Michael Bates: October 2011 Archives
An extensive collection of air refueling photos and videos, from the 1920s to the present day, hosted in blog form.
Moe Howard and The Three Stooges: My Pal Moe, by Bob Bernet
A sweet story: As a 12-year-old fan of the Stooges, Bernet wrote a letter that began a long correspondence with head Stooge Moe Howard, culminating in a visit to Howard's Hollywood home in 1973. The website includes scans of the letters and photos of the visit
All Work and No Play: Why Your Kids Are More Anxious, Depressed - Esther Entin - Life - The Atlantic
All Work and No Play: Why Your Kids Are More Anxious, Depressed - Esther Entin - Life - The Atlantic
"An article in the most recent issue of the American Journal of Play details not only how much children's play time has declined, but how this lack of play affects emotional development, leading to the rise of anxiety, depression, and problems of attention and self control.
"'Since about 1955 ... children's free play has been continually declining, at least partly because adults have exerted ever-increasing control over children's activities,' says the author Peter Gray, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology (emeritus) at Boston College. Gray defines 'free play' as play a child undertakes him- or her-self and which is self-directed and an end in itself, rather than part of some organized activity.
"Gray describes this kind of unstructured, freely-chosen play as a testing ground for life. It provides critical life experiences without which young children cannot develop into confident and competent adults. Gray's article is meant to serve as a wake-up call regarding the effects of lost play, and he believes that lack of childhood free play time is a huge loss that must be addressed for the sake of our children and society."
The Occupy movement is experiencing the lessons of history and the development of civilization the hard way. (Via Ace of Spades HQ.)
World power swings back to America - Telegraph
Some good news from the Telegraph's international business editor Ambrose Evans-Pritchard: America is supplying nearly three-quarters of its energy needs, up from half a decade ago. Wage inflation in China is encouraging manufacturing to come back home as the cost gap closes. A caution: "The switch in advantage to the US is relative. It does not imply a healthy US recovery. The global depression will grind on as much of the Western world tightens fiscal policy and slowly purges debt, and as China deflates its credit bubble." But the advantages are real: "It is almost the only economic power with a fertility rate above 2.0 - and therefore the ability to outgrow debt - in sharp contrast to the demographic decay awaiting Japan, China, Korea, Germany, Italy, and Russia."
Conferences Galore - Who, What, Where and When | Midnight Blue Says
A good round-up of blogger conferences focused on technology, politics, and "blogging while female."
Ed Stetzer - Why I Have No Difficulty Helping "Issue Christians" to Move On
For some Christians who are obsessive about a particular issue or point of doctrine, the best thing for the church is to encourage them to find another church home.
An amazing collection of database lookups, covering phone numbers, email, zip codes and statistics, address verification, maps, and much more.
James Fallows recounts his wife's experiences with a Gmail hijacker, the hazards of relying on "the cloud," the arduous process of restoring six years of messages deleted by the hacker, and some practical steps to protect your most sensitive accounts.
Word Around the Net: DEPRESSION SURVIVAL KIT
Re-learning the cooking, shopping, and home repair skills that allowed our grandparents to raise bigger families on much less money. Brief articles packed with good food for thought. (Via Ace of Spades HQ overnight thread.)
World Value Survey Cultural Map
Mapping survey results on a two-axis graph: Traditional vs. Secular-Rational and Survival vs. Self-Expression. There's an interesting Anglosphere cluster (US, UK, Australia, Canada, NZ, Ireland) straddling the Traditional vs. Secular-Rational line but well in the direction of Self-Expression over Survival. (Via Ace of Spades HQ overnight thread.)
NAVA - AMERICAN CITY FLAGS SURVEY
Best and worst city flags in America according to a survey of the North American Vexillological Association. Tulsa and Oklahoma City are down near the bottom of the list, along with other cities that merely slap their seal on a rectangular piece of cloth. Wichita's is quite nice. (Via TheAtlanticCities.com, which has some examples of nice flags from outside the US.)
The Awful Burden of Influence : The Other McCain
"No matter how often you're proven right in counseling against such folly, your superiority of judgment in being right, right, right will be held against you if the people who are wrong, wrong, wrong are sufficiently influential." Ain't that the truth?
Migrations Map: Where are migrants coming from? Where have migrants left?
Interactive HTML5 map. Click a country and see the top 10 sources for immigrants and the top 10 destinations for emigrants. Migrants are defined as people born in one country now residing in another, so these numbers are cumulative.
Cultural Faux Pas: What are some cultural faux pas in New York City? - Quora
A sensible summary of how to avoid giving offense or causing annoyance in The Big Apple. (For example, never call it that.) (Via the Ace of Spades HQ overnight thread.)
Ordnance Survey: A Guide to Coordinate Systems in Great Britain
Appendix B explains how to convert between earth centered earth fixed (ECEF) cartesian coordinates and ellipsoidal latitude, longitude, and height.
