The world would certainly be a better place without Elvis Costello.

Surprising that a well-read chap like Mr Cole would make the mistake of judging someone's literary credentials by how smoothly they talk. Sometimes, (often?) the relation is directly inverse, as in the case of Vladimir Nabokov:

"I think like a genius, I write like a distinguished author, and I speak like a child."

As poetry rap with its short lines, highly stressed and thrusting couplets, captures the spirit of these times as well as Alexander Pope captured the aspirational classicism of C18th England with his balanced iambic couplets. Rap at its best can seem as clever and pithy as Pope, and I dare say there were plenty of second-rate heroic couplets churned out in the Age of Reason.

Yes, looking believably intelligent is a sine qua non for the deeper kind of beauty.

But that rules out Nicole Kidman for marrying Tom Cruise, even if she tried to make amends with a false nose.

Interesting. I've had exactly the same response as KP to the elegant trailing-vine style tattoo on very pretty young women.

Normally I hate tattoos and think they demonstrate a distinctly unattractive attitude to time, the self and to nakedness, but the trailing-vine style, which I've only seen a couple of times, where the eye is teased with what remains hidden, has got under my radar. Is there an allusion to Eve in them? As painted by Cranach - probably.

Of course these things will age badly, and I dare say they lose their charm when the wearer is naked - I've not been tempted to find out.

Read some James Gould Cozzens, the criminally neglected mid c20 American novelist, and one of the few of a conservative bent.

'Men and Brethren' is an excellent starting point, a few days in the life of a NYC minister. Like the best 40s movie you ever saw, only better.

'Ask Me Tommorow' is a terrific early one; young American writer in Europe in the 20s - but the other side of the Hemingway/Woody Allen cliche.

'Guard of Honor' is his masterpiece; a staggeringly well-observed novel of the ww2 experience on the home front of the army air corps.

'Morning Noon and Night' his concluding unscientific post-script to life and work.

Readers of Dostoyevski should take a look at the work of Russian political theorist and commentator, and former advisor to Putin, Alexander Dugin. Apart from a certain physical resemblance, I can't help thinking that if FD were alive today he'd be spouting a similar kind of Eurasianism as Dugin. He'd certainly be no better friend of the USA.

Howellis' example highlights the symmetry of the problem and shows why there should not be any advantage to switching.

If you actually set this one up as an experiment there is no problem. You could do it like this: First randomly choose n (the smaller amount for specificity) and then independently choose whether player 1 picks envelope n or envelope 2n.

Run this on a computer or on paper it works out because...

...you've actually had to settle on a distribution for n.

It is however, never the case that given the contents of player 1's envelope the other envelope has either twice or half as much with equal probability.

Say that n was chosen randomly between 10 and 100 (inclusive), with equal probability for each value.

If payer 1 shows a value between 10 and 19 (case 1), then switching is always better, if it is between 101 and 200 then switching is always worse (case 2). If it is between 20 and 100 (case 3) the expectation is  better for switching.

If you include in your calculations the probabilities of which case you are in, it comes out even.

Thanks for the Hitchins anecdotes, my gut feels entirely vindicated.

Religions cultured despisers these days are generally despicable and not very cultured.

It's mathematically more elegant to treat Calculus as a subset of Probability theory, via Measure theory. The integral is just a type of mean value. It gets right away from the old examples based on motion of bodies. This could be a better way of teaching these topics after devising a new set of exemplary paradigms.

The solution to the Monty Hall problem is far easier to see if you remove  all subjectivity:

Say Monty Hall is a robot, and if the strategies "stay" or "switch" are embodied in two different robots, and all even-numbered contestants are represented by the "stay" robot, odd-numbered by the "switch" robot.

If a contestant wins they put a gold star on the robot that played for them. In that case the "switch" robot would acquire twice as many gold stars over time as the "stay" robot.

When humans are involved in the choices,  then we get into the whole area of reading the motives of others, and it gets a bit more complicated. What's behind Monty's knowing, cheesy grin?

Craigen's problem depends on your utility function. If it was just $1 at stake most people would rightly switch.

Following the logic of the linked article by Ms. Sentilles liberals should be strongly encouraged to fulfil their nurturing needs and faith in their creed by adopting rather than breeding.

How refreshing to come across a Moldbuggian moment, however hedged, on Ricochet.

"If women refused to spend time with men who disrespect women, if they refused to hook up with guys who don't acknowledge them the next day—then they could begin to resurrect a culture where dating and romance, not casual sex, are the norm."

- Right, re-wire attractive young women so that they no longer dig jerks.

Good luck.

I think most of the 70% of Jews who vote Democrat are not ultimately concerned with Israel. They see themselves primarily as ethnic Americans and discount anything resembling anti-semitism they see on the left side as anti-zionism, which they kind of agree with, although they'd never admit it.

They don't feel comfortable with the Republican Party and the center-right because if they move the dial one or two notches further right they find serious anti-semitism. Just try reading the Comments to most articles at TakiMag.com

This story is an inverse-'Casablanca' in some way. 

Switch the roles of Rick and Victor Laszlo. What would Bogart do? Write to the NY Times? Hardly.

My fellow, Ricocheteers you are the nicest most civilised bunch of people a chap could hope to meet. As the sun goes down on us, I draw strength by reflecting that a gentleman only supports losts causes.