According to ABC News, the White House and the Secret Service "quietly signed an agreement last spring in the midst of the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal declaring that records identifying visitors to the White House are not open to the public." The agreement is in the form of a five-page…
I have a confession.
If the general consensus is that I should never do this again, I will seriously consider stopping (not that I had ever done this before–see below). I know that the story I am about to relate will disgust and confound some readers. Beware that I am thin-skinned, but don’t hold back.
Here’s the short version. While in Chicago, my family and I (my wife and I have two daughters, aged six and eight) went to a trendy chocolatier (a store that sells high-priced chocolate). While at said store, I ate some of the high-priced chocolate left by a customer who had left the store just as we were sitting down.
As I relate this, I am haunted by the Seinfeld episode where George Costanza is caught rummaging through the trash can in the kitchen of a house eating a pastry that someone had thrown away. My adventure also brings to mind an idea put forth by “Tim,” a friend of mine, who has long argued that all morality starts with what one puts into one’s mouth.
Here’s what happened. We went to a chocolatier, where my wife ordered a high-priced cup of hot chocolate. The chocolatier was located on the first floor of an upscale mall that sells lots and lots of things that nobody really needs. It just so happened that the Lego store was on the second floor of that mall. That was our true destination when we were distracted by chocolatier’s prominent location.…
Lewis Lapham served as editor of Harper's Magazine from 1976 until his retirement in from those duties in 2006. But he has continued on in his writing. In the January 2007 "Notebook" he bristles at the suggestions of Nancy Pelosi and others that impeachment hearings are "off the table." Lapham…
My family and I just returned from a wonderful trip to Chicago. My wife and I have two daughters, aged 6 and 8. All of us learned many new things at Chicago’s spectacular museums. For instance, the Field Museum
has a terrific exhibit, called Evolving Planet, which examines the evolution of life forms on Earth from 4 ½ billion years ago up to modern humans, combining displays regarding genetics with numerous awe-inspiring fossils. There’s no sign that the museum has given in to the creationist crowd. It’s mainstream science all the way. In fact, the website for Evolving Planet takes misconceptions regarding evolution head on. Here’s a refreshing sample:
Misconception: Evolution is just a theory, just as intelligent design and creationism are theories.
Answer: False. Evolution is a scientific theory based on the scientific method, which involves systematic data collection of observable phenomena and scientific experiments that can be accurately replicated. Intelligent design and creationism are faith-based belief systems—not testable scientific theories—that offer non-scientific explanations for life’s origins and the diversity of life forms.
Top off a visit to Evolving Planet with a visit to the Shedd Aquarium where you can see evidence of transitional forms like the Australian lungfish.
[I realize some of these photos are grainy–the aquarium prohibits flash photography.]
Or view this exquisitely camouflaged leafy sea dragon. God designed each and every fake leaf, even though He engaged in conscious deception by doing this (very unbecoming of omnipotence and omniscience).
Travel note: Chicago hotel rooms …
I’m in the middle of reading This is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession, a delightful work by Daniel J. Levitin. I plan to write about this book when I’m finished reading it, but one thing he wrote in his introduction especially intrigued me. Levitin writes…