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Over 50 public parks in Tokyo have cleverly-designed amenities that can be quickly converted into kitchens, shelters, and toilet facilities in the event of a widespread disaster. Continue reading Disaster Prevention Parks
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Enter the Braille Institute’s contribution, the Atkinson Hyperlegible computer font, especially designed for those of us with blurry vision. Follow the link to download your free copy, ready to install on a Mac or Windows PC. I gave it a spin yesterday with Microsoft Word, and it works like a charm, much more readable than Word’s default Arial or Calabri fonts. Continue reading Take a look at Atkinson Hyperlegible
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Michael Tanner, writing for National Review online, attempts to answer the question “Why Is There So Much Government Hostility to Private Charity?” The answer is simple, once you understand this guy’s fundamental message Continue reading Private Charity? No way!
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Remember this guy? Turns out he’s got competition from this guy. Tip from American Digest. Update: And here’s a Texan who spent 10 years getting the US Constitution amended; that’s cool the hard way. Update: Let’s not forget this old fart who broke the sound barrier gimmicking the controls of his Bell X-1 with a piece of broomstick. Continue reading The Cool Just Keeps on Comin’
Everything within the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State. –Benito Mussolini Whether the State seizes Business, or Business seizes the State, the result is still Fascism. –The Random Texan BIG BIZ Amazon employees are listening in on your conversations with the Alexa device. No potential for abuse there, is there? BIG STATE Automated license plate readers: threat or menace? xx BIG ED X BIG MED In Singapore, police can use COVID-19 contact tracing data to investigate crimes. If used here in the States, experts say the practice may cause people to avoid tracing. Ya think? ANTI-SOCIAL MEDIA … Continue reading HTML Testing
Karen Swallow Prior has some interesting thoughts in The Real Problem with 4-Letter Words. She has one interesting warning Research has also shown that swearing can actually lessen physical pain, which is why it can be so easily triggered involuntarily by sudden pain or fear. Yet overusing taboo words diminishes that effect. In other words, the more we swear, the less “effective” it is. Well, F! me. Tip from the ever resourceful K J Lopez at National Review. Continue reading An Etiology of Cursing
Local geology doesn’t yield such a sight, so Frank went back a few weeks later and crawled inside. It was a single shaft, about 15 feet long; at its end, while on his back, he found what looked like claw marks all over the ceiling. Unable to identify any natural geological explanation for the cave’s existence, he eventually concluded that it was a “paleoburrow,” dug, he believes, by an extinct species of giant ground sloth. Continue reading Science Continues to be Unsettled
It’s possible to educate Bayesian statisticians from infancy. Eric-Jan Wagenmakers, of JASP fame, shows us how with his new book, Bayesian Thinking for Toddlers. Continue reading The Anti-Frequentist Baby
So I was glancing at the American Council on Science and Health article The Environmental Defense Fund’s Silly Food Chemical Claim, and came across an unfamiliar term, the threshold of toxicological concern (TTC). A bit of link-chasing landed me in the midst of a delightfully geeky set of toxicology tutorials at the ChemSafetyPro website. Probably more than you or I would ever want to know, but it’s all in plain view for the interested. Cool stuff. Tip from Maggie’s Farm. Continue reading Name your poison, pardner
Writing in arch daily, Ann Sussman and Katie Chen explain why 20th century architecture is so ghastly. Synopsis: the “greats” of 20th century architecture were perceptually and socially impaired. We live in a world designed by whackos. Tip from the Wrath of Gnon. Continue reading They’re not prisons, they’re bunkers
Good news from a long-term experiment in Norway: painting a single blade of a power-generating windmill may reduce fatal birdstrikes by as much as 70%. This is certainly an experiment that bears replication, especially at facilities that (1) keep careful records of birdstrikes and (2) care enough to make the effort. It’s pretty sad that the Norwegians spent 7 years on this, and few other researchers got on board with it. If this were clinical research for a debilitating disease, mobs would be clamoring for more trials. Bird conservationists should be outraged at the pace. Of course, they’re not even … Continue reading Good news for windmill operators
Hey, Kid! Whadda doin’, playin’ in my driveway? Huh? Continue reading This guy is a total failure at being a jerk
The Home for Wayward Statisticians 