Archive for June, 2008
Ten thousand things you didn’t know
If a picture is worth a thousand words, then here are about ten thousands words’ worth of photos for you. A few months ago, I bought a small camera that I try to take everywhere I go. The plan was to make myself look more careful at the world around me, which I actually do [...]
The Wisdom of Crowds and the crowds within us
In an article entitled “The Crowd Within,” The Economist has commented on some recent work that has expanded on the earlier and well-publicized counter-intuitive findings of James Surowiecki, author of “The Wisdom of Crowds” (2005). Surowiecki found that the aggregated guesses of non-experts were often startlingly accurate. The averaged guesses of non-expert crowds were often [...]
Pridefest 2008
Today we biked over to see the 2½ hour long gay pride parade. “You’re here, you’re queer, we’re used to it.” About 40,000 other people came to see the parade along the edge of my neighborhood today. You can see the crowds looking down Grand Boulevard. Many people were festively dressed. There were many couples [...]
The Bush-McCain challenge: can you really tell them apart?
I’m aware that McCain is different than Bush on a few issues. But these are areas in which McCain has stumbled over a very low bar, indeed. For instance, McCain has the intellectual brilliance to admit that we are terribly screwing up our environment and that energy is an issue that needs attention. These are [...]
Sex-ed lite bill to be introduced in Utah
Under a bill to be introduced soon in Utah, sex education teachers would be criminally liable if they “deviate from state law governing sex education, which requires that it focus on physical and emotional development of adolescents, healthy relationships and the threat and prevention of diseases.” The bill is being prepared in response to a [...]
Let there be hecklers
It’s difficult to watch hecklers, even when you agree with them. On a superficial level they are rude. By interrupting formal speeches they are preventing the officially designated speaker from delivering his or her message. But what alternatives do we have when modern-day powerful politicians carefully exclude people who disagree with the speaker? Here’s the [...]
Are human beings evolving into honeypots?
I’m learning a lot about honeypot ants. They are incredible little creatures. Also known as repletes or storage ants, certain members of these ant colonies serve as living storage jars for the nectar gathered by the other workers. Their abdomens extend many times bigger than the ant originally was, such that each of these living [...]
It’s time to ask the candidates simple questions about birth control
A group called Birth Control Watch is suggesting that we ask the following questions to the candidates: 1. Do you support couples having access to safe and effective birth control options, including emergency contraception? 2. Do you agree that for women to achieve equality, they must have access to family planning services, including birth control [...]
Could the President order that someone be buried alive? Yes or no?
This testimony by John Yoo is disgraceful on many levels. Yoo was commenting (or, rather, refusing to comment) on his previous “work” in Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel. Of course, in this Think Progress video, Yoo is doing his best to uphold the disgraceful actions of his former boss, George W. Bush. He’s doing [...]
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