Last week's catastrophic EU vote to censor and surveil the whole internet to catch copyright infringers isn't a local affair; the same corporations who were willing to sacrifice the internet to eke out a few percentage point gains in licensing revenue are busily at work in Canada, where a rewrite of copyright laws is underway. (more…)

A week ago, Apple announced a redesigned smartwatch that could track heart data, run EKGs, and even detect atrial fibrillation, promising that it would save lives. Today, one of America's biggest insurers killed its traditional life insurance policies, replacing them with "interactive" insurance that encourages users to use such devices and share the data with them to get perks. (more…)

NPR reporters poked around in Maria Butina's social media world, looking at the accused Russian agent's thousands of social media friends and reaching out to over 200 individuals. The resulting investigative report paints a portrait of Butina's life, from Siberia, to the tight-knit Moscow pro-guns shooting community, to D.C, Las Vegas, Washington state, and South Dakota. (more…)

I'd hate to see the ones that didn't quite, ahem, make the grade.

From Wired: "Dialect coach Erik Singer once again analyzes the accents of some of Hollywood's biggest names. How accurate were their accents, really?"He looks at Margot Robbie's Pacific Northwest accent in I, Tonya ("fantastic"), Giancarlo Esposito's Chilean/Mexican accent in Better Call Saul ("entirely appropriate"), Jennifer Lawrence's Russian accent in Red Sparrow ("doesn't fully cohere"), and 25 other actors' attempts at accents.

Real or not, the Loch Ness Monster brings in $54 million to the Scottish economy each year, an increase of $14.4 million from four years ago. The data comes from accountant Gary Campbell who also happens to be the official keeper of the Nessie sightings register. From the UK Press and Journal:

Before Thomas Borgen was CEO of Danske Bank, he ran the bank's Estonian branch from 2009-2013, presiding over years of neglect of basic, commonsense money-laundering controls, allowing more than €200B to flow through the bank from well-known financial secrecy jurisdictions like the British Virgin Islands, as well as Russia. (more…)

"Porn for women" was Pornhub's "top trending" search term for 2017; across the pornosphere, the number of women viewers continues its meteoric rise and rise, up to 25% now -- for the porn industry woman viewers represent a huge opportunity for growth. (more…)

People with certain types of baldness might be able to sniff their way back to a head of hair. In a study that was published in Nature Communications, researchers found that the scent of synthetic sandalwood, found in perfumes and cosmetics, can stimulate hair growth.According to Inverse:

When three masked burglars tear through a betting office in Ireland, threatening people with hammers and a sawed off shotgun, an 85-year-old great grandfather comes to the rescue. Watch how he fearlessly tackles one of them, and then chases them out with a chair. When it was all over he refused to be interviewed, preferring to spend his morning playing pitch and putt.Via BBC

Cage diving operator Calypso Star Charters or Port Lincoln, South Australia posted this startling photo of Satan disguised as a great white shark. (@calypsocharters)

Clever and wonderfully-presented: The Incredible Palindromic Hat-Trick. You may be unimpressed if you feed it small numbers. Feed it big ones!

Apparently, you are looking at the President's penis. (more…)

“We’re working on new ways to give you more control over your timeline,” Twitter Support tweeted tonight (during the Emmys live broadcast). (more…)

PACER (previously) is a paywall that charges you every time you look up the US's public domain Federal court records; for years, activists have railed against its existence, liberating key documents from it and putting them online for free, calling on Congress to eliminate it altogether. (more…)

Angry that cave rescuer Vernon Unsworth mad fun of his ridiculous rescue submarine, Elon Musk called him a "pedo" and, later, a "child rapist," then dared him to sue over the remarks. Unsworth has filed his lawsuit.

