Although Google has great satellite images of Taiwan, until recently I knew of no decent online maps of Taiwan. There seemed to be nothing comparable to what Google offers for the United States and parts of Europe. But thanks to Ilya, I now know about UrMap, which is an excellent mapping service. There is currently [...]
While some bloggers seem intent on spreading the rumor that the elections mark a shift to the right on the part of Democrats, Stirling Newberry shows that the opposite is true: Thus while many people speculate on whether this election will produce a Democratic Majority, still an open question, it is already on the road [...]
I’ve been working way too hard lately, so I gave myself a mental mini-vacation by watching the entire two season run of Samurai Champloo (混沌武士, サムライチャンプルー). Samurai Champloo is by Shinichiro Watanabe who made my previous favorite anime TV series, Cowboy Bebop (see here). Wikipedia explains the name: Its name comes from the Okinawan word [...]
We’ve been very busy over at Savage Minds – promoting Open Access at the AAA. See our wiki for a general overview of the subject, or here to see what we are planning for the AAA. But what I really wanted to tell you about are the great new T-shirts Rex and CKelty designed for [...]
And the winner is … Geoffrey Nunberg! A lot has been said about this nasty debate, and I’ve avoided it because it seems hard to get engaged without slinging mud, but Geoff Nunberg’s piece is truly excellent. Actually there isn’t much here about Pinker, which is perhaps why the piece is so good. Nunberg takes [...]
There are two important stories about the use of “alternative interrogation techniques” by US forces which deserve to get more attention: First, the suicide of Army specialist Alyssa Peterson, a 27 year old mormon translator who “died by her own hand after objecting to interrogation methods used on prisoners.” What I find especially troublesome is [...]