Tag: ethics

Full day of teaching and Lego

After four ethics classes this morning, I took Scully for a walk to the post office, where I had to mail a couple of things, and the to the fish & chip shop for some lunch. I ate at my usual favourite spot, in the small park on the hill overlooking the harbour. The day was sunny and mild, really nice.

They were very generous with the fish today. Normally it’s one fillet piece, but today the pieces were smaller, about half the usual size or a little more. But they didn’t just give me two pieces, they gave me three!

Back at home I spent the rest of the afternoon photographing the next batch of Irregular Webcomic! strips, that I’d written over the weekend. That took almost three hours of effort. By which time my wife was home from work. She took Scully out for a walk while I finished off photographing the last few strips.

Then I made pizza dough for dinner. While that was rising, I assembled a few strips and uploaded them to the server, ready for the first new update of the week tonight. And then it was time to make the pizza, rolling out the dough, topping it with tomato paste, herbs, cheese, and the regular diced pumpkin, walnuts, feta, and some chilli flakes. into a super hot oven and five minutes later it was ready to eat!

Then I had a shower, before two more classes in the evening. In between those I’m writing this. The first evening class has two kids in it who are very talkative. Either one of them I could probably ask one or two questions and they would be happy talking for the remainder of the lesson. But because there are two other kids in the class as well, I have to keep interrupting them to let those kids have a say too.

I’ve also just done my daily Japanese and Italian practice. I’m using Duolingo for Japanese now, and have moved to listening exercises on YouTube for Italian. I just watched a five-minute cake recipe video in Italian and made note of some new vocabulary words, like mescolare (to mix), versare (to pour), stampo (cake mould), impasto (dough), manciata (handful), dattero (date, as in the fruit), and my favourite new word of the day: sbizzarrire (to indulge) and the related sbizzarrirsi (to indulge oneself).

New content today:

More signs of spring

Out walking with Scully at lunch today and the London plane trees are all starting to produce new spring leaves. And wisteria is blooming all over the place. And jasmine.

My wife and I both hate jasmine. We can’t stand the smell of the flowers. But as far as I can tell this doesn’t seem to be a very common thing. I don’t recall ever meeting anyone else, except my mother, who also hated the smell of jasmine. Whenever I tell people this, everyone looks at me like I’m crazy and declares that they love the smell of jasmine.

Anyway, we walked all the way to Cammeray to have lunch at Maggio’s Italian Bakery. I didn’t want to overload on sweets today, so I had two slices of the pizza, a mushroom and a capricciosa. And this afternoon I made a quiche for dinner, so my wife and I could eat our slices separately because I had classes online from 5-8pm.

At Cammeray they’re demolishing a couple of shops next to Maggio’s Cafe (which is a couple of doors down from Maggio’s Bakery, run by the same people). It looks like they might be keeping the old Victorian era front facade on the street and redoing the entire rest of the building behind it.

Oh, and I thought of a cool idea for a future ethics/critical thinking class. I’ll get the kids to do a Turing Test on me, but I won’t tell them if I’m answering as me, or copying their questions into ChatGPT and pasting the results. I’ll prime it first by telling it about the exercise and that it needs to impersonate a human response as best it can. I tried this today and it worked… moderately well, but not great. And then I’ll see if the kids can work out if I’m being human or an “AI”. It should be fairly easy with the right sort of questions. The exercise will be for them to think of the right questions to ask.

New content today:

Making a will

Yep, you heard that title right. Today my wife and I took the important step of starting to draw up wills. We’d been talking about it for a bit, but today we had an initial appointment with a solicitor to go through the details, legal formalities, and so on. We covered what we want to happen if either of us dies, or in the event we both die at the same time (or in quick succession). We also covered powers of attorney and other stuff. The solicitor will draw up drafts based on what we covered and pending any amendments or errors we’ll get to sign them in the next few weeks.

That appointment was in the afternoon. In the morning I wrote up my lesson plan for the new week’s ethics topic, on the subject of “Hospitality”. I did a first class this evening, but it was abbreviated because the only student had to leave early. I’m hoping there are enough questions and subject matter to sustain a full length class. I think it should be okay.

Weather was chilly again today. But should be back up to 29°C in a couple of days. Spring here really isn’t a “warm” season, it’s more like cold and hot days randomly interspersed.

Also today I collated, photographed, and listed on eBay a big pile of Magic: the Gathering cards. All the common cards and basic lands from the 1994 Revised Edition of the game, 4 copies of each, for a total of 360 cards. If anyone reading this is interested, the eBay item is here.

New content today:

Starting mega-engineering

This morning I wrote up the lesson plan for the new week’s ethics classes, on the topic of “Mega-Engineering”. I start with potential technological solutions to climate change, such as large scale carbon capture, stratospheric aerosols, or space mirrors. Then I move on to an existing mega-project: the Three Gorges Dam. And ask about good and bad things about these things. Then go on to speculative future things like arcologies, space elevators, and Dyson spheres.

I had the first class tonight and it went pretty well. It was only one student, and she was returning after a long break. She was surprised that I remembered her!

