Category Archives: Culture

What Would Make Someone Change Their Mind

Posted on Friday 23 May 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Fascinating essay in The New Yorker by Maria Konnikova, I Don’t Want to Be Right, which addresses the various results that show you just can’t change people’s minds with evidence. Could various pro-vaccination campaigns change parental attitudes toward vaccines? They … Continue reading →

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Climate Change, Denialism, and History’s Judgment: With a Prediction

Posted on Saturday 17 May 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

I love Andrew Sullivan’s blog, The Dish, since he gathers comments about many topics as well as responses to them, and is willing to post long reader comments that challenge earlier posts. (Sullivan is gay, but he’s also a self-described … Continue reading →

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Amateur Astronomy and Cultural Mythology

Posted on Saturday 3 May 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Since my post the other day about the my trigger to amateur astronomy in my youth, a grade-school textbook called A Dipper Full of Stars, I picked up the copy of that book I bought for a few dollars over … Continue reading →

Posted in Astronomy, Culture, Personal history, Science | Comments Off

The Range of Human Perception

Posted on Tuesday 29 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Alternet, Chris Mooney: Why Right-Wingers Think the Way They Do: The Fascinating Psychological Origins of Political Ideology These experiments suggest that conservatives actually do live in a world that is more scary and threatening, at least as they perceive it. … Continue reading →

Posted in Cosmology, Culture, Psychology, Science | Comments Off

American Christianity and Conservatism

Posted on Monday 28 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Andrew Sullivan strikes at Sarah Palin’s glib, despicable remark that “Waterboarding is how we baptize terrorists” — to which her audience cheered — with this post: Sarah Palin: Anti-Christian It reveals that vast swathes of American Christianity are objectively anti-Christian, … Continue reading →

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Dignity of our Lives: “I burst into tears”

Posted on Sunday 27 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

There was so much coverage of the right-wing outrage and vitriol over passing depictions of gay families in a couple TV commercials earlier this year, from Coke and then Nabisco, which I saw reported on some of the news sites … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture, The Gays | Comments Off

Cosmos So Far

Posted on Thursday 24 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

I should update my thoughts about the new version of the TV series Cosmos, since earlier I posted a mild critique about it needing to explain the background of scientific discovery – presenting not just the grandiose conclusions humanity has … Continue reading →

Posted in Cosmology, Culture, Evolution, Philosophy, Physics | Comments Off

Christian boycotts

Posted on Tuesday 22 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

From Joe.My.God, about numerous recent events. REMINDER: When major national Christian groups with millions of followers call for boycotts, that is a righteous use of the free market in order to preserve morality, marriage, family, and the American way. But … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture, The Gays | Comments Off

The Reality of Sexuality

Posted on Tuesday 22 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

From a few days ago, this post by Andrew Sullivan, on his blog, about a recent discovery of a particularly weird animal sexuality. The more we learn about nature, the more the notion that the universe reflects a cosmic version … Continue reading →

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Bunnies, Eggs, Spring

Posted on Sunday 20 April 2014 by Mark R. Kelly

Everyone’s posting about Easter today, so I’ll acknowledge two or three of those posts, that capture better than I have time to do myself why I find the whole Easter tradition fascinating as a cultural development, but implausible and uninteresting … Continue reading →