"Whole streets flipped from white to black, almost overnight," Casey-Leininger said. "Real estate practices of the day were largely unscrupulous."

One method was known as "blockbusting," when an agent or lender would start a rumor that a black family was moving onto a street, that whites were moving out and homeowners should sell to avoid plummeting property value. Real estate listings in The Enquirer in 1954 advertised homes for sale in Avondale as "Colored Man's Dream" and "Unrestricted."

http://m.cincinnati.com/enquirertopnews/article?a=2012303190016&f=880

"As you get older and you accumulate more things in life through the game here, then it becomes how much do you still love to play?" Baker said. "Then it becomes if you have pain, how much more pain can you tolerate. I know he loves to play, and right now he's not in pain."

http://m.cincinnati.com/sports/article?a=2012303140157&f=881

One day I'm sure everyone will routinely collect all sorts of data about themselves. But because I've been interested in data for a very long time, I started doing this long ago. I actually assumed lots of other people were doing it too, but apparently they were not. And so now I have what is probably one of the world's largest collections of personal data.

http://blog.stephenwolfram.com/2012/03/the-personal-analytics-of-my-life/

Falling oil consumption is rare and, in the absence of recession, almost unprecedented. In fact, the United States has only experienced declining oil consumption without an accompanying recession once -- during a 12-month period from 1980 to 1981. In every other instance -- 1973, 1979, 1981, 1990, 2001, and 2008 -- a fall in oil use has gone hand in hand with recession. And, in each case but 2001, rising oil prices were implicated as a cause of the economic slowdown.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/03/05/the_petrostates_of_america

It's reasonable to conclude that speculators are also playing a key role in the current oil-price run-up, in addition to the sabre-rattling over Iran and other geopolitical and economic factors. A study by none other than Goldman Sachs has found that each million barrels' worth of speculation adds 10 cents to every barrel of oil. There were about 233.9 million crude oil contracts that were the subject of speculation as of Feb. 28. Thus speculation added $23.39 to the price of a $108 barrel of oil, which translates to 56 cents a gallon at the pump. Without speculation, Forbes writer Bob Lenzner notes, a barrel of oil would have cost as little as $74.61, and the cost of fuel would have been $3.12 a gallon on Feb. 28, and not the price it was actually commanding in the northeastern U.S.: $3.68.

http://www.salon.com/2012/03/07/the_real_way_to_hold_down_gas_prices/singleton/?mobile.html

Whenever Julio received his reward, his brain activity would spike in a manner that suggested he was experiencing happiness.

http://mobile.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2012/02/an_excerpt_from_charles_duhigg_s_the_power_of_habit_.single.html

But increasingly I think these issues --how we move "freely" online, or more properly, how we pay one way or another -- are actually the leading edge of a much bigger discussion about the relationship between our digital and physical selves. I don't mean theoretically or psychologically. I mean that the norms established to improve how often people click ads may end up determining who you are when viewed by a bank or a romantic partner or a retailer who sells shoes.

http://m.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/02/im-being-followed-how-google-and-104-other-companies-are-tracking-me-on-the-web/253758/

a 250-qubit quantum computer would contain more bits that there are particles in the universe.

"Whereas psychologists tend to view humans as fallible and sometime even self-destructive, economists tend to view people as efficient maximisers of self-interest who make mistakes only when imperfectly informed about the consequences of their actions."

http://neurosciencenews.com/economics-brain-how-people-make-decisions/

"The fundamental problem in all this is there are a lot of different opinions in town as to whether the trustees are sort of willfully evil or just incompetent,"

http://m.yahoo.com/w/news_america/351-old-sparks-bitter-dispute-mass-221843513.html?orig_host_hdr=news.yahoo.com&.intl=us&.lang=en-us

"Coach told us there's no offense, no plays, just play,"

http://m.espn.go.com/ncb/gamecast?gameId=320542132

The secret was the timing: If new proteins couldn’t be created during the act of remembering, then the original memory ceased to exist. The erasure was also exceedingly specific. The rats could still learn new associations, and they remained scared of other sounds associated with a shock but that hadn’t been played during the protein block. They forgot only what they’d been forced to remember while under the influence of the protein inhibitor.

