My name is
David Robins:
Christian, lead developer (resume), writer, photographer, runner,
libertarian (voluntaryist),
and student.
This is also my son David Geoffrey Robins' site.
FNH SCAR-H (17S) finally secured!
News, Guns ·Saturday March 19, 2011 @ 22:27 EDT (link)
Picked it up today. Shooting it real soon. That is all.
Well, most. I should mention that I bought the firearm through GunBroker, from seller JERRYS GUNS (Turner's Gun Shop in Sidney, Ohio); he was quick to answer questions, everything was as specified; he gave me a tracking number for the package, and it arrived in good time. Thoroughly good experience; would buy from him again; recommend (A+ feedback).
Books finished: Rollback.
Master's degree requirements completed
News, School, Economics ·Friday March 18, 2011 @ 22:26 EDT (link)
Last presentation Friday night, for Cryptography - random ordering, 6th of 12, behind another person not on "the list" who as it happened had the same topic, Bitcoins. Think it went reasonably well; not much over the five minutes; answered questions. One I think I could have answered better in hindsight; but I don't blame myself for not apprehending it immediately. The question was about deflation—causing it—in a Bitcoin system (by recalling coins), presumably after inflation, which really can't happen, given the fixed maximum number of coins (21 million) and (controlled) steady rate of generation (300/hour). Naturally I answered that inflation or deflation (a flood or dearth of coins chasing the same amount of goods), if it were possible, is fixed by the market's price mechanism. But I use inflation and deflation in the economic sense, that is, an increase or decrease in the money supply. The layman sees inflation (deflation) as an increase (decrease) in prices: however this is actually an effect of inflation. But even if the question was more correctly, "How would the Bitcoin system handle rapidly falling (rising) prices?" the answer would be that it would do nothing. First, there is no central controller able to do anything in any case. Second, prices are a market feature, used to convey information about relative scarcity and so forth, and meddling in them is unwarranted and inimical. So, questioner, if you're out there, I hope you find this and this better answers your question.
It is a sigh of relief to be finished. Graduation is Saturday June 11 at Husky Stadium; my parents are coming to town for it. Relief. Won't miss being out late on class evenings or poring over homework, either. Feel bad about this last class: the grader was borderline incompetent and the profs, although I went through the system of appealing first to the grader, and then sent an appeal request to them, and then they asked I resend it and promised in class to give it attention, continued to ignore it. So I felt cheated and hoped the class doesn't hurt my GPA. But in the end, they re-graded everything, so I guess they agreed about the grader.
But it's great to be done. I don't know how or if I can leverage it in my present job, but it may be useful in the future (the Master's is the new Bachelor's, don't you know?) It's an accomplishment; I have an excellent GPA; no debt; I wish I knew more profs to write me a recommendation if I want to do a doctorate, but I'll worry about that when I get there.
For now, it feels good to be done.
Hanging with Matt
News, Political, Guns ·Wednesday March 16, 2011 @ 01:48 EDT (link)
Matt E. let us (the libertarian/voluntaryist/Austrian economist cadre of various DLs such as CLAMS) know he'd be in town (he works out of Microsoft's Fargo, ND office) and so we arranged to have dinner at Rock Bottom in Bellevue at 1830; we arrived a little late due to traffic, but so did Matt (we weren't sure about anyone else; it turned out nobody else could make it—middle of the week is tough, but we did try to plan things earlier and Matt let us know well in advance when he was going to be in town). He had his Murray N. Rothbard, Enemy of the State T-shirt on (first time I'd seen one; would be nice to get one sometime). The three of us ate and talked politics and Microsoft and Fargo and such. I had their pulled pork sandwich which was good.
After eating we headed over to West Coast Armory's Bellevue range to shoot—just handguns this time; we got there at around 2030 and Matt had to sign in since it was his first time there; we finished pretty close to closing time (2100).
We headed back to our place for coffee, Guitar Hero (Honey and Matt played, it's not my game), and more politics. Matt left around 0130; I believe a good time was had by all. It was great to actually meet in person after all the DL and Facebook discussions.
Books finished: Stone of Tears.
100% of Irish nationals surveyed agree my AR is better than Max's
News, Guns ·Sunday March 13, 2011 @ 16:06 EDT (link)
We were promised food, but no food was provided.
