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Thursday, July 27, 2017

Heaven Forbid

School Segregation

An excerpt from Vox -

School segregation didn’t go away. It just evolved.
How parents are gerrymandering school borders and fencing out poor kids.
Updated by Alvin Chang

Their idea was simple: to create their own school district.

Their stated reason was simple: Schools do better when they’re part of smaller, city-based districts where they can make hyperlocal decisions.

So five years ago, organizers in Gardendale, Alabama, decided it was time to secede from the Jefferson County School District — because of the changing “dynamics.”

But this simple idea has historically caused a contentious debate about race, class, and education in America. And when the courts ruled on this issue, it resulted in the biggest setback to school integration since Brown v. Board of Education: a legal decision that allows parents to use borders to segregate their kids away from their less desirable peers.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/27/16004084/school-segregation-evolution


Falling Sperm Count

An excerpt from New Scientist -

Sperm count has fallen by nearly 60 per cent in richer countries
By New Scientist staff and Press Association

An analysis of research into male fertility suggests that there has been a steep decline in sperm counts for men living in richer nations.


The review pooled data from 185 different studies, and found a 59.3 per cent drop between 1973 and 2011 in the average amount of sperm produced by men from North America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. No similar pattern was seen in South America, Asia and Africa, although fewer studies had been conducted in these countries.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2141784-sperm-count-has-fallen-by-nearly-60-per-cent-in-richer-countries/#link_time=1501018098

The Next Time You Have A Slice of Birthday Cake

An excerpt from the Atlantic -

Blowing Out Birthday Candles Increases Cake Bacteria by 1,400 Percent
But it’s okay, really!
By SARAH ZHANG

I can identify the exact moment when my relationship with birthday cake changed forever, and it was last week, when I read a study titled “Bacterial Transfer Associated with Blowing Out Candles on a Birthday Cake.”

Of course, the more cautious (aka germophobic) among us have already thought about it in gruesome detail. One colleague said she scrapes off the top layer of frosting, a habit that suddenly made perfect sense but which I for some reason had never before considered. I had been living in ignorant, saliva-splattered bliss.

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/07/birthday-candle-bacteria/534987/?utm_source=nl-atlantic-daily-072717

Here are the Trump administration's worst spelling errors

How fentanyl is making the opioid epidemic even worse

Why Is the ‘Mona Lisa’ So Famous?

'L-G-B-T' - James Corden Sings for Transgender Troops

Wednesday, July 26, 2017

The amount of time it takes for trash to break down is staggering

How does land surveying work?

You can take a seat anywhere with this wearable chair

Thailand’s Floating Markets Serve Up a Feast on the Water

Necessity is the Mother of Invention

An excerpt from Wired -

INSIDE CUBA’S D.I.Y. INTERNET REVOLUTION
by Antonio García Martínez

Every week, more than a terabyte of data is packaged into external hard drives known as el paquete semanal (“the weekly package”). It is the internet distilled down to its purest, most consumable, and least interactive form: its content. This collection of video, song, photo, and text files from the outside world is cobbled together by various media smugglers known as paqueteros, and it travels around the island from person to person, percolating quickly from Havana to the furthest reaches in less than a day and constituting what would be known in techie lingo as a sneaker­net: a network that transmits data via shoe rubber, bus, horseback, or anything else.

https://www.wired.com/2017/07/inside-cubas-diy-internet-revolution/?mbid=nl_72617_EIC_p1&CNDID=

Usher Carpool Karaoke

A Guitar Made of Trees

From Atlas Obscura -

Pedro Martín Ureta's Forest Guitar
Guitar made of trees, dedicated to a man's lost love. 

GENERAL LEVALLE, ARGENTINA
http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/guitar-forest

Brown Sugar Waffle Recipe

From the LA Times -

http://www.latimes.com/food/recipes/la-fo-sos-waffles-brown-sugar-kitchen-20170719-story.html#nws=mcnewsletter

Cap and Trade - Explained in 90 Sec

From the LA Times -

http://www.latimes.com/politics/94177818-132.html

Tuesday, July 25, 2017

Brain Damage

From the NY Times -

110 N.F.L. Brains
A neuropathologist has examined the brains of 111 N.F.L. players — and 110 were found to have C.T.E., the degenerative disease linked to repeated blows to the head.
By The New York Times

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/25/sports/football/nfl-cte.html?action=click&contentCollection=Television&module=Trending&version=Full&region=Marginalia&pgtype=article

The bizarre physics of fire ants

Monday, July 24, 2017

The Problem Isn't His Mouthpiece

Excerpts from the Washington Post -

Why Anthony Scaramucci won’t make a dent in Trump’s problems
By Michael Gerson

The Trump administration’s reality problem is a historically unpopular president, pushing historically unpopular legislation (at least on health care), in a historically divided party, to a historically polarized country. Hiring a new head of communications will not fundamentally alter this state of affairs.

~~~~~~~~~~

Trump’s greatest need is not someone who will defend him on cable television. It is an administration capable of even the baby steps of governing — defining a positive, realistic agenda and selling it to Congress, starting with one’s own party. Trump does not have a communications problem; he has a leadership problem.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-anthony-scaramucci-wont-make-a-dent-in-trumps-problems/2017/07/24/5db1d3b0-708b-11e7-8f39-eeb7d3a2d304_story.html?utm_term=.7a1e65a74c3b