Not! (Hey, if we can’t get our corrupt and lazy lawmakers to end daylight saving time, then at the very least let’s change the name of Daylight Saving Time Day to “Path Dependence Day.” In the meantime, can you think of any other examples of path dependence?)
Photo credit: Hannah Jane DeCiutiis
Among other things, the Metropolitan Museum of Art features 21 period rooms in its American Wing, ranging from a 17th-century colonial interior to an enormous Prairie-style living room by Frank Lloyd Wright, but as Penelope Green reports, “the newest addition [to the Met] … is an unexpected meditation on modern city life: a modest closet from a studio apartment in the West Village, filled with the curious, lovely, and very particular personal effects of Sara Berman, a Belarussian and Israeli émigré …” According to the Met, the artists Maira and Alex Kalman (who are also Berman’s daughter and grandson), inspired by the beauty and simplicity of Berman’s closet, have recreated her closet and its contents as an art installation.
How do you like them apples? These curious carvings were created by Gaku, an imaginative and inventive Japanese artist whose canvas consists of perishable fruits and vegetables. (Hat tip: Kottke.)
Microsoft billionaire and quasi-monopolist Bill Gates recently proposed that we should tax robots. But should we really tax robots? Why not impose a tax on every line of computer code instead? Or why not tax computer programmers who sport beards? Via Wikipedia: “In 1698, Peter I of Russia instituted a beard tax to bring Russian society in line with Western European models. [1] To enforce the ban on beards, the tsar empowered police to forcibly and publicly shave those who refused to pay the tax. [2] Resistance to going clean shaven was widespread, with many believing that it was a religious requirement for a man to wear a beard. [3] The tax levied depended upon the status of the bearded man: Those associated with the Imperial Court, military, or government were charged 60 rubles annually; wealthy merchants were charged 100 rubles per year while other merchants, and townsfolk were charged 60 rubles per year; Muscovites were charged 30 rubles per year; and peasants were charged two half-kopeks every time they entered a city. [4]” Notice the “progressive” nature of this old Russian beard tax. (The footnotes are below the fold.)
Save me from Bill Gates…
He would have still won the election! Maria Guadalupe and Joe Salvatore, professors at NYU, conducted an ingenious experiment (see video below) and found some surprising results. Happy International Women’s Day and be sure to check out the video below (hat tip: Alex Tabarrok) for a demonstration of Professors Guadalupe and Salvatore role-reversal experiment:
You can read more about the Pan American Highway here.
Source: brilliantmaps.com
Although modern probability theory dates to the 1600s, our ancestors have been playing games of chance for a very long time. Via the amazing Cliff Pickover, for example, check out this ancient die (circa 2500 B.C.) from the Indus Valley Civilization. (Photo Credit: Lahore Museum in Lahore, Pakistan.)
The Lucky Five?
Have you ever downloaded copyrighted content from the Internet or shared your Netflix password with a friend? We sure have! In our next class, we will debate the law and ethics of copyright infringement and discuss how the law attempts to balance “fair use” (or sharing) with property rights in the domain of copyrights. In particular, we will focus on two cases: The Sony Betamax Case (decided in the mid-1980s) as well as Metallica v. Napster (decided in the early 2000s). In summary, before Sean Parker discovered Facebook, he had co-founded a company called Napster in 1999, a peer-to-peer file-sharing website that allowed users to share MP3 music files with each other. Napster became an instant success; according to Wikipedia, “verified Napster use peaked with 26.4 million users worldwide in February 2001.” The rock group Metallica, however, wasted no time in filing a federal lawsuit for copyright infringement against Napster, and the courts eventually issued an injunction shutting down the website … But did the court make the correct decision, and on what legal grounds did the court issue this draconian remedy, i.e. the injunction shutting down Napster?
Have you seen fugitive war criminal George W. Bush’s collection of oil paintings of veterans? (See fragment below.) These remarkable portraits are assembled in his new book Portraits of Courage: A Commander in Chief’s Tribute to America’s Warriors. This series of portraits got me thinking … Just as the Library of Congress appoints a United States Poet Laureate, who serves as the nation’s official poet for a designated term, why don’t we also create a space for an Artist Laureate, a Movie Director Laureate, or even a Blogger Laureate as well?
Matt Thomas just brought this beautiful TV ad to our attention via his blog. The ad in question is composed of a series of movie scenes featuring the iconic Rolex watch. (In several of these classic scenes, the actors actually refer to the brand by name!) Some marketing scholars, however, claim that product placement is an unethical business practice and should be regulated by law. (See here, for example.) We totally disagree with this claim. Whether product placement is ethical or not (i.e. a form of deception), regulating this practice would probably do more harm than good. After all, how could a director shoot a motion picture without placing any products in his film?
Hopefully It’s Interesting.
In Conversation with Legal and Moral Philosophers
PhD, Jagiellonian University
Books, papers, and other jurisprudential things
Ramblings of a retiree in France
BY GRACE THROUGH FAITH
Natalia's space
hoping we know we're living the dream
Lover of math. Bad at drawing.
We hike, bike, and discover Central Florida and beyond
Making it big in business after age 40
Reasoning about reasoning, mathematically.
I don't mean to sound critical, but I am; so that's how it comes across
remember the good old days...
"Let me live, love and say it well in good sentences." - Sylvia Plath
a personal view of the theory of computation
Submitted For Your Perusal is a weblog wherein Matt Thomas shares and writes about things he thinks are interesting.
Logic at Columbia University
Just like the Thesis Whisperer - but with more money
the sky is no longer the limit
Technology, Culture, and Ethics
Just like the horse whisperer - but with more pages
Poetry, Other Words, and Cats
prior probability 