[BLOG] Some Sunday links

• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait notes the first time that an exoplanet, HR 8799e, has been directly observed using optical interferometry.
• Centauri Dreams notes the possibility, demonstrated by the glimpsing of a circumplanetary disc around exoplanet PDS 70b, that we might be seeing a moon system in formation.
• The Citizen Science Salon looks what observers in Antarctica are contributing to our wealth of scientific knowledge.
• The Dragon’s Tales shares links to articles looking at the latest findings on the Precambrian Earth.
• The Frailest Thing’s L.M. Sacasas writes about his ambivalent response to a Twitter that, by its popularity, undermines the open web.
• Gizmodo notes that NASA is going to open up the International Space Station to tourists.
• JSTOR Daily looks at how croquet, upon its introduction in the 19th century United States, was seen as scandalous for the way it allowed men and women to mix freely.
• Shakezula at Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the unaccountable fondness of at least two Maine Republican legislators for the Confederacy.
• Marginal Revolution suggests that the economic success of Israel in recent decades is a triumph of neoliberalism.
• Stephen Ellis at the NYR Daily writes about the gymnastics of Willem de Kooning.
• Drew Rowsome profiles out comic Brendan D’Souza.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel looks at the still strange galaxy NGC 1052-DF2, apparently devoid of dark matter.
• John Scalzi at Whatever shares his theory about a fixed quantity of flavor in strawberries of different sizes.
• Window on Eurasia looks at a contentious plan for a territorial swap between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: GTA, Montréal, Portland, Berlin, Seoul

• Sean Marshall at TVO notes the limited, if real, potential of a new ride-sharing app to bridge the transit gap between Kitchener-Waterloo, Guelph, and Hamilton in the west of the Golden Horseshoe.
• CBC Montreal notes delays in the renovation of the Biodôme.
• CityLab notes that in Portland, Maine, volunteering can help one get access to affordable housing, literally.
• CityLab notes how the government of Berlin is set to intervene directly in the housing market to ensure affordability.
• Guardian Cities looks at how Seoul is set to redevelop the districts once at the heart of the South Korean economic miracle.

[ISL] Five #islands links: Malaga, Greenland, Vancouver Island, Menorca, Palau

• Atlas Obscura takes a look at Malaga Island in Maine, an island brutally depopulated by state authorities a century ago because of its non-white population.
• Gizmodo notes the discovery of some of the oldest soil ever found, paleosoil, 3.7 billion years old, in Greenland.
• A fringe political candidate in British Columbia wants his Vancouver Island to become a separate province. The Province reports.
• The Gibraltar Chronicle has a feature on a journalist with a book exploring the historical connection between Gibraltar and the Balearic island of Menorca, at one time a British possession.
• The Guardian reports on how Palau dealt with a freeze on tourism from China over its continued recognition of Taiwan.

[NEWS] Five science links: HIV/AIDS in Florida, Maine rockweed, Wood Buffalo, Europa, SN 2001ig

Jon Cohen at Science Magazine describes the ever-worsening HIV/AIDS epidemic in Florida, with governmental inaction made worse by the diversity of the epidemic’s pathways.

Maine coastal landowners are taking Nova Scotia business Acadian Seaplants to court over its harvesting of rockweed, and the legal fight centres over whether rockweed is an animal or a plant by state law. The National Post reports.

Wood Buffalo National Park, in northern Alberta, is undergoing serious degradation. Are the tar sands to blame? The National Post reports.

In some polar areas of Europa, sheltered from the radiation of Jupiter by ice, signs of life might be detectable mere centimetres below the surface. VICE’s Motherboard reports.

Universe Today reports on the discovery of a star in galaxy NGC 7424, partner to supernova SN 2001ig, that survived its partner’s explosion.

