Sonic Route 44 Lemon Berry Slush

It is 77 Fahrenheit. It is hot. It is sunny. It is Spring. You haven't seen the sun in months at this intensity. Your tongue is dry. Your throat is dry. You are driving. Where do you go? What do you do about your life problems?

YOU GO GET A ROUTE 44 LEMON BERRY SLUSH FROM THE SONIC ON NEIL ST, THAT'S WHAT YOU DO!!!!! DO IT!!!

Courier Breakfast

Ahhh, the smell of pancakes, coffee, omelettes, and bacon in the morning. And to have it in an old fashion place that seems to have some sense of history soaked into its seats. This is a winner here in terms of identity and character. Home-grown, no franchise, Champaign-Urbana place to eat. Breakfasts are great. I had the steak and omelette, there's other great stuff of course!

Check out the movie here [movie].

Check their website out too:
http://www.couriersilvercreek.com/couriercafe/

Texas Roadhouse, Champaign, IL

Standard Texas steak dinner here. They throw their peanut shells on the floor. Quite a busy place, very popular. Food is not bad. Not gourmet, but think of it as upper-class comfort meat food place. What was fun though, was the peanut shells and the noisy crowd. And they celebrate birthdays there by making the birthday person sit on a horse saddle, and yell out their name, and shout "Yee Ha!" They also do this quirky looking dance. Oh, and although they are Texas Roadhouse, they originated in Indiana. Check out the movie here [movie].

Crash!

It happened again! This is the second time I have witness a truck crashing into the train bridge across Springfield Ave. The first time was when we were walking along Springfield on the way home. And then, BAM! This truck's container hits the bridge because it was to low. That truck ended up stuck underneath because it was going fast enough so that the momentum got it through a little under the bridge. But then it was unable to move forward or backward anymore.

This one happened before we got there. But again, we were walking to work when we say this truck there. When will they ever learn? Is the signage of the bridge height inaccurate? Do truck drivers not know the height of their trucks? Do truck drivers not believe in the laws of physics? Are train bridges invisible to truck drivers? Is there a gravitational singularity in the Springfield train bridge that draws large bodies such as trucks to itself uncontrollably?

Stay tuned next time, when we find out the answers to...The Mystery of the Crashing Trucks

SPRING 2007!

It took a while lah. At first the weather turn hot, then it suddenly snow again. But now it look like it is here to stay lor. The flower all come out again. This shot is of a tree outside my apartment. The flower bloom white one. Quite the very impressive lah. More thing happening now.

Feedback about recent heated Intelligent Design debate

Here are some recent articles in CNN about the science and intelligent design debate. The first article [download] considers a scientists reasons for why he believes in God as a scientist. The second article [download] talks about the possibility that religion is simply a matter of evolutionary necessity.

Recently, this author has heard about some incidences which reflected a bias of non-religious scientists who think that religious people do not consider what the evidence is suggesting. This comment arose out of a scientific discussion on how our personal beliefs do affect the way we interpret objective data.

I think I will have to comment on this as I feel that the discussion has a very crucial point, and the remark made by non-religious scientists may not be a fair one. Firstly, I do not think that the discussion point was wrong. In fact, I agree with it. Beliefs most certainly bias our interpretation of the world, and of reality. In fact, that is fundamentally what belief is. It is attributing meaning and cause to what we see around us. In this sense, the idea that belief is a psychological state innate in human beings (since we do not seem to see animals that have beliefs) out of evolutionary necessity. One theory is that if we do not have something to believe in, human beings would not function, we would in fact go crazy. Thus, to resolve this state, we developed religion.

This might be true, it might not. Scientifically, we cannot prove that it does not exist. No science can prove that anything does not exist. I think scientists have to conceed to this. This author is a scientist too, and I think there is no reasonable argument to suggest that science can ever get past this problem of proving non-existence, at least with current empirical methods. Similarly, science cannot prove the non-existence of God.

But back to religion as an evolutionary outcome. If in fact this is true, it says nothing about whether God is real. Just because we think our ideas of God are a result of our neurons firing, which are a result of our DNA "directing" our neurons to wire in a certain way, that results in this "feeling" or state of thinking there is a God, these do not have bearing on whether God exists or not. If God exists, he exists whether I think he does or not, he exists whether my thoughts about his existence arise out of a reflection of truth or if they arise due to pure chance.

That being said, religious people, specifically Christians, do not necessarily disagree with the existence of evolution. In theory, God could implement evolution as his way things should work? Is it not also a theory that he did not? What I mean is, these are theories, not facts. And science has yet to show that it can prove that evolution = no God.

