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Who’ll win, Al Gore or George W. Bush? Let me explain why my statistical model proves Al Gore is gonna be Mr. 43. Oh, wait– the election was a decade ago, argh. So much for my 10,000 word essay! When it comes to politics, the longer you hold off, the better the return you get [...]

Truth, no matter how inconvenient, is more beautiful than fiction. An Echo Chamber is a community based around a subjective set of assumptions, which never questions those assumptions, and twists everything into supporting those assumptions. It can be useful and profitable to spend some time in such a community, because of the unique lens they [...]

Child psychologists once noticed an amazing pattern. Whenever six or more children got together, either three would become mutual friends, or three would become mutual non-friends. It was more than mere rule of thumb: it happened every single time, without fail, without even one single “exception that proves the rule”. The psychologists were baffled, and [...]

Is there a certain optimal work week length? Of course, different jobs require different amounts of work, but I’m talking about on average. In the U.S. right now, there’s supposedly an average work week of around 40 hours a week. If so, should it depend on the state of technology? This comes down to what [...]

There are great teachers out there, but there are also lousy ones. Practically every kid who goes through the school system eventually experiences being Smarter Than The Teacher. In high school, I once got a calculus textbook confiscated because the principal felt it was a distraction during algebra class. It can feel frustrating, especially in [...]

We see them all the time. On television, newscasters nod deferentially while Very Serious People tell us what to believe. On the street, we see them wearing their suits, scowls on their faces, always running off to their next Powerpoint Presentation. Who are these mysterious people? Why are they always so miserable and guarded? I [...]

We all love the land of Hello Kitty, but some of us take it too far. Some of the white guys teaching English in Japan want to really become Japanese. Their efforts to morph their race go unacknowledged by local authorities and up goes the old cry: “Racism!” It’s true, no matter how fluent Billy [...]

Whether he holds great power or is just a figurehead, the ultimate measure of a king’s success is whether he continues his line. He might conquer the whole world by force and brilliant strategy, but if he has no heir, his accomplishment will be completely unwoven by the competing warlords in the vacuum of power. [...]

History has been full of arbitrary kings, temporary monarchies built in the sand, artificial and forced. But there is an intrinsic and natural monarchy, a hidden and subtle monarchy with no explicit decrees or crowns or throne rooms, but in the long run this monarchy has absolute authority over all mankind. This is Mathematical Royalty, [...]

A dystopia is a utopia which went astray And admit it, to someone from the 1900′s, we have all the components of a utopia. We have so much abundance that a very tiny minority of farmers can provide food for everyone, and the vast majority never has to worry how big the next harvest is. [...]