[ISL] Five islands links: Machias Seal, Newfoundland and Labrador, Orkneys, Haiti

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• Global News outlines the state of the Machias Seal island territorial dispute between Canada and the United States.
• Faced with mounting costs owing to an aging and dispersed population, is Newfoundland and Labrador headed for bankruptcy? What would happen then? The National Post reports.
• The selection of names of beers from the new brewery of Dildo, NL, has been undertaken with great care. Global News reports.
• The Island Review shares an extract from the new book by Robin Noble about the Orkneys, Sagas of Salt and Stone. http://theislandreview.com/content/sagas-of-salt-and-stone-orkney-unwrapped-robin-noble-extract
• Ayanna Legros makes a compelling argument for the recognition of Haiti and Haitians as not being somehow foreign to their region, but rather for including them in Latin America.

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

• Centauri Dreams considers the concept of the “Clarke exobelt”, a hypothetical ring of space stations in synchronous orbit of a planet that might be detectable across interstellar distances.
• The Everyday Sociology Blog considers the new American phenomenon of millennials moving back home with their parents.
• Far Outliers shares the second part of an an article summary on African and Japanese interactions in early modern Asia.
• JSTOR Daily takes a look at “precisionism”, an art movement in the early 20th century United States that looked to the machine for inspiration.
• Language Hat shares a poem by the late great Ursula K Le Guin, “Dead Languages.”
• Lawyers, Guns and Money, looking at the anti-Uighur police state that China has established in Xinjiang, points out that there are many ways in which American hegemony can be followed by something worse.
• The LRB Blog looks at how many documents vital in understanding the history of Iraq have been removed from the country or destroyed altogether. How will Iraqis be able to understand their history without them?
• The New APPS Blog takes a look at a newly released Foucault lecture from 1978, “Analytic Philosophy of Politics”.
• The Planetary Society Blog reports from Mars, enveloped by a planet-wide dust storm that might endanger the intrepid rovers.
• Drew Rowsome takes a look at an exciting new film biography of Vivienne Westwood.
• Strange Company tells a story of a 19th century insurance fraud rooted in murder.
• Frank Jacobs at Strange Maps shares an old tourist map of Maine noting how many placenames from around the world are in that state.
• Towleroad shares a lovely ad from Ireland’s Dublin Bus company featuring fathers picking up their gay children to take them to Pride. Wow.

[BLOG] Some Saturday links

• Anthrodendum recommends design researcher Jan Chipchase’s Field Study Handbook for anthropologists interested in field practice.
• Architectuul investigates strange similarities between buildings built in far-removed parts of the world.
• Centauri Dreams takes a look at TESS, the next generation of exoplanet-hunting satellite.
• Crooked Timber investigates the connections between the spiritualism of the 19th century and the fiction of the uncanny.
• D-Brief notes the many names, often delightful, that newly-discovered locations on Mercury and Charon have received.
• Cody Delistraty investigates two exhibitions of French satirists, including Charlie Hedo’s Georges Wolinski, to examine the nature of satire.
• The Dragon’s Tales considers the possibility of cryomagna leaving marks on the surface of Europa.
• Drew Ex Machina takes a look at the strangely alien skies of TRAPPIST-1e. What would its sun look like? How would the other planets appear?
• The Everyday Sociology Blog takes a look at the new prominence of multigenerational households in the United States. While a response to economic strains, it also looks back to past traditions.
• Hornet Stories notes how, on RuPaul’s Drag Race, Monet X Change gave a decent explanation behind the surprisingly recent birth of the modern British accent.
• Imageo notes how a massive blob of warm water is rising to the surface of the Pacific.
• At In A State of Migration, Lyman Stone explores the unique population history of Maine, to my eyes easily the most Atlantic Canadian of the fifty American states.
• JSTOR Daily links to a paper exploring why modern video games can produce such rewarding experiences for players. (We can get meaning from many places.)
• Language Log takes a look at the complexity of Chinese language classifications with a song by Yishi Band. What exactly is Yibin Sichuanese?
• Lawyers, Guns and Money takes a look at an interesting question: When did Jews in the United States become white?
• The LRB Blog takes a look at the baffling reasons behind the poisoning of the Skribins with Novichok, and the science behind it.
• Marginal Revolution notes that this year, GDP per capita measured at PPP in Spain is higher than in Italy. (This probably says more about the disarray in Italy.)
• The NYR Daily shares an interesting interview with cartoonist Art Spiegelman.
• Personal Reflections’ Jim Belshaw tells of his experiences on a trip to the small Australian city of Armidale, in the region of New England.
• Justin Petrone reflects on the tidy and clean, minimalist even, rural landscape of Estonia.
• Progressive Download’s John Farrell notes brain scans that provide evidence of consciousness even in very young infants.
• Drew Rowsome praises the Toronto production of the musical Fun Home, based on the Alison Bechdel graphic novel. I, for one, can’t wait to see it.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel notes that, although Proxima Centauri is far too active a star for Proxima Centauri b to be Earth-like, that world could still plausibly host life-supporting environments.
• Ilya Somin at the Volokh Conspiracy suggests a recent deal at the federal level in the US between Trump and Cory Gardner has created space for states to legalize marijuana without fear of federal intervention.

