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August 14, 2004

LauraFries.com's thoughts: 'Ello. Could non-Poynter emails be provided for you young gentlemen? I have things of an... >>

And We're Off...

Robin and I ship out tomorrow to our respective stops in California (I'm going straight to Fresno; he's making a week-long stop-off in Michigan before heading to Sacto). So Snarkmarket, a little dusty and unused these past couple weeks while we've been making our preparations to move, will continue to gather dust for a week or so more. I know it will be difficult for you to bear the continuing wait. But next time you hear from us, it'll be from Californ-eye-ay. And we'll be back with a vengeance. Promise.

mthompson-sig.gif
Posted August 14, 2004 at 10:24 | Comments (7) | Permasnark
File under: Gleeful Miscellany

August 4, 2004

Tim's thoughts: Here's the Chronicle link on d à vu: <a href="http://chronicle.com/free/v50/i46/46a01201... >>

It's Raining Brains

Coming soon from the people that brought you "Google Hacks" and many others:

"Brain Hacks"??

Oh yes.

At first I was afraid this was going to actually be, like, ways to mess with your brain. (I feel like that subject has been well-documented elsewhere.) Instead it sounds to be more of a user's guide:

I'm talking about minute-by-minute stuff: This is why you scratch your face when somebody else does. This is what will grab your attention in the corner of your eye, and this is what won't. Why the status icons in the corner of your desktop should be black and white and not in colour. That's what Brain Hacks is about, letting you see how all that works, from a standing start.

We, the nerdy public, have been treated to many good brain books in recent years.

Steven Pinker's excellent "How the Mind Works" was one of the best books I read in college, and Steven Berlin Johnson's "Mind Wide Open," which I kinda stalled out on in the middle of the second chapter, still looks really good -- he uses his own brain as a lens to explore and explain modern neuro- and cognitive science.

Malcolm Gladwell is coming out with a brain book, too, though his has a different angle. I actually heard about it back in November 2002. Here's a re-enactment:

Setting: a large house in Cambridge, Mass., full of journalists.

Robin: (sidles up) Hey, Malcolm. Nice speech.

Malcolm: (with huge afro) Thanks.

R: So, whatcha working on now?

M: Book on intuition.

R: Cool.

End scene.

Now Jason Kottke has the deets from Amazon.com:

Drawing on cutting-edge neuroscience and psychology, he shows how the difference between good decision-making and bad has nothing to do with how much information we can process quickly, but on the few particular details on which we focus.

Apparently Gladwell "leaps boldly from example to example" as well.

I think all these books are actually very important insofar as they all seem to be based on actual science and not just neat-sounding theories.

As Matt Webb, a co-author of the new "Brain Hacks" book, explains, there really is all this new knowledge -- generated only in the last few years -- that has yet to be absorbed by the public, even the smart book-readin' Web-surfin' public. We really do have access to way, way more legitimate information about our minds than Kant could ever have dreamed of -- now we just have to learn it.

So, "Brain Hacks" looks fun. "Blink," too.

I'm sure there will a "Your Brain for Dummies" before long.

Robin-sig.gif
Posted August 4, 2004 at 12:14 | Comments (3) | Permasnark
File under: Braiiins

August 1, 2004

"Chemotherapeutically Nauseating"

So you've seen the pictures of John Kerry in a protective blue jumpsuit, crawling around inside the space shuttle Discovery with John Glenn. Looks dorky, it's like Dukakis in the tank helmet, whatever, no actual events are occurring in the world, etc.

Here's Clive Thompson with the ultimate meta-commentary:

Of course, Kerry was wearing completely standard-issue scientific gear. He was dressed the way scientists dress all the time. Which is what makes this little media pile-on so chemotherapeutically nauseating -- because of course, the point is that scientists are about as "unmanly" as you can get. [...]

Hey, I've got an idea. If political pundits and right-wing assholes find scientists such laughable fools, why don't they all go live on an island somewhere utterly devoid of scientific progress past, say, the 13th century? Then they can all foam at the mouth with scurvy and beat each other to death with human thighbones.

I was going to write something about the popular perception of scientists and engineers, the coolness of FIRST, blah blah blah, but forget it. Just bask in Clive's righteous indignation.

Robin-sig.gif
Posted August 1, 2004 at 11:44 | Comments (0) | Permasnark
File under: Society/Culture
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