Waldo Jaquith

Archive for July 2010

links for 2010-07-30

In ShortLinks on 30 July 2010 with 13 comments

New Scientist: Morph-osaurs—How shape-shifting dinosaurs deceived us Here's a wonderful new theory: there was no such thing as triceritops. They're just baby torosauruses. This is like future palentologists finding the fossilized remains of baby chicks and chickens and, lacking enough data points to connect them, figuring that they were two entirely different animals. (tags: biology [...]

links for 2010-07-29

In ShortLinks on 29 July 2010 with 2 comments

Good: Where Did the Money to Rebuild Iraq Go? I listened to a several-minute-long story on NPR on Wednesday morning about the $8.7B in Iraq reconstruction money that the DoD cannot account for. I think I paid pretty close attention. Yet something, the data encapsulated in this one pie chart by the folks at Good [...]

links for 2010-07-28

In ShortLinks on 28 July 2010 with 3 comments

gizmag: Toshiba fast tracks SCiB battery technology The Super Charge ion Battery looks like the first real break-through in battery technology in a long time. It can charge to 90% of capacity in five minutes, and hardly loses any capacity after 6,000 cycles. It's a lithium-ion battery, so the fundamental technology is the same—Toshiba has [...]

links for 2010-07-27

In ShortLinks on 27 July 2010 with 11 comments

Wall Street Journal: Does Language Influence Culture? The long nature-or-nurture-styled debate over whether thought influences language or vice versa appears to be tipping in favor of language's impact on how we think. Beginning with Noam Chomsky, it's been assumed that our brains operate at a level above language, and that language is simply the conduit [...]

links for 2010-07-22

In ShortLinks on 22 July 2010 with 34 comments

San Francisco Weekly: Voodoo on the Vine Every so often I've seen the word "biodynamic." The Seven Stars yogurt in our fridge, for instance, claims to be "biodynamic." What does that word mean? A cursory search revealed that it means more organic than organic, a higher level of quality and environmental friendliness. That is wrong. [...]

links for 2010-07-20

In ShortLinks on 20 July 2010 with 3 comments

FML: Everyday life flop stories The submissions to FMyLife that received the most "you totally deserved it" votes. And, yeah, these people totally deserved it. (tags: humor) My Fault, I'm Female A very funny blog (at least from my perspective) featuring brief stories of sexism, all ending with "my fault, I'm female," in the "FML" [...]

Poll: Voters are confused.

In Politics on 19 July 2010 with 10 comments

For the AP, Charles Babbington writes about the Fifth District race The bumps that Hurt and Perriello are finding on the campaign trail reflect nationwide discontent and suspicion among voters. The latest Washington Post-ABC News poll found that 68 percent of voters lack confidence in Democratic lawmakers, and 72 percent lack confidence in Republican lawmakers. [...]

links for 2010-07-16

In ShortLinks on 16 July 2010 with 9 comments

The Atlantic: Shameful GOP Ad Blames Democrats for Scarce Jobless Aid Republicans are attacking Harry Reid for not bringing enough stimulus money to Nevada. I'm confused—I thought Republicans thought that stimulus money was bad. Shouldn't they think that this is a good thing? (tags: nevada republican politics) Mother Jones: Obama's Gitmo by the Numbers 779 [...]

links for 2010-07-14

In ShortLinks on 14 July 2010 with 5 comments

Mother Jones: CREW Accuses Liberal Democrat of Ethics Violations Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has filed a complaint against Rep. Gregory Meeks for what looks like accepting a very large bribe. A New York businessman gave him $40k in 2007, which Meeks is claiming was a loan despite that he never disclosed such [...]

links for 2010-07-13

In ShortLinks on 13 July 2010 with 19 comments

Wall Street Journal: Crash Data Suggest Driver Error in Toyota Accidents NHTSA's analysis of data recorders in Toyota acceleration accidents supporters the logical conclusion: that these incidents are matters of driver error. The drivers in these incidents are old, tending towards elderly. Acceleration problems wouldn't discriminate. (tags: toyota business) Merriam-Webster: Comptroller The word is pronounced [...]

links for 2010-07-12

In ShortLinks on 12 July 2010 with 3 comments

New York Times: America Builds an Aristocracy A law school professor specializing in estate planning explains why our country has historically favored estate taxes, and why the current arrangement is such a serious problem. I thought I understood this topic, but I knew nothing about the newly established dynasty trusts that allow enormous fortunes to [...]

links for 2010-07-09

In ShortLinks on 9 July 2010 with 1 comment

Washington Post: Recovery effort falls vastly short of BP's promises In March, BP told federal officials that, in the unlikely case of a spill, they could recover 491,721 barrels of oil from the ocean each and every day. Two and a half months after Deepwater Horizon exploded and sank, they have collected a grand total [...]

links for 2010-07-07

In ShortLinks on 7 July 2010 with 7 comments

Detroit Free Press: BP gas station owners switching brands as customers boycott I'm awfully surprised to read that business is actually down—significantly—at BP stations, at least a handful of ones around Detroit. There's no organized boycott of any note. My guess is that people just plain don't like BP now. There's no such thing as [...]

links for 2010-07-05

In ShortLinks on 5 July 2010 with 3 comments

Wikipedia: Arbre du Ténéré The most isolated tree on Earth was in the Sahara, 120 miles from its nearest neighbor, sprouting in the middle of the desert. A drunk driver ran into it and killed it in 1973. The only tree in 120 miles, and somebody plowed right into the thing. Amazing. (tags: sahara desert) [...]

links for 2010-07-02

In ShortLinks on 2 July 2010 with 7 comments

Bad Astronomy: Climategate's death rattle Climate researcher Michael Mann has been totally cleared of any wrongdoing by Penn State, using awfully strong language. "Dr. Michael E. Mann did not engage in, nor did he participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or [...]

links for 2010-07-01

In ShortLinks on 1 July 2010 with 1 comment

Tea Party Jesus The words of ostensible Christians in the mouth of Christ. While not fair to Christians in general, it sure is funny especially to those of us who are baffled by what passes for Christian values in mainstream culture. (tags: religion humor teabaggers) Woot: Amazon, Woot, and You—But Mostly Woot Woot got bought [...]