It's been 54 years since Mary Poppins hit the big screen, and now Walt Disney Studios is releasing its sequel, Mary Poppins Returns. Directed by Rob Marshall, Mary Poppins will be played by Emily Blunt, and although I can't imagine anyone but Julie Andrews playing the part, by the looks of the trailer Blunt looks like she does a practically perfect job. Other actors include Meryl Streep (Mary's eccentric cousin), Colin Firth, Angela Lansbury, and most exciting of all, Dick Van Dyke (Mr. Dawes' son).The plot is nicely summarized by i09:

Donald Trump, Jr. thinks that allegations of sexual assault against Judge Brett Kavanaugh is "nonsense." He also thinks that a woman accusing Kavanaugh of attempted rape is joke-worthy material. Rather than investigate to see if Kavanaugh is fit to serve the Supreme Court Justice, he ignorantly posts his knee-jerk juvenile reaction to the allegations on Instagram titled, "Judge Kavanaugh sexual assault letter found by Dems..." Along with a drawing in crayon that says, "Hi Cindy will you be my girlfriend?" with "yes" and "no" checkboxes, he writes, "Oh boy... the Dems and their usual nonsense games really have him on the ropes now. Finestein [sic] had the letter in July and saved it for the eve of his vote... honorable as always. I believe this is a copy for full transparency." View this post on Instagram Oh boy... the Dems and their usual nonsense games really have him on the ropes now. Finestein had the letter in July and saved it for the eve of his vote... honorable as always. I believe this is a copy for full transparency. 🤣🇺🇸🤣🇺🇸🤣 #politics #maga A post shared by Donald Trump Jr. (@donaldjtrumpjr) on Sep 15, 2018 at 12:30pm PDT Kavanaugh has denied pinning down a 15-year-old girl when he was 17 years old and covering her mouth while trying to undress her, although the woman who is accusing him, Professor Christine Blasey Ford, has passed a lie detector test about the allegations.Via CBS NewsImage: DonkeyHotey/Flickr

Our European immigrant ancestors did an unspeakable number of shitty things to North America's Indigenous peoples. Massacres, rapes, pillaging and residential schools designed to destroy their culture – we ticked off all of the genocidal boxes. Take a visit to a nearby reservation and you'll find that the legacy of our white asshole doings still echo on today. Amidst the systematic racism and down-home bigotry that many natives in the United States and Canada are still putting up with, federal and local government officials are doing what they can to make amends for the atrocities of the past. Issuing an official apology for the indignities, pain and death visited upon those forced into Canada's residential school system is a good example of this. However, not every gesture needs to be as grand in scope: inclusion, education and acceptance of indigenous cultures that were, for generations, forced outside of the mainstream, can go a long way towards healing the wounds of the past on a local level. To help move things along in this area, Professor Onowa McIvor of the University of Victoria's Department of Indigenous Education has put together a collection of words, greetings other and phrases in the languages of British Columbia's Indigenous peoples that can be incorporated into our day-to-day lives.From The CBC:Learning how to say "hello" or displaying a welcome sign in the language of the local First Nation are just a few ways the author is encouraging people to get involved."To learn a greeting but also the appropriate response is a way of deepening our understanding of that language a little bit, and being able to have just a very short conversation," McIvor told On The Island host Gregor Craigie."A greeting and a response is a way of beginning to learn the Indigenous language of the territory that you're in."According to the CBC, McIvor's goal in creating the list was to provide a starting point for communities to gain a better understanding of the local Indigenous peoples whose lands their towns and cities are built upon. Hopefully, its an idea that spreads to other areas as well.Image by Internet Archive Book Images - https://www.flickr.com/photos/internetarchivebookimages/19175400218/Source book page: https://archive.org/stream/annualreportofbu1018881889smit/#page/n491/mode/1up, No restrictions, Link

