We are each free to believe what we want and it is my view that the simplest explanation is there is no God. No one created the universe and no one directs our fate.As always, Hawking expresses the truth in a simple, declarative way.
Today, the world lost a creative icon. Michelle and I join millions of fans from around the world in mourning the sudden death of Prince. Few artists have influenced the sound and trajectory of popular music more distinctly, or touched quite so many people with their talent. As one of the most gifted and prolific musicians of our time, Prince did it all. Funk. R&B. Rock and roll. He was a virtuoso instrumentalist, a brilliant bandleader, and an electrifying performer.
“A strong spirit transcends rules,” Prince once said -- and nobody's spirit was stronger, bolder, or more creative. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family, his band, and all who loved him.I'm so sad right now (all I can hear is that last 2 minutes of keening Prince does on the extended version of "Purple Rain" on loop in my head! )
Born in Lima, Ohio, on the eve of the Great Depression on June 17, 1929, Arthur Worth Collins, Jr. graduated from Baldwin-Wallace College and went on to serve with the U.S. Army. While a graduate student at Boston University in 1959, he began a five-year stint coaching the men’s tennis team at nearby Brandeis University. Among his players was future social activist/anti-war icon Abbie Hoffman. He officially launched his tennis journalism career in 1963, when he joined the Boston Globe, and later worked his way into radio with Boston’s PBS affiliate WGBH.He will be missed!
Collins broke into television with CBS Sports in 1968, regularly joined in the broadcast booth by serve-and-volley extraordinaire Jack Kramer. In 1972, Collins moved over to NBC, where he would become a staple over the next 35 years. Generations of Americans welcomed him into their living rooms through the tennis-boom years of the 1970s and beyond via his Breakfast At Wimbledon broadcasts, as NBC brought live coverage of the fortnight across the Atlantic. Collins made us feel as if we there alongside him at the All England Club, and he was as much a part of the most prestigious of the four Grand Slams as a tumbler of Pims or a bowl of strawberries and cream.
He developed a unique rapport with players that allowed him to go beyond the usual post-match fodder. After falling to longtime rival Martina Navratilova in the Wimbledon final, Evert famously quipped, “Nice pants, Bud.” Before Collins could get off a question to Pam Shriver in 1978, the future Hall of Famer insisted, “First, turn off those pants.”
just thinking about atheism increased implicit death thought accessibility to the same level as [thinking about death itself]. These findings complement existing research and extend our understanding of anti-atheist sentiments by showing that hostility toward and mistrust of atheists is particularly pronounced when existential concerns are aroused and that, for believers, the mere contemplation of atheism can arouse intimations of mortality.The conclusion that the research leads to is that perhaps atheists like yours truly should be wary of making "militant denunciation of theistic conceptions of reality" regardless of how good it feels because just thinking about atheism makes some religious people conscious of their own mortality.
Leonard Nimoy, the sonorous, gaunt-faced actor who won a worshipful global following as Mr. Spock, the resolutely logical human-alien first officer of the Starship Enterprise in the television and movie juggernaut “Star Trek,” died on Friday morning at his home in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles. He was 83.
[...]
His artistic pursuits — poetry, photography and music in addition to acting — ranged far beyond the United Federation of Planets, but it was as Mr. Spock that Mr. Nimoy became a folk hero, bringing to life one of the most indelible characters of the last half century: a cerebral, unflappable, pointy-eared Vulcan with a signature salute and blessing: “Live long and prosper” (from the Vulcan “Dif-tor heh smusma”).
#8 Greta Garbo (September 18, 1905—April 15, 1990)The stars are listed in the order that they were mentioned in the song (which if you click on the image at the top of the post has the text of the bridge).
#3 Marilyn Monroe (June 1, 1926—August 5, 1962)
#9 Marlene Dietrich (December 27, 1901—May 6, 1992)
#13 Joe DiMaggio (November 25, 1914—March 8, 1999)
#14 Marlon Brando (April 3, 1924—July 1, 2004)
#2 James Dean (February 8, 1931—September 30, 1955)
#4 Grace Kelly (November 12, 1929—September 14, 1982)
#1 Jean Harlow (March 3, 1911—June 7, 1937)
#12 Gene Kelly (August 23, 1912—February 2, 1996)
#6 Fred Astaire (May 10, 1899—June 22, 1987)
#10 Ginger Rogers (July 16, 1911—April 25, 1995)
#5 Rita Hayworth (October 17, 1918—May 14, 1987)
#16 Lauren Bacall (September 16, 1924—August 12, 2014)
#14 Katharine Hepburn (May 12, 1907—June 29, 2003)
#11 Lana Turner (February 8, 1921—June 29, 1995)
#7 Bette Davis (April 5, 1908—October 6, 1989)
