February 26, 2016
Are negative forces playing a larger role than expected?
Fyfe, Meehl, England, Mann et al. (2016) Nature climate change article: A lot of ink has been spilt about global warming.
A big and recent argument has been on the last 10-15 years and whether (or not) we have had a substantial reduction or change in the warming rate, sometimes called "the pause".
A major development: some of the top IPCC authors (including Michael Mann) have just published a commentary suggesting it's real... [more inside]
The New Republic has been sold again.
"Chris Hughes, the owner of The New Republic, said on Friday that he had sold the magazine to Win McCormack, a publisher and editor based in New York and Portland, Ore., who founded the literary quarterly Tin House. Mr. McCormack will appoint Hamilton Fish, the publisher of The Washington Spectator and a former publisher of The Nation, to be publisher and editorial director, The New Republic said."
Okay. Thanks. Long live the First Order.
The modern adventures of the Solo family. Spoilers if you've been living under a rock since December.
Buckwheat - Rhubarb - Sorrell
The Plant Food Tree of Life leads you through the major plant foods and their evolutionary relationships. It is a complement to the list view of the same information, in which each link takes you to a related article at the excellent blog, The Botanist in the Kitchen.
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh
Trains in distress. (slyt)
“Is my Slack down or am I fired?”
The Deactivation of the American Worker with the creepiest GIF illustartions ever.
(semi-ironically, the same day this piece was published, The Awl announced its "current editors are departing and it is looking for a new editor(s)-in-chief." The editors' Slacks are still reportedly working, so it isn't too sudden.)
(semi-ironically, the same day this piece was published, The Awl announced its "current editors are departing and it is looking for a new editor(s)-in-chief." The editors' Slacks are still reportedly working, so it isn't too sudden.)
werkin werkin werkin
New York Times Magazine's The Work Issue: Reimagining the Office presents longform articles on questions regarding hiring, teamwork, meetings, automation, and more. Semi-permeable paywall. [more inside]
“Social media is 95 percent of what happens in all relationships now"
Selfies, Dating, and the American 14-Year-Old. "As crushes go from real-life likes to digital “likes,” the typical American teenage girl is confronted with a set of social anxieties never before seen in human history. Nancy Jo Sales observes one 14-year-old as she gets ready to embark on her first I.R.L. date."
“In my family, a B-flat was a fuckin’ B-flat.”
How Randy Newman and His Family Have Shaped Movie Music for Generations by David Kamp [Vanity Fair] Sure, you know of the Oscar-winning composer behind Toy Story and his endearingly offbeat songwriting, but Newman, 72, is also the patriarch of a clan that has helped shape movie music since the talkies. [more inside]
the oscars are coming.....
Screen Junkies have released their Honest Trailers Oscar Clip. They are also having an Oscar party at their YouTube channel. (previously)
fabrication is the ultimate sin of journalism
The bombshell accusations left anyone who'd ever worked with Thompson wondering if he'd scammed them too. It's a tricky question to untangle, noted Josh Marshall, the editor and publisher of the liberal online publication Talking Points Memo, which had published one of his essays. "One of the dirty little secrets of fact-checking," Marshall wrote in an editor's note, "is that it is quite difficult to uncover a determined effort to deceive." Juan Thompson Wrote About St. Louis for the National Media. But Were Any of His Stories True? [more inside]
New Music from Seattle
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis - Spoons (feat. Ryan Bedard) (SLYT)
7. Tattoos of memes are a thing now
Melissa Click has been fired.
Controversial prof booted by University of Missouri Board of Curators. Communication faculty member Click rose to fame and notoriety for her role in recent protests against Missouri's administration, where she called for two journalists, one a student, to be blocked or removed from a protest site. Images and video of her circulated widely.
Recently Click was suspended by Mizzou, and also charged with assault by local prosecutors. She ended her appointment with the university's journalism department. A group of state legislators wanted her gone. A similarly-sized group of faculty publicly supported Click. [more inside]
Recently Click was suspended by Mizzou, and also charged with assault by local prosecutors. She ended her appointment with the university's journalism department. A group of state legislators wanted her gone. A similarly-sized group of faculty publicly supported Click. [more inside]
I understand that there is a writer named Jonathan Franzen
Rebecca Solnit: 80 Books No Woman Should Read.
Justina Pelletier
The family of Justina Pelletier has filed a lawsuit against Boston Children's Hospital; in 2013, while being treated for a suspected mitochondrial disease, the physicians at Boston Children's intercepted the teen's care, believing her issues were psychosomatic. When her parents attempted to get her discharged, the Massachusetts Department of Children and Family Services stepped in, and Justina was placed in a psychiatric unit. [more inside]
*Some* of the kids are all right
The current crop of 28-34 year old Canadians is the wealthiest ever, according to an internal Finance Canada study obtained by the CBC. This group averaged a net worth of $93k, compared to previous 28-34 year olds' more typical $60K. Most of this wealth is concentrated in the top 10%, whose net worth doubled to $500k, while most others saw a gain of only $1500 (CBC video). But efforts to narrow the gap are underway, in some corners: Ontario announced that students with family incomes under $50K will be getting free tuition for college or university.
Face/On
Face Swap Live is an app for iOS and Android phones that lets you swap faces with someone (or some thing, like your cat) using your phone's camera. It garnered some attention last year for the horrific nightmare fuel that can result from a swap. Now, Rhett LeCompte has recorded a video of himself singing "We Are The World" using Face Swap to play all the original singers.
GNC, Target, Wal-Mart, Walgreens accused of selling adulterated herbals
The New York State attorney general’s office accused four major retailers on Monday of selling fraudulent and potentially dangerous herbal supplements and demanded that they remove the products from their shelves. The authorities said they had conducted tests on top-selling store brands of herbal supplements at four national retailers — GNC, Target, Walgreens and Walmart — and found that four out of five of the products did not contain any of the herbs on their labels. The tests showed that pills labeled medicinal herbs often contained little more than cheap fillers like powdered rice, asparagus and houseplants, and in some cases substances that could be dangerous to those with allergies. [NYTimes], [WaPo] [more inside]
Talk softly, but equip a large aerial
The University of Washington has developed Passive Wi-Fi. A method of generating 802.11b transmissions using backscatter communication, while consuming 10000 times less power than existing Wi-Fi chipsets (and 1000 times less power than Bluetooth or Zigbee)
Passive Wi-Fi transmissions can be decoded on any Wi-Fi device including routers, mobile phones and tablets. [more inside]
Silver, metal, liquid, blue
Earth May Be a 1-in-700-Quintillion Kind of Place
The Crazy Injustice of Denying Exonerated Prisoners Compensation
In California, as well as many other states, even if a prisoner is exonerated of the crime for which they were imprisoned, they are not automatically compensated for prison time. They may have to wait years before receiving payments, if they receive any at all.
The Turncoat
Burly and middle-aged with a mop of brown hair, Jessop spent more than a decade as security chief and spokesman for the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, a polygamous sect that split from the mainstream Mormon church at the turn of the last century. As head of the "God Squad," he was perhaps the highest profile FLDS member -- with the exception of its prophet, Warren Jeffs. 'Thug Willie' spills secrets of FLDS and its 'prophet' [autoplay video -- stop that and read the article] [more inside]
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