Let me start from the beginning. We were promised food. Did I mention that? Max wanted to take his Irish soon to be brother-in-law Ed (hope I got that right) who had to leave the country soon to an outdoor range where he could shoot rifles, so he asked a few of us that were members at SVRC if we could take him and Ed there as guests, and in thanks he'd provide food—mouthwatering pork cooked to perfection with several kinds of sauce. Garrett and I agreed to go shoot that weekend, at noon; I showed up at perhaps 1205 and Max and Ed were already there; Tony arrived a little after I did, Garrett maybe half an hour later. But there was to be no food: Max's sous vide blew up, or something. :(
But I did get to shoot Max's baby, his Steyr Scout, as did others; and there are pictures. Garrett showed up with his arsenal and Tony brought a few fun toys too, like a Beretta CX4 Storm carbine; and we were hitting the metal targets at the back of the range (200 yards, supposedly, although I've heard it may only be 178) quite consistently. We had a couple spotting scopes up, and I think this was the first time I had my Caldwell Rock shooting rest out.
Regarding the AR, Ed liked my red-dot scope and magnifier better but Max's Magpul stock made his better for felt recoil.
I left around 1430; there was some talk of going to eat afterward, but I don't think it went anywhere. Nice to meet Ed, and Tony (first time in person); I'd met Max before at a group buy at Surplus Ammo. We should do this sort of thing more often.
First Action Pistol shoot
News, Guns ·Saturday March 12, 2011 @ 14:12 EST (link)
I just got back from my first action pistol shoot at SVRC—first in which I participated, that is. Honey came to observe this time. We got there around 1030, and just got home a few minutes ago (1400). The weather was pretty miserable—constant drizzle—which may be why they set up four stages (one with two different courses) by the rifle range firing line instead of downrange at the sides and far end. I'd loaded mags the night before—five standard Glock mags and a 33-round mag (which I learned wasn't eligible, but hadn't expected it to be; I was loading it for another outing). The most mags needed for a course was four (three mandatory reloads), and there was plenty of time to reload between.
When we arrived they had started shooting, but I was by no means late: they put me into the (larger) "new shooter" group and most hadn't gone through the first stage yet. I had had the safety instruction at a previous event when I didn't shoot, so was good to go. Seemed like most targets were about 10 yards out, and I'd been practicing (with the Glock 34 that I used) at 15, so it wasn't too difficult; not many misses. I need to work on points on the paper targets (too many out of the A-zone) and speed, which I'll do at future events. Had fun, will definitely be back.
Seattle Geek Shootout
News, Guns ·Wednesday March 9, 2011 @ 20:27 EST (link)
We went to an event called the "Seattle Geek Shootout" (Facebook event), #3 in a series (our first attendance) on Wednesday at West Coast Armory. It was listed as 6-9pm but didn't start until 6:30. The group—which only ended up being 10-12 people (some there were joking about "event math" and the "Seattle flake factor", which leads to 30-some FB "Yes"es and the same number of Maybes becoming 10-12)—had booked the LE ("Law Enforcement", #3) bay, and the previous group in the LE bay went long. Worries about crowding were completely unwarranted. They put up 5 rectangular tables across the bay 10 yards from the target line, and clipped a bunch of those big zombie targets on a string. The tables were the firing line. There was some brief instruction and then people were shooting, with the folks from GunUp providing one-on-one help for newbs that had rented guns. I wanted to take a look at my first target when they changed them (after someone shot the string) but I wasn't fast enough; they threw out the pile pretty quick.
We left around 7:30—were about shot out, didn't really know anyone (except Mitchell—nice to meet in person), and I didn't see the point. It was more of an "introduce newbs to shooting" event: people blasting away at a bunch of zombie targets with more concern about making noise than accuracy. We left after about an hour of shooting even though the event was scheduled longer. It was nice to have some free zombie targets and shoot our XDMs again (second range trip!), and the .22, but it wasn't nearly as good as shooting with a bunch of MSGun people at a pit, or even working on skill improvement on my own. I appreciated the effort the GunUp and WCA folk went to setting it up, for sure; I guess we just weren't the intended audience. The group was going to eat afterward; we went out to Subway instead on the way home.
Books finished: Spearwielder's Tale.
