On The Lady or the Tiger, and Other 'Questions with no answers' in the Media

• February 19, 2005
• James Skemp

In Frank Stockton’s 1882 piece The Lady or the Tiger, Stockton asks us to determine the ending of the story. While one thinks they have enough information to make an informed decision and come to the correct answer, they in fact do not. His later piece, The Discourager of Hesitancy, also continues this tradition. Of course, Stockton is not the only writer to use this method to capture an audience. However, Stockton is one of the few to take this method to such a level. For this article I’ll be discussing Stockton’s pieces, as well as other cases of this in the media, including Tarantino’s movie Pulp Fiction.

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Pulp Fiction: A Timeline of the Events of the Movie

• February 18, 2005
• James Skemp

The movie is Pulp Fiction. The story is intense. Here's my cheat sheet for the movie, as I saw it while watching the movie. This is taken from the DVD, and the Collector's Edition at that. If anything is wrong with this, let me know (email is at the bottom of the page) or, if its right, let me know about that as well :)

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Getting the Most of Your InboxDollar$.com Account

• February 9, 2005
• James Skemp

A while ago, I wrote an article regarding InboxDollars.com (also known as, InboxDollar$.com). That article, On InboxDollar$.com, and similar programs, discussed some of the good things about this site and it’s program. However, I feel as though some additional information could be given. Specifically, I feel as though people are afraid to enter into these kinds of sites for a couple of reasons, which I detail, and hopefully dispel, below.

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English language books by or on Arthur Schopenhauer

• February 2, 2005
• James Skemp

If you’re going to read more on Arthur Schopenhauer, I suggest you start with his main works, followed by other primary resources (id est, books written by him), followed by secondary resources.

For ease, I’ve compiled a list of books currently available to the English language reader. Obviously, if you can read German, it makes little sense to purchase any of the translations, since the language the work was written in is better suited for Schopenhauer’s original thoughts.

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Linking to documents online: the good and bad

• February 1, 2005
• James Skemp

Linking to documents that are found online is almost always a troublesome issue. Unlike print documents, that one could purchase online, read in the library, or read in a bookstore – for those that don’t like to purchase books – online documents are fairly fluid. This is because one major reason, as well as a few other reasons. This article will discuss that main reason, as well as whether it’s beneficial to link to documents online, and if it is, how to best do it.

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Have we discovered the true goals of the United States of America?

• January 22, 2005
• James Skemp

First it was Afghanistan. Next, it was Iraq, Iran and North Korea, parts of the ‘axis of evil’. Now Condoleezza Rice is calling our attention to Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Zimbabwe, Burma and Belarus (Belarus? Is anyone else wondering where this is? And I keep myself fairly up to date on these things, I thought.). Gavin introduced me to Noam Chomsky’s spoken word, so I understand why Cuba would be a threat to the United States.

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Stoplights: Is it better to be the first one at the light, or the last one through?

• January 19, 2005
• James Skemp

Something has been on my mind for a number of months as of late regarding stoplights and cars. People tend to, and perhaps naturally, speed, and my article regarding speed limits (On the Speed Limit) is fairly popular because of it. However, people also tend to not stop for yellow lights, and sometimes even for red lights, but would much rather drive through them. This raised the question of whether it really is best to be the last one through a stoplight (speed up while the light is yellow), or if it makes more sense to not ‘run’ the light, and instead be the very first one in ‘line’ at the light.

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Blockbuster is ending late fees? Kind of

• January 10, 2005
• James Skemp

Somewhat major news is the fact that Blockbuster™, the popular video and game rental store, is ending late fees. While it’s certainly interesting news, reading up on this you’ll find that Blockbuster™ hasn’t really ended late fees, rather they have changed them in order to make more money[1]. For those of us new to late fees, these are basically fees imposed by a rental agency for not returning the rented items by the due date.

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Anti-Virus Software

• January 9, 2005
• James Skemp

The average computer user is not an IT (Information Technology) professional. That said, the average computer user, computer users below average (especially), and many above average computer users, will end up with some kind of computer related problem at least once while using computers. There are a great number of reasons why this will occur, but for the most part it is because there are a number of programs out there that attempt to use computers for a specific purpose, while ignoring the desires of the computer’s user.

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Can Wisconsin Pick a Presidential Candidate, or What?

• January 8, 2005
• James Skemp

After the 2004 election, where Bush won by allowing the American public to live their lives in fear (see my own On the Saying “Terrorists Will Put Bush in Office”), I decided to look at the voting record of Wisconsin, whether they could pick a President, or not.

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