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| compos mentis. Concision. Media. Clarity. Memes. Context. Melange. Confluence. Mishmash. Conflation. Mellifluous. Conviviality. Miscellany. Confelicity. Milieu. Cogent. Minty. Concoction. |
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A Romance Battles the Odds: Risk Assessor Woos Daredevil |
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| Topic: Movies |
3:12 pm EST, Jan 17, 2004 |
A major movie studio releases a "gross-out" comedy about the improbable romance between a carefree, "attractive young everywoman" and a risk-obsessed nerd. In a sign of the times, it says to the public, "Lighten up!" and wonders aloud, "See? Isn't risk funny?" Unfortunately for those carefree enough to risk $10 on this film, the answer is ... no, according to NYT's Stephen Holden. One might be inclined to take comfort in a tasty bucket of buttered popcorn, but even this simple pleasure is denied by an awareness of the implications of massive overproduction of corn. Is ignorance bliss? A Romance Battles the Odds: Risk Assessor Woos Daredevil |
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NASA Cancels Trip to Supply Hubble, Sealing Early Doom |
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| Topic: Science |
2:35 pm EST, Jan 17, 2004 |
Savor those cosmic postcards while you can. NASA decreed an early death yesterday to one of its flagship missions and most celebrated successes, the Hubble Space Telescope. In a midday meeting at the Goddard Space Flight Center, two days after President Bush ordered NASA to redirect its resources toward human exploration of the Moon and Mars, Sean O'Keefe told the managers of the space telescope that there would be no more shuttle visits to maintain it. "This is a pretty nasty turn of events, coming immediately on the heels of W's endorsement of space exploration." Fly him to the moon, then, if it's so damned important. This is foolish. NASA Cancels Trip to Supply Hubble, Sealing Early Doom |
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| Topic: International Relations |
2:25 pm EST, Jan 17, 2004 |
Among many other worthwhile articles in the Winter 2003/2004 issue of The National Interest, you'll find an essay by James C. Bennett entitled "Networking Nation States." It's also described on the cover by the title "The Coming Info-National Order." The lead-in sentence is: "The nation-state is not dead, but technology is leading it down a very different road." I am reminded of Walter Wriston's "The Twilight of Sovereignty", although Bennett has a different thesis. Check out this issue the next time you're at the bookstore or newsstand. |
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Farmed Salmon, Pro and Con |
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| Topic: Science |
2:16 pm EST, Jan 17, 2004 |
No sooner had we started fretting about the risk of mad cow disease in our hamburgers than a new report indicated that the salmon raised on fish farms were laced with far more toxic chemicals than their wild brethren. Just what this may mean for human health is murky, given that the risk appears to be small and the health benefits of eating salmon, whether farm-raised or caught in the wild, are thought to be considerable. But the message to fish farmers, the dominant suppliers of salmon in this country, was unmistakably clear: stop feeding your penned-up salmon the fish meal that seems to be causing the problem. This looks like a case where risk estimation has outrun common sense. The probability may be very low, but the consequences are so severe that extreme preventive measures are warranted, even if it means giving up something basic, fundamental, or essential in the process. Where have I heard this before? It's deja vu all over again. Farmed Salmon, Pro and Con |
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Greeting Big Brother With Open Arms |
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| Topic: Surveillance |
2:09 pm EST, Jan 17, 2004 |
To a post-cold-war generation of Americans, the prospect of living under surveillance is no longer scary but cool. ... essentially a scam: propaganda for a new business model that only pretends to give consumers more control while in fact subjecting them to increasingly sophisticated forms of monitoring and manipulation. The true beneficiaries are the marketers, advertisers and corporate executives who have a large stake in seeing surveillance portrayed as benign. If you opt to follow this link, you can look forward to another one of those silly juxtapositions of disparate statistics that is supposed to be deeply insightful but is really meaningless. Greeting Big Brother With Open Arms |
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| Topic: Politics and Law |
2:11 am EST, Jan 15, 2004 |
It's no surprise that Iraq should have come up at Mr. Bush's first national security meetings -- after all, the United States was patrolling the skies above Iraq to enforce "no-fly" zones. Nor is it surprising that the Bush team should have contemplated regime change: That was the declared policy of the United States, supported by the Clinton administration and Congress. Thanks to the Post for taking a moment to review for the benefit of Paul O'Neill and some of the Democratic candidates what was already plainly obvious to anyone actually paying attention to the matters in question. Perhaps O'Neill was too busy doing crossword puzzles to listen attentively during those NSC meetings, but he could at least bother to read the newspaper once in a while. The Post is only 35 cents on weekdays. Mr. O'Neill and Iraq |
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A Real-Life Debate on Free Expression in a Cyberspace City |
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| Topic: Games |
1:59 am EST, Jan 15, 2004 |
Electronic Arts terminates the account of one Peter Ludlow, "an unabashed muckraker" in The Sims online world of Alphaville. Members of the community react, strongly. ... more than simply a source of entertainment, they are also a gateway to a complex social network that takes on a life of its own. Sherry Turkle: "Part of the original reason people went to these games was for a sense of time out. But as these spaces get more integrated with real life the kind of boundaries people want are still being negotiated." A Real-Life Debate on Free Expression in a Cyberspace City |
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| Topic: Fiction |
1:50 am EST, Jan 15, 2004 |
Adam Cassidy is twenty-six and a low level employee at a high-tech corporation who hates his job. When he manipulates the system to do something nice for a friend, he finds himself charged with a crime. Corporate Security gives him a choice: prison -- or become a spy in the headquarters of their chief competitor, Trion Systems. ... He's rich, drives a Porsche, lives in a fabulous apartment, and works directly for the CEO. He's dating the girl of his dreams. His life is perfect. And all he has to do to keep it that way is betray everyone he cares about and everything he believes in. A thrilling tale of telecom espionage. Enjoy. Paranoia : A Novel |
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| Topic: International Relations |
1:42 am EST, Jan 15, 2004 |
If, somehow, Iraqi Kurds, Sunnis, Turkmen, Christians, Assyrians and Shiites find a way to embrace pluralism, it will be a huge boost to moderates in the war of ideas all across the Muslim world. Those who scoff at the idea of a democratic domino theory in the Arab world don't know what they're talking about. But those who think this is a done deal don't know Iraq. War of Ideas, Part 3 |
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Why I'm Not Buying The US Dollar |
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| Topic: Markets & Investing |
11:36 pm EST, Jan 14, 2004 |
I'm about to deliver a warning regarding the US trade deficit and also suggest a remedy for the problem. I wonder what Paul O'Neill thinks of this plan. Wait; no, I don't. Why I'm Not Buying The US Dollar |
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