Trains, tunnels and phones

Mobile phones should have a "stay connected" mode for when travelling on trains so that the call is automatically reconnect after a period of no signal, such as when going through a tunnel.

Caffeine atomiser alarm clock

Waking up is painful. Caffeine eases the pain. But how to eliminate the time between waking up and getting caffeine? Alarm clocks with a built in coffee percolator exist. But you have to wake up before drinking. What if the caffeine could be in your blood stream before you wake up (and thus waking you up)? Without using an intravenous line, an atomiser would be the best bet - it would atomise caffeine by your head and you would breath it in. All connected to an alarm clock of course.

Free (canine) energy

People like having dogs as pets. Dogs need walking. People don't always have enough time to walk their dog. We need more energy. Inference of this collection of facts: put the dog in a giant hamster wheel and let it exercise itself and generate electricity at the same time. Alternatively a roller-bed could be used. Dogs may need some encouragement to do this electricity generation, perhaps the metaphorical carrot on a stick could be used. Or train it young.

Moral priorities

Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Utilitarianism. And the ultimate purpose: the perpetuation of intelligent life.

These can be unified into a moral theory whereby the first priority is the perpetuation of intelligent life, the second priority is ensuring the physiological needs (bottom of the pyramid) of the existing community of intelligent life (greatest number), the third priority is ensuring the safety needs (next level of the pyramid) of the existing community of intelligent life, etc.

The obvious interpretation of this theory is that it is a moral traversty that the rich worry about their self-actualisation needs, whilst the poor worry about there physiological needs. But then we knew that anyway...

Swearing

The swear words used in the English language are atrocious. Most these days (post-racism, post-misogyny, post-xenophobia) are related to sex, possibly deriving from victorian prudishness, and have unfortunate consequence of perpetuating the stigma of sex in society. And yet the worst thing a person can be is arrogant. There is just one noun, egotist, to call someone that's arrogant. And even that hardly rolls off the tongue.

How much to do?

How much should we do to help our fellow man, our environment, future generations, etc? A complete altruist would work hard all day (at an ethical job), spend their free time working in soup kitchens or some such, never have any indulgences and give all their spare money to charity. Can you really justify going to the cinema once a month, costing ~£8, when just £2 a month can cure all sorts of ills? Well yes, in fact you can. You do. Everyone does. Even crazy hippy types have luxuries and they certainly aren't doing all that is possible to make the world a better place. So how do we do it? Perhaps this graph will help. I think the relevant variables are the impact on your quality of life (for most people £2 a month is very low impact) and guilt.

All we need now is some data, and we can start predicting how much people are prepared to do...

Penny for your thoughts

Ever noticed how when someone asks "penny for your thoughts" you completely forget what you were thinking about. It's a perfect example of the observer effect, which is often confused with Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. I wonder what happens when someone asks "penny for your thoughts" when you've been thinking about position and momentum...