Astronomers Observe An Expanding Nova Fireball For The First Time

io9 reported Astronomers Observe An Expanding Nova Fireball For The First Time "An international team of astronomers have finally caught a glimpse of an expanding thermonuclear fireball from an exploding white dwarf. It's the first time this kind of data has ever been captured, allowing the researchers to study how the fireball evolves and rapidly expands into space."

"This particular nova is located about 14,800 light-years from here in the constellation of Delphinus (the Dolphin), so technically speaking it exploded some 15,000 years ago. The astronomers observed the event on August 14th, 2013."

"The data showed that the ferocity of the initial expansion was intense, engulfing a region the size of the Earth's orbit within a day, and passing Jupiter's orbit in less than two weeks. At the 43-day mark, the fireball had expanded to the size of Neptune's orbit."

"We found the initial nova explosion wasn't spherical, giving the fireball a slightly elliptical shape," noted Australian National University's Michael Ireland in an ABC News article. "This happens because the white dwarf's atmosphere is spinning, and there's a disk of accreted material falling onto it from the companion star, so there's a lot happening to prevent the system from being spherical when it goes bang."

"What's more, mysterious multiple shells were seen as the nova exploded. A main shell expanded at about 600 kilometers per second, but there were also semi-transparent shells further out going even faster. The astronomers observed the optically thick inner shell and the transparent outer shells expanding at the same time — and they're not entirely sure what they are."

Talks I've Been To Recently

I saw Melissa Harris-Perry give a talk at the Radcliffe Institute, Who's Choosin' Who? Race, Gender, and the New American Politics. This was one of the most entertaining talks I've been to. She spoke much more quickly and candidly than on her TV show with a lot of amusing asides. The main point was that in our government the winners don't take all, they take some, but lately it's been closer to all. Which is odd, because even as more minorities get elected they seem to have less and less influence. While there were nice graphs and things, it still seemed more about the asides. She doesn't seem to be a fan of Hilary (anyone who loses to a black guy named Hussein who just a year prior was a school board president, you've had your chance). She's less against Sarah Palin than I would have expected. Egalitarian incompetence should exist for women as it does for men, see John Edwards and Palin caused many woman GOP women to run in the next election. She also pointed out that Rick Perry and Justice Scalia favor repeal of 17th Amendment, allowing direct election of Senators.

I saw Art Spiegelman and Phillip Johnston's Wordless! at the ICA. Spiegelman spoke about and read from early wordless (often woodcut) comics while Johnston led a jazz sextet providing a soundtrack. I'd read some of the works in the collection, Graphic Witness. I enjoyed the presentation but I didn't learn all that much.

I saw Slate‘s Dahlia Lithwick at the Harvard Kennedy School talk about how the Supreme Court Is Increasingly Wary of the Media and Internet (full audio at that link). Justice Stewart gave Bob Woodward a lot of insider information for his 1979 book The Brethren, that's not going to happen again. The court has no press arm and believes everything that anyone needs to know is in the opinions. It seems lost on them that the average person isn't going to read (or necessarily understand) an opinion that journalism could be a useful tool to them. Court reporters are allowed to bring into the court one piece of paper and one pen. No video of the arguments is taken. While audio of arguments is released, it's made available after 5pm on Friday, "when news goes to die". She said that for the Obamacare ruling a reporter had three options:

• They could be in the chamber and see and hear the ruling, but were not allowed to take notes and couldn't leave early
• They could be in an overflow room where they couldn't see but hear, take notes and leave (but not come back)
• They could be in another room where they couldn't see or hear the ruling but could read the opinion.

The court doesn't get modern journalism. When asked about the difficulties of getting several rulings in one day and having to write about them, Justices say to write articles on different days. Journalists don't understand this, though I think I might be on the Justices side on this one. There's enough time to read the court summaries and write a quick article and they could write more detailed articles after having time to read the opinions. We wait for months between arguments and rulings, what's a few more days?.

