Michael Bates: February 2013 Archives
rec.arts.books Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
How did one find quirky local bookstores before the World Wide Web was invented? Well, there was Usenet, and there was the rec.arts.books FAQ, with its listing of bookstores by region, edited by Evelyn C. Leeper. The list is still being edited and maintained, although some entries are out of date. (Remember Novel Idea? First Edition?)
Aquila Report: Top 10 Reasons Our Kids Leave Church
"I work in a major college town with a large number of 20-somethings. Nearly all of them were raised in very typical evangelical churches. Nearly all of them have left the church with no intention of returning....here are the most common thoughts taken from dozens of conversations. I hope some of them make you angry. Not at the message, but at the failure of our pragmatic replacement of the gospel of the cross with an Americanized gospel of glory."
Modern Manliness and the Perpetual State of Low Expectations « Acculturated
"To one extent or another, I've been a party to this culture of low expectations. Part of the reason I was able to spend years rationalizing away my self-indulgent lifestyle and disinterest in committing to a serious, long-term relationship is because 90 percent of the guys I knew were as well (for various reasons, admittedly). In my case, I was having fun and getting to spend my time, money, and energies on Numero Uno. Despite the fact I've always been considered-mostly by myself-to be "manly," the direction I was heading in, and vision I was heading toward, was one that men of my grandpa's generation would rightfully shun and publicly shame."
How to be gritty: what children don't know can hurt them | Audacious Ideas
"Regardless of whether students are rich or poor, she said, the two habits that most accurately predict achievement are their self-control and their grit: the ability to deliberately practice new skills even when it's frustrating and confusing and kids feel like they're failing."
The Importance of Excel | The Baseline Scenario
Billions of dollars may be riding on the accuracy of formulas in an Excel spreadsheet or the accuracy of manual copy-and-paste from one sheet to another. "But while Excel the program is reasonably robust, the spreadsheets that people create with Excel are incredibly fragile. There is no way to trace where your data come from, there's no audit trail (so you can overtype numbers and not know it), and there's no easy way to test spreadsheets, for starters. The biggest problem is that anyone can create Excel spreadsheets--badly. Because it's so easy to use, the creation of even important spreadsheets is not restricted to people who understand programming and do it in a methodical, well-documented way." Comments on the story contain more anecdotes on the hazards of Excel overreliance.
The computer on which I learned how to program, and the first computer I got paid to program. A wealth of info about the Wang 2200, a machine that pioneered the BASIC programming language and interactive computing.