[NEWS] Five notes on food: pork in Germany, California agriculture, NL clam, Maine lobster, food box

• Pork consumption in Germany is dropping, a consequence of changing demographics and changing dietary preferences. Bloomberg reports.
• Raids on illegal immigrants by ICE have the potential to badly hurt agriculture in California. Bloomberg reports.
• The story of how an effort to open up the Arctic surf clam fishery of Newfoundland, particularly to natives and non-natives alike became a big mess is sad. The National Post reports.
• Apparently, to cope with injuries and chronic pain, the lobster fishers of Maine are coping by using heroin. Is this going on in Atlantic Canada, too? VICE reports.
• Things like the Trump plan to substantially replace fresh foods with boxed non-perishable goods in food stamp problems have happened to Native Americans already. The dietary and health consequences are significantly negative. NPR reports.

[BLOG] Some Friday links

• Centauri Dreams looks at the potentially deadly effect of the stellar flares of red dwarfs on potentially habitable exoplanets.
• Charley Ross notes the strange 1957 disappearance of William ad Margaret Patterson from their Texas home.
• D-Brief notes the evidence for a second planet at Proxima Centauri, a super-Earth Proxima C with a 215 day orbit.
• Tom Yulsman of ImaGeo shares shares photos of the active Sun.
• The argument made by Scott Lemieux of Lawyers, Guns and Money that Americans were learning to love Obamacare and Republicans wanted to take it away before they got used to it … well.
• Marginal Revolution notes that, and why, restaurant servers in Maine wanted their minimum wage lowered. (Tips.)
• Roads and Kingdoms shares the story of Na De Fo, a rare Korean restaurant in Mexico City.
• The NYR Daily looks at how Macron might try to “California-ize” France, and whether he could pull this off.
• Unicorn Booty notes studies noting bisexuals have a lower quality of life than gays, and wonders why. (Stigma is an issue.)
• Window on Eurasia notes that global warming, by leading to permafrost melt, is literally undermining the infrastructure of Russia.

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• Beyond the Beyond notes an upcoming exhibition of photos of Vaclav Havel.
• blogTO notes a local controversy over the demolition of a community-built skate park.
• Centauri Dreams considers how advanced starfaring civilizations might deal with existential threats.
• Crooked Timber looks at how presidential debates could be used to teach logic.
• Language Hat examines the origins of the evocative Slavic phrase “they perished like Avars.”
• Language Log notes how “Molotov cocktail” was confused by a Trump manager with “Mazel tov cocktail”.
• The LRB Blog notes Brexit-related insecurity over the rule of law in the United Kingdom.
• The Map Room Blog notes an exhibition in Maine of Acadian-related maps.
• Marginal Revolution looks at how the Hong Kong press has been influenced by advertisers.
• The NYRB Daily looks an exhibition of abstract expressionism.
• The Planetary Society Blog looks at what we can learn from Rosetta.
• Savage Minds considers the place of archeology in anthropology.
• Window on Eurasia looks at Belarus’ commemoration of the Bolshevik Revolution and considers the dispute in Kazakhstan as to whether the country should be known as Qazaqstan.