I saw Jill Lepore explain How Wonder Woman Got into Harvard also at the Radcliffe Institute. I knew some of the history, that Wonder Woman was created by William Moulton Marston, who invented the lie detector (hence her magic lasso) and lived with his wife and girlfriend and there was a lot of bondage in the early comics. It turns out there was a lot more I didn't know. His wife, Elizabeth Holloway Marston, was as accomplished as he, at a time when that wasn't common. She had a law degree from BU and a masters in psychology from Radcliffe and was an editor for Encyclopædia Britannica. The girlfriend was his student Olive Byrne. He came home and told Elizabeth that Olive was moving in and if she objected he'd leave her, she said ok if Olive would raise the kids so she could have a career. Elizabeth and Olive continue to live together long after William's death. This arrangement damaged his academic career which had some questionable issues anyway. Olive's aunt was Margaret Sanger who was a famous birth control activist and founded organizations that became Planned Parenthood. Marston was surrounded by feminists and conceived Wonder Woman to teach kids that woman could be the equal (or better) of men. The bondage stuff was using the iconography of suffrage and feminist movements (editorial cartoons often had women breaking chains). Many of the plots were modeled on events from Marton's past. When he was at Harvard, women weren't allowed; some Wonder Woman stories had her breaking into colleges. A psychology professor of his didn't believe in educating women (even though he also taught at Radcliffe for the money) and was the model for the villain Dr. Psycho. It was a really interesting talk and I'm curious about her new book, The Secret History of Wonder Woman.

Cops can force you to use Touch ID, but not your passcode

Cult of Mac reports Cops can force you to use Touch ID, but not your passcode.

"A related feature has now been the subject of a court case in Virginia, however, with the judge ruling that cops can legally force suspects to manually unlock their iPhones using Touch ID. This differs from the current ruling related to passcodes. Police cannot force defendants to give these up on the basis that they are considered ‘knowledge’ rather than a physical object, and that knowledge is protected by the Fifth Amendment. A fingerprint, on the other hand, is considered to be more in line with a DNA sample or physical key, which means that citizens are compelled to give them up to police."

I hate when laws don't keep up with technology. This is similar to when you privacy rights were different based on if your ISP was a phone company or a cable company.

Rand Paul just gave one of the most important foreign policy speeches in decades

Last week Vox reported Rand Paul just gave one of the most important foreign policy speeches in decades. "Sen. Rand Paul just gave one of the most important speeches on foreign policy since George W. Bush declared war on Iraq. But instead of declaring war on another country, Paul declared war on his own party. Or, at least, its entire approach to foreign policy."

"His moderate non-interventionism is a far cry from his father's absolutist desire for America to exit the world stage. But Paul's stance is light years away from the hyper-hawk neoconservatism that's dominated Republican foreign policy thinking for decades."

6 reasons Elizabeth Warren should run for president

While I'm a big fan of Elizabeth Warren, I don't think she's managed to accomplish much in the Senate. Now that's fine, no one in the Senate has accomplished much and she has managed to raise a lot of money (though I wish there was less money in politics). I've been mostly annoyed with all the questions about should she run for President. To me the obvious answer is no. But Ezra Klein gives 6 reasons Elizabeth Warren should run for president and I find them pretty compelling.

Most of it comes down to that by doing so she could have more influence in political agenda and if she loses she'll probably have more influence as a prominent Senator. And hey, Obama won with not much more experience.

Here's how gun control works in Canada

After last weeks shooting in Ottawa, Dylan Matthews explains Here's how gun control works in Canada "Here's a more detailed rundown of how Canada and the US's gun control regimes differ."

