I was reading some Yahoo news today, complete with links to the New York Times, and I was surprised to see that "A new study says it's possible to boost the amount of mental ability you were born with."

I understand what they're going for, and I get their point.

BUT! The wording just sounds like you can do something in the here and now that would retroactively impact how smart you were at the moment of birth. If you could "boost the amount of mental ability you were born with" by 100%, you'd effectively double how smart you were however many years ago you were born. But that would cause ripples throughout the past 20-60 years…

Let's see if the article (from the Times) can shed some light on the matter. Surely it will be much clearer than the short Yahoo headline.

The first sentence of the article reads, "A new study has found that it may be possible to train people to be more intelligent, increasing the brainpower they had at birth."

Wow, this is serious. This is great! So long, SAT score of 200! I'm gonna change everything.

First I'll go back and double how smart I was at age 0. Then I'll live my life up to April 30, 2008, and go back and double my intelligence again! And again and again and again…

I know who I'm investing in…

From: "veforipy45606" <veforipy45606@hotmail.com>
To: 2santafe@microdsi.net
Subject: The company has real clients and income stream.
Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 10:28:33 -0400

We have not said much in the last few weeks. We have not seen anything
of intrest. This one looks like it will be strong and steady mover.
With the new company Leadership and up and comming contracts. We feel
comforatble to bring QRVI to you.

Not all our picks will do as our last few with all climbing over 100%
in the first 5 days after our pick. But we do expect big things from
this Company.

Please take the time to do your research on this Company. Everything we
found looks like it will breakout anytime. The recent new is good but
we expect bigger things to come soon.

Quality Restaurant Ventures, Inc
QRVS
April 25: 3.90

Quality Restaurant Ventures, Inc., announced that its Board of
Directors has approved Tim Murray as the new President of QRVI. The
announcement follows several months of financial and operational reorganization.
The board has also given Murray, along with Peter Brown, President of
Obee's Franchise Systems, Inc., a seat on QRVI's Board of Directors.

Quality Restaurant Ventures Inc. announced today that a new co-branded
Sobik?s - Wing Way restaurant recently opened in Central Florida. This
is the first location that will serve both the Sobik?s and Wing Way
menus starting from opening day.

Quality Restaurant Ventures Inc. announced today it has now opened a
new Wing Way location in Central Florida . As with the company?s first
Wing Way restaurant, the new store is also co-branded with an existing
Sobik?s Subs location.

Quality Restaurant Ventures Inc. announced today that it is now
preparing to open four new locations of it?s recently announced
WING WAY fast-casual restaurant concept. The new Wing Ways will be
co-branded with existing Sobik?s Sub?s locations in Central Florida.

[End Email]

I know those question marks are just glitches, but they really give the second half of the email a feel of doubt, of question.

Gotta love that opening paragraph:
"…not seen anything of intrest…new company Leadership and up and comming contracts. We feel comforatble…"

With such a relaxed attitude toward spelling, I feel comforatble too!

"We have not said much in the last few weeks." Could that be true? Could the stock market spammers have taken a break in light of the craziness of our economy? Hmm…

I wonder who 2santafe@microdsi.net is? Maybe if you send an email there, it gets forwarded to tons of other accounts… If that were the case, then anyone could send out thousands of spam messages just by clicking "Send" once… And then off to jail with them!

"Please take the time to do your research on this Company." Totally cliché. "Wow, gee, if it requires research, forget that, I'll just take their word for it. Hyuh hyah, I'm brilliant!"

Check this out:

So, the first time I saw it, I thought, "Wow, what a considerate friend that other guy was, worrying about Kobe's sanity and trying to avert any potential problems." And also, "Hyperdunks???!!!"

Then I visited kb24.com (site looks incredible), where you can watch the same video in much higher quality.

I wondered if Kobe really was just messing around, or if maybe he'd told Nike he'd come up with some publicity stunt.

But watching the video again, it almost seems like a cross between an unscripted "casual" video, and a totally scripted professional one.

I think it was a super scripted professional one, crafted to look and feel casual. I've seen a couple of ads on TV that try to imitate casual videos, but reall end up looking stupid.

I think this video is awesome, no matter what motivated Kobe to make it.

