Today, in our very last Lord Snow Presides, we watch the wheel turn from the old to the new once again.
Lord Snow Presides
Posted inGeneral
Change: A Very Special Lord Snow Presides (LSP #221)
Of late, some of you have heard some rumblings about Roll to Disbelieve making a platform move in the near future. These rumblings are true.
Posted inBiology, Culture, Evolution, Latest research, Psychology, Research, Science, Your World, Your Life
Semantic paraphasia: The things we can’t help
I often mis-say specific words. I know the word I want and I’m thinking of the right thing at the time, but the wrong word consistently pops out. It turns out there’s a term for this situation: semantic paraphasia. Today, Lord Snow Presides over our brains — and the stuff we literally can’t help sometimes.
Posted inComedy, Culture, Leaving Religion, News, Nonreligious News
Have YOU Seen This Missing 100-Ton Recycling Plant? (LSP #219)
Interestingly, absolutely nobody has offered a supernatural explanation for this disappearance. And of course nobody has. This is a 100-ton recycling plant we’re talking about, not lost keys or a parking spot or a missed connection on the subway. Nobody’s going to blame this one on demons or pixies or malevolent Neolithic Bell-Beaker ghosts. Nobody thinks wizards cast a spell to shift a recycling plant into the astral plane.
Posted inCulture, Deep Dive, History, Religion
Before Evangelicals and Fundamentalists Fused Together (LSP #218)
The evangelicals I knew back then thought fundamentalists were dangerous zealots and wingnuts who’d missed the entire point of Christianity in their mad dash to theological super-correctness. Meanwhile, fundamentalists thought evangelicals were lukewarm weaklings who couldn’t handle the real deal of TRUE CHRISTIANITY™ — and thus would fold and accept the Mark of the Beast the moment the Endtimes began in earnest.
Posted inSex & Gender
Seeking the trans people of the past
To learn about trans people, we have to read between the lines of history. Info about trans folks comes to us not from autobiographies or travelogues, but rather largely from legal cases from centuries past. And that info comes to us filtered through the worldview of authority figures who condemned transgender people entirely.
Posted inGeneral
Context is Everything in Spookiness (LSP #216)
We humans are extremely context-sensitive creatures, and when something runs out of context, it can be a spooky experience for us.
Posted inGeneral
We Found a Possible Exoplanet in Another Galaxy! (LSP #215)
If life existed on Earth, my ten-year-old self figured, then it had to exist elsewhere. If our Sun had oodles of planets and moons whizzing around it, then other stars had to have them as well. And on those planets, who knew what might exist? It seemed far more likely to me that at least some other planets hosted life — and more than that, intelligent life — than that none possibly ever could.
Posted inGeneral
Myxozoa: Pushing the Limits of Definitions (LSP #214)
The sheer mind-blowing facts of our world never end. These rabbitholes we explore turn into warrens full of information for the curious to devour — and each new twist and turn in the warren only leads us to more questions we want to answer. At no time in human history has it been easier to learn and grow — and best of all, to share what we’ve found with others.
Posted inGeneral
The ‘Help-Rejecting Complainer’ (LSP #213)
Not long ago, I discovered a very useful term in dealing with difficult people: the help-rejecting complainer. Sure, it gave me flashbacks to my time in the trenches doing tech support, but it also gave me a framework of perception that’ll help me in the future. I thought y’all might also find it useful. So today, Lord Snow Presides over the unique way that descriptions help us frame problems — and solve them.