European Scientists Conclude That Distant Comet Smells Terrible

NPR reports European Scientists Conclude That Distant Comet Smells Terrible

"A European spacecraft orbiting a distant comet has finally answered a question we've all been wondering: What does a comet smell like? 'It stinks,' says Kathrin Altwegg, a researcher at the University of Bern in Switzerland who runs an instrument called ROSINA that picked up the odor. The European Space Agency has posted a full rundown of the comet's BO on its website. The mix includes ammonia (NH3), hydrogen sulphide (H2S), formaldehyde (CH2O) and methanol (CH3OH). Of course, anyone visiting the comet would be wearing a spacesuit (on top of that, the sense of smell is notoriously numb in space). Nevertheless, taking a whiff of this comet would be like sharing a horse barn with a drunk and a dozen rotten eggs."

Science!

Watch: Neither candidate at a Congressional debate could name a book he'd read recently

Vox writes Watch: Neither candidate at a Congressional debate could name a book he'd read recently "In a debate Tuesday night for a contested House of Representatives seat in Staten Island, Rep. Michael Grimm (R) and his opponent Dominic Recchia were each asked, "What was the last book you've read?" Neither could come up with an answer"

I'm not sure if it's better that they couldn't come up with a lie. I wonder what newspapers and magazines they read?

This is what it’s like to try to get a Voter ID when you’re disabled, poor or don’t drive

WonkBlog describes This is what it’s like to try to get a Voter ID when you’re disabled, poor or don’t drive - The Washington Post "But it glosses over the reality of life for some voters, who may struggle to get around because of disabilities, who may lack the seemingly small sums necessary to pay for documentation, who may not have the flexible scheduling to visit a government office twice, or three times, or more."

Boehner’s Lawsuit Has No Legal Basis

Remember when the Republicans in the House voted to sue Obama for delaying a provision of Obamacare? Whatever happened with that? Oh right, nothing. The Washington Monthly writes The Congressional Research Service Finds that Boehner’s Lawsuit Has No Legal Basis

"Now, three months after the party-line House vote to green-light the lawsuit, no complaint has yet been filed. If this stretched out delay means that Boehner has actually redirected his sue-Obama gambit toward oblivion, the reason may be this unnoticed six week old CRS report. While bearing an opaquely generic title - ‘A Primer on the Reviewability of Agency Delay and Enforcement Discretion,’ the report actually targets a single instance of alleged agency delay and exercise of enforcement discretion - the Obama Administration’s adjustments of effective dates for the Affordable Care Act’s so-called employer mandate to offer employees ACA-complaint health insurance or pay a tax. This delay happens to be the basis - the sole basis - for the legal action against the President that Boehner outlined in July. Although shrouded in twelve pages of fine print and protectively bureaucratic phraseology, the report’s bottom line is clear: not merely are the legal underpinnings of the Republicans’ planned lawsuit weak; the report turns up no legal basis - no ‘there’ there - at all."

"The Report offers two conclusions: First, under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), no rulemaking procedure was necessitated by the Administration’s initial one-year delay in enforcing the employer mandate, past the ACA’s prescribed January 1, 2014 effective date. This was so, the Report states, because, `where an agency fails to take a discrete action by a statutory deadline, … no rulemaking is required.'"

"Second, the Report states that, when, in February 2014, the Administration announced an additional year’s postponement of full enforcement of the mandate, until January 1, 2016, “informal rulemaking procedures” appeared to be required. In fact, as the report’s authors reference, the Administration had engaged in precisely the type of informal rulemaking process that, the report concluded, was called for. The Administration’s action finalized a September 2013 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, making adjustments in response to comments from interested parties, precisely as prescribed by the APA. In other words, having been asked whether the Obama administration had crossed all its t’s and dotted its i’s, the CRS’ answer was unequivocal: yes it had."

USS North Dakota SSN 784 Commissioned

DefenceTalk reports USS North Dakota SSN 784 Commissioned. Excerpts:

USS North Dakota (SSN 784) officially became the Navy’s newest addition to the submarine force following a commissioning ceremony held Oct. 25, at Naval Submarine Base New London.

