» 2017 » February Epicene Cyborg

What they want is for the law to bow to “consumer demand” for cheaper taxi services by granting Uber the right to ignore collective regulations on worker rights and conditions. But all this equates to is an economic transfer from the working class over to urban metropolitan elites.

The Scully Effect: the anecdotal, and subsequent academic, term given to an influx of young women pursuing STEM or law enforcement careers during the show’s heyday.

On the other side of the wall: Mexicans on the border are ‘psychologically traumatized.’

A new study reveals that nearly one in three non-elderly cancer patients are not taking their prescribed drug regimens because they can’t afford it.

This is what America looked like before the EPA cleaned it up.

Rachel Dolezal: ‘I’m not going to stoop and apologise and grovel.’ Demonizing her really improved the world, didn’t it? Did it feel good? That’s what matters, right?

Chinese wages now higher than in Brazil, Argentina and Mexico.

Chinese factory jobs vanish as robots take over. There is no good non-paywalled version of this from FT; best I could do.

When Work Disappears: Manufacturing Decline and the Falling Marriage-Market Value of Men.

In one generation, the Internet went from opening up new free markets to creating a series of Fake Markets that exploit society, without most media or politicians even noticing.

Writing and identity.

We may well be seeing the rise of fascism — but Democrats and liberals have helped make it possible.

The gentlemen farmers of Wall Street: How the profit motive has seized America’s farmland. Financial trusts snatch up valuable U.S. acreage, then convert into fast-buck investments for global speculators.

Republicans Want Retirement Plans That Keep Wall Street Rich.

Monarch miscalculation: Has a scientific error about the butterflies persisted for more than 40 years?

The Strategy of No Strategy. What I’ve learned is that we struggle at understanding how even simple things work, and that struggle shows how much we have to learn about the things that aren’t so simple.

Esther Duflo rediscovering the lost art of economics.

Uncontrollable Bleeding: A Brain Surgeon’s Nightmare.

La La Land: Anatomy of a Backlash.

Because IQ is partially hereditary, and resistant to change, it conflicts with a lot of modern values about self-determination.

Can the Climate Survive Electoral Democracy? Maybe. Can It Survive Capitalism? No. Nor overpopulation.

Mark Zuckerberg wants Facebook to have more power in our lives, and we should resist.

736 Record Highs Set This Week.

For the 2016 postmortem, liberals, because we tend to lean toward compassion, blamed the poor. We didn’t phrase it that way, of course. We blamed hillbillies, rednecks, trailer trash, as though this hasn’t always been prep-school code for poor people.

Tori Amos released “Little Earthquakes” 25 years ago today. One of the best albums ever made, along with Lorde’s Pure Heroine.

Tech jobs are already largely automated. Yes, but don’t buy the lie that somehow by magic other, better jobs get created as this occurs.

Local and organic is a romantic myth – the future of sustainable agriculture is all about smart technology and scaling up.

Numbers of neurons as biological correlates of cognitive capability.

Total energy expenditure (kcal/d), varies relatively little within species, despite variation in physical activity; it varies considerably among species even after controlling for the effect of body size.

I recall travelling to Berlin and pacing the featureless platforms of a railway station for two full hours in a grinding, dreary panic, wholly unable to summon up my wits, in tears, beseeching passersby for help, and too ashamed to phone the friend I was visiting and reveal that I was weak, despairing and confused.

Fasting diet ‘regenerates diabetic pancreas.’

Sweden’s feminist foreign minister has dared to tell the truth about Saudi Arabia.

Technocratic liberalism prides itself on having no ideology to speak of — which is itself the most dogmatic ideology of them all.

Astro-Inertial Navigation System.

The Debt of Disability. I owe everyone.

Spatial reasoning is only partly explained by general intelligence. Yep. My IQ as measured is pretty high. Spatial reasoning (and math ability) nonexistent.

Verizon’s takeover of Yahoo is all about user data.

For a Society without Jobs.

Ex-CIA officer jailed in Portugal for her alleged role in kidnapping a terrorism suspect.

Surge in opioid epidemic death rate continues, hitting 2.5-fold increase.

Google Report: 99.95 Percent Of DMCA Takedown Notices Are Bot-Generated Bullshit Buckshot.

Facebook Is Not A Community.

Obama’s Lost Army.

Congressional Republicans brush aside Trump’s promise to keep Social Security, Medicare safe.