I took Scully on a longish walk at lunch. I had a sausage roll at The Grumpy Baker. They used to be delicious, but they’ve changed the recipe and now the meat is dry and gristly and rather unpleasant. It’s been this way the last few times I tried one, hoping that it would be back to how they used to be. I think I’ll have to remember to just never buy them again. Very disappointing.

One of the LED light bulbs in the bathroom blew again today. This is the third time in about a year. I think there must be something wrong with the wiring… LED bulbs should last much longer than that as I understand it. The weird thing is: There are two sockets in the oyster light fitting. I install one daylight colour temperature bulb and one warm colour temperature bulb, so we get a pleasant mix of colour temperature. The warm one blew the first two times. Last time I switched the sockets and put the daylight one in the suspect socket. But now it’s the new warm bulb that’s blown again. The daylight one has been fine for like 3 or 4 years. Warm ones keep blowing every few months. Despite swapping sockets. A friend thinks it’s most likely humidity from hot showers getting into the fitting and messing with the voltage step-down circuitry, blowing that before the actual LED itself.

New content today:

Ticking off many tasks

I had several things I wanted/needed to get done today. I started making a Darths & Droids comic, from a script we worked on last night (with my friends online), ready for tomorrow’s update. Then I made Irregular Webcomic! strips for tonight and tomorrow.

With those out of the way, I had some tasks to do for photography standards work. I went through the list of currently open ballots for international standards, recommending voting positions for the Australian committee, and emailing the committee members about those.

Then I had to do some mandatory training exercises for the university, so that they will pay me for the lecturing and tutoring work I’m doing. I had four new courses to complete, about data security, fraud, corruption, and remote working. One course said it took 10 minutes to complete, but it had about 5 or 6 videos to watch, each of them three minutes long! It took me 25 minutes to complete that one. The others had more reasonable time estimates. Overall I spent about an hour and a half on them.

I kind of wonder, has anyone in the world ever done a mandatory training course and then failed the quiz at the end so many times that they actually had to resign or be dismissed because they couldn’t complete the mandatory course?

After that I went through the lecture material for tomorrow’s image processing lecture, to make sure I knew all the work and could explain it to the students. I had to refresh myself on the Canny edge detection algorithm, for about the tenth time in my life. But having to lecture about it to students tomorrow will hopefully mean that I never forget the details of the algorithm again!

This evening I had three ethics classes in a row. We’re having fun discussing Sayings. a friend of mine suggested using some foreign sayings and found a good one in Swedish:

Att glida på en räkmacka.

Translated literally into English, this means:

To slide in on a shrimp sandwich.

I told the kids this and then asked them to guess what the saying meant metaphorically. I got some wildly varied answers, including:

  • To do something dangerous, like sliding on something slippery
  • To be lucky
  • To make something delicious
  • To be lazy, like sliding off your couch
  • To do something ridiculous

My own guess, before I knew the correct answer was “to make an unwelcome appearance”. But it turns out the real meaning in Swedish metaphor is “to succeed without having to work at it”. This is a really fun topic, at least with kids who get into the spirit of it. I had one class where they were all a bit reserved, and nobody wanted to guess in case they got it wrong.

Oh, my wife got to ride the new Metro train today, from the station near her work to the one near our home. A day before I get to try it to go to the university tomorrow!

And the weather today was absolutely gorgeous! We got up to 26°C. I don’t think this winter has any real cold left in it. It’ll be a touch cooler the next few days, but then next week we’re forecast to have a run of 25°C, 28°C, and 26°C. It was so nice going out today without a jumper or jacket on.

New content today:

Ethics of video games

It threatened rain all day today, but I don’t think it ever actually happened. I took Scully for a drive to get pies for lunch and also fill up the car with petrol. I have this petrol price monitoring app and it’s amazing how the price fluctuates over the weeks. Thankfully we don’t drive enough to have to refill weekly, so I can wait a few weeks for the price to come down. The difference can be 30-40 cents a litre these days, if you just wait a couple of weeks for the prices to cycle, which is insane.

I spent much of the day writing a class plan for a topic on Video Games. Some questions:

  • Why do you think video games are so popular among both kids and adults today?
  • Do you think playing video games is any better or worse than traditional hobbies?
  • What do you think about in-game purchases?
  • What do you think about people making a career out of playing video games or esports?
  • Are video games an important part of modern culture? In what ways?
  • Are old video games worth preserving for future generations?

I also planned ahead for future topics in the next few weeks on Mega-Engineering, and Hospitality. Which should be interesting subjects!

New content today:

Sampling the menu at Moon Phase

This morning I worked on a new Darths & Droids comic. I was over a week ahead recently, but have now let the buffer slip back to nothing, so I needed to get one made today.

I had to decide today whether to eat the last falafels in a wrap with tahini, cheese, tomato, lettuce—my usual home lunch—or leave it for tomorrow and go out to get lunch somewhere. I had one day’s lunch supply at home and two days to go until the next grocery shop on Friday morning. I decided to let the Fates decide and used a die rolling bot to choose randomly. It rolled odd, which I’d decided was eat out today. So I took Scully up to Moon Phase to try sampling some more of their menu. I’ve been there maybe 5 times now, and haven’t had the same item more than once. Today I decided to try the “hot dog” pastry—a frankfurt encased in flaky croissant-like pastry, with mustard and some other condiments—and a “kimcheese” pastry.

