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It felt like spring today - 22 March 2007
Mar. 23rd, 2007 01:11 amOnce we officially kicked over into the season, things got rainy and warm today. Nice change of pace, and the magic umbrella did its job admirably. The rest of my work today, which consisted of fiddling a bit with the authorization plugin and failing (I’m more inclined to say I don’t necessarily need it for what I’m doing, and that I’ll just convert my current calls into something more human-readable), and playing a little with AJAX (where I’ve already hit my first snag - I need a link to potentially point to two different places, depending on whether the browser has Javascript or not), and then going off to search class and doing laundry. (Yay, laundry.) So it’s been a less-than-productive day, but that’s okay. I can handle having one of those every now and then.
In the Washington Post, however, is a story of just how selective Sharia can be in the wrong hands. Two women were sentenced to death by stoning over adultery, while the man accused was acquitted because of "insufficient evidence". That’s a textbook example of a double standard, in my opinion.
The first fruits of the TPM grid-style muckraking by commenters may have already appeared. The main Talking Points Memo page has made mention of an eighteen day gap in documents released by the Justice Department, right around the time of the firings. The White House also issued a threat saying that if House Democrats issue subpoenas, all offers to talk to staff in private are void. I don’t think that kind of threat will be a deterrent to the House subcommittee - if they’re already at the subpoena stage, there’s a good chance they’ll go through with it. The Wall Street Journal’s Opinion page sees politics at work, and accuses the Democrats of seeking to cripple the Presidency by making a giant controversy over something entirely legal. This sounds kind of familiar, like people were seeking to impeach a sitting president because he had an affair with an intern or something...
Research in the New York Times tells us that there is a possibility that moral decisions are somewhat grounded in brain biology. Persons with injuries to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex tended to choose toward actions that would cause direct harm to one being if it was more likely to spare more beings from harm or death. The injury appears to make people a bit more utilitarian in decisions, rather than emotional.
The Chicago Tribune has an article about the town of Paris, Texas, and some worries from the local African Americans that racism is alive and well. The centrepiece of the story is a girl who received seven years in prison for pushing a hall monitor after the monitor had refused to let her in the school before hours. Unless there was significant amounts of damage and violence done by that shove, seven years is definitely extreme. The rest of the article notes that there’s definitely disparity in discipline in this particular school system.
In other school oddities, a 10-year=old student in the Hawke's Bay, New Zealand school district was told to remove his piercings. The principal was worried that the piercings could cause injury in the rough play of primary school. Apparently, the piercings also were supposed to be covered, but the coverings continued to fall off.
An attempt to scale the tallest buildings in the world without rope or safety devices has been thwarted with the arrest of the climber as he achieved the sixtieth floor on the building. I’m more worried about what would have happened had he fell.
A summary of Al Gore’s ten proposals on what to do about climate change to the House. Many of these proposals are likely to meet fierce resistance from opponents, and possibly some raised eyebrows from people who otherwise support him. Lester Brown agrees that green is good, but he's worried that corn prices will match fuel prices as ethanol is adopted widely. He says that the grid could do quite well with the addition of wind turbines, and that plug-in hybrids could make it so our cars then run mostly off the wind energy, rather than oil.
Recall, tobacco smoking is a bad idea for those expecting. And also bad for those who take up the habit in their lives. Now, a new study claims that the problems stack on each other. Adolescents exposed to smoke in the womb who later take up smoking are significantly less likely to be able to concentrate. These are at tasks where there are strong attempts to distract the person from their focus.
Something from the health realms that’s odd - glaucoma-like symptoms are appearing in many nearsighted Chinese males and females, but it’s not completely glaucoma. The theory is that it’s the nearsightedness that’s causing the damage, but rather than progressive vision loss and damage, this appears to be holding semi-steady.
There are no images of the device, but it appears that soon vagina dentata will be much more than a phrase. Marketed as an anti-rape device, the trap will attach itself to a gent and require the assistance of a doctor to remove. It’s an easy way of identifying your assaulter, assuming he’s not being pseudonymous. But would doctors be obligated to inform authorities if they removed or had a patient with such a device attached?
A radio show that I enjoy listening to here and there, when it’s on and I’m listening to radio, This American Life debuted tonight on Showtime, and will continue for a little bit. The TV format is much the same as the radio format - slices of life and other things, from around the country. It being TV, though, we get visuals with the stories.
For those definitely interested in the Greek Myths, Theoi.com offers a one-stop sort of shop for your mythological needs. Still a work in progress, though, so there may be a couple holes here and there.
