Wonder if I can liveblog/Twitter Dalai Lama Ethics of our Time talk.
2:23 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Big applause for Blum telling the people with China connections to help encourage talks with the Dalai Lama.
2:24 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Hi Holiness the Dalai Lama speaks. Says “dear brothers and sisters”
2:25 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Important concept: take all people as brothers and sister, ie global responsibility. People who don’t is the source of many of our problems.
2:28 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Attention paid to material things as opposed to self and mind.
2:30 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Mic problems leads to laughter and a quick reminder by the translator.
2:31 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Rich people have more friends, but are they the friends of the person or the money?
2:34 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Can still be unhappy with lots of money, because the mind is not cultivated. “Some sense? <applause>
2:36 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Translator helps with year of birth. <laughter>
2:36 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Problems with children often caused by lack of affection in the family.
2:40 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Met Chairman Mao in 1954 and developed respect for him and his passion for working people. Next year full of confidence, but by 60s fear.
2:43 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Inner compassion and spirit of forgiveness and realism bring inner peace, more than cats.
2:45 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Again, peace and happiness found within ourselves
2:47 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

There are peaceful dogs and aggressive dogs. Peaceful children and aggressive children. Regardless of religion.
2:50 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Most of the time people are human beings, not religious. There is a secular ethics #dalailamaucsb
2:54 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Secular ethics not a rejection of religion, but promotion of universal compassion. #dalailamaucsb
2:55 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

We see when a mother gives full care, then children are stable. When mother doesn’t give full care, children are difficult #dalailamaucsb
2:58 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

In his own life, his mother almost spoiled him #dalailamaucsb
3:00 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

In some animals, like turtles, survivial not dependent upon mother means no affection. Some need care & affection to survive #dalailamaucsb
3:03 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Any method with certain purpose must be realistically done. #dalailamaucsb
3:07 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Look at the different directions to see the reality. #dalailamaucsb
3:09 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Today’s reality, everything is interconnected. The world is “we” #dalailamaucsb
3:10 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Dalai lama is just another human being, not special. #dalailamaucsb
3:11 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Dalai lama has no healing powers. As evidenced by his surgery. #dalailamaucsb
3:13 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Q: How do people in fields where corruption is inevitable? A: Corrupted people will go. Don’t follow them #dalailamaucsb
3:15 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Create own healthy, indivdual family. Then many families that are healthy and happy. Step by step peaceful solution. #dalailamaucsb
3:16 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Vision of internal then external dissarmament. This generation should work towards that. #dalailamaucsb
3:19 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Q: ethics of environmental responsibility. A: only one world. Problem is gap between rich and poor. #dalailamaucsb
3:21 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

We have the capacity to protect the environment without destroying our economy. This is for our next generation. #dalailamaucsb
3:22 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

This economic downturn is good, as constant growth not sustainable. A more ethical life is not in pursuit of money. #dalailamaucsb
3:25 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Q: Do you live the Tibet simple life, and do you garden? A: He has a greenhouse but no longer gardens. He “exploits” others and enjoys them.
3:27 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Breakfast of samba. Learned to eat a spoonful a day. Except on airplane. #dalailamaucsb
3:30 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Brings food sack because some airplane food is bad. Samba also is healthy. #dalailamaucsb
3:31 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Q: what do we need in the sciences to make sense of reincarnation? A: Dialog is not between science and Buddhism. #dalailamaucsb
3:34 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Conversation between science and Buddhist science. Rebirth is a Buddhist business. #dalailamaucsb
3:36 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Q: How will my son find his mother when he dies? A: I don’t know. Rarely a person has a clear memory of a past life. #dalailamaucsb
3:39 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Q: I’m practicing mindfulness and positiveness, when my partner is doing the opposite? <Gibbering in Tibetan>
3:41 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

A: Traditionally recommend celibacy. Married person, must accommodate wife, if she’s a good wife. Married give up half life #dalailamaucsb
3:43 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Q: Can a person be a spiritual leader and a political leader? A: democracy is a good system despite problem.
3:44 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Q: How to maintain self through hardships? A: Training of mind, transformation of emotion, then it doesn’t take much. #dalailamaucsb
3:47 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Buddhist saying specific application of antidote to problem. If grasping at permanency, think about impermanency #dalailamaucsn
3:49 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

When you become old, is very beautiful that you’ve lived so long. Young can’t lie, middle age are independent. #dalailamaucsb
3:54 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

If there is a solution, no need to worry. If there is no solution no need to worry. #dalailamaucsb
3:57 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Be realistic and look at things from different angles. Out of Tibet, chance to meet people. #dalailamaucsb
3:58 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Look at the problem in a holistic way. #dalailamaucsb
4:00 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Exit time. Thank organizers for opportunity and audience for paying attention and university. #dalailamaucsb
4:01 PM Apr 24th from Twitterrific

