A Sceptical Mind

It’s time for the last blog post in our series of wedding related posts. After a great wedding day, a few days went by with organizing gifts, figuring out who bought what, cleaning up at home etc. etc., and then on July 14th we jumped on a plane headed for Dalaman, Turkey.

We were going on a fairly expensive 8 day trip to Marmaris in Turkey, where we were going to be staying at Turban Palace down by the shore. A 5-star hotel resort complete with All-inclusive concept, 3 pools, private beach, 4 restaurants, 7 bars, a water park, mini golf, huge apartment area for the rooms and.. well – a shit load of other things! The all-inclusive concept means that we don’t have to pay for food and drinks at all. Even several of the activities were included in the room price! So 24 hours a day, we could go to any bar and ask for a coke, a beer, a whiskey or whatever, and get it for free! Even the restaurants were free (however with special rules for the ala carte ones – more on that later).

So we got down there sometime around 1 am local time on Wednesday the 15th of July and quickly proceeded to our hotel room because we were so tired. Here we were met with a fantastic room, complete with a huge bed, a guest bed, a balcony, a flat screen TV and a lot more – and we even found out the mini bar was a part of the all-inclusive concept, so we were happy to be able to drink the few waters that were in there at this point.

Next day, we woke up and went down for breakfast. Here we saw how nice this all-inclusive thing really was! Huge buffets, specialized cooks standing around making specific meals (i.e. omelets or pancakes), free beverages and all you can possibly eat! It was great and you quickly started eating a lot more than you probably should. I’m pretty sure we gained quite a lot of weight down there! The same principle held for lunch and dinner, however with a lot different kinds of food and changing from day to day. You could even change your normal Main Restaurant meal for a ala carte restaurant once a week, so that you could get i.e. a five course meal in Italian cuisine or Turkish cuisine.

So the first day, we didn’t do much. We went for a small strole down Marmaris towards another hotel where we had an info meeting with the travel guides and where we also needed to pay for a few extra trips we wanted to go on. But all in all the first day was mostly relaxation in the resort. The second day was pretty much the same. We simply used our time getting used to the weather, enjoying the pool, the all-inclusive stuff and basically just relaxing. I also used a bunch of my time reading Seeds of Terror by Gretchen Peters – a book I recommend to anyone who has an interest in criminal finances, specifically how heroin is bankrolling the Taliban and Al qaeda.

But then on Friday, we went to something called Haman, which is a traditional Turkish bath at a spa house. The bath consisted of several things. We started off by changing clothes to bathing clothes and we then proceeded to sit in a sauna for 10 minutes (as if the 40 degrees Celsius outside wasn’t hot enough). After these ten minutes, we were guided to a big bathing dome where there was a large marble round table in the middle of the room and a bunch of fossets around the walls in this very damp room. Here we received a bath and scrub by a trained Haman specialist and were afterwards sent to a shower and rapped in a bunch of towels and stuff – basically like a mummy! Last but not least we received an oil massage for something like 20 minutes and was then finished – clean, relaxed and floating a bit!

On Saturday, we had planned to go on a boat trip with Star Tours – so that’s what we did. We joined another group of Danes on a small boat lead by a local. Here we proceeded out from the harbor and sailed to different bays in Marmaris, where we stopped for around 30 minutes and jumped of the boat to swim in the bays. I was a bit hesitant to begin with, as I knew the bays had some tiger sharks and white sharks, however both were very very seldom seen. The first time I didn’t jump in the water, but as Sara was pressuring me a bit, I finally decided to give it a try. I however got up quite quickly again, as did Sara – it was simply too creepy! I prefer swimming in pools! Later on in the day we stopped for some food on the boat and finally sailed back towards the harbor. We had however gotten seriously sunburned from lying on the boat during the siesta hours, so we were in a bit of pain the rest of the day and the day after that.

On Sunday, we were simply relaxing most of the day. Only in the evening did we do something special – we attended Turkish Night at a local restaurant where there was music, dance and food. All in all the entertainment there was great, since they had a bunch of dancers some of which were extremely talented. However the food was in no way something we can recommend. They market it as a real traditional Turkish three course meal, however in reality only the first course was Turkish and only the first two could even be called courses. A few water melons cut out does not constitute a course! However, as I said, all in all it was a good evening. Especially the male belly-dancer was cool – that guy is completely psychotic.

