2022 archive
Drive Carefully on the Disinformation Superhighway 0
Psychologist Mark Travers observes that “(s)ocial media can bring out the worst in people.” Follow the link for tips on how to avoid getting sucked into muck.
And, remember, “social” media isn’t.
The Good Tweets 0
It turns out that some tweets are good for us. Needless to say, that aren’t from twits on Twitter.
Psychologist Daniel Fryer reports on a recent study.
The two-week study involved participants from the UK, Europe, the U.S., Australia, and China, so it’s pretty safe to assume that birdsong is of a cross-cultural benefit.
Act quickly, though. My local rag reports that
Tipping point species are close to threatened or endangered because they have lost half or more of their populations in the past 50 years. The State of the Birds Report, by the North American Bird Conservation Initiative, used five different sources of data, including the North American Breeding Bird Survey and the Audubon Christmas Bird Count.
Follow the links for the full stories.
The Climates They Are a-Changing* . . . 0
. . . and Republican Senators don’t want anyone to talk about it.
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*Just for example, I went cycling today in a tee-shirt and gym shorts in November for Pete’s sake. And we’ve been running that AC all week. In November. This is beyond being a fluke.
I fear for my grandchildren.
Words Matter 0
At Psychology Today Blogs, Joe Pierre argues forcefully that violent political rhetoric leads (or, perhaps more accurately, has already led) to actual violence.
He also notes a double standard in dis coarse discourse:
Follow the link for his article.
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*I would argue that it was not a gaffe. Ill-expressed, perhaps, but not a gaffe.
Twits Own Twitter 0
People of the Book 0
At Chron.com, University of Texas at Austin Professor Eric MacDaniel examines what’s behing the emergence of “Christian nationalism” as a political force. Frankly, I do not find his findings at all surprising; it goes back to original sin–America’s original sin of chattel slavery justified by racism, that is. A snippet:
Follow the link for a detailed and thorough analysis.
Originalist Sin 0
At AL.com, Auburn University Professor Colin Gabler parses the phraseology that makes some rights seem less inalienable than others.
(Stupid writing error corrected.)
Republican Family Values 0
At The Sacramento Bee, Melinda Henneberger marvels at the outburst of Republican mean for the sake of mean following the assault and battery of Nancy Pelosi’s husband.
Lies and Lying Liars 0
Gordon Weil comments on persons’ willingness to believe what they want to believe, regardless of facts and evidence, and how “social” media, though it did not create this willingness, feeds into it.
No excerpt or summary can do his piece justice; I commend it to your attention.
Cheating on the Test Scores 0
At the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Ted Dintersmith argues forcefully that the furor over student test scores declining in a period of pandemic is much ado over not much of anything. (I know that Virginia’s Governor Trumpkin has been riding that bike as hard as he can peddle.)
Here’s a small bit from his article (emphasis added); the rest is at the link.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Show politeness to your hunting companions.
Aside:
I think I’ve told this story before, but it seems germane.
Many years ago, my brother’s boss at the time mentioned that he was giving up hunting.
He was returning from a hunting trip when he heard a couple of other hunters talking.
One said, “Did you get anything?”
The other answered, “No, but I got off a couple of sound shots.”
And we are again at the confluence of guns and stupid.