Coca-Cola is reportedly talking with Canadian marijuana producer Aurora Cannabis Inc. about CBD-infused beverages. “We are closely watching the growth of non-psychoactive CBD as an ingredient in functional wellness beverages around the world,” Coca-Cola spokesman Kent Landers told Bloomberg News. (Of course, Coca-Cola was also a pioneer in marketing psychoactive drug-infused beverages.)From Bloomberg:Aurora’s shares surged on the news, jumping as much as 23 percent Monday in New York to $8. Other stocks in the cannabis industry got a boost, with Tilray Inc. adding as much as 9.4 percent in response to Coca-Cola’s interest...The discussions with Aurora are focused on CBD-infused drinks to ease inflammation, pain and cramping, according to the BNN Bloomberg report. CBD, or cannabidiol, is the chemical in the pot plant often used for medicinal purposes, and doesn’t produce the high that comes from THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol. There are no guarantees of any deal between Aurora and Coca-Cola, according to the report.

Fill a plastic soda bottle with ground meat, attach a plastic plumbing elbow, and start squeezing your way to kebab heaven.this life hack rules pic.twitter.com/OE0NDfpoMB— an actual dog🌹 (@devtesla) September 16, 2018

Right now I'm listening to a mix of coffee shop chatter and tweeting birds. I'm using a website called A Soft Murmur, which lets you create an ambient mix of rain, thunder, waves, wind, fire, birds, crickets, coffee shop, singing bowl, and white noise. You can save your favorite mixes, too, or click a button for a random mix.[via Nag on the Lake]

In August 2017, the powerful public radio star John Hockenberry mysteriously left his job as host of “The Takeaway,” abandoning millions of listeners on hundreds of stations. A few months later, the reasons became clear: he was accused of creepy sexual propositions, complaints from co-hosts, ass-touching, grabbing and kissing producers and other women colleagues, and bullying, racist and sexist remarks. He admitted his behavior was "not always appropriate," laid low for a few months, and is now back with a lavishly self-pitying 7,000-word cover story in Harper's about his "exile" and how terrible it's all been for him.Do I dare make a spirited defense of something once called romance from the darkness of this exile, at a nadir of my personal credibility, at a moment when all of civilization seems to be in turmoil, over what is a plausible narrative of male/female attraction? Not only do I dare, knowing what righteous anger is out there, I really believe I have no choice. Ah yes, romance. Here's Hockenberry's idea of romance:The vacant seat was filled, for about four months, by African-American journalist Farai Chideya. Initially Hockenberry was friendly, she said, but when it seemed like she might become a regular, he “got nastier.” One day, after a story meeting in which Hockenberry became argumentative, she said, he called her into his office. “You shouldn’t stay here just as a ‘diversity hire,’” he told her, according to Chideya. “And you should go lose weight.” Even The New York Times' Michelle Goldberg, trying to conjure up sympathy, is having none of that: "Reading Hockenberry’s essay, it hit me: I feel sorry for a lot of these men, but I don’t think they feel sorry for women, or think about women’s experience much at all."...the most frustrating parts of “Exile” are where he casts himself as the victim of the women who spoke out against him.“Only one of my accusers reached out or responded to my heartfelt queries,” he writes. (Why would they?) Elsewhere he describes his children’s experience of his disgrace as a “pain I wish on no one, not even my accusers.” He invokes his children repeatedly, furious at the toll the scandal is taking on them. Maybe he behaved offensively toward women, he allows, but asks, “Is a life sentence of unemployment without possibility of furlough, the suffering of my children, and financial ruin an appropriate consequence?”Luckily, his unemployment isn’t total; he is writing for a major magazine after enduring nine months of obscurity. But in the nearly 7,000 words of his essay, as he demands that we consider his misery and embarrassment, he never really grapples with the misery and embarrassment he caused, never thinks deeply about how he affected the lives of the women who changed jobs to escape his advances.What Hockenberry's Harper's piece shows is not that he was too severely-punished. It shows that he was not punished at all beyond a fleeting unpopularity and an imposed sabbatical at the threshold of retirement age, free to enjoy dinners with friends constantly flattering him as the victim of revolutionary tyranny.For a time the only employment I could contemplate was detailed on an email list seeking disabled senior citizens to be greeters at Walmart stores in Utah and Georgia.What a vain and revolting man. What has he offered in restitution to his victims? Illo: Rob. Photo: Shutterstock

Apparently, teacup holsters have been a thing since at least 2016. But it was just today that I was introduced to them (through this post humorously captioned "Open carry, in the UK..."). Needless to say, I'm a big fan.Want one? There are many different varieties on Etsy: Leather ones, fancy Jacquard fabric ones, and someone's even selling sewing patterns for them.image via LeatherHeds Thanks, Argyre!

