This happened: airport evacuated, shrapnel filled bomb defused.
Race is a social construct
So what does that mean, “a social construct?” I think of it as something that a group tacitly agrees to think, do, or believe which is exists solely because of that agreement. You can sometimes tell if something is a social construct by evaluating if it varies significantly between different groups. For example, the concept…
If you think everybody likes/hates Trump, think again
This is a fascinating glimpse into how polarized our country has become. Gallup asked Americans to rate Trump from 0-100. Among Democrats, the average score is 16; a majority of Democrats give Trump a score of 3 or lower, and 75% rate him below a 20. In contrast, the average score among Republicans is 77,…
14,000 year old village in Canada
This story is amazing for two reasons. It changes our understanding of how North America was settled, in that it supports the idea that there was land that wasn’t covered by ice during the ice ages along which people migrated. For me, it’s even more intriguing that the story of this settlement was passed along…
Dunbar’s number: number of people with whom you can have a “stable social relationship”
Dunbar’s number is a suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships—relationships in which an individual knows who each person is and how each person relates to every other person. Informally, this is “the number of people you would not feel embarrassed about joining uninvited for a…
I have a little bit of a crush on a man I’ve never met
This was brilliant. Payload: Not all ideas are the same, and not all conversations about ideas even have basic legitimacy. If you feel isolated by this, that your views are basically unwelcome in tech and can’t be spoken about… well, that’s a fair point. These views are fundamentally corrosive to any organization they show up…
Meet your death panel
For years, the Republican right suggested that if Obamacare passed, the result would be “Death Panels” which would choose whether or not individuals would get the healthcare they need. We all denounced those claims as specious; there was no such provision in the ACA. Now that the Republicans have control of the government, they’ve trotted…
The game “Set” rocks the mathematical world
You may have played the game “Set”: Invented in 1974, Set has a simple goal: to find special triples called “sets” within a deck of 81 cards. Each card displays a different design with four attributes—color (which can be red, purple or green), shape (oval, diamond or squiggle), shading (solid, striped or outlined) and number…
This is my America.
I believe in this dream of America: a place where no one profits from the misery of others, where the suffering of the smallest child matters as much as the glory of our captains and leaders. I believe in a place where we seek truth, where we treat disagreements with respect and patience, where honesty…