I recently noticed that a comment was posted that urged me to shy away from posting "lesser" tidbits of interest, and focus on pleasing my readership.

I must not disappoint my millions of readers…

"But wait," I thought. "Could the person posting this comment consider my site worthy of such a remark?"

I had to be sure.

So I searched google for the exact contents of the comment.

203 results came up.

Unlucky me, I was sucked into thinking that my little old blog was interesting enough to be taken seriously.

The real clincher for how I know the comment was bogus is the fact that both the comment posted here and the first one I found on google point to [blah].nx.cn and seem to advertise risqué content.

Ho hum, another day of spam-motivated deceit…

About half an hour ago this comment was posted as a response to my post on Theoretical Dollars And Internet Wealth.

Name: oh minseok

Dear,

I'm a korean living in seoul.(name: Oh Minseok)
Korean special investigative team are investigating samsung
corporation.
But they do not work right.
I am suspicious to be bought off.
samsung corporation has many crimes.
And the team investigates samsung corporation.
It contains korean companies samsung,huyndai,sk CEOs' illegal issuing
stocks or bonds.
The quantity are plenty.
(Three company CEOs did(and are doing) many crimes to me.
Many koreans are knowing it.
But many koreans are bought off by illegal issuing stocks or bonds.)
The team are knowing it.
Korean special investigative team must investigate this.
But they are trying to conceal it.
I ask for asking for this criminal investigation to prosecutors in any
country.
And help the shareholders and me.

P.S)
Three companies are hacking me and trying to kill me.
And are suspicious to use my name and email illegally.
If you receive another message that I dictated above are not true,
it is not from me, but from three companies.
The things I dictated above are true.

[End Comment]

Seems a tad creepy to me… First impression: It's just like those YouTube chain letters. Second impression: Could it be real? Third impression: Why bother to comment on a post that has nothing to do with what you're talking about? It's not like you're being robbed in your own home and dial a random number in the hopes that someone will come help you because 911 doesn't work in your area and you've got nowhere else to turn…

Fourth impression: Maybe it's designed to keep people interested…

Back in February I posted my thoughts on a certain spam message and a copy of the email in question. A few days later, someone said they were interested in the opportunity! So, I made it clear I was just commenting on the situation, and not participating in it.

Early this morning, someone posted a new comment sharing their story about what happened when they responded to a similar email and went along for the ride. Here's what they wrote:

Remember a few years ago when computers used to shut down just to provoke us? I'm assuming your computer has gotten better. I know mine has.

I've seen clips of guys (from the '90's I assume) freaking out and trashing their monitors. It's like you're the king, and your messenger shows up during a crucial battle in World War -7, and he says, "We're losing!" And you say, "Execute the traitor!" It's not the messenger's fault… just like it's not the monitor's fault…

Anyway, I found a couple variations of a YTMND that seemed interesting, and they fit right in with this topic. The first one is the original. I think it's based on an old TV commercial. Make sure your volume isn't too high…

Mad Dad

Here's the second variant. I thought this version was outrageous:

Tech Support Is Not The Answer

You can see the father sulking over the computer on the right as the camera moves left to show the girl. So then when the father shows up from the left, it's like a completely different guy! Could he have called PC Express, and gotten the typically horrible service that many (most? [all?]) customers receive? Assuming the answer is yes, then he must have been so infuriated that he dedicated the rest of his life to inventing time travel.

Years later, at age 79, he's finally perfected his technology. He returns to the time after he got the run-around over the phone, and just after his younger self decided to invent time travel. Old version guy gives the technology to fed up young version guy.

Fed up young version guy then time jumps back to the moment just before his daughter originally suggested to her imaginary friend that her "Daddy needs to call PC Express." She goes ahead and delivers her suggestion. Fed up young version guy loses it and smacks his daughter with the keyboard. Her head falls off easily. …Too easily.

Fed up young version guy didn't manage to prevent the girl from sharing her idea, but he did uncover the sinister truth. That she is a robot infiltrator sent by PC Express! Fed up young version guy teams up with his slightly younger (and slightly less fed up) counterpart, and they use the power of time travel to erase PC Express from existence. (I've never heard of it, have you?)

