LegendaryLife Blog

Earth is insignificant compared to the vastness of the Universe!

I am an avid fan of CBC’s Quirks and Quarks show and last week, they had a top 10 listing of how our world will end by leading scientists.

End of the World?

It isn’t a question of IF but WHEN, whether tomorrow or 100 000 years from now, our species is a blink in the universes eye and we are meaningless in the grand scheme of things. I am sure the universe is a very creative being and will use something abstract to end our civilization no matter how far away from Earth it colonizes. If you are hoping and praying for an after-life, where would it take place if there was NO UNIVERSE? Fun questions to ask yourself on a Sunday afternoon eh?

10: The Sun eats the Earth!

Our Sun uses hydrogen as it’s primary fuel source, it WILL run-out in about 7 billion years and turn into a quickly expanding “Red Giant”. Growing to over 250x its current size while losing a third of its mass in the process. The Earth’s oceans would evaporate, the surface would return to a molten form and if you are a human on this planet, no amount of air conditioning will keep you from spontaneously catching fire. Try to imagine yourself holding a nuclear bomb when it explodes and it should give you an idea of how uncomfortable this era of our Earth will be.

9: Gamma-Ray burst will microwave us!

What happens to water when you put it into a microwave? It gets how… now imagine if you where stuck in a microwave that had a wattage exponentially higher! How does this happen? Well, a star, such as our Sun, right before it explodes into a quark, releases a bursts of energy while undergoing a Super Nova. This DOES happen, has been recorded and so far, we have escaped them. Don’t worry, if you survived the first few seconds of this gamma-ray burst, our ozone layer would be destroyed and you would be fried by our Sun’s UV rays. Best to stock-up on some sunscreen and dig yourself a BIG HOLE to live in right now!

8: Rogue black hole eats Earth!

If the rogue black hole was large enough, it would completely shier the entire Earth and spit it out into its base elements. It would need to be just a few hundred kilometers in wise as well… so we aren’t talking about a HUGE black hole being necessary. Interestingly enough, the center of our galaxy is occupied by a super massive black hole!

7: Earth gets KO’ed by an asteroid

An asteroid a few kilometers in size hitting the Earth would lead to massive tidal waves, worldwide instant incineration as the seismic waves engulf our planet causing both volcanos to show-up everywhere and millions of molten asteroids caused by the initial impact zone rain down. If that wasn’t bad enough, possibly a few decades of nuclear winter along with a complete collapse of the Earth’s ecosystems would sure make the planet a lonely place unless you had Wikipedia to keep you busy!

6: Earth goes into a super massive ice-age!

Imagine that the entire Earth was covered by kilometers of ice! Scientists actually believe this happened about 750  to 650 million years ago on Earth. What can cause this? Well, our Sun greatly reducing it’s power output or CO2 levels dropping exponentially, no longer trapping any heat in our atmosphere.

5: Magnetic field collapses across our Milky Way Galaxy!

The magnetic field throughout our galaxy is all that is stopping it from imploding onto itself due to the powerful forces of gravity, remove this and our entire galaxy becomes flatter than a pancake! Don’t worry, the Super Novas caused by such a decline would fry you far before you ever felt the sky falling onto you.

4: Earth’s magnetic field reverses itself!

Cosmic radiation would be able to reach the surface of Earth and basically black-out our energy sources such as telephone wires, wireless networks and cause havoc on with any electronic equipment of any kind. The last reversal on planet Earth actually happened about 700 thousand years ago and we are 250 thousand years (so far) overdue for this to happen again as they usually occur every 500 thousand years. Time to trash your car and buy a wheelbarrow!

3: A nearby star goes Super Nova on us!

Damage from a Super Nova first causes a massive release of gamma-rays (above) followed by massive amounts of x-rays. Our ozone gets depleated in the blink of an eye (depending on distance) and voila, we get fried by our own Sun’s UV rays. To have any impact the super nova would need to be at least 25 million light years away from us. If you happen to still be alive, the genetic damage this causes would probably mean permanent infertility for all living things on our planet. The good news about this is that teenage pregnancy becomes impossible!

2: Super Volcano comes-up on Earth!

74 thousand years ago, a super volcano, about a hundred times bigger than anything we have now, exploded an incredible amount of material into our atmosphere. The result? Causing a global nuclear winter due to the ash thrown into our atmosphere with constant super-tsunamis and Richter Scale crushing earthquakes. Scientists expect one to occur in the next 10 thousand years.

