10 non-work-related items that I found fun or interesting

Tiny statue from the third century CE via Boing Boing by David Pescovitz
This is believed to be a Roman boxer from 1,800 years ago. Well, a teeny marble bust of a boxer anyway. Archaeologists found the statue, just six centimeters tall, in Jerusalem’s City of David. 1,800-year-old marble head unearthed in Israel

Time Magazine
Is a Bookless Library Still a Library?
I think the answer is a resounding “YES” but how does Tim Newcomb answer his own question?

via Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
The government of India is gathering biometric data on its 1.2 billion citizens. But there’s a hitch: The fingerprints of peasants are unreadable after years of manual work...more

via Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
What are books good for? Every book by a single author is a particular performance, a story told as only one storyteller could recount it... more

via Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
When biologists talk of animal altruism, self-sacrifice, kindness, murder, slavery, or warfare, they are actually using their own technical vocabulary... more

via Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Financing the welfare state depends critically on population increase. That a growing nation is a kind of Ponzi scheme was a fine idea when people still thought the Baby Boom would go on forever... more

via Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Heidegger was undoubtedly a genius. You can tell he was a genius because his philosophy is so hard to grasp... more

Friday Fun: Compulse via the How-To Geek by Mysticgeek
Today we take a look at physics based game called Compulse.
Guide the ball to the goal by using Compulse directional tiles. There is really not any way to “win” as you can use as many or few tiles as you want. Once you complete a level you can go to the next level, try the same level again for a better score, and watch the events again via replay. As you progress up the levels the challenges get more difficult. This is an very casual game and allows you to easily pass the time until the bell rings.
Play Compulse at the How-To Geek Arcade

via Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Adam Smith's great book, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, is a global manifesto for the interdependent world in which we live. Amartya Sen explains why... more

via Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Fashions in social explanation come and go, but there remains no substitute for game theory in modelling human behaviour... more

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