Little talk:

***

Absent Friends

My dad would have been glued to the TV for the Jan. 6 hearings, and the Watergate anniversary. "This is history!", he would have been saying. "This is history!"

It's perhaps appropriate to talk about some of my dad's political opinions:

1. My (highly imperfect) understanding of Sri Lankan politics is that the LTTE (which I do not support) agreed to a cease-fire with a moderate Sri Lankan government. Then a non-moderate government came into power, escalated tensions, with a fair amount of help from the LTTE, and eventually cancelled the cease-fire agreement. The military readiness of the LTTE had declined during the years of the cease-fire, and they were routed, with hard-to-forgive human rights abuses committed in the last stages of the war.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mullivaikkal_massacre

So I was complaining about the human rights abuses being committed by the Rajapaksa government. My dad heard out my complaints, and did not disagree with me, but, significantly, he refused to let the LTTE off the hook. "Why did they stop at a cease-fire?" "Why didn't they take the chance when there was a moderate government in power and negotiate a comprehensive peace?"

In hindsight, it's perhaps predictable that once Rajapaksa had acquired a taste for committing human rights abuses, he was not going to stop. By tolerating human rights abuses against Sri Lankan Tamils, the Sri Lankans, in the long run, were setting the stage for human rights abuses against Sri Lankan non-Tamils, and the weakening of Sri Lankan democracy.

2. I was complaining, again, about the relentless criticism of the "Nehru-Gandhi" legacy. A family member was defending the criticism, and pointing out that that they were only criticizing I. Gandhi, and not MK Gandhi. I was angry enough that I was not accepting this, and suggested that maybe the RSS was practicing dog whistle politics, holding secret meetings where they were saying, "Actually, when we say Nehru-Gandhi, we mean MK Gandhi! Godse forever!"

My dad did not really take a side, but told me a story about Nehru I had never heard before. It seems that after partition, India owed Pakistan some sterling, but Nehru had withheld payment, after the invasion of Kashmir. Gandhiji started a fast for communal harmony, but also in protest of the government not honoring its agreement. On the third day of the fast, Nehru gave in: the government agreed to pay the sterling owed to Pakistan.

https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/gandhi-s-last-and-greatest-fast/story-wpf0NL3LgsWUegv7uVTopL.html

It seems to me a story that illustrates the kind of things that political leaders often have to do to keep civilization going: they have to show the restraint to not extract every available form of leverage, to not exploit every available pressure point.

It's a story that reflects well on Gandhiji, of course, but it also seems to me to reflect well on Nehru, that he allowed the little pip-squeak of a saint to get within earshot, to get a hearing, and to change the policy. You don't necessarily want your political leader to be a saint, but you do want a political leader capable of listening to and learning from the saints.

I'm not sure what my dad thought exactly about the rise of the BJP. He was not outraged about it, in the way that I was, or some of my cousins were. He was perhaps bemused by it. And he at least made clear that Nehru, despite many flaws, was nevertheless a great man, worthy of some respect and veneration.

3. My dad told me about a very strange theory, that he attributed to Omar Bradley, that the ideal general is intelligent, and capable, but slightly lazy. Because of the intelligence, and the capability, the general would do the things that were necessary. Because of the laziness, the general would not do the things that were unnecessary, or impossible. My dad not really believe the theory. I doubt Omar Bradley did, either. But it is perhaps worth thinking about the dangers of a hard-working general trying to achieve the impossible, or the unnecessary.

It seems to me a theory that is genuinely politically incorrect, as opposed to the reactionary pseudo-political incorrectness that we have been so awash in for the last thirty years:

 https://www.simpsonsarchive.com/episodes/4F10.html

      Bart: Sharing is a bunch of bull, too.  And helping others.  And
            what's all this crap I've been hearing about tolerance?
     Homer: Hmm.  Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to
            subscribe to your newsletter.  

4. The recent election that my dad probably enjoyed the most was the 2020 democratic primary. I particularly remember a debate between my dad, playing the role of the venerable old-timer, and my cousin, playing the role of left-leaning millennial.

My dad: These unrealistic socialist ideas! They are unrealistic!

My cousin: Biden is trash!

I was perhaps a bit off to the side, playing the role of gen-x voice of reason.

Me: Warren is good! Bernie is good! Biden is not trash!

Eventually, my dad's gleeful dunking on socialism got to me, and I was forced to hit, not below the belt, but closer to the belt than I was comfortable. I was forced to remind the venerable old-timer about the time when we had gone to the east coast for Swami Dayananda's 80th birthday, and my dad had slipped and fallen on a New Jersey train platform. He had tried to be stoic, he had tried to walk it off, but eventually he decided to get it checked out. And when he decided to get it checked out, he did not shop around for the best deal, but went to the most reassuring, imposing, medical center-y Medical Center he could find:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JFK_Medical_Center_(Edison,_New_Jersey)

We waited for a good long while in the waiting room, then my dad went in, and we waited for a good longer while, while they conducted tests. While we were waiting I got a good look at a ground-level, policy-taker's view of the system, as opposed to a high level, policy-maker's view:

There was a patient, I think maybe in a wheelchair, holding his arm. He would say, "Ow." Then he would wait a while, perhaps 15-30 seconds, and say "Ow" again. He wasn't screaming it. But he was saying it loud enough to disturb the peace. I think there was some sort of mind game being played between him and the emergency room admitting clerk. The patient perhaps felt that the admitting clerk wasn't giving him high enough priority, and was making him wait too long. He did not feel strongly enough about it to scream and holler and escalate the situation. But he did feel strongly enough about it to keep saying "Ow", every minute, on the minute. The admitting clerk seemed to have developed a thick hide in the course of doing his job, and never gave any evidence that he had heard a single Ow. 

