Big Bird – Small State
As many of you know, it is our sworn duty here at the Mep Report, not only to report on the pressing human issues of our day, but of the Emu-related ones as well. It seems as if one of our flightless brethren escaped his confines in a Rhode Island farm and is currently AWOL. We wish him a safe journey while he’s on the lamb.
Two Centuries in Four Minutes
Hans Rosling and his team of statisticians organized an unfathomably huge swath of historical health statistics since the beginning of the 19th century. The results are eye-opening.
Religion – The Bad Parent
One of my favorite YouTube pages, TheraminTrees, recently released an addendum video to its series on Transactional Analysis. Here, the narrator is presenting the psychological basis for religious fundamentalism, and much of it comes from an implanted desire to chastise, scold, and belittle others.
Eat It, Malthus
In the 19th century, British Economist Thomas Malthus, famously predicted that while societal food production can only grow numerically (due to limitations in technological development) population grows exponentially. He concluded that overpopulation would inevitably overburden and overwhelm our resources. And, he may be correct in that projection. But his premise of exponential population growth has taken a few hits recently:
Paul is Dead?
I really don’t know how I missed out on the whole Paul is Dead, urban legend. But this piece sums it up rather nicely.
Exporting Democracy
I’m sort of amazed that this video from 2007 hasn’t been more widely seen. Perhaps because the bombings that it discusses are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to US foreign policy incursions into other sovereign nations.
Narcissism Now Considered Normal
In what is possibly the greatest unintentional cultural commentary of all time by a scientific journal, the Times reported today that the Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders has removed narcissism from its list of mental disorders, along with four others.
Post-Structuralism for the Street Student
I’ve just discovered this young commentator who hilariously calls himself Hennessey Youngman. And I dig his work.