1: Aliens invade us!

Let’s hope that these aliens don’t have the same mentality as us, otherwise, we are doomed.

The Bottom Line

The Earth may die tomorrow but you are alive today… appreciate it!

Buzvia: CBC’s Quirks and Quarks

For those who may not know who Randy Pausch is, he’s the university professor who was told he had only 6 months to live, as such, he decided to give one last lecture to his students. If you had only one last lecture to give, what would you speak about? This is great advice from somebody who has lived a very good life and some of these words may help you achieve your goals in the future.

Lecture’s Key Points

Aptly titled, his lecture is about achieving your dreams and allowing others to achieve theirs, here are the key points from his lecture:

• he grew up always being happy in his childhood, always dreaming about what could be, he was a child of the 60′s while people where landing on the moon when he was young
• dream specific dreams, they help to establish focus and make things happen
• get the fundamentals down otherwise the fancy stuff doesn’t work
• when people stop pointing out to you the things you are doing wrong, it means they have given up on you
• critics that carve you up are actually expressing their love for you
• experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted
• learning that is done indirectly is the most valuable type as they tend to stick with you through life and aren’t as easily forgotten
• you don’t have to be the smartest, most talented nor physically gifted person to succeed in life and lead others
• it’s cool to meet your boyhood idol but even better when they come to visit you because you have done something special
• brick walls are there not to keep you out but to provide a challenge to keep others out (how badly do you really want to achieve this goal?)
• it’s easy to sound smart when you study a subject intensely and ask others for advice
• wait long enough and people will surprise you
• it’s important to realize when you are in a pissing match and even more importantly to get out of it as quickly as possible
• there is a good way and a bad way to say “I don’t know”
• giving people a bar to strive for only does them a disservice, tell people they can always do better then they will, DO BETTER. People will always better themselves at a far faster pace then if you give them specific criteria to be met
• if you are going to be a pioneer in anything, you will get arrows in your back and experience many headaches but it will be all worth it when you look back
• find somebody better then you to give a project you hold dear
• self-reflection is the best give you can give anybody
• parents and mentors are vitally important to achieving a successful life
• being humble is a very difficult habit to build and maintain
• respect authority while questioning it
• never loose your childhood wonder, it’s what keeps your mind young and energy boundless
• it’s fun to do the impossible
• loyalty is a two way street
• actions speak louder then words
• never give up on achieving your goals
• you cannot get “there” alone, earnest people are worth more then any salesman could ever hope to be
• apologize when you screw up and focus on other people
• brick walls show us our dedication
• don’t bail out, the best gold is at the bottom of barrels of crap
• when you do the right thing, good things will come out of it
• get a feedback loop and LISTEN to it
• show gratitude
• don’t complain, just work harder
• be good at something that makes you valuable
• be prepared, luck is where preparation meets opportunity
• if you lead your life the right way, karma will make your dreams become reality

If you wish to watch this for yourself, here is the video of the entire lecture thanks to Google.

After the lecture

As some of you may know, this lecture became an international hit in 2007 after it was given. He appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show to discuss his situation and the lecture, spent a day with the Pittsburgh Steelers to accomplish his goal to play for the NFL and even better, Disney through it’s subsidiary, purchased the rights to his story for millions of dollars, providing his family with financial security long after he is gone. I think the only way to explain this is the last summary I wrote about his lecture, if you lead your life the right way, karma will make your dreams become reality.

The Bottom Line

Dreams are as important as breathing (hint hint).

PS: I wish everybody a very happy and prosperous 2008!

More information about:

• Randy Pausch himself at Carnegie Mellon
• Transcript of this lecture
• Alice Programming Project
• Entertainment Technology Center
• Randy Pausch on Wikipedia

The founder of GoDaddy has had tremendous success online as a domain registrar, he risked everything he earned from the sale of his company Parsons Technology, turning his 64 million dollar buyout to what will soon be a billion dollar company. Without further ado, here is his top 10 keys (suggestions) for success in 2008.

10: Never listen to advertising experts

The reason for GoDaddy’s success is doing everything that it was told not to do by agencies, the more people say you shouldn’t do something, the more you should do it. People generally fear change, they don’t want to make waves so becoming an agent of change is the only way to get any type of attention no matter your field.

