Humanities & Cultures

This is a surprisingly interesting thinkpiece for its length that ultimately arrives at no conclusion, but it's an important discussion to be having while we still can.

But the thing that excites me most about taking public transit is watching the people who come in at every stop. It is exciting to recognize the middle schooler with the headphones, the young mother with the infant in a stroller, and the construction workers with their hard hats tucked under their arms. They are my neighbors. On public transportation, I am reminded that they are the people I am called to love.

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — The latest search for the remains of 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre victims has ended with three more sets containing gunshot wounds, investigators said.

The three are among 11 sets of remains exhumed during the latest excavation in Oaklawn Cemetery, state archaeologist Kary Stackelbeck said Friday.

“Two of those gunshot victims display evidence of munitions from two different weapons,” Stackelbeck said. “The third individual who is a gunshot victim also displays evidence of burning.”

Stories like this underscore the importance of reading history, because (at least here in Missouri) I was never taught about the Tulsa Massacre and didn't learn about it until I read about it myself.

Other things you may want to read about that you may have never heard of: The Battle of Blair Mountain, Haymarket Square, or the Great Rail Strike of 1877.

Shielding of lights is an important aspect. Instead of having an open light, flat lights or shielded lights that prevent spill upward are crucial. They direct light to the ground, and not up into the sky.

In Canberra, the Australian Capital Territory government and light operator Omexom have been changing streetlights to do exactly this – no upward spill, and controllable lights.

In doing so, Canberra has reduced its light pollution by about 30% in only a few years, as my colleagues and I report in a forthcoming paper.

Our new research, published in the journal Communication Research, suggests that’s the case. In two studies, we found that people generally trust journalists when they confirm claims to be true but are more distrusting when journalists correct false claims.

Some linguistics and social science theories suggest that people intuitively understand social expectations not to be negative. Being disagreeable, like when pointing out someone else’s lie or error, carries with it a risk of backlash.

Archived link

To bolster its claims of rampant Russophobia in the West, the Kremlin not only cites sanctions imposed for the war against Ukraine, but also perceived attacks on Russian culture and identity.

Canceling everything Russian because it could potentially be weaponized is anathema to the liberal traditions of Western countries. Russian propagandists and the special services take full advantage of this. Since the annexation of Crimea in Ukraine, investigations have revealed that Russian cultural centers across the world have been used to spread disinformation not to mention their use as “umbrellas” for spy agencies SVR and GRU operations.

On September 11, 2001, Genelle Guzman-McMillan made it from the 64th floor to the 13th floor of the North Tower when "everything went black." Over 27 hours later, she was miraculously pulled out of the wreckage.

Though I hate the overuse of the word 'miraculous', this is an interesting story for sure.

Does economic education spoil students’ morality? Economists and the Trolley problem

https://www.economics-sociology.eu/?1030,en_does-economic-education-spoil-students’-morality-economists-and-the-trolley-problem

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The Problem of Collective Harm: A Threshold Solution

https://ejpe.org/journal/article/view/798

"Many harms are collective: they are due to several individual actions that are as such harmless. At least in some cases, it seems impermissible to contribute to such harms, even if individual agents do not make a difference. The Problem of Collective Harm is the challenge of explaining why. I argue that, if the action is to be [moral], the probability of making a difference to harm must be small enough."

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Utility, social utility, democracy, and altruistic and moral behavior from unexploitability, Darwinian evolution, and tribes

https://www.rangevoting.org/OmoUtil.html

"S.M.Omohundro in 2007, by building on and/or simplifying ideas by a large number of economists, demonstrated that the philosophy of utilitarianism is forced upon an organism if that organism wishes to be "unexploitable." Exploitable organisms presumably tend to get exploited, suffer a competitive disadvantage."

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Right away, the data clearly showed that cash helped people spend more on their basic needs. Those who received $1,000 monthly spent $67 more per month than the lower-paid group on food, $52 more on rent and $50 more on transportation. They also spent about 26 percent more financially supporting others, typically family members or children, suggesting that the beneficiaries of guaranteed income programs extend beyond the actual participants.

Some of the volunteers told the researchers that the money allowed them to stop living paycheck to paycheck and start imagining what they could do if they had more financial breathing room. Karina Dotson, OpenResearch’s research and insights manager, often heard participants talk about the cash giving them a “sense of self.” She said it “gave them head space to dream, to believe, to hope, to imagine a future they couldn’t imagine before.” Other research has found similar outcomes.

Those who received $1,000 monthly were 5 percent more likely to report having a budget, spending an average of 20 minutes more a month on finances than the group that received $50 monthly. The money also affected how much medical care people sought, how much they considered entrepreneurship or additional schooling and even the kinds of jobs they took. Those choices varied widely from person to person.