Links

Everything is heritable:

• “Genome-wide patterns of selection in 230 ancient Eurasians”, Mathieson et al 2015 (media)
• pervasive cross-correlations of polygenic scores for various traits: particularly Krapohl et al 2015
• “Genome-wide analysis of over 106,000 individuals identifies 9 neuroticism-associated loci”, Smith et al 2016
• “Signaling and Productivity in the Private Financial Returns to Schooling”, Bingley et al 2015 (highly unusual design)
• “Childhood Autism and Assortative Mating”, Golden 2013

Politics/religion:

• “The American Robber Barons Who Stole Medieval Europe”
• “Book Review: Empire of the Summer Moon”
• “Little to Show for Cash Flood by Big Donors”
• “Why Our Kind Can’t Cooperate”
• on mood affiliation
• Proper procedures for stoning an adulterer

Statistics/AI/meta-science:

• converting all-cause mortality reductions to life-expectancy increases
• “How to visualize data with cartoonish faces a la Chernoff” (on Chernoff faces)

Psychology/biology:

• The girl who feels no pain
• “Insecticide Resistance and Malaria Control”
• “Cochrane findings that will help you”
• Rubber duck debugging
• “Species-characteristic Responses to Catnip by Undomesticated Felids” , Hill et al 1976
• “Meditation and Its Regulatory Role on Sleep”, Nagendra et al 2012

Technology:

• “Carnegie Mellon Denies FBI Paid for Tor-Breaking Research” (If the FBI is harvesting any de-anonymizing data security researchers collect using subpoenas, this seems like a serious attack on academic freedom and research integrity.)
• “DagCoin: a cryptocurrency without blocks”; in an entirely different direction, Bitcoin-NG splits blocks from mining (Bitcoin is just the first, not necessarily the universally ideal. We’re in a Cambrian explosion of financial cryptography and should be open to new approaches.)
• “Air Force cadet sentenced to 3 years after buying modafinil, molly, & LSD on Silk Road 2”
• ‘man sort’: ‘–random-sort’ misleading (use shuf if you need random sorts on the CLI)

Economics:

• “As Coasts Rebuild and U.S. Pays, Repeatedly, the Critics Ask Why”/“Should the Northeast Bury its Power Lines to Prevent Outages?”/“Having your cake and eating it too: The maturity structure of US debt”
• “Ricardo’s Difficult Idea”/“The Real Winners and Losers of Globalization: Globalization has radically changed global income dynamics. So who has won and who has lost?”
• “Cosmic Commodities: How much is a new planet worth?”
• “The Goethe Auction”

Philosophy:

• “When Do Extraordinary Claims Give Extraordinary Evidence?”, Hanson 2007
• Philosophy of humor
• “Fog-like sensations”
• A Softer World, #891
• Esotericism as a form of communication

Books

Fiction:

• A Perfect Vacuum, Lem (review)

Nonfiction:

• Do No Harm, Marsh (elegantly written and moving neurosurgeon memoir on the theme of iatrogenics; I did disagree with his comments on the cost-benefit of operating in one case, though)
• Digital Gold: Bitcoin and the Inside Story of the Misfits and Millionaires Trying to Reinvent Money, Popper (review)
• The Party: The Secret World of China’s Communist Rulers, MacGregor
• Drop Dead Healthy, Jacob (review)

Film/TV

Anime:

• Hanamonogatari/Tsukimonogatari (disappointments, coming after Second Season. Neither had a particularly compelling story - Hana was interesting but could not support that many episodes and Tsuki’s ending with Tadatsuru was bafflingly idiotic and incompetent an anticlimax with apparently the whole thing being mostly wasted time on developing yet another one of the worst & overused archetypes in anime)

Music

Touhou:

• “Night Sakura of Dead Spirits” (彩音 〜xi-on〜; Quartet -カルテット- {C88}) [classical]
• “Desire Drive” (あかみ／彩音 〜xi-on〜; Quartet -カルテット- {C88}) [classical]
• “敢闘 -little bravery-” (漉餡; 水古譚 -suikotan- {C88}) [orchestral]
• “蒼月夜 (Instrumental ver)” (漉餡; 水古譚 -suikotan- {C88}) [orchestral]
• “夕暮れ色のカップ” (夕暮れ色のカップ; 喫茶白玉楼 {C88}) [classical]

Doujin:

• “City Cycle” (tigerlily; AD:PIANO VIVACE {C88}) [classical/instrumental]
• “‘Love’” (en;Dolphin Records; 夏と原稿用紙 {C88}) [acoustic]
• “You again my love” (CYO Style feat. henohenomoheji; CY {2013}) [pop]
• “Shoulda Known Better” (DJ Noriken; HARDCORE SYNDROME 9 {C88}) [hardcore]

Vocaloid:

• “NEW YEARS[Long Version]” (Miku; ATOLS; ATOLS/MIKU 0 {VM28}) [trance]
• “YUMEGIWA LAST BOY” (Ia; FLARE; VOCALO COVERS {2013}) [electronica/Jpop]