Posts Tagged ‘blogs’
[BLOG] Some Monday links
- Centauri Dreams’ Paul Gilster raises the possibility of bringing an asteroid into lunar orbit, for scientific and space-settlement purposes both.
- Daniel Drezner is pleasantly surprised that the situation of Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng hasn’t led to anything like a breakdown of Sino-American relations.
- Eastern Approaches notes the Polish holiday of “Flag Day” on the 2nd of May, commemorating the substantial Polish participation in the conquest of Berlin in 1945.
- Far Outliers’ Joel discusses the Canary Islands and the role they played in the emerging imperium, both vis-a-vis Portugal and the later imperial strategies of unified Spain.
- Geocurrents describes the Sino-Soviet border disputes in eastern Siberia in 1969 that killed hundreds of people, nearly led to a Sino-Soviet war, and played a critical role in deciding the future of the world.
- Language Hat starts a discussion about the depressing plight of non-Russian languages inside Russia that quickly expands to include discussions of Turkish immigrants in Russia, the situation of Gaelic in Ireland, and Canada’s own language situation.
- Laywers, Guns and Money reviews a book describing how environmentalism in the Colorado ski resort of Aspen helps to legitimate anti-immigrant sentiment.
- At NewAPPSBlog, Mohan Matthen makes the contrarian argument–compelling, but I think ultimately incorrect–that a “Oui” outcome in the 1995 Québec referendum would have been good for Québec and rump Canada both.
- Yorkshire Ranter Alexander Harrowell discusses the consequences of Bo Xilai’s wiretapping of other officials in China, in the context of ubiquitous state surveillance generally.
[BLOG] Some Wednesday links
- Dan Hirschman at A (Budding) Sociologist’s Commonplace Book distinguishes between the economic measurements GDP and GDP.
- James Bow mourns the death, via cutbacks and falling passengers, of Ontario’s Northlands railway.
- Centauri Dreams considers the question, inspired by evidence that Alpha Centauri is significantly older than Sol, and speculation that habitable planets are likely to be considerably older than Earth, of where the aliens are.
- Daniel Drezner is somewhat surprised that he is optimistic about the spread of liberal-democratic ideals worldwide, at least relative to others in a recent issue of The National Interest.
- Geocurrents’ Asya Pereltsvaig considers the similar Russian-based contact pidgins in Siberia and along Russia’s Arctic coast as the product not of contact with a single language area but rather as consequence of a mindset of how to talk to non-Russians.
- Marginal Revolution notes a New York Times article noting the culture shock experienced by trained professionals migrating to Germany from southern Europe.
- Registan notes that the International Labour Organization’s demand to inspect Uzbekistan’s cotton plantations to verify that forced and child labour is not used there, likely to be rejected because (among other things) Uzbekistan does use forced and child labour, is likely to lead to worsened relations with the United States.
- I’m late on this one, but Slap Upside the Head notes the retraction of the only credible study on ex-gays by the paper’s author.
- Towleroad notes the hysterical anger of Islamic clerics and the usual in Iran at the rumour–not the reality–of a gay pride parade in neighbouring Azerbaijan.
[BLOG] Some Friday links
- A BCer in Toronto’s Jeff Jedras argues that the Liberal Party should try to become the party of federalists, inside Québec particularly.
- Centauri Dreams links to astudy suggesting that elliptical galaxies, older galaxies with less dust than our Milky Way, could still support planets and potential life.
- Geocurrents reports on the various problems–economic, environmental, political–facing the timber industtry in the Russian Far East.
- Marginal Revolution’s Tyler Cowen questions Ross Douthat’s arguments about the decline of religious practice and its imports in the United States by wondering how, given the social and economic changes of the post-war period, this could have been prevented.
- Naked Anthropologist Laura Agustín takes issue with a recent New York Times article on the sex trade in Spain. Unquestioned narratives are not good analysis.
- At Personal Reflections, Paul Belshaw considers definitions of the Enlightenment and civilization as seen from different places–West versus non-West, England versus Scotland–with links.
- Registan’s Nathan Hamm comments on the unseemly ties between Susan G. Komen Uzbekistan Race for the Cure, a breast cancer charity that recently featured in the American culture war, and various charities run by Gulnora Karimova, daughter of Uzbekistan’s dictator.
- Torontoist’s Jamie Woo makes the point that Rob Ford’s disinterest in doing anything with Pride doesn’t speak to his being very up-to-date.
- Kenneth Anderson at the Volokh Conspiracy notes that the background of the emergent war between the Sudans over oil pipelines proves that clear property rights can diminish conflict.
[BLOG] Some Thursday links
- Anders Sandberg at Andart approves of entrepreneur Elon Musk’s desire to use space travel to create offworld backups for our biosphere.