So, in sum, we all belief something. For the non-religious scientist, it is simply that they believe that all they can observe has no intelligent cause. For the religious scientist, we also need to look at the objective evidence that there is intelligent cause for everything we see. No one is spared this burden. And surely, which side we are on, will bias the way we see thing. The point is not to say the other side believes what they do because they are not objective. The point is to recognize how we ourselves are biased, and how others might have different biases, and consider the data together.

If God exists, then the data will show it, if indeed this method can show it. If he does not, then the data will show it too, if this method permits, however, we know that this method cannot show that something does not exist. So perhaps we should be thinking if there is ever any way to show that something does not exist?

Binding and Bandwidth

This is an idea about what might happen if different types of information were attended to. Consider this thought experiment:

There is an item A, and another item B. A and B both contain sub-features A1...An, B1...Bn. When we attend to A or B, we are in fact binding A1...An, and/or B1...Bn, to represent A, B.

Now, we have limited bandwidth. Which means, we can only process a limited amount of information at any one time. Consider for the moment that we can only process 4 bits of information. So, if we attend to A, we only process A1-A4, and if we process B, we process B1-B4. We could, by way of divided attention, process A1,A2,B1,B4. Assuming that there is minimal cost in having to dissociate between two different groupings of features (which is rarely the case, but lets just assume that this is possible for argument's sake). This also means, we do not process the other information about the other features that are present.

Now, consider another type of processing, or rather, another level. If in fact we process something called A-B. That is, we bring the binding function up from the item level of A and B, to a higher representation that binds both A-B. What would this result in terms of the amount of information we can process at a time?

This is now only 1 bit of information. We would have more capacity left over (3 bits) from our initial 4 bits. Furthermore, within the 1 bit, we might be able to reinstate the original A1-A4, and B1-B4 via past experience. However, we will suffer from interference in this case, since we did not explicitly process A1-A4 or B1-B4, but rather A-B. Thus, there should be a cost of attending to this higher level at the expense of the lower levels. Likewise, there is a cost of attending to the lower levels at the expense of the higher levels. This is also known in the literature as chunking.

Thus, in summary is that the level of binding should be inversely related to the bandwidth, or the amount of information we can process at any one time.

Unsupervised Learning

Here's an R code that implements unsupervised learning.

vdmulearning.R

Here's the code to display the hexagonal outputs you see in this page.

vdmhexplot.R

This is a specific instance of an unsupervised learning network used by Von Der Malsburg, hence VDM. He was interested in getting the network to exhibit similar behavior to what is observed about the human primary visual cortex. In humans, the primary visual neurons are organized in a columnar fashion according to their sensitivity and selectivity to visual line orientations. That is, each neuron in the primary visual cortex is maximally active for a specific orientation of lines that it receives visual signals from in the environmental space. Furthermore, these neurons are grouped together such that adjacent neurons are each sensitive to close orientations.



This R code implements the VDM network specifically using the following line orientation stimuli. The stimuli consist of 19 input units selectively made active (1 or 0) to give rise to "orientation". In fact, the input stimuli is realized in R as a matrix of 1s and 0s in the right positions.





At first, the network outputs a roughly clustered pattern of activity to a particular orientation (bottom left). But after several training iterations (about 100 cycles, which is quite fast!), it displays columnar organization (bottom right).













Interesting directions to pursue from this code are: object-level representation, color, moving stimuli, 3D representation, binding, repetition suppression.

Here's my paper which describes the model in greater detail [VDM.pdf].

Perceptron Neural Network: Backpropagation

Here's an R [http://www.r-project.org/] implementation of a backpropagation network.

trainnet_perceptron.R
testnet_perceptron.R

The network learns by propagating the input activity to the output layer, then comparing the resulting output with desired outputs. The difference is computed as an error which is backpropagated to the lower layers to effect a weight change that will reduce this error magnitude.

The network is then tested with original or distorted inputs. In general, this network can compute input-output mappings effectively (within network limits which are a function of the number of bits of information required to distinguish inputs, and the number of hidden layers and units). However, it is poor at generalization and distorted inputs compared to the Hopfield network.

Check out my paper that explains in greater detail [Backprop paper].
Also check out this website http://www.gregalo.com/neuralnets.html

Hopfield Neural Network

Here's an R [http://www.r-project.org/] implementation of the Hopfield, auto-associative network.

trainnet_hopfield.R
testnet_hopfield.R

Here's an brief on how it works. Every unit in the network is connected to every other unit (see weight matrix configuration in figure). Input patterns are used to trained the network using Hebbian learning. The network learns by additively changing its weights to reflect instances of unit co-activation. Unit dissimilarities and inactivations are ignored.

