Circadian rhythms

This year’s Nobel prize for Physiology or Medicine was given to three scientists for their work in understanding the nature of circadian rhythms, the daily pattern of life that we all, animals and plants alike, follow that seems to be governed by the rate of the Earth’s rotation about its axis. This topic has been of interest as far back as the 18th century when astronomer Jean Jacques d’Ortous de Mairan found that the leaves of mimosa plants opened at the time of daybreak and closed at night, even when they were kept in the dark all the time, suggesting that there was an internal biological clock that was not triggered entirely by sunlight.
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Being paid to influence others

Businesses have long realized that we are swayed more by the opinions of our friends and neighbors than by advertisements in the media, which is why social media has become so powerful in shaping messages. For some people, this trust apparently also extends to celebrities on social media since their recommendations are also assumed to be disinterested. So a celebrity who recommends something on Twitter is more likely to sway readers than the same celebrity saying the same thing in a commercial. The former is seen as an honest preference while the latter is just an actor reading someone else’s words.
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Taking artistic license too far

When you see drawings for proposed architectural projects, they show an idealized vision with pleasant environs consisting of wide, neatly landscaped streets and pedestrians and dogs walking among minimal traffic. My eye was drawn in today’s local newspaper, the Plain Dealer, to an article about a new condominium project on a street that is very close to the university I used to work at and so I am familiar with the neighborhood.
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Now that’s what I call a trailer

We know that filmmakers put some of the best scenes into their trailers. In fact, when it comes to many action films where character and plot are given short shrift and the focus is on fights and chases, once you’ve seen the trailer, you can pretty much skip the film. But there are some trailers that are so compelling that you know immediately that you want to see the film. One such case is the trailer for the black comedy Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri that was released this past week. It tells you just enough to make you curious for more. It helps that it has two superb actors Frances McDormand and Woody Harrelson in the lead roles of the mother of a raped and murdered woman and the local police chief.
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Hipster racism

I tend to skip any news story that has the word ‘hipster’ in the title, thinking that it will deal with some trivial and ephemeral social trend that I am not part of nor wish to be part of and that will have disappeared by the time I learn what it is by the process of news osmosis. What I basically knew about the word ‘hipster’ was that it was used pejoratively against people who tried to differentiate themselves from their peers by adopting some lifestyle that was supposedly ironic and avant garde but could just as easily be described as pretentious.
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How many wrongs will it take?

Russia, Russia gate, overthrow, regime change, propaganda, coup d’état, 2016 presidential election, hiking, interference, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, 81 wrongs, Cold War, covert, CIA

As cartoonist Ted Rall says: “The United States tried to overthrow or directly interfere in the elections of at least 80 countries throughout the Cold War alone. How exactly is it in a position to complain if it turns out to be true that Russia interfered with the 2016 presidential election?”

The Trump administration tries to subvert yet another agency mission

The Donald Trump administration is likely to be headed to the courts again, this time over the leadership of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This was an agency set up to police the consumer financial markets and protect the rights of consumers against big banks and was championed by senator Elizabeth Warren as one means of preventing another financial crisis. Its first director Richard Cordray was quite effective in that role but his term ended in 2018 and he wanted to step down this year, reportedly to run for the governorship of Ohio.
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How Congress protects its own abusers

We are learning that sexual harassment knows no boundaries. It takes on all forms and the perpetrators span ideologies, professions, ages, everything. Those waves are now lapping at the feet of members of Congress. So far there has been only a trickle of information about sexual abuse there with senator Al Franken and congressman John Conyers being named but it is only a matter of time before more names come out, given that the nature and culture of that institution is ripe for abuse. One member of congress Jackie Speier has spoken from her own experience as a young intern about what goes on and said that there are at least two others, whom she did not name, who are culpable.
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