North Dakota is the 11th Virginia-class attack submarine to join the fleet, and the first of eight Block III Virginia-class submarines to be built. The Block III submarines are being built with new Virginia Payload Tubes designed to lower costs and increase missile-firing payload possibilities.

The 10 current Virginia-class submarines have 12 individual 21-inch diameter vertical launch tubes able to fire Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles (TLAMS). The Block III submarines being built will have two-larger 87-inch diameter tubes able to house six TLAMS each.

As the most modern and sophisticated attack submarine in the world, the submarine can operate in both littoral and deep ocean environments and presents combatant commanders with a broad and unique range of operational capabilities. North Dakota will be a flexible, multi-mission platform designed to carry out the seven core competencies of the submarine force: anti-submarine warfare, anti-surface warfare, delivery of special operations forces, strike warfare, irregular warfare, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and mine warfare.

The submarine is 377 feet long, has a 34-foot beam, and will be able to dive to depths greater than 800 feet and operate at speeds in excess of 25 knots submerged. It will operate for 33 years without ever refueling.

TIL the word littoral.

Apple Replaces iPad Destroyed by Exploding NASA Rocket

So I'm reading this story in Cult of Mac, Apple replaces iPad destroyed by exploding NASA rocket.

I setup my iPad to take a time lapse on the ledge of the road, it was being held by the Smart Cover. Rocket launches everything looks good and then it blows up, about 15 seconds later the shockwaves comes and knocks my iPad down into the swamp. I can’t see it because the water is so murky and when I finally get it it doesn’t turn on so I lost the video also… Tried cleaning it and plugging it into iTunes nothing happens.

However, after being prompted by his fellow Redditors to try bringing the iPad into the Genius bar to tell them “it landed in a swap because a spaceship exploded,” iOSecure found himself rewarded for his good faith.

I just went to the Genius Bar and explained what happened. He called out the manager and the manager said “I think we’ve officially seen it all” she then offered a free replacement but on 16GB instead of 64 which I had (not complaining)

Great story, I totally believe this about Apple (or about a genius bar). As I read "it landed in a swap because a spaceship exploded" I thought of the Luke in the Empire Strikes Back who landed in a swamp because (basically) a spaceship exploded. He should name his iPad "R2". Then I thought, I wonder if I could rename Siri to "R2" so I could say "Hey R2...". Well my iPhone was plugged in, so I said "Hey Siri, can I call you R2?". Well both my iPhone and iPad were plugged in so I got two different answers:

iPhone Siri: But...everyone else calls me Siri

iPad Siri: No. But really, I can't imagine why you'd want to

First I think it's nice that I got two different answers. It gives Siri some personality. Second, this situation is an answer to iPad Siri's response. It would be nice to talk to only one Siri if more than one is listening.

What It’s Like to Carry Your Nobel Prize through Airport Security

I thought I had blogged this already. Astrophysicist Brian Schmidt, who won the 2011 Nobel Physics Prize for co-discovering dark energy—the mysterious element of the universe that is causing the expansion of spacetime to speed up describes What It’s Like to Carry Your Nobel Prize through Airport Security "Among the many changes the Nobel Prize brought to Schmidt’s life: travel hassles. Here’s what he said it’s like to carry a Nobel medal aboard an airplane:"

They’re like, ‘Sir, there’s something in your bag.’

I said, ‘Yes, I think it’s this box.’

They said, ‘What’s in the box?’

I said, ‘a large gold medal,’ as one does.

So they opened it up and they said, ‘What’s it made out of?’

I said, ‘gold.’

And they’re like, ‘Uhhhh. Who gave this to you?’

‘The King of Sweden.’

‘Why did he give this to you?’

‘Because I helped discover the expansion rate of the universe was accelerating.’

At which point, they were beginning to lose their sense of humor. I explained to them it was a Nobel Prize, and their main question was, ‘Why were you in Fargo?’”

Apparently they didn't think it was as dangerous as a belt buckle.