Wide World of Sports Video Games picks just one classic video game to represent each sport and organizes them into a neat gallery. It's the work of Tim Szetela, with Jason Eppink and John Sharp.Players compete in more than 8,000 different sports around the world, but many sports video games focus on baseball, basketball, football, and soccer. Wide World of Sports Video Games explores the range of sports that have been adapted to video games over their 60-year history, featuring 123 different sports from Aerobics to Zumba.

Roland has announced the AX-Edge, a brand new keytar for synth players who want to "step into the spotlight." The AX-Edge, approximately $1000, features 49 full-sized keys, hundreds of preset tones, ribbon controller, and modulation bar, and Bluetooth MIDI. It's available in black or white and the "edge blades" on the instrument can be swapped to change the look. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72_v-S1iDKA

Researchers from extraterrestrial research initiative Breakthrough Listen, the SETI Institute, and UC Berkeley used machine learning to detect mysterious repeating radio bursts from a galaxy 3 billion light years from Earth. As of now, the source of the fast radio bursts (FRBs) is unknown and, yes, the bursts "could be the signatures of technology developed by extraterrestrial intelligent life," according to the scientists. From the SETI Institute:In August of 2017, the Listen science team at the University of California, Berkeley SETI Research Center observed FRB 121102 for five hours, using digital instrumentation at the GBT. Combing through 400 TB of data, they reported (in a paper [pdf] led by Berkeley SETI postdoctoral researcher Vishal Gajjar, recently accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal) a total of 21 bursts. All were seen within one hour, suggesting that the source alternates between periods of quiescence and frenzied activity. Now, (UC Berkeley doctoral student Gerry) Zhang and collaborators have developed a new machine learning algorithm, and reanalyzed the 2017 GBT dataset, finding an additional 72 bursts that were not detected originally... Additional FRB research may provide clues about whether or not they are signatures of extraterrestrial technology. More at UC Berkeley news: "AI helps track down mysterious cosmic radio bursts"

Xavier Cunningham, age 10 of Kansas City, Kansas, was climbing up to a tree house when yellow jackets attacked. Cunningham fell several feet from the ladder and impaled his head on a meat skewer. University of Kansas surgeons removed the skewer during a several hour operation. Cunningham is doing quite well and expected to be released in a few days. From Fox4KC:"He was more upset about the yellow jackets than he was about the metal piece sticking out of his face," (Cunnigham's dad Shannon) Miller said."It missed his brain. It missed his brain stem. It missed the nerves, everything that`s valuable in your head. It missed everything," Xavier's dad said..."Only God could have directed things to happen in a way that would save him like this," he said. "It really was a miracle."

There's money to be made building websites; but, whether you do it on the side or full-time, it can get dull and painfully tedious. However, there are resources out there to break up the monotony and make the experience much more enjoyable, like the Premium Bootstrap Theme Bundle.Loaded with 26 Bootstrap templates and UI kits, 311 customized plug-ins, and much more, this massive bundle delivers an absolute treasure trove of assets to help you make sites that are more inspired and interactive. You can integrate thousands of custom design assets seamlessly into your workflow; and, with hundreds of example pages to reference, you'll have no issue discovering new sources of inspiration and creativity.The Premium Bootstrap Theme Bundle is on sale in the Boing Boing Store for $49.99 today.