Event accounting($) production: 62000 pre, 142600 production, 9000 post; 62900 transport&lodging, 107300 security total 375700 NOT ACCURATE!
4:46 PM Apr 24th from digsby

Event accounting($): missed the ticket sales and surplus amount, but there was a surplus donated to Tibet office in NY #dalailamaucsb
4:47 PM Apr 24th from digsby

Final word: This was much better than the morning talk. It had a much clearer purpose and more general appeal. #dalailamaucsb
4:48 PM Apr 24th from digsby

Over the weekend, I visited the Ellwood Main Monarch Grove and saw the many butterflies eating and flying and clinging to trees.  One great spot to view butterflies was near the creek, where the monarchs drink whatever water is there.  You can really see the butterflies close up there.  However, that means kids can easily go catch them as well.

When I first passed the spot, I did find several kids running around with butterflies on their hands and disturbing their activities.  So behind me, someone started yelling at the kids to get out of there and not chase the butterflies (I don’t know if that was in an official capacity or not).

After walking around the grove and returning to the spot, a new group of parents and kids had congregated to see many monarchs drinking the water.  They had clearly been told to only watch, but you could see the kids getting closer and closer until they were picking them up by the wings.  Unfortunately, the parents weren’t willing to tell their kids to leave the butterflies alone, attempting to tell the kids to let the butterflies land on them, as if kids had that kind of patience.

Eventually, the young kids left, leaving two separate, smaller groups: a family with older children and a few guys in their 20s.  Each commented on how what the kids shouldn’t have been grabbing the butterflies, and one even talked about how the parents should have stepped in more.  In my mind though, the question was, in the absence of the appropriate parental response, shouldn’t one of them or myself have stepped in, since they would probably have listened to an authoritative voice regardless of whether it wields true authority.

I believe, we didn’t feel right telling other people’s children how to behave.  We felt we lacked the authority to tell anyone else what to do.  In truth though, we had the moral authority.  One that the parents of the children would clearly recognize.   If one person would say it, others would support it.

Don Barber (2008) : A surprising parable of foie gras
Don Barber is a chef who tells the story of the best foie gras he has ever had.  Foie gras is a delicacy; it is liver from a goose that has been fattened, almost exclusively through gavage or force feeding; as such it’s become a symbol of animal cruelty.

A Spanish farmer wins a French foie gras competition, and the French, being they way they are, are instantly aghast and looking for scandal and foul play.  Ultimately, the only bad mark against his foie gras was that it didn’t come through gavage.  It was natural.

The geese naturally gorge themselves before the onset of winter.  So this farmer keeps them in fenced area that’s only electrified on the outside to keep out predators.  The area is full of fig trees, peppers, and yellow seeds that are mostly there because the geese enjoy them, but also because they provide natural flavoring.  It’s true heaven on earth for the geese.  So much so that they will call down passing wild geese to join their flock.

This method is actually the original method of foie gras.  The dish was discovered by the slaves of Ancient Egypt.  One day it was fed to the Pharoh, who enjoyed it so much that he wanted it year round.  Thus gavage was used to provide the Pharoh with what he wanted.

The result is goose liver that is delicious straight from the goose without adding spices.  A meat that is unworthy of the greatest chefs, who would try to make it their own.  A meat that respects nature and history.

Today, I bought from KMart two clear plastic 15L containers for COPRNet.  They don’t appear to be watertight, so we may have to look at that in the future.  How do they professionally do it will be a good starting point.  Also, I purchased some tarps from Home Depot, to cover our equipment and give them some visual protection.

Carter and I set up two cameras on the bridge to record from 8am to 4pm.  We’ll check on them tomorrow, but finally pick it up on Friday.  I must remember to bring something heavy to weigh down the container with just the camera.

The power supply on one of the computers has probably died.

COPRNet: Met with Cris on the 12th at her home and with Kevin Lafferty.  Kevin’s interests are in the spread of parasites, and he did a survey of birds in a specific area over time with a cassette video camera in a large, transparent container and compared it to snail populations.  His advice for us was largely based upon developing inexpensive camera technology that can be “dropped” into remote location, then transmit the data back without need maintain it very regularly.  Our conclusions from it were that we need to ensure we can get good resolution images of the birds and that that is the only way to reliable identify them.  Additionally, we should focus on the identifying white egrets like the great white egret and the snowy egret, which are perennial birds.

We also looked at the path on the opposite side of the slough.  There’s a path that’s accessible either from the beach or the golf course.  Neither are that easy to get to by car.  Much of the path hugs the Slough, with several benches for watching birds.  Though the area near the bridge is not accessible to us, and we’ll have to talk to Cris about getting into there.  The hope is that somewhere along there will give us more interesting locations to put cameras and have a better multiple camera network.

