Mapmakers everywhere must have breathed sighs of relief when they learned they would not have to redraw the United Kingdom to reflect an independent Scotland. History suggests they should remain at the ready. Coming just a week after an effort…
Je ne comprends pas
In preparation for an autumn visit to Paris, I’ve been trying to learn some French. Au Secours! (Help!) When my wife and I traveled to Italy in 2012, I thought my high school and college Spanish classes might help with…
Death of the Novel?
“There is one question alone that you must ask yourself in order to establish whether the serious novel will still retain cultural primacy and centrality in another 20 years. This is the question: if you accept that by then the…
Tiananmen at 25: Selective Amnesia
European courts ruled recently that people have the “right to be forgotten.” What about the right not to be forgotten? Does that not apply to Tiananmen Square, where thousands of unarmed protesters were killed 25 years ago by their nation’s…
Total Recall
Can anyone recall a car manufacturer having a tougher time than GM is having right now? Oh yes, there was that dust up Ford faced in 1978 over the tinderbox it named after a bean—the Pinto. But as notorious as…
Privacy in the Age of Cellphones
Although the paranoid among us fear a long-running government conspiracy to track our every move à la Orwell’s 1984—and to be sure, technology now makes that possible—the path to having GPS in every pocket was more uncertain, less coordinated and…
Books as Ornaments
“By way of decorating a baby shower with the second edition of “Staff Patient Communication” because it is the right shade of pink, we here enter the realm of the truly objectified book, a world that has everything to do…
(crap-ti-mal)
adj: the least bad outcome you can achieve Note: This new word was inspired by my poor NCAA bracket performance this year, but it seems increasingly applicable to domestic and foreign policy outcomes.
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the ISS
As Vladimir Putin tightens his grip on Crimea and masses troops along the Ukraine border, it’s a good time to remember that U.S. astronauts are entirely dependent on Russia for transportation to and from the International Space Station. NASA astronaut…
(hy-poc-a-lyp-ti-cal)
adj: of or relating to scientific theories about the end of life as we know it