The network is then tested on original or distorted inputs, and it will robustly return one of the original trained inputs (within limits).

Check out my paper that explains in greater detail [Hopfield paper].
Also check out this website http://www.gregalo.com/neuralnets.html

Parko Beero!

The blind pig. Here lor. Even though hor, its Spring break lah. This is a one week holiday. So we all supposed to be relax lor. But then suddenly got so many works to do. Is very siao one. Suddenly is Thursday already. The whole like disappeared like that. I dunno why. So I say lah, we all go Blind Pig to have a beer to relax. How can not relax? Is Sprint break mah! So the lab came. Fun fun. I had two beers, one is call er...dunno what, an India pale ale (7.2%), and the other is the famous Delirium Tremens (8%). Blind Pig very good lah. I think so is my favorite pub in Champaign. Got character. Feel like an old English pub. Got one of the most selection of beers in town. You even got beer you dunno inside got what. Anyway, we talk talk talk, and then we go home. At least got relax a little bit lah.

Soba Tempura

This is a set meal consisting of cold soba noodles, vegetarian tempura, and miso soup. I will be explaining how to make this as a set, rather than as individual portions, so the descriptions will overlap as I found this the best way to save time and hassle while making the meal. It is worth it though. Really really good!

Ingredients
For soba:
Soba
Soba sauce
White radish

For miso soup:
Spring Onions
Silk Tofu
Miso
Fish stock (dashi)
Dried seaweed (kombu)


For tempura:
White onion
Carrots
Shiitake mushroom
Anything else you want to fry
Flour
Oil
White radish
Sesame oil
Soy sauce
Fish stock

Method: Initial preparation
Batter
Place a bowl of flour into the freezer, this is to make the batter, and it is lighter cold. While waiting, prepare the soba.

Soba
Boil the soba noodles until soft. Drain the noodles and rinse with cold water to stop the cooking. Place the noodles on ice cubes in a bowl and put in the freezer. Prepare the tempura pieces.

Tempura
Slice the onions, carrots, mushrooms and others into bite size pieces.

Method: Ready for the frying
Prepare the batter. Take the cold flour out and set aside a small portion on a flat surface, this is the coating flour. Take the rest and pour water to mix in small amounts while stirring. Add and mix only enough water so that you get a sticky mixture with some lumps in it, this is the dipping batter.

Heat up enough oil so that the tempura pieces can float in the fry. Heat the oil hot enough by testing it with some of the dipping batter. Throw some in and if it floats, then the oil is ready.

Take one tempura piece and coat it in the dry coating flour, then dip it into the dipping batter. Make sure it is well covered. Fry the tempura in the oil for about one minute, constantly turning and watching. The tempura is done when it becomes relatively stiff and floating freely in the oil. Remove it and drain the oil on a napkin. Prepare the miso soup.

Method: Miso soup
To make the miso soup, prepare the fish stock by either dissolving some pre-made fish stock or powdered dashi. Boil the stock. While waiting for the boil, prepare the seaweed by soaking bits of it in cold water. Cut the spring onion into small pieces for soup, and the tofu into small cubes. Dissolve the a spoonful of miso into one cup of cold water. Once the stock is boiling, add the miso mix under low heat. Add the seaweed and cubed tofu and let the soup warm under low heat. Do not over boil miso soup, it will taste bad. Serve the miso soup with the chopped spring onions.

Method: Sauces
Soba sauce
Shred some white radish and chop some spring onions. Pour some soba sauce in dipping bowl and add the spring onions and the shredded white radish. The soba sauce is ready. You can add wasabi and raw egg in it if desired.

Tempura sauce
Prepare the tempura sauce. Mix the soy sauce, a little sesame oil, the fish stock, and boil the mixture. Add shredded white radish. Serve in another dipping bowl.

Method: Serving
Take the soba out from the freezer. Serve the soba on ice cubes, the tempura pieces on a plate, the miso soup, and the soba and tempura dipping sauces. Recommended to serve with a cup of green tea or roasted tea (hoji-cha).

Enjoy your meal!

Lake of the Woods

This is a park about 15 min drive away from Champaign-Urbana. Not bad lah. A little small, but got lake. As you can see, its all frozen over, can walk and skate on it if you want...good for Sunday afternoon picnic.

