[In case it needs to be said: I don't agree with every word of everything I link to. --L.]
- Can you teach yourself synaesthesia?
- [io9]
A form of synaesthesia in which people experience letters or numbers in colour may be trainable. The discovery could shed new light on how such traits develop.
- The microbes within
- [Why Evolution Is True]
If you missed “How microbes defend and define us,” Carl Zimmer’s piece in yesterday’s New York Times, go read it. It describes new DNA-based work showing that we’re not only colonized by thousands of bacterial species—and the identities of those species differ from person to person—but that many of those bacteria are absolutely essential for our normal functioning. Excerpts: [redacted]
- He trying to put
- [I Can Has Cheezburger]
- How to Find Thousands More Prospects for Your Business
- [Copyblogger]
[subheadings:
The desperate buyers strategy
The conquer-the-universe strategy
The key is the content net-L]
- on suburban growth, and the movement of people
- [twistedchick@dreamwidth]
- The Visual Du Jour – What (The Hell) Are We Eating?
- [Global Sociology Blog]
[Average U.S. diet, in wheel-chart format. -L]
- Social Security Protects Our Children
- [Social Security Works]
Former Senator Alan Simpson, the co-chair of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, was on a tear when he declared that the traditional defenders of Social Security “don’t care a whit about their grandchildren…not a whit.” Besides being disrespectful, the logic of his assertion is all wrong. The nation’s children have a huge stake in the preservation of Social Security…
- Nebraska "Mental Health" Screening Law Put on Hold
- [RHReality Check]
A new law that requires all women to be prescreened for possible mental issues prior to obtaining an abortion has been blocked by U.S. District Court Judge Laurie Smith Camp. The law, which was scheduled to go into effect on July 15th, was challenged by Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, who argued that the law was so vague that it would be impossible to correctly adhere to it…
- Proposition 107: Arizona’s Students Under Attack!
- [reappropriate]
California, Washington, Michigan and Nebraska: what do all of these states have in common?
Each of these states have been the victim of the American Civil Rights Initiative (ACRI) – a deceptively named national campaign founded by Ward Connerly to work state-by-state to eliminate affirmative action programs. In each state, a seemingly benign ballot initiative is put up to popular vote that would eliminate “preferential treatment” or “discrimination” in public institutions based on race or sex. However, upon passage, the measure is used to outlaw affirmative action programs, particularly in state universities.
The most obvious consequences of ACRI’s efforts can be seen in California, which passed Proposition 209 in 1996. In the following graph…
[Crunchy. -L]
- Journalists and Critics Tackle the Casting Controversy in ‘The Last Airbender’
- [Racebending.com]
The Last Airbender took a critical drubbing and is currently ranked 8% at RottenTomatoes.com. In part due to the awareness Racebending.com readers and other supporters were able to bring to the casting issue through “our mid-June letter writing campaign, nearly every single article on or review of The Last Airbender that came out around July 1st, 2010 mentioned the casting controversy and/or even Racebending.com. Below are some of the numerous articles that mention the casting controversy…
- New York And Unions Threaten To Move Money
- [Move Your Money]
New York City has already showed its support of local financial institutions by putting up to $25 million of municipal tax dollars into local credit unions, and now it is teaming up with six major unions to pressure the biggest banks to work harder to prevent foreclosures. City comptroller John C. Liu and the presidents of the United Federation of Teachers, the Transport Workers Union and the Motel Trades Council, among others, are sending a letter to the major banks to demand a change. If the group isn’t satisfied with the response, they will move their money. The New York Times reports…
- The Two Party System at Work
- [Metablog]
[This is an amusing but scientifically inaccurate meta-script of U.S. politics. -L]
- Linkspam barefoot in the kitchen
- [Geek Feminism Blog]
* Mystery and the Modern Woman: Tara Hunt writes about heterosexual dating, and men who are intimidated by heavy social networking “full disclosure” women.
* Closing the Venture Capital Gender Gap: Astia’s CEO, Sharon Vosmek, writes about why she and Astia promote and support women entrepreneurs.
* svollga points out a lot of irritating privilege fail in a discussion about the invisibility of queer characters in the current Doctor Who season.
* Time to Hire a Housekeeper?: “The study shows that highly productive faculty members, both male and female, employ others to help with core housework at a higher rate than others — but women do it much more often than men. ” (Note, there’s no discussion of any of the race, class or disability issues around doing housework or paying others for it.)
* A Conversation with Ava Pope, physicist: “Most physics majors don’t spend months carefully analyzing a few lines of poetry, let alone publish a paper on the research in a national publication. But Ava Pope wasn’t the average physics major.”
* skeptifem: Where are all the female skeptics at?: “Anyone who has been in a skeptics group knows this discussion. Some dudes (and occasionally a few ladies) decide that it has something to do with the evolution of the mind and the innate ability of women to understand science or logic… These debates start because there is a noticable lack of women in skeptic groups, but also because statistically women are more likely to be religious or believe in stuff like psychics.”
The Link(s): Wed, Jul 14th, 11am by Lee Salazar, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. Terms and conditions beyond the scope of this license may be available at leesalazar.com.