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• Bobby Fischer - b. 1943 - The Wonder Match - Chess - The Lives They Lived - Obituaries - NYTimes.com

  Before he was secretly buried on a dark winter morning in a lonely Icelandic churchyard at the age of 64 (there were only four people in attendance at the hastily arranged funeral) . . . before his last ailing days of bad kidneys and rotting teeth (he had all of his fillings removed, convinced that U.S. and Russian agents would otherwise send radio signals to his brain) . . . before the long hours whiled away at a Reykjavik bookstore, a place that vaguely reminded him of one from his Brooklyn youth (in both, he read comic books and studied chess) . . . and before his decades of ghostly peregrinations through the world, like a profane monk or an idiot savant searching for perfect exile (from Pasadena to Hungary to the Philippines, where he supposedly had a child, and on to Japan, where he supposedly married and was arrested and imprisoned for a passport violation) . . . before his bizarre eruptions (he applauded the events of 9/11 as “wonderful news” and believed, among other defamations, that the Jews wanted to eradicate the African elephant because its trunk was a reminder of an uncircumcised penis) . . . and before the spectacle of meeting his one-time nemesis, the former world-champion chess player Boris Spassky, for an anticlimactic 1992 rematch in war-torn Yugoslavia despite U.N. sanctions against it (in front of whirring cameras, he spat on the U.S. order forbidding him to play) . . . even way back before their original 1972 meeting, called the Match of the Century, when the eyes of the world were riveted on him as a shining emblem of American will, innovation and brilliance (the match in which he took on the Soviet chess machine and single-handedly crushed it, but not before the fabled call from Henry Kissinger, urging him to put aside his jumbled demands and just play) . . . even before his brazen, almost obnoxious deconstruction of a cavalcade of grandmasters who stood in his path to Spassky (he won 20 games in a row, the longest winning streak in modern chess) . . . before he traded the rags of his youth for his new wardrobe of expensive suits . . . before his mind slowly unhinged and he became a walking paradox (the anti-Semitic Jew; the anti-American national hero, the wastrel-wizard of his craft) . . . yes, before the whole circus of his life unfolded, he was a 13-year-old kid in the first flush of the thing he most loved in the world: chess.



• Darwin's dangerous idea: Top 10 evolution articles - life - 28 December 2008 - New Scientist


• How Progressive Are Our Taxes? « Consider the Evidence

  Stephen Dubner has a post on the “Freakonomics” blog titled “The next time someone tells you that taxes are not progressive…” He relays information from a new Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report, via Greg Mankiw, which lists effective federal tax rates for households at various points in the income distribution. The rates are higher for those with larger incomes. The implication is that our tax system is quite progressive.

  But it doesn’t make much sense to look only at federal taxes.



• Culture Dish : Is This Cute Video Just a Rat Loving a Cat, or the Beginning of the End of Toxo


• Video: George Monbiot meets ... Jeroen van de Veer | Environment | guardian.co.uk

  Series: Monbiot meets ...Previous | Index George Monbiot meets ... Jeroen van de VeerIn the latest of his groundbreaking encounters with the figures whose decisions shape our environment, George Monbiot challenges Jeroen van de Veer, chief executive of oil and gas giant Shell, on ethics, greenwash advertising, renewable energy investments and gas-flaring in Nigeria



• Secular Philosophy - The Happiness Myth

  After having greatly enjoyed Doubt: A History, by Jennifer Michael Hecht, I’m now reading her The Happiness Myth: The Historical Antidote to What Isn’t Working Today. The first book is a must-read for anyone seriously interested in skepticism across time and cultures, including the many -- usually under appreciated -- religious skeptics. Hecht’s second volume should also be on the shelf of anyone seriously interested in happiness, and who on earth isn’t?
  



• UN contradicts Israel over depth of crisis in Gaza

Posted by Norm at 5:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Damn now I can't remember who sent me this link, but thanks it made me laugh.

Posted by Norm at 10:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Posted by Norm at 5:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

He also had a device that looked rather like a largish electronic calculator. This had about a hundred tiny flat press buttons and a screen about four inches square on which any one of a million "pages" could be summoned at a moment's notice. It looked insanely complicated, and this was one of the reasons why the snug plastic cover it fitted into had the words DON'T PANIC printed on it in large friendly letters. The other reason was that this device was in fact that most remarkable of all books ever to come out of the great publishing corporations of Ursa Minor "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy." The reason why it was published in the form of a micro sub meson electronic component is that if it were printed in normal book form, an interstellar hitchhiker would require several inconveniently large buildings to carry it around in.*

Posted by Norm at 10:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

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Posted by Norm at 9:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

• Don’t Panic « Mostly Anecdotal

  My son doesn’t like my Kindle. It was his suggestion that the family give it to me for my birthday, but he doesn’t like it. “It’s not the same he says, the bits and bytes are not substantial. I like the smell of the book, and how it feels in my hand,” he said. “You’ll be the ruin of the book as we know it,” he added.