Ambulances weaved through narrow backstreets to ferry the injured to hospital, dodging burning trash bins and the running battles between rioters and police.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/2012/02/12/greek-debt-deal_n_1271524.html

The reason that upper-middle-class children dominate the population of elite schools is that the parents of the upper-middle class now produce a disproportionate number of the smartest children.

http://m.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/02/the-truth-about-income-inequality-in-america/252892/

If she has turned herself into what she thinks we all want, then we resent her for thinking so lowly of us.

http://www.salon.com/2012/02/02/lana_del_rey_and_the_new_culture_of_failure/singleton/?mobile.html

"I've come to the conclusion in my 11 years in Congress that it isn't necessarily a difference in philosophy between Republicans and Democrats -- there's a difference in philosophy between urban and rural," Rehberg said.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/2012/02/02/denny-rehberg-child-labor_n_1250207.html

Yet another pragmatic argument in favor of the belief in immortality appeals to the need to find meaning in life. Perhaps Miguel de Unamuno’s Del sentimiento tragico de la vida is the most emblematic philosophical treatise advocating this argument: in Unamuno’s opinion, belief in immortality is irrational, but nevertheless necessary to avoid desperation in the face of life’s absurdity. Only by believing that our lives will have an ever-lasting effect, do we find motivation to continue to live. If, on the contrary, we believe that everything will ultimately come to an end and nothing will survive, it becomes pointless to carry on any activity.

Understanding of the self only arises in relationship, in watching yourself in relationship to people, ideas, and things; to trees, the earth, and the world around you and within you. Relationship is the mirror in which the self is revealed.

Gravity slows time, so that it runs a little bit slower in the basement of your house than it does on the roof

Perhaps we will gradually get used to the weird ways of our cosmos and find its strangeness to be part of its charm

Our capacity to retain memories and develop foresight allows us to plan for the future, says Edelman, by using a mental "personal space-time machine" that jumps between past, present and future.

http://www.salon.com/2012/01/28/the_neuroscience_of_happiness/singleton/?mobile.html

I came to see it as a social experiment, because what I learned, surprisingly, is that until about the 1950s,there was no society in the history of our species that supported large numbers of people living alone. Since then, living alone has become incredibly common, throughout the developed world. Wherever there is affluence, and a welfare state, people use their resources to get places of their own.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/Eric-Klinenberg-on-Going-Solo.html?device=android

"There are two things people say about the streetcar" in Portland, Ore., says Michael Andersen, creator of the publication Portland Afoot. "One is, 'The streetcar is soooo sloooow.' And the other is, 'I loooove the streetcar.'"

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/17/in_the_future_urban_bikers_go_faster_than_cars/singleton/?mobile.html

Each night, an Obama aide hands the President a binder of documents to review. After his wife goes to bed, at around ten, Obama works in his study, the Treaty Room, on the second floor of the White House residence. President Bush preferred oral briefings; Obama likes his advice in writing.

Those entrepreneurs with more "entropic" and "diverse" social networks scored three times higher on a metric of innovation, suggesting that the ability to access "non-redundant information from peers" is a crucial source of new ideas.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/01/opposites-dont-attract-and-thats-bad-news/

Old or new, Jacksonianism has always combined the pretense of egalitarian rebellion against privilege with the reality of domination by upper-class rentiers and crony capitalists.

http://www.salon.com/2012/01/17/why_do_the_republicans_nominate_blue_bloods/singleton/?mobile.html

"You say, man, this is what it feels like once it's over period," Gates said. "Everybody's time will come to an end. I think it makes you appreciate it more and really try to grasp the game more while you're still able to play."

http://m.cincinnati.com/collegesports/article?a=2012301120181&f=1660

''I'm Eli's oldest friend,'' James Montgomery says, ''and I don't think I've ever had a serious conversation with him. The last time he called we spent 15 minutes trying to figure out the last song in 'Teen Wolf.' ''

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/19/magazine/19MANNING.html?pagewanted=all&%23038;position=

The average NFL career is about three years long. Your average football player is 28 years old when he's forced into retirement. He has no marketable skills, his knees are shot, and his brain is probably damaged, and the thing he's been doing his whole life, the thing that gives his life meaning and value, the thing he's been told he can do better than anyone else—well, he can't do that thing anymore. That part of his life is over; what is he going to do now? Within two years of retirement 78 percent of NFL players are in bankruptcy or close to it.

http://www.themorningnews.org/post/wild-card-weekend

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

From a system point of view, when an understanding of information theory is combined with genetics, then life is an accumulation of information with a measurable per-generation information gain. The concept of "I" is just a consequence of our subject/object language structure and it's looking more likely that language syntax is innate. It's always better to ask "what is the purpose?" of rather than "what is the meaning of?". If you ask what's the purpose of the concept of "I" then the answer seems quite clear to me.. to enable communication. This can also be viewed in an evolutionary context.