Monday, we once again mostly just relaxed and enjoyed the pool. Only during the evening did we do something special. We used up our ala carte reservation at the Italian ala carte restaurant at Turban Palace. Brilliant food really! Five courses, all of which were traditional Italian meals. Complete with a brilliant view of the mountains and the local bay – simply beautiful! Monday evening we started packing, because we had to go home the next day, and we did a final attempt at using our all-inclusive rights by taking up something like 8 drinks to our room.

Tuesday, the last day of our vacation, was used to the max by a trip with Star Tours. We began the day by packing everything and going down to eat. After having eaten, we checked out from Turban Palace and was picked up by a Star Tours bus. With this, we drove to a fishermen city called Dalyan were we would try a mud-bath, see ancient burial monuments and even visit turtle island. An island that’s special because it has fresh water on the one side of it and salt water on the other side. Also, turtle island should be the home of Caretta Caretta, an endangered species of sea turtle – however we didn’t see any. After the days activities we got a shower at a local hotel, got something to eat and then proceeded to the airport for our plane home.

All in all it was a great trip with a lot of experiences. Obviously I left out a ton of details here, because I’m trying to describe a week of activities – but I hope you got somewhat of an idea of what we did in Turkey.

Also, last but not least. A cute Turkish kitty cat we saw relaxing under a tree!

As I said in my last post, I’m currently doing a small series detailing the activities involved in my recent wedding to Sara Lind (now Sara Lind Mortensen). After having covered the bachelor party in my last post, it’s time to cover the actual wedding.

On July 11th 2009 I woke up after having slept at my dads house. As you may know, it’s customary the couple don’t sleep in the same house together the day before the wedding, so I had gone home with my dad to Haderup in Midwestern Jutland. I had slept fine really, however when I woke up I was oddly dizzy and was bleeding from my nose, so I was probably more nervous than I was aware of! After having eaten breakfast and gotten ready, we drove towards Silkeborg at around 11 am, stopping on the way to drop off a few things where my dad was sleeping the next night.

When we finally got to the church, it was around noon and only a handful of people had shown up yet (the wedding was at 1 pm). So we simply waited and said hi to the people who had shown up already, before we went into the church to sit up by the alter at around 12:40. At this point I was quite nervous! Time went by, as people slowly arrived and filled up the church. My best man, Michael Dahl, however hadn’t shown up yet. And even 5 minutes before it all started, he still hadn’t shown up. Apparently there had been some trouble with getting all people in the car from Aarhus fast enough, so they had arrived just a few minutes before the wedding started and Dahl came rushing in, apologizing straight away. At this point everyone was pretty much there and now we were just waiting for the bride to walk in.

And then, the music started and in came Sara! Smiling, happy and beautiful as ever. If there ever was a time where I was truly fucking nervous, this was it! A very odd feeling really. One that I don’t think most would understand unless they’ve tried it. You feel oddly overwhelmed and confused..but in a good way! So well, it’s fairly hard to describe – however what I can say is that for once I actually felt like crying because of something else than sadness.

So there we were – sitting across from each other, listening to the priest’s speech (which was surprisingly good.. she even dissed religion at one point: “We all know nothing in the bible is science and nothing should be taken literally” – I like her!). Things happened fairly like you would expect, with everything going smoothly. We even had two professional singers sing “Come What May” from Moulin Rouge as a duet – something that actually did prompt a tear from me – again.. overwhelming. All in all, a brilliant ceremony where everything worked as planned and everything was great!

After the ceremony, we had a small photo session with a friend photographer, a few pictures and greetings from guests outside and then onwards to our reception next door with champagne (imported from Italy), cake and other food and beverages. The wedding cake was even made by Sara’s little sister Anna, who has used the last several months figuring out how to make the perfect wedding cake (sshh: Don’t tell anyone, but I think she nailed it!). Anna is the girl to the right of here, the one in the red dress. After having eaten and greeted people, we got picked up by a white limousine, so that we could be transported to our photo session with a professional photographer by the name of Lars Lærkesen (www.laerkefoto.dk) – a thoroughly brilliant photographer, that did everything exactly like we wanted it, who was extremely professional, funny and creative.. basically the greatest pick we could have made! We highly recommend him! Also the limousine firm DanLimo (www.danlimo.dk) was very professional and the driver was very cool.. he even came up with great picture ideas!

