The Tyler Cowen

Trying to juggle a thousand things at the moment. Firefly reviews, hierarchies of need, and all the rest should pour forth next week. Until then, read what's good for you. Or no dessert.

1. Digging into North Korea's ICBM capabilities. Is it just me or does everyone just fall into line with the 'even so...they're pretty crappy' analysis? I'm no rocket scientist, but I'm no HTML programmer and I managed to make a high-class FBML page. Seems to me that a discovery, once having been discovered, should be relatively easy to replicate. This is, after all, the foundation on which human progress rests. 
2. Two articles from NKEconomy Watch, both about (unsurprisingly) North Korea's economic situation. The first discussed the increased output of, and quality in, light goods. At least, as far as has been reported by the various North Korean media outlets. The second discusses the economic impact of the cold spell currently gripping the Korean peninsula.
   
   Re: the first article; how important is a demand-side analysis of the North Korean economic situation? Most of what I read is either about the production capabilities of North Korea or the poverty of its citizens. Should we simply take it at face value that demand is always outstripping supply? I'm sure, fifty years hence when the peninsula is in a better state of affairs, memoirs will come out highlighting the various ways in which supply inefficiencies gave them 100 useless vases while they starved for butter or something. But such an analysis needn't be done in hindsight need it?

The Tyler Cowen

1. The man himself on sovereignty. (And yes, read Imagined Communities.)
2. The State of the Union infographic. It's a long one but mesmerizing. Also included, the State of the Union! Via Infoaesthetics.
   
3. Happiness and socialism. Via The Browser. 

Dating Rules from Nerve

It doesn't get much better than this friends. Clear-eyed, honest, get-over-yourself advice on getting over yourself.

Now get over yourself. Seriously.

Apocalypse!

Well, we're all going to die. Apparently the super volcano beneath Yellowstone just blipped onto our collective radars again thanks to some geological shifting that moved ground as much as 10 inches in some places. Here at BofHam we first learned about this super volcano several years ago via the Discovery Channel on a lazy-turned-terrifying Sunday afternoon.

The Tyler Cowen

1. Self-evidently, depressingly, hilarious. Via Marginal Revolution. 
2. How a new generation of tennis strings is changing the way the game is played. Via The Browser. 
3. Is the tone shifting in North Korea? 
4. An EXTREMELY dorky (but nonetheless interesting) description of the passive tense in English. Via The Browser. 
5. 360 degree interactive helicopter ride in Canada. Via The Awesomer. 

Firefly: The Real Pilot Review

Much has been written about, commented on, and lamented regarding Joss Whedon's short-lived science fiction romp, Firefly. While not finding the broad audience it was hoping for, the passion among the show's followers is legendary. The self-described 'Brown Coats' managed that rarest feat in entertainment: using devotion to overcome profit margins. The production of the Serenity movie owes its existence almost entirely to the efforts of the fans who picketed, propositioned, and petitioned it into being.

The Tyler Cowen

1. People freaking out.
   
2. Great read about the laying of the first trans-Atlantic cable from Wired via The Browser. 
3. Two Nords rocking their faces off to Smooth Criminal. Via The Awesomer.
   
4. As though I wasn't already careening toward a metaphysical meltdown, here a terrifying summary of scientific discoveries vis a vis the brain and how malleable our reality is. Also via The Browser. 

Funny Angry Birds related media

Everyone loves Angry Birds. I do. You do. They do. Wait...you don't!? Well then watch the hilarity below. Then kill yourself.

Morality

Ronald Dworkin (leave it alone...just leave that joke alone) writes an excellent essay on morality and ethics here. In it, he attempts to unpack what we mean by the 'good life' by understanding the concept through the twin but separate frames of morality and ethics and arrive at a concrete definition by merging the two. Being at a particularly shaky point in my life at the moment, lost amid the buffeting waves of second-guessing and what-ifs, Dworkin's essay hit the spot. Before attempting to codify my own topsy-turvy morals and ethics, I should understand the foundations of what I'm attempting to organize.

LBJ Orders Pants

That's a man's man right there. A man's man's man. Frank but polite. And not above a little bunghole talking. Via The Awesomer.