Cheetahs in captivity still want to run and chase things, so the caretakers at Oregon Zoo made a custom-built a catapult that launches balls from one end of the cheetah habitat to the other. The cheetahs get a treat when they fetch a ball. (more…)

Circle Line Art School explains how to draw this simple but effective anamorphic illusion of cubes falling into a hole in the page.(via The Kid Should See This)

Former prison inmate Josh of Lockdown 23and1 teaches the proper way to make prison pizza using only ingredients that an inmate might easily be able to acquire: saltines, Ritz crackers, ramen, tomato sauce, cheese, pepperoni, Slim Jims, and pickles.(via Laughing Squid)

On January 29, 1979, six years after the band formed, Bauhaus recorded their iconic goth anthem "Bela Lugosi's Dead" and four other songs. Now that entire session, remastered from the original tapes, will be released on vinyl and digital download in November to celebrate the band's 40th anniversary. "Some Faces," "Bite My Hip," and the original version of "Boys" have never been available before. "Harry" was an early B-side."The Bela Session" (Bandcamp)Fan video for "Bela Lugosi's Dead":https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtLlmrrCajA

With legalization comes acceptance. With acceptance comes more use by respectable grownups.About 9 percent of U.S. adults between ages 50 and 64 used marijuana in the the previous year, according to survey results. About 3 percent of people over 65 used the drug in that time period. This appears to be up from years past. In 2013, the same survey reported that 7 percent of middle-aged Americans used marijuana in the previous year, and only 1.4 percent of people over 65.Here's the research: Marijuana use by middle-aged and older adults in the United States, 2015–2016.

Farmers are the vanguard of the Right to Repair movement; accustomed as they are to fixing their own equipment (you can't wait for a repair tech when the tractor doesn't work -- as the saying goes, you have to make hay while the sun shines), they were outraged when companies like John Deere started using DRM to pick their pockets, creating tractors whose engines wouldn't recognize a new part until they paid a tech a few hundred dollars to drive out in a day or two and key an unlock code into the tractor's keyboard. (more…)

California's Democratic Governor Jerry Brown repeatedly vetoed universal healthcare after the state legislature voted it through; Democratic state majorities in NY, CT and NJ refused to enact legislation to close the "carried interest" tax loophole that makes billions for hedge-fund managers; Rhode Island Democrats went on a slashing spree, taking down pensions for teachers, firefighters and other public servants while the finance-affiliated state treasurer funneled the pension funds into her pals' underperforming hedge funds; Democrats in NJ gutted the tax bill to give millionaires an easy ride; New York Democrat Governor Andrew Cuomo shut down the state anti-corruption commission, only to have his top aide busted for being horrifically corrupt. (more…)

I've been using this picnic blanket for a few years, and it has held up very well. It's waterproof, padded, tough, and easily folds into its own compact carrying case. Amazon has it on sale now for $13.59.

For all we know, the drivers of these cars fighting to take possession of the middle lane of a freeway could be the nicest people in the world, beloved by friends, coworkers, and family members. But I doubt it.Dumb & Dumber

Tomorrow's the day: the EU will vote on the text of the new Copyright Directive, including the most sweeping and invasive internet regulations in European history: Article 11, letting news sites decide who can link to them and charge for the privilege; and Article 13, creating vast, unaccountable databases of "copyrighted works" and censoring anything that appears to be a match. (more…)

