His desperate need for adulation will lead his followers into an abyss. — Donald Trump is a junkie. He has an insatiable need for attention, adulation, even worship. His rallies, made up of followers who have given over their will and reason in blind submission, supply him with that — for the fleeting moment at least. Then, as with every junkie, the fix…

With brief summaries and takeaways from each one — Thirty-five years ago, while filling out an application before a job interview, I was asked to write down a list of 7 self-improvement books that I had read. The list I wrote down was probably not what they were expecting, but it sure seemed to get their attention. …

How a bloody event inspired an iron resolve — The tower in the image, located in the village of Perchtoldsdorf, in Austria, is about a half an hour bike ride from my family’s house on the outskirts of Vienna. The picturesque town, located on the edge of the Wiener Wald (Vienna Woods), has for generations been a favorite place…

Nice writing, Orrin. But your world is certainly different than mine. I don't know how old you are. I'm 72 and still incapable of lying on a beach for more than a few minutes. I want to comment that sinking gracefully into senescence is not for everyone. Aging is something…

Some Thoughts on the Biggest Mysteries — Each day I’m astonished to be alive. I can’t help contemplating how I/we got here. Or what I/we are. Let’s start with the big picture. The Fine Tuning The observable portion of our universe contains some one trillion galaxies that are visible to telescopes. Each of those galaxies likely contains an average of…

At least not in the Lifetime of Anyone living Today. — In January, the inflation rate for the US climbed to 7.5 % from a year earlier — the highest rate in 40 years. As a result, the consensus among every economist I have read or listened to is that it is time to raise interest rates to rein in inflation…

This is a pretty one-sided presentation of the results of the Mongol conquests. The ruthlessness of the Mongol armies is not mentioned. Historians estimate that the Mongol conquests caused the extermination of perhaps 60 million people, which would have been more than 10% of the world's population. The author mentions that Persian scholars were employed by the Mongols; that may be true, but estimates are that 90% of the population of Persia was slaughtered.

The Inoculation against Misinformation requires Self-Examination — The Other Pandemic In my youth, I entertained the postmodern idea that reality is subjective and open to interpretation. I am much less inclined that way now. There is an objective reality out there that is open to discovery through critical thinking, examining facts from credible sources, and using the scientific method. We…

How to fight back against the machines — What’s going on? With all the information we have available now, why are so many people embracing bizarre “alternative facts” as reality? The recent US election, as Umair Haque pointed out, was a census of idiots. There are 74 million of them in the US. How did a so-called first-world…