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On Friday, I had a talk at work (which I’m loving, btw) with my boss. It slightly revolved around goals, but was mostly just laying out how the two of us would work together.

That’s not really related to this post. Actually, it isn’t related at all. Oh well. I changed the subtitle of this blog to be non sequitur, so if you’re reading this, you deserve it.

I’ve often thought about things I’d like to do before I die, and then recently I’ve been thinking more about where the Earth came from and how people get so convinced that someone put them together like legos. I was thinking about that earlier tonight while rocking Nate to sleep, when I thought it would be eye-opening to go to Africa.

My only fear is that I’d be eaten by lions. That’s not in jest. When I say “go to Africa,” I mean camp out in the wilderness for some extended period of time. I’d be thrown in the mix with the rest of the world, but instead of some environment like Austin where the rest of the world are techies who don’t usually require much reflection, it’d be next to buffaloes, lions, hyenas, snakes, elephants, hippos, and lots and lots of grass. 

At the same time, I think it’d do a lot to remove the idea that humans were put here separately and specially. We’re just animals, who happen to be smart enough to form large civilizations. The problem is, while living in a large civilization, it’s hard to accept that. It’s hard to think that the world wasn’t just made for our consumption.

I think understanding exactly where I am in the food chain would do a lot to focus that understanding. 

I’ve got a lot of other things that I’d like to do before I die, but I don’t think they’re nearly as exciting or worth writing about. Or I lost my list. Take your pick.

Tags: Family, Self Righteousness // Add Comment »

Sara wants to find out the sex of our baby before it’s born. I don’t. So, she and her sister came up with the idea that she could find out and everyone would know but me, and thinks that it will somehow be a surprise when the baby is born.

Obviously, I disagree. I’m convinced there’s no way that I can be kept in the dark for that long. Now, I understand that if I tried to keep myself in the dark, I could maybe lie to myself and stay uncertain, but it’s no longer about that. Now it’s all about proving that I’m right, and that I was tragically overlooked by the CIA as maybe the best intelligence agent in the world.

So, to make things interesting, there’s a wager. 3 months from when Sara finds out the sex of the baby, I’m going to tell everybody what it is, and how I know. I’m essentially locking in to my answer. Nobody will confirm or deny it, but everybody will silently, begrudgingly, acknowledge that I’m right. Because I’m super cop.

So, if I guess wrongly (and I’m using the word “guess” here a little liberally, it’s not a guess, but rather a precise analysis), Sara gets a day out, away from the kids. I’ll be taking care of both of them.

When I’m proven correct, though, then I get to attend the Texas Tech bowl game, provided it’s in Texas. If it’s not in Texas, then I get to sit at home and drink beer and watch the bowl game without having to juggle kids.

So, the bet is set. I’ll post an update when the bet starts (when Sara learns the sex), and then when I announce my decision. I’m a little worried about Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle here, but I’ll take the risk.

Tags: Family, Sara, Self Righteousness, Tongue in Cheek // 4 Comments »

@Meezy tweeted the other day asking if employee morale should be valued, and if so, why, and how. I don’t follow anyone who said “no,” but I figure the question deserves more response than 140 characters. Or a multiple of 140 character blurbs. Anyways…

Employee morale is what drives an organization. It’s directly proportional to an organization’s performance, though the effect will appear slightly lagged. Too many bad financial quarters, and employee morale goes down. Too many bad managers, and a company’s performance declines. 

I had a boss who said that he didn’t believe in motivation, and that it only comes from a person’s drive to succeed, but that’s bullshit. There’s a reason that I did no work at company V and why I worked incredibly hard at company O, and I doubt it’s my own age or drive. I had 2 days off between the jobs. To say that motivation is out of control is to surrender a fight that you have to win to be successful, which is arguably why company V lost 5/6 of its developer team in under a year. 

To improve morale, it’s good to have an accepting environment that breeds cult like mindshare. That doesn’t mean squashing dissenting ideas, but everyone should love working with each other. There shouldn’t be anyone who’s viewed as inferior or stupid - those people break an organization back into reality. You want everyone to be happy that they’re getting up to work with competent people.

So, here’s a list of items you can do to fix morale, in my not-at-all-humble opinion:

* Beer : It seems simple, but it’s a nice sign of a more lax work environment. The majority of us in the workforce don’t appreciate military environments (regardless of your affection for the military itself). We’re also grown ups. The majority of us appreciate alcohol. Keep it available for good achievements or just random Fridays.

* Casual dress code : I know this list will seem along the lines of my ideal employer, but I think keeping up morale is something I want in an employer, and these are obvious ways to do it. Again, don’t tell us how high our socks need to be or how many buttons we need to have on our shirts. For those of us who work in offices or cubes and don’t deal with clients, why can’t we work in sandals and caps? If we work better that way, doesn’t it make more sense?

