No to insult our Prophet.no to insult Islam.no to terrorism

In the wake of the assault on the US Embassy in Libya and the murder of ambassador Christopher Stevens, some Libyans have taken to the streets to say "not in our name". I hope I speak for all Americans of good will when I express my gratitude to these people. The world is a messy place, and we don't fit into neat boxes, especially not the ones drawn in pretty colors on a map.

In the linked suite of photos, two of the protestors are holding printed signs with Arabic text above English:

The English reads "No to insult our Prophet.no to insult Islam.no to terrorism". I think (hope?) I know what this means: something along the lines of "We disapprove just as strongly of terrorism as we do of denigration of Islam and the Prophet." But can someone who knows Arabic give a translation of that part of the sign? Does it say, more or less, what the English part does?

Amenability of Thompson's Group F

Justin Moore at Cornell has just announced a proof that Thompson's group \(F\) is amenable. The paper is short; I read through it last night, admittedly not following all the details.

There are, as it happens, a lot of details.

Ecomomics go-to conversation resources

I posted this over at Atheism+, where I am intending to become an active member. Y'know, in all my free time. Maybe I'll post something soon about why I think that atheism+ is a great and positive thing that I hope grows and becomes a force to be reckoned with, but not today.

Anyway, here's a question I asked there, which might as well get cross-posted here:

No, I'm not looking for homework help ;)

I found myself in an unusual position yesterday while having a Facebook discussion with some politically conservative friends from high school; I tossed off what was meant to be a transitional comment that supply-side economics is completely empirically discredited, which was met with complete disagreement. Now, if this were a discussion of evolution/creationism, or of abortion, or many other topics that I find myself sparring with friends about, I have a go-to list of links to introduce people to the ideas, going from the friendly and accessible to the mathematically and statistically imposing.

But what I realized about economics (in which topic I am very much a layperson) is that the conversational/blog circles I move in treat supply-side economics as very much a settled deal, and if they pass on evidence (such as is done here) it's in the spirit of "let's add one mote to this mountain of empirical disproof of this theory". I don't know of a resource intended to gently (or not-so-gently) bring someone into that conversation.

Do y'all?

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Update: A couple of good links to Jared Bernstein out of that discussion already: a qualitative intro to several of the theoretical problems with supply-side, with an internal link to empirical work by Saez and Piketty on the correlations, if any, between high-income taxation and economic activity/growth.

Old man yells at chair

If Clint Eastwood's RNC speech turns out to have been viral marketing...

... I will be simultaneously awed and lose all hope for the human race.

Mark Pilgrim vs the Android

Discovered completely by accident that the up-to-date version of the book I'm learning Python from is available, for free, from the Android appketplace.

Also, now that I have a handy reference for Python 3, I think it's time to upgrade my IDE too.

Lamb Of God: Resolution

Been listening to the new Lamb of God album "Resolution" this week. Not a record for the ages, and I don't have the time to give a detailed review in any case, but still two-and-a-half solid stars.

Punchline: forget the first single ("Ghost Walking"). Otherwise, the album begins strong with "Desolution", hits its groove hard in "Insurrection", and ends on an absolute high point with "King Me":

Look, LOG, as long as Randy ain't playing shows in Czecho, swing by Nashville and I'll be the first motherfucker in the pit. (Though after that last song, I have this odd urge to play checkers...)

Turning coffee into...

In the mug: Starbucks Malawi coffee, brewed on the Clover.

In the earbuds: Nachtmystium, Black Meddle I.

On the page: slides for my qualifying talk (scheduled for Tuesday, 2 PM, SC 1206).