CapitalistImperialistPig

I might have previously mentioned that everyone in Hollywood who can afford a publicist has a stratospheric IQ*, or at least one higher than Richard Feynman, and that 160 seems to be the mode of the distribution. So does everybody named Trump, except for Eric who is reportedly a couple of IQ points short of the Feynman standard. So do most prominent athletes, including those you would swear couldn't pour piss out of a boot if the instructions were printed on the heel. Football players are not prominently mentioned on the list, probably because the NFL tests everybody with the Wonderlic, and the average NFL Wonderlic score is 20, while an IQ of 100 corresponds roughly to a Wonderlic of 22. Quarterbacks and offensive linemen are the brainiacs of the NFL, averaging about 24. By comparison, a Wonderlic of 29 would correspond to IQ 115. Pat McInally, a Harvard grad, was the John von Neumann of the NFL Wonderlic, scoring a perfect 50 out of 50. I expect that a few of the numbers...

Irma is a big powerful major hurricane that is still far out in the Atlantic, but several models a pushing it into the East Coast near one or another major cities (DC, Philadelphia, or New York). It's much too early to put much credence in these models, but emergency responders there need to be prepared. By the time landfall is imminent, it will be way too late.

The Indo European (IE) Languages are the most widespread in the world, now spoken virtually everywhere, but widespread in Eurasia more than 2000 years ago. The discovery of deep affinities between many of the major languages of India and those of Europe was one of the seminal events in linguistic history, but soon became ensnarled in racist and political controversies. The sequencing of ancient DNA from human fossils seems to have clarified the prehistory of Europe: an early population of hunter gatherers was largely but not completely replaced by neolithic farmers from the Iran and the Middle East, and they in turn were substantially replaced by mostly male pastoralists from Central Asia. These pastoralists are very likely to have brought the Indo-European languages. The situation in India is more fraught, partly because many Indian nationalists are offended by the idea that their civilization might not be autochthonous, but more importantly because we don't yet have good anci...

What's very slightly smaller than a breadbox, weighs about as much as one of those armored Chevy Suburbans favored by the Secret Service, and packed with most known information about relativity, optics, statistical mechanics, fluid and plasma dynamics, and elasticity? If you took the hint and guessed Modern Classical Physics: Optics, Fluids, Plasmas, Elasticity, Relativity, and Statistical Physics by Kip S. Thorne and Roger D. Blandford, you would be right. Yes, my hard copy finally arrived. Fans of Thorne's previous collaboration in the monster truck textbook category ( Gravitation, with Misner and Wheeler ) may be heartened to note that MCP shares the same large page format, has nearly 300 more pages, and weighs a lot more, thanks in part to its hardcover format. The text is based on the course that the authors' taught at Caltech. As to exactly why this was published as a single volume, rather than three, four or even five normal sized textbooks, I can only specula...

Translations: 1) I don't have a clue 2) I got nothin'

India, Bangladesh, and Nepal are currently experiencing even more catastrophic flooding. Over 1000 dead. Story and pictures . The world has more than enough catastrophes to go around.

Rebuilding Houston will cost tens, or quite possibly, hundreds of billions of dollars. Twenty Texas US Representatives and both Senators voted against the bill to provide relief to victims of Hurricane Sandy. One of them at least, Ted Cruz, is busy lying about his vote now. They should be ashamed, and so should their constituents who approved of their behavior, but now is not the time for bitterness or revenge. Northeasterners and liberals should turn the other cheek, and they and all Americans should promptly approve an aggressive package to ameliorate the devastation in Houston and elsewhere by Hurricane Harvey. It's the right thing to do for America and for Texas. If we are lucky, the good example will inspire others. A nation is far stronger when we all see ourselves as being in the same boat.