Stephan Zielinski: Dwa

These photos are from the San Francisco 2009 Carnaval parade (the 31st,) which took place on 2009 May 24.

2009 Carnaval Parade

130 Photos

(TinyURL for this post:  http://tinyurl.com/m9fa7l .)

The fifth annual Asian Heritage Street Celebration took place on 2009 May 16.

Asian Heritage Street Celebration 2009

9 Photos

(What I was trying to do was find out if the code was familiar with ratios. I started with “Ratio of women to men in San Francisco”; it suggested, as a “Related inputs to try”, the phrase “women to men in San”. When I tried that, it then suggested “women to men”.)

The tenth annual How Weird Street Faire took place on 2009 May 10.

How Weird Street Faire 2009

48 Photos

From Chapter One, “Laying Plans”, of Sun Tzu’s The Art of War:

18. All warfare is based on deception.

19. Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable;
    when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we
    are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away;
    when far away, we must make him believe we are near.

20. Hold out baits to entice the enemy.  Feign disorder,
    and crush him.

For the last ten years or so, the reactionaries– the xenophobic and anti-rationalist segment of the USAen population– have organized under the banner of the the Republican party.  As I type this, the Republicans are now little more than a joke.  I fear many are concluding from this that the reactionaries are thus now little more than a joke.

Listen to Sun Tzu.  A specific political party being reduced to irrelevance is not the same as a movement being reduced to irrelevance– just as one must not conclude from the sight of a platoon in disarray that the army is in disarray.  That the Republican party as such is now apparently comprised of dolts running in circles and bonking into each other should be considered nothing more than a distraction.  The effective reactionaries have not disappeared; they’re just not as inclined to wear a straw hat decorated with an elephant.

45.7% of the votes in the 2008 Presidential election went for McCain and Palin.   These people have not vanished.  We cannot afford a repeat of what happened during the Clinton administration; we must not dismiss the reactionaries as mere clowns no longer relevant to the political process.

I’m all for Schadenfreude– more so than most, perhaps, because I’m not a nice guy.  But the correct reaction to seeing the Republicans thrashing like gaffed tuna is not, “The reactionaries’ organization is broken, hooray”– it is, “Given the Republicans are no longer an effective right-wing organization, where have the reactionaries’ organizers gone, and what are they doing?”

22. If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to
    irritate him.  Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant.

23. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest.
    If his forces are united, separate them.

24. Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where
    you are not expected.

The algorithm used to produce “Swine Flu Hemagglutinin” (PDF, 16K)

Swine flu has been sequenced.  More out of curiosity than anything else, I wrote code to translate a key gene into a piece of ambient music:

“Swine Flu Hemagglutinin” (MP3)

The algorithm I used is a bit complicated, but just in case you’re curious: since the gene is expressed as a surface protein antibodies can sense, it’s considered as a string of amino acids.  Each beat corresponds to one amino acid, and the piece is in 3/4 time, so each six measures would correspond to five turns around the alpha structure.  (I’m weaseling because I haven’t the foggiest idea how the protein actually gets folded.)  Amino acids with side chains that are neither aromatic not aliphatic control the piano and organ: the nine non-hydrophobics the piano, and the four hydrophobics the organ. The three amino acids with aliphatic side chains control the low synthesizer, while the four with aromatics control the percussion.  

ש

Update 2009-04-30: For folks coming in from the cnn.com article Making music out of swine flu and wondering about the line, “Zielinski saw it as a form of highly organized information that a human did not design.”: Yes, that phrasing raises the question of who or what I think DID design it. (God? Aliens?) In reality, self-organizing systems evince great complexity without need for a conscious designer. Swine flu was not designed at all– it evolved.

Strictly speaking, this is a version of swine flu hemagglutinin, FJ966952. The actual amino acid sequence:

MKAILVVMLYTFATANADTLCIGYHANNSTDTVDTVLEKNVTVTHSVNLLEDKHNGKLCK
LRGVAPLHLGKCNIAGWILGNPECESLSTASSWSYIVETSSSDNGTCYPGDFIDYEELRE
QLSSVSSFERFEIFPKTSSWPNHDSNKGVTAACPHAGAKSFYKNLIWLVKKGNSYPKLSK
SYINDKGKEVLVLWGIHHPSTSADQQSLYQNADAYVFVGSSRYSKKFKPEIAIRPKVRDQ
EGRMNYYWTLVEPGDKITFEATGNLVVPRYAFAMERNAGSGIIISDTPVHDCNTTCQTPK
GAINTSLPFQNIHPITIGKCPKYVKSTKLRLATGLRNVPSIQSRGLFGAIAGFIEGGWTG
MVDGWYGYHHQNEQGSGYAADLKSTQNAIDEITNKVNSVIEKMNTQFTAVGKEFNHLEKR
IENLNKKVDDGFLDIWTYNAELLVLLENERTLDYHDSNVKNLYEKVRSQLKNNAKEIGNG
CFEFYHKCDNTCMESVKNGTYDYPKYSEEAKLNREEIDGVKLESTRIYQILAIYSTVASS
LVLVVSLGAISFWMCSNGSLQCRICI

Maggie Koerth-Baker’s excellent article from 2009 April 28, “Swine Flu Q&A”, is available here:
Maggie Koerth-Baker, “Swine Flu Q&A”, at boingboing.net

This year’s first Sunday Streets San Francisco took place on 2009 April 26.

Sunday Streets San Francisco (2009 April 26)

14 Photos

The 2009 Cherry Blossom Festival Grand Parade took place on 2009 April 19.

2009 Cherry Blossom Festival Grand Parade

68 Photos

All of these are from 2009 April 18. 

2009 Cherry Blossom Festival Street Fair

12 Photos