Fauci

Posted on Saturday 10 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

NY Times, Anthony Fauci opinion guest essay, 10 Dec 2022: A Message to the Next Generation of Scientists

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Half the Country

Posted on Friday 9 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Quick post late in the day, mostly just copying a public Facebook post from Adam-Troy Castro, who writes novels (see pic above) but seems to be better known for his short fiction (see his sfadb.com page), and is apparently even better known to many people on Facebook (he has 4.6K friends) for his comments there. He’s a resident polemicist.

Here’s a post of his from yesterday. which I’ll quote in its entirety. Continue reading →

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Current Affairs, 8 Dec 2022

Posted on Thursday 8 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

How Christian morality plays out; the Respect for Marriage Act and the weeping Republican; the right’s sense of grievance; how the media is disconnected from reality; opposite opinions about the American defense budget.

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Current Affairs: Concerning Morality, and Good and Evil

Posted on Wednesday 7 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

And a fun item about Christmas. That one first.

Boing Boing, Gareth Braynwyn, 3 Dec 2022: In search of a more “Bible accurate” Christmas

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Current Affairs, 6 Dec 2022

Posted on Tuesday 6 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Warnock v. Walker; high-IQ stupid people, with comments by David Brin and Charles P. Pierce; restaurant discrimination; and Republicans’ psychological needs.

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Permafrost Viruses; Blue Blobs; the Ridiculous; the Sublime

Posted on Monday 5 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

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Daily Details and Existential Threats

Posted on Sunday 4 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Perhaps I should start with daily details? Chilly today but sunny, in between storms. Despite yesterday’s post, I decided to walk around the house for 30 or 40 minutes last night (while the TV showed Jeopardy or whatever) in order to hit my 5000 step mark, and keep up my 25 some day record. Moreover, we went out for a walk today, up and down the Montclair Railroad Trail (which I blogged about back in February), two full miles, which gained me another 5000 steps all by itself. So as of right now, I have 6456 steps for the day.

(Below this break, discussion of an article about how Western philosophy has ruined the world.)

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Rainy Saturday; Current Affairs

Posted on Saturday 3 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

It’s early December, a Saturday, and it’s been raining all day here in the Bay Area, another cold rain like the storm two days ago. We need the rain; we’re still behind average rainfall for the season. Still, the rain lasting throughout the entire day is unusual here. In California rainstorms last a few hours, typically, and recently in the Bay Area they’ve begun early morning and cleared by early afternoon. Not today.

This has disrupted my walking schedule, which I’ve been doing much better at in the past couple months than before. With a goal of 5000 steps a day set on my iPhone, I’ve achieved my goal for over three weeks currently, even though a couple times they were done by walking around the house, back and forth and around and around, while watching Jeopardy or the news. Today? Well…

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Big Sky, Deep Sky

Posted on Friday 2 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Here’s an Astronomy Picture of the Day, for 2022 November 29, that shows how big some nebulae and galaxies are on the scale of the night sky, in a way that we never realize. The highlight here is “The Gum Nebula Supernova Remnant.” Continue reading →

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A Chilly December Evening

Posted on Thursday 1 December 2022 by Mark R. Kelly

Topics for today: A French take on Americans; How a Narcissist Knows Nothing.

No photo from either of the two linked items here seemed appropriate, so here is tonight’s sunset. In the aftermath of a rainstorm that lasted from before dawn to about 2pm today, this sunset. It’s chilly today, the high just 47F, and a predicted low by morning of 35F.

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