The Last Lecture

Dr. Randy Pausch’s The Last Lecture is a pretty good read.  The highlight for me is his description of higher education not as “learning to learn,” which is the accepted cliche, but as “learning to judge yourself.”  In other words, developing your own internal feedback loop so that you know where you stand in life—both in your own mind and as others perceive you.

Some comments I’ve read criticize Dr. Pausch for spending time on a book instead of with his family.  To me that’s unsympathetic:  “acute as well as terminally ill patients frequently prefer to be surrounded by persons and possessions that are familiar” [1].  So why not a familiar task?  After all, here was a hardcore academic who spent his life writing furiously to meet deadlines.  Here, he didn’t have to pretend to be someone else—and he created a lasting legacy for his kids.

Hack’ & ‘Hack

I woke up and scrambled two eggs for breakfast.  I travelled to campus to meet with my friend Lonn, and we played hacky sack for a bit.  By then I was hungry, so we looked for food but all the lineups were too long.  Instead, I bought a granola bar out of a vending machine and we played nethack for *hours*.  I managed to polymorph my dog (via polymorph trap) into a master lich; meanwhile, Lonn found rings of poly-control and polymorph and decided that a master lich was the best thing for him to polymorph into.  I died when an air elemental engulfed and tore my meager 59-hp character to shreds, but Lonn’s is alive and well.  Afterwards, I was so… hungry…

Today my ankle is doing fairly well (hence the hacky sack) but still not completely recovered.  I really want to go back to judo & teh jitz, but not just yet.

Tomorrow I start my Ph.D. studies.  I *still* need to decide on a class to take, but I’m uncertain enough about each of the classes to have to visit each one in turn to make my decision.  I also need to decide on a research topic—my supe is taking several very interesting directions in his research, and experience tells me I’ll benefit by complementing his interests and experience.

Static on the Radio

On Wed June 11 2008 I passed my M.Sc. oral exam. Besides the minor revisions I have to make, this is the end of the road.

It’s getting hard to remember everything that happened, so this is a good time to take stock of the last three years…

Machine Learning Book

Here is a webpage hosting a downloadable version of the book Machine Learning, Neural and Statistical Classification. It’s old (1994) but on first glance seems to be well-organized and written. What’s more, it’s free…

[Edit: Donald Michie (editor) recently passed away.]

Ketchup

Hello, devoted readers! My absence is mostly due to the fact that, for the past few weeks, every day & all day has been spent writing my thesis. It really doesn’t leave me with much of a desire to write here (I don’t know how some people do it!). But today I’m taking it easy, so I thought I’d play some catch up.