The Adventures of Floating Clausewitz Head: the OODA Loop and the Journey into the Chinese Room: Part III

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Zero Derp Thirty

6 min readJun 6, 2015

Continued from the previous installment:

Floating Clausewitz Head, due to the fact that he was in a room with people with hoodies, was followed by an murderous-looking individual that claimed to be a member of an neighborhood watch organization.

Before Zimmerman could kill Floating Clausewitz Head, Clausewitz Head stood his ground and unleashed the power of Cyber Pearl Harbor (TM).

The attack instantly killed Zimmerman, causing Thomas Rid’s article “Cyberwar Will Not Take Place” to be retracted.

At this time, philosopher John Searle appeared.

“No, no Floating Clausewitz Head. That isn’t the Chinese Room! Just because Chinese hackers with hoodies are hacking in a room full of binary numbers doesn’t mean that this isn’t what I meant by the Chinese room!”

“So where can I find the Chinese Room?” Clausewitz Head asked.

“Say no more,” Searle said. He clicked his heels three times.

Clausewitz Head was magically transported to a 1930s Shanghai opium den. A beautiful woman (later revealed to one of the Soong family sisters)handed him an opium pipe. “It’s too dangerous to go into the Chinese room alone, Floating Clausewitz Head. Take this.” Another Soong sister told him that once he entered the Chinese Room, he would understand the secrets of cybersecurity and strategy. One of the Soong family sister’s husband, Chiang Kai-Shek, appeared and promised as well that Clausewitz Head would understand Who Lost China (TM).

A squirrel attempted to warn Clausewitz head not to trust the Soong sisters. Smoking the pipe would not help Clausewitz become a strategist.

But it was too late. Clausewitz was already in the Chinese Room. He would not step back now. “Before you take a hit of that pipe,” the Soong sisters intoned, “you must first know the effects of opium.”

Opium (poppy tears, lachryma papaveris) is the dried latex obtained from the opium poppy (Papaver somniferum).[3][4]Opium latex contains approximately 12% of the analgesic alkaloid morphine, which is processed chemically to produce heroin and other synthetic opioids for medicinal use and for the illegal drug trade. The latex also contains the closely related opiates codeine and thebaine and non-analgesic alkaloids such as papaverine and noscapine. The traditional, labor-intensive method of obtaining the latex is to scratch (“score”) the immature seed pods (fruits) by hand; the latex leaks out and dries to a sticky yellowish residue that is later scraped off, and dehydrated. The word “meconium” (derived from the Greek for “opium-like”, but now used to refer to infant stools) historically referred to related, weaker preparations made from other parts of the opium poppy or different species of poppies.[5] …
Opium contains two main groups of alkaloids. Phenanthrenes such as morphine, codeine, and thebaine are the main psychoactive constituents.[121]Isoquinolines such as papaverine and noscapine have no significant central nervous system effects, and are not regulated under the Controlled Substances Act. Morphine is the most prevalent and important alkaloid in opium, consisting of 10%–16% of the total, and is responsible for most of its harmful effects such as lung edema, respiratory difficulties, coma, or cardiac or respiratory collapse. Morphine binds to and activates mu opioid receptor in the brain, spinal cord, stomach and intestine. Regular use can lead to drug tolerance or physical dependence. Chronic opium addicts in 1906 China[53] or modern-day Iran[122] consume an average of eight grams of opium daily.
Both analgesia and drug addiction are functions of the mu opioid receptor, the class of opioid receptor first identified as responsive to morphine. Tolerance is associated with the superactivation of the receptor, which may be affected by the degree of endocytosis caused by the opioidadministered, and leads to a superactivation of cyclic AMP signaling.[123] Long-term use of morphine in palliative care and management of chronic pain cannot be managed without the possible development of drug tolerance or physical dependence. Many techniques of drug treatment exist, including pharmacologically based treatments with naltrexone, methadone, or ibogaine.[124]