Science and Intelligent Design I

One debate that is current is that of the existence of Intelligent Design. There are two basic camps. On one side, people believe in a God who started it all. On the other, people claim that there is no such thing, and things are simply the expression of physical laws that govern space and time. People from both camps can get quite heated and emotional argueing for each case. But I don't see why they should. When dealing with this matter, it is of utmost importance that one keep personal emotions and preferences and predispositions out of the arguments. One MUST sit down and cooly think through with reason the merits and pitfalls of either accounts of life as we know it.

I prefer to think of this matter in this way. First, how can we think about things or argue about the matter at hand? Here, we have to assume one thing. That anything which considers anything, and anything which communicates anything, must do so within the boundaries of logic. That is, if my opponent were to form conclusions from what I say that did not follow from prior premises, then there is no way to proceed, because the arguments would be arbitrary. Anything goes, and therefore there is no argument, no final goal for a truth. So, we must debate this within the confines of logic, or insofar as it is necessary, inference.

Second, are things real? Or is everything we experience part of a dream, or non-substantial, and thus inconsequential? Descarte had a brilliant answer. Cogito ergo sum. I think therefore I am. He approached the problem by doubting everything. But in the end, he realized that no matter how hard he tried, there was one inescapable truth (yes, there is apparently such a thing), that he could not doubt that he was doubting. It was impossible to think of such a state since to doubt that one was doubting, one would in fact be doubting, and end up concluding that if anything ever existed, it would be doubt. And to doubt, is to think, and to think, requires a thinker. Hence, cogito ergo sum. So, the thinker exists. And if a thinker exists, something exists.

More to come...

Catfish Creation

Ingredients
Catfish fillets
Broccoli
Potatoes
Carrots
Thyme
Parsley
Mustard seeds (black)
Olive oil
Chilli powder
Gin
Lemon
Salt
Pepper
Portabella Mushroom
Milk

Method
Season the catfish in a stock of gin, lemon, chilli powder (just a little), salt and pepper. Let the mix set in the fridge for about an hour or so. In the meantime, cut up the broccoli into bite size pieces, the potatoes and carrots as well, and the mushroom. Boil the broccoli, carrots and potatoes. Once well cooked, remove and set aside the broccoli, seasoning it with salt and pepper. Place the boiled carrots and potatoes in a mixing bowl. Season with salt, pepper and add some milk, and mash the mixture.

Heat some olive oil in a pan, and some mustard seeds. Lightly fry the mushrooms for just a little while, then remove them and set aside. Next, lightly saute the catfish in the olive oil, mustard seed mix, with the seasoning sauce as well. Let the mixture simmer over medium fire for about 10-15 min.

Arrange the broccoli, mash, mushrooms and fish on the plates. Pour the sauce over the fish. Serve with White Zinfandel (chilled).

Blizzardy Evening

Storm finish. From top left to bottom right: Snow pile in Beckman Circle lot, Walkway lit by lamps in Beckman Circle lot, Charlene's car stuck, my car stuck, block of snow, bigger block of snow!

Lots of cleaning up, but even today, there's another snowfall, another 2-3 inches. But its not as bad as the previous one. Here's a video report of the day.

Post Blizzard Desert

So, let's start from the very beginning. It was a dark and stormy day. The wind was blowing at about 40 mph, snow was beating down of the roofs. Schools were closed, the University was closed. The University! That which has never closed in 30 years finally fell prey to yukimon! Everyone stayed at home and peered their eyes out the window to see whiteness falling and falling, growing, wafting, blowing, twisting, and they sipped their hot chocolates and tea.

The next morning brought better news. Sunlight. Something we haven't seen in a day. In all its glory. But it shines through the aftermath, through my kitchen window. Yet, the warmth is welcome as I have my coffee.



Of to the lab then! Stepping out, we are greeted with what appears to be last nights deposits. People will have to dig their way out of this one.





And yes, its about a foot of snow, but in some places it comes up to your waist. That's me in the middle, see where the snow stops. There's another view.










Onward still! Charlene's feet are in a foot. The cars are all under, and I had to dig my car out of its icy prison.



















Finally, we arrive at the Beckman again, it is still standing. This monolith, impervious to yukimon. Impervious I say.










So coming into the Beckman, we hang around and work a little, then we go for coffee. Here are some shots taken while on coffee break. And then eventually head back for the classic approaching Beckman shot again.

Blizzard!!!!

According to wikipedia, a blizzard ain't a blizzard until:
1. There is snow or ice precipitation
2. Visibility must be reduced to 1/4 mile (400 km)
3. Wind speed must be at least 35 mph (56 kph)

Here's footage of a blizzard happening outside my door right now. [blizzard movie]

UIUC never closes because of snow, but today, classes are canceled and movement is down to almost nil. The snow ploughs are working over time and the snow just keeps coming and coming...estimated about a foot or more of snow by the end of today.