9: Surround yourself with beautiful, intelligent and successful women

Half of the world’s population is female yet if you attend enough board meetings, you will quickly realize that these statistics don’t hold true in the executive world (sadly). I would easily argue that women are our smarter half and a company without at least 50% of the top management that isn’t one is missing out on huge opportunities.

8: Take care of your employees and give to charity

Employees leave a company because of stress but if you provide a good working environment that is fun, challenging and rewarding, even at lower pay then a competitor, they will stay with you. Charity is also always a great thing, once you can afford to do so.

7: It’s never too late to get a motorcycle but always wear your safety gear

I got my motorcycle license a few years back, the freedom that you experience driving on the road is tremendous, cars are so boxed that I got to the point where I actually hated being inside of one. Driving a motorcycle gives you instant feedback about the environment, the flexibility to move on a dime and just pure pleasure of the open road… something lost in cars and trucks.

6: Earn a Ph.D. in International Relations so you can become the head of ICANN

A degree is only worth as much as you do with it, ICANN is just about the most useless organization out there, they are experts at conducting meetings in exotic locations that produce absolutely nothing. Each time somebody registers a domain, they send a few cents to these guys who wine and dine on our efforts and provide anything but leadership or vision for the online industry.

5: Figure out what “Brad” does in GoDaddy

An inside joke but if you have an employee or somebody who really serves no value to your company, no matter your affiliation, time to let them go unless you can afford to do otherwise. Same goes with software and hardware, if it doesn’t have a use, then there is no purpose in supporting it any longer.

4: Figure out what “Yahoo” actually does

Yahoo use to be known as a search engine, now it’s morphed into a huge conglomerate but unlike General Electric, they are experts at buying up overpriced companies then shutting them down. They lack a vision, purpose and to be quite frank, are headed for the same fate as AOL… oblivion.

3: Let the devil within you come out every once in a while

Living life on the straight and narrow is nice but it’s good to get out of your shell or comfort zone every once in a while. When was the last time you did something crazy? If you can’t remember, time to do it again.

2: Never, ever, buy a Zune

Hmmm… let me see, Microsoft is an expert at creating loss leaders, they have the Xbox franchise which looses money hand over fist, more software packages then I can count which do little but offer pale imitations of other software products and are sitting on a huge pile of cash. Microsoft has their operating system (XP) that is their backbone and Office, otherwise, everything else has been a dismal failure… why? Well, they got too much money and I think they fear loosing it, so instead of making waves inside of new industries, they are stuck taking cautious approaches towards everything… which leads to mediocrity. If you aren’t in an industry to shake it up, don’t go into it… the Zune (so far) is no different. Let me put this another way, if you own stock in Microsoft, how much has it grown over the past few years compared to a company that does take chances such as Google?

1: Be Godaddy’est in everything you do

The definition of Godaddy’est is simply the ability to live on the fine edge between decency and absurdity. It’s a fine line between being labeled a mad man vs a crazy man, if you live your life on that edge, sometimes you get burned but more often then not, you will progress faster. Take chances, take risks and more importantly, enjoy the trip while it lasts.

The Bottom Line

Follow your gut, more often then not, it will prove right.

Buzvia: GoDaddy,  GoDaddy Radio, Bob Parsons Personal Site, ZipitLive: GoDaddy Reseller

There are two types of lies in this world, those you tell yourself and those you tell others… smokers seem to be experts in both! Caring about their health while smoking is one of the biggest.

Drug addicts are all the same

So far, I have talked to smokers from Canada, United States, Australia, Malaysia, Japan and Korea over an extended period of time and the excuses are all the same. They seem to relish describing how “addicted” or “hardcore” they are. I was talking to one addict yesterday and they where quite proud to say their breath smelled like that of an ash tray… interesting, another from Australia told me exactly the same thing while I was in that country! Here are some fantastically delusional lies you can expect to hear from a smoker (feel free to add more):

I can quit anytime

If this where true, they could quit right now but just try to get enough guts and throw their pack away in front of them… they will run like a squirrel right into the bin to get them. I know… I have done this several times with the same results.

I don’t smoke that much

Sadly, the effects of smoking both primary and second (onto non-smokers) is cumulative. You won’t die right away from emphysema or COD but I wouldn’t want to be a lung in a smokers body after a few decades of continual self-poisoning.

I feel fine

Next time a drug addict tells you that they feel fine, ask them to join you for a hike up a sizable hill… their tune will change guaranteed. The reason they feel fine is because they are use to living in a marginalized body, not because they are actually “fine”.

