法律，正义，快意江湖

 

（题图来自 douban.com） 

昨天看了 the Untouchable，一部捧红了 Kevin Costner 和 Andy Garcia，以及 Charles Martin Smith 的电影。从电影一开始就把心提到了嗓子眼，一直到最后一分钟，那个记者问 Ness 对禁酒令即将取消的看法，Ness 说：”那么，我就去喝一杯。“这才跟着剧中人一笑，释然。

然后又想，Malone 和 Wallace 的死换来了 Capone 的入狱，如果 Capone 只是贩卖私酒，而不是组织黑帮犯下滔天罪行，这一切是否值得？

并非一切法律都代表了正义（Justice），有些法律是 non-sense，有些法律是为虎作伥。作为影片背景的禁酒令就是一部试图用行政命令简单干涉个人自由的法律，从这个意义上说，这部法律不仅荒唐，而且可说是非正义的。从电影里也看得出，只要不受惩罚，没人把这禁酒令当回事。就连 Malone 也在自己房间里藏了瓶酒。但是 Ness 刚到警察局，就要求警官们”以身作则“，拒绝酒精，难怪他不招人待见。

但是，我想与其说 Ness 是在试图捍卫具体的禁酒法令，不如说他是在捍卫法律系统的尊严。这个角色身上有我们熟悉的许多主人公那种死磕到底的精神。在他看来自己的工作就是按照法律的要求抓住 Capone，减少酒类走私。在与那位可怜的母亲见面之后，他的行动里加入了新的驱动力：对 Capone 所作所为的仇恨。但自始至终他都没有怀疑法律的正确。看惯了主角们的自我怀疑，Kevin Costner 扮演的主角显得有些”一根筋“，但我深深赞赏他的理想主义和主张：法治的地位是正义的必要条件，而个别的荒唐法甚至恶法必须被纠正，但法治的地位不应因此被怀疑。

而 Malone，George，Wallace 的加入，多半是受到 Ness 这种主张的感染，但他们的驱动力更多的是对 Capone 的仇恨，或者不愿像其他警察那样收受贿赂，混到退休。历史上真正的 Untouchables 虽然也有人身怀绝技，但影片里的人物设置无疑更激动人心：重新振作的经验丰富的老警察，初出茅庐的神枪手，出人意料超常发挥的书呆子会计──看到他们在蒙大拿的草原上策马奔驰，怎一个爽快了得。而这也是商业片，或者说”好看“的电影不可缺少的元素。

这部电影其实有些像西部片：英雄主义+道德高地+快意江湖的侠客精神。DePalma 的作品年表里，似乎不乏这样的电影。不过，the Untouchable 的杰出在于对”主旋律“的把握，以及成功的镜头语言──这部电影里只用了一次 Tommy Gun，其余子弹的数量基本都可以数得出来，但是你不会去数，因为每个镜头都危机四伏。

最后还是忍不住要赞一下偶像 Robert De Niro. 虽然他出场的时间不多，但每次出场后的压迫感都持续到了他下一次的出现。张扬的 Capone，其实比冷静的 Michael Corleone 更难演。装酷谁都会，霸气可不是谁都能演得出来的。

Trivia：Capone 1931 年入狱，1934 年被转到 Alcatraz，没错，就是 the Rock 里 Sean 和 Nicholas 战斗的地方……

Trivia 2：the Untouchable 2: Capone Rising 已经宣布了，还是 DePalma 导演…… 

Ducks in the School’s court

Posted by: snakehsu on Buzznet


昨天在机房加班出来，在填加班记录本的时候看见中庭里的一群小鸭。它们看见我也纷纷跑过来用嘴敲打玻璃门，也许是周末没人喂，饿了。心下甚喜，取出相机拍之。

今天在学校又跟一只松鼠不期而遇，它站起身来盯着我看了一眼，可惜没来得及掏相机。

Possibly a better classification scheme

The 1987 article on moss vegetation identification using Landsat TM proved not very useful as no Sphagnum-related information was revealed.  However, in the afternoon I combined RGB aerial photographs and the infrared (Band 1) image of color IR image using layer stack, and found the new image can be used to clearly identify different landcover in combination of ESA vegetation map.  A new spectral signature is also derived.  The classification using this signature shows very realistic distribution of Sphagnum, which can be verified in next week's field survey.

Illuminating… de-illuminating

This morning I went to the library in the hope of finding a book on fieldwork planning. But most book with this title talk about how primary/secondary teachers organise field trip. However, to my delight I found a book on vegetation mapping (Alexander and Millington, 2000), which is quite relevant and informative. I regret that I did not find this book earlier.

The book talked about Countryside Survey and Land Cover Mapping, both involve collecting data from multi-spectral images and field survey. and are similar to my project. There are also chapters on moorland vegetation classification. It cited an article on blanket bog classification in International Journal of Remote Sensing, Vol.8, and I will check this out tomorrow.

However, in the afternoon after I browsed the webpage of CS2000 and LCM2000, I realised that though they provide a resolution up to 25m, they do not contain species information but land cover such as ``bog'' or ``improved grass''. Besides, the price of LCM2000 is very high (500P per 1km^2 Grid cell for academic use).

