Law enforcement officials identified the suspect as James Wenneker von Brunn, born in 1920, from the Eastern Shore of Maryland, NBC News reported. NBC said he may have had connections to hate groups or anti-government groups.

For those who started something when the terror book came out about right wing groups, this and the Tiller murder are the sort of thing it was talking about. How many lefty attacks have there been? Oh that's right, none.

Reality does have a liberal bias, and it's because of people like these guys.

Gunman, guard shot at Holocaust museum - Crime & courts- msnbc.com

So — as post-1960s cliché decreed — I left my comfortable job and life to live for a year in a temple on the backstreets of Kyoto. My high-minded year lasted all of a week, by which time I’d noticed that the depthless contemplation of the moon and composition of haiku I’d imagined from afar was really more a matter of cleaning, sweeping and then cleaning some more. But today, more than 21 years later, I still live in the vicinity of Kyoto, in a two-room apartment that makes my old monastic cell look almost luxurious by comparison. I have no bicycle, no car, no television I can understand, no media — and the days seem to stretch into eternities, and I can’t think of a single thing I lack.

The Joy of Less - Happy Days Blog - NYTimes.com

Scott Aaronson:

A biggest number contest is clearly pointless when the contestants take turns. But what if the contestants write down their numbers simultaneously, neither aware of the other’s? To introduce a talk on "Big Numbers," I invite two audience volunteers to try exactly this.

Who can name the bigger number? Whoever has the deeper paradigm. Are you ready? Get set. Go.

Have you read Rucker's classic?

A captivating excursion through the mathematical approaches to the notions of infinity and the implications of that mathematics for the vexing questions on the mind, existence, and consciousness.

It is in the realm of infinity, he maintains, that mathematics, science, and logic merge with the fantastic. By closely examining the paradoxes that arise from this merging, we can learn a great deal about the human mind, its powers, and its limitations.

What about Penrose's The Road to Reality?

"What a joy it is to read a book that doesn't simplify (*), doesn't dodge the difficult questions, and doesn't always pretend to have answers."

Granted, it's not for everyone:

The film opens with her visiting a bookshop and fingering a copy of Roger Penrose's book, The Road to Reality. "Don't want to go there," she mutters to herself. Meanwhile, outside, her bicycle is being stolen.

(*) Ah, Lisa:

Grandma: I saw all your awards, Lisa. They're mighty impressive.

Lisa: Aw, I just keep them out to bug Bart, heh.

Grandma: [reproachful] Don't be bashful. When I was your age, kids made fun of me because I read at the ninth-grade level.

Lisa: Me too!

Grandma: You know, Lisa, I feel like I have an instant rapport with you.

Lisa: [gasps] You didn't dumb it down! You said "rapport".

Who Can Name the Bigger Number?

The end result is that G.M. will not become more like successful car companies. It will become less like them. The federal merger will not accelerate the company’s viability. It will impede it. We’ve seen this before, albeit in different context: An overconfident government throws itself into a dysfunctional culture it doesn’t really understand. The result is quagmire. The costs escalate. There is no exit strategy.

Op-Ed Columnist - The Quagmire Ahead - NYTimes.com

Alex Pang:

Tinkering is about seizing the moment: it is about ad-hoc learning, getting things done, innovation and novelty, all in a highly social, networked environment. Tinkering is a bit like jazz.

Today we tinker with things; tomorrow, we will tinker with the world.

The counterculture is one important influence on tinkering; so is computer hacking, with its casual contempt for established authority, deep respect for arcane technical skills, and refined love of imaginative jokes.

Consumption encourages you to just react; the more thoughtlessly the better. Tinkering forces you to reflect, to learn from your experience, to think about why something has worked or failed, and to consider the possibilities before you.

Tinkering to the future

Time lapse video of night sky as it passes over the 2009 Texas Star Party in Fort Davis, Texas.

The galactic core of Milky Way is brightly displayed.

Images taken with 15mm fisheye lens.

From the archive:

Oh! I feel it. I feel the cosmos!

Galactic Center of Milky Way Rises over Texas

“It has been a long time since any of us boys have seen a woman, so we are writing to you in hopes that you’ll help us out of our situation,” Cpl. Frank J. Gizych lamented in a letter posted from the fog-shrouded Aleutian Islands. “Since we know that it’s impossible to see a woman in the flesh, we would appreciate it very much if you could send us a photo of yourself.”

It was July 1944, and America was at war. From bases and battlefields in Europe and on Pacific islands, soldiers, sailors and airmen were sending streams of letters to their favorite actresses in Hollywood, asking for pinup photos and commenting on life on the front lines.

Almost all of that mail, which studios usually answered with a glossy shot showing the star in a saucy pose, has been lost. But the actress Donna Reed, later famous for her roles as Mary Bailey in “It’s a Wonderful Life” and the middle-class housewife Donna Stone on “The Donna Reed Show” and who won an Oscar for “From Here to Eternity,” saved some of the correspondence. After nearly 65 years in a shoebox inside an old trunk long stored in the garage of her home in Beverly Hills, Calif., the letters have at last been read and made public by the actress’s children. Ms. Reed died in 1986 at age 64.

Dear Donna - A Pinup So Swell She Kept G.I. Mail - NYTimes.com

The Caitlin Rhododendron is a beautiful pink scented rhododendron that was created by Dr. Jim Marcellus through the crossing of the Fortune and Hummingbird Rhododendrons, and named after his granddaughter.

Its my great uncle Jim who had a major influence in my interest in science at an early age - this is just one of many reasons:) He has made a new flower - and it is soooo beautiful!

Official Flower

Your Life Ambition

Joshua Wolf Shenk:

Is there a formula—some mix of love, work, and psychological adaptation—for a good life? For 72 years, researchers at Harvard have been examining this question, following 268 men who entered college in the late 1930s through war, career, marriage and divorce, parenthood and grandparenthood, and old age. Here, for the first time, a journalist gains access to the archive of one of the most comprehensive longitudinal studies in history. Its contents, as much literature as science, offer profound insight into the human condition—and into the brilliant, complex mind of the study’s longtime director, George Vaillant.

Have you seen Seven Up!?

Happiness Isn't About "Me"