The Maths

Some people believe in cosmological intentionality, that God loves them and watches over their every moment, often intervening.
Some people believe in string theory.
And some people, well, speak a language I cannot understand and must take on faith. Faith that they know what they're doing, not necessarily that they have a final answer for me to believe.
Black holes. Time. Space. What's for dinner?

A Little Light Summer Reading

Guess I have no excuse not to read David Foster Wallace now. Somebody's compiled an informed list of best magazine articles and he seems to dominate. Whatever happened to Susan Orlean anyway?

Goodbye, And Good Luck

No, I'm not going anywhere soon that I know of. And neither are you, that I know of.
But eventually we'll all go.
As usual, the peerless Atul Gawande offers something important to think about.
I know, I don't want to either. Read it anyway.
On that cheerful note:

Twenty-five per cent of all Medicare spending is for the five per cent of patients who are in their final year of life, and most of that money goes for care in their last couple of months which is of little apparent benefit.

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/02/100802fa_fact_gawande?printable=true#ixzz0uqNR0GY6

Ah, The Race Card. Now I Get It.

Josh Marshall draws the depressing conclusion from TODAY'S NEWS IN REPUBLICANS.
So they did some polling, right, and found there is a lot more anti-black feeling directed at Obama than they thought. Enough to win elections even. This makes sense to me. I spent a harrowing afternoon with a woman who is convinced that Tacoma is "mostly black," and that it's crime-ridden and that's why. Blatant, unthinking, uninformed racism. It's her mind set and has been for 70-some years.