in other news

The blog has been languishing lately, partly because I've been away, and partly because I've been squaring away my phd prospectus. It's not going to get better for a while, because I'm about to head off to Maine for the rest of the month. Before I go, though, one more thing:

Walmart has a new look. As Tyler says, way overdue.

Yeah. That second picture definitely feels more like the place I go to buy cheap socks.

alice and bob

I wish I had thought of this first.

Alice: You are late. How was your day?
Bob: Sorry honey, I had to wait for t = infinity, it took forever.

(As I said once before, if you get the joke, you have no right to complain.)

29 June roundup

A week of extremely exciting excerpts:

• Americans arrested abroad: Tijuana, Guadalajara, Nuevo Laredo, London, Mexico City, Toronto, Nassau, Mérida, Nogales, Hong Kong. 7 of the top 10 crime hotspots for Americans are in Mexico.
• Cloned T cells kick cancer.
• Proprietary bacteria poop petroleum. [/.]
• Bumper stickers bespeak bad behaviour. Other drivers get mad, but don't act out.
• Comedy crushes Communism, via 3QD: "'Is it true that Marxism-Leninism is scientific?' 'No, surely not. If it were, they would have tested it on animals first.'"
• Major microscopic mutation materializes: evolution in the lab
• Terrifying trippy tune: thousand-year time travel [via, inspired by]

why you should throw books out

Most people, if they aren't going to keep a book, pass it along to someone else. But that's irrational if the book isn't good, says Tyler Cowen. You should throw it out.

If you donate the otherwise-trashed book somewhere, someone might read it. OK, maybe that person will read one more book in life but more likely that book will substitute for that person reading some other book instead.

The question is whether the book is worth it. You've read it and can make an informed judgment. It is your duty to do so--else you will be encouraging the propagation of bad books to the detriment of the good. Particularly if, like me, you are more likely to keep good books and dispose of the bad. "But note the calculation is tricky. Sometimes a very bad book can be useful because it might appeal to 'bad' readers and lure them away from even worse books." Another confounder is that some of the books I know are bad are just the only book I know on a subject--can I really recommend against such a one?

This is not an idle question: my small graduate department once maintained a room-sized private library of books in the field. Private libraries are discouraged by the university library system (for good reason), and so when we ran out of office space, the library had to go. Now we have boxes and boxes of books--some good, some bad. The university library wants them. But would it be responsible to give them?

on knowing math

A straight cut from 3quarksdaily:

During the Russian revolution, the mathematical physicist Igor Tamm was seized by anti-communist vigilantes at a village near Odessa where he had gone to barter for food. They suspected he was an anti-Ukranian communist agitator and dragged him off to their leader. Asked what he did for a living he said that he was a mathematician.

The sceptical gang-leader began to finger the bullets and grenades slung around his neck. "All right", he said, "calculate the error when the Taylor series approximation of a function is truncated after n terms. Do this and you will go free; fail and you will be shot". Tamm slowly calculated the answer in the dust with his quivering finger. When he had finished the bandit cast his eye over the answer and waved him on his way.

What's the lesson here? To remember your Taylor series? To never exaggerate your mathematical prowess to anti-communist vigilantes? That in Ukraine, even vigilantes know more math than I remember? Or that in Ukraine, even knowing math won't keep you out of a life of vigilantism?

every grad student should get one of these

This Okiro! Asa Ichiban Taiyou Senshi - Charenjaa Kitto (Wake up! First Sun Warrior of the Morning - challenger kit) alarm clock wakes kids up "by turning them into Ultraman."

The commander wakes the child up at 6 a.m., and prompts players to put on the helmet and hit a "roger" button to acknowledge their wakefulness. Then, they are ordered to count to 10 in five different languages: English, Japanese, German, Swahili and Malagasy. At that point, the player is "allowed to take off the equipment and start the day"...

Awesome. (Hat tip Marginal Revolution)

on being left-handed

10% of the general population are left-handed. Ford, Reagan, the elder Bush, Clinton, Gore, and now Obama and McCain are all left-handed [via MR].

Does my being left-handed increase my chances of becoming President of the United States?