After a great photography session at Gl. Skovridergaard and Lunden in Silkeborg, we drove to Funder Kirkeby, where the rest of the wedding would take place. Here we started out with a few more pictures (your face feels quite numb after smiling that much) and then proceeded with a welcome drink and food.

Our Toastmaster was my brother Lars Bruun-Mortensen, whom handled the assignment perfectly, timing every speech, song etc. efficiently, so that it never seemed stressed and always seemed like everything was going smoothly. The first speech was mine, which I had initially written a lot for, because I was so nervous about it and wanted it to be perfect. But shortly before the wedding I threw out speech after speech, starting from scratch over and over again, simply because I didn’t know how to express everything exactly like I wanted it and exactly the way in which Sara would understand what I meant. In the end I ended up with not really having a speech.. I basically only had a baseline of what I wanted to say and then let it come out naturally on the spot. I even sang a song for her, because that’s something she loves – even though I’m no Sinatra! So I sang “You Belong To Me” by Jason Wade from Lifehouse (accompanied by Mads Noe on guitar).

Sara also gave a speech and a song – specifically “Everything” by Michael Buble. Something I enjoyed very much! On top of this my brother Lars, my dad Steen, Sara’s mom Karin, Sara’s sister Anna, my grandparents, Sara’s half-sister Birgitte + her family and a few others I sadly don’t remember right now, all had either a speech, a song or a complete musical piece.

All in all it was a brilliant wedding with everything you could expect! We even had a great band called Rockfathers (www.musiknu.dk) whom everyone loved – even the oldest of the guests praised the band for being very comfortable, varied and talented – so if you’re planning an event and need music in Denmark, consider Rockfathers!

After having danced the first and last dance, having eaten and drunk a lot, and having had a fantastic time – Sara and I jumped into a car and was driven to Gl. Skovridergaard where we stayed in a suite for the night!

In all regards – it was a great day!

So, some of you probably already know this, but for the few who don’t: I recently got married! For that reason, I have decided to write a few blog posts detailing some of the activities surrounding these events, starting with one of the obligatory activities before ones wedding: The Bachelor Party!

On the July 4th 2009 I woke up, made some coffee and, as I remember it, took out a melon for breakfast. Everything seemed normal. Sara was at work, but she’s always at work Saturday morning until noon, so nothing odd about that. In general nothing much seemed out of the ordinary, so I was a bit unsure if this was the day the bachelor party was going to take place. But then, at 11 am, 4 guys stood outside my door with breakfast and an irritating camera pointing at my face. These guys were: Michael Dahl (the best man), Wel Rachid, Mads Noe and Morten Slot Kristensen. (later on Lars Bo Brink joined us – he was initially unsure if he could join because of work).

After having eaten we took Wel’s car to Event Company on Katrinebjergvej, where it was time for massive fighting! Basically, what they’d apparently thought of was, that given my love for violence and brutality, beating at each other for an hour seemed like a good way to go.. So we started out with sumo-wrestling wearing these silly giant foam sumo-wrestler outfits and fighting each other in a top-down tournament style ending up with two fighters up against each other for first place and braging rights. These two fighters?: Morten Slot Kristensen and myself – evidently also the two guys with most martial arts experience (not that kicking or grabling is much of an option when you’re wearing a giant foam suit). Each fight was 3 rounds, and best out of 3 won. As I recall, Morten took the first round after a lot of pushing each other around and trying to get on top of each other. Second round was taken by me after having thrown Morten behind me and landing on top of him for the takedown..but sadly, the last round was taken by Morten who then effectively became the winner of the sumo-wrestler challenge. Oddly enough actually, it did seem as though martial arts and/or military experience seemed to dictate the outcome, with Morten being the most experienced (my guess: 10+ years), myself (6 years experience), Wel (military experience), Dahl (some Karate experience some years back), Mads (no experience to my knowledge) and Lars Bo (also no experience to my knowledge).

