February 2011

I started to call this post “The Unbearable Lightness of Thomas Friedman” but discovered that the NY Times columnist had already been the subject of not one but two articles similarly titled. Likewise a play on the title of Friedman’s most recent lightweight book was also taken (“Hot, Fat, and Clouded”). Friedman has been at [...]

The speed with which computers have surpassed the expectations of all but the most visionary science fiction writers has been astounding.  David Levy, both an international master at chess and an early expert on artificial intelligence, famously wagered that in the next ten years–starting in 1968–no computer could win a chess match with him. He [...]

A recent talk by Jonathan Haidt and covered by the New York Times–despite stating what is obvious to anyone familiar with academia and even most of those who are not–has caused a stir in its claims regarding the representation of political ideologies within the professoriate. Although the vast disproportion of Democrats and liberals to Republicans, [...]

Because the American electoral system has structurally evolved only slightly since its 18th century blueprint, we have contradictory vectors at work in our political system. That is not entirely a bad thing as the Founding Fathers saw virtue in setting political influence against itself, not just in the form of division of power and checks [...]