Voltaire by Houdon
The present births, supposedly, the future. Events are chained, one another, by an invincible fate; it is this destiny that, in Homer, is more powerful than Jupiter, himself.
When I was a kid, the UK police made a big deal out of how they didn’t carry guns, but not anymore. Terrorism is starting to pull the police away from the people and increase the separation between the government and the governed.
It turns out that a large number – possibly several hundred – of the antisemitic bomb threats that have been coming in to Jewish community centers around the US, originate from one very sad puppy in Israel.
I’m not sure what the correct term for this is, perhaps “halo effect” or maybe it’s “transferrence” or just plain old “confirmation bias” but there’s a weird thing humans do, when they notice that someone is knowledgeable about X they sometimes get super impressed and assume that person is also knowledgeable about Y and maybe Z. I think it’s “confirmation bias” – but I’m skeptical of terminology in general.
It’s a wonderful animated version of Noam Chomsky’s thesis from “Manufacturing Consent”[amazon] narrated by Amy Goodman. It’s all compressed down to 5 minutes, which is pretty impressive.
I’m a pretty avid gamer. And by “avid gamer” I mean that the last time I tried to remember every game I’ve ever played, the list went on for almost 2 pages. Starting with “Space War” on a DEC PDP-1 at the Johns Hopkins University summer fair in 1972, I’m still pretty active, depending on work commitments. Blogging (ahem!) eats into my gaming time, I have noticed.
So the FBI was supposedly investigating Trump’s campaign quietly, while loudly investigating Clinton’s emails?
I’m unhappy about the way the anti-Trump media (i.e.: anyone who has any sense) is acting as if suddenly Comey is this great pillar of rectitude, now that he’s refused to play along with Trump’s game of the day. Please let’s not go back to “you can trust the FBI” because the FBI’s not playing politics incompetently for a change. They’re still playing.
Last year, a friend of mine recommended I read Thomas Hager’s The Alchemy of Air. [Both recommended reading] Then, I was talking about Derek Lowe’s “Things I Won’t Work With”[lowe] column with a former chemist, who expressed shock and horror that I had read The Alchemy of Air and not Hager’s other book: The Demon Under The Microscope.
Saturday, at Paris’ Orly Airport, a man attacked a soldier, tried wrestle her rifle away from her, and was shot and killed. Earlier, he had exchanged fire with police in another incident when he was pulled over for speeding. In the earlier incident, he fled in his car; he had a record of robbery and drug offenses. That’s a summary of some of the facts in the case. [mcdc] [cnbc]
Jean Meslier
Originally, savage nations, ferocious, perpetually at war, adored, under various names, some God conformed to their ideas; that is to say, cruel, carnivorous, selfish, greedy of blood. We find in all the religions of the earth a God of armies, a jealous God, an avenging God, an exterminating God, a God who enjoys carnage and whose worshipers make it a duty to serve him to his taste. Lambs, bulls, children, men, heretics, infidels, kings, whole nations, are sacrificed to him.