cleaning up my desk

if i don't clean off my desk every now and then things get ugly.

so here's some stuff i've had hanging around here.

if you are a map geek or a US civil war buff, you have already seen this because it was all over this honkin' place in july. i was at a thing last week and by way of chitchat a guy asked me if i'd seen it.

"oh! are you a map nerd?" i asked him.
"no, just a middlebury alum." he laughed. "it was all over our alumni magazine."

if you have nto seen it and you have a passing interest in maps or the battle of gettysburg, or how new technology can explain new things about that to us, you should go look at it.

smithsonian look at viewsheds on gettysburg battlefield



here is a fascinating interactive graphic that shows the inconsistencies in the bible. if you are a biblical scholar, it is a handy tool for thinking about context and interpretation. if you are a skeptic or an outright atheist, you will find it amusing. if you are a biblical literalist hung up on inerrant word, you should not look at it, because your brain will 'splode.

bibviz project

this week there's going to be a lunch of a minotaur rocket on september 6 and if you live in much of the northeastern US, you will be able to see it. it's going to be SO past my bedtime, and pretty low in my sky, but if it's a clear night i might stay up and have a look.

minotaur V mission updates

if you'd like to read a thorough long form piece with explanatory video about the history of US involvement in syria, the BBC has a thing for you. if you are mystified by who will profit from this (US oil companies) or why the syrians are looking to russia for help (still), you should go read it.

the baby and the baath water

in case you haven't gone and made yourself a tinfoil hat yet, here's (yet) a(nother) look at the expanding surveillance state.

NSA intimidation expanding surveillance state

and if that makes you depressed, look at this school. take a long hard look at it. ask yourself why we don't have more schools like this. ask why we don't have governments and corporations that run like this. ask where the kids who graduated from this school are. we need more of this.

sudbury valley school

that kid who has to sign the staff contracts? i'd vote for her.