January 2012
6 posts
1 tag
The Boy Who Heard Too Much →
Like a comic-book villain transformed by a tragic accident, Weigman discovered at an early age that his acute hearing gave him superpowers on the telephone. He could impersonate any voice, memorize phone numbers by the sound of the buttons and decipher the inner workings of a phone system by the frequencies and clicks on a call, which he refers to as “songs.” The knowledge enabled him to hack...
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mumble mumble: Why Is an Atheist High School... →
jonathan-cunningham:
eddyizm:
Why Is an Atheist High School Student Getting Vicious Death Threats?
If you take away just two things from the story about atheist high school student Jessica Ahlquist, and the court case she won last week to have a prayer banner taken out of…
December 2011
8 posts
The 56 best/worst similes →
4. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.
17. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
24. He felt like he was being hunted down like a dog, in a place that hunts dogs, I suppose.
48. I felt a nameless dread. Well, there probably is a long German name...
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Fail
anaphora:
“If you start doing things that frighten you or you don’t know, there’s a very good chance you will actually open up your consciousness. The important thing is confronting your own fears. If you’re afraid of pain, that is exactly what you have to experience to find out what pain is. When you open the door to pain, you might find out you can actually control it. You might be free of the...
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The Curse of Cow Clicker →
It’s a Facebook game called Cow Clicker, and it’s unlike anything Bogost ever made before, a borderline-evil piece of work that was intended to embody the worst aspects of the modern gaming industry. He meant Cow Clicker to be a satire with a short shelf life. Instead, it enslaved him and many of its players for much of the past 18 months. Even Bogost can’t decide whether it represents his...
Brave leadership spreads hope: Attawapiskat takes... →
abcsoupdot:
From Pamela Palmater, rabble.ca:
In 1979, the largest diesel spill in northern Ontario occurred from underground pipes which leaked under their reserve lands. INAC [Indian and Northern Affairs Canada] did not remediate this environmental hazard, but instead, INAC built a school for the community on these contaminated lands. The school itself ended up acting like a cap for the...
Can the public Ivies be saved? →
Higher education leaders have dreamed up two big, radical ideas that could potentially rescue the nation’s top public universities from the brink of fiscal oblivion. Mary Sue Coleman, president of the University of Michigan, thinks they probably won’t work.
November 2011
15 posts
Eff Yeah Microbiology!: I've discovered a miracle... →
effyeahmicrobiology:
you know those nicks you sometimes get while shaving, that NEVER seem to stop bleeding? I get them all the time. I nicked myself today, and didn’t want to get blood on my clothes, so I searched desperately for a way to stop the bleeding.
I tried astringent (Sea Breeze, 46% alcohol) which is…
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“Forget the room of one’s own - write in the kitchen, lock yourself up in the...”
– Gloria Anzaldua, ‘Speaking in Tongues: A Letter to 3rd World Women Writers’, in This Bridge Called my Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color, (New York: KITCHEN TABLE: Women of Color Press, 1981), p. 170. (via feministquotes)
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The Woman Who Bested the Men at Math →
Central to the 19th-century concept of human development was the idea that the adolescent body was a closed system; there was only so much energy available, and so a body in which resources were diverted to mental development was one in which physical development necessarily suffered. This was thought to be a particular problem for women, because their reproductive system was far more...
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Viewpoint: Abortion doesn't empower women [The... →
The impoverished conditions, under which the majority of the world’s population lives, are truly appalling. However, I believe the suggestion that legalizing abortion should play a part in reducing poverty is gravely flawed for two reasons. First, it is inappropriate to solve societal problems by eliminating the people affected. We don’t fight malaria by killing those with malarial infections....
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October 2011
14 posts
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a 16 year old wrote this. →
lovetheloyal:
” All of you, you will seek success you close your minds and forget the rest of life, you all focus on self gain until it takes over you, you become inhumane this is the system you raise the youth heres an example of the sad truth: Tommy goes to his factory of learning so called “teachers” spend every second burning his confidence, every action he takes precedes intriquite...
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Rush to Drill for Natural Gas Creates Conflicts... →
It’s more fun to watch two evils go head-to-head than having to choose the lesser between them.
Sounds like a big game of chess, except it’s money, and will probably end up like the 3 dimensional Star Trek chess set that magically changes shape between shots as the flow of money gets optimized in the background.
3 tags
Did You Know....?
effyeahmicrobiology:
onestudentagainsttheworld:
The FDA banned the sale of turtles less than 4 inches long in 1975?
Why?
“There were approximately 280,000 cases of salmonellosis in the U.S. each year directly as a result of those turtles,” says Stephen Sundlof, who heads the FDA’s center for veterinary medicine.
The symptoms of salmonellosis include gastroenteritis, bacteremia or...
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September 2011
3 posts
4 tags
7 tags
A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not “Crazy” →
When someone says these things to you, it’s not an example of inconsiderate behavior. When your spouse shows up half an hour late to dinner without calling—that’s inconsiderate behavior. A remark intended to shut you down like, “Calm down, you’re overreacting,” after you just addressed someone else’s bad behavior, is emotional manipulation—pure and simple.
Comments are good. Read them.
August 2011
1 post
9 tags
July 2011
1 post
1 tag
June 2011
3 posts
