"Liberty without learning is always in peril; learning without liberty is always in vain." - John F. Kennedy

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Preoccupations: 'I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men and German to my horse' (attributed to Charles V) - "Some commenters deplored the inflectional complexity of the German language. I find the complexity reassuring rather than offputting, because it means that you always know where to find the functional parts of the sentence. The lack of inflectional complexity in English is made up for by its much more complicated structural form. English word order is nuts"

Disable Annoying Vista UAC popups with TweakUAC (free!) - "You keep all the positive effects of UAC, such as Internet Explorer operating in the protected mode, applications starting without the administrative privileges by default, etc. The only thing that gets changed is that you will no longer see the infamous “Windows needs your permission to continue” messages whenever you attempt to make a change to your Vista configuration, or when you run a program that needs administrative rights."

The nasty history of supermarket-bashing - "There is a peculiar paradox that while Nazi Germany is held up as a symbol of evil today, many of the core ideas and beliefs associated with Nazism, such as the mystical worship of nature and hostility towards Enlightenment modernity, are increasingly commonplace amongst today’s radical middle classes. And nowhere is that clearer than in their hang-ups about supermarkets... Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Eton-educated cook and organic farmer-cum-campaigner, alongside numerous broadsheet columnists, argues that the supermarket’s cutting of prices ‘undermines the true value’ and ‘meaning’ of commodities. In truth, it seems that cheaply available goods undermine these campaigners’ own sense of moral worth and social status... The ‘Blood and Soil’ ideas of Walter Darré, for instance, which were hugely influential on Nazi thinking, considered humans to be best suited to a simple existence living close to the land, and argued that urbanisation and industrialisation were so decadent and corrupt that ‘stultifying cities’ would weaken a nations’ ‘racial stock’. Darré’s ideas also influenced the Nazis’ belief in the virtues ofKultur, which embodied the folk traditions and craft skills ‘over the essentially empty products of Western civilisation’. Does this sound familiar? Is it really so very different from the complaints of countless commentators today, about mass-produced commodities, the destruction of nature by greedy mankind, and the emptiness of Western civilisation?"

Biology at Work: Rethinking Sexual Equality - "Does biology help explain why women, on average, earn less money than men? Is there any evolutionary basis for the scarcity of female CEOs in Fortune 500 companies? According to Kingsley Browne, the answer may be yes. Biology at Work brings an evolutionary perspective to bear on issues of women in the workplace: the "glass ceiling," the "gender gap" in pay, sexual harassment, and occupational segregation. While acknowledging the role of discrimination and sexist socialization, Browne suggests that until we factor real biological differences between men and women into the equation, the explanation remains incomplete. Browne looks at behavioral differences between men and women as products of different evolutionary pressures facing them throughout human history. Women's biological investment in their offspring has led them to be on average more nurturing and risk averse, and to value relationships over competition. Men have been biologically rewarded, over human history, for displays of strength and skill, risk taking, and status acquisition. These behavioral differences have numerous workplace consequences. Not surprisingly, sex differences in the drive for status lead to sex differences in the achievement of status."
One comment: "Yes ladies; from the male standpoint, it REALLY is about sex. Really. Women do not have a male sex drive and cannot fathom the lengths that a man will go to just to do...it. So they make up tall tales about men in power seeking to have sex with female subordinates in order to assert male authority."; Amazingly, this review costs more than the book itself!

The Secular Outpost: An empirical test of the existence of sensus divinitatis in atheists -
"But if there is really an innate universal belief in God--or a natural direct perception of God, a sensus divinitatis, a mental faculty that allows direct basic knowledge of God's existence--it seems to me that we should be able to find much stronger empirical evidence of it... Fales presents three arguments based on empirical evidence which cast doubt on the existence of a sensus divinitatis--first, the divergence of claims and beliefs by those who claim to have one (lack of reliability, even within Christian sects). Second, the lack of a demonstrated superior moral life by Christians versus non-Christians (similar comparisons can be drawn between Christians and nontheists). Third, the presence of Bible verses--accepted by most varieties of Christian as authored by men inspired by the Holy Spirit, presumably with their sensus divinitatis functioning properly--in which "God performs, commands, accepts or countenances rape, genocide, human sacrifice, pestilence to punish David for taking a census, killing David's infant to punish him, hatred of family, capital punishment for breaking a monetary promise, and so on"?"
One comment: "BTW, what if you conduct this experiment on adults in societies where children believe in Santa Claus, and it makes adults say that they really still believe in Santa?"

Toddler's Elmo Doll Makes Death Threats, Family Says - "A Lithia family says a cuddly, programmable Elmo doll revealed its dark side yesterday after fresh batteries were installed. Instead of singing songs or reciting the favorite color of its 2-year-old owner, James Bowman, the doll started making death threats, the family says. With a squeeze of its fuzzy belly, the Sesame Street character now says, in a sing-song voice, "Kill James.""

BOILER - "In world culture there exists quite a number of works of art, which if desired (and here we have the desire and time for this) can be attributed to child pornography. In painting, for example, the theme of Venus and Cupid (mother and son) is presented rather ambiguously. The child is either present during his mother’s sexual games, or takes part in them. It is suffice to recollect the well-known masterpiece by Agnelo Bronzino “Venus and Cupid” (1540), in which the son is caressing his mother’s nipple. In Velasquez’s painting “Venus before the mirror” (1648), the child is forced connive at his mother’s exhibitionism. Despite the fact that until the present day the issue of whether children should or should not see their parents naked is still disputed in psychiatric and pedagogical literature. And the idea that parents’ nakedness can shock or confuse a child is very popular in the society. “Cupid” (1602) by Caravaggio does not cause objections among moral advocates, though the nude boy falls under the stereotype of sexual abuse of children. Imagine Cupid without wings and you will receive an example of child pornography in the Internet. NAMBLA activists are brought to trail for such pictures."

Tetrapod Zoology : Traumatic anal intercourse with a pig - "A 62 year old male Bulgarian farmer suffered from abdominal pain, and it was eventually discovered that the cause of the pain was a 0.5 cm ragged tear of the rectal wall. This was repaired and the patient recovered without event. But how exactly had he received this unfortunate injury? Despite early reluctance to discuss it, he later admitted that the injury had been received during sexual intercourse with a boar."

No Surrender Japanese Holdouts After WWII - "World War II did not neatly end with Japan's surrender on September 2, 1945. At its height the Japanese Empire was more than 20 million square miles of land and sea. Soldiers in isolated regions fought on for years after the surrender some unaware the war had ended, other refusing to believe. Some hide in the jungles alone, others fought in groups and continued to make attacks and conduct guerilla warfare. These men were called Japanese Holdouts, or Stragglers and their stories are some of the most fascinating human interest stories of the 20th Century."

Suburban Legend - Weird News Story Archive - "Ohio Rep. James Traficant is worried about the Internet. He is urging Congress to protect kids from sexual content online, and says he now has proof of its dangers: a letter from a constituent who says she got pregnant over the net. “That’s right, pregnant,” he ranted, telling how “Frances” was impregnated via e-mail by a boyfriend 1,500 miles down the wire. “It’s time for Congress to act,” he claimed. “The Internet needs a chastity chip” to protect online users from “immaculate reception.”"