How Do We Get the Kids to Vote?
Andy Abeyta, Quad-City Times/Quad-City Times via ZUMA As I’m sure you all know, the latest craze among kids is the Juul, a vaping device that produces pure (flavored) nicotine hits. That’s it. No tobacco, no tar, nothing that has ever touched soil. Just nicotine. Over at the New Yorker, Jia Tolentino writes about Juuling this…
Why Do We Have So Many Short Buildings?
Tyler Cowen poses a conundrum that I’ve also wondered about: Why aren’t all tall buildings in the same neighborhood the same height? Let’s say there is a 40-story building and a 60-story building. You would think the different builders face more or less the same costs for their height decisions. If you want to own…
Gavin Newsom Tagged as Big Fat Liar
Rory Merry/AFLO/ZUMAPRESS In an ad currently running on every TV in California, our well-coiffed lieutenant governor, Gavin Newsom, says he was “the first to take on the National Rifle Association and win.” This has unleashed a tsunami of tut-tutting, like today’s column in the LA Times from George Skelton: You’ve got to wonder what goes…
Chess Robots Are Getting Kind of Sneaky
PhotoXpress/ZUMApress From Garry Kasparov, trying to get everyone to calm down about increasingly intelligent AI: Imagine a chess program with the potential to trounce human opponents and explain its moves to us, revealing the patterns that turn knowledge into practical wisdom, like a father teaching chess to his daughter or son. That sounds so cozy.…
Wall Street Got Its Tax Cut, and Now It’s Depressed
I don’t follow the stock market super closely, but I was curious about why I haven’t heard Donald Trump bragging about it lately. This is why: The market seems to have spiked in anticipation of the tax cut, but then it slumped once it finally got its tax cut. Kinda strange. I guess they’ve got…
Eels Are Not Afraid of the Dark
EelsThe DeconstructionE Works/PIAS Mark Oliver Everett, who records as Eels, could be mistaken for a modern-day Job, recounting tales of extreme psychic distress in a weary rasp of a voice that suggests he’s perilously close to the breaking point. On his first studio outing in four years, Everett mixes up the grooves with his usual…