September 2010
45 posts
WatchA History of Rap with Justin Timberlake, Jimmy Fallon and The Roots.
3’32” of Pure. Fun.
— Via Unlikely Words and Kottke, From SF.
adsinfinitum asked: Ladies!
Werdigier's Tumblr asks one to follow the link for her "three continent blogging joint venture." As you obviously know, it leads to WYWS, originally curated by Mlle. Rascouët-Paz. I've noticed that both of you now post there, from London and SF. Which brings me to my question: What's the third continent??? Did I miss something? It's been bugging me...
Werdigier's Tumblr asks one to follow the link for her "three continent blogging joint venture." As you obviously know, it leads to WYWS, originally curated by Mlle. Rascouët-Paz. I've noticed that both of you now post there, from London and SF. Which brings me to my question: What's the third continent??? Did I miss something? It's been bugging me...
“Incomprehension is simply what a narcissist calls disagreement.”
– Malcolm Gladwell, in a chat today with New Yorker readers about his latest piece (whose thesis, in essence, is that hardcore activism relies on strong ties among the participants: real friendships - as opposed to acquaintances - and highly organized, hierarchical structures - as opposed to...
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What we did when the lights went out
In his latest ingenious piece, Michael Lewis examines what went wrong in Greece’s economy. He writes that when credit was cheap and no one was looking, every country messed up in a different way but that Greece really went wild.
“Entire countries were told, ‘The lights are out, you can do whatever you want to do and no one will ever know.’ What they wanted to do with...
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First Year of Marriage: a User's Manual.
Him: I can see no difference between silent approval and silent disapproval.
Me: My disapproval is never silent.
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“[Flamboyant work is] work that is intentionally created for design annuals...”
– Stephen Doyle, the
creative director of Doyle Partners,
designer of Stephen Colbert’s “I Am America (And So Can You!),“
recipient of this year’s National Design Award,
gives his definition of “flamboyant work” in an interview with Debbie Millman for The...
The ism of the week: Know-nothingism →
From Johnson, The Economist’s blog on language:
IN HONOUR of Newt Gingrich and Dinesh D’Souza, this week’s excerpt from The Economist’s ”Book of Isms” is about a reactionary, racist movement that revelled in ignorance:
Know-nothingism The anti-immigrant and anti-Roman Catholic ideology and programme of the Know-nothing Party (also called the American...
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Would someone please inform professor of social and political theory Paul Apostolidis that if three out of five words are adverbs, you should get a better (read “ruthless”) editor?
I’m translating one of his papers into French. It’s a critique of Theodor W. Adorno’s study of The Psychological Technique of Martin Luther Thomas’ Radio Addresses, mass culture and...
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“So while America’s Republicans turned ‘climate change’ into a...”
– Thomas L. Friedman’s column is one of today’s NYTimes most-emailed. Here’s more:
“There is really no debate about climate change in China,” said Peggy Liu, chairwoman of the Joint U.S.-China Collaboration on Clean Energy, a nonprofit group working to accelerate the greening of...
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“I think Democrats will fuck this up by simply missing the point. The Republican...”
– Jason Jones in the Sept.15 edition of The Daily Show. He “argued” with fellow correspondents Wyatt Cenac and John Oliver over the ways in which Democrats will take yet another opportunity to win and ruin it.
Regarding those unpaid bills, read more here about that and other reasons why...
Of Tightly-Squeezed Kingdoms and Cathedrals
It can’t be easy being a royal. Yesterday the Queen had to do some chit chat with a rather uncommunicative Pope, who’s currently visiting Britain. The Guardian documented their conversation:
The Queen was still chattering brightly. “It was a very small car you arrived in, wasn’t it? Very tight squeeze?” The pope, looking uneasy, shifted silently in his seat. Perhaps...
