邂逅

坐在對面的女士
望車窗外望人群
目光瞬間碰見了
不好意思微微笑

雖是無名人海中
該也同我有故事
過著某樣的生活
有願有煩有心思

只用臉孔打招呼
面後包含路一程
個個完整的自己
點點滴滴是人生

Evidencing Eureka

An article (a cute one I should say) mentions a press conference from CERN giving the latest update in the search for the Higgs boson, which arouse my interest as, aside of the exciting subject, I've never watched any scientific press conference before.

So here it is. (The embedded streaming didn't work for me, but some browsers should be able to play one of the download links directly.)

I quite like the tone of this one. We get a procedural picture of the real work involved:

"What we have seen today is a fantastic demonstration of how an experiment works, from the operation in the cavern to the data-taking, the data-processing, reconstruction, computing, the quality calibration, all the way to the analysis and interpretation of the result. So a simple plot showing a mass distribution contains a lot of work." -- FG

The romantic touch:

"We are discussing something that is the last chapter, we hope, of a story which lasts 47 years." -- GT

The ethics:

"Those are really preliminary results. They're very interesting, they're intriguing, but really preliminary. First of all, as it is the duty of the scientific community, we will speak more solidly through papers that will be submitted on final results we hope to be able to come out sometime end of January, beginning of February [...]" -- GT

The mild humor:

"It *is* really exciting. I can tell you. But nonetheless, we take questions." -- RH

And apparently a number of excited enthusiasts have added their own opinions into the mix, or reinterpreted the news to make their own conclusions, so the scientists have learned to be carefully accurate with their statements:

"First of all, it's not an evidence. Be careful [to ensure that] we're using scientific words at the precise meaning. We're talking of intriguing, tantalizing hints [...]" -- GT

"Don't believe all the blogs. Okay? Believe only what has a stamp from the scientists and not the blogs. Please." -- RH

It is also pleasant to listen to people who know exactly where they are:

Question: "Is it possible to find the Higgs with the present dataset and improved analysis?"
RH: "A quick answer, Madam?"
FG: "No."

And to close, the inspirational quotes:

"Of course it will be good to find new physics, new things, and we have some ideas of how, for instance, new physics could manifest itself. But we should not forget that we are researchers, and the foundation of research [is] really looking for something that is also unexpected, or something new. So we have to remain open, because we don't know what Nature has chosen. And so we may be soon confronted with some surprises, and this would be, I think, for us, the best reward -- something unexpected." -- FG

Question: "Before, you spoke about the next 20 years, the physics beyond the Standard Model, and then about the rest of-- 96% of the universe to explore. And I want to ask, is there an end to the scientific question, and if not, then why?"
GT: "Because we are-- this is the mankind. I mean, mankind started asking questions, and we will continue forever."
FG: "Remember what Isaac Newton used to say: 'What we know is a drop, what we don't know is an ocean.'"
RH: "Each time we find something new, we have new questions to ask. And that's the fascinating thing of science, yeah? You answer some questions which you know how to post. And then you find, suddenly, new questions. And that will go on, I'm sure. And it's very difficult to find the moment 'when do I know everything?' That's impossible, at least for me. So, there's a lot to do."

Notes:
The above has been transcribed from the video, with minor edits for clarity.

RH: Prof. Rolf-Dieter Heuer, CERN Director General
FG: Prof. Fabiola Gianotti, LHC ATLAS
GT: Prof. Guido Tonelli, LHC CMS

s.ty.lized

So there's this thing with some stage names or pen names where, though they consist of normal English words, are not supposed to be written with the usual capitalization rules. For example, e.e. cummings and k.d. lang. Wikipedia calls it "stylized", or sometimes "typeset".

It gets rather chaotic in the Japanese music scene, where some English names are natively written in katakana, which is ordinarily transferred to Latin in all-caps. So it is not clear whether DREAMS COME TRUE or FUNKY MONKEY BABYS should always be written in all-caps (which can really be quite glaring), since it might just be due to the katakana representation. It is easier to figure out true stylization when it's all non-caps, like the brilliant green (which looks like just a part of this sentence), or when it's mixed, like HIGH and MIGHTY COLOR (which is still glaring). Of course, some name owners themselves are inconsistent about the typeset, like how Every Little Thing have named themselves in all-caps, all non-caps, and katakana, all in three different single releases.

I am the type to rename my music files when I find out I've not been capitalizing them correctly, so this is significant. =D Well, getting someone's name correct is a sign of respect (though this guy here does bring up a compelling argument). Capitalization may not be as crucial as spelling (say, when mix-and-matching Patti Smith with Patty Smyth) but in names like hitomi the lack of capitalization is the factor that makes it Furuya-san and not Yaida-san or Shimatani-san, while missed capitals on names like KinKi Kids could push them a step closer to distasteful misspelling (as well as land one in trouble with dedicated fans).

