculations available to all, as we were enjoined to do as graduate students?

THE CARDINAL SIN: FUDGING DATA

The Oxford Dictionary gives the following definition of "fudge": "Adjust or manipulate (facts or figures) so as to present a desired picture". This would include altering given data to make it fit a hypothesis or discarding data that doesn't fit;

inserting fictitious data or data not relevant to the hypothesis, for a better fit;

cherry-picking data , taking selected data from a set that will fit and ignoring data that doesn't;

In this context I'll discuss first McIntyre and McKittrick's attempt to replicate the famed "Hockey Stick", the cornerstone of the IPCC dire predictions of the effects of AGW, and then cite just a few of the many relevant emails and computer program comments revealed in the Climategate documents.  I'll not give a detailed account, but only a summary and show some figures that justify McKittrick's and McIntyre's report that the hockey stick is, to put it charitably, not a compelling statistical analysis.  If you read both papers you can judge whether the statistical treatment, Principle Component Analysis (PCA) was adjusted, data were selected and replaced, in other words, whether "fudging" (as in the above definition) occured:

"How do we know 1998 was the warmest year of the millenium?" Stephen McIntyre.

"What is the 'Hockey Stick' debate about?" Ross McKittrick.

Here are some figures to illustrate the above:

From Ross McKitrick Hockey Stick article:

Illustrated in the figure above the left are plots of two tree ring sizes (used as proxies for temperatures) one from California (top), the other from Arizona. The x-axis is time, from about 1400 to present. In the original hockey stick paper the top data set is presumably given 390 times the weight of the bottom.  One can see how this will force a huge temperature rise.

From Ross McKitrick, Hockey Stick article:

In the figure to the left the top plot is data using the presumed principal component analysis of the original hockey stick paper. The second down from the top is the simple mean of data.The third down is obtained with a conventional principal component analysis (no segmentation).  The fourth down eliminates one set of data (high-altitude from Idaho) and uses a segmented principal component analysis, as in the original paper.

There is also a figure in McKittrick's article (not reproduced here) that shows how they obtained a temperature (tree-ring proxy) rise in the latest years from random noise data, using a selection pattern presumed to underly the original hockey stick results.

Examples can also be had from excerpts from the Climategate files, emails and comments on computer programs (see CRU's Source Code: Climategate Uncovered , HarryReadMe files for full texts):

"I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) amd (sic) from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline."

In two other programs, briffa_Sep98_d.pro and briffa_Sep98_e.pro, the "correction" is bolder by far. The programmer (Keith Briffa?) entitled the "adjustment" routine “Apply a VERY ARTIFICAL(sic) correction for decline!!”

Plotting programs such as data4alps.pro print this reminder to the user prior to rendering the chart:   "IMPORTANT NOTE: The data after 1960 should not be used. The tree-ring density records tend to show a decline after 1960 relative to the summer temperature in many high-latitude locations. In this data set this "decline" has been artificially removed in an ad-hoc way, and this means that data after 1960 no longer represent tree-ring density variations, but have been modified to look more like the observed temperatures."

"NOTE: recent decline in tree-ring density has been ARTIFICIALLY REMOVED to facilitate calibration. THEREFORE, post-1960 values will be much closer to observed temperatures then (sic) they should be which will incorrectly imply the reconstruction is more skilful (sic) than it actually is. See Osborn et al. (2004)."

See also Climategate: The Smoking Code and Climategate: hide the decline for a more detailed analysis by Anthony Watts (a programmer) of the deficiencies; for problems with temperature data stations as well as artificial corrections and deletions as applied to such data--see the links above.

PERVERSION OF THE PEER REVIEW PROCESS

The peer review process* is an essential mechanism in contemporary science to throw out the dross and keep the gold.  In order to be effective, it has to be applied objectively, without prejudice due to preconceived political, economic or theologic standards. When such considerations enter into judgment of scientific work, the scientific method is tossed out the window.  Examples are shown in excerpts from Climategate emails (see "ClimateGateKeeping" in Climategate and the Corruption of Climate Science [by David Pratt])

"The skeptics appear to have staged a ‘coup’ at ‘Climate Research’ ... My guess is that Von Storch [one of the editors] is actually with them (frankly, he’s an odd individual, and I’m not sure he isn’t himself somewhat of a skeptic himself) ... I think we have to stop considering ‘Climate Research’ as a legitimate peer-reviewed journal. Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal." Michael Mann, March 2003, commenting about an article by Soon and Baliunas.

"I will be emailing the journal to tell them I’m having nothing more to do with it until they rid themselves of this troublesome editor" Phil Jones, again referring to the editor von Storch of Climate Research

These are just two of many examples in which an effort was made (sometimes successful) to remove members of editorial boards who were not on board with the AGW dogma (again, see the link ClimategateKeeping in Climategate and the Corruption of Climate Science.)

In my view the most reprehensible of these partisan attacks was the effort to get a skeptic, Chris de Freitas, sacked from his job at the University of Auckland.  See Climategate 2 and the Corruption of the Peer Review Process.