Ants in the Pants
Here is some comfort for your foreign soul in the alien world. I just had drinks with a Canadian friend who has been living in London for three years. We talked about his circle of friends that sounded like the entire eurovision song contest though slightly less painful and he said how funny it was that all expats say the same thing about London: why do they serve ice-cream in theatres, they say...
Heart on Sleeve.
Xntrek asked me how I am coping with the move to SF. Here’s what I said:
Ha! How can I answer this honestly without making an enemy of this whole town?
I’m joking.
May I please go all scientific on you for a second? Take a look at this…
And allow me to add a few numbers:
I’ve lived in 8 countries.
Shortest stay was 12 months (St Louis, Missouri and Brussels,...
“In New York City, a group of Muslims is trying to build something. Mr. Jones and...”
– NYTimes editorial September 11: The Right Way to Remember.
You Gringos. See, this is the thing us foreigners always have a hard time wrapping our minds around: how very far you take the notion of freedom.
It is so difficult for us to accept that the mentality that allows for such horrors is the...
“Observing the battle between Murdoch and the Sulzbergers feels a little like...”
– Sarah Ellison in a piece about the two in Vanity Fair.
— From London.
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Only One Third of Americans Think Obama's a... →
A mere 34% of American adults believe Obama’s a christian. One in five believe he’s a muslim whilst 43% have no idea what religion he practices. These are the findings of an Aug. 19 Pew survey.
Expectedly, the view that he’s a muslim is more common amongst conservative republicans. The unsavory bit is that right now, more than half of his allies don’t know that he’s...
The Guardian: What is the most common misconception about your work?
Stephen Hawking: People think I'm a Simpsons character.
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I *must* join him under that stone.
Me: It just hit me that I haven't even seen the trailer to The Social Network.
Him: Yeah, I just heard about that movie, what is it about?
Me: The Social Network?
Him: Yeah.
Me: The thing about Zuckerberg?
Him: Who?
Me: Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook?
Him: Never heard of him.
Me: Am I pronouncing it wrong or something?
Him: Who are you talking about?
Me: Mark Zuckerberg, the guy who created Facebook when he was at Harvard?
Him: I don't know who that is.
Me (jaw on lap): ...
Him: If you'd told me Facebook had been created by an elderly woman, I'd have gone "really?"
Me: You're telling me you've *never* heard of Zuckerberg.
Him: I don't go looking for that kind of info...
Me: Baby, it's not like you can *avoid* Zuckerberg!
Him (with a bewildered shrug): ...
Me: I have nothing to say to that. Nothing.
“[Richard Dawkins] doesn’t actually want to persuade, he just wants to be...”
– Jonathan Jones, art blogger for The Guardian, misses times when humility was de rigueur, times that saw Charles Darwin, as he wrote the book that changed the world forever, reach the painful conclusion that there may not be a God…
… And opposes them to our era of “strident”...
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“I’m working on tumour cells from two childhood cancers, called...”
– Nicola Harris, a researcher at the Northern Institute of Cancer Research (part of Newcastle University), in her award-winning essay on rare childhood cancers.
The Max Perutz Science Writing Award honors the best writer amongst young medical scientists. The point is to encourage them to communicate...
Religion as a Selective Advantage →
Not a new idea nor too surprising a notion, but one I’m only beginning to explore.
I tend to distinguish faith and religion and understand the latter to be a historical (if sometimes misguided) necessity, designed to prevent men from killing each other, create a common identity and promote cohesion within a group. In short, a tool that is up there with language.
Just look at the way...
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“There is a misconception that mass media is called that because it is media for...”
– David Grossman talking about the press in a Q&A session following the presentation of his new novel “To The End of The Land.”
— From London.
Surprise! Hot-Looking Female Musicians Rated More... →
The Guardian reports on a Teesside University study in which, tightly controlled for performance, women played for an audience of 30 musicians (students and professionals) wearing four different types of outfits.
Predictably, when they wore a clubbing dress, they were rated much lower for both technique and musicality than when they wore a concert dress.
The story also brings up an...
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August 2010
63 posts