After the initial sumo-wrestler fight, I did however get back at Morten in a gigantic fist-fight with giant foam gloves (that were extremely heavy). None of us wanted to give up the fight, that basically kept on until one of us called it quits. However after having taking a shitload of blows to the head, Morten eventually feel to the ground having bitten his tongue after I hit him with a hard frontal blow.

Last but not least we gave a mechanical bull a try to see who could stay on the longest. As I recall the score at the end was:

1. Morten – 54 seconds
2. Michael (me) – 49 seconds
3. Dahl – 48 seconds
4. Mads – around 30 seconds
5. Wel – around 20 seconds
6. Lars Bo – no score (he didn’t have an attempt)

At the end, most of us were extremely tired and a few of us were somewhat beaten up. When Morten beat me in the first challenge, he gave me a few marks, just for me to remember  him defeating me. We documented it below just because it looked fairly cool:

That bitch Morten used nails

Not sure who gave me that - probably Morten

So what about the rest of the day? Well, first we just took something to eat and drank a few beers.. you know – the obligatory stuff. Then the guys had planned something relaxing on top of the fighting – going in to see a movie! Specifically: Public Enemies! By far one of the greatest movies I’ve seen this year. I love their film technique and how they use sound so beautifully to make every shot out so much more intense – it’s well worth the 90 DKK (about 17$) the ticket cost. (even though I obviously paid nothing.. bachelor party you know..).

After this, we went back to my apartment where we drank a shit load of beer, a bit of wine (at least me and Morten did before we passed out), grilled and for some reason watched a shitload of Jackass on MTV. Apparently people hurting themselves becomes extra funny when alcohol is involved – who knew?

So all in all – a great bachelor party! I thank all of you guys who were there and all who helped to plan it. I’ve been told finding the date was more than a bit tricky, especially because I forgot to tell Sara about a belt graduation at the Shotokan club.. something she wasn’t especially happy about. But in the end you got it done and everything went fine. Even though only a few of the invited peeps were able to come that day, those who came made it a fantastic day. Thank you!

Just a few last pics from the evening before I shut up!:

When it comes to music I’m mostly a Metal, Jazz and Hard Rock kinda guy, but lately one artist has captivated me in a new and deeper way – This artist is the talented and beautiful Ayoe Angelica.

Truth be told, I actually know Ayoe indirectly through my fiancee Sara Lind, however Ayoe never striked me as a potential world artist until I heard her sing. With a combination of mellow soul and powerful lyrics, Ayoe’s debut-album is a wonderful piece of art that tears up your mind and soul. Not only do I firmly believe Ayoe’s music will appeal to most everyone in some way or another, but I also believe that 5 years from now, such a statement will be so universal that it almost constitutes a given!

This belief was strengthened even further when I accidently turned on Denmark’s DR1 in December and saw Ayoe Angelica as a supporting singer for Ufo & Yepha (for a charity event as far as I know.)

So am I expecting you’re just gonna take my word for it? Of course not!! You can find more information about Ayoe on her own website: http://ayoeangelica.dk/ … Other than that Ayoe also has a MySpace page, a Facebook fan page and a bunch of YouTube videos, one of which is included in the bottom of this post! I hope Ayoe’s music brings you enlightenment as it has me! … That is all!!

Ayoe Angelica – Dr. Jekyll:

Ufo & Yepha feat. Ayoe Angelica (This is in Danish):

Let me first state: I did this review not because many have heard about Me.dium’s search engine – but because one of the people behind it wrote a comment on my blog earlier today and requested I took a look at it – and so I did!

After having just reviewed Cuil, the alleged competitor to Google, it’s quite an uplifting feeling to go to http://me.dium.com/search. At the very least, here is a search engine that can actually claim originality. Not that we haven’t seen popularity search engines before, but never in this way.

