Spirit food: "Something only you can see" -- Filmmaker Jean Sebastien Monzani wants to help you gain access to happy secrets. (via The Rumpus)
Brain food:
- Last month, we found out that caffeine doesn't work the way we think it does. So how does it work, exactly?
- Gravity is an illusion! (So says this guy.)
- Benefit from playing violent video games.
- Are "being hit with unfair charges, fines or incarcerations."
- Are choosing to vacation with their parents.
A concern/UU news: The Rev. Paul Sawyer, minister emeritus at the Throop Unitarian Universalist Church of Pasadena, California, died this week of pancreatic cancer. His obituary really makes me wish I'd known him. (via The Los Angeles Times)
Good answer!: Scientists in Great Britain claim to have solved the ancient chicken-egg conundrum. So which really did come first?
Churchy things:
"[W]e have on one hand the persisting intuitive sense that the universe is not alien to us, that our existence is not accidental and our complexity and brilliance are not simply unaccountable extravagances on the part of evolution. On the other hand we have the conviction, also no doubt intuitive to the degree that it is strongly held, that we are indeed creatures of accident, alone with our brilliance unless accident has come up with like creatures elsewhere." --- the fabulous Marilynne Robinson writes, at the Huffington Post, on science and religion.
Curiosities:
- Your weekly dose of Muppet: A history of Muppet bands, including "Nine Inch Snails."
- Just lovely: here, the history of evolution told in graffiti. (via Brain Pickings)
- Two American institutions are rebranding: the YMCA is now just "The Y," and the NPR in National Public Radio now stands for...nothing.
Young adults of note: In the first installment of the Rumpus's "Talks With Teachers" column, an anonymous YA high school teacher from Brooklyn talks about her students, what drew her to teaching, and more.