* Challenge us : Employees take jobs to have a good time. Part of that good time comes from solving difficult problems. Keep the problems in breathable workspaces and timeframes, but don’t put off things because they might be difficult. Embrace the difficult stuff, because that’s where innovation happens. Nobody cares about easy shit. 

* Treat us like adults : This probably encompasses several of my other items. Like I said, we’re adults. We know how to get our work done. We’re trustworthy. If you don’t think that’s an accurate description, then you have a shitty work relationship with your employee. When we arrive, when we leave, what we do during the day, what we do on our vacation, really should be 2nd to the idea of getting work done. If we show up for meetings but then only spit out work at 3am in the morning, that shouldn’t be an issue as long as it’s at an acceptable pace. Power hungry bosses like to treat their employees like kids, which isn’t good for morale (I’ve already gone through that and left the house - what’s to keep me from doing the same with you?)

* Recognizing that it’s your responsibility to retain employees : I think this is a catch-all for the things people will think I’ve missed. It’s your job, as an employer, to retain employees. If they leave, it’s because of you most of the time. It means you weren’t paying enough for the environment you were producing. Think of things that you do that you think are important but aren’t vital to the running of the company, and interfere with your employees more than it needs to. Cutting down on those might help a lot.

That’s all I thought of off the top of my head. Feel free to leave your suggestions for keeping morale up in the comments.

Tags: Navoty, Self Righteousness // 8 Comments »

In December of last year, Jeremiah and I started a company, Navoty. We’ve learned a ton since then. Here’s a few items:

Time is valuable 

Neither of us realized this at first, and were putting in 30-50 hours on top of our full time jobs to power Navoty. This leads to a few things: burnout (who can sustain 70-90 hour weeks?), angry families (wives and kids need attention!), and unrealistic expectations. We were doing lots of work and getting paid for it, but the short term income boost was met with the realization that we were fairly strapped and there was no growth plan. That’s discouraging. Solution: we’ve started treating our time as billable, even when it isn’t. We now look to delegate more often than not.

Freebies hurt 

We did mockups, wireframes, lots of feature requests, and travel, for free. We’ve stopped doing lots of that now. Making good mockups and wireframes takes a lot of time, just like doing well written features. Doing those for free hurts our bottom line. Further, people are more likely to dismiss your work if you’re too willing to offer it for free. Solution: no more freebies. 

Taxes hurt worse

“Thanks for making jobs and boosting the economy. Don’t forget to send me half of your revenue. Thanks!” - Government. Solution: ouch. 

Not all money is worth taking

At first we would take any job we could get. $200? Sure. What we didn’t realize is that people who offer too little money often have unrealistic expectations for what the money can get them, because their nephew out of college can do the site for less. We’re not trying to compete with those nephews. Solution: only take jobs that understand the value we’re delivering. 

We’re here to deliver value, not just code

We used to just think about time spent coding, but really, we’re delivering a lot more value than that. We’re familiar with open source frameworks, web services, and other consultants who can help out. That’s value. Solution: make our value proposition more obvious when meeting clients. 

Most consulting shops are mediocre, at best

Everybody we’ve talked to has had horrific experiences with outside software shops. This makes our job much, much easier. We talk about how we keep clients in the loop, and they say, “wow, that’s a really good idea.” Exactly. Solution: keep being too good to ignore (courtesy of Steve Martin).

Add value on the top, not from the bottom

We’ve actually learned this over the years, but it needs reiterating. There are very few problems presented in the tech world where a solution hasn’t already been mostly created. This means that the correct solution is to take the previous solution and customize it to work for the new client. If you’re building a POS or CMS from scratch, you’re doing something wrong. 

Tags: Code, Design, Navoty // 3 Comments »

I realized a while ago that if you argue in the context of a specific religion, you’re conceding a lot that can’t be compensated. If you stop arguing for the existence of a god and start debating a specific god - say, Jesus - you’re done. The other guy, granted he has an efficient handle of logic, will argue you into a corner, because you’ve conceded so much.

The same goes for arguing in the context of science. If you try to prove a god’s existence in science, you have to play by the same rules as everybody else. This means following the scientific method. This means that claims must be testable, and falsifiable (intelligent design is *not* science).

If you want to argue for a god, it’s also important to avoid arguments from final consequences (e.g.: Hitler believed in non-natural selection because he bought into Darwin’s ideas, therefore Darwin is bad; “I believed in God and I came into money!”).