One of the nice things about owning a MacBook is that, more often than not, you don't have to give too much thought about what's going on behind the scenes. Mac OS is stable as all get out. Most users will never need to fart around with terminal commands or futz with file structures. As much of a cliché as it may be to say it, it just works. Most of the time.I discovered, over the years, that as stable as Apple's software experience typically is, there are a few ways to improve on things by tweaking and cleaning my SSD up. These are not tasks that I am good at. Admittedly, this is likely due to the fact that I've been too lazy to learn the ins and outs of making my computer do tricks outside of what my work requires. As such, I let apps do the behind-the-scenes heavy lifting for me. I've relied on MacPaws' CleanMyMac for years to clean junk files from my computer and maintain my drive's health. I can't remember how much I paid for it, back in the day, but I've very likely gotten my money's worth out of it. The only thing that I likely know less about than what goes on behind the scenes of Mac OS is what in the name of Hell makes Windows 10 run. While I find the OS and the software I run on my Surface Go to be adequate for churning out words and a bit of photo editing, I haven't got the slightest idea of what to do in order to keep my new Windows 10 PC healthy. So, lazy fella that I am, I checked to see if MacPaw had a solution for Windows. Yup.I've been using CleanMyPC with my Surface tablet for the past few days now. It works pretty well! I like how easy it makes it to reclaim drive space, repair my registry (I've ALMOST got a grasp on what that means) and noodle with my startup settings. Instead of having to go spelunking through Windows for interfaces that allow me to do all of these things, separately, it's all gathered together in one place. I've noticed that CleanMyPC's automatic drive cleaning protocol takes a lot longer to run on my Surface Go than it ever has on my MacBook Pro. I don't know if this is a consequence of how Windows 10 is set up or if it's because of the Go's pokey chipset. What takes five minutes on my Mac goes on for at least three times as long while I'm working under Windows. That said, as I can run CleanMyPC in the background while I continue to work, it doesn't really matter, I suppose. I've tried other applications in the past that do much the same work as CleanMyPC does, CCleaner, for example, but I found them more irritating--or at least in need of more human interaction--to use. If you're like me and just want your computer to work as well as it can without fully understanding how it is that it does its magic, you might want to consider taking Clean My PC for a spin. A single-user license will set you back between $40 and $50, depending on whether you find it on sale or not. Before taking this financial plunge, it's possible to use it in a limited, but telling, free trial.Images via MacPaw and Seamus Bellamy

Corrupt Baltimore police officers have a way to shoot anyone they want with impunity: they carry toy guns to plant on their victims. From Vice:Detective Maurice Ward, who's already pleaded guilty to corruption charges, testified that he and his partners were told to carry the replicas and BB guns "in case we accidentally hit somebody or got into a shootout, so we could plant them." The directive allegedly came from the team's sergeant, Wayne Jenkins, the Washington Post reports. Though Ward didn't say whether or not the tactic was ever used, Detective Marcus Taylor—another cop swept up in the scandal—was carrying a fake gun almost identical to his service weapon when he was arrested last year, according to the Sun.The revelation is just one of many egregious abuses that have come out of the sprawling trial that the Sun has called "Baltimore’s biggest police corruption scandal in memory." Prosecutors say the squad, which was tasked with getting illegal guns off the streets, abused its power by robbing suspects and innocent people, raiding homes without warrants, and selling confiscated drugs, among other crimes.Image: SALONIC/Shutterstock

One of the absolute all-time greats, Steve Caballero talks about his favorite skaters.I am always jazzed to see how awesome, and still so very cool, all my old skateboarding heroes turned out.

As the European Parliament prepares for tomorrow's vote on the new Copyright Directive with its provisions requiring mass-scale filtering of all public communications to check for copyright infringement (Article 13) and its provisions requiring paid permission to link to the news if you include as little as two words from the headline in your link text (Article 11), a dismaying number of "creators groups" are supporting it, telling their members that this will be good for them and their flagging financial fortunes. (more…)

I heard a rumor that Willem Dafoe will be filming a movie for Disney near where I've been dry camping these past six months. All of the employees at the lodge where he'll be staying have been instructed to only speak to him if he talks to them first. Gross. But not quite gross enough to keep me from wanting to see At Eternity's Gate, a new film starring Dafoe about the trials and tribulations in the life of Vincent Van Gogh.

