Thought That Came Unbidden

Dear men in urban environments and in grocery stores,

Standing behind it and pushing the stroller or the grocery cart doesn’t make you look less manly.  You look less manly by standing beside the stroller or grocery cart and pushing it with one hand. It is your very standing beside it that tells the rest of us you care about how manly you look which in and of itself makes you look less manly.

Please think about this before you block the entire sidewalk or grocery store aisle.

Sincerely,

Every urban pedestrian and grocery shopper ever.

There’s a huge push in the U.S. these days for STEM – Science Technology Engineering Math – education, as if the only thing you need to be a successful human being is the ability to program, build a bridge, or solve the quadratic equation.

One thing that is good about this push is the emphasis on science. We need more science in a country that has a Creation Museum that posits with no irony whatsoever the idea that dinosaurs and homo sapiens lived simultaneously. The bad thing, though, about this devotion to science is that there’s too much science in it.

A key component of science is the experimental method:

1. Try something
2. See what the outcome is
3. Judge the outcome as desirable or not desirable
4. Note the conditions under which you tried something
5. Repeat if necessary adjusting and noting the conditions you adjusted until you achieve a desirable outcome
6. Once a desirable outcome is achieved, attempt to replicate those conditions every time you do that something.

The thing about this method is it works across every thing you do in life, even things like cooking and team sports that don’t meet the strict -ology definition that characterizes science. The harm in restricting the experimental method to things that are strictly science is how it shackles us to the idea of perfection.

I’m skipping my first curling team this year and it’s a huge learning experience. The first thing my Vice, who has been playing three times as long as I have, asked me was if I knew the best way to learn. By failing. The experimental method takes the stigma out of that failing and lets failing become learning, something we also need more of to be successful human beings.

If Donald Trump’s ascendancy as a viable presidential candidate didn’t already prove that we have surrendered our capacity for critical thinking then you need look no further than the USDA’s food recall email list to seal that judgement.

Stop & Shop is one of the larger grocery store chain owners on the Eastern seaboard.  They have outlets from Massachusetts to central Virginia.  In the Mid-Atlantic states they do business as Giant Food.   Today Stop & Shop, and Giant Food, issued a voluntary recall for one of the frozen vegetables in their Nature’s Promise organic line because of an ingredient which is not listed on the label.  Here’s what the USDA sent out (emphasis added by me):

U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) <fda@service.govdelivery.com>
9:55 AM (23 minutes ago)
to me
You are subscribed to Recalls, Market Withdrawals and Safety Alerts for U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA).

This information has recently been updated and is now available.

Giant Food Alerts Customers To Voluntary Recall Of Nature’s Promise Organic Edamame
10/30/2015 05:59 PM EDT

Landover, Md. – Giant Food, LLC announced it removed from sale Nature’s Promise Organic Edamame products because they contain soy, which is not listed on the ingredient label. These products are safe to consume for individuals who do not suffer from a soy allergy.
For detailed information pertaining to this Recalls, Market Withdrawals and Safety Alerts message, please click the link at the beginning of this bulletin.

Edamame are soy beans.

I’m just going to leave that right there so the ridiculousness of this can seep in.

In places that follow it, the U.S. switched from Daylight Saving Time to Standard Time this morning. Practically this means 1) we get an “extra” hour today (yay for manipulating time through philosophy of knowledge principles) and 2) it means it will be lighter in the morning and pitch black when I leave the office at 5pm on Monday evening. Based on when we switch back, however, Standard time isn’t really standard any more.

Daylight Saving Time applied in the U.S. for 237 days in 2015. That means will only have been on so-called Standard time for 128 days out of the 365 in 2015. For 2016 we’ll be on DST for 239 out of 366 days (Thanks, Gregorian calendar!).

So how can something be “standard” if it’s the smaller portion of the division?

Random things I ponder as I reset the 23 clocks I have in my house.

If you want to read more, check out this great article on how the U.S. Navy master clock keeps time for the world or CNN’s annual piece on the myths behind Daylight Saving Time.