When you go to me.dium, you are met with your typical search bar and two buttons: Search and I’m feeling social. Also on the page is a list of search strings just typed in by other users. Now for a security guy like myself I’m a bit reluctant to call the “suggestion list” a good idea. Theoretically it’s a good idea because it can give people interesting things to read. I myself found out Bernie Mac apparently almost died recently. On the other hand the list could potentially be a bit damaging if users start typing in personal information like their e-mail address, name, address and so on. It’s a well-known fact that many try to “google” themselves to see how much information is publicly available on them – doing the same thing here might actually lead you into more trouble than you were before you did the search. However it largely depends on the algorithms set into place to control that list and if it’s handled properly it shouldn’t be a problem.

When it comes to the actual standard searching, me.dium does a fairly good job actually. There’s nothing really revolutionary about it, but it does what it’s supposed to and I got way more results than I did on Cuil (however not anywhere near what I get on Google.. but me.dium is still only released as an alpha version so what can you expect really?). The I’m feeling social feature is also quite interesting as it displays what other users like – thereby sorting out a lot more spam- and/or irrelevant sites so that you get a more precise and relevant search. I must say I really like that feature!

Now for the layout. Well, I like the colors and I like the graphics. But what I don’t like is the blatant Google rip-off. I’m feeling social is a very cool feature, but as for the name anyone can see it’s a complete rip-off of Google’s I’m feeling lucky. I would have liked a bit more originality here! The same goes for the search results, which also look way to much like Google’s – actually so much that I would fear a lawsuit had I been from me.dium.com.

So all in all I like Me.dium Social Search soo much better than Cuil and I really think it has some new and cool features. I don’t believe it’s a realistic competitor to Google, as it doesn’t support many of the cool features Google does (define, site, image searching, calculator, currency converter etc.) and I’m a bit afraid Me.dium Social Search can’t handle the pressure of 60.000.000 unique users pr. hour or whatever Google actually handles (probably a lot more) and of course – Me.dium needs to index more sites. That being said, it’s not unrealistic that Me.dium Social Search, given time, could potentially be a competitor to Google – So my advice to the dium.com people: Be original, stay original, increase power and ease of use and just expand with servers and new indexed pages – maybe in 5-10 years people will be using your search engine!

I recently tried out the “new” search engine Cuil which supposedly was the new up and coming competitor to Google. Now, I really went into this with an open mind and thought: “Hey, if they claim to be better than Google, they probably have even better features that make my searching and related tasks easier” — well, I was wrong!

Cuil is in many ways a semi-finished project. It doesn’t have superior searching in any way. It actually didn’t even have any relevant results half the time I searched for things.. Things that Google did have relevant results for.

One of the other things that make Google special is their many functions. As in you can use commands like define: and site: , and even use Google as a calculator with support for trigonometric functions and currency converter. Cuil has none of these features!

Also, when it comes to Cuil’s layout, they’ve said that the picture-paragraph thing is there because users should visit websites based on pictures and not “meaningless” text.  While I can partly agree with this, they do a terrible job of actually making this work. The pictures shown are seldom relevant and you have a tendency to choose the results with the pictures – yet the real information could easily be on a website without a relevant picture. Text is still the single most relevant thing we search for – it’s why we use the Internet.. so that we can share information.. and text is information.. images are seldom necessary..

All in all I’m very disappointed in Cuil and at the moment I don’t believe for a second that it will even remotely be a competitor to Google…

I’m definitely sticking to Google for the time being.

I love debates! I really do.. I simply love discussing the facts, opinions and actions of one self and others – with the appropriate argumentation of course. This is something I’ve often loved doing with my family and friends (whom often hate me for it, as I’m kinda strict with correct argumentation) and of course in my work with politics in Radikale Ungdom here in Denmark.

But during all of this over enthusiastic opinion sharing I’ve often come across certain argumentation styles I’ve found .. well, ridiculous! Let’s take a few examples:

Arguments of the form “Everyone knows … “ or “Everybody agrees … “ are inherently false – Always!! No matter what subject you pick, no such subject will be known by all of the general population and no opinion will be shared by the general population. The mere fact that you are having the discussion with someone should tell you that your argument is inherently wrong, as that person clearly does not know or does not agree! This form of argumentation often comes up in emotional subjects like “Everybody agrees child molestation is wrong” – Which is obviously false, since some actively molest children. Or perhaps in another context “Everyone agrees that global warming is real” which is again obviously false, since some don’t believe this to be true.

