Most of my best ideas come from Kate, so I’ll steal this one, too: If you could only give me one piece of advice [regarding FutureBaby, due in July], what would it be? If you’ve been itching to provide child-bearing or -rearing advice (and I know some of you have), here’s your chance. Please limit… Continue reading Baby Advice Open Thread
Deep Questions from Pop Music: Commas
Today’s question come to us courtesy of Ivy League white-reggae band Vampire Weekend: So, who gives a fuck about an Oxford comma, anyway? Well, John Scalzi, obviously, but the real question is: why? Why does this simple piece of punctuation engender such strong negative feelings in people who are otherwise mostly sensible? Personally, I lean… Continue reading Deep Questions from Pop Music: Commas
Manual Links Dump
You may or may not have noticed the absence of the “Links for [Date]” posts the last couple of days. There’s been some sort of glitch at del.icio.us, and they didn’t auto-post the way they usually do. You may or may not have missed them, but I do, so below the fold you’ll find the… Continue reading Manual Links Dump
Class and National Service
The Dean Dad posted an interesting article about “national service” programs yesterday. He’s against them, for class reasons: The message that national service programs send strikes me as dangerous. The implication seems to be that rich kids can just jump right into higher ed and start moving up the ladder, but the rest of us… Continue reading Class and National Service
Richard K. Morgan, Broken Angels [Library of Babel]
This is the second Takeshi Kovacs novel, sequel to Altered Carbon. Kovacs is a former UN Envoy, a generally amoral individual loaded up with a bunch of sophisticated mental conditioning, and sent out into the world to troubleshoot problem spots for the world government. And he’s a guy who really puts the “shoot” in “troubleshoot”…… Continue reading Richard K. Morgan, Broken Angels [Library of Babel]
So Much for Faculty Indoctrination
David Horowitz is an idiot. Granted, anyone with any sense has known this for a good while now, but now we can prove it with SCIENCE!!! Well, political science– Inside Higher Ed reports on a study of student political views that finds that liberal faculty make no real difference: One of the key arguments made… Continue reading So Much for Faculty Indoctrination
Matthew Hughes, Majestrum [Library of Babel]
Matthew Hughes’s Majestrum is part of a linked series of novels and stories set in a distant future in which the rational rules of logic and science governing our universe are beginning to weaken and give way toa new age goverened by “sympathetic association,” better known as magic. He’s been writing these for a while,… Continue reading Matthew Hughes, Majestrum [Library of Babel]
Paul Melko, Singularity’s Ring [Library of Babel]
I tried to get a copy of this at Boskone, but Larry Smith’s whole stock sold out on Friday, before I hit the dealer’s room at all. I’m not sure how many copies there were originally, but Melko was doing the Happy Dance at the Tor party, and deservedly so. I had to wait to… Continue reading Paul Melko, Singularity’s Ring [Library of Babel]
Mysteries of Tenure
Timothy Burke has a typically excellent post about the problems with academic tenure. Not the usual “It’s an abomination that prevents that Magic Power of the Market from working its wonders” complaint from outside, but problems from the academic side: Oso Raro and Tenured Radical underline one of the biggest problems with the tenure system… Continue reading Mysteries of Tenure
Matthew Jarpe, Radio Freefall [Library of Babel]
Returning to logging the books next to my computer in the order in which they were read, Matthew Jarpe’s Radio Freefall was one of the few books I picked up at Boskone (I think I got Larry Smith’s last copy). I read most of it during our trip to DC a little while back, and… Continue reading Matthew Jarpe, Radio Freefall [Library of Babel]