The only evidence of these events are the two YTMNDs and a small handful of other web media…

This is another YTMND that I thought was interesting. Check it out.

Someone took The Enchantment Under the Sea Dance scene from "Back to the Future" and edited it to change the part where Marty goes nuts on the guitar. Instead of hearing what he originally plays, you hear the end of an intense song called "Through the Fire and Flames" by Dragonforce, an English power metal band.

I mean, this song is nuts! And to imagine Marty playing that instead… it's mind blowing. It makes perfect sense for Strickland to cover his ears.

I can only imagine how you'd feel if you were there living in 1955, and all of a sudden some psycho with a guitar loses it and plays something too wild to comprehend.

You might say, "He's in league with Lucifer!!"

This freaked me out the first time I heard.

Back in 1989, a week before Halloween, Jim Davis began a short storyline in which Garfield discovered himself all alone in a dark, deserted house. No one had been in that house for years. So what was going on?

There were 6 separate strips in this story line. Check them out:
10-23-1989
10-24-1989
10-25-1989
10-26-1989
10-27-1989
10-28-1989

Wikipedia says that among the theories regarding the meaning of these strips, there's the possibility that "Garfield was either dead or starving to death in an abandoned house, imagining future strips in a state of denial."

Evidence supporting the idea that Garfield is dead and imagining current strips (and all others subsequent to October 28, 1989) in a state of denial:

• October 27, 1989 - During Garfield's odd experience, he suddenly sees Jon and Odie. Jon offers Garfield food. Jon disappears. If Garfield imagined Jon then, he could have gotten much better at imagining things. Maybe he could imagine his whole life.

• October 27, 1989 - Caption: "Locked fast within a time when he no longer exists, Garfield grapples with his greatest fear… loneliness." How is he locked within this time? Two possibilities. Either he is imagining it (like in a dream), or it is real. If it is a dream, and he can't wake up, he's locked in. If it's real, and he can't change things (i.e., go back in time to when he was alive and when Jon still lived in the house), he's locked in. So the caption doesn't definitively specify one way or another (dream or reality), but it does leave room for the possibility that Garfield really is dead.
• October 28, 1989 - Caption: "After years of taking life for granted, Garfield is shaken by a horrifying vision of the inevitable process called 'time.' He has only one weapon… denial." Maybe some of those years (the ones leading up to 1989) were also denial of his death. He "woke up" to reality for a few moments, realized the truth, and quickly dove back in to his make-believe world, using denial to shelter himself.
• October 28, 1989 - Garfield says, "I don't want to be alone," and immediately Jon and Odie appear. Garfield is in the same position he was in the "Dead Garfield" reality. His arms were raised. If he had been sleeping, he likely wouldn't have been on the counter. He'd have been in his bed box. He'd have woken up, and still have been tucked in. So if the "Dead Garfield" reality was part of a dream, and Jon and Odie are part of Garfield's reality, then Garfield experienced that dream while moving around on the counter. That is unusual. Jon greets him with, "Want some breakfast, Garfield?" That is just like before, when he offered some food and then faded away. It seems like Garfield could very likely be imagining this resolution out of desperation.
• October 28, 1989 - Caption: "An imagination is a powerful tool. It can tint memories of the past, shade perceptions of the present, or paint a future so vivid that it can entice … or terrify, all depending upon how we conduct ourselves today…END." The use of the ellipsis at the end seems to denote a "loose end." Does this caption mean that Garfield used his powerful imagination to paint a vivid future of things to be, and that future was terrifying? Or did it mean that he has finally woken up to the truth, that he is really dead, and will from now on use his powerful imagination to shade his perceptions of the present, so as to (re)create an imaginary and comforting home in place of a dark, abandoned house in which his spirit is locked?

I like Garfield. I think he's alive. And Wikipedia says, "Jim Davis is reported to have actually 'laughed loudly' when informed of these rumors circulating on the internet."

But I think that this short storyline was created, maybe accidentally, to show two separate realities, both equally possible. In Reality #1 (the commonly accepted reality), Garfield is alive. So whatever he experienced between October 23 and 28, 1989 was just imagined, and provided him with a life lesson regarding appreciation and not taking things for granted. In Reality #2 (the alternate reality), Garfield is dead, and perhaps was dead before October 23, 1989. Some of the strips prior to 1989 and all of them following that year have been imagined by Garfield out of desperation, in denial of his unfortunate circumstances. In Reality #2, Garfield is possibly haunting Jon's old house, moving around while acting out his imagined life.

