My last post talked about bots and bullying. Perrin’s story also talked about how bots affected the democratic process. He mentioned that China was using bots to spread propaganda. This is such a tricky subject. One person’s propaganda is another person’s opinion. Knowing how to discriminate between fact and fiction on the internet is becoming so important. If we swallow whole hog what other’s say, without examining the source and the probability of truth, we are allowing ourselves to be controlled.

There was a time, when people were influenced by those in positions of power to vote according to their desires. If your livelihood was dictated by someone else, they could dictate how you would vote or loose your livelihood. Thus the secret ballot.

The internet poses a similar problem. There are people who have no scruples about sowing disinformation or out right lying to reach their goals. In some cases they think the ends justify the means, but it is for their ends. To make an informed choice you have to have facts, real facts. Sifting fact from fiction is a skill which can be learned and which we must learn if we are to live in a world we want.

I was going to do a post on ants, really. They have been everywhere this year, as have rabbits and skunks. Hmm maybe the skunks are because there are a lot of ants. But that isn’t what I am going to talk about.

The Globe and Mail this morning had an interesting article by Benjamin Perrin –  “I tweeted about Harper. Then the Twitter bots attacked”. The gist of the article is that bots were used to attack him for a tweet, a quite mild tweet, he did. My first reaction is that once more the dark side of the internet had made itself known. But I, trying to be an informed reader, looked up about bots and realised that, as usual with the internet, bots can be both benign and nasty. http://qz.com/572763/the-best-twitter-bots-of-2015/ has a list of twitter bots which sound really interesting and funny. They are so innocuous and yet lighthearted and fun that I am tempted to follow one or two of them. Perrin’s point, though, is well made. There are bots out there which people can use to indiscriminately attack any one, either through personal targeted abuse or based on keywords the user has selected. As with anything, it is the user which makes something bad and can ruin it for others. (This of course is an opportunity to mutter about guns and how stupid it is not to have some control on them because there are people out there who ought not to have them, BUT I would then be digressing).

When Perrin informed Twitter, they reacted appropriately, ‘vapourising the tweets’.  This form of cyber bullying is not just about twitter, or Facebook or Instagram, it will happen wherever people congregate.  Anonymity on the internet makes it easier for the bully to swagger his/her way through someone else’s life. Perrin’s point about the victim of the attack may not be someone who can discern that it is an automated attack and the world is not attacking them, only a few, count 1, nasty person, is important. There have been a few high profile cases of teenage suicide because of cyber bullying. Which means we really need to teach everyone, children and adults, how to be informed, sceptical users of everything internet based. That will make it harder for that nasty underbelly of the internet to be effective, not impossible, just more difficult.

We’ve been away for a few weeks. The middle daughter graduated with a PhD in psychology and my husband,  her youngest sister and me went to the ceremony. Her older sister, unfortunately, had to work (or fortunately as she is employed).  The middle daughter has been attending Swansea University in Wales so we went to Edinburgh before the ceremony. Well, we landed in Edinburgh and then went south. Our intent was to get to Vindalanda and Hadrians Wall. What was supposed to be a 2 hour trip took a day. Not because there was a problem but because we were fluted off the highway to look at a bridge – not just any bridge but 3 bridges one next to the other – a 19th century bridge, a 18th (or it might have been a 17th) century bridge and a 20th century bridge.

A roman fort also was at this spot and there was a bridge across the river at that time as well. There was also a ford near here. There is no need for bridges or fords unless people need to cross. What was here that people wanted? Was it just a way point to someplace else? I look around and all I see are fields. It probably hasn’t changed much since the Romans built an amphitheatre overlooking this river and people are still crossing this river.

Going where? Coming from where?

The more things change, the more they remain the same.

Social media can be confusing since there are so many places one needs a presence. My daughter, Sarah, and I are working on stream lining my presence. As a result, I have gotten rid of one Facebook page and am going to direct everything to another Facebook page which I have renamed. What is amazing is that my snap in app, which updates Facebook with the new blog posting, was updated as well with the new name. I love it when computers talk to each other! Or they talk to much!

My husband came home last night all excited. He had read an article in the Guardian that Gravitational Waves had been discovered. This is, apparently, the last unproved idea from Einstein.

