All this makes it patently clear: 

American leadership in the fields of science and technology is coming to an end. We had a good run, bringing many important advances, such as the vaccines for polio and COVID-19, to the world, not to mention prosperity to American businesses. But the demise of our scientific progress and influence didn’t begin with Donald Trump or Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Their actions are the natural consequence of a concerted effort begun long ago by a group of people, and a political party, who decided that supporting reason and rationale were not in our national interest. 

You have to wonder if any of them saw this coming.

-Heather Digby Parton in Salon.com

 

The mark of an intelligent person is not simple, glib answers, but thoughtful, meaningful questions, well thought-out and evidence backed answers.

 

Another football season just in time to distract us at least a few hours each week from politics and pointless everyday blather! Thank goodness!

 Fred Hudson

August 20 at 8:54 AM · 

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Great author presentation and discussion last night at The New South Bookstore in Montgomery by Professor Scott Spillman. So great to learn about the history of slavery discussions in our history from the 1750's to 1619 today, leading up to 2026, the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Sobering, but enlightening.

One participant, an historian obviously, voiced concern about the current administration's attempt to destroy or downplay historical evidence in presenting a total white supremacy version of US history. He specifically mentioned the Carter Woodson -John Franklin Jameson materials which are a treasure trove of African American history.

Prof. Spillman agreed, and suggested contacting his Congressman and Senators.

"That wouldn't do any good in this state!" was the questioner's response.

I said out loud to the biggest laugh of the night, "You mean Sen. Tuberville wouldn't want to hear your views!"

I brought up the "both sideism" issue.

Students should be presented with "both sides" of slavery. Sure it's reprehensible, but weren't slaves taught useful skills? (Was that the Florida or the Texas governor? I get them mixed up as to who said or did what). Sure, Hitler was an evil man, but didn't he do some good things also?

And after all, our historical revisionist POTUS says that the Civil War could have been averted---it could have been negotiated.

No mention all night of "states rights" or "property rights," historic euphemisms for slavery. We have come a long way since Antebellum times, even if not so much in The Heart of Dixie.

You can make serious points with a laugh.

My kind of setting, have fun, and learn from history.

 

I am on FIRE this morning. If you see me around town you can be sure it's not me. I am somewhere else and you will never learn where.

 In the men's corner at Starbucks this morning the debate is over which is worse: an overactive bladder, an overactive tongue, or an overactive imagination? Having to run to the men's room every ten minutes, running your mouth too often, or thinking anybody out there really cares what you think. Some of all three in my case.

Everything Evolves

 Everything Evolves 

by Mark Vellend (Princeton)

Nonfiction

In this ambitious book, Vellend, a biologist, attempts to establish a “generalized evolutionary theory” to stand alongside physics as a crucial paradigm for understanding “how everything came to be.” Here, biological evolution is merely one instance of a more fundamental process that can be seen in any system in which “new variants are produced, inherited, and moved around” and only some variants proliferate. Stepping away from living things, Vellend finds this dynamic at work in the development of violins and typewriters, in the technologies undergirding ChatGPT, and in the spread of cultural values like individualism.

From The New Yorker