Happy 45th Birthday, Internet!

Yesterday was the 45th birthday of the Internet. Happy 45th Birthday, Internet! "How do we define the invention of the internet? It's a question that scholars and armchair historians have debated for decades. Did it start with the birth of the web? Did it start with the adoption of TCP/IP? You could make a case for either. But one seminal moment in the creation of the internet cannot be denied: the first host-to-host connection of the ARPANET between UCLA and Stanford on October 29, 1969. At 10:30pm."

TSA Confiscates Raygun Belt Buckle BECAUSE TERRORISM!

Reason reports TSA Confiscates Raygun Belt Buckle BECAUSE TERRORISM! "Award-winning videographer Sean Malone had a raygun belt buckle confiscated recently by the good folks at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). You know, because all of the 9/11 hijackers were packing rayguns or something."

Tim Cook: "I'm Proud to be Gay"

Not a surprise, but Apple CEO Tim Cook comes out in Businessweek, Tim Cook: "I'm Proud to be Gay". Even less of a surprise, he does so eloquently.

"While I have never denied my sexuality, I haven’t publicly acknowledged it either, until now. So let me be clear: I’m proud to be gay, and I consider being gay among the greatest gifts God has given me.

Being gay has given me a deeper understanding of what it means to be in the minority and provided a window into the challenges that people in other minority groups deal with every day. It’s made me more empathetic, which has led to a richer life. It’s been tough and uncomfortable at times, but it has given me the confidence to be myself, to follow my own path, and to rise above adversity and bigotry. It’s also given me the skin of a rhinoceros, which comes in handy when you’re the CEO of Apple.

The world has changed so much since I was a kid. America is moving toward marriage equality, and the public figures who have bravely come out have helped change perceptions and made our culture more tolerant. Still, there are laws on the books in a majority of states that allow employers to fire people based solely on their sexual orientation. There are many places where landlords can evict tenants for being gay, or where we can be barred from visiting sick partners and sharing in their legacies. Countless people, particularly kids, face fear and abuse every day because of their sexual orientation.

I don’t consider myself an activist, but I realize how much I’ve benefited from the sacrifice of others. So if hearing that the CEO of Apple is gay can help someone struggling to come to terms with who he or she is, or bring comfort to anyone who feels alone, or inspire people to insist on their equality, then it’s worth the trade-off with my own privacy."

Ten hours of walking in NYC as a woman

"In August 2014, Rob Bliss of Rob Bliss Creative reached out to Hollaback! to partner on a PSA highlighting the impact of street harassment. He was inspired by his girlfriend — who gets street harassed all the time — and Shoshana B. Roberts volunteered to be the subject of his PSA. For 10 hours, Rob walked in front of Shoshana with a camera in his backpack, while Shoshana walked silently with two mics in her hands."

The comments on YouTube are pretty disgusting. Most along the lines of "but they were just saying have a nice day". So this video also works as "What it's like being a woman on the Internet". Now she's getting rape threats.

Alex Alvarez tackles the Relax, it's a compliment argument:

To anchor this more concretely, consider the behavior of the men in the video. Take a look at how they seek the woman out to wish her a good morning, despite her not having made eye contact or shown any interest in talking to them. Take a look at how they’re not wishing a good morning to any other person, particularly male people, also walking around. The woman is walking directly behind the man filming her (the camera is hidden in his backpack), and not one of the men shown in the video are seen to be greeting him and wishing him a good day. Just her.

Why is this?

It’s because they don’t care, really whether she has a good day or not. What they care about is letting her know that they have noticed her — her hair, her face, her body, her outfit. They want her to notice that they’ve noticed, and they want her to notice them, however fleetingly.

I’ve had men wish me a good morning by looking me in the eyes and smiling, their tone light and pleasant. And I return the sentiment. And I’ve also had men wish me a good morning with their eyes tracking my body, resting on whatever they like the most. I can hear the growl in their voices, like a small, untamed animal living at the back of their throats. And I don’t say anything back.