  I made my arguments about that bastard Gutenberg who put the monks out of business with his cold lifeless print, but my son was not persuaded. I even argued that his computer games have put board games out of business.

  WoW, he said. . .



• Informed Comment: Gaza 2008: Micro-Wars and Macro-Wars


• Maud Newton: Blog


• YouTube - RichardFeynmanFan's Channel


• Uncommon Hours: Barack Obama could do worse than keep "The Education of Henry Adams" on his nightstand while he stays at the Hay-Adams Hotel


• The Satirical Political Report - An Offbeat Look at the Hot-Button Issues of the Day » Barack Gets Even for the ‘Magic Negro’ Song


• 43 Folders Clips - Eric Idle, on John Cleese’s Approach to Writing ...


• Orwell, blinding tribalism, selective Terrorism, and Israel/Gaza - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com


• monkeybicycle.net


• Smoke and Mirrors, Whales and Lampreys: A Guest Post by Ken Miller | The Loom | Discover Magazine


• Don’t be Religulous - Colin McGinn

  I went to see Bill Maher’s documentary last night, on a balmy Miami night. Afterwards the rains came down in Biblical proportions, thus announcing God’s displeasure at the film and my attendance (I thwarted His wrath under a convenient restaurant umbrella). It’s an enjoyable and instructive film, especially if you enjoy groaning at people’s amazing credulity and nastiness, not the mention the silly outfits. What the film conveys better than any book is the sheer nuttiness of it all: the weird fantastical beliefs, the mental contortions, the verbal slipperiness, the flickering wild eyes. Each religion seems determined to outdo the others for sheer bizarreness—the less credible the better. The Mormon religion took the grand prize for me, with God relaxing on his nearby planet and Missouri the site of the Second Coming. But there was plenty to root for in the realms of the Higher Charlatanry, e.g. the portly Hispanic guy who fancies he is Jesus Christ (and thousands agree with him). My question afterwards was who was the most repulsive of the religious fanatics on display: Christians, Moslems and orthodox Jews had their strong contenders. This was equal-opportunity religion-bashing; except that Maher didn’t do much bashing, leaving that to the proponents of the various sects themselves. What a gallery of pious rogues! A book almost inevitably takes its subject seriously, but a film like this can simply let the camera record the gaudy tapestry of human delusion and manipulation. What they all had in common was that when testing questions were raised so were their hackles--and the whiff of violence was suddenly in the air. We knew all this before, of course, but seeing and hearing so much of it brought the whole terrible farce home.

Posted by Norm at 9:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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• Acronymization Labs

  It's true, anyone can blog. Onegoodmove reader Mike starts a blog.

• Opinio Juris » Blog Archive » Dershowitz on Israel and Proportionality

  An interesting article on Israel and justice.

• BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Who on earth is Matt Smith?

  Matt Smith has been named as the actor who will take on the role of TV's most famous time traveller.

• Point of Inquiry

  Simon Singh is an author focusing on science and mathematics for the general public. His books include Fermat's Enigma: The Epic Quest to Solve the World's Greatest Mathematical Problem, The Code Book, and Big Bang. He has produced a number of documentaries for television on science topics, and is a trustee of the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts, and the National Museum of Science and Industry, both in the United Kingdom. He is currently being sued for libel by the British Chiropractic Association for comments he wrote in a column in The Guardian. His newest book, co-authored with Dr. Edzard Ernst, is Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts about Alternative Medicine.

• My family values: AC Grayling, philosopher | Life and style | The Guardian

  My father only said one thing to me of any importance and it was especially notable because he said so little. I was about seven and we were passing a garden. He said: "Look into that garden. Do you notice anything?" I said it was over-manicured. He said, yes, but there is an oddity - a wooden wheelbarrow painted white with plants in it. "People tend to glance," he said. "They don't really pay attention. Always look for the hidden and the interesting - be a good observer."

