Category Archives: Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure

Government Schools Versus Government-Contractor Schools

Posted on July 21, 2016 by mikethemadbiologist

Apparently, conservatives, in line with their scorched earth approach to governance, have decided to call public schools ‘government schools’ (boldface mine): Somewhere along the way, the term “government schools” entered the lexicon in place of references to the public school … Continue reading →

Posted in Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure, Conservatives, Education | 2 Comments

The Killer App Is John Rockefeller?

Posted on January 26, 2016 by mikethemadbiologist

Despite all the hoopla and rhetoric to the contrary, much of the ‘new’ economy, the ‘sharing’ economy, and the various other names for it is nothing more than the same old economy, just with more CPUs. With that by way … Continue reading →

Posted in Bidness, Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure, Economics | 2 Comments

Policy Nudges and Fudges

Posted on January 5, 2016 by mikethemadbiologist

One thing the technobrat set loves is the concept of ‘nudges’, which are seemingly small changes in policy that cause behavioral changes leading to Utopia better policy outcomes. A few years ago, when ‘nudging’ people to save more for retirement … Continue reading →

Posted in Bidness, Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure, Economics | 1 Comment

An Alternative Hypothesis For Academic Obscurantism

Posted on December 15, 2015 by mikethemadbiologist

Which is: they’re not writing for you. Noah Smith argues that difficult, if not impossible to penetrate, jargon-laden social science papers exist as a way to enforce artificial entry barriers (boldface mine): To many readers not steeped in critical theory, … Continue reading →

Posted in Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure, Education, Genomics | 8 Comments

Conservatives Wanted to Do These Things Thursday Evening

Posted on November 17, 2015 by mikethemadbiologist

I’ve seen sentiments like this come across the Twitter transom: It's hard to understand why people like Cruz are so eager to do what terrorists want, https://t.co/SK1y4pnJEM — David Colquhoun 🇺🇦 💙 (@david_colquhoun) November 16, 2015 Paul Krugman his very … Continue reading →

Posted in Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure, Conservatives | Comments Off on Conservatives Wanted to Do These Things Thursday Evening

Why Trump Is A Plausible Republican Candidate

Posted on September 8, 2015 by mikethemadbiologist

Because he’s no more full of shit than any of the other candidates (boldface mine): I’m not saying that everything is great in the U.S. economy, because it isn’t. There’s good reason to believe that we’re still a substantial distance … Continue reading →

Posted in Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure, Conservatives | 2 Comments

Some Thoughts on Mind Coddling

Posted on August 18, 2015 by mikethemadbiologist

Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt wrote an Atlantic article arguing that trigger warnings and campus speech codes have lead to a rise in depression and mental illness among campus students. While I think there are problems with the ‘speech code’ … Continue reading →

Posted in Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure, Civil Liberties | 1 Comment

Bullsh-t

Posted on June 30, 2015 by mikethemadbiologist

Observed at a D.C. area used bookstore:

Posted in Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure | 7 Comments

Je Suis Potemkin

Posted on January 18, 2015 by mikethemadbiologist

Remember the picture of all of the world leaders uniting to lead the Paris March after the Charlie Hedbo murders? Well… Image is everything…

Posted in Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure | Comments Off on Je Suis Potemkin

The Rule of Base Ten Numbers and New York’s Teacher Evaluation Insanity

Posted on January 6, 2015 by mikethemadbiologist

Many moons ago, I defined the Mad Biologist’s Rule of Base Ten Numbers: …the Mad Biologist’s Rule of Base Ten Numbers is a pithier way of describing how certain numerical estimates or quantities are chosen based on little or no … Continue reading →

Posted in Bullshit As a Load Bearing Structure, Education | 1 Comment