Not bad for a guy I’ve often slapped in the back of the head and called Space Monkey on multiple occasions.

Besides the obviously great job he’s done turning what once was an eyesore into a useful and attractive space, I love is that he’s renaming it The Taggart Building. Personally, I would have gone with Roark Towers, but The Fountainhead influenced me more than Atlas Shrugged.

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It reminds me of a story…

I went to see a Credence Clearwater Revival tribute band with my buddy Half once. In between sets one of the band members was standing near us at the bar, and Half struck up a conversation with him that went something like this:

Half: When ya’ll gonna play “Lodi”?

The Guy: We don’t play “Lodi”.

Half: *with full contempt*  If you don’t play “Lodi” you ain’t no damn CCR tribute band!

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The current poll asks for your Waffle House hash browns order. So far, seven people have voted, but only three have included “scattered” in their options.

Uh…can you get hash browns at Waffle House that aren’t scattered? I could be wrong, but I don’t think so.

Carry on.

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But it’s important to remember that rhetoric and logic, while related, are not the same thing. For example, let’s look at this tweet my buddy Alex wrote the other day:

A former professor once told me, “studies show those who demand less government score lowest on their understanding of how it’s designed.”

That’s a powerful statement, and is even more powerful given the fact that Alex was able to clearly express it in less than 140 characters. But it makes a rhetorical implication, not a logical implication. It’s pretty obvious to me that the intended implication here is that people who favor small government don’t know what they are talking about. But if we break this statement down logically, it’s pretty weak.

Some background first–there are four possibilities in a simple logical implication, which is represented by this table.

Possibility 1: Given the correct information, you come to the proper conclusion. This is an acceptable result (indicated by T). Makes sense right?

Possibility 2: Given the correct information, you come to the wrong conclusion. This is not an acceptable result (indicated by F). This means that the information was processed incorrectly–faulty logic.

Possibility 3: Given false information, you still come up with the correct answer. This is an acceptable result. Imagine blindly guessing on a multiple choice quiz–you still get credit if you fill in the correct bubble, right?

Possibility 4: Given false information, you come up with the wrong answer. This is an acceptable result. It is reasonable to expect you’d get the answer wrong if your information is suspect.

Now, let’s assume Alex’s statement is true. Let’s assume people who favor small government really do score lowest. That would mean they are basing their decision on false or faulty information. Although the rhetoric presented would lead us to believe they can’t possibly be correct in favoring small government because they are ignorant (Possibility 4) , a quick glance at our truth table shows us that it is still possible for them to arrive at the correct conclusion (Possibility 3).

Think of it this way–let’s say you fall off a ladder and break your arm. Your ignorance of the gravitational constant, the tensile strength of your bones, or even basic anatomy doesn’t change the fact that your arm is broken. Even if you are given a completely false explanation that you believe to be true as to how your arm was broken, it’s still broken.

In other words, you can be completely ignorant, yet still be perfectly capable of stating the truth.

Of course, it’s a huge leap to assume Alex’s statement is true to begin with. It brings up all types of questions:

1. What studies, what professor, what test, and who was tested?
2. What is this professor’s area of expertise?
3. When was the study conducted? Where? By whom?
4. Who funded the study?
5. Is there a similar study on those who favor big government?
6. Have you seen this study yourself? Does it even exist?

Although I disagree with his statement, It’s not my intention to pile on Alex here, but to point out how rhetoric is used by every side of an argument to make a point.

Videos are especially effective in using rhetoric to make points. A really popular method is to show clips of complete ignoramuses and make the implication that these fools represent the entirety of the group they are associated with. I see people post them, and I’ve posted them as well. Take a look at these two videos which represent “both” sides, and keep in mind the purpose of the person who produced them. After watching each one, ask yourself a few questions:

1. Do I have true, unbiased information about this group of people?
2. If I can’t say that my information is completely true, how much trust do I put in my conclusion?
3. Does this video reinforce what I already believe to be true/false? Is that why I like/dislike it?

My point–there’s nothing wrong with writing, posting, plagiarizing, enjoying, spreading, dispersing, selling, buying, manufacturing and encouraging rhetoric. Just recognize it for what it is.

And if you don’t have the ability to recognize the difference, you are an ignoramus.

Q.E.D.

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Check out this awesome video of our ol’ buddy at ktownlowdown and his (much) better half, CouponKatie. You may have to watch the video twice, because the first time through you’ll most likely be distracted with thoughts of, “how did that guy land her?!?!?”

I don’t think such things, because I’m in a similar situation myself.

UPDATE–Had to link to the video…the autoplay was driving me nuts.

Katie is a serious money saving ninja and has built an incredible resource for families looking to save money in our area.

If I had any money I would actually pay her to come help me save it!!!

