Mark R. Kelly
» Founder in 1997 and site-runner for 20 years of Locus Online (Hugo Award winner in 2002). Founder in 2012 and still site-runner of sfadb.com (Science Fiction Awards Database). Retired in 2012 after 30 years as a software engineer for a certain rocket engine factory.
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» Previous Views from Medina Road (2010-2013)
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Recent Posts
- Gaslighting Reality
- Outdoing Themselves Every Day
- Incompetence and Restlessness
- Sea Change: Living in History, and Most People Not Noticing
- A Continual Stream of Lies and Gaslighting
- How Soon Will This Madness End?
- Mark Lilla, IGNORANCE AND BLISS
- Today’s Political Readings from Facebook and Substack
- What They Mean By Traditional
- Richard Dawkins: THE MAGIC OF REALITY
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Category Archives: Book Notes
Robert Lanza and Nancy Kress, OBSERVER
(The Story Plant, January 2023, 380pp) This is a hard science fiction thriller that impressed me in many ways, though I’m not a regular reader of thrillers per se and perhaps am not in a position to judge the book … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, science fiction
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Yuval Noah Harari, UNSTOPPABLE US
Here’s a book I read near the end of last year that, like the Dawkins book recently reviewed, is a book directed at young people. Like the Dawkins, it’s heavily illustrated; unlike that, Harari’s book is essentially a rewrite of … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Evolution
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More About Stories v. Reality
Yet another item about that anthology of historical essays. Plus items about pandemics, bestseller lists, wokeness in the military, the attraction of conspiracy theories, and violence on TV.
Posted in Book Notes, Conservative Resistance, Narrative
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Myth America
Today in the papers, both an op-ed about and a review of a new book called Myth America: Historians Take On the Biggest Legends and Lies About Our Past, edited by Kevin M. Kruse and Julian E. Zelizer, published by … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Narrative
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Richard Dawkins, FLIGHTS OF FANCY: Defying Gravity by Design & Evolution
This book was released in the UK in November 2021 — here’s its Amazon UK page — and was announced for US release in May 2022. I ordered the latter when it came out; here is its Amazon.com page. Turns … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Evolution
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One More Book Story
The Washington Post did a list about two weeks ago about this: Washington Post, Alyssa Rosenberg, 6 Dec / updated 19 Dec 2022: Opinion | To build a delightful library for kids, start with these 99 books Then today posted … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Personal history
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Two Tales About Books
There is a wide range of attitudes about books. Many people read no books at all. Some read books but only by borrowing from libraries; some people buy and read books but treat them as disposable objects (these are the … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Personal history
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Andy Borowitz, PROFILES IN IGNORANCE: How America’s Politicians Got Dumb and Dumber (2022)
I hesitated reading this book, because I’ve seen and heard for myself over the years the vacuous platitudes of Ronald Reagan, the jejune idiocies of Dan Quayle, the conspiratorial lies of Donald Trump. So what would be gained by reading … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Politics
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Neil deGrasse Tyson, STARRY MESSENGER: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization
Review: Rather similarly to a couple three other nonfiction books I’ve read lately –- Ari Wallach’s LONGPATH (review here, Jim Al-Khalil’s THE JOY OF SCIENCE (review here), and even Justin Gregg’s IF NIETZSCHE WERE A NARWHAL (review here) -– this … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Cosmology, Science
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Three Interesting Books That I Probably Won’t Read
About free markets, the fundamentals of biology, and unsustainable growth. And I probably won’t read them simply because I have so many other books to read, such as the few on a bookcase just to the left of my computer … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Economics
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