Excavating random links

[razzleccentric]

I found a bunch of links stuck on a notepad .txt - now I pass them on to you!

Ten Most Harmful Books of the 19th and 20th Centuries, according to HumanEvents.com (leading the Conservative movement since 1944). Surprisingly, Darwin didn't make the list... but "The Kinsey Report" did. Logical fallacies unsue!

Caffeine: A User's Guide to Getting Optimally Wired. Oh, and coffee protects your brain from the cholesterol onslaught.

Speaking of which, apparently Britons were healthier in medieval times, thanks to the low dietary cholesterol. According to a pharmacy chain who opened a history book and guesstimated the nutrient distribution. And the 8 hours of exercise per day. And disregarded things like lifespan, sanitation, infectious disease, etc.

Scientific support for one of my favorite sayings: "Men have two brains, but only enough blood for one to work at a time."

Ben Stein's "Expelled" is getting pulled from theaters because the makers plagiarized a cellular animation produced by Harvard University. I'm sure this will only serve to further convince IDiots that scientists are OUT TO GET THEM!

Because, of course, they are.

*sporfle*


PS - Dick-to-the-Dawk-to-the-PhD rolled his D&D char:
Richard Dawkins

22th-Level Evolutionary Biologist
Lawful Neutral Human
Strength: 12
Dexterity: 13
Constitution: 10
Intelligence: 18
Wisdom: 22
Charisma: 25
Special Abilities: Spell Resistance Infinite (because magic is not real).
All Cleric-Priest within 60 feet gain 2 negate levels due to logical paradox.
Special Equipment: Spectacles of Trueseeing (always sees things as they really are).

Comments

[beldar.livejournal.com]

Wow, even for a man of a little faith like me, the brain does hurt while reading the elaborations on why those "Most Harmful" books should be consigned to the "firemen."

While history and educated debate can disprove the communist works, justifying their presence on a conservative bad-books list, I'm wondering if "Mein Kampf" is only there just out of obligation to include it on any "most dangerous books" list anyone could come up with. After all, much of what Hitler and his ilk believed is echoed in so many of the paranoids, antisemites and nativists that make up a noticable part of today's conservative movement. And tell me with a straight face that neocons aren't putting "Beyond Good and Evil" (with a convenient right-wing religious coating so it goes down better) into use. Or maybe I'm thinking Machievelli -- note "The Prince" ain't on the list.

"(Marx) could not have predicted 21st Century America: a free, affluent society based on capitalism and representative government that people the world over envy and seek to emulate."
Yes, he would be amazed at the degree to which socialism and capitalism coexist today, and would be tickled at the degree to which guys like this ignore the heavy dose of socialism in Western democracies, and its effects on bringing about our "affluent society."

And it's easy in 2008 to disregard "The Feminine Mystique" but I have a different view, spending a couple of hours a week in old newspapers where women were known as "Mrs. John Smith," their true first names lost to history.