As you may know, Beloit College makes up a “Mindset List” each year to reflect the world of the new incoming college students (born in about 1991) — what their life has included, and what it hasn’t. Understandably, reading it makes those of us over, um, thirty feel old and alienated. And who doesn’t like that? So check it out; here’s a few of my favorites from this year:
- 5. Salsa has always outsold ketchup.
- 6. Earvin “Magic” Johnson has always been HIV-positive.
- 9. Rap music has always been mainstream.
- 15. Babies have always had a Social Security Number.
- 22. The European Union has always existed.
- 30. There has always been a Cartoon Network.
- 32. Their folks could always reach for a Zoloft.
- 34. Women have always outnumbered men in college.
- 38. Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Latvia, Georgia, Lithuania, and Estonia have always been independent nations.
- 68. Official racial classifications in South Africa have always been outlawed.
There’s the beginning of a collection of funny philosophy videos on YouTube. I’ve pointed to a couple before (like the excellent Kant Attack Ad and the Noam Chomsky Show), but hopefully it will grow into a nice collection.
Sure, it’s geeky. But being a fan genetic algorithms, Terminator world, and the failure of Pascal’s wager, I can’t resist:
From the excellent xkcd – A Webcomic, “Genetic Algorithms”.
Here’s a little real world local neighborhood visual paradox that’s half Magritte’s “This is not a pipe/The Treachery Of Images” and half the Liar Paradox.
I went with my wife and son to the Albany “Winter Festival” yesterday, and we saw a collection of kid-friendly acts and some fireworks. Some of those acts were in the Crown Plaza Hotel downtown; and as we walked through the building, we came across the following glass door leading from an indoor stairway to an outside brick “courtyard” sort of area:
So, to us on the inside, the door says “This is not an exit”. The those on the outside, it says “Exit only”. So is it an exit, or not? If not, what is it?
PHD Comics is painfully on the mark again, with I should be done in…
Again, PHD Comics captures the essence of grad school in Going Green:
