by Carl Howard | Jan 12, 2012 | Blog Topics, Language, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Science and Skepticism
It’s very common to mention Orwell’s 1984 when criticising a tyrannical/repressive/linguistically manipulative government/corporation/individual. This is often followed by praise of Orwell and how wise and prophetic his 1984 was. I find these comparisons ridiculous...
by Carl Howard | Dec 9, 2011 | Blog Topics, Links
A special edition today — some of my favourite dating messages showing various levels of misogyny, cluelessness, creepyness, pretentiousness and/or entitlement (or all 4!), mostly from The Annals of Online Dating Tumblr. I’ve excerpted some favourite bits but you...
by Carl Howard | Aug 22, 2011 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Evolution and Biology, Interesting Stuff, Science and Skepticism
You’re probably familiar with the original Sokal’s Hoax. If not here’s a brief summary otherwise skip down to the Sokal 2 heading. The Sokal hoax was perpetrated by Alan Sokal, a professor of physics+mathematics dismayed at the excesses of postmodernism in academia....
by Carl Howard | Jul 8, 2011 | Blog Topics, Interesting Stuff, Language, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Science and Skepticism
I’ve recently realised that not everyone is aware of this wonderful sentence. Having unrestricted access to a blog, I might as well introduce it. But first, a bit about garden path sentences. These are a lot of fun. They’re sentences which while grammatical have...
by Carl Howard | Jul 5, 2011 | Atrocities and Oppression, Blog Topics, History, Society
This post is the last in a series of 3 posts (first here, second here) about the monstrosities of the Russian prison system. As mentioned, I didn’t find the worst thing to be the terrible living conditions or even the tortures invented by the administration. The worst...
by Carl Howard | Jul 4, 2011 | Atrocities and Oppression, Blog Topics, History, Society
This post continues from last week’s post on a Russian prison system documentary. As I said, the poor living conditions may be the least of your worries. The second issue is kinds of abuses the guards dish out. I’m sure you’ve seen plenty of exposes of stunning abuse...
