Data dumps aren’t the sole province of whistle blowers like Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden.  In the name of transparency, our government unloads reams of data on a regular basis, so much so, that the search for specific information is like a forced to march though the dessert i

Encryption, which makes our electronic communications secure, is only as good as three things:  human nature, human nature, and human nature.  After Edward Snowden leaked information about government surveillance on our citizenry, Congress amended the USA Freedom Act to end NSA’s

Fracking is a dirty word in my circle of friends and I admit, I am as eager as they are to see this country decouple from fossil fuels.  But when Hillary Clinton was criticized for taking money from the fracking industry, a  donation amounting to less than 1% of total contributions,

Strategy, strategy, strategy.  To reach our goals we need to have one or several.  Unfortunately, planning is a lesson we don’t learn early.  The young have little sense of time.  They live in the moment like the hedonistic cricket in Aesop’s fable.  The ant’s wisdom usuall

A poet in China complains her country has weaker communications skills than Americans and therefore is less able to promote its core values.  Students in China, she says, are taught by rote rather than encouraged to use creativity and imagination.  (“Shall We Teach Creativity?”

Guilt and shame seem to describe the same human condition. Both reactions arise from having done something wrong.  According to the experts, however, the two are different.  Guilt is a response to a specific action, an event external to an individual.  Stealing a cookie from a shop

Literature makes a great contribution to our culture, but should it be taught in high school? That question is the genesis for a new book, Lit Up by David Denby.  (“Saved by the Bell,” by William Giraldi, New Republic, March 2016, pgs. 66-68.)  As a former high school English te

Coloring books for adults are all the rage.  One retired acquaintance admitted she’d recently bought a book, attracted by the elaborate patterns.  She insisted a high degree of concentration was necessary to stay within the lines, a comment which made me think of the earnestness o

The election-industrial complex is alive and well, as anyone can see by the amount of propaganda bombarding us through the media.  The assumption is that votes can be bought if a candidate can throw enough commercials at the public.  Commercials suck up money the way tornadoes suck

Artificial intelligence mirrors the many faces of being human.  Our creations can be vicious and cruel as in The Terminator or curious and compassionate as in Wall-E.  They can destroy our word as in The Matrix,  betray us as in Ex Machina or give us a glimpse of miraculous possibi