This string of thoughts came about as I was just getting all starry-eyed blissful-eared clickety-fingered watching k.d. lang on YouTube, and trying to put my finger on how she can sing the same song differently every time (a swell here, a shortening there, a few different notes once in a while...) without ruining the original feel of the song. Even when it's a cover, instead of performing it as a musical composition she grasps its story and just tells it, and with that seemingly effortless divine vocal delivery she can surely afford to improvise and still tell it flawlessly.

...Yeah, watch me ramble, but the point is, for someone as accomplished as that, I'd pay really good attention to how she wishes her name to be written! (And here's a pretty entertaining article on the controversy over the miscapitalization.)

But this blog entry would not have been written had I not gotten extra rambling material from the recent realization that one-north (the MRT station where my office is at) is so far the only station with a stylized name... except counting HarbourFront, which would not cause any capitalization dilemma anyway, for example when the station name occurs at the beginning of a sentence.

Now to close this entry, Happy New Year! (And this one I'm pretty sure is meant to be capitalized like that.)

Safe in A Crazy World

I once read someone saying, "Music saved my life." He was in depression for an extended time and had repeatedly considered suicide. I suppose he found an outlet in music -- all I knew was he started composing music in genres that were... not so mainstream. The phase passed, and he seems to be a happy person nowadays.

With a brief Google search I found more such stories. A youngster who grew up in a slum learned to play the guitar and so instead of getting drawn into the neighbourhood gang he became a performer. A student who couldn't do well in any subject at school found her potential and purpose of life in playing music.

I haven't thought of music that way until the past week when I experienced something like that, albeit in a much milder scale. In my case, stress was building up from an assortment of little things: unsettled issues that piled up, small annoyances from people all around... Sometimes I feel the little things are worse, because in addition to these you second-guess yourself why you should be so upset with them when they seem so insignificant, and you chide yourself for being narrow-minded.

So I needed a tranquilizer. I turned on music and sang. And to dramatize a bit, I can say that music saved my sanity at the time.

As a Buddhist, a perhaps better alternative would be silence. But I'm ashamed to say that I've been struggling with meditation, that my mind is still too untamed that it kept slipping back to the noisy thoughts. But drawing a lesson from our former music director, I'd like to think music could be a form of meditation to some.

So while I continue to train this monkey mind, let me just hold on to my music -- the ever reliable companion when I need to be alone.

Noise keeps chasing me no matter where I go
And life likes pretending that it's on a TV show
When it's hard to tell what's real
From what the world just wants to preach
You are the voice I seek

'Cause when I'm wrapped up in your arms
Nothing else can touch me
What a wonderful way to recharge
I feel like I can breathe again

You keep me flying
You keep me smiling
You keep me safe in a crazy world

-- Corrinne May, "Safe in A Crazy World"

In Other Words, A Tropical Winter

つながった
冬の星座

Once again Orion tells me that winter is here,
a kinder sign than the cold that bites my skin.
Ah, winter has come, year by year,
even to this land that has only sun and rain.
And the world churns out songs of snow,
of feelings white that keep you warm;
tunes ringing with the longing you'd know
despite a climate tens of degrees off.

Yes, winter is here,
the season dancing in the sounds,
the season written in the stars;
and with none* of the freezing it still lets me glimpse
icy lands far and foreign,
frosty wonders my eyes have never seen.


* Except for the illusion of it on fingertips and such extremities.

扉

次々に歌を聞き返す
君の脳裏を知っていないけど
君の思想を理解したいから。

曲も詞もちゃんと感じ取る
君の心に入れないけど
君の世界を認めたいから。

Big History: Beautiful Story

I'm sharing this video link in the spirit of "collective learning" as recommended by the speaker of this wonderful talk on the history of the universe. I recommend watching it in full-screen mode (and darkened room if possible) to enhance the experience. =)

David Christian, "Big History" @ TED Talks



If the above streaming is slow, you can also find it on YouTube here.

Teaser snapshots:

Look Smart

Feels like I've grown rather saturated of smartphones without even starting to use one. =P Too much seeing them used in buses and trains and they start to look the same*. With running apps that look the same too (usually messaging or touchscreen games... pardon me for glancing).

* Even those of a certain fruity flavour, as I'm just not a gadget person enough to bother to differentiate at a glance, with those protectors on.

The increase in capability is of course a good thing, but visually speaking, I feel that the older feature phones, with range of models that are more distinguishable, have more of a personality.

But call me biased, as I'm still using a feature phone and liking it (points for it being able to fit unobstrusively in my pocket, and I'm on full-fledged computers almost all the time, anyway); wait til it's time for my mobile plan recontract + handset upgrade and see --- shall I go for looks, or intelligence? ;P


On a related but not exactly relevant topic, here's an interesting article that questions the nurturing of that intelligence (in general terms) where it should foremost be.