Eventually my dad got a clean bill of health, and we went back to my cousin's home, where we were staying while in New Jersey.

The point of all this is that a couple of months later, JFK Medical Center sent a bill for. . .a lot. Like, a whole lot. I don't remember exactly how much, but it was perhaps a bit more than $10,000 dollars. Kaiser eventually paid an arm and a leg, and my dad paid the rest.

As I said, I was forced to bring up this not all that painful experience in my dad's life in order to best him in a political debate. I reminded my dad of this incident. I reminded him that the medical bill was quite a bit. Then I conducted a thought experiment: Suppose the medical bill had been more? Suppose the bill had been $20,000? Or $30,000? Or $40,000? Or $50,000?

The venerable old-timer grunted irritably. In the context, the grunt meant, roughly, "Your thought experiment is invalid. That wouldn't happen. They wouldn't do something like that."

At which point I had my opening: "Really? Why not? Why wouldn't they? Who's going to stop 'em?"

At which further point my cousin recognized the opening, and joined in on the tag team: "Not Joe Biden!"

***

Notes on technical reading II

zeroth pass: Skimming, scanning, surveying. No thought of rigor, no presh. Your yoke is easy, your burden is light. Be quick.

first pass: A reasonably careful and thorough reading. Some thought of rigor, some presh. Don't hurry.

second pass: Working through examples (if any). 

I find, when working through examples, I am sorting them into three kinds: Snippets, samples, and sample files. Snippets are short bits of code, not necessarily meant to be run through the cpu. Samples are longer bits of code, which can and perhaps should be run through the cpu. Sample files are examples large enough to be in their own individual files or projects.

third pass: Working through review questions (if any) 

fourth pass: Working through exercises (if any)

last pass: Reflection, review, re-reading. Synopsis, summary, notes, highlights, commentary.

Current books in the pile for nth-pass working: Introducing Python, Javascript: The Definitive Guide.

Current books in the pile for first-pass reading:  PHP and MySQL Web Development, Practical SQL: A Beginner's Guide To Storytelling With Data.

***

On First Reading Flanagan's Javascript

Chapter 15 in the latest edition of Flanagan's Javascript is a bit of a monster, where Flanagan covers all of client-side Javascript in a single super-chapter. (Chapters 1-14 are core Javascript, common to client and server. Chapter 16 is server-side. And chapter  17 is Javascript extensions) Perhaps for that reason, it's useful as an upper bound for how long it should take to read a chapter.

It took me 7 days, reading as as much as I could each day. The chapter is 165 pages, about 300-400 words a page, I think.

So my maximum reading rate for technical reading is on the order of 20-25 pages a day, around 8000-10000 words a day.

What should be my minimum reading rate? I think on the order of 2-8 pages a day, around 1000-3000 words a day.

What should be my average reading rate? I think on the order of 5-15 pages a day, around 2000-6000 words a day.

So the minimum amount of time I require for a first-pass reading of the chapter is one week, seven days, 25 pages a day.

The maximum amount of time I perhaps should require is five weeks, 35 days, 5 pages a day.

And a reasonable amount of time, neither min nor max, is perhaps three weeks, 8 pages a day.

It's perhaps interesting to think about what would happen if I had unrealistic expectations about how long reading the chapter should take. What if I though I should be able to read the chapter in 2 or 3 days, rather than 2 or 3 weeks?

In that case, it seems to me, I would wind up falsifying the metrics. I would tell myself I had done the reading, when in fact I hadn't.

***

My current reading plan:

1. HTML, CSS, jQuery

2. C, Python, Javascript

3. PostgreSQL, PHP, MySQL

4. Go, Angular, React

5. Node, Express, NoSQL

6. C++, Java, Lisp

7. Computer organization, hardware/software interface, assembly

I think I can finish the first four steps in the next few months after the next few months. The outlook after that is hazier.

 ***

Big talk:

***

Perhaps the highlight of Ben Carson's campaign: "You know, neurosurgeons tend not to be racist. Because we know that it's our brain that makes us who we are. And we know that everybody's brain is the same color."

***

I am afraid my opinion on what the Democrats should say and do is that they should say things they think are true and do things they think are important.

My opinion on reasonable priorities, apart from war and crime:

1. Climate change / energy transition / energy and transportation costs

2. Child-care / day-care / Pre-K / after-school care

3.  Housing and out of pocket health care costs

4. Good government, the idea of having a trusted point of contact, who you can call and ask for help if you are having issues with government systems, or medical systems, or criminal justice systems, or financial systems.

One of my favorite essays is Neal Stephenson's "In the Beginning was the Command Line". In it he makes the point that when a poor country system breaks down, it breaks down in a simple, transparent way. But when a rich country system breaks down, it breaks down in a way that turns you into a conspiracy theorist:

 http://project.cyberpunk.ru/lib/in_the_beginning_was_the_command_line/

We like plain dealings and straightforward transactions in America. If you go to Egypt and, say, take a taxi somewhere, you become a part of the taxi driver's life; he refuses to take your money because it would demean your friendship, he follows you around town, and weeps hot tears when you get in some other guy's taxi. You end up meeting his kids at some point, and have to devote all sort of ingenuity to finding some way to compensate him without insulting his honor. It is exhausting. Sometimes you just want a simple Manhattan-style taxi ride.

But in order to have an American-style setup, where you can just go out and hail a taxi and be on your way, there must exist a whole hidden apparatus of medallions, inspectors, commissions, and so forth--which is fine as long as taxis are cheap and you can always get one. When the system fails to work in some way, it is mysterious and infuriating and turns otherwise reasonable people into conspiracy theorists. But when the Egyptian system breaks down, it breaks down transparently. You can't get a taxi, but your driver's nephew will show up, on foot, to explain the problem and apologize.

***

Next post: July 22, 2022