100 reasons I'm better than you

A catalogue of the 100 reasons that I'm better than the readers of this. Maybe I won't be better than each of you for every reason, but I'm sure there'll be at least one reason why I'm specifically better than YOU

29 August, 2006

22. Customs Officials quail before me

Either I have terrifying psychic abilities to occlude the minds of border and immigration staff, or they're just scared when they see the picture of my mighty beard and moustache.

But either way, I've never been refused access to another country. And yet, compare the picture in my passport, with a recent picture of me. It looks nothing like me, does it? (Occasionally a Swedish border guard will point that out "you have shaved off - your beard?") Somehow, I've resisted saying "of course, it was making me look like a terrorist", but you think they might pick up on the fact that my passport shows my eyes are a warm brown, rather than the cold, dead grey they are in real life.
There's also things that could be said about the effectiveness of biometric passports, national identity cards, profiling and other such wastes of money, but I think my protean eye colour, plus the fact that some of my chums have accidentally boarded planes in the last month while carrying Stanley knives, effortlessly displays superiority over those charged with guarding the edges of our countries. Simply put, I am mightier than the state's sphincters.

24 August, 2006

21. I've competed in an international athletic competition

OK, a few of you may have also run marathons. But how many of you have ascended to the lofty heights of competing in the World Championships of anything? Indeed, how many of you have a picture of yourself, with the word 'Athlete' inscribed beneath it?

22 August, 2006

20. I've written a novel

Now, it might not be published yet, but perhaps there's little demand for a fragile, romantic tragi-comedy of manners set in Bromley. But that can only show that through my contrarian nature, I have more rareified tastes than the general hordes, as they slowly blunder their ways through Jordan's second autobiography.

02 August, 2006

19. Incredibly durable testicles

I will elucidate on this point further shortly, along with a photograph to demonstrate.

18. I understand what Pascal's Wager is all about

As usually framed, Pascal's Wager runs as follows:
If God exists and I believe in Him, I'll go to heaven (which is an infinitely good thing) as long as I act correctly on earth (which may be a finitely bad thing, as I'll have to abjure prostitutes and other forms of moral incontinency I might otherwise enjoy).
So if God doesn't exist, I'll exchange a finite cost for no return.
But if God does exist and I don't believe in Him, I'm infinitely worse off, because I'll either miss out on heaven, or end up in hell, which would be infinitely bad.
If we multiply the probability of God's existence by the reward for believing in Him, we find we still have an infinite benefit, whereas we only have finite risks and rewards if we don't believe in Him.
Thus, it's rational, as any student of statistics would tell you in a trice, to believe in God.
Keeping up so far?
Where my superiority is demonstrated is that you probably thought that was it: Pascal computes his expectations and then goes off and starts believing in God. But that isn't the deal here. What Pascal actually points out is that although he's shown that it would be rational to believe in God, on the basis of the expected reward, that's not enough. You still have to go to church and inculcate religious beliefs and practices, otherwise you're not being sincere, and that's what counts, rather than a rational choice to bet your life's path on the possible existence of a deity.
Now, of course, you know that. But you didn't use to, did you? And thus you'll always have understood the consequences of Pascal's wager for a shorter time than me.