Long-winded speech could be early sign of Alzheimer’s disease, says study.

The left’s Brexit dilemma.

Giving weight to Darwin’s theory of ‘living fossils.’

How Peter Thiel’s Palantir Helped the NSA Spy on the Whole World.

America’s Monopolies Are Holding Back the Economy.

Personalities can transform almost beyond recognition over a lifetime, study finds.

The real assimilation dilemma.

A Fight to Fix Geometry’s Foundations.

AI and automation are about to implode blue collar jobs. Been saying this is on the way for 10 years. Now it’s here. Thanks all ya’ll for showing up.

Single atom feels the quantum heat.

Zuckerberg’s world.

Why Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Could Sink U.S. Home Prices. Doubt it, but that is a huge benefit if so.

The Rise of the Mall. Not particularly well-written, but still interesting.

Cosmos Controversy: The Universe Is Expanding, but How Fast?

For years, astronomers have been trying to determine which of these three processes – cosmic rays, AGB stars or novae – might produce the most lithium.

Typology of Leftism.

There Better Be Some Goddamn Aliens in This Solar System Loaded with Earth-Sized Planets. And they better be ‘muricans or we’ll bomb some freedom into ’em.

Chile over USA.

Over the last decade, L.A. County has traded high-paying jobs for low-paying ones. Areas (as all country is doing) trading $87,000/yr jobs for $20,000/yr ones does not prosperity make.

The Holocaust’s Great Escape.

Air Pollution Causes 4.2 Million Premature Deaths Around The World.

I found the best anagram in English.

Here lies the existential challenge faced by the style guide or writer’s manual: beyond the nuts and bolts of usage and basic writerly manners, they are attempting to teach the unteachable.

“Someone would always answer”: The sad death of the internet message board. In IMDb’s case, it’s because studios can’t control messaging, not due to trolls or hostile users.

There are ways of making it so that immigrants produce more jobs than they consume, but that has to be something you want to do, and it hasn’t been a priority for most nations for decades.

The last big crime of a dying political establishment in Brussels.

Subprime auto lender facing FTC inquiry over GPS-tracking kill switches.

Used Cars Can Still Be Controlled By Their Previous Owners’ Apps.

Liberal Hatred for Susan Sarandon is a Symptom of People Who Refuse to Acknowledge Their Own Failure.

Spills From Fracking Are Worse Than We Imagined.

Colleges Lost Billions to Hedge Funds in 2016.

Our Miserable 21st Century.

America Has Been Screwing Over Its Veterans Since the Revolutionary War. Every vet knows this.

U.S. life expectancy will soon be on par with Mexico’s and the Czech Republic’s.

Therapy Experience in Naturalistic Observational Studies is Associated with Negative Changes in Personality.

Electorate would be more willing to abide by advice of expert-class if expert-class wasn’t viewed as having messed up so many big things.

Low-level inflammation is the most important correlate of not only survival, but also capability and cognition at extreme old age. Note that this does not mean treating inflammation will result in you being a centenarian.

Meritocratic Myths.

A tale of two cities: What happened when factory jobs moved from Warren, Ohio, to Juarez, Mexico. See how much NAFTA improved these people’s lives? Why, it GDPed the fuck out of ’em!

Long-distance Uber, Lyft drivers’ crazy commutes, marathon days, big paychecks.

Brain pollution: Evidence builds that dirty air causes Alzheimer’s, dementia.

Hackers who took control of PC microphones siphon >600 GB from 70 targets.

Outrage vs Hazard.

For all the screams about “fake news” the worst purveyors of false news in the past 20 years were the mainstream media who sold the Iraq war for George Bush; with the most prestigious newspaper in America, the New York Times, making the flagship effort. Nailed it.

The reasons for our left or right-handedness.

Why the notion of “race” persists in science.

Austerity was a bigger disaster than we thought.

The gaslighting of the American public continues, with Gaslighter-in-Chief, The New York Times, whipping up a frenzy of Russia paranoia.

Bernie Sanders just proposed a law to save millennials’ retirements.

‘From bad to worse’: Greece hurtles towards a final reckoning.

Labor in the Ancient World – Summary.

Call it “Islamsplaining”: First-world keyboard virtue-signallers have put themselves in the business of issuing fatwas. Frequent white liberal problem: telling minorities how they should feel and behave.

We need to build a new system: one that will balance economic growth with sustainability and human flourishing.

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