KirbyNet: One node will go in KITP (Kohn Hall) in an office almost right above the building’s main entrance.  Carter and I went over to talk to the person in that office, and found that it would work great.  We have to get it in there next week.

I also talked to the KITP Information Systems Director today about hooking into their network.  He’s concerned about us too much bandwidth, so he would like to know our estimate on how much data we’ll be transferring and when.  Other things on “his” network are backups at night and general usage during the day.

HFHNet: Prof. Manjunath mentioned today about setting up a camera network withing HFH, observing all of the entrances and exits to each floor, so that we can know how many people are on each floor.  I need to make a schematic by Monday, as they’re meeting on Tuesday.  I wish building floorplans were easier to find.

It came in a brown box, inside of which was the Macbook Pro box, which is so incredibly sleek.  There are laptop cases that are larger than the box the laptop came in.  Of course, opening that box, I was greeted with the silver top of a shiny new Macbook Pro in clear plastic covering.  Underneath it was the power supply and manuals/CDs and a bag that contained the remote and DisplayPort to VGA connector.  I’m very surprised that they put that in the box, as most other companies would probably have shipped it separately.

Removing the MBP, I was really struck by its size.  It seem much larger sitting on my desk than it did at the store.  The jump from 12″ to 15″ is massive.  Probably the 13″ is a more reasonable size for a laptop.  However, I probably can’t complain as much about the small size.

The magnetic latch is amazing, much better than the physical latch.  However, the outer aluminum has a slight lip inside of which is the screen, and right where you open the screen, if your finger falls to the screen, it covers the camera.

The screen is incredible.  Everything on it seems so bright and vibrant.  I kinda want to look at everything through this screen.  Glare can be issue, but usually tilting it down gets rid of it.

The chicklet keyboard definitely feels different.  But it doesn’t really affect my typing.  I use so many different keyboards that they all take a little getting use to.

Now, the big change is that the complete trackpad has become the button.  The best place to click is still on the bottom, so you’re still aiming for the same part.  The initial difference was that the button use to be raised, and I would look for it.  But on a laptop, I don’t use the hard click that often because of soft clicking.  On the MBP is makes a lot of sense, since it’s you can “left click” and “right click” through the multi-touch trackpad anyway.  The additional multi-touch commands are great as well.  They really make browsing through the internet or files faster.  However, the different multi-touch commands can’t be changed (maybe through some internal code somewhere?).  In the end, big trackpad great, and trackpad click works fine, after a period of adjustment.

Also of note is that this laptop runs much cooler than my Powerbook.  It still get warm, but it’s not the scalding heat that the Powerbook could generate.

Transferring data from my old Powerbook was a little more troublesome than I thought it would be.  Since I had not yet pulled everything off of my old computer yet, I decided to setup my MBP with an account and wait to migrate data, that was the same account name, etc.  However, the Migration Assistant did not like that and would not transfer the account information.  It would add other accounts, and but creating a different account and trying to modify the native account just wouldn’t work.  Eventually, I followed an Apple help forum and copied over relevant data by hand, like pictures and music and documents, and decided to reinstall most programs, since the majority of the programs I used are free and legal.

So I’m still settling into my new laptop.  The next project are finding out how to develop with the iPhone SDK and setting up Time Machine.

The actual tracking is done by the BlobTrackingAuto class in cvaux.  This code is not well documented.  Perhaps it would be if the OpenCV wiki were fully operational, but as such I can search online for and find the source code.  It’s not actually included in the OpenCV download, at least not the 1.0.0 release.

President and Vice President: Barack Obama and Joe Biden
Clearly the smarter person in the race and a proper repudiation of Bush’s failed administration.

US Representative 23rd District: Lois Capps
As incumbent, it’s Capps to lose, yet Kokkonen’s website toes the Republican line without really showing leadership.

State Senator 19th District: Hannah-Beth Jackson
Tough call, but I like Strickland’s fiscal responsibility as well has Jackon’s stances on social issues.  Ultimately, though Strickland’s negative campaign of lies turns me off.

Member of the State Assembly 35th District: Pedro Nava
Didn’t really research this one, but Nava is clearly going to win.

Judge of the Superior Court Office No. 5: John Mackinnon
By the SB Independent’s description, Mackinnon’s focus on drugs seems more interesting than Beebe’s stance as judgeship being the next logical progression.

Santa Barbara School Districts Governing Board Member: Jacqueline Inda, Susan Deacon, and Annette Cordero
Inda and Cordero’s focus on gang activity is important as it rises in the community.  Susan Deacon came of as an intelligent choice as well.  Ware’s an engineer, which almost made me vote for her.  Kate Smith seems like a perpetual thorn in the School district’s side and Heron seemingly entered because he though there was a free open space.

