A 29th twofer.

First, an interesting little article on a very strange research project that, strangely, seems to have produced some results. Strange ones. Basically, they are trying to map personality traits according to geography in the US.

Second, an article about the mistakes made by Einstein. This, in my opinion, is an important thing to write and read about, because it defuses the idea that science is ideology. If a physicist whose name and countenance are symbols of intelligence itself can be shown to have been wrong - well, that's only to be expected really.

All the other great scientists of the past were wrong about things, because advancing the state of the art in knowledge is like that - better theories, better data, better models - but never The Truth. Just a useful approximation. This is the power and glory of science: to recognize and correct its errors.

This is why I dislike terms such as "Darwinism" and "evolutionism" so intensely. They attempt to crystallize the ever changing ideas of how species originate into an ideology that, if somehow shown to be false, can then be defeated. It surely must be comforting for opponents of science and knowledge to think that this could possibly work. However, they are just as wrong about this as they are about so many other things.