They warmed them up for me as I waited at one of the small tables outside with Scully. I would have preferred to be indoors because it was bitterly cold and very windy. Both of the pastries were okay. Enjoyable enough, but I think I prefer the other savouries that I’ve had on previous visits.

In the afternoon I sorted out some piles of Magic: the Gathering cards, to try to bring some order to mixtures of sorted and unsorted piles and half-deconstructed decks. I’m consolidating them all into sorted collections so I can see just how many of each card I have before I sell them off in a systematic way.

Tonight I had the first three classes on the new “Empires” topic, from 5-8pm. So I made a quiche for dinner before hand during the afternoon and had one slice before 5, and the second slice after 8. And my wife could eat whenever she was ready, though she chose to eat pretty early. I think this Empires topic is not bad. I was a bit worried about it, if I’d have enough material and if the questions would be ones the kids could relate to well enough or not. But having them pretend to be the Emperor of Rome and presenting them with some governance problems and asking how they’d respond seems to be a good tactic!

New content today:

Thinking about Empires

Today I worked on my lesson plan for the new week’s critical and ethical thinking topic, on “Empires”. I thought this would be a cool topic for a class, since we haven’t done any history related topics for a while, and I like them. But i realised it was a bit tricky to come up with enough relevant questions that are suitable for kids aged as young as 10 years old. I eventually got a plan that I’m happy with, but it took much of the day. Some questions:

  • In the ancient world, what would be the advantages of having a single person rule a land for life?
  • What would be the disadvantages?
  • How would these be different in the modern world?
  • If you were the emperor, what sort of things would you do to ensure peace within your empire?
  • If you became the emperor, would you consider giving territory back to the native people and reducing the size of your empire?
  • If your neighbouring lands were always at war with one another, would it be good to conquer them to reduce the fighting?

Well, this should be interesting!

It was very cold again today, and it threatened some light rain for much of the day, but we barely had a drop.

Last night I finished watching Doctor Sleep, the sequel to The Shining, which I watched for the first time just a few weeks ago. I really enjoyed Doctor Sleep, probably more than the first movie, to be honest. There’s just something about Jack Nicholson which annoys me in almost every role he plays, the main exception being The Joker in Batman.

New content today:

Windy Sunday, prelude to August

Today was cold and very windy. The temperature reached only 14.7°C, and the “feels like” temperature was hovering around 1-2°C for much of the morning. I did brave it to go for a 5k run after lunch, when it had warmed up a little.

We went for a drive earlier, in the late morning, so my wife could have coffee with her family. They sat inside the nice warm cafe while I took Scully a bit further in the car to get pies at Collaroy. I took her to the park nearby to run around a bit while I ate, but it was really cold with the wind near the ocean, so we didn’t stay too long. I saw a greyhound running around, and did laps around the outside of the children’s playground, and it was going really insanely fast.

Back home I worked on some comics and tried to stay warm. I got a very cool message from a student in one of my ethics classes, who had done her first class with me earlier in the week. She’d written a three-page story based on the class and sent it to me! A story about two kids who go fishing for the first time with their grandfather, and wonder about various ethical questions, like what if their grandfather caught too many fish. And at one point one of the kids trips over a tangle of fishing line, and the grandfather complains about some fishers who leave their trash around. It’s a really cute story. And this kid sounds super excited for next week’s class. Which is a good feeling when you’re the teacher.

I’ve also been searching for restaurants in Tokyo, to plan out some of our trip in February. With my wife’s mother and sister coming with us, it will be a bit challenging finding places to eat that fit all the dietary requirements, so I’m starting my research well in advance.

New content today:

Ethics of fishing

Today was gloriously warm for a winter’s day, reaching 23°C. After two classes this morning I took Scully for a walk at lunchtime, the long one around Waverton and the harbour shore. It was beautiful being out in the warmth. But the forecast for the weekend is back to cold again, so winter hasn’t quite lost its grip yet.

I’ve been doing the Fishing topic in my ethics classes for two days now. There are some very interesting comments from some of the students about the topic. Most think the idea of going fishing is boring, spending hours doing nothing but waiting for a fish to bite. One kid said it could be fun because you could spend the whole time playing games on your phone!

Another kid in a class last night was a keen fisher, saying he often went on fishing trips and really enjoyed it. So he was super keen on the topic and gave some very interesting answers compared to some of the other kids with no experience.

One interesting question I ask is about subsistence fishing, the tradition in many cultures of people catching fish not for recreation, but as a primary food source. I ask them if this is a cultural tradition that has value and should be preserved, or if it’s okay that the practice might die out as people transition to developed societies with other food sources. The responses have been extremely varied, from kids saying any cultural tradition is important to preserve, while others say that if you’re having to fish to survive it must be a very impoverished lifestyle and should be changed.

I made a few more comics from the recent batch of Lego photos I took, enough to last this week out. I’ll get to completing the rest of the batch over the weekend, hopefully.

New content today: