[BLOG] Some Sunday links

• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait notes how TESS detected a star being torn apart by a distant black hole.
• Centauri Dreams’ Paul Gilster looks at the past and future of the blog.
• Crooked Timber takes on the sensitive issue of private schools in the United Kingdom.
• The Crux considers the question of why women suffer from Alzheimer’s at a higher frequency than men.
• D-Brief notes a study suggesting that saving the oceans of the Earth could reduce the effects of global warming by 20%.
• Bruce Dorminey considers a paper suggesting that, if not for its volcanic resurfacing, Venus could have remained an Earth-like world to this day.
• The Dragon’s Tale notes that NASA will deploy a cubesat in the proposed orbit of the Lunar Gateway station to make sure it is a workable orbit.
• Andrew LePage at Drew Ex Machina looks at Soyuz T-10a, the first crewed mission to abort on the launch pad.
• Gizmodo reports on a paper arguing that we should intentionally contaminate Mars (and other bodies?) with our world’s microbes.
• io9 looks at how Warner Brothers is trying to control, belatedly, the discourse around the new Joker movie.
• JSTOR Daily looks at how, in industrializing London, women kidnapped children off the streets.
• Language Hat links to a page examining the Arabic and Islamic elements in Dune.
• Scott Lemieux at Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at a new documentary examining the life of Trump mentor Roy Cohn.
• The LRB Blog looks at how BBC protocols are preventing full discussion of public racism.
• The Map Room Blog looks at different efforts to reimagining the subway map of New York City.
• Marginal Revolution shares a paper claiming that increased pressure on immigrants to assimilate in Italy had positive results.
• The NYR Daily looks at the background to George Washington’s statements about the rightful place of Jews in the United States.
• Casey Dreier at the Planetary Society Blog looks at the political explanation of the massive increase in the planetary defense budget of NASA.
• Drew Rowsome takes a look at the Rocky Horror Show, with its celebration of sexuality (among other things).
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel considers why there are so many unexpected black holes in the universe.
• Frank Jacobs at Strange Maps examines why Google Street View is not present in Germany (and Austria).
• The Volokh Conspiracy reports on a ruling in a UK court that lying about a vasectomy negates a partner’s consent to sex.
• Window on Eurasia notes the controversy about some Buryat intellectuals about giving the different dialects of their language too much importance.

[PHOTO] Three photos taken from around Broadview and Danforth in late evening

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[VIDEO] Crossing the Bloor Viaduct, facing south

[PHOTO] Looking north, Church at Wellesley

[VIDEO] Fountain lights changing colour, Yonge-Eglinton Centre

[CAT] Shakespeare, just past 7

[PHOTO] A number of turtles, Allan Gardens

[URBAN NOTE] Five notes about cities: parks, productivity, suburbs, borders, libraries

• CityLab looks at a new study examining the relationship between gentrification and new city parks.
• Guardian Cities looks at the hardest-working cities in the world, and wonders if that duration of work is a good idea.
• The Conversation looks at how population growth in Canada is increasingly concentrated in car-dependent suburbs.
• VICE looks at how arbitrary municipal borders in built-up areas can have nasty effects on the lives of people caught up by them.
• Rabble reports on how Canadian libraries are handling the opioid crisis.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Hamilton, Kingston, Montréal, Saskatoon, Washington D.C.

• Hamilton, Ontario, now has a wall open to public street art. Global News reports.
• An early immigrant to Kingston, Ontario, explains what it was like to move to this eastern Ontario hub. Global News reports.
• MTL Blog notes that Montréal mayor has cancelled the construction of a condo tower because it was not including social housing.
• A museum exhibit in Saskatoon is offering free HIV testing and blood donation services in the fight against stigma. Global News reports.
• Ellen Mauro at CBC explains to readers the movement to make Washington D.C. into the 51st American state.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: wealth, east-end, marijuana, 1930, ride-hailing

• blogTO notes that Toronto is getting richer even as the rest of Canada is getting poorer, though growth in Toronto is driven by debt.
• Steve Munro looks at the ongoing reconstruction of the intersection of Kingston Road and Queen.
• blogTO looks at the reopening of an illegal cannabis store.
• Jamie Bradburn looks at the different ways mass media in 1930 Toronto shared election results.
• Nicholas Sanderson writes at Spacing about what other cities can learn from the experience of Toronto with ride-hailing apps.