County Supervisor 3rd District: abstain
Farr and Pappas are so similar on their position that it’s difficult to choose, so I won’t.

City of Goleta City Council Member: Edward Easton and abstain
We can vote up to two, but Easton is the only one that stood out to me.  Blois and Connell are current and past city council members locking in some partisan battle, while Gilman is promising, but inexperienced.

Goleta Water District Director: Bill Rosen, Larry Mills, and Lauren Hanson
Rosen and Hanson have crafted niced ideas for the water district, and Mills represents the voice of experience as a former water district director.  The news of arguments in the current meetings leads me to vote against the one incumbent in the race.

Proposition 1A: Yes
After years of political wrangling, the high speed rail has finally come before us.  It might not affect Santa Barbara much, but it’s good for California and the environment.

Proposition 2: Yes
Tough one.  Regulations on the egg industry may well drive them away from California, but the argument seems to be caged vs. free-range, while I don’t actually see anything in the legislative summaries that larger cages aren’t a possible solution.  Perhaps I missed something.

Proposition 3: No
Children’s hospitals are great, but it’s not time to force debt on a state that has so many budget problems already.

Proposition 4: No
The waiting period for a minor’s abortion keeps coming up, and keeps getting shot down.  It would be great if teens would tell their parents if they were pregnent, but I don’t want to legislate that kind of responsibility.

Proposition 5: Yes
Potentially saving money and opening some space in the prisons sounds good, as are the laxing of certain drug laws.

Proposition 6: No
Again, not the time to put more debt on the state to help the criminal justice industry.

Proposition 7: Yes
Hard call on this one.  It’s pretty much not supported by any major organisation from the political parties, to environmental groups, to the power companies. The power companies aren’t going to meet the current standards, should we be pressing new ones?  But the part that baffles me more is turning power from the PUC to the EC.  I don’t understand it, and don’t have the time to.

Proposition 8: No
A same-sex marriage never hurt anyone.

Proposition 9: No
Potentially increasing the prison population in the future sounds like a bad idea.

Proposition 10: No
The environment is actually something I feel important enough to spend money on, but this proposition just smells fishy.

Proposition 11: Yes
Independent districting!  Definitely needed to fight the gerrymandering and entrenched political parties.

Proposition 12: Yes
We don’t pay unless the veterns default on their loans.  I think their good for it.

Santa Barbara High School District Measure H2008: Yes
Needed to offset less taxes coming from the state.

Measure A2008: Yes
Widening Highway 101 around Milpas is key to clearing some of traffic there.

1. CvGaussBGModel in cvbgfg_gaussmix.cpp from An Improved Adaptive Background Mixture Model for Real-time Tracking and Shadow Detection by P. KaewTraKulPong and R. Bowden in Proc. 2nd European Workshop on Advanced Video-Based Surveillance Systems, 2001
2. CvFGDStatModel in cvbgfg_acmmm2003.cpp from Foreground Object Detection from Videos Containing Complex Background by Liyuan Li, Weimin Huang, Irene Y.H. Gu, and Qi Tian in ACM-MM 2003

Have to yet read these papers to figure out their exact methods, but will do so.  There is also a variable that sets different parameters for the method, which needs further exploration.  Documentation on these functions are non-existent, especially with the OpenCV wiki down, though I got the above information from a forum post.

On the default settings, GaussBGModel updates a lot slower compared to FGDStatModel.  Thus GaussBGModel selects objects cleanly, but when the camera gets knocked slightly, it takes a while before the shake is accounted for in the background.  It also captures the ripples and waves in the pond made by the wind and by the animals.  Occasionally this is good, since a bird that appears from the water creates a wake that would otherwise make it difficult to detect.

FGDStatModel ask almost like frame differencing, in that stationary objects disappear after a couple frames, and the foreground model includes both where the object is and where it was.  We hope to combine this data to get better results.  The effect on ripples may still be present in this video.

One idea would be to combine these Models, or more generally combine models with different temporal relevance.  This may be a good contribution.

In other news, my Powerbook is ailing.  I was watching an online video, and an error appeared telling me to hard shtudown my computer.   I did so, imagining it might have been too hot, but when I started it again I only got a light blue screen typical to the startup.  I tried to start it in safe mode, and that also ended at the same spot.  I’ll have to try to access the drive some other way.  Unfortunately, my CD drive is broken and doesn’t seem to work.

iwconfig – configures wireless network interface including specific wireless interface
iwlist [interface] scanning – lists available wireless nodes
iwconfig [interface] essid [essid] – sets wireless point to connect to
sudo dhclient [interface] – DHCP get IP address.