Joseph's life as an example of Christ

I just discovered for myself this amazing message in the story of Joseph. Joseph was most favored, and also was "worshiped" by his brothers and father in his dreams. Joseph was then betrayed by his brothers and sold into slavery in Egypt. Just as Jesus was crucified at the hands of men, His brothers, and took on our sins, and also became limited from His divinity during His time on earth, a sort of Egypt. While Egypt is rich and has comforts and wonders, it is temporary and it worships false gods. That is, they stop short of the ultimate reality. The true God. Instead, they attribute the wonders they see to half-way icons, idols. Just like here on earth. That is what we do.

But Joseph, even though he was in Egypt, he prospered it. He established it. In fact, if you read carefully, it was Joseph who brought Egypt and Canaan under Pharoah's control, and its seemed as if Pharaoh and the other Egyptians weren't doing much at all. It seemed that Joseph brought the lands and servants under Pharoah using economic superiority and also established a 20% tax system (the first national tax ever with priests exempt? at least the first mentioned in the bible - Moses might have later taken this up in the 10% tithe to God, and the Levite concept). We think we do great things on earth. Might it be that it is the Creator of the earth that actually knows how it really works that does these great things for us?

And later, Joseph is instrumental in saving his brothers and father from the famine as he is revealed to them, and also in sharing all that he has in Egypt (the world) with them. How he was once dead but is alive again! And more than alive, he brings his family with him into prosperity. In return, they are to take care of livestock, use their skill to prosper Egypt in kind. Sound familiar? It sounds like Christians, being blessed to bless in return, being saved by Christ in a "foreign land".

Note though, that there is a sense that Egypt is not the final destination for Israel. There is an even greater finality. And that is played out in layers upon layers, cycle upon cycles of biblical records. Moses, David, Judges, prophets, Abraham, Isaac, Joshua amongst others and finally the ultimate reality all these are pointing to - Jesus. Note also that this story of Joseph was probably written by Moses. And he probably had access to some historical records in Egypt to investigate how things turned out they way they did at that time. In faith then, he wrote this down, and we now have the benefit of the the revelation of Jesus to see how when Moses wrote this down, it was truly the Holy Spirit writing in him to tell us of Jesus that is to come. Who He is and what He does. Also, we see how God uses human knowledge to reveal a little of His plans to us. And even more so, we see how those who did not yet have a change to know Jesus at that time, since He had not come yet, could still hope in God through these themes of God's deliverance, and that is credited to them as righteousness through their faith and His faithfulness.

John 3:1-21

Nicodemus, Pharisee, ruler of the Jews...

This event occured while Jesus was in Jerusalem, after He has cleared the temple. Nicodemus' question shows that he has been considering Jesus for quite some time, along with others. And this reflects a certain contemporary thought at the time: that the Jews were expecting the Messiah to come and deliver. Jesus seemed to be a suspected candidate, but the things He did did not square with a lot of their conceptions about what Messiah would be like. And there, they were tripped up in all their thinking, even as Pharisees.

Note how Jesus begins the conversation. It has nothing to do with Nicodemus' statement. But Jesus knows his heart even before his mouth spoke and started the conversation immediately on what is important for Pharisees to know: the idea of being born again, to be saved.

"The wind blows where it wishes..."

Somethings happen, we experience it, and we believe that it is there. The wind. And we do not question it. How is it that we cannot bring that same faith into spiritual matters? That is the point in Jesus' declaration here about being born in the spirit. To be born again means to be born in of water and the spirit. Baptism? This is linked with John the author's references to baptisms before and after this passage.

"We know and testify what We have seen..."

Simply this, the only way to really know, is to believe the testimony of the one to whom true knowledge is found. We can try to increase knowledge through observing for our own, to believe only when we see things or experience things. But how often, even though the truth is before our very eyes, we still refuse to believe, but choose to explain it away by other "theories" or worse, ignore it. So then, perhaps this is something to consider with respect to philosophy of knowledge, perhaps the only true knowledge can only be obtained by faith in another. And this Another is the ultimate Another, who has seen what is the truth. So we can rest assured in His testimony.

"For God so loved the world..."

The famous verse. The only hope we have. Note, how we cannot do anything to have everlasting life other than to believe. And how this all stems from one point only. God's love. Love that saves, but also, love for which the rejection of is unimagineable.

Jesus' pleads here are entirely logical and reasonable. He who does truth comes to the light. Why then do people still not believe in the One? Choosing other alternatives? If they truly do what is true? What is their thinking and answer to Christ's words here?