Blog
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There is nothing as sad as the suicide of a student. There is the feeling of remorse of the entire university community, for one, on top of the morbid calculation of suicide rates that complements any discussion of the “toughness” of a school–be it MIT, Cornell, or the University of Chicago. There is the irreconcilable…
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For some reason, when a judge does something particularly scandalous, we find it so much more shocking than if, say, a congressman were to do something just as bad. In this case, a judge was found to have posted sexually implicit images on his private (or so he thought) website, including “a photo of naked…
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I found John McCain’s campaign briefing video laughably hilarious. Campaign manager Rick Davis bumbles through a list of “Reasons” why John McCain can talk about the issues that no one wants to talk about, including the War in Iraq, plus he seems to be reading from cue cards and noticeably pauses at inopportune times during…
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When I signed up to take the University of Chicago class Global Warming, with professor David Archer, I was not surprised when I went to buy the required readings for the course and found the main textbook priced at $50. I was also not surprised to find that the book, Global Warming: Understanding the Forecast,…
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The most disturbing story to come out of the news of late has not been the Michael Pfelger videos (although, unlike Wright, he has managed to issue a somewhat sincere apology). Lost in the Politico’s election analysis and the media’s echo chamber has been a little-noticed story about Dunkin’ Donuts, who just pulled an ad…
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Massive tsunamis. Sinking cities. Mass hunger, limited food, uninhabitable climates and the devastation of the earth’s most productive biomes. These are what Mark Lynas predicts for an earth that is just an average of 6 degrees Celsius warmer, in his new book Six Degrees. What is so scary is that, according to the UN Intergovernmental…
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I had a bit of fun and slapped together a program that simulates odds for the board game Risk. Fascinatingly enough, the point at which a territory attacking a territory with the same number of armies starts losing is at 12. So if you’re 10 vs. 10, you’re favored to win, but if you’re 13…
brian mayer 