Tuesday roundup

Pesticides are linked to autism (among those most exposed).

Of all the BS anti-immigration arguments, the most ridiculous--and one I've heard in person--is "why don't they focus on making their country better?" I don't know where to start with that one; there are so many possible responses. Like, how do you make your country better when those who thrive on the status quo, make a show of killing people who try to make the country better? And besides, do you appreciate that immigrants can make--and have made--your country better? Oh, and here's one response to that question, in the context of the World Cup.

The key take away from this article on Latin America's middle class is,

And though living standards have improved for millions in Brazil over the last decade, some here contend that grouping so many into the middle class is misleading. “There are families now who can afford to buy flat-screen televisions but who still live in places without treated sewage,” said Lena Lavinas, an economist at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. “We shouldn’t confuse the formation of a society of mass consumption with the expansion of the middle class.”

The key take-away from this interview with Belle Knox is,

...this is what we do to young women. We catapult them into fame, or more often infamy, based on the ease of ridiculing, shaming or objectifying them. We reward them for their bodies, not their brains — and the reward is so often meted out like punishment.

Not mutually exclusive: literacy and an enviable badonkadonk.

I am so sorry for the sad, confused people who found these pictures offensive. What a pathetic existence they must experience.


Did you know there's a lake on Titan?

Sean Carroll tells philosophy-hating physicists to check their cluelessness:

I don’t know about all those other folks, but personally I did not fall in love with science as a kid because I was swept up in the romance of finding slightly more efficient calculational techniques... Part of that is knowing how to do calculations, but another part is asking deep questions about what it all means.

I'm a huge fan of newspaper mulching.

Your brain on creativity.