Additions to the family
News, Guns ·Sunday February 27, 2011 @ 12:02 EST (link)
This weekend we drove down to Puyallup to go to the WAC gun show, with the aim of getting a carry gun for Honey (who just paid the state's shakedown fee and got her non-infringement permit), and possibly one for me too. We ended up getting her a Springfield Armory XDM-9 3.8 (compact), black, and me a standard XDM-9, black slide, OD ("Olive Drab") green receiver. We also got her a concealed carry purse (Rama Leather). We picked up Honey's gun at the gun show, and mine and her purse at a store called Welcher's Gun Shop in Tacoma: since we were going all the way to Puyallup, I found a few other gun stores nearby, some recommended on The High Road, some I knew already. It was the first time we'd stopped in at Welcher's, and The Marksman; we also stopped at Federal Way Discount Guns and Surplus Ammo and Arms (bought 500 rounds of Wolf since I just ran out).
Guns for Honey
News, Guns ·Saturday February 19, 2011 @ 18:23 EST (link)
We went over to West Coast Armory this evening to rent their guns (all in one caliber, $15), to find a carry gun for Honey, since she recently got her concealed carry permit (yes, we know it's a shakedown; that's a topic for another day). We tried out all 9mms, and mostly XDs (XD-9 subcompact, XD-9 standard, XDM-9) and a Glock 19. I liked them all, and was glad they finally had a 9mm XDM in; pretty sure I'll pick up one soon. Honey also liked the XDs over the Glock (although I think I also want a Glock 19—did great with it too and it's a good companion to the 34), so we'll probably get her an XDM 3.8; perhaps at the WAC gun show next week in Puyallup.
Still having a hard time finding a SCAR-H (17S) that's not overpriced… guess they're still new enough for demand to well outstrip supply. Hopefully things settle a little and I can get one for around $2600. Also now that I had the chance to handle and fire some of Mark's revolvers I'll feel more confident looking at used and new revolvers at the gun show—I have an idea of what I like, such as the Ruger Security Six or S&W 686—so might pick up one too, more for fun than to carry.
The "private education as privilege of wealth" fallacy
Political ·Tuesday February 15, 2011 @ 19:28 EST (link)
Question:
I suppose if one wanted to eliminate public education (which I know you do) and return to the days when education was mostly a privilege of wealth, then allowing "market forces" to dictate teacher pay would be an excellent first step. But I fail to see how reducing the pay and benefits of teachers is supposed to attract better teachers and improve education for most.
Answer:
Massive benefits and immunity from any sort of metrics, let alone discipline, sure haven't helped. Here's how the market gets you better teachers: the ones that suck get paid less or get fired, or their schools, being unresponsive to parents' demands for better education for their children, get reduced business or none (and the bad teachers then still lose their jobs).
Also your problem with "return to the days when education was a privilege of wealth" is that costs are far less now. Suppose government massively subsidized televisions, and then someone proposed they stop: while there was a time that a television was a "privilege of wealth", that time would not return given the technological developments between then and now. Or, in other words, let the nature of the education market be represented by Syear={si}, 0 < i ≤ n; you want to claim that changing s1298 (the data point reflecting that teacher pay is extorted by force) in S2011 ("education in 2011") to s1298 from S1500 ("education in 1500") will make S2011 precisely the same as S1500, disregarding the fact that there have been many other changes and innovations since then. For example, almost any highschool graduate should be competent to teach basic science (public schools are so bad that this isn't always the case), and thus vast supply over the small number of teachers competent to teach what we consider basic science today (much of which wasn't even known then) decreases the cost a great deal. There is also much more in-depth information available practically for free via the Internet. This changes the calculation a great deal.
See also my back of the envelope private school cost breakdown. Continuing to pay public school prices ($10k and up) for poor-quality monopolistic education is ridiculous.
Mount by label
Technical ·Saturday February 12, 2011 @ 15:52 EST (link)
I'm sure this is an old features by now—seems to have been around since 2007 or even earlier—but I finally got around to investigating how to mount my array of /dev/sdXn devices without having to depend on the order they're detected, using, of course, the disk label (set by the appropriate tool for the filesystem, such as e2label or mlabel). Setting LABEL="…" in /etc/fstab works great for VFAT and ext3 drives (which is all I've tried it on) and is much better than having to worry about the particular ordering of labels that the system will produce, even for drives that are fairly permanent (couple of LaCie FireWire 800s, for instance) and especially for devices like cameras.
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