- Burgh Diaspora’s Jim Russell believes that the close links between Brazil and Boston–driven by migration, at first strictly economic but then driven by interest in Massachusetts’ education institutes–could serve Boston quite well.
- Two links from Centauri Dreams today, one describing the planetary system of HD 10180, a Sun-like star that supports nine planets to our eight, and the other describing hypothetical laser-based defenses for starships against interstellar dust.
- At Extraordinary Observations, Rob Pitingolo describes the difficulties tourism planners in destination cities have with getting people to visit sites that aren’t the most heavily trafficked.
- Geocurrents’ Asya Pereltsvaig deflates the myth that Chinese men (lacking spouses owing to a male-biased sex ratio at birth) will flood into Russia (especially Siberia) looking for Russian women (lacking spouses owing to a high male death rate). Among other things, there actually isn’t much of a shortage of theoretically marriageable men in Siberia.
- The Global Sociology Blog discusses what happens when celebrity culture and social networking sites like Twitter insect. The answer? It’s easier to get social capital than ever before.
- At GNXP, Razib Khan notes that Argentina–unlike English-speaking countries also products of mass European immigration–still evidences the genetic trace of indigenous populations.
- Open the Future’s Jamais Cascio points out that, at long last, global climate change is kicking off (as expected as early as 1981).
- Registan features a guest post from Uzbekistan commentator Azamat Seitov, who discusses the possibility that the Eurasian Economic Community–a Russia-centered bloc also including Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan–will take off. He’s skeptical.
[BLOG] Some Monday links
- Andrew Barton at Acts of Minor Treason writes about how the CBC’s innovative programming let him learn and enjoy things he’d otherwise not have. The cutbacks will not do good things for the national broadcaster.
- Jeff Jedras at A BCer in Toronto pins the blame for the massive cost overruns in Canada’s share of the vastly overexpensive F-35 fighter program squarely on the Conservative Party and its ministers.
- Centauri Dreams’ Paul Gilster shares the good news that the United States will resume producing the radioactive isotope plutonium-238 so as to provide the necessary fuel for outer-system space probes.
- Crasstalk’s Mean Ol’ Liberal reflects on the meaning of the bulls of Wall Street, not only the statue but the speculators.
- Daniel Drezner thinks that if China’s leadership really does see global geopolitics as a zero-sum phenomenon, China’s relationship with the United States may face substantially more risks than previously thought.
- At Geocurrents, Martin Lewis notes that the northern half of Mali claimed by Tuareg rebels for their national homeland actually has very large non-Tuareg populations.
- The Global Sociology Blog notes the incentives to sociopathy in the global economy.
- Noel Maurer, at The Power and the Money, notes that the Mexican city of Monterrey has a rather high population density by American standards, and a high density of police, too. Thus, its crime rate has little if anything to do with the city’s sprawl.
- Registan notes the ongoing solidification and intensification of ethnic divisions between Kyrgyz and Uzbek in southern Kyrgyzstan in the years after the deadly Osh riots.
- Torontoist’s Todd Aalgard notes that plans to immediately rebuild a platground in Toronto’s High Park are stymied by the need to meet city safety and building codes.
[BLOG] Some Tuesday links
- Andrew Barton at Acts of Minor Treason despairs on the occasion of Earth Hour. Broader recognition of the critical problems facing the environment of Earth is so badly needed.
- Bruce Sterling quotes at length from Michel de Montaigne, pioneering essayist and critical futurist.
- At Crasstalk, LaZiguezon describes, in pictures and words, five haunting abandoned places: a mine in California’s Death Valley, Cyprus’ abandoned international airport, and more.
- The Everyday Sociology Blog’s Janis Prince Inniss comments on the way that the Trayvon Martin shooting case in Florida is polarizing people into two audiences, once seeing his shooter as an inveterate racist and the other blaming the victim. Intermediate situations are possible: class might be more of a factor than race, for instance.
- Eastern approaches notes that after having been stripped of his doctorate for plagiarism, Hungarian president Pál Schmitt has resigned.
- Geocurrents notes South Korea’s significant presence in post-Communist Central Asia.
- The Language Log’s Victor Mair calls for the use of more pinyin in Chinese classes to help boost education.
- At the Naked Anthropology, Laura Agustín comments on the recent ruling on prostitution in Ontario, noting that the ban on public solicitation hits relatively disadvantaged prostitutes worse than their more advantaged peers who can better take advantage of the new liberalization.
- Registan is unimpressed by Mitt Romney’s identification of Russia as the United States’ main enemy.
- Yorkshire ranter Alex Harrowell notes that great efforts are being made to keep new Chinese soldiers depoliticized.
[BLOG] Some Thursday links
- James Bow makes the point that streetcar systems like Toronto’s are not the same as light rail.
- Over at Crasstalk, a poster makes the point that when Santorum talks about the threat gays in military service pose, he betrays his ignorance of Plato’s observations and the Sacred Band of Thebes.
