Memories of the 28th Century

“The short-term physiological effects of cocaine include constricted blood vessels, dilated pupils, and increased temperature, heart rate, and blood pressure. Large amounts (several hundred milligrams or more) intensify the user's high but may also lead to bizarre, erratic, and violent behavior. These users may experience tremors, vertigo, muscle twitches, paranoia, or, with repeated doses, a toxic reaction closely resembling amphetamine poisoning. Some users of cocaine report feelings of restlessness, ...

There have been too many examples of police killing too many innocent and unarmed people recently, and it is unacceptable that public employees, even police, should be targeted for assassination. How did we get to this horrible situation, and what can be done about it? One of the basic underlying problems is that police seem to regard themselves as being above the law, that laws do not apply to them. Together with this is the fact that many police are quite ignorant of the laws that relate to and ...

Or Are You A Psychopath?

I still amuse myself with online personality questionnaires, and some of them are entertaining. I recently took the Psychopath test, and the result was “The complete opposite of a psychopath.” I have done similar questionnaires in the past; I even joined OKCupid to take their Psychopath test. I have flunked all of those tests, not that I thought that I was a psychopath. These questionnaires certainly aren't rigorous, but they do give some idea of general tendencies. ...

Why do people believe conspiracy theories? Apparently there are several reasons, but most reasons amount to intellectual laziness, by which I mean that people don't bother thinking about the matter but just accept something that fits what they want to believe without examining the facts. You are entitled to your own opinions but not your own facts.

Within the last few days I ran into a few people who still believe that the 9/11 attacks were not what has been presented by the investigators. ...