Friday, February 1, 2013

Dear Huffington Post: you are part of the audience for this one

The Huffington Post apparently now runs a TEDWeekends feature, each a
curated weekend program that introduces a powerful "idea worth spreading" every Friday, anchored in an exceptional TEDTalk.
Aside from the fact that whoever did the web design forgot to create permalinks to such features, I think this is as good an idea as TED more generally (i.e. cool, if somewhat masturbatory and promotive of quick-fix-thinking).

I also like the focus of this week's: Why We Deceive Ourselves (Sometimes). Anchored by Michael Shermer, whose "Why People Believe Weird Things" should be somewhere in every high school student's reading list, with contributions by Laura Kray, Laura Cococcia, and Art Markman, it's a topic near to my heart (though as has been discussed recently, e.g. at Pharyngula, Shermer sets out a somewhat narrower bailiwick for skepticism than I do).

I surely hope the editorial board at HuffPo has a nice, slow Friday in front of them, so they can pour a cup of coffee, put their feet up on the desk, and read all about how the woo they're in the habit of pitching to the masses is bullshit.

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