This situation is just like Total Recall, where the director made the film so that you never know whether Arnold is dreaming or awake. Most people think it was all real, because Arnold's an action hero, and making it into a dream would invalidate his heroics. I too like to think it was real. But there are 3 distinct realities presented in that film. The first, he's really a secret agent, and the memory implant of a vacation to Mars (where he would have been a secret agent) was coincidence, and never given to him. In the second reality, he did receive the implant, and had a schizoid embolism followed by a free-form delusion. After a certain point in the movie, he was making up the adventure as he went along, and was lobotomized at the very end of the film (the white light when he kisses Melina). The third possibility is that the memory implant worked perfectly, and everything, all the doubts and confusion, was simply built in to make his adventure seem more convincing. After all, he paid good money for that memory implant!

This also happened in the TV shows "Smallville" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." Both series each featured an episode in which the main character of the show wakes up in an insane asylum and is told that his/her adventures are all part of an ongoing delusion. I believe both episodes ended by leaving the question up in the air as to whether or not the entire series was a part of one big delusion.

So it does seem possible that Garfield could be dead…

But everybody loves Garfield!

Nigeria yet again…

From: adamuisa@switched.com
Subject: PAYMENT NOTIFICATION OF YOUR FUNDS
Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 02:27:11 +0100

OFFICE OF THE GOVERNOR.
CENTRAL BANK OF NIGERIA
Tinubu square, Lagos- Nigeria.
Our ref: Cbn/Ohg/Oxd1/2008
Your ref: ………………………….
Telex: Cenbank.
Payment file: Cbn/Ben/08.

PAYMENT NOTIFICATION OF YOUR FUNDS.

Attn: Beneficiary,

Hello. We have decided to bring to your attention, the fact that we
have done everything necessary to make sure payments from the debt
remittance account are made to the Bonafide Beneficiaries. I am informing you
of an attempt by some men to collectyour payment on your behalf. I had
to ask them why they came to see me in person and they said that they
came to collect your inheritance/contract funds payment sum of $20M
which rightfully belongs to you as shown in your file with us, on your
behalf and by your authorization.

However, I am writing you this email to find out from you if you
actually sent them. Note that they actually tendered some vital documents
which proved that you actually sent them to collect these funds. Below is
the list of documents which they presented.

1) Letter of administration
2) Order to release
3) High court injunction

Due to the nature of my job, I cannot afford to make any mistake
inreleasing the funds to anyone except you who is the recognized and true
beneficiary to these funds.I want to hear from you before I order the
release of the funds to these men who claim to be your representatives
because they will be back to my office next week. I decided to carry out
this decision based on my work experience and this is a risk I cannot
take because I have not heard anything from you.

Kindly direct your response to the private email address of my
boss,Prof. Charles Soludo, the executive governor of the central bank of
Nigeria Cbn, below for quicker deliberation and response from him on the
release of your funds to you. Please remember to indicate your personal
phonenumber he can reach you on in your response.

Email: prof_c_charlessoludo@myway.com

Note that for security reasons you have been assigned a code/password
which is {TT7270CBN}, please note that this code is the reference number
for your transfer and it’s being disclosed to you alone, guard this
jealously and all your email response should carry this code as the
subject.

Yours faithfully,

Dr. Adamu Isa

Secretary.
To the Governor.
Central bank of Nigeria
Tinubu square, Lagos- Nigeria.

CC: SENATE COMMITTEE ON FINANCE

[End Email]

This message is a bit similar to ATM FROM CBN, and both invoke the name Soludo. That CBN one only offered $10 million, though. I guess they upped the ante to compensate for our Cadbury-killing weak dollar.

Can you imagine if any of these messages were real? If you suddenly became $10 or $20 million richer? You could kick back! A whole new set of shiny worries…

I'll bet that whoever falls for these scams does indeed imagine the possibilities. Too bad experiencing that pleasant dream is just another step in the scheme.