LEGO Han in Carbonite is reason enough for me to buy the LEGO Star Wars Carbon-Freezing Chamber.While LEGO Lando isn't to be seen, he's clearly still a traitorous jerk! LEGO Han is getting frozen in carbonite! LEGO Boba and an Ugnaught are included to run the operation.LEGO Star Wars Carbon-Freezing Chamber 75137 via Amazon

In 1761 a French schooner was shipwrecked in the Indian Ocean, leaving more than 200 people stranded on a tiny island. The crew departed in a makeshift boat, leaving 60 Malagasy slaves to fend for themselves and wait for rescue. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of the Tromelin Island castaways, which one observer calls "arguably the most extraordinary story of survival ever documented."We'll also admire some hardworking cats and puzzle over a racer's death.Show notesPlease support us on Patreon!

Tackle winter's snow in over-the-top eighties luxury with this snowcat stretch limo, posted on Craigslist by its owner Robert Falck of Vancouver. This mashup of an old Bombardier SV250 Skidozer and a 1989 Cadillac Brougham limousine can be yours for the low price of $6,000 CAD (approx. $4,575 USD). Jalopnik:Falck said he built this contraption for a movie, which featured a rich guy who owned a ski resort. When filming was done, the Vancouverite decided to buy the Caddy back. Now it’s up for sale on Craigslist for a price that, he says, doesn’t reflect what he’s put into the vehicle. Falck says the thing will move, but it’s not likely to climb a mountain or blaze its own trail; the vehicle is best left on groomed trails, and it’s not likely to exceed 15 mph.Still, despite the vehicle’s limited practicality, the builder says the Cadillac Snowcat has been popular among Craigslisters. “I’m literally fielding about 30 calls a day,” he told me over the phone.Thanks, Eveline!

For better or worse, we've been trying to find ways to gauge human intelligence for hundreds of years. A century ago, Charles Spearman twigged to the notion that no matter what methodology one uses to figure out exactly how much cheese is on someone's mental cracker, the results from test to test, provided each of the methods employed are of equal complexity, should be the same. This is a very simple way of explaining the "g factor:" which Wikipedia describes as "...a variable that summarizes positive correlations among different cognitive tasks, reflecting the fact that an individual's performance on one type of cognitive task tends to be comparable to that person's performance on other kinds of cognitive tasks." So, if you're wicked good at putting together Ikea furniture using nothing but the crap instructions that come in the box, chances are you'll also be good at solving other puzzles, too. A group of scientists from Germany and Denmark feel that this same principle can also be used to judge exactly how evil a given individual is: if you're a malicious jerk in one corner of your life, the chances are very good that you'll be a sociopath about stuff in other areas as well. They're calling this crosshatching of shitty tendencies a "D-Factor":From Scientific American:Morten Moshagen and his colleagues proposed that a D-factor exists, which they define as the basic tendency to maximize one's own utility at the expense of others, accompanied by beliefs that serve as justifications for one's malevolent behaviors. In their definition, utility refers to goal achievement. For those scoring high on the D-factor, utility maximization is sought despite running contrary to the interests of others or even for the sake of bringing about negative outcomes in others.Utility in this definition does not refer to utility maximization that is irrelevant of the effect on others-- such engaging in sports to improve one's health, engaging in consensual sex, or recreational activities. Also, it should be noted that those scoring high on the D-factor aren't always uncooperative, as they can be very strategic in choosing when to cooperate. Their key prediction is that those scoring high on the D-factor will not be motivated to increase the utility of others (helping others in need) without benefiting themselves, and will not derive utility for themselves from the utility of others (e.g., being happy for the success of others).Over at Scientific American, Scott Barry Kaufman goes into great detail describing what information testing someone's D-factor may unlock and suggests a number of questions that could be used to do so. It's a short, fascinating read. Image by Unknown - Internet Archive, Public Domain, Link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUgK8I0FGF4Rudy Rucker writes, "'Return to the Hollow Earth' is my new steampunk novel of the Hollow Earth." (more…)

“Putin’s Russia,” as ABC News reports today, would have featured the Russian President hunting, fishing, and generally being a very macho man outdoors. (more…)