Is Monogamy the Only Way to Be Happy?
via Big Think by Kayt Sukel
There’s a pervasive notion that a monogamous relationship is the ideal. Certainly, that’s what most Americans have been hearing for as long as they can remember. A committed, loving relationship between two people is the end-all-be-all – and, to hear many tell it, the only thing that helps keep the fabric of society from being torn asunder.
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Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Oscar Wilde in America. One year, 15,000 miles, 140 stops. Henry James was not impressed: “a fatuous fool, a tenth-rate cad, and an unclean beast”... more
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Chasing the total eclipse across the Pacific Ocean
Frank Close in Prospect via 3quarksdaily by S. Abbas Raza
What is the most beautiful natural phenomenon that you have ever seen?
A brilliant rainbow set against a distant storm, or a blood red sky just after sunset, perhaps? But anyone who has experienced the diamond ring effect that heralds the start of a total solar eclipse will agree it puts all others in the shade.
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1969 : The Magic Christian
via Retronaut by James Golff
“The Magic Christian” is an obscure British cinema classic with an A list cast including Ringo Starr (just before recording Abbey Road) and Peter Sellers. John Cleese makes his big screen debut, Raquel Welch is a dominatrix, Lawrence Harvey recites Hamlet while doing a strip-tease, and lounge singer Yul Brynner serenades Roman Polanski and Christopher Lee in drag.
More images here
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Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Frivolous, debased, entirely too clever: How did punning – one mark of a supple, fertile mind – acquire such a dubious reputation?... more
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1900s-1960s : Kodak Christmas
via Retronaut by Chris Wild
Further images here
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End of the Line: 1865
via Shorpy Historical Photo Archive – Vintage Fine Art Prints by Dave
April 1865
“Richmond, Virginia. Destroyed Richmond & Petersburg locomotive”
Aftermath of the Confederate evacuation in which Richmond’s business district, accidentally torched by its own citizens, burned to the ground, the flames extinguished only with the aid of the occupying Federal Army.
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Arts & Letters Daily – ideas, criticism, debate
Pride and Prejudice was “too light...and sparkling,” Austen worried. Others say it’s cloistered and unworldly. Both claims are nonsense... more
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state of the language
via 3quarksdaily by Morgan Meis
Why is English spelling such a tangle?
It all started when Latin-speaking missionaries arrived in Britain in the 6th century without enough letters in their alphabet. They had 23. (They didn't have “j”, “u” or “w”.) Yet the Germanic Anglo-Saxon languages had at least 37 phonemes, or distinctive sounds. The Romans didn't have a letter, for example, for the Anglo-Saxon sound we spell “th”. The problem continues. Most English-speakers today have, depending on their accents, 40 phonemes, which we have to render using 26 letters. So, we use stratagems such as doubling vowels to elongate them, as in “feet” and “fool”.
With the Norman invasion in 1066, spelling became more complicated still; French and Latin words rushed into the language. As the centuries went by, scribes found ways of reflecting the sounds people used with the letters that they had. They lengthened vowels by adding a final “e”, so that we could tell “hope” from “hop”.
more from Michael Skapinker at the FT here
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Gravity powered lights, cheaper than solar
via Boing Boing by Jason Weisberger
Simple things that we take for granted, like flipping a switch and having light suddenly appear, aren’t so simple in developing countries. This fantastic gravity powered light may change that, if their Indiegogo project is successful.
The designers developed the project in their spare time over four years, while working at London-based design firm Therefore. They’re expecting the light to cost less than $5 to manufacture at scale. Once a family purchases the light, they’ll be able to keep it running at no additional expense.(Thanks, Thom!)
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