I mean. Would you?

Syfy Plans to Lure You Back With These 5 Shows

EW says Syfy plans to lure you back with these 5 shows "Syfy knows they messed up. Now they have a plan to win you back. The cable network’s top executives won’t say this in such blunt language, but they acknowledge that somewhere along the line, the network missed an opportunity to have more great scripted dramas. It happened sometime after the name change from Sci Fi Channel to Syfy and the conclusion of Battlestar Galactica—the acclaimed series that was once mentioned by critics alongside titles like Mad Men and The Sopranos as representing TV’s top-tier of storytelling."

Nice interview with Bill McGoldrick, SyFy's head of original programming.

• Ascension - 6 hour mini-series, premieres Dec 15, 2014
• 12 Monkeys - 13 episode series, premieres Jan 16, 2015
• Childhood's End - 6 hour mini-series
• The Expanse. Series - 10 episode series
• Hunters - 13 episode series

I don't know, isn't it time we had a Star Trek series again?

Verizon's 'Perma-Cookie' Is a Privacy-Killing Machine | WIRED

Wired reports Verizon's 'Perma-Cookie' Is a Privacy-Killing Machine.

Verizon Wireless has been subtly altering the web traffic of its wireless customers for the past two years, inserting a string of about 50 letters, numbers, and characters into data flowing between these customers and the websites they visit.

The company—one the country’s largest wireless carriers, providing cell phone service for about 123 million subscribers—calls this a Unique Identifier Header, or UIDH. It’s a kind of short-term serial number that advertisers can use to identify you on the web, and it’s the lynchpin of the company’s internet advertising program. But critics say that it’s also a reckless misuse of Verizon’s power as an internet service provider—something that could be used as a trump card to obviate established privacy tools such as private browsing sessions or ‘do not track’ features.

Ugh.

Nighttime Rocket Launch Will Be Visible from US East Coast Monday

Sorry for the last minute notification, Nighttime Rocket Launch Will Be Visible from US East Coast Monday "If you live along the U.S. East Coast, you have a great opportunity to see a rocket launch from your own backyard Monday evening (Oct. 27), but you'll need to know when and where to look to spot the brilliant liftoff. Early Monday evening, a commercial Antares rocket built by the Orbital Sciences Corp. is due to blast off at 6:45 p.m. EDT (2245 GMT) from a pad at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport on Wallops Island, Virginia. It is the first-ever night launch of the two-stage Antares rocket, and the flight could be visible from Massachusetts to South Carolina, weather permitting."

Long Article Dump

I've been making progress through my Instapaper queue but have been bad about blogging them. Here's a bunch of articles I found interesting to load up your Instapaper queues. If you want to follow me on Instapaper, my profile is, HowardLikedThis.

Politics and Economics

• Paul Krugman, In Defense of Obama. "The Nobel Prize-winning economist, once one of the president’s most notable critics, on why Obama is a historic success."
• Does He Pass the Test? by Paul Krugman. Krugman reviews Tim Geithner's book, Stress Test.
• Putting Ukraine in Its Place - The Atlantic. "From the current debates you’d never know what matters more: Russia’s land grab, Iran’s nuclear program, or China’s territorial claims. How America stopped thinking strategically."
• How LBJ Saved the Civil Rights Act - The Atlantic. "Fifty years later, new accounts of its fraught passage reveal the era's real hero—and it isn’t the Supreme Court."
• Why Did Maine's Governor Conspire With 'Sovereign Citizen' Extremists?. This was just a strange strange story. It's "an excerpt from Chapter 1 of As Maine Went: Governor Paul LePage and the Tea Party Takeover of Maine, by Mike Tipping."
• Wired's long article: Edward Snowden: The Untold Story
• Scott Walker's Toxic Racial Politics from The New Republic.
• Not a Tea Party, a Confederate Party. "Here’s what my teachers’ should have told me: “Reconstruction was the second phase of the Civil War. It lasted until 1877, when the Confederates won.” I think that would have gotten my attention." A fascinating article.
• Where the Tea Party Rules. "Lima, Ohio, has been struggling for decades – and the GOP’s radical policies are making it even worse."
• The Explosive, Inside Story of How John Kerry Built an Israel-Palestine Peace Plan—and Watched It Crumble from The New Republic
• A Former AP Correspondent Explains How and Why His Colleagues Get Israel So Wrong from Tablet Magazine.
• Vox goes Inside San Francisco's housing crisis

