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Wednesday, 2004 December 15, 21:08 — drugwar, medicine

death by safety

Independent Institute: History of Federal [drug] Regulation (cited by Sunni Maravillosa)

Wednesday, 2004 December 15, 19:37 — humanities, neep-neep

how soon the inevitable?

My One True Ex hears from her mother a rumor of an effort to “put the New York Public Library, the Library of Congress and the British Library on line”, and commands me to ask my Vast Network of Contacts what substance there is to it.

Mike Linksvayer promptly responds:

. . . you probably heard indirectly of [press release] which includes the NYPL and several universities, but not the LoC or British Library AFAIK. The Internet Archive also has several scanning projects involving various universities and grants from the LoC and British National Archives among others, see [press release]. Perhaps a news story mentioned both archive.org and Google.

Monday, 2004 December 13, 18:19 — language

Argentine dialect?

Mail through yahoo.com.ar yesterday carried the tag Ahora podés usar Yahoo! Messenger en tu Unifón . . . . Shouldn’t podés be puedes?

Monday, 2004 December 13, 15:04 — humanities

QotD

Acton:

Many men have compressed their entire wisdom into portable aphorisms. Others have had it done for them.

Epigraph to — what else? — a collection of excerpts from the writings of Lord Acton.

I became curious as to when Acton was enlorded. Having no luck in two of the dead-tree books within reach, I turn to Wikipedia (thanks to Mike for leading me by example to acquire that habit), which mentions that our Acton’s maternal grandmother was created duc de Dalberg. Hm, I thought, what was Dalberg’s coat of arms? I open Rietstap’s Armorial and my eye soon falls on

Dalberg-Acton baron ActonShropshire (Baronet, 17 janv. 1643/44; baron, 11 déc. 1869.) . . . .

Now I need not finish reading the Wikipedia piece, ha ha. Acton’s arms, by the way, are given thus (my free translation):

Quarterly: I and IV Acton: gules semy of crosses crosslet fitchy or, two lions passant in pale argent; II and III subquarterly: 1 and 4 Kämmerer von Worms: azure, six fleurs-de-lis argent and a chief indented or; 2 and 3 Dalberg: or, a cross ancry sable; and over the subquarters an inescutcheon, azure, a tower argent. Crest: within a torse argent and gules, a human leg in armor, couped at the thigh and dripping blood. Supporters: two lions gardant proper, each collared of a chain or, and hanging therefrom a cross ancry gules.

No motto given here.

Monday, 2004 December 13, 08:52 — psychology

linky goodness

Robin Hanson: Is Fairness About Clear Fitness Signals?

Ryan Sager: The Killing of Peter McWilliams

Linda Schrock Taylor: Great Ideas of Homeschooling

. . By the way, I recently tried to post a comment on an old entry, and ran into a bug. If you yearn to express yourself and are similarly frustrated, there’s always mail.

Sunday, 2004 December 12, 16:22 — constitution

approof of appudding

What would political campaigns be like if approval voting — in which a vote for X cannot cause Y to lose to Z — were the rule?

Candidates other than the frontrunners might do more “positive” than “negative” campaigning, in the hope of mutual coat-tailing.

The major parties, rather than putting all their eggs in one basket, might (at least when not backing an incumbent) put up several candidates.

Saturday, 2004 December 11, 14:54 — drugwar, futures, medicine, security theater

links without comment

Barlow v TSA (password-protected) (thanks Sunah)

Tasteless Screeners Awards

Gun Grabbers Say the Damnedest Things!

School as prison

What is Too Human? The ethics of human-animal chimeras

An Indian’s Thanksgiving Proposal

Give ’em what they want: more government

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