Do you realize—that everyone you know someday will die? And instead of saying all of your goodbyes—let them know You realize that life goes fast It's hard to make the good things last You realize the sun doesn't go down It's just an illusion caused by the world spinning round

http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/do-you-realize-by-the-flaming-lips

Congress is endlessly complex, because complexity can be a useful tool in wielding power without scrutiny.

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/12/matt-stoller-why-ron-paul-challenges-liberals.html

The market price of coconuts is low, but the utility I would derive from a gift of coconuts is actually negative.

The probability of a successful manoeuvre increases as more and more people adopt a bias in one direction, until the tendency sticks. Whether it’s right or left does not matter; what does is that it is the unspoken will of the majority.

myelination seems to increase with practice, suggesting that the insulation and repetitive use of our neurons play an important role in the development of expertise. (This is what's known as muscle memory.)

http://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/athletes/Some-Reassembly-Required.html?page=all

The past and future are equally real. This isn't completely accepted,
but it should be. Intuitively we think that the "now" is real, while
the past is fixed and in the books, and the future hasn't yet
occurred. But physics teaches us something remarkable: every event in
the past and future is implicit in the current moment. This is hard to
see in our everyday lives, since we're nowhere close to knowing
everything about the universe at any moment, nor will we ever be — but
the equations don't lie. As Einstein put it, "It appears therefore
more natural to think of physical reality as a four dimensional
existence, instead of, as hitherto, the evolution of a three
dimensional existence."

http://mblogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2011/09/01/ten-things-everyone-should-know-about-time/

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The University of California-Berkeley, which is forbidden by state law
to consider race in admissions, is more than 40 percent Asian — up
from about 20 percent before the law was passed.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/story/2011-12-03/asian-students-college-applications/51620236/1

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If we all had balanced budgets, we would not have capitalism.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/acomm;jsessionid=CED4E5281A30679C94A0DCA3BB0048F0.w5?a=868275

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We learn how to be mad, the same way we learn how to be male or
female, or how we learn how to participate in society. We look to
others we respect and imitate their behaviors. We follow the
instructions of teachers and parents, and we are subtly punished or
rewarded for various quirks until we learn to mold ourselves in a
certain way to avoid responses we don't like and attain the responses
we do.

http://www.thesmartset.com/article/article10281101.aspx

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Mind-reading, then, has become a reality. It is crude. The results
would not stand up in court—yet. But, as the Franck report said of
America's first atom bomb, the thing does work.

http://www.economist.com/node/21534748

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Which is not to say that musicians should reflexively adhere to the
static desires of their fan base, because that's bad, too; on a
personal level, I'm glad Metallica and Reed⁠2⁠ tried this, if only
because I'm always a fan of bad ideas.

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7146312/lou-reed-metallica-album

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The Hunter from 1959 and 1960 was this long, lean, athletic, handsome man, who used to type The Great Gatsby over and over to see what it felt like to write a masterpiece. 

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2011/10/23/johnny-depp-on-hunter-s-thompson.html

"You know, the Clovis-first model has been dying for some time," he
finished. "But there's nothing harder to change than a paradigm, than
long-standing thinking. When Clovis-First was first proposed, it was a
very elegant model but it's time to move on, and most of the
archaeological community is doing just that."

http://www.google.com/gwt/x?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15391388&wsi=68a4ecb312c046ce&ei=tVulTtj7NZPwwwXg7uS-BA&wsc=yq

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In biology, we got stuck with a particular coding system that
precluded anything else from moving in. It's the same in the world of
code: It is constrained by the original protocols but beyond that it
is very open. And the evolution of computer code is now moving much
faster than the evolution of biological code.

http://theeuropean-magazine.com/352-dyson-george/353-evolution-and-innovation

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Consumer spending (70 percent of the economy) is flat or dropping
because consumers are losing their jobs and wages, and don't have the
dough. And businesses aren't hiring because they don't have enough
customers.

http://www.salon.com/2011/10/19/austerity_isnt_the_answer/singleton/?mobile.html

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We'd just returned from China, where everything about Internet use in
general and Google services in particular is insecure and fraught.

http://m.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/11/hacked/8673/?single_page=true

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Years ago, when I was a graduate student in physics, I was introduced
to the concept of the "well-posed problem": a question that can be
stated with enough clarity and precision that it is guaranteed an
answer. Scientists are always working on well-posed problems.

http://life.salon.com/2011/10/02/how_science_and_faith_coexist/singleton/?mobile.html

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No matter who we are, how alternative or preppy we seem, we're all
drawing from something bigger than ourselves. No one, it seems, is
quite unique.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2011/10/06/exactitudes_a_photographic_argument_against_uniqueness.html

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