I'll leave it to the reader to judge whether the principles of scientific integrity outlined at the beginning of this post were followed by these proponents of AGW.

WHY I DON'T BELIEVE THAT AGW IS HARMFUL

In the late 1980's the notion of AGW was very attractive to me.  However I read papers by Richard Lindzen (Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at M.I.T.), Frederick Seitz (former president of the National Academy of Science), Fred Singer, Willie Soon and Sally Baliunas that convinced me as a physicist with some statistics background, that many more factors are involved in climate than CO2 re-radiation, and that the non-linear differential equations involving heat transfer, cloud cover and condensation aren't going to be approximated as a predictive tool by computer models.  

Moreover, my wife (a historian with Medieval Period her specialty) pointed out to me that there was a Medieval Warm Period (MWP--a period from about 800 AD to 1300 AD), historical evidence that temperatures higher than those predicted by the AGW computer models existed--Greenland was called that because, presumably, it was green. (The hockey stick model was presumably designed to belie the existence of the MWP and the Little Ice Age that followed it.) The MWP was followed by a Little Ice Age, a cool period from which we are now recovering.  It is ironic that a graph of historic temperatures in an early 1990's publication of the IPCC showed the MWP and the Little Ice Age:

From Ross McKitrick, Hockey Stick article:

The basic form of the above graph correlates well with earth bore core measurements and indirect measurements of solar output.

One last point: I don't regard current temperatures taken by government agencies to be that accurate given the haphazard distribution of weather stations (near urban environments, near pavements, air-conditioning outlets,...) as the picture below illustrates:

From "Is the US Surface Temperature Record Reliable?"Anthony Watts

REFERENCES (other than links given above).

Climate Change: The Facts.  A collection of articles by various authors including Delingpole, Lindzen, Watts.

* A personal note: I've been involved over the past 60 years as both reviewer and reviewed for papers and grant proposals.  When allowed, I've given my name as a reviewer, and have been thanked on a few occasions by authors for pointing out errors that, if not corrected, would have prevented publication.  I myself have had more than one paper rejected because of legitimate errors, and in fact, on one of these, I rewrote the paper according to the reviewer's comment, including a major factor I had neglected and invited the reviewer to be a co-author.  (This was indeed possibly one of the few good pieces of work done in my scientific career, and I've been fortunate--one of the equations in the work has been used often enough that it is a "name" equation cited without footnotes.)

From a series of articles written by: Bob Kurland - a Catholic Scientist

Story with images click below:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/catholic-physics-reflections-scientist-part-43-harold-baines/?published=t

[freckleslikestars]

heyyy

so, I currently have 18/100 question cards for the X files trivial pursuit, and I’ve created a discord server for both the assistance of creating questions and testing questions (because all I have to test them on at the moment is my dad and...I don’t know if some of them are too hard)

Any help would be wonderful!

(see my pinned post for more info)

[freckleslikestars]

Ok, so, I’ve vaguely mocked up the front and back templates of the cards so that when all the questions are done and I’ve edited them and everything I can just drop them into the template

I want to keep them relatively free of anything that could potentially flag up copyright problems, which…even having that X there is potentially going to be a problem, but I also like the clean look of having just the X. I dunno.

Also, I’m planning for it to be a deck of 100 question cards (600 questions) plus one card that’s just like this as a key, which is the same as the licensed fan versions.

As a comparison, these are the 20th anniversary trivial pursuit cards and the licensed Friends trivial pursuit cards

So they’re designed kind of the same way I’ve just taken out any mention of trivial pursuit

They’d have rounded corners and be the same card size as standard (American) poker cards. I’m toying with a linen finish but honestly that racks the price up quite a bit so they’ll probably be the same matte finish as most game cards. Also, if I do go through with making them and people want them, I’m thinking of making the tuck boxes myself to cut costs, and also because I think it would be pretty cool if they all had different designs, so I’m thinking about asking various fan artists out there to design a tuck box that I’ll make so everyone gets a random design on there box.

I dunno. There’s still a lot of logistics to figure out with everything, but it is slowly coming together.

As a rough guide, how much interest would there actually be if I were to finish making this X Files Trivial Pursuit that I started last year?

I’ve just been looking at prices to get them made, and found a couple of places that are viable options for printing, but obviously the price varies depending upon how many decks are ordered, so I was wondering if it was something people were actually willing to pay for (a deck of 100 cards would be anywhere between £12 and £21 depending on how many people wanted them - cheaper the more people wanted them, obviously)

It would be something that you’d have to play either on an already owned trivial pursuit board (if you don’t have one you can get them pretty cheap second hand at charity shops/ebay/facebook marketplace) or without a board like the other fan versions of the game are played, with a colour die, which, again, are pretty easy to find second hand or DIY (though tbh you could just use a standard D6 and have pink questions as one, blue questions as two, etc.), because as soon as you start adding game boards it gets even more expensive.

Like…is an X Files Trivial Pursuit something people would be interested in buying? Like, just paying the cost of production + shipping?

[freckleslikestars]

Hear me out though: x files trivial pursuit