From our backyard...

I no longer believe we should maintain troops in Afghanistan. We blew it, Dubya dug too deep a hole and we cannot go back in time.

The cost is too great in a time when we need to refocus on our priorities.

Nonetheless, I still oppose claims from folks like Bill Maher who claim that it is a waste of time to wipe out terrorist training camps in Afghanistan. Yes, these cells exist everywhere (or rather, in many places scattered across the globe), but they are more dangerous when they feel safe and able to operate in the open. To buttress my case, I offer "The Case for Calling them Nitwits."

These guys are often really dumb and they need much more training than they can get from secret cells in Western countries.

Funny 20 minute presentation that explores some of the ways in which it is impossible to take the Bible literally. Everyone picks and chooses what they feel is important.

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Thanks to daddYman for breaking out the camera when Banjo and Buster did some playing. Nice to see Banjo play without attacking.

Over the last weekend, I spent a fantastic weekend with my wife and good friends up at a cabin north of Brainerd in the middle of Minnesota. Between the long drives, waking up earlier than anyone else save Michelle, and a few moments here and there, I got hooked on a fantastic summer read. Geek-readers of the blog will know what a daemon is - a program that runs in the background on a computer that does specific tasks (DAEMON is short for Data & Execution Monitor).

In the mystery-thrilled "Daemon" by Daniel Suarez, a distributed daemon created by a genius geek is unleashed on the world after he dies. The book is gripping and hard to put down, especially for those of us with a strong tech background that can appreciate just how vulnerable we are to such an exploit. I knew Suarez had written a second novel, but I didn't realize that "Freedom" continues (and finishes, I believe) the story. As soon as I got back to the Internetz, I ordered it and hope it arrives by Friday at the latest.

You don't have to be a geek to enjoy it, but it sure is nice to see such a good story filled with accurate claims and realistic tech (for the most part).

For those who missed this when it happened, the story behind what was almost the 21st perfect game in the history of Major League Baseball, is a perfect example of why I am so passionate about sports.

It is a beautiful story of human error, forgiveness, and humility.

I'm not familiar with Clay Shirky, but after this article in Wired, I want to read up on his work. I've heard his name frequently, but this article reminded me of the many many flaws with classical economics - flaws that led me to totally disregard the entire field of economics for many years.

Pink: Which is nonsense. Both of us cite research from University of Rochester psychologist Edward Deci showing that if you give people a contingent reward—as in “if you do this, then you’ll get that”—for something they find interesting, they can become less interested in the task. When Deci took people who enjoyed solving complicated puzzles for fun and began paying them if they did the puzzles, they no longer wanted to play with those puzzles during their free time. And the science is overwhelming that for creative, conceptual tasks, those if-then rewards rarely work and often do harm.

Shirky: You talk about the laws of behavioral physics working differently in practice from what we believe in theory.

Pink: Yes, often these outside motivators can give us less of what we want and more of what we don’t want. Think about that study of Israeli day care centers, which we both write about. When day care centers fined parents for being late to pick up their kids, the result was that more parents ended up coming late. People no longer felt a social obligation to behave well.

The faster we can move beyond outdated ideas of what motivates people to action, the better.

Michelle and I were officially wed on Saturday, June 26. We had an amazing time, thanks to our friends and family. Michelle and Kim's work planning it and creating the decorations really paid off.

I went through the photos that were taken with my cameras (almost all by Perry - thanks!) and posted a few on Flickr for people to enjoy while we do a more serious editing.