It's a felony:
Alexis captions:
Apparently, there were 2,836 "laser events" logged with the Federal Aviation Administration. That's nearly double the number of "laser events" from 2009. … When you aim a laser pointer very far away, the cone of light it emits grows with distance. So, by the time it reaches a helicopter or plane, it can light up the cockpit and blind the pilots.
Farhad Manjoo warns that AI will eventually wreak havoc on many highly-skilled jobs:
In the next decade, we'll see machines barge into areas of the economy that we'd never suspected possible—they'll be diagnosing your diseases, dispensing your medicine, handling your lawsuits, making fundamental scientific discoveries, and even writing stories just like this one. Economic theory holds that as these industries are revolutionized by technology, prices for their services will decline, and society as a whole will benefit. As I conducted my research, I found this argument convincing—robotic lawyers, for instance, will bring cheap legal services to the masses who can't afford lawyers today. But there's a dark side, too: Imagine you've spent three years in law school, two more years clerking, and the last decade trying to make partner—and now here comes a machine that can do much of your $400-per-hour job faster, and for a fraction of the cost. What do you do now?
Forty-two percent of primary-care physicians think patients are receiving too much medical care. Aaron Carroll looks at the reasons doctors give for overtreatment and spies a disconnect:
Could it be that doctors might practice more aggressively because when they do, they make more? Well, only 3% believed that financial considerations could influence their own practice. Most, however, thought that other physicians would be affected by such things.
Kevin Drum isn't surprised.
Photo of the Wall Street protests by Flickr user Paul Stein.
A blind man explains the pitfalls of paper money:
(Hat tip: TDW)
The Economist's R.M., reacting to research that found utilitarian moral beliefs correlate with antisocial personality traits, makes the "case:"
Most of us seem to be placing too much value on the wrong characteristics. Our preferred candidates are able to "connect" with the public. We want to like our leaders; we favour candidates who we'd be comfortable having a beer with. But according to the study, this isn't the type of candidate who will give us utilitarian outcomes. If we really want the greatest happiness of the greatest number, we should be electing psychopathic, Machiavellian misanthropes. And while America's cut-throat brand of electoral politics does attract such personalities, most candidates fall short of this ideal. So what is a utilitarian to do? Dammit people, we can still make this happen.
Will Wilkinson counters:
Since it seems implausible that we are best off governed by Machiavellian psychopaths, I take the findings of Bartels and Pizarro–that those attracted to utilitarianism tend toward the psychopathic and Machiavellian–as prima facie evidence that utilitarianism is "self-effacing," that it recommends its own rejection. This is a study about how, if you are a utilitarian, you should probably do the world some good and shut up about what you really think is best.
"Penn's The Miracle Worker moved me so much as a child. I was fascinated as so many children are – were? – by Helen Keller. In a way, more than any preacher from any pulpit or any passage from the Bible the concept of this person trapped in all that darkness and all that silence being able to communicate in our world – much less smile with such joy without ever having seen what a smiling joyous human face was – spoke to me somehow about the existence of God who when trapped in the infinite silence and darkness of some sort of existential vastness found a way to exist as well and thrust existence upon the world and upon us," – Kevin Sessums.
Despite all the worrying right now, once a nominee is chosen — whether it’s Perry or Romney — Rush Limbaugh and Fox News hosts and Republican politicians will unanimously tell everyone what a wonderful nominee he is. And there’s no reason to think that Republican voters won’t buy it.
A reader writes, "This is SO relaxing":
Inspired by American Beauty, of course.
The Dish 