Posts tagged “News”
#FridayFive: Podcasts
In which I recommend some podcasts
What has happened to us in this country? If we study our own history we find that we have always been ready to receive the unfortunates from other countries, and though this may seem a generous gesture on our part, we have profited a thousandfold by what they have brought us.
Eleanor Roosevelt – 1939
Misdirection and Contraception: On Hobby Lobby
Imagine yourself in a bar where a pickpocket takes money out of your wallet and with it buys you a glass of chardonnay. Although you would have preferred a pinot noir, you decide not to look that gift horse in the mouth and thank the stranger profusely for the kindness, assuming he paid for it. You might feel differently, of course, if you knew that you actually had paid for it yourself.
Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause and effect. I call these the “wet streets cause rain” stories. Paper’s full of them.
In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.
Michael Crichton
Redemption through Reading?
Prisoners can reduce their sentences by reading.
Why Federal Construction Spending Doesn’t Translate to GDP Growth
Genetic Memories
Fascinating Fact about Planarian Worms
Bad News for Resolutionists
Starting in the next few days, you’ll start to see them. They’re the resolutionists, and they’re going to invade your local gym. But new studies show some bad news for everyone working a desk job, and not just for the ones suddenly motivated to start lifting weights or getting some cardio “this year”. Those of