My tour along the coasts of Oregon and Washington was an unqualified success, and I was able to interact directly with several hundred people. Thanks to the eclectic combination of generous people who provided local transportation, housing, food, venues, interviews, and fiat currency for air fare, and especially to Holly for organizing the trip on …
As if he could peer into the future, American author Henry David Thoreau is credited with the expression: “Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.” I’ve written and spoken often about the requirements for maintaining an empire, particularly an empire in decline: obedience at home, oppression abroad, and wholesale destruction …
Like many people, I served time in a college dormitory. Two years in college were preceded by eight weeks in high school as part of a National Science Foundation physics session for smartasses “smart” kids. I have a few memories from those times long ago. In an act of self-indulgence, the likes of which have …
I’m pretty sure you know the drill. You pose the scenario and ask the hypothetical questions: There’s an asteroid headed for Earth. We know exactly when it will strike, and it will kill all humans. Do you want to know it will strike? Do you want to know when? I know of no poll results, …
En route to Tucson for a two-day visit last month, I retrieved my mail from the local post office. Included was one of the few Christmas/New Year letters to appear this year. Apparently you have to write them to receive them, and in this case it was a form letter from a long-time friend and …
Tonight’s event on the University of Massachusetts campus was livestreamed and is embedded below. Viewers are subjected to a short advertisement. Video streaming by Ustream _____________ My presentation was subject to simultaneous interpretation by two American Sign Language interpreters. One wrote about it here. _____________ My presentation from earlier this week was featured in a …
American writer Tracy Kidder points out: “In order to go on with our lives, we are always capable of making the ominous into the merely strange.” We ignore ominous warning signs at our own peril. But ignore them we will, and have. And we continue to call them strange, thus attempting to build a protective …