Tech

• The Disruption Machine - The New Yorker. Jill Lepore has some issues with Clayton Christensen's theories.
• Inside the Military's Secretive Smartphone Program by Gizmodo.
• Email Is Still the Best Thing on the Internet by Alexis C. Madrigal in The Atlantic.
• Who Really Found the Higgs Boson describes the working and management process at the LHC.
• How Andreessen Horowitz Is Disrupting Silicon Valley
• Before the Startup, an essay by Paul Graham. "Here I'm going to give you the first part of it—the things to remember if you want to prepare yourself to start a startup."
• Published for the First Time: a 1959 Essay by Isaac Asimov on Creativity from the MIT Technology Review.

Misc

• Where the Card Sharks Feed by David Samuels in The Atlantic. "In 2011, the justice department targeted online-poker operators for violating the unlawful internet gambling enforcement act. Since then, many guileless amateurs, known to poker pros as “fish,” have been moving back to casinos."
• For Former Military Lawyer Colby Vokey, the Defense Never Rests. Vokey is an inspiring person, and the subject of my all-time favorite comment thread on this blog.
• Aggressive police take hundreds of millions of dollars from motorists not charged with crimes from The Washington Post
• The Secret Rules of Adjective Order. "A long fascinating article—or is it a fascinating long article?"

Law

• This Alabama Judge Has Figured Out How to Dismantle Roe v. Wade Nina Martin writes in ProPublica about Tom Parker. His approach in trying to ban abortions struck me as similar to Ginsberg's work on equal rights.
• Scalia wrote a book so there were some reviews:
  • Scalia v. Scalia. Dahlia Lithwick in The Atlantic wonders: "Does his faith influence his judicial decision making?"
  • How Scalia's Beliefs Completely Changed the Supreme Court Scalia: A Court of One reviewed by Justin Driver in New Republic.

Entertainment

• I killed At The Movies. Ignatiy Vishnevetsky tells "The inside story of the dueling critics’ last hurrah".
• My ‘SNL’: Testimonials From Cast Members Who Lived It from Grantland
• The Cost of Survival The New Yorker reviews The Last of the Unjust and makes me want to see it.

Daring Fireball: Retailers Are Disabling NFC to Block Apple Pay

Daring Fireball: Retailers Are Disabling NFC to Block Apple Pay

Earlier this week, pharmacy chain Rite Aid shut down unofficial support for the Apple Pay and Google Wallet mobile payments systems, resulting in an outcry from users who have been testing out Apple’s new system since its launch on Monday. Rite Aid was not an official Apple Pay partner, but the payments system generally works with existing near field communications (NFC) payment terminals anyway, and many users had had success using Apple Pay at Rite Aid stores early in the week.

It now appears that fellow major pharmacy chain CVS is following suit and as of today is shutting down the NFC functionality of its payment terminals entirely, a move presumably intended to thwart Apple Pay. Google Wallet services are obviously also being affected by the move.

"Think about what they’re doing. They’re turning off NFC payment systems — the whole thing — only because people were actually using them with Apple Pay. Apple Pay works so well that it even works with non-partner systems. These things have been installed for years and so few people used them, apparently, that these retailers would rather block everyone than allow Apple Pay to continue working. I can’t imagine a better validation of Apple Pay’s appeal.