- At The Crux, Vaughan Bell discusses the interesting phenomenon of contagious hysteria as evidenced at a high school in upstate New York (here, involving seizures).
- Far Outliers is posting excerpts from Iron Kingdom, Clark’s book on the history of Prussia, Two excerpts, one on the broad-based nature of patriotism in Prussia in the Napoleonic Wars and the other describing Prussia’s shift from cautious support of the French Revolution against Austria to alliance against France, are noteworthy.
- Marginal Revolution observes that the incumbent Haitian president might be expelled from office if it turns out that he has been hiding a foreign citizenship, dual citizenship being illegal in Haiti.
- Progressive Download’s John Farrell reports on claims to have discovered fragments of the Gospel of Mark dating back to the 1st century CE. Thoughts?
- The Volokh Conspiracy’s Kenneth Anderson is almost certainly right to suggest that proposals to dispatch German tax officials to Greece are absolutely politically impossible.
[BLOG] Some Wednesday notes
- Daniel Drezner links to an analysis of the import of Taiwanese-American basketball star Jeremy Lin that makes the point that Lin likely never would have come to prominence had he (say) grown up in China instead of the United States: not only is he not tall enough, but the concentration of China’s sports bureaucracy on sports to the exclusion of all else puts off the parents of many potential players.
- Lawyers, Guns and Money’s SEK fisks an essay claiming to be literary analysis in its conspiracy theory claiming Obama’s books were ghostwritten by one left-wing radical or another.
- NewAPPSBlog examines the connections between economist Adam Smith and philosopher Henry David Thoreau, seeing the extent to which their conceptions of freedom were compatible.
- Not Rocket Science reproduces the news of the thirty thousand year old seeds frozen in the permafrost which were made to flower.
- John Lorinc at Spacing Toronto reacts to yesterday’s firing of Gary Webster by arguing that the anti-Ford majority on Toronto’s city council should mobilize against him.
- Toronto transit blogger Steve Munro thinks the same.
- Finally, Sublime Oblivion’s Anatoly Karlin posts a brief note suggesting that, with recent population growth driven by immigration and rising fertility along with falling mortality rates, Russia has left its demographic crisis period.
[BLOG] Some Monday links
- Crooked Timber hosts a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure novel about the Greek economic crisis. What will you, aided by your assistant, do to solve the crisis? In the comments and elsewhere, readers report opting for Argentine-style bankruptcy as the least bad option.
- Daniel Drezner is worried about Iran, suspecting that the ambiguity of the American government as to the ultimate goal of sanctions on Iran (limiting nuclear proliferation or regime change) may back the United States into a corner where regime change is the only option.
- The Global Sociology Blog notes that the culture warriors’ opposition to liberalized divorce laws and growing singledom may be ill-founded, inasmuch as the traditional family may no longer be a useful unit and it’s–at the very least–open to question whether or not singles are more isolated than people in couples.
- The Global Sociology Blog also looks at the tradition and mechanics of patriarchy in Afghanistan and Kashmir.
- Lawyers, Guns and Money considers the question of what web documents get tweeted on Twitter as opposed to liked on Facebook. The consensus seems to be that Twitter, as the more professional medium, carries links to more professional documents than a more informal Facebook.
- Another post at Lawyers, Guns and Money links to the Crooked Timber CYOA novella I mentioned above but also to a statement by the Greek foreign minister warning that the country’s military can still respond to threats from Turkey.
- Spacing Toronto’s Luca de Franco interviews Sharon Switzer, the woman who curates art displays on video monitors in the subway.
- Strange Maps explores through maps the idea of a Scandinavian Scotland.
[BLOG] Some Monday links
- 80 Beats reports on a proposal to protect New Orleans from risk of inundation by restoring the marshlands that once provided a natural buffer for the metropolis against the ocean.
- Anders Sandberg argues against the surgical sterilization of the transgendered on the grounds that it’s not only intrusive, it’s linked to effort to enforce a gender binary that doesn’t exist.
- blogTO celebrates the 35th anniversary of the Eaton Centre with photos and videos from throughout its long history.
- The Burgh Diaspora discusses the appeal of foreignness–or out-of-stateness–on prospective migrants’ attractiveness to natives, starting from Texas.
- Centauri Dreams reports that Vesta, unlike the Moon, has no permanently shadowed craters where water ice could exist on the surface on account of its pronounced tilt. Ices would exist below the surface, rather.
- Language Hat links to a contentious article claiming that no such thing as an Arabic language exists, but rather regional Arabic standards, inspiring an interesting debate about the dynamics of language in the Arab world.
- Progressive Download’s John Farrell traces the origins of hockey in Montréal, referring to an Adam Gopnik essay suggesting the sport took off as a product of an alliance of Irish Catholics and French Canadians against Anglo-Scottish Protestants.