  My father was kindly and gentle but distant. My mother was difficult, not affectionate, fiery tempered and controlling. She was an angry, frustrated woman, the sort of person you avoid. I was a late mistake and my mother used to say, "It was so annoying I got pregnant with you." But we didn't have a difficult relationship. She'd tell me: "I don't have to worry about you. You're as smart as a bag full of monkeys."

  She did teach me about love. She said that most people think what they feel in the first flush of a relationship is love. It isn't. It's infatuation. You can only talk about loving somebody when you've lived with them for 10 years, with the smelly socks and the quarrels. Only then will you know what you mean when you say you love them.

  There was no religion in the family and my parents were extremely liberal.



• Religious influence is losing ground in the US


• Luck vs. Effort? « Consider the Evidence

  This article reminded me of a conversation I recently had with a former Wall Street analyst, or was he an associate. I suppose it doesn't matter. I could use the catchall VP. Yes, VP should be safe, they're all VPs. I was ranting on about the subject of bonuses and what a sweet deal this group had, bonsuses come what may. And as expected the attempt to defend such greed was soon on display. "You know I had to travel over 200,000 miles a year to do my job. Away from home, blah blah blah," he said. I said well yes, that is difficult, but then airline pilots probably fly more than that and they make nowhere near what you were making. It was a good comeback, but now I wish I used flight attendants instead.



• Stumbling and Mumbling: Social mobility: an uphill battle


• Bonobos
• The Science of Weight Loss: In-Depth Reports


• Bush a “Total Failure” Says Former Iraqi PM—By Scott Horton (Harper's Magazine)


• Senate race certification set for Monday with Franken up 225 votes


• blog.rightreading.com » Why am I working today?


• No 2 ID - Taking Jane | John Baker's Blog

Posted by Norm at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

• Sympathy For the W? / In the end, a new portrait of Bush as tired, misunderstood, ruined


• The neighborhood bully strikes again - Haaretz - Israel News


• More oddities in the U.S. "debate" over Israel/Gaza - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com


• The Language Guy: My Dear Galileo Galilei

  My Dear Galileo Galilei, "It gives me great pleasure to inform you that we have reconsidered your case. A small mistake was made by our Vatican astronomers in the determination of the relationship between the earth and the sun. It was an easy mistake to make. I'm sure you will agree, since it was obvious to all that the sun moves from East to West in our skies whilst we remain in place. We regret that you were put in prison and that you were forced to recant under the threat of torture. As a result of the discovery of our mistake, it is our determination that you should no longer be confined to your home."



• xkcd - A Webcomic - I Know You're Listening


• Not Exactly Rocket Science : In conflicts over beliefs and values, symbolic gestures matter more than reason or money


• Fox News, touchy


• Look At This...: Optical Illusions

Posted by Norm at 1:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

A recent episode of Boston Legal raises an interesting question, where to draw the line between individual rights and the common good. The choice of alzheimer's disease and experimental drugs is a good one. If you can get by a bit of silliness I think the program did a good job of highlighting the issues. I come down squarely on the side of the common good, unless of course I'm the individual.

Posted by Norm at 11:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Every year or two or three, okay it's only happened once before, I make the links with your tea rather than my favorite drink, coffee. First as a tip of my hat to my many British friends, but also, and this is something you may not have realized, tea gets you a break on your car insurance. Why, because of the anti-accidents it contains.

• The World Question Center 2009

  WHAT WILL CHANGE EVERYTHING?

  "What game-changing scientific ideas and developments do you expect to live to see?"



• A Good Idea « Mostly Anecdotal

  Some members of my extended family are not as liberal as I am. They view capitalism in a more centrist way. I would claim they view it through rose-colored glasses, but that’s my bias. They are always ready with a story of how someone had a great idea and turned it into great wealth. The details are unimportant, the story is always the same, the hero started with nothing but a good idea and now he’s rich. The implied, anyone can do it, is clear from the telling. . .



• Daily Kos: Donate for Civil Disobedience - DeChristopher Needs your help

  Tim DeChristopher, a University of Utah student who single-handedly messed up the BLM's December 19th auction of oil and gas leases on property near some of our most beautiful public lands and parks, hopes to raise $45,000 to secure his 13 successful bids. This would buy Tim some time to find donors to actually purchase the leases, worth about $1.8 million, and could help his defense in the event he is charged with a crime. I suspect that Tim's lawyers (Pat Shea, former head of the BLM, and Ron Yengich, a renowned Utah criminal defense attorney) think that if he follows through on the purchase, the government won't be able to prove intent to defraud.



