Most math teachers wish they had a dollar for every time some cheeky 14-year-old raised his hand in their class and asked, “Am I ever going to use this even once in my life?” I’ll grant that, if you’re not …
Author: craigshields
Flywheels as Energy Storage
The subject of energy storage is like anything else in technology: lots of entrants of completely different types that, over time are winnowed down, and ultimately, the “winners win and the losers lose.” What happens next is that the losers …
Tagged with: Flywheels as Energy Storage
What Americans’ Tattoos Signify
Here’s a woman with a tattoo that reminds us that about 45% of our countrymen have joined a cult of ignorance and hate, and another 5% are in another, closely related cult: one of selfishness and greed. Both vote for …
Tagged with: cult of ignorance and hate
Question on Grammar
From a reader, with my comments below: So, I started this sentence with ‘so’! And I followed up by starting another with a conjunction. But do I care? There are many people who object to these practices, condemning them as …
Tagged with: Question on Grammar
Why Mars?
I’m not a billionaire, let alone one with the net worth of Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk, so maybe I’m the wrong guy to ask, but I would say that the answer to the question that this young man raises …
Tagged with: why mars?
What the American People Need to Take Away from Trump’s Flipping Off the U.S. Justice Department
At left are the words of U.S. representative Adam Schiff. Sure, conservatives view Schiff as some sort of blend of the anti-Christ and Karl Marx, but doesn’t he have a point here? Didn’t the American people have a right to have …
Tagged with: Trump's Flipping Off the U.S. Justice Department
The Unelected Bureaucracy
When people like Ramaswamy are taken to be serious candidates to become president of the United States, it can only be because the people they’re speaking to are morons. It’s a grotesque truth–but one we’re forced to accept.
Tagged with: Unelected Bureaucracy
Trump and U.S. Foreign Relations
The author of this meme asks a very good question–one I would love to have answered before I check out of here. If you surveyed everyone who voted against Trump, I think you’ve find four prevalent responses: • Trump has …
Tagged with: Trump and U.S. Foreign Relations
Haunted by Disappointment
Perhaps there were times in U.S. history when government failed the people in a way that was not too different from what we have today. I heard recently that the robber-barons of the late 19th Century were so corrupt that …
Tagged with: Donald Trump in the White House
Which Generation of Americans Was “The Best?”
This photo appears to have been taken about the same year I was these kids’ age, ca. 1965. It depicts white and black school students , all standing to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. What made this generation “the best?” …