What are gravitational waves you ask? The Globe and Mail had a good analogy. Below is a their explanation from the article:  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/einsteins-gravitational-waves-detected-in-scientific-milestone/article28713410/

Ripples in space

The key to understanding gravitational waves is to forget the idea that gravity is an invisible force of attraction between two massive objects. Instead, picture the space around those objects as curved in a way that causes them to move together.

The curvature of space cannot be seen, but its effects are obvious. Think of a bowling ball sitting on a trampoline. The weight of the bowling ball deforms the stretchy trampoline surface, creating a dip. Put a second bowling ball on the trampoline and the two balls naturally roll toward each other until they touch, forming a bigger dip. Click! That’s gravity in action, with the trampoline representing space.

The gravational wave came from two black holes colliding. Black holes can’t be seen because space curves so badly around them that light can’t escape and if it can’t escape we can’t see it but now it can be heard (it is a wave!).  Their collision which took place 1.3 BILLION years ago was detected. Like a stone in a pond, the wave propagated through space and across time to reach two, not just one but two, listening posts.

“Hmmm,” you say, “but what exactly does that mean to me?”

Good question and I don’t know what it really MEANS. I barely understand it. But as the article says this is as big a deal as when Galileo turned his telescope to the heavens for the first time. Look where we are now and we wouldn’t be there without that craving to understand what is around, above and below us. So I am really excited about where this will lead us – into the unknown and speculative fiction which has been talking about harnessing the power of black holes for years will be all over this.

I ski. My family skis. Consequently, we love winter. It has been depressing until this week when finally, finally! the snow has come. There was a little just before Christmas, but not enough to withstand the warm spell and rain. RAIN – what an awful weather event. Rain in winter is like a cold snap in July. Barely faced with equanimity. But I digress. It has finally cooled off, the snow has fallen and there is hope that my husband and I can get out on our snowboards. Yes, I know I said we ski, but since we live in southern Ontario, skiing is pretty boring.  When we travel more than two hours north of the city we ski (snobs that we are) but when we want fun on the slopes close to home we pull out the snowboards.  The weekend is looking good. Saturday will be a little warm, 0 c, but Sunday appears to be more seasonal at -6 c.

Quoting temperature is all well and good but the problem is that you have to figure out not only what clothing to wear but also what your body is used to. I really like it when the temperature slowly drops through the fall and into winter. You get used to cooler and cooler temperature, adding a scarf here, a sweater there until you have the perfect combination of clothing for the outside temperature. When the temperature goes up too much the body immediately re-acclimatises itself to the warmer temperature and forgets all about the cold and you’re back to square one.

Except that square one is significantly cooler than before.  No easing into the temperature. Nope, the body has betrayed you and it shivers away at 5 c, where before the warm snap it would have been happy at that temperature. Now, the problem is you end up either under dressing or over dressing.  I hate sweating inside a heavy coat and NOT being able to take it off because then all that sweat will freeze!  Undoing it, removing hats, mitts, scarves, just won’t work if the coat is too heavy. Wait, I hate being under dressed. Huddled into the coat, head pulled down like a turtle to keep as much of the warmth in as possible, shoulders sore and stiff from hunching, back sore and stiff from shivering. Hands thrust into pockets, arms tight against the body. All the muscles locked down, but still you shiver. Jaw clamped tight to keep from chattering.  The core has to be kept warm, and the body knows that. You try to relax, to drop your shoulders, ease your jaw but that doesn’t last. The body wrests control from your mind and everything curls in towards the core to keep it warm.

Both are pretty bad, but freezing is worse so, paranoid about being cold, which ruins a day of skiing or boarding, I end up taking everything with me. The car looks like a clothing sale table. Sweaters, scarves, mitts, gloves, even another pair (lighter?, heavier?), of long underwear. Thank goodness for cars. If I had to put all my choices into a bag, I’d never be able to carry it! Then I get there, get out of the car and generally go with what I though was right initially, leaving behind all the extra stuff. I guess, those additions were my security blanket.

But then, as is often quoted in our family, there is no bad weather, only bad clothing choices.