• Greg Laden's Blog : Seismic Activity at Yellowstone

  If it goes boom, you read about it here first. I suspect being only three or four hundred miles away I may get a more explosive announcement.



• Gallery - Most stunning images of 2008 - Image 1 - New Scientist
  

Posted by Norm at 9:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

It's In The Wrist, Doll: Killing a mother is unforgiveable, so forgive me already. Please.

So I' ve been so sick. Sick almost to death and it's largely my own damn fault for my love of a good smoke. Even now, with oxygen and a gasp to die for, I suck on these fuckers like the teat of life itself. . .

We all have to answer to something, and having given up the traditional subjects of devotion as unworkable in my world, there are those people I love that I wouldn't hurt if I could help it.

And I wish I could help it. I'm a cipher. If I were my own judge, I would not be silent and sanguine, for killing a mother is an unforgiveable act. Yet I have to find a way to forgive myself so I can leave my children without a gaping maw where their ma used to be.

They deserve as much high minded positive projection as my soul can deliver, and frankly, I do too.

When we will draw our final breath is uncertain. It is however more certain for some, like my friend Jill, than for others. I only know Jill from her blog, her participation here and an ocassional email, but I think of her as a friend. In some ways we know those we meet online better than those in 'real life' since we meet them through the written word.

Jill says people tell her she's smart, and she is, and in the same breath, one that is increasingly difficult for her to take, she acknowledges that being smart is not enough. She doesn't apologize for the mistakes she's made in life, but faces them head on. Jill will be leaving us, not soon, but sooner than I would like, and certainly sooner than she would like. I'll miss her insightful, thoughtful comments but that's down the road a way. And who knows if I'll still be here then, or you who are reading this.

When my time comes I hope that I face it with as much honesty and grace as Jill. She asks those who love her to forgive her for killing a mother and that it is easy for me, for who of us leads a perfect life. I think her children will also find it easy to forgive her, though they'll miss her terribly. It's a good reminder to get the most out of each day for each one is a gift we should cherish.

Posted by Norm at 1:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

• One from the archives, magic underwear


• Mark Tran: The secret literary life of George W Bush | World news | guardian.co.uk

  I guess I'm just a piker when it comes to reading since I was only able to get through 79 this year

  Throughout his career, George Bush cultivated the image of the common man. Unlike Al Gore or John Kerry, he was a guy Americans would be happy to have a beer with - well, fruit juice maybe, as the president gave up the bottle long ago.

  Now comes incontrovertible evidence that Bush's country bumpkin persona was a bit of a front. Karl Rove, in a piece for the Wall Street Journal, tells us that underneath that bluff exterior, Bush was, if not exactly an intellectual, an avid reader. According to Rove - often referred to as Bush's brain - the two competed for the last four years over who read the most books. By the end of 2006, Bush had read a highly respectable 95 books to Rove's 110. That works out at about two books a week - a fairly impressive feat for such real masters of the universe.



• Mano Singham's Web Journal: And now for something completely different…

  I like comedies. And within that genre of films, I particularly like parodies. The best ones are those that are based on clichés of particular genres or specific stories that are well known, since a successful parody depends crucially on the ability of the audience to immediately recognize allusions to the original

  A parody idea is not hard to come up with. What is hard is to be able to sustain the conceit over the length of a film. Even in the written form, short article parodies are difficult (I know because I have tried and failed miserably) and only a skilled writer can pull it off. I often come across attempts at parodies that seemed to have started out as a single good idea but the writer could not sustain the conceit and it soon becomes painful to read. The ability to maintain a light tough and not to belabor the point is a skill that only a few seem to be able to master. Stephen Leacock and S. J. Perelman are two writers who were good at it. As a very young boy I read Perelman's Somewhere a Roscoe, a parody of the hard-boiled detective story, and I was hooked on parodies for life.



• Lawsuit seeks to take 'so help me God' out of inaugural - CNN.com


• Language Log » More (dis)fluency and (in)coherence

  As a public figure, you're in trouble when the media are less interested in what you have to say than in how you say it. This is now the sad situation of Caroline Kennedy, whose filled pauses seem to be getting more press than any other aspect of her bid for Hillary Clinton's senate seat.



• The Last Road Trip / Freakishly cheap gas? Nation broke? Just hit the road


• Books - Still Revered for ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ and the Glass Family, J. D. Salinger Remains Elusive at 90 - NYTimes.com


• Doing the Hokey Cokey 'could be hate crime' - Telegraph


• The Millions: A Reading Resolution

  I'm in.

Posted by Norm at 12:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)