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This explains so much.

Submitted for your consideration: (Analogy: only people who have no class whatsoever call things "classy." Example: Tony Soprano.)

Pharyngula blog has a link up today to a very interesting video about the origin of our belief in the supernatural almost as a form of neoteny, or a holdover into adulthood of infantile/juvenile characteristics-- in this case, the beliefs that come naturally to children as a part of intellectual...

Our culture favors a version of "love" that is actually pretty dysfunctional in many respects. Movies, pop songs, and TV-- thanks to the broader historical, largely Judeo-Christian forces-- tend to depict love in ways that equate it with total self-denial and enmeshment. This leads to a society...

This one is about horror. An interesting topic, and I like the Negarestani and Ligotti pieces. But there are some strange statements in the first article about genetics. I can't quite decipher this: Erm which recessive traits? What?

In the early days of the internet, this sort of thing was all the rage, and I remember taking tons of these. I used to try to manipulate the results and still I'd score similarly on the more legitimate-sounding psychologicalistical ones. Since I was recently reminded of them, I just revisited...

There's tons of new research in autism (and I found most of it on Science Daily, which is awesome) but it all points to what the medical community has been saying all along: it's genetic, or heritable, and it's NOT caused by mercury or preservatives in immunizations. In case anyone is...

Steven Shaviro's blog has a really interesting post up right now about Peter Ward's new book. This leads Shaviro to a critique of the current reliance on a metaphysics of "emergence", which informs our politics via an emphasis on "self-organization" and its outcomes. While I agree with him...

Here's a thread for anarchism discussions. The following is a question for Padraig, but anyone else who has info, too: Where can I find some good readings in anarchism (contemporary or historical)? I've read some Graeber and some Newman, I've read Bakunin, Goldman, and Proudhon. But I know...

More good news for New Orleans tourism: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29371878/ A Mardi Gras parade erupted into chaos on Fat Tuesday when a series of gunshots struck seven people, including a toddler. The child was not seriously injured and two suspects were in custody, police said. The...

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Showing one's teeth, in primates, is considered a submissive gesture. "Monogamy" (pair bonding and sharing domestic/offspring-related duties) in primates is not to be confused with sexual fidelity, which is rare. Primates have advanced cognitive abilities: some make tools and use them to...

What Do Women Want? From the Times Magazine today:

I don't think there's ever been a proper thread about this but I thought that a lot of what we've been talking about recently might fit into this broad category. I was trying to come up with the best examples of biopolitical analysis or critique in American culture and the best I could think of...

Is there something wrong with me? I really like this song. Some girl at work had it as a ringtone. This video is pretty great, but it's more proof that white people can't dance even if they write really funky songs.

Among the various factions or branches of the Left (where/if they exist), but especially among intellectuals in the U.K., modernism is held in high esteem above other eras and cultural movements. This thread is for discussing modernism. Is the "modernism" favored by many a fantasy or did it...

Seems like meth keeps coming up in all kinds of threads. I guess I'll christen the thread with this little item: Meth found in boy's Halloween bag

High profile murders in the U.S: what is going on? Is it just me, or have there been a simply huge number of senseless murders this year?? First, we had the rampages where those two guys each killed a bunch of people at their former place of employment (one was at a Simon and Schuster...

I am, regretably, sci-fi illiterate, and this is doing horrible things to my theoryhead credibility. Please recommend the best sci-fi books and films here. Thanks in advance for your help :D

I was reading this list of top ten salaries in the U.K., and they seem awfully low to me. A doctor in the U.K. only makes $160,000?? I would guess the average internist in the U.S. makes about $25,000/month--specialists much more! A lawyer in the U.S. also makes much much more than $100,000...