Follow-Up: A history professor ‘s controversial claims about the origins of gun culture — and his inability to back up those claims using scholarly methiods accepted by his peers — cost him his job. A passage from Emory’s official investigative report (a PDF document) — “Taking all this into account, we are led to conclude…
“Star Trek originally got it right. In early episodes, when something exploded in outerspace, it made no sound. That’s because there is no air in outerspace to transmit sound…. Yes, an explosion probably would create an expanding cloud of gases which would eventually impact a spaceship in its path. However, in the vacuum of space…
“When writing, don’t try to edit as you go. Say what you want to say, unencumbered by the constant commentary from that fussy little editor swimming around inside your head. First, get it all down. Then, have at it, keeping what works and bug-zapping the rest. By separating writing and editing functions, you can convince…
“If you persist, you are about to read a theoretically-inflected critique of what some people call ‘codework.’ Potentially codework is a term for literature which uses, addresses, and incorporates code: as underlying language-animating or language-generating programming, as a special type of language in itself, or as an intrinsic part of the new surface language or…
Inaugural adresses of the presidents; a letter from Columbus, letters from a Civil War soldier from Iowa, and the letter of transmittal introducing the Constitution. This up-to-date site has an archive spanning from the Magna Carta (1215) to Bush’s 2002 State of the Union Address. —US Historical DocumentsU of Oklahoma) Similar:It's such a privilege to…
“Librarians have degrees. They go to graduate school for Information Science and become masters of data systems and human/computer interaction. Librarians can catalog anything from an onion to a dog’s ear. They could catalog you. Librarians wield unfathomable power. With a flip of the wrist they can hide your dissertation behind piles of old Field…
“Nerve activity in the teenaged brain is so intense that they find it hard to process basic information, researchers say, rendering the teenagers emotionally and socially inept… The team found the speed at which people could identify emotions dropped by up to 20 per cent at the age of 11. Reaction time gradually improved for…
“The Web site Arts & Letters Daily returns today, following its purchase by The Chronicle of Higher Education.” —Arts & Letters Daily to Resume Publication After Purchase by The Chronicle (Chronicle) O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! Similar:Impact of One-size-fits-all Web DesignI don’t particularly miss the splash lan…BusinessIn January 2001, I was blogging about Bill Clinton's #WhiteHouse…
“ANCHOR: Now, this breaking news. Something has reportedly happened. Details are sketchy, and we really don’t have any idea of what it might be, but let’s show these impressive aerial shots from our helicopter. Now let’s go to our correspondent in the field to tell us that he doesn’t know anything. Bob? ” Howard Troxler…
“More than 30,000 employees at Indian call centers, among whom Radhika becomes Ruth and Satish becomes Steve, are told to adopt American names and say they are calling from a U.S. city in order to put their American customers at ease. Their training includes a smattering of U.S. history and geography, along with speech therapy…
“When the question period came, he started with the first of the four large men. ‘You say the probate records show very few guns, and argue that this proves people in early America didn’t have guns. But when my father died, there was nothing in his will about his guns… Are probate records really a…
“Google Inc has been sued by a search engine optimization company, which claims Google deliberately altered its ranking when it realized the SEO company was competing with it.” —Google Sued by Search Optimism CompanyThe Register) Note the reference to “optimism” in the title… Optimism leads me to hope that The Resister will one day optimize…
“Truly happy people live by the maxim ‘Overrate thyself.’ They are raised by loving parents who slather them with praise. They stride through life with a confidence built on an amazing overestimation of their own abilities. And they settle into an old age made comfortable by the warm glow of self-satisfaction. Each of these people…
“A newspaper reporter questioned the practicality of the Internet bookmobile. Wouldn’t it be better to print materially more cheaply at a central location and then distribute them normally through book stores, online sales, or libraries? … The bookmobile reminded me of an itinerant vegetable cart which is a now a rarity in the United States.…
“Virtually every encyclopedia or textbook etymology of the word ‘robot’ mentions the play R.U.R. Although the immediate worldwide success of the play immediately popularized the word (supplanting the earlier ‘automaton’), it was actually not Karel Capek but his brother Josef, also a respected Czech writer, who coined the word. The Czech word robota means ‘drudgery’…
“The genesis of Churches ad hoc was the photograph I made of a cross that seemed to rise up out of a tree. The cross, located in a park overlooking Eugene, Oregon, created a controversy regarding the separation of church and state. Proponents of the cross called it a war memorial. Others saw it as…
“Catholic church authorities were displeased by passages in Copernicus’ text that seemed to contradict Scriptural teachings. But, the Inquisition decided not to ban De revolutionibus outright because its observations might be needed in the future to adjust the Gregorian calendar. Instead, a Papal decree in 1620 demanded alterations in ten specific places in the text.…
“Hi! I’m Sally, and I’m Johnny… Welcome to our website: Black People Love Us! We are well-liked by Black people so we’re psyched (since lots of Black people don’t like lots of White people)!! We thought it’d be cool to honor our exceptional status with a ROCKIN’ domain name and a killer website!!” —Black People…
“You are a games theorist. Your object is to defend games (and yourself) from the imperialism of a thousand theories. Navigate the four levels of narratology, psychology, film theory, and pathology. Control the spaceship with your mouse.” —Game LiberationJesper Juul) Similar:The Crucible, Geyer PAC (Scottdale, May 16-19)My wife is directing Arthur Miller’s The…CultureEnjoying more live…
“The toy area has its own distinct odor: sort of a musty, mildewy, plastic, sour-milk, baby-vomit, metallic, rotting-cloth smell… It isn’t quite the smell of evil-just despair.” —Goodwill Toy Section Most Depressing Thing EverOnion) Similar:"If It's Not Baroque, Don't Fix It" Cogsworth Broadway Supercuthttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mx6t-pef…AmusingThe 1931 Histomap: The entire history of the world distilled into a…