The Chamberlain announces the completion of the Astrolabe. Please see the Clocks page. ~Chamberlain of Content

Every good prag­matist knows that one of the absolutely essential functions of government is to own, operate, and maintain public roads. Several arguments I have heard advanced in favor of publicly-​​​​owned roads include: Uniform standards; Unrestricted access; Cost-​​​​free access; Universal access to an essential resource; Safety; Efficient allo­cation of scarce resources; Availability of eminent domain power to effi­ciently locate major roadways; And of course the vague but ever popular, “that’s what govern­ments are for!” And every good economist knows that all of this is bunk. But is there something more nefarious in the insti­tution of the public road? Consider cable tele­vision. [ . . . ]

Read the Rest...

Alex Trebek asks a contestant, who boasts that she has slept in a hotel room floating on the Kwai river in Thailand, whether the original bridge (of cinema fame) is still there.

Since the beginning of the semester, the University has received a fairly consistent (and consis­tently bogus, but nonetheless consis­tently disruptive) stream of bomb threats.  One day, one building.   The next, another.  It was almost like some lazy and mischievous under­graduate, displeased with the crepus­cular hour of his first class of the day, decided to send a little email.  A new one for each building for each day of the week.  They were always resolved without incident, and an arrest was made after the second one.  But alack, alas!  The perpe­trators are multi­farious and inde­pendent, engaging in wicked, wicked copycat mischief!  They have continued, [ . . . ]

Read the Rest...