prior probability

My wife and I will be attending the Miami, Florida stop of the Drake-Migos Tour on 14 November. In honor of these contemporary artists, below the fold are two of our favorite Drake/Migos songs, along with some artful choreography: Continue reading →

To celebrate our impending “200,000th hit” (see the counter on the right side of the desktop version of our blog), we are sharing this fun rendition of “Let’s Groove” by Earth, Wind, and Fire. The choreography is a smash! (Hat tip: Rachel Wong.)

One aspect of Mexican culture that has always fascinated me is the custom of making ofrendas to honor the dead. (An ofrenda is a collection of physical objects–some sacred, others profane–placed on a ritual display, usually during the annual “Dia de los Muertos” celebration every 2 November, and many ofrendas are quite large and elaborate.) The Mexic-Arte Museum in Austin, Texas contains, among other things, an eclectic collection of ofrendas. Most of the museum’s ofrendas honor actual persons, but the one below honors Cri-Cri, a beloved Mexican cartoon character!

The First World War ended on this day 100 years ago (11 Nov 1918), when Germany surrendered to the Allies. The combatants then negotiated the Treaty of Versailles, which was signed on 28 June 1918, formally ending “the war to end all wars.” (As an aside, the Great War inspired a class of strategic games known as Blotto Games, and this branch of game theory has informed our understanding of civil litigation. For more, see our work-in-progress “The Colonel Blotto Litigation Game.”)

As Aatish Bhatia notes (via Wired): “A sheet of paper placed across two books can’t even support the weight of a pencil. But if you corrugate the sheet by folding it a few times, it supports a can of beans!” (hat tip: @pickover)

Credit: Aatish Bhatia

Given the enormous increase in voter turnout during this year’s midterm elections, doesn’t President Trump deserve a lot of credit for this swell at the polls? (See chart below for average voter turnout rates in previous U.S. elections this century.) After all, whether by design or by accident, Trump was somehow able to accomplish what so many other politicians, sundry rock stars, and various assorted do-gooders weren’t able to do: he got more people to vote than ever before!

Credit: Brookings Institute