Anyways, here’s a list of common arguments, taken from blogs around the internets, against scientific theories (note, please, that “theory” doesn’t mean “just an idea,” but actually means more like “shown to provide answers that are verifiable and has no obvious flaws”):

1. First law of thermodynamics (matter and energy can be neither created nor destroyed): First off, let’s not get sidetracked here by semantics between “law” and “theory.” As far as science is concerned, they’re the same. “Theory of gravity” and “law of gravity” mean the same thing. Second, this is an argument from ignorance. Nobody knows how matter came to be, but that doesn’t necessitate that a god did it. It could have just as easily been a gigantic Logitech Harmony Remote. We wouldn’t know a difference. See? Arguments from ignorance provide no value to a debate. [1]
2. Second law of thermodynamics (depending on how you learned it, either “you can’t break event” or “energy is lost and is unrecoverable from any reaction”): This is used to claim that nothing more complex can come from something less complex. It also requires a closed system of life on the Earth - which it isn’t. We have energy coming from external sources, and send energy to other sources. If we’re to take the law and apply it how this argument is applied, it’s impossible for a person to grow out of an embryo. [1]
3. There is no anecdotal proof of evolution: This is an interesting argument, since requiring a tangible proof of evolution would require in several cases *lots* of time, but lucky us, we indeed *do* have a few cases (yay!). First, there’s the case of bacteria adapting to antibiotics. That’s a case on a small level, where organisms can adapt quickly over relatively short periods of time. Another more appreciable example of evolution can be found here, where a lizard’s digestive system changes significantly in under 30 years in response to a new environment.
4. There are no transitional fossils: It’s absurd that this argument is still circulated, but it’s found on nearly every creationist page. There’s 2 problems with this claim. First, it’s a moving goal post. Every time a transitional fossil is found, creationists can just ask for the fossils in the middle of those two transitions. This can go on ad nauseam. Second, there *are* transitional fossil records. For a more detailed answer, check here.
5. Darwinism couldn’t possible create complicated life as we know it: This is a little bit of an annoying argument, because it clearly causes changes over time, but it also makes the error of equating natural selection (aka “Darwinism”) to evolution. There are several mechanisms by which evolution occurs. To mention a few (not all): genetic drift, genetic variation and kin selection. None of those require that a species be better equipped to reproduce; it just demonstrates ways that gene pools can change and (tongue-in-cheek:) evolve over time.

Further, evolution is an entirely falsifiable theory that makes predictions. A great article that talks about predictions of evolution can be found here. Further, evolution is entirely disprovable. If you find a goat or rabbit fossil in the Precambrian, evolution is wrong. There’s no other explanation to it. The theory is busted. It would be wrong to say that evolution is true *because* there have been no current animal fossils found from the Precambrian (hello, argument from ignorance!), and accordingly the reason scientists agree that evolution is true hinges more on current testable claims (e.g., that we will find more transitional fossils, that homologous features won’t be found in animals that don’t share a common ancestor).

Now, notice how many metaphysical arguments I had here? None. That’s a whole different burrito, where things like social influence and morality can be brought into question. Metaphysics, I think, better determines if something should be believed/acted upon, instead of whether or not it is true. That’s an entirely different issue. I’d be stupid if I denied that believing in a god and praying hasn’t helped people in the past by realigning their values and such.

I’m just not one of them.

*I actually provided most references immediately next to their use, but this one didn’t fit well.
[1] Four Bad Arguments Against Evolution

Tags: Religion, Self Righteousness // Add Comment »

Before Sara and I got married, or before we even got engaged, I’d been talked to by several family members (on both sides) about my lack of commitment to God. It wasn’t that I was anti-God or anything; I just hadn’t given it much thought. The only debates I’d engaged in were over passages from the Bible, and the debates centered entirely around a Christian god.

After we got engaged, I decided that I wanted to be a Christian. So, I prayed about it. I read about it. Probably not nearly at the length that other people do, but I did, nonetheless. I went to church (not as often as I could have, but hey, I made an effort).

Sara and I were married by my grandpa, who’s a baptist pastor. He’s a hardcore, hellfire and brimstone pastor. He told Sara not to marry me unless I accepted Jesus. When I asked Sara’s dad to marry her, he told me it always bothered him that I wasn’t openly committed to Jesus. I told him that there seemed to be too much to be going on for it to be random. I hadn’t really thought it out, but it seemed to be the right answer at the time.

Clearly, there was a lot of pressure. I just went along, and figured it was part of the conversion process. For someone who hadn’t thought about it much, it seemed normal.

Sara and I finally moved back to Austin, got a house out in Leander, and started attending the same church as her sister and brother-in-law. They’re committed to the church. I don’t know what else to say about it beyond that.

After starting to attend the church, we were invited to their small group. It’s essentially a bunch of people who meet on Wednesday nights (in our case) for a few hours, discussing God and how the previous Sunday message applies to our life, and how everybody can help each other. They’re a really good group of people, so I’m not poking fun at them at all. Most of them are still friendly and helpful to me, even now, after I think it’s clear that we don’t see eye to eye.

