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Air
How much of Sonny Vaccaro’s inspirational close to MJ is really about Ben Affleck? Ben, after all, knows a thing or two about meteoric rises, the insatiable public need to tear down its heroes, and the long-term price of fame. Affleck is having a well-deserved “moment” right now, and, even better, is delivering consistently good…
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Nothing to be Frightened Of: Julian Barnes on Death and Dying
If you’re a voracious reader and a cheapskate, Libby is a great application. Getting digital books from your library(s) is very satisfying. But while Libby is a perfectly good e-reader, one thing it doesn’t do well at all is help find books. This isn’t the Spotify of eBooks. So, when I ran out of Libby…
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Ars Technica and Public Health Experts Win a LAZY
Technically, Beth Mole’s (Senior Health Reporter for Ars) write-up of her short panel with two public health experts on learnings from Covid doesn’t really qualify for a LAZY. It’s a perfectly reasonable overview of what was discussed. This LAZY really goes to the panel discussion, to lazy answers, and lazier follow-ups. Small kudos to Ken…
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Infernal Affairs
Tight, intricately plotted, often thrilling, this 2002 Hong Kong crime drama delivers in almost every way except, perhaps, for its romantic nods. Two great leads, Tony Leung and Andy Lau, anchor the action and give real heft to the movies concerns about choice, identity, and, yes, transformation. –. .-. . .- – (Criterion)
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Nothing To Be Frightened Of
If you’re a voracious reader and a cheapskate, Libby is a great application. Getting digital books from your library(s) is very satisfying. But while Libby is a perfectly good e-reader, one thing it doesn’t do well at all is help find books. The Spotify of eBooks it is NOT. So, when I ran out of…
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Cognitive Science, Decision-Making and Ethics
Everybody loves a good debate about the mystery of consciousness. Physicists get to invent quantum mechanical explanations of macroscopic phenomena. Humanities folk get to poo-poo the evils of reductionism. Journalists can trot out their full repertoire of both scientific and ethical cliches. Everybody gets to argue. There are good working theories of consciousness that are…
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Spending Quality Time with the Most Interesting Man in the World
“The young man visiting the archeological site on Skraeling Island is the same fellow who at the end of the book encounters a stranger on the road to Port Famine, but also not.” So says the end of the beginning of Horizon, Barry Lopez’s unique travelogue through a lifetime. And what a life he’s lived.…
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College: America’s 4 Year Queue
There’s been much discussion lately around various aspects of education and policy – from AP classes to book “banning” to school choice. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. The single most important part of any culture is what it teaches people: the skills we teach, the attributes we mold and reward in the young, and…
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Words Fail Us – Language and Rationality
“Strange to wander in the mist, each is alone. No tree knows his neighbor. Each is alone.” Hesse Cognitive science can’t settle questions of right and wrong. But it can set the table for theories of rational decision-making and ethics. And the one thing we know for sure about how we think is that, at…
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Section 230: Why Push vs. Pull is THE Critical Distinction
Understanding a basic distinction between “push” and “pull” mechanisms makes the right path for Section 230 clear. The debate over Section 230 is one of those unfortunately common cases where an issue has been sucked into the great consumer packaged ideology wars despite having almost no ideological content. The left and the right each have…
We are not rational animals, we are animals that must work to be rational
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