Quote of the Day
“When many remedies are proposed for a disease, that means the disease is incurable.”
-Anton Chekhov
“When many remedies are proposed for a disease, that means the disease is incurable.”
-Anton Chekhov
I have written a couple blog posts recently based on reflections inspired by Daniel Okrent’s wonderful book, Last Call. But there are so many wonderful tidbits from this book, I thought I’d share a few of my favorite quotes. First there is William Jennings Bryan, a prominent force in the Democratic Party at the end…
I have been thinking a lot about C Everett Koop lately, ever since his death on February 25 at the ripe old age of 96 and more recently with the announcement that our current Surgeon General, Regina Benjamin, is planning to step down from that post. In particular, I have been pondering what made Koop…
Widower Woodrow Wilson fell in love with Edith Galt in 1915. The President’s doorkeeper summarized the situation tersely: “She’s a looker; he’s a goner.” (Click here to view comments)
In recent posts, I’ve presented several interesting pictures of how arbitrary thresholds influence behavior. I showed how airplane pilots speed up flights to make on-time arrivals, but don’t speed up late flights that won’t make it on time. I’ve shown that the price of used cars changes when the mileage on the odometer passes arbitrary round…
I recently read Margalit Fox’s wonderful book, “The Riddle of the Labyrinth,” which tells the extraordinary tale of how three people, working in parallel, figured out the meaning of what, to me, look like random scribbles on ancient tablets – the language known as Linear B. In trying to deduce the riddle of these scribbles,…
One of the great pleasures of blogging is reaching new audiences and, better yet, interacting with new people. On the other hand, blogging also puts us bloggers into contact with unpleasant commenters. This unpleasantness has compelled me to establish some guidelines for my own on-line behavior. First, I strive always to blog, and to comment…