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I’m going to fix the social networking world’s woes. I’m starting a group called “We Don’t Have To Be Friends“. Here’s how it works…

If you’re thick skinned enough to join the group, you’re basically saying to everyone that you are cool with them un-friending you. Your feelings aren’t gong to be hurt by their decision, no hard feelings, and you can continue to know each other both virtually and in the real world–you just aren’t FRIENDS.

If you are a member of the group and someone else tries to friend you but you don’t really want to accept, just check the group and see if they are members. If they are, no hard feelings as far as denying them goes.

Of course, I will not be dropping any of my friends on Facebook, all of whom I love dearly, but the rest of you may be able to use it. Sound like a good idea?

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The concept behind Akoha is pretty simple–do something nice for someone, and burden them with the task of doing the same for someone else. What’s cool is the little cards you give them with their “mission” have unique IDs. When they go to Akoha’s website and enter the ID of the card you’ve given them they can see who had the card before them and where in the world it has been. Sort of like Where’s George with a cool user interface.

Oh, and each mission has points associated with it. Some of the missions are really simple like “Take Someone for Coffee” or “Make Someone Smile”, and there are even “Wildcard” missions you can make up for yourself.

I’m interested to see if I’m just idealistic, or if my friends are willing to play along.

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He’s also put up a second map that shows info on the Ocoee Dam release on January 4.

Good example of mashing up information from several different sources and dispersing it to the public!

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Seriously, you guys helped us get the word out, give us feedback, encouragement, and even content.  We can’t thank you enough!

Michael Silence was unbelievably generous in writing our first feature article, and he went a step further by featuring us in his Sunday deadwood column.  Jack Lail wrote a very nice intro for us on his blog last Thursday too.  These guys got us noticed by Glenn Reynolds, who gave us an unbelievably successful first day “live” when he linked to us from Instapundit. All this within the first three days!!!

Guys, I know a link from me here is worth about 1/100 of what you did for us, but it’s all I can do for now.

Since then, we’re receiving more support from people like SVD at KTownLowDown, and some local guys from Copa Creative, Abunga.com, and TUAW who were generous with their time in answering some questions about the iPhone for an article we were doing.  I can’t even begin to thank all the people who’ve talked about us on Twitter and sent their followers our way.

I’m uber-busy with work (real job) right now, but I intend to (at some point) thank all the local people I’ve forgotten in this short post and all the other folks around the country who’ve been so supportive.

I’m also going to change that poll before the eight week period (I hope).

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I think I came pretty far in 2008, and I hit most of the goals that I’d loosly set for myself, but there’s a pretty good chance I’ve just forgotten about the ones I didn’t hit, so I think writing them down is the way to go.

1)  Get at least two friends to start blogging.  This means you!!!  Even if you keep your blog private (that’s easy to do) or accessible only to your friends and family, it’s just too easy to have a nice site these days.  I have a whole different post coming about managing your online reputation.  Having your own site is the first step.  Grab a domain name for a few bucks a year, and talk to me about hosting.  I’m running a friend special right now.  ;)

2)  Get over 100 subscribers to this blog (finally).  I’ve been hovering at around 85 for quite a while now.  I’m not really sure how to make it over the hump, but I have a year to figure out, right?  I think one of the problems may be that I bounce around a lot of different topics and get pretty streaky on things.  But that’s the way my mind works, and this is supposed to reflect what I’m thinking, right?  Oh wait, there is one thing I can do…BEG!!!  Please subscribe if you haven’t yet.  If you aren’t sure what I mean by “subscribe”, here’s a quick tutorial.

3)  Launch three new sites.  I actually know what two of these sites will be centered around–more on that next year.  That leaves me with the task of coming up with one other idea.  This shouldn’t be too tough to do–I’ve got a million ideas I haven’t even thought yet.  But then, there’s the implementation–there’s the rub.

4)  Money.  Financial goals are always fun.  With all of my efforts combine, I’d like to make it to $600/month by the end of 2009.  Right now I’m at about $225 per month, and it’s increasing at a pretty steady rate.  I think this goal can be attained by June or July, but I think it’s prudent to give myself some wiggle room just in case I don’t get a bailout.

5)  Empower a bunch of people.  This one is tough to measure, but I know a bunch when I see a bunch, and I hope some of the projects I’m working on will help a bunch express themselves and share information.

6)  Complete two WordPress plugins.  I’m almost finished with one sizeable plugin, and there’s another I’d like to write as well.  They both tie in with goal #5.  I think they will go a long way in making things easier for people to accomplish some tasks with their WordPress blogs.

7)  Get two links from A-list bloggers.  I’m not as concerned with which of my site(s) get these links as I am that I get them.  And I’m not picky about who these A-listers are.  Why would I be?  I think this is definitely doable–I got one last year.  Then again, that was in January and I didn’t get another one all year.

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