After I cross-checked the ESA vegetation map and my unsupervised classification result, it reveals that my classification has very little consistency with the actual vegetation distributioni on the ESA map. Using NIR band the vegetation can be easily identified but most of them are not moss as supposed. Thus I think visible bands should also be considered when doing classification. Luckily the ESA map indicates bog and bare peat land cover, thus I can use it in my field survey. See if I can find more Sphagnum patches this time.

I'll go on contact LCM2000 see if the map is useful anyway. The LCM1990 and LCM2000 dataset may serve as a base for model validation... if I can get my hand on them!

Choosing sampling points

I need a score of sampling points to verify the spectral signature of sphagnum patches.  My original idea is to extract all pixels on the image.  Then use sample function in Excel or similar software to draw out sample points.  The problem, however, is that I have a too large dataset with over 200,000 pixels in a single grid cell.  To assign x,y values to each of them in one cell will take over 10 hours, and I have 7 such cells....

Thus I will turn to quota sampling method now.  I will generate random coordinate pairs once at a time.  The randomisation is controlled to ensure the position of the point within the cell.  Then I will check if the coordinate pair corresponds to the image of sphagnum patch.  If not, generate another pair.  This is repeated untill I have enough points for field observation.

你多美啊！请你停留！

这句话似乎是某名人去世前说的话。谁也不知道这是不是呓语，人之将死，其言也昏。然而最近常常想到这句话。有时候会感到有些恐慌。

考虑到这句话的语境，应该是对即将逝去的生命的挽留。不幸的是这样的挽留即使对一个有急事要离开的朋友也没有什么作用，更不用说客观规律了。所以，每次我想到生命的短暂，都会想到这句话，and vice versa. 

前几天跟一个朋友聊到这个话题，她说生命不是太短了，而是太快了。也有道理。总之，早在我们想得起抓牢它之前，生命里相当重要的一部分就已经成为过去了。24岁……再过几个月我就要进入这个年龄段，不知为什么只有在这个时刻我才真正觉得我似乎就要成为我一度那样讨厌的“成熟”的人。而到了25岁，大概自己也没有权利再过无忧无虑的生活了（虽然生活早已不是那个样子了，但是自己放弃无忧无虑是另一回事）。

更可怕的是，对于一个做学问为生的人而言，ta 可以很晚才出成果，得到公众的承认，但是作为基础的思考和学习，却往往都是年轻时完成的。35岁以后研究就成了一种 routine，像现在这样想法多得做不完的状态不知道还能不能保持。而我现在在宽泛的环境学科中，还没有找到一个真正愿意做一辈子的方向——一切看起来都有无限的问题和可能性。

万幸的是这句话让我想到了这些，我总算不用等到垂垂老矣之时才来反思。这仅有的一次生命应当怎样度过呢？

（此处删去背诵《钢铁》选段的一百来字）

奥斯特洛夫斯基说得是不错的。不过，什么是为了人类解放而进行的斗争？这个时代，大部分工作都可以增进人类的福祉，但是我认为如果没有创新性的工作，那么人的生活以及人类的追求不会有任何提高——比如说，我们会比二千年前拥有更多的柴火，土豆多得吃不完，但是我们永远不会发明石油工业和现代零售业。所以，工作的很大一部分意义在于创造。如果我们的工作让我们陷入了日复一日的重复劳动，那么我们应该做些什么来改变这种状况，生命才不算虚度。即使流水线上每10秒要敲4个钉子的工人，在他的工作和生活中也一定有可以改变的部分。而有些职业本身就带有创造的色彩，比如研究者和文艺工作者，那么他们更应该做 significant 的工作。

所以，我想常常有所创造，会是一种更充实的生活，比仅仅是忙碌好很多。创造性的研究，创造性的 hobby，创造性地发酸，sounds delicious...忙得跟狗一样也心甘了。

（写 blog 的同时正在用 ArcGIS 跑一段给 30,000 个点加 x,y 坐标的程序，已经跑了 80 多分钟还没跑完，所以利用这段时间 blog，本来如果晚上干完活了再写行文可以流畅些，不过中心思想在，现在也就省点时间了） 

Hacking MODFLOW and making plans for preliminary survey

I made another topology dataset for spatial discretion of MODFLOW.  This set is following Reeve et al. (2000) though I cannot tell why he used 11 layers to present the acrotelm, catotelm and mineral soil, the book they cited cannot be located anywhere on the web.  This model in fact assumes that vertical flow are important in blanket bog hydrology.  But there is another school of thought who claims that catotelm is relatively impermeable thus separating acrotelm from underlying mineral soil and the hydrology is completely determined by precipitation.

I found some books on aerial photograph interpretation, such as Jones (1968), Warner et al. (1996), and Lueder (1959).  Some of their references seems to be really interesting.  But, they are really way too old.  I wonder whether I can find those documents cited in them.

A problem rises when I want to do field observation to verify the reliability of Sphagnum spectral signature identified from aerial photographs.  How do I sample the verification points so I can tell how many patches are corresponding to the image?  The sampling will be a random sampling for each 1kmx1km grid, I will have a list of all pixels with that signature and choose points from the list randomly.  But for allocation of points between grid cells, I will use probability-proportional-to-size (pps) approach.  Because each cell has different proportion of possible patches, if I select the same number of points in each of the cell, cells with less areas of patches will in fact have weights more than they deserve.