There is a correct way to use the “Everyone .. something” argumentation form however, you just have to limit your population. So an argument like “All doctors agree ..” might be right, it’s definitely not inherently wrong. Also, in the same category, an argument like “All soldiers know guns can shot” would also probably be correct, while “Everyone knows guns can shot” isn’t!

Let’s take another example of bad use of argumentation: “Abraham Lincoln would have …” - Using what a dead guy might have said, is very very bad argumentation! Actually this is one that Jon Stewart already pointed out (very delicately I might add) on The Daily Show a few months back.

Sadly many actually do this! Like refer to Martin Luther King, Abraham Lincoln, JFK or some other historical figure – but really, how the fuck do you know what that person thinks? Maybe he would have hated your guts?

Hmm another example: “Studies have shown…” A very commonly used argument for some given product or solutions correctness. Yet this seemingly normal expression is probably one of the worst forms yet, since it begs the question: “Which studies?”, and as long as that question can not be answered by the individual, his or her argument doesn’t count for shit! It’s all too common:

Normal guy reads newspaper, sees a headline “Studies show mobile phones cause HIV” and then unquestionably believes this snippet of information to be true. He then tells his friends, his girlfriend, his dad, his teacher, a couple of stoners and perhaps his dog (he’s probably kinda drunk). This then circulates even further with these individuals talking to other individuals, claiming that studies show mobile phones cause HIV and finally, 1 year later, people are so damn scared no one dares use a mobile phone for fear of HIV.

Using an argument like “Studies have shown … “ is the equivalent of saying: “As far as I know and believe …” - that is if you can’t mention the source of course!

So what was this post all about? Well – mainly it was about me getting some frustration out there .. I’m tired of people believing arguments like the above are worth anything, and I’m tired of people unquestionably believing everything they hear or read… So really my one goal here, my one morale, is simply:

Be sceptical – Question everything!!

So Sara and I were planning our weeding next year and were talking about wine. We were trying to decide on which white wine to use for the first course, since we didn’t want to use extreme amounts of money on it, but still didn’t want to slack too much on quality.

So we came to the perfect compromise – Silverlake Sauvignon Blanc 2006.. One of the best white wines we’ve ever tasted (which probably isn’t saying much – but we still like it).. So if you ever need to buy a bottle of wine that’s good, but not “get homeless buying it” good – then Silverlake is the wine for you..

At the time of writing, the price for a Silverlake Sauvignon Blanc 2006 was 11,95$.

So this is it – My first post! What to say? Well there isn’t much to say actually at the moment, except for of course: welcome to “A Sceptical Mind”, which is my personal blog and website, where I will be ranting on in the future and breaking the limits of free speech!

A s the name suggests I am a sceptic. A sceptic in the sense that I never take other peoples word for anything. I continually try to find the truth behind any subject and I don’t conclude one way or the other without the help of science – I am a true believer of science! On top of being a sceptic by nature, I am also a successful entrepreneur and security professional from Denmark, and this webpage will therefore also include some business related material from time to time – so it’s not all ranting!

Politically speaking I am a liberal! To be more exact I’m probably a socialist liberal, with heaviest emphasis on the liberal part. This will probably also shine quite clearly through my writings.

If you want to learn more about me, please read the “About the author” page which will be edited shortly.

Also, if you at any point disagree with me – please say so! Don’t hold back, simply just write a comment on my post – but if you do write a comment saying “Fuck you! You’re wrong!” Please be as kind as to prove it! If I’m wrong, there should be evidence that shows I’m wrong – so show it to me. I don’t claim to know every detail of the world and I don’t believe that knowledge is constant. Knowledge is ever changing, evolving and improving. So again – if you find anything! Please let me know! Let yourself be heard and inform me of what I have gotten wrong – but then again.. if you’re argumentation sucks, be prepared to get bashed back – hard!

Also a last note to any stuck up individuals: Profanity is crap! I will use any language I so choose at any given time and no one, not a one, shall force me to use a vocabulary they can accept! If you have a problem with foul language, then my message to you is: “Fuck you and get off my blog you fucking asshole”.

That is all

Cheers

Michael