While I’m sure Laura (sister) and Shelby (brother-in-law) are slightly disappointed that I’ve given up on the whole Christianity thing, it’s important to note that their small group did a lot for me. It was there that I finally started to think how church messages, the bible, God, and everything else fit together.

…And that’s when it started to make no sense. About the same time as I was starting to think about this, I started reading some blogs concerning the autism/vaccine debate. I started to read a lot about logical fallacies, and try to structure my thoughts without them. Then I realized - why? Why would I think there’s a god, when there’s no evidence for one?

Saying “well you can’t explain how X happens” is called an argument from ignorance. It’s a statement of fact, but it has no bearing on any other arguments. Consequently, saying that “you can’t explain the existence of atoms,” while true, adds nothing to the debate. I realized that just having an answer for something doesn’t mean it’s true.

I read a lot of blogs, and I share a lot of stuff on Google Reader. To the point that a few of the posts offended some of my family members the other day. While I agree with their message, I’m not a fan of the hostility on the blogs. There’s no point to calling someone a “fucking idiot.” You’re not gaining anything in debate, and only adding more hate to an already combustible situation.

So, for the few readers who are theists and read my blog or my shares, I’m not out to offend you. I’m out to share my point of view. Generally I can convey it without any profanity or attacks, though occasionally an asshole like Jerry Falwell requires it.

My next post is going to be about the common arguments against Scientific reasoning for our existence, etc.

I feel like going on a blogging spree tonight. This should be interesting.

Tags: Family, Religion, Self Righteousness // Add Comment »

I’m wiring up Navoty’s blog so that it’s a Yahoo pipe and comes from all of our blogs that are categorized as Navoty. I’ll post an update with a link as soon as it works.

Tags: Navoty // Add Comment »

Comedians usually tell the truth and avoid the whole impaling thing. Here’s another example. 

Tags: Religion // Add Comment »

I was talking to a guy on Twitter the other day, and commented that there’s a stark difference between .NET driven codemonkeys and the rest of us codemonkeys. Now, I realize that I’m probably drawing on the wrong criterion, and that all of the .NET people I follow on Twitter are also super-agile evangelists, but I have other friends on Twitter who are agile-koolaiders and tweet significantly different.

You can tell a .NET tweeter from the following criteria:

• 90% of posts are about work
• >50% of posts are about Microsoft
• <20% of posts are about family, friends, fun, etc.
• Tweets aren’t complete thoughts and generally require 2-3 messages before conveying anything
• Tweets are vague and filled with at least 5-5 syllable words
• Everybody in the same circle follows each other, and they don’t reach out to new circles for fear of being exposed to new ideas. 
• LOL Open Source

Tags: Code, Religion, Tongue in Cheek // 1 Comment »

Sara and I went looking for houses today, and as we’re talking about the merits of one of the houses, she says to me, “I want to stay in this house for a *long* time.”

That got me thinking. First off, for anyone who knows me, I change jobs. More than most people you know. I don’t get fired; I go somewhere that looks like a better fit.

Initially, when I’d look for a job, I’d tell the guys, “I want to work here a long time.” I realize now that this makes no sense. What’s the point of committing for a time frame? I’ll commit until it doesn’t make sense to anymore. Time blocking 5 years of my life to justify a decision only serves to tell people that for the next 5 years, my head will be in the sand - consequences be damned.

I think agile development practices stem from the same idea. You can’t know what’s coming up in 6 months, or how your client or boss or whoever is going to respond to your product, so the idea is to make your product in a way where change catastrophe is minimized.

So, for our house, I’m trying to talk Sara into thinking more immediate future. We know we’re having another baby, and we already have Nate. That means we need at least 3 bedrooms, and preferably a play area. Were we to plan for the next 5 or 10 years, we’d need either 5 or 7 bedrooms (I want 6 kids; Sara wants 4), which would make for a house that (1) we can’t afford right now and (2) would be waaaaaaaaay too big.

For those interested, I really like the neighborhood at Forest Creek. It feels a little Stepford-Wives-y, but at the same time, the houses are really well designed. I feel like our house right now was poorly designed, in that there’s no real segmentation in the house. I like borders, and knowing clearly where I am. I’m not against open houses, but I like them to at least have some semblance of a partition.

As for a job, I think the same rules apply. Right now, I’m headed to employer B from employer ST because B satisfies what I want to do and how I want to do it. It’s not an indictment of any previous employer, it just means that over time (sometimes, shorter time increments than people would appreciate) criteria for a good work environment, good work hours, good location, good benefits, etc., change.

I think from the Enlightenment, people realized that it’s better to question things than to not, and that critical evaluations lead to crystalized purpose. If we start committing blocks of time to endeavors, we’re closing our eyes to whatever might happen in the unforeseeable future. I don’t know about you, but I’d prefer not to go back to the 16th century. Kthx.

Tags: Code, Self Righteousness // 3 Comments »