More imagery, again helping with the coincidences that are of the “mention one, get many” sort. A Flickr photo set of the Sci Fi covers of Ron Turner, and more of Ralph McQuarrie's Star Wars art.
To close out on a funny note, though, here’s 15 unintentionally funny comic panels. Most of which rely on subtext and lowbrow humor to work properly.
After this, there is bedtime. And thus, the most appropriate place for tips on how to get up in the morning when the alarm goes off.
In the Washington Post, however, is a story of just how selective Sharia can be in the wrong hands. Two women were sentenced to death by stoning over adultery, while the man accused was acquitted because of "insufficient evidence". That’s a textbook example of a double standard, in my opinion.
The first fruits of the TPM grid-style muckraking by commenters may have already appeared. The main Talking Points Memo page has made mention of an eighteen day gap in documents released by the Justice Department, right around the time of the firings. The White House also issued a threat saying that if House Democrats issue subpoenas, all offers to talk to staff in private are void. I don’t think that kind of threat will be a deterrent to the House subcommittee - if they’re already at the subpoena stage, there’s a good chance they’ll go through with it. The Wall Street Journal’s Opinion page sees politics at work, and accuses the Democrats of seeking to cripple the Presidency by making a giant controversy over something entirely legal. This sounds kind of familiar, like people were seeking to impeach a sitting president because he had an affair with an intern or something...
Research in the New York Times tells us that there is a possibility that moral decisions are somewhat grounded in brain biology. Persons with injuries to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex tended to choose toward actions that would cause direct harm to one being if it was more likely to spare more beings from harm or death. The injury appears to make people a bit more utilitarian in decisions, rather than emotional.
The Chicago Tribune has an article about the town of Paris, Texas, and some worries from the local African Americans that racism is alive and well. The centrepiece of the story is a girl who received seven years in prison for pushing a hall monitor after the monitor had refused to let her in the school before hours. Unless there was significant amounts of damage and violence done by that shove, seven years is definitely extreme. The rest of the article notes that there’s definitely disparity in discipline in this particular school system.
In other school oddities, a 10-year=old student in the Hawke's Bay, New Zealand school district was told to remove his piercings. The principal was worried that the piercings could cause injury in the rough play of primary school. Apparently, the piercings also were supposed to be covered, but the coverings continued to fall off.
An attempt to scale the tallest buildings in the world without rope or safety devices has been thwarted with the arrest of the climber as he achieved the sixtieth floor on the building. I’m more worried about what would have happened had he fell.
A summary of Al Gore’s ten proposals on what to do about climate change to the House. Many of these proposals are likely to meet fierce resistance from opponents, and possibly some raised eyebrows from people who otherwise support him. Lester Brown agrees that green is good, but he's worried that corn prices will match fuel prices as ethanol is adopted widely. He says that the grid could do quite well with the addition of wind turbines, and that plug-in hybrids could make it so our cars then run mostly off the wind energy, rather than oil.
Recall, tobacco smoking is a bad idea for those expecting. And also bad for those who take up the habit in their lives. Now, a new study claims that the problems stack on each other. Adolescents exposed to smoke in the womb who later take up smoking are significantly less likely to be able to concentrate. These are at tasks where there are strong attempts to distract the person from their focus.
Something from the health realms that’s odd - glaucoma-like symptoms are appearing in many nearsighted Chinese males and females, but it’s not completely glaucoma. The theory is that it’s the nearsightedness that’s causing the damage, but rather than progressive vision loss and damage, this appears to be holding semi-steady.
There are no images of the device, but it appears that soon vagina dentata will be much more than a phrase. Marketed as an anti-rape device, the trap will attach itself to a gent and require the assistance of a doctor to remove. It’s an easy way of identifying your assaulter, assuming he’s not being pseudonymous. But would doctors be obligated to inform authorities if they removed or had a patient with such a device attached?
A radio show that I enjoy listening to here and there, when it’s on and I’m listening to radio, This American Life debuted tonight on Showtime, and will continue for a little bit. The TV format is much the same as the radio format - slices of life and other things, from around the country. It being TV, though, we get visuals with the stories.
For those definitely interested in the Greek Myths, Theoi.com offers a one-stop sort of shop for your mythological needs. Still a work in progress, though, so there may be a couple holes here and there.
More imagery, again helping with the coincidences that are of the “mention one, get many” sort. A Flickr photo set of the Sci Fi covers of Ron Turner, and more of Ralph McQuarrie's Star Wars art.
To close out on a funny note, though, here’s 15 unintentionally funny comic panels. Most of which rely on subtext and lowbrow humor to work properly.
After this, there is bedtime. And thus, the most appropriate place for tips on how to get up in the morning when the alarm goes off.