And the reason they don’t want to allow Apple Pay is because Apple Pay doesn’t give them any personal information about the customer. It’s not about security — Apple Pay is far more secure than any credit/debit card system in the U.S. It’s not about money — Apple’s tiny slice of the transaction comes from the banks, not the merchants. It’s about data.

They’re doing this so they can pursue a system that is less secure (third-party apps don’t have access to the secure element where Apple Pay stores your credit card data, for one thing), less convenient (QR codes?), and not private."

iPad Air 2

So the new iPad is available in stores. I noticed it today and ran over to pick one up. The Apple Store was a little less busy than usual and there was no crazy long line, it was nice. I picked up an iPad and found it really nice and an employee asked if I had any questions. I said "Yes, can I have one". They had stuff in stock that was easy. I replaced my 64GB iPad 2 with another maxed out iPad; 128GB with cellular using Apple's new SIM card. I'm sure 64GB would have been fine, but I was trying to future-proof a little. I also could have done with a wifi only model, but I have used the cellular connection on occasion and while I could tether to my iPhone, I like that the iPad can use another network if Verizon isn't giving good reception. Also, you only get real GPS if you get the cellular model.

I ran into one issue buying it, my credit card was denied. First time that ever happened. I called the customer service number on the back and got to fraud detection. Apparently there was no other reason to suspect fraud other than I was buying an iPad, at an Apple Store I've regularly bought stuff at with that card. The Apple clerk told me it's pretty common happening 2-3 times a day. I finally got to a person and everything was cleared.

I got it home and backed up my iPad 2 and then plugged in the new iPad and did a restore. Oddly not everything came over. I got the right number of home pages and some folders but only a couple of apps. I called AppleCare and why the guy was walking through some simple stuff, I plugged in the new iPad again and it started another sync and it started copying all the other apps over. I told him it was working and he didn't have to wait for it finish and hung up. Though after an hour it was only about halfway done and stopped. I started another sync and that one finally worked, recopying over what was done and finishing with everything else.

So how is it? Great. It's smaller than my iPad 2 and feels a lot easier to hold. It's also a lot zippier. It's very responsive, like the iPad 2 was when I first got it. Because my iTunes backup was encrypted (there's a checkbox in the iTunes Summary page for the iPad to do this) and because I've been using iCloud Keychain all my passwords came over too, so all my apps just work. The new retina screen is nice. I can't say I can discern that's it's much better than the iPad 2, but everything does seem sharper. Comics look noticeably better on it. Handoff works and I suspect I'll use that a fair amount with the iMac. I've setup TouchID and I think I'll get used to that very quickly. I haven't used it much yet, but I'm looking forward to having Siri on my iPad, I've tried to use it a few times since getting it on an iPhone. Now I'll want it on my iMac, but I suspect Hey Siri will make up for it.

Two small issues so far. First it was nice that I got the rest of iWork included with the iPad (I had only bought Numbers). But while a version was on it, and update was in the App Store and it took 3 or 4 attempts to actually get them installed. I guess they were busy today. Also, while apps came over fine (eventually), any web apps that had home page icons were there, but their icon was a blank. A couple of times visiting the page was enough to fill in the icon, and a couple of times I had to reinstall the home page shortcut.

So hopefully, I'm done with Apple upgrades for at least a little bit.

The Fed is telling Wall Street banks to clean up their ethics or get broken up

Vox reports The Fed is telling Wall Street banks to clean up their ethics or get broken up "Speeches from Federal Reserve Bank presidents tend not to be very interesting, and indeed New York Fed President William Dudley's recent talk on 'Enhancing Financial Stability by Improving Culture in the Financial Services Industry' seems to have been titled so as to maximize the number of people who ignore it. But he ended with a bombshell, telling CEOs that unless they clean up their acts, the Wall Street megabanks are going to get broken up."

A Tale of Momentum & Inertia

A Tale of Momentum & Inertia from HouseSpecial on Vimeo.