The consequences of believing stupid sh#t: The Republican party has arguably become increasingly anti-science in the last few years. The majority of Republicans are creationist. Perhaps more interestingly, in 2008, the Republican party platform contemplated "addressing climate change responsibly." In 2012, there was no mention of it whatsoever, reflecting growing denial about anthropogenic global warming in the party.
Republicans are shifting their platform to reflect the ideals held by their base. But there are consequences to an anti-science platform, and one of the most notable is increased alienation among those at the forefront of technology. Nate Silver has a great piece about how this may have contributed to their downfall in the most recent election cycle.
Speaking of anti-science and its consequences: Some scary news about ice melt in Greenland. Apparently, polar ice caps are melting at three times faster a rate than 20 years ago.
Apparently, Carl Sagan was involved in covert ops: During the cold war, the US had plans to nuke the moon. And the US Air Force put Carl Sagan on the team that planned the operation.
8 loops = creamy: Someone is working on algorithms to help predict whether a recipe will taste good.
Not-so-easy arguments for the left: One popular argument of the left to increase marginal tax rates is that tax rates were much higher in the '50s and '60s, and the US economy still grew much faster then than it does today. This always struck me as a bit simplistic. Most critically, the US population was growing much, much faster then. It's natural that economic growth would also be easier to achieve then. It would also appear that the actual tax rates paid by the wealthiest back then were nowhere near as high as the marginal rates would seem to indicate. Not sure exactly what this means for tax policy, but it's an important point to keep in mind when debating tax policy.
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