It helps me keep my shape (slim)

There are two ways to keep your body in shape, one is to exercise and the other is to under-feed it. Sure, smoking is keeping you slim, but guess what, you can accomplish far more by working out and quitting smoking then otherwise. What you are doing is actually starving your body, making it waste resources trying to clean the crap out of the air you take in instead of improving or optimizing it.

My father/mother/uncle smoked till they where 90 years old!

George Burns also smoked a cigar until he hit 100 years old, sure, there are some people out there with wonder genetics but odds are, you don’t have them. Imagine if George Burns never smoked, he might still be alive today! Regardless of how you cut it, smoking WILL reduce not only your lifespan but the quality of the live you live dramatically with time.

Smokers Facing Death

I had a grandfather who I wish everyday never smoked because he died a painful death over several years, his body was fine but his lungs where shot from a live addicted to cigarettes. Now, this week, I got news that one of my uncles, one who saw what my grandfather went through his final years, has been diagnosed with lunch cancer caused by smoking. My grandfather openly admitted that if he ever got a lung transplant that the first thing he would to is smoke and oddly, my uncle, even while at hospital surrounded by smokers slowly fading away, still had the conscience to go… you guessed it right… smoke in hiding! Each and every smokers has to face up to the fact that one day, guaranteed, they will face their maker far sooner then anticipated due to a slow, selfish, purposeful self-poisoning of the very body they inhabit.

Unfunny Joke

Here is an unfunny joke I seem to repeat to myself just about every time I see somebody smoking. What is the difference between a smoker and a junkie? One uses a legal substance. Sad isn’t it… mentally, a junkie is in the same place as a smoker.

How do I treat smokers?

I take my health very seriously, to the point that if I find out a friend smokes, they are no longer somebody I associate myself with. I would honestly prefer to be alone the rest of my life then to spend it with somebody hell bent on destroying their health. There is no sugar coating things, smokers have a death wish but are too much of a coward to get it over with, instead, they drag the emotions of those around them into the hole they inhabit. My only exception to this “banish them from my sight” rule is family but then I try to spend my time outdoors with them as much as possible, limiting exposure to second-hand smoke. Would I ever hire somebody who smoked? Nope, politically correct or not, why the hell would I want to invest my time and resources into somebody who doesn’t give a damn about themselves?

Spiders on Drugs

To some, alright, many out there, this may seem kinda harsh but I live my life by many simple rules, at the top of my list is that if you don’t care about yourself, then I don’t care about you. I do have a very well developed sense of humor so here is something to lighten up the mood on a serious topic. The effect of drugs on spiders! If you can’t laugh at even the worst of things, then the thoughts that follow them have no way out of your head.

The Bottom Line

Reversing a denial is the first step towards a successful life.

If you take religion out of the equation, evolution is a rather simple and logical method of explaining life on earth.

What is evolution?

Quite simply, evolution is the process by which new species come into being while for others their entire demise. Think of it this way, let’s say I had 3 arms and it made me not only more attractive to woman around the world but it also allowed me double my lifespan… this mean the genetic information that allowed me to grow a third arm will be passed on to thousands of children who would then pass on this trait to thousands more of their children (and so on). Within a few generational cycles, one person (me) with a genetic abnormality would literally have produced the equivalent of a small city with this specific trait. Put another way, I had more sexual success passing on my trait then those poor two armed fellows, as a result, “more” of me was passed on to future generations… making me an evolutionary success story (and very happy in the process).

Is evolution fast or slow?

There is some debate about this, in the example above, I grew a third arm in one shot and was able to pass this trait rather fast geologically speaking where things occur over millions of years. Some evolutionary characteristics happen fast while others, like dolphins loosing their hind legs (yes, they are still there under their skin) over an extended period of time. Regardless of speed, it’s happening right now within all of us.

Why does evolution happen?

Before you think evolution happens for a reason, it really doesn’t, that same roll of the dice that gave me the third arm could have just as likely given me no head! You see, evolution is completely random. Sometimes people are born with fantastic gifts but never have children while others are born with genetic defects and go on to produce too many offspring. Evolution has no rhyme or reason, it just is. There is no superior mind figuring out the endless calculations and ratio dynamics.

Proof of evolution

Although there is proof of evolution all around us, to all those who aren’t sure, here is proof beyond a reasonable doubt!

The Bottom Line

Watch out… evolution may strike at any time!

Buzvia: http://crunchgear.com/2007/10/05/riverdance-monkey-style/