Author Archives: Meredith L. Patterson
A Field Guide to White Trash
Welcome coastal elites! As the Trump campaign continues to shred its way through the Republican primaries, many of you seem confused and frightened at your sudden realization that another 80% of the United States exists. Don’t worry! The cultural landscape of Middle … Continue reading
Exit, Voice, and Lighthouses
This is my favorite joke of all time. Transcript of a US naval ship with Canadian authorities off the coast of Newfoundland: Americans: “Please divert your course 15 degrees to the North to avoid a collision.” Canadians: “Recommend you divert … Continue reading
Dumber Than Socrates
Polus. And is that not a great power? Socrates. Polus has already said the reverse. If you’ve ever taken a course that touched on the Platonic dialogues — intro philosophy, intro classics, even some rhetoric courses still — you’ve probably heard them described as … Continue reading
Viral Science
The internet has been abuzz over the last few days about a preprint in PeerJ Preprints, “Gender bias in open source: Pull request acceptance of women vs. men.” Scott Alexander delivers a summary of popular-media responses to this, among other … Continue reading
Totalizing Politics and Insurance Rackets
Let me tell you a story. A friend of mine who shall remain nameless is an engineer at a financial services company that shall also remain nameless. After complaints to HR about the behavior of the finance and sales bros who … Continue reading
